that unruly lose Spirit and Mind they were gone into being some of them filled with Prejudice they had written a Book which they brought in Manuscript to the Meeting and urged to have it read But I told them we had the Papers there and they might lay down their Objections they being there and we would Answer them But that would not serve but the Book they would read and we sate in quietness till they had done And when they had done I reached for it and by my memory did go over the Heads thereof and did clear G. F. and Friends in our godly Care and Intents and opened the Service and Benefit of such Things which they did Cavil at and shewed Friends the Advantage that was therein both to the Truth and them and withal reprehended their Slanders and Falshoods with which they had hurt the Minds of several young and newly-convinced Friends and so opened unto them how it was the same Spirit that of old led those that opposed the Apostles and endeavoured to bring a slight and begit a disesteem in the Minds of the Believers against them that watched over them for their good and so endeavoured to lead them into a fleshly Liberty to shun the Cross c. And when I had cleared my self and informed Friends of the truth of Things that then by them had been objected against Friends in general were satisfied and saw the Mistakes which they had let into their Minds through the Insinuation of those three men that had been chiefly concerned in the writing of the Book and in the Opposition And so the Lord's Power broke in upon the Meeting and Friends Hearts were broken and great meltings in the Power there was amongst us and so in the same we blessed the Lord and praised him and prayed unto him and they were bowed and went away And so Friends were comforted and the Seed and Life reigned over all everlasting Glory and Honour and Praise be given to him for all his Mercies and Preservations for he is worthy for evermore And so when all our Meetings were over and Friends in the heavenly Power and Seed comforted and the bad Spirits and their evil Work confounded and brought under as in the Minds of the Simple-hearted that were like to be hurt and betrayed by them and so a coolness and calmness amongst Friends I was clear And then took my Journey with some Friends that did accompany me and went to Flushing and down to Gravesand and when I had visited Friends there I went to New-York and had a Meeting and then took shipping for Maryland there and set Sail the the 23 d of the eighth Month 1671. We met with a sore Tempest a West-north-west-wind that blew so hard we could carry no Sail for some days but at last we got into Virginia and then sailed up the Bay and got to Pertuxon River in Maryland the fifth day of the ninth Month and there I landed with my Companion Daniel Gould who came with me from Road-Island and did travel with me that Winter We visited Friends in Maryland and I went down to Virginia to visit Friends there and found a freshness amongst them and they were many of them restored and grown up to a degree of their former Zeal and Tenderness and a great Openness I found in the Country and had several blessed Mettings And then I did advise them to have a Mens-Meeting and so to meet together to settle things in good order amongst them that they might be Instrumental to the gathering of such as were yet scattered and stirring up of such as were cold and careless and so to the keeping of things in order sweet and well amongst them And thus having cleared my self in the Love of God I committed them unto the Lord and the Word of his Grace and so took Boat again for Maryland and got well thither at last but met with strong Winds and rough Weather and some danger and so spent some time more in Maryland till the Spring And in the 2 d Month I appointed a Meeting at West-River in Maryland for all the Friends in the Province that I might see them together before I departed for I was determined to go as soon as I could after that Meeting And when the time appointed came and Friends from all Parts began to come George Fox with several Brethren came from Iamaica and landed at Pertuxon and from thence came streight to the Meeting And there were Friends from all Parts of the Province where they dwelt and we had a very large Meeting which did continue for several days and a Men and Womens-Meeting for the setling of Things that Men and Womens-Meetings might be established in the Province according to the blessed Order of the Gospel of Christ Jesus which Friends by the Power thereof were gathered into in most places And G. F. did wonderfully open the Service thereof unto Friends and they with gladness of heart received Advice in such necessary Things as were then opened unto them and all were comforted and edified And then when all was over and we all clear and all sweet and pleasant among Friends we departed and went down to the Clefts some by Water and some by Land and there we had a large Meeting of both Friends and other People And when that was over we departed some went down to Virginia and some stayed in Maryland And George Fox Robert Withers George Pattison and I with several Friends of the Province took Boat and went over to the Eastern-shore and there had a Meeting on the first day and on the second day we began our Journey through the Woods to go over Land to New-England And took Horse at Iohn Pitts at the Head of Tredaven-Creek and did go through the Woods above the Heads of Miles-River and Wye-River and also headed Chester-River and lay two Nights in the Woods viz second and third days at night And on the fourth day we came to Saxifrax-River and did swim our Horses and went over our selves in Boats or Canowes And so rode on to Bohemia-River and there did cause our Horses to swim and went over our selves in Canowes And then came to a Plantation called Augustines and there we stayed a little and about three in the Afternoon we set forwards and some of us got to Delaware to Newcastle and got Lodging for we were sore wet with the Rain but Ro. Withers and George Pattison lay in the Woods all night their Horses being tired Next morning they came to us at New-castle We stayed there that day and next day we got over the River And when we were over we could not get an Indian for a Guide and our Dutchman we had hired would not go without an Indian so we were forced to stay there that day And the next day he rode about to seek an Indian but could get none to go and so late in the Evening there came some over from the other side
we took our Journey towards Swanzey and Cardiff and had several pretious Meetings in Glamorganshire and then went over into Monmouthshire And after we had visited Friends Iohn went with me to the Ferry and stayed to see me take Boat and then returned And I went that same day to Bristol and stayed some Meetings there And then went down into Somersetshire and did visit Friends there and had many blessed Meetings And returned back to Bristol and stayed some Meetings there And then went up into Wiltshire and so into Glocestershire and through Barkshire and into Oxfordshire and so into Worcestershire as far as Worcester and visited Friends and had many pretious Meetings through those Counties And from Worcester returned again down through Glocestershire and had several Meetings And came again to Bristol and from thence took my Journey through several Counties visiting Friends And so came to London and stayed there some time in the Service and Work of the Gospel And being clear I took my Journey for the North and did not make much stay at any place till I came into Cumberland And the reason of my so travelling was because of a Meeting that was agreed upon by Friends to be at Draw-well in Sedber-Parish about the former Difference that had been heard at Powbank that was among Friends in Westmorland chiefly occasioned by the aforesaid Iohn Story and I. Wilkinson and a lose sort of People that they did countenance in a Liberty that the Truth would not allow and therefore could not be born with by such tender Friends as were zealous for the Truth who kept their first love and therein delighted to uphold that Antient Testimony for the Lord against the Priests and their Tithes Hire and Maintenance with other things that were to be born Witness against through Sufferings as also for Meeting together to worship God which from the beginning had been our practice against such there being divers Statutes with Penalties upon us for so doing for fear of which the aforesaid I. S. and I. W. with such as had let in the same fear through fleshly Reasoning did shrink and hide and so let fall the Nobility of that Testimony which we had received and were raised up to stand for in the beginning And so because of a failure in divers things and a pleading for a Liberty from under the exercise of the Cross that the Offence thereof might cease the Faithful became concerned to stand up against that Spirit that thus was like to weaken or overthrow the Faith and Testimony of many through its subtil Workings in and through divers who like them the Apostle writes against in his Epistle to the Galatians that to avoid Persecution endeavoured to bring the Believers under Circumcision that so the Offence of the Cross might cease or Sufferings for the Gospel might be avoided Now this Difference still continuing and they abiding obstinate and not willing to receive Advice nor bear the Iudgment in the Truth placed upon them Friends in condescension to see if they could be gained appointed a Meeting at Draw-well near Sedber that they might have another opportunity and be heard what they could further say And then the Matters were fully gone through before many antient faithful Brethren that were there then assembled who spent four days in hearing and going through the Matters relating to that Difference that was then occasioned through their Opposition to the blessed Order of the Truth who withstood Friends godly Care for the Preservation of the Dominion thereof in Righteousness And when all things were heard and gone through by the Brethren the Iudgment was again given in the Power of the Lord upon that Spirit that they had let in whereby they had been led into a Separation and Division and Opposition to the Truth and the holy Order and Testimony thereof and they in the same Power and Love with great Bowels and Tenderness sought to return back again unto that Spirit of Love and Peace wherein the Unity and Fellowship of the true Body doth consist But alas many of them would not be wrought upon nor prevailed with but in that hardness the Enemy had wrought their Hearts into did persist until they became open Enemies to the Truth and the faithful Witnesses of it even to the Writing and Printing publickly against them and what the Truth doth lead into and so are become such as the Apostles write of that greatly withstood their words and slighted them of which both Paul Peter Iohn and Iude write This Meeting at Draw-well was in the second Month 1676. From thence after Friends had done what could be done at that time with holy Endeavours for the reconciling and gathering into the Heavenly Unity and making up of the Breach I returned again into Cumberland with several Brethren to wit I. T. I. B. Hugh Tickhill Thomas Laythes Iohn Steel and so spent a little time in Cumberland and then I took my Journey with Iohn Tiffin towards London And in our Journey we came into Westmorland to visit Friends there where we met with some of those with whom we had to do at Draw-well and then they were grown hard through resisting the Counsel of the Lord and had set up a Separate Meeting and so run into the Self-Separation and grown more into the Enmity and stronger in the Opposition through Resisting the love of God that so richly was reached forth unto them in the Heavenly Bowels that by the Power of the Lord Jesus Christ were opened in the Brethren at the aforesaid Meeting at Draw-well For then did the Power of the Eternal God in great Majesty appear and in a weighty Dread was Iudgment set and sealed upon that Spirit by which they had been betrayed and by the same Power and Word of Life was a Door opened unto them that had been betrayed and an entrance in the same set before them and they with much brokenness and tenderness in the Power of Love were sought to return and be reconciled unto God and unto his People But this great Visitation by them being rejected they grew harder and harder until they grew many of them as before said Enemies unto the Cross of Christ and so withered as to their Spiritual State and so did become as some of old whom the Apostle wrote of as Trees twice dead and pluckt up by the Roots And then from Westmorland I went over into Yorkshire had a Meeting at Sedber and went through the Dales to Massom and visited Friends there-aways And then I. T. and I with Robert Lodge took our Journey to York and from thence towards London visiting Friends by the way and so came to the Yearly Metting in the Year 1676. where there were many faithful Brethren assembled together there from most Parts of the Nation Amongst many things of Concern relating to the Truth and the Churches of Christ that Division in Westmorland was laid before the Meeting and how they were hardened and had set
hath a good place amongst sober People Though the Professors who shrink and hide we are informed do rail against Friends they do seem as if they were given up to hardness of heart and so set in their blindness and hardness as to go on till the Rod come upon them For they do not lay any thing so to heart as thereby to be brought off from the evil Errour of their hard and prejudiced Minds It doth appear that they envy Friends good and are offended that we do not flie into holes as they do But as for Friends they are very cheerful and we have had a very blessed Season and kept in Unity Peace and Concord in our Meetings and Concerns and the Lord 's good Presence pretiously with us to our Comfort and Consolation And blessed be the Lord he is not wanting unto us both to sanctifie our hearts and also to fill them with his Spiritual Mercies and to Contribute of his other Mercies and Blessings whereby he may make our days pleasant unto us that with Gladness and Joy of Soul we may serve and praise him who is worthy for ever Amen! Dublin the 4th of the 6th Month 1685. Yesterday I came home having been through the South-end of the Nation and between six and seven weeks away and have had a very comfortable Journey amongst Friends and peaceable Blessed be the Lord for his Mercies towards us Dublin the 6th of the 7th Month 1685. I am glad to hear that things are so still and quiet in England and that Friends have some little breathing time of ease from their sharp persecution It is the Lords mercy towards us but our Innocency is that which must speak for us and if we loose that our defence would depart from us and then there would be none to fly unto for vain is all help from below Therefore it will be our happiness to rest quiet with our Faith in him for he is able to preserve who promist them of old he would give them favour in the eyes of the King of Babilon And it had been their safety to have trusted in his word but in their taking of their own way they brought Ruin upon themselves and so will all do now whose eye is not unto the Lord to stay their minds upon him but look out to follow their own Contrivances I know the Truth will keep out of all such things if Friends be careful to keep under the Conduct thereof But if fleshly Reasonings prevail in the Unbelief then the Eye goes out and the Mind into the haste so the Patience and Long Suffering is lost and the Hope and Faith let fall Then the Creature can neither trust in the Lord nor stay rightly for his Time and Season Our Meetings are very quiet and peaceable which is a Mercy we greatly value and our Hearts in the Lord's Truth are at rest and that 's our Comfort Both there and here and where-ever we are it will be our place to be prepared for Sufferings that 's likely to be our Portion for the Truth And it is but as it has been of old If any will live Godly in Christ Iesus he must suffer Persecution I am ready to go out of Town to visit Friends in the County of Wicklow Dublin the 19th of the 7th Month 1685. I am sorry that so much Occasion of Offence should be given to some Friends here by some that take Liberty there viz. at London by running back into such things as the Truth Condemns and so to be Encouragers of Pride and Vanity that will grow too fast to the drawing down of the Displeasure of the Lord upon Man And therefore I would have Friends to stand in that which is plain and keep to the Cross in their Trades and Dealings and Cloaths and in all things that they may remain standing Witnesses for God in Righteousness against Pride and all the Vanity of the World for therein will stand our Safety for ever I desire that we may live up to the Truth in all Things that the Blessing may attend us And indeed we had need to be Circumspect For every Lawful Thing is not Expedient because there may be an unlawful Liberty strengthened thereby The Lord keep us all in his Wisdom truly Lowly and Humble that we may still honour him in all things and remain a People through our Day to his Glory For if upon us in our Day we let the Spirit of the World prevail to the overthrowing of our own Testimony what Example and Footsteps shall we leave to them that come after us I am full and could say much for my Heart is concerned to hear them who themselves are not so good as they ought to be strengthen themselves by bad Examples For though some may be slow to mind that which is good so as to learn Good from the Example thereof yet they are quick to take Encouragement from the Contrary Dublin The 18th of the 9th Month. We have had a comfortable Season this Half-Years-Meeting quiet and peaceable and in Love and Unity among our selves so that we have cause to be truly thankful unto the Lord for that Mercy amongst all other Mercies we Enjoy from his blessed Hand Dublin the 29th of the fourth Month 1686. Though the World be full of Tumults Disquietness and Amazements yet blessed be the God of our Salvation who hath brought us into a Degree of that Rest which the Distresses that are from below cannot Reach So that there is something known to Retire unto for a Sanctuary that the World knows not neither can the Destroyer come into it Therefore our Safety is always to keep our Interest therein that we may have our Priviledge unto our Mansion there and so rest in the Time of Trouble where no Hurter nor Destroyer can come The Lord's Power is to be admired loved and believed in for ever who gives us blessed Seasons and Calms and Quiets It 's true for ever the Winds and Seas must obey him blessed are all that put their Trust in him Fears and Restlesness doth possess the Hearts of many but for our parts we have an Eye unto the Lord and know he hath a hand in ordering of or suffering all things for Ends best known unto himself and therein we Rest. And I desire that the Lord by the Indwelling of his Power in our Souls may still so keep and preserve us in that Simplicity and Godly Sincerity wherein we may always know one another and be a Comfort one unto another in the plainness and simplicity of that blessed Truth that saves and sanctifies from all Unrighteousness and Unites unto God and brings into near Fellowship one with another For this is that which sanctifies fits and prepares the Heart of Man for every good Vertue and settles and composes his Nature not only for heavenly Mercies and that he may receive and enjoy them but also for his Station in this World and the Enjoyment of Temporal Favours that he may
rest quiet under his disposing and ordering Hand by which he will in his Wisdom and Power over-rule all Men and Things who knows best how to Execute Iustice and Iudgment upon all according to their Works or Deserts For before him all things are naked and bare therefore he cannot miss in Iudgment We resting here and waiting upon him it quiets our Spirits and sweetens them and also I can say it makes many bitter things sweet and so sanctified that we meet with Comfort in Tribulation And though it be both Natural unto and Lawful for us in Affliction reverently to pray for and desire Deliverance and also when obtained to rejoyce therein and bless the Lord therefore yet still our Happiness is to mind his Providences and wise Ordering of all things and therewith to be Content without either murmuring at or strugling against what he seems good to bring to pass And so here we shall all rest in one Fold and Covenant and seed in one Pasture together and so have a Fellow-feeling of one anothers Ioy or Sufferings For our Resting-place is but one in the Truth and our Salvation stands therein for ever and therefore we need look at no other Iohn Burnyeat SEVERAL EPISTLES WRITTEN By J. B. to Friends from divers Places Dear Friends IN the dear and tender Bowels of Love and Life do I dearly salute you all who are faithful to the Lord without respect of Persons in whose Life and Love I feel you and enjoy you wherein my Heart is opened towards you my dearly beloved ones with whom I am daily refreshed and comforted in Christ Jesus the Fountain and Well-spring of Life and living Refreshment who is our Rock and daily Refuge unto whom we fly and are safe in the day of storms and tempest when the floods arise and the raging Waves of the Sea do swell and beat yet in the Light have we a safe hiding-place and a sure and peaceable Habitation against which they cannot prevail As faithful to the Lord we abide therein whose Love towards us hath abounded and will abound as we abide in that unto which his Love doth reach which is his own Seed which he hath raised in us by his own Power and outstretched Arm wherein the Issues of Live and Love are known and received Therefore my dear Friends keep to it and feel it continually that fresh and lively and open-hearted ye may always be in the Life that nothing may enter that would vail the Seed and oppress it for that will stop the Issue of the Love of God which is shed abroad and shedding it self abroad in the Hearts of all the Faithful whereof we in the bountifulness of his Love have richly been made partakers of Therefore as one who with you have been partaker of the rich and endless Love of God I do exhort you my dearly beloved ones to continue in his Love and all to abide faithful in the Life that Death again may not pass over any one but that the Life which God hath raised may be felt and that may rule over him that hath the Power of Death in every one of us to his own Praise and Glory who hath redeemed us wherein the comfort strength and refreshment is re-received daily from him who is the Life and Strength of all that wait upon him and who is near to preserve all them that are upright in their Love towards him And herein have we boldness believing that neither Tribulation nor Affliction Persecution nor Distress shall be able to separate us from the Love of God which we enjoy in Christ Iesus although he may suffer great things to come upon us as it is at this day to try us nor yet to separate us one from another nor to break our Unity in the Spirit wherein we feel and enjoy one another In which my dear Friends I feel you and have you often in my remembrance to my great Joy and Gladness of heart for ye in the Lord are my Ioy and Rejoycing many times when all other Comforts are taken from me but only that in which I feel and enjoy you wherein our Unity Life and Love doth stand wherein I remain Your Brother in my measure received J. Burnyeat Postscript Dear Friends I Wrote a Letter in the Eleventh Month before I went out of these Parts and sent with one who did intend to pass through Cumberland but I hear it was left in Yorkshire which did something trouble me because that I did not obtain an Opportunity to send again so soon as I could have desired in regard we travelled into the West towards Galloway and Cork But at Dublin when I was there I wrote a Letter which I partly believe may be come to you So being in haste I cannot give you an account as I would desire only Times are very troublesome in regard of the Distractions of the People in this Nation We were taken Prisoners after we came from Dublin at Ardmagh and kept three days It is very hard to Travel in this Nation for us but for the Seed's sake we are freely given up into the Will of God Clanbrasel in the County of Ardmagh in Ireland the fourth day of the fourth Month 1660. Dear and well-beloved Friends in Cumberland BRethren and Sisters in the holy Covenant of Life with you is my life bound up in the unspeakable Bond of perfect Unity and unfeigned Love wherein I feelingly reach unto you in this day of weighty Trial wherein every ones Faith and Patience must come to be tried and every ones Foundation made manifest whereon he stands blessed are they whose Foundation and standing is in the Power of Christ Jesus the Rock of Ages and Foundation of many Generations such shall stand immoveable on the Rock in the day of Tempest and shall be at Peace and kept in Safety in the Power in the hour of Temptation and time of trial Therefore my dear Friends as if I were present with you my Bowels are opened towards you and my Life reacheth unto you in pure love even desiring that every one of you may truly feel and abide in the feeling of the pretious Life and pure invisible Power of the blessed God which he hath made manifest in your Hearts whereby every mind of them that hath been faithful to the Lord is changed and renewed and redeemed and made pure and sweet through the vertue and goodness of the same whereby our Souls continually are refreshed as we abide in the sensible seeling of the Lord's Presence O! therefore my dear Friends ye who have tasted of the Lord's goodness and have been nourished by his mercies inwardly who have felt the weight of his love and the value of his truth in your inward parts Mind that as your chiefest treasure my dear Friends that the sweet Consolation and the pretious Spring of the Father's love ye may feel opened in your Hearts from day unto day and from time to time For truly Friends large is the Lord's
goodness and exceeding pretious is the Fountain of endless mercies which he hath opened in this day for the refreshing of his own dear Children whose whole trust and confidence is in him alone Therefore let none again incline in their minds after the things in this Creation or desire further to enjoy it or any thing in it then you may enjoy them in the Covenant of God This my dear Friends is truly in my Heart from the Lord to lay it before you and to warn you of in his Name and Fear I say Friends that ye who have tasted of the Lord's goodness in any measure and have felt the working of his heavenly Power to the redeeming of your minds out of all visible things and to give you an entrance into the Inheritance that never fades away That ye may not look back again into the Glory of the things of this Creation now in this day of Trial of your Faith but that all may be offered freely into the Will of the Lord that whatsoever you enjoy it may be in his Covenant that his blessing may richly be felt in your inward parts and his peace sweetly enjoyed in your Hearts Or else truly otherwise if any seek in the declining mind to hold any thing out of his Covenant and pure fear the blessing will not be upon that heart but it will be unto them as the spoil which the Children of Israel fell upon contrary to the Word of the Lord and like unto Achan's wedge of Gold which became a Curse in the Camp of Israel Therefore let all with their all be freely offered up unto the Lord in Righteousness with an upright heart which is but a Service reasonable in this day from us who have so largely been made partakers of the richness of his Loving-kindness and Mercies that so every heart may stand open purely waiting for the heavenly vertue and for the renewing of the heavenly gift that every one may be strengthened by the same in the inward man that so we may all together with one heart truly rejoyce in the Salvation and Consolation of the Lord our God which we feel and enjoy in Spirit And furthermore my dear Friends that you all who feel your hearts and all freely given up unto the Lord both you and yours into his Will Mind the Power which hath made you willing and dwell and abide in the sensible feeling of that continually that so every mind may be kept low and humble before the Lord sensible of the Rock of their Salvation and of the Arm of their strength and preservation that so all fleshly boasting and glorying may for ever be excluded out of the Salvation Preservation and Keeping of all the Redeemed of the Lord that he alone who is the Salvation of his People and the Keeper of Israel may have the Honour and Glory and the Praise from the Work of his own Hands who is God over all blessed for ever and ever whose Works will for ever praise him in all his Children From me your Brother who is now Prisoner in the Dungeon in Rippon Common-Goal where I am separated from having Liberty to be amongst the rest of my Fellow-Prisoners only because the Lord opened my Mouth among them in our Meeting when we were together waiting upon the Lord. Iohn Burnyeat Written the fourth day of the sixth Month 1662. Barbadoes the third day of the first Month 1665. Dearly Beloved UNto whom the pure love of my heart in the Covenant of Life doth plentiously flow forth at this time my Soul dearly Salutes you all who are faithful unto the Lord without respect of Persons whose Minds are kept faithful unto the unchangeable Power of Life and Vertue wherein your Souls have been refreshed and by which you have been gathered into the belief of the Truth and to the Acknowledgment of the same which in a good degree hath been made manifest in and among you My Exhortation as a Brother in the Bowels of Love unfeigned unto you whom my Soul dearly loves is That as the Lord hath appeared and made manifest his Power in your Hearts even so wait ye that your dwelling ye may come to witness to be in the same For Friends ye know that it is not sufficient only to know that he hath Appeared but that ye feel your Dwelling to be in the Power and so in the daily sense of the renewing of his appearing in your Hearts that by it your Hearts may be kept open unto him and so you from day to day may know the renewing of his Presence and the Vertue of his own Life in you O! my dear Friends this is that by which every heart may be kept sweet and living and vertuous and open unto the Lord so that the Issues of his Love will become as a Refreshing River unto every Soul that keeps faithful unto him Therefore Friends all mind your standing and your dwelling in the Power and wait for the Inward Operation of it in your Hearts that by its dwelling in you and living in you your Hearts may be kept tender and contrite and broken before the Lord. And Friands beware of hardness of heart I warn you in God's Fear for therein the deceitful Worker gets advantage and Unbelief comes to enter and so such will come short of the Rest that God hath prepared for his People who through the deceitfulness of sin come to be hardned And so Friends least this should come upon any one of you and so ye fall short of the Rest Watch in the Fear of God and keep down to the tender Principle of Life every one of you in your own particulars by which your hearts may be kept out of the hardness in the tender and brokenness of heart in which state the Lord is witnessed to dwell with man and in man according to his promise And so will you know the growing of the holy Seed in you into the pure Dominion by which that which would darken or harden will be subjected and kept in the subjection and so your Souls kept in the freedom of the Seed in God's Covenant where life and peace is witnessed and so Heirs of the Promise and of the Blessing being come into the promised Seed Children of the Promise and so of Abraham through Faith unto whom the Promise was made and so blessed with him who is the Father of all the Faithful through which we come to be Heirs of the Kingdom and so in it according to the promise come to sit down with Abraham Isaac and Iacob in this day of the Gathering of the Gentiles and bringing home of the lost Sheep of the House of Israel Therefore Friends mind your standing in the Seed Christ the true Vine that you may have life abundantly and know its abounding in you For whosoever goes from him the Life the Seed the Vine Christ Iesus the Power of God shall wither and decay and die and in the end be fit for nothing but the
fire And that shall such know who in the day of the Lord 's Gathering and tender Visiting in Mercy and Loving-kindness will not be won and gained into Faithfulness but slight the Day of their Visitation Therefore my dear Friends be faithful unto the Lord every particular of you in that which you have receiv'd from him and wait to be guided by that in your own hearts And keep low and down to the Principle of Life in your own hearts that you may never become stiff-necked nor hardned in your hearts again For this was Israel's Sin of old whose hearts were hardned and whose neck was become like an Iron sinew that it could not bend unto God's Toke For which he was wroth with his People and cast off his Inheritance in that day so that their Enemies had power over them and laid their Dwellings desolate Those things are left unto us for an Example that we might not fall after the same manner of Unbelief but fear lest a Promise being left us of entring into his Rest we should fall short through Unbelief and so loose the Inheritance and so by the Enemy have our Habitations luid desolate and so be carried Captives out of our Dwelling-place These things my Friends and Brethren I lay before you in the fear and love of God which is weigty in my heart towards you all and so desire that the Lord may preserve you all faithful unto himself in the feeling of his life and good presence by which your hearts may be kept open unto him and so open in true Love one towards another that as a Family in the love of God you may dwell together In which love my Soul dearly Salutes you all and so in it remain To my dear Friends in the North of Ireland about Kilmore Lurgan and that way Your Brother and Companion in the Tribulation and Patience of Christ Jesus I. B. Bristol the 25th day of the 11th Month 1667. Dearly Beloved WIth whom in the Covenant of Life Light and Peace I am one wherein I am with you and in Spirit do reach unto you in that love which many waters cannot quench in which my Soul at this time doth very dearly salute you all ye Children of the Covenant which have been born again of the Word Immortal and in the life of the true Seed remain unto you all without respect of Persons doth the love of my Soul reach with the Salutation of my life in the power that is endless In which my desire is that the Lord may preserve you all that as living Plants in the Vineyard of God you may flourish and bring forth righteous Fruits and so be a honour unto the Lord in your generation and then you need not doubt but the Lord will honour you in the glory of his Kingdom that is without end And therefore Friends the life of Righteousness in the power that is without end do you all mind to live in that fruits of holiness in a godly conversation may be brought forth by you all by which the Gospel of Peace and Salvation comes te be adorned and so the effects of Righteousness you will all come to know which is peace and assurance for ever Which is that you ought all to be mindful of that the evidence of peace by the testimony of the living Spirit in all your hearts ye may feel renewed daily which will not be without an abiding and living in the life of Righteousness whatsoever Notion of Profession may be held in the wrong mind and not in the power and life of Righteousness For this Testimony is true and living searching narrowly under all Coverings and breaking through all Vails entring into the inner Court and breaking through into the Secret Chambers to see what may have a being there or be worshipped So that in vain it is to cover any thing in this day wherein the searcher of all hearts hath appeared and he is come whose Fan is in his hand who sits as Resiners fire and as Fullers sope to cleanse and to purifie his chosen Tribe that they may be a peculiar People a chosen Generation and a Royal Priesthood to shew forth the Praises of him who hath called out of darkness into his marvellous light And therefore My dear Friends with open hearts and nakedness of Spirit do you all walk before the Lord not seeking any Covering but that of the Spirit in the life of Righteousness that its Testimony and witness you may all have in your hearts to bear witness with you unto Justification that so ye may be cloathed with the white Robe of Righteousness in the power of the Lamb and so become Kings and Priests unto God reigning over that in the power of the Lamb's Spirit which can never offer a Sacrifice acceptable before which the hearkening and obedience hath acceptance and so will the life of the true Priest be known to spring in you in which you are accepted and so in the life of him that is a Priest for ever after the Order of Melchisedeck according to the word of the promise and of the oath you will be a Royal Priest-hood offering up an acceptable Sacrifice unto the Lord. And so my dearly beloved unto whom my heart in pure love is opened keep your habitations in the Life of the Son in the Life of the Priest that lives for ever that you may never be rejected in him is the Father well pleased in him are all our Offerings accepted and without him ye can do nothing All Coverings and Robes without him are but as filthy Rags and all Garments without his power and life of righteousness are no better than a Menstruous Cloath and abomination in the sight of the Lord. And therefore keep your Garments clean your hearts pure before the Lord that the acceptance you may never lose and mind the living of the power in your hearts and your living in it unto God the Father that as we have been quickened together in the Resurrection of the Life even so in the same we may worship the Father for evermore And so in this Friends doth my heart's love reach unto you all in which my Soul doth once more very dearly salute you all ye Children of the Covenant and of the blessed day of God Almighty who walk in the Light my heart is ravished with pure love in the Remembrance of you O ye dearly beloved of my Soul I have not forgotten you neither have I been unmindful of you though outwardly we have been separated but the antient love hath lived in my heart yea and doth live towards you all which draws forth strong desires in me unto the Lord that in his Will I might see your faces which I hope will be answered in his time and until then I am freely given up into his Will to stand out of time being satisfied with the invisible union and fellowship in the Spirit that I have with you which time nor distance of places can never
Friends in quietness sitting still only one who reasoned the matter with him he at last went out and all his Company to the Stable and there took all the Horses and Friends Horses all they could find in the Town But after Meeting we got them again they being then taken without any colour of Law But the next day being the 3 d day of the 10 th Month the said Informer went to one William Pugh of Mathauern a Justice of Peace so called who came along with him and met Iohn Burnyeat and Thomas Ellis upon the Road and stopt them both and caused them to turn back to an Ale-house where this Informer and another Man which was William Pugh's Bayliff Swore against them for Preaching at the aforesaid Meeting for which the Justice Fined them and wrote a Warrant and sent for a Constable who by that Warrant seised upon Iohn Burnyeat's Mare and Thomas Ellis's Horse with Saddles and Bridles and so they were constrained to Travel on their Way on Foot till they could get to an Ale-house to get Lodging This Reward the Lord's Servants Received at their Hands for their Love and Good will to the Souls of People Iohn Burnyeat's Mare was worth about 8 l. Thomas Ellis's Horse about 3 l. 10 s. Iohn Burnyeat's Mare Dyed within an hour and an half after Seizure and the other Friends took the Mange and Dyed in the Informer's Hands within six Months time J. B. Dear and Well-beloved in the Lord WITH you my Soul hath Precious Unity in the Spiritual Fellowship and Nearness and Heavenly Oneness which stands in that Life by which we were first Quickened in which we Live and in the Increase of which we grow into a Heavenly Understanding and true Soundness in Discerning and Judgment whereby the Faithful come to be more and more accomplished for their Places and fitted for every good Work that so they may answer their Office and Membership in the true Body whereof Christ Jesus is the Head of which Body we are made living Members through his Love who hath called us and in his Son chosen us to be Heirs of Life Dear Friends your selves know that he who through his Bounty hath blessed us with Spiritual blessings in Christ Jesus so that we are made Stewards of his Manifold Graces who now doth require answerable Service from us all according to our gifts received from him and whosoever is found Faithful to their Gifts and Places shall certainly witness an Increase and so grow in Grace and in the Knowledg of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ and so come more and more into true soundness and to the Spirit of a sound Mind For you know how richly the Power of Christ was Manifested in us and among us in the beginning and how wonderful it did work for the Redeeming of our Hearts out of the World the Vanity and Pleasures of it that we might Love and Affect Heavenly things and delight in the glory of that which comes from Heaven And in that day you may remember the glorious and Heavenly Raptures we many times were raised up into and with admiration were ready to turn about and say We will Behold this Wonder the Bush which Burns and is not Consumed But since that time many have been the Exercises and weighty have been the Tryals that have been met with in our Spiritual Progress through which the Lord hath led us and many Temptations hath the Lord delivered us from and led us out of and many Weaknesses hath he passed by and Trespasses hath he in his great Mercy forgiven so that to this day we remain and that in covenant with him Therefore have we cause to Praise him and to Sing unto him Now our present state and capacity to which he hath brought us is to be minded and our duty therein for now many are come to be Free from being Servants or Slaves unto the old Task-masters and though but in our Journey yet there is something to be done which was truly Figured out in Israel's Travel they were to fit the Tabernacle with all the Services and Ornaments belonging thereunto though in the Wilderness in their Travel and the Men and Women were both concerned as you may read in the work to prepare for the Fitting of the Tabernacle according to the Command of the Lord. And this was after the Lord had appeared unto Moses shewed his Wonders in Egypt wrought that great Salvation at the Red Sea and manifested his dreadful Presence upon Mount Sinai and given forth his Holy Law and his Manifestations by which he Taught Israel to do his Will so that in the observation of which they were blessed a lively Figure of what our Souls are Witnesses of in the Heavenly Substance So that now we are not to be negligent for it would not have been well in Israel to have answered Moses when according to the Command of God he put the People upon it both Men and Women to Work for the Fitting of the Tabernacle We had no such thing when we came out of Egypt we had no such thing put upon us when we began our Iourney we will do as we did in the beginning This would have been Rebellion against him that by the Hand of Moses brought them out of Egypt and freed them out of Bondage And you know what Judgments and Destruction he brought upon them that did rebel and gainsay as Corah and his Company who withstood the Ordinance of God Oh! my dear Friends methinks I am as if I were talking with you of the Lord's Mercies and former Loving Kindnesses and Dealings with us and being also under a present sense of our present state and capacities to which he hath brought us my Bowels within me are even Melted with a Holy Love and Tenderness towards you and in that Love I send these Lines as the Salutation of my Soul in that which Lives for ever and as a signification of that entire love which in my Heart lives towards you Wherein I desire that both you and I forever may so mind our present state and our growth and the increase of the Mercies of our God unto us as to answer them by a Faithful Serving of him and one another in that love which thinks no Evil and is never weary of doing good and yet will not vaunt it self Now this is that which lives in my view the Power of Christ which was so Richly Manifested in the beginning did then Work to the preparing of us to be a People fit to do his Will and so it wrought unto a Cleansing Washing and Sanctifying of us that we might be Holy Vessels fit for his use Now being Prepared the same power in the Faithful works mightily to the Fitting and Furnishing of us unto every Good Work that we might be to the praise of his grace who hath called us and if we so be to his praise we must grow in Grace and in the knowledg of our Lord and Saviour
Jesus Christ And if we grow in the Knowledg of him as we have known him to save us from Sin and to destroy the evil one and so to be our Sanctification and Redemption even so we must Wait to know him to be made of God unto us Wisdom that he may be our Wisdom and the Fountain of it unto us may be the gift of his Holy Power in our Hearts And so then as it did mightily work in our Hearts to Prepare us even so will the same Gift be felt to work mightily to furnish us with Wisdom and to enable for every Good Work and so you will know him to be made of God Wisdom unto you For the Holy dread of the Power upon the Heart in Righteousness being felt guides him or her in Wisdom that Speaks the same Holy Fear and Dread upon the Heart guides him in Silence that in Silence sitteth whose mouth is not opened and so he is made still and Christ your Head who is one in the Man and in the Woman Wisdom unto you and so here all will be kept in your places as you keep in Subjection unto him who is the Head the Husband of the true Wife And dear Friends mind his Heavenly Power and keep under a Holy Reverence unto it and that will keep you Savoury and Reverent in your Meetings and clear and in a good understanding and Subject one unto another and so you will be Co workers together and helpers one of another and so you will come to have the benefit one of anothers gifts And thus as Members will you supply in a Blessed Unity every one your Office in the Body And therefore my Counsel as a Brother in Love unto you is Let all be Subject None in whom the tender Life in a Heavenly Reverence doth move for Counsel Advice or otherwise to quench it or to stop the Service for in so doing others may be wronged as well as the particular unto whom the Lord intends benefit by thy gift For it is not good to Stop only let all take heed that their own Spirits may be Subject that Christ may be head in all and he may be your Wisdom And be open and ready in your Hearts to Receive Counsel Help and Instruction one from another and keep down the forward heady and rash Spirit that would run without Reverence and speak without the true Fear from that none will rightly understand nor have a true sense of the Weight of the Service of this Day O! it is fresh in my Heart the Dread the Reverence the Fear that our Hearts were filled with in the beginning in which we went about Truth 's Concern this same is still to be Felt and Minded and then all will be kept Savoury and in this will all your Meetings your Care and Labour of Love be a sweet Smelling Sacrifice unto the Lord. And Friends let your Monthly and Quarterly-Meetings be kept orderly for the Service determined and aimed at that you may be retired from the World and such not concerned in the Service Proposed for such Meetings that so all that come may be either Capable of doing Service in a Reverent Mind or to Learn that which may be for Truths Honour their own Good and your Comfort and then will all you who are concerned get into your Service without Straitness and so will be a help one unto another in your particular gifts and the Spring of Life will be opened among you and your Meetings will be Delightful unto you and you in that will be a Delight one to another and then with one Consent in the Pleasant Unity you will do the Lord's Work together as his Servants and Hand-maids and a part of his pleasant Heritage which he hath Chosen and upon whom he rains down his 〈◊〉 daily And so the God of Peace and Love fill your Assemblies with his Presence Life and Love that you may Flourish as the Plants of his Right-hand-planting and be faithful through your whole Day is the desire of my Heart and Soul who Remain Your Brother in the Lord Jesus Christ I. B. To the Women's Meetings in Cumberland From London 20 th of the 4 th Month 1678. Dear Friends YOU whom the Lord hath visited and reached unto by his own holy Arm of Heavenly Power for that blessed end for which he hath visited many Nations and appeared unto many People that he might shew Glory again unto Mankind which through Sin they were fallen short of that so in his Visitation he might renew that Heavenly Image whereby he might be glorified again among the Sons of Men and now in this great Day of Visitation which hath dawned upon the Nations you in these Countries have been visited and reached unto and graciously saved and delivered from the Snares of Death and opened unto the way of Life so that you have both seen into that hidden Glory and tasted of and been enjoyers of the power of that Life which hath no end And now that care which always ought to dwell upon your Hearts is this that you may keep in possession that which you have received That as was said of old None may take your Crown from you nor none may fall short of that Rest which is prepared for the visited and redeemed of the Lord. The way you have known God hath shewed it unto you and called you to walk therein and the mark you have seen the Lord hath set that before you that you might press towards it as the antient Christians did for the Price of the high Calling of God in Christ Jesus And now dear Friends that which I desire all may be concerned in is how there is a pressing forward towards the Mark and a going on in this way which the Lord hath cast up or revealed and called you to walk in for it is he that travels on that shall come to the blessed End and obtain the Crown of Glory and not such as lingers or sits down by the way either to take up a Rest or look for another Inheritance besides what God hath promised shall be the possession after the War is over and the Conquest obtained For Iordan must be gone through and the Canaanites utterly subdued before any Man of War sit down in his Inheritance Therefore those Tribes that had their Lots on the other side of Iordan were to go through Iordan and continue in the War till all was subdued And thus is the saying true He that continues unto the end shall be saved and he that 's faithful unto Death shall have the Crown of Life And therefore let a concern be always upon your Minds in this weighty matter that you may see how it is with you and whether you are still in your Journey upon your Travel towards the Mark for the Price And as you must mind whether you are in your Travel pressing forwards or no even so you must mind also that you press forwards toward the Mark or else you
drowning surfeiting Cares and Pleasures of it that you may neither be choaked nor surfeited with the excess of that nor so led up into the worldly Pleasures and Liberty out of the Truth which that draws into as thereby and therein to forget the Lord and overlook your inward State For if any so do they lose the Glory the Beauty and Sweetness of their Heavenly condition and then they grow weary of the Way of the Lord and ready to say as some of old What profit is there in serving of God or in keeping of his Ordinances And therefore the God of Life stir you up and awaken all unto Watchfulness and Diligence that you may grow rich in the inward Man and be replenished with the Vertues and Graces of God that you may be a fruitful People in those parts of the World to the Honour and Glory of him who hath called and visited you who is Worthy of all Glory and Honour Praise and Dominion for ever And dear Friends my Heart's love reacheth unto you all who love and fear the Lord and in the Love of God I dearly salute you all and send this as a Testimony of that Love that still lives in my Heart unto you and therein I remain London 1680. Your Friend and Brother I. B. Dear Friends THE Love of my Heart and Soul is richly extended forth unto you and surely my Heart is affected with you in the Exercise you are under and do endure in this Day wherein the Lord seems to be pleased to try you as in a Furnace of Affliction and to prove your Faith and Patience that you may come to know the value of it even of that which is more precious than Gold that perisheth And truly my Heart believes that the Lord doth not suffer it to come upon you to destroy you but to try you and when his good Will is fulfilled in that and they have filled up their measure whose Hearts are hardened in their Cruelty he will find a way to deliver and bring forth his tryed and proved People whose Hearts are right before him and whose Souls are wisely set to seek him unto such shall all things be rightly sanctified and the Blessing and the Peace and Glory shall rest upon their inward Man with the richness of that Life which comes from Heaven for which you suffer for it is your innocent suffering for this as you have the Witness thereof in your selves that brings the Crown and Diademe of Glory to be put upon the Head of your inward Man So that the saying of the Apostle comes to be witnessed The Spirit of God and of Glory shall rest upon you Oh my most dearly beloved Friends How is my Soul melted into tenderness and my Heart broken within me in the meltings of the love of God towards you and in the sense of your long and weighty Trials that you have endured and gone through and yet for all must they seem as if they were but beginning Is the strength of the hard-hearted such that they are resolved to make a full end or to try what the Lord can do Will they prove their Arm to the utmost Well the Lord in his own time will manifest that it is but Flesh and not Spirit and therefore that which must decay and wither and be dried up and so prove weak at last when the unseen Arm of the Lord which they see not nor know not shall be revealed and stretched out and made bare which you that look not at things that are seen have a Faith in which Faith is that by which you live and in which you have your Victory and in which your Hope doth fasten as an Anchor both sure and stedfast So that though the Winds do blow and the raging Waves do swell high yet you are preserved and kept from being overthrown and destroyed Dearly Beloved methinks I find a Word of sweet Exhortation in my Heart unto you whom my Soul loves who may be or are tryed in this exercising Day with Bonds or Imprisonments In the first place get into a quiet frame of Spirit and Mind within your selves every one and into a resignedness freely up into the Will of God out of time looking as little at that as you can for if you do it will make your Exercises worse and harder For this I have experienced that when a Man is freeliest resigned into the Will of God and in a right Spirit most given up to suffer for him he is fittest to have his Liberty and most commonly it is the nearest unto him Dear Lambs I know there is sometimes a Travel in Spirit to get into a right place with the inward Man when the outward Man is in Bonds but when the Heart once gets thither all things are made easie and comfortable by him who said his Yoke was easie and his Burthen light And now be all concerned thus to get through in your Spirits and then you will feel that the Word of God is not bound but free and your Souls will be free in it and its holy Power and so be fed by the Milk of it that your Souls will draw spiritually from the blessed Breasts thereof by which you have been born again And being thus in your inward Man renewed unto God and up into his Life where the Habitation of Peace and Quietness is for your Souls that they cannot reach to bring a Disturbance to and there feeling your Ease Joy Peace and Pleasure to be such that you can in your Prison-House sing joyful Praises unto the Lord then my Friends be vvatchful tender and kind one unto another and over one another that Love Peace and Joy may be maintained among you all who suffer rightly and innocently for the Truth of our God that so you may be one anothers Ioy and Crown of Rejoicing in the Lord Jesus Christ your Life and Strength And dear Friends where there is innocency and simplicity bear one with another and help one another that in your sufferings you may have fellowship one with another and so keep in the fellowship of the sufferings of Jesus Christ where all may be humble and tender that so while others are striving to provoke you to come out of your places and to offend the Lord you may not provoke one another nor be an occasion unto any one to go out of their place in the Truth and so to lose their Peace with the Lord and in his Spirit For I have observed that there is a care to be amongst Friends at such times and in such conditions when they are kept up together that all things may be kept sweet and pleasant and that they may even join together in bearing the Burthen that is laid upon them and those that are more grown and deeper in their experience of what they are called unto may help the weak and so fulfil the Law of Love And dear Friends let not unprofitable Discourse be gone into for that may lead into
Presence and before him shall the Hills Fly yea the Sea also shall Fly and Iordan shall be Driven back that his Ransomed may pass on his Redeemed People may Enter into their Rest. Oh! theresore let us Cleave unto the Lord our Saviour and so sollow Christ our Redeemer who can cut a passage through the great Deep let us not be dismayed at any thing that may rise up in our way to oppose us so long as our Leader is with us and our blessed Rock attends us and we feel our dwelling within the Munition thereof our Bread will be sure and our Water will not fail and our Hearts will not be barren nor our Souls will not be faint but we shall grow through the blessing of Israel's God and Live when with all their cunning the enemies of the Truth have contrived our overthrow For there is nothing can hurt us more in the Trying Day than want of Faith in God's Power and Arm of strength which never failed them that put their trust therein And therefore my dearly Beloved with whom my Soul is bound up in the Covenant of Life wherein I have Unity with you and can say although you bear the Burden yet my Heart is concerned for you and also with you in your Godly concern and Testimony for which you Suffer and therefore cannot you be forgotten by me For as we Love the Truth and the Holy Testimony thereof for which you Suffer and are in Bonds in Spirit we are often as Bound with you and fellow-feelers of your Burthens And furthermore we cannot propose to our selves any other than e're long to be Sharers with you to be Partakers of the like Sufferings Trials and Exercises and therefore still it is our safety to be Prepared in our Hearts and into the Will of God to be given up to Do or Suffer for his Name 's sake For our days do seem to be like the Days of Old wherein the Apostle said they were Killed all the Day long and accounted as Sheep for the Slaughter If we look into the Scriptures we have a Cloud of Witnesses and so through what was Written aforetime which was Written for our Learning we may have Comfort and our hope Strengthened and so be Encouraged to Trust in the Lord our Strength and in whom our Hope is And now it is still to be our care as Lambs or Sheep to Live in Innocency and so as Lambs to Suffer for our Innocency and for our Testimony which we are called unto and surely I often consider what more Innocent Practice can we ever be found in than in our Peaceable Meetings to Wait upon the Living God and to Worship him in his peaceable Spirit by which our Hearts come to be cleansed of all Evil and our Spirits gathered into the Peace and Love of God in which we Love God again and not only so but have our hearts filled with Love and Good will towards all Men in the Peace and Sweetness of which we are enabled to Pray for the Good of All even our Enemies And if this must be misinterpreted and our Righteous and Godly Intents counted a Transgression of the Law and a Breach of the Peace I do not know what such who so do can call Innocency For surely every one whose Heart is rightly Exercised in this Godly Duty which the Living God calls us unto must needs be Innocent before God and in that Frame of Spirit wherein we cannot nay dare not desire the Hurt of any but as the Truth ariseth Pray for all Men both for Rulers and People Thus I know under the Exercise of the Righteous Power of Christ in our Meetings are our Hearts qualified and then if we must Suffer for Well doing under the name of Evil-doers we shall be happy and may satisfy our selves with what Christ of old said The Servant is not greater than his Lord For if they accounted him a Blasphemer and said he had a Devil and so Persecuted him we may well look unto him and Comfort our selves in following such an Example And therefore be ye Comforted you Faithful Sufferers with Christ and for him and Comfort your Hearts in the Recompence of Reward which is with God for you and wait for the Spirit of God and of Glory that it may rest upon you And never look out for your Cause is Good it is that which God hath called you unto and you are happy in your Nobility and Valour and whosoever shrinks from their Innocent Testimony in this matter will suffer Loss in their Inward Condition for if any draw back such shall know the Lord will not go with them nor have any Pleasure in them nor be their Comforter but Reprover And therefore my Soul desires that all may be Valiant for the Truth and stand in the Power thereof unto what the Lord hath called unto that so you may be together as a City set on a Hill that cannot be hid For though the Foxes have Holes and the Fowls of the Air have Nests yet remember what Christ said to the Man that said he would follow him And so the Lord give you all Valour and Strength and Enrich you with true Patience which the Tribulation worketh into in the right Exercise that so you may all grow up into the true Experience and so into the Hope which makes not ashamed that the Love of God may be shed abroad in your Hearts every day by his Spirit which he hath given you And then will you all feel a dwelling in his Covenant and in his Peace And so in this Covenant Peace and Love I very dearly Salute you all and in it do I still remain Your Friend and Brother I. B. Castle-Salem in the West of Ireland the 30th of the 10th Month 1682. J. B's Epistle to Friends in Glocester-Prison Dear Friends UNTO you who are Faithful Sufferers in that City with the rest of the Faithful in that City and Country who in your Hearts are given up to Suffer for the holy Name of the Lord Jesus Christ our Saviour who hath Called and Redeemed Chosen and given you Hearts not only to believe but also to suffer for his Name 's sake and thus hath counted you worthy as Vessels of his Choice unto you all I say in the Name and Love of Christ Jesus our Lord I send Greeting and with-all the tender Salutation of my Soul and Spirit in that near Affection and holy Union into which by the power of the Holy Ghost we have been gathered and united So that as Members of that one Body into which we have been Baptized by that one Spirit wherein the true access unto God doth stand we have our Fellowship together and so drink together into that one Spirit and are refreshed with the Water that flows from the living Rock that followed Israel of Old who is the Rock of our Age the stay of the Generation of the Righteous in this Day that upon which we have our sure standing so
you as a Cart is pressed that is full of Sheaves saith he Hence it may be understood that when he hath been at work and hath done good by his glorious Power who worketh wonderfully for them and now in them also that believe in his Power if there be a going from him and a letting in of other things into the Heart where he should Rule and have his Dwelling in Man and so with Man it becomes a Grief and an Oppression unto him and so a Provocation that he will not always bear it nor spare Man though he is long-suffering as may be seen very fully in that Prophesy of Amos and more at large through the Scripture which was written for our Learning that we might be warned and thereby be stirred up unto that diligence care and watchfulness which may tend to our preservation And now considering these things that were of old and observing how that in our Age the Lord hath made known his wonted goodness unto us even that which doth far exceed the outward Priviledges of outward Israel for that which he blesseth us withall is a Possession and Enjoyment of a degree of his own Life who is the Creator by which he Created all things which is more than the Enjoyment of the Creature the Loss of which was the great penalty laid upon Adam if he broke the Command which he having lost is again restored unto us through Christ Iesus the Second Adam the Lord from Heaven which we having received do thereby live unto God and therein serve him And so Dear Friends the thing that is chiefly in my mind unto you in the reach of the Heavenly Bowels is To intreat and beseech you all To be tender in your Hearts and careful over your Spirits that you may not let in nor join with any thing that will bring Grief or Oppression upon your Life or lead you into the Transgression of the Law thereof Mind the Exhortation of the Apostle Grieve not the Spirit by which you are Sealed c. And so as you are careful watchful and wise to take heed unto the Holy Conduct and Blessed Leadings and Direction of this Spirit and the Law thereof your Souls will dwell in Peace and your Feet will tread in a safe Path even the Path of Peace and your Steps will not Slide but you will witness what David said of old to be true The Righteous shall inherit the Land and dwell therein forever for saith he The mouth of the Righteous speaketh Wisdom and his Tongue talks of Iudgment The Law of his God is in his Heart none of his steps shall slide So here you see what it is that keeps from Sliding the Law of God which is in the Heart this preserved David for it was as a Lanthorn to his Feet and a Light unto his Paths Oh! my Dear Friends you may be happy yea we may all be happy if we be as careful as we ought to walk by this Rule Oh! the Sweetness Peace and Glory that he fills the Hearts of all his People with that take heed unto his Law the Spirit is not grieved the Life of the Soul is not Oppressed the Soul Life or Spirit of Man is at ease and so in the glorious Liberty of the Sons of God and so in that state where it can Sing unto the Lord and Praise him And therefore all of you mind your Dwelling and inward Liberty and Spiritual Freedom from all the Corruptions of the World and of the Flesh both inwardly in your selves and all Temptations from without that you may reign in the Dominion of the Seed Christ Iesus for ever and so with him be Co-heirs of that Heavenly Inheritance and Possession which he hath Purchased for you And so in the Unity of that Life which reigns over all do I very dearly Salute you all who Love the Truth and in that do I desire that the God of Life may bear up your Spirits by his Power over and a top of all that would Defile or Oppress that you may be preserved to remain the Sons and Daughters of God without Rebuke in and among this Crooked and Perverse Generation amongst whom do you Shine as Lights to the Glory of him who hath called you out of Darkness into his Marvellous Light who over all is worthy of Glory and Honour and Dominion World without End From Your Friend and Brother in the Truth I. B. Dublin the 23 d of the 11 th Month 1685. Dear R. R. IN the Love and Unity of the Blessed Truth which lives and abides for Ever do I very dearly Salute thee and thy Wife and therein is my Heart's desire for you unto the Lord that by his blessed Hand and Power you may be born up and supported under all Exercises that may attend and in your minds Preserved with an invisible Eye unto the Lord taking notice of his Orderings as it is his Hand that brings to pass what he sees Good and then in his Fear and Love there will be a Reverent Submitting unto his Will without Murmuring or Repining at what the Lord doth Though Nature in the True and Natural Affection which good Men and Women cannot be without may be broken and greatly bowed down yet as long as the mind is preserved from Murmuring at what the Lord doth it will be well there will be a Heart Capable of giving him his due as it was with Iob. Dear R. I must needs say my Heart is concerned for you both upon thy own Account having heard of thy great Weakness there and Affliction thou hast been under and also because of the Loss of thy Dear and Tender Daughter who in your Absence is taken away both from you and us But what shall I say It is so and the Lord hath done it and it is not safe to Dispute the Case with him or say Why hath he done so But tenderly submit unto his Will and bless him that gives and takes away as he sees good However this I think I may say to thee and thy Wife with safety you need not sorrow as such who have no Hope because of the ground God hath given for a sure Hope of her Eternal Well-being which is the Mark we are all Pressing towards and they are happy that do obtain it For I was with her that same day that she Dyed in the Afternoon and had a serious weighty season with her She sent for me and told me as soon as I came to her That now she was satisfied she must Die and her Heart was wholly set after her Assurance of Peace with the Lord and her desires to us to wit her Husband and me was That the Doctor might not trouble her or meddle with her for she was not willing to be molested or hindred from a quiet Departure For her Heart was set after a peaceable Departure out of this World as was evident from her words several times And she was very sensible and did speak to me with
speak the Word and it shall not stand for God is with us For the Lord spake thus to me with a strong Hand and instructed me that I should not walk in the way of this People saying Say ye not A Confederacy to all them to whom this People shall say A Confederacy neither fear ye their fear nor be afraid Sanctify the Lord of Hosts himself and let him be your fear and let him be your dread Isa. 8. 10 11 12 13. ADVERTISEMENT TO THE READER Christian Reader ANother Letter coming to our Hands subscribed J. T. the tendency thereof being to beget a dislike in R. L. to whom it was Writ to the Principles of Truth as professed by us the truly Reformed Christians called Quakers and to prevent the writing of more such occasion'd our making thus publick the following Answer to Priest Potts ' s Letter and the rather understanding the said J. T. saw it and takes no notice thereof in his although it Answers the substance thereof excepting in these following particulars 1. His accounting it an Errour in us Not to Swear Ans. We in short say we have Christ's Command for not Swearing Matt. 5. 3 4. Swear not at all And seconded by the Apostle James 5. 12. which we believe ought to be observed by all Christians 2. He charges us with Denying the Trinity as he terms it Ans. We do really own the Three that bear record in Heaven the Father the Word and the Holy Ghost and these Three are One Iohn 5. 7. And we also own the Three that bear witness in Earth the Spirit the Water and the Blood and these Three agree in One as verse 8. and so we do and always did believe according to the Holy Scriptures 3. He charges us with Denying the Scriptures to be the Word of God Ans. We believe the Scriptures to be what they call themselves a Testimony or Declaration as in Luke 1. 1. John 5. 39. But Christ we own and believe to be the Word of God according to John 1. and Rev. 19. 13. So we own the Word of the Lord that came unto the Prophets saying as in Ezek. 7. 1. and in divers other places and we own and believe the Sayings of the Word as recorded in the Holy Scriptures So the Word that came unto the Prophets was the Sayer or that which spake unto them and the Scriptures are the Words or Sayings which the Word or Spirit of Christ spake unto and through the Prophets as is evident from the Testimony of the Apostle 1 Pet. 1. 10 11. Dublin the 12th of the 9th Month 1688. J. B. J. W. The Holy Truth and its Professors Defended c. Lawrence Potts WE having met with a Paper of thine and finding our selves and others of the People called Quakers concerned therein with our Christian Religion and Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ which we are called to bear witness unto and contend for were not willing to let it pass without taking notice of thy false Charges upon Us and our Religion together with thy weak Vindication of thy self with the rest of the Clergy of your Church in those things which thou hast yet to prove And we find our selves the more concerned because of thy Challenge in thy Paper where thou say'st It dos become your Teachers to make this plainly appear to you and me from whom they have drawn you and therefore if they can make it out I again challenge it of them and you By the way we would have thee take notice of this that Robert Lacky in his Letter to thee doth acquaint thee that it was the Light or Grace of God that let him see the Evil or Defects in himself and others and so meerly the Love of God that prevailed in his Heart so that it was not Man that drew him from thee and thy Teachings but the Lord Iesus Christ the true Shepherd whom the Father promised that by his Spirit of Light and Grace did draw him and so fulfilled the Promise of the Father in Ezek. 34. 10. where he saith He would deliver his Flock from the mouth of such as fed themselves that they might not be Meat for them c. In the first place we observe thou blamest him for saying If he or any other through the Light of God's Grace in the Heart do see Defects in themselves or others that profess that Religion wherein they were bred he does not understand how he incurs Damnation by forsaking it c. And so in thy Answer blamest him for confounding Religion as thou say'st with the Carriage of its Professors c. Answer It 's true there may be wicked Men Professors of a most holy and pure Religion and therefore for some particulars being of an evil carriage to condemn a Religion is not proper But when a Man finds and understands that in the Exercise of his Religion he receives not power against Sin and Temptation in himself nor yet sees the effect of such a power in others it may be not in the very Teachers but that is lived in which answers not the Law of God nor the Life of a true Christian and yet here is no dis-membring of such or excluding them from their Church-Fellowship This may justly give ground to suspect a Defect in that Religion And therefore it may be warrantable for a Man under these Observations both concerning himself and others to enquire and seek after a Religion wherein Power may be enjoyed from Christ to overcome Sin and withstand Temptation And we do believe thou thy self art not ignorant how that not only many of the People of your Church are of a loose Conversation but diverse of your Clergy also and yet they suffered to abide in their Places and Offices without either being excluded or silenced though the Apostle exhorts To withdraw from every Brother that walks disorderly And again 1 Cor. 5. 11. He writes unto the Church not to keep company with any called a Brother that was a Fornicator or Covetous or an Idolater or Railer or a Drunkard or an Extortioner such thou mayst see were to be denied Fellowship in the Church But we have often observed how that in your Church there have been and still are both Swearers Liars Drunkards and Men given to other profaneness and yet little zeal appearing to Excommunicate or exclude them But when any for Conscience sake could not pay the Priest his Wages though it were but some small matter oftentimes such a one should soon be prosecuted and Excommunicated so that by your practices what-ever you may profess in words you are more zealous for your Gain and Interest than for excluding Evil and promoting Righteousness in your Church and so like them the Apostle speaks of who minded earthly things whose end he said was Destruction Phil. 3. 19. Now such practices are no marks of the Church of Christ but of a false Church where there is want of zeal for Righteousness Whereby it is manifest that you
bring you to a Reformation that the People you may lead in Errour no longer We conclude and remain Desirers of the Good of all Men. Dated the 13th of the 4th Month 1688. Iohn Burnyeat Iohn Watson An Addition of two Epistles of Iohn Burnyeat's to Friends in Long-Island and Barbadoes which came to Hand since the Printing of the former Long-Island the 23d of the 5th Month 1666. Dearly Beloved WHO are called to be Saints and to believe in the only Begotten of God the Father which he hath raised to be the Horn of Salvation in the House of his Servant David to rule over the Redeemed in Israel for ever unto you are my Bowels opened in pure unfained Love and in the plentiful flowing of the same at this time doth my Soul dearly salute you all who keep faithful unto the Beloved and live in the power of his Salvation over all the fallen Spirits which are in the World which brings into bondage With you my Soul hath Unity in the Life which was before Transgression and the Fall was and in that My Friends are you written in my heart and often in my remembrance even when my Supplication is poured forth unto the Lord in the behalf of his People that you in that place among the rest of his heavenly Flock and Sheep of his own Pasture may be safely kept by the right hand of his power from the Devourer and from the deceitful Snares of the Enemy which are laid as Traps by the cunning flight of Satan to ensnare the Simple and betray the Innocent from the simplicity of the Gospel which ye have received in Christ Jesus our Lord in which as ye have believed ye have found Salvation and Peace and Rest unto your Immortal Souls I even as a Brother and one that entirely loves you with that unfeigned love which thinks no evil do at this time beseech you all in the fear of God to see that ye Walk Circumspectly answerable unto the Gospel of Christ Iesus in which ye have believed that ye may adorn the same in your Lives and Conversations as Children of the Light and of the Day bringing forth the Fruits of the Spirit in Righteousness and true Holiness and not the Fruits of the Flesh in the night and in the darkness in which they walk who follow not the Lord Jesus Christ. And therefore My Friends stand fast in your Liberty in which Christ Jesus hath made you free and be not entangled with the Yoak of Bondage but mind purely the operation of the Eternal Spirit and invisible power of the everlasting God which he hath made manifest and revealed in your hearts by which you have in measure known Liberty from the Bondage of Corruption the corruptible Bond and have tasted of the glorious Liberty of the Sons of God in which your Souls have found pleasure I say Friends mind all its lively Operation in your hearts and wait upon it with diligence that your hearts may be kept clear and the eye of your Understandings single that you may purely distinguish and put a difference between the pretious and the vile between that in which the Lord is to be Worshipped and that in which there is no Acceptance with God And so will you come more and more to know how to chuse the good and refuse the evil And Friends in the freedom of God's Spirit and in his fear I warn you all Take heed of a fleshly Liberty beyond or above the pure fear which keeps the heart clean for that will let in Pollutions and bring the Just into Bondage and your Souls into death again where there will be a want of the pure presence of God to refresh them although the Boaster may boast of liberty and promise it as they did in the Apostles days who themselves were the Servants of Corruption And so My Dear Friends whom my Soul loves with the heavenly love that seeks the good of all you who have tasted of the love of God and of the power of the World which is to come and of the power of that life which is without end Keep Constant in the Faith unto the Beloved of your Soul and gad not abroad to change your way like her whose Feet abides not in her house but runs out after other Lovers and so lose the first Love For this the Lord reproved the Church in the days of the entrance of the Apostacy when they begun to decline from the purity of the Gospel And therefore as ye have received that which is unchangeable live in it that your Souls may never die from the sense of God's Love and the feeling of his vertuous presence that in the joy and peace that is unspeakable and full of glory you may abide and for ever live where your Souls may be refreshed from day unto day and from time unto time through the multiplying of his numberless Mercies by which he nourisheth all them that fear him and wait upon him And so will you all keep lively and vertuous in a growing and flourishing Condition fruitful bringing forth fruit to his praise who hath called you And as you keep unto the power of God which is the Cross unto that part which would be out and dwell in it your mind will be setled and stayed and kept clear and the understanding open whereby you may behold the Glory of God and be kept in Covenant with him and so feed upon his Mercies with all his Lambs and Children and lye down in the fold of Rest and Safety with the Sheep of his pasture in Covenant with him for evermore In which I remain Your Friend and Brother J. B. For Friends in the Barbadoes New-England Virginia and Maryland the Signification of my purest Love unto you all amongst whom I have travel'd in those parts Friends IN the eternal Truth and Power of the Lord God dwell and keep your Habitations in that which changes not in the power of an endless life where there is no shadow of turning All you that have known the Lord and have been sensible of the Word of his Eternal Power in your hearts by which you have been quickned unto him so that with the rest of his beloved ones you have been made Partakers of that heavenly treasure of Life and Vertue which is in him and through his Son is manifested unto us by whom Life and Immortality is brought to Light unto you all without respect of Persons doth the Love of my Soul reach and the Salutation of my Life at this time having you fresh in my Rememberance In the Bowels of true Love is my Heart opened and my Spirit drawn forth in this word of Exhortation unto you all who have tasted that the Lord is gracious That you all take heed of turning from the Grace of God into Wantonness Laciviousness or any vanity whatsoever by which your Hearts may be defiled But that ye all watch unto the Truth and wait upon the preserving power of the Lord
Truth Exalted IN THE WRITINGS OF THAT Eminent and Faithful Servant of CHRIST Iohn Burnyeat COLLECTED Into this Ensuing Volume as a MEMORIAL to his Faithful Labours in and for the TRUTH Prov. 10. 7. The Memory of the Iust is Blessed Psal. 112. 6. The Righteous shall be had in Everlasting Remembrance LONDON Printed for Thomas Northcott in George-Yard in Lumbard-Street 1691. THE PREFACE TO THE READER READER AS the Tree is known by its Fruits so I desire thee to Taste of these which are here presented to thee with a Serious and Unprejudiced Mind which are but Some of the Many Testimonies of the Love and Labour of the Deceased Author for the General Good of Mankind and particular Edification of the Churches of Christ that are Gathered in our Day by the Eternal Spirit in and among whom he was a Faithful Able and Successful Labourer The End of Books is the End of Preaching viz. Informing the Inquirer Stirring up the Careless Stopping the Gainsayer and Comforting and Building up those whose Faces are turned already Sion-ward and that are Attended with many Exercises in their Iourney to Everlasting Habitations And as the End is the same so where the Servants of Christ cannot come Books may that are the Testimony of their Care and Ministry for others They remain also with us and are a Memorial of those that writ them when they are Gathered to their Fathers and by them the Living often Converse with the Dead who yet Die not but Live in their Labours in the Children they beget to God in their Writings they leave behind them as Pledges of their Love and Care for the Flock and in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus with the Spirits of the Just To whom and to God the Judge of all the Dispensation of our Day has brought Thousands Blessed be his Eternal Name for ever These following Writings I Recommend the more Earnestly and Pleasingly to thy Solemn Perusal Serious Reader because they are very little Controversial they chiefly Refer to Practice to an Holy and Divine Life and Walking with God The First is an Account of his own Convincement the Path he trod-in to Peace with God out of a Wicked World where the Heavenly Call found him It is Sweet Lively Instructive and Perswading to others to Try as he did and to Embrace the Holy Truth Then follows a Relation of his Travels and Ministry in these Nations and beyond the Seas as Luke presented the Churches with the Acts or Travels of the Apostles in their Infancy A Pleasant and Seasoning Lecture both for the Young who love to hear of Voyages to Excite them to seek the Lord his Way and Kingdom and to Journey towards the New and Heavenly Ierusalem and to Quicken those more Aged to shake off their Dust the Earth that is too Apt to Contract and Stick upon them in the Daily Attention they give to their Temporal Affairs and to Lift up their Eyes and see the Fields how White they are to Harvest and how few Labourers there are to Take it in and what need there is of an Holy Care and Oversight of those that are already Gathered especially Considering how many Eminent Ones of late are Taken from us His Next Writings are Epistles of divers sorts to several Places and upon different Occasions containing Divine Truths and Strong Perswasives to Faithfulness Love Holiness and Perseverance in the Way of God Revealed to them in the Light of Iesus Christ the Great Light of the World that Enlightens every one that comes into the World Those that have any Spiritual Savour will Taste a Sweet Savour in them and God will Witness to them as he is wont to do to the Labours and Writings of his Servants in the Hearts of those that with Seriousness shall peruse them His last Two Tracts in this Book saving Two Epistles that by coming too late are misplaced are in Defense of the Truth against some Opposers of it and the only Controversy in the Book The Soundness of his Answers and Moderation of his Spirit in delivering of them are no small Commendation to the Truth he defends whose Faithful Servant he was for it shews the Power it had over him how well he knew what he writ and that he was not only a Professor but a Possessor of the Living and Saving Faith that was once deliver'd to the Saints and is now again Restored by the Operation of the same Holy Spirit I shall Conclude with saying That as the Author was one of the Most-Eminent of the Second Stock of Ministers the Lord Anointed and Sent forth in this his Glorious Day and was so Generally Witnessed in his Services in the Hearts of his People It is tenderly hoped that those who loved him will prize his Remaining Testimonies and be Good Examples to their Families in Reading such Edifying Labours of the Brethren that their Children and Servants may be brought up and Instructed in the Religious Tradition of our Day according to the Testimony of the Blessed Truth in the Inward Parts Unto which they are all left and the holy Teachings and Guidings of it and Thou Reader likewise that leads into the Way of Holiness and into the Path of Endless Peace ON IOHN BURNYE AT ' s Book GO Little Book speak out the Praise Of him that did thy Author Raise An Eminent Apostle of our Days May He that Blest him Bless thee too That thou the Way of Truth may shew To the Vain Gentile and Benighted Iew Thee Who spake through him can speak by And make thy Readers Hear and See The Saving Truths of thy Divinity A TESTIMONY Concerning the Life and Death OF OUR Dear Friend and Brother in the Lord John Burnyeat HE was a faithful Friend and Brother and an able Minister of Christ Jesus who freely preacht the Everlasting Gospel and laboured to keep it without Charge who was a True Apostle of Iesus Christ and preacht him Freely both by Sea and Land He received the Truth in 1653. in Cumberland and died in the Lord in Ireland in the Year 1690. after he had stood those great Troubles Storms and Trials there and was a great Strength to Friends in the time of their late great Sufferings He stood it out when many were Ruined and fled to England for Succour and remained till after King William came in and King James went out of Ireland And then he went up and down Visiting Friends Meetings that were gathered in the Name of Jesus And after he had intended to come for England but there he died in the Lord and is Blessed and Rests from his Labours and his Works follow him He travelled and Preacht the Gospel in Ireland Scotland Barbadoes Virginia Maryland New-Jerseys Long-Island Road-Island and up and down in New-England and had many Disputes with many Priests and Professors that opposed the Truth but the Lord gave him Dominion over all and to stop the Mouths of the Gainsayers and he turned many to the Lord
on and that many Afflictions and Exercises would attend us and that many People being possest with great Fears fled for England at which time many Testimonies came from Friends of sundry Meetings for all to mind the Lord's preserving Power and not to let Fears take hold of them as it did of others who knew not the Lord Our Dear Friend though he had an Opportunity had no Freedom to go for England but gave himself up to stay with Friends here and bear a part of the Sufferings that might attend us In which time he was a pretious Instrument in the Lord's Hand for the Comforting his People in the time of great Afflictions and Calamities for he was a Chearful Encourager of us He was a Dear Friend a True Brother a Diligent Over-seer and Tender Father a Perfect and Upright Man in his day who feared God and eschewed evil And though he sought the Salvation of all yet could not bear with Deceitful Men and Evil Workers who profest the Truth yet brought Dishonour to it against such he had a Iust Indignation and Godly Zeal Oh! the Remembrance of his Fatherly Care over God's Heritage in keeping things in good Order is not to be forgotten For his Care was great that the Professors of Truth might walk answerable to it in a Chast Life and Blameless Conversation And in all his Travels into whose House he entred he was Content with what things were set before him were they never so mean which was great Satisfaction to many poor honest Friends amongst whom his Lot was cast He would not usurp Authority over his Brethren but was of a healing Spirit and Lamb-like Nature and of a good Report in all his Travels Our Dear Friend and Brother did greatly delight to Read the Holy Scriptures and would often and with great Earnestness Advise Friends frequently to read the same and the Young and Tender in years more especially as also Friends Books wherein the Principles of Truth were Treated of that so none might be Ignorant of the Principles of the true Christian Religion now again preached and clearly held forth He was at our Province-Meeting at Rosean-Allies a little before his Decease where he bore a Living Fresh Testimony amongst Friends to our great Comfort and Exhorted Friends to Faithfulness From thence he went to Montroth and had a Meeting there and from thence to Ballinakill and had a Meeting there So he came to the Monthly-Meeting at New-Garden where many heard him bear a living sweet Testimony in the Opening of the Word of Life to the Refreshing of their Souls After Meeting he came home with our Friend John Watson to his House and feeling himself not well took his Bed and was visited with a Fever and continued sick for the space of Twelve days All which time he was preserved in his Senses and in a sweet Frame of Spirit and did often say he was sine at Ease and quiet in his Spirit The Lord did Attend him with his heavenly Power and Presence to his Comfort and our great Satisfaction He said to John Watson That he ever loved the Lord and the Lord loved him from his Youth and that he felt his Love He was wonderfully preserved in a sensible Condition to the Last and on the Eleventh day of the Seventh Month 1690 about Two of the Clock in the Afternoon he quietly and peaceably Departed this Life about the 59th Year of his Age and is gone to his Rest with the Lord and his Works follow him And as he honoured the Lord in his Day so he was honoured with the Company of many Antient Friends from several Parts of our Province to Accompany him to his Grave at New-Garden where he was Decently Interred the Fourteenth day of the same Month and there we had a good Meeting to the great satisfaction of many Friends and others And now surely If David did well in Sorrowing for Absolom we have Reason greatly to Lament the Loss of so Dear Tender and Upright-hearted a Friend whose Labour and Travel was great both in Body and Spirit faithfully to serve the Lord his Church and People and to Exalt his Glorious Name and propagate his Living Truth in the Earth and to preserve Unity and Peace in the Churches of Christ. But believing 't is the Lord's Will that 's done concerning him in a Holy and Reverend Resignation and Submission thereunto we ought to be Content knowing 't is his unspeakable Gain to be Absent from the Body and at home with Christ. And thus Dear Friends We that yet remain do see how the Lord is pleased to Remove from among us many of our Antient Friends and Faithful Labourers in the Gospel of Peace who have been serviceable in this Day for the Gathering and Confirming of many in the Truth that we may walk therein And Friends we that are yet behind are the more immediately concerned for to Labour in the Heavenly Gift of his Divine Grace the Lord in his Love hath bestowed upon us that so we may come up in this Gospel-day to succeed them that are gone before us to their Rest in the Lord in bearing a Faithful Testimony to the blessed Truth that our Memorial may live to Ages to come as this our Dear Friend and Elder Brother's doth amongst God's People this day who having Faithfully finisht his Course here in great Patience and an humble and holy Subjection to the Will of God hath now received a Crown of Immortal Glory which is laid up for all the Faithful Followers of the Lamb and Lovers of the Appearance of our Lord Jesus Christ To whom and the Father through him be Glory and Honour both now and for ever Amen Dated in Dublin the 22th of the Second Month 1691. Anthony Sharp Roger Roberts Amos Strettel John Watson Henry Hillary John Haukes An Account of John Burnyeat's Convincement Together with a Iournal of his Travels IN the Year 1653. it pleased the Lord in his Love and Mercy to send his faithful Servant George Fox with others of his faithful Servants and Messengers of the Gospel of Peace and Glad-tidings whom he furnished with the eternal power of his Word in the wisdom and power of which he proclaimed the Day of the Lord unto us in this County of Cumberland and the Northern Parts of England and discovered the right Path of Life unto thousands that was in Error seeking the Lord but knew not where to find him nor how to come acquainted with him although he was not far from us But this blessed man G. F. one of a thousand may many say and chosen before many thousands was sent amongst us in the power of the most High filled with the strength of his Word in the wisdom whereof he directed thousands unto the Light and Appearance of Christ Jesus their Saviour in their own hearts that he might come to know him and the Glory of the Father through him in his Appearance and so come to believe in him with the
Heart and with the Mouth confess him unto Salvation and blessed be the Lord and the Day of Mercy in which he visited he was pleased to make his Labour of Love effectual unto thousands in which he sent his Servants to labour amongst whom it pleased the Lord to grant me that favour to keep a share of the benefit of this blessed Visitation whereby I came to be informed concerning the right way of the Lord and directed unto the true Light which the Apostle was sent to turn People unto in his Day and so from the Darkness and from the Power of Satan unto God and his blessed Power which in my waiting in the Light I received through which deep Judgment did spring in my Soul and great Affliction did grow in my Heart by which I was brought into great Tribulation and Sorrow such as I had never known before in all my Profession of Religion so that I might say in Spirit it was the Day of Iacob's Trouble for the God of Heaven by the Light of his blessed Son which he had lighted me withal which shined in my heart let me see the body of Death and power of Sin which reigned in me and brought me to feel the Guilt of it upon my Conscience so that I could say he made me even as it were to possess the sins of my Youth and for all my high profession of an Imputative Righteousness and that though I lived in the act of sin the guilt of it should not be charged upon me but imputed it to Christ and his Righteousness imputed to me I found it otherwise when I was turned unto the Light which did manifest all reproved things then I came to see that the guilt remained while the body of death remained and through the power thereof was led into the act of sin then I saw there was need of a Saviour to save from sin as well as the Blood of a Sacrificed Christ to blot out Sin or Faith in his Name for the remission of Sins past then began the warfare of true striving to enter the Kingdom then Paul's state seen to will was present but to do many times power was wanting then was that cry known O wretched man that I am who shall deliver me from this body of death and free from the prevailing power of the Law which remained in the Members warring against the Law of my Mind which brought into Captivity to the Law of Sin then when this War was truly begun all my high conceit in my invented Notional Faith and my pretence and hopes of Justification thereby was overthrown so that all that I had builded for several years in my Profession after the days of my Youth in which tender stirrings was in me after acquaintance with the Lord and the knowledge of him and peace with him was seen to be but a Babel-Tower which God brought Confusion upon and so that which could never be perfected to reach to Heaven being out of the Faith of his Covenant and that which never could bring truly to trust in his Word and rely thereupon but led out into the Invention willing and self-acting though another thing talked of and then seeing all my Works confounded by the visitations of God and by the springing of the day from on high which discovered things as they were seeing them all end at Babel and the God of Heaven bringing Confusion upon them I was amazed and fear beset me on every side and I began sometimes to fear I was undone for ever for that had entred my heart that had turned the fruitful Field into a Wilderness and made that which I thought had been as the Garden of Eden a Forest and so the Day of God discovered all to be Desolation Driness and a Heath and so brought my Soul to a deep Lamentation to the beginning of such Sorrows as had never been known by me before then did I lament and bewail my self many a time and wish my self in a Wilderness where I might neither meet with Temptation nor Provocation from without my weakness was such to withstand in my spirit for all my Notion I had to talk of my Imputation of the Righteousness of Christ being but my own which by his Spirit I had no seal for and so but a Presumption I saw clearly it was my own Invention and so but like Adam's Fig-leave Apron in which he could not abide God's coming O the wo that overtook me O the distress that seized O the horrour and terrour that sprung in my Bosom O the poverty and want that my Soul saw it self in through the springings of the discovering Light towards which the Eye thereof was turned And as this Light did spring which the Apostle of old had wrote of it manifested all things not only the want that I was in but also the reproved things and then sin became exceeding sinful and the load and burthen of it became exceeding grievous and all the pleasure of it was taken away from me and many more in that day and then we began to mourn after a Saviour and look for a Deliverer and cry for a Helper and a Healer for the day of the Lord that made desolate had overtaken us and the Fire and Sword that Christ brings upon the Earth by which he takes away Peace had reached unto us and yet we knew not from whence it came though the Burning and the Judgment thereby was begun by which the Filth was to be taken away And now in this Distress deep was our Groanings and our Cries unto the Lord which reached unto him and he was pleased to hear and shew mercy for we often assembled together as the Lord's Messengers whom he sent amongst us had exorted us and minded the Light of Christ in our Hearts and what that discovered and in our spirits through its assistance warred and watched against the evil seen therein and according to that understanding received waited therein upon the Lord to see what he would further manifest with a holy Resolution to obey his will so far as we were able whatsoever it cost us for this I know was the Condition of many in that day we valued not the World nor any Glory nor Pleasure therein in comparison of our Souls redemption out of that state and freedom from that horrour and terrour under the Indignation of the Lord we were in because of the guilt of sin that was upon us and so being given up to bear the Indignation of the Lord because we had sinned we endeavoured to wait till the Indignation would be over and the Lord in mercy would blot out the guilt which remained that occasioned wrath and sprinkle our Hearts from an evil Conscience and wash us with pure water that we might draw near with a true Heart in a full assurance of Faith as the Christians of old did Hebr. 10. 22. but alas we had not boldness for the living Faith was wanting and a true heart we had not
I spake something in Exhortation unto Friends and prayed unto the Lord as he enlarged my Heart that we might be comforted and edified together the Magistrates were offended and sent the Under-Goaler to take me away and put me in the Dungeon from among my Fellow-Prisoners who came at three several times and every time haled me from my knees when I was at Prayer and put me in the Dungeon a little dark Room where I was one time two days and nights another time three days and nights and the last time seven days and nights There was a Bowling-Alley before the Prison-door where several of the Magistrates and others did use to come to their Game and hearing my voice were offended and so sent to take me away So after fourteen Weeks I was set at liberty and in some little time I had freedom to return home and then did as at other times follow my outward Calling and kept to our Meetings at home but when I was moved to go forth to visit Friends sometimes in our own Country and sometimes into Yorkshire and Bishoprick and would sometimes be Two Months away or thereabouts and then return home to my Calling or Trade and so thus continued till about the fore-end of Summer in the Year 1664. And then that which had been opened unto me four years before began again to arise in my Heart in that Word which lives for ever and the living motion of it began to press upon my Spirit towards the fulfilling thereof and then I saw the Time drew near and the Season was coming upon me wherein the Lord would have me go and fulfil his Word that I had yielded unto in Spirit so long ago And then I began to prepare and set my Heart to leave all things behind and give up all things else that I might follow him and so his Power wrought my Spirit into a right frame that I could easily leave all things and then he gave me time to settle and order my outward Concerns and leave all things clear And then that Summer I took shipping for Ireland and passed through most Friends and did visit them And about the Seventh Month 1664. I took shipping at Galloway in Ireland for the Barbadoes and was seven weeks and two days in sailing to the Barbadoes and I stayed there about three or four Months and did visit Friends and travelled and laboured in the Work of the Gospel both for the Confirmation of those that were gathered and for the gathering of others unto the Truth that they might partake with us of the like precious Faith And there I met with many that had been hurt by Iohn Parrot and carried away with his Imaginations who lead out of the Power and from the true Cross into high Notions and vain Conceits and so into a fleshly Liberty and ease therein from the true Spiritual Travel and right Exercise both in Spirit and outwardly pretending to be against Forms and under that pretence led out of the faithful and diligent practice which Friends had been gathered into as to their meeting together and waiting upon the Lord counting that a Form which he did lead into a slight of and so caused many both there and in Virginia and other places to neglect or in a great measure to forsake the Assembling of themselves together contrary to Friends practice and the Counsel and Advice of the faithful Labourers who first laboured amongst us as also contrary to the Advice of the Apostle Hebr. 10. 25. And also he in his new Notion led many to keep on their Hats in the time of Prayer when any Friend prayed and condemned our reverend practice of putting off our Hats at such times and so in many things led such as were taken with his Notion out of true Order into Loosness and such a Liberty that the Cross in most things was laid down by them and their own Wills followed and Truth 's Testimony let fall But he ran out of the Truth so far at last that many began to see him and what his Spirit led to and so came to see their own loss and returned back unto their first love and the Power of the Lord went over that dark Spirit with all the vain Imaginations they had been led into thereby and so Friends were gathered into their former Unity Now because of the prevalency of this Spirit I had the greater travel and exercise among Friends in that Island and in other places of America both in withstanding such as were high and hard and also to gather back and preserve such as had in some measure been betrayed and yet were more innocent and tender And so when I had travelled and laboured as I said before about three or four Months in that Island and was clear I took shipping for Maryland about the latter end of the first Month and landed there about the latter end of the second Month 1665. and so I travelled and laboured in the Work of the Gospel in that Province that Summer and large Meetings we had and the Lord's Power was with us and Friends greatly comforted and several Convinced But a sore Exercise I had with one Tho. Thurston and a Party he drew after him for a while so that both I and faithful Friends were greatly grieved not only with his Wickedness but also his Opposition that he made against us and the Disturbance that he brought upon us in our Meetings and great was the exercise and travel that was upon my Spirit both Day and Night both upon the Truth 's account that suffered by him and also for the People that were betrayed by him to their hurt who were under a great mistake But through much labour and travel in the Lord's Wisdom and Power that both I and other faithful Friends of that Province had to search things out and to clear things to their Understandings both as to what related to the Truth and also Matter of Fact which he was guilty of it pleased the Lord so to assist us and bless our endeavours in manifesting the Wickedness and Wrongness of the Heart and Spirit of the Man that most of the People came to see him and in the love of God to be restored into the Unity of the Truth again to our great comfort Truth 's honour and their Everlasting happiness But he himself was lost as to the Truth and became a Vagabond and Fugitive as to his Spiritual Condition and little otherwise as to the outward So in the Winter following I went down to Virginia and when I came there Friends there the greatest part of them were led aside by Iohn Parrot who had led them into his Notions as before is related and they had quite forsaken their Meetings and did not meet together once in a Year and had lost the very form and language of the Truth many of them and were become loose and careless and much one with the World in many things so that the Cross of
Power and in Love Peace and Concord all was carried on amongst us and so all was sweet and comfortable Here is a Discourse of putting the Laws in Execution against Dissenters however if the Lord suffer such a thing to be I believe it will be for his own Glory at last in the manifesting the Approved and trying the Faith of his People But we are yet quiet save some that are in Prison for Tithes Our Meetings are large and full in this Nation and Friends tell me there is an Openness in many places O! that we may be found faithful that we may work with him in his Vineyard and Harvest Dublin the 6th of the 10th Month 1682. The Lord preserve us all in the Faith that gives the Victory and faithful to God in this Trying day wherein it appears the Lord sees it meet to Try his People both in their Faith and Patience that the Approved may be made manifest We have large Meetings in this City and an Openness in divers places in the Country I have been in the Counties of Wicklow and Carlow and the Queens-County and at the Mote and Edenderry And to morrow I intend if the Lord will forth again to the Province-Meeting at Rosen-Allies Cork the 8th of the 11th Month 1682. I have been through these Parts as far as Castle-Salem and had a Meeting there yesterday was a Week and so returned back again to Cork to the Six-Weeks-Meeting where we had a blessed Season the Lord's Power was richly amongst us And after to morrow I think to go toward Toughill and so into the County of Tipperary and then to Castle-Dormant-Meeting and then for ought I know towards Dublin I am comforted in my Service amongst Friends who are generally glad of my coming and of what they have an Expectation of in relation to my Marriage but my Heart is fully satisfied in that I feel the Lord's Goodness towards us and in his Fear I do delight to wait upon him in this as in other things and desire that we may be a good Example And therefore I find it our way not to be hasty The Lord give us wisdom to walk so as that he may be Glorified and Friends in us Comforted This I desire above all Earthly Things Dublin the 30th of the first Month 1683. I am concern'd to hear of the Continued Sufferings of our Friends in England we are yet at Ease here as from those things The Lord work our Hearts more and more into Thankfulness and guide us in Wisdom to walk worthy of these Favours that in displeasure he may never take them from us but when-ever he is pleased to Remove them it may be in his Love for a Trial unto us as I believe it is with many of his Faithful Ones whom my Soul desires he may still preserve in the Faith that gives the Victory I have been in the North and did pass through Friends and had a blessed Service I am intended to go forth of this City to morrow towards Wicklow and so through the County of Wexford to visit Friends there Dublin the 10th of the 3d Month 1683. We have now Accomplisht that Concern of Marriage which we have for some time been under and blessed be the Lord he has been unto us a comfortable Director in our Undertakings in this Matter to the Satisfaction of Friends in the General who were with us And besides the Friends of this City we had many of the Friends of the South-end of the Nation who were come to be at the Half-Years-Meeting and some the sooner upon our Account and abundance of other People We had a blessed Meeting several Brethren with us and the Lord's Power assisting all things were well and we had Peace and Comfort and the Truth was honoured and not only Friends but many sober People were greatly affected with the Management thereof Well the Lord will honour his Name and Way and People if we be but careful to honour him The Lord is good unto us we have Cause to mind his Goodness unto us and truly that which is chiefly in both our Hearts is to seek his Glory and above all things to desire preservation in his Wisdom Dublin the 4th of the 8th Month 1683. I have been a time in the Country and came into the City again but yesterday I went to the Prevince-Meeting at Rosen-Allies and have visited many Meetings I was comforted with Friends in the good presence of the Power that did attend us Things are pretty well among Friends and our Meetings large and full We feel little of those Sufferings that our dear Friends in England have heavy upon them The Lord preserve us Tender Low and Humble that we may be worthy of such a Mercy from the Hand of the Lord. Dublin the 24th of the 5th Month 1683. Here is a Report abroad that Meetings will be disturbed and broken up but nothing done yet It must be Friends here as well as in other Parts that must bear the Burden as to the right part in Suffering and I hope it will be Friends Care to be given up in the Innocency to suffer for that Testimony the Lord hath raised in their Hearts by which we have been kept Innocent and Clear from the beginning under all Governments And so never could touch nor join with that which did seek the hurt of any This must be our Cloak or Covering and that gives Boldness and is and will be the Ease of the Spirits of all the Faithful and that which will answer the Consciences of our Adversaries And I believe if some Suffering do come it will work for good through Trying our Spirits Faith and Patience so that many may come to know themselves and the Lord and his Power also better thereby From the Marshalsee's Prison in Dublin the 9th of the 6th Month 1683. We are very likely to partake in some measure of Sufferings with our Friends and Brethren in England The last first day the Major sent the Marshal to our Meeting in the Forenoon and I being speaking he commanded me to go with him which after some Discourse I did He commanded the Meeting to Disperse but Friends kept quiet in their plaplaces I was carried before the Major with whom I had some Discourse to this effect He asked me Why we did act contrary to the Government having been commanded not to meet I told him We do nothing in Contempt of the Government But said he why do you not obey then I said Because it is Matter of Conscience to us and that which we believe to be our indispensible Duty to Meet together to Worship God To which he Answered You may be misled I told him If we were misled we were willing to be informed if any could do it Then it was urged Other Dissenters had submitted and why would not we I said What they do will be no Plea for us before the Judgment-Seat of the Great God So after some other Discourse the Major committed
into this Country again Graysouthen the 19 th of the 6 th Month. Between two or three Weeks time I hope to be as far as Edenborrough Leith the 6th of the 8th Month 1684. I have had a very peaceable and prosperous Journey since I came into Scotland hitherto I came to Edenburgh at the time appointed and stayed here one first day and then took my Journey into the North and I. H. and I. T. with me and spent about three weeks there and in my Journey had Meetings while I was there almost every day and a blessed open Service through the Lord's Power amongst Friends For there is an open tender-hearted People and they were glad of my coming for there had not been any English Friend among them of a long time And being clear I. T. and I came away this day a Week and left I. H. there we got to this Town the fourth day of the last Week and was at Edenburgh the fifth day at their Meeting and yesterday had a blessed Meeting there in the Fore-noon and here the Afternoon and to morrow we intend to take our Journey for the West and do hope to be clear this day a Week to go for England and hope to be in Cumberland to morrow a Week if the Lord will Hitherto all hath been very quiet where I have been and I hear nothing but Friends Meetings are quiet all over Scotland and Friends are suffered to be quiet but in some places they are very busie with some other People Here hath been a pretty deal a-do about a Plot but of these things we know nothing nor in such doings have no hand and therefore about it desire not to meddle Though others doings may bring Sufferings upon us yet still our Happiness is to be kept Innocent that if we suffer it may not be for evil-doing and then it will be well Eaglesfield the 12th of the 9th Month 1684. And truly in this Trying day wherein we are all of us like to have our Faith and Love to God Tried our greatest Concern always is to be in our hearts truly and wisely given up and resigned into the Will of God that we may therein rest in and under whatsoever the Lord may order for us or call us unto and then may we have peace in every Exercise and have Dominion in our Spirits over every Opposition which are many that the true Travelling Israel of God doth meet withal in this Age. I got very well through the West of Scotland met with no Disturbance All was quiet when I was there Our Meetings are quiet in Cumberland I suppose I may stay yet about two weeks here Stockton the 11th of the 10th Month 1684. I came out of Cumberland about two Weeks ago and was at Strickland-head and then came on into Bishoprick and thought I should but have touched at Darnton and this Town and so on into Yorkshire But when I was at Darnton it came upon me to give Friends a visit further in this County And so I went to Durham and had a blessed Meeting there and did visit the Prisoners And then went to Sunderland had a Meeting there And then to Shields and to T. F. had a Meeting there And so returned to Shâ—tton and so to this Town and had a blessed Meeting in the Evening yesternight it being their Meeting-time They are usually kept out of their Meeting-House here but yesternight we got in and the Meeting was full and peaceable and so have all the Meetings where I have been And now I am ready to go over into Yorkshire and do hope to be at York in about two Weeks time I suppose I may be there first day come two Weeks Grayrig the 26th of the 11th Month 1684 5. I have had a very comfortable and peaceable Journey and came through Cleveland and the Moors to Whitby and from thence up to Molton and to York Meetings have been quiet all along where I have been Yesterday a Fortnight a Constable was at the Meeting-House before I came and stood in the way to speak with the Friend that I came along with it being just before the Sessions He had a Warrant and was to give his Return at Sessions and therefore threatned that if we would not forbear to meet that day he must carry us before a Iustice. However after we had Reasoned a while with him we parted and went into the Meeting and he went away and did not come into the Meeting So we had a blessed Meeting and parted in Peace and the Lord's Power was over all to our great Joy This was all the Appearance of Molestation I have yet met with And I have had a very good Season and abundance of Meetings since I left York In Yorkshire I was at Robert Lodge's House and had his Company a pretty time out of Yorkshire I went to Lancaster and when I had visited Friends I came into Westmorland to Preston-Meeting and yesterday was at Sedberge We had a peaceable Meeting but out of the Meeting-House in the Street the Meeting-House being locked up from Friends I intend some Meetings in this County and so down to Swartmore and on into Cumberland as the Lord makes way Eaglesfield the 25th of the 12th Month 1684. I have had a very peaceable Journey and did visit Friends Meetings very fully in Westmorland and all quiet And since I came into Cumberland I was down at Carlisle and the Border And now my Service seems to be over and I am preparing to go home And was at Workinton this day and to morrow I intend to go to Whitehaven and to take the first Opportunity for Dublin Thus far I have been preserved very well through all my Travels and now I hope I shall get home Dublin the 25th of the first Month 1685. I got well here last Night but was put ashore in the North in Strangford-River about seventy Miles from Dublin and about four and twenty from Lisnagarvy And being put ashore there I found an Openness in my Heart to give Friends a Visit in the North and so spent near two Weeks among them and had many good Meetings I am very glad and my heart is truly Thankful unto the Lord for his preservation through this last Journey so safe and clear and ordered my way so comfortably home where I hope I may be of Service in my place and a Comfort to Friends The Lord our God is to be minded by us in all things I find things amongst Friends generally pretty well as formerly and Meetings very large and peaceable here and in the North. I am intended out of Town to the Province-Meeting Dublin the 16th of the 3d Month 1685. This Half-Years-Meeting we had a very great Appearance of Friends out of the Country many say they have not seen so many ever before And to our publick Meetings abundance of other People came even far more than could get into our House and they were very sober so that the Truth
receive and enjoy them with a Blessing and in true Comfort and also be a Blessing and a Comfort in his place unto all concern'd This is the Happiness and Advantage that is to be witnessed through the Working and Indwelling of that Eternal Power which God Almighty has Revealed in the Hearts of his People in this Day as there is a faithful Minding of and Subjection unto it in the true Love of it And sure many there are which if they knew the comfortable Effects of it would not abide under its Condemnation as they do But it is as it was said of old They will not believe though a Man should tell it unto them Dublin the 6th of the 11th Month 1688. The Account of the Death of my dear Wife will be come to hand before this which is no small Exercise to me But though my Loss be great in having her Remov'd from me yet I believe it is her Gain For she has been under great Weakness and Exercise of Body a long time however this I can say she bore her Exercise beyond Expectation and told some Friends She believed she was kept the longer because I was so unwilling to give her up And I must confess it was hard that it could not easily be got to and that for several Reasons but when I saw that it must be so I was made willing for her Exercises took hold of my Spirit The Morning of that day she did depart she said to me She was afraid her Passage would be hard I told her I did hope not She was under a great Exercise of Pain but bore it with wonderful quietness and sate under it as one waiting for Deliverance and very sensibly spake to me a little before her Departure So she went away like a Lamb without so much as a Groan We lived Comfortably together her Nature was Good Kind and Courteous she was Merciful very Confiderate and of a good Understanding she will be greatly missed in this place for Friends had a good Love and Esteem for her and I have Experience and know that many who seemingly might exceed in Appearance will come far behind Dublin the 7th of the 12th Month 1688. We are pretty quiet here at present but Peoples Hearts are like the troubled Waters no stay nor settlement cannot tell what way to go to be satisfied or quiet in their Minds only they that know the Truth may rest there and be quiet under the Covering of it otherwise it would be mighty uneasie I did intend for Cumberland but at present Friends could not well bear my going away neither have I freedom in my self So I rest in my place waiting the Time and Season for it Dublin the 13th of the 3d Month 1689. Our Half-Years-Meeting is over where were Assembled many Friends and Brethren from divers Parts of the Nation according to our usual manner We enjoy our Meetings peaceably and quiet generally over the Nation and in most Places our Meetings are large and many People come in and all People have their Liberty in the Free Exercise of their Consciences in Matters of Religion And as for Friends and Truth they are in good Esteem both with High and Low The Lord's Care and Mercy over us hath been largely manifest and Friends do learn great Experience of the Preservation of the mighty Arm of the Lord in this Great Day of Trial which is upon this Nation yet to our Joy and Comfort Friends are carried over it in the Faith of the Son of God and have been preserved miraculously even beyond our Expectation in several places where their Trials have been very great and the Dan gers as to appearance dreadful yet Friends have kept to their Habitations trusting in the Lord and following their lawful Concerns and Business At this Half-Years-Meeting our Hearts were made more than ordinarily glad to see one anothers Faces in such a time as this and the Lord's Power and Presence was with us that Crowns our Meetings And in the sense and sweetness of the same are the most of our Friends and Brethren this Day gone towards their outward Beings in the Peace of God and in great Love and Unity which did pretiously abound amongst us in this our Meeting throughout all our Concerns and Affairs The fourth day next I am intended to go into the Country towards our Province Meeting and do think to visit Friends e're I return Wexford the 5th Month 1689. I have had a very comfortable Journey among Friends and for the most part very large Meetings beyond my Expectation and very peaceable viz. On the third day at Tipperary and fourth day at Iohn Fennels But at Tipperary I had like to have been got hold of by the Rapperies and lost my Mare but I got away and escaped and rode back into the Town Last first day we had a very large Meeting at Edward Goodings it was their Monthly Meeting This day we have a Meeting here to morrow at Samuel Watson's and the fifth day at the Meeting that belongs to Lambs-Town I think Carloe-Monthly-Meeting is next first day I intend to be there Dublin the 12th of the 8th Month 1689 Friends as far as I can have account are in the General pretty well in Health and at Liberty and our Meetings quiet and peaceable and so are all others for ought I know But many in the Country under Sufferings as in respect to the Loss of their Goods by reason of the Wars this Land is greatly attended with However our Friends their Eye is to the Lord who doubtless suffers not all these things to come to pass without a Cause but to be a Chastisement for the sinfulness of the Children of Men. O! that all would take warning to keep out of that which provokes him to Displeasure that his Hand might be removed And truly that which is our Comfort and Stay in the midst of all is the holy Presence of his Power that attends our Meetings from the Evidence of which we receive our Satisfaction that the Lord is well-pleased with us And this is that which bears up our Spirits in the time of Exercise Dublin the 25th of the first Month 1690. I had the Opportunity this last Winter to go through Friends both in Leinster and Munster which was a great Satisfaction both to me and them Friends are generally well and our Meetings are full and we enjoy them in quietness as formerly and the Lord's Presence is with us to our great Comfort which is valued by all that are rightly sensible of it as a great Mercy Dublin the 21th of the 6th Month 1690. I have been visiting Friends in the North and had an acceptable and comfortable Season amongst them and found them very chearful It is still to be lamented that Sin and Wickedness should so abound but the Lord doubtless will plead with all that grieve him in his own way and time though he be Long-suffering And therefore it will be our Happiness to
wear out because that life and power which is eternal is known and that love which changes not is injoyed in which I am one with you and remain Your Brother in the Covenant where Sin is blotted out and Everlasting Righteousness is brought forth in which we worship the Father acceptably I. Burnyeat Barbadoes the 30th of the 11th Month 1670. Dear Friends I Have had a great Exercise upon my Spirit concerning this late Observation of a Day or Fast which was set forth and pretended unto and seeing the pride and vanity that people was in not like true Mourners and Fasters and such as would have the Iudgment removed and also seeing the bitter Cruelty that appeared as a part of the fruits of it and furthermore seeing the difference that did seem to appear in Friends minds about the owning or not owning of it by submitting unto their Requirings or doing to the contrary as a testimony against it after I had passed under a deep Exercise in Spirit for some time at last the Lord God by his Eternal Word raised up my Spirit in the zeal thereof and did smite against all such Mockeries and then in a heavenly Revelation my Understanding being opened and closing with the Word he shewed unto me that it was to be Witnessed against by all that stood in the Testimony of God and that those that would weaken the Spirits of any in their Testimony in this or other things wherein Friends have a Testimony for God it was plainly shewed me from the Lord how they would draw a vail over the pure in themselves and in others and in a cowardly underly Spirit by the corrupted sallen wisdom would put the Candle that God hath lighted under a Bushel or under a Bed and so cover it for a while until at last it would be put out so that we like other Professors at last by this Spirit would be led to yield to any thing rather than suffer and so then the offence of the Cross might cease And then also there was another thing which had been very long under my consideration of which I was not hasty to judge or meddle wherein Friends have somewhat differed but at this time was not minded by me because of the other that was upon me But when the Lord had cleared the other to me he brought up this also before my mind which is about Sending Men Horse and Arms to the Training Trooping or Playing which is folly as to us for which many that could not send have suffered the spoiling of their Goods And the Lord then plainly satisfied me that it was his Testimony wherein Friends were to stand and that they that bore another Testimony either in words or action it was from that Spirit and in that Wisdom that would put a bushel over the lighted Candle and by degrees would put it out and would lead us to crouch to the Spirit of the World until its large wing of Darkness would over-shadow us and become our Covering and then we should be like others that have lost their Testimony And then when the Lord had thus done oh how my Soul was filled with heavenly divine love towards all the willing Sufferers for the Lord's Testimony So that I can say it was with me as it was with Deborah when she said her heart was towards the Governours of Israel who offered themselves willingly among the people and then I could not but praise the Lord. And so this is the Testimony that the Lord did put into my heart which I am moved of him to give forth for the comfort and satisfaction of all that desire to serve the Lord in their Generation and to keep their Consciences pure and their Garments unspotted And therefore Friends keep in the first for he is the last and shall stand when all others shall fail And reason not with flesh and blood but wait for the power that it may open you and as you are kept open thereby the wonderful things of God in it will be made known unto you and the depths of Satan will be seen also and there will be a growing in righteousness For in the power is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith by which the just lives which cannot be witnessed where the Testimony is let fall and the Light covered and the Talent laid in the earth though it may be tied in a white Napkin of fair Profession For the Gift or Talent is neither to be hid in the Earth nor bound by any in any thing but to have its liberty until by its own power all be subjected unto it self that God may be all in us all This is the Testimony that I am to leave with you in these matters and so being eased in Spirit in the lasting love of God I remain Your Brother Iohn Burnyeat Salem in New-England the 30th of the 4th Month 1671. Dear and Well-beloved YOU whom the Lord hath called to believe and to be partakers of his Divine Nature and of his manifold Mercies that through the strength thereof you might bear witness to his Name and testifie to his Truth in your Day for which the God of Wisdom suffers you to be tried and your faith to be proved as it hath been his way in all Ages for the proof of his people that their hearts might be tried and their Love appear how weighty it is to him that hath loved them whereby the Glory of the Truth and the Excellency of it might be made manifest And now my Friends this is your day and hour of your Trial wherein the Lord by you I believe shall be honour'd and you rewarded with that good Reward which shall out-ballance all the present Sufferings unto which the Glory of the present World is not to be compared And though from you it is my Lot to be separated and so in the like kind not to suffer among you yet I cannot say but that I suffer with you for my Spirit is not without a feeling of your sufferings O! you dear Lambs of the Shepherd's fold is it so that the Wolf seeks to devour and is the Lion and devouring Bear let loose that would snatch up the Lambs Fear not though in his Mouth We have a Shepherd that will deliver and like David will save from the power of the Destroyer so that your Life shall not come under his power For God is on Israel's side to preserve though they would swallow up quick And therefore let your Trust be in the Arm of his strength for ever and you shall know that he is able to make up all to you again Dearly beloved My very Heart and Soul salutes you all in the Reach of that Life which by nothing that is visible can be stopped and in the sense and enjoyment of that I am spiritually with you wherein I may say I do partake with you both of the Sufferings and Tribulations and also of the Ioy and Consolation that abounds in your
Souls as the Reward of your Obedience and Faithfulness unto the Lord that hath called you thereunto and raised you up for that purpose And therefore let none look back nor be dismayed for the Cause is the Lord's and he will stand by you and will plead your Cause with all that rise up against you and will bring your Righteousness to light more and more and shew who are his and approved in his sight And he will also discover and lay open the Cruelty of such and manifest them who outwardly would shew themselves to be Sheep but are inwardly Ravenous and so Ravening Wolves and so labour to lay waste the Heritage of the Lord to spoil his Flock They are such who would not have the Lambs seed quietly in the green Pasture of the Lord's pleasure nor to lie still in the Fold of true Rest. But blessed be the Lord for ever and ever he hath brought many to the Mountain of his Holiness where they shall not hurt nor destroy even as he hath promised And therefore let all mind their dwelling there and be not moved and the Treasure will be known and the Riches received which all the Spoilers from Babylon and Men of War from Egypt shall not rob you of For it is from thence they all come to spoil Zion and to rob her of her Glory But the Lord is her defender and her King is in the midst of her and Salvation is round about her for Walls and Bulwarks Glory and Honour and Praises to the Lord our God for ever and ever For he hath taken to himself his great power and is going on Conquering and to Conquer And will effect his own purposes and bring to pass his own Designs in despite of all his Adversaries so that when they think to pull down he is building up and in that way which they think to destroy he will establish and so repair the Streets of Zion in troublesome times and build up her Desolations and repair her Breaches as before hath been prophesied And seeing it is certainly thus let us all trust in him for ever and wait upon him that his power by us may be felt and his Love and vertue may be fed upon which nourisheth up the Soul to Eternal Life Dear Friends the Aboundings of the Love of God which is in my Heart towards you all I cannot but signifie unto you amongst whom I have been a partaker of such pretious Mercy and rich Blessings as we have enjoyed together and as I am satisfied still abounds in your Hearts from the God of our Mercies And so Friends this is a Testimony of my love unto you all do you receive it in particular as if I had writ unto you all one by one For this it is the Lord hath made one in his Son and brought us into Unity as we abide in him there is no Separation therefore cannot we be forgotten one by another Dear Friends by this you may understand that I am very well every way and going on in the Service into which I am called The last day but yesterday I had a Meeting in Boston but very few of the People came they are still under the fear of them who are like them and of that Generation unto whom Christ said would neither enter-in themselves nor suffer others However we had a very comfortable and peaceable Meeting and Truth is over them and will bring them under and confound their Inventions From Your Friend and Brother Iohn Burnyeat To the Rulers Ministers and People of the Island of Barbadoes who see and take notice in any measure of the Hand of the Lord that is upon them and have desires in them to have his Iudgments removed FRIENDS IT is Sin that provokes the Lord and causeth his Judgments in his wrath to come upon a Nation a People or a particular and for that doth the Lord visit with his Rod and many times smite with his sore Judgments And while that is lived in the Lord will not hear though man may cry and make many Prayers as you may see in the Scriptures of Truth Read Isaiah the 1 st and see what the Lord said unto Israel when they were revolted and become a sinful Nation a People laden with Iniquity Tho they offered Sacrifices and burnt Offerings and called Assemblies and observed the new Moons and the appointed Feasts the Prophet called them the Rulers of Sodom and said Hear the Word of the Lord ye Rulers of Sodom give Ear unto the Law of our God ye People of Gomorrah to what purpose is the multitude of your Sacrifices saith the Lord c. And further told them That though they spread forth their Hands he would hide his Eyes from them and when they did make many Prayers he would not hear their Hands were full of Blood And therefore commanded them to wash make clean and put away the Evil of their doings from before his Eyes and cease to do evil and learn to do well seek Judgment relieve the Oppressed judge the Fatherless plead for the Widow and then come and let us reason together saith the Lord. So here you may see this is the way for Man to cease from doing Evil and to learn to do well whereby he may come into acquaintance with the Lord and to have his Prayers to be heard and his Requests to be answered and so the Judgment to be removed And also Daniel's Counsel to the King was that he should break off his Sins by Righteousness and his Iniquities by shewing Mercy to the poor that it might be a lengthening to his Tranquillity Dan. 4. 27. And all along in the Scriptures of truth you may see that Sin was the cause why the Lord was angry with any People and why his Wrath came upon any Nation and that the Lord though he spared long many times would not be reconciled unto them till they obeyed his call in turning from the Evil of their ways and if they would not be turned at last he brought his Judgments upon them to cut them off As you may see concerning Israel many times both in the Wilderness where the unbelieving and disobedient were cut off and perished and also after they were come into the Land of Promise how often because of their Sins he brought his Judgments over them and Destruction upon them after that he had warned them and by his Prophets called unto them to leave their Wickedness and to learn to do righteously and to amend their ways and their doings And because they would not hear but continued in their Sin the Lord brought his sore Judgments upon them and rejected them and cut them off and laid the Land desolate notwithstanding the multitude of their Sacrifices of their Prayers and of their Observations So that he that killed an Ox was as if he slew a Man and he that sacrificed a Lamb as if he cut off a Dog's neck and he that offered an Oblation as if he offered Swines
you may grow in and be guided by it in your further Travels in the Heavenly Journey towards the blessed Heavenly Canaan which is still before you as the Price of the high Calling of God in Christ Jesus And therefore observe the true Mark and still press forward towards the same as the Apostles and ancient Saints did And take heed I intreat you unto your selves and the exercise of your Minds lest your Eye inwardly be drawn forth to look at another Mark for if you do then will not the Price be the same that was theirs who was faithful unto Death and so continued unto the end and obtained the Crown Therefore be you all watchful to keep the Enemy of your Souls out of your Hearts that he may reign who is your Friend for ever who seeks your good and brings Life and Peace unto your Souls under whose Government and peaceable Dominion you will find Rest and Pleasure for your inward Man And now my dear Friends since it is the Lord's Truth you have received and his Holy Power that you have felt in these Countries even as his People in other parts dwell you with it and in it with careful Minds that you may therein live unto God as such that have a part in the first Resurrection that you may reign for ever and ever over the Power of the Second Death And all take heed of the mysterious Workings of the wicked one who works in Deceit by Guile in every transformed Appearance to draw the Mind out of the pure Center in the true Power to the Likeness and Image which hath no Life in it where there can be no stedfastness nor true reigning over the Will that is unruly and foolish Therefore my dear Friends keep your Watch every one in your own Hearts continually that you may not be betrayed from that pure Life that yields vertue unto your Souls and nourisheth up to Eternal Life For I know that the wicked one in his deceitful Workings you have been acquainted with and his evil Design the Lord by his Power in his Light hath discovered unto many of you so that you by the same have escaped his hurtful Snares and yet lives in that which must reign at last over all And therefore keep your Habitation in the Power that is unchangeable wherein you may live for ever without fading for the Power fades not but abides in its Glory for ever so that the first is the last the Root and Off-spring Blessed are they that have kept their first Love and have stayed in their Righteous Habitation into which the Power did redeem them they do still witness a growing from Grace to Grace from Strength to Strength and from one degree of Holiness unto another until they come to be purely like him who is their Redeemer who shall change them and bring them from Glory to Glory till they bear the Image of the Heavenly Man and be like him that is altogether glorious who is putting of his Glory richly upon his Church which is his People in this Day And therefore you that have received the Spirit of the Lord and are acquainted with it do you follow it in all its pure leadings with faithful Hearts for it will certainly lead all the Faithful to know an increase of Glory And take heed of the Spirit of the World which is not of God but leads from him that Spirit where it prevails causeth to wither and sade and brings Barrenness upon the Soul and Darkness and Death and then the Glory is lost and the Image of the Heavenly then is not born nor no Man in that is Heir of the Heavenly Inheritance Therefore it doth behoove all to look to their standing in that wherein the Heirship is that none may come short of that Crown which Paul said was laid for him and all them that loved the appearance of the Lord Jesus Christ. And so the God of Love and Peace keep you all in his Love Fear and Wisdom that your Dwellings for ever may be in his Peace which the World cannot take away nor rob you of that so with the rest of his Heritage you may shine in the Light of his Glory and dwell in the Richness of his Kingdom for ever and ever Amen Bristol the 9th of the 10th Month 1675. This is the Desire of my Soul for you all whom I truly love and in the Life Salute wherein I am your Friend and Brother J. B. Taunton the 7th of the 2d Month 1677. My dear Friends in Cumberland UNto you my Love and Life reaches and purely flows forth in that which Lives for ever wherein I do in the Innoceney and Life of Righteousness truly Salute you all whom the Lord hath raised and called to be a part of the first Fruits unto himself in this day of ours wherein the Glory of his hidden Life he hath Revealed unto a Remnant even that which from the Wise and Prudent of this World is still hid and from such as turn back into that Wisdom it comes again to be Vailed so that the Light of the Glory of it they lose again though they had a view thereof And therefore blessed are all who keep their Habitation in that Power which never Changeth nor Decays the Glory of the Heavenly things will be still in their view by which their Hearts will be enlarged towards the Lord both in Love unto him and a Living People to his Honour in all things that his Name may be Exalted and the Testimony of his Truth in its own pure Nature in every thing kept up according to its Brightness and Glory as by the power thereof we were raised up in the beginning as the life of Holiness grew in us dear Friends that which quickned and raised us from the Dead in years past through which we Live unto God and as we keep in the same we shall for ever be accepted by him and be well pleasing in his sight but out of that you know none shall be regarded by him though ye might do much for he did not regard them in the days of old for all they could do that did not keep in the Life of Righteousness though they might go far even to the covering of the Altar with Tears And therefore as I said that by which you were first quickned and raised is that in which for ever we must be accepted so that every one is to mind and wait for an increase and by experience of the growth of that wherein there is a coming upwards from a Child's State to a farther growth and still it is in the same Nature without degeneration from that which was first and so the first is witnessed to be last and ye grow more and more into the fulness of Christ in whom all fulness dwells And therefore my dearly Beloved in all your Meetings upon the Truth 's account have an eye unto and wait for an Injoyment of his Blessed and Heavenly and Heart-breaking Power
of the Lord God among you that your Hearts may be broken thereby and your Spirits melted into true Love and Contriteness and you preserved in that state and then will your Hearts be inlarged in the Heavenly Wisdom that is Pure Peaceable Gentle and Easy to be Intreated and in that Wisdom and Power in you all in the same will all your works stand to the Honour of God and Comfort one of another and your Eys will be always to the Promotion of Truth in Righteousness keeping up your ancient Testimony into which God raised you by his Power in years past and in the Life and Power of God you will keep under and weaken that which would arise to trample his Holy Testimony under Foot and so keep the House and Family of God in Order and keep to the Cross to that which would be out in a Fleshly Liberty to make void the Cross of Christ by which we were Crucified to the World and the World to us for that which would be from under the Cross is the same that would lead into the World again and so would make shipwrack of Faith and a tender Conscience and lead into headiness hardness stubornness and looseness again and then do they Apostatise from the Life of God that is in them and become Reprobates concerning the Faith and so through forsaking their first Love lose their Reward at last And therefore the true Elders Elder Men and Elder Women ought to have this Care upon them over the younger that all may be preserved in the first Love and first Zeal that none may lose that nor draw back into a fleshly Liberty down into the Wisdom that is from below which hath not its Spring in nor from that Heavenly Gift which cannot keep the Hearts pure as the Heavenly doth and you know it was the Gift of the Heavenly Power that first Quickned us and made us to Live to God and you know it is the same that keeps our Hearts Tender and Lively by which we Live for ever For our Life that we now Live is by Faith in him who is the Power of God and we Feed upon him and his Flesh is Bread according to his own Words for he is the Living Bread that came down from God and still comes down therefore mind it wait for it and stand up for it and be not starved again upon the barren Mountains of your own Imaginations where this Bread of Life is not to be found And dear Friends keep your Men and Womens Meetings in the Lord's Fear and Power and keep in the Holy Care where you may have a sense of your concern in the Body and feel your Place and Charge every one of you and be Zealous for Righteousness in the particular and in the general and the Lord will be with you as he hath been I am witness For none no longer dwells in the Truth and Love than they dwell in Righteousness though they may make a profession And be not at all discouraged in your works for the Lord and his Truth by that Spirit that would bring a light esteem upon your Holy Care and Godly Order in the Truth for it is the same in Nature that in all ages endeavoured to lay wast God's Heritage and obstruct his Work and layed stumbling blocks in the way of God's Traveling People to cause them to fall and to turn back again the Lord will blast every desire that those go about in this matter who let in this Spirit and bring his Life over it and preserve his People therein that in this Life and Heavenly Liberty they may Serve him and Praise him who Lives for Ever who is Everlastingly Worthy to whom be glory and Dominion World without End Dear Hearts you being Living in my Remembrance as also the Heavenly Seasons we had together when I was last with you my Heart is filled with Love towards you and in that I send these few Lines as a Salutation and tender Greeting unto you that you may know you rest in my Remembrance as I believe I do in yours So the God of Love and Peace keep you all in his Love and Fear unto the End that your Portion may be with him in his Eternal Kingdom where there shall be no Sorrow but you may dwell in Pleasure for ever and for evermore From your Friend and Brother in the Fellowship of the Gospel J. B. Dear and Well-beloved UNto you who are the called of God in those parts unto whom the visitation of his Day hath reached and upon whose Hearts the Heaven'y Light thereof hath shined in its pure spiritual breakings forth so that you are become the Children thereof and do walk therein unto you all doth the tender Salutation of my Soul reach in the love of God and in the Fellowship which is a Mystery which is held in a pure Conscience and continued as we walk and abide in the Light in which we have fellowship with the Father and with the Son and also one with another and so are of one Family and Houshold partakers of that one Bread which all the sanctified in all Ages did feed upon which is that which we are to wait for in this Day that we may live thereby unto God and grow through the Divine Nourishment thereof up into his Nature and into his Strength wherein we may triumph over the Adversary as the Antients did of old and rejoyce in the God of our Salvation who is our Strength and Tower of Safety for ever Dear Friends Great and large hath the Love and Kindness of our God been unto us who were Strangers Aliens and Enemies in our minds unto him in this that he hath called and chosen us to be his People and to bear witness unto his appearance and the shinings forth of his Light and of the Glory of his Presence whereby he hath richly comforted our Souls and lifted up our Heads above all sorrow even when the Enemy hath thought to sink us down into the Pit Thus hath the Lord dealt bountifully with our Souls and been a ready help in the needful time to him be the Honour and Glory for ever and ever So that now it behooves all after so many Deliverances Favours and Mercies to stick close unto the Lord and seek his Glory above all and that with all their strength that so he who is the good Husband-man may be glorified through every ones bringing forth of Fruit according to Christ's command Now my Friends this all observe that none can bring forth Fruit unto God's Glory but as they abide in Christ the living Vine from him is the Life received by which every one lives unto God and it is by the vertue of that Life that every one must act to his Praise And therefore see that you all retain it in its own Purity and live in subjection thereunto through your whole Day that you may be as fruitful Branches abiding in the right Nature and bearing holy Fruit
a striving that may hurt the unity that should be kept in the Light and hath sometimes grown into a Heat which hath set some Spirits against one another which should have been one and kept in the Unity where the love and comfort is And so all watching in the Light and waiting to feel the healing Power and Life in your Souls there will be a sweetness and Heavenly oiliness over your Hearts in which you will have a delight one in another and in one anothers good and this will help you all and so the strong comforted in the innocent and reverent care of the weak and the weak comforted in the Love Care Gentleness and Kindness of such that are strong And this preserves as a pleasant Family to the Honour of the great Lord and Father And so then shall you see how he will delight in you and appear among you and enrich you and bless you every one with a Portion from himself out of his Heavenly Bounty and Divine rich Treasure that none will want Bread nor refreshing Wine to nourish you in the inward Man but the holy Gift in you will be as a Well springing up unto Eternal Life And so you dear suffering Children of the Lord God Allmighty my Heart and Soul most dearly salutes you all and in the Love of God I have Unity with you in your blessed Testimony for which you suffer in which the God of all Grace and Truth comfort your Hearts and bear up your Heads over all your Hardships and deep Sufferings which as I understand are renewed and increased upon you That through him for whom you suffer who is your God and the great Lord of Heaven and Earth you may be strong to endure and abide to the end to his Glory and Honour who is over all and Worthy of all Blessed for ever Amen London the 20th of the 3d Monh 1682. From your Friend and Brother in that which shall out-live all Hardship in which we have believed J. B. A Copy of an Epistle written to Friends at Bristol in the time of their Sufferings Dear Friends UNTO you whom God hath Visited in his Love and Mercy and unto whom he hath shewed Kindness through his Son our Saviour whom he hath given for Salvation unto the Ends of the Earth unto you I say doth the real Love of my Heart reach forth and for you in my Heart there Dwels a Care that as God in the exceeding Riches of his Love and Mercy hath Visited you and called you to be Saints through the Sanctification of the Word and Purifying through Faith that you being made Holy might become Heirs of Eternal Life through his Son Christ Jesus and of that Eternal Kingdom into which no Unholy thing must Enter And now being you are called with this Holy Calling thus to be Heirs through Faith in the Seed in whom the Election and Heirship doth stand for ever do you all mind the Heavenly Rule and Government of this Holy Seed in all your Hearts that your Spirits may be kept in their Places in Subjection and Reverence unto him whom the Father hath Anointed and whose Spirit the Father hath sent forth into your Hearts to lead you into all Truth even into him who said I am the Truth in whom the Fulness Dwells that you might be in him that is True even in the Son in whom the Heirship is That so you may be Heirs yea joint-Heirs with him that is True and Holy for ever And now my Friends being the Lord in Mercy hath called you unto this high and honourable Calling to be Saints and Heirs in Christ mind your Calling and what you are called unto and be careful to keep in him and walk in him as you have received him and to sit together in him in Heavenly places as the Saints of Old did for the Heavenly Places are in him the safe dwelling and he is the Way and in him is the safe Walking and therefore did the Apostle exhort the Saints to Walk in him as they had received him Now my dear Friends all learn to know what it is to walk in Christ the Power and Righteousness of God and then your steps will be sure For he is the Light and Day where there is no occasion of stumbling And you are to mind your Sitting together in Heavenly places in Christ not a-sunder not out of the Unity but together in him who is but one in all and holds all in Oneness in Life and Fellowship that abide in him For he cannot be divided his Coat was without Seam that was the Figure and so is his Spirit that is the Covering of his Body now which he hath Purchased with his own Blood it hath no Division or Seam in it but is One although it differs in Manifestation or Gifts as to degree or operation because of the many Offices proper to the distinct Members of one and the same Body whereof Christ is the Head yet the Life through the whole Body by which every Member is supplied with ability to answer its place is but One and thereby is the Body kept in Unity For the Life doth rule the Members of the true Body and therefore that Member that goes from under the Government of the Life must needs Die Death comes over it and the Power of Death rules it and hence comes the Breach of Unity and the Discord and the Strife and the Contention And therefore let all your Hearts be kept in the Sense of the true Life and Power of God and in subjection thereunto in true Love Lowliness of Mind and Humility of Spirit and then in this right frame of Spirit you will be ready to serve one another in Love and not to rule over one another in Lordship for that is not proper no nor it is not Natural unto the Living Members of the Living Body unto whom Christ is the Head and over whom he Rules And so dear Friends you all keeping in the Power and that ruling in your Hearts that keeps tender and lowly you will be full of an holy Care and the living Zeal for the Lord's honour and for the preservation of his People in Righteousness that the Truth may be kept a top and Righteousness Lived in by all that do make a Profession of that honourable Name and Truth in which we have believed and through which we have been Saved and Sanctified and made holy and then will Unity Love and Peace spring and grow among you and you will be a Joy and Comfort one unto another and strengthners and helpers one of another in this great Work and Day of God And thus the Faithful keeping their Places and their Care in every Meeting and minding the Order and Government of Truth in themselves to be kept in Humility and the holy Tenderness in their own Hearts there will be that Sweetness and peaceable Reverence that will be Savoury and Comely in the Eyes of all And in and under the Government
of this peaceable Spirit you Living and Walking you may then come to be rightly concerned to God's glory in the Blessed Order which the Truth hath led into and by the Power of God is now set up in the Churches of Christ for the keeping of all out and down that are unclean unruly and unholy and preserving of the Camp of God in that Purity that is proper for it that he that is holy may delight to dwell there and abide in the midst thereof And dear Friends all you that keep your habitations in the Lord's Power neglect not your Gifts received from Christ but be you all concerned in your places and according to your abilities for the Honour of Truth that every thing that would bring Dishonour to that worthy name by which ye have been called and give Occasion of stumbling unto the weak may be removed in the Wisdom of God or at least by the tender power of God Judged out from among you that the Camp may be kept clean and Righteousness may run down and the glory of the Lord break forth upon you and you therein may shine to his Praise and Glory for ever more Dear Friends I also was willing to let you know that our Meeting this year at London was very quiet and peaceable and blessed Unity and comfortable Fellowship in the Power and Love of God was Witnessed among us and we gathered up in that together into that care and concern which the state of the Churches of Christ in this trying day did require For many of our Friends in divers places of this Nation are under great Sufferings for their Testimony But otherwise the Truth doth prevail and gain upon many Hearts and through these Tryals God will Magnifie his Power in the end and Crown his People with Dominion for through Sufferings will the Lamb and his Humble and Faithful Followers have the Victory We had also account from divers Countries of the Prosperity of Truth and the State of Friends at the Yearly Meeting now lately over as Holland and the Country that way and from Ireland and Scotland and so had an account in Letters to the Yearly Meeting of the state of things and the affairs of Truth to our great Comfort And therefore it is desired that if the Lord should so order that we may Meet together as hitherto we have done and intend if he permit to do that you in America would endeavour to send over against that time from your several Countries an account of the Prosperity of Truth and how it is among you as to the Affairs thereof that at that Meeting Friends may have an account from you as we have from other Parts And for this end it was desired by Dear G. F. whom many of you know hath a general Care upon him for the good of the whole Body that at your Half-years-Meeting in the latter part of the year you might draw up an Epistle which might be sent to be at London at the Yearly Meeting every year and so from your Half-years-Meeting in every place there may be an account given yearly which will be a refreshment and comfort to Friends And therefore it is desired that if this come in time to your Half-years-Meeting you would be mindful of it and answer the desire of Friends and let Copies of this be sent to Virginia Maryland Pensylvania and New-Iersey and to Long-Island and Road-Island and to Sandwich and where there may be a Service or to Scituate if the Half-years-Meeting be there and to Barbadoes or the Leeward-Islands So with my Love to you all in that wherein all the Faithful have Fellowship I conclude and remain Your Friend and Brother in the Truth I. B. Hartford the 19th of the 4th Month 1682. An Epistle to Friends of Bristol Directed to C. J. Dear C. J. IN that everlasting Truth and Seed of Life through which the God of Truth hath reached us and visited us is the living Love and true endeared Affection of my Heart and Spirit Richly and Sweetly let forth and extended unto thee with thy dear Wife and your Children as also unto the Faithful and true-Hearted to the Lord in that City who in this Trying day are given up unto God both to Do and Suffer for his Name 's sake My Soul I can still say is deeply Affected with your Suffering state and be sure you are many times livingly in my Remembrance and that in the near Approaches of my Spirit unto the Lord for in that in which the access and the true drawing nigh unto him is experienced do you live upon my Heart and are brought very often into my view together with your Suffering State under which it is the Pleasure of your Heavenly Father to Try you and to prove your Faith and Confidence and to let you know the preciousness thereof in the time of need And now my dearly Beloved see all of you that you keep in the Faith that gives the Victory and truly saves and defends and know that ancient saying true for ever The very hairs of your Head are all numbered and not one shall fall to the ground without your Father's Providence And therefore let your Eyes be unto him both for Salvation and Preservation and know that he both can and will deliver when he sees good for you know him that is the living God that reigns and will reign over all and in due time make all know that he can do whatsoever he pleaseth in Heaven and in the Earth And therefore mind your acquaintance with him and your knowledg of him in that which may be known of him in your Hearts and your Unity with his Life in your Souls that you may all feel the Peace thereof and the Holy Spring therein which Man by all his Cruelty cannot reach to put a stop unto But when they that seek to destroy you and to take all Comfort from you have done all they can this Spring being open in your Hearts you have Comfort Peace and Joy that they neither know of nor can keep from you Oh! you dear Suffering Children and tender Babes of the Almighty who are called unto this day and hour of Temptation or Trial how doth my Soul Love you how is my very Heart's Love let forth unto you at this time as at many other times The Lord the God of Strength be with you and strengthen and fill your tender Souls with the Glory of his Life and the sweetness of his Presence that your Spirits with gladness may Praise him in the midst of all these Exercises with which you are compassed And now my dear Friends you being so in my Heart with a living Sense of your Trials that are upon you methinks I see the Wall with which the God of Israel doth compass you about over which the Adversary cannot shoot an Arrow tho his Boasting may be great what he will do as of Old it was Oh! happy are they that abide within the compass of it
and so retire and spread their Cause before the Lord who is the living God Remember the King of Old who commanded silence and said Answer him not a Word and so returned to the Temple and to the Altar of the Lord and spread the Cause before him and confessed the weakness of the Daughter of Sion to bring forth and also his Faith in the sufficiency of God's Power when he said Thou art able to Save c. Oh! my dear Friends Live up to the Lord in your Spirits and be Faithful and keep your Peace with him in the inner-Man and mind your Unity with his Spirit and take heed of that which would obstruct your Fellowship with his Life let no Fair Pretences over you Prevail that may have any tendency to bring your Spirits into Bondage or any straitness over your Hearts for that Bondage will prove the greatest Slavery and this I do believe you right well know And now my Dear Friends all of you minding your inward Freedom and your Spiritual Ease in the Freedom and Liberty given you of God through Christ your Saviour you will have a Dwelling and Habitation filled with Glory Riches and Comfort over which the Enemies Cloud cannot come and in that you will see through to the end of all that would either Darken or bring Distress And so you will see how good it is to trust in the Lord and to rely upon his Power and be given up freely into his Will And so dear Hearts my Love is truly unto you all and in the Love with which I have anciently Loved you and in which I Love you as much as ever do I very dearly Salute you all you tender Suffering Children and with my Soul and Spirit desire that God in Mercy and Kindness may bless you with Spiritual Blessing in Christ Jesus and enrich your Souls with the Divine Fatness of his House and Pleasure of his Life that you may have Joy every day and delight every Morning in your Bosoms that so your Strength may be renewed and your Ability so encreased that you may be able to bear what is upon you till the Lord see good to Work your Deliverance and case you of the yoak and Burthen that you bear Which the Lord in Mercy take off if it be his pleasure is the desire of Your Friend and Brother in the Fellowship of the Sufferings and Tribulation and also of the Consolation which we are called unto through Christ Jesus our Lord. I. B. The Copy of an Epistle sent to Friends at Bristol in the time of their Sufferings Written at Eaglesfield in Cumberland the 1st of the 6th Month 1682. Cork the 25th of the 10th Month 1682. Dear Friends IN the Everlasting Covenant of Life and Peace and in the pure spring of Divine Love in the same do I remember you and in Spirit reach unto you and very dearly salute you all who in the Faith that gives the Victory do remain and stand stedfast and so keep your Habitations and Dwellings in the Heavenly places in Christ Jesus your Redeemer who hath redeemed you out of the Wickedness that is in the World unto himself and so into his own Power and Nature which is righteous that you might become the Righteousness of God in him and so be restored into the Image Nature and State in which Man was Created by him that made all things good and Man in his own Image that he might delight in Man and that Man might honour and glorifie him Now this Work of Restauration you know God hath sent his Son to effect and accomplish in Man and for Man that again Man might honour his Creator and become the delight of his Maker whose delight is to dwell in the Habitable parts of the Earth even among the Sons of Men. And therefore that you may be his Delight and that he may take Pleasure in you do you all keep in that which hath Renewed or doth Renew and change the Heart and Spirit of the mind that in the Newness thereof you may serve and honour and glorifie him from whom the renewing Power and Word doth come that so the new Creation the new Heavens and Earth may be known wherein Righteousness doth dwell and that you may have your Conversation there and so shine as Lights among this crooked and perverse Generation in whose Heaven and Earth Unrighteousness doth dwell And therefore will the Lord as the Apostle said not only shake the Earth but the Heavens also that that which cannot be shaken may remain And truly I do believe that many ones Heaven will be shaken before this searching winnowing trying Day be over that 's growing on upon the Nations and People for the Heavens of many are grown over and covered with Darkness and thick Clouds and the Glory thereof is gone and the brightness and stedfastness thereof is lost not a Star to be seen except a Wanderer out of its course out of the Covenant that hath greatly lost its Light and so in the Clouds of Darkness driven to and fro by the variable uncertain Winds that are and may be suffered to blow to shake that which is shakable and remove that which will not endure that that which cannot be shaken may remain and the Glory of that may appear which will endure Dear Friends God hath manifested that which is sure for ever and will endure and stand and last and you have known the power of it and as you keep in the holy sense thereof you will be stedfast constant and firm in your Minds and not soon shaken nor removed from your Habitation and stedfastness in the Gospel of Christ Jesus our Lord which is the power of God which is above all Powers Thrones and Dominions and will stand and cannot be shaken For it s above Iohn's Ministration the Gospel Power and Kingdom is and he that 's least there is greater than Iohn and is come to that which is surer than a Reed that may be shaken with the Wind though it be not broken yet it may be shaken And therefore they that would dwell there and not come on to Christ the Rock that cannot be shaken their Dwelling is not safe their Habitation will be thrown down and their House made a Desolation Methinks I see it so in our Days upon such that have sitten down short of the Eternal Substance that ended all Shadows Iohn's as well as those that were before him And therefore dearly Beloved you that have known the Eternal Substance the living Power of the Lord Iesus Christ manifested in your Hearts by which you have been quickned raised up and made alive unto God keep to the Power in your Souls and mind its living in you that you therein may live unto God and so abide a living People through your Age God's living Witnesses in your Day without Alteration and so be such as have not only been Hearers of the Word but Doers also and so such whose House is built upon
the Rock Christ Iesus which by the Storms and Winds cannot be thrown down For the sure Foundation being kept unto you will abide and endure and the Lord will bless you with inward Peace in your Souls and true Pleasure in your Hearts and you will enjoy the true Riches and Heavenly Treasure and learn as you keep to the power of God in your Hearts to lay up this true Treasure in Heaven through the true Faith where the Thief cannot come to steal nor the Moth to waste or corrupt And then your Riches and Treasure that you trust and delight in being thus laid up in Safety your Hearts will be at quiet and in ease and setled in the Kingdom in Heaven where the Treasure is and then Christ's Words will be witnessed Where the Treasure is there will the Heart be also Oh my dear Friends how true are these things Happy are they that grow up into the experience thereof through the working operation and openings of the true living Heavenly Power in their Hearts such their Minds are kept free from that which would entangle and their Feet at liberty that they may run chearfully the Race that is set before them For the Riches the Price that their Hearts are upon being before them and the Mark also that they look at this draws them to look forward and press forward so that they are not of them that draw back to Perdition And thus Friends you may see where and in what your profitable Exercise is through your Day and where the lasting Gain Riches and Treasure is to be got that will endure and be your Portion when the Enemy and all his Instruments have done what they can And this made David say he would not fear what Man could do unto him for the Lord was his Shepherd he said and the Lord was the Portion of his Cup and the Lot of his Inheritance c. And therefore keep your Hearts out of the World and the Riches thereof which are uncertain and also above the delighting in the Glory thereof and let your delight be in the Lord and in the sweet and pleasant Enjoyment of his righteous peaceable Power all the Day long that you may still feel a Habitation therein and a place of Safety to fly unto in every needful time And wait you upon its holy springings in your Hearts that your Souls thereby being united unto God you may dwell in his Covenant and so in Unity with him and his blessed Son and so feel the Fellowship which is a Mystery held in a pure Conscience And dearly Beloved live at Peace among your selves and wait for the Spirit of Love and Concord to spring in all your Souls that the true Mark of Christ's Disciples may appear among you Remember what he said unto his of old By this shall all Men know that ye are my Disciples if you love one another And consider what the Apostle said He that dwells in God dwells in Love c. And therefore I intreat you wait for the power of it in your Hearts that you therein may serve one another and so the whole Body may be edified the weak strengthned the faint-hearted encouraged and the lame not turned out of the way but all helpt forward on their way And you all being thus in the righteous holy Power exercised for good which is that it will lead unto you will be a Strength and Comfort and Crown of Rejoycing one unto another and so helpers forward of one anothers Joy in the Lord Surely this is needful in this Day wherein Zion hath so many Enemies she had need to be as a City that 's at Peace within her self So the God of Peace keep you all in the Dominion of his Life that therein you may reign over every hurtful Thing and so dwell in the holy Mount of Safety where the Destroyer cannot come and upon the holy Hill of Zion about which he hath appointed Salvation for Walls and Bulwarks That so you may all witness Peace to be within her Walls and Prosperity within her Palaces And so you may every Day witness high Praises in your Hearts and Mouths unto her King who is King of Kings and reigns over all who only hath Immortality and dwells in the Light To whom be Glory and Eternal Praises saith my Soul for ever and for evermore Amen From your Friend and one that truly loves you in the Truth J. B. Dear R. S. UNTO thee with thy Dear Wife C. H. R. U. and theirs with the rest of Friends there in Prison with you doth the living sincere Love of my Heart truly reach and livingly flow forth for I can say of a truth that you are often near my Soul and livingly in my Heart and that in my nearest approach unto the Lord when my Life opens and my Spirit is let forth through the Power thereof and poured forth into his Bosom as blessed be his Name he gives us access by his own Spirit even then are you many times fresh in my Heart and Livingly before me as if I were present in Body with you and with great delight do I put up my Supplications upon your account unto the Lord our God rejoycing to feel the Lord so concerned for you that by his own Spirit he so often stirs up a remembrance of you in my Soul and that upon such Holy occasions Oh! blessed be his Name he is the Keeper of Israel that neither Slumbers nor Sleeps but remembers his People and his Eye is open to see their Afflictions and his Ear is open to hear their Complaints and tender Groanings and no doubt but he will arise in his own due time to work Deliverance and Salvation and they shall glorify him Oh! my dear Friends how is my Soul overcome in the weighty Love of God at this time unto you all who Suffer or are given up to Suffer for his Name 's sake that hath Loved you and values your Testimony above all things and so are of that number that love not your Lives unto Death but are given up to follow the Lamb whithersoever he goes Oh! my Heart is affected with you in your Testimony and can say as Debora of old My Heart is towards you who offer your selves willingly among the People now to Suffer in the Lambs Battle as they did to War in the outward War for that 's the way the Lamb and his followers do overcome he was made Perfect through Suffering And the Promise still is The Lamb shall have the Victory everlasting Glory and Honour and Praise to the Living God that sits upon the Throne and to the Lamb who is worthy for ever more And therefore my dear Friends look not out look not back but to the Lord your Rock and Strength look for Help and for Deliverance for you know that its from him that Salvation comes and not from the Hills and Mountains for he is the God of the whole Earth and the Mountains shall Melt at his
that we cannot easily be moved Though the Winds do blow and the Waters swell and toss and the unestablished be driven to and fro and so afflicted in their Spirits yet this Rock abides for a Habitation and Being of Safety unto all them that keep firm thereunto and so do abide near in their Spirit unto the holy Power thereof they find the living Spring of that Grace from the same in their Souls that the World cannot take away whose Treasure the Thief cannot steal nor the Moth waste for its Heavenly and kept by a Heavenly Hand And such who mind this will be ready to offer up their Earthly Substance and also themselves into his Hand and Will out of which no Man is able to pluck And surely in this Day there is no true Rest nor Satisfaction to the Souls or Spirits of Friends but as they get hither in the Faith with their Hearts and Spirits And when we are here spiritually oh this holy Shield how doth it defend Oh the holy Rock how do we sit under the shadow of it Oh the holy Ioy that the Dwellers upon this do feel in their Spirits though the Tempest be great Oh the God of Heaven keep us all in the holy sense of this that our Spirits may be born up from sinking under our Exercises in the Trial that so we may all glorify him in our Day Dearly Beloved you tender suffering Children whose Hearts are tender of God's Glory and therefore are willing to give up your selves and your all for his Name 's sake that you may be of that number who following the Lamb whithersoever he goes and not loving your Lives unto Death that may stand with him upon Mount Sion My Heart and Soul is knit unto you and you are near me and in the unity of the antient Life I feeling Love abundantly to flow unto you you have had a proof of the sincerity of my Love of old unto you And truly you that stand in your innocent Testimony faithfully do ingage my Heart still more and more in Love unto you Oh the tender meltings of my Spirit in the sweetness of the Love of God in which I reach you and rejoyce with you in your Ioy which all the Wrath of Man cannot put a stop unto I know your Hearts are at ease and your Spirits free and the Weights and Burdens from off you who are freely given up to suffer though in these Bonds outwardly But there can be no such spiritual Portion received by any that shrink from their Testimony in this Day of Trial. For the Word is true for ever They that suffer with him shall reign with him He the Captain was made perfect through Sufferings he must be followed by all that come in the fulness to pertake with him of his Glory And such who draw back and would find a place of Safety for themselves to escape their Sufferings for their Testimony though they should fly to the uttermost parts of the Earth the Lord's hand will find them out and there will not only be a holding back of the Portion but a spiritual Pain will overtake where the Heart is tender and because thereof uneasie will every ones place be unto their Spirits And therefore my dear Friends keep in the Faith and Word that Iustifies and then will you reign in the Seed that 's heir for ever wherein you will Overcome and Inherit and be Conquerors and so Triumph with the Lamb that must have the Victory before whose Feet the Crowns of all the Mighty must be laid down unto whom the Kings of the Earth and all Flesh must bow in him we trust his Heavenly Kingdom we wait for and pray for the coming of that even such as are our Enemies by the power thereof may be Converted unto God and so have an Inheritance with us in that Kingdom that hath no End That so Mankind might rest together in that Hope that makes not ashamed where the Love of God might be shed abroad in all Hearts by his Spirit Thus God is filling the Hearts of his Children with good Will towards all The Lord keep us therein for ever Dear Friends by this know that I am well and am now come to have a share with you of the Sufferings that attend for the Gospel's sake I have been three Weeks a Prisoner here in the Marshalsee of Dublin So in the true Fellowship of the Gospel am a Partaker with you both of the Sufferings and Consolation that attend us for the Testimony thereof I remain From the Marshals in the City of Dublin the 25 th of the 6 th Month 1683. Your Brother I. B. Dublin the 19th of the 6th Month 1685. Dear J. Banck UNTO thee with thy fellow-Prisoners who suffer for the blessed Testimony of that precious Truth in which we have believed doth the real and tender Affection and Love of my Heart and Soul flow forth at this time and in the sweetness and peaceableness of that which is our Life do I dearly salute you and in the unity thereof tenderly greet you all whose Hearts are kept up in that and under the holy conduct of it for which you suffer In this have we our unity which in it self lives and reigns over all and shall reign in its own pure Dominion and Dignity even the Power of our Lord Iesus Christ to whom Principalities and Thrones and Dominions must be subject It is for the Testimony of him you know that you suffer to wit the Testimony of Iesus which you have received from him by his Spirit and thereby have it sealed in your Hearts Though many do not understand the weight and certainty of your Testimony for which you suffer and therefore may look lightly upon it yet you who are enjoyers of the Power and so have received the Spirit of Iesus which is the Spirit of Prophesy and so his Testimony therein you feel the Weight of it and know the Certainty of the Testimony for which you suffer and so in your Sufferings have your Peace and Iustification And therefore my dearly Beloved in the Lord see that you all hold that fast in all your Hearts in the inward rich Possession of it for which you suffer that you may feel your Reward with you and your Comforter in you to bear up your Spirits over all your Sufferings and so you will have a Satisfaction in your selves that whatever others say or may think of your Sufferings and the reason thereof you know within your selves that it is for the Truth and its Testimony that you suffer and for the keeping of your Consciences clear in the sight of God And so in the hidden Man of the Heart you rest in quietness in that hidden Life which you receive from Christ and here is your Peace and Comfort which no Man can take from you no nor Man knows of it but such as are in Fellowship with you who live in and love the same Testimony And therefore those that know
not your Reward your Crown nor your Peace cannot reach to take it a way and that is our Joy that we have a Crown and Inheritance that is out of their sight and so out of their reach Oh therefore let all take heed that through carelesness or looseness of Spirit or any other thing you be not beguiled or betrayed from that to the losing of it while you are suffering for it You know my Friends it is possible such things have been even in our Age that while some have been suffering for the Truth they have been betrayed from the Truth and the Innocency and Simplicity of it in their Hearts and so have lost the Truth even that for which they were called to suffer For you know it is an inward thing and must be held in the inward unity of the Mind in a spiritual Fellowship and if there be not a care even while we are in one thing doing for the Truth in the outward in the inward we may lose it and our Justification by it and then whither shall we go for our Peace and Recompence The God of my Life give you all Wisdom and Fear and fill you with holy Reverence that you may still stand in awe before him and be watchful over your spiritual Path and the Feet of your Souls and Minds that you may invisibly tread in the invisible way of Peace and Righteousness And Dear Friends live in Peace and Love together amongst your selves and in a holy solid Life before all Men keeping out of the Spirit of the World in all things that as it is upon a Religious Account that you suffer you may appear in all other things to be Religious Men or otherwise you know the Truth cannot be honoured by your suffering For if Men that suffer for or upon the account of Religion appear not to be Religious Men this overthrows the Glory and Beauty of their Religion and brings it into Dis-esteem amongst Men And therefore did Christ command that our Light should shine before Men by their seeing of our good Works c. And Dear Friends have a care of provoking one another unto any thing that is Evil but endeavour to stir up and provoke one another unto Love and good Works that you may build up one another therein and so help to bear one anothers Burthen and fulfill the Law of Christ that you may all be kept up together in the Iustification and Peace And so Dear Friends my Heart's Love being unto you I send these few lines as a Testimony thereof by which you may know you are in my remembrance in the Love of God and my Heart hath an honourable Esteem of your Testimony and your Sufferings in Righteousness for the same I desire to be remembred to Friends in the Country both below Carlisle and above and Friends in the City to Io. Carlisle and Family with the rest My Wife 's dear Love is to you all My Love is with you Farewell From your Friend I. B. Dublin the 12 th of the 8 th Month 1685. Dear Friends IN the universal Spirit of Life and Truth and of Righteousness and Peace doth the tender Affection and pure Love of my Heart flow forth and reach unto you all who are true Lovers of the Power and the Holiness of the same wherein alone it is that we bear the Image of him whose Name is Holiness and his Nature and Being is Purity so that in that only we do draw and may draw near unto him and have Fellowship with him and enjoy his Presence who is our God our Life and Salvation And therefore in the Unity of that whereby we have been quickened and through which we Live unto him that hath quickned us do I exhort and beseech you all to mind with Reverence his secret and sweet Visitations by his Holy Power upon your Spirits in your Hearts that you feel that to appear there and so through the brightness of its appearing to destroy him whose coming is after the Working of Satan with all Power c. and with all Deceivableness of Unrighteousness in them that Perish And not only to appear and destroy him and his Works but also to abide with you and dwell in you and so make you his dwelling-place And then you being Watchful shall not Watch in vain because the Lord then will be your keeper and then as one said of old He keeping the City the Watch-man watcheth not in vain Thus you may see it fulfilled in your own Hearts unto your own Souls and so have Comfort and Confidence with Holy David and with him Live above the fear of Evil though you might walk through the Shadow of Death as he said because of the Lord 's being with you And therefore Friends see that you all be mindful of him in his Appearing by his Power and Spirit of Grace in your Hearts and let him have Room there and not to be straitned or thronged up or oppressed for he delights to dwell alone there and have the whole Heart to himself and at his own disposing that he may Fill it with that which he takes Pleasure in and in which he only may be Glorified and Honoured And therefore doth he require the Heart saying My Son give me thy Heart And Christ Commands That we should Love him with all our Hearts c. So as I said let him have room in your Hearts and take heed that with this World the Spirit of it Nature of it and Love to the things therein your Hearts be not filled and so taken up that there be not room for him whose coming is with such Glory and Fulness that he fitls all that are rightly poor and empty with that Fulness Richness and Glory that there can be no want to them that have him for their Portion and Inheritance and so keep single in their Hearts before him But where the Heart is filled with Delight in or desire after other things out of the Covenant of God which is out of his Favour there the Lord will not have delight to Dwell there is not room nay he will not have delight to appear there because it will be his Grief and an Oppression unto him Was it not so of old when he took up his Complaint against both Iudah and Israel As you may see Amos 2. how the Lord pleads with them and threatens them what he would bring upon them for their Sins that he reckons up against them and withall to aggravate their Crimes as he might justly do he also reckons up and tells them what he had done for them how he had destroyed the Amorites for their sakes brought them out of the Land of Egypt led them in the Wilderness given them the Land of the Amorites to Possess raised of their Sons to be Prophets and their young Men to be Nazarites But saith he unto them Ye gave my Nazarites Wine to Drink and commanded my Prophets saying Prophesy not behold I am pressed under
and so taught of the Lord according to that New Covenant promise They shall be all taught of the Lord Isa. 54. 13. Iohn 6. 4 5. Then was our Hearts inclined to hearken unto the Lord and our Ears which he had opened to hear was bent to hear what the Spirit 's Teaching was and what he said unto the Church who was the chief Shepherd and Bishop of the Soul And thus were we gathered into a right Gospel Exercise and Gospel Worship by him and through whose Name we had received Remission of Sins past and whose Blood had sprinkled our Hearts from an evil Conscience and who gave the pure Water that washed and made clean so that with true Hearts many began to draw nigh unto God in the full assurance of Faith as the ancient Saints did and was accepted and had access by that one Spirit by which we came to be baptized in one Body and so came to drink into one Spirit and was refreshed and greatly comforted and grew up together in the Mystery of the Gospel fellowship and so worshipped God who is a Spirit in the Spirit received from him which is the Gospel Worship according to Christ's appointment Iohn 4. 24. And then we came to see over all the Worships in the World which were set up either by Imitation or man's Invention and saw it to be in vain to worship God and teach for Doctrines the Commandments of men as our Lord had said Matth. 15. 9. and therefore were we constrained to withdraw from them and also many of us to go and bear witness against them in their invented and traditional Worships where they were ignorant of the Life and Power of God And thus being gathered by the Lord Jesus Christ that great Shepherd and Bishop of our Souls we became his Sheep and did learn to know his Voice and to follow him and he gave unto us Eternal Life and manifested the Riches of his Grace in our Hearts by which we were saved through Faith and delivered from that wrath fear and terrour which had been so weighty upon our Souls and in measure from the power of that Death that had reigned and made us miserable and wretched and came to partake of that Life wherein the blessedness doth consist and so then the Lord becoming our Shepherd he taught us and led us forth into green Pastures where we did feed and rest together with great delight O the Joy the Pleasure and the great Delight that our Hearts was overcome with many times in our reverent and holy Assemblies how was our Hearts melted as Wax and our Souls poured out as Water before the Lord and our Spirits as Oyl Frankincense and Myrrhe offered up unto the Lord as sweet Incense when not a word outwardly in all our Assembly has been uttered And then did the Lord delight to come down into his Garden and walk in the midst of the Beds of Spices and he caused the North-wind to awake and the South-wind to blow upon his Garden and the pleasant Showers to descend for the refreshing of his tender Plants that they might grow still more and more And now unto them that had known the Night of Sorrow was the joyful Morning come according to that ancient experience of David Psal. 30. 5. and such as had been in the foregoing deep Afflictions Tossings and Distresses came to witness the fulfilling of that great Gospel Promise O thou afflicted tossed with tempest and not comforted behold I will lay thy stones with fair colours and lay thy foundations with Saphires and I will make thy windows of Agates and thy gates of Carbuncles and all thy borders of pleasant Stones and all thy Children shall be taught of the Lord and great shall be the peace of thy Children In righteousness shalt thou be established thou shalt be far from oppression for thou shalt not fear and from terrour for it shall not come near thee Isa. 54. 11 12 13 14. Thus then came we by him to be gathered into Covenant with God and to witness the fulfilling of the Promises of God in whom all the Promises are Yea and Amen and so come to sit together in heavenly places in him and so come to feed upon the heavenly food the Bread of Life that came down from Heaven which Christ the heavenly Shepherd did give unto us who had gathered us from amongst the Shepherds that fed themselves with Temporal Things from the Flock but knew not how to feed the Flock with Spiritual Food for they had it not And now we coming to be acquainted with the Power of the Lord Jesus Christ in our Hearts became great Lovers of it and Delighters in the Enjoyment thereof having already counted all things but as Dross and Dung in comparison of the Excellency that we saw therein and therefore was willing to suffer the loss of all that we might win him as it was with the Apostle of old and blessed be the Lord many obtained their desire they found their Beloved met with their Saviour witnessed his Saving health by which their Souls was healed and so became his Flock and Family or Houshold of Faith And thus then as his Children and blessed Family we still did continue to meet together twice in the Week or oftner and in his Name and holy Fear being gathered together his Promise we did witness according to Matth. 18. 20. he was in the midst of us and did honour our Assemblies with his heavenly Power and Presence and that was our great delight and the sweetness of it did wonderfully engage our Souls to love him and our Hearts to wait upon him for we did find the ancient experience of the Church true as testified in the Scripture because of the savour of thy good Ointments thy Name is as Ointment poured forth therefore do the Virgins love thee And growing thus into this Experience of the Goodness of the Lord and of the Sweetness Glory and Excellency of his Power in our Assemblies we grew in Strength and Zeal for our Meetings more and more and valued the benefit thereof more than any worldly Gain yea it was unto some more then our appointed Food And thus continuing we grew more and more into an understanding of Divine Things and Heavenly Mysteries through the Openings of the Power that was daily amongst us and wrought sweetly in our Hearts which still united us more and more unto God and knit us together in the perfect Bond of Love of Fellowship and Membership so that we became a Body compact made up of many Members whereof Christ himself became the Head who was with us and did rule over us and so further gave Gifts unto us by which we still came to be enlarged and further opened that we might answer the end for which he had raised us up and so far blessed us and sanctified us through his Word that dwelt in our Souls and so we keeping still in our Zeal and unto our first Love and
keeping our Meetings and not forsaking the assembling our selves together as the manner of some was of old whose Example the Apostle exhorted the Saints not to follow the Lord's Power still continued with us and was renewed daily in our Meetings by the Openings of which our Understandings was still more enlarged into the Mysteries of Life and hidden things of God so that many through the favour of God grew in their Gifts and had their Mouths opened and so became Instruments in the Lord's hand to bear witness unto the World of the Day of the Lord that was broken forth again even of the great and notable Day that Ioel had prophesied of and Peter bore witness unto and also they were sent to bear witness against the World and its evil Deeds with all the false Religions with which Mankind had covered themselves withal in the Darkness and Apostasie which had spread over them and now was seen and discovered by the Light and Day of God And thus the Truth grew and the Faithful in it and many was turned unto God and his Name and Fame and Glory and Power spread abroad and the Enemies Work and Kingdom was discovered and struck at by the Lamb and his Followers which made him begin to rage and stir up his Instruments to oppose the Lord's Work and with all subtilty to hinder People from following the Lamb or believing in his Light and so with Pen and Tongue and Hands also the Beast and his Followers began to war and to whipping and scourging and prisoning and spoiling of Goods with reproaching belying and slandering the way of Truth and all that they could do to hinder the Exaltation of the Kingdom of the Lord Jesus Christ blaspheming his Light and his Power calling his Light natural insufficient false Guide with many reproachful Names and calling his Power Diabolical and the operation and blessed work of it which was both to the renewing of the Spirit of the Mind and also to the reformation of the Conversation from Debauchery Wickedness Unrighteousness and Witchcraft even like them of old who said Christ cast out Devils by Beelzebub the Prince thereof But by this time they that kept faithful to the Lord and his Light and Spirit in their Hearts who had come forth through the deep Tribulation as before related was confirmed setled and satisfied and in the Life that was manifested established in which they saw over Death and all mens profession in it and where they were and what they sed upon that cried out so against the Light and Power of Christ that was thus with us and wrought thus in us in our Meetings and how they were but mocking at the same that those mocked at spoken of in the second of the Acts when they thought the Apostles were full of new Wine and so drunk for the high Professors of our days being ignorant of the Holy Ghost through their resisting of it blasphemed the Life and Power and in the Death at the best did but feed upon the Tree of Knowledge For this I still right-well remember that in my waiting upon the Lord in the deep Distress and weighty Judgment that was upon my Soul to see if he would appear and break through and open and give relief from under that which kept me down as Bars of Iron that I could not arise nor asscend nor have access although out of the Deep I cried unto him for deliverance I say I can remember that in the first notable inbreaking of the Power of God upon my Soul or pouring forth of the Holy Ghost upon me the first opening in the same unto me thereby was a true discovery of the Tree of Knowledge in the Mystery upon which I saw I had been feeding and all the Carnal Professors of Religion and how we had made a Profession of that which we had no possession of but our Souls in the Death feeding upon the Talk of that which the Saints of old did enjoy and then I saw there was no getting to the Tree of Life that our Souls might be healed by the Leaves of it and so feed upon the Fruit thereof that we might live for ever But as there was a coming under the wounding slaying Sword that Christ brings by which the Life of the Old man comes to be destroyed who would still live in sin and serve that and yet profess Faith in Christ and to be his Servant which is impossible according to Christ's own saying No man can serve two Masters c. Matth. 6. 24. and therefore I saw there was no remedy either I must be buried by that fiery Baptism of Christ's with him into Death or else there could be no rising with him into newness of Life there might be a rising into newness of Profession Notion and Words but that would not do it was newness of Life I must come to the other I had tried over and over I saw I must dye with him or be planted with him in the likeness of his Death that is dye unto sin if ever I came to be planted with him in the likeness of his Resurrection and so live unto God according to Romans the sixth Then when things thus opened in me I clearly saw we had all been deceived thinking while we did live in the Flesh and after the Flesh and so in the Death feeding upon the Tree of Knowledge which was forbidden for Food we might make such a Profession as might bring us to reap Life everlasting but I soon saw such as a man lived after such as a man sowed such should he reap and not what a man professed or what he talked of and then I was willing to bow to the Cross and come under the fiery Baptism of the Spirit and let that which was consumable be destroyed that my Soul might be saved and come to possess that which would endure and abide and could not be shaken Thus were the Heavens shaken also as well as the Earth that that which was not shakeable might remain according to Hebr. 12. 27. and so that which condemned the evil Fruits of the Flesh as they were owned by us so to be in our Profession both in our loose Conversation and also in the desires of our Hearts and fleshly Lusts that therein sprang unto the Judgment of which we did assent even so did that same Light and true Witness discover and condemn our fleshly Profession of Religion in that same Nature and Mind which brought forth Evil or in which Evil did dwell and Rule and so came our Heaven to be shaken and our Covering and Garment to be taken away and we left comfortless and naked destitute and without a Habitation and then we saw our sacrificing and our sinning to be alike in the sight of God for our Prayers was rejected and all loathed because both was done in one Nature and from one and the same Seed and corrupt Heart and therefore it came to be with us as with Iudah of