said He that respects Persons commits Sin for there is no Respect of Persons with God and therefore saith James Houle ye Rich men and here your professed Ministers abide not in the Doctrine of Christ and so have not God but the Devil and his Ministers they are whom they exalt And now you shall see the Partiality of the Names in this your Breeding and Manners First from a Poor man to a Rich man it is called Honour and due Respect and Manners from a Rich man to a Poor man it is called Courtesie and Humility but amongst the Rich and Nobles of the Earth it is called Court-like Breeding but of those of the lower degree it is call'd Country-Breeding and amongst the lower sort of the World it is called Neighbour-hood and civil Respect one to another and so the Devil hath covers for all his Deceit and so he is honoured and exalted both in Court and Country but the highest in the Court and therefore they have the highest Title But We unto them that hide their Sins and cover with a Covering and not of the Spirit of the Lord. But this is the Riches of the World and the Devil that makes so many Degrees as between Dives and Lazarus and Haman and Mordecai for the Lord hath made all the Nations of the Earth of one Mold and one Blood But we who are redeemed out of his Kingdom he calls us Clowns and Fools and saith our Religion is built upon such small and frivolous things and stumble at Strawes and leap over Blocks this saith his Wisdom but it is even Death to him to bear these Strawes especially where he is the highest exalted for it puls down all his Honour and therefore do Rich men and great ones of the Earth and Rulers and Priests and Pharisees persecute and oppress us and draw us before Judgment-Seats and would root us out of the Nation as Haman would have done by Mordecai and the rest of the scattered Jews because they cannot bear those Straws but I say whatsoever it is that comes to be forbidden in the Conscience it becomes a Weight and a Burden though it be never so small a thing in the eye of a Pharisee So let none despise the Day of small things But some will call it Stubbornness Obstinacy Pride and Presumption but the same Nature would have called it so in Mordecai who could not bow to Haman as the rest did that sate by and so let every one take heed of speaking Evil of that you know not least you call Good Evil and Evil Good for the Wo is pronounced against such but they that were after the Flesh alwayes in all Ages persecuted them that were after the Spirit And so it is not many Mighty nor many Noble nor many Wise after the Flesh are called but God hath chosen the Foolish things of this World to confound the Wise and the Weak to confound those that are Mighty that no Flesh should glory in his Presence 1 Cor. 1. 26 27 29. VVe are accused that we say We are perfect without Sin I answer Man was perfect without Sin before the Fall or else he could not have been the Image of God for God is pure and perfect and he made Man after his own Image pure and perfect without Sin but when he sinned he defaced his Image and lost his pure Estate and was drove out of Paradise and became the Image of the Devil for Sin is the Image of the Devil and here all Sin is in the Fall and who are in the Fall are in the Devil's Kingdom which is impure and imperfect and unclean but God promised the Seed of the VVoman shall bruise the Serpent's Head and Christ the Seed said he was come to preach Deliverance to the Captive and to heal the broken-hearted and to seek that which was lost and to bring again that which was driven away and this was his VVork to redeem to Man that which Man had lost Now consider what Man hath lost and I shall leave this as Querie with all both Priests and People who deny Perfection from Sin here Whether Christ is but a part of Redeemer or a perfect and full Redeemer and which is the Place betwixt Heaven and Earth where man shall be made free or cleansed from Sin if not upon the Earth Seeing that no unholy nor unclean thing can enter the Kingdom of God But who can witness this have passed through Death and that have none who plead for Sin neither can they witness Christ come But for some Simple ones sake I shall speak more clearly of this for it is a great Delusion of the Devil to keep People in Sin to tell them they shall never be made free from Sin so long as they are upon the Earth and bring this Scripture to maintain it He that saith he hath no Sin deceiveth himself and is a Lyar but he tells them Christ dyed for all and if they can but lay hold on him by Faith he will not impute their Sins unto them though they sin daily for the Righteous man sins seven times a Day and all the Holy men of God sinned and so he takes Scripture to maintain his Kingdom and this he delivers by the Mouth of his Ministers which he sends abroad to deceive the Nations leading People in Blindness full of Sin and Corruption ever learning and never come to the Knowledge of the Truth nor never shall do for them and here he carries them on an easie delightsom way to the Flesh but the End is Death and so heals them up in their Sins with a feigned formed Faith which perisheth and here they settle upon the Lees and set up a Rest in the Devil's Kingdom which is Sin and here many are meerly blinded and hardned and all Tenderness of Conscience is done away But you shall find that he that sooths you up in this Faith is the gratest Enemy of your Souls and whosoever witnesseth Christ their Redeemer shall witness that he is come to destroy the works of the Devil which is Sin and to redeem out of the Fall out of Sin and out of the Devil's Kingdom which is Sin and all Sin in the Devil's Kingdom which is in the Fall but for this End Christ is manifest to destroy the Works of the Devil and to redeem out of the Fall out of the Devil's Kingdom into his own Kingdom and no unclean thing can enter therein but none can witness this Redemption but through the Death and through the Cross which Paul rejoyced in by which he was crucified to the World and the World to him and had put off the Body of Sin and was made free from the Law of Sin which once warred against his Mind which once he complained of Which Scripture the Unlearned which are Strangers from his Conditions who read them with the carnal Eye now pervert and Wrest to their
all made perfect in One And here is the True Church where there is but One Teacher One Lord One Faith One Baptism One Light One Life and One Way One Shepherd and One Sheepfold and One Priest over the Houshold of God and One Hope and One Language One Family and One God and Father of all And they that cannot witness this are Strangers to Christ and Strangers to his Cross and Strangers to the Common-Wealth of Israel And this is the Work which the Lord has now begun and is carrying on by a Strong Arm and Mighty Power to redeem unto himself a pure Church and Blessed are they that hearken unto his Voice Here all you Formalists Imitators and Self-actors are shut out here all you Proud Ones are shut out here all you Lustful Ones Fleshly Ones and Carnal Ones are shut out and all you that are conformed like unto the World in their Fashions in their Customs in their Words in their Ways in their Worships and Traditions in their Love and in their Fellowship who are seeking the Glory and Honour and Riches of this World you are the Children of this World under the Dominion of the God of the World whose Kingdom is of this World Here all you are shut out who live at Ease in your Pleasures and live wantonly upon the Earth in the Lust of the Flesh the Lust of the Eye and the Pride of Life you are the Children of Babylon you kill the Just and he lies slain in the Streets but here you all are shut out of the New Covenant of Life in the Dark World under Death's Dominion of what Profession and Judgment soever Aliens and Strangers to the Covenant of Promise for they that are not with us are against us and our Union and Society is in the Light of Life But you must all suffer the Death of the Cross to the Life which you now live in before you can witness this Redemption for those that live with Christ are crucified with him therefore so it is they that will take up Life must first lay down Life for the Way to Life is through Death Therefore you must be stripped of all your Old Covers naked and bare that your Deceit and Shame may appear which you have so long covered with your own Righteousness but now you must suffer the Shame of the Cross if you would have part in Christ and all your old Wisdom Knowledge and Notions which you have gotten into your Comprehensions by your Conceivings of the Scripture-Letter wherein hath been your Life and Pride and Exaltation must all come to the Death of the Cross that no Flesh should Glory in his Presence but I say unto all you Professors Formalists Notionists and Disputers and Wise Ones of this World If you will not take up and imbrace this Cross Publicans and Harlots shall enter the Kingdom before you Therefore not many Mighty nor many Noble nor many Wise after the Flesh are called but he hath chosen the Foolish Things of this World to confound the Wise and the Weak to confound those that are Mighty that no FLESH should Glory in his PRESENCE but CHRIST is made over unto us Wisdom Righteousness Sanctification and Redemption that they which Glory might Glory in the Lord. And this I witness in my Measure the things which I have seen and heard and felt and tasted of the good Word of Life which was in the Beginning the same do I declare and am known and read by the Children of Light And now I shall proceed to several Passages that I have had with the People called Baptists in several Meetings that their Deceit and Delusion may be laid open to the Simple-hearted Upon the Thirtieth of the First Moneth called March in the Year 1655. I was at one Ashen's House in Fenstanton in Huntingtonshire where I was freely declaring the Truth of God to the People that came there together that Day as I was taught moved by the Spirit of Truth by which the Holy Men of God spoak forth the Scripture as they were moved and there came several of the People called Baptists into the Room amongst us amongst whom was one of their Teachers called Richard Elligood who after a while stood up in his Will and Wisdom to accuse me and said That I had said That God did not respect any Forms and yet saith he you use the Form and so use that which God hath no Respect to But his first words were Sir if you please I will speak something to what you have said To which I made Answer Here needs no Complements And then he runs on as aforeâ— said to which Accusation I reply'd was False and bad him prove what Form I used And he said The Letter And I replyed He that takes the Letter to talk of without the Life and Power such sets up a Form and makes a Form But this would not satisfie his filthy Wisdom which darkened his Understanding but because I spoak words which are mentioned in the Scripture by the same Spirit that spoak forth the Scripture by which I challenge the Scripture from him and all such who have gotten it to talk of but denies the Life and are Strangers to the Life and Power therefore with his contrary Spirit tasked me with a Form which by his Logick and deceitful Art would have proved but could not but his Deceit was laid open to the People and many declared against him for a Form is this as I said before the Likeness of a Thing but not the Thing it self as they have the Likeness of a Church which they have imagined from the Letter with their Elders Pastors and Teachers but not the Church it self and so they imitate the Scriptures but live not in the Life of them that spoak forth the Scriptures neither are acted and guided by the same Spirit that gave forth the Scriptures and so want the Life and Power and those are the Formalists that make Forms and Likenesses to deceive the simple as the Devil hath the Form of an Angel of Light but not the Life and Power who appears to rule in those Formalists and Self-Actors but the Day doth make him manifest and therefore he rages and then this Elligood denyed that I had the same Spirit that gave forth the Scripture and he said The Spirit might be tryed by the Letter for he said Many false Spirits are entered into the World and I asked him By what did the Apostle know that false Spirits were gone out into the World and he replyed and said By the Spirit of God then I replyed and said If by the Spirit of God the Apostle knew that there were many false Spirits gone out into the World then by the Spirit of God be tryed FALSE SPIRITS and knew False Spirits from the TRUE and here his Deceit was laid open to the People and he judged out of his own Mouth to be a Lyar and to be guided by a false Spirit
hast so long professed which hath been so long preached in thee Is this thy Divinity And are these thy Preachers of Divinity Nay they are now found out by the Light of God to be the Diviners Sorcerers Witches and Magicians that are only Opposers and Gain-sayers of the Truth who must perish in the Gainsaying of Core they are known by their Fruits and the Fruits of their Ministry and thy Well-head of Divinity is now found the Well-head of Sorcery Witchcraft and Spiritual Whoredom and all Abomination and Uncleanness the Day doth declare it and one Fountain cannot bring forth both Bitter Water and Fresh Oh! Antichrist hath reigned long over poor enslaved captivated Souls but now Israel's Redeemer hath appeared and the Sun of Righteousness is risen with Healing in his Wings and Antichrist's Kingdom is come and coming to an End and Christ himself will reign and rule in Truth and in Righteousness in his Ransomed Ones and this is the Mighty King and Redeemer of Israel out of Captivity into a Land of Peace and Love and Unity where the Ransomed Ones do dwell with their Captain and their King who doth deliver his own Lambs out of the Mouthes of Raging Wolves and Dogs Praises Praises Everlasting Eternal to the Everlasting God of Life forever And thus we are sent as Sheep amongst Wolves but in the Power of the Almighty we are sent forth and the Arm of the Almighty is with us and doth deliver us from being a Prey to the Lyon's Whelps which would us devour and blessed are all they that receive our Testimony it is Peace and Salvation to their Souls Now where is the Wise Where is the Scribe Where is the Disputer of this World Hath not God made Foolish the Wisdom of this World and hath chosen the Foolish Things to confound the Wise and the Weak to confound those that are Mighty that no Flesh should Glory in his Presence Unto this Doughty I sent several of these Queries which are before mentioned but I received no Answer Another Meeting betwixt the People called Baptists and the People called Quakers UPon the fourth Day of third Moneth called May we were several of the Lord's People met together in a Friend's Oarchard at Litleport in the Isle of Ele and there came in Three of the Teachers of the Baptized People the chief of them was one John Ray of Wickombruck in Suffolk and he came as he said with a Message and that was To Excommunicate two Persons that were there namely Samuel Cater and Ezekiel Cater had formerly been Elders amongst them out of their Society whenas they were come out of their Society before and owned the Substance and denyed their Form and Shadow without their casting out but thou Ray to uphold-thy Form didst there disorderly run into Words in thy own Will and then wentst away and wouldst not stay to prove what thou hadst done but saidst Thou wast to be at the Steeple-house shortly so as I was moved I spoak unto the People there present and after a while when I had spoken what was given me of the Lord to speak I passed into the Town and there I hearing how the Baptist was railing on the Truth in the Steeple-house I passed to the Steeple-house with some Friends that had formerly been of their Society and when I came there I found thee John Ray set up in the Seat of the Pharisee the chiefest Place in the Assembly speaking a Divination of thy own Brain not from the Mouth of the Lord as thou confessedst openly amongst the People that none in these Dayes had any open Vision or heard God speak immediately and here thou wast an open Lyar amongst the People but here thou barredst thy self from the same Spirit that spoak in the Prophets and Apostles and therefore art a Deceiver for he that hath not the Spirit of Christ is none of his and so thou measuredst others by thy self but I and Hundreds more of the Children of Light do witness thee to be a Lyar and Deceiver in these Dayes who comes not in the Name of the Lord but in thy own Name therefore the World receives thee but here out of thy own Mouth thou art judged and condemned out of the New Covenant for there God himself is Teacher and thou that never heardst him speak immediately and yet comest to preach his Word Thou art a Stranger unto God and a Blind Guide a Deceiver and a false Prophet who runs and the Lord never sent thee therefore thou profits not the People at all but art a Thief and steals the Words of the Prophets Christ and his Apostlâ—s and adds a Divination of thy own Brain and so feeds the People with Notions and airy Knowledge and casting the Childrens Bread unto Dogs but the greater is thy Condemnation who for a Pretence makes long Prayers and wrests and perverts the Scripture to thy own Destruction but think â—ot that thou shalt be heard for thy much Babling for the Hand of the Lord is against thee And there in the Seat of the Pharisee thou Ray hadst taken a Text of the Apostles Words and added thy own Meanings Uses Applications and Divinations thou Merchant of Babylon and Diviner where hast thou any such Example from the Prophets or Apostles They spoak from the Mouth of the Lord and as they were moved by the Holy Ghost and as the Spirit gave them Utterance and they spoak with Power and Authority and not as the Scribes but thou dost speak in the Wisdom of the World like as the Scribes and Pharisees and Priests amongst whom I number thee and here thou art shut from the Apostles and their Practice with thy Carnal Meanings Uses Applications and Divinations and this was thy TEXT which thou hadst stoln out of the Apostles Writings which were writ unto the Church and thou applyedst them unto the World and saidst For if after they have escaeped the Pollutions of the World through the Knowledge of the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ they are again intangled therein and overcome the latter End is worse then the Beginning c. And from this thou raisedst thy Uses Applications and dark Meanings whenas neither thou nor any there which belonged to thee or owned thee that had ever escaped the Pollutions of the World or ever had come to the Knowledge of Christ but are still in Darkness and Blindness in their Sins and Corruptions in Covetousness in Pride and Wantonness in Lightness in Wrath and in Anger and Maliciousness in Back-biting in Slandering and false Accusing in Railing and Cursed Speaking in Lying and Blaspheming only it may be have passed through the Water But it is not the washing away the Filth of the Flesh But here both thou and they are still and these are the Pollutions of the World but they that know and witness Jesus Christ come in the Flesh witness the washing away those Sins and Pollutions and thus thou
Opposed the Truth He was but Young in Years and of a Little Stature for the which he was by Brutish Envious Persecuting Priests and Professors Mocked and by them in a scornful Mind called The QVAKING BOY but in him was seen the Mighty Power of God VVhen any of them that were climed up so high in their Imaginations and strengthned themselves in their Self-righteousness and came forth in the Strength of the power of Darkness to Oppose the Truth of God which he bore Testimony unto with him did then appear the Name and Power of the Living God which was with the little Stripling David in which Name and Power he many times stopped the Mouths of Gain-sayers and by the Wisdom of God that was with him he caught the Wise and Crafty in their own Snares and Confounded them in the sight of all that had an Eye to see and so brought shame upon them whereby the Saying is fulfilled That by Weak things the Lord would confound the Mighty and things that are Despised hath God chosen yea and things that are not to bring to nothing things that are He had also a good Gift to declare the Truth and was full of Zeal and Heavenly Courage in the which he performed the same for the informing of the Minds of those that wanted the Knowledge of the Lord also to Mark Out and Make Manifest the Deceivers which People were to turn from His Exhortation was unto Us that were turned unto the Truth To Walk in it and to Watch unto it and to Keep Low in God's Holy Fear to Deny our selves and Take Vp the Daily Cross to our own Wills and to be Faithful in that Little Appearance of Light Truth which we had already receiv'd alwayes declaring unto us That if we were Faithful in that the Lord would make known more unto us whose words many of us are now Living Witnesses of the fulfilling of Blessed be the Name of the Lord forever and for evermore saith my Soul Also He was a Good Example and a Pattern in his Life and Conversation unto us by the which he preached Truth unto us as well as by his VVords for He himself lived according to what he taught us for he was adorned with Gravity and walked before us in Humility yea he had a Blameless Conversation and was unspotted from the World so that his Presence as well as his Words was a Strengthning and a Comfort to the Upright and Honest-hearted but he was an Awe a Dread to the Careless and Disobedient which made a Profession of the Truth but did not walk Answerably thereunto who he alwayes told should be cloathed with Rags which could not cover them and their SHAME should appear and they left Naked for the Light and Day of the Lord was come that would make all manifest and strip off all False Coverings so that a Profession although it were of the Truth it self would no longer do nor cover without the Life and Power be known and witnessed which doth not only Discover Sin and Evil but also Overcomes it Removes it Takes it away The Truth of this Doctrine which he preached unto us there are many of us by the good Hand and Power of the Lord have do see the Fulfilling of this Honest-hearted Young Man's Testimony both on them that received the Truth which he preached into an Honest and Good Heart and also upon the Careless and Disobedient so that I shall and do conclude in this Testimony concerning Him That He was a Faithful Servant and Messenger sent by God to Declare the Way of Life unto them that wanted the Knowledge of it and to Reprove Sin and to Make Manifest Deceivers and to Testifie against them which may be seen and felt to the better Satisfaction of them that never saw his Face in reading over his own Books and Epistles which were written by his Own Hand which all that read with an Honest Heart in a Serious Mind I doubt not but will say with me Surely the Mighty Power and Wisdom of the Lord was with him of a Truth Samuel Cater Thomas Bayles HIS TESTIMONY Concerning James Parnel THis Blessed Man the Writer of these following Books was made a Partaker of that Faith Patience through which the Righteous in all Ages obtained the Crown of Life and Victory over all their Enemies and had a share in his Day and Time as alwayes they had in this World of the Sufferings of Christ in him He was sent into this County with the Testimony of God in his Heart Mouth and therefore was Bold in the Name of the Lord to cry REPENTANCE in the Ears of the Sons of Men and as He said so lived he as many in this Town and Place are living Witnesses of who have true Cause to bless and praise the Name of the Lord and do for that He and other of his Brethren were sent amongâ—â— us He was of a sweet Savour of Christ to the Almighty God through his Faithfulness to him who sent him hither in them who receiv'd his Testimony though many there were that hardened their Hearts against the Lord of which Number were many of the Rulers Priests and Professors of that Time who notwitstanding they cryed Reformation the Ordinances of Christ Jesus Christian-Duties and the like yet manifested themselves of that Stock and Generation which always slew the Righteous and the Lord God soon stretcht forth his Righteous Hand of Judgment upon some as Warnings unto others whom he spared from that swift Stroak that they might Repent as some did and seek his Face who is the Light of the World God blessed for evermore He was as a Youth and mean in hâ—s Outward Presence and Appearance but God hath chosen the Foolish Things of this World to confound the Wise And so high was the spirit of the Professors and the Prophane encouraged thereby that with whom among such was his Name used but in a way of Derision and Scorn terming him The Railing Fellow in the Castle He owneth himself to be Christ Jesus A Wandering Star to whom is reserved the Blackness of Darkness forever But since it came to Light and the Wandering Stars seen and their Blackness of Darkness felt who durst not stand by their Ordinances Duties nor Christianity but in Obscure Holes Secret Places Vaults which shews them of a low dark earthly wandering spirit who know not the Spirit of Life from God nor the Stability thereof to set them above the Fear of Man where they lie in great Captivity The Lord hath put it into my Heart in the blessed Remembrance of his Innocent Life to bear my Testimony upon this Occasion and thus to appear in the Memorial of him And I am assured in my Spirit That although the Lord suffer'd him to be cruelly kept in Bonds until Death and to be hated persecuted beyond what we had known before amongst us yet it was for his Righteous Life sake as from
is our Guide Teacher Judge and Law-giver if we never see letter Luke 1. 79. John 6. 45. Isa. 33. and this alone is the Ground and Foundation of our Faith and Hope by which we are made able to cry Abba Father 1 Cor. 3. 11. Rom. 8. 15. And here it is not self that judgeth or condemns but Christ that liveth in us Gal. 2. 20. and it is not self that justifies us but Christ that liveth in us and here Christ is exalted into his Throne and the Scripture owned in its place without contempt or undervaluting And they are found the Ministers of Antichrist who would cast Christ out of his Throne and take the Scripture out of its place to exalt above him applying to it that Authority which alone belongs unto him for their own by secret self-ends so that in that they apply such Authority to the Scripture they in the same Rob Christ of it and undervalue him as the Pharisees did who thought in the Scriptures to find Eternal Life but would not come to Christ that they might have Life in whose steps ye and your Teachers are now found professing Christ in words but in Life denying him and therefore must be judged and condemned by him as they were And if you Priests do alledge there is a false Light as well as a True Light I Answer That is it in you which blinds your Minds so that you cannot receive this Gospel but from you it is hid 2 Cor. 4. 3 4. And therefore you bring another Gospel calling the four Books Mattew Mark Luke and John the Gospel in which these four Books will Witness against you and bear Witness of Christ to be the Gospel which is the Power of God unto Salvation who is the Lamb of God slain from the Foundation of the World who came to take away the Sins of the World and blessed are they that are not offended in him John 1. 26. and vers 13. Luke 7. 23. And also that is a false Light in you which leads you into the Form or Resemblance or outward Shew of Holiness but denies the Life and Power 2 Timothy 3. 5. and to profess the Scripture to be your Rule but in Life and Practice deny it and to be short leads into a Profession without Possession but that which leads into the Life and Power is no false Light for it leads into the Possession before the Profession and so the Profession is from the Possession but your Profession is from anothers Possession and so Boast in anothers line by which you beguile both your selves and others and therefore in that you go about to Arm your selves with the Scripture to oppose the Light by exalting it above the Light thinking thereby to debase the Light and so to keep Peoples Minds from the Light that they may still remain in Darkness and Blindness under you You do but in the same bring a Weapon to cut off your own heads and raise a War to destroy your selves and increase more light to the people and manifest your selves odious and to be the Blind Guides of the Nation who are to be denyed and turned away from by us as Deceivers and to be held as accursed who bring another Doctrine in oposition to the True Doctrine which is held forth in the Scripture for the Scripture and the Light agree in one from both which you are shut with jangling contentious spirits by which you would wrest the Scripture out of its place to clash against its Original thereby to uphold your Father Antichrist's Kingdom and therein do the more Manifest your selves to be the Ministers of Antichrist who under Profession of the True Christ do oppose him and make War with him 2 Cor. 11. 13 14 15. but your Weapons are weak as is daily made manifest James Parnell THE TRUMPET Of the Lord BLOWN OR A Blast against PRIDE and OPPRESSION and the Defiled Liberty which stands in the FLESH WO unto you that are called Lords Ladies Knights Gentlemen and Gentlewomen in respect to your Persons who are exalted in the Earth who are proud and high and lofty who are called of men Master and Sir and Mistris and Madam in respect to your Persons because of your gay Clothing because of your much Earth which by Fraud Deceit and Oppression you have gotten together You are exalted above your Fellow-creatures and grind the faces of the Poor and they are as Slaves under you and must labour and toyle under you and you must live at ease sporting in day time and spending your time in Pleasures and Chambring and Wontonness according to your lustful minds in Hauking and Hunting and Bowling and Carding and Dicing in all manner of Musick Pleasure and Delights in Eating and Drinking and Sleeping and you must have your Wine and Ale and all your Dainty Dishes and all manner of Delights and Novelties and so ye feed the lust eating and drinking and rising up to play which is Idolatry and you have your fine Attire and all manner of New Fashings Silk and Vilvet and Purple Gold and Silver and you have your Waiting-Men and Wating-Maids under you to Wait upon you and your Coaches to ride and your high and lofty Horses are like your selves according to your lofty minds and you sit at ease Dives-like Devouring the Creation and spending it upon your Lusts and with it committing Fornication into it your hearts being adultred from God who created you and your Fellow-Creatures must labour like slaves under you and work for all this when you are at your Pleasures they must be at work and labour and must hunger and thirst and labour when you are eating and drinking and sleeping and here like Dives you sit at ease and poor Lazarus lies starving without and here you are Lords over your Fellow Creatures and they must bow and crouch to you or else they must be hated and punished and put out from your presence and be scoffed and scorned and reproached and you will be called Masters and think Scorn that a Poor Man should stand with his Hat on before you and so set up partiality which the Law of God condemns upholding that which Christ in his Doctrine forbids who saith Be not ye called Masters and so by that which you do prosess you are condemned And you think Scorn in particular to be Thou'd of your Fellow-Creatures which is the Scripture Language to one but you will Thou God and Christ and yet you will not be Thou'd and here you exalt your selves above God and lord over your Fellow-Creatures but though you be exalted as high as the Heavens and set your Nests amongst the Stars and lay up Treasures for many years thence will the Lord fetch you down and cast you into Hell the Pit as he did Lucifer Dives and Hamon and Pharaoh and Herod and the rest of your Fore-Fathers who would have been exalted above the Creator as you would for it is Lucifer who is Head and
the same they were before but the Baptism of Christ makes a New Creature and this I witness for I received Water upon my Face as my Parents told me which they called Baptism but I grew up a Heathen as all other Children do and no New Creature though my Parents were counted Believers among the World and their Priests but now I witness the Baptism of Christ by One Spirit into One Body and now I witness a New Creature old things are past away and all things become New And now I see the other to be formal Imitation and the Invention of Man and so a meer Delusion and all are Heathens and no Christians who cannot witness this Baptism who can witness this denies all other for the Scripture saith The Baptism is but One and who can witness this are Believers but who cannot witness this are no Believers and so it is that Water or no Water availeth nothing but a New Creature for all by Nature are the Children of Wrath and except they be born again they cannot enter and as for the Baptism of Water which the Apostles used it being a Figure for its Time the Power went along with it and the Disciples received the Holy Ghost when they were Baptized but none can witness this who set themselves of acting or imitating the Apostles and so take it up by Imitation and their Ground is the Letter and are not guided to it by the same Spirit which guided the Apostles and so they are the same after Water as before and so now Water or no Water availeth any Thing but a New Creature for Water was but for its time though many in Darkness have now got the Form and are groping in it for Life but want the Life and Power and so from such turn away We are accused to deny the Supper of the Lord. The Supper of the Lord we own which is the Body and Blood of Christ which the Saints feed upon and this is Eternal Food and Life And here they all feed upon one and are of one Heart and Mind and here is pure and Eternal Union and Communion and this is not Carnal but Spiritual for Saints are Spiritual and their Communion is Spiritual and Eternal and this we witness who are of one Heart and one Mind who are in the New Covenant and herein we discern the Lord's Body and here all Drunkards are shut out and all Lyars Adulterers Proud Covetous Lustful and Envious Ones and all Back-biters Revilers Extortioners and all Deceitful and Unrighteous Persons are shut out of the New Covenant and are without feeding upon the Husk and Shadow which is Carnal for the Bread which the World breaks is Carnal and Natural and only feeds the Outward Carnal Body and goeth into the Belly and so passeth out into the Dangil and so likewise the Cup which they drink and so the Communion and Fellowship of the World passeth away but this is no Nourishment to the Soul but still the Soul lyes in Death and here is no Communion but Natural Outward and Carnal of several Minds and Hearts full of Filthiness and Uncleanness which is the Table of Devils eating and drinking their own Damnation not discerning the Lord's Body which is Spiritual which the Natural Man discerns not And here stands the Worlds Communion and Fellowship which is Carnal and cross but their Carnal Wills and it is turned into Envy and for Earthly Trifles they will go to Law and Cozen and Cheat and Defraud one another for Earthly Trifles and like People like Priest but if they lye in wait for Revenge of one another then they will not take their Sacrament as they call it And here the Devil hath as great Hold for he that envies is a Murderer and here is the Difference betwixt the Worlds Communion and the Saints Communion Life and Death For to be Carnally-minded is Death but to be Spiritually-minded is Life And here they are without feeding upon the Husk and Shadow without and would destroy the Life and Substance where it appears both Priest People and Rulers and so have a Form of Godliness and deny the Life and Power from such turn away for it is a meer Delusion to take the Shadow for the Substance We are accused to deny all Prayer The Prayers of the Wicked we deny and God denies for they are abominable for Cain the wicked one who was out of the Commands of God who was the first Birth he offered up a Sacrifice of the Earth but God had no Respect to it but Abel the second Birth who was the Righteous his Sacrifice God had Respect to so the Prayers of the Faithful and Righteous God doth accept and they avail and what comes from his own which is the second Birth his own is pure what comes from it is pure and God who is pure doth receive that which is pure but he receives nothing which is polluted or unclean for he is of purer Eyes then to behold Iniquity for his Sacrifice must be without Spot or Blemish and that which comes from an unclean Heart is spotted and defiled and unclean for nothing that is pure can come forth of an unclean Vessel But who can witness the second Birth and that the Seed of the Woman hath bruised the Serpents Head which is the first Promise and Faith which purifieth the Heart then that which comes out is pure proceeding from a pure single Heart and this Prayer God receives and he hath Respect to it and this we own and witness and this comes from the second Birth which is pure for the first Birth is unclean and out of the Command of God in the Fall in the Wrath in the Peevishness and Perversness and Frowardness Cain-like and the Seed of the Serpent is first in every one and rules the Head but the Promise is The Seed of the Woman shall bruise the Serpents Head So you who are not come to this are still in the Fall and are not come to the first Promise so all your self-acting and imitating thinking to merit with your Prayers and Praises Singings and Duties and Worships and Traditions which are all in vain and you are sacrificing to an unknown God a Sacrifice of the Earth from the first Nature which God hath no Respect to and the flaming Sword is set against that to keep from the Tree of Life for both Drunkards and Swearers Lyars Proud Covetous and all Manner of Unrighteous Persons are offering up Sacrifices and are in their Formal Worships and Duties thinking that is sufficient to pacifie for their Sins and yet do not repent But saith the Lord Bring no more vain oblations away with your New Moons and Sabbaths they are Abomination and my Soul loaths them When you spread forth your Hands I will hide mine Eyes from you yea when you
for against such there is no Law But they that walk after the Flesh cannot please God neither know how to rule or govern who cannot witness their own Wills subjected by the Law of God in the Heart but are guided by their own Wills and stand in their own Wills and such wink at Deceit and rule with Partiality and Respect of Persons and so transgress the Law of God which respects no man's Person and also give forth Laws in their own Wills which take hold of the Righteous persecute the Righteous countenance encourage the Heathen who know not God so Cain slayes Abel within them and they suffer Cain to slay Abel without them the Wicked and Ungodly have more Liberty in the Nation then the Righteous and so the Land abounds with Iniquity Oppression and Treachery because such corrupt Magistrates wink at Deceits for Carnal Ends and uphold Iniquity and Oppression and tread Truth under foot and this is the Cause why the Land so abounds with all Manner of Ungodliness and Deceit Falshood Tyranny Oppression and Persecution and yet full of Magistrates and Officers And corrupt Magistrates put corrupt Magistrates in Office and so they bear with and wink at one another and feed and nourish up Deceit amongst them unless they cross one another's Will and then they are as much in Deceit on the other side seeking and perverting the Law for Revenge and such as these uphold these corrupt Ministers and false Prophets which the Nation swarms of and they can have a Law to maintain their Deceit and uphold them in Oppression and so the Beast upholds the false Prophet and they combine together against the simple and so the Law is made a stalking-horse to deceive the simple and they will pervert and wrest the Law out of its Place and act contrary to their own Law against the Righteous And such Magistrates and such Government we honour not but deny and testifie against it as the Prophets of God alwayes did for by such Magistrates and Government did the Righteous ever suffer and for the same Testimony of a pure Conscience I have and do suffer by such corrupt Magistrates and hundreds more in the Nation who are redeemed out of Transgression who walk not after the Flesh but after the Spirit And Haman who stood in the corrupt Will would have destroyed Mordecai because he crossed his Will and could not bow to him and also Pharaoh and Nebuchadonozer and Herod who beheaded John who stood in their own Wills but the Hands of the Lord they did not escape And so corrupt Magistrates say We deny all Magistracy and Government as Haman did but Christ comes to fulfil and end all outward Laws and Government of Man and he himself will reign for as Truth and Righteousness grows the Law is fulfilled and passeth away and the Lyon and the Lamb lye down together and this is the Cause why corrupt Magistrates beat down the Truth as much as they can and so to uphold themselves but God will deliver his own and Pharaoh will he plague and confound But such Magistrates as are guided by the Light of God in the Conscience and rule and govern by it without Partiality or Respect of Persons in Singleness of Heart discharging their Consciences before the Lord and executing the Law in its Place such Magistrates and such Government we own honour in our Hearts for such are a Terror to Evil-Doers and for the Praise Encouragement of those that do well and such bear not the Sword in vain but stand in the Will of God which is a Cross to their own Wills and rule for God and not for themselves and this Government is of God and not of Man nor after the Will of Man neither takes hold of any tender Conscience nor oppresses it but stands in the Place where it is set and some such Magistrates there have been in the Northern Parts of this Nation who witness the Law of God set up in their Hearts and feared God and hated Covetousness and testified against those who did not and so corrupt Magistrates sought to put them out So let all who are single-hearted judge who are destructive to true Magistracy and Government We are accused to be destructive to all Superiority Honour Breeding and Manners because we cannot put off our Hats not follow the Fashions of the World nor respect any Persons but speak the plain Word THOU to any one Rich or Poor In the Beginning when God made Man he made him to be Lord over all Creatures but not Man to be Lord over Man yet he was to be Servant of God and when he had disobeyed the Command of God God spoak to Adam and Adam spoak to him and God Thou'd Adam and Adam Thou'd him and here was the plain Language betwixt God and Adam And when God appeared to Moses in the Bush God Thou'd Moses and Moses Thou'd him and this was the plain Language which ever passâ—d betwixt God and his People in all Ages And thou that disdainest to be Thou'd wouldst exalt thy self above God who Thou 'st God in thy formal Prayers and scorns to take it thy self therefore thou must come down as Lucifer did But it is Lucifer in thee that is exalted who must not be honoured but must be cast down into the Pit and it is he who is Head in Man who would be honoured and would be superior and would be above God and calls this Manners and Breeding to bow to him and honour him and he hath invented Wayes whereby he is honoured and exalted and worshipped and he calls this Manners and Breeding and who can honour him the most and exalt him the highest those he saith are the best bred and of the best Breeding and those he calls Noblemen and Gentlemen and the other he calls Yeomen and common People and Inferiors though they all honour him but they observe it not so much as the other but their Minds are more set upon the Earth and Earthly Things to get Wealth and Riches and those he calls Provident Careful People but he that seeks Preferment in the World and would be exalted and set up seeks to get his Breeding in as excellent Manner as he can that so he may get in Favour with Lucifer that sits in the Courts and high Palaces and so long as he pleases Lucifer he will set him up but both he and Lucifer must be cast down into the Pit together And here is the Ground of the Worlds Superiority Nobility Gentility Honour Breeding and Manners and here they Lord over one another by their corrupt Wills and here is the Ground of all Tyranny and Oppression Rackings and Taxings and Wars and Imprisonments and Envy and Murder and the Persecutions of the Righteous all arise from proud Lucifer the Lust in Man who would be honoured and all this is in the Fall and under the
Curse But Mordecai could not bow to him in Haman and therefore he sought to destroy him and informed the King against him and all the Jews in the Nation and said They were a scattered People and their Laws were divers from all People neither did they observe the Law of the King then he set up a pair of Gallows for Mordecai but Haman was hanged on his own Gallows and is cast down to nothing and Mordecai is exalted in his stead So there is a Time that Mordecai is despised and Haman exalted and there is a Time that Haman is cast down and Mordecai exalted And there is a Time that Esau reigns over Jacob and there is a Time that the Elder serves the Younger And there is a Time that Pharaoh rules and oppresses the Israelites but there is a Time of Israel's Deliverance and Pharaoh drowned in the Sea So there is a Time that Anti-christ sits in the Temple of God as God and saith he is God and Christ lyeth low in the Manger but there is a Time that he must be cast into the Pit and Christ alone exalted He that can receive it let him But in all Ages the Children of God could not bow to Lucifer nor his Image and this was the Cause why Shadrach Meshach and Abednego were cast into the fiery Furnace and this was the Cause why Daniel was cast into the Lions Den but by the Hand of his God whom he alone worshipped and honoured he was delivered and exalted and his Adversaries cast down in his Place And this was the Cause why the Prophets were alwayes persecuted and imprisoned and the Apostles who came to turn the World upside down And this is the Cause why the Ministers and Messengers of Jesus Christ are imprisoned stoned stocked whipped and shamefully entreated whom the Lord is pleased immediately to call from their outward Callings and Countries and sends them abroad into several Countries to preach his Name no more after the Flesh but after the Spirit and who knows him must know him no more after the Flesh but after the Spirit and those come to turn the World upside down being crucified to the World and the World to them and these cannot honour Lucifer nor bow to Lucifer nor worship his Image though there was a Time when they did but that was done in Egypt when they knew not God but now Lucifer and his Image is cast down and Christ alone exalted and the pure and perfect Law is witnessed which respects no Mans Person but God alone honoured and exalted and this we witness for amongst us there are no Superiors after the Flesh but Christ is the Head and amongst those who were redeemed out of the World there were no Superiors but only Christ the Head and all the rest Fellow-Servants and he that would be the greatest should be the least and he that respects Persons commits Sin And the Angel would not suffer John to bow to him but said he was his Fellow-Servant and this we witness who are redeemed out of the Kingdom of the Devil from amongst the Children of this World into the Kingdom of the Son who are crucified to the World and the World to us by the spiritual Cross of Christ in which we joy and glory amongst whom there is no Partiality nor Respect of Persons but all in Union in one though Ten Thousand and here God alone is King and he alone is honoured exalted and worshipped no more after the Flesh but after the Spirit for we have no other God in whom our Hearts delight And here proud Lucifer and his Image is cast out and here all his Honour is thrown down and his Breeding and Manners and Fashions and Customs and Words and Wayes and Worships which are after the Flesh and not after the Spirit whereby he sets up himself and causeth his Image to be worshipped and this is the Cause he rages in his Kingdom wheresoever we come and saith We are destructive to all Superioriry and Magistracy and Ministry and Honour Breeding and Manners and turn the World upside down for he knows where Christ comes he comes to take his Kingdom from him and cast him down into the Pit and there he must be tormented quick and all who bear his Image or his Mark and these are some of his Marks which he calls Nobility Gentility Honour Breeding Manners and Civility But true Nobility we own the Seed of God is Noble wheresoever it is born up and who can witness to the Head of the Serpent bruised and the Seed of God born up to reign and rule there is true Nobility there is true Gentility no more after the Flesh hut after the Spirit and this is to be honoured for Honour is due to this both in Magistrate or Minister Fisherman or Ploughman Herdsman or Shepherd wheresoever it rules without Respect of Persons and here Fear to whom Fear Honour to whom Honour and this is no more after the Flesh but after the Spirit And here all the true Prophets of God were Noblemen and Gentlemen sprung of the Noble Seed though of the Nobles and great Ones of the Earth they were disdain'd reproached because according to the World they were of low Degree some of them Ploughmen some Herdsmen some Shepherds and therefore they persecuted them and destroyed them yet they were Gentile and bore all Christ was Noble sprang of the Noble Seed though of the great Ones and Nobles of the Earth he was disdained reproached and scorned to be the King of the Jews because according to the World he was of low Degree and supposed to be a Carpenter's Son so they spit upon him and disdained him and crucified him yet he was gentile and bore all The Apostles were Noble sprung of the Noble Seed though of the Nobles and great Ones of the Earth they were despised and disdained and reproached because according to the World they were of Low Degree some of them Fishermen and the like and came to turn the World upside down so they were despised persecuted and killed yet they were gentile and bore all But those were all Noble sprung of the Noble Seed and so are all now who are of the same Seed and those were all gentile sprung of the gentile Seed those have the Nature but not the Name and to those belongs the true Honour not after the Flesh but after the Spirit for they denyed the Honour of the World and therefore Christ said I receive not Honour from Men and said to his Apostles Be ye not called Masters neither call any Man Master upon the Earth and though the Princes of this World exercise Doâ—inion oâ—e over another yet it shall not be so amongst you but he that would be the greatest amongst you let him be your Servant and said he How can ye believe which receive Honour one of another and
condemn Sin in the Flesh which is the Word which became Flesh and dwelt amongst the Apostles This Christ we witness no more after the Flesh but after the Spirit and before We knew him after the Spirit we had no Profit by him but were in the State of Reprobation and so are all now who profess him in Words and know nothing of him but by the Letter without them And such deny Christ come in the Flesh who plead for Sin who live in Sin and do not witness him come but those who are crucified with him do live with him and he in them and none are Christians of the Flock of Christ but who are baptized into his Death by one Spirit into one Body and he that can witness this is crucified to the World and the World to him But who talk of Christ to be their Saviour and are still alive in the World's Nature must first witness him a Condemner for his first Appearance is with Sword and breaks the Peace and maketh the War and ends the War and makes the Peace and this Peace endures for ever and so he is a Condemner before he is a Saviour and he is a Peace-braker before he is a Peace-maker But who are at Peace in their Sin the Serpent is Head and the strong man keeps the House and Christ they do not witness come in the Flesh but who endure the War shall enjoy this Peace and he that can witness Christ his Saviour can witness this but Silence all Flesh before the Lord and let him that nameth the Name of God depart from Iniquity for he that saith he knoweth God and keepeth not his Commandements is a Lyar For saith Christ why call ye me Lord and do not the things which I say And none can call Jesus Lord but by the holy Ghost so it is plain you know not God who cannot keep his Commands then how can you believe in him whom you do not know We are accused that we judge People It is written The Saints shall judge the World and for Judgment I am come into the World saith Christ that those which see not might see and that they which see might be made blind and where Christ rules in his Saints he judges the World as Paul witnessed It is no more I but Christ in me and he is come to reprove the World of Sin of Righteousness and of Judgment of Judgment because the Prince of the Air is judged who rules in the Children of this World and they cannot bear the righteous Judgment of Christ but kick against it and call him Devil and so they kick against the Prick which will the more torment them And this is the Spirit of Truth which came into the World which the World cannot receive because he testifies of it that the Deeds thereof are evil and this is the Condemnation of the World Light is come into the World and Men love Darkness rather then Light because their Deeds are evil and every one that doth Evil hateth the Light and will not come into the Light least it should reprove them yet they will say Christ is meek Love and lowly It is so but not to Ungodliness but he is meek to the meek and lowly to the lowly and Love to the Seed of God and his Saints are meek and lowly and bear all both Scandals Reproaches Persecutions and Imprisonments but to the Seed of the Serpent Christ is Judgment and Wo and a Sword to that which is for the Sword and a Condemner to the Wicked and our God is a consuming Fire and terrible to the Wicked to consume the Proud and Haughty in their Imaginations and here Christ is a Lyon and he is a Lamb he is a Condemner and he is a Saviour he that can receive him let him the Hungry Thirsty he feeds with living Food but the Fat he feeds with Judgment and that which would not bear his Judgment must never know his Peace but is for Judgment and cryes out as the Devil did who said he was come to torment them before the time but the Teachers of the World have deceived the People long crying Peace to them because they put into their Mouths and healing them up in their Sin with a feigned formed Faith which works no Reformation so sewing Pillows under their Arme-holes and here the Devil hath reigned in Peace and now Christ is come with the Sword to break his Peace with Plague and Judgment and now he rages and stands up for his Life in all both Priest and People and now the Beast makes War with the Lamb but it is hard for him to kick against the Prick for he must be bound and cast into the Pit and there be tormented quick and the false Prophet and all who bear his Image We are accused to deny the Church I answer The true Church which is in God we own and witness through Death but the Worlds Church we deny for the true Church is the Body of Christ made of tryed Stones elect and precious washed and cleansed by his Blood and Spirit that he might present it a glorious Church not having Spot or Wrinkle but this is not a House of Lime and dead Stones nor the People that meet in it for all manner of Unrighteous Persons meet there which is the Synagogue of Satan and a Cage of unclean Birds and like People like Priest but who comes to be elected into the Church of Christ which is spiritual denies the World's Church which is carnal and the World's Teacher who is carnal selling the carnal for carnal Money and Earth for Christ himself is the Teacher of his Church who feeds it with living eternal Food freely and it needs no other Teacher and this Church we own and witness but all other Churches we deny for the Church is but one and the Temple of God we own which is at new Jerusalem the City of the living God but all other Idols Temples we deny which is the Invention and Imaginations of Man and though God commanded Solomon to build him a Temple nevertheless God that made the World dwels not in Temples made with Hands and when Christ the Substance came he prophesied against it and also Stephen was stoned to Death when he prophesied against it and this we witness whose Bodies are the Temples of the Holy Ghost who are now stoned and persecuted by such as know not the living God but worship Idols because we speak against their Idols Temple which God never commanded to be built but was set up by the imagining Idolizing Papists and upheld by the blind Protestant so called and so they cast out the Papists and uphold their Idols and so the Inchanters Diviners and Sorcerers of England lead silly People in Blindness to worship Idols telling them they are the Houses and Temples of
God which is a meeer Delusion We are accused to deny the Sabbath The Sabbath of the Saints we own which is not for a Day but Everlasting and who dwells in Christ witnesseth this Sabbath which is the Substance and the Shadow without is vanished for saith Paul let no man condemn you in respect of Meats and Drinks or of an Holy Day or of new Moons or of the Sabbath-Dayes which are but Shadows of things to come And so the World hath the Shadow and the Saints the Substance and you who have the Shadow persecute them who have the Substance as the Scribes and Pharisees and High Priests did who had and upheld the Types and Figures of Christ and persecuted him who was the Substance so they that are alter the Flesh persecuted them that are aftor the Spirit But your Sabbath is a Shadow of Nothing for the Jews Sabbath in the time of the Law was upon the seventh Day which was the last Day of the Week but yours is the first Day of the Week for which you have no Scripture and they were not to do their own Wayes nor their own Pleasure nor speak their own Words upon the Sabbath Day and here you transgress in the Figure and walk in your own Wayes and speak your own Words and do your own Pleasures both of that Day and every Day We are accused that we justifie our selves and condemn all others I answer When we were our selves without the Spirit of God and had a Form and Profession of the Saints Condition which we did not possess we sought to justifie our selves in our Profession and earthly Wisdom and to exalt our selves and be something in the Eyes of others and here we were Pharisee and yet feigned Publicans saying we were sinfull but thought higher of our selves then others though we were in the same Nature and here our Justification was of our selves and not of Christ and here all you Pharisees and feigned Publicans both Priests and Professors who are in your earthly Wisdom feeding upon the Letter but as the Light of Christ arose in us all our earthly Wisdom wherein we were exalted became Foolishness and Self was judged and denyed and all that which was of Self both Wisdom and Righteousness wherewith we covered over our filthy lustful unclean Hearts and so were as painted Sepulchres and here are all Professors at this Day who are feeding upon the Tree of Knowledge and are from under the Cross of Christ but all would not hide from the Light of God but as it arose it searched through all and lay'd open all and all our Covers became rotten and fell from us and so it will be with all Professors as the Light of Christ doth arise and the Book of Conscience is layd open for no Flesh must glory in his Presence But now we have nothing but what we have received of the Father through Death and Christ is made over unto us Wisdom Righteousness Sanctification and Redemption and though we glory we glory in the Lord for we have nothing in our selves to glory of and the Saints thought it no Presumption to call themselves the Sons of God and said they were of God and all the whole World lie in Wickedness and here the same Spirit would have accused them yet they were no Pharisees and Christ thought it no Robbery to be equal with God yet he was no Pharisee though of the Pharisees he was judged a Blasphemer and as he is so are we say the Saints yet they were no Pharisees and so who are made the Sons of God it is no Self-justification to witness it forth neither those who are made free from Sin to witness it forth as the Apostles did and to witness forth the Life and Power of Truth and deny them that have gotten the Form Notion or Profession And here Christ is the Witness and the Justification for the Way is but one and the Truth is but one and they who dwell in the Truth witness one with another for the Light of God owns its own wheresoever it is for God cannot deny himself but they that are not with us are against us and out of the Truth in the State of Condemnation for all who are out of the Truth are under the Curse in the Fall and this Truth we witness by the Spirit of the living God through Death the same Truth as ever was and there is that in every Conscience shall bear us Witness yea in the Heathen and condemn them that hate it Jer. 3. 19 20. We are accused to be one with the Ranters I answer it is false for we abhor their Principles in our Hearts and deny any Liberty to the Flesh or any light or loose or vain Conversation which they live in or any thing which is impure or unclean for our Principles are pure and clean and are at Enmity with any thing that is impure or unclean for Purity and Impurity cannot agree together and it is our desire to keep our selâ—es unspotted of the World for that which is unclean defiles and from that we are seperated who are the Sons and Daughters of the living God But some of them have tasted of the Love of God and Grace of God and have had Appearances of God but by hearkning to the Voyce of the Serpent and giving way to the Lust have turned with the Dog to the Vomit and the Grace of God into Wantenness casting his pure Law behind their Backs and walking despightfully against the Spirit of Grace and have crucified afresh the Lord of Life and put him to open Shame therefore hath the Lord given them up to their own Hearts-Lusts and vile Affections and their Consciences are seared as with an hot Iron for it is written It is impossible that those who were once enlightned and have tasted of the heavenly Gift and were made Partakers of the Holy Ghost and have tasted of the good Word of God and the Powers of the World to come if they shall fall away to renew them again to Repentance but they have deceived many with their alluring Speeches and have caused the Truth of God to be evil spoaken of by their pernicious lascivious wayes but Wo Wo be to them for double shall be their Reward But God is our Witness we deny and abhor all things which are filthy or unclean and though all the World condemn it is without For there is no Condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus who walk not aefter the Flesh but after the Spirit And it is my tender desire towards all tender Consciences that they may take heed of giving any Liberty to the Flesh lest they loose the Tenderness of Conscience and harden it by Lust and Uncleanness for nothing but Purity will the Lord receive for he is of purer Eyes then to behold Iniquity We are accused that the Ground of our Religion is Popery The
defrauding one another of the Earth which is none of your own and you are Persecutors and Stoners and Strikers of the Innocent Children and Servants and Messengers of God and what Sin is there among those whom you account Heathen that is not amongst you and doth abound yea those whom you account Heathen may condemn you in much of their Practice Oh! be ashamed blush you Priests Teachers of England to see your Ministry the Fruits of your Ministry so laid open before you and thus you are those who come near the Lord with your Lips Mouthes but your Hearts are far from him in the Earth or else you would walk more uprightly But saith the Lord In vain do you worship me teaching for Doctrine the Commmandments of Men but I know some Pharisees and Priests will be ready to say We are not Drunkards nor Swearers nor such like but I say unto you You are Hypocrites and your Hearts are full of Deceit Envy Wrath and Bitterness Covetousness Pride and Earthly-Mindedness and self-Love and self-Wisdom and Persecutors and the greatest Oppressors of the Truth and Publicans and Harlots shall enter the Kingdom before you Jesus Christ the Light marked out your Fore-Fathers and found them to be such though they were more strict and zealous then this Generation and by the same Light you are soâ—nd in their Steps and those Things both Christ and his Apostles judged to be without and condemned them out of the New Covenant for there no unrighteous Person can dwell and there all Wars are ended and the Swords beat into pruning Hâ—oks and Guns into Plow-shares and there is no Oppression nor self exalting but he that would be the greatest must be the least and in Righteousness are they established and they are far from Oppression and the Lord alone is their Teacher and there is no need of an outward Law For to them there is no Condemnation who walk not after the Flesh but after the Spirit and there is no Respect of Persons but all Members of one Body of which Christ is Head serving one another in Love and here is the New Covenant and the Children of the New Covenant who are washed and made clean by the Blood of the New Covenant but you are Aliens and Strangers from this Covenant who are in your Notions and Professions therefore all you ignorant People who are led by these deceitful Priests and Pharisees and disdâ—in to be wiser then your Fore Fathers now see who are your Fore-Fathers and the Original of your Priests and who is your Example for you are out of the Life and Practice of the Apostles and the Children of Light and by their Life are judged and condemned for they were mortified to that Life which you live in neither did the Ministers of the Gospel Baptize Infants with Water neither did they Teach for Hire or stand up in the chiefest Place in the Assembly neither were they called of Men Master neither had they the long Gowns neither did they Respect any Place more then another to teach or preach in except for Conveniency for they taught in dwelling-Houses and by the River sides or in any open Place neither did they give to the World David's Conditions to be sung in â— Meter neither did they give to natural Men and Women Bread and Wine which you call a SACRAMENT neither did they use to Church Women as you call it and take Money for it neither did they take a Text of other Mens Words and speak from it a Divination of their own Brain neither did they study what or how to preach but spoak as they were moved by the holy Ghost neither did they teach People The Letter was the Word or That the Letter was the Light but they bore witness of God to be the Word and â—hrist to be the Light neither did they teach People That they could never be free from Siâ— while they wâ—re upon the Earth but they preached Jesus Christ the Lamb of God who came to take away the Sins of the World and to redeem his People from their Sin and to set them in the Glorious Liberty of the Sons of God that he might redeem unto himself a pure Church not having Spot or Wrincle or any such Thing neither did they teach People That a House of Liâ—e and Stone was the Church or the House of God neither were they set up or upheld by a Law of Man or came by the Will of Man or stood in the VVill of Man but by the Revelation of Jesus Christ and from him they received their Message and Command neither were they brought up in Human Learning at an University as it is called to learn Arts and Sciences and take Degrees from Sir to Batchellor and from Batchellor to Master of Arts from Master to Batchellor of Divinity from Batchellor of Divinity to Doctor of Divinity and had so many several Gowns but the Pharisees loved these Things but the Ministers of Christ were not such but most of them were ignorant and unlearned in that Wisdom and Learning but unto them it was given to know the Mysteries of the Kingdom but it was hid from the World and the wise Ones thereof and now the wise Ones of the World say That is the Means ordained of God to come to the Knowledge of the Truth and that is the Original to wit human Learning and deny all Revelation or immediate Inspiration and say it is ceased for all which they have no Scripture Proof for the Apostles never taught this Doctrine nor prescribed this Way therefore your Teachers are such as bring another Doctrine and climb up another Way who are not to be received but shut out for Thieves and Robbers who shut up the Kingdom of Heaven against Men and will neither enter in themselves nor suffer others that would and the Ministers of the Gospel never preach'd up Hebrew and Greek to be the Original but they preached the Word to be the Original neither took Tythes nor ever had a set Maintenance or so much a Year namely forty fifty or sixty or a hundred or two hundred Pounds a Year more or less to abide in one Place neither sued any at the Law for any such Thing but all their Care was to make the Gospel free and without Charge neither did they take of those that did not own them as denyed them but shoke off the Dust of their Feet and so left them neither had they an Hour-Glass to limit themselves by or had a Clark to say Amen But your Priests will tell you Now the Gospel is published and the Churches are gathered and planted Oh! with Shame might they speak it what Churches have they gathered here I have before laid down their Church the Ground thereof the Gathering thereof and the Planting thereof and what they are and also the Gathering of the Apostles Church and the Planting thereof so that here
the Flesh in the Name and Power of our Lord Jesus Christ for in the Spirit Paul discerned it for saith he Though absent in Body yet present in Spirit I have judged already as though I were present concerning him that hath done this Deed and so those Formalists and Imitators if any differ from them in Judgment they will also deliver him up to Satan as they imagine taking the Apostles Words though they cannot tax him for any Thing but his Judgment differing from them but they want the Power and here they are the Magicians like Jannes and Jambres opposing the Truth and those are they that are called Baptists and another Form they are more spiritual in their Judgment and they hold a spiritual Baptism and not a Water-Baptism and as many as hold with them are of their Church and Faith and thus they are divided into several Forms and Churches and so have several Names and there are several Judgments of one Thing under one Name and here is the Confusion of Babylon with their several Sects Judgments and Opinions and every one are professing the Name of the Lord and stealing the Words of the Prophets Christ and his Apostles and saying The Lord saith when he never spoak to them and here is the Difference from another only in Profession Judgment or Opinion but still in Babylon and Babylon's Fashions Customs and Traditions and Fellowship Manners and Breeding which is all Heathenish and at Enmity with God being in the Fall and thus they stand in the first Nature in Pride in Covetousness Anger Wrath Malice Fleshliness and Lustfulness and Idle Words Vain Talking Foolish Jesting and Evil Communication and to be short still alive in the World's Nature Strangers to the Holy God and so under Death's Dominion and here I comprehend all Forms Sects Judgments and Opinions by the Light which slayes Death and takes away its Dominion unto its self to whom it belongs and doth see them and judge them to be out of the Light in Darkness and so in Confusion one clashing against another with their Judgments and Opinions and here are the Disputes of this World and the one cryes Lo here is Christ in this Form and another cryes Lo here is Christ in this Form and none else whenas Christ is within his Saints and there is a false Christ which they have set up in their Imaginations and here are the False Prophets and False Christs that are gone out into the World who have deceived many And here is the Ground of Forms a setting up a Likeness of a Thing a Figure or Image of a Thing but not the Thing it self and here is the Beast and the Image of the Beast which all the World worships and wonders after even Satan as an Angel of Light in his several Shapes Forms and Likenesses to deceive the Simple and here is the Form without the Life and Power and here is the Building upon a sandy Foundation which all must come down who hear the Words and talk of the Word are Sayers of the Words here is him that saith he hath kept the Commandments and Ordinances and yet his Heart from God after other Lovers who is searched and found out by Christ the Light and here is the Spiritual Babel with its Foundation and Babel's Building and Babel's Builders and here is the Image whose Head is Gold whose Breast is Silver and Thighs of Brass and Legs of Iron and Feet part Iron and part Clay but now is he come and made manifest who strikes at Feet of Image who is called the Stone cut out of Mountain without Hands even Jesus Christ the Son of God now after all this Profession of his Name and of Faith in him but now he finds none in the Earth who hath revealed himself in the poor despised ones of the World and those who have been counted the blind and igrant and as you have read the Poor receive the Gospel the World was made by him but the World knew him not he came unto his own and his own received him not but as many as receive him to them he gives Power to become the Sons of God to whom that Promise is fulfilled which was promised in the Dayes of old by the Father That in the last Dayes he would pour forth his Spirit upon all Flesh and his Sons and Daughters should prophesie and the Young Men see Visions and if you will receive it this is the Elias which was for to come in the Spirit as he came in the Flesh even the Life and Power of what hath been so long professed which the Lord hath now manifested in his Servants and Hand-maids whom he hath now sent forth abroad freely to call into the Supper of the Lord even the Marriage of the Lamb and to preach his Name no more after the Flesh but after the Spirit and to preach him within the Hope of Glory the Ministry that hath been hid from Ages and Generations and they that will be his Disciples must deny themselves and take up his Cross follow him through evil Report and good Report through Persecution and through Death and who are faithful until Death must receive a Crown of Life and reign with him for evermore in his Kingdom of which there is no End neither Beginning over which he is made Heir and King blessed be Jehovah sing Halelujah to his Name all ye that know him And now that his Name is spreading abroad and his Message declaring by the Mouth of his faithful Messengers those who have long talked of his Name and so long professed his Name know him not neither believe on him but are found Hypocrites and Dissemblers and blind Leaders of the blind whited Walls and painted Sepulchres but within full of Uncleanness Hypocrisie and Deceit even the Generation of Vipers and Serpents and those will not receive the Message but make light of it and say they believe on a Christ at Jerusalem and now in the Heavens far off they know not where and they cry he hath done all for us and hath satisfied for our Sins and they shall not be imputed to us say they and they cry out this is a new Light and a strange Light and we know not whence it is but they say they will keep to the Old Rule the Scriptures which they call the Word of God and the Old Way though they be meer Strangers to the Life of the Scriptures but it is that the Scripture might be fulfilled upon them as Christ saith For Judgment am I come into the World that they which see not might see and that they which see might be made blind as their Fore-fathers professed Abraham and Moses and said We know that God spake unto Moses but as for this Fellow we know not whence he is John 9. 29. and they said God was their Father but Jesus Christ answered them and said If ye were Abraham ' s Children ye
are they who are led and guided by the One Spirit of which the World cannot receive even the Comforter of whom you have heard should come by which they are separated out of the World and redeemed out of the Rudiments and Pollutions thereof their Fashions their Customs their Words their Wayes their Manners their Breeding their Fellowship Love and Friendship their Honour and Glory and their Worship and so are become Strangers to the World and so are hated of the World because they are not of the World and the Enmity stands betwixt the two Seeds but while they were of the World the World loved them but now they are gathered out of the World and separated from the World and testifie against the World both in Words and Actions therefore the Enmity is raised in the World against the Righteous Seed and those are they upon whom the Ends of the World are come to whom it is given to know the Mysteries of the Kingdom though to the World in Parables and those are they that are come with a Mighty Arm and Power to trun the World up-side down whom the Lord hath gathered and is a gathering out of the World by his own Spirit of Truth and Love to walk in the Way of Truth even the Way of Holiness where the Ransomed of the Lord do walk and serve and worship him in Spirit and in Truth and such is the Father seeking to worship him in whom he is in doing his own Work even to destroy the Old Creation and create New Heavens and New Earth wherein dwelleth Righteousness and those are they that are the New Creatures in whom this New Work is witnessed in whom the Father hath manifested his Son that in the Likeness of sinful Flesh he might condemn Sin in the Flesh and to bind the Strong Man and cast him out of his House and spoil his Goods and so to destroy the Works of the Devil and to cut down the Man of Sin even that Son of Perdition who is exalted above all that is called GOD sitting in the Temple of God as God and saith He is God this is he by whom the World is deceived who is the God of the World even the Prince of Darkness who rules in all the Children of Disobedience and so saith John in the Light The whole World lies in Wickedness and unto this doth Christ come with a Sword for to make War with him and to take and bind him and cast him into utter Darkness and so to take his Kingdom from him and to rule himself in Righteousness And this is the King of the SAINTS who is now come to redeem unto himself a Pure People and to wash them cleanse them from their Sias by his BLOOD and so to wash away all Filthiness both of Flesh and Spirit and this is the Baptism by which they are received into his Church and Faith and here is the Effect of his BLOOD wrought in MAN and thus he doth and will manifest his Mighty Power to purifie and cleanse and make Man a fit Temple for himself to dwell in And thus is GOD with us manifested in Flesh and thus are the Saints Bodies made the TEMPLES of the HOLY GHOST and thus is the Word of Life and Reconciliation witnessed to the raising up the Soul to Life and reconciling the Soul to GOD and those are they that are begotten and born again of the Immortal Word which dwelleth and abideth forever and here is the Houshold of God the Houshold of Faith and the Houshold of Love who speak the things which they have heard and seen and tasted of the good Word of Life which was in the beginning and those are the Children of Light who are gather'd out of the dark Forms Judgments and Opinions into the Life and Power of Godliness to walk in the Light of Life wherein they are gathered and united by the One Spirit of Love and Life into One Body of which Christ is Head and here is the true Church which the Lord is a gathering and washing and cleansing and purifying by his Spirit that he may redeem unto himself a pure Church not having Spot or Wrinkle or any such thing whose Insides are washed and made clean through the Word by which they are reconciled into the Love and Union which springs from the Life of God and here is the Vine and the Branches and here is the Communion of the Church all feeding upon One Bread all drinking upon One Cup this is Christ the Life of the Saints and as many as are baptized into this Church partake of this Communion and those are they which have denyed themselves and have born the Cross of Christ by which they are crucified to the World and the World to them who are gathered into one Covenant of Life where all are Fellow-Servants under one MASTER who serve one another in Love and Meekness And here is the true Humility in the Heart wrought and here is the true Washing of Feet without Hypocrisie which some are imitating without for LIFE but fall short for the Heart the Lord requires And thus is the Church of Christ gathered by one Spirit and by the same circumcised and baptized into one Light and Life and Power where all dwell as MEMBERS of One BODY of which CHRIST is the HEAD And here is the Blessed Union and Communion in One and here God is worshipped in Spirit and in Truth and as CHRIST is spiritual so is his BODY and so are his Ordinances And here are the true Christians not those that only have the Notion of those things but they that witness and possess this in Life and they that believe have the witness within themselves and they that believe have passed from Death unto Life and the Life which they now live in is by Faith in the Son of God which Faith is without Respect of Persons who are the New Creatures who are IN Christ Jesus to whom there is no Condemnation who walk not after the FLESH but after the for against such there is no LAW for they are translated out of that NATURE for which the LAW was added and are set free by the Law of the Spirit of Life and are made Partakers of the Divine Nature of Christ by which they are made Christians and therefore saith John As he is so are we in this present World and such now witness the Effect of the Blood of Christ wrought within them and the End of his Coming and the Benefit of his Death who are Dead with him and risen through the Death of the Cross and these are they that have escaped the Pollutions of the World through the Knowledge of the Son of God within them Christ within the Hope of Glory or else no Hope of Glory for they that cannot witness him so are in the Reprobation so saith the Apostle and here is the Son in the Saints and the Father in the Son and thus are
who would try the Living by the Dead and again he said that one Spirit could not try another for by that Judgment the Evil Spirit might try the Good Spirits to which I replyed By the Spirit of God all other Spirits are tryed and also that by the Light Darkness is discovered but Darkness cannot comprehend the Light neither discover the Light and here again his Blindness and Ignorance and Deceit was much discovered to the People although he fed himself and would have shuffled it off by his Consequences and filthy Logick but it the more laid open his Deceit and presently the said Elligood was found with another Lye in his Mouth for he said that I said the Thing should be proved by every Man's Spirit which was a very Lye for I said that the Baptism of the Spirit was the Substance of the outward Baptism the which he denyed and bid me prove it and I said I spoak to the Witness in every Man's Conscience which his dark Mind could not comprehend but with his dark Mind wrested my Words and therefore said that I said it was witnessed by every Man's Spirit but his Spirit was a lying Spirit there tryed and made manifest to the People and his Blasphemy against the Spirit of God in calling Truth Error and Error Truth and putting Darkness for Light and Light for Darkness because the God of the World hath blinded his Eye and many witnessed against him for his filthy Spirit was odious to many of the Hearers then afterward he again said that I was a Deceiver and his Proof was that I was not obedient to the Command of Christ to be baptized and I told him I was baptized but he said with Water and he said that was a Command of Christ to be baptized with Water and I bid him shew me that Scripture but he could not but brought a Scripture in the Acts where the Apostle commanded some to be baptized and this by his filthy Logick and Consequences he would have made a Command of Christ but he could not deceive the Light which did him try and make him manifest to the Shame of his Prosession but he could not bring one Scripture to prove it to be a Command of Christ to baptize with Water and then he shuffled to that Scripture where the Apostle said Be ye Followers of us even as we are Followers of Christ and then he said Christ was baptized but he confessed it was to fulfil all Righteousness and I said he was also circumcised and he said that was not for Example then not the Baptism for both were to fulfil all Righteousness to which End he the Substance came but Christ himself baptized not with Water neither do they read that the Apostles were baptized with Water then who is their Example and how do they follow the Apostles in that seeing they are baptized and the Apostles were not then he fled from that being there routed and said They might be Disciples before they could take up the CROSS of Christ and I replyed with Christ's Words That they might take up his Cross before they could be his Disciples which he denyed and said That Wicked Men upon that Account might take up the Cross of Christ and that Christ required Wicked Men to take up his Cross and I said it was so he did require them so to do for by taking up his Cross they come to deny their Wickedness for they that bear his CROSS live not in Wickedness but this Elligood said That Wicked Men could not take up his CROSS for he said Reproaches and outward Sufferings were the CROSS of Christ for his Name 's sake but this was not the Cross by which Paul was crucified to the World and the World to him and saith Paul where he was speaking concerning Wickedness and Unrighteous Ones to the Corinthians Such were some of you but you are now cleansed c. And here Wicked Ones and Unrighteous Ones took up his CROSS which to them was the Power of GOD unto Salvation though to the GREEKS Foolishness and to the JEWS a stumblingâ— Block amongst whom this ELLIGOOD is found who is a Stranger to the CROSS OF CHRIST who saith REPROACHES and Outward SUFFERINGS are the CROSS OF CHRIST whenas the CROSS OF CHRIST makes DISCIPLES and they must be DISCIPLES before they can suffer REPROACHES or PERSECUTION for the NAME OF CHRIST and must depart from Iniquity before they be a Prey to the World for CHRIST's sake for the VVorld loves its own and they that take up the CROSS do depart from Iniquity which is before Reproaches or Persecution is suffered for the Name of CHRIST And here ELLIGOOD is found the Lyar who said Wicked Men were not called to take up the Cross of CHRIST whenas all are wicked before they take up this Cross and here ELLIGOOD is found to be no Disciple of Christ who is such a Stranger to the Cross of Christ who is a Lyar and so are not the Disciples of Christ for the Lyar is of the Devil and therefore is ELLIGOOD Then I knowing him to be one of the Baptists Teachers I took out some Queries which not long before I had sent them but no Answer to them had I received and I would have read them openly that the People might have heard and also he that was one of their Teachers but as I was reading he not having Power over his own VVill could not bridle his Tongue but disorderly run into many VVords so that the People could not understand and I spoak to him for it and he said He had not Time to stay and further said That he was not of the Society of these Baptists at Fnestanton and yet he came with them and from them and then I replyed That be owned them to be the Church of God and this he did and then if he was not of their Society he was shut out of the Church and then he would have shuffled off with his Consequences and said he dwelt for off and then I replyed with the Apostles Words Though absent in Body yet present in Spirit and the Multitude that believed were of one Heart and Mind and here was the Society of the Saints and he being out of this Society is shut out of the Church and then he would have made it stood by his Logick which only is to make a false Thing seem true but it the more laid open his deceitful Heart and Shame to the Hearers who severally witnessed against him to speak nothing but Deceit and then saith he you call the Apostles Words Deceit because he had often stoln the Apostles Words to make his DECEIT seem TRUTH by covering it with the APOSTLES Words and this is a more subtil Deceit and then in his Will he called me Deceiver the which he was to prove and all the People was silent and there he uttered several Lyes and laid open himself to be the Deceiver as I had told him in
and by what did the Prophets and Apostles try the Spirits and whether yours is the same Tryâ—r of Spirits as theirs was yea or nay 39. What is the Faith of the Saint and what is the Faith of the Hypocrite and how are they known the one from the other 40. How and by what were you called to the Ministry which you profess 41. What is the Gospel which you profess and what is the Light of the Gospel which the Infidel cannot see and what is an Infidel and what is the Eye which the God of the World blinds in the Infidel 42. What is the State and Condition of the Jew inwardly whose Praise is not of Man but of God and wherein doth he differ from the Jew outwardly 43. What is the New Covenant and where any in the New Covenant pay'd Tythes and why do you cry against the Priests and their Tythe and their Worship and yet uphold them by paying them Tythes and helping to maintain their Places of Worship and whether this be not Babel Yea or Nay These Things I donot ask because I know them not but that the Truth may be manifest and the Deceit laid open therefore answer by plain Scripture or else all ye Formalists Imitators and Self-actors bow unto the Truth and be silent and let your Mouthes be stopped and thereby confess and yield your selves in an Error and to have gotten the Form without the Life and Power that the simple may no longer be deceived by you taking the Shadow for the Substance Read this openly in your Church that all may hear and answer for themselves from him who by one of you was called a Deceiver yet true who according to the World am called James Parnel A Copy of most of these Queries was sent to the chief Teacher of the Baptized People in Festanton and after a certain Time these Words they sent me back again as followeth A few Words to him that saith that according to the World he is called James Parnel WE have received your Paper and according to your Desire read it in the Congregation unto which you desire our Answer by plain Scripture to which we reply That when you make good your Affirmation that you are no Deceiver but True by plain Scripture then shall we return you a further Answer to your Queries From them who desire to serve the Lord Jesus Christ John Denne Edmund Male. Then after I had received this Libel I returned them this Answer at the Bottom of their own Paper Answer THis is plain Scripture Though as a Deceiver yet true and if my Life and Conversation doth not prove the same and make good my Affirmation then in your Answer to my Queries you might have taxed me and proved to the contrary But this of you is but a plain Shuffle to blind the World and shun the Shame and still to blind the People who are enslaved under your Deceit but this will the more manifest your Ignorance Then not long after they return'd me this Answer as followeth IT is not plain Scripture Though as a Deceiver yet True As Deceivers yet True is plain Scripture the greatest Deceiver in the World might as well have brought it to prove himself no Deceiver but true as well as you For your Conversation we know it not we have nought to say to that but this we know that Wolves may come in Sheep's Cloathing and this doth appear in you in drawing People from the Truth as namely from Water-Baptism which is a Command of the Lord unto Believers As for your saying We might have taxed you in our Answer to your Queries We think you might plainly see your Folly in this You affirmed nothing in them as your Judgment how should we then tax you and prove the contrary And again We made no Promise to Answer and therefore you might have spared your Daring and False Words to say The People are Enslaved under our Deceit And therefore until you have made good what you have taken in hand by plain Scripture by the Fruit of your Lips by bringing the Doctrine of Christ and owning his Commandments we say until then we are exhorted To let you alone Let them alone they be blind Leaders of the Blind you having been so plainly manifest unto us Rep. Here all People who with a single Eye read may see the Deceit of this People for I spoak but of one and therefore in that Respect it is plain Scripture though as a Deceiver yet True But these are they who if they could would make a Man an Offender for a Word My Conversation they cannot touch and yet are not ashamed to say The greatest Deceiver might as well have brought this Scripture as I this is the Blindness of their Minds And also say because I deny Water-Baptism to be an Ordinance or a Command of Christ that I am a Wolf in Sheep's Cloathing which they do affirm to be a Command but cannot prove it and so are such as use their Tongues and say The Lord saith when he never spoak to them But surely a Wolf in Sheep's Cloathing is to be known by the Life and Practice but in this they are blind and cannot discern and so themselves are the Blind Leaders of the Blind but I shall not let you alone but make you manifest unto the World neither did Christ let them alone but pronounced Woes and declared against them And here I am sure you might see your Folly who say I have been so manifest unto you and said You know not my Conversation What a Confusion is this But it is your Mother's Language And also in expecting me to affirm my Judgment upon my own Queries then what need I send them to you to Answer if I Answer them my self And here I am sure you might see your own Folly for it is here plainly laid open so that all who are led by you are plainly seen to be enslaved under your Deceit And these words shall stand for Truth against you which you call false who are the Blind and so put Evil for Good and Good for Evil And the Doctrine of Christ I have brought and his Commandments I do own from and against you who are the Busie Bodies and Self-Actors who have nought to do with him nor his Commands Therefore Silence Deceivers for here I have made good what I have taken in hand which witnessed shall be in your Condemnation The Occasion of another Meeting betwixt the People called Baptists and the People called Quakers SEveral times when I have come to the Town of Cambridge I have heard a Rumour of a Boasting and Daring that sprung from the People called Baptists behind my Back concerning a Dispute with me yet I had received nothing from them neither by Word nor Writing to be certain of their Minds therefore I being in the Town sent them Word That I heard a Voice of such a thing but knew not the Certainty therefore to let me know
you can witness of the Work of God in your Hearts for all this your long and great Profession and esteeming your selves of the Church and Faith of Christ and Saints in Christ So if you can witness yet the Earth-Quakes and that the Earth is yet removed out of its Place and Mountains removed by the Eye of Faith and if the Vail of Darkness be yet rent Is not the first Man yet standing and the first Image and the Serpent's Head For while you are Strangers to the Light and your Minds are from the Light you are wandred and strayed in the Pathes of Darkness and so are the Children of Darkness in whom the Prince of Darkness ruleth even the Serpent who is Head in Man but the Promise is The Seed of the Woman shall bruise the Serpent's Head But you are acting in your own Wills and Wisdom the Serpent is your Head and you are not yet come to witness the first Promise fulfilled but are still in the Fall under the Power of Darkness in the Disobedience and Strangers unto the Cross and so have no Part in Christ in that Nature For none come to have a Right in Christ but through the Cross for As many as are baptized into Christ are baptized into his Death and they that are Dead with him do Live with him and they that are Dead are freeed from Sin and they that are in Christ are New Creatures old things are passed away and all things become new But they that are not in Christ are still in old Adam and so in the Fall under the Curse and under Death's Dominion drove out from the Presence of God into the Earth and Death reigns over all from Adam until Moses of what Profession soever Therefore now read your selves by the Light which comes from Jesus Christ and shineth into your dark Hearts and searcheth the Heart and tryeth the Reins and maketh manifest the Secrets to which Light I am made manifest and by it witnessed in you all and unto it I do direct your Minds for the turning of your Minds from the Darkness to the Light all you that have a Desire to find the Way of Truth in what Form soever that thereby you may come to see how you have been wandred and scattered in the many ways of Darkness in the Land of Darkness in this cloudy dark day as Sheep without a Shepheard being carryed about after the Voice of Strangers from the Shepheard of your Souls Therefore hearken no more without to those that cry Lo here or Lo there is Christ and so draws your Minds without to seek for a Christ without and a Redemption and a Sanctification without a Righteousness without and a God without but turn your Minds within for it is to be found within if ever you find it For there is no Way to come unto the true Knowledge of the Truth or of God or of Christ but by that of God within For what is to be known of God is manifest within and the same which descended the same doth ascend And so the Way to God is to be found within by the Light which maâ—nifests Death and slayes Death Do not you read the Parable of the Woman that had lâ—st the Piece of Silver and could not find it until she had turned into the House and lighted the Candle and swept the House and then she found that which she had lost and rejoyced with her Neighbours Now the Spirit of Man is the Candle of the Lord and his Life was the Light of Men so turn in your Minds to the Light of the Lord Jesus which if you love it to bring your Deeds to it it will let you see the Deeds of Darkness and the Paths of Death and it will also search your Hearts and make manifest your inward Parts and let you see what you have lost and as you love this Light and like to retain it in your Minds and by it to be guided it will lead you out of all the crooked and froward Wayes of Darkness into the Light of Life and so to come to find and know the Voice of the true Shepherd who is come to seek out and gather all his scattered Sheep out from amongst the Mountains and Valleys and the many Wayes and crooked Pathes wherein they have been scattered and strayed in the Land of Darkness and to gather them together into one Flock into one Way into one Sheepfold and he alone will be their Shepherd and this you shall come to witness as you love this Light and follow it it will lead you out of your many Forms and many Wayes into one Way out of your own Wisdom and Imaginations wherein you have been building Babel and this will strip you of all your own Righteousness wherewith you have covered over your deceitful Hearts and it will lay your Deceits before you and bring you to Judgment and if you love this Light and follow iâ— and be willing to wait upon it out of your own Wills and Wisdom and Imaginations and Carnal Thoughts Reasonings and Consutations and self-Acting and Imitating it will lead you to know the Voice of the true Shepherd within you from the Voice of the Stranger and so to know the precious from the vile he who saith I am the Light he saith I am the good Shepherd who will bring you to know the Way and the Door into the Sheepfold if you do not run out in your own Wills and seek to climb up another Way for the Way is but one and he that saith I am the Light saith I am the Way and I am the Door into the Sheepfold so if you turn from the Light and stumble at the Light you stumble at all and so fall but if you love the Light and be willing to follow the Light it will lead you through all and to deny your selves and to take up his Cross unto your selves and to pass through good Report and evil Report through Persecution and through Death and the VVay will not be grievous but joyous and so you will come into the VVay and in at the Door unto the Sheepfold and so into the Fellowship and into the Life and into the Power and into the Faith of the Saints where all live in Union in one united by one into one Body the End of all Jarring Jangling Divisions and Disputes therefore said the Apostle Where is the Wise where is the Disputer of this World hath not God made foolish the Wisdom of this World Therefore I do call you to come out from amongst them and be ye separate and touch no unclean Thing and I will receive you saith the Lord and I will be unto you a Father and ye shall be my Sons and Daughters Now you are called and this is the Day of your Visitation for now Light is come into the VVorld and if you like to retain it in your Minds happy are you but if
as one not worthy to live amongst them yea and they said He that killed me would do God Service But he that had called me out from amongst them unto himself that I might no longer follow the Vain Courses of the World nor set my Delight on things below but that I might serve him in Newness of â—ife that in me his Workmanship might appear to the Confounding â—â—f the Heathen who know him not He by his â—â—â—wer kept me and gave me Strength to bear his Cross and despise the Shame so that neither Foul Words nor Fair Words could cause me to Deny what God by his Grace had wrought in my Heart but by his Power he carried me above the Raging Waves of the tempestuous Sea so that I knew that he that was in me was greater then he that is in the World yea and out of my Kindred and Acquaintance I came and became a Stranger to them that lov'd not the Truth Yea and presently I came to see the Priests of the World by their Fruits and the Fruits of their Ministry which was cursed from God and therefore profited not the People at all But when the Lord by his Power had changed and converted my Heart unto himself the Priests became mine Enemies and said I was deluded whenas before when I lived in the vain Conversation of the World they took no Notice of me either to Reprove me or Instruct me but as they went on in a customary way for Gain and Lucre speaking against Sin in the general but not reproving it in particular but were as deep in it in their Lives as others and so what they preacht down with their Tongues they upheld in their Lives and countenanced in their Conversations and so from them I turned whom I saw had gotten a Form but deny'd the Life and Power and I sought for a People with whom I might have Union and there was a People with whom I found Union a few Miles from the Town where I lived whom the Lord was a gathering out of the dark VVorld to sit down together wait upon his Name but we were the Objects and Reproach of the Country and were accounted as the Off-scourings of the VVorld but in all this we saw the Scriptures fulfilled and that we might thus suffer if we would live Godly in Christ Jesus and here was our Confidence and Strength which carryed us above our Sufferings as knowing it was for the Name of Jesus And thus I continued a certain time counting it greater Riches to suffer Affliction with the People of God then to enjoy the Pleasures of Sin for a Season and about this time I was about Fifteen Years of Age. And afterwards I was called forth to visit some Friends in the North Part of England with whom I had Union in Spirit before I saw their Faces And afterwards I returned back to my outward Dwelling-Place and remained in my outward Calling And the Lord all this time still more more perfecting encreasing his Work in my Heart which by his Power he had begun in me and by his pure Power bringing forth his Truth in me and making known his Will unto me until by his Power He opened my Mouth to declare his Truth in the VVorld and still I continued in my outward Calling and also in the VVork of the Lord as not being called far from my Dwelling-Place And when I was betwixt Seventeen and Eighteen Years of Age I was moved in my Spirit to go to a Place about Fifteen Miles from my outward Dwelling-Place southward amongst a People to whom the Lord was making known his Truth not knowing when I went out of going farther then that Place but when I was there I was moved of the Lord to come on the Cambridge and in Obedience unto the Lord I came to see what he had to do for me not knowing one Foot of the Way but as I was directed neither knowing when I came there where to be receiv'd but had heard before of Two of my Friends that were there Whipped caused by the Mayor that then was only for declaring the Truth as they past through the Town against the Deceit thereof neither did I know but it might be my Portion also when I came there but without conferring with Flesh and Blood I passed on my Journey and he that called me forth went along with me and did direct me And when I came there I found those that were worthy that received me and also I found a Friend whom the Corrupt Rulers had put in Prison for the same Testimony which I also was sent to declare before I had continu'd there the space of Fourteen Nights William Pickering the Mayor of Cambridge committed me to Prison for publishing two Papers the one against the Corruption of the Magistrates and the other against the Corruption of the Priests at the time of their Commencement as they call it and there they kept me in Prison the space of two Sessions and tossed me from Prison to Dungeon and had nothing to lay against me whereby to prove the Breach of any Law but when I came to the last Sessions they called a Jury to prove the Papers to be Scandalous and Seditious Papers and they were nigh Two Hours about them but could not prove it but came and said That they found nothing but that the Papers were mine which I had before own'd in the open Court and there was my Name to them to testifie the same And so they were crossed in their Intentions and their Plots came to nought Then they committed me back to Prison again and after the space of Three Days they sent me away with a Pass under the Name of a Rogue yet durst not give me the Law which belongs to Rogues but had me away with Clubs and Staves and I could not see the Pass until I was Three Miles out of the Town where I lodged that Night and the next day there came a Justice of Peace from Cambridge who knowing me to be Innocent of what was laid to my Charge so he witnessed the Pass to be false and took it back to Cambridge and so I was set free And not long after I went of Cambridge again and went abroad preaching and declaring the Truth freely in the Countries about and many I found that received the Truth gladly but more Enemies yet nevertheless Truth spread conquer'd over its Enemies and there I continued labouring in the VVork of the Lord about the Space of half a Year in the Countries about Cambridge and from thence I was moved of the Lord to come into Essex where I heard of a People that was seâ—king the Lord and when I came there I found those that were worthy who received the Truth gladly and there I continued freely declaring and preaching the Truth from Place to Place sometimes in the Synagogues and was haled out by the Priests Party that the Scripture might be fulfilled upon that
Day and Night and thus I was led 18 Miles through the Country for a gazing-Stock unto the World but Truth was preached in all this and prevailed on the Hearts of the People so that I could rejoyce in all and triumph over mine Enemies So when we were at the Assize-Town which is called Chansford the Judge came in upon the seventh Day of the Week and upon the second Day of the next Week I was brought into the Court before Judge Hills who sate upon Life and Death and there I stood for a gazing-Stock while and then the Judge commaâ—ded them to take me away and did not say any thing to me for then I was singled from the rest only had Irons upon one of my Hands then upon the next Day Morning the Goaler sent his Man to take off my other Irons and so in the afternoon I was had before the Judge without any Irons and the Goaler took off my Hat and cast it upon the Floor and then the Clerk read a long Indictment full of Falshoods and asked me if I was guilty and I told him I denyed all Guilt and called for my Accusers and the Judge said I might see my Accusers and told me I might say Guilty or not Guilty and I told him I was not Guilty so called twelve Men to try me and the Fore-man was a Drunkard and they bid me object against any of them and I told them I owned none out of the Doctrine of Christ and all that swore were out of the Doctrine of Christ and they had all sworn before my Face and therefore I openly denyed by them to be tryed yet nevertheless they went on with their Work and Priest Willis was called and he swore against me and swore falsly too and the two Men called Justices swore against me and swore falsly too and one of the Justices Men so called and another Man swore against me and swore falsly too yet all these false Witnesses were heard to the full what they would say aginst me and thus the Leader of the People caused them to err for if the Teacher be a Swearer and a false Swearer what may the People be for Christ saith Swear not at all but let your Yea be Yea and your Nay be Nay for whatsoever is more is Evil and the Apostle saith In all Things my Brethren swear not at all c. and he that abides not in the Doctrine of Christ hath not God and thus like People like Priest all live without God in the World And when their false Witnesses had spoaken what they could against me they brought in the Letter which I had sent to the Men called Justices in Reply to their Mittimus and it was openly read in the COURT and I owned it for my Name was to it and the reading of it was much Satisfaction to many that understood it and they also brought another Paper that I writ against the Idol's Temple and the Deceiver therein both which shall follow in Order afterwards and then when they were both read Judge â—ills took them both and repeated over unto the Jury all that he could gather by wrong Interpretation and Construction against me whereby to incense the Jury against me and told them If they did not find me Guilty the Sin would lye upon their Heads and he as it were passed the Sentence upon me before the Jury went forth yea and told them what they should do whenas they had sworn before to speak the Truth and nothing but the Truth and I had charged them to take heed what they did for I told them None could judge betwixt Truth and Heresie but by the Spirit of the Lord but when I would have spoken something to the Jury before they went forth the Judge interrupted me and would not suffer me though one of the Jury desired it neither would he suffer that the Jury should have the Papers that were brought in against me though I required it but sought all that he could against me true or false although I had sent him a true Declaration of the Grounds of my Imprisonment with Hands of four Witnesses to it neither would he suffer that to be read And that which I would have spoaken unto the Jury was to clear it unto them that it was no scandalous nor reproachful Words to call a corrupt Magistrate a corrupt Magistrate and to call an Unjust Judge and Lawyer an Unjust Judge and Lawyer or a Persecutor a Persecutor or a Deceiver a Deceiver all which was brought against me and call'd Railing and Scandalous for by that Account they might have taxed all the Prophets for Railing and Scandaling for they open and often declared against the Corruption of the Priests and Rulers as you may read in many Places in the Prophets Records Isaâ—ah called the Priests Greedy Dumb Dogs and the Prophets called them Idol-Shepherds and the like and Christ call'd them Hirelings and the Rulers Hypocrites and Herod a Fox read Maâ—thew 23. and see if you may not as well call that Railing and yet in all this they did not rail nor scandalize any but gave to every Nature its Name and due Reproof whether they would hear or forbear But this is the Condemnation of the World Light is come into the World and Men love Darkness rather then Light because their Deeds are Evil. So when the Jury came in to bring in their Evidence they could charge me with nothing but the Paper I had writ in Reply to my Mittimus after I was imprisoned which Paper I had before owned in the open Court with my Name to it But the Indictment they could not charge me with for it tended to a Riot which I was far from or any that owned me But the Judge and the Clark both dishonestly strove to draw Words out of the Fore man of the Jury which the rest did not consent to neither could he speak their Minds but others of the Jury were fain to speak themselves but nothing was cleared against me Then the Goaler was commanded to take me away and when I was gone forth of the Court they sent for me again and the Judge imposed two Fines upon me to the Value of about Forty Pounds the one he said was for the Contempt of the Magistracy the other for the Contempt of the Ministry for he said The Lord PROTECTOR had charged him to see to punish such Persons as should Contemn either Magistracy or Ministry But what a Ministry is this that stands in need of an outward Magistracy to uphold it against a People that come with nothing but Spiritual Weapons to defend themselves against Spiritual Wickedness which now sits in high Places But this Ministry is contrary to the Ministry of Christ whose Weapons are not Carnal but Spiritual And also several of mine Accusers stood upon the Bench hard by the Judge several time Whispering him in the Ear and leavening and incensing his Mind against me and I reproved
Messengers of the Most High and wilfully resisting the Truth of God making Lyes your Refuge as here doth plainly appear For upon the day aforesaid I was at a Friend's House in Great Coggashall where several Friends and Neighbours were come to see me and there sate peaceably together waiting upon the Lord and I having heard of a publick Meeting at the Steeple-House in the said Town of the Priests and Professors of these Times as it was openly published by Priest Sammes and the Priest of the said Town in the said Steeple-house upon the First Day last past to that End as I heard and since did understand for to Fast and Pray against and lay open the Errors as they said of the People called Quakers for the Returning of them who owned them and the Establishing and Strengthening those against them that did not own them to wit the People called Quakers so I being pressed in my Spirit for to go amongst them in the Behalf and Defence of the Truth of God brought forth in these People whom the World scornfully calls Quakers I also being made a Minister of the same Eternal Truth through the Power of God by which I am made able and carryed on to declare it openly and publickly to the Confounding of the Heathen and the reviving of the Witness for God in the Conscience and also to suffer for the same which I did believe the Priests did much Blaspheme and Reproach striving to present it Odious to the People so in Obedience to the Lord I went out from amongst my Friends not telling one of them whither I was a going as many can witness and one Friend followed me to the Door and perceiving something of my Going he asked me If he might go with me and I bad him Use his Freedom to come after but I desired to go alone and so I went on the Way single And when I came at the Steeple-house Door which you Persecutors call a Church also account your selves another Church and thus you set up Churches in your Imaginations yet are Strangers to the True Church which are no Persecutors but when I came there there were several Boys and Children that would have flocked in after me and I bad them go in before me rather then to go in Disorderly whereby to occasion any Disturbance and so I went in very Orderly and stood very Orderly not speaking one Word until their Priest had done and was coming out of his Seat as many can witness though the Priest had been openly Reviling and Reproaching the People of God in particular whom he scornfully called Quakers Therefore let all People whose Understandings are enlightened judge in what Riotous Manner I entred the place which you call a Church and bear witness against you who are not ashamed to make Lyes your Refuge against the Innocent and also what are the Weapons which you make use of who call your selves Christians but make Lyes your Refuge and cover your Actions with Deceit But was this the Practice and Nature of Christ For a Christian is Christ-like and let all that profess Christ walk as he walked But these are the Fruits of your publick Humiliation who go about to mock God but your End shall be according to your Works 2. Accusation And whereas you say Being in order thereunto then exercised in the Divine Worship of God Almighty He the said James did then and there stand up and told the Minister He Blasphemed and spoak Falsly and used many other Reproachful Words against the said Minister Reply Until him called Minister had done the Divinatlon of his own Brain from whence you derive your Divine Worship and was coming out of his Seat I did not speak one Word unto him as Hundreds can witness and the first words that I spoak were not as you accuse me but this I said This is the Order of the True Church that all may speak one by one and if any thing be revealed to him that stands by let the first hold his Peace Then I spoak on in the Behalf of those People called Quakers whom the Priest had before often and openly reviled but so soon as I had spoak a few words the Priest and several others disorderly ran into many words so interrupted me in speaking that it bred much Confusion Then the Priest asked me What I would Object against him I told him In that he Reviled the People called Quakers and said they were built upon a Sandy Foundation and so called them Shakers and the like But I told him I would prove their Foundation not to be Sandy and him to be the False Prophet And so I declared of the Stone cut out of the Mountain without Hands which strikes at the Feet of the Image whose Head is Gold and Breast of Silver and Thighs of Brass and Legs of Iron and Feet part Iron part Clay and this Stone is become a great Mountain upon which the Church is built as a City set on a Hill cannot be hid And this is the Foundation of the People that are called Quakers not all that are called Quakers but the Real People whom the World scornfully calls Quakers And this is become a Stumbling-Stone and a Rock of Offence to the Nations and so it seems it is unto you because you are the Worshippers of the great Image which you call the Divine Worship of your God but God Almighty you know not for he abhors all the Sacrifices of Cain and his Generation which was ever the Persecuting Generation upon which must come all the Righteous Blood-shed from Righteous Abel until now Therefore Wo unto you ye Serpents ye Generation of Vipers How can ye escape the Damnation of Hell And now you fill up the Measure of your Fathers Wrath. Ye Stiff-necked and Uncircumcised in Heart and Ears ye do alwayes resist the Holy Ghost as did your Fathers so do ye But think not that you shall be heard for your much Babling who for a Pretence make long Prayers but ye shall receive the greater Damnation And the Lord will make your Diviners Mad who have spoak a Divination from their own Brain and not from the Mouth of the Lord but cryed Peace Peace where there is no Peace because ye put into their Mouths and so heal you sleightly daubing you up with Untempered Morter but you shall all fall amongst them that fall in the Day that I visit you saith the Lord ye Murderers and Crucifiers of the Just. So when I had cleared the Foundation of the People called Quakers as aforesaid some of you accused me That I owned no Church And I said It was False Then some of you asked me What Church I owned And I answered The Church in God and more words I spoak about the Church Then Willis the Diviner stood up in his Will and said I spoak nothing but Nonsense And I bad him Name one Word that was Nonsense that I had spoaken And he said
Words to all my Dear Friends in and about the County of Essex AND all you my dear Friends you scattered and despised Ones in and about the County of Essex whom the Lord by his Powerful Word is now gathering out of Darkness into his Marvelous Light out of the Kingdom of this world into the Kingdom of his dear Son whom he is separating unto himself to walk before him in Holiness that you might know him and he might know you in the Light of his Countenance whose Faces he hath turned towards Sion to seek after a Land of Rest unto your wearied Souls which have been tossed to and fro from Mountain to Hill in this Cloudy and Dark Day seeking Rest but finding none But now is the Day of Beauty broaken forth nigh you even in you Yea and Glad-tidings is come unto your wearied Souls by which a pure Love is begotten in you to the Everlasting Truth which hath been freely declared amongst you by the Messengers of the Most High who have reached the Witness for God in your Consciences which doth seal the same upon your Hearts which your Teacher is and unto it you hearken and are obedient In which Light all stand still and behold the Work which the Lord hath begun amongst you and you shall have no Cause of Discouragement though the Sea doth rise and the Raging Waves do swell as if they would swallow all up yet it is limited by the Unlimited and it shall but foam out its own Shame And as I had a Time to preach the Truth amongst you to the Convincement of many so also now I have a Time to seal the same with Patient Suffering in the Bonds of the Gospel that you may see That it is no other but what we are made able and willing to seal with patient Suffering yea with our Blood if we be called to it as many of us have done in this Nation though it be called A Land of Liberty but it is for Iniquity but Truth and Equity are Strangers in it and therefore are persecuted But you that are found worthy to receive these Strangers happy are you And though the Raging Sodomites compass you about for to cause you to cast out these Strangers that they may work their Wills upon them yet be Faithful and fear them not but cast out your Darlings before them and stand in the Faith of the God of Truth and Equity and you shallâ— see the Sodomites struck with Blindness that they shall not be able to prevail against you but when they are weary with striving they shall be made to sit down in Sorrow and so shall it be fulfilled which of old was prophesied that No Weapon formed against the Faithful shall prosper but Wo unto them that lift up their Heel against them Therefore I charge you all in the Name of the God of Truth Be Faithful Valliant and Bold for the Truth received and as you have received it so walk in it that you may profess no more in Word but what in Life you seal that the Light may be preached forth in your Lives and shine forth in your Conversations to the Glory of the Father of Lights and the Confounding of the Heathen who profess God in VVords but in Life deny him And be willing that Self shall suffer for the Truth and not the Truth for Self for the Truth was ever sealed with Persecution since Gain's Generation had a Being upon the Earth and so own the Cross and despise the Shame and give up your selves to suffer for the Truth received all you that would follow the Lamb to the Land of Rest and through many Tryals you will wax strong and bold and confident in your God for God is not known what a God he is until the Time of Tryal And all keep your Meetings in the Name and Fear of the Lord God waiting for his Power in the Obedience to his Light which in your Consciences doth reprove you when you do amiss that in it you may wait and watch over the Foes that are of your own House that you may know the Warfare begun in your Hearts against your Spiritual Enemies and so the God of Power manifest himself amongst you by his Mighty Power bringing down all that in you which opposes him and would not that he should reign over it and exalt his own Seed in your Hearts and establish you in Righteousness that his Image you may bear and He shall be your God and Ye shall be his People And so in the Unchangeable Truth I rest in Unity with all the Faithful in the Glorious Liberty of the Sons of God though in Outward Bonds for your sakes Known to all that can read me in Spirit JAMES PARNEL Goliah's Head Cut off with his OWN SVVORD In a Combat betwixt Little David the Young Stripling who stands in the Power and Strength of his GOD and great Goliah the Proud Boaster who stands in his Own Strength glorying in the Arm of Flesh and contemning and despising Little David because of his Youth In a REPLY to a Book set forth by an Unnamed Author under Pretence of an Answer to Thirty Six Queries propounded by Iames Parnel whom he in Scorn calls The Young QVAKER And also an Answer to several Counter-Queries propounded by the same Unnamed Author whom I understand to be one Thomas Draton a Teacher of the World at Abby Rippon in Huntingtonshire wherein his Folly and Ignorance is much laid open and the Pride and Deceit of his Spirit much manifested and also he that takes his Part who writes himself W. P. who knows not the Power of God and therefore glories in the Length of Time and the Multitude of Years But Solomon who was a Wiser Man then Great Goliah said That the Honourable Age is not that which is of Long Time neither that which is measured by the Number of Years but Wisdom is the Gray Hair and an Vndefiled Life is Old Age. And therefore let not the Wise Man glory in his Wisdom nor the Strong Man glory in his Strength for it is Vanity JAMES PARNEL Printed in the Year 1675. GOLIAH's HEAD Cut of with his Own Sword c. The Title of the aforesaid Book An Answer according to Truth that trembles not nor quakes nor quaileth given to thirty six Queries propounded by James Parnel commonly called the Young Quaker to an ancient Country Minister with some Counter-Queries by the said Minister unto the said Young Quack and his Fellows Reply HEre thou mayst be ashamed to stile thy self an ancient Minister who manifests such an Ishmael's Spirit who with reproachful Words makest a Scoff at the Power of Truth which the Ministers of God in all Ages witnessed which made them to quake and tremble And though the Truth neither quakes nor quaileth yet all that owned the Truth owned and witnessed quaking and trembling which Truth thou manifests thy self but a Professor of and a Stranger to the Power and
And thirdly thou say'st Thou doubtest whether any of those that are called Quakers are alwayes guided by that Spirit Rep. Here all that are guided by any Measure of that Spirit may easily see the Lyes and Confusion for thy first is a Lye That any of us do teach that all Men are taught and guided by that Spirit at Times for I deny that thou art who art now taken with a Lye in thy Mouth which all that understand our Doctrine will witness against And 2dly That thou art guided hy an Infallible Spirit is a Lye against the Holy Ghost for no Lye comes from that Spirit And again thou belyest the Spirit of Truth to say Thou art guided by it and yet canst not give an Infallible Testimony whether those thou call'st Quakers are guided by an Infallible Spirit Yea or Nay but art in thy Doubts but that Spirit is without Doubts which now judgeth thee to be a Lyar and thy God thou praisest to be the Devil the Father of Lyes who must both be tormented together Qu. 4. Whether they that are guided by that Spirit need study how or what to say Pr. Ans. And in thy Answer thou sayst Timothy had that Spirit in a greater Measure then James Parnel yet Paul saith thus unto him as in 1 Tim. 4. 13 14 15 16. And thou saist If the Apostles had been put to preach upon a short Text or Theam methodically as by long Practice in the Church is expected from you they must oft times have studyed for it as thou conceivest though if you were left at large to speak as the Spirit of God moves you and gives Matter in thou hopest some of you by God's Assistance should speak as to good or better Purpose then any who now pretend to the Spirit 's Actings Rep. Here thou hast sufficiently manifested thy Spirit and thy Ignorance of the Spirit of God to any who understand the Things of the Spirit of God and all these Scriptures which thou hast brought concerning Timothy doth not at all prove that he that is guided by the Spirit of God need study how or what to preach But Paul exhorted Timothy to the Gift that was in him which was given him by or for Prophesie for in so doing he should save himself and those that heard him which you never do by the Fruit of your Study but rather destroy them witness the Fruits of your Ministry these many Years in this Nation who have wrought no better Reformation among your Hearers and also this Scripture doth not at all prove that Paul bad Timothy study old Authors and Heathenish Commentators as you do neither to Study Arts and Sciences as you do who with your Philosophy and vain Deceit do spoil the People for thou hast manifested thy self to be altogether ignorant of the Spirit of God who by thy own Conceivings judgest the Spirit of God to be insufficient to instruct and teach the Apostles what to speak at all Times without Study when as Christ himself exhorteth them to take no Thought what to speak for it should be given them in the very same Hour for saith he It is not you that speak but the Spirit of your father that speaketh in you which Spirit speaketh not without Method which Spirit you Teachers of the Church of England are great Strangers to who think that the Spirit of God can be limited to a Text or a Theam as thou confessest you are but thou Lyar where is now thy infallible Spirit who thus speakest thy own Conceivings And therefore be ashamed hence-forward to pretend to an Infallible Spirit who hast here so openly manifested thy Ignorance of it and its Movings so that if thou wast left at large to speak from that Spirit in thee and wast shut out of thy Library and from any Text or Writing thou wouldst plainly manifest thy self to be one of the dumb Dogs that could not bark which Isaiah from the Spirit of the Lord declared against without Study For I do believe that if thou and the rest of the National Teachers whom thou confessest are tyed to a Text or Theam could tell how to please the People and get Gain without studying or speaking from a Text you would for the Credit of your Cause as thou saist for I know nothing that tyes you to it but your own Covetous Ends to make a Gain of these Scriptures and to deceive the Ignorant with feigned Words whom Peter without Study foretold of and therefore thou Hypocrite pretend no more to an infallible Spirit but with the rest of thy Brethren confess thou art void of it as many of them have done for in such Pretences thou art but the greater Deceiver and thy Folly doth the more appear Qu. 5. Whether is it as lawful now for Tradesmen Shepherds or Plowmen to preach if they be led by the Spirit of God as those that spake forth the Scripture Pr. Ans. And in thy Answer thou saist If this was wholly granted James Parnel cannot claim any Interest therein as thou conceivest for thou saist he is neither Tradesman Plowman nor Shepherd nor will take any Course to maintain himself by this Labour for he hath been tryed But herein James Parnel can plainly tell thee thou art a Lyer for he followed a Trade with his Father until the Lord by his Spirit called him from it into his own Word and so I obeyed the Word of the Lord and left my Father with his Trade as James and John did their Father in the Ship For he that will not forsake Father and Mother Lands and Livings Wife and Children and all for Christ's sake is not worthy of him in which Work neither thou nor any other can tax me for Idleness but I believe my Labour and Diligence in the same is more offensive to you Deceivers then if I had been Idle But he that would call me from this Work that I am set about into the Work of Man I should answer him God must be served before Man for if it had not been the Will of God to call me forth into his Work I should still have served my Earthly Father sooner then any other Man notwithstanding the Evil Thoughts and Conceivings of such like as thee who art given up to believe Lyes and tell Lyes but where is now thy infallible Spirit who speakest by thy own Conceivings and thus the Thoughts of thy Heart deceive thee And as for my Maintenance I need not a Law to compel it as thou dost neither am chargeable to the World as thou art who by a Law of Man takest nigh three hundred Pound by the Year of them therefore in this thou mightst have laid thy Hand upon the Mouth for thou and hundreds more of thy Brethren never followed any honest Calling whereby to get an honest Livelyhood without being chargeable to the World but were from your Youths brought up at Babylon's Schools learning her Witchcraft and Sorcery thereby to deceive the
it and uphold it which Christ hath cryd down and it is well known by them that are not wilfully blind that Master or Doctor are Names that are given taken amongst you Clergy-men as you call your selves as Titles of Honour witness your Degrees in your Nurseries of Deceit which you call Universities as first Bachellor then from Bachellor to Master of Arts from that to Bachellor of Divinity and from that to Doctor of Divinity which highest Title is given to thee and therefore it is no Wonder that thou so pleadest for it but the least Child of Light will judge these Traditions to be upheld by the Pride and Arrogancy of the Flesh that would be idolized but the Old Man must needs plead for his Life neither do these Scriptures in Eph. 4. 11. and 1 Cor. 12. 28. at all advantage thee for neither Doctor nor Master is mentioned in these Scriptures and thus thou art ignorant of the Letter then far unfit to be a Teacher of others which thou dost assume to thy self by the Name of Doctor according to thy own Meaning Pr. Ans. And as for the chief Seats in the Synagogues and uppermost Rooms as Feasts some thou sayest that are Worthy were allowed them by Christ himself which to prove thou quotest Luke 14. 7 8. c. Mâ—rk 5. 22. and by Luke Acts 13. 15. and Chap. 18. 8. 17. And as for Salutations they are allowed thou sayst as well in the Market-Places as any where else Rep. This is the truest Word that thou hast yet spoaken in one Respect though from a false Spirit for your Heathenish Customs and Salutations are allowed of no where by the Scripture neither hast thou brought any Proof to the contrary and it is also easily discerned you rather chuse them in the Markets or in Publick to be seen of Men that you might be accounted Courteous and looked upon for your Breeding witness your Congying and Bowing with your Hats off in Admiration and Idolizing of one anothers Persons wherein you exalt your selves above the Angel who would not suffer John to bow unto him but said he was his Fellow-Servant therefore let this judge you and condemn you in these Practices which by you are used from an ambitious and inordinate Desire of them and therefore are the most unworthy as thou confessest the Scribes and Pharisees were and therefore art out of thy own Mouth judged although thou would'st cast it upon the Quakers as thou callest them but we can justly clear our selves and cast it into thy own Bosom for we use no such Heathenish Customs yet we can justly say with John We are of God and the whole World lyes in Wickedness which thou accountest an exalting of our selves and in that thou belyest Christ and the Scriptures in saying he allowed these Things to any which he cryed down thy Impudency doth the more appear that thou wouldst not stick to bely us whom thou callest Quakers for none of these Scriptures which thou quotest to uphold the chiefest Seats in the Synagogue and uppermost Rooms at Feasts do at all concern the Matter but only Luke 14. 7 c. which Christ spoak as a Parable to the Pharisees who loved the uppermost Rooms at Feasts which also may fitly be applyed to you now who take the uppermost Room and think Scorn to take the lowest which may easily be discerned by you with an Impartial Eye or else you would not own these Things which Christ declared against to his Ministers and also taught that he that would be the greatest should be the least and the Apostle forbids all Respect of Persons and Christ shewed an Example of Humility to his Ministers when he washed their Feet and condemned the Pharisees who received Honour one of another which thou art here pleading for then if thou beest not in their Steps let the Understanding judge Qu. 17. Whâ—t is the Church and whether it be not a Delusion to the People and a Dishonour to Christ to call a House of Lime and Stone a Church Pr. Ans. And in thine Answer thou pleadest it a Custom in most Ages and by a Trope of Figure but thou confessest the Word Church is first and properly a Congregation of Saints or of such as profess so to be as in 1 Cor. 1. 2. And in the second Place thou say'st This Word is used for a Place where such a Congregation use to assemble which to prove thou quotest Cor. 11. 23. and Ver. 18. and Chap. 14 5. 23. compared with Ver 19. 28. Neither is this any Delusion to the People thou sayest nor more Dishonour to God then to use this Phrase the House of God which to prove thou quotest Isa. 60. 7. and Eph. 42. 4. Therefore here we seek a Knâ—t in a Bulrush thou sayest Rep And thus thou Blasphemer valuest thy Blasphemy covering it with Lyes that thou might'st still keep the People in Blindness who makest such a light small Matter of it to put a House of Lime Stone for the Body of Christ which is the Church And thus you have long fed the People in Blindness with your Vain Customs and Traditions and they put you out of your Customs and you are vexed and troubled as the Heathen was at Paul and Silas and said They came to turn the World up-side down And then to cover your Blasphemy and Lyes you have Tropes and Figures which is the Wisdom of Man to cover Lyes and thus you Learned Ones make use of your Learning to make Lyes in Hypocrisie contrary to the Scripture for the Types and Figures in the Scripture figured forth something to come But your Steeple-houses are no Figures of Christ nor his Body which is the Church And when the Substance is come of what Use is the Figure For the Temple which God commanded Solomon to build him which was called the House of God where them that feared the Lord worshipped him was a Figure of Christ but when Christ the Substance came he prophesied of its Destruction Mat. 24. And Steven after him declared against it and by them that upheld it was stoned to Death Acts 7. 47 48 49 c. And Paul declared against it and by them that upheld it was persecuted Acts 17. 24 25. Acts 19. 26. 2â— as we are by You now that uphold Your Idols Temples that figure forth nothing but the Imaginations of Man neither were ever commanded by God to be built as Solomon's Temple was which for its Time was called The House of God but the Prophet Isaiah saw the End of it when he spoak that in Isa. 66. 1 2. But that you should call your Popish Houses The House of God which were built by the Papists and such like without any Command of God thou hast no Scripture-Proof to maintain it neither are those fit Examples to bring to prove it as the Schollars and the Schools and the Jews and their Synagogues What doth this at all
Faith but act contrary to the Scripture the Doctrine and Practice of the Ministers of Christ and teach People so be not such as abide not in the Doctrine of Christ but bring another Doctrine and so â—re the Witches Magâ—cians Deceivers Antichrists and False Teachers who are not to be received but denyâ—d Pr Answ. And in thy Answer thou confessest That they which are truly such in Doctrine and Life as this Query describes may be truly termed spiritual Witches and Magicians and must be rejected as False Teachers and Antichrists Rep. Here thou hast passed the Sentence unto thy own Condemnation for thou art the Man as sufficiently is proved both out of thy own Mâ—uth and the Scriptures which thou thy self hast quoted as aforesaid And so henceforward let all People take notice That thou Thomas Draton of King Rippon in Huntingtonshire art a spiritual Witch and Magician and they are to reject thee as a False Teacher and an Antichrist as here out of thy own Mouth is plainly proved And this Him thou callest James Parnel doth testifie and deny thee with thy Sorcery Ribbons Stones Waters Glasses Powders Charms and other like Enchantments which thou who art given up to believe Lyes impudently wouldest cast upon him and thoâ—e thou callest his Confederacy who abhor all such Abomination and therefore return it into thy own Bosom from whence it comes Priest And thus thou say'st by clear Scripture and Experience thou hast answered the bold Queries of him who is known to the World to be but a Boy or Stripling Rep. As thou begann'st with a Lye in thy Mouth so also thou endest with a Lye for by plain Scripture and true Experience thou hast not answered these Queries for in many Things thou may'st find no Scripture at all in the least to countenance thee then thou pleadest old Stories and Records and say'st also It sufficeth thee that there is no Scripture to the contrary but thou shalt know that in any Thing that thou dost in which the Scripture will not stand for thee it will in the same stand against thee and also when thou didst wrest any Scripture for thy own Ends it was made Use of to witness against thee in the same and how hast thou answered by thy own Experience whenas thou stolest the Apostles Declaration and set it down even Word for Word to prove the Estate of a Christian whenas it was proved out of thy own Mouth that thou art not come to witness in Possession the lowest Estate of a Christian and thus thou might'st have been ashamed to boast of thy Age who art found such an impudent Lyar as to say by clear Scripture and true Experience thou answeredst these Queries which are not so bold as true in which all that are not wilfully blind will witness against thee and thus him thou contemnest as a Boy or Stripling is made able to cut of thy Head with thy own Sword and therefore henceforward let Shame and Confusion of Face cover thee for boasting of thy Age who yet knowest not That the Wisdom and Power of the Almighty stands not in the Number of Years or the Arm Flesh but the Righteous are as bold as a Lyon Prov. 28. 1. And now to thy Counter-Queries as thou callest them which for a Complement thou biddest me give thee Leave to propound but meanedst not to stay to know whether I did so or nay First Concerning Honour and Respect to be given to Men. And to the Substance of this Query I answer That Christ himself cryes down all Earthly Honour and Admiration and Respect of Man's Person and only attolerates the Honour that is of God and cometh from God and belongs unto the Seed of God which is not known amongst you Children of this World whose Honour and Glory is of this World in whom the Seed of the Serpent rules Head to which no Worship nor Honour is due the which all the World wonders after and worship the Beast and his Image but none of these Scriptures which thou hast quoted do at all maintain your Heathenish Breeding Worship Honour Manners and Respect as you call it but now he is risen and reigns to whom all Nations must bow to whom alone belongs all Honour Priase Dominion and Thanks therefore silence proud Flesh that wouldst go about to rob him it 's you that are offended in him and persecute him because he cannot bow unto you and as for that Scripture Honour all Men I answer with another Scripture which thou hast quoted Psal. 15. 4. In whose Eyes a vile Person is contemned Here all Men are not honoured but in the Lord therefore you that abide not in the Doctrine of Christ must not be received not bidden God speed And as for that Scripture Lev. 19. 2â— which thou quotest in thy seaventh Query I answer with Solomon's Words Wisdom is the gray Hair and an Undefiled Life is Old Age and this is not without Honour though by the World contemned Qu. 9. And to thy 9th Query Whether standing bare with the Head uncovered before the Magistrate be not a decent Posture since it is a Posture that the Apostle requires in the Behalf of God which to prove thou quotest 1 Cor. 11. 4 5 6 7 8. Answ. I answer No Man must be honoured in Respect to his Person and the Honour of Justice and Equity lyeth not in the putting off the Hat or keeping it on but it is a Heathenish Custom contrary to any Scripture-Rule or Example and therefore not a decent but an unseemly Posture as thou callest it for Men so to adore one anothers Persons and that Magistrate that seeks for or owns such a Thing stands in his own Will and is partial and rules not for God but for himself and such God doth not stile as Gods upon Eearth as thou saist but rather Unjust Stewards and thou blind Guide read in the 3d Verse of the Chapter aforesaid and see what is the Head of the Man but thy Head is the Serpent and according to thy own Meaning most of ye Priests condemn your selves in this who commonly have your Heads covered with Caps when you pretend to pray or prophesie And that Scripture 1 Tim. 6. 11. which thou hast quoted in thy 10 th Query and Rom. 10. 10. which thou hast quoted in thy 11 th Query was not spoken to the World who accounts Man in gay Cloathing and a Gold Ring as a Superiour and a Man in vile and poor Rayment as an Inferiour and accordingly preâ—ers them and respects them contrary to Scripture and you Leaders cause them to err threfore wrest not the Scripture for your own Ends lest it turn to your own Destruction 2 Per. 3. 16. Qu. 12. Whether the Pronoun of the second Person singular may not out of the Hebrew and Greek be as wâ—ll redered You as Thou especially since in the plural Nuâ—â—hr it is alwayes rendered Ye and not Thee and the Dutch Tongue whence we borrow muâ—h of
Twenty Eighth Query answered also Qu. 29. Whether the Apostle's Interdiction be absolutely against all Ornaments or Comparatively only And thou hast quoted a Scripture in 1 Pet. 3. 3 4. which answereth thee where thou may'st read what Ornaments he approves of and here thy Thirty Thirty One and Thirty Two Query is answered Answ. But Moderation in every thing Iown but what is waste is for the Lust both in Kings Princes and Great Personages as thou callest them but with us there is no Respect of Persons neither taking thought what to eat what to drink or wherewithal to be cloathed as the Children of this World do amongst whom thou art found but our Kingdom is not of this World And Israel after the Flesh was a Figure of Israel after the Spirit therefore now read their Adorning if thou canst and remember No Creature was made for the Lust though Lustful Men Abuse them Thy next is concerning Pride And thy first Question of this is Whether Pride doth lye in Apparel though there may be much Wastefulness Vanity and Ostentation committed therein or inwardly in the Heart and Mind of the Poor as well as of the Rich and thou quotest Mark 7. 21 22 23. Answ. The Scripture which thou hast quoted doth answer thy Question where Pride lyeth but Apparel is a dead Thing and no Pride in it but the Vanity and Wastefulness which thou confessest is committed therein figures forth the Pride of the Heart and where Riches are this is shown therefore you Priests look at home and judge your selves though Poor and Rich be both in one Nature before the Regeneration Ephes. 2. 3. Qu. 34. Whether one of the greatest Things that puffs up the Hearts of Men be not knowledge whether it be true or false and imagined only and thou quotest 1 Cor. 8. 1 2. Answ. You that are Carnal and Fleshly are puffed up with your Fleshly Notional Knowledge and in that you steal from others Experiences but the true Knowledge of the Spirit puffs not up but judges down that which would be exalted but this unto thee is a Mystery because thy Knowledge hath blinded thy Eye who art confused in thy Imaginations so read thy self in the Scripture aforesaid which thou hast quoted Qu. 35. Whether another Thing that exalts a Man in Pride and makes him despise his Brethren and perhaps those that are better then himself be not a Conceited and Self-chosen Holiness seeing such a Proud Saint is brought in Isa. 65. 5. which Thing also thou sayst is verefied in the Pharisee and the Publican Luke 18. 15. Answ. Thou hast here answered thy self with these Scriptures wherein thou may'st read thy self who thinkest thy self more holy then thy Brethren and wouldst only answer for thy self and not for thy Brethren though thou art found in the same Practices but thou blind Pharisee he was not a Saint which was spoken of in Isa. 65. 5. but he was a Saint which said We are of God and the whole World lyeth in Wickedness 1 John 5. 19. And here also thy 36 Question is answered with the Scripture which thou hast quoted 1 Tim. 3. 6. who art a false Teacher doting about Questions Qu. 37. And here thou askest whether a Young Man be not the proâ—est of all other to be thus seduced and puffed up and thou quotest 1 Tim. 3. 6. Answ. Thy Spite is much against Youth but him thou shootest at thou canst not hit because thou art blind and canst not divide the Word aright but thou may'st plainly have read thy self in that Chapter aforesaid and find that thou art the Novice who knowest not the Truth but despisest the Young Man because of his Youth which is contrary to Paul 1 Tim. 4. 12. And thy next is to maintain Swearing Qu. 38. And thy first Query of this is Whethâ—r it be lawful now in the New Testament to take an Oath before lawful Authority to put an End to Controversies and thou quotest Heb. 6. 16. Answ. This which thou goest about now to uphold manifests thee an Enemy to Christ and his Doctrine who saith Swear not at all for saith he it hath been said in the Old Time thou shalt not forswear thy self but shalt perform unto the Lord thine Oath but I say unto you Swear not all but let your Yea be Yea and your Nay be Nay for what is more is Evil Now here he doth not only forbid false Swearing but also all Swearing Mat. 5. 33 34 c. and also the Apostle James doth the same in Jam. 5. 12. both which Scriptures thou hast quoted in the 39th Query and so here out of the Doctrine of Christ again thou art found in the Evil and all you that cannot believe one another without Swearing and so are more then Yea Nay and what is more is Evil saith Christ now read your Condemnation And as for that in Heb. 6. there the Apostle was speaking by Way of Comparison how the Lord made a Covenant and confirmed it with an Oath which is Christ Jesus the Everlasting Oath who saith Swear not at all and the Apostle brought a Comparison from Men in Strife and Controversie but this doth not at all maintain Swearing now for Strife and Controversie is out of the Doctrine of Christ and such run into the Swearing and into the Evil amongst whom thou art found upholding the Evil and opposing Christ's Doctrine and so art found in the Condemnation of the Devil Jam. 5. 12. This was not the Saints Practice for in the New Covenant neither Strife nor Swearer is and thus you Leaders cause Men to err by upholding that which Christ is against and here thy 39th Qâ—ry is answered Qu. 40. Here thou askest Whether Paul himself did not swear in these Words 2 Cor. 11. 10. as the Truth of Christ is in me c. Answ. Oh thou Enemy of Truth that would'st here scandal and accuse Paul for Swearing that so thou might'st uphold Swearing but by what doth he here swear this is plain Language And thy next is concerning Outward Material Churches and the publick Exercises therein Most of these Queries are answered in my Reply to thy Answer to my 17th Query wherein I have declared why I object against your Steeple-houses which thou callest Churches Qu. 44. Here thou askest if such Meetings may not be mixt Assemblies of Learned and Unlearned of Believers and Unbeliers and thou quotest 1 Cor. 14. 23. Answ. But the Unbelievers are not owned by the Believers though they come amongst the Believers as in 2 Cor. 6. 14 15 16 17 18. then the Ministers are far off being maintained by Unbelievers as thou art for though thou confessest the greatest Part are Earthly-minded and Worldly-minded thou yet art maintained by them and I am sure they that come into the true Faith which purifieth the Heart come out from amongst you so that you are not much mixed for you are all one Nature like Priest like People And in thy 47 th and