Words in Season From that late Worthy Sufferer and Servant of the Lord Jesus an able Minister of the New-Testament according to that Character 2 Cor. 6.4 5 c. Mr. Abraham Cheare VIZ. I. Faith's Conquest over the Tortures and Tenders of an Hour of Temptation on Heb. 11.35 II. The Embalming of a Dead Cause on Mark 14.8 III. Remarkable Discourses on his Dying-Bed with Copies and Extracts of Letters on several occasions Useful for those whose Hearts are engaged to serve the Will of God in this Generation London Printed for Nathan Brookes in Bartholomew-Close 1668. The Publisher to the READER I Doubt not but the following Discourses carry so much evidence of Truth and Holiness as will sufficiently commend them to the Hearts and Consciences of the upright as proceeding from one who believed and therefore spake delivered what he received as a Scribe instructed unto the Kingdom of Heaven the Fear of the Lord being evidently his treasure wherein he walked all the day long and by which he was enabled to bear those hard things which a constant Spirit in keeping the Commandments of God and Faith of Jesus holding fast the Word and Works of God drew upon him bringing him into fellowship with tryals and sufferings upon the Wayes Truths Interest and People of the Lord in this Generation It may highly concern the living to lay to heart the removal of Prophets and holy Ones true mourners that sought to stand in the Gap to turn away wrath that it might not come to the utmost I am sure it hath a sad aspect when even a Professing but too much complying People stand as on the other side or at a distance from those who earnestly contend for the Faith holding fast what they have received and are far from right laying to heart That through the hatred of the world righteous men perish and merciful men are taken away I doubt not but there remains a remnant whose minds by such providences are deeply impressed well-nigh to over-whelming further than help is given and the hand stretched forth to lead to the Rock that is higher than we when in all parts and corners the beauty and glory is cutting off as a fading-flower and how hard is it to speak and do as becometh under such astonishing stroaks and with him Ezek. 24.18 to hold on doing as the Lord Commands I am perswaded that sigh often goes up Ezek. 11.13 with Amos 7.5 O Lord cease I beseech thee by whom shall Jacob arise for he is small The reviving and desired issues of that work falling under great distrusts even with those that are the Friends thereof when if I may allude to it Luke 24.19 c those who are as Prophets mighty in deed and word before God and all the People Instruments polished to carry it on to an expected end are cut off and laying aside daily so hard is it for us to understand that thus it ought to be that so the excellency of the power may be acknowledged to be of God and not of men that all may see his Work is perfect his Word is tryed with whom is no restraint for he sendeth by whom he will the residue of the Spirit being with him who will in due time raise up and furnish Instruments for every service and if at this time men think that by cutting off and wearing out Saints and faithful Ones their nest is set on high they shall be delivered from the power of evil none remaining to cry out of their violence and spoyl to detect the unrighteousness of their wayes and doings the very stone shall cry out of the Wall and the beam out of the Timber shall witness against them I humbly pray and wish that the cast-out scattered peeled people in whose heart is the Fear of the Lord under all amusing dispensations may yet increase in the Faith that stands in the Power of God and is of the operation of his Spirit in the exercise thereof which judgeth not after appearances they may understand all these deaths passing over persons and things but needful and preparatory for the Glory that is to follow when their filth and defilements by the Spirit of Judgment and by the Spirit of Burning shall be put away the slow progress of which work with the discovery made of so great a defection from professed Light and Principles ought greatly to be laid to heart how many by reason thereof turn from the Truth and are confirmed in Athiesm even by the deceitful working of those who in the failure of outward advantages and exposal to necessities bonds and death set themselves at such a distance from the works of God our eyes have seen the begining of fulfilling Prophesies Threatnings and Promises to the last dayes as if either there was no Holiness or Righteousness in them or that they were unacquainted with the inward Life and Spirit of them so deeply hath corruption the spirit of the world mingled it self with those who not long since in greatest seeming Light and Zeal professed to seek after a better state of things Even looking for and hastning to the new Heavens and new Earth wherein dwells Righteousness but the Works of God being forgotten no wonder his Word is so little believed or his counsel waited for It was a worthy Expostulation but a few years since before some then in the exercise of Authority of one who I fear hath out-lived the force of it which though large hoping it may be of use I take leave here to transcribe If you will be able to steer your Course a-right if you would take one streight step have in a readiness an acquaintance with the work of God what it is that he aims at by which you may be guided in all your undertakings Suppose now a man or men should come and ask of you What God hath done in these Nations What he hath wrought and effected What is brought forth Have you an answer in readiness Certainly God hath done so much as that he expects you should be able to give an account of it take heed that every one of you be not ready to speak the disquietments of your own Spirits and so cast contempt on the Work of God something else is required of you I have sometimes in darkness and under temptations my self begun to think that what hath been is the thing that is and there is no new thing under the Sun as it hath been among the Heathen of old so it hath been amongst us or as it was with Israel 1 King 16.21 22. Then were the people of Israel divided into two parts half of the people followed Tibni the son of Ginath to make him King and half followed Omri but the people that followed Omri prevailed against the people that followed Tibni the son of Ginath so Tibni died and Omri reigned That a common thing and frequent in the World had befaln us wherein God had no hand but that of common Providence in dashing
Eye and Ear witness and the God that hath hitherto kept us alive to this day cause all those clouds to flee away and bring out your soul yet more fully not only to find pitty from him to escape the snares that others are catcht in to their hurt but grant also that you may come forth as one of those Palm-bearers cloathed in white Rev. 7.9 as having gotten the victory over all Enemies and made to sing with grace in your heart as they vers 10. Salvation to our God which sits upon the Throne and to the Lamb. And the love extended by you to me unworthy and in me to my Lord and Captain of my Salvation Oh! that streams of Salvation may come forth if it be his blessed will from him to you so also make you a blessed pattern of Piety Purity and Stability for him whom I desire to serve in the Gospel His Sister asked Will you have some Cordial He said Oh! when shall I drink of that good new Wine in my Father's Kingdom In a morning his Friend asked him What of the Night He said It hath been a long Night But saith his Friend The Morning comes Yea said he as a snare on it comes stealing upon the world but the Children of the Day and of the Light that have on the Armour of Light shall have no cause to fear He Exhorted a good Woman that watched with him with all earnestness to close walking with the Lord. His Sister said to him I hope Brother as your Tribulations abound your Consolations abound He said It was a hard question Consolations being very inward deep things She then asked how he felt his Heart He replied I feel the fleshly parts declining apace but I trust the spiritual renewing But saying further to his Sister Come are you wiling to part with me yet She answered Yes in some measure she hoped she was considering his pains on the one hand and the glory that should follow Then said he Be careful I charge you to walk close with God in your generation and take heed of departing from his wayes but walk as becomes a Christian that would be found to his praise After this through extremity of pains the exercise of his Understanding was at seasons interrupted but very sensible and spiritual in his Intervals One asked him How it was with him He said Vnder great rebukes from the Land by reason of sin Saying I have been a wretched sinner have perverted my way and my walks with God have been short and formal But Oh! that it may go well with Israel in the latter dayes though I be as reprobate silver because the Lord hath rejected me It was told him If any man sin we have an Advocate with the Father Jesus Christ the Righteous who is the Propitiation for our sins Yea saith he through Faith in his Blood he is so and thither doth my soul flee He was also cautioned to take heed of casting away any his Confidence that hath great recompence of reward and of making a judgement of things in an hour of temptation and tribulation contrary to another judgement made and confirmed by the Lord again and again to him heretofore minding him how the Tempter waited such seasons to disturbe him and drive him from the strength he had laid up for him in Grace that is in Christ Jesus when Grace in us may be but at a low ebb Yea replyed he I would leave this Exhortation with you that when God bruises breaks treads down a poor soul and it lyes before him as ashamed and confounded and not able to open its mouth Oh! then to look up to the Lord for then will the Tempter be busie at such seasons for we are not ignorant of his devises but if God give another day and more strength I hope to speak more convincingly of these things The next day being asked How it was with him Whether all were clear within He said It was very tempestuous round about but yet the Lord is instructing and answering such a poor worm from the secret place of thunder And afterward sayes It will be better and there is hope in the end for all this And then broke out with admiration saying He is ever mindful of his Covenant Holy and Reverent is his Name he is a God near to those that fear him in the needful season Sometimes after one saying to him I hope you can yet say God is good and a strong hold in the day of trouble and knows them that trust in him Yes I can say so blessed be my God but not alike at all times can I say so but I remember the counsel and advise yesterday to wait on the Lord and keep his way and my place appointed me by God which I desire to do all the dayes of my appointed time till my change come though flesh and blood suggest this is hard work and would make haste out of it In the morning following being asked How is it now He said God had been at work closely with his Spirit in the three dayes past before this though this was left him for support That the foundation of God remains sure to all his sealed ones but sayes he I have been ready to say Why should I speak of sealed ones being such a one as might for mine iniquities be sealed up to a day of Wrath and be kept in chains of Darkness to the great day I have been so foolish to think my attainments were such as if I were got to the top and needed little more but the Lord hath laid Judgement to the Line and Righteousness to the Plummet and hath not only thrown down the high raised Structure but razed the very foundations of all fleshly glory and excellency and the Lord hath delivered his glory into Captivity and his strength into the Enemies hand yet hath not left me without hope I trust good hope in mercy that all notwithstanding shall issue well in the end But Oh! the reproach that I have brought on the Name of God! might that be done away by all I feel and suffer inward and outward I shall rejoyce In the After-noon the same day it was said to him I have observed by some hints from you That you have in these few dayes past had some exercises on your Spirit I would be glad to know whence and what they were and the way of God with you in them He replyed He had indeed some such exercise occasioned by close searches made in his soul about the clear and certain right and title it had to a substantial well-founded Interest in Christ which though sayes he I have mentioned heretofore to you and others what it was and how it was the Lord had begot and carried on in me and thought it had been above questions yet had I some doubts and fears renewed of a very ancient date about if not above thirty years ago with many miscarriages since to promote the same matter and this
complains So is there betwixt his heart and hand or as Christ tenderly excuseth it in his Disciples betwixt a Spirit that is willing and the Flesh that is weak Mat. 26.41 This is that the Apostle in the person of a poor Child of God complains Gal. 5.17 We cannot do the things we would And Rom. 7.15 to the 21. he finds a Law that when he would do good evil is present Here now is a Christians case and the comfort concerning his act when in all his apprehended shortness he finds a true gracious principle that delights in the Law of God and presseth after a perfect union with and a similitude to it groaning under and conflicting to his utmost with the contradictions of his infirm self where this is indeed and in truth obvious to the searching eye of Christ he puts that blessed construction on it as to his Disciples the Spirit indeed is willing c. and the Spirit testifieth 2 Cor. 8.12 That if there be first a willing mind it is accepted according to what a man hath and not according to what he hath not We serve not an hard Master that requires impossibilities or expects beyond what he hath inabled for He was judged a wicked and slothful Servant who had formed up that dreadful apprehension of a severe and cruel Master that reaped where he did not sow and gathered where he did not straw Mat. 25.24 26. We have a very choice character of the disposition of the Lord toward the off-spring of a willing mind Mark 12.42 to the end a Widow cast into the treasury two mites that make a farthing a very small and inconsiderable thing for the bulk of it but being the product of a noble mind and being extended to all that ever she had she had done all what she could and this hath more acceptable entertainment and high commendation than the many rich who cast in much of their abundance they might have comparatively to her narrow spirits though they had larger Pursses Hence was the commendation of the Churches of Macedonia 2 Cor. 8.2 3. The deep poverty was matched with abounding riches of liberality and then to their power and beyond their power they were willing of their own selevs and that was on this principle vers 5. First they gave their own selves to the Lord and to us by the will of God Souls yielded up to the Lord are the only generous spirits The greatness of Davids joy 1 Chron. 29.14 17 18. was not so much for the greatness of the gift but the willingness and uprightness of the heart his own and others that drew them out to do what they could for the House of God But a little more particularly to attempt the resolution of this enquiry When a soul may be said to do what he can for Christ 1. First We only then do what we can when our spirits are bending and pressing toward an abundance and increase of act according as we find the concernments of Christ about which we are conversant requires or needs it when as we see the distress of it increase there grows upon us daily the care of these concerns as we see the dayes are evil wicked men worse and worse and good men faint and weary we then lay about us What excellent thing do we can we do what do we more than others It s the guise of many Professors when they see Christs things go to the Wall as we say then to study Prudence and Wisdom things good in themselves and in their place but what do they signifie here but a meer politick contrivance how to preserve themselves by an abatement of their zeal a temperament and qualification of the height and strickness of their Profession the disposition of such tends this way they will do as little as they can for Christ They hope they may be saved if they meet not so often nor so publick nor so many as formerly until at length their prudence will be to leave Christ alone and repair to and care for their own things Nay it will be well if it turn not them aside to their crooked wayes where God hath threatned to lead them forth with the workers of iniquity Oh! where are those stirrings of spirit when we see a City a Nation wholly given to Idolatry ingageing the more publick frequent and fervent appearing on Gods behalf Acts 17.16 That would have entred into the Theatre had he been suffered Acts 19.13 31. That when the Decree is signed of death without mercy yet will keep on not only Moral but Instituted Worship to the utmost as aforetime Dan. 6.10 Rashness is not here pleaded for but a zeal of God according to knowledge and an holy fervency of spirit serving the Lord rejoycing in Hope patient in Tribulation continuing instant in Prayer not forsaking the assembling our selves though the manner of some be so but exhort one another daily while it is day provoking to Love and good Works and that so much the more as we see the dayes be evil and that day approacheth 2. Secondly We then do what we can when we make it our care and business to get our spirits and frames in all we do raised on more noble principles than formerly Gospel-principles are not revealed to us or improved by us to their height at first The Righteousness of God is revealed from Faith to Faith Rom. 1.17 Who walk by it from strength to strength Psal 84.7 And are changed from glory to Glory 2 Cor. 3.18 They that rest in and trust to former Attainments and Experiences will find them short of furnishing for new services of Sufferings We have need in these thorny and rocky paths to have our shoos of iron and brass and as the day is so should our strength be Deut. 33.25 We have need not only to prefer that request Lord help our unbelief but also Lord increase our Faith 3. Thirdly We do what we can then when we improve our utmost interest in others Saints and Sinners do ingage them to do what they can for Christ when the distress is publick and extended to others generally it should not satisfie our spirits to narrow up our care and endeavour within the compass of our own things It was a sad complaint All seek their own Phil. 2.21 Ye shall be scattered every one to his own Joh. 16.32 This good Woman in the Text doth not satisfie her self to make preparation for the embalming her dear Lord but she is still found accompanying and ingaging others with her Luke 23.55 56. chap. 24.10 Our forwardness and zeal as was theirs of Macedonia which provoked very many 2 Cor. 9.2 Alas we are debtors to others both Saints and Sinners Rom. 1.14 15. And we should do as much as lies in us to get them engaged to Christ as debtors to him chap. 8.12 Oh! did the worth and need of souls press more upon us we should not be so private spirited as we seem to be in
gives Power to the faint and our strength is in the Name of the Lord that made Heaven and Earth who doth and will do much by Babes wherefore say not I am a Babe a Child c. but rather say Here am I send me that God who was Jacob's God who fed and led him all his life long he hath been and is the God of the Seed of Jacob to this day that hath led us thus far also through a vast howling Wilderness and sustained us and not suffered us to deny his Name Oh this God is our God let him be our guide even unto death The Fathers that were before us alas what were they and the Prophets do they live for ever no they were weak as we and died as must we but when the Lord had work for them to do he gave Anointing for it and then they could say they were full of Might and Power by the Spirit of the Lord to shew Israel their transgression and the House of Jacob their sin So we through Christ can do all things he strengthning us Look then to the Lord that gave the former rain and will give the latter also in its season according to his Power And my dear Brother Be not discouraged your work seems cutting short also day by day by many things though what you may live to see or suffer I know not neither do I know how meet it may be to mind you of a motion I made to you about two years since on the like occasion about remembring the poor Flock I have travelled and laboured amongst if God cast your lot in these parts but hoping you will mind what may be your Duty in this matter I shall say no more but the Will of the Lord be done be of good courage and God shall strengthen your hearts His Sister was troubled seeing him so weak which occasioned him to say Oh! be ashamed Sister of such a demeanor cannot you let a poor Believer go to Heaven Oh! did you but stand on the threshold and see what preparations God hath made for such a poor worm as I am you would never be afraid of Death more Oh! honour Christ much I think he is coming near to honour me though I know not yet that my Sentence is come out from him yet I speak not as if I had hankering thoughts to stay Oh! when shall I see the day We shall sing at parting and not mourn as now blessed be God for ever that he hath not let the Righteous to be ashamed nor Wicked men to triumph over them for my sake Ah! did they know what God hath pardoned in me they might be apt to triumph more than now they can If there seems any importunity from any Friends for any thing to be mentioned of me when I am gone speak moderately of me I beseech you but if any thing hath been seen in me worth learning let it be offered with much humility or rather I think let my Works praise me in the Gate but I limit not His Sister asked Will you drink Yea Sister saith he Have you any of the best spiced Wine He then grew faint and could speak no more at that time Afterwards being asked how he did He said All his bones were as it were out of joynt And added God hath reserved this Proof of my Ministry viz. in much painfulness until these few years last past having been little acquainted with Sickness before He then asked If it were day A Friend answered The night was far spent the day was at hand even a morning without clouds to which you seem hastening To which he replied Yes as a very clear shining after rain Being asked a while after How he did He with his eyes lifted up answered Nevertheless I am still with him he holds my soul in life will guide me by his Counsel and afterward receive me up to Glory A Friend that dwelt upon the place coming to him and speaking Religiously He replied There was much talk of Religion in the World but few had attained to acquaintance with the powerful inward part of it and then minded that much of the power of Religion indeed was comprehended in that word Phil. 1.21 For me to live is Christ not only to live on or to Christ but to live Christ in all we speak or act is a high work Lord let my soul saith he into the sight and joy of it yet more and more The same person enquiring of him How it was with him in this hour He said Blessed be God he hath washed away my sins and spoke peace to my soul and thereby obliged me to follow him while I live and much more to go to him when I die Then said O Father shall I not now go hence but return into a world of so many snares and dangers again And further tells the Person aforesaid That he was very sensible of great respects received from her and her Relation And said For a full recompence to you all I desire when ever you come to such an hour as I am now approaching to you may meet with the same Comforts that through Grace I now find A Brother coming from far a day or two after to visit him being brought in suddenly upon him seemed a little displeased saying His Spirit was not now able to bear any sudden thing without over-setting That Brother asking him how he did He answered Never better in my life But adds Think it not to be passion or words of distraction for though I am very weak in body yet God is very near to me He also then said to a Friend sitting by on the occasion of turning in his bed by reason of weariness Ah! this is not our rest it is polluted but there remains a rest to the People of the Lord and his rest shall be glorious After this he had a day or two that seemed to be hopeful to his Recovery in which season little was said to him or by him being desirous to let his spirits rest from exercise in order thereunto if so were the Will of the Lord. But his Pains returning and a Friend asking how he did He answered It had been a night of exercise to him inward and outward To which it was answered That exercises were appointed by the Lord both for body and spirit but how are you sustained under them To which he answered I am graciously born up still and kept in peace under all Being asked if he had yet any hint how the Lord might do with him as to this dispensation he was now under as to life or death He replied He had nothing in that matter he could call divine teaching but by laying all circumstances within his view in the present case together he thought he must go hence at which poor flesh was ready to shrink and murmur It was answered That must and would do so while in its present being it naturally seeking self-preservation and avoyding and shrinking at
that which threatens its destruction and it must needs be irksom to it to be following God in wayes it knows not whence they come or whither they lead but yet notwithstanding it must be brought down for a corn of Wheat cast into the ground is not quickned except it die and so in this case precedent to the quickning that is to be brought out on the proper subjects of it Death in one respect or other must be brought on upon all fleshly glory and excellency even in its perfection Whereunto he replied Yes it must so for unless it die it remains alone and cannot be brought out in its glorious state of the manifestation of the sons of God but by cracking the shell of this earthly tabernacle and so coming out to it A Friend coming to have felt his Pulse He said I have not askt your observations in my case it may be thought possibly it might adde some impressions of hopes or fears if I should know what it is The Friend replied His Observations in such cases vere not very material to acquaint him with but saith the Friend What are your own Observations in the case He answered His Hope was on high yet Flesh he found hankering in his Musings at some seasons suggesting there was much desirable work to do some of one sort some of another at this and the other place making him ready to desire to stay and loth to be gone but when looking up and considering the state of things then he is made to say to his soul Oh! haste away to thy Mountain And Oh! that I had wings as a Dove then would I flee away and be at rest I would not live alwayes and am ready to say sometimes as he Take me away for thou knowest my dayes that they are vanity But Oh! I am much more cumbred on the other hand with crying How long Lord And sometimes am ready to wish an end which way ever it be by recovery or death To which it was told him That argued him a man Yes said he a poor man It was told him again All our Poverty Weakness and Unworthiness in the day approaching shall but make matter for a song the more to the praise of rich Grace and Mercy in the Lord 's remembring us in our low estate because his Mercy endureth for ever On the same day in the afternoon a Friend asking him how he did He answered Coveting to overcome referring to a word had been spoken that day in the Family from Rev. 2.26 of which one had given him some account It was replied to him That was a good work and good in it to be eying him that had overcome by whom only we can be helpt to overcome He replied Yes to be able to say I have fought a good fight I have kept the Faith is a great word and work And further said He had had his reflections and he thought some injections also that day of his neglects of service for the Lord that he might better have improved in times past though in the main the Testimony I have born to Christ in my day is a quieting comforting Consideration through the blood of Christ though not the bottoming Consideration on which my peace is built yet 't is of great use in a secondary sort at such a season and I mention it to you that you may do much suffer much shrink not nor neglect no work for God it will be no grief of heart to any that have spent and been spent for God his Name and Interest for dayes to come Being verâ— ill and in the apprehensions of those about him like to leave them he was asked Had he any further word to them or any of the Lord's People before he left them To which he answered I have spoken to you and them already the whole Counsel of God according to what I have received and was under no temptation to keep back any thing through fraud I cannot now speak much and if I could unless the great Remembrancer set home with Power and Efficacy what is spoken upon our minds and spirits it will signifie but little and to add many words would be but a vanity but for you and them and all Saints I pray that you may abide with God and never be ashamed or tempted with fear or cowardize or unbecoming complyances with base Earthly Worldly Interests to let go your holdfast on any Truth you have professed as Truth is in Jesus I have delivered to that poor Church I appertain unto the Doctrine of a Free Gospel of Grace wherein a foundation is laid in the blood of Jesus of Peace with God through him and they also have witâ— hands lift up to the most High professedly accepted 〈◊〉 that Grace tendred to them and I being I think about to leave Earth and to go to my Father and give 〈◊〉 account of my Stewardship therein I do go in fâ—â— assurance that it is the true Grace of God wherein they stand and I do lay it before them with the utmost ability such a poor worm as I can do that they be not by Doctrine Word nor Spirit soon shaken from their stedfastness hither or thither for life or salvation but as they have been taught He farther said I also have been engaged in a witness to the Royal Soveraignty of Christ in his Institutions against the Inventions of men opposed thereunto which Testimony hath been born up against blindness and ignorance in a poor dark world that lies in ignorance and wickedness and their Testimony in fellowship with this of mine hath flourisht in former dayes under those more promising propitious Prospects we were then encompest and encouraged with it had then by them and others Hosanna's ascribed to it but since God hath seen good to try this Testimony and Spirits of such as profess it with a day of adversity that many looked not for and they have hereby been tempted basely and unworthily to throw away the Shield as if it never had been anointed the thoughts whereof hath many times almost broken my heart in pieces But let all such know I go away in this firm perswasion as to the things we have together professed as aforesaid that they are the true sayings of God and that such as in this hour of temptation have deserted their Profession of â—hem God will meet with all such if he love them to â—waken and recover them from such paths and postures â—f back-sliding or else to make them know to their â—hame and confusion of face that they have dealt disâ—onourably with Christ and his Concerns and dangerâ—usly with their own souls which I desire they may â—nd Mercy to repent unfeignedly of before it be too â—ate I have been also concerned in a Testimony with divers Churches as to a work God hath had on the wheel among us in our dayes very mysterious in many parts of it there have also many tryals been upon it and to try it and to
all they are apt to trust in of a fleshly carnal kind 2 Cor. 1.9 Again that day a Friend asking how he did He replyed Heavy heavy It was told him Earth would be so Yea saith he and the Sand weighty but the New Heavens and New Earth will not be so their make will be of a more transcendent nature by reason of the Spirit of Holiness and Righteousness that shall dwell in them It was answered Yes In those dayes the Righteous shall flourish Whereunto he quickly replied That the Righteous had their day a day that might be properly called theirs in which they should in some sort flourish But said he it 's said in his day entitling it to Christ principally the Righteous shall flourish Christ shall have a day for it in the world Being asked What think you shall you be returned to us again or not He said Truly he knew not what to think in that matter and when all thoughts about it were made it was hardly worth a serious consideration in regard of their uncertainty and the little of Christian concernment in such kind of knowledge for though sometimes it were very grateful to Flesh and Blood to be able to say hereby shall it be known I am a man of God by my coming to such a place or doing such a thing at such a season yet when Paul went bound in Spirit to Jerusalem under fullest gales that ever he went he must not know what must betide him there Acts 20.22 nor whether God would be glorified in him by life or death A Clyster being ministred that day which wrought not it was asked How he did He said Hastening home now apace What makes you think so sayes the Friend Why saies he the Lord hath usually made it his way with me when he works me up to settled perswasions of things they have usually come to pass accordingly now having had Clysters and such means administred that have wrought with my poor body long even to admiration but now it ceases to do so and all passages seem stopt for evacuation of the humors lodged in my body I conclude he intends to take me away It was told him It was but one Clyster had so miscarried with him another might operate and that such a conclusion could not well be drawn from no better premises than that Then he added God hath been many wayes bringing me to an acquiescence in his Will as to such an issue he seems to be putting and hath likewise been for this week or more taking you off from glorying in the flesh of such a poor creature any longer by bringing this poor body under such straightning circumstances as may make you all willing to part with me rather than to be continued under such sore pains to me as well as trouble to you that so you might let me go and he having dealt thus with me and also spoke and continueth to speak peace to my soul I am upon the whole perswaded I shall leave you and am helped to say in that matter The Will of the Lord be done The same day a Friend asking him How he did He said I am labouring that whether present or absent I may be accepted of the Lord. His Friend answered It became him to be so labouring eying him whose Soul hath travelled and laboured that such poor ones as we might be accepted and through whom God hath graciously witnessed his acceptance of you and also of your witness-bearing unto him in this your present suffering state not only from men but his own hand likewise as I am fully perswaded Then he groaned and said Alas this poor weak weary body To which his Friend replied It was made poor in order to enriching and seemed to be uncloathed in order to be cloathed upon with his house from Heaven There he fetch'd a deep sigh and said Ah! if in this life only I had hope in Christ I were of all men most miserable To which it was answered Blessed be God for that well-grounded hope in Christ for a better life even that hope that is as an Anchor sure and stedfast cast within the Vail where our Fore-runner is for us entred Yea said he that better hope by which we draw nigh unto God And bid him be of good chear Rest would be more sweet to him when he entered into it by all the toyle he met with in the way Then he groaned and said He was groaning after Liberty Yea saith his Friend a Liberty that tarrieth not for man nor waits for the sons of men No sayes he it is as a dew from the Lord 't is a glorious liberty On the same day attempting to repose A Friend seeing him very ill said Oh! my dear Brother Must we part He said Yes he thought so though it may be but for a little time to meet again with more advantage But said the Friend Alas how dark are the Providences still taking away the best and leaving the poorest and neediest for the day and duties of it To whom he answered Lay not much stress upon that the work is not yours but Gods he will provide only will vary his methods as pleases him look therefore to him and those that are with you Heb. 12.22 He then asked a Friends advice about some Physical administrations whereto was replied Oh! my dear Brother you know my weakness to advise in any case and much more in these I so little understand that should you practise any thing as my advice in competition with others and miscarry in â—t I should not be able to stand under it though I have this witness with me that the best advice I have I would gladly give and were it better I would more readily give it in any case but my weakness every way is not unknown to you He replied It might not be meet for us to speak of each other what might otherwise be said having both our fears each way lest we should speak more than is meet but he hoped we had both our witness in that matter since our coming together and that we have carried it to each other in uprightness of Spirit and truth of Affection for which we had both occasion to bless the Lord for favour therein afforded and for advice desired in the case propounded he should not further put any such burden upon him To another Friend about him He said Alas what care is there generally and particularly among persons to conform to the fashions of the world But Oh! let our eyes be upon Jesus in opposition thereunto and in that path of the Lord the God of Love and Peace shall be with us Then breaking out into holy Admonitions on that word 1 Cor. 2.9 of the greatâ—ess which Eye had not seen Ear heard nor had enâ—ered into the Heart of man to conceive And said Oh! as you love your souls press press on and after it with all your might and keep close to the Lord and his paths in pursuit
coming in a time of such weakness and when by the working of my Spleen which sent up dark and disturbing vapours clouding my imagination and made sore work within but the Lord made me see much of my own fleshly gloryings as also others in me and in my flesh which God would take down in this day of tryal when every ones work must he tryed of what sort it is even by fire and truly I was made to see to my shame much hypocrisie and formality in my converse with the Lord in one respect or other and that the Practical part of Religion I had yet arrived to little acquaintance with to what I had in dayes past but this brought me in the issue to see that I was what I was that was good only by grace and no room for flesh to glory but was brought through grace to experience this Truth that when I am weak then am I strong and that however it be yet the Lord forgetteth not his poor nor despiseth not his prisoners this is a brief account of the Way God led me in in this matter and hath so issued it that I trust through grace I shall yet come to lay down my weary head and heart in the peace of Gods speaking that will keep and carry me to the end His Friend told him here somewhat of the danger of attempting such great works under such disadvantages as these seasons and circumstances he had in these dayes past been under for such works as these minding to him That every season was not a fit season for judgement especially to be calling in question things so long and often under more clear light and leadings confirmed formerly and however that be a great Truth that every day will yet more demonstrate that we are but yet Children in Christianity far short of that manly state of things to which the present dispensation of God both publick and personal have a proper and true tendency towards which more excellent way 't is our duty to be pressing yet so to be pressing towards it as to remember both how we have heard and received and hold fast the beginning of our confidences firm unto the end that so the Tempter get not advantage against us as he doth or may do against persons ignorant of his devices But he being still weak either to speak or hear more was not said but that he his Friend was glad to see the Lord had issued the matter so well to the Preventing the Tempters design and giving his poor Servants to see how great that mercy is of all the Saints and their concerns being in Gods hand when the strength of our own hands heads and hearts fails so frequently as they do yet he remains the same for ever and in such seasons secretly succours and supports and at last brings out into a wealthy place to his own praise and encouragement of the poor and needy to trust in him at all times In the morning supposing him drawing near his end a Friend was called to him who finding him discomposed again in his head and convulsive motions renewed with shortness of breath yet soon after asking how he did He said He was a wonder unto many by reason of the rebukes of God upon him but the Lord was and he hoped would be his strong refuge to the end His Friend told him He had made know himself to him as a strong hold in this day of trouble hitherto else he had sunk under his afflictions but to â—e kept up and carried on under such great long exâ—rcises justifying God still and blessing him in giâ—ing as well as taking spake much of divine support â—iven in Yea sayes he I would not only justifie but 〈◊〉 have great reason to glorifie God as the God of my â—alvation It was answered His present posture of submission and subjection to him as the Father of Spirits was a notable way of glorifying God in the fire and giving praise to him in the Isle of the Sea And after a little pause He added He had now but a few steps more to go which he desired the Lord would also so order as he might not be left to sin against him and blessed the Lord that he had given him and yet maintained such good hope through Grace in him that he was not and hoped he should not fear to follow him through the valley of the shadow of death to which he now seemed hastning A Friend coming to him and asking him How doth this honest Watch-man Honest Watch-man saith he hath much in it to be a Watchman indeed looking out for the morn as the Watchman of Ephraim that was with his God when other watchmen are as the Prophet is said to be Hosea 9.8 A snare of a Fowler in all their wayes and hatred in the house of their God as is too evident of the Watchmen of our day by reason of deep defilements found amongst them wherefore the day of the Watchman cometh yea maketh haste now shall be their perplexity and thâ— dayes of their visitations are come the dayes of recompences are come Israel shall know it for the Lord dispensations are now very swift Being asked How he had done to Night Hâ— said I laid me down to sleep and waked again 〈◊〉 the Lord sustained me and hath not made this night night of terror by affrightning dreams and imagâ— nations as sometimes but I seem to be going on as weary traveller his way Sometimes after being asked How he did Hâ— said A poor weak creature It was answered But trust in the Lord you have strength Yea said he blessed be God everlasting strength and they that indeed trust in him shall be as Mount Zion that cannot be moved but abideth for ever for as the Mountains are round about Jerusalem so is the Lord about his People for ever A Friend telling him There was an acquaintance of his come to see him who was going to Preach amongst the poor Saints abroad He wished him prosperity in that good work saying He never found cause to repent of any of his working dayes for Christ in his life-time At the same time one coming from far to visit him and telling him He had dear Remembrances from many Friends of his who in a way of supplication with humble submission were looking to the Lord the God of all Consolation concerning him and his case He replyed He is indeed the God of all Consolation of strong Consolations which were sealed up to his soul And then added I am very much affected with this surprising visit of yours And soon after said to â—he same Friend He had in the two Nights past been graciously led and let into the understanding of that Word Psal 37.37 Mark the perfect man and behold â—he upright the end of that man is peace So as he â—as never let into it in like manner before A Friend saying How doth my Brother He â—eplyed I cannot say of you as he of old
and execute Laws which have direct threatnings and a present tendency that way toward such as you who stand in a profession of Christ's which testifieth that their works are evil This rage hath already invaded and uncovered some Families among you and multitudes in other places and all such as will live godly in Christ Jesus must expect the like not as if some strange thing hapned to them and therefore should be in daily preparation to make and leave their own such as are instructed and have learned to trust in God and to own and improve a Relation for themselves in him according to their capacity which may make an abundant supply to this lack or loss of your company and society which will turn to their great blessing and help to your confident and comfortable surrendring them up to the Lord in a way of folâ—owing him whithersoever he goeth and may call â—r dispose of you 2. These are times in which a more than ordinary disadvantage and danger is designed to spoyl and destroy both Infants and Youth not only in respect of their Schooling which must be carried on by such Tutors and under such Rules as tend to tempt and subject them to suck-in the Principles of that Apostasie and misery that the former years have been delivered from or else can hardly make any procedure in Learning requisite to accomplish them But principally are they exceeding liable to danger and destruction if the Lord wonderfully prevent not by means of their unavoidable company and converse with other youths of their growth and degree the which generally is become everywhere so wanton wicked debauched through the looseness of the times and the countenance that all filthiness finds where it ought to be punished and restrained that unless your Children and Servants be through a blessing on your Prayers and Endeavours in-laid with good Principles in awakened Conscience followed with constant Instruction and an exemplary Conversation with a wise moderated steady discipline it will be a marvellous thing if thâ—y be not utterly spoiled become a scourge and torment to you and at length repent that ever they saw you and perish in the gain-sayings of this wicked and adulterous generation 3. The dayes that have passed over you havâ— been dayes of the Lord 's wonderful Salvations and the stretching forth of his Arm in these Nations to dâ— marvellous things toward the getting himself a glorious Name The putting away the remembrance oâ— which from under Heaven and razing out of all thâ— marks and monuments thereof is the manifest design of the wicked men of this generation The memory whereof as it alwayes ought to be dear to you who have been blessed in those Salvations and have sung his praise So should it be your great care to preserve the same by teaching and instructing those committed to your charge therein and that not only in the History and Letter of them the very memory whereof will be famous in the ages to come but especially in the inward Principles Springs and Spirit of them as well as the issues whereunto they were by the Lord intended that yours may be able to tell the generations to come and the people uncreated may praise the Lord. Which things your off-spring will only be capable to understand and sutably to comply with the Lords motions and designs therein when they shall be spiritually instructed in and experimentally acquainted with the way and operations of the Lord on the Spirits of his People to which your utmost diligence is indispensibly required as ever you would glorifie God in your generation 4. Moreover you generally profess your selves to be such as expect glorious dayes to succeed the deep tryals that are or are coming on upon the heritage of the Lord and do you not wish so well to your own as to do what in you lies that they should have a share in that Salvation which your selves have professed longed prayed laboured suffered for And how think you will they be capable of bearing that glory or suppose there be yet a reserve of tryals for them that are to usher it in which will be very full of power and purity unless they be indeed brought up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord instructed in Christ as the Truth is in him and from a fellowship in his Spirit brought within the compass of the rich and glorious Promises which shall manifest and convey the blessed things unto the Ages to come that instead of the Fathers may be the Children 5. Add hereunto that the force and violence of this evil time is such as doth drive you frequently and may yet be expected to drive you more from your stated seasons on the first dayes of the Week and other times of following the Lord in those solemn publick Appointments and Institutions of the Gospel unto your Family retirements at least a great part of your time in those dayes the which affords you more enlarged opportunities than you had formerly to teach and instruct your own houshoulds great and small according to their capacity in the things of the Kingdom to the which you are concerned to give all heed diligence and indeavour not in any neglect of opportunities in the Assemblies of the Saints while they do continue or may be had but when there is an interval the solemn exercises in the Church being ended or when through force and fury they shall if the Lord shall permit them to be so utterly broken as you should be reduced again to that ancient way of the Saints being governed as in Abrahams and the Patriarchs time in Family-Worship You are I say so much the more concerned to set your selves vigorously to this work of endeavouring that your houses may become as so many Churches of Christ in respect of that Instruction reading the Scriptures Praying gracious Conference Discipline exemplary Walking in all holy Conversation and Godliness which ought to be professed and maintained in beauty set in majesty among them and in this sense to be setting your houses in order for you know not how soon these very staves of beauty and bands may be violently invaded disturbed and broken by the same spirit of hatred which now offers force to your more solemn Assemblings While therefore you have this price in your hand this undisturbed opportunity you should be doing this good I hope I need not largely follow these with other Arguments which might be drawn out at length from the inestimable value of their immortal souls the redemption whereof is precious which now are committed to your care and over-sight and will be strictly required at your hands in the day of Accompts that draweth nigh and that the rather for that now is their making or marring time which effects you may expect will and frequently do follow according as you either are found in the due and diligent discharge of your duty among them or are negligent and remiss therein Little it is considered and laid
of the relation wherein the Lord hath placed me in his House wherein you and others look on me and expect much from me as yours intimates who am so unsutable to a door-keeper there lest while much weight depends on such a worm that Word be fully and justly verified Isa 22.25 and so of being reared up a Monument for a living end as was his Pillar 2 Sam. 18.18 I prove but an heap of Infamy vers 17. But over against these faintings when they have ran in as a flood I have hitherto found the Spirit of the Lord lifting up a Standard and displaying a Banner in his Fear by which a seasonable rescue hath been offered in a time of need And that by keeping me upon and now and than succeeding me in some measure in this Three-fold work which I doubt not but you have arrived to a good degree and great boldness in the Faith of First That I do not satisfie my self in any ordinary and slight Evidences of an Interest in eternal Love but press toward that full Assurance of Faith founded on the New-Covenant and universally influential on the New-Creature I speak not as if I had attained much but this is with me by the Grace of Christ my soul is so much the more engaged to press after the riches of full assurance of understanding a fellowship in the mystery of God the Father and of Christ as I see the dayes are evil the glimmerings whereof in that degree the Father sees good to intrust me withal have been an unspeakable stay to me against the fears of what man can do unto me and through your Prayers and the help of the Spirit of Jesus I hope will continue so to be unto the end the powers whereof both to peace against the fears of this day Rom. 8.31 to the end and to purging against the filth of it 2 Tim. 2.19 1 Joh. 3.3 I need not insist to shew you who your selves are taught it of God Job 36.22 2dly Another main work which I find of great necessity and advantage is the setting up in my soul the dominion of the Cross of Christ in a daily mortification through spiritual aid and arguments of the affections and lusts of the Flesh to every thing that may or must suffer loss in the expected fiery tryal whether it be either corruptible things as Silver and Gold any under-Christ enjoyments or corrupted corrupting things as is all the filthiness both of the Flesh and of the Spirit The entanglements of one or other of these is the snare which so easily besets most of those who in this day are contriving how much Truth they may possibly sell or at least expel for peace who seldome treat upon these terms but Satan makes his market on them we are not ignorant of his devices To be therefore mortified by time to thâ—se things is a very great part of our best Interest not only that in this sense our sins go aforehand to judgement that we may not be judged in them and for them with the World when the Lord comes out of his place to punish the inhabitants of the Earth and ariseth terribly to shake it but also that our pleasant pictures costly coverings and all our detectable things may be so crucified to us and we to them in the love of them that it may be no hard thing when the Lord calls for them to glorifie him to say to them Get ye hence What profit is there in my Blood If the Lord his Name Cause Testimony hath need of it what is that between us and him 3dly I also am brought into an experimental observation how much of moment is the spirit of a sound mind to have real substantial and digested principles and to be in union with them concerning that Cause for which we are at the point to be throughly tryed Whether that part of it that concerneth Worship or otherwise to have our Faith in such a day as this to be only founded in the wisdom of man our own or others short of the power of God to build another man's foundation or boast in another man's line of things made ready to our hand at a time when every man's work must be tryed and every man must bear his own burden and give such an accompt as this is of himself to God though the structure seem never so stately and to be founded on the highest resolution yet will that doom and out-cry sooner or latter attend it as did his Ax 2 Kings 6. And indeed as you observe backslidings at this time of day are very rarely and hardly repaired though I trust some will ere the door be shut Mat. 25.8 9 10. To have therefore our rejoycings in our selves and not in another Prov. 5.17 Gal. 6.4 is our great Interest That it may be your sweet portion is the prayer of him who being unexpectedly interrupted having nothing of moment to impart as tydings Rests Yours as ever To a Friend long kept close Prisoner under hard Circumstances and greater threatnings Everlasting joy upon your head while sorrow and sighing flee away Beloved and honoured by and for the Lord THis morning having obtained that mercy from the Lord of reading a Character of your heart drawn by your own hand wherewithal I and others were not a little refreshed and a safe hand presenting for the conveyance of this to you which I hope may reach you I thought my self providentially called and concerned to give you a testimony of my joy in the Grace of Christ which is engaged hitherto to uphold you with everlasting arms that neiâ—her the strength nor length of your Suffering is such to you as is accompted otherwise by you than â—ight and but for a moment being laid on the ballance with the Glory that is ready to be revealed in us In this way of reckoning while our eye is kept on invisible and eternal weights of Glory realizing and impropriating them Crowns of thorns are more easie and less dishonourable than at a distance they seem to be or than we sense and apprehend them while we are reasoning after the flesh Weights indeed they have and are and such as make the oppressed many times to groan earnestly none for the present being joyous but grievous and are tenderly thought upon by him who in all their afflictions is afflicted the Angel of whose presence also is with them but we know the End of the Lord and his Rest shall be glorious when his indignation ceaseth in their destruction but he rests in his Love and there also shall make the weary to rest I judge my self some-way rebuked from above and untaught what and how to pray as I ought if in any prayer of mine I forget the Sons of your noble Order and especially in seeking what you desire namely that you through the greatness of Faith may enter into rest and at this time of day while he hath taken business out of your hand he may the more abundantly
great Owner and Fraughter beyond their own Lives determine to stem the storm and press toward the Port unto which they are bound in the face of all difficulties and of these few Alas How rare is it that two keep in company with intents to strengthen and help each other as they can I need not make the Application particularly to spiritual things the day we live in gives sad evidence of the Truth of all these Instances and now the case being thus how desireable should it be to such who in disposition desire and endeavour are pressing forward to meet with good Neighbours who may keep company and yield if need be advice supply or assistance till we all come to drop Anchor within the Vale whither the Forerunner is for us entered If in this providential coming-up with one another it might be of any encouragement or advantage to you I could at large acquaint you That by the Grace of God I am what I am who have great occasion to exalt wonderful loving kindness that hath helped hitherto so as after five year imprisonment in more than five Prisons and in this last year above nine months sickness with divers tryals of Faith and Patience I have never yet seen the least reason I praise Christ my Lord never been under an hours temptation to relinquish or repent of my Testimony in Word or Deed to any one persecuted Truth of Christ for which I suffer and though my present lot be in a place where the salt sharp Air is manifestly ruinous to my health exposing me more than ever I was in my life to daily distempers and under a Sentence of Primunire and in a readiness on all occasions for threatned Transportation besides other threatning and straitning circumstances yet under all is Christ as precious to my soul as ever and so is his Cause Work and Institutions and faithful Children and every way as worthy of my All as I professed him to be in the greatest fulness or plenty of all things neither durst I for my life balk the least Truth of Jesus which is to be witnessed unto for the obtaining any health liberty or other accommodations whatever nor can I express the constant satisfaction and sometimes consolation that my soul is made to enjoy in following God especially when in my greatest sickness about this time twelve month and at other seasons when I have been ready to step into Eternity Thoughts and Pen cannot set forth the Peace passing understanding wherewith my soul was possessed in respect of the present Truths of Jesus Christ and his heart love to me therein which do to this day abide in their excellency and obligation engaging my soul to love and praise the Lord for his unspeakable gifts of Grace to me herein who have as fearful cowardly unbelieving slothful self-saving a poor heart as I think any poor Christian alive is pestred withal In the mention therefore of this or any part of it I would not be understood to intend the proposing my self to any high Thoughts that should be had of me as if I were better than others or had attained to any praise-worthy or exemplary degree of stedfastnest herein for I have much more to say in way of self-judging humbling and loathing before the Lord but my design in this liberty of speech is to engage you to a like freedom and to give you in part a Character how you may represent me to your self in your addresses before the Lord but principally that hereupon I may take occasion as from experience the more confidently and earnestly to beg you That you would be much in the searching and trying your heart and wayes examining to the bottom if that work have layen neglected as in too many it doth how it stands between the Lord and you in point of union and relation toward each other The dispensations that are over us are come to lay the Ax to the root of every Tree if the root be found to be rottenness the blossoms of an external Profession will go up like the dust Nothing short of true Interest in Jesus Christ laid in real Regeneration and the renewing of the holy Spirit will hold out to the end of this tryal to any purpose forms of Godliness will expose to man's wrath and where there wants the Power of it it will expose to Gods wrath whose fire is in Sion and his furnace in Jerusalem Nor will it suffice that Interest in it self in Christ be safe barely considered unless also Influences from him be obtained and Communion with him be improved unto a daily resignation to him and walking in the beauties of Holiness before him Any sinful shortness neglect abatements losses of this kind are very perilous in such a time as this it 's one to a thousand that is under decayes of this kind and proceeds in a path of it without early sense and repentance but that word is verified Men gather them they easily sink down into an earthly carnal sowre discontented fearful heartless posture of spirit and then are unable to make resistance to any temptation whether to sin or sinking They therefore have of all others the advantage who by the constraints of Faith and Love abide close serious spiritual faithful conscientious with and towards the Lord not slothful in business fervent in Spirit serving the Lord rejoycing in hope patient in tribulation continuing instant in Prayer That you may be found in this attire waiting for the coming of our King is the sincere desire for you of him who would be glad to hear from you and to serve your soul in any thing within the compass of Yours in true respects A. C. To a Friend advising to look well to his steps in some quick turns of Providence An Hiding-place in the Cleft of the Rock till the Indignation be over-past Desired for you Honoured and Beloved WHat a blessing beyond compare is it to be as those living things mentioned Rev. 4.8 Full of Eyes within and before and behind v. 6. Indeed so short are the turns that the Lord takes so mysterious are his works his way in the clouds and paths in the deâ—p waters that we must needs say as he Job 26.14 Lo these are part of his wayes but how little a Portion is heard of him the Thunder of his Power who can understand When I either look back and see what hath the Lord wrought Or forward and think what great things seem to hover over us in Promises The former things are come to pass and new things he doth declare truly I have many tremblings in my self Alas Who shall live when God doth this On what a single foot have I need stand both in point of Hope and Holiness that I may preserve a station undefiled and not be ashamed before him at his coming I was never more fearing my self and others than in this half-work that seems to be in a capacity of being done before us the bottom is
such as neither Saints nor Sinners methinks durst adventure much upon yet many go on in the simplicity of their hearts to try if perhaps they may do the least service to help the desired work forward to its just issues I am apt to think you see enough of Lamentation in the divisions of Reuben that make such searchings of heart the same Cloud as I was saying last extends hither and the Effects are the same I suppose here and there They that have gone hand in hand in their mourning hitherto seem necessitated to part and yet neither sing nor weep mutually at parting but a spirit seems to sunder them that is not likely to carry them far without miscarriage But it 's no wonder to see a sinful Nation a People laden with iniquity fuller of passions than of compassions divided and lose one another in a season when it seems neither day nor night and about a work that is so fitted to set out thâ— manifold wisdom of God as if the Maker of Heaven and Earth had reserved his work his strange work his act his strange act till last and left this inscription on every footstep he takes Yet he will shew him greater works than these that ye may marvel Joh. 5.20 They of all have the crowning mercy who are thought worthy to have that Righteous man's portion to be called to the foot of God Isa 41.2 Deut. 33.3 A very holy Evangelical large Spirit is only fitted to comply with what our God is doing Blessed are all they that wait on him These Parts afford no Intelligence only Evil-men and Seducers wax worse and worse mens hearts are failing for fear and for looking for the things that are coming on upon the Earth while the Powers of Heaven and the Pillars of the Earth are shaking I find few seriously enquiring in any other than a superficial Spirit What must the Righteous do Our very Character seems to be a People void of counsel I am Yours in spiritual affection knit to you waiting to obtain relation to you in all the will of our King A. C. To a Friend with Arguments for Patient waiting The Lord be your shade upon your Right-Hand My Dear I Have sometimes had Instruction and conceived engagement from that word 2 Kings 3.16 17 to dig pits till the rain fill the pools Ye shall not seâ— wind neither shall ye see rain yet the valley shall bâ— filled with water that ye may drink c. The latteâ— dayes work hath Promises prepared and proportioned to a design of magnifying the Naked Arm oâ— God in the spoyling the Glory sealing up the hand and hiding pride of every man And this advantagâ— have we beyond our Predecessors that the Lord hath made eminent evident advances upon this Work iâ— our view and remembrance having given us as in a little Map a lively description and testimony of what he both can and will do for his Names sake and he having been at work in a way of Wonders nay proceeding to do very terrible things still he expecteth we should be following him in a Faith and expectation of great things Joel 2.21 That was a very good advice Job 5.8 c. I would seek unto God and unto God would I commit my cause which doth great things and unsearchable marvellous things without number who giveth rain upon the Earth and sendeth waters upon the Fields to set up on high those that be low that those which mourn may â—e exalted to safety vers 16. So that the poor hath Hope and Iniquity stoppeth her mouth This is a day wherein the Lord 's great Contests seem to be drawing towards a determination and period all Interests and Preparations seem hastning their march â—oward the Valley of Decision Thither bring down â—hy Mighty ones O God! Ah! how should we be wakening up our selves and others to look about us that we be not found naked unclothed unwarnâ—d unarmed and the day over-take us as it may â—nd will do others at unawares How may we see â—n every quarter Idolatrous and Prophane persons â—trengthning and stretching one another to the utmost â—xtent of Abomimation and should not this yield â—n enforcing Argument to quicken us up for Christ â—o look and lay about us to engage as many as is â—ossible to be on the Lord's side lively valiant viâ—ilant with the Arm and Armour of God on the â—ight hand and on the left as those who are in an â—xpectation of following the Lamb on the Mount â—ion under those Virgin qualifications as bespeaks them Called Chosen and Faithful And that to this end we admit not impressions to be made on our Spirits to the abatements either of our Light or Life in following on to know the Lord from either our fear at the swellings of Jordan without or offence vexation or inordinate grief and dispondency at the discords and inconsistencies of the Saints within I must confess this Prison hath produced a fresh tryal of Spirit to me of late beyond what hitherto I have ordinarily observed and experienced it to see the abounding encreasing filthiness of this prophane Family the Governors and Governed in it being set upon the impudence of Abomination not only slighting and hating Reproof but daring us and Heaven with their Oaths Curses Singing Roaring Rageing c. insomuch as were not the goodness of God and of his Cause a relieving support the place would become a Prison indeed but this I take to be buâ— as a little Scheme of a great World of Wickedness How great is that Grace that gives ground to say We know we are of God while the poor World lieâ— thus in wickedness Ah poor England Oh thaâ— my head were waters Yours c. To a Friend encouraging to stedfastness Light arising out of obscurity and darkness My honoured Friend THe principal intendment of this is to let you know that through Grace I am preserved alive in the midst of many cooling and killing dispensations of Providence yet hath not the length nor strength of the pressures been hitherto admitted to draw my Soul into any dislike of the hand that layes them on or of the Cause for which at mens hand I endure this hard usage but the more I am led either to behold the true principles of this Cause or the gracious engagements and endearments of the heart of Christ in and to it and to those who in a spirit of Faith and faithfulness adhere to it and are the Confessors of it or to call over the gracious experiences that my self and fellow-sufferers in other places have had and testified the dearer hath it and every part and point of it been made unto me and the more confidently am I satisfied that the Lord will appear to the shame of those Prophane or Professors who are either the open enemies or secret betrayers of it and weakners of the Friends and Favourites thereof And truly I wish your soul may stand at due distance from any defilements and
the Righteous Death Isa 57.1 Psal 84.6 Who can but Rear a Bacha here When such drop off the Earth When Circumstance shall Evidence In Judgement it may be Slight it who can make me the man O Lord may cry Ah me Amen To the Memory of Mr. ABRAHAM CHEARE An Acrostick Art gone Dear Soul Art fled Hast left the Earth Below thee 't was it answered not thy Birth Rare was thy Life choice was thy latter end At last for God and Truth thou didst contend Hast Overcome Hast got the Victory Ah! then let others say Why may not I Mercy Begate him Led him Fed him Kept Chear'd him did all until the time he slept Hath now enthron'd him enter'd him in Rest Each Soul that walks with God shall thus be blest Awake then Rouze faint hearts shake off distrust Rampant be Faith greatest of men are dust E'relasting's God and Worship him we must ANAGRAM Abraham Cheare Ah Arme a Breach TO Saints and Sinners God this day doth call To hear consider and to lay to heart What he hath done is doing and yet shall Be done amongst us ere this Cup depart Blessed are they whom Chast'ning he doth teach To hear and fear when he makes such a Breach O hasten Saints how is the Sun now setting The Light which on you sometimes brightly shone Away from you apace seems to be getting As if God's work amongst you now were done By treble stroaks God heretofore did Preach To you not hearing comes this fearful Breach And is there not a Cause Consider try What mean those bleatings everywhere so rise A worldly Spirit Pride Formality Bent to back-sliding as if 't were your life First-Love first-Works alas you do not reach No wonder then the Lord makes such a Breach Sayes to his chiefest Children Come away Remove the Candle and put out the Light These People eat and drink rise up to play Are not the Children of the Day but Night They hear indeed but do not what I Teach Wherefore in fury I will make a Breach Poor Church in Plymouth whom methinks I spy As men astonied stand and thus they speak The Lord hath dealt with us most bitterly Dear Cheare 's gone from us O behold a Breach 'T is so indeed a breach full sore and wide That is upon the choicest Mercies made And each of you are like now to be try'd Whether Religion be your chiefest Trade That you are driving Heaven for to reach Or fixt on Earth if so a sorer Breach Will yet attend you fully to discover Upon what ground you stand what ends you have Before this over-flowing Scourge pass over Look well about you Cheare 's gone to his Grave The Shepherd's smitten he no more must Preach Watch Warn nor Water Oh! this is a Breach Ah! Plymouth thou thy Shepherds that hast turn'd Out of thy Gates the men who sought thy good Against them cruelly thy wrath hath burn'd Thou suckst in poyson loathest wholsome food Hughs Martin Cheare all thy hand could reach Thou castest out wherefore behold a Breach And you poor Sinners living in that place Where God set up this burning shining Light And did display the Glory of his Grace Thereby your Souls to Christ for to invite Your Day is gone your Night its shadows reach Instead of Building now behold a Breach A sound of Gospel-Grace you may not hear Again till God have made your Souls to say Blest are those feet on Mountains that appear Bringing glad tydings of the joyful day Who coming in the Name of Christ shall Preach And thereby shall repair this woful Breach Poor outward inward Prisoners and Exiles Have lost a worthy sympathizing Friend So hath whole Sion within many miles She hath not any so able to extend Help every way Compassions he did reach And laboured till he died in Sion's Breach The day before he di'd when speech seem'd failing His Soul did travel groan and cry to God Most bitterly lamenting and bewayling Causes in Sion calling for the Rod The deep Apâ—stasies his Soul did reach And while hâ—â—v'd made on him many a Breach But Ah! the day is great 'mong Jacob's Seed Horsemen and Chariots swiftly flee away And none are rais'd to stand up in their stead When each choice piece goes to its House of Clay By whom shall Jacob rise Lord thou us teach And send Supplies sufficient to the Breach Which cannot be but by thy holy Spirit Giv'n forth amongst the Remnant that remain Who till then Places desolate inherit As men to be made free among the slain Without this who can Suffer Do or Preach Or stand this day in such a widened Breach Look up then Sion's Friends from things below To Jesus who was dead and is alive And hath in heart and hand for to bestow All that we need to make poor Sion thrive Though men of Might be gone Hee 's all to each Yea more than all to repair such a Breach He shall not be discouraged nor fail Till all in purpose purchase Promise true Be brought to pass also both head and tayl Of Beast and Whore receive their final due And Kings and Kingdoms out their hands shall reach Submissively to Him that heals the Breach ERRATA PAg. 8. line 24. for manifect r. manifest p. 20. l. 4. for or r. of p. 37. l. 18. for promises r. premâ—ses p. 59. l. 29. for salutations r. salvations p. 73. l. 27. for â—nd r. as p. 82. l. 31. for came r. come p. 93. l. 1. for promises r. premises p. 112. l. 26. for promises r. prophesies p. 114. l. 1. r. largeness p. 120. l. 1. for affait r. affaire p. 125 l. 1. for do ingage r. to p. 203. l. 32 for Admo r. Admi. p. 228. l. 13. f. you r. your p. 245. l. 33. r. lifegiving p. 279. l. 30. f. to r. too There are also several mis-pointings which the Judicious Reader will of himself amend FAITHS CONQUEST OVER THE TORTURES TENDERS OF An Hour of Temptation Heb. 11.35 latter part By Faith And others were tortured not accepting deliverance that they might obtain a better resurrection THis Chapter in the main scope of it is designed to set forth the Incomparable Excellency of Faith commending it self in the Example and Instance of many Worthies as answering to that description the Lord himself gives of it Mark 9.23 All things are possible to him that believeth the which Catalogue and Register of their Acts and Monuments is not intended meerly to preserve the memory of such men though their remeâ—brance is blessed Prov. 10.7 Psal 112.6 but mainly to recommend to the Saints and Ages to come the mighty Power of that Principle by vertue of which they believed things incredible attempted things impossible sustained things insufferable in the eye of sence and reason nothing therefore low or mean is attributed in this place nor should our aims or expectation be flat and indifferent in the contemplation thereof It 's most true this History of the famous
acts of Beleevers is drawn out of the Old Testament and calculated as I may so express it to that meridian These all died in faith obtaining a good report but received not the Promise vers 13. 39. yet serveth not only indifferently for the Gospel-dayes wherein we are but indeed commends it self the more transcendently to us by how much God hath provided some better things for us having opened more fully the obiect of believing the Lord Jesus in the Gospel and poured out more plentifully the holy Spirit of Promise than it was ordinarily in those dayes which Consideration may serve to afford both mighty Aid and Argument to Believers now to encourage Christians to trust upon the Lord to do for them more than they can ask or think according to the power which worketh in them in their faithful following him Not to stand upon the opening particularly of these words nor on the exact time when they were fulfilled very likely this and some other here about had reference to the cruel sufferings in the times of the Maccabees which the Hebrews to whom this Epistle was written had reason to have a particular knowledge of although the History to us be Apocrypha it may suffice us that the Spirit of the Lord hath here infallibly determined such things were done and that the Conquest was truly attributable to this believing as it dealt with and drew vertue from the power of God So that without more a-do in the words are Four things observeable 1. Here is the Noble and Glorious Principle in which all these rare exploits are wrought on the commendation of which the whole Chapter insisteth By Faith they did it whether in all the subject mentioned it was a Faith that was saving will not be here disputed this is plain it was such Faith at least as falls within the Word of God and builds upon the Authority thereof in the business they were concerned in upon which foundation they went through and under-went what was before them in following God in their generations 2. We have here the subject or seat of action upon which this great Experiment is tryed and that is a tortured butchered massacred harmless weak Believer Others were Tortured a particular Inventory whereof made and taken in the verses following 36 37 38. such cruel usages as were beneath humanity to inflict and above humanity to sustain were exercised on and invincibly endured by these poor souls under the aid and influence of that Faith of theirs 3. Here is the magnanimity and excellency of spirit described unto which their faith raised them putting its self in the noble denyal repulse given to the tender of deliverance upon any unworthy terms They Accepted not Deliverance though their Persecuters came with torments in one hand and tenders in the other in as much as both were manifest Artifices and Engines to accomplish the same design as they slighted the threatnings of the one so they scorned the allurements of the other Deliverance in it self and as it may be considered is a mercy and the acceptance of it is a duty and consequently the refusal of it would have been their evil But if Deliverance cannot be had but upon terms dishonorable to the Lord if deliverance be a snare then to accept of such deliverance is a sin at least a great blemish to beleeving of which more hereafter 4. We have the powerful Motive and blessed Prospect that Faith took in view from whence strength was gathered to bear the tortures and forbear the deliverance and that was The obtaining a better Resurrection they had their eye and heart set upon a way of deliverance for which they would be beholding to the Lord only and this is called A better Resurrection that is not only better than their tortures but better also than any deliverance that could be offer'd to them this fixed expectation of their Faith carried them above any base or unworthy cringings to the sons of violence If you consider the words in their Connexion and dependancy on the former part of the verse you have this observable Women received their dead Children returned to life again this was verified 1 King 17.23 2 King 4.36 Others viz. other Women were tortured i. e had their living children tortured not accepting deliverance for them this is storied 2 Maccab. 6. If we consider Women as the subjects of this strong Faith who are stiled 1 Pet. 3.7 the weaker vessels Widows perhaps and desolate yet trusting in God hardly any faith out-went theirs Oh Woman Great is thy Faith we might by the way gather this Observation ☞ That the weaker vessels may be capable of exercising the strongest Faith Out of weakness they were made strong when I am weak then I am strong this treasure as well as the discoveries of the Gospel is put into earthen-vessels that the excellency of the power may be of God and not of us that as the strength of Flesh may not glory in his presence so neither may the weakness of a poor Saint occasion him to sink or dispond but he that glorieth may glory only in the Lord. But I shall not stand here but proceed to draw forth and make a brief improvement of some of the Observations that lie most plain in the words themselves one of which is plainly thus Doct. 1. That the most cruel tortures that have been invented by the vilest sons of men have by divine permission been vented upon the choicest sons of God They of whom in Gods accompt the world was not worthy the best of earth was not good enough for them vers 38. in mans accompt the worst of earth was not bad enough As they are made the filth of the world and off-scouring of all things 1 Cor. 4.13 so no instruments of cruelty can be enough vile or forcible in their thoughts to rid and deliver it of them The lust and rage in all generations hath been fruitful in inventions of this kind they were stoned they were sawn asunder c. the innumerable variety of particulars are reducible to this general They where Tortured I shall only attempt to pursue this Point to an issue by speaking briefly to these two enquiries 1. What is meant by these Tortures 2. Whence hath it sprung that they such an harmless People as they have had this for theit lot or why have they been tortured thus As for the former thus The word here rendered torture is observed no where else to be used in the New-Testament and in strictness of speech signifieth to be used and dealt withal as men do with a Drum viz. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 à nomine 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which figurative expression directs us for its meaning either to the manner or end of mens cruel dealing with them If the former be lookt on as intended then the resemblance is taken from the manner of their torments answering either to the violent stretching out or distending the head of the
a Religious Pretext for their cruel act Gen. 34.31 Cursed be their anger for it was fierce and their wrath for it was cruel Gen. 49.7 4. Another occasion of their wrath boyling up to torment ariseth from the constant bold and couragious Spirit that is sometimes found in the Lord's people that will neither be debauched with their terms nor broken by their threats this exasperats exceedingly So it is with the three Worthies Dan. 3.16 18 19. We are not careful to answer thee in this matter be it known to thee O King we will not serve thy Gods nor Worship thy golden Image which thou hast set up Then was the King full of fury and the form of his visage changed against them and commanded the Furnace to be heated seven times more thaâ— it was wont c. See also vers 22. When Steven stood in the boldness of his Testimony Acts 7.54 57. It cut them to the heart they gnashed on him with their teeth cryed out stopt their ears ran upon him with one accord cast him out of the City and stoned him If Mordecai will not bow Haman is on a rack all his comforts do not comfort him till he shew himself profound for slaughter not an ordinary gallows will serve the turn A Consideration which ought not to be improved as many do that because they are apt to be thus enraged therefore we are to slack our Testimony thereby to abate their fury but rather to wait on the Lord with the more earnestness to double and multiply his Spirit and the strengths and consolations of it with us as they Acts 4.29 Though the Heathen rage c. Now Lord behold their threatnings and grant to thy Servants that with all boldness they may speak thy Word They do not beg Prudence Policy Skill to evade and escape but more anointing to testifie boldly for the Lord which was granted fully 5. When unto all this there is super-added the opportunity of wicked men's having the power of Magistracy in their hands Prov. 28.15 16. I mind when they have a providential admittance to the capacity of making Laws and putting them in execution against the people of God having their own lusts uncontroulable and an advantage of covering their cruelty under pretext of Law and to asperse the faithfulness of Saints to the Laws of Jesus Christ with the odious charges of being against Magistracy and not being subject to the higher Powers c. the old accusation Neh. 2.19 ch 6.6 Hest 3.8 Acts 17.6 7. They now rush upon the poor Lambs of Christ with all their lusts as so many sayls bearing nay in these capacities there is occasion to draw forth those monstrous cruelties which perhaps they hardly thought were hid in their hearts as you see in that remarkable instance of Hazael who when he was told He would slay the young men of Israel with the sword dash the Children and rip up the Women with child replied But what is thy servant a Dog that he should do this great thing He thought its likely that unless he did degenerate from humanity and became a beast he could not perform such strange things but what is the answer of the Prophet The Lord hath shewed me thou shalt be King over Syria 2 King 8.18 Intimating that whatever fierce and dogged disposition lay hid in his heart against the Lords interest under what plausible pretext soever it might be covered for a time from others nay whatever better perswasions he might have of himself about it yet his King-ship would give opportunity and provocation enough to draw them forth to grow up into his conceipt Joh. 19.10 Knowest thou not that I have power to crucifie thee and power to release thee will give strong temptation to a wicked man to condemn and kill the Just though he doth not resist especially when an intrest of worldly honour seems to lie that way ver 12. notwithstanding convictions and reluctancies of Conscience to the contrary Dan. 6.14 15 16. Mat. 14.7 9. These may serve as some of the Reasons giving light why and whence it is that it hath been the lot of Saints some have been tortured thus I shall only touch a little Practical Improvement by drawing these Inferences Use 1. If it be so that the Lord's people have their times by the permission nay the appointment of God wherein they have been and may be tortured put to the most violent shameful way of dying or the most slavish miserable and disgraceful way of living though the most choice of all his Children It then may serve to caution such as are lookers on how they proceed to make a positive judgement of men and things according to the severe dispensations they are carried through a mistake upon which very great inconveniencies have often followed and yet very incident in our censuring-Censuring-day to divers who deal with the Lord's Interest in their conclusions as the Barbarians with that providence of the Viper on Paul's hand pass a judgment Without doubt this man is a murderer whom though he escaped the Sea yet vengeance suffereth not to live But such rash conclusions frequently revert as much into the quite contrary extream as it did with them Acts 28.4 5 6. It becomes us therefore to lay our conclusions of this kind upon other principles than these which are not appointed directly to signifie what we are apt often to infer from them singly considered Eccles 9.1 if the best of men have endured the worst of torments if from the beginning it hath been so such fiery tryals should be no strange things to us nor should we draw any strange deductions from it either to the censure of the persons or dislike of the cause testified to thereby Use 2. If the rage of man having all the aggravations and advantages above-named be such a fierce thing and hath been so fruitful in torments on the Saints and if we have such caution to expect more in the latter days wherein iniquity must be expected to abound then let it teach us to admire the wonderful grace of God to poor England and to the poor Saints of God in it that have lived in such times wherein men that hate them have such Laws in hand and at hand to destroy them nay having it in the power of their hand to put them in execution having also received such exasperation in the years that are past to remember and revenge many old grudges and yet so few to this day compared with the body of professing people in this Nation have suffered these things in their extremity that we should be helped to cleave to the Lord and every one of us alive before him That there is no more blood mingled with our sacrifices the Bush burn in the fire and yet not be consumed it is the Lord's doings and marvellous in our eyes and should be owned and improved as an argument to strengthen our faith against the many faintings we are lyable unto in further
tryals Use 3. If from the Spirit that is in poor fallen man there be such ill fruits as those mentioned against the image people and heritage of the Lord let us not only prize that grace which hath delivered us from that power principle and interest to which all the former fierce Characters do naturally and necessarily agree But on the other hand be very conversant with the Lord for subduing in us the remains of that spirit that lusteth unto envy even in us and that towards them that persecute us there may be shewed forth our Dove-like innocency in pressing toward that Gospel-qualification of praying for them Mat. 5.44 45. Rom. 12.17 to the end 1 Pet. 3.9 and doing them good for all the evil they do to us that we may shew our selves to be the Children of another Father living in another principle and referring our selves in all the injuries done unto us to another judgment and if the Lord will bless it to that end we may hereby leave a powerful conviction that they hate and persecute us as they did our Lord before us without a cause I proceed to take some other Observations from the words Others were tortured Some were tryed otherwayes others this way some were tortured not all all are exercised some way or other every man's work must be tryed Whosoever will live godly in Christ Jesus must suffer persecution 2 Tim. 3.12 He chasteneth every son whom he receiveth Heb. 12.6 Whomsoever he loves he rebukes and chasteneth Rev. 3.19 But though every man must be tryed it is not appointed that they must all be this way tryed tryed by fire and water tryed by tortures Some were tortured where I note Doct. 2. That though the Lord hath provided tryals for all his Children yet he hath designed tortures but to some of them Thus Christ expresseth himself to his Disciples Some of you they shall put to death Luk. 21.16 The Devil shall cast some of you into prison Rev. 2.10 All Saints are some way tryed they be but some Saints are alwayes tryed All men are born to sorrows Job 5.7 yet but of some it is properly said they are men of sorrows Isa 53.3 Lam. 3.1 Psal 88.15 This is a plain case and obvious to frequent experience Yet because it may be seasonable and useful we may consider it by inquiring into these Two Things 1. Why some are Tortured 2. Why but some are Tortured For the former We now respect tortures as they are more immediately under the disposal and ordering of the Lord appointing more or less in point or measure to more or fewer subjects as it pleaseth him they being such bitter things as afore is described it is enquired Why the Father appoints it to any of his Children To this is answered 1. Negatively not from any love God hath to the Torments or from any lack or abatement of love to his Children he doth not take pleasure to see his precious believing People lie scattered up and down as they are described Psal 141.7 79.2 3. Lam. 4.1 2. as so many marks and monuments of the cruelty and butchery of the sons of men no saith the Psalmist Psal 116.15 Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his Saints he esteems them precious in their lives and puts a value on them in their death It goes as we may speak with reverence near the heart of the Lord to see his Jewels thus dealt withal In all their Afflictions he is afflicted and the Angel of his Presence is with them Isa 63.9 He that toucheth them toucheth the apple of his eye Zech. 2.8 He doth not afflict willingly or grieve the children of men Lam. 3.33 much less the Children of God but rather like as a father pitieth his children so the Lord pittieth them that fear him for he knoweth our frame and considereth that we are but dust Psal 103.13 14. nay he hath testified the greatest displeasure against such as have bin executioners of his rebukes when they have not performed them with pity Zech. 1.15 Isa 47.6 Psal 69.26 27. His Anointed Ones must be very tenderly handled and have no harm done against them Psal 105.14 15. wheresoever they wander Moab hath a charge to do so Isa 16.3 4. and in defect thereof his controversie is dreadful with the Nations Ezek. 25 throughout so chap. 26.2 3. c. 2. But positively and in general thus Though the Lord doth not assign these Tortures these fiery Tryals to his Children for want of love to his or from any delight he hath in such Tortures considered in themselves Yet many times the Lord hath higher and better ends to promote then their deliverance ends that have more of good in them than these Tortures can possibly have of evil and when it is so these dispensations are not only excusable but are to be justified Good is the Word of the Lord. As namely 1. Sometimes in giving his darlings thus to the power of the Dog he designs to bring to light the worth and excellency of some Truths of his which otherwayes would be much obscured if not quite excluded from among the children of men namely such Truths in the vindication of which his children are called and brought forth thus to suffer being wrought to a contentedness rather to endure torments than to let them go When a soul or people having obtained help from God continue witnessing to such Truths whatever it costs them There is reflected this honour upon Truth as was said of it of old Great is Truth and it shall prevail whereas if it should be as it is with the generality of Professors at this day when a Truth comes to be spoken for there is such a shrinking twisting shifting to evade the dint of the Tryal how would the World have too just cause to say What is there in your beloved Truth more than in our beloved Error What is your Profession more than ours your Religion more than ours If there were any excellent thing in it you would do and suffer somewhat excellent and extraordinary for it to take off this stumbling block and occasion therefore from them who seek or desire occasion the Lord is pleased to steel a people to this height We can do nothing against the truth but for the truth 2 Cor. 13.8 And then to shew a proof of Truth in them and the power and goodness thereof he puts them on a tryal proportioned to this design he hath some truth of the Gospel to shew in Paul and then must he be troubled on every side 2 Cor. 4.8 9 10. chap. 6.4 10 11. chap. 11.23 to 29. If the truth of Christ be in him no man shall stop him of his boasting none of these things move him or separate him from the love of God Truth shall be tryed in those vessels of earth though it be by fire seven times and the furnace seven times hotter than aforetime 2. Sometimes the Lord doth by these Tortures assert and
stayed He bringeth the counsel of the Heathen to nought and maketh the devices of the people of none effect Psal 33.10 11. It s not unusual that they fall into their own net whilst we escape Psal 141.10 Use 2. If it be but some that are Tortured and they stand distinguished by the absolute sovereignty and gracious disposal of the Lord who appoints their call anointing and season as it pleaseth him on whose will also the with-drawment of influences hereunto doth depend Then it may caution you and me to take care how we judge of men that are assisted or not assisted in point of enduring tortures It s not the smallest infirmity of this day there is a present over-valuing and under-valuing men and parties according as there appears or dis-appears an ability to endure the tortures that attend the tryal of their profession The persons of some are had in admiration because of advantage above what is written and the persons of others so dispised as if God were not able to make them stand that is a needful counsel in a case not very different Rom. 11.18 Boast not against the branches for if thou boastest thou bearest not the root but the root thee and the teaching therein hath been oftentimes enforced on me by that determination of our Lord which is admitted frequently to take place at this day Many that were last shall be first and the first last And it falls frequently under observation That men as well as things do very speedily and often countermarch and shift places Many tall Cedars who did run well suffer many things gave great ground of perswasion that they would have gone thorough have notwithstanding at one point or other faultred deserted their station and as Sampson grown weak as another man when perhaps on the same ground a poor weak believer over-looked and dispised by most hath obtained grace and strength from on high to make good that post and to walk from strength to strength in the Name of the Lord his God So that all glorying or being puffed up for one against another is excluded here Let not him boast that putteth on his Armour Use 3. Must some be tortured must all be tryed is not the day of the expectation of greater things than these yet over Then let us learn to prepare our Faith and Patience get on our Armour and gird it on take heed how you be drawn into a sleep of security from the present interval of Calm and Rest which the Lord is pleased hitherto to continue to you in a very wonderful manner Some are if not tortured yet sorely tryed and tempted while you have your mercies and opportunities so peaceable about you you should be reckoning this is a space allowed you to gather courage not to contract rust by rest but laying up a store against the evil day that question should be still with us in a way of endeavouring its resolution Seeing we look for these things what manner of People should we be standing on our guard expecting to be drawn forth and ready to comply with that Call Who will rise up for me against the evil-doers who will stand up for me against the workers of iniquity Psal 49.16 in a faithful humble Lamb-like readiness to follow Jesus Christ and witness for him though it be in tortures temptations or wherever he goeth But to proceed to some farther Observations in the words Others were tortured c. It is implyed to make up the sense at every sentence by Faith they were so although it be not so expresly named By Faith they were tortured by Faith they accepted not deliverance by Faith they looked for a better Resurrection all the famous doings and fearful undoings recorded in this Chapter are to the honour of Faith This expression therefore that comes first to hand By Faith some were tortured may be considered two wayes 1. It hath a great truth in it if we thus understand it by Faith that is by means of their Faith upon this occasion and for this reason they were tortured even their Faith This was the quarrel the Devil and World had with them viz. They were men of Faith Or else 2. The expression may be thus understood By Faith they were tortured that is they were supported in and carried through their Tortures living or dying by their Faith This was the victory that overcame the world in all these tortures even their Faith I take this latter to be most immediately aimed at in this place and sutably is my eye to prosecute it Though I take the former not to be excluded or at least we may draw some useful considerations from that sense By Faith that is upon occasion of their Faith they were quarrelled with singled out and tortured by Satan and his instruments Great Faith exposed them to great sufferings And so it is now and may afford us this Observation Doct. 3. That a lively Faith possessed and professed is that which will enrage and engage the worlds highest violence and cruelty on him that hath it I intend a very brief dispatch of this not being so immediately perhaps intended in the words and that by considering Faith as contracting and incurring this rage in a two-fold sense or respect 1. Consider we this Faith unfeigned as it is possessed or respecting its inward root and principle as it dwelleth in the hidden-man of the heart in that which is incorruptible against this and as such doth the Prince of Darkness mainly bend his batteries It s true he brings his torments to bear upon the limbs and members of the Body the sensitive part but nothing is more evident than that his design lies farther as appears by this That if by the frights or feeling of these tortures he can but get in pollution and defilement upon the soul of a poor Saint if he can but corrupt that from the simplicity or debauch that of the virginity it hath with Christ then is the offence of the Cross ceased the torments are all called off the work is done He is mad to see any soul delivered from his dominion and translated into the Kingdom of the dear Son of God and there lives by this Faith on comforts that he cannot intermedle withal derives strength and influence which he cannot obstruct is acted in a life and on principles and reasonings which have a fixed and unalterable antipathy to his former courses nay have vertue and success to make resistance to Satan oftentimes to put him to flight 1 Pet. 5.9 Jam. 4.7 And this is the Victory that so frequently overcomes not only the World 1 Joh. 5.4 but the Prince of the World 1 Joh. 4.4 Now there is little reason that we should wonder to see Satan rage and in a rage to bring his instruments of greatest cruelty to bear upon a soul that lives by Faith above him and in such an advantagious way of conquest over him as the Gates of Hell cannot prevail to do him real
harm to bring him down from his excellency But he still stands on ground and fights with instruments that are invisible and invincible such Births the Red Dragon watcheth to devour casts his floods after raiseth war against upon this foot of account They keep the Commandments of God and the Faith of Jesus Upon this foundation also he exasperates all his crew acted by the spirit of this world who are enforced to gnaw their tongues for pain that in all their on-sets from generation to generation they could never come at nor quell that spring and root of action and suffering whereby they have been so perpetually baffled and all their costly and promising attempts been brought to nought Hence all their consultations and endeavours resolve themselves into this issue To rid the world of them who by a constant steady testimony of their drawing vertue as Olive-trees from the God of the whole earth being here in torments to them that dwell upon the earth 2. We may consider Faith in its Profession or the Profession of our Faith that is to say not only as it inwardly unites a soul to Christ whereby he draws forth consolations and aids to do so wonderfully on Gods behalf But also as it engages a believer to stand forth in the face of the World to testifie against it that its deeds are evil bearing witness to the Holiness and Faithfulness of God in opposition to the stream of the lusts of men Thus it contracts rage to the utmost Joh. 7.7 Me it hateth because I testifie of it that the works thereof are evil When the whole demeanour of a Christian both in point of Worship and Conversation is kept on so as not to be tempted to fall down before the Idolatry on one hand or fall in with the debauchery on the other which is proposed under Countenance or imposed by Law The world cannot bear the words of such a people Amos 7.10 c. Can the abomination of a people be offered up before their eyes and will not that Nation stone them Exod. 8.26 In this matter the Disciple is not priviledged above his Lord Joh. 15.18 19. The world will hate such a people as it hated him for witnessing against their ignorance and superstition Ye worship ye know not what we know what we worship Joh. 4.22 Ye are too superstitious whom ye ignorantly worship him we declare to you Acts 17.22 23. This is enough to get the world in an uproar This is said above Rev. 11.10 to torment them that dwell on the earth these two Prophets that have no other weapons but the Blood of the Lamb and the Word of their Testimony the Testimony of Jesus which is the Spirit of Prophecy and in this Message and under this Anointing witnessing though in sack-cloth against the evils that are in the world through lust lighting them as Gods Candlesticks the way to heaven this torments men of earth No wonder then that they torment you why your conversations testimony profession of your Faith torments them Christ came not to send peace in the earth but a sword Mat. 10.34 but a fire and what if it be already kindled Luke 12.49 Is Christ delighted with such contention nothing less But these are the consequences of the lusts of men irritated occasionally by the faithful rebukes of the Gospel of Christ and a practical profession of the Faith thereof in such as embrace and obey it A word or two of Practical Improvement and I shall leave this Point Use 1. If Faith both in the Possession and Profession of it be apt to draw the rage of the world in the extremity of it upon you this speaks the reasonableness of this Exhortation that you give diligence to it that the Faith any of you profess be Faith unfeigned 2 Tim. 1.5 Since I say Oh ye professed Believers your Faith in God and faithfulness to God is that which you must expect will enrage the world against you I beseech you satisfie not your selves with any Faith short of such as will carry all the world in a way of victory before it I have thought that at this day there is no man so miserable as a professor of Faith which is not right and real he will contract the worlds rage anger and displeasure because he professeth some Faith and he incurrs the Lords anger and displeasure because he but professeth because he hath not true Faith Faith unfeigned Interest in former dayes led some to profess at an high rate and their credit engageth them now not to fetch their turns too short upon it but the worlds rage chargeth them so hot in the rear that they cannot hold it but are forced in by open Apostacy to dash themselves against the thick Bosses of his Buckler Use 2. As it concerns you that your Faith be unfeigned so the like reason and necessity ariseth from the Promises that your Faith be unmixed in your present contest with the world that is that they may have nothing to charge you with but your single Faith and such things as are the proper off-spring of it and of faithfulness to God upon it It was the admirable advantage Daniel had against the greatest Council that day in the world Dan. 6.4 5. They could find no occasion against him forasmuch as he was faithful unless they could find it against him in the Law of his God The like had David against the envious and evil eye of Saul that God was with him and helped him in all his affairs wisely and faithfully 1 Sam. 18.12 14 15 28 29 30. There was no occasion administred to them that sought occasion The contrary whereunto is very detrimental to you when they that pursue you have ground for that charge Jer. 50.7 We offend not because they have sinned against the Lord the habitation of Justice even God the hope of their Fathers See the Spirits strict caution against this 1 Pet. 2.20 What Glory is it if when ye are buffeted for your faults you take it patiently see ch 4.15 Oh it will be your blessedness that they who pursue you though they will not do it perhaps without a colour yet they may do it without a cause may have nought to charge you with than that which when their vizor of Rhetorical eloquence and invective malice is stript from it resolves its self in a sober gracious eye into this it is for their being true to Jesus Christ their Faith in him their subjection to him their adhering to his Cause Name Works Institutions Such a bottom will render you at length more than a Conqueror Use 3. Take heed how you admit a Parley with those Reasonings which tend to prejudice you against believing to make you think hardly at least to think slightly of Faith in that it involveth you in so many dangers and perplexities Satan lies at a Bay to possess you with offence especially in such dayes as this Christ tells you These things have I spoken that you
might not be offended Blessed is he that is not offended in me But Oh! how strong are temptations to reason thus why this way of Professing of Meeting of Exercising is the high way to make me poor a beggar to undo me at last and what shall I do then Such Reasonings have need be rejected with utmost abhorrency Use 4. These Considerations should sweeten Heaven and Glory to us If while we live by Faith we draw the World and such a world of miseries on us it should quicken the edge of our longings not in a way of impatience neither to be dissolved and be with Christ who is far better Where sorrow and sighing shall flee away where shall be no more death neither sorrow nor crying neither shall there be any more pain for former things are past away Rev. 21.4 But to go forward to another Point By Faith some were c. Understanding it thus that by Faith as the principle that bare them up and carried them through as conquerors they were tortured This sense of it is most agreeable with the drift and design of the whole Chapter The nobility of their Spirits commends the excellency of their Faith To be tortured and bear it patiently is well but so may many do from other Principles and Causes they cannot tell possibly how to escape but now to chuse affliction with the people of God to become companions of them that are so used to improve what God doth in it and think this is best of all a Spirit thus managed and demeaning its self through the sharps of it commends the Fatih by which he doth it By Faith they were tortured the tortures on one hand and temptings on the other made no impression no alteration on them they were the same as formerly or rather much better By Faith they were so The Note is this Doct. That the Faith of Gods Elect is of invincible power to make them Conquerors in all their tortures What I have to say to the clearing up this Point I shall offer by endeavouring to shew these two wayes wherein Faith contributes to the performing this high service 1. Faith doth contribute to bear up under tortures themselves and much more under less tryals as imprisonment banishment c. by way of evidencing things to the Soul which otherwise are not so clear and substantial as its the office of Faith to make them Heb. 11.1 2. Faith contributes hereunto by way of ministring influence and assistance to the soul strengthening and heartning it to indure that which otherwise would seem insufferable break and sink the Spirit As for the former of these Faith 's proper tendency to give light and evidence to the soul and by evidence to beget a conquering magnanimity commends it self to us as its conversant about a three-fold object or imployment 1. Faiths main evidencing work is concerned about the grand Interest and Propriety that the Soul hath in God and God in him to get this case once cleared up beyond controversie and to maintain the soul in a satisfactory veiw of an interest in Christ Where this is uncertain or clouded up the soul sets upon such hazards with much trembling and good reason it should do so all things considered But where this Mystery of Union and Relation to Christ is cleared to and by believing the soul becomes impregnable as might be abundantly made out by that triumph of Faith recorded exactly and accurately Rom. 8.33 to the end Can any of the instruments of torture or cruelty there ennumerated separate such a one from the love of God who stands resolved and undoubted upon Gospel-grounds nay He is more than a Conqueror Tribulation distress persecution famine nakedness peril sword though all the day long we be killed and counted as sheep for the slaughter yet can none of these managed either by men or Angels do any thing of importance to the shaking of such a one When he arrives to that pitch of triumph Psal 27.1 The Lord is my light and my salvation whom shall I fear the Lord is the strength of my life of whom shall I be afraid You may guess how far he is hereby removed out of the way of danger inroads may be made upon him but he cannot be easily moved 2. Faith hath another matter to clear up in a way of evidence and by doing it effectually it contributes exceeding encouragement to a Believer to endure torments namely it evidenceth the Truth and Goodness and the special Relation that God hath to the Cause that it suffers in from all the clouds aspersions and calumnies that men would cast upon it I do not say that Faith can make a bad cause good but it can make an obscure cause clear It is not enough that a Christian have the clearness of a personal interest in the Lord when he comes to endure torment but it is needful that he have the clearness of a good Cause and a good Call that he suffers on or else he may suffer as an evil-doer and what thank will that be the truth and goodness of his Cause needs then to be cleared and Faith is of singular essicacy this way when perhaps the wisdom and devilish policy of men have been at work with opprobrious reproaches to vilisie it or some time-serving Apostates with their sophistical arguings and scholastical distinctions as Jannes and Jambres to invalidate and resist the Truth to which service Scriptures and Arguments are not wanting to be wrested for the perverting the plain wayes of God when the case is so and a poor Christian is frequently so assailed and baited with them that he knows not how to give a distinct satisfactory convincing answer to all these sophisms nay perhaps cannot demonstrably extricate himself from all the subtle entanglements that of this kind may be drawn about him Now is it the office of Faith to clear up the innate goodness and truth of the principles it suffers on that at least to its own satisfaction the soul is abundantly cleared and convinced therein and united thereunto And this hath helped the Martyrs of Christ to bear so bold a testimony to divers Truths of which they were not able to make a scholastical defence by way of disputation yet could set to their seal by dying or sustaining any tortures When this point is once satisfactorily evidenced that the Cause is Gods that Jesus Christ is interested and imbarked in it it gives strong consolation What an encouragement was that 2 Chron. 20.15 Be not dismayed at this great multitude for the battel is not yours but Gods So was it to David with the Philistine 1 Sam. 17.47 The battel is the Lords When a soul can see God not only interested with it but really more deeply interested and concerned than its self is it yields full assurance of good success at last I know the Lord will maintain the Cause of the Afflicted and the Right of the Poor Psal 140.12 because it can in title God
better than their proffered Deliverance The main Point that I shall propound to be handled from the words is this Doct. 5. That it is no less the excellency of Faith to reject the tempting Tenders than to sustain the cruel Tortures of a trying Day The supposition is of a person put upon this Dilemma he is brought into a condition of torturing be it actually so to his feeling or only vertually in the threats or Laws that represent them at hand or to his fears In this condition he hath two offers two tenders made to him First the tender of the Torturer and he offers Deliverance full and compleat deliverance Secondly the tender of the Comforter and he offers the Resurrection And now the man is put to it Will you comply with the design of the Torturer and you shall have Deliverance Or will you adhere to the design of the Comforter and you shall have perhaps not any ease mitigation but rather an increase of pain But at length a lot in the end of the dayes in the Resurrection Look to your choice let your choice be the off-spring of a well-deliberated and digested judgment upon the case Now here lies the excellency of believing in fixing the soul upon principles of the highest reason to cleave to this the Resurrection is better When sense comes in with its judgment life is sweet Skin for skin and all a man hath he will give for his life The body is more worth than food and the life than raiment Death is a King of terrors Banishment is terrible tortures intollerable hunger insufferable Spare thy self this evil shall not overtake thee What saith Friends Wife Children Oh! do not disgrace your self do not destroy us men will praise thee when thou dost well for thy self But what saith Faith Ah will a carnal heart say I hate him for he never speaks good to me but evil Well but what will it say Why there is a glorious Resurrection that will repair all tortured bodies tottered limbs massacred members will all be done up better in the Resurrection And in mean time these light afflictions are but for a moment and not worthy to be compared with that glory which is ready to be revealed in us Scorn the torturer slight the tender reject the offer at man's hand it is and hath a lye in the right hand fall into the hands of the Lord commit the keeping of thy soul to him in well-doing as into the hands of a faithful Creator be assured he is able to keep that which is committed to him against that day This is an hard saying flesh cannot bear it but faith can and doth Now that we may not miscarry or offend on the right hand nor on the left in this narrow point I suppose it may be requisite to draw the matter thus into Consideration Deliverance from tortures and consequently from any other or lesser tryals may be considered Three wayes 1. In a simple and abstract Notion in its self unclothed of other circumstances and dependencies and then we shall see what acceptance Faith will give to it when tendered 2. We are to consider Deliverance as in the torturers hand and design as an Engine or Instrument to carry on the same end which he attempted to extort by torments namely to bereave the man of his Testimony 3. We may consider Deliverance as it stands compared with and opposed to the better Resurrection these Two standing in competition in their tender Now in each of these respects there are several considerable Truths to be taken notice of especially in such times of attempts to debauch all manner of wayes 1. For first of all If we consider Deliverance apart from the projects and designs of men who are tempting and attempting by it to bring about their ends upon a poor tortured Child of God I say take it in a single and abstract notion apart from such entanglements and the matter admits of a very vast difference in the judgment and to the acceptation of Faith For if the case can be clearly and truly so stated Faith can and must accept deliverance with all thankfulness with honour to God and with great advantage to the soul concerned in it And therefore as we pass along I would willingly speak a little distinctly to this case that some stop and prevention may be put to the prejudice that may otherwise arise upon a rigid insisting on this Doctrine as if the tendency of Faith in times of tryal were inevitably to run all upon the Rocks without any respect had to the preserving our selves or any thing concerning us or committed to us of our external mercies Being therefore the contrary is to be supposed and is implyed all along under the main Truth asserted in the Text I will fairly lay down this Supposition ☞ That Deliverance as Deliverance may be considered is a Mercy not to be refused but accepted by Believers Deliverance from tortures from tryals if you would think of it very abstractly and in its meer simple nature Deliverance from harm and evil may be reckoned among a Christians middle things I mean such things as in their own nature are neither good nor evil but do receive the impression denomination of good or evil sutable to their relation improvement or design to which they are bent and levelled accordingly as they are either used or abused And therefore it is that the Spirit of the Lord Eccles 9. beginning declares that there is neither love nor hatred by all that of this kind is under the Sun But in this sense it falls not immediately under our present discourse A little farther therefore Deliverance to a Christian represents it self so as he can clearly and comfortably eye it in God's hand and as something conveyed to him by the goodness of a good God And when deliverance can be thus beheld not only as coming in a common effective providence but by the approbation allowance and good will of the Father then such deliverance is entertained with the best acceptation of Faith he compasseth God about with songs of deliverance To this Point a little may be spoken There are several respects in which no man is so capable to accept Deliverance such Deliverance as a Believer 1. None as he can tell what to make of Deliverance 2. None as he knows how to improve Deliverance 3. None as he can accompt with God for it at the last Day 1. First of all When Deliverance comes in in such a way as he may accept of it none is able to make so much of it put such a value upon it as he every thing on this side Hell is Mercy It 's of the Lord's mercies we are not consumed Faith advanceth the value of every received good according to the love that sent it the price it cost the grace that brings it it sayes as Jacob I am less than the least of all thy mercies Gen. 32.10 What am I that thou hast brought me
so should we There are divers Truths that in most Ages are not controverted these are not so properly the Truths under present consideration but such as the design of the Adversary is manifest to root out from being professed under heaven such are the Word of Patience which must be kept Rev. 3.10 the present Truth which must be had in remembrance and establishment 2 Pet. 1.12 Object Why is not every truth a truth now a present truth Answ Though that which is truth at any time abides truth at all times yet as hath been said those truths in a most eminent manner are called present truths which concern at present the vindication of the Glory of God and draw on the present tryals of the day upon the Assertors of it I note this the rather because in this shifting-shifting-day many that would be thought to be the Lord's Witnesses please themselves with this Blessed be God we hold to Fundamentals What Fundamental Truths have we yielded or denied and think themselves no way concerned to keep up a testimony for those truths which they call Circumstantial such as are not matters of Salvation whether it be held or practised this way or the other way Alas by such distinctions and evasions as these men have let go almost their whole testimony about the Royal right of Christ to set up Institutions of Worship that are to be maintained in his Authority only And I fear that such who can so easily relinquish their testimony to present Truths under this pretention They are not Fundamental Truths it will be found that when those Truths which they now call Fundamental shall be brought as they may speedily be brought to their tryal and so become present Truths there will other distinctions be found out to avoid the offence of the Cross concerning them also For an unconceiveable weakness in sticking close to every Truth is unavoidably contracted by yielding to the betraying of any Truth Hence Paul would not give place by subjection no not for an hour when there was great contention that the Truth of the Gospel might be continued Gal. 2.5 so vers 14. you see how eagerly he contended with Peter which might have endangered the Peace of the Churches meerly because he walked not uprightly according to the Truth of the Gospel That Point which that Epistle handleth being the present Truth which was most assaulted and endangered to be lost in that day occasions him to be so jealous of it that he would and did run all manner of hazards rather than betray it Our case is the same now many glorious Truths hath the Lord brought forth asserted cleared and committed to his Saints and Churches to keep unrebukeable till the appearing of Christ especially those of his Dominion over his Saints and others these now being put upon a publick test upon the stage of the World and we as Witnesses Subpoenâ to give in Evidence to the truth and goodness of them We durst not accept of any overtures of Deliverance or otherwayes whereby our Testimony to them should be balked 4. When I cannot come at the good of Deliverance but I must bind up my hands from being capable of doing God that service in my generation which he requireth of me freely for the time to come when these are the terms Deliverance is too dear forme and may not be accepted We are called unto Liberty and withal required to stand fast in the Liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free and not to be entangled with any yoke of bondage Gal. 5.1 Not to be the servants of men 1 Cor. 7.23 For if we seek to please them we cannot be the servants of Christ Gal. 1.10 Now that thing which would bind up my hands from being serviceable to Jesus Christ when he calls for my service my yielding thereunto whatever it be is a betraying of my Christian Liberty which Christ hath purchased for me with his blood We are debtors unto Grace and may not violate that obligation or yield to any thing that incapacitates us to discharge it by any means or on any terms You reade frequently at what an high rate in several contests Paul stands upon his Romane Priviledges he would not when in Prison came out to the detriment or disparagement of those his humane liberties Acts 16.37 And shall Paul think earthly priviledges to be such as he would indure longer imprisonment rather than basely betray them and shall we who are called to Gospel-liberties bought at so dear a rate beyond his Acts 22.28 1 Pet. 1.18 sell them for a song God forbid You know when Moses was upon the Treaty with Pharaoh about the enlargement of Israel out of Egypt divers overtures Pharaoh makes according as the hand of the Lord pressed on him They should sacrifice in the Land Exod. 8.26 or they should go out so none but the Men might go leaving the Women and Children chap. 10.9 10 11. or They should all go but they should leave the Flocks and Herds chap. 10.24 But what is the resolution of Moses There shall not an hoof be left behind for thereof must we take to serve the Lord our God and we know not with what we must serve the Lord until we come thither v. 26. Shall Moses and Israel stand on their Points to endure Bondage rather than leave an Hoof behind And shall we make such terms to have Locks and Fetters upon our Hands and Feet from serving Christ for time to come seeing we little know what he may require of us to serve him withal God forbid Can true Israelites endure to have Deliverance upon such terms as the thrusting out their right eyes and laying it for a reproach on all Israel Would not all the Lords people lift up their voices and weep if it should be so 1 Sam. 11.2 4. Object What would you have me do I am now perhaps a Prisoner They will give me liberty so I will engage to Preach no more to Meet no more c. If they keep me a Prisoner I cannot Meet or Preach c. And if I promise I will not I shall be but in the same capacity I am in now and am likely to be still in Answ This way of reasoning is very ensnaring for first if thou art in bonds thy great interest lies in this in giving diligence that the Word of God is not bound 2 Tim. 2.9 but rather as Paul saith Phil. 1.12 That the things that fall out of this kind fall out rather to the furtherance of the Gospel Such therefore as seek and get freedom on terms that leave the Word obstructed in that free passage wherein it should run and be glorified 2 Thes 3.1 they do but get the fetters off from their own feet and set them upon the Word of God which is but Deliverance with a mischief 2 Thy liberty obtained in such a way and on such reasonings is but a liberty and freedom to serve thy self feed and satisfie thy self and lusts
as a man not to serve Christ or do any thing for thy God as a Christian man 3 If thou art violently restrained by them the sin of any omission of Duty and Service lies at their door and to their peril be it when the King shall demand the reason of thy want of service but when thou acceptest of those terms thou becamest accessary with them art in conjunction with them it s thy sin as much if not more than theirs they think they do God good service 4 If thou art only bound by the hands of Violence the Lord looks on thee and reckons thee as his free man free in Spirit thou reservest the dominion of that for God Thou livest not dyest not as a Fool dieth but as a man falleth before wicked men 2 Sam. 3.33 34. Object Now there is little opportunity to do the Lord any such service but if ever an opportunity present I hope to be as ready as another may not such obligations be enervated repented of and a soul disobliged from them Answ It hath been and is still the crying sin of this day and of the years past That persons have thought it a very small matter to make and break these kind of Engagements according as interest presents them with an opportunity the iniquity and provocation whereof I shall only attempt to open in one Scripture Ezek. 17.12 13 to vers 20. where God expostulates the case with the rebellious House of Judah They and the King of Babylon make a Covenant and there is for ratification of it the Oath of God added The King of Babylons design was to make the Kingdom base that it might not lift up its self and in this exigency they make a Covenant The question is put Whether their taking an opportunity to shake off this yoke and break this Covenant might not be succeeded with prosperity This consequence the Lord disclaims with the highest indignation and that because of the Oath of God the quarrel and controversie of that Oath and Covenant should be required severely at the hands of such a treacherous people If thy hand have been lifted up in Truth Righteousness and Judgement already then take care how thou retract that and to whom thou lift it up the second time lest it prove a double provocation 5. If I cannot come at the good of Deliverance but I must intrench upon the Name Honour and Glory of God which he hath lifted up in the World I may not touch with that Deliverance There are some wayes and works of God wherein he hath more immediately and eminently in some generations concerned his Name than in others or than ever it was before God went to make him a Name of Greatness and Terribleness by Redeeming Israel out of Egypt and driving the Nations out of Canaan 1 Chron. 17.21 Isa 63.12 14. Sâ— by bringing Judah out of Babylon and will do by bringing his Sion from under Antichrist Toward the later whereof he hath made very glorious advances in our dayes and we have sung his praise in them so as it may be said of his Holy People at this day as of Israel of old Deut. 4.32 33 34. And all this he hath done to get himself a glorious Name Our zeal for which and love to which is now brought to tryal whether we will yea or nay deny his Name A faithful adhering to which though by a people that have but little strength is very acceptable to the Lord Rev. 3.8 9 10. And he will do great things for such in times and hours of temptation If therefore God be at this day so tender of his Name as he is that he will not give his glory to another we ought to be upon his side in this design and especially when this Name of his comes to be spoken about all our Deliverances ought to be brought to this test if they may be had with a saving to this Name they are welcome otherwayes they may not be accepted Object But whatsoever we can say was done in our dayes of that kind the Lord now appears plucking it down again leads that strength into captivity gives that glory into the enemies hand bestowes the marks of favour upon the other party who thrive and prosper and being advanced to the capacity we see them we do but follow Providence in joyning there Answ 1. The best of thy plea is God is angry with his People hath a great Controversie with them which he pleads with deep and bitter strokes and thou wilt be on his side angry with them too and plead against them In so doing thou mayest be right and safe but I must tell thee thou hast very much reason to take heed both of thy standing and frame of spirit lest his indignation take place on thee for being out of thy place the Lord is very jealous against such as offer their service to be the executioners of his rebukes upon his heritage Zech. 1.15 Psal 69.26 Isa 47.6 that was a sore word Obadiah vers 11. For thy violence against thy Brother shame shall cover thee in the day that thou stoodest on the Other side thou shouldest not have looked on the day of thy Brother c. The Lord takes special notice on what side men stand when he is dealing with his own Children for their folly 2 Moreover the Lord's rebuke is not against his People for their Principle and testimony but for their unsutableness to that Testimony and Principle of theirs which they professed And now he is come in the way of this tryal to see whether we will cleave to him with our whole heart and with our whole soul what remnant they be who will cleave to him in principles of Righteousness of Holiness of Purity of Godliness of Gospel-worship of an Heavenly Conversation and underneath the feet of these subject their interest of Ease Rest Liberty Estates Limbs Lives his Voice is therefore now in this respect who is upon the Lord's side Psal 94.16 Here it s an exceeding mercy indeed to have obtained mercy to be faithful not to deny his Name whatever it costs 6. Deliverance is then to be dreaded not accepted when I cannot come at the good of Deliverance without giving just occasion of stumbling to many to fall and of grief and affliction to the bonds of many that stand Precious in the sight of the Lord are the lives and souls of the poorest Saints and ought to be tender to us that we do nothing whereby they be stumbled offended or made weak much less destroyed for whom Christ died Asaphs first conviction of his extravagancy Psal 73.15 was if he should speak thus he should offend against the generation of Gods Children As he was tender so the Lord is very jealous of this Ezek. 13.22 how the heart of the Righteous be made sad whom God hath not made sad and the hands of the wicked strengthned that they should not return from their wicked way c. I confess
be he hath more reason to refuse Deliverance than it is safe for him to express unto others in an age when men are made offenders and destroyed for a word leave him to the Lord and charitably suppose he hath a Conscience to God-ward in what he doth and though it be misguided in this matter yet it s the best he hath and he is bound to make much of it Do not judge another man's Servant to his own Master he stands or falls 2. I would upon the Promises further beseech you That since there are so many cases in which its dangerous however it may seem pleasant to accept Deliverance you would give diligence that when these soul-shaking tryals are ready to beset you and set upon you you may not be taken in a way of surprize the greatest mischief Satan doth to souls in this kind is when he frights them into Deliverance and escape ere ever their spirits are recovered to a just capacity to weigh and make a solid judgment what is best to be done in the case all things considered They are ready to be taken with that way of reasoning that Esau was Gen. 25.32 Behold I am at the point to die and what profit shall this Birth-right do to me So they Behold I am at the point to be imprisoned to be banished to be tortured and what good then can this Profession do to me And so being surprized with the fright sell their Birth-right for a little meat or something like it which perisheth with the using of it In order to the preventing which mischief I beseech you Consider 1. First That this Tryal whereupon the Lord brings you perhaps is the principal if not the only opportunity in which you may ever have the advantage to speak a word on Gods behalf and bear thus witness for him as long as you live What shall we do for our Sister in the day that she is spoken for was a seasonable question Cant. 8.8 There is a day when God is to be spoken for Christ to be spoken for Truth to be spoken for which being elapsed the things of this our peace may be hid from our eyes Oh! therefore while you have this opportunity omit not to do good to improve it to the utmost 2dly Consider A little ground lost at such a Season and in such a Testimony is hardly recovered again where you find one Christian soundly recovers it you may observe abundance decline and grow weak in making any future resistance to temptations We are called to follow the Lord as Virgins now where the enemy hath prevailed once to violate the chastity of such to bruise the teats of their virginity they afterward grow weak to make opposition to attempts of the like nature Ezek. 16.30 How weak is thy heart seeing thou doest all these things the work of an imperious whorish woman A back-sliding Professor is like a whorish woman who having lost her chastity though she gets an imperious forehead yet hath a weak heart though she is bold to assert her chastity yet she is weak to preserve it 3dly Consider How easie and frequent it is with the Lord to make that deliverance which you buy so dear become a real burden to you How many wayes hath he to make your liberty a burden by fresh vexations such meet withal your Trade for the sake of which you adventure such strange attempts a real burden by Losses Deadness Crosses in it Your very Lives a burden by sickness and divers other vanities and vexations of spirit And who would buy that too dear that is lyable to so many causualties Take heed that Satan doth not at such surprizals make a market upon you for you are not ignorant of his enterprizes 3. But leaving this Point let us proceed to the Third Head or manner of our considering Deliverance and that is as Deliverance stands compared with and undervalued by the preference of a better Resurrection when the Torturers tender of Deliverence and the Comforters tender of a better Resurrection come in competition though both are good in themselves yet Faith helps to make the choice of the Resurrection as being the better incomparably notwithstanding any inconveniencies on this side it Hence the Third Supposition in the general Doctrine is ☞ That a Believing Prospect into the Resurrection is of mighty force to carry a Christian through any Tortures and to reject any unworthy tenders of Deliverance Faith transmitting the eye upon Eternity and fixing the expectation thereupon the consequences of the blessed coming of the King sets all at rights turns the Scales toward the advantage of the Glory and Interest of God as worthy to be adhered to in comparison of which Resurrection Torments are but a flea-biting and Tenders of Deliverance as a painted feather The Emphasis lies in the term Better Faith satisfies that the soul in this hath chosen the better part not only better than Suffering for so may Deliverance seem to be But Better upon all accompts whatsoever than the best and fairest offer that can possibly be made to defloure and intice from following after God Earth may be good Deliverance unto it and the Accommodations in it may be good but when they are at the best Christ is better Heaven is better to have Christ with us in Sufferings with Peace Joy and Satisfaction here and to be ever with Christ in the Resurrection of the Just this is transcendently best of all The clearing this Point would be attempted did not time prevent in considering particularly these Three things 1. Deliverance at the best with its power to allure us unto the choice of it for it s not it when we are under offence at it but Deliverance with its full allowance that is brought undervalue in this choice 2. The Resurrection considered at the worst and as it lay obvious to Objections especially to them in that day yet forcible and effectual to perswade 3. The actings and excellency of Faith in singling out and fixing the souls choice herein notwithstanding the absence of any other Reasonings or Arguments to turn the Scale other than these drawn singly from the Concerns of this Resurrection These can be but briefly touched at present as for the former thus First Deliverance here offered as was shewed before is Deliverance with all its Accomplishments and Accommodations that we can imagine to set it off admirable and apt to take with a tortured tempted poor Creature I mean in an humane dress all that the Adversary is capable of adding to it to give it a gloss that may effectually answer his ends Now there are Two things which do tend much this way and are apt to be very taking to a sensual or watchless eye 1 The Pleasantness 2 The Presentness of Deliverance as I may express it 1 It s one main part of the Tempters business to set off as he can the taking Pleasantness of Deliverance he baited his Hook to Christ with all the Kingdoms of
busieth them with Martha's lot in many things and then they think they have as good excuse for their neglects as had she that doing as much as nothing it must pass because they do what they could This is very lamentable though frequently spoken to it remains the guise of many Professors You know my business what a deal of work I have saith one What a deal of care and destraction I have saith another Just as they that were bidden to the Wedding-Supper one had bought a Farm and he must go and see it another had bought a yoke of Oxen and he must go and try them another had married a Wife and therefore he cannot come all desire Pray have me excused all begin to make excuse with one consent Luke 14.18 You may reade one word and see how badly such excuses will stand in the day of Christ when not one of those that were bidden shall taste of the Supper v. 24. Oh! when mens hands are so full of business and that most times greedily and unnecessarily sought after and pursued that they cannot come or at least their hearts so over-charged with the cares and pleasures of it that they cannot come to any purpose what doth this portend but some swift stroak at hand on such a foolish people to make up that lamentation Jer. 9. 3. Thirdly A third advantage Satan gets on many by which he incloseth them within their spiritual benumedness That they can do very little for God and yet please themselves is the old usual complaint and that not without cause though most times without sense of a bad dead cold heart when this seems to be the Religion of people and that from whence they get or would get not only excuse for their shortness but a supposition that they are very humble tender ingenious watchful experimental because they are so able and apt to tell of and mourn over bad hearts but hardly have I ever observed a people so inclinable to the deepest hypocrisie and palpable neglect of any spiritual means to make them better but as the door turns upon the hinges so do they upon such complaints till what they artificially complain of at first spring up at length as a Leprosie in their foreheads to be seen and read of all men 4. Fourthly Another sinful boundary wherein Satan wraps many and disableth them from doing any thing excellent for Christ and then they think it well enough if they do what they can within their compass is The offence of Spirit that is apt to grow either at the ways or people of Christ because of the imperfection they espie or suppose to be found in them But blessed is he that is not offended in Christ Mat. 11.6 Such distemper is dangerous especially in such a dark state of things wherein that word seems verified Mat. 26.31 This night shall ye be offended because of me When Professors are apt on all hands to stagger and fall into sin providences frown opportunities of serving God cannot be come at without apparent hazard spirits of people grow froward apt to catch at advantages glad to find excuses for departure from Relation to one another hard to be reconciled this is a bad season for souls apt to stumble at the stumbling-stone It begins with this I am not free to meet pray with hear joyn with such a one although all acts of Christian duty for removing offence are neglected and at length it appears that of whom one is overcome of him he is brought into bondage Oh! study to preserve the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace Great peace have such as love the Law of Christ and nothing shall offend them 5. Fifthly To name no more at present Satan gets hold on many by pleasing them under a slothful sinful abuse of this notion We can do nothing without we have help from the Lord The which way of reckoning as it is most commonly abused hath this signification All the idle neglects of Professors shall be as much as they durst for modesty express themselves fathered upon God As the first way of Satan to cover the mans iniquity was The Woman that thou gavest to be with me she gave me c. as if he had said Hadst thou not given me a Woman I had not sinned the evil lies at least between us but from all such excuses God will be clear when he is judged This may serve as a taste That it s not every I can do no more will serve the turn to excuse us much less obtain for us this blessed Testimony Christ gave of this Woman She hath done what she could she hath come aforehand to anoint my Body to the burial You may do more than you do all of you nay all things considered must do more than this perfuming-work of which I shall speak a little more particularly to shew its special nature when I have first offered a few Considerations shewing what engagements do lie on us to do what we can for Christ especially in this business of begetting a good savour on his things in this day when they are exposed as much as may be to stinking 1. First We are concerned to do what we can for Christ in this respect because Christ hath done what he can to put a sweet savour upon us when we stank to purpose and doth not ingenuity require that we put the question the Prophet did 2 Kings 4.13 Thou hast been careful for us with all this care what is to be done for thee Or as the Psalmist Psal 116.12 What shall I render to the Lord for all his benefits especially when he looks for nothing but our returning on his Name the reflection of the sweet savour that he hath bestowed on us let 's but consider what great things of this kind he hath done for us 1 Sam. 12.24 What were we when he cast a look of Love upon us Our navel was not cut nor washed in water at all not salted at all nor swadled at all cast out in the open field in our bloud to the loathing of our person troden under in bloud c. Ezek. 16.4 5 6. The stench of a soul in such a plight may be read Psal 38.3 4 5 6 7. Well to take away this evil savour What hath Christ done in his Oblation Eph. 5.2 Gave himself an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet smelling savour What doth he by constant Intercession Rev. 8.2 3. stands with much Incense to offer up the persons and services of Saints with acceptation as a cloud of perfume ascending up before God out of his hand All the offerings under the Law both on the Brazen Altar for Sacrifice and on the Golden Altar of Incense are only figurative of what Christ doth this way of all which it s so frequently signified It s an offering made by fire of a sweet savour before the Lord. What doth he by bestowing his Spirit in the work of regeneration but anoint
Jabesh-Gilead for the Funeral-love they had shewed to one who had been the Lords Anointed 2 Sam. 2.5 6. Blessed be ye of the Lord that you have shewed this kindness to your Lord even unto Saul and have buried him and now the Lord shew kindness and truth unto you and I also will requite your kindness because ye have done this thing The blessing he gives them shews his acceptance to the uttermost the occasion thus There was a day when the men of Jabesh-Gilead were in unspeakable distress by means of the hard terms offered them by Nahash the Ammonite 1 Sam. 11. 1 2. they could have their peace upon no other terms than by espousing an irreparable mark of reproach and infamy on themselves and all Israel and in this nick of extremity Saul puts his life in his hand and rescues them seasonably and wrought a very great deliverance This kindness of Saul to them they were never in a capacity to requite till the day that the body of their Lord and instrumental Saviour was hanged on the Wall of a Garison of the Philistines as a mark of like reproach and ignominy on the whole Interest of God In such a day of death and danger when the body of their Lord and his dear Children is hung a stinking in the face of the Sun now is a time to prove and improve the kindness and ingenuity of their spirits toward their Lord and Israel by putting their lives in their hands and doing what they could to fetch him off from and give a check to that reproach of the enemies of the Lord on his Name and Interest They attempt it they succeed and bring off these dead bodies and mark it they came to Jabesh and burnt them there and took their bones and buried them and fasted seven dayes 1 Sam. 31.11 12 13. They not only buried but burnt them there which was the manner of Royal Funerals compare it with 2 Chron. 16.14 They laid Asa in a bed which was filled with sweet odours and divers kind of spices prepared by the Apothecaries art and they made a very great burning for him See Jer. 34.5 With the burnings of thy Fathers the former Kings which were before thee so shall they burn odours for thee This perfumed Royal Funeral you see hath acceptance and recompence with David And shall Jesus Christ who laid down his life to take away the curse and reproach from us and hath set us free from wrath to come which we can never requite now call for a proof of our kindness and thankfulness by doing what we can to rescue the honour of his Name and Interest that is now exposed to contempt and to bestow a more perfuming funeral on it and lamentation over it than without danger we durst do and shall we stand upon the hazard and cost of it and in so doing shall not we lose the blessing of David The Lord shew kindness and truth unto you Nay shall not the men of Jabesh-Gilead rise up in judgement who did what they could to cover the shame and recover the honour of a wicked Prince who fell for his iniquity as if he had never been anointed and shall we refuse or come short of perfuming this service to the King of Glory who is put to an open shame in his Name and People God forbid This honourable act will find acceptable resentment and recompence from Christ as that did from David and as kindness to the dead hath alwayes done on ingenious spirits Ruth 1.8 2.20 Blessed be he of the Lord who hath not left off his kindness to the living and the dead But let us see how Christ doth manifest this his acceptance of such attempts 1. Christ is ready to shew forth his acceptance of this kindness by his being so willingly ingaged to plead the cause and vindicate the innocency and integrity of such a People as do what they can for him many are the ill instructions at home and the ignominies abroad that will be raised upon such an account But of this we may have assurance he stands ingaged to make good that word 1 Sam. 2.30 Them that honour me I will honour and they that despise me shall be lightly esteemed As Christ stood not upon his own vindication when his Father's honour was in his eye but he committed his cause to him who effectually hath brought it about So should not we stand upon our own vindication when the Name of Christ lies at the stake See Psal 35.5 6. Commit thy way to the Lord c. And he shall bring forth thy Righteousness as the light and thy Judgement as the noon-day We see how effectual he doth it in the Text concerning this poor Woman in all her ignominies and hard speeches that she met withal and no less will he shew it at this day to be the high title of his honour Thus saith thy Lord the Lord and thy God who pleadeth the cause of his people Isa 51.22 He will thorowly plead their cause Jer. 50.34 and execute Judgement for them bring them forth to the light and their eyes shall behold thy Righteousness Micah 7.9 Marvellous have been the Lord's wayes and methods of asserting the integrity of his people from the midst of the clouds of ignominy 2. Christ sheweth his acceptance by ordering the issues of all the provision that a people makes for his Name and Glory that it proves the directest provision they can possible make for themselves and their best interest The liberal man deviseth liberal things and by liberal things shall he stand Isa 32.8 That course which the generality of people conclude according to rules of Providence is the way to ruine them proves the most effectual means to establish them of this Psal 112. gives a full testimony The good man is there brought in gracious full of compassion shewing favour and lending dispersing giving to the Poor and yet in all respects making the fullest provision for his own best blessedness in so doing That of Christ is the Paradox to prudent Professors in perilous times which they can by no means resolve He that will save his life shall lose it and he that will lose his life shall save it How evidently is this made good in the good Name of persons Men have generally reasoned that to cleave to such a Profession or Testimony or People hath been the high-way to be disgraced for ever whereas the Lord hath manifestly built up the Houses of such as it s said of the Midwives Houses in Egypt We reade in the first and last verses save one of Heb. 11. concerning the Worthies That by Faith they obtained a good report though they received not the Promise It was matter of reproach to them that they should imbrace and cleave to certain Promises from generation to generation owning them as their Interest which yet brought not forth in their day the great things they testified of and professed that as Pilgrimes and Strangers they
It was a brave spirit in Araunah when there was a â—ebate betwixt David and him about the price of â—he Sacrifice that was to be offered up for a sweet â—avour in an infectious nasty season As a King gave he to the King 2 Sam. 24.23 'T was hard to discern by their spirits if external badges had not â—een there to distinguish them which of them had most of the spirit of a King in him Such largeâ—ess of heart is exceeding proper and honourable â—n the case before us A little laid out in the power of this Principle will be highly enhansed in the value of it It was a notable Instance and evidence that Rispah though but the Concubine of Saul retained some tincture of a Royal mind that when the seven men of the off-spring of Saul were executed at the instance of the Gibeonites with that reproachful and cursed death yet she from her noble disposition and generous respect to that Royal off-spring doth what she could to keep them from those corrupting casualties that are apt to attend carkasses exposed as they were in the open air to be a prey to the Birds by day and the Beasts by night her sack-cloth was accepted as a noble pavillion spoken well of at Court till a more noble Funeral was provided for them 2 Sam. 21.9 to 14. Christians if you are as you profess made Kings and Priests to God a Royal Priesthood then you have another a nobler spirit than have others it concerneth and becometh you to stir up and improve on things that are most excellent It 's not for Kings Oh Believers It 's not for Kings and Princes to do less than the noblest things To open their mouth for the dumb in the Cause of all such as on this account are appointed to destruction Open thy mouth judge righteously and plead the cause of the poor and needy 5thly Know for your encouragement That though Christ expecteth you should do what you can to imbalm his Interest yet the soveraign vertue of that which indeed doth and must preserve it from rotting and stinking depends upon the Lord 's own provision and preparation Though your good will be accepted and your work shall be rewarded yet it 's freedom from corruption flowes from the absolute dominion he hath over the Grave where he lieth and the purpose and ingagement that he hath made known in the New Covenant to give it a Resurrection It 's no small encouragement therefore to know and be insured that we are workers together with Christ in this design which must needs be succeeded with a good issue and therefore it 's good adventuring thereupon 6thly Lastly Resolve upon this That if you live not long enough to see its Resurrection yet you will be laid in the same Grave with it where it dieth you will die and there you will be buried The Spices then prepared and laid in to imbalm it will also perfume you The last Testimony of Friendliness the old Prophet could shew to the young Prophet 1 Kings 13.28 29 30 31. was to take up his dead caâ—kass though a Lion had slain him and stood by lay him in his own Sepulchre and give this charge When I am dead then bury me in the Sepulchre wherein the man of God is buried lay my bones besides his bones Joseph laies the body of Christ in his own new Tomb Mat. 27.60 Abraham and Sarah Isaac and Rebeka Jacob and Leah and Joseph also covet to be laid together Gen. 49. 29 31. A Cave in Canaan where they must be laid in the Faith of Promises which is more desireable than the chiefest Royal Sepulchres in Canaan Gen. 23.6 chap. 49.29 chap. 50.25 26. It was nobly resolved in Ittai the Gittite 2 Sam. 15.21 Surely in what place my Lord the King shall be whether in death or life there also will thy Servant be Such blessed Resolutions raised on true Principles Rev. 12.11 Acts 15.26 chap. 20.24 chap. 21.13 have their acceptation now and shall not miss of an early Resurrection in due time 2 Kings 13.21 Dan. 11.13 Isa 26.19 FINIS The gracious Author of the fore-going Treatises after full Three years Suffering under very hard circumstances enduring many inhumanities from merciless Goalers in Excester-Goal was continued Prisoner under Military Guards in the Isle of Plymouth where a violent Sickness in a few dayes seized upon him in which a Friend admitted to a constant Converse judged these following Passages worthy his Observation which may fitly be here inserted as a Discovery of the Grace granted in his various Changes and Abiding with him until by the Will of God having finished his Work he fell asleep A Friend giving him some Emulsion to drink he drank and said All passages are clear between Stomach and Belly Head and Heart and that and Heaven blessed be God A Friend then asking him if he had any thing to say to them in the Family with him in case the Lord should call him from them He replied I desire the blessing of the God of Heaven may be upon you and a full Reward from him be ministred to you for all the labour of Love you have shewed to me for the Lords sake and I beseech you continue stedfast in the Faith and Testimony to Christ and his Concerns who is as worthy as ever notwithstanding all the reproach cast on him and them and I desire earnestly you will take heed of being offended at Him his Word Works or Wayes but be careful to be found in his paths as ever you hope to have help to stand before him with peace and comfort at his appearing He further said Christ had a poor Remnant yet left that he was perswaded should be helped to stand and no more to be afraid of the worst that men can do than he through Grace was now afraid of what Death could do to him And said Though I may be rolled into my dust yet there is a promised approaching Glory that God will most certainly bring forth out of all these great deeps with which we are now encompast though saies he it may be you also may not live to see it but to die in the Faith of it will be enough and the Lord grant you may not stagger and that no cloud may be upon your Testimony to God nor unless clouds be good for you upon your Interest in him And as to the Church at Plymouth he said He had oft since his Sickness on his bed begg'd of God that the Lord the God of the spirits of all flesh would set a man over that Church a man whom he should chuse to go in and out before them to feed them that so the Lords poor flock be not utterly scattered by those that carry or keep them Captive Numb 27. he referred to And further said to a Friend then present I desire you if God by his Providence or otherwise shall hereafter speak any such thing to you though but in a whisper you would
not despise or neglect it but look on it as the Call of God to you and obey it accordingly To which that Friend replyed My weakness is sufficiently known to you my self and others for such a weighty service making me dread the thoughts of such an undertaking as at present furnisht yet I hope I shall carefully mind what the Lord may speak to me in future as also what hint you have now given about it to do therein as God shall direct After this discourse ended he further said He had been a poor staggering vain creature and since the time he came to this place and the Lord gave a little recovery he had not so improved it as became him he earnestly wisht he could write a little that he might leave a witness against it Saying also Ah! I have many things in Short-hand that none can read but my self by which means they will be lost Then added I have a poor Sister an honest affectionate soul who I desire you will do what you can to comfort support and strengthen according to that counsel 1 Thess 5.14 Now we exhort you Brethren warn them that are unruly comfort the feeble-minded support the weak be patient towards all men And desired we would sometimes speak a word in season to her And further said as to the Church in Plymouth wherein he had laboured he designed to serve the Lord in it and to gather souls to Christ and had now the witness of a good Conscience in that matter that he had not wilfully omitted or dealt negligently in that Work in the main of it as opportunity presented and blest the Lord that since his Imprisonment he had heard of six or seven of that Church that had gone triumphing to Heaven before him Then speaking of Christians Sufferings he minded that word 1 Pet. 4.16 Yet if any man suffer as a Christian c. He minded what a blessed thing it was to suffer as a Christian viz. To begin hold on hold out and at last come off as a Christian It was a great Word and Work and speaking of his pains he had on his outward-man yet blessed God There was no sorrow added nor no sting in them that was stuck in the sides of Christ blessed be his Name A Friend asking how he did Never better in my life said he blessed be God One asked him whether he would have any Cordial He said Yes may it be an instrument on Gods behalf to recover a little strength before I go hence and be seen no more to speak yet a word for God else tel me of no more Cordials for I drink full draughts One giving him a little he drank and said I am made to drink of the best spiced Wine the Wine of the Pomegranate his Love is better than Wine I am drinking of a Vineyard not a drop of red Wine blessed be God the Day I think is come I shall be led to the Fountain of Living Water and shall hunger nor thirst no more And added The Wine that is red might have been my Portion even fire and brimstone and an horrible tempest might have been the portion of my Cup. Oh! if Jacob's heart revived to see the Chariots to carry him to Joseph in Egypt How should my Soul revive in me to see my God's Chariots of Salvation to carry me to see him not in Egypt nor Earthly but Heavenly Canaan Then he fetch'd a sigh saying I sigh but am not sad Then applying himself to speak to Friends about him he said And to you that are troubled rest with me there is prepared for you shortly One telling him he spent himself he said He would gladly spend and be spent for Christ yet would not make undue haste to Heaven till his Beloved pleased yet I would bid my Friends Farewel remembring Elijah threw his Mantle on Elisha at parting and though I cannot yet say whether it be finally farewel Paul bid the Romans farewel often but I can bid you heartily farewel blessedly farewel Then added I have one word for Sion I have been oft refresht in thoughts of old Jacob as I mentioned but now how he revived and said Joseph is yet alive I will go down and see him before I die But yet before he comes out of Canaan he is at a stand and God must be sought to know his mind Gen. 46.4 God assures him he would go with him into Egypt and would surely bring him up thence and yet Jacob must die there I have thought how can this word be true and have been answered it was true to Jacob collectively though not personally considered his seed and with them him also dead or alive must be brought up with them in the time appointed and though Jacob's life indeed is took off in somewhat an unexpected time and way yet his Faith is kept up so as he gives charge in that matter ere he dies that his bones should be carried up with them and so gives testimony to the Truth of God in that case and the like doth Joseph Oh Friend God hath brought us down unto Egypt it may be where we would not have gone he hath indeed let us go in the beginning of our way where we would and we then went under full gales like to them Exod. 15.14 to 18. saying We shall come up out of Egypt it may be pitching it too personally as to us for whether we in our persons shall be brought from Bashan and the depths of the Sea may yet be a question but if we be indeed the seed of Jacob that seek him and his face we shall then most certainly be brought up dead or alive out of Egypt let 's endeavour to keep up Faith in that There is a Cause God hath stretched out his hand to own amongst us though men may be divided about it what it is some say it consists in Stating and Asserting our Rights against Oppressours but I take it to be such a Testimony to Christ's Kingdom that few will espouse but such as love the Lord Jesus in sincerity Though as to out-works they must be owned as works of wonder but the inward-part is the main thing even to bring forth Judgement and Truth into Power and Practice so as all the upright in heart shall follow it this even this shall be so brought out and lifted up over the heads of all oppositions and oppressors but God hath much of this kind yet to bring forth in the hearts of his own Children But Lord what wait I for my hope is in thee One asked him Will you have some refreshing I have refreshing saies he the world knows not of and Strangers cannot intermeddle with His Sister desired he would take rest He answered Christ's Disciples said of Lazarus Joh. 11. If he sleep he shall do well speaking it of natural sleep but to sleep in Jesus as those that God will bring again with him is much better Adding It was a sweet resolve of Hezekiah's broken
his praise while I have my being so that thus 't is with me now Christ is lovely to me in all the afflictions I have met with in all I have seen and suffered wherefore rejoyce with me O my Friends let us rejoyce and bless the Name of the Lord together that hath dealt well with me and do not I beseech you disgrace the throne of his Glory because of me or this fleshly state that must be taken from you Murmur not I pray ye that yet you see not Saviours come up upon Mount Zion The reserve of Spirit is with him and the Lord hath many Children to bring in besides those that are brought that shall be brought in by vertue of fresh Anointing so as they shall be known to be Children of his that he hath blest And as I desire you would not weep for me so not inordinately for your selves neither adhere to Christ and fear none of those things ye shall suffer I have no deep insight into deep Mysteries but this I Believe God is a-rising to do some great thing in the World for Sion's sake and though it be hard for us to lose our Chariots and Horsemen some by Apostacy some by Death some by Scattering yet when the Gathering time shall be it will be no grief nor sorrow of heart to behold the way of Gods working in all these things when we shall say he hath done all things well There are many signs upon us that prognostick great things near at the doors though I dare not say I know much distinctly as to Times Means and Methods only be assured not one jot or title of all God hath spoke shall fail though our interpretations of them may fail If any ask how it stood with me as to these things at this season tell them If I die I die in as full Assurance that God will give reviving to his poor despised Cause and Interest as I do believe the Resurrection of this Body and that I know both the one and the other are founded on such a Word as shall stand as Mountains of Brass And advise them also to take heed how they wait on mens Indulgence so much talked of but let their Faith stand in the Wisdom Power and Faithfulness of God and their Prayers be directed more that way endeavouring to make Religion their business yet if any shall lean to such a deceitful Bow be not you dismayed or discouraged at it but hold on your way that shall be strength to you And now Oh now could I send Epistles to all the Churches in these things I would but that work I think is over be ye therefore as the Epistle of that to them And now my dear Brother and Sisters I desire to bless God for you and for your great tenderness to me but herein as to particulars my mouth is stopt I hope you will continue love to my poor Sister you see what a poor Creature she is yet I hope one that will find Mercy in the day of Christ And dear Sister A. L. remember me to all Saints in Plymouth and tell them I have no greater joy than to hear that they are of those Children that are walking in the Truth as to hear of any of them walking loose to Christ and loose to the Profession of him is my Souls grief Oh! tell them that as ever they hope to see my face with joy at the great Day that what they have seen and heard from me a poor worm that hath been according to the mind of the Lord they would do and the God of Peace shall be with them And now Friends as a * Sir H.V. good man once said so I say as to what you may have further to say to me or ask of me While the Oyl runs bring your Vessels His Sister asked what he had to say to her Family He answers They had been a kind poor Family the Lord make them his Family and dear Sister look over a weak Husband and Family and difficulties that may occur as to them and you You and I have been Witnesses to the Faithfulness of Christ how he hath provided for us in former dayes and I challenge you if you can to say to the contrary he hath not failed us thus far Then he said I am weak and faint A Friend by said to him The Lord the Creator to the ends of the Earth fainteth not but gives power to the faint and to those that have no might renews strength He answers Yes he doth so and will also roul away the reproach of his People in due time for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it Oh this part this part of the reproaches of Christ this now almost eight years reproach What Glory is there in it to those that are helpt to bear up under it Then speaking to his Sister A. said Dear Sister Bear up bear up blessed be God for strength to you thus far bear up still I beseech you accept all in good part and pass by all weaknesses you and your Husband had Relations each of you dear to you both and also I trust to Christ I desire not complementally but really to be remembred to them all and desire they may be all gathered up to Christ to meet him at his appearing And I desire for you all that you may be strengthned to all the pleasure of God that is yet to come to pass concerning you and that you may come out of these great Tribulations as Sheep from the washing and though you may see me possibly go away from you in the fiery tryal yet it may be you may be admitted to that Mercy of being bid come out and shew your selves yet that is but little considering the snares that may yet attend such a state But Oh! how much clearer is my way to come out thus than by men Then speaking to the Maid he said I desire God may have the praise of what he hath wrought in and for you and wherever you are cast I desire you may walk as a chaste Virgin And to the Nurse he said I know not how you may think your self concerned in such discourse as this since these may seem strange things to you yet give me leave to say they are some of the true sayings of God how strange soever they may seem yea they are also needful things for you to be acquainted with Oh press after them with all earnestness Then a Friend present speaking after this manner Ah! Brother What is the meaning of these Dispensations of the Lord in snatching away his choicest Saints from amongst us and leaving the poorest and weakest to be Concerned for him in such a day making them ready in sorrow and sadness of heart to say By whom shall Jacob arise since he is so small To which he replied How small soever Jacob was yet Jacob's God was not small He is a great King and a God above all Godds and as was minded but now he
make up such a tryal as all things considered hath not been known in many generations It hath also a Dark-side and a Vail that God keeps upon it by reason of which many are offended at it but if I have not been left to mistake God and Gospel it hath also a Beautiful-side that this world is not worthy of and a time also appointed when its beauty shall be brought forth as the Light and shine as the Sun at noon-day though it seems yet to me that times may pass over it that may make some of those few stagger also but this remains sure upon the whole that though it be the day of Jacob's trouble and it 's very great so that none is like it yet he shall be delivered out of it wherefore let not your hearts nor any other upright ones be dismayed at what remains for though I cannot tell what comes next nor have attained to that distinctness of knowledge as were to be wisht and waited for as to times and seasons which God the Father hath very signally yet hid in his own hand Yet I am very much perswaded this Generation shall not pass away till the Lord appear to give signal Evidence of the Great Work he hath had and yet hath upon the wheel and also of his care of all that are concerned in it Oh! Love the Lord all ye his Saints the Lord preserveth the Faithful and plentifully rewards the proud doers At another time being asked Would he have any thing to Plymouth He said No for saving the Interest of the Lord in Plymouth the Town was now as little to him as this little Island where he was Being asked how he did He said I am a poor sick weak creature still Adding That the Tempter had been very busie this Night with him suggesting that it 's much to him that he should be a Creeple but the Lord he said had put the Tempter to shame and given him to know that though he was at present weak yet in the Lord Jehovah he had still everlasting strength At another season a Friend asking What doth your hard work continue still He said Yes I am labouring as it were in the fire which were not to be endured but in hopes of the Crown At another time being asked how he did He said Still in the Warfare but on the Conquerors side To which his Friend replied Blessed be the Lord that hath chosen you to be a Souldier and helpt you thus far as a good Souldier of his to endure hardships He replied Yea we account them happy which endure One comes to him and saith Poor Neighbour What of the Night He said The Lord had made it a Night of sore affliction to him And said He was now poor and needy indeed yet saith he my God thinks on me To which his Friend replied Yea he hath also greatly magnified Mercy to you in this your sickness by strengthning your Faith and lengthning out your Patience under such long sore visitations as these have been and I trust is signally teaching you Obedience by the things you suffer At which he sighed And said Ah! that word learning Obedience by the things we suffer is a great word and hath much in it when God rightly opens it and he doth teach Obedience much indeed by such things beyond what we think of our thoughts and wayes being far short of his in such things Another Friend that had been with him about the beginning of his Sickness coming now to see him again He said to him I remember I told you formerly I had no cloud on my peace and joy in the Lord since this Sickness but have seen cause since to change my voice in that matter the Lord having since that brought me under tryals and cloudings sometimes though blessed be God they have been day not night-clouds through which God hath shined and I cannot so much desire for my self or others that we might alwayes be without clouds as that our Holiness might might be promoted and carried on by them then all will be well A Friend asking how he did He said I have been this Night full of disorders It was answered The whole Earth was so and we while dwelling on it are like to participate in somewhat of the same kind in one sense or other all these disorders are but making way for that blessed orderly state of things by which he will manifest himself indeed to be the God of Order and not of Confusion not only in the Assemblies of the Saints but throughout the whole Earth The same day being asked by one How doth this valiant Souldier of Christ He shook his head at it and said A pitiful Souldier It was replied One great part of a Souldier was to endure hardships and this part God had helpt him to do at a blessed becoming rate thus far which was matter of thanksgiving to the Lord on his behalf and gave ground also to hope he would in like manner be helpt to the end Then those about him looking at one of his hands now bereaved of strength He said Come What see you What tydings Doth it rot Let it do so it must do so yet shall mortallity he swallowed up of life and this now poor perishing Carkass shall be brought up again into a more glorious state by the mighty power of God by which he is able to subdue all things to himself It was then told him We have no tydings more than ordinary only had little hopes as to men and means as concerning his case whatever the Lord might please to do It was then asked him What tydings he had in himself as to his case He said Nothing at any certainty But said He heard Friends in the Room whispering oft as if they saw or discerned some great change that were not fit for him to know But I bless the Lord said he I begin to be more mortified to all this state of things here below though Flesh and Blood hath sometimes its hopes and fears in exercise about them but when God knocks off their Wheels I see and then can say by these things men live Yea said a Friend they live indeed at a rate they could not live were it not for such dyings daily to all other kinds of living and thereby bringing out to that way of Life as to which way of Life it 's said it cannot be brought out but by dying it else remains alone To which he said Flesh and Blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God nor Corruption Incorruption yet Flesh is unwilling to hear of this To which it was told him No marvel that Flesh and Blood did boggle in such cases when 't is called to go in a way it knows not and a knife at the throat ready to kill all the way 't is therefore reckoned a great lesson to be learnt by all Christians not to trust in themselves but the Living God and is taught best by sentences of death past upon
of it though these wayes be every where spoken against Upon a first-First-Day of the Week in the morning he began to speak to all in the Family with him one after another as follows Ah! Sister A. the Lord gave you a heart to own and profess him his Name and Wayes early when they were wayes every where spoken against and since you have held up and out the Profession thereof in a flourishing day and now are concerned in and with the same in this hour of temptation which I beseech you be not affrighted nor offended at You know how it fared with our Lord and Master whom the Religiou◠as well as the Prophane world persecuted and expelled their Coasts the Servant is not above his Master It is true you have had the Name of a Gentlewoman and of being descended of great Parantage and raised to great things in a worldly account but keep these al◠under-foot as you ought and let that be the song still Worthy is the Lamb to receive Power and Riches Wisdom and Strength Honour and Glory and Blessing Oh! give up all to him as Auranah of old as a King to a King so let the Offering be given up cheerfully and resignedly intirely to him I bless God I have learned something of this in conversing with you of your readiness and freeness heretofore and now to lay out for the Lord and though 〈◊〉 now go the way of all flesh yet you know in all your hearts and in all your souls that we have none of u◠cause to be sorry or repent for what we have laid ou◠for the Lord. And you for your part have heretofore entertained Saints yea it may be Angels unawars the Lord reward you for it and the God under whose wings you are come to trust be your great reward but Oh! take heed your Good be not evil spoken of and that your Table become not a trap nor what was provided for good turn to your hurt I desire the Lord Jesus may teach you to look carefully about you that you lose not the things you have wrought but receive a full reward I remember it 's said of Abel who though dead he yet speaketh and have thought that word in a bad sense looking at me and many others who while living have been but dead Speakers but I am now hastning to another kind of death where after Worms have consumed this flesh and bones yet I may be brought forth as a living speaking Witness in these words of mine against such as slight the instruction of them Then said I bless the Lord for ever that he hath kept me from Hell horror to hope of Salvation eternal Salvation by Jesus Christ and that I shall be helpt in my poor measure to shew forth his praise in this Generation as well as to every one that is to come Oh Friends you are like yet to have opportunities amongst living Saints that speak livingly and audibly Oh! take heed take heed this present dispensation that you yet are and I have been trusted with be not as the Lord's Trumpet sounding an Alarum against you on the behalf of the Lord of Hosts whose words have not been received by you Then speaks of England and sayes Oh! poor England sinful England who stonest the Prophets and choice men that are sent unto thee but wouldest not hear in this thy day the things that appertain unto thy peace but now they are hid from thine eyes Thou hast had an Iron Sinew and brow of Brass and wouldst not be gathered to the great Shepherd and Bishop of Souls Ah England England What would many Kings and Princes and Righteous men have given to have enjoyed one of those blessed dayes of the Son of God which thou hast sinned away and rendred thy self unworthy of Oh! how art thou become a place of Persecution treading and trampling down God his Name and Concerns as much as in thee lyes But Oh! there is yet a Remnant according to the Election of Grace whom the Lord hath yet seen good to winnow till he hath driven each grain of Corn from other yet be of good chear you that are wholly a right Seed abide with God and know assuredly you are more precious in his sight than Gold of Ophir and lay this Cordial by it that the World is not worthy of you yet judges you unworthy of it but there is a day coming even the day of Jezerel the seed of God shall have a day for it in which the Righteous shall flourish and abundance of Peace as long as the Moon endures That word hath been sweet to me many times Psal 72.19 And let the whole Earth be filled with his Glory Amen and Amen The Prayers of David the Son of Jesse are ended Oh! methinks here is an ending of Prayer indeed Comprising the whole Glory of the great David in this short request that is the compleat end of all Prayer calling worthily for Amen and Amen to close it up Then speaks to all in the Room saying I charge you all in the Name of the Lord Jesus and as you will ever answer it at that great day that you make Religion your business and that you make not Godliness a slight thing nor walking with God a small matter as ever you hope to stand with boldness before God in the judgement Then he said God indeed hath took strength from these Arms of mine I speak it not as if I murmured at it or by way of discouragement as if he could not if it please him raise dead bones and of stones make Children to Abraham desires that they would lift up his arms which they did and then he layes this solemne Charge upon them and desires they would by lifting and holding up his hands be witness to it as his Charge to all of them That they make it their great business the remaining part of their dayes to walk to the praise and glory of the Lord Jesus in all the paths of his pleasure His Sister being troubled to see how he spent himself in speaking He said to her Come Sister is this becoming to cry over a dead Dog when by dying he may glorifie God the more And added I am here yet among the Living though with many marks of death upon me yet nothing with infallible certainty with me that I shall die at this time but Oh! look up from me to the Lord that so that whether I live or die your Interest may be sure in the Lord Jesus and now the Lord watch between me and every one of you when we shall be apart one from the other Then speaking to his Brother A. said My dear Brother the God of Jacob the restorer of the dry scattered bones of Israel shine forth from between the Cherubims of Glory on thy dear soul dispersing and dispelling all Clouds Foggs and Feares under which thou hast been long serving God with many tears and temptations many a day of which I have been
You took our Brother by the heel in the womb but hope we shall â—â—ke one another by the hand in Heaven and that both 〈◊〉 you intending the Friend that came to visit him â—ill live love as Brethren or words to this purpose 〈◊〉 near as could be gathered for now speech failed Then speaking of the pressures that were upon him he was advised to look to the Lord who in depths of Wisdom administred them managing all Circumstances about them as also to eye Christ the Captain of our Salvation who endured sore travel yea bruising from his Father also as knowing he ought to suffer such things and so to enter into glory and the Spirit spake of the Sufferings of Christ and the Glory that should follow He replyed Oh! that Glory that Glory on the other side Calling for drink and the Maid bringing it him he desired a Friend present might give it who coming to him said You appear now as one that is shortly to drink new Wine in the Kingdom of the Father He answered Though many have greater marks of Faith than I have yet I am assured I shall be received into fellowship with the Father Son Spirit and all Saints And looking earnestly on the Friend said If it please God to renew strength he should give good evidence that he loved that Friend dearly and all Saints A little after the same Friend acquainted him of two dear Friends of his in London that desired particularly to be remembred to him and were much exercised in fellowship with his present tryal He being very weak replyed I can say little but I pray God they may be strengthned with all might and power in the inward man to hold out to the end according to his glorious power Being asked by another How he did He said My heart begins to fail I now feel But after said Blessed be God for Christ's Grace and eternal Glory Soon after he broke out into fervent earnest Prayer 1st Deeply lamenting Israel's dealing falsely with Goâ— in his Covenant 2dly Speaks forth with great clearness his faith that God would make the decision between real and pretended Saints and that God would abide with those that abode with him greatly encouraging such as found grace to stand in this hour of temptation Concluded committing himself Soul and Body to the Lord for keeping and carrying to the end At another time in like manner in great zeal and fervency implored the Lord to make the decision between the true Seed of Israel and pretenders who had dealt falsely with the Lord under shew of much love Then beggs If God had any thing for him to speak he would communicate and enable to it and that if Abraham's work were done that he would say to him with that clearness and evidence as he might understand it Thou hast fought a good fight hast kept the Faith henceforth is laid up for thee a Crown which God the Judge of all shall give thee A while after and but three hours before his dissolution a Friend perceiving him under great pressures spake softly to him They looked unto the Lord and were lightned A right look will bring down relief under all difficulties Yea replyed he with strength and earnestness And their faces were not ashamed Thence forward he spoke not but in a few hours after it being the 5th day of the first Month 1668. yielded up his Spirit falling asleep without pang or considerable groan FINIS Copies and Extracts OF LETTERS Written on several occasions BY That Deceased Servant of CHRIST The Author of the fore-going Discourses Printed in the Year 1668. A Book that he approved being the work of an other containing Instructions for Children he sent several of them to some of his Acquaintance accompanied with this Letter to their Parents Vnto my dearly beloved Brethren Sisters and Friends whom the Lord hath intrusted with the oversight of Families Children and Servants abundance of the Spirit of Glory and of God is desired Endeared in the Lord UNder the strong obligations of bounden duty which my Father hath been pleased to lay upon me of serving the Interest of your Souls and theirs whom God hath given you to my uttermost it hath been not the least part of my study in this School of Instruction unto which he hath sent me how I might at this distance most effectually attend and be found therein as one â—hat must give an account not only of the Law of my Relations but also of these fruits thereof on your hands which have extended and abounded to me-ward in un-interrupted tender love and sympathy as well in this my chain â—s in the many years of my weak endeâ—vours to serve Christ among you in liberty in requital whereunto as I can do little at most so am I often inwardly checked and rebuked for my sinful shortness toward you both in general and particular from soul to soul and very lately it hath been with more than ordinary weight on me to exercise pitty and compassionate thoughtfulness on those Families of yours both Children and Servants many of which the Lord hath multiplied like a Flock whose particular affections as far as they have been capable to express them I have been at a loss how to recompence or improve to their advantage but having been advising with some of my Companions here as well as laying the matter before him who is able to give seed to the sower and multiply with blessing the seed sown I have herewithal attempted to make an Essay for enterance with them in presenting to them this upright plain Address prepared to my hand by some one of the Lord's Prisoners full of bowels toward such young subjects consisting of such proper matter and brought forth in such a condescending Spirit and Language as I trust by the blessing of the Lord will find good acceptance and success among such souls My present Writing therefore with it is not so much to crave its acceptance in good part by them for of that I have much assurance buâ— to lay hold of this opportunity to desire your faithful following the design of it by stirring up your selves and zealously and unweariedly doing your endeavour with all your wisdom interest and might behaving your selves among them as Men and Women of knowledge that your account of their souls as mine account of yours may be given up with joy and not with grief Here am I and the Children and Servants which thou hast graciously given me unto which faithfulness of yours besides many other weighty Arguments that might be urged the very remembrance of the dayes being so very evil may afford you as it hath me many forcible motives 1. These are dayes wherein you know not how suddenly you may be hurried pluck'd and separated from them not only by death which climbeth up at the windows in most Families this sickly season but by the violenee of the Sons of Men through the wise ordering of God who are permitted to make
to heart how much of the interest of your present peace and the comfort of your lives is laid up in your wise constant gracious endeavour of this kind and the Lord's blessing thereupon Whereas on the contrary it were well if the common reproach upon the Name of the Lord were altogether groundless and that it were not too evidently to be seen in many Families of Professors that their Children and Servants are as rude untaught incorrigible wanton wicked unruly as any others as if the only care upon those entrusted with the Headship of Families were and that hardly performed as it ought to be to have them brought forth and brought up to Adam or to Earth rather to learn their Books Complements Manners and Trades but to understand themselves to learn Christ to know the Lord God of their Fathers to be instructed in the Holy Scriptures from their youth up to know themselves miserable without a Saviour and to be led as by the hand unto him Oh! how rare are these attainments and that because endeavours are so slack in order thereunto I pray you examine your selves your prayers your practices your conversations where are the bowels of Christ towards your own Do you travel in birth again for them till he be formed in them Should it not be much more your care to see them Saints than to see them men and women Alas if you Families who would bear the World in hand that there is some excellent thing among you more than others be not taught the fear of the Lord where do you think a Seed should be reared up to serve him that in the stead of the Fathers should be the Children accounted with God for a generation Among worldly men it may not be expected whose Children are ordinarily the off-spring of their lust the painted Idols of the rich and pinching burdens of the Poor and their Servants the meer drudges to promote the Interest of their ease gain and covetousness few enquiring or caring what becomes of their immortal precious souls The manifest ruines upon whom unless the Lord work extraordinarily upon them should provoke us to pitty them and be the more jealous over our own concernments herein in order hereunto suffer this further word of Exhortation Make it I beseech you your main business to set before them the pattern of a standing even serious holy conversation Fâ—milies do usually receive faster and deeper the impression of the similitude of their dispositions and behaviour who have the over-sight and government of them than of their meer precepts and exhortations The Majesty and Authority which God hath entrusted and invested you with among them is only held up in its enamouring beauty and convincing power while you improve it much in the fear of God neither debasing it on the one hand by a vain fond frothy lightness in your spirits and carriage toward or before them or exercising it by a proud furious imperious domineering over them on the other hand Much spiritual wisdom lyes in your tempering and mixing a sweet affable behaviour without vanity with a grave reproving demeanour without fierceness and this not in an affected appearance but in truth nor only at uncertain fits and flashes but in a constant fixed frame within doors and without Consider also you have in their sight taken up an high and holy Profession of the Cause and Institutions of Christ and those about you are likely to be someway interested in the sufferings you are threatned to sustain for your adhering faithfully thereunto in respect whereof it will be their happiness that you hold fast in their eye and as their example these truths in a pure Conscience to which you have begun to witness not only for the Truths sake themselves which deserve that you should deliver them to the next generation unmixed and unbetrayed by you but for your own dear Relations sake also before whom it would be sad should you lay such a stumbling-block in the beginning of their way as doth bespeak so loud as you can proclaim it that there is no such thing as Truth worth your adhering to in a day of tryal and consequently worth their enquiring after imbracing or engaging themselves in in times of such persecution I hope better things of you and such as accompany Salvation though thus I write trusting that you either do or will do the things which I desire or rather the Lord requires of you to whom I leave you and rest Yours many wayes obliged to love and serve you for Christ's sake To a Friend in a time of Great uncertainties as to publick Transactions A spiritual understanding of the times and what Israel ought to do be granted largely to you Holy and Beloved I Think yours of the 9th and 16th instant are both of date later than my last to you by which you may easily perceive my aptness to tire in prosecuting divine advantages At present I was willing to have followed you closer but that my frequent little Journeys have of late prevented me How faithful is that Word and verified to a thousand generations Whoso is wise and shall observe these things even they shall understand the loving kindness of the Lord. And that none of the wicked shall understand but the wise shall understand If ever there was a time to have the eye of Saints kept very intent upon the Lord to trace out his footsteps it seems now to be such a time when his Pavilion is darkness and fire enfolding it self to be then divinely enabled to read not ony particular loving kindness sealed up to the observer in special but to see the Salvation of Israel carried on in a strait path and that he that buildeth Sion worketh still by line and plummet is a grace bestowed not in common in the House of God but is methinks one of the special love-tokens by which he will shew among all his Disciples who is the Beloved One that leans on his bosom and that have the favour to ride in the Chariot the midst whereof is paved with Love for the Daughters of Jerusalem I may take up a just mournful Lamentation of my own short-sightedness and incapacity I had almost said impossibility to discern with any distinction of apprehension the Temple of God open in Heaven and in it the Ark of the Testament while there proceedeth out of the Throne and by means of the Censor cast into the Earth such lightnings and thundrings and voices and earth-quakes and great hail Only I durst not say short of this the Lord giveth me now and than a glimps of the King in his Glory and the Land that is very far off And ah then how good is a Pisgah-sight of Canaan It 's even as the Chariots that Joseph sent that revived fainting Jacob what life and signification it manifests to lie hid in such a word as this Yet God is good to Israel Yet surely I know that it shall be well with them that fear God
that fear before him With what a different power is a soul acted then in such a request Thy Kingdom come Thy will be done from what it is when only in an usual formal way it breatheth it out Such transfigurations may well constrain an out-cry It 's good to be here though many times one knowes not what he sayes But alas why speak I think I long I so much for such sights and tastes which indeed though precious yet are transient mean while not valuing as I should that substantial feeding and living upon Sions lasting foundations such as remain unshaken though he bring us into the place of Dragons and cover us with the shadow of death though there be no fruit in the Vine and the labour of the Olive cease yet then to live above hope under hope c. have the Lord's joy remain in us and our joy be full Methinks all the Lord's footsteps point to us that as our proper lesson To be securing all that which concerneth us upon such Foundations as cannot be shaken when Heaven and Earth is moved Foundations are destroyed the Earth and all its Inhabitants dissolved before the Lord when he cometh for he cometh to judge the Earth with Righteousness and his People with Equity Yours in special Relation and Affection To two of his Acquaintance Imprisoned Direct leadings to living Fountains of Water and wiping all tears from your eyes is desired Much Beloved I Salute you both in the same bowels and with the same respect although I have not much that I know of to communicate that can add any thing to either of you trusting and in a measure tasting that you are as on Eagles wings carried beyond what my poor dark confused heart or hand can contribute to you in the force and fellowship of that blessed Word 1 Pet. 4.13 14. And as I trust you in a good measure are so I am by Grace helped with many others in every Prayer of ours to desire you further may be advantaged with those walks with God in the perfect liberty of Grace and Peace that may make up abundantly your blessedness not only in equality with but in a way of surpassing and transcendency to their present priviledge that have as yet opportunity allowed them to walk up and down about their Father's business It is not a little or low ground of Consolation for you and I pray that the power of it may still remain with you which one was mentioning that you are as really in the Cause and Business of the King though you can do nothing but make Prayers for him and bewail the dishonour done to his Majesty as if you were in Field or Council for him It is to one of you a state not unusual I hope it s to neither of you strange or unexpected it cannot be but a little while at the longest run ere that Word will be made good on you in a most blessed sense Eccles 4.14 and ere that be I am by Grace perswaded that as you share in many more Prayers and direct personal remembrances than formerly so also that experience of Pauls will redound to your real Consolation Phil. 1.12 13 14. as verified and is in part upon you The dreadful and unexpected issue to which all things in appearance are reverting beyond what we were willing to suppose the former Apostacy should or indeed could extend unto nay beyond the hopâ—s of those poor worms that are everywhere wallowing in the vomit of their own druâ—â—â—nness and belch out blasphemy I trust will have with many as I hope the consideration of it hath begun to have with me its effects to lead the Lord's people into a deeper search after and greater sense of the Idols of Jealousie that have provoked to this exceeding Jealousie in which the Lord seemeth not pleased to spare the giving his own Name together with the memorial of all his Wonderful Works to be reproached and as a by-word to the vilest of men and no one left that can say Restore Surely though the personal iniquities be great and manifold that have been found in the skirts of the Lord's People under their Profession that they are Saints yet do I believe there lies more combined united provoking guilt upon them unpurged unrepented of vindicated and pleaded for considered as they are Sionists and in their publick Relations Ah! these other man's sins are such eating evils to such as are in a sort related to them and yet in a seeming tolerable and excusable sense free from them as for which I am perswaded not only the Land mourneth but even Sion languisheth and her Children faint in the streets and yet few consider where is the malignity of the disease or declare the causes of banishment True it is some that I think honourably of have profest the discovery and a means for recovery of it but truly I think with such an hard and uneven hand have been the application that I fear though their good-will may be accepted of the Lord yet in the issue they will prove Physitians not of that value as may be expected from their Profession in that respect I am also in some hopes that the Lord is more effectually weaning his little Children from every Idol to which one after another they are so apt to apply themselves though guilt and unholiness be in the bottom of it how many a pitiful piece hath the Lord made manifest to be as Coniah Jer. 22.28 a dispised broken Idol a vessel wherein is no pleasure and yet such hath been the carnality of many that they have been concluding as they of this Coniah Lam. 4.20 When I have remembred all along that holy escape that the Lord helped you unto when many other good men were entangled and came not off till their bones were broken I have been made to rejoyce in that love and favour to you that hath preserved and I hope reserved you in a waiting Spirit till he should bring you forth among the sons that shall comfort Jerusalem when she sees their wayes and doings concerning all the evil that hath been brought upon her Ezek. 14.22 23. a passage that I read this morning which it may be I understood not that desired Prayers might be made to the Lord in that behalf encreased with holy jealousie my cry lest any influence of that Word Isa 51.14 which God forbid should light upon any of the dear Children of God that are this day in bonds I trust the grace of Jesus Christ will keep guide bless and sanctifie you both and all that are as you and when ever he lifts up your heads it will be to see his reserve of Wonders that shall glorifie his Holy Name I am cut short of enlargeing unless my opportunity of Conveyance were a little better known to me for a most plentious supply of this defect I shall return again to my travel in your behalf that the Shepherd and Stone of Israel may undertake for you
to keep you in perfect peace Now to him that after you have suffered a while is of all power to keep you from falling and to present you faultless before the presence of his Glory with exceeding joy to the only wise God our Saviour be Glory and Majesty Dominion and Power now and ever Amen 7th 3d month 60. Upon the death of some whom he honoured to two of his Acquaintance then fellow-Prisoners The Lord send you help from his Sanctuary and strengthen you out of Sion Greatly Beloved I Salute you both as is meet in the Lord. These two last Posts I have not written any Letter to you partly for that I have been out of Town some little journies but principally having been much under the surprize that those were Job 2. ult The voice indeed is loud and as if seven Thunders had at once uttered their voices the terribleness of it makes many shrink as Eliah into his den When Oh when shall we hear the still soft Voice and as men of understanding see his Name We may well cry out he hath shewn us hard things and given us to drink the Wine of astonishment which falls the heavier in that such who have obtained favour to lay nearest to heart the concernments of Sion and to be therein aided with greatest boldness and sweetest intimacy near to the heart of Christ and have had their Affections enflamed most with what they have sought and seemed to themselves and others to have been of those bosom intimates that know all that their Friend doth and have hereupon spoken openly and without clouds or reservations their confidence of things that have appeared in the issue to be mistakes how some of them bear it I do not well know but sure I am the hand is very sorely turned upon the little ones that believe in Christ great is their astonishment like that Isa 51.17 to the end I have often thought of them Acts 21.4 Who said to Paul by the Spirit that he should not go up to Jerusalem How like the language of our spirits heightned by fervent affection and attended with providential bringing to remembrance of sutable Scriptures and all this on a soul enjoying clear access to the Lord is to the voice of the spirit in truth as he fulfils that Promise He shall take of mine and shew it unto you and shall shew you things to come And if it may please the Father after he hath graciously allayed the storminess of these perplexing waves that at present doubtless discompose for any thing to lead his holy ones into a more perfect discerning of things which in this kind do differ and in mean time instruct to think more soberly of themselves and judge more tenderly of others I shall yet hope this sharp dispensation may bring out meat and sweetness that we thought not of As for the poor Martyrs themselves when I review what was of late said of their particular perswasions and how when their departure was hid from them they enjoyed such un-interrupted joyful communion with the Lord I cannot but admire the wisdom and goodness of the Father that took that course with them to anoint them for their burial but alas they had no burial But much more grace to admiration appears to me in it that when their perswasions and expectations from the Lord in that point gave way to his determinations yet that at that very time the Tempter should be bound up who doubtless desired to have them that he might have winnowed them as Wheat and would have made a great market of the least discouragement upon them over the whole Antichristian World Oh! how unsearchable are his wayes and his works past finding out The deadly Treacle that you speak of will doubtless swiftly become a Cup of trembling to this wretched generation and entayl the guilt of all down along from Abel c. A very strange efficacy that it hath to cry and to prevail at length though it tarry long first That Abels was not answered and expiated in the Flood that destroyed the World of the ungodly nor that of Zacharias if it was his who said The Lord look upon it and require it 2 Chron. 24.22 But they both must cry against that generation that put to death the Lord of Life and neither of these cryes expire at the ruines of them and their devastation to this day but shall be found as fresh in out-cry against that great City where also our Lord is crucified Rev. 18.24 And though it 's hard to discern yet great is the pravalency of those cryes of Saints that night and day follow the Lord herein though he not only tarry long but even seem to be angry with the Prayers of his People that word hath sweetly stayed me in this hour of temptation Thou tellest my wandrings put my tears in thy bottle are they not written in a Book by thee If their wanderings staggerings be tenderly numbered and their tears bottled and their grouns booked and all this by thee a Book of remembrance before the Lord We need not be so sollicitous what becomes of them though they are above out of our sight doubtless when it comes to much Incense in the Angels hand the Censor will be cast into the Earth Rev. 8.3 4 5. Rests Yours in tears 24. 8. month 60. Unto one who had acquainted him with the departing of some from their holy Professions The early visits of the bright and morning Star be a light in your dark place till the day dawn and the shadows flee away Beloved in and of the Lord SInce my last I have received yours wherein you were pleased to remember and send such a rich Token to your poor Friend whom you are pleased to describe by that merry title of your Father who blesseth God for grace and support ministred by tracking the footsteps of the Father of Spirits in those paths of peace and pleasantness wherein he pleaseth to lead you and others of his suffering ones so contrary to the methods and expectation of men whose breath are in their nostrils Job 22.29 Psal 41.8 12 13. unto which I account it no diversion that he is pleased as your last intimates to keep you in an humble sense of the shortness of self-sufficiency for bearing you up against the hour of temptation the very fear whereof hath already cast down so many stars from their excellency on whom this inscription is manifestly engraven as a caution to us though a by-word to scorners Lo this is the man that made not God his confidence Over whom as I have little ground to glory 1 Cor. 10.12 Rom. 11.18 20. so neither is there just occasion to be greatly offended Isa 2.22 2 Tim. 4.16 17 18. Joh. 6.66 67. chap. 16.13 32. Although I find it somewhat difficult to draw the memorial of their slips into a gracious perpetual remembrance without some mixtures either of wrath or doubting I confess it makes me many times tremble to think
acquaint and refresh you with that dismission to rest as may secure you until the indignation be over-past You know his priviledge who Jer. 36.5 though he was shut up that he could not walk abroad about his Lord's business was nevertheless hid there by the Lord when the Courtiers did purpose to take him vers 26. But if in the Father's Counsel it appear best that out of these Store-houses he bring more of his precious boxes of Oyntment to be poured out upon the present Funerals of the Cause he is concerned in I make no question but the savour thereof will commend it self to all the Virgins in this and other generations and they shall have Robes and Rest till they stand again in their lot at the end of dayes and who believing and loving Jesus Christ in Truth would not put off his filthy garments in expectation of such change of raiment As for my part my Father graciously indulgeth me and the Lambs here giving us an undeserved Covert of which no reason can be given even where Satan's seat is while other flocks are dispersed and scattered Neer about us by my last I acquainted that some from our neighbouring parts are sent to that place of ancient experience where they have a stock of prayers and presence to begin upon they begin on straw as learning to endure hardness as good Souldiers the Lord make that word good to them which often hath been in that place sweet to me Exod. 23.25 and at length Eccles 4.14 I expect daily the same lot in the Lord 's with-holding his hand from which I fear nothing more than a Spirit apt to do as Agag 1 Sam. 15.32 putting off the evil day the least Sun-shine brought forth a manifestation that notwithstanding the ruine of his Nation and danger of himself he was not mortified to the delicacy of his life nor had escaped though he thought he had waved the bitterness of his death I need your Prayers and precious Exhortations tending to prevent slumber that I be not taken at unawares The Lord keep fresh and manifest before your eyes and mine the Captain of our Salvation not only as a leading pattern but as a life-giving Principle on which having our minds stayed we may still be trusting in him as kept in peace upon peace there with true respects to all your Family Rests Yours in the love of Jesus 26th 4th month 62. His judgement about continuing or forbearing Assemblies to Worship the Lord. Strength and Beauty as is in the Sanctuary Beloved in the Lord I Thought it best while it is yet day and opportunity offers that we attempt to make improvement so as may mutually tend to the strengthning each others Faith and Love in Christ Jesus with such intimations of occurrences as may direct to sutable sympathy and supplication as the Interest of the Lord may require in its present circumstances at their hands who have learned to approve themselves as true Sionists This place affords little save the continued series of divine goodness holding our souls in life and not suffering our feet to be moved where he with-holds not the tokens of his Fatherly care and provision to supply all our wants both outwardly and within to shew that he is good our Rock and no unrighteousness is with him We had rumours of being this week brought before the Deputy Lieutenant but that came to nothing Fear and fury fills many mens hands with work of their own occasioning so doth he make their own tongue to fall upon themselves the Righteous shall see it and flee away and all men shall see and consider the work of God for they shall wisely consider his doing They at our Island I hear are well and chearful but free access to them is denyed nothing else can be expected as times and jealousies are yet Heaven is open still David could form a song in the Cave when his Faith reached to this assurance He shall send from Heaven and save me Earth was block'd up but Heaven was open still And as long as Heaven holds he had no ground to mistrust a want of the Promises accomplishment to the uttermost Many thoughts of heart have exercised us as well in groans at the throne as in other sad conferences among our selves at the reasonings and resolves of your strong men who by drawing away the shoulder from the yoke and their hand from the Plough wherein they seemed so well skilled and blessed formerly have given way to the ceasing of their work in a time when their Faith and Love to Christ is brought to its tryal and that any poor souls should interpose with their lives in their hands to bear up the Name of Christ and to preserve a nail in his House in their absence it serves to signifie that there is something of reality in that Promise The last shall be first and the first last And touching your Question What ground a Church hath in times of Persecution to appear publickly If by publickly be meant only so far knownly as wherein with the best prudence and caution used as their case stands they may most effectually answer the ends of mutual edification and hold up the Glory of Christ in the practise of his Institutions It 's so far from being a Question What grounds they have to meet as we know not what grounds can well be held up to the contrary by any who pretend to so much profession as that any part of the Instituted Will of God is worth the suffering for or that Christ is worth the following in Gospel-Precepts when the Obedience of Saints therein is to be tryed as by fire If you be pleased to single out any Reasons that can pretend to satisfiâ— Conscience guided by the mind of God in Scripture they may have an examination Rests Yours many wayes oblieged 20th 7th month 62 To the same Friend and something further on the same Subject My very Dear THe Sea-Monsters they draw forth their brest and give suck to their young ones Ah! what shall the Lord's People who have received anointing to Preach the blessed Gospel become cruel as the Ostriches of the Wilderness that the young Children yea and old Disciples too ask Bread and none giveth it unto them nay are willing to seek their Bread with the peril of their lives because of the Sword of the Wilderness And shall such men as we who have known the Terrors of the Lord and felt the Love of Christ constraining us that pretend to know the worth of an immortal soul the joy for one sinner that repenteth that have had a dispensation of the Gospel committed to us and yet no necessity lying upon such no wo to such if they Preach not the Gospel no compassion at least no more compassion to the multitudes that are scattered as sheep that have no shepherd Alas where is the fellowship of that Spirit which of old enabled the publishers of this Gospel after they were shamefully intreated to wax
bold in their God to Preach the Gospel of their God with much contention 1 Thes 2.2 approving themselves the Ministers of Christ in Imprisonments in Tumults in Stripes in Necessities in Distresses Where is the Lord God of Eliah Where is he that put his Spirit upon them who first trusted in Christ I have been often refreshed with a saying of holy Burroughs in his Epistle to the Reader of his Heart-Divisions alledging a saying of Luthers I desire to be a faithful Minister of Christ and his Church if I cannot be a Prudent one the standing in the gap is more dangerous and troublesom than getting behind the hedge there you may be more secure and under the wind but it 's best to be there where God looks for a man c. thus he Indeed in this day if ever the Lord looks who they be that will stand in the gap that will answer that Character My life is continually in my hand yet do I not forget thy Precepts They who rescued the Field of Lentiles and the Field of Barley which were part of the Lord's Land how inconsiderable soever it might seem in its self when the generalty of Israel deserted them were at last reckoned among the first rank of David's Worthies 2 Sam. 23.11 1 Chron. 11.13 though perhaps while it was in doing they might be reckoned rash heady hair-brain'd men they who cannot pass as well through evil as through good report in the Gospel of God can surely go but a little way in it he that left at Pamphilia and would go no further in the work because perhaps 't was too hot and heavy was not thought by Paul fit for the same imployment another time whatever his Kinsman Barnabas might think of him I could wish some of these things might be by the Lord let in and set home upon the spirits of such who not only Retire themselveâ— but sound a Retreat also to others who might otherwise be sweetly and advantagiously engaged to fight this good fight of Faith War this good Warfare endure this hardness as good Souldiers of Jesus Christ I am called off from pursuing this matter All here are well not else at present Rests Yours many wayes 18th 8th month 62. To a Friend released out of Prison Wisdom and understanding exceeding much and largeness of heart like the Sand of the Sea Precious and Beloved I Have my longings to know how it fareth with your Soul now you are under the advantage of gathering up at liberty the diffused Light and Anointing that is dropt with such variety in the Body of Christ especially in your City whither I observe it is the aim of most of the choice Persons up and down who either are driven or disengaged from necessary attendance in their Countrey stations to make haste promising themselves greater liberty and enjoyment there than ordinarily here can be expected In respect whereof I have been sometimes conceiting that it is a place and puts into a capacity for Believers to make the most rare Extracts and pick out the choicest Notions and Assistances of any where in the World which thoughts are easily attended with such temptations Oh! that I had the wings of a Dove I would flee far away from this stormy wind and tempest I would see that goodly Mountain and Libanon But then I am as often checked with this reproof He that encreaseth knowledge encreaseth sorrow these creaturely engagements may render a man the more prudent and rational it 's many to one if they make him more serious spiritual evangelical It may be easie to get the mind fraughted with noise news notions but to get the heart established with grace drawn into a more substantial and experimental communion with Jesus Christ according to the tenor of the New-Covenant and in the Grace and Truth thereof this is not so easie to be found and maintained without extraordinary watch and diligence These words of Wisdom may be more heard in quiet and to better purpose and improvement than in the out-cry of him that ruleth among Fools Soul-searching Heart-preparing Sin-mortifying work may have more advantage from the retirement of a nasty Prison then unless abundance of Grace be ministred from being left to walk in a large place especially if with a large principle of Liberty to touch withal but being laid in Gospel-bonds under the Instituted charge of none In these respects my much valued in the Lord I have not only had some tryals of my own soul while I have been representing things to my self in such a figure and also seen the woful issues thereof on some others who have fallen under my short-sighted observation but have withal had many a thought of you since you have been in an outward respect as a Hinde let loose I will not say I have had hints of any tamperings with you but only that it is marvellous if you have not which doth and will so much the more magnifie Grace in your being preserved in Christ Jesus stedfast in the Faith fervent in the Spirit lively and active in the wayes of God growing up more into Christ which is our Head and being more publickly diffused by a largeness of Spirit in all the members This all this I hope pray and shall to my utmost endeavour may be found remaining and encreasing in you according to the form of sound words the pattern of them who first trusted in Christ worthy of all the Grace you have received and Testimony you have born hitherto in doing and suffering and worthy of the blessed hope of the Resurrection of the Lord's Cause and the approaching of his promised Glory In a fellowship in this earnest expectation and endeavour you have the prayers of all our little Family but especially and particularly of 26th 6th month 63. Your wonted and constant Soul-Friend Unto an ancient Acquaintance taken at a Meeting and cast into Prison Entrance and abiding with joy and rejoycing into the King's Palace My never dearer than now Friend I Salute you in this new state into which you are cast by the wise hand of my good Father in fellowship with my self and other dear Companions and as you have obtained this Grace that you suffer not an evil-doer though as an evil-doer unto bonds that the Word of God may not be bound nor Gospel-gatherings unto Christ confined within and accommodated to state models answerable to the lusts of wicked men So I pray you may not miss of those full free uninterrupted streams of Strength Satisfaction and Consolation which have been the promised and experienced portion of the highest Saints that have appeared for God My soul hath had fellowship in that thanksgiving touching you Dan. 3.28 Blessed be that God who hath sent his Angel and hath kept his Servants that hath trusted in him that they have changed the King's word and yielded their bodies that they might not serve nor worship any God except their own God And I pray that you may never want the
mixtures of this kind which are apt to steal in insensibly upon spirits influenced either with the Fear or Love of Creatures in this staggering and back-sliding hour of temptation wherein men's politick and prudential contrivances to preserve themselves from danger hath abundantly weakned and wasted the Courage if not the Conscience of Testifying Duty It 's of no small advantage I find by blessed experience to be giving daily diligence in observation how nearly and firmly the great Concerns of the Lord's Glory in his Works and Wayes are related to the Lord Jesus in his raised and exalted capacity and how directly the weight of them all rests upon his shoulders who is mighty to bear and with what infinite wisdom and according to what an exact platform of eternal counsel all these seeming Meanders and Laborynths of exteriour transactions are managed according to the integrity of his heart and the skilfulness of his hand who is wonderful in counsel and excellent in working In the Faith and Hope of this the Soul of a Beleever hath gracious invitations and engagement to return to its rest knowing that in quietness and confidence is its strength and are as the secrets of a Presence-Chamber for it till these calamities be over-past and though it look on but cannot interpret signs in Heaven and on the Earth perplexity distress of Nations the Sea and Waves roaring through approaching woe to the Inhabiters of the Earth and of the Sea yet it can acquiesce in the infallible knowledge of that Interpreter one among a thousand who is concerned in all these things engaged by Covenant and resolved in absolute Will to bring about in the best time and way the Ends of his Glory and its blessedness in a most sweet harmony and conjunction This saying to the righteous It shall go well with them and commanding their fluctuating tempestuous souls into a calm is yet very far from inducing them to that carnal security and idleness wherein tyred Professors are apt to wrap and bless themselves concluding we must leave publick things to Providence and retire into a closset-converse with our selves and the Lord things good in themselves but usually abused into the generating of a private selvish narrow frame of Spirit unfit to serve God in our generation by Converting Sinners Edifying Saints or saving themselves from an untoward and adulterous generation by a faithful testimony That the contrary hereunto may be your blessed lot namely largness of Heart like the Sand on the Sea-shore accompanied with cleanness of hand and a Spirit clensed by the Blood and set free by the Spirit of the Gospel is the earnest desire for you of him who is Yours assuredly These Parts yield little only fresh gazing on a new Blazing-Star in the East and divers talks of the beautiful Star in the West few think of the Star of Jacob that bright Morning-Star they who overcome shall have him as a certain fore-runner and prognostick of a Morning without Clouds they must be up early who look to be visited with the comfortable beams of it Even so Amen 1st of the 2d month 65. Another to the like effect Supplies of every good thing from the Shepherd and Stone of Israel Dear Heart IT is in my desire for you that you may obtain the favour of a marked Mourner securing you from approaching Plagues and reserving you for expected Salvation among the Palm-bearing throng who only are competent to learn the new song as one of the One hundred forty four thousand that are redeemed from the Earth And though you are fed with the Bread of Affliction and Waters of Adversity and that also by measure and stealth yet you may not want the satisfactory sight and hearing of a Teacher that may guide you into all Truth as it is in Jesus keeping you upright in this staggering day when so many reel to the right hand and to the left I confess sometimes I have hopeful expectations of seeing some such effect as this oâ— all these slidings some of them of understanding sâ—all fall to try them and to purge and make them white even to the time of the end but yet It is a fearful thing thus to fall into the hands of the Living God My lye that promotes his Glory makes me no whit less a sinner or my doing evil that good may come thereby I think I was hinting to you last time the Caution the Lord hath ministred to me by Prov. 25.26 A righteous man falling down before the wicked is as a troubled fountain and a corrupt spring detrimental and infectious to all that have any thing to do with him The accompt that you give of the Wall of the Daughter of Sion much-like his Neh. 2.13 which was once such an inviting prospect Psal 48.12 13. would engage to that Out-cry Lam. 2.18 19. but that there is hope in her end That her Children shall return though now they are not her dead men shall live together this dead body shall arise A review therefore of her from the munition of Rocks sutable to that Landschip Isa 33.20 c. is becoming the Children of the King but especially hath it been of use to me to feed upon that discovery made of the temper of his heart who is principally interested and concerned in all these mutations He shall not fail nor be discouraged till he have set Judgment in the Earth Isa 42.4 The youths shall faint and grow weary and young-men utterly fail they who stand upon their youthful vigour and greenness may and shall give way but he who hath such engagements with him and for him as vers 5 6. he waits without weariness and expects without impatience till his enemies be made his footstool A fellowship through faith in in his Spirit will furnish to a similitude in his patience to a being armed with the same mind that was in him Rests Yours dearly To a Friend upon the death of a Zealous Faithful and therefore Persecuted Servant of the Lord. Where is the Lord God of Elijah My true Friend IT comes to my lot to take you now by the hand though you may justly and earnestly challenge and expect it from a righter and more instructed heart and hand who being under deep pressures and considering there is a time to be silent especially when put to shame as well as a time to speak is not easily drawn forth to any thing of this nature till he can recover a little strength waited for to comfort others with the same comforts wherewith himself hath been when he hath been comforted himself of the Lord dreading especially under such a dispensation to utter any thing rashly knows that to speak his troubles will add little to the allaying of yours and that as Vinegar upon Nitre will be the singing songs to an heavy heart his own or others wisheth therefore his present silence may have no worse interpretation than the seven dayes silence of Job's Friends who answered him not a word
when they saw his anguish was exceeding great and their own was not very small The Interest of words meerly such can be of little signification while the things themselves spoken of are manifestly absent Perhaps we have spoken enough if not too much for our part now God is come to speak his part which requires much quiet attention the rather for that though it be very loud yet very mysterious and deep as are many of the Oracles of God those especially wherein he designs to manifest himself to his and not to the World I could for my own part also lay hold on the like exemption and silent retirement as most befitting my present state and frame altogether entangled and perplexed and presuming that you have at hand to help not only the presence of the great promised Comforter who can supply all your wants but also the secondary supplement of many worthy Ones who have received the Anointing and thereby the Tongue of the Learned to speak words in season From you we have hitherto received the accounts given of the gradual stâ—ps of him who worketh all things according to the counsel of his own Will in the several gradations wherein we have not been wanting as enabled to pour out our hearts before him who was able to help and are now enquiring why he hath appeared as being angry with the Prayers of his People covering himself with a Cloud that they could not get through If any distinct answer be given you may expect to hear of it In mean time that Isa 57.1 is before us as verified not only in the loose generation of Professors who seem greatly hardened and estranged from the Interest of their chiefest mercies but to true even among those who seem to be most tenderly touched with affectionate sense of present privations and pressures of all kinds right laying to heart and due considerations of such stupendous works of God both in their present weight and future warning is very rare and require extraordinary teaching and conduct that neither on one hand we despise or on the other faint when thus chastised by him Your cry for help hence must be returned with the same importunity ye also helping by Prayer to God for us who though at some personal distance are yet in some sort of Sympathy pressed if not above measure and beyond strength yet to the utmost degrees of what is hitherto received yet wisdom and strength are with him with whom we have to do who hath graciously put himself under promise that as the day is the strength shall be The Lord prepare us for learning harping singing the new song which is the peculiar melody of them redeemed from the Earth which admits of no interruption from Thundrings Earthquakes Tempests Voices though they proceed out of the Throne and are subservient to the Ends of it Yours heartily 4th of the 4th mon. 67. Another on the same occasion Garments of Gladness for the Spirit of Heaviness My dear Sister WHile there is a Spirit in Heaven influencing spiritual Believers upon Earth in their frail capacities that Word will have its verity among them though absent from one another in the body how great soever their distance and how dark soever their circumstances may be yet are they present in the Spirit joyning not only in rejoycing while order and stedfastness in the Faith are manifest but also in affliction and mourning where knowledge is imparted or though but supposed of the hand of the Lord touching and bruising especially in the most tender part and on spiritual occasions such hath been the fellowship of the Spirit through Grace I trust in my soul with you under the very heavy rebuke of the Almighty wherewith you have been exercised especially of late dayes on divers accounts both personal domestick in the Church of Christ where you walk in the whole Sion of God and as in the Nation it self having a right and relation to its welfare or desolations as I also am fully satisfied you have had with me in divers proofs that have been put upon my Faith and Patience as far as they have come to your cognizance and I hope the same Grace will not only teach us to be tender but mutually helpful each to other toward the understanding and complyance more fully with our Father's mind in these stupendous dispensations so as his ends upon us may be actually furthered in the promotion of the power and beauties of Holiness Unto which issues though godly sorrow working Repentance never to be repented of hath a very direct tendency and humbling our selves greatly under the mighty hand of God is the straitest step towards the best exaltation in due time Yet when I read the present temper and its tendency of my own heart and also observe in yours and others late lines upon this heart-breaking occasion to what excess of sadness fear discouragement and even dispondency we are apt to yield the Tempter advantage to triumph over us and hardly recover our selves to a jealous thought that there is any considerable danger in the excess on that hand but that it is a kind of vertue to refuse to be comforted I say in such observations my heart hath bin smitten with reproof and somewhat awakned to stand upon its watch against incursions on that quarter lest Satan should get an advantage on us who should not be ignorant of his enterprizes It 's true we have lost a Prince and great man in Israel this day But who was his Father 1 Sam. 10.12 was it not the Father of Spirits with whom the residue of the Spirit is and who can at his pleasure set a man over the Congregation Know we not where is the Lord God of Elijah is he not in Heaven and can do whatever he pleaseth Is not his Spirit in Promise Are not all the Promises of Christ Yea and Amen Doth not the time of the Promise draw nigh of that grand effusion of the Spirit of Elijah that shall raise the Witnesses revive the Works lift up the Standard break the Yoke have not some sprinklings of the Spirit been found up and down in our dayes and should it not be owned as a token for good and turned to us for a Testimony that the Harvest is not far off Are not these discouraging complainings of ours much of the same kind and go upon the same mistakes and may righteously issue in the same dismissions to us from further service as it was with Elijah in his fainting fit after he had acted in so full a gale of the Spirit just before that now he complains They have killed the Prophets c. and I even I am left alone and my life is sought also What am I better than my Fathers We know the Answer of God to him which I trust is true at this day There is yet a remnant according to the Election of Grace and Seed that shall serve him and shall be accounted with him for a Generation
The Fathers where are they and do the Prophets the Worthies live for ever Why cry we out of loss God hath not lost them God took them they all live to God they are ever with the Lord. We have not lost them unless they that sleep in Christ are perished we shall go to them shortly though they shall not return to us We shall sit down with Abraham Isaac and Jacob they have not lost themselves they are found in Christ to die is gain to be with Christ is far better Death is theirs because they are Christs The work of God hath not lost them if we take it in its most capacious comprehensive acceptation God hath a Will to be done not in Earth but also in Heaven they are not dismissed from the King's business who are called from the Camp to the Court advanced from being Souldiers to be Privy Counsellors God hath a great Family in Heaven and Earth and many Vessels some above in honour some below in dishonour If God have fully purged any who can grudge them to be translated as Vessels unto honour sanctified and meet for the Master 's immediate use c. Besides look on the Work as it is below it must be granted That if it must alwayes proceed according to one measure or manner by a line that we have made ready to our Lord's hand then will the Work be deficient and suffer loss when those that we lay stress upon are taken away and others cannot be found presently to clap into their places but if the Work be the Lord's and receiveth various appearances and representations according to the counsel of his own Will and yet in all go strait forward then humbling acts passing on it changing its beautiful appearance laying it sometimes low in a low place making the fatness of its flesh lean and thin are not to be accounted loss or at a dead stand by such poor worms as we that can judge of such things only by appearance The wheel of divine Actings went alwayes streight forward Ezek. 1.9 12. and returned not when they went whither the Spirit was to go they went and yet that work that goes alwayes streighâ— forward hath not alwayes liftings up above the Earth nay many times standeth still vers 21. Yet God is not slack concerning his Promises nor Retrograde concerning his Work Gideon may have too many but God had never too few to do his work by there is no restraint to the Lord to save by many or by no might Well when Moses my Servant is dead Josh 1.2 and that at the straits of proud swelling Jordan what shall poor Joshua a Servant a slighted inferiour do Why he must be strong and of a good courage vers 6. Only be strong and very couragious vers 7. have not I commanded thee to be strong and of a good courage be not afraid nor dismay'd vers 18. So Deut. 31.6 7 8. such sweeping dispensations that fall upon the choicest men of Israel are apt to invade the courage of the Remnant that is left against which as Grace makes special provision to lay in matters for support it concerns us faithfully to draw it out Be of good courage and God shall strengthen your hearts all ye that trust in the Lord. Rests Yours affectionately for Christs sake To a Friend upon the Release of some who had been divers years Imprisoned Dear Friend I Am glad if those Friends come safe on shore if there be nothing of a Witness to be look'd at in such a lot it 's good to get to Land with all speed but if there be any thing of our being set for the defence or Apology of the Gospel Phil. 1.17 though but in the smallest point of it it may be very hazardous shifting places Acts 27.31 1 Sam. 22.23 1 Cor. 9.15 16. If God look for a man in the gap though but to defend a piece of Barley 1 Chron. 11.13 14. or though but of Lentiles 2 Sam. 23.11 12. If it be any part of the Heritage of Israel it will not be easie answering that question when found in a way of escaping What dost thou here Eliah It needs great care and caution to come out of Egypt well leavened when the most are making haste that they may not die in the pit When will that Roman greatness be out-shone by Christian Nobility of Spirit Acts 16.37 Yours 30th of the 9th mon. 67. Upon occasion of a Token of small value in Provisions sent to him and his fellow Prisoners Unto our Brethren and Friends in the bonds and bowels of the Gospel whose hearts have made them willing under the bounteous Influences of the God of Israel to comfort the hearts of the unworthy Prisoners of the Lord in Plymouth Island by a Côstly Present and to every one that hath contributed or helped therein to a tender groan or the value of a cup of cold water be a large recompence of Reward given in Grace and ascertained in Glory by him who is not unfaithful to forget such labour of Love shewed to his Name Beloved and esteemed as is meet in the Lord ALthough we are hitherto detained from the personal and particular knowledge of you by Name whâ—â—â— counsels and care have been concerned in this liberal expression of your Sympathy with a few poor undeserving creatures in which matter we could be glad to receive distinct information as far as such a desire might be thought modest in us to ask and be expedient for you to grant to the end that our Supplications for you and Applications to you might be more direct and particular Yet ere that come to hand and lest Matth. 6.3 may have influenced though we think the reason of it binds not in this case We thought it lay on us not to forbear the present acknowledgment such as it is at least as a fore-runner to what we should be willing to offer more particularly that hereby you might be informed that through the Lords Providence the whole of it came safe to hand and by his Grace we hope the heavenly voice in it hath and through your Prayers will yet have a more effectual access to our hearts to lay us under those obligations to a faithful chearful unwearied trusting in him and waiting on him at all times which we are satisfactorily perswaded was the design of your devising those liberal things for us Under which engagements we reckon our selves bound at least to give you some account of our selves in the present respect That if it may be our rejoycing each in other may be rendred more reciprocal we comforted together with you by the mutual Faith and Love both of you and us And first of all we wish you knew that under the varieties and vicisitudes of exercises wherewith our Heavenly Father hath seen good to prove and try us for some years together leading us in some paths and under some disappointments in our Creature-concerns and accommodations that we thought not of and
had not trod with our feet in dayes past Yet hitherto hath his bountiful Provision and tender Care over us exalted it self in a distinguishing manner and many times to our admiration so as hitherto our Bread hath not failed but hath been given to us in due season and our Waters have been sure so that knowing how little we are yet fitted to bear as a Father pittieth his Children in their low estate he hath not proved us with hunger or with straights nor called us up to approve our selves his Witnesses in necessities in distresses c. but our lot hath rather been to partake of the fat and sweet and soft insomuch as if he put that Question to us to be resolved according to that express literal sense of it When I sent you forth on the Services and Sufferings that attend your Testimony and you knew not whither you went Lacked you anything We must answer Nothing Lord but in that respect have in hand or we trust in some degree of sweet satisfaction we have all and abound and are full by the favour of him who giveth us all things richly to enjoy and is we would humbly hope teaching us in whatsoever state we are therewith to be content So that at many of the strange preventions of loving-kindness even in things of this sort we are often made with admiration to cry out What is this to us Lord Is this after the manner of men O God! Is this a Prison If we should have sought a Prison in a Prison these six or seven years Have we yet found it Whatever others in the same fellowship of bonds with us have found we must say for our parts That as we have escaped the Sword and we hope the Polutions of the Adversary so we have found great Grace in the Wilderness for his People his Chosen The which we mention not only that we may praise the Lord together while ye observe that we receive not nor accept not so thankfully your Present in respect of need through that unspeakable gift and care of his who hath hitherto continued the Bread of the day in its day but that herewithal we might take hold of an apt occasion to take you by the hand and lead you with a little the more encouragement up and down in those wayes of the Lord wherein we must sing Great hath been the goodness of our God even in the experiences that we have passed practically through in the Doctrine and Profession whereof we had been trained up in our years of plenty and prosperity so that we must say The Land that we have been sent to spy out even in the straitest passages of it as far as our Father assigned us to follow him in is a very good Land and if we rebel not against the Lord but abide with him those very circumstances that at a distance seem like sons of Anak and walls reaching up to Heaven apt to eat up the Inhabitants are well able to be overcome and will be found Bread for us while we stand and feed in the strength of the Lord and in the majesty of the Name of the Lord our God so that these Serpents at a distance from which we are apt to flee are found to believing but a rod and that a rod of God too when taken in the hand And could we come forth to you in Truth and Evidence as wise and right improvers of the sensible experiments we have actually found tasted seen and handled hitherto of this sort and that the savour of these excellent things had not been diminished in these souls of ours through too much an in observent careless earthly disposition bringing us down from our advantages of excellency we might speak more loudly to you than now we can Oh! taste and see that the Lord is good blessed are they that put their trust in him The Lions among whom we dwell do want and suffer hunger but they that fear the Lord lack nothing that is good In the midst of their sufficiency they are in straits while in the straits designed to wear out the people of the Saints of the most high there is a provision made of sufficiency be ye therefore strong and very strong and very couragious and God shall strengthen your hearts And now for a thankful acknowledgement though it may not be interpreted as any requital of your holy liberality What shall we farther say than that we do as we are able bring the matter in our requests and thanksgivings unto him who is able to make all Grace abound toward you All-sufficiency in all things may abound to every good work being enriched in every thing to all bountifulness which causeth in us thanksgivings unto God And this we beg on your behalf not as if we desired a gift or that it should be so again done to us knowing that there are many watery faces everywhere requiring Bread to be cast upon them as under far greater necessity than our selves But as hâ—ving perswasion and some small experience what a great recompence it is in such case to have the mouth and hand opened from the hearts being enlarged with those expatiating Graces and Vertues of the Spirit of the New Testament that constitute a true largeness of heart like the Sand on the Sea-shore and to encrease that greatness that is proportionate to the large discoveries of believing doing suffering-Grace and Preparations for expected Glory In order to it we desire for you all and intreat you to press and pursue after 1 Greater advances toward newness of heart the old heart will be as old bottles and an old garment that will not comport with the new Wine which is yet in the Cluster and a blessing in it though men attempt to destroy it And this is not only a newness of state but a newness also of frame by means whereof the inner-man may pass under experimental renewings day by day even the renewings in the Spirit of your minds by which the Truths Wayes and Works of the Lord the King may have an intimate access and abundant enterance into your own souls and you into them in their vertue dominion and power 2 Greater approaches in a way of heavenliness and nearness to the Lord at distance from the spirit of this evil World where the World is set in the heart the God of this World will be quickly filling it narrowing and enclosing it for earthly service and this not only in men of Earth who have their portion in this life but also in those that are by the Blood of Christ delivered from the gross pollutions of this prâ—sent evil World through lust but yet much concerned in the business cares and intricating-affairs of its many things which though lawful in themselves to be diligently prosecuted yet as lying under the influence and advantages of the Prince of it having a notable tendency to bring souls down from their excellency and to eat out insensibly the liveliness and sweetness of our spirits longer and further than the Victory that overcomes it in the vertue of the Cross of Christ by which we are crucified to it and it to us be kept up on fresh exercise 3 Right waitings for and waitings on the Spirit of Promise who is of power to quicken dry bones raise dead Witnesses and do great things in and for us which shall not be resisted nor need not be assisted with might and power though for a time the work about it may be made to cease with force and power We shall say no more at present but with the representation of our oblieged respects to every one of you as if known by Name leaving you in the blessed arms of our Beloved we remain 22th of the 9th mon. 67. Your Brethren waiting for the Consolation of Israel POST-SCRIPT IF any inquire what might occasion so much severity as to detain the Author so many years and until death a Prisoner It may suffice to insert here for the Readers satisfaction That in the state of his case left under his hand setting forth the illegality and unrighteousness of proceedings against him He concludes it thus If it should be suggested Perhaps he is a Ring-leader This true Character of the Person may alleviate jealousies of that kind He was born at Plymouth of mean yet honest Parentage is not by Kindred or any Alliance related to any Person or Family of any Note at all was not bred up to Learning at any University or sent any where to Travel for Education or Experience but contrariwise brought up and kept diligently by his Parents to Work in the poor yet honest Trade of a FVLLER never lived out of that Town a Month together all his life except in a Journey some Weeks on occasion about sixteen years since to London besides what he under-went by constraint in Prison Never in the former Wars was enlisted in any Troop or Company under Pay and in the Trained-Bands of the Town where he served never was accounted worthy of Promotion to so much as a Corporal nor in the Corporation whereof he was a Member ever advanced so high as a Constable never bettered his Estate one farthing by all the propitious advantages that might have given him opportunity for so doing nor is conscious to himself of the least desire of adding to what he hath by any present or future advantages that any favourable overtures of the times may tempt him with never was advanced to or improved in any Place or Office of Trust or Profit Civil Military or Ecclesiastical save only for some few weeks unknown to him and against his will he was Mustered a Chaplain to the Fort but quickly got himself discharged of that again Never was concerned in nor truly charged with any Plot Mutiny or Tumult giving the least disturbance or occasion of Fear or Jealousie This one thing then only can remain to give colour to such proceedings That about eighteen years since he being convinced of his Duty to the Lord by evidence of Scriptural Light joyned himself in an holy Covenant to walk in all the Ordinances of the Lord blameless to the best of his Light and Power in fellowship with a poor and despised People FINIS