SOME THINGS OF GREAT WEIGHT &C.

I. SOME ASSERTIONS CONCERNING THE PRINCIPLE AND WAY OF LIFE.

THAT it is a great and hard matter to come into a capacity of knowing and receiving the truth. It is no hard matter to take up any religion that a man finds in the world. To read scriptures, to believe what a man finds related there, according to his understanding of them; yea, to believe that he hath the light and help of the Spirit in his reading and understanding; to apply himself also to practise and observe what he finds therein required; and to aim at holiness, &c.; this is no hard matter; every man that is serious, and secks religion of any kind but in the weight of a man's spirit, may go thus far. But all this administers not the true capacity, but he that meets with it, must go further than thus.

2. That which gives the true capacity is a principle of life from God, and there alone and nowhere else, can man meet with it and receive it. This principle is the seed of the kingdom, or heavenly leaven, with which the mind must be in some measure leavened, ere it can come into a true capacity of understanding and receiving the truth. And in this leaven must it abide and grow up, if it abide and grow in the true knowledge, &c.

3. That from this principle, and in this principle, not only the true light and knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ and all spiritual things is given and received; but also the true faith, the true love, the true sanctification, the true justification, the true peace, the true joy, &c. And what of these is not received and held here, is not of the truth, but a garment of men's own forming, and not the covering of the Spirit.

4. That the Spirit himself sows this principle, and is received in this principle. And he that receives this principle, and is born of this principle, receives and is born of the Spirit; and he that receives it not, nor is born of it, neither hath received nor is born of the Spirit; but is but in the imagination and self-conceit about the things of God, but is not in the truth as it is in Jesus.

5. That in this principle the new covenant is made with the soul and entered into; and he that receives this principle from the hand of God, receives life, and enters into the covenant of life, and feels the pure fear, wherein God cleanseth the heart, and whereby he keeps the heart clean, and feels the laws of God daily writing there by the finger of God's Spirit, and feels the power and sense of the Spirit to teach and cause obedience; so that the yoke, which is hard to the transgressing nature (alienated from the life and power), is easy (and as I may say natural) to him that is born of this nature. For being dead with Christ, and risen with Christ, and changed into the nature of Christ, by the principle which is of him, through the power and Spirit of Christ, which worketh therein; he can say as Christ did, when the Lord calls him to any thing; Lo, I come; it is my meat and drink, yea, my great delight, to do thy will, O God! yea, thy law is written in the midst of my bowels!

6. Among those who are gathered into this principle, and abide in the sense, light, and life of this principle, there is great love and unity. They are of one mind, of one heart, of one soul, of one spirit, of one life, gathered into one demonstration of truth; and there is no jarring, no doubting, no dissenting, &c. All this is out, in the world, in the earthly wisdom, in the earthly professions and walkings; but it is excluded the principle of truth, and them that are gathered into and abide therein.

7. That all that are not gathered into, nor walk nor live in this principle, they are yet in the darkness and error from the pure power of God, and stand and walk in slippery places; and though their way may seem very right, and their estate and condition sure (as to God-wards) in their own eyes

and judgment, yet it is not really so; but they are but in a dream concerning the truth, not in the truth itself; which (how strange soever it may seem to them at present to be affirmed concerning them) yet they shall certainly feel it to be so, when the Lord by his powerful voice and bright appearance of his Spirit awaketh them. For many things go for truth now with men in the dark, which will vanish like smoke before the light of the day; and then that only which is truth indeed shall have the glory and praise of being accounted so; and then what will become of those who have mistook about truth, and are not clothed with the pure wedding-garment (the spotless life and righteousness of the Son), but only with that which they have accounted so?

8. That to those that see in the light of this principle, the mountain of the Lord's house is discovered; and those that abide and grow up therein, they know and experience it established above all mountains, and exalted above all hills; all earthly knowledge, earthly religions, earthly ways, earthly worships, earthly spirits and minds, &c., in their greatest exaltations and glory, being far beneath it. And here the feast of fat things, and wines on the lees well refined, even the fruit of the vine which gladdeth and refresheth the very heart of God, is fed on and partaken of by those that dwell here. For the Father, and the Son, and the Spirit is here revealed, in the holy house and tabernacles which are built here; and here they make their feast, bringing forth the riches of their nature, spirit, and precious life, on which they feed with the soul, and give unto the soul favor and ability to feed with them; in which food there is the life, strength, righteousness, and joy of the kingdom given forth and received.

9. That in the heart which discovers iniquity, reproveth it, witnesseth against it, and striveth with the mind to turn it from it, and to wait for life and power from on high, that is this very principle. In that is the divine nature, even the nature of God's Spirit, which was always against sin, and ever will so be, and in all its appearances testifieth

4. That the Spirit himself sows this principle, and is received in this principle. And he that receives this principle, and is born of this principle, receives and is born of the Spirit; and he that receives it not, nor is born of it, neither hath received nor is born of the Spirit; but is but in the imagination and self-conceit about the things of God, but is not in the truth as it is in Jesus.

5. That in this principle the new covenant is made with the soul and entered into; and he that receives this principle from the hand of God, receives life, and enters into the covenant of life, and feels the pure fear, wherein God cleanseth the heart, and whereby he keeps the heart clean, and feels the laws of God daily writing there by the finger of God's Spirit, and feels the power and sense of the Spirit to teach and cause obedience; so that the yoke, which is hard to the transgressing nature (alienated from the life and power), is easy (and as I may say natural) to him that is born of this nature. For being dead with Christ, and risen with Christ, and changed into the nature of Christ, by the principle which is of him, through the power and Spirit or Christ, which worketh therein; he can say as Christ did, when the Lord calls him to any thing; Lo, I come; it is my meat and drink, yea, my great delight, to do thy will, O God! yea, thy law is written in the midst of my bowels!

6. Among those who are gathered into this principle, and abide in the sense, light, and life of this principle, there is great love and unity. They are of one mind, of one heart, of one soul, of one spirit, of one life, gathered into one demonstration of truth; and there is no jarring, no doubting, no dissenting, &c. All this is out, in the world, in the earthly wisdom, in the earthly professions and walkings; but it is excluded the principle of truth, and them that are gathered into and abide therein.

7. That all that are not gathered into, nor walk nor live in this principle, they are yet in the darkness and error from the pure power of God, and stand and walk in slippery places; and though their way may seem very right, and their estate and condition sure (as to God-wards) in their own eyes