William Law · 13 of 44

An Address to the Clergy · Part 9

Sing, O ye Heavens, and Shout all ye lower Parts of the Earth, this is OUR GOD that varies not, whose first creating Love knows no Change, but into a redeeming Pity towards all his fallen Creatures.

Look now at Warring Christendom, what smallest Drop of Pity towards Sinners is to be found in it? Or how could a Spirit all Hellish, more fully contrive and hasten their Destruction? It stirs up and kindles every Passion of fallen Nature that is contrary to the all-humble, all-meek, all-loving, all-forgiving, all-saving Spirit of Christ.—It unites, it drives, and compels nameless Numbers of unconverted Sinners to fall, Murdering and Murdered among Flashes of Fire, with the Wrath and Swiftness of Lightning, into a Fire infinitely worse than that in which they Died.—O sad Subject for Thanksgiving Days, whether in Popish or Protestant Churches! For if there is a Joy of all the Angels in Heaven for one Sinner that repents, what a Joy must there be in Hell over such Multitudes of Sinners, not suffered to repent? And if they who have converted many to Righteousness, shall ‘Shine as the Stars in the Firmament for ever’, what Chorasin’s Woe may they not justly fear, whose proud Wrath and vain Glory have robbed such numberless Troops of poor Wretches, of all Time and Place of knowing what Righteousness they wanted, for the Salvation of their immortal Souls.

Here my Pen trembles in my Hand; but when, O when will one single Christian Church, People, or Language, tremble at the Share they have in this Death of Sinners!

For the GLORY OF HIS MAJESTY'S ARMS, said once a Most Christian King: Now if at that Time, his Catholic Church had called a solemn Assembly to unite Hearts and Voices in this pious Prayer, 'O blessed Jesus, dear redeeming Lamb of God, who camest down from Heaven, to save Men's Lives, and not destroy them, go along, we humbly pray Thee, with our Bomb-Vessels and Fire-Ships, suffer not our thundering Cannon to roar in Vain, but let thy tender Hand of Love and Mercy direct their Balls to more Heads and Hearts of thine own redeemed Creatures, than the poor Skill of Man is able of itself to do':—Had not such Prayers had more of the Man of the Earth, more of the Son of Perdition in them, than the Most Christian King's glorying in his Arms?

Again, would you further see the Fall of the Universal Church, from being led by the Spirit of Christ, to be guided by the Inspiration of the great fiery Dragon, look at all European Christendom sailing round the Globe with Fire and Sword, and every murdering Art of War, to seize the Possessions, and kill the Inhabitants of both the Indies.—What natural Right of Man, what supernatural Virtue which Christ brought down from Heaven, was not here trodden under Foot? All that you ever read or heard of Heathen Barbarity, was here outdone by Christian Conquerors. And to this Day, what Wars of Christians against Christians, blended with Scalping Heathens, still keep staining the Earth and the Seas with human Blood, for a miserable Share in the Spoils of a plundered Heathen World! A World, which should have heard, or seen, or felt nothing from the Followers of Christ, but a Divine Love, that had forced them from distant Lands, and through the Perils of long Seas, to visit Strangers with those glad Tidings of Peace and Salvation to all the World, which Angels from Heaven, and Shepherds on Earth, proclaimed at the Birth of Christ.

Here now, let the Wisdom of this World be as Wise as ever it will, and from its learned Throne condemn all this as Enthusiasm; it need be no Trouble to anyone, to be condemned by that Wisdom, which God himself has condemned as Foolishness with Him. For the Wisdom of this World has all the Contrariety to Salvation-Wisdom, that the Flesh has to the Spirit, Earth to Heaven, or Damnation to Salvation. It is a Wisdom, whose Spirit and Breath keep all the Evil that is in fallen Man alive, and which in its highest Excellence has only the full grown Nature of that carnal Mind, which is Enmity against God.—It is a Wisdom that is Sensual, and Devilish, that hinders Man from knowing, and dying to all those Deaths, without which there can be no new Life.—It is a Wisdom that turns all Salvation-Truths into empty, learned Tales, that instead of helping the Sinner to confess his Sins, and feel the Misery that is hid under them, helps him to an Art of hiding, nay of defending them.—For that which the Lusts and Passions do contrary to the Wisdom from above, is proved to be right Reason by this Wisdom from below, whose greatest Skill is shown, in keeping all the Powers and Passions of the Natural Man in Peace and Prosperity; and so the poor blinded Sinner lives and dies in a total Ignorance of all that Light, blessing, and Salvation, which could only be had by a broken and contrite Heart.—For (N.B.) with Respect to Conscience, this is the chief Office of Worldly Wisdom; it is to keep all Things quiet in the Old Man, that whether busied in Things spiritual, or temporal, he may keep up the Lusts of the Flesh, the Lust of the Eyes, and the Pride of Life, without any Disturbance from Religious Phantoms, and Dreams of mystic Idiots, who for want of sober Sense and sound Learning, think that Christ really meant what he said in these Words, “Except a Man be born again of the Spirit, or from above, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God.”—For this Wisdom, come to its highest perfection, is a Classic Moral Painter, which though it cannot alter the Nature, yet can change the Colours of every Thing; it can give to the most heavenly Virtue such an outward Form and Colour, as will force the stoutest of aged and learned Men to run away from it; and to a Vice of the greatest Deformity it can pencil such charming Features, as will make every Child of this World, wish to live and die with it.—Its next Perfection is that of a flattering Orator, who has Praise and Dispraise at his own free Disposal; for as they are all of his own making, so he can dispose them on whom, and on what he will; not only as outward interesting Occasions call for them, but also as the inward Necessities, the Ups and Downs of his own poor Self want them. For Self, however willing to be always strong, has its weak Hours, and would be ever tottering, unless this Elbow-Orator kept him every Day (though perhaps not every Night) free from the disturbing Whispers of a Seed of God in his Soul.—Now join (if you please) Learning and Religion to act in fellowship with this worldly Wisdom, and make their best of it, and then you will have a Depravity of Craft and Subtlety as high as Flesh and Blood can carry it, which will bring forth a glittering Pharisee, with a hardness of Heart, greater than that of the Sinner Publican.

‘Demas,’ says St. Paul, ‘hath forsaken me, having loved this present World.’—Here you see all the Good and Blessing that is inseparable from the Wisdom of this World, it always does the same Thing, and has the same Effect wherever it is; it will do to high and low, learned or unlearned, Clergy or Laity, that same unavoidably which it did to Demas; it will make them forsake Christ, turn their Backs on every Grace and Virtue of his Holy Spirit, as certainly as the Love of the World made Demas to forsake Paul.

This Wisdom has asked me, how it is possible for Christian Kingdoms in the Neighbourhood of one another to preserve themselves, unless the Strength and Weapons of War are everyone's Defence, against such Invasions, Encroachments, and Robberies, as would otherwise be the Fate of Christian Kingdoms from one another.

This Question is so far from needing to be answered by me, that it is wholly on my Side; it confesses all, and proves all that I have said of the fallen State of Christendom, to be strictly true.—For if this is the governing Spirit of Christian Kingdoms, that no one of them can subsist in Safety from its neighbouring Christian Kingdoms, but by its Weapons of War, are not all Christian Kingdoms equally in the same unchristian State, as two neighbouring bloody Knaves, who cannot be safe from one another, but as each other's murdering Arms preserve and protect them? This Plea therefore for Christendom's Wars, proves nothing else but the want of Christianity all over the Christian World, and stands upon no better a Foundation of Righteousness and Goodness, than when one Murdering Knave kills another that would have killed him.

But to know whether Christianity wants, or admits of War, Christianity is to be considered as in its right State.—Now the true State of the World turned Christian, is thus described by the great Gospel-Prophet, who showed what a Change it was to make in the fallen State of the World.—‘It shall come to pass,’ says he, ‘in the last Days,’ that is, in the Days of Christendom, ‘that the Mountain of the Lord’s House’ (his Christian Kingdom) ‘shall be established in the Top of the Mountains, and all Nations shall flow into it; and many People shall say, Let us go up to the Mountain of the Lord’s House, and he will teach us of his Ways, and we will walk in his Paths,’ Isaiah ii. 2.

Now what follows from this going up of the Nations to the Mountain of the Lord’s House, from his teaching them of his Ways, and their walking in his Paths? The holy Prophet expressly tells you in his following Words, ‘They shall beat their Swords into Plough-Shares, and their Spears into pruning Hooks: Nation shall not lift up its Sword against Nation, (N.B.) neither shall they learn War any more.’—This is the Prophet's true Christendom, with one and the same essential Divine Mark set upon it, as when the Lamb of God said, 'By this shall all Men know that ye are my Disciples, if ye Love one another as I have loved you.'—Christ's Kingdom of God is nowhere come, but where the Works of the Devil are destroyed, and Men are turned from the Power of Satan unto God.—God is only another Name for the highest and only Good; and the highest and only Good means nothing else but LOVE with all its WORKS.—Satan is only another Name for the Whole and all of Evil, and the whole of Evil is nothing else but its whole Contrariety to Love.—And the Sum Total of all Contrariety to Love is contained in Pride, Wrath, Strife, Self, Envy, Hatred, Revenge, Mischief, and Murder. Look at these with all their Fruits that belong to them, and then you see all the princely Power that Satan is, and has in this fallen World.

Would you see when and where the Kingdoms of this fallen World are become a Kingdom of God, the Gospel Prophet tells you, that it is then and there where all Enmity ceases.—'The Wolf,' says he, 'shall dwell with the Lamb, and the Leopard shall lie down with the Kid. The Calf and the young Lion and the Fatling together, and a little Child shall lead them. The Cow and the Bear shall feed, and their young ones shall lie down together, and the Lion shall eat Straw like the Ox. The suckling Child shall play on the Hole of the Asp, and the weaned Child shall put his Hand on the Cockatrice's Den.'—For, (N.B.) 'they shall not HURT or DESTROY in all my holy Mountain,' that is, through all holy Christendom, Isaiah xi. 6.

See here a Kingdom of God on the Earth; it is nothing else but a Kingdom of mere Love, where all HURT and DESTROYING is done away, and every Work of Enmity changed into one united Power of Heavenly Love.—But observe again and again, whence this comes to pass, that God's Kingdom on Earth is, and can be nothing else, but the Power of reigning Love; the Prophet tells you, it is because in the Day of his Kingdom, 'the Earth shall be full of the Knowledge of the Lord, as the Waters cover the Sea.'—Therefore, O Christendom, thy Wars are thy certain Proofs, that thou art all over as full of an Ignorance of God, as the Waters cover the Sea.

As to the present fallen State of universal Christendom, working under the Spirit and Power of the great fiery Dragon, it is not my Intention, in any Thing I am here upon, to show how any Part of it can subsist, or preserve itself from being devoured by every other Part, but by its own Dragon Weapons.

But the Christendom which I mean, that neither wants, nor allows of War, is only that where Christ is King, and his Holy Spirit the only Governor of the Wills, Affections, and Designs of all that belong to it.—It is my Complaint against, and Charge upon all the Nations of Christendom, that this Necessity of murdering Arms is the Dragon’s Monster, that is equally brought forth by all and every Part of fallen Christendom; and that therefore all and every Part, as well Popish as Protestant, are at one and the same Distance from the Spirit of their Lord and Saviour the Lamb of God, and therefore all want one and the same entire Reformation.

In these last Ages of fallen Christendom, many Reformations have taken Place; but alas! Truth must be forced to say, that they have been in all their Variety, little better than so many run-away Births of one and the same Mother, so many lesser Babels come out of Babylon the great.—For among all the Reformers, the one only true Reformation has never yet been thought of.—A Change of Place, of Governors, of Opinions, together with new formed outward Models, is all the Reformation that has yet been attempted.

The Wisdom of this World, with its worldly Spirit, was the only Thing that had overcome the Church, and had carried it into Captivity. For in Captivity it certainly is, as soon as it is turned into a Kingdom of this World; and a Kingdom of this World it certainly is, as soon as worldly Wisdom has its Power in it.—Not a false Doctrine, not a bad Discipline, not an usurped Power, or corrupt Practice ever has prevailed, or does prevail in the Church, but has had its whole Birth and Growth from worldly Wisdom.

This Wisdom was the great evil Root, at which the reforming Axe should have been laid, and must be laid, before the Church can be again that Virgin Spouse of Christ, which it was at the Beginning.—‘If any Man,’ says St. Paul, ‘will be wise, let him become a Fool in this World.’ This admits of no Exception, it is a Maxim as universal and unalterable, as that which says, ‘If any Man will follow Christ, let him deny himself.’—For no Man has any more to deny than that, which the Wisdom and Spirit of this World are, and do in him. For all that is in this World, the Lusts of the Flesh, the Lust of the Eye, and the Pride of Life, are the very Things in which alone the Wisdom of this World lives, and moves, and has its being. It can be no other, can rise no higher, nor be any better, than they are and do.—For as heavenly Wisdom is the Whole of all heavenly Goodness, so earthly Wisdom has the whole Evil of all the earthly Nature.

St. Paul speaks of a natural Man, that cannot know the Things of God, but to whom they are mere Foolishness. This natural Man is only another Name for the Wisdom of this World; but though he cannot know the Things that be of God, yet he can know their Names, and learn to speak that which the Saints of God have spoken about them.—He can make Profession of them, be eloquent in their Praise, and set them forth in such a desirable View, as shall make them quite agreeable to the Children of worldly Wisdom.—This is the natural Man, who having got into the Church, and Church Power, has turned the Things of God into Things of this World.—Had this Man been kept out of the Church, the Church had kept its first Purity to this Day; for its fallen State is nothing else but its Fall into the Hands of the natural Man of this World.—And when this is the State of the Church, the Wisdom of this World (which always loves its own) will be in Love with it, will spare no Cost to maintain it, will make Laws, fight Battles in Defence of it, and condemn every Man as Heretical, who dares speak a Word against this Glorious Image of a Church, which the Wisdom of this World has set up.

This is the great Antichrist, which is neither better nor worse, nor any Thing else, but the Spirit of Satan working against Christ, in the Strength and Subtlety of earthly Wisdom.

If therefore you take any Thing to be Church-Reformation, but a full Departure from the Wisdom of this World, or any Thing to be your Entrance into a Salvation-Church, but the Nature, Spirit, and Works of Christ, become living in you, then, whether Papist or Protestant, Reformation or no Reformation, all will be just as much Good to you, as when a Sadducee turns Publican, or from a Publican becomes a Pharisee.—For the Church of Christ, as it is the Door of Salvation, is nothing else but Christ himself.—Christ in us, or we in his Church, is the same Thing. When that is alive, Wills, and Works in you, which was alive in Christ, then you are in his Church; for that which he was, that must they be who are his. Without this, it matters not what Pale you are in. To every Thing but the new Creature, Christ says, ‘I know you not’; and to every Virtue that worldly Wisdom puts on, ‘Get thee behind me, Satan, for thou savourest not the Things that be of God.’ And the Reason why it must be thus, why worldly Wisdom, though under a Religious Form, is and can be nothing else, but that which is called Satan, or Antichrist, is because all that we are, and have from this World, is that very enmity against God, that whole Evil which separates us from him, and constitutes all that Death and Damnation that belongs to our fallen State.—And so sure as the Life of this World is our Separation from God, so sure is it, that a total Departure from every Subtlety and Prosperity of worldly Wisdom, is absolutely necessary to change an evil Son of Adam into a holy Son of God.—And here it is well to be observed, that the Church of Christ is solely for this End, to make us Holy as he is Holy. But nothing can do this, but that which has full Power to change a Sinner into a Saint. And he who has not found that Power in the Church, may be assured that he is not yet a true Son of that Church. For the Church brings forth no other Births, but holy Children of God; it has no other End, no other Nature, or Work, but that of changing a Sinner into a Saint.—But this can only be done, just as the change of Night into Day is done, or as the Darkness is quite lost in the Light.—Something as contrary to the whole Nature of Sin, as Light is to Darkness, and as powerful over it, as the Light is powerful over Darkness, can alone do this.—Creeds, Canons, Articles of Religion, stately Churches, learned Priests, Singing, Preaching, and Praying in the best contrived Form of Words, can no more raise a dead Sinner into a living Saint, than a fine System of Light and Colours can change the Night into Day. For, (N.B.) That which cannot help you to all Goodness, cannot help you to any Goodness, nor can that take away any Sin, but that which can take away all Sin.

On this Ground it is, that the Apostle said, 'Circumcision is nothing, and Uncircumcision is nothing'; and on the same Ground it must be said, that Popery is nothing, and Protestantism is nothing, because all is nothing, as to Salvation, but a Sinner changed into a Saint, or the Apostle's new Creature.—Call nothing therefore your Holy, Salvation-Church, but that which takes away all your Sins; this is the only Way not to be deceived with the Cry about Churches, Reformations, and Divisions.—If it be asked, What is meant by taking away all our Sins? The Whole is fully told us in these Words, 'To as many as believed, to them He gave Power to become Sons of God.' This is the true taking away, or Forgiveness of Sins; not a strong Imagination, or Brain-Fancy, that on such an Hour, on such a Day, or in such a Place, you felt and knew assuredly that all your Sins were forgiven you: By such a Forgiveness of Sins, That which made you a Sinner is not destroyed, but you will have every Day the same Necessity of confessing yourself a miserable Sinner, as you had that Morning, when your Sins were not forgiven you till the Afternoon.—The true Forgiveness of Sins is only then, when That which Sinned in us is done away, or become Powerless in us; but nothing can do this, but That Power by which we become Sons of God.—A blind Man has then only a Deliverance from his Blindness, when he is put in full Possession of seeing Eyes; this is the only doing away of his Darkness.—Just so, and no otherwise, are our Sins forgiven us, or done away, when the Power by which we become Sons of God, or the new Creature, is so given to us, so possessed by us, as seeing Eyes are given to and possessed by the Man, who before that was all Blindness.—And as our Old Man can only then be said to be truly put off, when the New Man in Christ is raised to Life in his Stead, so our Sins are only then truly blotted out, or done away, when an unsinning Nature, or a Birth of God that Sinneth not, is come to be the ruling Life in us.

Many are the Marks, which the learned have given us of the true Church; but be that as it will, no Man, whether Learned or Unlearned, can have any Mark or Proof of his own true Church-Membership, but his being dead unto all Sin, and alive unto all Righteousness.—This cannot be more plainly told us, than in these Words of our Lord, “He that committeth Sin, is the Servant of Sin”; but surely that Servant of Sin cannot at the same Time be a living Member of Christ’s Body, or that new Creature, who dwells in Christ, and Christ in him.—To suppose a Man born again from above, yet under a necessity of continuing to Sin, is as absurd as to suppose, that the true Christian is only to have so much of the Nature of Christ born in him, as is consistent with as real a Power of Satan still dwelling in him.—“If the Son,” says Christ, “shall make you free, then ye shall be free indeed.” What is this, but saying, if Christ be come to Life in you, then a true Freedom from all Necessity of Sinning is given to you. Now if this is hindered, and cannot come to pass in the faithful Follower of Christ, it must be, because both the Willing and Working of Christ in Man is too weak to overcome that, which the Devil wills and works in him.—All this Absurdity, and even Blasphemy, is necessarily implied in that common Doctrine of Books and Pulpits, which teaches, that the Christian can never have done Sinning as long as he lives.—Well therefore may Christendom Sleep as securely as it does, under the Power of Sin, without any Thought, Hope, or Desire of doing God’s Will on Earth, as it is done in heaven; without any concern at their not being Pure, as he who has called them is Pure, or Walking as he Walked.

The Scripture knows no Christians but Saints, who in all Things Act as becometh Saints. But now if the Scripture Saint did not mean a Man that eschewed all Evil, and was Holy in all his Conversation, Saint and no Saint would have only such Difference, as one carnal Man will always have from another.—Preachers and Writers comfort the half Christians with telling them, that God requires not a perfect, sinless Obedience, but accepts the Sincerity of our weak Endeavours instead of it.—Here, if ever, the Blind lead the Blind.—For St. Paul, comparing the Way of Salvation to a Race, says, “In a Race all run, but ‘ONE obtaineth the Prize: So run that ye may obtain.’—Now if Paul had seeing Eyes, must not they be Blind who teach, that God accepts of all that run in the religious Race, and requires not that any should obtain the Prize.—How easy was it to see, that the Sincerity of our weak Endeavours was quite a different Thing from that, which alone is, and can be the required Perfection of our Lives. The first God accepts, that is, bears with. But why or how? Not because he seeks or requires no more, but he bears with them, because, though at a great Distance from, they are, or may be making towards that Perfection, or new Creature, which he absolutely requires, which is the Fulness of the Stature of Christ, and is that which Paul says, is the ONE that obtains the Prize.

The same which Paul says, is said by Christ in other Words, ‘Strive,’ says he, ‘to enter in at the strait Gate.’ Here our best Endeavours are called for, and therefore accepted by God, and yet at the same Time he adds, ‘that many shall strive to enter in, but shall not be able.’—Why so, whence comes this? It is because Christ himself is the one Door into Life.—Here the Strivers mentioned by Christ, and those which St. Paul calls Runners in a Race, are the very same Persons; and Christ calling himself the one Door of Entrance, is the same Thing as when Paul says, that one only receives the Prize, and that one, which alone obtains the Prize, or that enters through the right Door, is that new Creature in whom Christ is truly Born. For whether you consider Things Natural or Supernatural, Nothing but Christ in us, can be our Hope of Glory.

The Pleader for Imperfection further supports himself by saying, No Man in the World, Christ excepted, was ever without Sin.—And so say I too; and with the Apostle I also add, ‘That if we say we have not Sinned, we make him a Liar.’—But then it is as true to say, that we make him a Liar, if we deny the Possibility of our ever being freed from a Necessity of Sinning. For the same Word of God says, ‘If we confess our Sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our Sins, and (N.B.) to cleanse us from all Unrighteousness.’

But surely he that is left under a Necessity of Sinning as long as he lives, can no more be said to be cleansed from all Unrighteousness, than a Man who must be a Cripple to his dying Day, can be said to be cured of all his Lameness.—What weaker Conclusion can well be made, than to infer, that because Christ was the only Man that was born and lived free from Sin, therefore no Man on Earth can be raised to a Freedom from Sinning; no better than concluding, that because the Old Man is every one’s Birth from Adam, therefore there can be no such Thing as a New Man, created unto Righteousness, through Christ Jesus, living and being all in all in him; no better Sense or Logic, than to say, that because our Redeemer could not find us any Thing else but Sinners, therefore he must of all Necessity leave us to be Sinners.

Of Christ it only can be said, that he is in himself the true Vine; but of every Branch that is his, and grows in him, it must be as truly said, that the Life and Spirit of the true Vine, is the Life and Spirit of its Branches, and that as is the Vine, so are its Branches.—And here let it be well noted, that if the Branch has not the Life and Goodness of the Vine in it, it can only be, because it is broken off from the Vine, and therefore a withered Branch, fit for the Fire.—But if the Branches abide in the Vine, then Christ says this glorious Thing of them, 'Ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you,' John xv. 7. The very same glorious Thing, which he had before said of himself, 'Father, I thank Thee, that Thou hast heard me,' and (N.B.) 'I knew that thou hearest me always,' John xi. 41. Now say that this new Creature, who is in such Union, Communion, and Power with God, because Christ is in him, and he in Christ, as really as the Vine is in the Branches, and the Branches in the Vine, say that he must be a Servant of Sin, as long as he lives in this World, and then your Absurdity will be as great, as if you had said, that Christ in us must partake of our Corruption.