time or other, that there is something in them besides holiness. I have no doubt but their end will be as awful and notorious as their conduct has been; for, as they measure to others, so shall it be measured to them; for this is the law and the prophets.

There is a little boy, a novice, who not long ago was hanging at his mother's pocket hole, but who is now a sprig of divinity, in pretended orders, mocking his Maker, deceiving sinners, and damning his own soul for a morsel of bread: he has lately written a threepenny volume upon the law as the believer's rule of life.

Another very popular man at Leicester, who called my doctrine buffoonery, even in his pulpit, has lately published three volumes upon the moral law. He has not, however, adopted Paul's method; first to preach the law, to bring the sinner in guilty before God, and then warn him to flee from the wrath to come, to lay hold upon the hope set before us. No; he is more abundant in wisdom than ever Paul was; for Paul says, "We know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered," Rom. viii. 26. But this great man has taught his readers how to pray. He sends them with his prayer to Christ, for grace to enable them to keep the commandments. He finishes at the law, but Paul finishes at Christ. "Stand fast in the Lord, and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage."

any

And Christ says, "He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit." This great man may labour hard, and, as he thinks, mean well; but he is totally in the dark about the business of salvation: and I believe it is well if his own soul be not in a worse state than of those that hear him. So that the proverb is applicable; Physician, heal thyself.' Nor shall he ever lead one soul into union with the Son of God, unless God bring him under a better influence. Let our opposers do their worst, I am fully persuaded that there are more souls, who are quickened by the Spirit of God, now in union and connection with us, than all our opposers have, put them all together, throughout the nation. And, if any of them can prove that we are the servants of sin, that we war after the flesh, or that we allow or indulge ourselves in wickedness, as they would insinuate, or that we do not live more becoming the gospel than even they themselves, let them proclaim it to all the world.

Furthermore. We believe that there is no one law in the book of God that is not put into our minds, and written on our hearts, and that by God himself. Let them prove to us, if they can, that any one law of God was ever put into their minds, or written on their hearts.

We are styled lawless Antinomians. We may rob, steal, commit adultery, or do what we please, say they; we have no law. Thus are we slanderously reported, and that by men who I believe

are destitute of every law of God. If we are lawless Antinomians, there is nothing to fear from us: our opposers are evangelists; and all evangelists are inspired men, and therefore well furnished for every good word and work. Besides, the Antinomians are few, but the name of the evangelists is Legion, for they are many, and therefore have the advantage of us, both in number and furniture. And I think they can never wish for a fairer ground to meet us on than this. Let any of them, and all of them, who have written against us, or who rail and traduce us as vile rebels; let them pick out of God's book what law they please, and as many as they please, which are essential to salvation; let them propose them to us, and, by the promised assistance of the Holy Spirit, we will shew the spiritual meaning of that law, and prove, from our own experience, that God himself has written that law in our hearts; and we will appeal to God and man for confirmation. Then let them prove, if they can, that any one law of God is written in their hearts; and let men of religion, or of common sense at least, judge who are the lawless Antinomians; they who have every law of God put into their minds, and written in their hearts, or they who have no law at all in them. No man can pass into the bond of God's covenant, or be in covenant with him, without having God's laws put into his mind, and written in his heart; as it is written, "Then will I sprinkle clean water upon you, and

ye shall be clean: from all your filthiness, and from all your idols, will I cleanse you. A new heart also will I give you, and a new Spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall keep my judgments, and do them." "I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people," Ezek. xxxvi. 2527; Heb. viii. 10. Let all our revilers come forth, and tell us what was their experience when they thus passed into the bond of God's covenant; if they cannot, they never knew the gospel, nor can they preach it; for the gospel is the covenant of grace confirmed, and the ministry of the Spirit, 2 Cor. iii. 6; and is the power of God to salvation; which the natural man, the unpardoned sinner, never knew, and which he never felt. We defy all our revilers, in the name of the living God, to come forth and prove that any one law, in all the book of God, was ever put into their mind, or written by the Spirit in their heart. Paul, in his natural state, was alive without the law, and without the law sin was dead, Rom. vii. 8, 9. They are ministers of the letter, 2 Cor. iii. 6. They have the letter of the law, but not the spirituality of it. "The law is spiritual," but they are carnal, sold under sin, and therefore ignorant of it. They have a form of knowledge, and of truth in the

law, Rom. ii. 20, but not the power of it; just as some have a form of godliness, but deny the power of that. God declares that all unrighteous men are lawless and disobedient, 1 Tim. i. 9. These then are Antinomians with a witness.

Before I began this book, I was one day wondering in myself how it came to pass that, out of all the legions of preachers which we are furnished with in the present day, not one should appear to be acquainted with the Spirit's work, but should immediately fall with violence upon every soul that appears to be convinced of sin and quickened by the Holy Ghost; and all this under a pretended zeal for the law. It was immediately brought to my mind that there never was one law of God written on the mind, or put into the heart, of any man in the world who is not in covenant with God, and who is not a partaker of the Holy Ghost. And scriptures flowed in from every quarter to confirm this. I must confess that at first I was astonished beyond measure: but, upon examination, 1 found it to be so indeed. I considered what Paul, in his second chapter to the Romans, says about the performances of the heathens, shewing the works of the law written in their heart. But the works of the law, or natural conscience, and the law of God, are two things. Hence Paul calls them a law to themselves. But God's spiritual law, and a carnal heathen sold under sin, are two things. Hence Paul says, they sin without law, and shall perish without law, Rom. ii. 12. I have