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THE

BROKEN CISTERN

AND THE

SPRINGING WELL:

OR,

THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN HEAD NOTIONS, AND HEART RELIGION; VAIN JANGLING, AND SOUND DOCTRINE.

ADDRESSED TO THE

REV. JOHN RYLAND, SEN. AT ENFIELD.

EPISTLE OF

FOR ASMUCH AS YE ARE MANIFESTLY DECLARED TO BE THE
CHRIST MINISTERED BY US, WRITTEN NOT WITH INK, BUT WITH THE
SPIRIT OF THE LIVING GOD; NOT IN TABLES OF STONE, BUT IN FLESHY
TABLES OF THE HEART.

OUR SUFFICIENCY IS OF GOD; WHO ALSO HATH MADE US ABLE MINISTERS
OF THE NEW TESTAMENT: NOT OF THE LETTER, BUT OF THE SPIRIT;
FOR THE LETTER KILLETH, BUT THE SPIRIT GIVETH LIFE.

2 COR. II. 3, 5, 6.

· B

VOL. XI.

PREFACE.

To the Rev. JOHN RYLAND, Sen.

REVEREND SIR,

THE reason of my addressing this to you, is because, some time ago, you said, as I was informed, in a barber's shop, that You had prepared a pill for William Huntington; and, if that did not do, you would give him a bolus. Soon after which your little Body of Divinity appeared, which I took to be the Pill; and, after that, Antinomianism Unmasked fell into my hands, which I took to be the threatened Bolus. However, I could not help smiling when I saw your Maid's name affixed to it, for I thought that was done in order to try my sagacity, or the strength of my eyesight. I perceived that there was a woman's name standing on the title, and a man's voice speaking in it. I said, "Come near to me, and let me handle thee, and see whose child thou art: thou art called the handiworks of Esau, but the voice is the voice of Jacob." However, the maid affirms that, by a miraculous conception, she compassed this production without the help of man; whereas,

if family likenesses express or mean any thing, the first nine or ten pages will speak for themselves. Many of the features of this child are Mr. Ryland's own: he is known, whether he appears in a magazine or in this piece. I think I may warrantably say of these pages, as we commonly say of a log of feather-edge boards, that it is the work of two; or of a pair of sawers, one on the top, and the other in the pit. The maid, by name, is the top woman; but Mr. Ryland worked under ground. There was a conjunction of heads in the production of this pamphlet. This discovers itself in the seventh page, where the noun plural appears; 'We have taken a short but comprehensive view of it, but who hath believed the report?' It might have been rendered, our report. Now, though I am no grammarian, yet I know that two are more than one, and that, we, implies a plurality. But it seems that Mr. Ryland refuses to father this little one, lest it should be overlaid, or found dead: but the maid lays claim to the whole of it, having no doubt but it is a living child. But I say, Divide it, seeing the girl has confessed to Mr. King that it contains Mr. Ryland's sentiments.

You should be a little more private, reverend sir, in your matters, and not let your secret things get abroad as they do. Your threatening me in the barber's shop; the former convention and council against me, when the calf's head fell into the ashes; the good works that appeared in your servant, and another, when the seventeenth squib

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