An Humble Affectionate And Earnest Address To The Clergy

1 Address 1: The reason of my humbly and affectionately addressing this discourse to the clergy 2 Address 2: If it be asked, What this one thing is? It is the SPIRIT OF GOD 3 Address 3: Everything else, be it what it will, however glorious and divine in outward appearance 4 Address 4: All scripture bears full witness to this truth, and the end and design of all 5 Address 5: The grounds and reasons of which are as follow. 6 Address 6: All possible goodness that either can be named, or is nameless 7 Address 7: All that can be called goodness, holiness, divine tempers 8 Address 8: God could not make the creature to be great and glorious in itself 9 Address 9: But now, if all that is divine, great, glorious 10 Address 10: The matter therefore plainly comes to this, nothing can do 11 Address 11: Now the reason why no work of religion, but that which is begun 12 Address 12: All TRUE religion is, or brings forth, an essential union and communion of the spirit 13 Address 13: Now as no animal could begin to respire, or unite with the breath of this 14 Address 14: Take away inspiration, or suppose it to cease, and then no religious acts or affections 15 Address 15: A religious faith that is uninspired, a hope, or love that proceeds not from the 16 Address 16: A religion that is not wholly built upon this supernatural ground 17 Address 17: No man therefore can reach God with his love 18 Address 18: Divine inspiration was essential to man's first created state. 19 Address 19: Hence it plainly appears that the gospel state could not be God's last dispensation 20 Address 20: Now from these words let this conclusion be here drawn 21 Address 21: Now as infinitely absurd as this conclusion is, no one that condemns continual immediate inspiration 22 Address 22: Behold a pride, and a humility, the one as good as the other 23 Address 23: The necessity of a continual inspiration of the Spirit of God 24 Address 24: Now when Christ had told them of the necessity of an higher state than that 25 Address 25: Here are two most important and fundamental truths fully demonstrated 26 Address 26: Secondly, that as the apostles could not, so no man 27 Address 27: For why could not the apostles, who had been eye witnesses to all the whole 28 Address 28: But if the belief of the necessity and certainty of immediate continual divine inspiration 29 Address 29: Now this middle way has neither scripture nor sense in it 30 Address 30: And here lies the TRUE unchangeable distinction between God 31 Address 31: This must be the case of all fallen Christendom 32 Address 32: But to return now to the doctrine of continual inspiration. 33 Address 33: And what is well to be noted, everyone, however high in human literature 34 Address 34: Our divine master compares the religion of the learned Pharisees |to whited sepulchers 35 Address 35: Now whence was it, that a religion, so serious in its restraints 36 Address 36: And yet, sad and satanical as this self is 37 Address 37: But to all this it must yet be added 38 Address 38: Let then the writers against continual immediate divine inspiration take this for a certain truth 39 Address 39: Hence it is, that grieving, quenching, or resisting the Spirit 40 Address 40: |When I am lifted up from the earth,| says Christ 41 Address 41: Now that which we are here taught, is the whole end of all scripture 42 Address 42: |Ye are not in the flesh,| says the apostle 43 Address 43: |Lo, I am always with you,| says the holy Jesus 44 Address 44: Again, Christ, after his glorification in heaven, says, |Behold I STAND at the DOOR and 45 Address 45: Now the matter is not at all about the different effects or works proceeding from 46 Address 46: It is to no purpose to object to all this 47 Address 47: But as I do not begin to doubt about the necessity 48 Address 48: Another charge upon me, equally false, and I may say 49 Address 49: I have elsewhere shown the gross darkness and ignorance which govern that which is called 50 Address 50: And here truth obliges me to say, that scholastic divinity is in as great ignorance 51 Address 51: Now hard as this may seem to unregenerate nature 52 Address 52: |Except ye be converted, and become as little children 53 Address 53: Now whether this self broken off from God, reasons 54 Address 54: Hence also it is, that Christendom, full of the nicest decisions about faith 55 Address 55: A scholar, pitying the blindness and folly of those who live to themselves in the 56 Address 56: But that I may fully show the perverseness of my accusers 57 Address 57: |You shall see reason possessed of all that belongs to it. 58 Address 58: |Man, considered as a member of this world, who is to have his share of 59 Address 59: |Now besides these organs of sense, he has a power or faculty of reasoning upon 60 Address 60: |Now how is it, that the good things of this world are communicated to man? 61 Address 61: |Now here, you must degrade reason just as much as it is degraded by religion 62 Address 62: |Now it is only thus helpless and useless in religion 63 Address 63: |For the good of religion is like the good of food and drink to the 64 Address 64: |But as soon as it is known and confessed 65 Address 65: Hence may be seen the great and like blindness both of infidels and Christians 66 Address 66: Our Lord says, |It is expedient for you that I go away 67 Address 67: Christ says further: |I have many things to say unto you 68 Address 68: Christ also says, |If any man loves me, my Father will love him 69 Address 69: Christ from heaven says, |Behold I stand at the door 70 Address 70: |Rabbi,| says Nicodemus to Christ, |we know that thou art a teacher come from God. 71 Address 71: It would be great folly and perverseness, to charge me here with slighting 72 Address 72: I exceedingly love, and highly reverence the divine authority of the sacred writings of the 73 Address 73: But now, if this is not thought that fullness of regard that is due to 74 Address 74: I shall now only add this friendly hint to the doctor 75 Address 75: Now if the doctor did that, though it was only from humility 76 Address 76: Let it be supposed, that our Lord was to come again for a while in 77 Address 77: Let the doctor figure to himself the gaudy pageantry of a divine high mass in 78 Address 78: O vainest of all vain projects! For what is Christianity 79 Address 79: I come now to the quotation from the pastoral letter of Mr. 80 Address 80: I cannot more illustrate the sense, or extol the judgment 81 Address 81: |A judicious naturalist observes, that sound and strong lungs are that on which 82 Address 82: These two instances are proof enough, that as soon as any man trusts to natural 83 Address 83: Whence is it, that we see genius and natural abilities to be equally pleased with 84 Address 84: The other instance of delusion from book learning, relates to Mr. 85 Address 85: |The things of God,| says St. 86 Address 86: The reports that are to be acknowledged as TRUE concerning the Holy Spirit and his 87 Address 87: |I am the way, the truth, and the life 88 Address 88: Here again may be seen, in the highest degree of certainty 89 Address 89: Take away this power and working life of the Spirit from being the one life 90 Address 90: How much then is it to be lamented, as well as impossible to be denied 91 Address 91: How is it that the logical, critical, learned Deist comes by his infidelity? Why just 92 Address 92: Through all scripture nothing else is aimed at or intended for man 93 Address 93: But this truth being lost or given up, vain learning and a worldly spirit 94 Address 94: Hence it is, that the scripture-scholar is looked upon as having divine knowledge of its 95 Address 95: Now to call such scripture skill divine knowledge, is just as solid and judicious 96 Address 96: That one light and Spirit, which was only one from all eternity 97 Address 97: |Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. 98 Address 98: For where can God's kingdom be come, but where every other power but his is 99 Address 99: What now have parts, and literature, and the natural abilities of man 100 Address 100: Now let this simple question decide the whole matter here 101 Address 101: Look now at the present state of Christendom, glorying in the light of Greek and 102 Address 102: In the first gospel church, heathen light had no other name than heathen darkness 103 Address 103: The simplicity indeed, both of the gospel letter and doctrine 104 Address 104: But now, what follows from this new risen light? Why 105 Address 105: And indeed, if we consider the nature of our salvation 106 Address 106: His intellectual faculties are, by the fall, in a much worse state than his natural 107 Address 107: Who then can enough wonder at that bulk of libraries 108 Address 108: What a grossness of ignorance, both of man and his savior 109 Address 109: This will be more or less the case with all the salvation- doctrines of Christ 110 Address 110: How came the learned heathens by their pride and vanity 111 Address 111: Self is the root, the tree, and the branches of all the evils of our 112 Address 112: All the vices of fallen angels and men have their birth and power in the 113 Address 113: What is then, or in what lies the great struggle for eternal life? It all 114 Address 114: And here it is to be observed, that every son of Adam is in the 115 Address 115: The enemies to man's rising out of the fall of Adam 116 Address 116: There has been much sharp looking out, to see where and what anti-Christ is 117 Address 117: But to know with certainty, where and what anti-Christ is 118 Address 118: What therefore has everyone so much to fear, to renounce and abhor 119 Address 119: This is that full-born natural self, that must be pulled out of the heart 120 Address 120: Now what is it in the human soul that most of all hinders the death 121 Address 121: Let then the high accomplished scholar reflect, that he comes by his wit 122 Address 122: The finest intellectual power, and that which has the best help in it towards bringing 123 Address 123: Yet so it is, in this fallen state of the gospel church 124 Address 124: However, to make way for parts, criticism, and language- learning 125 Address 125: The first and main doctrine of Christ and his apostles was 126 Address 126: This was the kingdom of God come to them 127 Address 127: No higher, or other thing is here said, than in these other words 128 Address 128: But now, is not this kingdom gone away from us 129 Address 129: What is the difference between man's own righteousness and man's own light in religion? They 130 Address 130: But lamentable as this is, the letter of scripture has been so long the usurped 131 Address 131: The TRUE nature, and full distinction between literal and divine knowledge 132 Address 132: Now clear and evident as this distinction is, between a mere literal direction to a 133 Address 133: Thus, as soon as a man of speculation can demonstrate that 134 Address 134: Again, another, forming an opinion of faith from the letter of scripture 135 Address 135: How trifling therefore to say no worse of it is that learning 136 Address 136: When the holy church of Christ, the kingdom of God came among men 137 Address 137: Hence it is, that from a religion of heavenly love 138 Address 138: It may perhaps be here said, Must there then be no learning or scholarship 139 Address 139: To this the first answer is, Happy, thrice happy are they 140 Address 140: Secondly, with regard to the demand of learned knowledge in the Christian church 141 Address 141: There is no knowledge in heaven, but what proceeds from this birth of love 142 Address 142: Let this be my excuse to the learned world 143 Address 143: One of Christ's followers said, |Lord, suffer me first to go and bury my father| 144 Address 144: The holy Jesus said, |I am the light of the world 145 Address 145: But to see the exceeding folly of expecting ability in divine knowledge 146 Address 146: For what is, or can be the fall of a divine Adam under the power 147 Address 147: But if fire and Spirit from heaven can alone make heavenly creatures 148 Address 148: Behold then your state, ye ministers, that wait at Christian altars 149 Address 149: Complain then no more of atheists, infidels, and such like open enemies to the gospel 150 Address 150: Our Lord has said, |The kingdom of God is within you 151 Address 151: Say now, out of reverence to sound literature, and abhorrence of enthusiasm 152 Address 152: What a sobriety of faith and sound doctrine is it 153 Address 153: What wonder, if sacraments, church-prayers, and preachings, leave high and low 154 Address 154: That the Jewish and Christian church stand at this day in the same kind of 155 Address 155: But is it not as easy to see, that the whole Christian church are in 156 Address 156: God said to Moses, |Put off thy shoes, for the place whereon thou standest is 157 Address 157: But here lies the great mistake, or rather idolatrous abuse of all God's outward dispensations. 158 Address 158: Need it now be asked, whether the TRUE Christ of the gospel be less blasphemed 159 Address 159: Christian doctors reproach the old learned rabbis, for their vain faith 160 Address 160: But nevertheless, in these condemners of rabbinic blindness, St. 161 Address 161: But now corruption, sin, death, and every evil of the world 162 Address 162: Let then the eager searcher into words for wisdom 163 Address 163: Now strange as all this may seem to the labor-learned possessor of far-fetched book- riches 164 Address 164: Show me a man whose heart has no desire 165 Address 165: On the other hand, show me a scholar as full of learning 166 Address 166: Again, all learned Christendom agrees in the same charge against temporal power in the church 167 Address 167: And first, can it be said that Mammmon is less served by Christians 168 Address 168: Look at things spiritual, and things temporal, and say if you can 169 Address 169: Again, secondly, |Ye have heard,| says our Lord, |that it hath been said by them 170 Address 170: |He that despiseth me,| says Christ, |despiseth not me 171 Address 171: If the swearing law was to order, that instead of kissing the gospel-book 172 Address 172: If it here be asked, whether I would have all private Christians to beggar themselves 173 Address 173: What I write, is not to show that Christendom's oaths 174 Address 174: When the matter of an oath is a manifest lie 175 Address 175: When a person swears of his own accord, or wantonly 176 Address 176: But here let it be well observed, that nothing that has here been said 177 Address 177: In a word, that which calls for, and requires oaths among Christians 178 Address 178: But to proceed now to a third and last instance 179 Address 179: In the darkest ages of Romish superstition, a martial spirit of zeal and glory for 180 Address 180: The light which broke out at the reformation, abhorred the bloody superstitious zeal of these 181 Address 181: Now who can help seeing, that satan, the prince of the powers of darkness 182 Address 182: Now fancy to yourself Christ, the Lamb of God 183 Address 183: But if this be too blasphemous an absurdity to be supposed 184 Address 184: Blinded Protestants think they have the glory of slaughtering blind papists 185 Address 185: When a Most Christian Majesty, with his catholic church 186 Address 186: A glorious Alexander in the heathen world is a shame and reproach to the human 187 Address 187: Can the duelist, who had rather sheathe his sword in the bowels of his brother 188 Address 188: Now imagine the duelist fasting and confessing his sins to God today 189 Address 189: What blindness can well be greater, than to think that a Christian kingdom 190 Address 190: Look at that which the private Christian is to do to his neighbor 191 Address 191: Love, goodness, and communication of good, is the immutable glory and perfection of the divine 192 Address 192: And if long and long ages of fiery pain 193 Address 193: O poor sinner, whoever thou art, repent and turn to God 194 Address 194: To prevent all this, and make thee a child of the first resurrection 195 Address 195: Now from this view of God's infinite love and mercy in Christ Jesus 196 Address 196: The temporal miseries and wrongs which war carries along with it 197 Address 197: But there is still an evil of war much greater 198 Address 198: That God's providence over his fallen creatures is nothing else but a providence of love 199 Address 199: Among unfallen creatures in heaven, God's Name and nature is LOVE 200 Address 200: Sing, O ye heavens, and shout all ye lower parts of the earth 201 Address 201: Look now at warring Christendom, what smallest drop of pity towards sinners is to be 202 Address 202: Here my pen trembles in my hand; but when 203 Address 203: For the GLORY OF HIS MAJESTY'S ARMS, said once a Most Christian king 204 Address 204: Again, would you further see the fall of the universal church 205 Address 205: Here now, let the wisdom of this world be as wise as ever it will 206 Address 206: |Demas,| says St. Paul, |hath forsaken me, having loved this present world. 207 Address 207: This wisdom has asked me, how it is possible for Christian kingdoms in the neighborhood 208 Address 208: This question is so far from needing to be answered by me 209 Address 209: But to know whether Christianity wants, or admits of war 210 Address 210: Now what follows from this going up of the nations to the mountain of the 211 Address 211: Would you see when and where the kingdoms of this fallen world are become a 212 Address 212: See here a kingdom of God on the earth 213 Address 213: As to the present fallen state of universal Christendom 214 Address 214: But the Christendom which I mean, that neither wants 215 Address 215: In these last ages of fallen Christendom, many reformations have taken place 216 Address 216: The wisdom of this world, with its worldly spirit 217 Address 217: This wisdom was the great evil root, at which the reforming ax should have been 218 Address 218: St. Paul speaks of a natural man, that cannot know the things of God 219 Address 219: This is the great anti-Christ, which is neither better nor worse 220 Address 220: If therefore you take anything to be church- reformation 221 Address 221: On this ground it is, that the apostle said 222 Address 222: Many are the marks, which the learned have given us of the TRUE church 223 Address 223: The scripture knows no Christians but saints, who in all things act as becometh saints. 224 Address 224: The same which Paul says, is said by Christ in other words 225 Address 225: The pleader for imperfection further supports himself by saying 226 Address 226: But surely he that is left under a necessity of sinning as long as he 227 Address 227: Of Christ it only can be said, that he is in himself the TRUE vine 228 Address 228: The sober divine, who abhors the pride of enthusiasts 229 Address 229: Our Lord has said this absolute truth, that unless we be born again from above 230 Address 230: Whence now comes all this folly of doctrines? It is because the church is no 231 Address 231: See how St. Paul sets forth the salvation 232 Address 232: What now is become of this TRUE church, or where must the man go 233 Address 233: Look at all that is outward, and all that you then see 234 Address 234: But truth, to the eternal praise and glory of God 235 Address 235: That this new birth of the Spirit, or the divine life in man