William Law · 11 of 44

An Address to the Clergy · Part 7

called Pride, Wrath, Envy, Hypocrisy, Hatred, Revenge, and Self-Exaltation, under the Power of Satan in his Kingdom of Darkness.—Nothing can possibly save you from being the certain Prey of all these evil Spirits, through the whole Course of your Life, but a Birth of that Love which is God himself, his Light, and Spirit within you.

There is no Knowledge in Heaven, but what proceeds from this Birth of Love, nor is there any Difference between the highest Light of an Angel, and the horrid Darkness of a Devil, but that which Love has made.—But now, since Divine Love can have no Beginning, but from a Birth of the Divine Nature in us, therefore says St. John, we love him because he FIRST loved us, the same as saying, we desire God, because he first desired us; for we could not desire God, but because He first desired us, we could not turn to God, but because he first turned to us. And so it is, that we could not love God, but because he first loved us, that is, because he first by our Creation brought forth, and by our Redemption continued and kept up that same Birth of his own Spirit of Love in us.—For as his Holy Spirit must first be a Gift to us, or born in us, and then we have that which can worship God in Spirit, so his Love must of all Necessity be a Gift to us, or born in us, and then we have that of God in us which alone can love him with his own Love.—A Truth absolutely asserted in these Words; 'Love is of God, and he that loveth, is born of God.'

Let this be my Excuse to the learned World, for owning no School of Wisdom, but where the one only Lesson is Divine Love; and the one only Teacher the Spirit of God. Let no one call this wild or extravagant; it is no wilder a Step, no more injurious to Man, to Truth and Goodness, than the owning no God but one.—For to be called from every Thing but Divine Love and the Spirit of God, is only being called from every Thing that has the Curse of fallen Nature in it.—And no Man can come from under this Curse, till he is born again of Divine Love, and the Spirit of God. For thus to be born, is as much the one sole Happiness, Joy, and Glory of Men, both now and ever, as it is the sole Joy and Glory of Angels eternally in the Heavens.—Believe me then, thou great Scholar, that all that thou hast got of Wisdom or Learning, Day after Day, in any other School but this, will stand thee in as much Stead, fill thee with as high heavenly Comfort at the Hour of Death, as all the long Dreams, which Night after Night, thou hast ever had in thy Sleep.—And till a Man knows this, with as much fulness of Conviction as he knows the Vanity of a Dream, he has his full Proof, that he is not yet in the Light of Truth, not yet taught of God, nor like-minded with Christ.

One of Christ's Followers said, 'Lord, suffer me first to go and bury my Father'; the Answer was, 'Let the Dead bury their Dead, follow thou me.'—Another said to him, 'Let me first go bid them Farewell, that are at Home in my House'; Jesus answered, 'No Man having put his Hand to the Plough, and looking back, is fit for the Kingdom of God.'—Now let it be supposed that a Third had said, Lord, I have left several deep-learned Books at Home, written by the greatest Masters of Grammar, Logic and Eloquence, suffer me first to go back for them, lest losing the Light which I had from them, I might mistake the Depth and Truth of thy heavenly Doctrines, or be less able to prove and preach them powerfully to others.—Would not such a Request as this have had a Folly and Absurdity in it, not chargeable upon those two other Requests which Christ rejected?—And yet, what can scholastic, classic, and critical Divinity say for itself, but that very same Thing, which this Requester here said?

The Holy Jesus said, 'I am the Light of the World, he that followeth me, walketh not in Darkness.'—Here spiritual Light and Darkness are as immutably fixed, and separated from one another, as the Light and Darkness of this World were divided on the first Day of the Creation. Jesus Christ, the eternal Son of God, is the one only Light both of Men and Angels.—Fallen Nature, the selfish Will, proud Tempers, the highest Abilities, the natural Sagacity, Cunning Arts and Subtleties, that are or can be in fallen Men and Angels, are nothing else but their fulness of spiritual Darkness, from which nothing but Works of Darkness can come forth.—In a Word, Darkness is the whole natural Man; Light is the new born Man from above. Therefore says the Christ of God, 'I am the Light of the World,' because He alone is the Birth of Heaven in the fallen Souls of Men.—But now, who can more reject this Divine Light, or more plainly choose Darkness instead of it, than he who seeks to have his Mind enriched, the Faculties of his fallen Soul cultivated by the Literature of Poets, Orators, Philosophers, Sophists, Sceptics, and Critics, born and bred up in the Worship and Praises of Idol Gods and Goddesses? What is this, but like going to the Serpent to be taught the innocent Spirit of the Dove; or to the elegant Lusts of Anacreon and Ovid, to learn Purity of Heart, and kindle the Flame of heavenly Love in our Souls? Look where you will, this is the Wisdom of those who seek to Pagans for Skill to work in Christ's Vineyard; who from long Labours in restoring the Grammar, and finding out the hidden Beauties of some old vicious Book, set up for qualified Artists to polish the Gospel Pearl of great Price.—Surely this is no better a Proof of their savouring the Things that are of God, than Peter gave, when his Master said to him, "Get thee behind me, Satan."—A grave Ecclesiastic, bringing forth out of his Closet skilful Meditations on the Commentaries of a murdering Caesar, or the sublime Rhapsody of an old Homer, or the astonishing Beauties of a modern Dunciad, has as much Reason to think that he is walking in the Light of Christ, and led by the Spirit of God, as they have who are only eating and drinking, and rising up to play.

But to see the exceeding Folly of expecting Ability in Divine Knowledge, from any Thing that is the Wit, Wisdom, or Spirit of the natural Man, you need only read these Words of the holy Messenger of God, the Elias that was to come. "I indeed," says he, "baptize you with Water, but He that cometh after me, whose Shoe's Latchet I am not worthy to unloose, He shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost, and with Fire."—Now if this which the Baptist said of Christ is not our Faith, if we do not receive it as the Truth in which we are firmly to stand, then, be as learned as we will, we have no better a Faith, or higher Wisdom, than those blind Rabbies who received not the Testimony of John.—A Fire and Spirit from above was the News which he published to the World; this, and nothing else, was his Kingdom of God that was at hand.—Now if this Fire and Spirit from above has not baptized us into a Birth of the Life of God in our Souls, we have not found that Christ and Kingdom of God, to which John bore Witness. But if (what is still worse) we are so bewitched through the Sorcery of Learning, as to turn Writers and Preachers against this inward, and only redeeming heavenly Fire and Spirit, we are baptized with the Spirit of those, to whom our Lord said, "Woe unto you Scribes, Pharisees, Hypocrites, for ye shut up the Kingdom of Heaven against Men; for ye neither go in yourselves, neither suffer ye them that are entering to go in."

For what is, or can be the Fall of a Divine Adam under the Power of Sin, Satan, and Hell, but the Extinction of that heavenly Fire and Spirit, which was his First Union with God and all heavenly Beings.—Say now, that he had not this heavenly Fire and Spirit at the first, that nothing lived or breathed in him but that astral Fire and Spirit which is the Life and Spirit of all earthly Animals, and then you have a Religion as Divine as that of the old Sadducees, who allowed of no Resurrection, Angel, or Spirit.—For, deny the Truth and Fulness of a Divine Life in the first Man, and then his Fall and Redemption are equally empty Sounds about nothing. For what can he be fallen from, or redeemed to, if he has now all that Fire and Spirit of Life which he ever had, or ought to have, and if all that is more than this, is but the Fiction and Dream of a distempered Brain? Tell me, why that burning and shining Light, that Man that was more than a Prophet, should come with his Water, and the Son of God, God of God, should come with his Fire-Baptism, if Man neither wanted, nor could receive a higher Water, and Fire of Life, than that which he has in common with the Beasts of the Field? Why is there all this Stir about Religions, Expiations and Atonements, why all these priestly Ordinations, Consecrations, Churches, Sacraments, and Prayers? For if the Fire and Spirit of this World is the one Life, and highest Life, both of Man and Beasts, we have it unasked for, and on the same Terms as the Beasts have it, and can only lose it, as they do when they lose their Existence.

But if Fire and Spirit from Heaven can alone make heavenly Creatures, and us, to be Children of an heavenly Father; if the Son of God took our fallen Nature upon him, that the first heavenly Fire and Spirit might again come to Life in us, if Divine Life, Divine Light, and Divine Goodness, can only come from them, and only in such Degree, as they are kindled in our Souls, what a Poverty of Sense is it in those, who are called to a Resurrection of the first Divine Life, where a new Creature is taught by that same Unction from above whence all the Angels and Principalities of Heaven have their Light and Glory, what a Poverty of Sense, I say, in such, to set themselves down at the Feet of a Master Tully, and a Master Aristotle, who only differ from the meanest of all other corrupt Men, as the Teaching Serpent differed from his fellow Animals, by being more subtile than all the Beasts of the Field.

Behold then your State, ye Ministers, that wait at Christian Altars, who will have neither Faith, nor Hope, nor Desire of Heavenly Fire kindled in your Souls, you have a Priesthood, and an Altar not fit to be named with that, which in Jewish Days had a holy Fire from God descending upon it, which made Priest and Sacrifice acceptable to God, though only Type and Pledge of that inward celestial Fire, which Christ would kindle into a never ceasing Burning, in the living Temples of his new born Children from above.

Complain then no more of Atheists, Infidels, and such like open Enemies to the Gospel Kingdom of God; for whilst you call heavenly Fire and Spirit, kindled into the same essential Life in us as they are in holy Angels, downright frenzy, and mystic Madness, you do all that infidel Work within the Church, which they do on the outside of it.—And if through a learned Fear of having that done to your earthly Reason, which was done to Enoch when God took him, you will own no higher a Regeneration, no more Birth of God in your Souls, than can be had by a few cold Drops of Water sprinkled on the Face, any of the heathen Gods of Wood and Stone are good enough for such an elementary Priesthood.—For let this be told you, as a Truth from God, that till heavenly Fire and Spirit have a Fulness of a Birth within you, you can rise no higher by your highest Learning, than to be elegant Orators about Scripture Words.

Our Lord has said, 'The Kingdom of God is within you,' that is, the heavenly Fire and Spirit, which are the true Kingdom and Manifestation of God, are within you. And indeed, where can it be else? Yet what learned Pains are taken to remove the literal Meaning from these Words, as too visionary a Thing for learned Ears.—And yet it is a Truth obvious to common Sense, that even this outward World of Stars and Elements, neither does, nor can belong to us, or we to it, but so far as it is, literally speaking, a Kingdom within us. For the outward Kingdom or Powers of this World signify nothing to a worldly Man that is dead; but no Man is dead, but because the Kingdom of this World, with all its Powers of Fire, Light, and Spirit, stands only outwardly about him, but has lost its Life and Power within him.

Say now, out of Reverence to sound Literature, and abhorrence of Enthusiasm, that the Kingdom of God is not really and virtually within, that its heavenly Fire, Light, and Spirit, are not, ought not to be born in a sober right-minded Follower of Christ, and then you have a good Disciple of Christ, as absolutely dead to the Kingdom of Heaven, as the Corpse that has Nothing of the Fire, Spirit, and Light of this World in it, is dead to all the outward World round about it.

What a Sobriety of Faith and sound Doctrine is it, to preach up a Necessity of being living Members of the Kingdom of Heaven, and at the same time the Necessity of orthodoxly holding, that a heavenly Birth neither is, nor can, nor ought to be within us! For if it either is, or could, or ought to be within us, then it could not be a brain-sick Folly to believe, that the literal Words of Christ had no Deceit, Falsity, or Delusion in them, when he said, 'Except a Man be born again from above, he cannot see, or enter into the Kingdom of God.' That is, he cannot possibly have any godlike or Divine Goodness, he cannot be a Child of an heavenly Father, but from the Nature and Spirit of his heavenly Father brought to a real Birth of Life in him.—Now if, without this Divine Birth, all that we have in us is but fallen Adam, a Birth of Sin, the Flesh, and the Devil, if the Power of this heavenly Birth is all the Power of Goodness that is or was, or ever can be in a Son of Adam; and if Logic, Learning, and Criticism, are almost everywhere set in high Places, to pronounce and prove it to be mere Enthusiasm and spiritual frenzy, what Wonder is it, if Folly of Doctrine, Wicked- ness of Life, Lusts of the Flesh, Profaneness of Spirit, Wantonness of Wit, Contempt of Goodness and Profession of Christianity, should all of them seem to have their full Establishment among us?

What Wonder, if Sacraments, Church-Prayers, and Preachings, leave high and low, learned and unlearned, Men and Women, Priests and People, as unaltered in all their aged Vices, as they leave Children unchanged in their Childish Follies? For where the one only Fountain of Life and Goodness is forsaken, where the Seed of the Divine Birth is not alive, and going forwards in the Birth, all the Difference between Man and Man is as Nothing with Respect to the Kingdom of God.—It matters not what Name is given to the old earthly Man of Adam’s bestial Flesh and Blood, whether he be called a zealous Churchman, a stiff-necked Jew, a polite civilized Heathen, or a grave Infidel; under all these Names, the unregenerate old Man has but one and the same Nature, without any other Difference, but that which Time, and Place, Education, Complexion, Hypocrisy, and worldly Wisdom, happen to make in him. By such a one, whether he be Papist, or Protestant, the Gospel is only kept as a Book, and all that is within it is only so much Condemnation to the Keeper, just as the old Man, a Jew, has kept the Book of the Law and Prophets, only to be more fully condemned by them.

That the Jewish and Christian Church stand at this Day in the same Kind of Apostasy, or fallen State, must be manifest to everyone, that will not shut his Eyes against it. Why are the Jews in a fallen State? It is because they have refused Him, who in his whole Process was the Truth, the Substance, the Life, and Fulfilling of all that which was outwardly taught, and prescribed in their Law and Prophets.

But is it not as easy to see, that the whole Christian Church are in a fallen State, and for the same Reason, because they are fallen or turned away from that Holy Spirit who was promised, and given to be the one only Power, Life, and Fulfilling of all that which was outwardly taught, and prescribed by the Gospel. For the Holy Spirit to come was just the same ALL, and FULFILLING of the whole Gospel, as a Christ to come was the All, and the Fulfilling of the Law.—The Jew therefore with his Old Testament, not owning Christ in all his Process to be the Truth and Life, and Fulfiller of their Law, is just in that same Apostasy, as the Christian with his New Testament, not owning the Holy Spirit in all his Operations, to be his only Light, Guide, and Governor.—For as all Types and Figures in the Law were but empty Shadows without Christ’s being the Life and Power of them, so all that is written in the Gospel is but dead Letter, unless the Holy Spirit in Man be the living Reader, the living Rememberer, and the living Doer of them. Therefore, where the Holy Spirit is not thus owned and received, as the whole Power and Life of the Gospel State, it is no Marvel, that Christians have no more of Gospel Virtues, than the Jews have of Patriarchal Holiness, or that the same Lusts and Vices which prosper amongst Jews, should break forth with as much Strength in fallen Christendom. For the New Testament not ending in the Coming of the Holy Spirit, with Fulness of Power over Sin and Hell, and the Devil, is but the same, and no better a Help to Heaven, than the Old Testament without the Coming of a Messiah.—Need I now say any more, to demonstrate the Truth of that which I first said was the one Thing absolutely essential, and only available to Man’s Salvation, namely, the SPIRIT of God brought again to his FIRST POWER of LIFE IN US. This was the Glory of Man’s Creation, and this alone can be the Glory of his Redemption.—All besides this, that passes for a Time betwixt God and Man, be it what it will, shows only our Fall and Distance from God, and in its best State has only the Nature of a good Road, which is only good, because that which we want is at the End of it.—Whilst God calls us by various outward Dispensations, by creaturely Things, figurative Institutions, amp;c., it is a full Proof, that we are not yet in our true State, or that Union with God which is intended by our Redemption.

God said to Moses, ‘Put off thy Shoes, for the Place whereon thou standest is holy Ground.’ Now this which God said to Moses, is only that very same Thing, which Circumcision, the Law, Sacrifices, and Sacraments, say to Man. They are in themselves nothing else but outward Significations of inward Impurity, and lost Holiness, and can do no more in themselves, but intimate, point, and direct to an inward Life and new Birth from above, that is to be sought after.

But here lies the great Mistake, or rather Idolatrous Abuse of all God’s outward Dispensations.—They are taken for the Thing itself, for the Truth and Essence of Religion. That which the learned Jews did with the outward Letter of their Law, that same do learned Christians with the outward Letter of their Gospel.—Why did the Jewish Church so furiously and obstinately cry out against Christ, Let him be crucified? It was because their letter-learned Ears, their worldly Spirit, and Temple-Orthodoxy, would not bear to hear of an inward Saviour, not bear to hear of being born again of his Spirit, of eating his Flesh, and drinking his Blood, of his dwelling in them, and They in Him.—To have their Law of Ordinances, their Temple-Pomp sunk into such a Fulfilling Saviour as this, was such enthusiastic Jargon to their Ears, as forced their sober, rational Theology, to call Christ, Beelzebub, his Doctrine, Blasphemy, and all for the sake of Moses and rabbinic Orthodoxy.

Need it now be asked, Whether the true Christ of the Gospel be less blasphemed, less crucified, by that Christian Theology which rejects an inward Christ, a Saviour living and working in the Soul, as its inward Light and Life, generating his own Nature and Spirit in it, as its only Redemption, whether that which rejects all this as mystic Madness be not that very same old Jewish Wisdom sprung up in Christian Theology, which said of Christ when teaching these very Things, “He is mad, why hear ye him?” Our blessed Lord in a Parable sets forth the blind Jews, as saying of himself, “We will not have this man to reign OVER us.” — The sober-minded Christian Scholar has none of this Jewish Blindness, He only says of Christ, we will not have this Man to REIGN IN US, and so keeps clear of such mystic Absurdity, as St. Paul fell into, when he enthusiastically said, “Yet not I, but Christ that liveth in me.”

Christian Doctors reproach the old learned Rabbis, for their vain Faith, and carnal Desire of a glorious, temporal, outward Christ, who should set up their Temple-Worship all over the World. — Vanity indeed, and learned Blindness enough?

But nevertheless, in these Condemners of rabbinic Blindness, St. Paul’s words are remarkably verified, viz., “Wherein thou judgest another, thou condemnest thyself, for thou that judgest dost the same Thing.” — For, take away all that from Christ which Christian Doctors call Enthusiasm, suppose him not to be an inward Birth, a new Life and Spirit within us, but only an outward, separate, distant heavenly Prince, no more really in us, than our high Cathedrals are in the third Heavens, but only by an invisible hand from his Throne on high, some Way or other raising and helping great Scholars, or great temporal Powers, to make a Rock in every Nation for his Church to stand upon; suppose all this (which is the very Marrow of modern Divinity) and then you have that very outward Christ, and that very outward Kingdom, which the carnal Jew dreamed of, and for the Sake of which the Spiritual Christ was then nailed to the Cross, and is still crucified by the new risen Jew in the Christian Church. — If it now be asked, Whence, or from what, comes all this Spiritual Blindness, which from Age to Age thus mistakes and defeats all the gracious Designs of God towards fallen Mankind? Look at the Origin of the first Sin, and you see it all. — Had Eve desired no Knowledge but what came from God, Paradise had been the Habitation of her and all her offspring. — If But now Corruption, Sin, Death, and every Evil of the World, have entered into the Church, the Spouse of Christ, just as they entered into Eve, the Spouse of Adam in Paradise, in the same Way, and from the same Cause, viz., a Desire of more, or other Knowledge, than that which comes from God alone.—This Desire is the Serpent’s Voice within every Man, which does all that to him, and in him, which the Serpent at the Tree did to Eve.—It carries on the first deceit, it shows and recommends to him that same beautiful Tree of own Will, own Wit, and own Wisdom, springing up within him, which Eve saw in the Garden; and yet so blind is this Love of Wisdom, as not to see, that his eating of it is in the strictest Truth his eating of the same forbidden Fruits as Eve did, and keeping up in himself all that Death and Separation from God, which the first Knowledge-Hunger brought forth.

Let then the eager Searcher into Words for Wisdom, the Book-Devourer, the Opinion-Broker, the Exalter of human Reason, and every projecting Builder of religious Systems, be told this, that the Thirst and Pride of being learnedly Wise in the Things of God, is keeping up the grossest Ignorance of them, and is nothing else but Eve’s old Serpent, and Eve’s evil Birth within them, and does no better work in the Church of Christ, than her Thirst after Wisdom did in the Paradise of God.—Speak, Lord, for thy Servant heareth, is the one only Way by which any Man ever did, or ever can attain Divine Knowledge, and Divine Goodness.—To knock at any other door but this, is but like asking Life of that which is itself Dead, or praying to him for Bread who has nothing but stones to give.

Now strange as all this may seem to the labour-learned Possessor of far-fetched Book-Riches, yet it is saying no more, nor any Thing else, but that which Christ said in these Words, 'Except ye be converted, and become as little Children, ye cannot enter into the Kingdom of God.' For, if classic Gospellers, Linguist Critics, Scripture-logicians, Salvation Orators, able Dealers in the grammatic Powers of Hebrew, Greek, and Roman Phrases, Idioms, Tropes, Figures, amp;c., amp;c., can show, that by raising themselves high in these Attainments, they are the very Men that are sunk Down from themselves into Christ’s little Children of the Kingdom of God, then it may be also said, that he who is labouring, scheming, and fighting for all the Riches he can get from both the Indies, is the very Man that has left all to follow Christ, the very Man that ‘labours not for the Meat that perishes.’

Show me a Man whose Heart has no Desire, or Prayer in it, but to love God with his whole Soul and Spirit, and his Neighbour as himself, and then you have shown me the Man who knows Christ, and is known of Him;—The best and wisest Man in the World, in whom the first paradisaical Wisdom and Goodness are come to Life.—Not a single Precept in the Gospel, but is the Precept of his own Heart, and the Joy of that new-born heavenly Love which is the Life and Light of his Soul.—In this Man, all that came from the old Serpent is trod under his Feet, not a Spark of Self, of Pride, of Wrath, of Envy, of Covetousness, or worldly Wisdom, can have the least Abode in him, because that Love, which fulfilleth the whole Law and the Prophets, that Love which is God and Christ, both in Angels and Men, is the Love that gives Birth, and Life, and Growth to every Thing that is either Thought, or Word, or Action in Him.—And if He has no Share or Part with foolish Errors, cannot be tossed about with every Wind of Doctrine, it is because, to be Always governed by this Love, is the same Thing as to be Always taught of God.

On the other Hand, show me a Scholar as full of Learning, as the Vatican is of Books, and he will be just as likely to give all that he has for the Gospel-Pearl, as he would be, if he was as rich as Crœsus. Let no one here imagine, that I am writing against all human Literature, Arts and Sciences, or that I wish the World to be without them.—I am no more an Enemy to them, than to the common useful Labours of Life.—It is literal Learning, verbal Contention, and critical Strife about the Things of God, that I charge with Folly and Mischief to Religion. And in this, I have all learned Christendom, both Popish and Protestant on my Side. For they both agree in charging each other with a bad and false Gospel-State, because of that which their Learning, Logic, and Criticism do for them. Say not then, that it is only the illiterate Enthusiast that condemns human Learning in the Gospel Kingdom of God. For when he condemns the Blindness and Mischief of popish Logic and Criticism, he has all the Learned Protestant World with him; and when he lays the same Charge to Protestant Learning, he has a much larger Kingdom of popish great Scholars, logically and learnedly affirming the same Thing. So that the private Person, charging human Learning with so much Mischief to the Church, is so far from being led by Enthusiasm, that he is led by all the Church-learning that is in the World.

Again, all learned Christendom agrees in the same Charge against temporal Power in the Church, as hurtful to the very Being and Progress of a Salvation-Kingdom that is not of this World, as supporting Doctrines that human Learning has brought into it. And true it is and must be, that human Power can only support and help forward human Things.—The Protestant brings Proof from a thousand Years’ Learning and Doctrines, that the Pope is an unjust Usurper of temporal Power in the Church, which is Christ’s spiritual Spouse. The Papist brings the Learning of as many Ages to show that a temporal Head of the Church is an Anti-christian Usurpation.—And yet (N.B.) he who holds Christ to be the one, only Head, Heart, and Life of the Church, and that no Man can call Jesus, Lord, but by the Holy Ghost, passes with the learned of both these People for a brain-sick Enthusiast.—Is it not then high Time to look out for some better Ground to stand upon, than such Learning as this? Now look where you will, through all the whole Nature of Things, no Divine Wisdom, Knowledge, Goodness, and deliverance from Sin, are anywhere to be found for fallen Man, but in these two Points; (1) a total entire Entrance into the whole Process of Christ; (2) a total Resignation to, and sole Dependence upon the continual Operation of the Holy Ghost, or Christ come again in the Spirit, to be our never-ceasing Light, Teacher, and Guide into all those Ways of Virtue, in which He himself walked in the Flesh.—All besides this, call it by what Name you will, is but dead Work, a vain Labour of the old Man, to new create himself. And here let it be well observed, that in these two Points consists the whole of that mystic Divinity, to which a Jewish Orthodoxy at this Day is so great an Enemy. For nothing else is meant, or taught by it, but a total dying to Self (called the Process or Cross of Christ) that a new Creature (called Christ in us, or Christ come in the Spirit) may be begotten in the Purity, and Perfection of the first Man’s Union with God.—Now, let the Christian World forget, or depart from this one mystic Way of Salvation, let anything else be thought of or trusted to but the Cross of Christ, and the Spirit of Christ, and then, though Churches, and Preachers, and Prayers, and Sacraments are everywhere in Plenty, yet nothing better can come of it than a Christian Kingdom of Pagan Vices, along with a Mouth-Belief of an holy catholic Church, and Communion of Saints.—To this melancholy Truth, all Christendom both at home and abroad bears full Witness. Who need be told, that there is not a Corruption or Depravity of human Nature, no Kinds of Pride, Wrath, Envy, Malice, and Self-love; no sorts of Hypocrisy, Falseness, Cursing, Swearing, Perjury, and Cheating; no Wantonness of Lust in every Kind of Debauchery, but are as common all over Chris