Whether we be able to drink of the Cup he drank of and be baptized with the Baptism he was baptized with Was it not to intimate That if we die with him we shall also live with him if we suffer we shall also reign with him and have it granted to us to sit down with him on the Throne of his Glory our very Enemies beholding What would it be less even in this world if he should but please to cause upon this occasion of our Suffering that the Spirit of God and of Glory should rest upon us and bring forth his Kingdom within us in Power giving us that Mouth and Wisdom that will make us mighty in word and deed that Faith to which all things are possible that Spirit of Supplication and Prayer that he will alwayes hear and immediately answer God's Arm is not shortned doubtess great and precious Promises are yet in store to be accomplished in and upon Believers here on Earth to the making of Christ to be admired in them If we come not to live here in the actual fruition and full accomplishment of them as they will be experienced by Believers even on this side the death or full change of their mortal body yet if we die in the certain fore-sight and embracing of them by Faith this will be no small blessing This dark night and black shade which God hath drawn over his Work in the midst of us may be for ought we know the ground-colour to some beautiful piece that he is exposing to the Light His Sons must be manifested and evidently distinguished from those who say they are such and are not There is a glory to be revealed in them unto which their Suffering is made the needful Preparation and this is called the Redemption of the body In that day the tabernacling of God in men shall be visible Their very bodies shall be the Temple of the Holy Ghost In them as his Sanctuary will God dwell for evermore whence shall be given forth such visible signs of his extraordinary Presence as shall render it past dispute to the sight of every man that God is in them and with them of a Truth This state of entire resignedness and subjection of our bodies to our Spirits and of our Spirits unto Christ the Father of them shall certainly be brought to the view of the whole World The eyes of those that see them shall acknowledge them and the ears that hear them shall bear witness to them that they are the Seed and Off-spring which the Lord hath blessed Our body thus considered as capable of such advance and honour is not meerly the outward case or shell that must return to dust but includes also the bodily organical state of Life or that souly animal Life which the Spirit of man exercises in conjunction with his mortal body In this kind of Life it is we see hear and speak have the exercise of our Senses after a distinct manner from Angels and intellectual Substances in a way of operation inferiour to theirs proper and peculiar to the rational Soul as needing and using the earthly Organs or Instruments of the mortal body There is also in man that which is peculiarly called Mind or Spirit in distinction from his Soul or from the souly Life and activity of the same Spirit in and by its earthly body 1 Thess 5. 23. The Spirit or Mind of man as distinguished from that life and operation it performs in the mortal body is capable even while in the body to be awakened by the Father of Spirits and come forth in a superiour way even of natural life received by man in his first creation to act as out of the body or without the use of bodily organs as an equal or associate to the very Angels Now because the bodily and inferiour powers of our mind are the instruments of that converse we are subjected to in these dayes of our vanity so that if we will be sociable it must be by the use thereof the Apostle James comprehends all the action of these inferiour powers by the sensible organs we make use of in the exercise thereof under the name of the tongue when he saith If any man offend not in word the same is a perfect man and able to bridle the whole body To bridle and regulate the tongue order all the language action and expression of the animal powers aright is to bridle the whole body under the government or ruling authority of the Mind or Spirit considered in its superiour and angelical kind of life and acting as out of the body or above and without the use of bodily organs The Mind or Spirit of man thus considered is as the Pilot that turns the Ship about whithersoever he listeth If it well and truly exercise its governing power it causes the animal life in all the operations and affections thereof to obey its dictates and commands however fiercely driven by contrary Winds false Doctrine any corrupting violent influences of Devils or men upon it and fetches it off from whatever tumultuous disorder it s own sensual lusts and passions are ready to run it into Jam. 3. 2 5. To be partaker of the Redemption of the body is to be made this perfect man which is taught so to live and act from right spiritual Principles as not to offend in word through the Power actually conferred on him and exercised by him for the bridling of the whole body in the sence above declared and for the keeping it in subjection to the Spirit or angelical part in him in righteousness and true holiness This taming of the tongue or subduing of the bodily part in us to the spiritual and intellectual is a work of no small difficulty a thing that is not to be purchased but at a dear rate It may cost us all that we have and no ill bargain neither since by our words it is that we shall be justified and by our words we shall be condemned For until we have brought under our body and reduced it into a fixed subjection and entire resignation to our Spirits let us boast never so much that which is perfect is not yet come even that perfection which in a very eminent degree shall be experienced by the Saints here on Earth on this side the grave and during their continuance in the mortal body This for ought I can discern will be the product of the present sharp and fiery Tryals that God hath brought upon his People all the World over After they have suffered a while and the same Afflictions have been accomplished in the rest of their Brethren that are in the World they may so far have the work of Patience perfected in them as in this sense to become perfect and entire wanting nothing and to shine forth as so many bright morning stars and fore-running signs of the near approach of the brightness of the Day of Christ's second coming This God hath set before the eye of my
that came willingly the skins the Badgers skins the red dyed Rams skins for the Covering of the Tabernacle on the out-side good enough yet very course the Boards of Shittem wood the Curtains the Pillars of Wood of Brasse of Wood over-laid with Gold each according to its place and service in the Tabernacle more or lesse excellent as more or lesse inward or spiritual So was the Linnen the Purple the Blue the Scarlet and curious Works the most curious and pure for the Vail next the Mercy-Seat So was it in the Composition of the Perfume and anointing Oyl after the curious and choice Art of the Apothecary that no Composition or Mixture must be made like it of the choicest Spices So for the Lamps of the Canalesticks to give light and for the Altar of Incense evening and morning Oh! great is the Mystery of Godliness in all these things no Lights but what was made of this pure holy Oyl must burn before the Lord if the Priests or Levites did burn any other they must be cut off And so for the Incense of sweet Spices the Lord that Spirit is very curious and can soon spy and smell out the Mixtures of Flesh or any false Compositions and abhor them So in the Priests Garments for Aaron and his Sons to minister in the nearer the Ministration was to the Lord the Purer and Holier and the Garments the more curious The imbroydered fine Linnen Coat holy and pure the Robe of the Ephod of blue the curious Ephod with the two pretious Onix Stones and the engraving therein set on the shoulder plates the curious Girdle of the Ephod with the wreathes of Gold and the holy Brest-plate of Judgement with the twelve pretious Stones coupled to the Ephod and of the same curious workmanship with the curious Girdle the Miter the Plate of Holiness and the Crown for his head For the other Priests not so curious nor such works in regard their Institutions was less glorious In all these things how excellent how skilful and what a cunning searching Spirit of discerning and Judgement had this wise-hearted Soul in the Mysteries unfolding the Riddles and hard Sayings still opening them in Spirit faithful in all God's House and keeping nothing of the Counsel of the Lord back nor hiding his Light under a Bushel but setting it up in the Candlestick so that it gave light to many of the Lord's House I was one of the number of those that constantly attending on his Discourses as oft as I was in Town knew him more in his Family Exercises and Discourses for many years than most from whom I received more help and light in the knowledge of God than from all the men in the World besides and found his Ministry most searching and trying What others took for Gold he proved it to be but Brass and some Doctrines that others preferred for Spiritual he tryed and found them Carnal He had such a Brest-plate of Judgement and Discerning that he did constantly bear the remembrance of all the Tribes of Israel on his heart before the Lord and distinguished every Tribe after his condition yea he had this singular and peculiar gift of Judgement to discern the two Natures the two Seeds the two Covenants to admiration Many a Soul he hath put upon the search that thought he had attained and ran well whom he found to be but in Egypt or at least but departing thence Shall we say he was a Scholler Nay but a Rabbi a Doctor in the knowledge of Christ in whom a greater Fulness of the riches of Wisdom and Knowledge were treasured up than in most like that Disciple that lay in Christ's bosom He obtained so long a share of his life and growth having the true sight and measure of every man's state and growth yet himself sate on a Rock higher than all and was such a blessing in his Witness and Testimony to the Lord in his threefold state of Life Death and Resurrection and so of our conformity and likeness to Him therein that no Book extant but the Striptures did ever clear so much Truth as his Retired Man's Meditations and this blessed Epistle now of his is as a Key that further opens that to the Sons of men and they are to be understood better in spirit and in operation than in words How did he seeing Truth lay scattered maimed and mangled in parts and parcels gather it all up yea and all the Professions and Professors of it and made one whole Garment of Truth amongst them all and that without any seam or rent reconciling and healing all the Wounds and Divisions that have been amongst good People from the crown of the Head to the soale of the Foot in the Spirit of Love Righteousness and true Judgement assigning every Profession and Principle his true and proper place and state in the Body whether Natural or Spiritual VALE To the scattered Seed and Sheep of CHRIST in all Nations the true Israel by Faith unknown for the most part to themselves but more to the World and Worldly Christian Yet in this their unknown or dispersed Estate owned of the Lord as the Church that are in God the Father truly pure Catholick and Christian of which Christ Jesus is the alone and immediate Head BRethren and Fathers c. that in Jesus Christ are dearly beloved and with God of great price Grace and Peace be multiplied unto you through the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ To you that are unknown and yet well known it is in my heart to be representing the knowledge of Him that is invisible and the view of your selves in your invisible state together with those that are your known or unknown enemies as that which may prove neither unseasonable nor unprofitable to you in this day of Israel's Captivity but approaching Redemption which hastens fast at which time the Sons of God shall be made manifest If Paul Acts 17. when he passed by and beheld the Athenians Devotions with an Altar having this Inscription To the unknown God took occasion from thence to make him known whom they ignorantly Worshipped Surely it ought not to be accounted blame-worthy in any that seeth the Worship and Devotions now in practise in the visible Christian Church to endeavour the distinguishing the right Catholick Church in its Purity and way of Worship in Spirit and Truth from them and from their wayes of Worship ignorantly however zealously performed that pass under the name of Christ's Mystical Body and his Divine Institutions But you Beloved are of God Elected known as by name having this Seal and Mark from the Lord upon you which is your Stability and sure Foundation the Lord knows who are his And let every one that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity No matter therefore if these come to you and find you as to your outward estate in Babylon where according to what is foretold by the Apostle John in the Revelation your abode is to be
as in a wilderness condition for 1260 years now near expired And although from that state of servitude and hard bondage unto which you have been exposed by the Rulers no wrestlings or contendings by humane wisdom and power have availed to work your deliverance because the appointed time set by God is not come Yet this ought to be your comfort that so soon as that time comes there will then need very little other help than the Grave it self to cast you forth as the Womb doth her fruit which it cannot longer detain For of this be assured that Christ's dead body mystical can no more be held in its figurative grave after the set time is come than his natural body could in his literal grave Acts 2. 24. where it is said that after Christ by wicked hands had been slain God raised him up having loosed the pains of death because it was not possible he should be held of it Nor are you to be too much grieved and discouraged in this your low depressed and dead estate under the rage and indignation of the World and Powers of it since to you is the promise of Life and Resurrection and you are sure for the present to be fed in the Wilderness and to be kept green and flourishing in your inward man by secret dew inspired and distilled from Heaven whatever perishing and decays are brought upon your outward where you are bearing the marks of the dying of the Lord Jesus Hearken therefore to the Call that is given you of retiring inward into the life of your Head and Root the life that is hid with Christ in God And as the means to be so with more freedom labour to keep the door of your sensual part shut and fast closed about you as much as may be that the noise and diversions of this sinful and unquiet World may not disturb nor interrupt you For though through impatience and unbelief you may be arguing and concluding against your selves as the whole house of Israel did Ezek. 37. 11. that your bones are dried your hope is lost and you are cut off for your parts yet ye shall know that the Lord he is God when he hath opened and brought you up out of your graves v. 13. He will then own you visibly for his people by wonderfully putting his Spirit within you and causing you to live And when you see this your heart shall rejoyce and your bones shall flourish like an herb and the hand of the Lord shall be known towards you his servants and his indignation towards his enemies He hath the weapons of his vengeance in readiness full Vials of his wrath to be poured forth by his heavenly Militia and Troops upon the Beast and his Worshippers when all humane means fail This you are therefore to know that though the Saints who have adventured to oppose the Beast and the kingdom of Antichrist all along contending in a good Cause have been still crushed and subdued as is foretold Rev. 13. 7. yet the time is coming yea is even at the very door for God to take the business into his own hands and to put forth the power of his wrath by heavenly Instruments forasmuch as the earthly ones as you have seen have proved ineffectual And this ought to be a teaching to us to depend upon God for the avenging of his people even when all humane ability to perform it is vanished and not hastily to run out in the use of any indirect means though tempted and allured thereunto But to return to the things which we propound to set before you in this Epistle They are reducible unto these particulars following 1. First The sight and knowledge of Christ as he is the Invisible and Holy One from whom as from the Head all natural as well as spiritual good doth flow 2. Secondly Christ's Headship exercised by him ever since his Ascension as he is the Son of man glorified and this in the two distinct branches and administrations of it The one that wherein he is the Lord and restorer of pure incorrupt Nature upon the Principles of the first Covenant renewed and confirmed in his blood The other that in which he is the giver of the Holy Ghost or the Minister of the Spirit and new Name as Ointment poured forth which where it is received upon the Principles of the new Covenant never fails but abides with such for ever 3. Thirdly The true Annointed Ones or Witnesses of Christ according to both his before-mentioned Administrations and the Annointing which is given by the one and by the other 4. Fourthly Those that in Principles are opposite unto these two Annointings and the effects of them declaring their enmity in and by the continued war they maintain against them in the posture of open enemies or dissembled friends both making up but one and the same Kingdom of Antichrist 5. Fifthly What Word and part of his Counsels contained in the Promises and Prophesies not yet accomplished is the Lord now fulfilling in the present dispensations of our day 1. To the first 'T is the Testimony which came out of Christ's own mouth concerning Himself and his Father Luke 1. 22. That no man knows who the Son is but the Father nor who the Father is but the Son and he to whom the Son will reveal Him which plainly declares that the beings both of the Father and of the Son are great and hidden Mysteries The one as well as the other is mystical and invisible and must be taught and revealed before it can be truly and fully known and understood what they are Agreeable to this is that Joh. 1. 18. No man hath seen God at any time that is immediately but by the means of the only begotten Son which is in the bosom of the Father he hath declared him The Son therefore who is the only begotten is said to be the Image of the invisible God The first name and similitude whereby God is possible and capable to be known to others beside himself For by and from Him as the Head the knowledge and fruit of the whole Deity is derived and communicated in such fit Images and lively Representations as He hath fore-determined within himself to be known by unto his whole Creation from the beginning to the end thereof Hence it is that we find Christ the Mediator by the Prophet Isa 43. 10. speaking of himself after this manner Ye are my Witnesses saith the Lord and my Servant whom I have chosen The Lord the Mediator hath and owns for his Witnesses the Womans Seed in the head and in the members the promised Seed in his Servant the Branch the chief and principal one and in his Brethren the same Seed and who are made to bear his Fathers Name by Adoption as well as himself and to continue it for ever that one Seed Gal. 3. which saith the Apostle is Christ the mystical body that are Heirs according to promise Ye are my Witnesses sayes
old ere ever the Earth was And what is true in Christ who is not only the Root but the chief and principal Branch hath its Witness and is declared in the Work which he begets and shines forth in amongst his Members knit to him by an abiding or indissoluable union all that are Branches in this true Vine whose Fruit is such as is cheering both to the heart of God and of Man that is to say of Man considered in his higher or lower attainments and growths up into the knowledge and love of God as he is Man and no more partaking of the Spirit of God by measure And secondly of Man made the only Begotten of God that lyes in the bosom of the Father and is anointed with the Oyl of gladness above his fellows which Christ's exalted Manhead is and that after such sort as not to have and inherit the dignity of it to himself single and alone but as the Head and Husband to that General Assembly of the First-born whose Names are written in Heaven and have right to the double portion The right opening of this is the great Key to all our practical and experimental Knowledge of God which is found amongst the dispersed Seed of God that are either of the one or other birth Children of the first or second Covenant in every Nation Tongue Language or Form truly searing God and working Righteousness and therein accepted of God either through Faith or with that common acceptance declared Gen. 4. If thou dost well shalt thou not be accepted whilst in the mean time they may be great strangers unto if not much prejudiced against one another for not walking together in one and the same way of Profession and external Communion Give me leave then to distinguish this Seed of God into Four sorts Two that are Witnesses unto Christ's first Ministry as he is the Author and Restorer of the Law and Principles of pure Nature and is the dispenser of God's Image and the manifestation of his Will upon the terms of the first Covenant And other two that are Witnesses unto the truth of Christ's second Ministry as he is the new Creator that regenerates and makes over again his first work anew is the Author of Life from the dead and bringer of Immortality to light which is not done by the first Covenant nor can be but by this second knowledge and Image of God begotten and wrought by and according to the tenor of the new and everlasting Covenant The first sort of Witnesses we shall speak unto and rightly to have the knowledge of them we must yet further consider Man in his first make and in the primitive constitution of being that was given to him in his state of Innocency before sin entred So as to enquire upon what terms Man then stood with God and in what respect he was pronounced good in God's eyes and might be said to be accepted of him Man then had the perfect knowledge of God and of Christ as his Creator and Law-giver for God created all things by Jesus Christ by the Word of God's mouth in the Mediator did all things live move and had their being so that what might be known of God even of his Eternal Power and Godhead by the things that were made that is by the means of any created beings visible or invisible it was manifested in man and was shewed to man by that mixt com pound being which was given him of an intellectual and sensual or animal Soul which furnished him with inward and outward senses proportioned for such a knowledge and which were retained in due subjection and subordination the one unto the other From such a prospect and survey of things as Man at first was fitted to receive both from within and without him the invisible things of the Godhead were clearly seen by him rendring him without all excuse being thereby instructed in the duty of his obedience and subjection to the Law of God under which he was made to the glorifying him as God which as God expected and required from man so he owned a liking and acceptance of from man with whom he treated and agreed upon the terms of his personal obedience and entire observance of all his Commands and continuance therein Three things man in this state might and did experimentally find in himself First The light and manifestation of God's Mind and Will as a Law within him called in Scripture The Candle of the Lord the Oyl with which God furnished the Lamp of man's spirit which he was to take care that through his default he did not let it go out nor diminish but quicken and renew it as it should need by such means God instituted The second thing which man experienced was the life of a rational and intellectual Soul that is to say a superior part in the same Soul affording the use of inward senses that by keeping open and awake he had as it were an intercourse with the spiritual and invisible beings of Angels and saw the intrinsick natures of the Creatures And thirdly He found also a brutish nature of which he was compouuded and made which furnished him with the use and operation of outward senses by which he might go abroad and walk up and down in converse with earthly things and inhabitants The fountain of these outward senses his inferior part to be in his soul or spirit With these he came to perform and put in execution that which the superior and directive part of him judged right and fit to be done This was the inward and outward order of actings that Man at first was created in with a freedom to make use of this Light within himself which God as a Talent had committed to him to imploy according to his will and rely upon his guidance and the sufficiency of it to attain the end God set before him in the way of his perfect obedience and keeping out the entrance of sin or else upon the sense of the instability he might discern in these Principles of Freedom that leave him alone and to himself and the Insufficiency to continue by the power of the Grace received in well-doing against all resisting and deceiving temptations to chuse rather to make resignation up of this his Freedom wherein he was at his own guidance and dispose in exchange for a better and more perfect Freedom that is to say in order to be intirely at the will of another and the leading influence thereof in all things even of such another whose service is perfect Freedom and who should be as Surety for the performance of the duty to God's Law and secure us from the penalty of the Curse therein threatned against the Transgression thereof which was pointed out to Adam in the Tree of Life as John interprets by the Promise mentioned Rev. 2. 7. To him that overcometh which is done through Faith will I give to eat of the Tree of Life or Immortality which is fed on
with it Heb. 2. 1. So there is a second sort of Witnesses unto the same Principles in substance that is to say to the life of the Image of God in pure Nature wherein man was at first created as it comes again to be renewed and restored with power in the soul by the knowledge of Jesus Christ and the Redemption that is by his Blood through the Ministry of the written Word and the operation of the Spirit of Christ in the use of those Ordinances and Institutions of Worship which he hath appointed and revealed in the Scriptures according to the several measures of their growth up into this knowledge of Christ and faithfull walking with him therein under the variety of Profession and Forms of visible Worships that are extant in that which is acknowledged or witnessed to be the visible Christian Church which by the preaching of the Gospel upon the Ascention of Christ and the Ministry of his Spirit poured forth in the primitive state of it came to be raised up by God's visiting the Gentiles to take out of them a People of his Name that he might substitute unto himself as another Israel and holy People and Church of visible Professors of his Name in the room and place of the Jews and the old Law and Form of Worship that had been in practice among them Rom 11. which made James in Act. 15. 16 17. apply the words of the Prophets unto this new Christian Gentile Church which sayes After this I will return and will build up the Tabernacle of David which is fallen down and will build again the ruines thereof and I will set it up that the residue of men might seek after the Lord and all the Gentiles upon whom my Name is called saith the Lord who doth all these things Now amongst the visible Members of the Christian Church as evidently appears Gal. 4. there were a Generation that under the Name of Christians and hearers of the Gospel and Ministry of the Spirit according to the New Testament chose still to retain the Principles of the Law and first Covenant as the ballance of all their Faith Obedience and Worship desiring to be under the Law and Dominion of it and to cleave to the upholding and doing those things which according to the Judgment of the Apostle Paul made them debtors to the whole Law and struck them clear off from the true Principles of Grace that are by the Law of Faith and of the new and everlasting Covenant and of this they gave but too clear a proof in that they gloried in something that was on this side the Spiritual mind which is set upon things that are above and which ought to be died unto by the Doctrine of the Cross unto which they shew themselves the declared and zealous opposers Not but that in words and profession these pretended as much to own the Principles of Free-Grace and of the New-Testament as any and have their approach to it at least when they please themselves some more and some less but when they are brought to the Tryal they quickly shew that they are not able to endure the bridling and restraint which the New-Testament puts upon them by the Doctrine of the Cross of Christ to the crucifying that wherein they desire and affect to glory from which they are excluded by the Law of Faith and the New-Creature as we shall shew in its place So that in Truth that which these second sort of Witnesses have in their eye is not the being and life of the New Creature but the restoration of the old Adam in his primitive righteous and holy state into which they grow up and are found for the life of their holiness and upon that bottom as a qualification to entitle them to all the Promises and their abode and continuance in Fellowship and Communion with Christ and Interest in his Death for the Remission of sins They do experience such acceptance from Christ and are in themselves so certain of their good Estates to their Eternal Salvation that they will not endure to hear wherein they are in a mistake nor that it is possible for them to be better These do indeed excel the first Witnesses in the doctrinal part of the knowledge of Christ confessing him in that great part of his Priestly Office which the others see not as he bare our Transgressions and made Atonement for the sin of mankind by the Sacrifice of himself in the benefit of which Sacrifice they find their outward peace and joy more than in their righteous works nay when as to the light and evidence of their Sanctification they are at a loss and in the dark they have an adherence to the blood of Christ as the propitiation for their sins and his intercession on their behalfs to the Father for the obtaining new strength against Corruption and the renewal of their former peace and comfort which experience the first sort of Witnesses are strangers to or see no need of but account themselves Justified as well as Sanctified by the inward purity and perfection which they have attained with power over the brutish and sensual Nature that they are more careful and able to keep under than this second sort are Nevertheless The Oyl which is given from Christ under this first Ministry in either of these respects before-mentioned is that Annointing that through the frailty and weakness of the Vessel that receives it is not abiding but at the best is but as a sojourner that finds not in these hearts the new man that is the place of its rest Isa 66. and though it be used by Christ to trim the Lamp of the spirit of man with when renewed and restored to the obedience and subjection that is required by the Law of God in any degree and measure of sincerity or chastity of the pure Lamb-like and virgin Spirit yet being only in the Lamp where it spends and consumes and must be duly renewed and by a frame of heart meet to receive it and cheerish it or else being grieved and quenched it suddenly departs Hence it is that amongst these two Witnesses under this Anointing which is from Christ and the operation good righteous holy and spiritual and the change made by it true and real there are such a number of visible Professors that prove Hypocrites Apostates and fall away from the Grace and enlightening they have felt and experienced deceiving both themselves and others being not able to hold it out in the day of Tryal nor to persevere and endure to the end without on the other hand stumbling on the stumbling stone and becoming prejudiced against any higher and further growths up into Christ or on the other hand through fear of loss by Persecution are terrified from well-doing with amazement or are bought off from it with the reward of unrighteousness as Balaam was and as Demas who embraced this present World And the Reason of this as to the one as well as
by the Law which he consents and agrees to as that which is righteous and holy and spiritual and good and a will to put it in execution as that which in the doing thereof he doth but his duty and which he is obliged to by GOD and his own voluntary Engagement and to continue therein under the danger of the Curse upon failer Here the Command is a Lamp and the Law is Light to instruct man in his Duty and the Spirit and Mind of man keeping to this Light and walking up to it and faithfully in it is in a good and perfect state by God approved and justified so that there be but a continuance in it And this Christ seems to acknowledge to him that put him the Question Luke 10. 25. What shall I do to inherit Eternal life In the Answer he gives bidding him do that which is written in the Law which sayes Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart with all thy soul with all thy strength and with all thy mind do this and thou shalt live Where then lies the difficulty what is it that is yet wanting The difficulty lies in man's part whereof he is not enough sensible and the want is that of a Guide and Surety to set and to keep man's spirit right in the doing of that which the Law requires in the manner God prizes and most esteems For there is a way that is right in man's eyes even in yeelding obedience to the Law of God wherein man glories and is puffed up in himself but hath no praise from God and this is from that spring and principle of activity which is seated in the freedom of Will which is natural to man in his first righteous Nature and was found in him before his Fall and is capable of Restitution since nay is actually restored through the benefit of his Death more or less in every man by that common Light and Grace which Christ doth no more withhold from any man than he doth his Rain from raining upon the Just and Unjust but in way of further bounty doth confer in large proportions where he pleaseth a distribution of his Goods and Spiritual Gifts in which he causeth the Receivers thereof to differ one from another according to the use he intends them unto By which enriching of man's nature upon this his restored natural bottom of a free active righteous spirit according to the Law whilst the primitive mutability is still continuing with him he is so far from being made a New Creature and truly regenerate as is but too generally conceived that nothing but passing under the new Creation-work translating man out of his primitive natural freedom and activity into an activity and Freedom of another kind is capable to hinder this first freedom from engendring to bondage and the righteousness accompanying it from failing and ending in the death of Hypocrisie and final Apostacy which made Christ in Joh. 8. 31. to deal so plainly with the Jews that in this wavering spirit were for the present such as passed currant for Believers and were so called by the Evangelists but Christ knew they were not of continuance and so told them ver 31. together with the Remedy which he had by him for the cure of it For they stood in need to be made free by the knowledge of the Truth or rather to be known of him that is True the Son that abides in the house for ever who is able to bring them into that state of freedom that shall make them free indeed with an impossibility ever to be imbondaged more or to serve sin as their lord and master This mutable state wherein man did at first receive God's Image by Creation and doth in the way of Restoration again partake of it by vertue of the Ministry of Christ's first anointing and comforting Presence in which he takes up his habitation in the soul as a so journer and passenger although there be given that knowledge of God's Will and Mind to man which is true and as perfect and full as the Vessel that takes it can bear yet the weakness of the Vessel is such that it is like the wave of the Sea tossed with every wind when temptation arises and is either of it self apt to mistake and misunderstand the Rule given him to walk by or to close and fall in with a false deceitful spirit transforming himself into the Image of Righteousness and imbrace him for the True one for whatever Image of God that which is a meer Creature and no more is found in the old Serpent knows how to imitate and personate the same in the very likeness wherein it shines forth in Christ's own Person and with the same to seat himself in the hearts of his followers as in the Temple of God and to shew himself as far as that will go for proof and demonstration that he is God to the imbondaging and carrying captive by this deceit all that receive not the Truth in the love of it Whereas the Image and knowledge of God and of his Will which is given by the Truth or by his coming into the Soul who is the true One doth anoint and impress the Soul with that Name of God which doth exclude by the very Nature of its evidence all possibility of falshood deceit or uncertainty as doth the Dayes-spring of Light to the natural eye which by its self-evidence assures it It is that Light wherein is no darkness at all but is able to distinguish it self as that which is separate from the darkness of every counterfeit and false representation This comes only by the Law of Faith and true Regeneration that Gift of the Holy Ghost as he is the Second and better Comforter the Spirit of Truth which the World neither doth nor can receive Christ therefore calls himself the Truth as he is the receiver and giver of this Anointing as these Rivers of Living Waters flow from him that fail not but are a well-spring unto Life Eternal as it is written Joh. 7. This spake he of the Spirit for the Holy Ghost was not yet given that is in this Ministry and by the means of Christ's Manhead because Jesus was not yet Glorified Jesus was a man and the most perfect righteous natural man which ever was the form of which is made in him Incorruptible having its first mutability fixed by being subjected and made a Servant though the elder unto a New-spring of Light and Divine Birth that was added to him as he became the engrafted Word and wherein he and the Father are One and not he but the Father doth the work Therefore he sayes in Rev. 1. 18. I am he that liveth and was dead and behold I am alive for evermore and have the Keyes of Hell and of Death According to this pattern of man's Natural Perfection made in Christ incorruptible and brought forth in perfect subjection and subservency unto and agreement with a more excellent birth
of Divine Glory which Christ's Man-head is exalted unto in which he is according to his Man-head He that is above all one with the only begotten that is in the Father's bosome and hath the highest and clearest sight of God beyond that of Angels themselves It is that all Regenerated ones that are made heirs of the Spirit in the single portion thereof are built up and are Temples of the Holy Ghost an everlasting Habitation of God through the Spirit And because the same Jesus that after this first pattern of humane Perfection which is in him gives only the Witness that he is a meer and perfect man and in the exalted and more heavenly state of Manhead which he also hath as he that God the Father hath sealed and admitted to the sight of his own shape and very similitude hath by Inheritance obtained a more excellent Name than the Angels and must also give the Witness of what he is and in what Glory he lives as he inherits the Spirit in this double portion thereof Therefore by the same new creating Power which he is intrusted to administer as he gives the Holy Ghost he produces this second sort of new men and adopted Children heirs according to the Promise upon whom Christ poures out his Spirit not only by the measure and pattern or Rule of the first Creation but above it and beyond it according to the proportion that his own glorified Manhead hath obtained it in its highest exaltation admitting them into the same bosome of the Father with himself wherein he is as the only begotten into which bosome and most intimate vision of God neither do the Angels nor first sort of Heirs and Children of the Son's Kingdom ever arrive but is reserved to be dwelt alone in by this Seed of Abraham God's friend that are made Christ's peculiar Possession consisting of a select number of his choice Favourites and Friends that he Redeems from amongst all other men to make as the first fruits of his Creation to God and to the Lamb who are joynt-heirs with him of the double Portion and co-habit together with him in his Father's bosom where they see and Inherit his Glory in the Naked and Primitive purity which it hath in the Breast of God himself Experiencing as well what the Gift of the Holy Ghost is when it is God's Name poured out above measure as well as by measure that which Paul had some taste of whether in the body or out of the body he could not tell upon his being caught up into the third Heavens to the hearing of things impossible for him to utter in his Bodily state nor others to receive And if thus we understand the third Heavens as indeed we ought then the finding out the other two next below them will not be difficult since the second Heaven is that wherein are the Angels and Spirits of Just men made perfect upon the laying down the Body and the first that Presence of Christ and knowledge of his Name which he vouchsafes unto his Church and particular Saints in the converse they have with him here below in the Body which Paul doth also call a Heaven Phil. 3. 20. where he sayes Our Conversation is in Heaven meaning by the walking with Christ in Spirit as well as being and living in it whilest we are here in this World in which Christ is able and doth appear to our Bodily sensual part before its change and putting on that which is Incorruptible as it must do and Christ's manhead thus considered as it makes this threefold Heaven was lively represented and described by the form of building God caused the Ark to be built up in Gen. 6. 16. where the directions that are given do require Noah to make it of lower second and third stories or heights one above another like the outward Court the Body of the Temple and Holy of Holies or inmost part of the House which God commanded also in Solomon's Temple and both not without signifying this great Mystery in the glorified manhead of Christ by the Spirit and Presence whereof he makes a threefold Heaven and way of converse with the Sons of men under the threefold degrees of Light and Glory that from his Face and by the Spirit of his Mouth are given forth and hath answerable Hearers and Receivers 1. That Administration of the Light of pure Nature the effects whereof upon the hearts of the Receivers produces healing and restoration of the wound made by sin and renews a like frame of Spirit in man as to the kind of it wherein he was at first Created and is still exercising his first mutable and wavering Principles that in time of tryal fail and so end in Apostacy and Death through the weakness and fault of the Vessel not of the Liquor or Oyl which is poured out into these Lamps that in his own Nature is Incorruptible but is suffered to leak out by these broken and frail Vessels Secondly The Light of pure Nature and right Reason fixed and made incorruptible through Faith and Regeneration whereby the former frailty and leaking of the Vessel is perfectly cured without changing the fashion of it any further than what is requisite to bring it into subjection and obedience to a supream Judgment and Will given as its guide and surety to sustain and influence the actings thereof throughout The Third is the Light of Divine Love which he that dwells in dwells in God and is in the Light as He is in the Light beholding divine beauty in its original where it is most attractive and binds up the Judgement and Will of the beholders into its own likeness most willingly and irresistably transforming them into the thing beloved This is the Love which casts out fear and all torment in the cleerest evidence and greatest assurance that the Creature can possess And by this Love it is when not seen that Faith works and the Spirit of Adoption crying Abba Father that Spirit and Presence of the Son that is sent into our hearts which we are knit into by an inseparable union and the Soul is formed thereby into the likeness of him that doth beget in either of the two last degrees of Light and quickning before-mentioned Both which do beget that Seed of Life in the heart that is immortal the Princely prevailing conquering Seed of Believers that are the true Israel of God to whom all the Promises are sure this is wrought by the coming of the Son in Spirit into the Soul there to beget and form his own likeness in our Understanding and Will the making us know him that is true and that we are in him that is true either according to this lower or higher birth of himself of which he calls us to partake and so become Witnesses thereof in our selves and unto others This then is the knowledge of the Truth which we are to understand doth make the Adopted Children of God free with another and better kind of
Freedom than that wherein man was at first Created in that mutable and Primitive state of purity And what this Freedom is we shall shew that is so worthy to be obtained and fought after in exchange for the other This Freedom consists in the witnessing every respect which is wrought in the Understanding and Will of man by Regeneration and Divine birth of the one or other sort to render them of entire use and service unto that higher and superiour Will in the second Adam the Lord from Heaven that is made and given of the Father to be a quickning Spirit unto them in a twofold capacity First of their natural Head and Sovereign whom they are to serve as in relation of Subjects to their King and Law-giver and therein fulfil and answer the very end of the Law of Nature and actually become those righteous persons against whom there is no Law that can take hold of them to punish them or take the least exception to their perfect Righteousness that have given to them a constant and perpetual Will to do right to every one and love the Lord their God most intirely by influence from their Head who in this respect is the common Parent to both the sorts of Children whom he makes free Citizens and Inhabitants of the Heavenly Jerusalem his own glorified man-head which is the Mother of us all But secondly Christ the second Adam comes forth also in another Headship to the second sort of these Children which is that of Husband and Bridegroom gathering them up into a state of higher Love and Duty than that of Servants and Subjects and receiving them unto more honorable use in familiarity intimacy and a kind of equality comprehending the Love and Duty of righteous and faithful Servants but in respect of the nearness of relation and union becoming much the more excellent and transcendant The Inspiration and holy Anointing which flows from Christ in this twofold Headship of his into the hearts of these his Members hath that effect upon them as joyns them to him in unity and agreement of spirit or of judgment and will and so entirely possesses them engrosses them in the service and to the use of their Lord that it leaves them at no liberty to 〈◊〉 the use or service of any other but in subordination to his will which excludes sin and all evil esteeming it their greatest happiâ—… thus to be bound up in a way of love delight and entire obâ—…nce in the Will of their Head their second Adam and Lord frâ—… Heaven Hence they experience that they are not their own in â—…ny thing for it is not they that live but Christ liveth in them and with his Princely prevailing Influence as their Head is their infallible Guide and firm Security in all their operations giving them such an abiding and growth up in all things into him in an entire resignation and obedience to his Will as co-workers together in every thought word and work that they cannot miscarry nor shall ever be hurt by the second death but shall be rewarded with those pleasures that are at his right-hand and at his left in his Kingdom for evermore And although this most perfect Freedom which is obtained by this binding and conjunction in unity and agreement of spirit with Christ be esteemed by the Possessors of it of price inestimable yet it is the greatest bondage and cross that can befall a wicked heart and is that which is reserved by Christ to be their torment for ever in the end which will be given by him to his first Ministry in the hearts where he is finally rejected from whom after he is departed and withdrawn for a season as if they should never hear of him as indeed they shall not to their comfort yet they shall to their terrour and sorrow be made sensible of him by the fastning which he will make of his Darts of enlightnings into the minds of the wicked as sharp Arrows and a gnawing Worm that shall never dye when by the breath of his mouth he shall kindle a fire of Conviction and self-judging in their Conscience together with the just sence of his Divine Vengeance they can no longer flee nor escape from But on the contrary the truly regenerated souls are made willing and exceedingly pleased to draw in this yoke with their Head to see with his eyes and act by his quickning in all they do and to put on with him this lowliness meekness and purity of spirit which feeds on that which is incorruptible and is with God of great price so great as no righteous workers have his praise and blessing but these who are properly Christ's Mystical Body the Branches that abide in him and whose Fruit is permanent unto Life Eternal and this Body or Church of invisible Saints and spiritual Worshippers of the true God even whilst they are in their Wilderness and suppressed state Christ the great Overseer of their souls doth feed with Teachers afâ—â—â— his own heart and is not wanting by an outward Ministry under him â—o feed and refresh with Oyl the Lamps of all sorts that he makes use of as his Witnesses and bear his Name whether according to the knowledge his Will that is revealed in the first or in the second Covenant that so hâ— may by upholding such an Office under him edifie all that are under his Charge as he sees occasion and is agreeable to the condition the Church is in whether of restraint or freedom from the Powers of the World By those which Christ puts in to the Ministry of his Spirit under him we are to understand such ahe gives his Vnction and Mission unto as he is the Head of Nature or of Grace and from their own Experience are made able to minister the knowledge of Christ in his healing and restoring work or in his regenerating and New-creation-building before described giving their Witness according to what they themselves have received of the Spirit in the three distinct Dispensations of it before expressed in the first of which because of the mutable state of the operation thereof both in themselves as well as in their hearers they that are eminent Preachers unto others by the excellency of Gifts with which they are anointed and that from Christ may nevertheless themselves be found at last Cast-awayes But in the other two they which experience the Anointing thereof become Pillars in the House of God that never go out more and may obtain the highest Order and Rank of Ministry in the Church even that of Apostles in the same way as Paul himself did by such a Spiritual Light of Christ as he sayes 1 Cor. 9. 1. Am not I an Apostle have I not seen Jesus Christ our Lord And as thus the Apostolical Order came to have being in the Church by the immediate sight of Christ in Spirit as we see in Paul's Case which comprehends in it all other the inferiour Ranks of Ministers whether Prophets
Evangelists or Pastors and Teachers So there are of these inferiour Ranks to the Apostles which hear and receive the knowledge of the Gospel and the holy Ghost either from the mouths of the Apostles and by the laying on of their hands as did the Evangelists or by other subordinate instituted means that is to say either inwardly onely by the inspiration of Angels thereunto sent and authorized by Christ as to Philip in the case of the Eunuch's Conversion and to Abraham and the Patriarchs after him four hundred years together before the written Word was given and who before the Incarnation were made use of to give the Law which is there called the Word spoken by Angels Heb. 2. 1. Or secondly by the communication of such Gifts for interpreting and opening of the written Word as we find in the Church of Corinth and this by such Prophetical Gifts as not only the Officers did partake of to fit them for the Ministry but secondly the very Members of the Church also shared in for the common edification of the Body So that either by inward Inspiration from Angels under Christ or by the witnessing Spirit of Christ immediately which is the Spirit of Prophecy or by Gifts of Abilities in a more ordinary way for the interpreting and opening the Scriptures Christ hath alwayes had his Labourers in his Harvest And all these several Degrees in the Ministry as they are found in subordination subserviency and agreement one with another in their place and differing measures do make sweet harmony and redound to great profit in the Church But if they break their Ranks and the inferiour exalt and lift up themselves in preference above and opposition to the superiour and greater measures these then corrupt and set up for themselves or are made use of by him that knows how to transform his ministers into Ministers of Righteousness to advance his Kingdom and turn bitter and implacable Enemies and Persecutors of the Womans Seed and true Spiritual Worshippers Let it not then be said that to be against the Ministry in this last sense is to be against all Ministry especially such who acknowledge Christ the Chief Minister and great Ordainer of God's Worship and all those to be his Ministers that have Unction and Mission from him in all the Orders and Degrees of them wherein they are acknowledged by the Scriptures whom God hath pleased to make use of to bear the Witness committed to them during Antichrist's Reign in a suffering sackcloth prophesying state which will not lose its fruit but become a sweet savour of life unto life in them that are saved and a favour of death unto death in them that perish We now shall proceed to the next Enquiry which is Who they are that in Principles are opposit to these two Anointings and the Effects of them and declare their Enmity by their continued War in the posture of our Enemies or dissembled Friends both making up but the same Kingdom of Darkness which since Christs coming is called Antichrists Righteousness and Truth are the two supporters of Christ's Throne with the frist God enlightens and quickens the natural beings of Angels and men who in their mutable and uncertain state are possessors of Righteousness in purity and perfection whilst they are and may be strangers to Truth that is firmness and certainty which is as the Crown and Top-stone to the first Building And therefore the Light of Truth which is a clearness in the Judgment that had a right discerning before that doth fix it and ascertain it beyond all possible doubt and contradiction and the activity of Truth which is a stedfastness and pressing forward in the Will wherein may be found righteous operation before to run in that race and never fail nor faint is most necessary to follow and succeed where the first goes before as that which is its consummation and final perfection In the breast where these two Lights meet imbrace and kiss each other there is the true Vrim and Thummim the Divine enlightned mind which makes all those wherein it is found free Citizens of the heavenly Jerusalem and beloved Children and Subjects of Christs Kingdom As it is written Joh. 3 19 20 21. Light is come into the world Light in both these respects is come to dwell with us in our own nature when the Word was made flesh and to be amongst us in our mouth and in our heart to hear it and obey it Whence it is that this is said to be the Condemnation of the World that Light is thus come in the person of our Redeemer the second Adam and men have notwithstanding loved Darkness better than Light because of the contrariety that is in the evil deeds of men unto the very nature of Light which makes manifest and reproves them and from thence contracts hatred from evil men very unjustly who love not to be discovered in their wickedness nor to be under censure and reproof for it but perfectly hate thus to be discovered and judged and that is at bottom the quarrel and rise of the enmity between the Subjects of these two Kingdoms of Darkness and of Light Hatred and enmity against the Light of Righteousness and Truth which shine forth in Jesus Christ as in the head and in his Witnesses and Children as the members in what hearts soever they are found are in general the opposit Principles we are now speaking of and the Root or Cause whence those spring is from the love that such hearts at bottom do bear unto evil that is to say to unrighteousness and falshood which they prefer and adhere unto before the Light of the Image of God which is wrought out in Christ and in his members Of these lovers of Darkness more than Light we are to consider Either first such as are born blind and are already darkned in their understandings and alienated in their wills by evil works dead in trespasses and sins Or secondly such as have their Light freely restored to them again for asking and however so much of it as may make them sensible of the need of more and to discern the means of their perfect cure Or thirdly Such as after their first Light restored are offered the gift of a better sight than ever they had at first which shall not only enlarge what they had at first in their primitive purity but preserve it in an endless life without any possible danger ever to lose it more For the first It is the condition of all Mankind in general and was the effect that followed upon the sin of our first Parents by which door Death entred and passed upon all men because in them all had sinned Nor did this befall the Children meerly or principally because of sin as if that were the end that God had in it but that the works of God's Grace should be manifested thereby For no sooner did the disease and wound appear but God had provided a Physician and healing
unto the death the seed of the Woman shall at last certainly and fully overcome the seed of the Serpent tread Satan and his kingdom under foot for ever and ever The principal means they shall rely upon for the bringing of this war to a good issue is the way of overcoming by the blood of the Lamb or force of Christs intercession whose blood cries for vengeance against his enemies as also by the word of their Testimony freely and boldly given forth by them in their very sufferings whilst worldly Power stands on the enemies side which shall have its effect upon friends and foes as a savour of Life to the one death to the other a sweet savour to God both ways prospering in the thing whereto he sends it and performing all his pleasure 2 Cor. 2. 15 16. Esay 55. 11. Pursuant to this counsel and decree of God declared Gen. 3. 15. he hath wonderfully and fignally preserved the seed of the Woman unto this very day He hath given them being preservation and protection in the midst of all enemies and in despite of all their rage and opposition He hath carried on his CAUSE and upheld righteousness on the side of his People whatever disguises reproaches or blemishes have been endeavoured to be put upon it by the Devil and his adherents The miraculous preservation of the Womans Seed the Scriptures distribute into three principal Branches which distinguish the whole tract of time allotted to them for their sufferings into three great Periods and seasons wherein the seed of the Woman hath received variation as to the outward form and dispensation of things though in mind principles and spirit they continue still the same in and under all these Changes The first appearance of the seed of the Woman in order to enter the list with the Seed of the Serpent we find in the line of Adam which he begat of Eve the Mother of all living Abel the first Martyr died before he had any issue or means to propagate it God supplied that defect in the line of Seth. In this new line is carried on the decreed enmity between the two seeds till the Flood came and swept away in a manner all mankind from off the face of the earth At that time the first war ended But the foundation and matter of a new war in this kind is contracted into and found even in the family of Noah The first war begun in Adams line and continued in Seths was in a way of God's just judgement upon the whole world brought to an end by the Flood The seed of the Woman was now narrowed and diminished into Noahs person and two of his sons The seed of the Serpent was contracted into a less room yet the other son This Epocha of 1656 years from the Creation to the Flood is in Scripture distinguished as one great period of time and revolution of things in the world relating to this war between the two seeds and the event of it It began in and with the Patriarchs in the person of Abel whom Cain that was of that wicked one flew It continued all along with the Patriarchs and their day on earth who lived every one of them hundreds of years And it had its period in that universal ministry of God's wrath and vengeance upon the whole world which in Scripture is called THE DAY OF THE LORD The second appearance then of the seed of the Woman and seed of the Serpent also we find in Noahs family From the matter and fuel contracted into this narrow compass does the fire of the war between the two seeds break forth a-fresh and another world as it were and state of things diverse from the forme runder the government of the Patriarchs is brought upon the Stage This new and differently stated war arises and is occasioned from the differing minds and principles found in Noah's three sons Sem Ham and Japhet The flood having destroyed all the families of the earth save Noahs onely the Government of the World came hereby to receive a considerable change because the Right of the Empire of the whole world was now by Gods Providence devolved upon the family of Noah and in particular upon himself in person as the right heir of it After him it came to Sem and his line by God's special designation though Japhet were the eldest In Noahs three sons as in type the three sorts of principles and mindes which influence this second world of mankind are described and as I may say personated to the life These three principles distinguish all persons descended of Noah's family throughout the whole world into three sorts of Inhabitants The same method does John by way of allegory hold Rev. 12. 12. calling one sort of them Inhabitants of Heaven or those that dwell and have their conversation in Heaven corresponding in their Principle and way of Life with the Jerusalem that is above Another sort he tearms Inhabitants of the Earth or those that dwell on Earth the tribes of the Earth or citizens of the earthly Jerusalem The third are those that dwell in the Sea or are found in a state of deep darkness and alienation from the Life of God casting up mire and dirt as raging waves of the troubled Sea Esay 57. 20. living in that open heathenisme and prophaness that the greatest part of the world chuse to abide in notwithstanding the offer of Liberty made to them by the ransom paid on their behalf in the blood of the Redeemer 1. The mind that shews it self in the first sort of these Inhabitants is that which was in Sem a holy spiritual mind set upon things above or in heaven at Christs right hand This when it comes to operate is that active living Faith of the new creature which works by love By this Faith or in this spiritual mind and principle of Life and operation Abel offered unto God a more excellent Sacrifice than Cain Heb. 11. 4. 2. The mind that discovers it self in the second sort of inhabitants those that dwell on Earth citizens of the earthly Jerusalem is that which was in Japhet as a middle wavering state perswadeable either to good or evil either to leave the earth and love of seen things and to ascend and dwell in the tents of Sem in order to be fixed and set on things above or else to cleave unto things seen in affection and desire and thence to descend and draw back to perdition apostatize and lodge in the heathenish principles of Cham and so partake of his curse as well as sin Those that thus decline from the wavering spirit and principles of Japhet to the prophane state of Cham are noted in Scripture to be such as having known the way of righteousness do turn aside from the holy command and so come to have their lot amongst those that are twice dead and pluck'd up by the roots whose latter end is worse than their beginning For upon such a fatal backsliding such
an irrecoverable fall in their own persons they come to be fixed in evil and bound up with the fallen Angels in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgement of the great day â— Pet. 2. 20. Jude vers 12. and vers 6. This wavering spirit of Japhet considered singly in its own sphear and activity as neither advancing towards the tents of Sem and things above nor declining to the heathenish and prophane state of Cham is that spirit which properly constitutes the Israel after the flesh in distinction from the true Israel of God or Circumcision of the Spirit on the one hand and the heathenish uncircumcised Nations on the other whilst God kept up the war in the line of Abraham or seed of Israel according to the flesh till Christ's incarnation For in Abraham's line deriving from Heber and Shem did God renew and maintain the war with the Seed of the Serpent and continued it till his signal rejection of that line and utter cutting them off from being any more a Nation and People of themselves at the last sacking and destruction of Jerusalem after the death of Christ by the hand of Titus Vespasian 3. The mind that declares it self in the third sort of Inhabitants who dwell in the Sea or in the depth of alienation from the life of God without any sense or feeling of that which is morally and naturally good according to the Law hating and despising God's image in any kind where-ever it shines forth is that which was in Cham. For this was he cursed and judicially fixed in his bondage as a servant of sin resembled by that servant under the Mosaical dispensation who for refusing his freedom when offered was bored thorow his ear in token of his perpetual servitude Exod. 21. 6. 1. The first sort of these Inhabitants are heavenly having a mind and principles fix'd in that obedience of Faith which is acceptable and by entring into God's Rest through Faith do become unmovable in the right way of working Righteousness wherein they attain the end of their hope that is the salvation of their souls 2. The second are earthly unfixed either in good or evil wavering between both having a mind sometimes serving the Law of God and sometimes the law of sin These however they may draw near to God with their words and tongue their heart is alienated and at a distance from him at least may be for ought they know notwithstanding the form of godliness they live in For they are not able to make a true and certain judgment of themselves till they partake of that Anointing from above that can teach them all things This is that only that will enable them to keep the word of Christ's patience in the day of their tryal Without this Grace extended to them and possessed by them they will become Apostates forget they have been washed from their old sins and will shew themselves at last the most hardned and bitter resisters of the holy Ghost and Power of Godliness 3. The third are like the Sea foaming out their own filth and they are constant and fixed therein having minds and consciences seard and made harder than the nether milstone in works of darkness Being past feeling they have sold themselves to work wickedness Peradventure sometime they may be made a little sensible of the sting and penalties of the Law so as to make some slender acknowledgments and feigned professions of obedience and subjection thereunto the Devils also believe and tremble but no hearty or sincere repentance from dead works or pure obedience of love springing from the spirit of Adoption and appearing in a steady amendment of life is to be found in them Yea they are by God himself judicially hardned and unchangeably fastned in their own chosen wayes of darkness They give themselves up to work all uncleanness with greediness and God gives them up to vile affections to take their course and fill up the measure of their abominations till he see time to strike them once for all The first and last of the above-named minds or principles are the two extreams in the one or other of which the middle or second sort of Inhabitants that are in the wavering changeable contending state with whom God is striving by his Spirit will come at last to be unchangeably fixed The perfect and righteous state which Man was at first created in was this middle wavering and unfixed state of perfection which was at first and upon renewal thereof is again capable to be guided by the Spirit of God through Faith into a higher and better or to be tempted and seduced by Satan into a lower and far worse The sinful state likewise into which mankind was plunged by the first transgression and fall of Man is not fixed or made immutable and desperate until a new proof and tryal be made of all men In order to this by vertue of the Blood of the Redeemer and through observation of the Rules appointed by God for recovery out of the Fall a restitution to the rectified Principles and Righteousness of our first Creation is in Christ most certainly attainable by every sinner without exception For by Christ's Blood there is remission to be had for all sins past and a new tryal is propounded and set before every one for time to come upon the terms and according to the tenor of God's conditional or absolute Covenant Hence it is the War arises and the Enmity is set or comes to be fixed between the two seeds each serving as it were for the proof and tryal of the unmovableness of one another either in good or evil Through this was occasioned the quarrel between the seed of the Woman and the seed of the Serpent growing up out of Noah's family The usurpation of the universal Government of the World in favour and assistance of the Serpent's seed was attempted and pursued by Nimrod and his successors Afterwards it came into Nebuchadnezzar's hands and by Daniel's interpretation of that prophetical Image of worldly Monarchy that Nebuchadnezzar saw in a dream the continuance thereof in his line and three other successive branches of Universal Monarchy in the lines of the Medes and Persians Grecians and then Romans was foretold All these have been the inheritors of Cham's spirit upholding a heathenish state of Idolatry Ignorance and Prophaness against the Kingdom and Obedience of Christ kept up and witnessed unto all along in and by the line and seed of Abraham from Sem downward to the last sack and utter ruine of the Temple and City of Jerusalem under the Romans The chief memorables in this space of time that concern the opposit interest to these worldly Monarchies were the eminent Call of Abraham Isaac and Jacob to the Faith the giving of the Law the building and rebuilding of the Temple the long continuing of the Prophetical Office in the Jewish Church Christ's Incarnation Ministry Death and Resurrection About forty years after the Resurrection
knowledge of the Life which is hid with Christ in God Those that are in this Kingdom and in whom the Power of it is are fitted to flye with the Church into the VVilderness and to continue in such a solitary dispersed desolate condition till God calls them out of it They have VVells and Springs opened to them in this VVilderness whence they draw the VVaters of Salvation without being in bondage to the Life of Sense and the objects depending thereon as touch not taste not handle not which perish in the using 2. But Secondly Christ's Kingdom is also outward appearing to sense and to the eye of the sensual or inferiour part of the mind which works only by bodily organs judging by the sight of that eye and the hearing of that ear whose life is in and by the body consisting in bodily exercise and is therefore compared Revel 11. 2. to the outward Court and the VVorship thereunto appertaining This is the Dominion of God in the Conscience also though but in the inferiour or sensual part of the mind where it becomes a Law in our Members to put in execution and perform the Law of the Spirit of our Mind that so our very bodies may become the Temple of the holy Ghost and we may be able to glorifie God not in our Spirits only but in our Bodies also as clean Vessels and earthen Tabernacles upon which may be written HOLINESS TO THE LORD Zech. 14. Now the Kingdom of Christ comes not properly to appear in outward shew and visibility but as it shines forth in this lower and earthly part of the Soul witnessing the Dominion and Power of God to be there as a Law and commanding Principle in and over the outward man With respect to this kind of its Appearance in affecting and influencing the bodily part of man and becoming the Life thereof it is capable to come forth in a Power and Glory that is corruptible fading and that wears away as also in that which is incorruptible and abides for ever The first of these is meant 1 Joh. 3. 1 2. where 't is said Now are we the Sons of God and it doth not yet appear what we shall be but we know that when he shall appear we shall be like him or have the like appearance with him for we shall see him as he is The Sons of God are not yet in the proper appearance of his Sons but do bear the form and appearance of the fleshly man to the making a fair shew in the flesh They have their Treasure but in an earthen Vessel unredeemed from its present bondage unto corruption But the time is hastening when they shall in Spirit shine forth as the Sun in its strength in the Kingdom of their Father and their very bodies shall be as the Firmament transparent and of service to unvail the glory of the inward man and not cover and disguise it as now they do But alas This fair shew in the flesh which may also be made by those that are strange Children passes with most for the Kingdom of Christ even yet in these last dayes some crying Lo here and some lo there according to that form of service and divine worship they are perswaded in their minds is according to the Rule of God's VVord though it be but that only which appertains to the outward Court which is given up by God into the hands of the Gentiles to possess and tread under foot at their pleasure The Heavens hereof are passing away with a great noise and these worldly Elements are melting apace As a Vesture they shall be folded up and changed they shall perish and wear old as a Garment whilst Christ's inward and spiritual Kingdom shall remain and in its due time come forth in an appearance that shall be lasting and unshaken for ever VVherefore we receiving this Kingdom which cannot be moved let us hold fast and have Grace whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and Godly fear For our God is a consuming fire But to return and apply our selves to the subject we were on before which is To give the view of what Word God is fulfilling and what part of his Counsel he is executing among us in this our day The Heavens are now black over our heads the Sun is turned into darkness the Moon into blood and mens hearts are failing them for fear of what God is bringing upon the Earth Great distress is in the Land and upon the Nations Wrath is coming upon that People who say they are Jews and are not but shall be found liars The Sea and the waves also will roar the prophane heathenish party of men will be in great perplexity too Surely the Figtree and all the Trees are shooting forth and after this cruel sharp Winter that is and for some space is yet to be upon us the Summer approaches that will make amends for all Great cause there is for the Sons of God to lift up their heads as foreseeing that their Redemption draws nigh In this point the Book of the Revelations will be every day more and more opened to give us light and instruction the Providences of God helping much every day too as to the interpretation thereof together with the Spirit of Truth that dwells and lives in the hearts of Saints Through mercy the Lord who is that Spirit hath not been wanting in his Teachings of this kind to a poor Worm in my present solitude and bonds I shall have occasion to tell you by and by that there appears cause to me of dissent from Mr. Mede as to some applications that are made by him in his learned Commentary on that Book when I come to speak of some particulars concerning the Witnesses and their twofold time and state of prophesying 1. Their thousand two hundred and sixty years prophesying in sackcloth in a persecuted wilderness state 2. Their prophesying in power and glory during the space of the pouring forth of the seven Vials of Wrath as a fore-running Eliah-like Ministry preparatory to Christ's thousand years Reign on Earth Yet as to that which Mr. Mede calls his great Key for the opening of that whole Book to wit his Synchronisms or Contemporations of things which he finds to agree and fall out together in the same age and time I exceedingly reverence his Judgement and look upon him as one that hath most happily found out the hidden order and method used by the holy Ghost in that Prophetical Book This method being once known to the very rational judgment of man that may be exercised upon the matters contained in that Book they are thereby rendred much more easie and intelligible Let us also take it for granted as that which is the common judgment of those that acknowledge the Scriptures that in this Book of the Apocalypsâ— are contained and revealed in an orderly method the things which were to fall out in the course of God's Providence and wise ordering of
and way answer but to the outward Court thereof and the Worship appertaining thereunto The former have the true inward Circumcision of the heart in the spirit whose praise is not of men but of God The latter are those who at best have but the Circumcision of the heart in the letter which labours to shew it self in such outward Circumcision of language and practice as may serve to keep up a shew or form of Godliness in the sight and to the well-pleasing of man whilst they are at an utter distance even in their hearts from the very life and power of Godliness that springs up from the new nature that is found in the true Circumcision which worship God in the spirit and answer to the inward Court Paul takes notice of this in his time Gal. 4. where he distinguishes between an earthly Jerusalem that is in bondage with her Children under the Covenant of Works or Dominion of the Law and a Jerusalem above which is free and is the Mother of all that Seed of Abraham who are Heirs according to the Promise These are described Rev. 12. by the Woman clothed with the Sun that hath the Moon under her feet and upon her Head a Crown of twelve Stars This figurative description shewes the Glory of the City Jerusalem as it is above inward and in spirit who with her Children is in freedom under the Covenant and Dominion of Grace The same is also signified by the inward Court appointed to be measured by the Reed of God in distinction from the outward Court which is not measured but abandoned and given up as it were to the power of the Gentiles to be by them troden under foot and defiled 2. In this same space of time falls out the impregnating of the Woman or her growing Great ready to be delivered of a Man-child The principal care of the Apostles and other Teachers who succeeded in their Spirit in the Primitive Church described under the representation of the seven Churches of Asia and the Angels or Officers appertaining to them was to be doing what had the most conducible tendency to the hastening and forwarding this birth of the Man-child which the Dragon opposed diligently watch'd to hinder resist and if possible to devour as soon as born 3. The seven-headed Dragon's lying in wait and managing the battel against Michael and his Angels about the aforesaid birth must needs contemporize with the two fore-mentioned Particulars All the three do therefore fill up the first space of time or age succeeding the Apostles measured out by what is contained in the six first Seals and was fore told to John as that which should happen both to the Church and World until the Womans flight from the Dragon after this great battel in Heaven and retiring into the Wilderness there to be nourished of God her appointed time These three are the immediate Antecedents of those things which have been shewed to contemporize under the seventh Seal and six Trumpets that is to say the distinguishing between the inward and outward Court with the Worship and Service appertaining unto each Secondly The impregnating of the Woman And then Thirdly The battel hereupon arising in Heaven or within the Primitive Church and continuing a long time till at length the Man-child comes to be born Then the Dragon loses his credit and authority in the Church His subtilty in accusing and laying false imputation on the Brethren the truly pure and spiritual part of the Church is detected Hereupon he is cast out into the Earth confined as it were to the outward Court and the Worshippers and Service belonging to it as the only matter for him to work upon for the increase of his Kingdom by the number of Hypocrites and Apostates drawn by him out of the true Church They were in truth never of it though for a while they were in it At length they find it their interest to make a Separation from it being sensual and not having the Spirit they can no longer endure those that have it and that shine forth daily more and more in the Life and Testimony thereof The old Dragon became hereby necessitated to manage and prosecute the War with the earthly Weapons only of worldly Power and Government in a way of outward force and compulsion exercised by the power of humane Laws and of the civil Sword This Power and Sword the corrupt sensual and malignant Church founded and consisting in the worshippers and service of the outward Court getting into their hands or engaging it on their side by mingling Interest with worldly Governours committed Whoredom like Tyre with all the Kingdoms of the VVorld upon the face of the Earth Isa 23. 17. Yea this Beast with two horns so influenced encouraged and back'd the ten horn'd Beast that he became thereby fixed and engaged in his Mind as well as Power to continue and carry on the War forty and two months longer against the Woman and her Seed and to blaspheme God his Name his Tabernacle and them that dwell in Heaven Thus in brief Heads have we seen how the two first great Sections or Divisions of time in the third Age are filled up to wit the space from John's receiving the Prophecy of them in the Isle of Patmos to the end of the first battel or war made in Heaven and as the issue of that the catching up of the Man-child unto God and to his Throne and the Womans actual flight into the VVilderness and from thence to the rising of the VVitnesses which puts a period to the suffering season alloted to their Prophesying in Sack-cloth And as to the third and last Section of time it is that which is measured out by the sounding of the seventh Trumpet and the pouring out of the seven Vials which begins with the beginning of that Trumpet and continues till the Whore be judged Babylon sunk and the whole Kingdom of the Beast for ever ruined and destroyed This makes way for the marriage of the Lamb to be celebrated here on Earth and so for the coming on of the Kingdom of Christ into the actual exercise of a visible ruling Power and universal Empire over the whole VVorld for a thousand years Having thus had a view of the distinct periods of time together with the matter of the Prophesies which were to be fulfilled in and under each of these distinct Revolutions it will yet much prepare and help our understandings rightly to discern and look into the Mysteries of this most excellent Book if once we can but arrive at a satisfactory opening and interpreting at least in some chief particulars the things which are signified under many of the Figures and Allegorical Expressions made use of throughout the whole Prophecy For Example Let us consider these The seven Churches and the Angels of them The Throne in Heaven The sealed Book The Woman The Dragon and his Angels Michael and his Angels The Man-child The throne and seat of the Dragon's
Power and Authority The outward and inward Court The Floud issuing out of the Dragon's mouth The distinguished Inhabitants of the Heavens of the Earth and of the Sea The 144000 sealed Virgins The Palm-bearers The Remnant of the Womans Seed that keep the Commands of God and have the Testimony of Jesus The seven-headed ten horn'd Beast The Beast's Image The two horn'd Beast The false Prophet The Whore Mystical Babylon The great City that rules over the Kings of the Earth The Number of the Beast's Name The two Witnesses their hidden or obscure Prophesying in Sack-cloth their glorious Appearing and Prophesying in Power and in a Wonder-working Ministry like to that of Moses and Eliah The Kingdom of the Beast and his ascent out of the bottomless pit The slaying of the Witnesses at the finishing of their Testimony or perioding of their Sack-cloth-Prophesying and their lying Dead in the streets of the great City spiritually called Sodom and Egypt The Witnesses rising and ascending up into Heaven The coming of the Wrath of the Lamb The sight of Heaven opened with the Temple and Ark therein contained The Harvest and Vintage The marriage of the Lamb The coming down of the new Jerusalem out of Heaven to be as a Tabernacle of God amongst men on Earth all the Kingdoms of this World becoming the Kingdoms of the Lord and his Christ The Charge given John by him that was dead and yet liveth for evermore the Amen or everlasting Truth of God Rev. 1. 18 19. was to write First The things which he had seen in the description of the fulness and excellency of Christ's Person exhibited to him vers 12 17. Secondly The things which are or the state of the Church in his time as it had for its chief places of abode those principal Cities in Asia by name expressed chap. 2 d. 3 d. together with the Representation in them as in Type and Figure of the state of the Universal Apostolick Christian Church which was to continue under the seven distinctions of time contained under the seven Seals under the last whereof six of the Trumpets were as 't were included There was that also found in those seven Asiatick Churches that did typically represent the decrease and sinking down of a great Party in the visible Christian Church into the Apostasie foretold in this Book of the Revelation until the very time of the rising of the Witnesses Thirdly and lastly John was Commanded to write the things which shall be hereafter or which were to succeed that present state in which the then seven Churches were at that time respecting as well the Corruption and Apostasie coming upon the face of the Primitive Church as the continuance of it with countenance and support from worldly Powers till the sounding of the seventh Trumpet These things that shall be hereafter when time shall be no longer or when the Mystery of God shall be finished and all persons and things shall appear plainly and manifestly as they are amount in general to the Constitution and Concerns of that glorious state of the Church which is to be from thenceforth for evermore To proceed then to the Explicating of many of the chief Allegorical Expressions in this Book of Revelations 1. By the seven Churches in Asia let us understand as in type the state of the Christian Church characterized and described as Brightman intimates under the distinct periods of time held forth by the things done during the seven Seals which reach to the sounding of the seventh Trumpet 2. By the Angels of the seven Churches are to be understood not only or principally the Officers or Persons ministring but rather the Light of the Gospel in its distinct measures and degrees administred according to the nature of the times and seasons which the things done under the first six Seals did occasion For upon the rejecting of that there was caused a gradual and successive removing of each Candlestick out of its place and the Church sinks down at length into an universal Defection and Apostacy as to the visible part of it This renders it in its concluding and final state so naucious and loathsome to God that he resolves to spue them out of his mouth and reject them for ever To confirm this we find each Church to consist of two very different sorts of Members one that are spiritual prepared with spiritual senses or eares to hear what the Spirit sayes to the Churches the other though they have the name and credit of Church-members yea and in process of time the greatest visible Power and Sway in it saying they are Jews or right Heirs of Promise yet are they not so but do lie They are indeed of the Synagogue of Satan They came out from the spiritual and better part of the Church as no longer able to joyn and go along or keep pace with them in their heavenly Life and Conversation Being sensual and having not the Spirit they separate from the true spiritual worshipper seeking their upholding and maintenance in this or that Form and Way from the Powers of the World And having once got worldly Power and outward strength and force on their side they resolved to persecute and make War upon the better and more spiritual part of the Church with earthly Weapons and by compulsion of the Civil Sword 3. The Throne in Heaven described in the fourth Chapter is the Seat which God hath made for himself in the Creature-being of Christ the Mediator as his own Sanctuary from whence to issue forth all his Authority and Power decreed to be by him exercised whether in Heaven or on Earth in the capacity of Head and universal King over all the works of God's hands He that sits on this Throne is the same that chap. 19. is cloathed with a Vesture dipt in blood and whose Name is called the WORD of God He is said chap. 5. vers 6. to have seven horns and seven eyes which are the seven Spirits of God sent forth into all the Earth and this by his being made flesh and by his Death and Resurrection in which he shewed himself the true Sanctuary which God pitch'd and not man This had been in type from the beginning a most glorious high Throne Jer. 17. 12. designed from all Eternity to be the Throne and the place of the soals of his feet whose Name is the WORD of God in order to dwell in the midst of the Children of Israel for ever and bear unto their sight and enjoyment the clear and compleat vision of the invisible God 4. The Book chap. 5. written within and on the backside sealed with seven Seals as it is part of the Vision given to John is a description of the inward and hidden meaning of the matter of this Prophecy whether as to that which more especially concerns the Affairs of the Church or that which more generally relates to the Affairs of the World and the Empire thereof The seven Seals with which it
is sealed on the back-side do intimate the dark and mystical movings or dispensations of Gods Providence that the seven-fold distinction of time under the seven Seals and Trumpets should produce as the method and way that Christ would take to open and make known the inward writing and to give so plain a Vision of it that he that runs may read it The matter of this Prophecy as it peculiarly relates unto the Church contains in it the Church's progress and growth up in all things into Christ her Head according to the purpose of the Father which he purposed in Christ Jesus before the World was and this in despite of all contradiction or opposition from the Serpent and his Seed In this respect it is that chap. 12. the Man-child with which the Woman was in Travel comes at last to be born and seated on high above the reach of Satan as to any hurt that he could do unto it In the end it becomes a Mountain filling the whole Earth As the matter of this Prophecy doth more generally relate unto the World that lies in the wicked one and holds of the Serpent as of its universal Head and Ruler it contains the wonderful workings and contrivances of God's Providence in favour of his Church and in rendring to every one according to their works filling those that are of the World with the wayes of their own chusing By this means his worst enemies are taught and made to acknowledge his Justice and long-Suffering towards them in and under all His steady Counsels lead to the certain and final treading of all his Adversaries under foot and to the exalting of the horn of his Anointed who is both Lord and Christ 5. By the Temple of God and the Altar and them that Worship therein appointed to be measured chap. 11. 1. is to be understood the right Worship of God as well with respect to the object of it shining forth in the Person and Spirit of Christ inwardly known and conversed with as with respect to the worshippers themselves who are such only as are qualified with spiritual senses rendring them meet for such Duty and Service which they are called to the performance of in their Spirits and with their inward man But that which consists in the outward and bodily exercise described by the outward Court is given up to be suppressed and troden under foot by the Gentiles for 1260 years vers 2. 6. By the Holy City is meant Jerusalem the City of the great King and Living God the incorporated Society of Inhabitants or Citizens that stand in relation to Christ as his Subjects and Servants under the obligation of one or other Covenant that is conditionally or absolutely Those that are his Subjects but in the conditional Covenant are Citizens whose Names are only written in the Earth who upon tryal and proof do not remain so Though they say they are Jews they are not but do lie Yea they evidently discover themselves in the end to be the very Synagogue of Satan But those that are the Subjects of Christ absolutely or in and by the new and everlasting Covenant established in all things and sure they are such Citizens whose Names are written in Heaven among the living in Jerusalem where they become Pillars in the House of God never to go out more being found in a state of Life and way of converse with and worshipping of God in Christ wherein they are secured from final Apostacy and Defection 7. The Earthly Citizens or the Inhabitants and Children of the Jerusalem on Earth do prove at last to be as great enemies to their King as any among the heathenish and prophane World when once they revolt from his Scepter disjoyn and separate from the spiritual and better part of the Citizens whose Names are written in Heaven or in the Lamb's Book of new-creature Life in a character that is indeleble and by vertue of that Covenant which cannot be broken And their great Design when once actually separated from the true spiritual Worshippers is by the calling in of strength and aid from the prophane World to tread under the holy City even the very Heavenly Jerusalem and so to keep it under that it may never come to have any Credit Authority or Power in the World These Citizens and Inhabitants of the Heavenly Jerusalem are described chap. 7. by those that are sealed with the Seal of the Living God and are either a Company certain and numbred making up the 144000 there mentioned or else a Company and Society of sealed ones that in comparison of the former are numberless and of a more large and universal extent called by way of distinction Palm-bearers The first sort of these sealed ones do answer to the 24 Courses of the Levites of old who were given unto God instead of the first-born They stand in a peculiar relation to and dependance upon the great High Priest as their Head and do properly constitute and make up that Assembly of the first-born whose Names are written in Heaven These are a Kingdom of Priests represented before the Throne by the four and twenty Elders The second sort of these Citizens and sealed ones do answer to the whole Congregation of Israel distributed into their four parts and stations round about the Ark at a greater distance from the Throne a Kingdom of common Subjects and less priviledg'd Children than the former Yet these latter sort of men shall be recounted as well as the former to have been born in her whom the Most High doth establish Psal 87. 5. Thus Psal 49. there is notice taken of high or noble men and of low or common men These two Orders are eminently found in a state of perpetuity and continuancy in Christ's own Kingdom Both of them have their original and foundation in the Manhead of Christ who is one manner of man as he bears the form of a Servant like unto us earthly men in all things sin only excepted In this capacity he is constituted King over the whole Earth But he is another manner of man as he is called and made an High Priest after the Order of Melchisedec without Father without Mother without Pedigree or Descent having neither beginning of dayes nor end of life It is therefore said of him in this second sense Consider how great this man is unto whom even the Patriarch Abraham gave the tenth of his spoyls And again the same Apostle Heb. 5. 11. testifies that of him he had many things to say that were hard to be uttered seeing they were dull of hearing and slow to discern the distinction of that excellency and perfection which shines forth in Christ's own humane nature in the twofold respect which we have mentioned 8. By the Two Witnesses then we are hereby taught to understand those two sorts of Citizens or Inhabitants of the Heavenly Jerusalem the word of whose Testimony is according to this their twofold and distinct birth which makes them Kings
or Priests with Christ or both that is joynt or co-heirs with Christ in the dignity and perfection of his Manhead in one or both of these Considerations of it This is intimated Isa 43. 10. Ye are my Witnesses saith the Lord and my Servant Christ whom I have chosen that ye may know and believe me or be one in Judgment and Will with me and understand that I am he Before me there was no God formed nor shall be after me And they are called Witnesses not only because they know and believe him and are one in Spirit with him as he is a glorified earthly man and a man also that is Michael God's fellow but as they Prophesie in Sack-cloth or in a suffering state not loving their lives unto the death rather then cease to be Witnesses and to bear their testimony to the Truth when called thereunto under the greatest contradiction of sinners 9. By the Woman chap. 12. clothed with the Sun c. who being with Child cried travelling in birth with a Man-child and pained to be delivered is meant the true Sarah or spiritual Womb of Christ's dead body Rom. 7. 4. which lawfully discharges us from the Covenant of the Law or obligation to act singly by the activity it gives that we should be married to another even to him who is raised from the dead that we may bring forth fruit unto God as quicken'd into a life and activity much more excellent There is therefore set before the eyes of our Faith the Law of the Spirit of Life that is in-Christ Jesus risen from the dead for us hence-forward to be conformed and live unto as that birth of manly perfection which shines forth in him who was crucified indeed in weakness but was raised in power or a man of Power in whose hands all Power in Heaven and Earth is intrusted And those who become one in conjunction of Spirit with him by the new and everlasting Covenant are with him caught up to the Throne of God in the one or other capacity before intimated of the two sorts of Citizens that by the new birth are members of the Heavenly Jerusalem and of the remnant of the Womans Seed that keep the Commandments of God and have the Testimony of Jesus The great Contest and Battel which happened between the Witnesses on the one part comprehended under the name of Michael and his Angels and the Serpent and his brood on the other was as the one were Friends and the other Enemies to the Cross and Death of Christ and as the Judgment Opinions and Practises of the one or other made void or else established and advanced the Mystery and Efficacy of the Cross and the Law of it which those that observe and follow peace will be upon them as on all the Israel of God In this Quarrel the Witnesses do fight under the protection and blessing of Michael their Head as the other do under the support and encouragement of the Old Dragon their Head 10. By the Old Dragon we are to understand the Spirit that rules in the Children of disobedience who is for the present Head and chief Ruler over the World as managing the universal Scepter thereof by Christ's permission The Ensigns and Characters of this Empire according to Scripture phrase is seven heads and ten horns intimating the nature as well as perfection and universality of that worldly Power which is exercised by the Old Dragon in waging war against the Woman and her Seed This War he is capable to manage either as an Angel of Light and a false Prophet in the Church or as an universal Monarch and Governor in the World In the first Capacity as this Dragon transforms himself into an Angel of Light and Minister of Righteousness he works with all Power Signs and lying Wonders As Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses and Aaron in their Commission so do the Serpent's Seed in Sheep's clothing and Christ's own likeness resist the Witnesses in their Testimony and oppose the Inhabitants of the Heavenly Jerusalem by pretending a greater Friendship to Christ and conformity to his written Law in all their words and actions than the true Seed of the Woman having indeed the form of Godliness but denying the Power and Spirit thereof After this manner did the Dragon and his Angels in the Primitive Church fight with Michael and his Angels to prevent the birth of the Man-child and to keep up the Credit and Authority of the Law and their following after Righteousness in the Principles and upon the terms of the first Covenant in opposition to the Ministry of the Spirit according to the Promise and Tenor of the new and everlasting Covenant This battel continued in the Primitive Church about four hundred years and came at last to this issue Satan was cast down out of Heaven upon an evident discovery of his deceitful workings and lying wonders in the Teachings and Inspirations which came out of his mouth as a false Spirit and Prophet so that he was not able singly this way to bear up any longer against the Power and Demonstration of the Spirit of Truth in the mouth of the Saints but found himself necessitated to resort to his earthly and worldly Weapons the Power of the Civil Sword that so joyning both his Interests together that of the Magistrate and false Prophet he might grow up into such a formidible posture as is mentioned Chap. 13. 4. where it is said Who is like unto the BEAST or able to make War with him This posture the Apostle John beheld the Dragon putting himself into when the seven-headed and ten-horned Beast arose out of the Sea and the two-horned Beast out of the Earth Both of these together do become the Seat or Throne to which the Dragon gave up his Power and Authority The first of these two Beasts receives him as the old unclean prophane heathenish Spirit they that are meant by that Beast are still the same in Principles as before only outwardly baptized into the name of the Christian Profession or Religion when Christian Religion became the Religion of the Roman Empire Thus was that Beast healed of its former Wound when Paganism was destroyed and pull'd down And because the bare name of Christian Religion or out-side Profession thereof without something of real Reformation and Power of inward Principles was not of credit or authority enough to advance Antichrist's Kingdom therefore the Ministry of the Law or first Covenant even the knowledge of Christ according to the flesh as it is capable to serve the Serpents Seed for a cover and vail of their enmity against the Cross of Christ and Power of his Resurrection doth spring up over the head as it were of the first Beast This second Beast or branch of Antichrist's Subjects and Kingdom with two horns like the Lamb but speaking as the Dragon chuses rather to joyn Interest with the first Beast than to suffer the Citizens of the heavenly Jerusalem to come out
and Body This is that Principle and Power that after the limited time of 1260 years must fall and be taken out of the way 15. By the Witnesses Prophesying in Sack-cloth are meant the true Circumcision in Spirit who Worship God in Christ Jesus and live in a through-resignedness of mind to him that is risen from the dead who is the Spirit of Truth which is given them by the Father to be their guide of whom and of whose Testimony they are not ashamed what ever disgrace it be in or however rejected by the Government under which the Providence of God hath placed them They do therefore own it as their Principle and make it their practice to bear and suffer under such worldly Powers and Governments in Faith and Patience whatever befals them for their Testimony 's sake without attempting to resist the Powers that are to disturb their peace or give them any just cause of offence They are called Witnesses because of the word of their Testimony which they forbear not to give in the worst and most suffering times whatever it cost them And they are Two described by two Candlesticks or Societies of Believers and two Olive Trees or Sons of Oyl because through Faith they are the receivers of the Anointing which comes from the Holy One and is Truth and no Lie This Anointing proportions it self in its Gift either according to the measure it finds the Nature of man capable to take in and possess without any new addition of a distinct superiour capacity and reception or else gives forth its self in a vast and boundless communication wherein it is capable to flow forth into man and to form in him an answerable Reception thereunto beyond and above that capacity and measure of knowledge and discerning which is proper to man in his first make or building to the extending and enlarging the intellectual part of man's Being into a more abundant fruition of God in a superiority to that of Angels even to a joynt inheriting seeing and enjoying of God with the exalted humane Nature of the Son of God in that Name which he obtains above Angels and wherein he is more excellent than they At this more excellent Name of Christ as it originally shines forth in Christ's own Person every knee must bow and every tongue confess to the glory of God the Father These two sorts of Saints are in most intimate Union and inseperable conjunction with the Lord that Spirit who is the Son of man glorified or justified in Spirit and who hath the gift of the Anointing in both the respects before-mentioned The one sort of these Saints as well as the other do with open face behold as in a glass the Glory of the Lord whether that wherein he is perfect man or that wherein he is more than man the man that is God's Fellow and Equal and so Superiour and Head to Angels Principalities and Powers ascended far above all Heavens And they are changed into the same Image respectively whether of the one Glory or of the other by the Spirit of the Lord or the Lord the Spirit These Two Witnesses do live and abide in their Principles and word of their Testimony when their persons die and they have put off their earthly Tabernacle For the Witnessing-work is carried on in a succession of new Witnesses brought upon the stage of this World one Generation after another during the time declared of 1260 years whilst they are appointed to prophesie in Sack-cloth And when that suffering season of theirs shall have an end put to it as it must the like two Companies and Societies of Saints spirited with the same Principles that these sackcloth or suffering Prophets are of both of them making but one Church and House of the Living God shall be quicken'd and rais'd up in Power by such a Redemption wrought in and upon their bodies even here in this life from the bondage of Corruption as is called the Adoption of the body Rom. 8. 23. This Adoption or Redemption of the body on this side the Resurrection will hold proportion very much with Christ's Transfiguration This state of the body is prophetically described Dan. 12. 3. where we are given to understand that the bodies of the Saints or of those that are wise shall shine as the brightness of the Firmament and their Spirits as the Stars for ever and ever For into such an intimate relation and conjunction will Christ as he is the Head of Angels take and adopt the Spirits of Angels and men regenerated with himself and with one another as by his own influence on the Spirits of Saints and by his and the influence of their own Spirits on their bodily or sensual part to reduce their bodies into so near a relation to and conjunction with the Life of their Spirits and Christ in Spirit as will raise and advance them into a heavenly frame and render them meet for so great a glory of Spirit or eminent exercise of spiritual Life and Power This will be a glory of the body not before known as a common and general dispensation since the World began nor yet hardly so eminently experienced even by those few choice Types and Shadowes of it Enoch Moses and Elias or others This is that state of body or of the very outward-man and sensual part of the Saint whereby Christ will be glorified in his Saints and admired in all those that do believe A LETTER OF Sir HENRY VANE To his LADY from the Isle of SCYLLY My Dear Heart THe Wind yet continuing contrary makes me desirous to be as much in Converse with thee having this opportunity as the Providence of God will permit hoping these will come safe to your hand It is no small Satisfaction to me in these sharp Tryals to experience the Truth of those Christian Principles which God of his Grace hath afforded you and me in our measures the knowledge and emboldned us to make the profession of For surely by this Fiery Tryal which is from God appointed to try us no strange or unusual Dispensation of God hath happened to us differing from that which all his Servants and Prophets from the beginning of the World to this day have found also to be their Lot Nor is it other than the Condition as I may say and Law that all those must come under and submit unto that will approve themselves Christ's Disciples indeed Luk. 14. 26 27. And it is no small Mercy that the greatest Extremities we have already under-gone and which do as yet threaten have found that strength and rooting of the Grace and Love of Christ in our Hearts which causes us not to despair of being made more than Conquerors in the end without desiring those Conditions of peace vers 32. which are not consistent with our being such Disciples of Christ as will cheerfully when called to it forsake all they have in love to him and subjection to his Will Why should Christ ask us
matters for the good of the VVomans Seed during the third Day or Age of the world This day reaches from Christ's Ascention or departure into a far Country to God's bringing again this his only begotten Son into the world that every tongue may confess and every knee bow to the honour of his most glorious Name Then shall he in the quality of Universal King as well on Earth as in Heaven enter upon and keep the possession of his Kingdom against all Usurpers and Opposers whatsoever This space of time between Christ's Ascention to Heaven and Reign on Earth is measured out in three great and distinct Sections or Divisions in the Book before-mentioned as Mr. Mede takes notice and every of these three are again made to contain in them seven Sub-divisions of that portion of time that is allotted unto each of them Hereupon Mr. Mede's own words are The order of the Seals and in them of the Trumpets is certain and undoubted to wit the same which the number to every one ascribed doth point out 1 2 3 4 5 6 7. The rest therefore of the Prophecies in that Book being compared first between themselves and afterwards with the Seals by way of Synchronism the Order of the whole Revelation will be evident This Assertion of his I take to be most clear He therefore begins with that notable quaternion of Prophecies which are so very remarkable by reason of the equality of their times 1. The first is the Prophecy of the VVoman's remaining in the VVilderness for a time times and half a time or 1260 dayes as is there more manifestly declared 2. The second is that of the seven-headed Beast restored and ruling forty two months 3. The third is of the Court or of the holy City trodden under foot by the Gentiles 4. The fourth and last is that of the two Witnesses prophesying 1260 dayes that is years Now although as Mr. Mede well observes the character of equality of times will not be sufficient to evidence that they are the same times but may be before or after yet by other characters which that Book affords to make out the demonstration it seems very clear These other characters he brings as well he may out of the twelfth Chapter where 't is plain that when the Dragon is cast down by Michael out of Heaven the VVoman escapes from his â—â—â—sence into the VVilderness ver 6 and 14. The Dragon being 〈◊〉 that he had failed of his attempt to destroy her in Heaven reâ—â—â— to his earthly weapons and applies himself to make war with the VVoman and with the rest of her Seed to wit those which she should bring forth in the VVilderness ver 17. And for this purpose he gave his Power his Throne and great Authority to the ten-horned Beast out of the Sea ascending Chap. 13. 1 2. By Chap. 11. it appears that the times of the Beast and of the Prophecy of the VVitnesses are equal and that they are finished together at the end of the sixth Trumpet which shews they began and held on together the whole space The twelfth verse shews the Ascention of the VVitnesses into Heaven which puts a period to their mourning Prophecy as also that great Earthquake wherewith the Imperial City being overthrown the Kingdom of the Beast comes to be abolished noted by the very moment in which the second Woe which is under the sixth Trumpet went out On this the third Woe is quickly to ensue at the sounding of the seventh Trumpet In that very moment of time that the Witnesses whom the Beast ascending out of the bottomless pit had slain being at the point of finishing their Testimony in sackcloth were revived by the spirit of life from God entring into them and ascending up into Heaven the same hour the tenth part of the City fell by means of the great Earthquake Then matters are brought to that pass that the seventh Trumpet sounding all the Kingdoms of the World become our Lord's and his Christ's In the same moment also the Wrath of the Lamb comes to be poured out by the Ministry of the Vials and the Temple of God is to be seen in Heaven ver 15 19. The great Harlot or mystical Babylon chap. 17. is of the same time with the seven-headed and ten-horned Beast as are also the hundred forty and four thousand sealed Ones being Virgins these are of the same time with the Whore of Babylon and the Beast The period of the Tyranny of the Beast and of this Company of the sealed Virgin-Saints is at the coming forth of the multitude of Palm-bearers For out of what tribulation could they come but of the Beast's persecuting the Saints Therefore they leave the Tyranny of the Beast behind them and are of one Mystical Body or Church with the sealed Ones and have been under the same Persecution with them but are Saints of an inferiour rank and station to those that have the priviledge and dignity to be sealed with the Name of the Father in their foreheads Chap. 7. The two â—orned Beast hath contemporized with the ten-horned Beast Chap. 13â—…e Whore with both and all these three with the Woman in the Wildernâ—… the treading under foot the holy City and the Witnesses mean time mourning in sackcloth The company also of the sealed Virgins and the company of Palm-bearing Virgins brought from under great tribulation into a safe and blessed state though no mention be made of their being sealed these as to the season of their tribulation under the persecuting Beast contemporize with the Whore and the Beast All these contemporize one with another and fill up the same space of time After this succeeds the Ministry of the seven Vials at the Rising of the Witnesses and the moment of their ascending into Heaven This will come to pass at the beginning of the sounding of the seventh Trumpet Then the triumphing state of the Witnesses will come on The power of the Keyes and the pouring forth of the Vials of God's Wrath upon the Kingdom of the Beast will be visibly committed to them and the time of the Beast's and Babylons inclining to Ruine or the visibly declining sinking state of both will fall in together with this Dispensation of the Vials to make way for the Marriage of the Lamb and the coming down of the New Jerusalem out of Heaven to be seen as the Tabernacle of God amongst men here on Earth The remaining difficulty then is to fill up the first of the three great Sections and Divisions of time before-mentioned to wit the space which had an end put to it by the Womans actual flight into the Wilderness This began when John received this Prophecy in the Isle of Patmos Mr. Mede very judicially summeth it up in these three Particulars 1. The value and preference which is put by God upon the state of the Church as it answers to the inward Court of the Temple of old comparatively with those who in their spirit principle