as to the ministry; and all other qualifications to it, besides the help, and gifts of the spirit of God, and those natural and common to men; and for a time they seemed, like John of old, a burning and a shining light, to other societies.

They were very diligent, plain, and serious, strong in scripture, and bold in profession, bearing much reproach and contradiction. But that which others fell by, proved their snare. For worldly power spoiled them too, who had enough of it to try them, what they would do if they had more; and they rested also too much upon their watery dispensation, instead of passing on more fully to that of the fire and holy ghost, which was his baptism who came with a 'fan in his hand, that he might thoroughly (and not in part only) purge his floor,' and take away the dross and the tin of his people, and make a man finer than gold. Withal, they grew high, rough, and self-righteous, opposing further attainment, too much forgetting the day of their infancy and littleness, which gave them something of a real beauty; insomuch that many left them, and all visible churches and societies, and wandered up and down as sheep without a shepherd, and as doves without their mates, seeking their beloved, but could not find him, as their souls desired to know him, whom their souls loved above their chiefest joy.

These people were called Seekers by some, and the Family of Love by others; because, as they came to the knowledge of one another, they sometimes met together, not formally to pray or preach, at appointed times and places, in their own wills, as in times past they were accustomed to do; but waited together in silence, and as any thing rose in any one of their minds, that they thought savoured of a divine spring, they sometimes spoke. But so it was, that some of them not keeping in humility, and in the fear of God, after the abundance of revelation, were exalted above measure, and for want of staying their minds in an humble dependence upon him that opened their understandings to see great things in his law, they ran out in their own imaginations, and mixing them with those divine openings, brought forth a monstrous birth, to the scandal of those that feared God, and waited daily in the temple, not made with hands, for the consolation of Israel; the Jew inward, and circumcision in spirit.

This people obtained the name of Ranters from their extravagant discourses and practices. For they interpreted Christ's fulfilling the law for us, to be a discharging of us from any obligation and duty the law required of us, instead of the condemnation of the law for sins past, upon faith and repentance, and that now it was no sin to do that which before it was a sin to commit; the slavish fear of the law being taken off by Christ, and all things good that man did, if he did but do them with the mind and persuasion that it was so. Insomuch that divers

fell into gross and enormous practices; pretending in excuse thereof, that they could, without evil, commit the same act which was sin in another to do; thereby distinguishing between the action and the evil of it, by the direction of the mind and intention in the doing of it. Which was to make sin superabound by the aboundings of grace, and to turn from the grace of God into wantonness, a securer way of sinning than before: as if Christ came not to save us from our sins, but in our sins; not to take away sin, but that we might sin more freely at his cost, and with less danger to ourselves. I say, this ensnared divers, and brought them to an utter and lamentable loss, as to their eternal state; and they grew very troublesome to the better sort of people, and furnished the looser with an occasion to profane.

It was about that very same time, as you may see in the ensuing annals, that the eternal, wise, and good God was pleased, in his infinite love, to honour and visit this benighted and bewildered nation with his glorious day-spring from on high; yea with a most sure and certain sound of the word of light and life, through the testimony of a chosen vessel, to an effectual and blessed purpose, can many thousands say. Glory be to the name of the Lord for ever.

For as it reached the conscience, and broke the heart, and brought many to a sense and search; so what people had been vainly seeking without, with much pains and cost, they by this ministry found within; where it was they wanted what they sought for, viz. the right way to peace with God. For they were directed to the light of Jesus Christ within them, as the seed and leaven of the kingdom of God; near all, because in all, and God's talent to all. A faithful and true witness and just monitor in every bosom. The gift and grace of God to life and salvation, that appears to all, though few regard it. This, the traditional Christian, conceited of himself, and strong in his own will and righteousness, and overcome with blind zeal and passion, either despised as a low and common thing, or opposed as a novelty, under many hard names and opprobrious terms; denying, in his ignorant and angry mind, any fresh manifestation of God's power and spirit in man in these days, though never more needed to make true christians: not unlike those Jews of old, that rejected the son of God at the very same time that they blindly professed to wait for the Messiah to come; because, alas, he appeared not among them according to their carnal mind and expectation.

This brought forth many abusive books, which filled the greater sort with envy, and lesser with rage, and made the way and progress of this blessed testimony strait and narrow indeed, to those that received it. However, God owned his own work, and this testimony did effectually reach, gather, comfort, and establish the weary and heavy laden, the

hungry and thirsty, the poor and needy, the mournful and sick of many maladies, that had spent all upon physicians of no value, and waited for relief from heaven, help only from above: seeing, upon a serious trial of all things, nothing else would do but Christ himself, the light of his countenance, a touch of his garment, and help from his hand; who cured the poor woman's issue, raised the centurion's servant, the widow's son, the ruler's daughter, and Peter's mother. And, like her, they no sooner felt his power and efficacy upon their souls, but they gave up to obey him in a testimony to his power; and that with resigned wills and faithful hearts, through all mockings, contradictions, confiscations, beatings, prisons, and many other jeopardies that attended them for his blessed name's sake.

And truly, they were very many and very great; so that in all human probability they must have been swallowed up quick of the proud and boisterous waves that swelled and beat against them, but that the God of all their tender mercies was with them in his glorious authority, so that the hills often fled, and the mountains melted before the power that filled them; working mightily for them, as well as in them, one ever following the other. By which they saw plainly, to their exceeding great confirmation and comfort, 'that all things were possible with him with whom they had to do.' And that the more that which God required seemed to cross man's wisdom, and expose them to man's wrath, the more God appeared to help and carry them through all to his glory: insomuch that if ever any people could say in truth, Thou art our sun and our shield, our rock and sanctuary, and by thee we have leaped over a wall, and by thee we have run through a troop, and by thee we have put the armies of the aliens to flight,' these people had a right to say it. And as God had delivered their souls of the wearisome burdens of sin and vanity, and enriched their poverty of spirit, and satisfied their great hunger and thirst after eternal righteousness, and filled them with the good things of his own house, and made them stewards of his manifold gifts; so they went forth to all quarters of these nations, to declare to the inhabitants thereof, what God had done for them; what they had found, and where and how they had found it; viz. the way to peace with God: inviting all to come, and see, and taste for themselves, the truth of what they declared unto them.

And as their testimony was to the principle of God in man, the precious pearl and leaven of the kingdom, as the only blessed means appointed of God to quicken, convince, and sanctify man; so they opened to them what it was in itself, and what it was given to them for: how they might know it from their own spirit, and that of the subtle appearance of the evil one, and what it would do for all those, whose minds should be turned off from the vanity of the world, and its lifeless ways and VOL. I.

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teachers, and adhere to this blessed light in themselves, which discovers. and condemns sin in all its appearances, and shows how to overcome it, if minded and obeyed in its holy manifestations and convictions; giving power to such to avoid and resist those things that do not please God, and to grow strong in love, faith, and good works: that so man, whom sin hath made as a wilderness, overrun with briers and thorns, might become as the garden of God, cultivated by his divine power, and replenished with the most virtuous and beautiful plants of God's own right hand planting, to his eternal praise.

But these experimental preachers of glad tidings of God's truth and kingdom could not run when they list, or pray or preach when they pleased, but as Christ their redeemer prepared and moved them by his own blessed spirit, for which they waited in their services and meetings, and spoke as that gave them utterance, and which was as those having authority, and not like the dreaming, dry, and formal Pharisees. And so it plainly appeared to the serious minded, whose spiritual eye the Lord Jesus had in any measure opened; so that to one was given the word of exhortation, to another the word of reproof, to another the word of consolation, and all by the same spirit and in the good order thereof, to the convincing and edifying of many.

And truly they waxed strong and bold through faithfulness; and by the power and spirit of the Lord Jesus became very fruitful; thousands, in a short time, being turned to the truth through their testimony in ministry and sufferings, insomuch as in most counties, and many of the considerable towns of England, meetings were settled, and daily there were added such as should be saved. For they were diligent to plant and to water, and the Lord blessed their labours with an exceeding great increase, notwithstanding all the opposition made to their blessed progress, by false rumours, calumnies, and bitter persecutions; not only from the powers of the earth, but from every one that listed to injure and abuse them: so that they seemed indeed to be as poor sheep appointed to the slaughter, and as a people killed all the day long.

It were fitter for a volume than a preface, but so much as to repeat the contents of their cruel sufferings, from professors as well as from profane, and from magistrates as well as the rabble: so that it may well be said of this abused and despised people, they went forth weeping, and sowed in tears, bearing testimony to the precious seed, the seed of the kingdom, which stands not in words, the finest, the highest that man's wit can use, but in power; the power of Christ Jesus, to whom God the Father hath given all power in heaven and in earth, that he might rule angels above, and men below; who empowered them, as their work witnesseth, by the many that were turned through their ministry from darkness to the light, and out of the broad into the nar

row way of life and peace, bringing people to a weighty, serious, and godly conversation; the practice of that doctrine which they taught.

And as without this secret divine power there is no quickening and regenerating of dead souls, so the want of this generating and begetting power and life is the cause of the little fruit that the many ministries that have been, and are in the world bring forth. Oh! that both ministers and people were sensible of this! My soul is often troubled for them, and sorrow and mourning compass me about for their sakes. Oh! that they were wise! Oh! that they would consider and lay to heart the things that truly and substantially make for their lasting peace!

Two things are to be briefly touched upon, the doctrine they taught, and the example they led among all people. I have already touched upon their fundamental principle, which is as the corner stone of their fabric; and indeed, to speak eminently and properly, their characteristic, or main distinguishing point or principle, viz. the light of Christ within, as God's gift for man's salvation. This, I say, is as the root of the goodly tree of doctrines that grew and branched out from it, which I shall now mention in their natural and experimental order.

First, repentance from dead works to serve the living God, which comprehends three operations. First, a sight of sin. Secondly, a sense and godly sorrow for it. Thirdly, an amendment for the time to come. This was the repentance they preached and pressed, and a natural result from the principle they turned all people unto. For of light came sight; and of sight came sense and sorrow; and of sense and sorrow came amendment of life. Which doctrine of repentance leads to justification; that is, forgiveness of the sins that are past through Christ, the alone propitiation; and the sanctification or purgation of the soul from the defiling nature and habits of sin present; which is justification in the complete sense of that word, comprehending both justification from the guilt of the sins that are past, as if they had never been committed, through the love and mercy of God in Christ Jesus; and the creature's being made inwardly just through the cleansing and sanctifying power and spirit of Christ revealed in the soul, which is commonly called sanctification.

From hence sprang a second doctrine they were led to declare, as the mark of the prize of the high calling to all true christians, viz. perfection from sin, according to the scriptures of truth, which testify it to be the end of Christ's coming, and the nature of his kingdom, and for which his spirit was and is given. But they never held a perfection in wisdom and glory in this life, or from natural infirmities or death, as some have with a weak or ill mind imagined and insinuated against them.

This they called a redeemed state, regeneration, or the new birth,