how it is with me in reference to them; for indeed I have not been taught to deny any teftimony the feriptures hold forth, concerning the Lord Jefus,. or any of his appearances, but am taught by the Lord more certainly and fully to own and acknowledge them.

The first is concerning the Godhead, which we own as the fcriptures exprefs it, and as we have the fenfible, experimental knowledge of it. In which, There are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit; and thefe Three are One, 1 John v. 7. This I believe from my heart, and have infallible demonftrations of; for I know three and feel three in fpirit, even an eternal Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, which are but one eternal God. And I feel them alfo one, and have fellowship with them (through the tender mercy of the Lord) in their life, and in their redeeming power. And here I lie low before the Lord in the fenfible life, not defiring to know and comprehend notionally, but to feel the thing inwardly, truly, fenfibly, and effectually; yea, indeed, this is to me far beyond what I formerly knew notionally concerning them, and I cannot but

invite others hither.

Now confider seriously, if a man from his heart believe thus concerning. the eternal power and God-head; that the Father is God, the Word God, the Holy Spirit God, and that these are one eternal God, waiting fo to know God, and to be fubject to him accordingly; is not this man in a right frame of heart towards the Lord in this refpect? Indeed friends, we do know God fenfibly and experimentally to be a Father, Word, and Spirit, and we worship the Father in the Son by his own Spirit, and here meet with the feal of acceptance with him. Nor would we contend with you about your crimes in this respect, but that ye provoke us thereunto, in laying to our charge as if we denied the thing; whereas we do not, nor can. deny the expreffions which the fcripture ufeth, nor our own fenfe and experience concerning the thing. I pray let this fuffice, and let us all strive to know God (and his Son Jefus Chrift) in his life, Spirit, and power, wherein is unity and true demonftration; and not contend about fuch expreffions concerning things, as are befide the fcriptures. For would not ye yourselves think it hard (I mean fuch of you as read the fcriptures feriously, defiring to understand and obferve what is written therein) to have a belief of things imposed on you otherwife than is there written, and otherwise than ye have the fenfe, knowledge, and experience of them from the Lord?

The second is concerning the offering of the Lord Jefus Chrift, without the gates of Jerufalem. I do exceedingly honour and efteem that offering, believing it had relation to the fins of the whole world, and was a propitiatory facrifice to the Father therefore. And furely he that is redeemed. out of the world up to God by Chrift, cannot deny that Chrift was his ranfom, and that he was bought with a price, and therefore is to glorify God, with his body and fpirit, which are God's, 1 Cor. vi. 20. And, faith the

apoftle

apostle Peter, ye know that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as filver and gold, from your vain conversation, &c. but with the precious blood of Chrift, as of a Lamb without blemish and without fpot, 1 Peter i. 18, 19. who fo offered himself up to God through the eternal Spirit, Heb. ix. 14. This we do own fingly and nakedly, as in the fight of the Lord; though I must confefs we do not lay the fole ftrefs upon that which is outward and visible (though we truly and fully acknowledge it in its place), but upon that which is inward and invifible; upon the inward life, the inward power, the Spirit within; knowing and experiencing daily, that that is it which doth the work. The outward flesh is not the meat indeed, nor the outward blood the drink indeed; but it is the Spirit, the life, the substance, which the birth that is born of the Spirit feeds upon and lives by. Oh! confider seriously, and wait on the Lord, rightly to understand that fcripture, John vi. 63. It is the Spirit that quickeneth, the flesh profiteth nothing, the words that I speak unto you, they are Spirit, and they are life. What doth this fcripture lay the ftrefs upon? Is it not upon the quickening Spirit, and the words which the quickening Spirit fpeaketh to the foul, which are living, and give life to thofe that hear them? Hear, and your foul shall live! Hear his voice who giveth life, and your fouls fhall live by him; but can any one live without hearing the voice of him, who alone is able to quicken and raise the foul from death, and out of the grave of fin?

The third thing is concerning the imputation of Chrift's righteousness, to fuch as believe in his name and power, which we have felt, witnessed, and own to be thus.

God vifits men by the light and power of his Holy Spirit, in their dead and dark eftate, even while they are ungodly. Now, they that feel life, and in the quickenings of life, by the faith which comes from life, turn to the light and power which vifits them, by this faith in the power, they are in measure tranfplanted out of the unholy root, into the holy root, where they partake of the nature and virtue of the true olive-tree; and the mercy of the Lord in and through his Son Jefus Chrift, is fpread over them, and their iniquities are pardoned, and their tranfgreffions done away for his name fake, and they are reckoned by God, not as in the old root and unholy nature, but that whereon they lay hold by faith, and are in union with, they are reckoned by in the eye of the Lord; and they are accepted and beloved in him in whom they are found, by him who tranfplanted them there, and ingrafted them thereinto. So that Chrift is really theirs, and they his; and what he did for them in his body of flesh is become theirs, and they have the benefit, and reap the fweet fruits of it. And if they fin afterwards, they have an advocate who pleads their caufe with the Father, and who breathes livingly upon them again, and quickens faith in them, and gives them to turn from that which ran after them, and overtook them and defiled them. So that in this ftate of true faith in, and union with, the Son, the fountain is felt fet open for fin and for uncleanness, which

daily washeth away the pollutions and ftains of the mind, which it is liable. to in the travelling ftate.

But now to every faith this doth not belong, but to the faith only which flows from the power of the endless life, and which ftands in the power. The faith which is from the power is precious, having a precious nature and virtue in it, and very precious effects flow from it. For it is the fubftance of things hoped for; it is of a pure nature, which hath dominion, and giveth dominion over the wicked one. There is no overcoming of the faints here; for as it came from the power, fo it ftands near the power, and engages the power of life against the enemy, and fo is ftill too hard for him. For he that refifteth the enemy in the true faith, ftill overcomes him and makes him fly, James iv.-7. But that belief on Christ, and applying his righteousness, which is not of this faith, nor in the true light of life, but according to the creature's apprehensions concerning things, that is not of the fame nature with this, nor hath the fame virtue, nor produceth the fame effects; but notwithstanding fuch a believing and hoping, men are ftill in their fins, and they are not washed away from them by the blood of Chrift, nor remitted or covered by the Spirit of the Lord. And oh! that men were wary, and did take heed in this matter, that they might not miss of true pardon from the Lord, and fo find their fins bound by him, in the days of his refreshing others!

For there is a state, wherein there is an imputation of Chrift's righteoufnefs to persons reached to by the power of the Lord, and coming up out of the ungodly ftate, and fo a real bringing into the righteousness. For in the true growth the foul daily grows more and more out of its own righteousness, out of the dark, corrupt image, into the righteousness of Chrift, and into his pure image. Thus Chrift is formed in the hearts of them that truly believe, daily more and more; they receiving him as an heavenly leaven, and giving up to be leavened by him, are changed daily more and more into the newnefs of Spirit, even until they become a new lump, even a lump wholly leavened, fo that old things are paffed away, and all things become new; that is, not of old Adam any more, but all of God in Chrift, all of the new nature and Spirit, which is all of it righteous in the fight of God. Now this is it all fhould labour for and feek after, even the kingdom of God and his righteousness, to find an entrance ministered to them into the everlasting kingdom, and the righteousness thereof, that they might really put off the old man with his affections and lufts, and put on the new man; the new man's nature, the new man's image, the new man's fpirit, the new man's righteousness, the new man's holinels; that they might have the wedding garment on to be married to Christ in, and might be as a bride prepared for the bride-groom. Oh! it is precious for any one to feel his foul in this ftate! And who would not travel and wrestle, and strive and watch, and pray and wait, that he might be thus fitted by the Spirit of the Lord for his Son Jefus Chrift? For, friends, there is a coming under grace, under

VOL. II.

Kkkk

under grace's wing, and out of fhame and confufion because of fin, into the glory which is in the pure image; and there is a being changed from grace to grace, and from glory to glory, by the Spirit and power of the Lord. Oh! that fuch as take upon them the profeffion of Chriftianity, might feel the power, and wait upon the power, and know what it is to believe in the power, and live in the power; for without this, the oppreffed ftate of Chriftianity is but dead, and dry, and cold, not having the true living fap and warmth in it. There are great deceits in the world about these things, but he that knoweth the truth as it is in Jefus, who was vifited by the power, gathered to the power, and abides in the power, he hath that with him which anoints his eye and heart, and ftrengthens them against the most fubtile devices and deceits of the transforming fpirit. But whoever he be that profeffeth Chriftianity, and is not here, he is not safe, but the enemy hath ways of bewitching and deluding him, which he hath not wherewith effectually to withstand and avoid.

Now having nakedly expreffed these things unto you, as they are in my heart, there is a queftion lies before me to propound to you, which deferves your serious confideration of, and ability to answer in the fight of the Lord, which is this:

Queft. Do ye rightly, truly, and fully (as the Lord requireth of you) know, efteem, and honour the Son? Do ye own him as God hath revealed him in the fpirits of his children, fince the apoftafy? Do ye feel him as an horn of falvation lifted up there? Do ye find and experience him revealed within by the Father, as the feed of the woman, bruifing the head of the ferpent? Oh! this is precious knowledge, and the right way of truly knowing him as he came from the Father, lived in obedience to him, fuffered for the fins of the whole world, afcended again to the Father, and now fits with him in glory! For, indeed, it is the chief thing, and that whereon the foul's reft depends, to know and feel him near. Oh! that we were one here (I mean in the inward fenfe and acknowledgment of the Lord Jefus Chrift), and we fhould foon be one in the other allo!

For we, who are reproachfully by many called QUAKERS, are (for the moft part) a people who have much and long fought after the Lord, and after the experimental knowledge of thofe truths, which are teftified of and related in the holy fcriptures. We fought not after a new Chrift, or a new Spirit, or new doctrines concerning Chrift or his Spirit; but to know Chrift, fo as to receive life from him, and to live to him in the life and fpirit received from him; this hath been the fingle aim and defire of our fouls. And if men could with patience confider what we hold forth, and wait till God open their understandings, they would not lay fuch blame upon us as they do in many respects, but find that we reverence the fcriptures, believ ing and holding concerning the things of God according as is there expreffed, from a true understanding received from the Lord, and in the true light and guidance of his Spirit. There is another question springs in my

heart

unto

unto you, I beseech you confider of it feriously, perhaps there may be a bleffing to you in it,

Queft. Do ye rightly and weightily confider and embrace that counfel of Chrift, Matt. vi. 33. Seek ye firft the kingdom of God, and his righteousness? Do ye mind what.Chrift likens the kingdom to? Even a grain of muftardfeed, a pearl hid in a field, a little leaven, a loft piece of filver, &c. Do ye know, and are ye acquainted with that little thing which is like unto these? And do ye really and rightly feek after it? Do ye feek it where it is to be found? Do ye know the place where it is hid? And do ye take the right way to buy and purchase it? How is that? Why not by outward obfervation, faith Chrift, but by inward fweeping the house, by keeping the eye upon it, and fweeping out the rubbish that covers it, this is the way to find it, purchafe and poffefs it. Oh! that ye could all learn thus, and be thus exercifed by the Spirit of the Lord daily. Surely they that thus feek fhall find, and they that thus afk fhall have, and they that thus knock, to them the everlasting kingdom fhall be opened.

For mark the difference between the ftate of the law and gofpel. The law was a fhadow of good things to come. The gospel is a ftate of enjoyment of the good things fhadowed out under the law. The law was a type of the kingdom, of the fpiritual kingdom of Chrift, which is fet up under the gofpel. In John's day the kingdom was at hand; but in the day of Chrift's power the kingdom is come. Under the law there was a taberna-) cle pitched by man; but under the gospel the true tabernacle and temple is witneffed, which God pitcheth and not man; and the holy, fpiritual, heavenly facrifices, and the living covenant, whereof Chrift is the mediator, and the law written in the heart, and the Spirit of the Lord put within, fo that his presence is as really witneffed inwardly, in that which is truly his tabernacle and temple now, as ever it was witneffed outwardly, in his outward tabernacle and temple under the law. Oh! that Chriftians might not have the name only, but might be in the life and in the power, wherein these things are felt and experienced; for indeed the wonders of the Lord are seen in his temple, and his name is praised there, Selah. There he breaks the shield and the bow, the fpear and the battle, Selah. There the enemy is overcome; the holy victory that bringeth him under, iffueth out thence, Selah. There the well is opened, and the Philiftine nature hath power to stop it no more, Selah. There the treafury of life and wisdom, and the riches of God's goodnefs are made manifest for ever.

Truly, friends, I have not loft any thing that ever I had, or acknowledged of God in the days of my former profeffion, by believing in the light which God hath now revealed in me, but have it ftill with me, and in greater clearness and plainnefs, and fuller demonftration than I then had it; but that of the flesh which mixed with it, and hindered it from being rightly ferviceable to the Lord, and fully comfortable to me, that the Lord hath been removing by his searching light, and by the demonftration of his Spirit Kkkk 2

and