reserved in heaven for them ready to be revealed in the last time They that are born of this seed are born not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of Man but of God and through the power of faith and the abiding of this seed in them are kept unto salvation without any possibility of sinning unto death or any danger of final falling away having by vertue of their reception of this seed in the heart through the gift of God the nature of true believers communicated unto them even the unity of the faith and knowledge of the son of God which makes them members of the new Jerusalem children of the promise who are born after the spirit and have that anointing whereby they know all things immediately from the head and fountain itself and need not that any man should teach them but as the same anointing teacheth them of all things 1 Joh. 2. 20 27. which was given to their head the true Aaron without measure running down upon all those that dwell together with him in the unity of the faith of the son of God even to the skirts of his garments upon the lowest members of this NEW JERUSALEM consecrating them a ROYAL PRIESTHOOD with himself to offer up spiritual sacrifices unto God This new nature in the seed of it whilst it is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things unseen is called faith even the faith that justifies spreading over us the propitiatory covering of Christs spiritual headship and EVERLASTING RIGHTEOUSNESS in which we are made to stand for ever spotless and without guile before the Throne of God Those that are of this faith are blessed with faithful Abraham and are of that one seed that are heirs according to the promise The work of this faith and new birth when once wrought out by Christ in the heart and conscience is to breed patience and that patience experience and that experience hope even that hope which maketh not ashamed The patience which is wrought out in every regenerate one by this faith is called the obedience of faith that when it hath had its perfect work maketh us perfect so as to want nothing arming us with the same mind that was in Christ Jesus to suffer in the flesh in order to put an end to sin and to work off the soul from the will desire of the flesh into an absolute subjection and conformity to the heavenly will of Christ wherein he is one with the Father and so enabling us to keep the word of Christs patience which is indeed the Law and Rule under which the true believer is subjected until Christs second coming being to rest in the grave with Christ untill the remainder of his sufferings be fulfilled in his whole body the Church under the certainty and with the comfort of his promise that those that thus suffer with him shall also raign with him and those that thus die with him shall also live with him And that all true believers are thus observers of this Rule according to the patern left by Christ in his own sufferings purifying themselves as he is pure keeping the word of his patience and performing the obedience of faith which is required by the law of the new covenant we shall endeavour to make known as in the experience thereof and Testimony from the Scripture it is held forth For through the comprehending power of Christ as he is the head and root of this spiritual seed and precious faith which is obtained by Gods chosen ones they are separated from the very womb yea they have grace given unto them in Christ Iesus before the world began and are blessed with all spiritual blessings in the heavenly in him being accepted in the beloved In this respect Jacob was loved and Esau was hated or the one was accepted and the other was refused in their mothers wombe the children being not yet born neither of them having as yet done good or evil that the purpose of God according to election might stand not of works but of him that calleth Howbeit we are not in Scripture sense nor in truth as some unwarrantably affirm actual believers until by effectual calling we are made receivers of whole Christ in the seed as before described And therefore the Apostle Paul who is a remarkable example herein though he had received grace in Christ Iesus as in his head before the world began and as thus comprehended in his head was separated and distinguished from the womb in whom the purpose of God according to the election was to stand yet it pleased not God to call him and by revealing his son in him to make him actually a believer and new creature until he had spent many years even a great part of his life in a sowerness and rigidness of spirit under the dispensation of the Law flaming out at last into cruel and fierce persecution of the Church of God though in all still preserved by his head from wilfull enmity For saith he I did it ignorantly In like manner all the children given to Christ by the Father whereof he is to lose none are thus separated and distinguished from the rest of the world as the beloved seed according to Gods purpose from the womb and so according to Gods purpose are blessed with all spiritual blessings in Christ before the world began Yet until it pleaseth God by his grace to call them whether they be in the state of circumcision or uncircumcision they live and walk according to the principles and Rule of that dispensation they are under For so we see in the great instance of Abraham the father of the faithful as by Stephen he is described to us Acts 7. in the manner of the calling with which he was called and whereby he was made actually a Believer and a new creature which was by Gods appearing to him and by the power of his WORD working in him calling and bringing him out of his own Country the land of his Nativity and from his natural relations into the land which he should shew him causing him herein to resign up his natural judgement and will entirely to his disposal and through faith to obey for he went out not knowing whither he went which first remove of his was out of the state of degenerate nature and his heathenish life into the earthly land of Canaan as that was a type and figure of the heavenly and into circumcision or experience of that communion with God which is by the first Covenant whereby the filth of the flesh in his heathenish state was cut off and cleansed and he in minde as well as in body brought into the figurative land of promise even to a conformity in mind and spirit to the Law the perfection of Christs flesh or natural man In this promised land perceiving by faith that it was but the type and shadow of the good things themselves the heavenly Country which was
THE Retired Mans Meditations OR THE Mysterie and Power OF GODLINES Shining forth in the Living WORD to the unmasking the Mysterie of Iniquity in the most Refined and Purest Forms And withall presenting to view I. The Riches and fulness of Christs Person as Mediator II. The Natural and Spiritual Man in their proper Distinction III. The Reign and Kingdom of Christ in the Nature Limits and extent thereof as well in his Saints as over his Enemies IN WHICH Old Light is restored and New Light Justified Being the Witness which is given to this Age BY Henry Vane Knight London Printed by Robert White and are to be sold at the three Bibles neer the West end of Pauls 1655. TO THE READER THere is not any thing which lies more cross to the busie and boundless Spirit of Man then that which takes him off the wing of his Natural desire and is as a bar unto that activity in him which if permitted to run its course makes his feet swift to his own destruction For when such a power is assumed and delighted in by man to direct his own steps the more he is gratified by God with a scope and freedom herein the more is he left alone and singled out in a self-sufficiency of wisdom and strength to be at his own dispose and reap the fruit of his many inventions The springing up of this spirit in man at first aspiring herein to be as God was that that cast him down from his excellency and gave him his Fall setting up in him that great Idol SELF-INTEREST which hath ever since so skilfully insinuated into the desire and heart of every natural man that by its influence the whole world seems to be governed as well in Religion as Civil policy being able to bring that gain and advantage to the observers thereof which as a powerful bait the Devil makes use of to bribe the conscience and by degrees to draw off the heart from God and from sincere love to all righteous and good principles as in the exercise thereof they lie thwart to its designs Self thus considered is no other then the Spirit of man lusting after the doing of his own will and procuring his own glory more then Gods a frame of spirit in direct contrariety to Christs Iob. 5. 30. c. 6. 38. which inordinate affection is the covetousness the Apostle calls idolatry Col. 3. 5. as wel-knowing that the cherishing and upholding of this lust in its credit strength and authority is dearer to man then all other things yea then God himself So as whilst Communion with God and the fruits of his presence are found gainfull and supporting hereunto man is content to part with the filthiness of flesh and be washed from his old darling sins putting on the form of godliness but when the cross of Christ shews it self and comes forth as an enemy against it then God must be dethroned the son of God and the true riches troden under foot so that nothing must stand up or be allowed competition herewith but all must bow and do homage or become the objects of its fierce wrath and displeasure If ever this spirit creep into the purest Forms of Religion in conjunction with worldly Government to back it as the case may be t is then got into its last strong hold and chief place of defence where sitting as on a throne of iniquity it frames mischief by a Law and in casting the truth down to the ground it practises and prospers for a season against the Saints of the most High and against the Prince himself of this heavenly Host magnifying it self and bidding defiance to all adversaries whatsoever Nevertheless the power and wisdom of the cross of Christ is able to grapple with it and in due time will visibly undertake it and triumph over it But forasmuch as this selfish spirit is prophesied of as that which shall be eminently in view in the last dayes 2 Tim. 3. 2. as an immediate forerunner of Christs second coming called Mark 13. 14. The abomination that maketh desolate described as being gotten into the holy place and standing where it ought not even in the very Temple of God clothed with a visibility of Saintship it does therefore behove us to stand upon our watch armed with the whole armour of God against it this being indeed the foundation of all that hypocrisie and apostacy which the last days shall be filled with For this purpose these Meditations on the WORD of Life are presented to thee setting forth evidently before thine eyes Iesus Christ and him crucified in whose grave this self-exalting spirit is found among the dead as conquered and slain either through the power of Faith in the true Saint or by the rod of iron dashing and breaking in pieces all wilful resisters as a potters vessel Christ as he is this WORD of Life is Alpha and Omega the first and the last In which dignity and preheminence he is not only him that is true but hath the property and way of being known by himself as the first and original patern of all true knowledge and discerning So as they that have been with this Iesus trained up at his feet under his immediate teachings are able through him strengthening them to give a reason of their hope whereof they need not be ashamed Being on this account encouraged and having an opportunity ministred through the retiredness of my condition I judged it my duty amongst that variety of witness in the things of God which is at this day given forth to bear also my part and stand up in my lot taking this age to record that I am herein free from the blood of all men as not having shunned to declare unto them the Counsels and truths of God that have obtained a large entrance and reception in my heart as a seed there sowen which is springing up to a perfect day The Warrant and Rule for this practice is so express and undeniable that it needs only the mentioning Rom. 10. 10. where it is said with the heart man believeth unto righteousness and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation And Christ says of himself For this cause was I born and came into the world that I might bear witness to the Truth And to this Paul exhorts Timothy saying Fight the good fight of faith lay hold on eternal life whereunto thou art also called and hast professed a good profession before many witnesses And this in imitation of Christ himself who before Pontius Pilate witnessed a good Confession Yet how ungrateful a thing is it to flesh and blood in the best of us to be bearing that witness which seems to carry contention in it with the whole earth Jer. 15. 10. sending forth a fire upon all that is earthly to consume the false Rests wherein Professors themselves are apt to take up even in that wherein we are allowed only to be as Sojourners Yea what streights are we in as streightned
and the works of his hands judging and condemning the wicked Angels for their disobedience reserving them in chains of darkness unto the judgement of the great day and taking the holy and obedient Angels into participation and fellowship with himself in the life from the dead by him obtained and possessed as the Lord to whom God spake to sit down at his right hand from the beginning until he made his foes his foot stool through whom as through a Propitiatory covering he did look down upon all the works of his hands and was at rest and well pleased with them as wrought in the Mediator notwithstanding all that had been done by sin or Satan to effect a breach and alineate his mind from them Hence Job 38. 6 7. it is said that God fastned the foundation of the first world and laid the corner-stone thereof viz. in the person of the Mediator by way of provision and preparation against all the power of sin and Satan in their attempts upon it At this the good Angels those morning stars and sons of God rejoyced prying into this mysterie which made them sing and shout for joy as on the same occasion it is said Psal 118. 22 23 24. This is the day which the Lord hath made we will rejoyce and be glad in it to see thereby the Devil and his Angels disappointed in their wicked designs who by the bringing in of sin were in hopes to have hindred the growing up of Jesus the BRANCH that was to spring out of this ROOT But Davids ROOT sitting as Lord at Gods right hand had before obtained that power which was to subdue all enemies and lay them flat at his foot-stool Davids OFF-SPRING therefore was in no danger of having his course stopped or race hindred wherein as a mighty Saviour and Redeemer he was to go forth and rescue the whole spiritual seed out of the hands of sin and Satan to bring them unto the true REST and obtain a gracious reprieve and forbearance for the most obstinate and rebellious also And as this was the end of Christs coming in the flesh he is accordingly fitted and qualified thereunto enabled in every particular to fulfil and accomplish the same But that we may the more clearly and distinctly understand and come to see wherein Jesus Christ as man is made this mighty Saviour and Redeemer unto men we shall consider this in three chief particulars all which were the product and consequents of the Word 's being made flesh As first the seeds and principles of a two-fold holiness and righteousness formed and set up in the mind of Christ as he is a man answerable to both Covenants For by the Word 's being made flesh the man Christ Jesus was taken into a twofold union and communion with God through the overshadowing of the Holy-Ghost in the womb of the Virgin becoming thereby in his own person the substance of both Covenants Isa 42. 6. and ch 49. 8. The true Abraham or Father to both seeds as well that of the Law as that of Faith In both which considerations of his man-hood he was substantially or personally united with God or with the WORD he and the WORD making but one Person and one Mediator which no man whatever besides himself is or can be and by vertue hereof he is qualified both as Priest and Sacrifice to pay that ransom and make that atonement for sin which God required The first of these unions he had as made under the Law or first-covenant which produced in him suitable righteous and holy principles unto the rule and tenor thereof enabling him to fulfill all that kind and sort of righteousness therein and thereby required and commanded In respect of which union and the image of God thence springing up in him and adorning of him he was truly and properly made a living soul and in this fashion and habit of a man was to taste death for every man as being in a state subjected thereunto called the natural body in distinction from the spiritual body For 1 Cor. 15. 44 45. there is a natural body and there is a spiritual body as it is written the first man Adam was made a living soul and the last Adam was made a quickning spirit Through this first union Christ had an exercise of life as meer man and in common with all men sin only excepted by reason whereof the workings and operations of his mind though they were in their kind most perfect yet were but those of the first Adams righteousness in the highest purity and perfection thereof The second union and communion then which is contracted between the WORD and Jesus the Son of Mary made him a quickning Spirit and brought him under the Law of the Spirit or of the second and everlasting Covenant as it is written Isa 59. 21. Thus saith the Lord my Spirit that is upon thee and my words which I have put in thy mouth shall not depart out of thy mouth nor out of the mouth of thy seed nor out of the mouth of thy seeds seed from henceforth and for ever Through which union Christ as man had the Spirit poured out upon him without measure and above the measure according unto which he was the receiver of it as he was under the Law singly considered as him whom God the Father seals and on whom he confers his new name or second image feeding him with hidden Manna and admitting him into the glory within the veil setting up in him the exercise of spiritual senses suited and prepared to converse with the very substantial brightness and similitude of God face to face even apparently in which Moses was the figure of him Numb 12. 8. In this exercise of life Christ as man is made higher then the heavens exalted to a name above every name far above all principalities and powers having herein obtained a more excellent name and inheritance then the Angels unto whom nevertheless as he was made under the law he was made inferiour for the tasting of death In respect of this his exalted state of humane nature he is called Gods first begotten Heb. 1. 6. by reason of whose hypostatical or substantial union with the WORD the Angels of God are appointed to worship him and to acknowledge him in this glory one and equal with the Father alwaies doing that which is pleasing unto him The seed of this union and communion was sown in the humane nature of Christ in the very womb the former and this both together making up that holy thing born of the Virgin that child Jesus who is said to grow in grace and in favour with God and with man like the vine whose fruit was refreshing to the heart of God and of man having the principles and exercise of life springing up in him that were most suitable agreeable to the heart of both being a man of God after Gods own heart as well as a righteous and holy man according to the Law
body is hereby quickned and brought forth as into its maturity and ripe age in a fulness of stature agreeable to this his raised and exalted state his corruptible having put on incorruption and his mortal having put on immortality to the bringing to pass in himself the saying that is written death is swallowed up in victory O death where is thy sting O grave where is thy victory And now the same Jesus that was crucified and slain by vertue of the compleat exercise of his spiritual senses enters within the veil converses with him that is invisible and sits down at Gods right hand retaining withal in perfect use the exercise of his natural senses powers and faculties of soul and body in a glorified state as being in one and the same person the fulness of Jew and Gentile the perfection of the spiritual and of the natural man joyning them both together in one sheepfold whereof himself is the one great shepheard and overseer This reconciliation Christ hath wrought through the blood of the Cross making in himself of twain one new man having slain the enmity thereby broken down the partition wall and removed that which else would have letted the bringing of life and immortality to light This is the form or fashion of Christs heavenly manhood wherein is to be found the perfection of both seeds built up together in perfect love usefulness and peace and this heavenly image thus wrought out in Christ is the law that shall go forth out of Sion prophesied of Isa 2. 3. and the word of the Lord out of Jerusalem that shall establish the mountain of the Lords house in the top of the mountains and exalt it above the hils causing all nations to flow unto it This is the pattern of the house spoken of also Ezek. 43. ver 7. and 10. wherein was the place of Gods Throne and the place of the soles of his feet to dwell in the midst of his people which was to be measured by the house of Israel to make them ashamed of their iniquities and Idols And v. 12. this is the law of the house upon the top of the mountain the whole limit thereof round about shall be most holy CHAP. X. Concerning the benefits that do inseparably accompany Christs person where he is received either by the first or second Covenant according to the tenor of both which there is vertue in his blood to reconcile and bring men to God CHrist in the 42. and 49. Chapt. of Isaiah is called The Covenant said to be him that God gives to be a COVENANT to the People to establish the earth and cause to inherit the desolate heritages to say to the prisoners go forth and to them that sit in darkness shew your selves The way wherein Christ given as a COVENANT to any soul is by becoming the received Lord and Christ in that heart ministring a participation and fellowship with him in spirit by the power and presence of himself there either in his first or second appearance and changing that soul into the likeness of himself more or less in one of those his appearances Thus according to the first Covenant he visited the Children of Israel in Egypt brought them out of the house of bondage and baptized them unto Moses in the cloud and in the red Sea causing them to eat the same spiritual meat and to drink the same spiritual drink for they drank of the ROCK which followed them which ROCK was Christ yet with many of them God was not well pleased but as he saith Jer. 31. 32. That my COVENANT they brake though I was an HUSBAND unto them and Isa 63. 8 9 10. he saith Surely they are my people children that will not lye and so upon that condition he was their Saviour admitting them to the benefit of his sacrifice In all their affliction he was afflicted and the Angel of his presence saved them in his love and in his pitty he redeemed them out of the house of bondage and carried them all the daies of old but they rebelled and vexed his holy spirit therefore he was turned from the way of love and pitty he exercised towards them before became their enemy and fought against them Thus also Ezek. 16. he ministers life to them decks them with excellent ornaments yea with his own comeliness and spreads his skirt over them After all which they provoke him with greater abominations then ever before and then he and they part again and he becomes their enemy It is evident then that upon such conditional terms as are comprehended in the tenor of the first Covenant Christ can and doth cause his own reception in the hearts and consciences of men and that there are inseparable benefits attending and accompanying this manner of reception of or believing in Christ which is begotten and held but upon the wavering principles of the first Covenant which in respect of its uncertainty is found fault with by God Heb. 8. 7 8. First they that are thus made receivers of Christ are called out of the world to come out of that heathenish state wherein men live as without God and Christ in the world and so are made of the number of those many that are called whereof there are but few chosen and endued with the wisdom from above which will make their calling sure Secondly Christ is made unto such RIGHTEOUSNES in a way of Justification who having made himself a sinoffering for fallen man is pleased even upon the tenor of this Covenant to make them the RIGHTEOUSNES of God in him that is to afford unto them the benefit of his legal righteousness whereby he satisfied the Law so that the Law hath nothing to say against such yea to make them that in him which God in righteousness imputing the benefit of his sacrifice unto them doth accept and is the justifier of them by in declaring Christs righteousness unto them as a propitiation for all their past sins and so to be continued to them as long as they shall do well In which sense God argued with Cain Gen. 4. 7. Whilst thou dost well shalt thou not be accepted and if thou dost not well sin lieth at the door Through this Propitiatory-covering of Christs blood they are under SANTCUARY and in a City of refuge from Gods wrath and the avenger of blood kept unto the faith to be revealed till by their wilfull sinning and making themselves unworthy of further or more grace there remains no more sacrifice for sin This Justification the world hath in common with true believers as well as the first faith and calling before mentioned Thus t is said 1 Tim. 2. 3 4. that God our saviour will have all men to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth who ver 6. gave himself a ransome for all to be testified in due time The third benefit inseparably accompanying this kind of Christs giving himself by the first convenant is that which we call
threefold nature and spirit proper to each of them In one of which all the nations of the world live and walk as they are distinguished from the earthly Jerusalem the children of Mount Sinai or the first convenant In the second the fleshly seed of Israel or the worldly Church lives and walks distinguished both from the nations of the world and from the heavenly Jerusalem or the true Mount-Sion And in the third the spiritual seed or children of the Jerusalem that is above do live and walk distinguished from both the former each of them therefore are placed by God under a several Rule and law according to which their lives and actions are to be fashioned and conformed and by which they are to be tried and judged at the last day when the secrets of men of all sorts shall be judged by Christ Jesus according to the Gospel which is of that large comprehension as to take in all the three dispensations First for the nations of the world they have judgements given them by God Ezek. 5. 6 7. with which Israel is reproched as having walked short of them so that the uncircumcision did out-doe the circumcision in the righteousness the effect whereof was contained in the law as in a much superiour and more excellent administration These the Apostle cals Rom. 2. 12. such as sin without law and perish without law but yet are acknowledged as such that though they have not the law as it was given to the Jews yet have a law given them from God the work and effect of which sheweth it self in their consciences accusing or excusing them as they walk up to it or short of it even the law of nature in which they are a law unto themselves having that within them that shall witness for them or against them before the Throne and judgement seat of Christ that is to say the law of natural right and just exhibited to them through the ministry of Angels that are invisible Thrones Dominions Principalities and powers set up by God for this very end as his ministers for terrour unto evil works and as encouragers and Protectors of them that do well as will presently more fully be evinced The second Rule or law containing the judgements and ordinances of God given unto the fleshly seed or children of the first covenant is the WORD of God coming forth in his first appearance or the law proceeding from Mount Sinai witnessed unto by the Scriptures of truth and Oracles of God that were committed to the Jews first and afterwards to the Gentiles which in all the degrees and steps of its administration answers the true measure and proportion of Christs natural righteousness and perfection as he is and so hath been here described the head and root thereof to Angels and men being that holy commandment that either may be turned aside from leaving them that have been under it to a far worse state then it found them in and rendring their latter end worse then their beginning as 2 Pet. 2. 20. c. or else be kept without spot and blameless through the power of faith by the true Saint or spiritual seed The third law and Rule is the law of the spirit of life in Christ Iesus the WORD of God in his second appearance which comes forth from Mount Sion the heavenly Jerusalem consisting not in meats and drinks and worldly rudiments but in the power of an endless life and an everlasting righteousness written out in fair characters in the death and resurrection of Christ when he ceased from his own works and became the beginning and author of life from the dead as the first-born among the many brethren whose names are written in heaven and upon whom God hath written his new name and the name of the new Ierusalem The perfection and righteousness of which second appearance is brought to light fully by the brightness of Christs comming the second time the first-fruits whereof are already given and set up in the hearts and spirits of the children of promise and of the free-woman being the hidden Manna which they feed on the new name which they can read and the holy anointing whereby they judge all things whilst themselves are judged of no man CHAP. XII Shewing wherein the three Rules and forms of administration in Christs mediatorial Kingdom do differ one from another and maintain an entire jurisdiction within themselves but in due subordination and subserviency still of the lower to the higher over the respective subjects that live under them THE first of these is the law and Rule which is given by God to all nations even to the whole world in their corrupt degenerate and fallen state occasioned by the entrance which sin made by Adam overrunning his whole posterity like a spreading leprosie whereby man that by his creation was made a temple of God became a habitation for Dragons a court for owls or birds of the night a hold for every foul spirit and a cage for every unclean and hateful bird so that although there was a natural being life and motion left unto man it was in the next degree to no being at all if not in some respects far worse Yet how great soever this desolation was and how thick soever the darkness be in this howling and barren wilderness-condition of mankind the blood of Christ is of vertue to make the heart of man again rejoyce and blessom as the Rose and the voice of the Mediator can make it self to be heard in the remotest and darkest corners of the world to the opening of the eyes of the blind and unstopping the ears of the deaf to the making the lame to leap and the dumb to sing to the causing the waters of his manifestation to break forth and stream in this desert in one word to the letting in the sound of the Gospel it-self in the shadowy dark appearances thereof upon the very ends of the world in pursuance of the extent of the reconciliation made through the blood of his Cross by whom all things are reconciled unto God whether they be things in earth or things in heaven so as the very creation it self is made capable to serve unto the ministry of the Gospel the heavens to declare the glory of God the firmament to shew his handy work day unto day to utter speech and night unto night to shew knowledge by means whereof there is no speech nor language where Christs voice is not heard their sound going into all the earth and their words unto the end of the world as Psal 19. 1 2 3 4. compared with Rom. 10. 18. doth evidence Thus the invisible things of God even his eternal power and Godhead shining forth in the face of the Mediator may be seen by the things that are made Rom. 1. and that either inwardly by the influence and operations of the holy Angels maintaining and keeping up the witness of Christ in the manifestation of natural justice
cutting them again off from his living body as unprofitable branches fit to be cast into the fire Joh. 15. 6. These are they considered in the exercise of this kind of life and holy operations that are as the fruitful married wife unto Christ under the first Covenant and over whom the Law hath dominion while they are in this life short of and unacquainted with an implantation into Christs dead body not having the similitude and conformity unto his death so much as in the seed of it brought forth in them The answer which these have of a good conscience towards God under the Law is particularly stated Rom. 7. where they are in Pauls own person represented as having that workmanship set up in their hearts and minds which stands in an exact conformity to the Law or image of Christs natural righteousness and perfection which is holy righteous spiritual and good and so having that heart-work in them whereby they adhere to and approve the Law and the goodness and righteousness thereof in opposition to the contrary body of sin and death which is still in being and exercise in them and with them ready upon all occasions to return with prevalency whilst they are but upon this tenure of the Covenant of works and in the wavering unconstant principles thereof by reason of which they find by experience no good thing dwelling in their flesh that is abiding and of a continuing residence with them but such as comes to them as a stranger or a sojourner for a night or short duration and is ready upon their miscarriage to be gone and leave them again estating them but in such a wavering condition as whilst with their mind they serve the Law of God they are ready with their flesh to serve the law of sin and the good that they would do that they do not and the evil which they would not do that they do By all which uncertainty and slipperiness of this their state Christ would teach them to see the need of following the Lamb whither soever he goes and to experience themselves to be most miserable if they advance no further but abide here thinking themselves rich and encreased with goods and wanting nothing whilst they are ignorant that they are miserable and poor and blind and naked as wanting that top-stone which must compleat the whole building And therefore the right frame of spirit in the faithful subjects of Christ under this dispensation is to find no Rest here but to see that this Earthly Jerusalem is no abiding City and to cry out miserable man that I am who shall deliver me from the body of this death wherein is not only comprehended the corrupted but the corruptible state of mans nature after that he hath been renewed in this life of COMMON SALVATION by vertue of the blood of Christ From this experimental sense God would teach us patiently to lie down under the power of the cross of Christ whose saying then we shall acknowledge to be most faithful and true that if we die with him we shall also live with him and if we suffer with him we shall also reign with him our fellowship with him in his death being the only means by him appointed to translate us out of all death into life eternal and to bring us under that Law of the spirit of life Rom. 8. 2. which hath power absolutely to free us from the law of sin and of death in all the branches of it This is the spirit and conscience and these the principles of the children of the first covenant under the Dominion of the law in which while they continue using of it lawfully they are knit unto Christ by his taking unto him his two staves BEAUTY and BANDS Zach. 11. 7. signifying the fruits of his presence with them and amongst them as he is their husband by this covenant until by slighting his greater glory and selling him for thirty pieces of silver they come to discover themselves to be the flock of slaughter and such as he at last departs from and leaves to draw back unto perdition whilst he carries on the poor of the flock that bear him company in his sufferings unto the saving of their souls keeping them through the power of faith unto his Heavenly Kingdom This generation of men are witnessed unto by the Scriptures under a twofold consideration First as they were under the Law as the Law was the figure and shadaw of the good things to come consisting in meats and drinks and divers washings and fleshly rites ceremonies and divine Ordinances under Moses his ministry imposed until the time of reformation or to the coming of Christ in the flesh who in that sense was the end of the Law and of the observance of it as considered in that fleshly commandment and Mosaical administration that pointed at the very image itself that was to be manifested in the flesh of Christ where the same Law was to begin again and become the holy commandment spoken and delivered unto men by the son himself requiring a conformity in and from all men unto the natural righteousness and perfection of man shining forth in his flesh who was made like unto us in all things sin only excepted In this second sense as the Law is now given by Christ the true MINISTER OF CIRCUMCISION Rom. 15. 8. Issued forth by his first appearance immediately written in the fleshly tables of the heart by his spirit whereby the children of it are taken into marriage-union and made one flesh with himself branches of this vine Joh. 15 are we to understand the subjects of this kingdom of Christ that live under this dispensation in the times of the Gospel since his coming in the flesh and putting down the Temple-worship and Service Acts 7. that was in force before his incarnation introducing in the room thereof a spiritual Temple-worship and Service in the conformity which he takes them into with himself in his flesh and living body making them his own Temple house and habitation the first Tabernacle or worldly Sanctuary built up together with him in his natural righteousness and perfection Such principles and such a birth as this of holy and righteous operations and actings are required in him and of him that is made by Christ under the law or a child of the first covenant which Deut. 32. Jer. 3. 21. compared with Chap. 11. 15. and Isa 5. and Ezek. 16. do in express terms testifie shewing how perfect they are as they come out of his hands to whom he is a Father and Redeemer in this covenant planting them wholly a right seed and that together with the choisest vine causing them to grow together for a while in himself the true vine John 15. and thereby renewing in them and upon them a state of holy flesh natural righteousness and holiness and as thus qualified taking them into his own house as his beloved spouse and married wife who yet after all this
abundantly confirm and make good the justification which is not of works but of grace according to Gods purpose The very nature and kinde of this faith may suffice to all unbyassed judgements to shew that those that are justified by it are not justified by works since in its principles and seed it is quite differing from that which is by the Law or born after the flesh which is of works so as the one is differenced from the other in the very kind of perfection and life both as to principles and works the seed and the fruit of each yea and this faith of the right kind considered as abiding in Christ not in us is that that properly justifies the believer For if it be by grace it is no more of works otherwise grace is no more grace But if it be of works then it is no more grace otherwise work is no more work And besides the Spiritual Seed are beloved as they are chosen in Christ before the world began and are distinguished as so accepted in him from the fleshly seed before they have done either good or evil This chusing in Christ is not the justification by faith inasmuch as that act of God never passes upon us till we be actually believers For though we have being in our head who is blessed and beloved before the world began Ephes 1. Yet we are not made to be in our own persons of that Spiritual Seed untill we have the righteousness of our head actually imputed to us and so are made to stand without guile or spot before the throne of God whilst as yet we are ungodly and bear about with us a body of sin and death unsubdued and unabolished which nevertheless in the end by faith is overcome and wholly done away The working power then which is put forth by faith in the heart and conscience of him that is the true Believer is to be distinguished from faith in the first act singly considered as the new birth and reception of Christ to inhabite and dwell there as the root and author of all spiritual life and perfection which indeed is rather itself the work or workmanship of Christ as the suitable reception that he makes for his indwelling presence in the heart then any effect of the power of faith working patience and experience there in pursuance of the end for which it is given which is to work the spirit of man either under the first or second dispensation to a compleat and full resignation of its understanding will and desire unto the teachings light and life of this faith evidencing him that is invisible and giving entrance into the glory that is within the veil shewing what is the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the Saints and what is the exceeding greatness of his power to us-ward that believe Which glory is not seen all that while to the natural senses and discerning but the life and workings of faith wherein the spiritual part of the believer does exceedingly rejoyce the fleshly or natural man in the Saint unsubdued cannot bear but hath its reluctancy against lusting to envy ready to oppose resist and contradict the same to the utmost and is all the season of the trial of faith in great heaviness grief and despondency through manifold temptations whilst the believing part is exercising love on him whom the natural senses cannot reach nor come to the sight of In whom though now we see him not yet believing we rejoyce with joy unspeakable and glorious girding up the loyns of our minds in sobriety and hope For the power of faith is such in its operation that it overcomes the world and all the powers of flesh and blood in us at the best which serve but to be made conquest of and triumphed over by faith in order to be nailed to the cross of Christ for the slaying of the enmity which thereby would be springing up to the choaking of the spirtual seed the crucifying afresh the Son of God and trampling under foot the blood of the everlasting Covenant as an unholy thing This power of flesh and blood that ends and expires at last under the conquering and triumphing power of faith causes for a long time a sore and fiery trial in the soul through the sharp contest and dispute that arises between the heavenly powers and spiritual senses on the one hand and the fleshly and natural powers in the same Saint on the other by reason of which the soul is often inclining and falling back into the life of the flesh and workings of the natural will instead of being strengthned in the inward man and fixed there in love and true Rest against all contradicting whatsoever made by flesh and blood whether pure and holy flesh or sinful and corrupt So that oft the party which faith by its power makes for it self in the heart and conscience of the believer is deserted and in a manner given off through the prevalent reasonings and desires of flesh and blood which make resistance in this warfare to their last breath or activity that remains in them And first when faith cals the heart to leave its natural state its kindred and relations in the heathenish world the morality and civility whereof seems to have much to say for it self after the corrupt part in it is cast off the natural powers and faculties of the mind in that state rebel and resist a long season not knowing how to submit though upon hopes of a land of promise specially when they must not know or cannot be made acquainted whither the soul is going and are therefore constantly representing all discouragements imaginable to hinder its obedience to this call of faith till at last they be over-ruled and brought under But secondly when through faiths workings by the power of the Law or Ministry of Christs first appearance the soul is brought out of the corrupt degenerate state of nature hath turned its back upon the land of its nativity and is come to the earthly Canaan to the circumcision of the flesh not in the letter only but in the spirit for the righteousness of works by the first Covenant then hath faith another Call or second voice to the soul causing it to sojourn as a stranger even in the land of promise and to look upon this earthly Jerusalem as no abiding City but that out of which it must also pass into a heavenly Country the Jerusalem that is above forgetting the things that are behind or unto which it hath already attained and pressing forwards to the mark for the price of its high calling to be clothed upon as with its house from heaven Through the call of this last voice of faith all flesh and the glory thereof is blown upon and made as nothing Isa 40. 6. the voice said cry and he said what shall I cry All flesh is grass and the goodliness thereof is as the flower of the field perishing and fading in a moment
as their living Oracles that proceed out of the mouth of Christ the Mediator is also called the WORD according to Scripturesense and acceptation which yet will be more fully evident by considering the Word of God in a third sense to wit as the holy Scriptures coming not by the will of man but by inspiration from God in men moved by the Holy Ghost are also called the Word and Oracles of God containing in them the same Declaration and Testimony of the mind and will of God as is to be found in the inward WORD but dispensing it in an outward form of wholsome words taught and inspired by the Holy Ghost himself Unto these words of the Holy Scriptures given by divine inspiration no man may adde Rev. 22. 18. or take there from v. 19. Wherefore it is that they are not of any private interpretation but require the inspiration of the living WORD to open and declare the true and full meaning of them which is near unto every true believer being the WORD which dwels in the heart by faith the key of David and that holy anointing 1 Joh. 2. 27. that is truth and no lye which abideth in the Saints in such manner that they need not that any man teach them but as the same anointing teacheth them of all things taking of the things of Christ and shewing them unto them according to his promise John 16. 14 15. whos 's teachings nevertheless are also derived and communicated from one Saint unto another by the Ministry of outward words and Exposition of the Scriptures as by being taught of God they are fitted and prepared thereunto and made able Ministers of the new Testament who handle not the Word of God deceitfully through any private interpretations of their own but by manifestation of the Truth in its own self-evidence do commend themselves to every mans conscience in the sight of God not preaching themselves but Christ Jesus the Lord and themselves servants for Jesus sake 2 Cor. 4 5. And Christ hath promised to send forth such a spirit of the Ministry as this in all Ages even to the end of the world Mat. 28. 20. for the perfecting of the Saints and edifying of the Body the Church till we all come in the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God unto a perfect man unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ Ephes 4. 13. That then which doth enable to the work of the Ministry thus considered is the shining forth of the Truth in the face of Jesus Christ by his indwelling presence in the heart comparing it self in the mind and understanding of the Saint with the testimony which is given of it self in the Outward Word And by discerning the perfect Analogie and Harmony that springs up between both answering one another as face answers face the believer receives such certainty and satisfaction in the mind of God made known as warrants him in the delivery and declaration thereof unto others This as the safest and best rule in judging and declaring truth from the Scriptures hath been owned in a constant harmony of witness by Saints in all Ages against all the enemies under one form or other that have sprung up either against the holy Scriptures themselves or the Spirit and inward WORD that lives and breathes forth in them and by them Thus through the faith that is in Christ Jesus the Holy Scriptures are able to make us wise unto salvation and to make the man of God perfect throughly furnished unto every good work being in this harmony and consent with the inward WORD of the same Authority with it and of the same divine and spiritual nature property and use able to save the soul and prosper to the end for which they are sent as a servant in the hand of the living WORD to fulfil all his pleasure and become either a savour of life unto life as ministred in harmony with and subserviency unto the living WORD or a savour of death unto death 2 Cor. 2. 16. as ministred singly in opposition thereunto The Scriptures then are not properly the inward and living WORD but have a testimony and expression peculiarly their own John 5. 39. search the scriptures they are they which testifie of me saith Christ in which Testimony of theirs they are either as a servant and preparer of the way unto the living WORD as those that literally testifie of it pointing at Christ the life and spirit of them or else they are to be considered as one and the same with the living WORD in perfect analogie and harmony both consorting and dwelling together in an inseparable band of union unveiling rather the naked beauty of the inward WORD then bearing any different sense from it professing themselves to be but as a dead letter or sealed book Isa 29. 11. any farther then the living unwritten WORD of God as breathing into them becomes their life and is made use of as the key to open them so that both together make up one and the same divine oracle whereas if consideration be had of the Scriptures in the letter only they are then capable of having a meer private interpretation and humane sense put upon them and so to nourish up a way of prophecying that hath its rise out of the divination of mans own heart or the single ability of the natural mind exercised in them which is so far from being the true ministry that it is but the vision of God that proceeds from man as he follows his own spirit and not Gods Ezek. 13. 2. 3. c. Now if the body of the Scriptures deserve the name as they do of the word of God their spirit and Original deserves it much more and is much more eminently of authority and use for the effecting of all that is or can be done by them even the WORD that is nigh thee that is in thy heart and in thy mouth the WORD of faith Rom. 10. 8. the unseen and unwritten WORD which evidences itself to faith which is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things unseen Heb 11. 1. This WORD is described Heb. 4. 12. where it is said the WORD of God is quick and powerful sharper then any two-edged sword piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit and of the joynts and marrow and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart neither is there any creature that is not manifest in his sight but all things are naked and open unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do By being here described as a person the Holy Ghost signifies to us in what sense we are to understand the WORD of God in this place even for Jesus Christ the Mediator not simply considered as the second in the Trinity any more then for the outward body of the Scriptures which person of Christ is spoken of under the same name and description Rev. 19.
those were that should be everlastingly saved or everlastingly perish would seem by this way of his ordering of things in the first creation to be very accessory to the sin and fall of Angels and men seeing it was in his power to have made them otherwise not at all subjected to this weakness it is very true God could have made them otherwise but when both in wisdom and justice he thought fit to make them thus who art Thou O man that repliest against God And how unseemly is it for the vessel to say to the potter why hast thou made me thus that is subject to such mutability and weakness as may end in everlasting contempt and misery seeing that God puts no influencing necessity upon thee either by his decree or otherwise but leaves thee to the free motion and choise of thy own mind and will herein and for this very reason made thee a creature indued with free will that no turning of the scale towards thy misery and ruine might proceed from him but from the moving and enticing of thy own hearts lust which state also ministred occasion to thee by the weakness and mutability thereof to have looked after that better state that was provided and was approaching even ready to be revealed whereby all the faultiness of thy first state might have been remedied and such a change attained unto as was more worth then all the hazard and loss that lay in the way of coming to the enjoyment of it amounted to The wisdom and justice then of God is very perspicuous in ordering that state of things which by creation was first brought forth as a preparatory and fore-running dispensation to the glory of the spiritual body that was to follow and succeed And the folly and weakness of Angels and men is very inexcusable that in this estate made so bad use of those gifts and communications of God so freely received from the hand of a bountiful Creator as to make him weary of giving more and repent as it were of what he had given already in that it was so shamefully abused by the receivers thereof as to reproach the maker and provoke him to exclude them for ever from the true Rest Now what this second and more excellent state is into which the creature is to be translated may partly be understood by the opposite weakness and faultiness in the other that hath been already opened forasmuch as it contains in it the full cure and remedy thereunto and in general doth procure a full redemption unto the natural body out of its first bondage of corruption and mutability in all respects which therefore the whole creature waits for Rom. 8. 19. but as for the manner and particulars of that glory wherein they shall be brought forth we are to wait till those times of refreshing that shall come from the presence of the Lord for this restitution of all things do themselves give the explanation thereof in visible characters But that which lies most properly before us in the matter we are now handling is the consideration of what that change is in reference to the inward intellectual and rational powers in Angels and men respectively who having received at the first immortal and invisible substances as hath been shewed are not in the essential parts of their first constitution to be annihilated but the Angels are still spirits and flames of fire and men do still consist of spirit soul and bodie retaining the powers and operations incident and proper thereunto after that they have passed by a considerable and irrevocable change through the resurrection from the dead into everlasting honour or everlasting contempt That the perfection of Angels and men which was communicated to them by creation was mutable and corruptible is generally confessed and experienced likewise is it as little to be doubted but that the instability and change in both by their sin and fall did proceed from that freedom of will proper motion of their own which they were enabled to exercise according to the first constitution and natural frame of their minds and spirits wherein they possessed an arbitrary independent and free exercise thereof without any interruption by God who was pleased to suffer this for his own most wise and holy ends intrusting them with what they had received to use and employ it for the glory and in the service of their Creator and not to serve their own private lusts and interests therewith In this honour and trust received from God it would well have become as well Angels as men to have found themselves not a little burthened under the straits and difficulties attending the right managing such soveraignty and arbitrariness of power which seems so much above the weakness of meer creature-beings that until God take them into such intimacy of union by the second Covenant as not to leave them alone in the exercise of this power they are every moment subject to miscarriage in the use thereof God therefore was willing to take a Rise from hence to discover to the creature the needfulness of its being taken out of this wavering state and translated into the permanent glory that was to follow whereby to secure it in the midst of all its present excellency and perfection from destroying itself by forfeiting and losing all that it had already attained and to set up in the creature a house and an abiding place for himself wherein he may rest for ever Esai 66. 1. when all things that his hands had made and are said by him to have been by virtue of the first creation came short of so glorious an end and use as left to themselves and were by him laid by as unregarded That then which God had in his eye and which his heart and regard was set upon consists in a frame of spirit and mind reserved by him to be brought upon Angels men that stood in direct opposition and cross constitution unto this eminently shining forth in the crucified spirit of Jesus the last Adam which God by the vertue and means of his death and resurrection designed to superinduce upon the natural beings of Angels and men as in the way of a new creation before which the old should vanish wear away This Isa 66. 2. is lively set forth where to those expressions all these things hath mine hand made and all these things have been the Holy Ghost subjoyns but to this will I look even to him that is poor and of a contrite spirit and that trembleth at my word The like is to be found Psal 109. 16. where Judas and such enemies unto Christ are prophesied of as persecuted the poor and needy man that they might even slay the broken in heart This poverty neediness and brokenness of spirit is that which Christ cals blessed Mat. 5. 3. saying that theirs is the kingdom of heaven being ever accompanied with a purity and a purifying through faith whereby they come to see God v.
and so agreeing with the pure natural heart of man In the exercise of this second and new-covenant-life Christ was enabled to offer up himself in the flesh through the eternal spirit as a Lamb without spot and guile unto God to bring in everlasting righteousness and that subjection of heart and brokenness of spirit in man which God requires by the law of faith or tenor of the second and new-covenant answering to the law of the new-creature-being and life whose original pattern was hereby set up in Christ as the first fruits in that image of the first-born from the dead wrought out in him unto whom all the rest of the adopted children whose names are written in the Lambs book of life from the beginning of the world were predestinated to be made conformable Jesus being thus qualified in the same nature and person even as the son of man to be as well a high-Priest as a sacrifice proceeds to fulfill the will of his father that is herein given him to do even to perform that obedience that is required of him as Surety and Mediator of both Testaments standing in force by vertue of his death This obedience is the second general particular which we have propounded to treat of consisting in the right use and mannaging of those powers and senses of mind that by the WORD were formed and set up in Christ for the performance of the will of God as to all that he required from man in and by the Rule and law of the first and second covenants the righteousness of both which laws he was to fulsil even all righteousness which accordingly he did as himself declares Heb. 10. 7 9. where he saith Lo I come in the volume of the book it is written of me to do thy will O God and this by taking away what was faulty in the first covenant and establishing the good and righteousness of both in the second For he came not to destroy the Law but to fulfil it so as the very righteousness of the Law which as upon its first bottom passeth away as a morning dew and waxeth old is fulfilled in the new-covenant-obedience by those who walk not after the flesh but after the spirit and was so fulfilled to the utmost in and by the man Christ Jesus who as the second Adam did all that was needful and which God required to be done for the remission of sin and the utter abolishing and removal of it out of mans nature with an absolute incapacity of ever returning more upon the true and right heirs of salvation In respect whereof it is said Rom. 5. 19. That as by one mans disobedience many that is all were made sinners so by the obedience of one many that is all shall be made righteous Having that ransom paid and means provided in him to make them righteous so that there shall be no necessity remaining upon any to perish forasmuch as sufficient provision is made to bring all men to repentance and to the knowledge of the truth that as in Adam all died so in this sense all again in Christ are made alive that is capable of receiving life from God upon the terms of one of the two Covenants For if through the offence of one many be dead and judgement was by one to condemnation much more the grace of God and gift by grace which is by one man Jesus Christ hath abounded unto many to the justification of many offences v. 15 16. God esteeming it just that by the righteousness and obedience which is performed according to his will by one man Jesus Christ the free gift should come upon all men unto justification of life as well as that by one mans offence and disobedience death should raign over all This one righteousness and obedience performed by Christ is that which not only answers by way of satisfaction unto all that was occasioned and brought forth by the offence and disobedience of Adam but where sin hath abounded grace hath abounded much more that as sin raigned unto death grace might raign through righteousness unto eternal life by Iesus Christ the second Adam Which eternal life sin shewed it self able to hinder the first Adams attainment of upon his first principles The obedience then which Christ performed we are to consider under a twofold respect First that which is usually called his active obedience whereby he was in his own person legally righteous and perfectly holy according to the tenor of the first covenant as made under the Law and rendred in the natural powers of his mind exactly conformable thereunto This conformity in Christ to the righteousness of the Law qualified him to be the Lamb without spot or blemish which God required to be offered up and slain as a sacrifice for sin which conformity may be considered either as inherent in him qualifying him thus for sacrifice or Secondly as coming into actual exercise by the proper activity of his living soul or natural man if left alone therein or Thirdly as being brought into exercise by the Fathers indwelling presence teachings not suffering him to speak or do any thing of himself or in the single activity of his natural principles as himself saith Ioh. 14. 10. The words that I speak unto you I speak not of my self but the Father that dwelleth in me doth the works In which third and last consideration Christ was made active through the exercise of a newness of life and operation set up in him in the way of faith flowing from that second seed and union begotten in him by the WORD as we have already shewed In which activity he did not only perform the righteousness and obedience required of man by the Law or first covenant but that also which is required of him by the new second covenant Without which second branch of his active obedience there could have been no sacrifice nor shedding of blood no Lamb slain nor feast of passover as it is written 1 Cor. 5. 7. Christ is our passover who was slain for us for there would have wanted the priest or sacrificing power to offer up the same according to the will of God declared in the new and second covenant Heb. 10. 9. For though it be most true that Christ through the righteousness of the Law and this considered chiefly as inherent in him is thereby the pure and spotless Lamb of God the male of the flock without blemish which it was needful for him to be as prepared for sacrifice and to be offered up it being requisite not only to be but to continue Holy harmless and separate from sinners throughout the whole course of his life and sufferings in the flesh yea and in the grave iâ—self not to see corruption otherwise he had not answered and fulfilled the righteousness of the Law nor been in his own person legally righteous such an one as justice it self upon that account could take no exception against yet this made him not high Priest
an union between the Word and Christs manhood as we have already shewed in the precedent Chapter that in a threefold respect according to one of w th his manhood is found in the form of God and as the son of man he accounts it not robbery to be acknowledged equal with God the man that is his fellow Thirdly there is a union between the manhood of Christ who in the sense before declared is made Gods equal and fellow and the whole spiritual seed in general and each of them in particular who are as the Bride and wife to this Lamb and so in a sense are his fellows and consorts heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ where the Spirit and the Bride say come living together in this unity as Bride and Bridegroom and so intimated Eph. 5. 32. where the natural marriage is made a type of it and the Apostle saith this is a great mysterie But I speak concerning Christ and the Church And now what is more evident then that the Saints by this union with Christ are not deifyed nor Christed but have the place only of his Bride and spouse as the Queen who is all glorious within and who is one the only of her mother To be therefore a member of this Heavenly City a living stone in this divine building is that which we are to understand by this second sort of calling wherein our Election is made sure to us and a new name given us that none can read but those that have it Secondly through this unity of the faith of the Son of God whereby those that are called are placed in the relation of members to Christ as he is the Head of the Church and the first-born from the dead they are for ever justified receiving this further benefit as they stand related to Christ in this his second Headship beyond those that are singly related to his first and obtain thereby but the common and conditional justification For this everlasting justification extends to sins past present and to come absolutely and at once discharging from all sin that their iniquities may be remembred no more and presents them faultless and without guile before the Throne of God as the objects of his eternal love and favour unto which they are entitled in right of their being made his first-born from the dead whose names are written in heaven adopted into his own line family and descent by this their marriage-union with Christ who according to his heavenly manhood is the immediate off-spring of the WORD and eternal Son of God without Father without mother without descent other then that of the very Son of God into which he is adopted and taken by marriage-union which dignity and grace he freely bestows and conveys in a secondary way upon his whole spiritual seed and in this neer union keeps them from ever departing from him Thirdly these unto whom Christ is thus made their righteousness and justification he is made also their sanctification to the purifying of their hearts through believing and cleansing them from all evil conscience as well that which consists in the filthiness of the flesh as that which lies in the filthiness of spirit renewing them in their minds through the putting on of the new man to the exercising as well their spiritual senses in likeness and conformity to Christs actings and life in that unity wherein he and his Father are one whereby he crucified and kept under his natural man as to the exercising of their natural powers and faculties in likeness and conformity to the actings of Christs natural man making them herein subject to the Father of spirits and to live acceptably and work holiness in his sight as renewed in knowledge after the image of him that created them or according to the pattern of the new man in the holy and righteous actings thereof set up in the person of Christ where Christ is all and in all which good works the Saints are fore-ordained of God to walk in as their true Evangelical and new-covenant obedience Fourthly and lastly those unto whom Christ is thus made sanctification he is made also redemption or glorification to the changing them throughout in spirit soul and body into a likeness with his spirit soul and body as he is declared the Son of God with power by the resurrection from the dead at such time as our vile bodies shall be made like unto his most glorious bodie by that mighty power of his whereby he is able to subdue all things unto himself which is to be brought to light in his times when he shall be admired in all them that believe and answer the expectation of the creature in delivering it from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the sons of God at their manifestation and the compleating of their adoption by this redemption of their bodies These are the benefits in short and in general that inseparably accompany the guift of Christs person to the soul as he ministers himself in the two Covenants respectively and are the fruits of his presence there Which will serve as a key to open many things in the following discourse when we come to speak of the practical conscientious part that is begotten in and exercised by the subjects of Christ as they live under his Rule and dominion in the world and are therein contesting and warfaring with the adversary the devil and his instruments CHAP. XI Shewing the subordinate use that the elect Angels are of unto Christ in his bearing up the pillars of the creation that else had been dissolved through the fall and the place which they have in the threefold general administration of his mediatoriall kingdom set up in the world THough sin entred upon all men and death by sin through the act of one mans disobedience and judgement came upon all men because in one man all had sinned yet by the obedience of one and his righteousness the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life Rom. 5. and where sin abounded grace did abound much more by reason whereof the whole first creation in all the parts of it is made Christs by the price of his blood which was made Sathans and sins by the fall that as the soul of the Father is Christs so also is the soul of the Son and he only that personally transgresses shall die Ezek. 18. 4. God having been pleased to find a ransom in Christ for atonement and propitiation to the forbearance of sins that are past and to the admitting of man to a new treaty of reconciliation and trial by vertue of the first covenant renewed in and through the blood of Christ whereunto the ministry of the good Angels serves and is made use of by Christ the KING OF RIGHTEOUSNESS who employs these his ministers of justice as the higher powers over the world committed by him to their charge to mannage order and govern in all the affairs thereof under him
large discussed and held forth 2 Cor. 5. as also Jer. 31. compared with Ezek. 18. where Christ challenges all souls to be his as having obtained the non-imputing of sins past unto them in order to put them upon a new trial of personal obedience unto him who is the Lord that bought them and hath renewed life in them that they should henceforth not live unto themselves but to him that died for them Yea this is so evident that the creature itself Rom. 8. 19 20. earnestly groans and labours expecting a restauration by this price of redemption paid by Christ from under the bondage of corruption so as to be brought into the glorious liberty of the sons of God In summ therefore there are these two great and general benefits flowing forth from Christs death upon all men The first is a common enlightning of spirit whereby there is set up in them in some degree more or less the candle of the Lord shewing the work of the law in their consciences to the accusing or excusing them in all they do and enabling them to such improvement thereof as to attain the answer of a good natural conscience unto the Rule set before them under the first administration of Christs kingdom The second is Gods not imputing to them sins past as also the often renewing of his pardon to them for sins present Psalm 78. 38. exercising therein his forbearance for the sake of his own justice as pacified and atoned by Christs sacrifice accompanied with protection and encouragement which thence also is afforded them by the hands of the good Angels as his ministers of justice unto all such as by approving themselves faithful in that little they have received are found in the number of wel-doers by which we see the extent of the vertue of Christs blood even to the ends of the earth wherein he hath prepared as large a remedy for the fallen seed of Adam as the dise ase required CHAP. XIV Shewing the continuance and progress of the war between the subjects of Christ and Anti-Christ and the terms and issues upon which they joyn THis war first discovered itself in the two brothers Cain and Abel where the devil comes off equal with Christ so as to gain and prevail with Cain as Christ chose and accepted Abel yea for success in the combate seems to have the better judging probably that in this murther of Abel the promised seed might have been wholly extinct and so have finally miscarried God therefore supplies Abels room with another son through whose line the PROMISED SEED might be yet figured out and carryed on as through Cains line the SEED OF THE SERPENT were shadowed forth and continued But the world coming to multiply and the generations of men to increase the subjects now of Christs three kingdomes distributed as before we have set down are upon the stage at once The first sort of men are those in a corrupt degenerated state whose daughters the SONS OF GOD went in unto Gen. 6. and so begat Giants or men of renown The second sort are typed out and comprehended in this race of GYANTS or men of fame and great repute having the name of sons and God for their Father but being weighed in the ballance of the sanctuary were found to be too light a fleshly seed only though such as therein did bear the first image of God yet who in process of time did so corrupt themselves that God refused to strive by his spirit any longer with them but gave them up to the destruction of the flood as those who became in the imaginations of their hearts alwaies evil before him and in the works they did perform The third sort were found in the family of Noah who was righteous in Gods account and typed out the true spiritual seed Thus we see the distribution of mankind before the flood but after the flood it became much more evident and apparent not only in the three sons of Noah that afterwards peopled again the whole earth but in the time of Abraham with whom God renewed both his covenants making him the Father of many nations or indeed of the two great nations one of the law the other of faith Ishmael born of Hagar the bond-woman figuring out the children of the first covenant that were born after the flesh and Isaac the son of the free woman who was by promise typing out the seed born after the spirit These two seeds were distinguished by their births and dispensations they were under from all the nations of the world besides who were in an open idolatrous heathenish state out of which Abraham was called into the land which God should shew him And in process of time when God made good the promises to Abrahams seed in giving them possession of the earthly Canaan he still continued this threefold distribution of mankind chusing the fleshly seed of Abraham from among all the Nations round about them and placing them in the midst of them and then by his Prophets and the true ministry of his Word subdividing again the spiritual seed from the carnal Into this threefold distribution God was pleased to sort and rank fallen mankind and so to continue them unto Christs second coming in order to accomplish and fulfil the whole counsel of his will upon them which he had fore-purposed and determined within himself and had chosen the Lord Jesus as a polished shaft in his hand to bring to pass accordingly by what he reveals of himself in the Gospel and word of TRUTH wherein first he is declared to the Captain and Author of salvation unto the whole spiritual seed the many sons that are given him by the Father to bring up to eternal glory in the same way he came to it himself who was made perfect through sufferings of whom he is not to lose one but to raise them up all at the last day into everlasting life Secondly he is declared the Redeemer and Ransomer so far of all mankind from under the power of sin and Satan as to disable them to keep off the good things contained in the promises of this life or of that which is to come from any that shall fulfill the condition of them or at least keep themselves as they may from such high provocations and wilful resistance for which God swears in his wrath they shall never enter into his REST. But when man finds such work before him as he cannot go through with by the strength of nature he will not resign up himself in such case though he see there is no other way that God may do it for him by bringing him to Christ that he may have life but sits down in a sullenness of spirit resisting the Holy Ghost and rejecting the counsel of God against his own soul In direct opposition to both these declared branches of Gods will in the Gospel the devil and his instruments set themselves First to attempt by all the power that is in
the gates of hell to prevail against the very elect themselves that are built on the Rock and are out of his reach to annoy in reference to the certainty of their salvation finding therefore little hopes or likelihood to frustrate them in that he makes it his business to render them of all men most miserable as to any hopes or enjoyments in this life wherein he finds latitude given him in the power allowed to him to bruise their heel Secondly he useth all the means-that lie in his power by subtilty or force so far as Gods permission gives way to him to assault the will and judgement of man how highly enlightned and how far quickned soever upon his single natural root in order to entice and draw him away from his subjection unto God in the natural service and worship that is due from him never leaving till he hath prevailed with and over him to provoke God so highly notwithstanding all his goodness patience and long-suffering to him extended through the blood of Christ as thereby to render himself unworthy of any further love or favour and to move God to swear in his wrath that he shall never enter into his REST. Under these two general heads we shall find as in a constant track throughout the whole Scripture the workings and counter-workings that are kept on foot and maintained between the MAN CHRIST JESUS who would have all men to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth and the MAN OF SIN and grand deceiver Satan who would have no man to be saved but all to be made children unto him who is the father of lyes The means used by Christ to produce renew and maintain the workings and operations of light and life from him in the hearts and consciences of fallen mankind is by setting on foot as hath been already shewed the threefold law and government given and erected by him at the beginning over all the sons of Adam upon the fall through the power and exercise whereof First he doth that to and in the hearts and consciences of the very heathen which fits and qualifies them to live answerable if the fault be not in themselves to the law and government they are under according to the measures of attainment which the meer natural man may have The like he doth unto the children of the first Covenant unto whom he is much more bountiful sutably to the state he farther leads them into And thirdly he exceeds what he doth to both these in the communications of himself unto the spiritual seed whom he suffers not to destroy themselves but takes a course to cross their own wils and desires when they are hearkning to the temptation of their own lust or Satan to draw them away This threefold conscience and spirit of man in the proper principles and operations of each of them whether they are to be found single or all of them together as in sweet harmony thus set up in the spiritual seed our purpose is to treat of and that as particularly and distinctly as we can to fall in with the experiences of all that may be therein concerned looking upon this as the best method we can take for the clear opening and stating the several dispensations of Christs three-fold government and Kingdom already entred upon And therefore we shall consider the principles and operations of each of these consciences either First as they are Christs own workmanship in and upon the heart and spirit of man as the beginning and foundation of those holy and righteous actings by him required under the dispensation whereinto each of them is brought by God or Secondly as they are the lawfull and righteous workings of the spirit of man enabled hereunto by free gift from Christ and in dependance upon him yet as the fruit and travel of his own proper judgement and will rectified in the use of those means prepared and laid before him by Christ to bring him to the right end of all motion which is the true REST whilst as yet he is under works and not under grace or Thirdly as they are the unlawfull and forbidden fruit of mans spirit qualified and enabled from Christ as before expressed when through his own lust he is enticed and through the subtilty of Satan he is ensnared so as lust when it hath thus conceived is the root of all evil operation bringing forth fruit unto death even death eternal in the end if the Lord upon the grounds of his new and everlasting Covenant do not pluck such souls out of this danger and lead them to such a state as contains in it a perfect security and freedom from the re-entry of sin with its prevailing power over them Through the right and distinct consideration of these principles and operations of conscience in the sons and daughters of men we may come to find our selves where we are and whose subjects whether Christs or the Devils and to what Kingdom or dispensation we belong in reference to the one or the other to the Kingdom of Christs marvellous light or to the power of Satans accursed darkness and upon what terms we stand in the one or the other whether in a wavering state consisting in a capacity and possibility of removal out of the one into the other or in a fixed determined state upon which it is impossible for any change to be brought either in a good sense or in a bad in which men are reserved and kept fast either in the bonds of perfect love light and freedom that casteth out fear as the elect or in chains of darkness and captivity unto the judgement of the great day as the non-elect who will be destroyed by the brightness of Christs coming when he shall appear the second time without sin to the salvation of his People And this we shall do if God permit as a service to these present times wherein like little children most are tossed to and fro with every wind of doctrine by the slight of men and cunning craftiness whereby men and devils lie in wait to deceive and lead on the ignorant to the Chambers of death CHAP. XV. Shewing more particularly the bounds of that Rule and Government which is set up by Christ in the natural conscience together with the answer of a good conscience thereunto in those that are under this first dispensation IT is most evident by the Scriptures that amongst the nations who are said to be without law as distinguished from the Jews that were under the law there were found doers of the law by nature who shewed the work of the law written in their hearts their consciences bearing them witness and their thoughts mean while accusing or excusing one another Rom. 2. 14 15. Of such Peter speaketh Acts 10. 34 35. where he saith Of a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of persons but in every nation he that feareth him and worketh righteousness is accepted with him according as David
therefore not to infer from what hath been said as some ignorantly or maliciously do that in asserting those under the two former dispensations to be capable of miscarrying as not therein arrived at that which is their true safety and blessedness we destroy the faith of many dear Saints and professors of Christ who have dyed or yet may die without ever acknowledging or experiencing a higher or other state of acceptation with God For upon this ground Christ should never have come in the flesh or have promised to come the second time without sin unto salvation because many a true Saint may have died and never seen nor acknowledged him in either of these his comings But indeed this assertion is so far from straitning or lessening the number of those that are the true heirs of salvation that it rather discovers how they may lie hid as they did in Elijahs time out of the observation of visible professors amongst those that they exclude as heathens and may be comprehended by Christ their spiritual head when as yet they may not have their spiritual senses brought forth into exercise so as to apprehend him but may be babes in Christ walking as men 1 Cor. 3. 1 3. undistinguished from the rest of the world And although they may in that respect seem to be men in the flesh yet they may live according to God in the spirit and find acceptance in the beloved one whilst they themselves may either be without law exercising a chaste natural conscience or may be under the law believers so Zealous of the law as to flie in the face of Paul himself for witnessing a higher light then they have yet experience of or can bear Which being premised we shall now proceed to shew what is the third and last sort of Rule and operation of Christ that is set up in the hearts and consciences of men by vertue of the new creation and everlasting covenant described Ephes 2. 10. to be that workmanship whereby we are created in Christ Jesus unto good works which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them distinguished as well from the good works of the law as the good works of nature before spoken to consisting in the operation and exercise of that faith through which we are preserved from falling away taken off from those operations wherein self is kept alive and weighs down the ballance and carried on to the saving of the soul For the nature of this faith is to give subsistence and reception in the heart unto Christ in his second appearance considered as in the seed thereof springing up more and more unto a perfect day which consisting in the very image it self and substantial brightness of Gods glory as it subjects and subdues the first earthly and shadowy image wherein man was created unto a perfect subserviency to and harmony with it self makes of twain one new man or Temple of God in heaven where also is seen the Ark of his Test ament and forms the heart into a subjection unto Christ not only as he is the KING OF RIGHTEOUSNES but as he is KING OF PEACE also qualifying the soul not only to minister in the charge of the Levits in the holy place but to draw neer unto God and enter with the high Priest into the holiest of all as having the exercise of all the natural powers and faculties of the mind in their own proper righteousness and holiness but retained in a broken bruised crucified state perfectly subjected to the spiritual sences and operations brought into exercise through faith to the perfecting and fulfilling of the other and so making the same Saint capable to sing the song of Moses and of the Lamb too Thus by living the life of faith the true Saint comes to have the evidence of things unseen and to hope above hope whilst the first Tabernacle is taking down to be laid in the grave and Christ is bringing a perfect weakness and insufficiency upon him to speak think will or do from any other spring or fountain of action and motion then from himself who is risen from the dead or from his exalted heavenly manhood who by degrees as their house from heaven cloaths them upon and keeps them from being found naked though despoyled of their first self-sufficiency ability as it stood single alone This is the faith whereby power is given to us to be the sons of God in a birth and participation of the divine nature wherein God communicates himself in his first and second appearance as knit together and made up of twain into one new name in Christ which none know but they that have it forming up the answer of a good conscience through the resurrection from the dead 1 Pet. 3. 19. to the receiving of whole Christ as he is the finisher as well as the beginner of our faith as he is the High Priest as well as the sacrifice in our nature or as through the unity of Spirit wherein he lives with his Father he does offer up and crucify the will of his flesh bringing it into perfect subjection to his Fathers will This is the patern of being and obedience according to which we are formed when we are made NEW CREATURES being that image of the Son unto which all the adopted children of the new Covenant given by the father to Christ are predestinated to be conformed in copartnership with Christ as he is the first born among many brethren for which he prayed as the peculiar mercy reserved for them in distinction from all the world beside whom therefore in this sense he did not pray for when he desired of his father that they all might be one as he and the father are one Joh. 17. 9 11. And says he the glory which thou gavest me I have given them that they may be one even as we are one I in them and thou in me that they may be made perfect in one and be with me where I am that they may behold the glory that thou hast given me in the love which thou shewedst me and wherewith thou lovedst me before the foundation of the world that so also the love wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them and I in them ver 22. 23 24 26. The effect of which prayer is accomplished in the heart and conscience of every true believer that is made a NEW CREATURE and is that which constitutes and sets up the new man in his right and perfect distinction from the first Adams highest purity and utmost perfection consisting in that building of God made without hands mans house from heaven with which he is gradually clothed upon as he is gradually unclothed of the first building and so formed up in the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God unto that perfection of manhood which is attainable even unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ unto which we shall arrive when
we come to be like him throughout in his glorified manhood and shall see him as he is having that love in us which he had from his Father before the foundation of the world For the opening of this we are to call to minde that the WORD when he was made flesh did set up this building in the seed of it in the person of JESUS THE SON OF MARY as well as that of meer man in which he was made under the Law In respect of both these birth 's of humane perfection in Christ he was said to grow in grace and in favor with God and man and so his manhood in the full extent of it may seem to be described and figured out to us by the vine in Jothams parable whose fruit cheereth the heart of God and of man According to the first of these births he had the effusion of the Spirit above measure a perfection given to him from above making him in this fashion and form of his heavenly manhood above all even the Jerusalem above that is the mother of us all upon which the new name is written qualifying him through this anointing with a heavenly raisedness of mind and divine heightning of all his humane powers and faculties to that fulness and extent whereby he may be enabled as the true Ark of God to swim live and abide in the waters of the divine glory where they are risen so high as to overwhelm and drown all his natural sences or powers of minde making up a river so deep as is impassable to them singly considered and as alone Ezek. 47. 5. which highest waters of the utmost discovery and manifestation of God import and make out that Love of God and of Christ which passeth knowledge and fils the true Saints with all the fulness of God exceeding abundantly above all they can ask or think Ephes 3. 19 20. This heavenly manhood anointing and new name which Christ hath renders him as the bush that Moses saw able to abide in the fiery and most glorious appearance of the very form and similitude of God himself and not be burned or consumed yea is that whereby he is prepared through the blood of the sacrifice of himself considered in his other capacity of manhood to enter within the vail and face to face as friend talks with friend converse with God in the unveiled brightness of his glory and express image of his person feeding upon it as his meat and drink even the dainties or feast of fat things provided for him in the kingdom of the Father The joy whereof set before him in the days of his flesh made him endure the cross despise the shame and finish the course of his sufferings with cheerfulness through the sight of him that was invisible to the natural eye In this sense was Christ made man when the WORD was made flesh and was the only begotten son in the bosom of the Father that thus sees God and is able to declare him whereas no meer man whatsoever either hath seen God at any time or can see him This is he of whom John said After me cometh a man which is preferred before me for he was before me upon whom the spirit rests and remains who therefore hath power to baptize with the holy Ghost as he did his own natural manhood when he offered it up Secondly then according to the other birth of humane perfection in Christ the spirit was given him by measure as it was to the first Adam when he was made a living soul whereby he was made under the Law like unto other men in all things sin only excepted that is to say with equal powers of mind and capacity of will and understanding as the earthy man or first Adam in his purity capable to think speak do will and desire in all things as a man bearing the same image as the first Adam did before his fall but with this difference that joyntly together with his being made thus a perfect natural man he had the perfection formerly mentioned of his heavenly manhood as that which was the top-stone of the building the crown of glory and honour wherewith he was crowned and made higher then the heavens all principalities and powers being made subject unto him This twofold humane perfection was brought forth in the holy child Jesus by the WORDS being made flesh and through his death and resurrection came to their full maturity and ripeness wherein Christ was declared the son of God with power having all power in heaven and earth put into his hands by the father even as he was the Son of man who in the dignity of this his state and glory can nevertheless do nothing of himself but what things soever he sees the Father do these also doth the Son likewise For the Father loveth the Son and sheweth him all things that himself doth For as the Father raiseth up the dead and quickeneth them even so the Son quickneth whom he will For the Father judgeth no man but hath committed all judgement unto the Son that all men should honour the Son even as they honour the Father For as the Father hath life in himself so hath he given to the Son to have life in himself and hath given him authority to execute Judgement also because he is the Son of man to wit in the twofold respect before mentioned But thirdly over and besides this twofold humane perfection which is in Christ he is also perfect God through the unity of Person whereinto he is begotten with the WORD from the operation whereof the same Jesus that is the Son of man is also the living and eternal WORD OF GOD and is so called Rev. 19. 13. out of whose mouth goeth a sharp sword and wherewith he smites the Nations and rules them with a rod of Iron as KING OF KINGS and LORD OF LORDS which high priviledge is peculiar to him it appertaining only to the man Christ Jesus to be God as he is that one blessed person that is the Mediator between God and Man and therefore incommunicable to any of the rest of the Seed or many brethren whereof he is the first born But as to what concerns this Jesus as he is the SON OF MAN in respect of the twofold humane perfection that is in him the rest of the seed even the many children given to him by the Father to bring up to glory are co-partners with him attaining to the measure of the stature of that his fulness and perfection through which they are made by him KINGS and PRIESTS to God and are to raign for evermore Into this perfection they are made to grow up in all things in him that is their head being by him begotten again unto a lively hope through the resurrection from the dead and having the immortal seed of the heavenliness of Christs perfection and life formed and brought forth in them as the inheritance incoruptible and undefiled that fades not away
so ignorant of and such enemies to as most prophanely to call it a fiction and make little lesse of it then blasphemy We say that the flesh or natural man in the Saint whether considered in the workings of his morall nature or of his renewed enlightned nature under the first Covenant is crucified and rendred a copartner with Christ in his dead body whereby the powers and faculties of the mind in the natural man are neither annihilated nor deprived of their lawful use as lawful refers to the obedience of faith and the rule of the Gospel but only have death passe upon them or a disability and privation as to all unlawful use of them or possibility of acting in rebellion resistance or contradiction to the Law of the heavenly nature and mind set up by faith In this crucified posture of the flesh and broken-spiritednesse into which the powers and faculties of the natural mind are brought by faith the Prophet Isa 54. 1. calleth out to the Saint to sing as intimating that though the natural man be hereby disenabled to bear or bring forth fruit to its first husband Christ himself as made under the Law and head of natural perfection single yet it ought neverthelesse to break forth into singing in regard that by her being become dead to the Law she is married to another even to him that is raised from the dead to bring forth fruit in newnesse of spirit and life and that this its barrennesse is no just cause of reproach to it seeing it came to be lawfully disengaged from all obligation to its first Husband by the dead body of Christ through which her first Husband is become dead unto her so that she is no adulteresse though she be married to another man Rom. 7. 3 4. And therefore Cry aloud for joy saith the Prophet for more are the children of the desolate then of the married wife or she that keeps to her first Husband under the Law Fear not for thou shalt not be ashamed neither be thou confounded for thou shalt not be put to shame for thou shalt forget the shame of thy youth and shalt not remember the reproach of thy Widowheod any more for thy Maker is thy Husband the Lord of Hosts is his Name and thy Redeemer the holy one of Israel the God of the whole earth shall he be called In these two particulars therefore conformity to the death of Christ is made to consist by the Prophet Isaiah in this Chapter First in Christs own refusal to be any longer a Husband unto the natural man in the Saint through his own voluntary departure and withdrawing of himself out of his own fleshly life to go to his Father and be and remaine for ever in the glory of the Father in order to returne againe to the Saint as he that is risen from the dead to marry and espouse the soul that he hath thus grieved by his withdrawing For saith he The Lord hath called thee as a woman forsaken and grieved in spirit and a wife of youth when thou wast refused by thy God for a small moment have I forsaken thee but with everlasting mercies will I gather thee Secondly the Saints conformity unto the death of Christ consists in the desolate forsaken barren state wherein the flesh and natural man is left by Christ as in a dry and barren wildernesse exposed to all temptations and trials from God Angels and Men within and without ready to sink and faile in spirit every moment partly under the appearance of Gods displeasure whose withdrawing and forsaking the soul understands not any more then Job did who was privy and conscious to the faithfulnesse and integrity of his heart to his first Husband whilest he abode with him and partly from the cold dead disconsolate frame of spirit wherein it now finds it self as it measures it self by the life of sense and not by the life of faith under both which pressures the Word of Christs patience is set before the soul by faith to be kept and observed Who for the joy that was set before him endured the Crosse and despised the shame patiently suffering the bruising of his heele according as he had received commandment from the Father In this posture as a Widow indeed the poor broken-spirited Saint remains mourning and weeping left for a season as an Orphan by Christ brought into that condition which Christ foretold unto his Disciples whom at the present he acknowledged children of the Bridechamber whilest they had no higher knowledge of him then in his fleshly glory and perfection Of whom therefore he said As long as the Bridegroome was with them they could not fast but the dayes would come when the bridegroome should be taken away from them then they should fast intimating thereby the dayes of fasting and mourning and being clad in sackcloth which the true Saints witnesses of Christ were to be exercised with during the time of the trial of their faith upon the Bridegroomes being taken from them and changing that living fruitful frame of spirit which they were fed and nourished up in by him as they were his married wife under the Law into a fasting broken mournful desolate state of Widowhood which they are brought into as they are made one with Christ in his dead crucified body and are planted with him into the similitude of his death Christ then after he hath become a Bridegroome and married Husband unto true beleevers in and by his first appearance shining forth upon them in the life and glory of his natural and fleshly perfection wherein he hath nourished them up and made them fruitful children of that his Bride-chamber is pleased and hath power to take himself away from them and continue no longer with them as a Bridegroome under the first Covenant or in the ministery of his first appearance but wholly dissolve that marriage-band betweene them as refusing any longer to come forth in the exercise of life toward them upon the single root of his natural perfection in order upon the trial of their faith and their dutiful keeping the word of his patience during the time of this his separation from them to return again after a little moment and with everlasting mercies to embrace them and be married unto them in the light and life of his second appearance not only supplying to them again that wherein he was withdrawn from them but adding over and above a fuller and more abundant communication of life and glory which untill this death or withdrawing of his be perfected in them they are not capable subjects perfectly to receive and inherit but according to the steps and degrees of this death doth the approa hand increase of this higher life let it self in upon them and fill them This separation and withdrawing of Christ as a Bridegroome is the more bitter and grievous because this his absence carrieth in it the appearance of his wrath and sore displeasure to the eye of flesh
imputed as it is written Where there is no Law there is no transgression hence is it that in his temptations and assaults with which he approaches men that are subjects unto Christ under his first dispensation or the birth of natural ight by him renewed and wrought out in their consciences he does endeavour either to make them reject scorne and withstand that work of the Law in their hearts so as in their operations to preferre and adhere to the unrighteousnesse and uncleannesse of the flesh before that righteousnesse and holinesse that Christ requires of them or else so to over-value trust and rest in their personal fleshly purity and holinesse unto which they may and do oft attaine under that first administration of Christ as to become fixed opposers and resisters of the higher discoveries of Christ that are yet behind and were to have beene made knowne unto them if through this insobriety and impatience of spirit they had not justly deprived and rendered themselves unworthy thereof Now this sort of sinners and corrupted consciences when thus againe returned into a voluntary subjection unto Satans Kingdome and Rule being such who have sinn'd against and denied the Lord that bought them are treasuring up wrath against the day of wrath and the revelation of the righteous judgement of God who though they shall not be judged for what they had not and knew not as to the righteousnesse which they themselves were to have found in Christs person for their justification in the sight of God as shall those that are under the second dispensation unto whom Christ in this sense is revealed yet they do justly fall under the sin of unbelief as well as the other bringing down the guilt of Christs blood upon their souls through the unlawful use they make of their present attainments and personal righteousnesse in which they harden themselves to the opposing and keeping off the manifestation of Christs own righteousnesse unto them so much as in the knowledge of him according to the flesh The second sort of Christs subjects which the Devil applies himself to and attempts the gaining over unto his use and service for the encrease of his Dominion in opposition to Christs are those of the Circumcision children of the first Covenant who are the subjects wherein Christ sets up and maintaines his Rule and Dominion by the Law the holy Commandment delivered to them in the knowledge of him according to the flesh into whose hearts he comes as that stronger man to the dispossessing of Satan and casting of him out as an uncleane spirit who till then had beene prevailing over their minds to runne into all excesse of riot in the grosse uncleannesses of the flesh whom now Christ restrains by binding him up and in the roome thereof bringing forth the fruits of his own indwelling presence in them to the cleansing sweeping and adorning of his house and Temple wherein he comes to live with them under the first Covenant Satan perceiving how desperate his game is like to prove by this work of Christ if he should in down-right termes attempt to bring such as these back againe into the bondage of corruption is willing for a while very much to decline that way chusing rather to endeavour a returne into these cleansed enlightened hearts in the forme and appearance of an Angel of light that he may work death in them by that which is good seducing and beguiling them with subtilty as he did Eve by making their very conformity to the Law and the upholding thereof in power and credit in the conscience to be not only the means of his re-entry with seven spirits worse then before but to serve as a strong-hold to resist and beat off Christ in his approaches unto the soul in the glory of his second appearance by fixing it in a hardnesse and implacable resistance against the dawnings of that day and brightnesse of his coming In this posture is the Devil able to seat himself in the very Temple of God as God shewing himself to be God whose coming into the heart is with power with signes lying wonders and all deceivablenesse of unrighteousnesse in all that perish and take pleasure in this kind of unrighteousnesse and hatred of the truth By this means sin comes forth in the mysterious workings thereof which lies dead amongst those under the first dispensation as it is written without the Law sinne is dead taking its revival as to this kind of its operation by occasion of the coming of the Commandment in power and prevalency in respect whereof it is said The strength of sinne is the Law which strength being wanting in those that are without Law is the reason that sinne thus considered remains in them as dead without motion or activity For untill the soul by the ruling power of the Law be brought into a kind of security in its own apprehension from all prevailing danger of fleshly impurity and uncleannesse this kind of sinning springs not up in its force and vigour working death by that which is undeniably good through which it becomes exceeding sinful In this security the heart of man is the more easily nourished up from the experience it hath of converse with Christ in his own immediate personal appearance as those Luke 13 25 26. who upon this ground maintaine their confidence for acceptance with Christ saying Lord Lord open unto us for we have eate and drunk in thy presence and thou hast taught in our streets finding themselves planted into him as branches in the Vine or good Olive-tree and so rendered righteous in the righteousnesse of their head and root which knowledge and experience those under the first dispensation are strangers unto being aliens from this Common-wealth of Israel Of this number are they who after much enlightning fall away and draw back unto perdition Heb. 6. and chap. 10. with Demas Hymeneus and Philetus making shipwrack both of faith and a good conscience In these kind of Seducements the Devil hath beene long versed who began this practice upon Adam in his natural righteousnesse and purity experiencing in his case all that resistance that man in honour or at his best estate standing but upon the root of his natural perfection does signifie or amount unto for the keeping out of sin or the hindering it a second time from re-entry and revival to the making of men sin over the same sin againe after the similitude of Adams transgression Thus the old Serpent through this deceit is able to slay man againe and work death in him as fast as natural righteousnesse and holinesse renewed and revived does give him matter to work upon this way This mystery of iniquity is undiscernable at first in the consciences of those where it works who judge it to be their duty and obedience to the Law which they are performing whilst in their very righteous and holy operation they are made to serve a contrary interest unto Christs by going about to establish
they serve the Law of sin finding sin so farre from being perfectly overcome and subdued as once they supposed that by degrees it returnes upon them with greater force then ever making them miserable men as abandoned and left to its inroad and violence without any possibility of being delivered from this death and wrath that comes upon such wilful sinning in which case there remains to them no more sacrifice for sinne but an expectation of fiery wrath Howbeit to repair this losse unto them whilst they have their abode in this world the Devil lets them have as their reward the praise of one another and enables them to carry the world clear before them to the oppressing and trampling down the righteous and spiritual seed wringing out waters of a full cup to them These are they who prosper in the world and encrease in riches who have no bands in their death but their strength is firme who are in no trouble nor are plagned like other men but have their eyes standing out with fatnesse enjoying more then their hearts can wish They set their mouths against the heavens and their tongue walks through all the earth under the universal Dominion and Rule which Satan as God of the world hath from one end of the earth unto the other This great City or universal worldly spirit and rule under Satan sits as Queene alone and knows no sorrow but with her fornications and sorceries bewitches the world and the inhabitants thereof exercising her universal Rule and Dominion over them under various formes and administrations of government till he come whose right it is and cast downe these Thrones before him receiving to himself Dominion Glory and a Kingdome that all people Nations and Languages should serve him in a Kingdome that is never to be destroyed The principal means which God uses to bring in his Kingdome and oppose these Counter-workings of Satan is his setting up in the person of Christ a bruised broken crucified man that humbled himself to the death of the Crosse suffering without the gates of Jerusalem as the mighty power of God by which to destroy the power of the Devil and bring to nought the wisdome of the wise and the understanding of the prudent as those foolish and weak things of God in mans eye which he hath chosen to confound the great and mighty things of the world and as those base and despised things that are not which he hath chosen to confound the things that are fairest in shew and appearance Which weapons of Christs warfare though mighty through God yet being despicable and weak in the eye of Satan and to the discerning and judgement of men they are thereby the more harden'd and encouraged to contest it out with Christ till at last they come to be trampled under his feet like mire in the streets CHAP. XX. Concerning death to sinne and life to righteousnesse considered as well in the distinct Branches and Parts thereof as in its full extent and comprehensivenesse together with the discovery thereby of that which is counterfeit hypocritical or otherwise defective THe summe of what we have beene Treating of in the preceding Chapters that concerne the Work and Rule of Christ whether in the Natural Legal or savingly beleeving Conscience as also the Saints conformity with Christ in his death the discovery wherof this chapter had immediately and more orderly succeeded but that I was unexpectedly prevented in it by the Presse may very well be reduced unto the two general termes of Mortification and Vivification or of our dying unto sin and living unto righteousnesse Rom. 6. and this according to the kind and measure of Grace received whether common or special temporary or everlasting For in what ever conscience Christ works and gains so farre reception as to be hearkened unto and obeyed in the Voice or Ministery he holds forth himself by whether upon the termes of the first or second Covenant the necessary consequent thereof is a departing from sin and an eschewing of evil as saith the Scripture Rom. 6. 16. Know ye not that to whom ye yeeld your selves servants to obey his servants ye are to whom ye obey whether of sinne unto death or of obedience unto righteousnesse so as the service and obedience ye yeeld unto the one frees and delivers you from the subjection ye were held in unto the other For those that are servants of sinne are free from righteousnesse or dead to it as on the contrary those that are servants unto righteousnesse obeying from the heart the teachings of Christ in any of his Three-fold dispensations before mentioned are free from sinne and become dead unto it according to the Law they are under or the manner of the working thereof in several measures and degrees experienced in any such conscience Now that which we are to understand by righteousnesse whose servants we ought to be and whereunto we are to yeeld our subjection is the Image of God formed and set up in the second Adam or Person of the Mediator propounding it self to be received and entertained by man since the Fall upon the foundation of a new entercourse and converse betweene God and Men which he hath obtained freely through his owne blood shed as a ransome for all whereby also the natural conscience is purged from dead works and fitted againe for the service of theliving God This Image of God consisting in righteousnesse and true holinesse hath power as it lives and dwells in Christ to dispence and give the communication of it self in part or in whole according to the nature of the Ministery and the manner of administration by which it is conveighed into the heart and conscience So as if this Image of God be but as the Word and Voice of God in the mouth only of servants whether Angels or Men unaccompanied with the personal presence of the Sonne himself it hath one kind of operation and effect intimated Esay 40. 3 4 5. by that Voice of the Lord or Word of God in the mouth of servants only Crying in the Wildernesse-condition of mans corrupt nature and degenerate state as he is dead in trespasses and sinnes Prepare ye the way of the Lord make streight in the desert a high way for our God and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together declaring herein this preparatory dispensation which tends and leads unto Christ in his first appearance as he is God manifested in flesh in which respect it is that all flesh can see him together for as to his second appearance he dwells in that light and immortality which no flesh can approach unto which no man hath seen or can see as he is a meer natural man This forerunning Ministery unto Christ we may also take notice of Luke 10. 1. After these things the Lord appointed other seventy and sent them two by two before his face into every City and place whither he himself would come saying unto
the one hand and the other upon distinct accounts are to be reputed enemies to the TRUTH in the Spirit and Power thereof as is at large set forth 1 Tim. 1. the first of which are also meant and described 1 Tim. 4. 1. where they are said to be those that are departed from the Faith through giving heed unto seducing spirits and to inspirations of devils in those transformed Ministers of Satan 2 Cor. 11. 15. who labour to vent the doctrines of devils such as devils either are authors or objects of through whose Ministery they come to have itching ears formed in them 2 Tim. 4. 3. ready to hearken to all that the Serpent transformed into an Angel of light presents to them by way of instruction and under colour of divine inspiration as taking upon him the Prophetical office of Christ and thereby undertaking to carry them forward to what is more spiritual and to heighten them in their experiences of what SPIRIT and POWER is In this very way he offered to impose upon and deceive if it had been possible Christ himself when perceiving that all the literal Religion and legal worship of the Jewes would not hold him but lay short of his light he shewed him all the Kingdomes of the world and the glory of them the utmost creaturely perfection or natural glory which he was able to give the prospect and representation of in his own Angelical nature being of that highest rank of creatures in the whole first Creation and that in a moment or the twinkling of an eye saying All these will I give thee or make thee to live in if thou wilt fall down and worship me This temptation then which Christ resisted these seduced ones fall under and are snared and taken with to the making of them love and believe a lie and to yield up themselves in a fixednesse of service duty and love unto this false spirit as unto Christ the true Prophet And the better to induce them hereunto and strengthen them in the beliefe of a lie Satan in this his coming as an Angel of light is accompanied with power with signes and lying wonders acting the part of a great friend and favourer of all that is spiritual heavenly and high not opposing at all their having the understanding of all mysteries and all knowledge yea or their having of all faith to the working of miracles or removing of mountaines their speaking with the tongues of men and Angels but unto all these attainments he is conducing as much as in him lies in all deceivablenesse of unrighteousnesse to serve his designes by gaining the greater credit and authority hereby in their hearts and affections and so the more unperceivably beguiling and winding them over into the belief of a lie and that in a point of highest concernment unto them prevailing with them to receive him in their love and affection even that adulterous spirit and deceiver of the Nations in this his Angelical brightnesse instead of Christ himselfe THE SPIRIT OF TRUTH and SON OF THE LIVING GOD and that considered as shining forth in the glory of his SECOND COMING In consequence hereof he makes them to resigne up all the powers and operations of their minde absolutely into his hands in obedience to his dictates and inspirations upon which they hold themselves obliged to be alwayes waiting in the posture of passive silence in a Counterfeit imitation of the true conformity unto Christ in his death and resurrection So then by this meanes the Devill is found sitting in the Temple of God as God to the apprehension of those who thus possesse him or if you will whom he thus possesses as also to the imagination of others their deluded proselytes where he is opposing and Exalting himselfe above all that is called God And as in former times by JANNES and JAMBRES he withstood Moses through a lively and skilful imitation of his works and miracles so in the latter dayes by such instruments of his as these he shall resist the TRUTH to the causing of many to stumble and be offended thereat for the resemblance sake which this false spirit is able to forme of it Which false and counterfeit appearance of his as we have said the Scripture sets forth and describes under these two heads MORTIFICATION and VIVIFICATION with a Character of Condemnation upon them in the very description made of them Such mortification is spoken of 2 Tim 2. 17. in the case of HYMENEUS and PHILETUS whose word is there said to eate like a canker Intimating what kinde of mortification the word by them ministered did produce even such a one as is caused in the body by cancerous humors carrying certaine mortality in it if not timely prevented not being a mortification in order to health and life but unto unsoundnesse and death These teachers with their followers are men of corrupt and unchast mindes towards the true Lord and husband under all their abstinence and seeming mortification Againe 1 Tim. 4. 2. this mortification is called the searing of the conscience with a hot iron importing the dead and insensible frame which thereby is brought upon the minde to any other delight love or desire save only towards this false spirit with whom it is as it were bewitched to the contracting a spiritual benummednesse and coldnesse to all other lovers whatsoever to the world and all seen things or bodily objects answering unto the lust of the flesh the lust of the eye and the pride of sensual life yea and also to Christ himself the true and living God so as to become past feeling in the case of any checks accusations or reproofs from the SPIRIT OF TRUTH in order to a totall and full resignation of themselves up to the dictates inspirations and commands of this false and seducing spirit In this sense and on this account we may finde men giving their bodies to be burned 1 Cor 13. 3. yielding up themselves to be deprived of all their natural or sensual comforts yea many times the most lawful of them thereby offering themselves up as in sacrifice unto these satanical flames wherein they are in danger to be everlastingly burning as in a fire that can never be quenched For this searing of their conscience as with a hot yron is but the first fruits in these SONS OF PERDITION of that resurrection into everlasting contempt designed unto such VESSELS OF DISHONOUR as on the other hand the true mortification and resigning up of the natural will and desire to Christ is the first fruits in the true SONS OF GOD of their resurrection into everlasting life This sinne of their under the Gospel as it is more spiritual seems to be pointed out to us by that sinne under the Law committed by those that offered up their children to Molech causing their sons and their daughters to passe through that material fire and to yield up their very bodies in the most literal outward sense and acceptation to be burned in
formes through counterfeit resemblances unto TRUTH to beguile and mislead unstable souls and is daily detected and discovered under all professions or visible formes of Saintship whether more or lesse refined whether earthly and sensual or heavenly and Angelical Hereof there are in these dayes of ours but too many living instances who as Lots wife are turned into Monuments of Gods righteous judgment declared upon them for the admonition of others And that we may not leave this subject without endeavouring to contribute some assistance towards the resolving of that great Question how the true Spirit may with certainty and infallibility be known and distinguished from the false I shall briefly recommend to consideration as conducible to the discovery hereof these following particulars The Spirit of TRUTH is evidently and infallibly distinguished from the spirit of lies and falshood three several wayes by which we may make a trial and judgement of the spirits whether they be of God or no. First by the evidence and witnesse which is given of it by the three that bear witnesse in heaven where the Spirit of TRUTH shines forth in its supreme original light and self-evidence as we have at large shewed in the first and second Chapters Secondly by the Record and witnesse that the Sonne or Christ the true Spirit gives of himself in his flesh or humane nature causing the truth to shine forth in the face of Jesus opening what he is and what he did by coming in the flesh suffering and rising againe according to the Scriptures which 1 John 5. 6. is rendred thus This is he that came by water and blood even Jesus Christ not by water only but by water and blood and it is the Spirit that heareth witnesse because the Spirit is truth even the witnesse shining forth in his Spirit and person who whether considered as being and subsisting in the WORD OF LIFE before his being made flesh or considered as after his coming in the flesh living dying and rising againe hath a witnesse born of him in heaven by the FATHER WORD and SPIRIT which Three are one and also in earth by the SPIRIT WATER BLOOD declaring themselves in and upon him as he was found in the fashion and habit of a man which agree in one Thus in the same person we have the greater witnesse which is the witnesse of God or of Christ as he is God and the lesser witnesse which is the witnesse of man or of Christ as he is the Son of man and in both these considered also as testified unto by the Scriptures we have the compleat witnesse which God hath testified of his Son By reason hereof 't is said 1 Joh. 2. 12. Who is a liar but he that denies Jesus is the Christ He is Antichrist that denieth the Father and the Son Whosoever denies the Son the same hath not the Father Whosoever sees not nor acknowledges the TRUTH as witnessed and shining forth in the face of Jesus the Son of man with those that are rightly admitted to serve in the first Sanctuary among the many that are called can much lesse behold it as witnessed and held forth in the brightnesse of Gods face or of the blessed Trinity with those who are culled out of the former and rightly admitted into the holiest of all among the few that are chosen By both these witnesses and records in harmony with the outward Word we do come to know him that is true as the right and whole object whereon through faith we are to fix our eye in the proper forme character and distinction which he gives of himself from all idols or counterfeit appearances of him whatsoever The third or last witnesse which is given us of the true Spirit is that which immediately and necessarily flows from his indwelling presence in our hearts growing up there more and more unto a perfect day by working out in the conscience and spirit of the beleever a confōrmity unto Christ in his death and resurrection causing a dying to sinne and a living unto righteousnesse in the full extent of both as we have opened For if any man have not the Spirit of Christ he is none of his and if Christ be in you the body is dead because of sinne but the Spirit is life because of righteousnesse Examine therefore your selves whether ye be in the Faith know ye not your owne selves how that Jesus Christ is in you except ye be Reprobate And If the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead awell in you he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortall bodies by his Spirit that dwellesh in you and so the Spirit it-selfe comes evidently and infallibly to witnesse with our spirits that we are the children of God as having this Spirit of Adoption poured into our hearts for if we be adopted children then we know we are heires heires of God and joynt heires with Christ if so be we suffer with him that we may also be glorified with him And though we are now Sonnes so as it doth not yet appeare what we shall be when we come to the stature of perfect men in Christ Jesus at the full manifestation of the sonnes of God yet now we know that we shall then be like him and that we shall then see him as he is yea by faith we now see him who is invisible Heb. 11. 27. and by this knowledge we have of him in the mean time we come to see and experience him that is true and that we are in him that is true even the true God and eternal life having the witnesse in our selves through that holy anointing which is TRUTH and no lie teaching us of all things and abiding in us as a seed to preserve us from the evil and snare of all false and seducing spirits Abide therefore in him that when he shall appear we may have confidence and not be ashamed before him at his coming These things I have written unto you concerning them that seduce you CHAP. XXI Shewing particularly the evil seed that is sowen in the natural conscience by Satan through which he works men off from their subjection to Christ in his first dispensation and fixes them in rebellion against him HAving already in general laid open the methods of Satan the weapons of his warfare together with the diligent and skilful prosecution of his designes upon mankind to seduce them work them off and forever deteine them from their duty and faithfulnesse unto Christ their true Husband and Lord we shall come now in a more particular manner to shew how closse an attendant he is upon the foregoing works of Christ in the hearts and consciences of men considered under the former dispensations walking about like a roaring Lion seeking whom he may devoure watching what he can find in such hearts that in the BEGINNING are Gods and Christs owne workmanship as hath beene shewed and trying whom he may corrupt from their first
purity and simplicity through the actings and lustings of their owne wills till he fix them at last in an unchangeable defection from and enmity against God that created them and Christ that bought them We shall here therefore declare what effect the power of Satan hath in the renewed natural consciences of men causing them to deteine the truth manifested in them in unrighteousnesse and rendering them unworthy either of keeping the good they have or of receiving any further or gre 〈…〉 by the blood of Christ who hath more grace and mercy in store for those that approve themselves faithful in the lesser measures committed to them For such is the long-suffering and forbearance which by Christs ransome is procured from God on the behalf of fallen man that he will have none to perish for want of meanes to be saved but does so provide for them according to the state they are in that all may if they will be led unto repentance and come to the knowledge of the TRVTH which the witnesse of God set up in them faithfully hearkened to will enable them to feele after but when it so comes to passe that in stead hereof they do abuse this good will of God towards them and through the impenitency and hardnesse of their hearts go on to despise and neglect the grace tendered to them then does God think fit to reveale his wrath from heaven against such ungodly and unrighteous men that hold the truth of God in unrighteousnesse accounting them unworthy of more favour who under all their receivings of the witnesse of TRUTH declaring it self in the work of their consciences and the protection and encouragement which in the practice of and conformity unto the same is afforded to them in this state from the wholesome and good impressions of the holy Angels as the benefit of their Ministery and charge do despise all this already shewed them being willing to be hardened by Satan and bid defiance thereunto walking on in wayes of unrighteousnesse highly provoking and displeasing unto God notwithstanding all the faithful dictates inward motions of light and impressions in their owne minds and consciences to the contrary of which number are they of the Nations Kindreds and Tongues throughout the whole world whether acquainted with the holy Scriptures and things contained in them or not being such as live without Law and perish without Law who being founded upon the principles of right reason or the common enlightning work of God in the conscience according to the measure and degree received do refuse to reteine the Truth thus manifesting it self in them in a way of righteous and holy operations and walkings according to the rule of that first dispensation and as taking pleasure in the contrary and preferring before it the corrupt conversation of the old Adam consisting in vanity foolish uncleannesse and noisome lusts do prosecute the same with all greedinesse till they come to be wholly alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them and affected by them because of the blindness of their hearts rendering them at last past all sense and feeling of the evil they commit being given up by God to this uncleannesse of spirit through the lusts of their owne hearts as the due reward unto their wilful disobedience that as they did not like to retaine God in their knowledge but rather chose to break with God so also he held it just to break with them and give them over to a reprobate mind to do things that were not convenient and to be filled with all unrighteousness fornication wickedness covetousness becoming full of envie murder debate deceit malignity whisperers back-biters haters of God despightful proud boasters inventers of evil things disobedient to parents without understanding Covenant-breakers without natural affection implacable unmerciful who knowing the judgement of God by that self-evidencing TRUTH with which all are enlightned more or lesse that come into the world do most wickedly and profanely imprison the workings thereof suppresse slight and reject all its motions and counsels declaring to them continually that they that do such things are worthy of death and going on in opposition and defiance thereof not only to do the same things that bring downe finally the wrath of God but take pleasure in them that do them Under this head of openly prophane persons what multitudes of subjects unto himself as their Lord and Ruler does the Prince of the aire gaine who works in these children of disobedience carrying them captive unto his owne will to accomplish his designes and maintaine his quarrel against all shew and appearance of godlinesse even in the very forme of it as well as the power and to render them in this corrupt interest of theirs the more formidable he embodies them as it were in one corrupt love and desire filling them with one common spirit of uncleannesse alienation and enmity to the life of God and godlinesse in any kind which influences them in all their operations whether considered as private persons in their actings betweene man and man or as publick persons in their Ministery of Rule and Government over one another according to the various formes and administrations thereof under which through Gods providence they are placed and become related to all which conspiring as it were together in one spirit and combined in one corrupt interest are as a universal Dominion and Rule which the god of this world maintains greatens and manages against Christ and his spiritual seed considered either under the first or second Covenant as a distinct jurisdiction of his owne keeping all that are under him in this sense as much as lies in his power without all appearance or influence of any other God but himself So as they are properly described in the Scriptures to be such as live without hope and without God in the world Therefore it is that this corrupt interest and prophane spirit considered as dispersed through the Nations Kindreds People and Tongues in the whole world is called the beast Rev. 13. which John saw coming out of the sea foaming out its owne filth in a way of open profanenesse having seven heads and ten hornes and upon his hornes ten crownes and upon his heads the name of blaspemy or evil speaking against godlinesse in any kind unto whom the Dragon gives his power and seat and great authority that is does so influence and advantage them in all their actings of Magistracy in the capacity of publick Persons and Rulers in order to render and keep them subservient to this corrupt interest that he gives them all manner of prosperity and successe in the exercise of all power and tyranny to the greatning and advantaging of themselves in the things of this life and of their worldly being who finding and experiencing the sweet of this gaine do shew themselves obedient and faithful in all their actings to the interest of the god of this world which they serve and are