William Law · 10 of 44

An Address to the Clergy · Part 6

This is that full-born natural Self, that must be pulled out of the Heart, and totally denied, or there can be no Disciple of Christ; which is only saying this plain Truth, that the apostate Self-idolatrous Nature of the old Man must be put off, or there can be no new Creature in Christ.

Now what is it in the human Soul that most of all hinders the Death of this old Man? What is it that above all other Things strengthens and exalts the Life of Self, and makes it the Master and Governor of all the Powers of the Heart and Soul? It is the fancied Riches of Parts, the Glitter of Genius, the Flights of Imagination, the Glory of Learning, and the Self-conceited Strength of natural Reason: These are the strong Holds of fallen Nature, the Master-Builders of Pride’s Temple in the Heart of Man, and which, as so many Priests, keep up the daily Worship of Idol-Self.—And here let it be well, and well observed, that all these magnified Talents of the natural Man are started up through his miserable Fall from the Life of God in his Soul.—Wit, Genius, Learning, and natural Reason, would never have had any more a Name among Men, than Blindness, Ignorance, and Sickness, had Man continued, as at First, an holy Image of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.—Every Thing then that dwelt in him, or came from him, would have only said so much of God, and nothing of Himself, have manifested nothing to him but the heavenly Powers of the triune Life of God dwelling in him.—He would have had no more Sense or Consciousness of his own Wit, or natural Reason, or any Power of Goodness in all that He was, and did, than of his own creating Power, at beholding the created Heavens and Earth.—It is his dreadful Fall from the Life of God in his Soul, that has furnished him with these high intellectual Riches, just as it has furnished him with the substantial Riches of his bestial Appetites and Lusts. And when the Lusts of the Flesh have spent out their Life, when the dark thick Body of earthly Flesh and Blood shall be forced to let the Soul go loose, all these bright Talents will end with that System of fleshly Lusts, in which they begun; and that of Man which remains will have nothing of its own, nothing that can say, I do this, or I do that; but all that it has or does, will be either the Glory of God manifested in it, or the Power of Hell in full Possession of it.—The Time of Man's playing with Parts, Wit, and Abilities, and of fancying himself to be something great and considerable in the intellectual World, may be much shorter, but can be no longer, than he can eat and drink with the Animals of this World.—When the Time comes, that fine Buildings, rich Settlements, acquired Honours, and Rabbi, Rabbi, must take their Leave of him, all the stately Structures, which Genius, Learning, and Flights of Imagination, have painted inwardly on his Brain and outwardly on Paper, must bear full Witness to Solomon's Vanity of Vanities.

Let then the high accomplished Scholar reflect, that he comes by his Wit, and Parts, and acute Abilities, just as the Serpent came by his Subtlety; let him reflect, that he might as well dream of acquiring angelic Purity to his animal Nature by multiplying new invented Delights for his earthly Passions and Tempers, as of raising his Soul into Divine Knowledge through the well exercised Powers of his natural Reason and Imagination.

The finest intellectual Power, and that which has the best Help in it towards bringing Man again into the Region of Divine Light, is that poor despised Thing called Simplicity. This is that which stops the Workings of the fallen Life of Nature, and leaves room for God to work again in the Soul, according to the good Pleasure of his holy Will. It stands in such awaiting Posture before God, and in such Readiness for the Divine Birth, as the Plants of the Earth wait for the inflowing Riches of the Light and Air. But the Self-assuming Workings of Man's Natural Powers shut him up in himself, closely barred up against the inflowing Riches of the Light and Spirit of God.

Yet so it is, in this fallen State of the Gospel Church, that with these proud Endowments of fallen Nature, the Classic Scholar, full fraught with Pagan Light and Skill, comes forth to play the Critic and Orator with the simplicity of Salvation Mysteries; Mysteries which mean nothing else but the inward Work of the triune God in the Soul of Man, nor any other Work there, but the raising up a dead Adam into a living Christ of God.

However, to make way for Parts, Criticism, and Language-Learning, to have the full Management of Salvation Doctrines, the well-read Scholar gives out, that the ancient Way of knowing the Things of God, taught and practised by Fishermen-Apostles, is obsolete. They indeed wanted to have Divine Knowledge from the immediate continual Operation of the Holy Spirit, but this State was only for a Time, till Genius, and Learning entered into the Pale of the Church.—Behold, if ever, ‘the Abomination of Desolation standing in the holy Place!’—For as soon as the Doctrine is set up, that Man’s natural Parts and acquired Learning have full Right and Power to sit in the Divinity Chair, and to guide Men into that Truth which was once the only Office and Power of the Holy Spirit, as soon as this is done, and so far as it is received, it may with the greatest Truth be said, that the Kingdom of God is entirely shut up, and only a Kingdom of Scribes, Pharisees, and Hypocrites, can come instead of it. For by this Doctrine the whole Nature and Power of Gospel Religion is much more denied, than by setting up the Infallibility of the Pope; for though his Claim to Infallibility is false, yet he claims it from and under the Holy Spirit; but the Protestant Scholar has his Divinity Knowledge, his Power in the Kingdom of Truth, from himself, his own Logic, and learned Reason.—Christ has nowhere instituted an infallible Pope; and it is full as certain, that he has nowhere spoke one single Word, or given the least Power to Logic, Learning, or the natural Powers of Man, in his Kingdom. He has never said to them, ‘Whatsoever ye shall bind on Earth, shall be bound in Heaven;’ never said to them, ‘go ye and teach all Nations,’ no more than he has ever said to Wolves, ‘go ye, and feed my Sheep.’—Christ indeed said of himself, according to the Flesh, It is expedient for you that I go away. But where has he said of himself according to the Spirit, It is also expedient for you that I go away, that your own natural Abilities and learned Reason may have the Guidance of you into all Truth? This is nowhere said, unless Logic can prove it from these Words, ‘Without me ye can do nothing,’ and, ‘Lo, I am with you to the end of the World.’

The first and main Doctrine of Christ and his Apostles was, to tell the Jews, ‘that the Kingdom of God was at Hand,’ or was come to them. Proof enough surely, that their Church was not that Kingdom of God, though by God's Appointment, and under Laws of his own commanding. But why not, when it was thus set up by God? It was because it had human and worldly Things in it, consisted of carnal Ordinances, and had only Types, and Figures, and Shadows of a Kingdom of God that was to come.—Of this Kingdom, Christ says, 'My Kingdom is not of this World'; and as a Proof of it, he adds, 'if it was of this World, then would my Servants fight for me'; which was saying, that it was so different in Kind, and so superior in Nature to this World, that no Sort of worldly Power could either help, or hinder it. But of this World, into which the Kingdom of God was come, the Holy One of God says, 'In the World ye shall have Tribulation, but be of good Comfort, I have overcome the World.' Now how was it that Christ's Victory was their Victory? It was, because he was in them, and they in Him, 'Because I live, ye shall live also'; in that Day ye shall know that 'I am in the Father, and you in me, and I in you.'

This was the Kingdom of God come to them, the same Kingdom of God in which Adam was born and begun his first glorious Life, when the Image and Likeness of the holy Trinity had an outward Glory, like that which broke through the Body of Christ, when on Mount Tabor his Face did shine as the Sun, 'and his Raiment was white as the Light.'—To the Children of this Kingdom, says its Almighty King, 'When they bring you before Magistrates and Powers, take no Thought how, or what ye shall answer, or what ye shall say unto them, for the Holy Ghost shall teach you in that same Hour what ye ought to say. For it is not ye that speak, but the Spirit of your Father that speaketh in you.'

No higher, or other Thing is here said, than in these other Words, 'Take no Thought, what ye shall Eat, or Drink, or wherewithal ye shall be clothed, but seek first the Kingdom of God, and his Righteousness, and all these Things shall be added unto you.' This is the Truth of the Kingdom of God, come unto Men, and this is the Birth-right Privilege of all that are living Members of it, to be delivered from their own natural Spirit which they had from Adam, from the Spirit and Wisdom of this World, and through the whole Course of their Lives only to say, and do, and be that, which the Spirit of their Father worketh in them.

But now, is not this Kingdom gone away from us, are we not left comfortless, if instead of this Spirit of our Father speaking, doing, and working every Thing in us and for us, we are left again to our own natural Powers, to run to every Lo here, and Lo there, to find a Share in that Kingdom of God, which once was, and never can be any Thing else but God, the Wisdom and Power of God manifested in our Flesh? Had it not been as well, nay better for us, to have been still under Types and Figures, sacrificing Bulls and Goats by Divine Appointment, than to be brought under a Religion that must be Spirit and Life, and then left to the jarring Interests of the Wisdom of the Greek, and the Carnality of the Jew, how to be living Members of it? For where the Spirit of God is not the continual immediate Governor of spiritual Things, nothing better can come of it. For the Truth and full Proof of this, no more need be appealed to than all the Libraries and Churches of Christendom for many Ages to this Day.

What is the Difference between Man’s own Righteousness and Man’s own Light in Religion? They are strictly the same Thing, do one and the same Work, namely, keep up and strengthen every Evil, Vanity, and Corruption of fallen Nature. Nothing saves a Man from his own Righteousness, but that which saves and delivers him from his own Light.—The Jew that was most of all set against the Gospel, and unable to receive it was he that trusted in his own Righteousness; this was the rich Man, to whom it was as hard to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven as for a Camel to go through the Eye of a Needle.—But the Christian, that trusts in his own Light, is the very Jew that trusted in his own Righteousness; and all that he gets by the Gospel, is only that which the Pharisee got by the Law, namely, to be further from entering into the Kingdom of God than Publicans and Harlots.—How comes it, that a Beast, a scarlet Whore, a horned Dragon, and other the most horrible Descriptions of diabolical Power, have been by the Spirit of God made Descriptions of the Christian Church? How comes it, that the Spirit describes the Gospel-Church as driven into a Wilderness;—the two faithful Witnesses, Moses and Jesus, as prophesying so many Ages in Sackcloth, and slain in the Streets of spiritual Sodom and Egypt? It is because Man’s own natural Light, Man’s own conceited Righteousness, his serpentine Subtlety, his Self-love, his sensual Spirit and worldly Power, have seized the Mysteries of Salvation that came down from Heaven, and built them up into a Kingdom of envious Strife and Contention, for learned Glory, spiritual Merchandise, and worldly Power.—This is the Beast, the Whore, and Dragon, that has governed, and will govern in every private Christian, and public Church, till, dead to all that is Self, they turn to God; not to a God that they have only heard of with their Ears, and their Fathers have told them, but to a God of Life, Light, and Power, found living and working within them, as the essential Life, Light, and Power of their own Lives.—For God is only our God, by a Birth of his own Divine Nature within us. This, and nothing but this, is our whole Relation to, our only Fellowship with him, our whole Knowledge of him, our whole Power of having any Part in the Mysteries of Gospel-Salvation. Nothing can seek the Kingdom of God, or hunger and thirst after his Righteousness, Nothing can cry Abba Father, Nothing can pray, ‘Thy Kingdom come,’ Nothing can say of Christ, ‘My Lord, and my God,’ but That which is born of God, and is the Divine Nature itself become creaturely in us. Nothing but God in Man can be a Godly Life in Man.—Hence is that of the Apostle, ‘The Letter killeth, but the Spirit giveth Life.’ But you will say, can this be true of the Spiritual Divine Letter of the Gospel? Can it kill, or give death? Yes, it kills, when it is rested in; when it is taken for Divine Power, and supposed to have Goodness in itself; for then it kills the Spirit of God in Man, quenches his holy Fire within us, and is set up instead of it.—It gives Death, when it is built into Systems of Strife and Contention about Words, Notions and Opinions, and makes the Kingdom of God to consist, not in Power, but in Words. When it is thus used, then of Necessity it kills, because it keeps from That which alone is Life and can give Life.—This then is the Whole of the Matter; all the literal Truths, and Variety of Doctrines and Expressions of the written Word, have but one Nature, one End, and one Errand, they all say Nothing else to Man but that one Thing which Christ said, in these Words, ‘Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will refresh you’; just the same, as when it is said, ‘Jesus Christ, who is of God made unto us Wisdom, Righteousness, and Sanctification’; this is the only Refreshment from Christ. Again, ‘But ye are washed, but ye are cleansed in the Name of our Lord Jesus’; just the same as when it is said, ‘Except ye abide in me, and I in you, ye have no Life in you.’ Again, ‘By Grace ye are saved, by Faith ye are saved,’ says neither more nor less than this, ‘He that eateth my Flesh, and drinketh my Blood, hath eternal Life’; the same as when Christ says, ‘Without me ye can do nothing’; the same as the Apostle says, ‘Yet not I, but Christ that liveth in me’; the same as ‘Christ in us the Hope of Glory’; if Christ be not in you, ye are Reprobates.’—Therefore to come to Christ, to have our heavy laden, fallen Nature refreshed by him, to be born Spirit of his Spirit, to have his heavenly Flesh and heavenly Blood made living in us, before we put off the bestial Body and Blood of Death which we have from Adam, is the one only Thing taught and meant by all that is so variously said in the Scriptures of the Merits and Benefits of Christ to us.—It is the SPIRIT, the BODY, the BLOOD of Christ within us that is our whole Peace with God, our whole

Adoption, our whole Redemption, our whole Justification, our whole Glorification; and this is the one Thing said, and meant by that new Birth, of which Christ says, “Except a Man be born again from above, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God.” Now, the true Ground why all that is said of Christ in such a Variety of Expressions has only one Meaning, and points only to one and the same Thing is this, it is because the whole State and Nature of fallen Man wants only one Thing, and that one Thing is a real Birth of the Divine Nature made living again in him, as at the first; and then all is done, that can be done, by all the Mysteries of the Birth, and whole Process of Christ, for our Salvation.—All the Law, the Prophets, and the Gospel are fulfilled, when there is in Christ a new Creature, having Life in and from him, as really as the Branch has its Life in and from the Vine.—And when all Scripture is thus understood, and all that either Christ says of himself, or his Apostles say of him, are all heard, or read, only as one and the same Call to come to Christ, in Hunger and Thirst to be filled and blessed with his Divine Nature made living within us; then, and then only, the Letter killeth not, but as a sure Guide leads directly to Life.—But Grammar, Logic, and Criticism knowing nothing of Scripture but its Words, bring forth nothing but their Wisdom of Words, and a Religion of Wrangle, Hatred, and Contention, about the Meaning of them.

But lamentable as this is, the Letter of Scripture has been so long the usurped Province of School-Critics, and learned Reasoners making their Markets of it, that the Difference between literal, notional, and living Divine Knowledge, is almost quite lost in the Christian World. So that if any awakened Souls are here or there found among Christians, who think that more must be known of God, of Christ, and the Powers of the World to come, than every Scholar can know by reading the Letter of Scripture, immediately the Cry of Enthusiasm, whether they be Priests, or People, is sent after them.—A Procedure, which could only have some Excuse, if these Critics could first prove, that the Apostle’s Text ought to be thus read, The Spirit killeth, but the Letter giveth Life.

The true Nature, and full Distinction between literal and Divine Knowledge, is set forth in the highest Degree of Clearness in these Words of our Saviour, “The Kingdom of God is like a Treasure in a Field”: Thus far is the true Use and Benefit, and utmost Power of the Letter, it can tell us of a Treasure that we want, a Treasure that belongs to us, and how and where it is to be found; but when it is added, that a “Man goes and sells all that he has, and buys that Field,” then begins the Divine Knowledge, which is nothing else, but the Treasure possessed and enjoyed. Now what is here said, is the same that is said in these other Words of Christ, 'Except a Man denies himself and forsakes all that he hath, he cannot be my Disciple'; that is, he cannot partake of my Mind, my Spirit, and my Nature, and therefore cannot know Me; he is only a Hearer of a Treasure, without entering into the Possession and Enjoyment of it. And thus it is with all Scripture, the Letter can only direct to the doing of that which it cannot do, and give Notice of something that it cannot give.

Now clear and evident as this Distinction is, between a mere literal Direction to a Thing, and a real Participation of it, which alone is a true Perception of it, the generality of Christians seem quite insensible of any other religious Perception, or Knowledge of Divine Things, but such Ideas or Notions of them, as a Man can form from Scripture Words. Whereas Good and Evil, the only Objects of religious Knowledge, are an inward State and Growth of our Life, they are in us, are a Part of us, just in the same Manner as seeing and hearing are in us, and we can have no real Knowledge of them any other way, than as we have of our own seeing and hearing. And as no Man can get or lose his seeing or hearing, or have less or more of them, by any Ideas or Notions that he forms about them, just so it is with that which is the Power of Good, and the Power of Evil in us; Notions and Ideas have no effect upon it. Yet no other Knowledge is thought of, or sought after, or esteemed of any Value, but that which is notional and the Work of the Brain.

Thus, as soon as a man of Speculation can demonstrate that, which he calls the Being and Attributes of God, he thinks, and others think, that he truly knows God. But what Excuse can be made for such an Imagination, when plain Scripture has told him, that to know God is eternal Life, that is, to know God is to have the Power, the Life, and the Spirit of God manifested in him, and therefore it is eternal Life. 'No man knoweth the Father, but the Son, and he to whom the Son revealeth him.' Because the Revelation of the Son is the Birth of the Son in the Soul, and this new Creature in Christ has alone Knowledge of God, what he is, and does, and works in the Creature.

Again, Another, forming an Opinion of Faith from the Letter of Scripture, straightway imagines that he knows what Faith is, and that he is in the Faith. Sad Delusion! For to know what Faith is, or that we are in the Faith, is to know that Christ is in us of a Truth; it is to know the Power of his Life, his Sufferings, his Death, his Resurrection and Ascension, made good in our Souls. To be in the Faith, is to have done with all Notions and Opinions about it, because it is found and felt by its living Power and Fruits within us, which are Righteousness, Peace, and Joy in the Holy Ghost. All which are three Names or Powers peculiar to Jesus Christ; He alone is our Righteousness, our Peace, our Joy in the Holy Ghost. And therefore Faith is not in us, by reason of this or that Opinion, Assent or Consent, but it is Christ, or the Divine Nature in us; or its Operations could not be Righteousness, Peace, and Joy in the Holy Ghost.—By Faith ye are saved, has no other Meaning than By Christ ye are saved. And if Faith in its whole Nature, in its Root and Growth, was any Thing else but Christ, or a Birth of the Divine Nature within us, it could do us no Good, no Power could be ascribed to it, it could not be our Victory, it could not overcome the World, the Flesh, and the Devil.—Every Faith that is not Christ in us is but a Dead Faith.

How trifling therefore (to say no worse of it) is that Learning, which sets up a Difference between Faith and its Works, between a Justification by Faith, and Justification by its Works.—Is there any Difference between Christ, as a Redeemer, and his redeeming Works? Can they be set above one another in their redeeming Efficacy? If not, then Faith and its Works, which are nothing else but Christ in us, can have no separation from, or excellency above one another, but are as strictly one, as Christ is one, and no more two Things, than our Saviour and our Salvation are two different Things in us. Every Thing that is said of Faith, from Adam to this Day, is only so much said of the Power, and Life of a one redeeming Christ, working within us; so that to divide Faith from its Works is as absurd, as to divide a Thing from its self, a Circle from its Roundness. No Salvation would have ever been ascribed to Faith, but because it is, in the strictest Sense, Christ Himself, the Power of God, living and working in us. It never would have been said of Faith, that every Power of the World, the Flesh, and the Devil, must yield to it, but because it is that very Christ within us, without whom we can do nothing. But if without Christ we can do nothing, and yet all things are possible to our Faith, can there be a fuller Demonstration that our Faith is nothing else but Christ born, and living within us? Whatever therefore there is of Power within us, that tends to Salvation, call it by what Name you will, either Faith, or Hope, or Prayer, or Hunger after the Kingdom of God and his Righteousness, it is all but one Power, and that one Power is Christ within us. If therefore Faith and its good Works are but one and the same Christ living in us, the Distinction between a good Faith and its good Works, and all the contentious Volumes that have been written about it, are as mere ignorant Jargon, as a Dis- tinction made and contended for, between Life and its living Operations.

When the holy Church of Christ, the Kingdom of God came among Men, was first set up, it was the Apostle's Boast, that all other Wisdom or Learning was sunk into nothing. "Where," says he, "is the Wise, the Scribe, the Disputer of this World? Hath not God made them Foolishness?" But now, it is the Boast of all Churches, that they are full of the Wise, the Scribes, the Disputers of this World, who sit with learned Pomp in the Apostle's Chair, and have the Mysteries of the Kingdom of God committed to them.

Hence it is, that from a Religion of Heavenly Love, built upon the redeeming Life and Doctrines of a Son of God dying to save the whole World, Division, Bitterness, Envy, Pride, Strife, Hatred, and Persecution, nay every Outrage of War and Bloodshed, breathe and break forth with more Strength in learned Christendom, than ever they did from a Religion of Pagan Idolatry, set up by Satan.

It may perhaps be here said, Must there then be no Learning or Scholarship, no recondite Erudition in the Christian Church? Must there be nothing thought of, or got by the Gospel, but mere Salvation? Must its Ministers know nothing, teach nothing, but such Salvation-Doctrines as Christ and his Apostles taught; nothing but the full denial of Self, Poverty of Spirit, Meekness, and Humility, and unwearied Patience, a never ceasing Love, an absolute Renunciation of the Pomps and Vanities of the World, a full Dependence upon our Heavenly Father; no Joy or rejoicing but in the Holy Ghost; no Wisdom but that which God gives; no Walking but as Christ walked; no Reward or Glory for their Labours of Love, but that of being found in Christ, Flesh of his Flesh, Bone of his Bones, Spirit of his Spirit, and clothed with the Wedding-Garment when the Bridegroom comes, "when the Lord Himself shall descend from Heaven with a Shout, with the Voice of the Archangel, and with the Trumpet of God, and the Dead in Christ shall rise first"?

To this the first Answer is, Happy, thrice happy are they, who are only the thus learned Preachers of the Gospel, who through all their Ministry, seek nothing for themselves or others, but to be taught of God; hunger after nothing but the Bread of Life that came down from Heaven, owning no Master but Christ, no Teacher but his Holy Spirit; as unable to join with the Diggers in Pagan Pits of Learning, as with those that "Labour for the Wind, and give their Money for that which is not Bread."

Secondly, with regard to the Demand of learned Knowledge in the Christian Church, it may be answered, that all that has been said above, is only for the Increase and Promotion of it, and that all Ignorance and Darkness may be driven quite out of it.—The Church of Christ is the Seat or School of all the highest Knowledge that the human Nature is capable of in this Life. Ignorance is everywhere but in the Church of Christ.—The Law, the Prophets, and the Gospel, are the only Treasures of all that can be called the Knowledge either of God or Man; and He in whom the Law, the Prophets, and the Gospel are fulfilled, is the only well-educated Man, and one of the first-rate Scholars in the World. But now, who is he, that has this Wisdom from these rich Treasures? Who is he, in whom all is known and fulfilled which they teach? The Lip of Truth has told us, that it is he, and he alone, 'who loves God with all his Heart, with all his Soul, with all his Mind, and with all his Strength, and his Neighbour as himself.' This is the Man that is all Wisdom, all Light, and let into full Possession of all that is meant by all the Mysteries contained in the Law, the Prophets, and the Gospel.—Where this Divine Love is wanting, and a diabolical Self sits in its Place, there may be great Wits, shining Critics, Orators, Poets, amp;c., as easily as there may be a profound Machiavel, a learned Hobbs, or an atheistical Virtuoso. But would you divinely know the Mysteries of Nature, the Ground and Reason of Good and Evil in this World, the Relation and Connection between the visible and invisible World, how the Things of Time proceed from, are influenced by, and depend upon the Things and Powers of Eternity, there is but one only Key of Entrance; nothing can open the Vision, but seeing with the Eyes of that same Love, which begun and carries on all that is, and works in visible and invisible Nature.—Would you divinely know the Mysteries of Grace and Salvation, would you go forth as a faithful Witness of gospel Truths, stay till this Fire of Divine Love has had its perfect Work within you. For till your Heart is an Altar, on which this heavenly Fire never goes out, you are dead in yourself, and can only be a Speaker of dead Words, about Things that never had any Life within you. For without a real Birth of this Divine Love in the essence of your Soul, be as learned and polite as you will, your Heart is but the dark Heart of fallen Adam, and your Knowledge of the Kingdom of God will be only like that which murdering Cain had.—For every Thing is Murder, but that which Love does.—If Love is not the Breath of your Life, the Spirit that forms and governs every Thing that proceeds from you, every Thing that has your Labour, your Allowance and Consent, you are broken off from the Works of God, you have left his Creation, you are without God, and your Name, and Nature, and Works, can have no other Name, or Nature, but that which is