their Salvation aright, they drink in wrong Opinions of him; from which it's harder to be difintangled, than while the Soul remains a Blank, or Tabula rafa. For they that conceit themfelves Wife, are worse to deal with than they that are fenfible of their Ignorance. Nor hath it been lefs the Device of the Devil, the great Enemy of Mankind, to perfwade Men into wrong Notions of God, than to keep them altogether from acknowledging him; the latter taking with few, because odious; but the other having been the conftant Ruin of the World: For there hath scarce been a Nation found, but hath had fome Notions or other of Religion; so that not from their denying any Deity, but from their Mistakes and Mifapprehenfions of it, hath proceeded all the Idolatry and Superftition of the World; yea, hence even Atheism it felf hath proceeded: For these many and various Opinions of God and Religion, being fo much mixed with the Gueffings and uncertain Judgments of Men, have begotten in many the Opinion, That there is no God at all: This, and much more that might be faid, may fhew how dangerous it is to mifs in this first Step: All that come not in by the right Door, are accounted as Thieves and Robbers.

Again, How needful and defirable that Knowledge is, which brings Life Eternal, Epictetus fheweth, Epictetus. faying excellently well, Cap. 38. ἴσθι ὅτι τὸ Κυριώτατον. Know that the main Foundation of Piety, is this, To bave ¿bàs úxonúteis, right Opinions and Apprehenfions ὀρθὰς ὑπολήψεις, of God.

This therefore I judged neceffary, as a first Principle, in the first Place, to affirm; and I fuppofe will not need much farther Explanation or Defence, as being generally acknowledged by all (and in these Things, that are without Controverfie, I love to be brief) as that which will eafily commend it felf to every Man's Reafon and Confcience; and therefore I fhall proceed to the next Propofition; which

though

though it be nothing lefs certain yet by the Malico of Satan, and Ignorance of many, comes far more under Debate.

PROPOSITION II

Of IMMEDIATE REVELATION.

Mat, 11.17. Seeing no Man knoweth the Father but the Son, and he to whom the Son revealeth him: And feeing the Revelation of the Son is in and by the Spirit; therefore the Teftimony of the Spirit is that alone by which the true Knowledge of God hath been, is, and can be only Revealed: Who, as by the Moving of his own Spirit, be difpofed the Chaos of this World into that wonderfulOrder, in which it was in the Beginning, and created Man a living Soul, to Rule and Govern it; fo by the Revelation of the fame Spirit, he hath maa nifefted himself all along unto the Sons of Men, both Patriarchs, Prophets and Apoftles: Which Revelations of God by the Spirit, whether by outwardVoices and Ap pearances, Dreams, or inward objective Manifeftations in the Heart, were of old the formal Object of their Faith, and remain yet fo to be; fince the Object of the Saints Faith is the fame in all Ages, tho' held forth under divers Administrations. Moreover, thefe Divine Inward Revelations, which we make abfolutely neceflary for the Building up of true Faith, neither do nor can ever, contradict the outward Teftimony of the Scriptures, or right and found Reafon; yet from hence it will not follow, that thefe Divine Revelations are to be fubjected to the Teft, either of the outward Teftimony of the Scriptures, or of the Natural Reason of Man, as to a more noble or certain Rule and Touchftone; for this Divine Revelation, and Inward Illumination, is that which is evident and clear of it fell; forcing, by its own Evidence and Clearness, the welldifpofed Understanding to affent, irresistibly moving the

fame

fame thereunto, even as the common Principles of na-: tural Truths do move and incline the Mind to a na-. tural Affent: As, That the whole is greater than its Part; That two Contradictions can neither. be both true, nor both falfe:

§. I.

I

by Apoftate

T is very probable, that many carnal and natural Chriftians will oppofe this Propo- Revelation fition; who, being wholly unacquainted with the Chriftians Movings and Actings of God's Spirit upon their rejected. Hearts, judge the fame nothing neceffary; and fome are apt to flout at it as ridiculous: Yea, to that Height are the generality, of Chriftians apoftatized and degenerated, that though there be not any thing more plainly Afferted, more feriously Recommended, or more certainly Attefted to, in all the Writings of the holy Scriptures; yet nothing is lefs minded, and more rejected, by all forts of Chriftians, than Immediate and Divine Revelation; infomuch, that once to lay Claim to it, is Matter of Reproach. Whereas of old, none were ever judged Christians, but fuch as bad the Spirit of Chrift, Rom. viii. 9. But now many do boldly call themfelves Chriftians, who make no Difficulty of confeffing they are without it, and laugh at fuch as fay they have it. Of Old they were accounted the Sons of God, who were led by the Spirit of God; ibid. verfe 14. But now many aver themfelves Sons of God, who know nothing of this Leader; and he that affirms himself fo led, is, by the pretended Orthodox of this Age, prefently proclaimed an Heretick. The Reafon hereof is very manifeft, viz. Becaufe many in thefe Days, under the Name of Chriftians, do experimentally find, that they are not acted, nor led, by God's Spirit; yea, many great Doctors, Divines, Teachers and Bishops of Chriftianity, (commonly fo called) have wholly fhut their Ears from hearing, and their Eyes from feeing, this Inward Guide, and fo are become Strangers unto it; whence

C

they

they are, by their own Experience, brought to this Strait, either to confefs that they are as yet ignorant of God, and have only the fhadow of Knowledge, and not the true Knowledge of him, or that this Knowledge is acquired without Immediate Revelation.

For the better Understanding then of this ProKnowledge pofition, we do diftinguish betwixt the certain Knowand Literal ledge of God, and the uncertain; betwixt the spidiftinguish ritual Knowledge, and the literal; the faving heart

Spiritual

cd.

Knowledge, and foaring, airy head-Knowledge. The laft, we confefs, may be divers Ways obtained; but the firft, by no other Way, than the inward immediate Manifestation and Revelation of God's Spirit, fhining in and upon the Heart, enlightning and opening the Understanding.

§. II. Having then propofed to my felf, in these Propofitions, to affirm thofe Things which relate to the true and effectual Knowledge, which brings Life Eternal with it; therefore I have affirmed, and that truly, that this Knowledge is no otherways attained, and that none have any true Ground to believe they have attained it, who have it not by this Revelation of God's Spirit.

The Certainty of which Truth is fuch, that it hath been acknowledged by fome of the moft refined and famous of all forts of Profeffors of Chriftianity in all Ages; who being truly up-right-hearted, and earnest Seekers of the Lord,(however ftated under the Difadvantages and epidemical Errors of their several Sects or Ages) the true Seed in them hath been anfwered by God's Love, who hath had Regard to the Good, and hath had of his Elect Ones among all, who finding a Distast and Disgust in all other outward Means, even in the very Principles and Precepts more particularly relative to their own Forms and Societies, have at last concluded with One Voice, That there was no true Knowledge of God, but that which is revealed inwardly by his own Spirit. Whereof take these following Teftimonies of the Ancients.

I." It

Tract. Ep.

1." It is the Inward Mafter (faith Auguftine) that Ang ex "Teacbeth, it is Chrift that Teacbeth, it is Infpirati- Joh. 3. on that Teacbeth: Where this Infpiration and Unti"on is wanting, it is in vain that Words from without are beaten in. And thereafter: For bethat created us, and redeemed us, and called us, by Faith, and แ dwelleth in us by his Spirit, unless he speaketh unto us inwardly, it is needlefs for us to cry out.'

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"

1. 1. Strom.

2. "There is a Difference (faith Clemens Alexan- Clem. Alex. "drinus) betwixt that which any one faith of theTruth, "and that which the Truth it felf, interpreting it felf,

faith. A Conjecture of Truth differeth from the Truth "it felf; a Similitude of a Thing differeth from the "Thing it felf; it is one Thing that is acquired by Ex"ercife and Difcipline; and another Thing, which by "Power and Faith." Laitly, the fame Clemens faith, "Truth is neither hard to be arrived at, nor is it im- Padag. "poffible to apprehend it; for it is moft Nigh unto us, " even in our Houfes, as the most wife Moles bathin"finuated."

Lib. deve

3. "How is it faith Tertullian)that fince the Devil Tertullianus always worketh, and ftirreth up the Mind to Iniquity, land. Virgi"that the Work of God fhould either ceafe, or defift to nibus,cap.r. "act? Since for this End the Lord did fendthe Com

forter,that because humaneWeakness could not at once "bear all things, Knowledge might be by little and lit"tle directed, formed, and brought to Perfection, by the "boly Spirit, that Vicar of the Lord. I have manythings

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yet (faith be) to fpeak unto you, but ye cannot "as yet bear them; but when that Spirit of Truth "fhall come, he fhall lead you into all Truth, and "fhall teach you these things that are to come. But

of this his Work we have spoken of above. What is then "the Adminiftration of the Comforter, but that Difci"pline be directed, and the Scriptures revealed? &c."

4. "The Law (faith Hierom is Spiritual, and there Hierom. Ep. "is need of a Revelation to understand it. And in his Paulin. co. "Epiftle 150. to Hedibia, Queft. 10. he faith, "The "whole Epiftle to the Romans needs an Interpretation, C 2

66 it