|
A COLLECTION OF LETTERS |
By William Law
Revised and
printed in the year of our Lord 2000 by the Old Truth Publishing Company,
'United States
Of America'
Original
printing in London: Printed for J. RICHARDSON, Pater-Noster Row. 1760.
Table Of Contents
About the
“Letters”
The Letters in this Collection having
been found of great private benefit, the consent of the author has been
obtained to their being made public. And as they contain a rich treasure of
Divine truths, that come home to the bosoms of men, comprehending the fullness
of religion, and resolving a great variety of important points, the editors
have great pleasure, in being allowed to publish them.
In Answer to a Question
Letter 6
You tell me, sir, that after twenty
years of zeal, and labor in matters of religion, it has turned to so little
account, that you are forced, most earnestly to desire a speedy answer to this
question, Where you shall go, or what you shall do, to be in the truth?
Allow me to expound upon
the first premise. Every man in his fallen state, has all that in him, though
in a state of death, and hiddenness, which was the living glory, and perfection
of the first created man. Just as the root of the lily, in the winter's cold,
has all that in it, though as in a state of death, which was the glory and
beauty of the summer's flower. What is hidden in the root of the lily, lies no
longer in its seeming death, than until the spring-sun calls forth its life.
Now, one divine dispensation after another, is to do that same to the fallen
soul, which the spring, and daily advancing sun does to the lily root; namely,
to call it out of its state of death, and make something of its first glory
come to life, and spring forth out of it. Hence it is that the kingdom of God
(which was that to which Adam died) is like to treasure hid in a field; and
again, the kingdom of God is within you. But this could not be true, unless all
that glory, which Adam lost, was still preserved, as a seed, or a shut-up root
of life within him: and all this, through the mercy, and free grace of God, who
foreseeing the fall of Adam, willed, that a seed of His first glory, should be
preserved in him; declared, and made known to him, by a seed of the woman,
which through the Word made flesh, should, in spite of death and hell, grow up
to the fullness of the stature in Christ Jesus.
And as the kingdom of heaven, is every man's treasure, as surely within him, as his own soul, so that which hides, and covers it from us, is that awakened, bestial life, which is called Adam in us, and in which, the immortal soul, that was born for heaven, is wedded to the lusts of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, and subject to the workings of that satanical nature, which our Lord calls the prince of this world. And so it is, that every man comes into this world in a twofold state; Adam and Christ are both in him. And if this was not the state of man, nothing within you, would, or could ask, as you have done, or have any anxiety after the truth. And your being either led from this true knowledge of your state, or having never been sensible of it, is the reason of your having made so many religious inquiries in vain, both from yourself, and other people. For nothing can tell you the truth, or establish you in a just and solid discernment of right from wrong, in doctrines, opinions, and practices of religion, but this personal knowledge of yourself, namely, that Christ and Adam, are not only both of them essentially within you, but the whole of you; that nothing is life or salvation, but that, which is the life and growth of Christ in you, and that all that is done from the life, the power and natural capacity of the Adamical nature, is heathenish, is mere vanity and death, however gloriously set forth by the natural gifts of wit and learning.
Religion has no good in it, but as it
is the revival, and quickening of that divine nature, which your first father had
from God, and nothing can revive it, but that which first created it. God is no
otherwise your God, but as He is the God of your life, manifested in it; and he
can be no otherwise the God of your life, but as His Spirit is living within
you. Satan is no other way knowable by you, or can have any other fellowship
with you, but as his evil spirit works, and manifests itself along with the
workings of your own spirit. "Resist the devil, and he will flee from
you"; but he is nowhere to be resisted, but as a working spirit within
you, therefore to resist the devil, is to turn from the evil thoughts, and
motions that arise within you. "Turn to God, and He will turn to
you": but God is a universal Spirit, which you cannot locally turn to, or
from; therefore to turn to God, is to cleave to those good thoughts and motions
which proceed from His Holy Spirit, dwelling and working in you. This is the
God of your life, to whom you are to adhere, listen, and attend, and this is
your worshipping Him in spirit and truth. And that is the devil that goes about
as a roaring lion, who has no voice but that which he speaks within you.
Therefore, my friend, be at home, and keep close to that which passes within
you, for be it what it will, whether it be a good, in which you delight, or an
evil, at which you grieve, you could have neither the one, nor the other, but
because a holy God of light and love is essentially dwelling in you. Seek
therefore for no other road, nor call anything the way to God, but solely that,
which is His eternal, all-creating WORD, and SPIRIT working within you. For if
anything else could have been man's way to God, the WORD would not have been
made flesh.
The last words in your question, to be in the truth, are well expressed, for to be in the truth, is the finished state of man returning to God, therefore declared by Christ Himself, "You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free"; free from the blindness and delusion of your own natural reason, and free from forms, doctrines and opinions, which others would impose upon you. To be in truth, is to be, where the first holy man was, when he came forth in the image and likeness of God. When he lost paradise, he lost the truth; and all that he felt, knew, saw, loved, and liked of the earthly, bestial world, into which he was fallen, was but a separation from God, a veil upon his heart, and scales upon his eyes. Nothing of his first truth could be spoken of to him, even by God Himself, but under the veil of earthly things, types, and shadows. The Law was given by Moses; but Moses had a veil upon his face, the Law was a veil, prophecy was a veil, Christ crucified was a veil, and all was a veil, until grace and truth came by Jesus Christ, in the POWER of His HOLY SPIRIT. Therefore to be in the truth, as it is in Jesus, is to have the veil lifted, to have passed through all those dispensations, which would never have begun, but that they might end in a Christ spiritually revealed, and essentially formed in the soul. So that now, in this last dispensation of God, which is the first truth itself restored, nothing is to be thought of, trusted to, or sought after, but God's immediate, continual working in the soul, by his Holy Spirit. This, sir, is he where you are to go, and what you are to do, to be in the truth. For the truth as it is in Jesus, is nothing else but Christ come in the Spirit, and His coming in the Spirit, is nothing else but the first lost life of God, quickened, and revealed again in the soul. Everything short of this, has only the nature of outward types and figures, which in its best state, is only for a time. If therefore you look to anything but the Spirit, seek to any power, but that of the Spirit, expect Christ to be your Savior, any other way, than as He is spiritually born in you, you go back from the grace and truth, which came by Jesus, and can at best be only a legal Jew, or a self-righteous Pharisee; you can go no further than these states, but by being born of the Spirit, living by the Spirit, as His child, His instrument, and holy temple, in which He dwells, and works all His good pleasure. Drop this full adherence to, and dependence upon the Spirit, act as in your own sphere, be something of yourself, and through your own wisdom, etc., and then, though all that you say, or do, is with the outward words of the spiritual gospel, and in the outward practices of the spiritual apostles, yet for all this, you are but there, where those were, who worshipped God with the blood of bulls and goats; for nothing but the Spirit of God can worship God in spirit and in truth.
But you will perhaps say, that you are still, exactly where you were, because you don’t know how to find the continual guidance of the Holy Spirit. If you know how to find your own thoughts, you need not be at a loss to find the Spirit of God. For you have not a thought within you, but that is either from the good of the Spirit, or from the evil of the flesh. Now the good and the evil that are within you, and always more or less sensible by turns, do each of them teach you the same work and presence of the Spirit of God. For the good, could not appear as good, nor the evil be felt as evil, but because the immediate working of the Spirit of God creates, or manifests this difference between them, and therefore be in what state you will, the power of God's Spirit within you, equally manifests itself to you; and to find the immediate, continual, essential working of the Spirit of God within you, you need only know what good, and evil are felt within you. For all the good that is in any thought or desire, is so much of God within you, and while you adhere to, and follow a good thought, you follow, or are led by the Spirit of God. And on the other hand all that is selfish and wicked in thought, or affection, is so much of the spirit of Satan within you, which would not be known, or felt, as evil, but because it is contrary to the immediate, continual working of the Spirit of God within you. Turn therefore inwards, and all that is within you, will demonstrate to you, the presence, and power of God in your soul, and make you find, and feel it, with the same certainty, as you find and feel your own thoughts. And what is best of all, by doing this, you will never be without a living sense of the immediate guidance and inspiration of the Holy Spirit, always equal to your dependence upon it, always leading you from strength to strength in your inward man, until all your knowledge of good and evil, is become nothing else, but a mere love of the one, and mere aversion to the other. For the one work of the Spirit of God, is to distinguish the good, and evil, that is within you, not as in notion, but by affection; and when you are wholly given up to this new-creating work of God, so as to keep your mind upon it, abide with it, and expect all from it. This, my friend, will be your returning to the rock, from whence you were hewn, your drinking at the fountain of living water, your walking with God, your living by faith, your putting on Christ, your continual hearing the WORD of God, your eating the bread that came down from heaven, your supping with Christ, and following the Lamb wherever he goes.
For all these seeming different
things, will be found in every man, according to his measure, who is wholly
given up to, and depending upon the blessed work of God's Spirit in his soul.
But your mistake, and that of most
professing Christians, lies in this; you try to be good by some outward means,
you would have methods, opinions, forms, and ordinances of religion, alter and
raise your fallen nature, and create in you a new heart, and a new spirit, that
is to say, you would be good in a way that is altogether impossible, for
goodness cannot be brought into you from without, much less by anything that is
creaturely, or the action of man; this is as impossible, as for the flesh to
sanctify the spirit, or for things temporal, to give life to things that are
eternal.
The image and likeness of Father, Son,
and Holy Ghost, are in every man, antecedent[1]
to every outward work, or action that can proceed from him: it is God thus
within him, that is the sole cause that anything can be called godly, that is
done, observed, or practiced by him. If it were not so, man would only have his
being from God, but his goodness would be from himself.
All of man's outward good works, are
only like his outward good words; he is not good, because he frequently uses
them, they bring no goodness into him, nor are of any worth in themselves, but
as a good, and godly spirit speaks forth itself in the sound of them. This is
the case of every outward, creaturely thing, or work of man, no matter what
kind it is, either hearing, praying, singing or preaching, etc., or practicing
any outward rules, and observances; they have only the goodness of the outward
Jew, no, are as vain, as sounding brass, and tinkling cymbals, unless they be
solely the work, and fruits of the Spirit of God: for the divine nature, is
that alone, which can be the power to any good work, either in man, or angel.
When a man, first finds himself
stirred up with religious zeal, what does he generally do? He turns all his
thoughts outwards, he runs after this, or that man, he is at the beck and call of every new opinion, and thinks
only of finding the truth, by resting in this, or that method, or society of
Christians. Could he find a man, that did not want to have him of his party,
and opinion, that turned him from himself, and the teaching of man, to a God,
not as historically read in books, or preached of in this, or that society, but
to a God essentially living and working in every soul, him he might call a man
of God; as leading him from himself to God, as saving him from many vain
wanderings, from fruitless searching into a Council of Trent, a Synod of Dort,
and Augsberg Confession, an Assembly's catechism, or a Thirty-nine Articles.
For had he an hundred articles, if they were anything else but a hundred calls
to Christ come in the Spirit, to a God within him, as the only possible light,
and teacher of his mind, it would be a hundred times better for him, to be
without them. For all man's blindness and misery lies in this, that he has lost
the knowledge of God, as essentially living within him, and by falling under
the power of an earthly, bestial life, thinks only of God, as living in some
other world, and so seeks only by notions, to set up an image of an absent God,
instead of worshipping the God of life and power, in whom he lives, moves, and
has his being. Whoever therefore teaches you to expect great things from this,
or that sort of opinions, or calls you to anything as saving, and redeeming,
but the manifestation of God in your own soul, through a birth of the holy
nature of Christ within you is totally ignorant of the whole nature, both of
the fall, and the redemption of man. For the first is nothing else, or less,
than a death to the divine life, or Christ-like nature, which lived in the
first man; and the other, is nothing else, but Christ new-born, formed, and
revealed again in man, as He was at the first. These two great truths are the
most strongly asserted by Christ, when He said, "If any man will be my
disciple, let him deny himself, take up his cross daily, and follow me."
Let him "deny himself," is the fullest declaration, and highest
proof, that he has lost his first divine and heavenly nature, that he is not
that self, which came first from God, or he could not be called to deny it.
Say, if you will, that he has not lost that first heavenly life in God, and
then you must say, that our Lord calls him to deny, crucify, and renounce that
holy, and Godlike self, which was the first gift of God to him.
To read whole libraries on these
matters, is only to be bewildered in the strife of fictions, and contradictions
about them. But to read this one single line of Christ, is to be led into the
open, full truth of the whole nature, both of the fall, and redemption. And
indeed, if we were but freed from the Babel of opinions, which have so long
confounded the first truths of the gospels, it would be plain from every part
of it, that nothing could be called the fall of man but his loss of the divine
life, or nature, nor anything be called his redemption, or the real means of
it, but solely that, which God is, and does in him. For what can be a good, or
work good, in man, but God, or the divine nature in him? All the divine truths,
that ever came from God, speak only to the pearl of the divine nature, that is
hidden in our earthly field of flesh and blood, because nothing else wants
them, or has any capacity to receive them; that which is divine, can only
receive the divine things from God. And so it is, that unless a "Man be
born again from above, it is not possible for him to see, or enter into the
kingdom of God," that is, the divine life must arise again, in the
power of a new birth, or there is nothing in fallen man, that can partake of
the kingdom of God. And the reason is, because "The kingdom of God is
righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost," and therefore
not possible to be anywhere, but where it proceeds from the Holy Ghost. "Thou
shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, with all thy
mind, and with all thy strength." Now what is this God, that you are
thus to love? Is it some abstract idea, that learned men have helped you to
form of him? No such thing. This would be but a poor fiction of God, and a poor
fiction of love. God is all good, the only good, and there is nothing good
besides him, therefore to love God with all your heart, etc., is to love all
goodness, and to love nothing else but goodness, and then, and only then, do
you love God with all your heart, and soul, and strength. But now, to what
purpose could this precept of such a love be given to man, unless he
essentially partook of the divine nature? For to be in heart, and soul, and
spirit, all love of God, and yet have nothing of the nature of God within you,
is surely too absurd for anyone to believe. So sure therefore as this precept
came from truth itself, so sure is it, that every man (however loath to hear of
anything but pleasures, and enjoyments in this vain shadow of a life) has yet a
divine nature concealed within him, which, when allowed to hear the calls of
God, will know the voice of its heavenly Father, and long to do his will on
earth, as it is done in heaven.
The conclusion then, is this, if to
love God with your whole heart, and soul, is to love all goodness, and nothing
else but goodness; and if all that is done without this love, whether in
religious duties, of common life, is but mere separation from God, then it must
be the grossest blindness, to believe you can have any love of God, or goodness
in any duties you perform, any further, or in any other degree, than as the
eternal, Holy Spirit of God, lives and loves in you.
Again, to see the divinity of man's
origin, you need only read these words: "Be ye perfect, as your Father
which is in heaven is perfect." For what could man have to do with the
perfection of God, as the rule of his life, unless the truth and reality of the
divine nature was in him? Could there be any reasonableness in this precept, or
any fitness to call us to be good, as God is good, unless there was that in us,
which is in God? Or to call us to the perfection of an heavenly Father, if we
were not the real children of his heavenly nature? Might it not be as well, to
bid the heavy stone to fly, as its flying father the eagle does?
But this precept from the lip of
truth, is another full proof, that by the fall, a death, or suppression is
brought upon our first divine life, and also that it is yet in a state, capable
of being revived again, in us. For if it was not in a state of death, or
suppressed in us, there could be no need of calling us to live according to it;
for every being naturally acts according to the life, that is manifested in it.
Nor could we be called to be heavenly, but because the heavenly nature has its
seed in our soul in a readiness to come to life in us.
Lastly, "You shall love your
neighbor as yourself," is another full proof, that God is in us of a
truth, and that the Holy Spirit has as certainly, an essential birth within us,
as the spirit of this world have. For this precept might as well be given to a
fox, as to a man, if man had not something quite supernatural in him. For mere
nature, and natural creature, is nothing else, but mere self, and can work
nothing but to, and for itself. And this, not through any corruption, or
depravity of nature, but because it is nature's best state, and it can be
nothing else, either in man, or beast.
"I say unto you, love your
enemies, do good to them that hate you, pray for them that despitefully use and
persecute you," etc. Every word here is demonstration, that nothing
but the new birth from above, can be a Christian. There is no other nature, or
spirit that can breathe forth this universal love and benevolence, but that
same Spirit, which laying aside its own glory, came down from heaven, to
forgive, to love, to save, and die for a whole world of enemies and sinners.
This is the Spirit of Christ, that
must as essentially live and breathe in you, as it did in Him, or all
exhortations, to do as He did, to walk as He walked, are but in vain. The
natural man is in full separation from this holiness of life, and though he had
more wisdom of words, more depth of literature, than was in Cicero, or
Aristotle, yet would he have as much to die to, as the grossest publican, or
vainest Pharisee, before he could be in Christ, a new creature. For the highest
improved natural abilities, can as well ascend into heaven, or clothe flesh and
blood with immortality, as make a man like-minded with Christ in any one divine
virtue. And that for this reason, because God, and divine goodness, are
inseparable.
No precept of the gospel, supposes man
to have any power to effect it, or calls you to any natural ability, or wisdom
of your own to comply with it. Christ and His apostles called no man, to
overcome the corruption and blindness of fallen nature, by learned cultivation
of the mind. The wisdom of the learned world, was the same pitiable foolishness
with them, as the grossest ignorance. By them, they only stand thus
distinguished, the one brings forth a publican which is often converted to
Christ, the other a Pharisee, that for the most part, condemns Him to be
crucified. They (Christ and his apostles) taught nothing but death, and denial
to all self, and the impossibility of having any one divine disposition, but
through faith, and hope of a new nature, "Not born of blood, nor of the
will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God."
To speak of the operation of the Holy Spirit,
as only an assistance, or an occasional assistance, is as short of the truth,
as to say, that Christ shall only assist the resurrection, of our bodies. For
not a spark of any divine virtue can arise in us, but what must wholly and
solely be called forth, by that same power, which alone can call our dead
bodies, out of the dust and darkness of the grave.
If you turn to your own strength, to have Christian piety, and goodness; or are so deceived, as to think, that learning, or logical abilities, critical acuteness, skill in languages, church-systems, rules and orders, articles and opinions, are to do that for you, which the Spirit of Christ did, and only could do for the first Christians; your diligent reading the history of the gospel, will leave you as poor, and empty and dead to the divine life, as if you had been only a diligent reader of the history of all the religions in the world. But if all that you trust to, long after, and depend upon, is that Holy Spirit, which alone made the scripture-saints able to call Jesus Lord; if this is your one faith, and one hope, the divine life, which died in Adam, will find itself alive again in Christ Jesus, IN YOU. And be assured, that nothing but this new birth, can be the gospel Christian, because nothing else can possibly love, like, do, and be that, which Christ preached in His divine sermon on the mount. And be assured also, that when the Spirit of Christ, is the spirit that rules in you, there will be no hard sayings in the Gospel; but all that the heavenly Christ taught in the flesh, will be as meat and drink to you, and you will have no joy, but in walking, as he walked, in saying, loving, and doing, that which he said, loved, and did. And indeed, how can it be otherwise? How can notions, doctrines, and opinions about Christ, what he was, and did, make you in Him a new creature? Can anyone be made a Samson, or a Solomon, by being well versed in the history of what they were, said or did?
Ask then, my friend, no more, where
you shall go, or what you shall do, to be in the truth; for you can have the
truth, nowhere, but in Jesus, nor in Him, any further, than as His whole
nature, and Spirit is born within you.
Letter 10 By William Law
To Mr. J. T.
My dear worthy Friend,
Whom I much love and esteem, your
letter, though full of complaints about the state of your heart, was very much
according to my mind, and gives me great hope, that God will carry on the good
work he has begun in you, and lead you by His Holy Spirit, through all those
difficulties, under which you are presently laboring.
The desire that you have, to be better
than you find yourself at present, is God's call begun to be heard within you,
and will make itself to be heard, even more within you, if you but, give way to
it, and reverence it as such; humbly believing that He that calls, will, and
only can, help you to pay right and full obedience to it.
As to the advertisement in the public
paper, it deserves no regard from you, or anyone else. It must have come,
either from a very ignorant and weak friend, or from a very insignificant enemy
to the writings of Jacob Behman. But be it as it will, it was not an object of
your attention, nor could be of any use to you.
But to come to your own state, you
seem to yourself to be all infatuation and stupidity, because your head, and
your heart are so contrary, the one delighting in heavenly notions, the other
governed by earthly passions, and pursuits. It is a happy thing for you, that
you know and acknowledge this: for only through this truth, through the full
and deep perception of it, can you have any entrance, or so much as the
beginning of an entrance into the liberty of the children of God. God is in this
respect dealing with you, as He does with those, whose darkness is to be
changed into light. Which can never be done, until you fully know,
1.
The real badness of your own heart, and
2.
Your utter inability to deliver yourself from it, by any sense,
power, or activity of your own mind.
And if you thought that you were in a
better state, the matter would be worse with you. For the badness in your
heart, though you had no sensibility of it, would still be there, and would
only be concealed, to your much greater hurt. For there it certainly is,
whether it is seen and found, or not, and sooner or later, must show itself in
its full deformity, or the old man will never die the death which is due to
him, and must be undergone, before the new man in Christ can be formed in us.
All that you complain of in your heart
is common to man, as man. There is no heart that is without it. And this is the
one ground, why every man, as such, however different in disposition,
complexion, or natural endowments from others, has the same full reason, and
absolute necessity, of being born again from above.
Flesh and blood, and the spirit of this world, govern every spring in the heart of the natural man. And therefore you can never enough adore that ray of divine light, which breaking in upon your darkness, has made it known to be the state of your heart, and raised only those faint wishes that you desire to be delivered from.
For faint as they are, they have their
degree of goodness in them, and as certainly proceed solely from the goodness
of God working in your soul, as the first dawning of the morning, is solely
from, and wrought by the same sun, which helps us to the noonday light. Firmly,
therefore, believe this, as a certain truth, that the present sensibility of
your incapacity for goodness, is to be cherished as a heavenly seed of life, as
the blessed work of God in your soul. Could you like anything about your own
heart, or so much as think that any good could be found in it, or believe that
you had any power of your own to embrace and follow the truth, this opinion,
would be your turning away from God and all goodness, and building iron walls
of separation between God and your soul.
For conversion to God, only then
begins to be in truth, and reality, when we see nothing that can give us the
least degree of faith, of hope, of trust, or comfort in anything, that we
are of ourselves. To see vanity of vanities in all outward things, to
loath and abhor certain sins, is indeed something, but yet as nothing, in
comparison of seeing and believing the vanity of vanities within us, and
ourselves as utterly unable to take one single step in true goodness, as to add
one cubit to our stature.
Under this conviction, the gate of life is opened to us. And therefore it is, that all the preparatory parts of religion, all the various proceedings of God either over our inward, or outward state, setting up, and pulling down, giving, and taking away, light, and darkness, comfort, and distress, as independently of us, as he makes the rain to descend, and the winds to blow, are all of them for this one end, to bring us to this conviction, that all that can be called life, good, and happiness, is to come solely from God, and not the smallest spark of it from ourselves. When man was first created, all the good that he had in him was from God alone. This must be the state of man for ever. From the beginning of time through all eternity, the creature can have no goodness, but that which God creates in it.
Our first created goodness is lost,
because our first father departed from a full, absolute dependence upon God.
For a full, continual, unwavering dependence upon God, is that alone which
keeps God in the creature, and the creature in God. Our lost goodness can never
come again, or be found in us, until by a power from Christ living in us, we
are brought out of ourselves, and all selfish truths, into that full and
blessed dependence upon God, in which our first father should have lived.
What room now, my dear friend, for
complaint at the sight, sense, and feeling of your inability to make yourself
better than you are? If you truly wanted this, every part of your religion
would only have the nature and vanity of idolatry. For you cannot come unto
God, you cannot believe in Him, you cannot worship Him in spirit and truth,
until He is regarded as the only giver, and you yourself as nothing else but
the receiver of every heavenly good, that can possibly come to life in you. Can
it trouble you, that it was God that made you, and not you yourself? Yet this
would be as unreasonable, as to be troubled that you cannot make heavenly
affection, or divine powers to spring up, and abide in your soul.
God must for ever be God alone;
heaven, and the heavenly nature are His, and must for ever and ever be received
only from Him, and for ever and ever be only preserved, by an entire dependence
upon, and trust in Him. Now as all the religion of fallen man, fallen from God
into himself, and the spirit of this world, has no other end, but to bring us
back to an entire dependence upon God, so we may justly say, blessed is that
light, happy is that conviction, which brings us into a full and settled
despair, of ever having the least good from ourselves. Then we are truly
brought, and laid at the gate of mercy: at which gate, no soul ever did, or
could lay in vain.
A broken and contrite heart God will
not despise. That is, God will not, God cannot pass by, overlook, or disregard
it. But the heart is then only broken and contrite, when all its strong holds
are broken down, all false coverings taken off, and it sees, with inwardly
opened eyes, everything to be bad, false, and rotten, that does, or can proceed
from it as its own.
But you will perhaps say, that your
conviction is only an uneasy sensibility of your own state, and has not the goodness
of a broken and contrite heart in it. Let it be so, yet it is on the road to
it, and it can only begin, as it begins at present in you. Your conviction is
certainly not full and perfect; for if it was, you would not complain, or
grieve at inability to help or mend yourself, but would patiently expect, and
only look for help from God alone. Know therefore your want of this, as of all
other goodness. But know also at the same time, that it cannot be had through
your own willing and running, but through God that shows mercy; that is to say,
through God who gives us Jesus Christ. For Jesus Christ is the one and only
mercy of God to all the fallen world.
Now if all the mercy of God is only to
be found in Christ Jesus, if he alone can save us from our sins; if he alone
has power to heal all our infirmities, and restore original righteousness, what
room for any other pains, labor, or inquiry, but where, and how Christ is to be
found.
It matters not what our evils are,
deadness, blindness, infatuation, hardness of heart, covetousness, wrath,
pride, and ambition, our remedy is always one and the same, always at hand,
always certain and infallible. Seven devils are as easily cast out by Christ as
one. He came into the world, not to save from this, or that disorder, but to
destroy all the power and works of the devil in man. If you ask where, and how
Christ is to be found? I answer, in your heart, and by your heart, and nowhere
else, nor by anything else. But you will perhaps say, it is your very heart
that keeps you a stranger to Christ, and Him to you, because your heart is all
bad, as unholy as a den of thieves. I answer, that the finding this to be the
state of your heart, is the real finding of Christ in it. For nothing else but
Christ can reveal, and make manifest the sin and evil in you. And he that
discovers, is the same Christ that takes away sin. So that, as soon as
complaining guilt, sets itself before you, and will be seen, you may be
assured, that Christ is in you of a truth.
For Christ must first come as a
discoverer and reprover of sin. It is the infallible proof of His holy presence
within you.
Hear Him, reverence Him, submit to Him
as a discoverer and reprover of sin. Own His power and presence in the feeling
of your guilt, and then He that wounded, will heal, He that found out the sin,
will take it away, and He who showed you your den of thieves, will turn it into
a holy temple of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.
And now, sir, you may see, that your
doubt and inquiry of me, whether your will was really free, or not, was
groundless.
You have no freedom, or power of will,
to assume any holy temper, or take hold of such degrees of goodness, as you
have a mind to have. For nothing is, or ever can be goodness in you, but the
one life, light, and spirit of Christ revealed, formed, and begotten in your
soul. Christ in us, is our only goodness, as Christ in us, is our hope of
glory. But Christ in us, is the pure, free, gift of God to us.
But you have a true and full freedom
of will and choice, either to leave, and give up your helpless self to the
operation of God in your soul, or to rely upon your own rational industry, and
natural strength of mind. This is the truth of the freedom of your will, in
your first setting out, which is a freedom that no man wants, or can want so
long as he is in the body. And every unregenerate man has this freedom.
If therefore you have not
that which you want to have of God, or are not that which you ought to be in
Christ Jesus, it is not because you have no free power of leaving yourself in
the hands, and under the operation of God, but because the same freedom of your
will, seeks for help where it cannot be had, namely, in some strength and
activity of your own faculties.
Of this freedom of will it is said,
"According to your faith, so be it done to you"; that is to say,
according as you leave and trust yourself to God, so will His operation be in
you. This is the real, great magic power of the first turning of the will; of
which it is truly said, that it always has that which it wills, and can have
nothing else.
When this freedom of the will wholly
leaves itself to God, saying, not mine, but Your will be done, then it has
that, which it wills. The will of God is done in it. It is in God. It has
divine power. It works with God, and by God, and comes at length to be that
faith which can move mountains; and nothing is too hard for it.
And so it is, that every unregenerate
son of Adam has life and death in his own choice, not by any natural power of
taking that which he will, but by a full freedom, either of leaving, and
trusting himself to the redeeming operation of God, which is eternal life, or
of acting according to his own will and power in flesh and blood, which is
eternal death.
And now, my dear friend, let me tell
you, that as here lies all the true and real freedom, which cannot be taken
from you, so in the constant exercise of this freedom, that is, in a continual
leaving yourself to, and depending upon the operation of God in your soul, lies
all your road to heaven. No divine virtue can be had in any other way.
All the excellency and power of faith,
hope, love, patience, and resignation, which are the true and only graces of
the spiritual life, have no other root or ground, but this free, full leaving
of yourself to God, and are only so many different expressions of your willing
nothing, seeking nothing, trusting to nothing, but the life-giving power of His
holy presence in your soul.
To sum up all in a word. Wait
patiently, trust humbly, depend only upon, seek solely to a God of light and
love, of mercy and goodness, of glory and majesty, ever dwelling in the inmost
depth and spirit of your soul. There you have all the secret, hidden, invisible
upholder of all the creation, whose blessed operation will always be found by a
humble, faithful, loving, calm, patient introversion of your heart to Him, who
has His hidden heaven within you, and which will open itself to you, as soon as
your heart is left wholly to His eternal ever-speaking WORD, and ever-sanctifying
Spirit within you.
Beware of all eagerness and activity
of your own natural spirit and temper. Run not in any hasty ways of your own.
Be patient under the sense of your own vanity and weakness; and patiently wait
for God to do His own work, and in His own way. For you can go no faster, than
a full dependence upon God can carry you.
You will perhaps say, Am I then to be
idle, and do nothing towards the salvation of my soul? No, you must by no means
be idle, but earnestly diligent, according to your measure, in all good works,
which the law and the gospel direct you to, both with regard to yourself and
other people. Outward good works to other people, may be justly considered as
God's errand on which you are sent, and therefore to be done faithfully, according
to His will, and in obedience to Him, who sent you.
But nothing that you do, or practice
as a good to yourself, and other people, is in its proper state, or grows from
its right root, or reaches its true end, until you look for no willing, nor
depend upon any doing that which is good, but by Christ, the wisdom and power
of God, living in you. I caution you only against all eagerness and activity of
your own spirit, so far as it leads you to seek, and trust to something that is
not God, and Christ within you.
I recommend to you stillness,
calmness, patience, not to make you lifeless, and indifferent about good works,
or indeed with any regard to them, but solely with regard to your faith, that
it may have its proper soil to grow in, and because all eagerness,
restlessness, haste, and impatience, either with regard to God, or ourselves,
are not only great hindrances, but real defects of our faith, and dependence
upon God.
Lastly, be courageous then, and full
of hope, not by looking at any strength of your own, or fancying that you now
know how to be wiser in yourself, than you have hitherto been; no, this will
only help you to find more and more defects of weakness in yourself; but be
courageous in faith, and hope, and dependence upon God. And be assured, that
the one infallible way to all that is good, is never to be weary in waiting,
trusting, and depending upon God, manifested in Christ Jesus.
I am your hearty Friend,
and Well-Wisher, William Law.
March 20, 1756.
Highlights
From Brother William Law’s Writings
Brother Law stresses the need of the
believers continuing in a vital relationship with Christ after their
conversion. Every branch of a tree, though ever so richly brought forth, must
wither and die the moment it ceases to have a life union with the root. To this
truth, grounded as absolutely in the
spiritual as in the natural, our Lord appeals as an illustration of
the necessity of His constant indwelling and continuous working in the redeemed
soul of man.
According to brother Law,
salvation is an inward experience, and a spiritual operation of God in man. No
one can know the truth of salvation by a mere rational consent to that which is
historically said of Christ. Only by an inward experience of His cross, death,
and resurrection can the saving power of the gospel be known. For the reality
of Christ's redemption is not in fleshly, finite, outward things, much less in
verbal descriptions of them, but is a birth, a life, a spiritual operation,
which as truly belongs to God alone as does His creative power.
Brother Law also addresses
the disparity between many professing Christians' position in Christ and their
outward living. Many Christians are careful to observe certain times, places,
and rituals of worship; but when the service of the church is over, they are
but like those that profess no regard for religion. In their manner of life, in
their cares and worries, fears and pleasures, indulgences and diversions, it is
often impossible to distinguish professing Christians from the rankest
unbelievers, until they once again unite to sing of their love and devotion to
Jesus. Little wonder that the skeptic makes such false standard-bearers the
object of his scorn and jest, because he sees that their devotion goes no
deeper than the words they use in song and prayer. How can this be called
Christianity, when such a manner of life finds its proper condemnation in every
page of the New Testament?
Brother Law strongly states
that the appreciation of Biblical scholarship of the letter is in opposition to
the ministry of the Holy Spirit. This results in a scholar who is empty of the reality
of the gospel. This scholarly worship of the letter has greatly opposed the
ministry of the Holy Spirit, and blinded men to the living reality which the
gospel holds out to those who believe. The manner in which Greek and Hebrew
scholarship is admired and sought after in the church would lead one to believe
that a man has all the divine life and reality that Paul had, if he can only
recite his epistles by heart. What could such a man truly be said to have,
except the letter of the gospel without the Spirit? And what would be the
advantage if he knew this letter in the original Greek, and had thoroughly
mastered all the niceties of grammar and shades of ancient meanings? Such a
man, while more thoroughly grounded in the letter, must remain just as empty of
the reality of the gospel, unless he knows in his own experience the immediate
inspiration and quickening power of the Holy Spirit.
Bible teachers and religious
leaders
Finally, brother Law gives
a strong denunciation of leaders who gain positions by their intellectual
attainments and eloquence. The Bible teacher and religious leader who gain and
hold a church position through intellectual attainments and oratorical skills
can be said to differ from lesser men only as the serpent differed from the other
beasts of the field, in that it was more subtle.
In commenting on 1
Corinthians 4:15 "For though you have ten thousand guides in Christ, yet
you do not have many fathers..." he says: "Thousands stand ready to
split doctrinal hairs and instruct others in the fine meaning of Scripture
words - but there are so few through whom the Holy Spirit can work to bring men
to a new birth in the kingdom of God."
Brother Law's provocative
style of writing is again displayed in his desire to turn his reader away from
the natural pursuit of knowledge to a genuine experience of God's salvation
with regards to his entrance into God's kingdom. Natural genius and human
wisdom can feed on no other food than the deceptive fruit of that ancient tree
of knowledge. What a gross ignorance, both of man's need and Christ's
salvation, to run to Greek and Hebrew schools to learn how to put off Adam and
to put on Christ! How absurd to seek to be wise in scholarship concerning the letter
of Scripture in order to obey Christ's command that we must become like a
little child to enter into His kingdom!
To
a Person burdened with inward and outward troubles
This is the response to a letter sent to
Brother William Law, I believe that it will be as good a help to any other soul
that is not fully in Christ, as it was to the soul that it was addressed
to. Editor.
Worthy Sir,
My heart embraces you, with all the
tenderness and affection of Christian love; and I earnestly beg of God, to make
me a messenger of His peace to your soul.
You seem to apprehend that the account you have given of
yourself might surprise me; but I am neither surprised, nor offended at it; I
neither condemn, nor lament your condition, but shall endeavor to show you, how
it may be made a blessing and great happiness to you. I shall not enter into a
consideration of the different kinds of trouble you have told me about. I think it better to lay
before you the one true ground and root, from which all the evil and disorders of
human life have sprung. This will make it easy for you to see, what that is,
which must, and only can be the full remedy and relief for all of them.
The scripture has assured us, that God made man in His own image
and likeness; a sufficient proof, that man, in his first state, as he came
forth from God, must have been absolutely free from all vanity, want, or
distress of any kind, from anything either within, or without him. It would be
quite absurd and blasphemous, to suppose, that a creature beginning to exist in
the image and likeness of God, should have vanity of life, or vexation of
spirit: a Godlike perfection of nature, and a painful, distressed nature, stand
in the utmost contrariety to one another.
Again, the scripture has assured us,
that man that is born of a woman, has but a short time to live, and is full of
misery: therefore man now is not that creature that he was by his creation. The
first divine and Godlike nature of Adam, which was to have been immortally holy
in union with God, is lost; and instead of it, a poor mortal of earthly flesh
and blood, born like a wild donkey's colt, of a short life, and full of misery,
and is through a vain pilgrimage, to end in dust and ashes. Therefore, let
every evil, whether inward, or outward, only teach you this truth, that man has
infallibly lost his first divine life in God; and that no possible comfort, or
deliverance is to be expected, but only in this one thing, that though man had
lost his God, yet God is become man, that man may be again alive in God, as at
the first. For all the misery and distress of human nature, whether of body or
mind, is wholly owing to this one cause, that God is not in man, nor man in
God, as the state of his nature requires: it is, because man has lost that
first life of God in his soul, in and for which he was created. He lost this
light, and spirit, and life of God, by turning his will, imagination, and
desire, into a tasting and sensibility of the good and evil of this earthly
bestial world.
Now here are two things raised up in
man, instead of the life of God: first, self, or selfishness, brought forth by
his choosing to have a wisdom of his own, contrary to the will and instruction
of his creator. Secondly, an earthly, bestial, mortal life and body, brought
forth by his eating that food, which was poison to his paradisiacal nature.
Both these must therefore be removed; that is, a man must first totally die to
self, and all earthly desires, views, and intentions, before he can be again in
God, as his nature and first creation requires.
But now if this is a certain and
immutable truth, that man, so long as he is a selfish, earthly-minded creature,
must be deprived of his true life, the life of God, the spirit of heaven in his
soul; then how is the face of things changed! For then, what life is so much to
be dreaded, as the life of worldly ease and prosperity? What a misery, what a
curse, is there in everything that gratifies and nourishes our self-love,
self-esteem, and self-seeking? On the other hand, what happiness is there in
all inward and outward troubles, when they force us to feel and know the hell
that is hidden within us, and the vanity of everything without us, when they
turn all our self-love into self-abhorrence and force us to call upon God to
save us from ourselves, to give us a new life, new light, and new spirit in
Christ Jesus.
"Oh thank you for the
famine," the poor prodigal might well have said, "which, by reducing
me to the necessity of asking to eat husks with the swine, brought me to
myself, and caused my return to my first happiness in my father's house."
Now, I will suppose your distressed
state to be as you represent it; inwardly, darkness, heaviness, and confusion
of thoughts and passions; outwardly, ill treatment from friends, relations, and
all the world; unable to strike up the least spark of light, comfort, or
happiness, by any thought or reasoning of your own.
Oh happy famine, which leaves you not
so much as the husk of one human comfort to feed upon! For this is the time and
place for all that is good and life and salvation to happen to you, which
happened to the prodigal son. Your way is as short, and your success as certain
as his was: you have no more to do than he had; you need not call out for
books, or methods of devotion; for, in your present state, much reading, and
borrowed prayers, are not your best method: all that you are to offer to God,
all that is to help you to find Him to be your Savior and Redeemer, is best
taught to you by the distressed state of your heart.
Only let your present and past
distress make you feel and acknowledge this twofold great truth: first, that in
and of yourself, you are nothing but darkness, vanity, and misery; secondly,
that of yourself, you can no more help yourself to light, comfort, and
happiness, than you can create an angel. People at all times can seem to assent
to these two truths; but then it is an assent that has no depth or reality, and
so is of little or no use to them: but your condition has opened your heart for
a deep and full conviction of these truths. Now give way, to this conviction,
and hold these two truths, in the same degree of certainty as you know two and
two is four, and then you are with the prodigal, come to yourself, and more
than HALF YOUR WORK IS DONE!
Being now in full possession of these
two truths, feeling them in the same degree of certainty, as you feel your own
existence, you are, under this sensibility, to give up yourself absolutely and
entirely to God in Christ Jesus, as into the hands of infinite love; firmly
believing this great infallible truth,
that God has no will towards you, but that of infinite love, and an infinite
desire to make you a partaker of His divine nature; and that it is as
absolutely impossible for the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, to refuse all
that good and life and salvation which you want, as it is for you to take it by
your own power.
Oh drink deep of this cup! For the
precious water of eternal life is in it. Turn to God with this faith; cast yourself
into this abyss of love; and then you will be in that same state the prodigal
son was in, when he said, "I will arise and go to my father, and will say
to him, 'Father, I have sinned against heaven, and before thee, and am no more
worthy to be called Your son'"; and all will be fulfilled in you, which
was fulfilled in him.
Make this, therefore, the twofold
exercise of your heart: now, bowing yourself down before God, in the deepest
sense and acknowledgement of your own nothingness and vileness; then, looking
up to God in faith and love, consider Him as always extending the arms of His
mercy towards you, and full of an infinite desire to dwell in you, as He dwells
in angels in heaven. Content yourself with this inward and simple exercise of
your heart, for a while; and seek, or look for nothing in any book, but that
which nourishes and strengthens this state of your heart.
"Come to Me," says the holy
Jesus, "all you that labor, and are heavy laden, and I will refresh
you." Here is more for you to lie upon, more light for your mind, more
unction for your heart, than in volumes of human instruction. Pick up the words
of the holy Jesus, and beg of Him to be the light and life of your soul: love
the sound of His name; for Jesus is the love, the sweetness, the compassionate,
the goodness, of the deity itself; which became man, so that men might have
power to become the sons of God. Love, pity and wish well to every soul in the
world; dwell in love, and then you dwell in God; learn to hate nothing but the
evil that stirs in your own heart.
Teach your heart this prayer, till your heart continually says,
though not with outward words: "Oh holy Jesus: meek lamb of God! Bread
that came down from heaven! Light and life of all holy souls! Help me to a true
and living faith in You. Oh do open yourself within me, with all your holy
nature, spirit, tempers, and inclinations, that I may be born again of You, a
new creature, quickened and revived, led and governed, by Your Holy
Spirit."
Prayer so practiced, becomes the life
of the soul, and the true food of eternity. Keep in this state of application
to God; and then you will infallibly find it to be the true way of rising out
of the vanity of time, into the riches of eternity.
Do not expect, or look for the same
degrees of sensible fervor. The matter does not lie there. Nature will have its
share; but the ups and downs of that are to be overlooked. While your will, or
spirit is good, and set right, the changes of creaturely fervor do not lessen
your union with God. It is the abyss of the heart, an unfathomable depth of
eternity within us, as much above sensible fervor, as heaven is above the
earth; it is this that works our way to God, and unites with heaven. This abyss
of the heart, is the divine nature and power within us, which never calls upon
God in vain; but whether helped or deserted by bodily fervor, penetrates
through all outward nature, as easily and effectually as our thoughts can leave
our bodies, and reach into the regions of eternity.
The poverty of our fallen nature, the
depraved workings of flesh and blood, the corrupt tempers of our polluted birth
in this world, do us no hurt, so long as the spirit of prayer works contrary to
them, and longs for the first birth of the light and spirit of heaven. All our
natural evil ceases to be our own evil, as soon as our will, or spirit turns
from it; it then changes its nature, loses all its poison and death, and only
becomes our holy cross, on which we happily die from self and this world into
the kingdom of heaven.
Would you be done with error, scruple,
and delusion? Consider the deity to be the greatest love, the greatest
meekness, the greatest sweetness, the eternal unchangeable will to be a good
and blessing to every creature; and that all the misery, darkness, and death of
fallen angels and fallen men, consist in their having lost their likeness to
this divine nature. Consider yourself, and all the fallen world, as having
nothing to seek or wish for, but by the spirit of prayer to draw into the life
of your soul, rays and sparks of this divine, meek, loving, tender nature of
God. Consider the holy Jesus as the gift of God to your soul, in spite of every
inward or outward enemy. These three infallible truths, heartily embraced, and
made the nourishment of your soul, shorten and secure the way to heaven, and
leave no room for error, scruple or delusion
Expect no life, light, strength, or
comfort, but from the Spirit of God, dwelling and manifesting His own goodness
in your soul. The best of men, and the best of books, can only do you good,
so far as they turn you from themselves, and every human thing, to seek, and
have, and receive every kind of good from God alone; not a distant, or an
absent God, but a God living, moving, and always working in the spirit and heart
of your soul.
They never find God, who seek for Him
by reasoning and speculation; for since God is the highest spirit, and the
highest life, nothing but a like spirit, and a like life, can unite with Him,
find or feel, or know anything of Him. Hence it is, that faith, and hope, and
love, turned towards God, are the only possible, and infallible means of
obtaining a true and living knowledge of Him. And the reason is plain, it is by
this holy attitude, which is the working of spirit and life within us, we seek
the God of life where He is, we call upon Him with His own voice, we draw near
to Him by His own Spirit; for nothing can breathe forth faith, and love, and
hope to God, but that Spirit and life which is of God, and which therefore
through flesh and blood thus presses towards Him, and readily unites with Him.
There is not a more infallible truth
in the world than this, that neither reasoning nor learning can ever introduce
a spark of heaven into our souls: and since this is so, you have nothing to seek,
nor anything to fear, from reason. Life and death are the things in question:
they are neither of them the growth of reasoning or learning, but each of them
is a state of the soul, and only thus differ, death is the want, and life the
enjoyment of its highest good. Reason, therefore, and learning, have no power
here; but only by their vain activity to keep the soul insensible of that life
and death, one of which is always taking the ascendancy in it, according as the
will and desire of the heart worked. Add reason to a vegetable, and you add
nothing to its life or death. Its life and fruitfulness lies in the soundness
of its root, the goodness of the soil, and the riches it derives from air and
light. Heaven and hell grow thus in the soul of every man: his heart is his
root; if that is turned from all evil, it is then like the plant in a good
soil; when it hungers and thirsts after the divine life, it then infallibly
draws the light and Spirit of God into it, which are infinitely more ready and
willing to live and fructify in the soul, than light and air is to enter into
the plant, that hungers after them. For the soul has its breath, and being, and
life, for no other end, but that God may manifest the riches and powers of His
own life in it.
Thus hunger is all, and in all worlds,
everything lives in it, and by it; nothing else eats, or partakes of life; and
everything eats according to its own hunger. Everything hungers after its own
mother, that is, everything has a natural magnetic tendency to partake of that
from which it had its being, and can only find its rest in that from whence it
came. Dead as well as living things bear witness to this truth: the stones fall
to the earth, the sparks fly upwards, for this only reason, because everything
must tend towards that from which it came.
Were not angels and the souls of men
breathed forth from God, as so many real offspring’s of the divine nature, it
would be as impossible for them to have any desire of God, as for stones to go
upwards, and the flame downwards. Thus you may see, and feel, that the spirit
of prayer not only proves that you came from God, but is your certain way of
returning to Him.
When, therefore, it is the one ruling,
never ceasing desire of our hearts, that God may be the beginning and end, the
reason and motive, the rule and measure, of our doing, or not doing, from
morning to night; then everywhere, whether speaking or silent, whether inwardly
or outwardly employed, we are equally offered up to the Eternal Spirit, have
our life in Him and from Him, and are united to Him, by that spirit of prayer,
which is the comfort, the support, the strength and security of the soul,
traveling by the help of God, through the vanity of time into the riches of
eternity. For this spirit of prayer, let us willingly give up all that we
inherit from our fallen father, to be all hunger and thirst after God; and to
have no thought or care, but how to be wholly His devoted instruments;
everywhere, and in everything, His adoring, joyful, and thankful servants. Have
your eyes shut, and ears stopped to everything, that is not a step in that
ladder that reaches from earth to heaven.
Reading is good, hearing is good,
conversation and meditation are good; but then they are only good at times and
occasions, and in a certain degree; and must be used and governed, with such
caution, as we eat and drink, and refresh ourselves, or they will bring forth
in us the fruits of overindulgence. But the spirit of prayer is for all times,
and all occasions; it is a lamp that is to always be burning, a light to be
ever shining; everything calls for it, everything is to be done in it, and
governed by it; because it is, and means, and wills nothing else, but the
whole, of the soul, not doing this or that, but wholly, incessantly given up to
God, to be where, and what, and how He pleases.
This state of absolute resignation,
naked faith, and pure love of God, is the highest perfection, and most purified
life of those, who are born again from above, and who through the divine power
become sons of God: and it is neither more nor less, than what our blessed
Redeemer has called, and qualified us to long and aspire after, in these words:
"Your kingdom come; Your will be done, on earth, as it is in heaven."
It is to be sought for in the simplicity of a little child, without
being captivated with any mysterious depths or heights of speculation; without
nature, grace, or creature, but so far as it brings us nearer to God, forces us
to forget and renounce everything for Him; to do everything in Him, with Him,
and for Him; and to give every breathing, moving, stirring, intention, and
desire of our heart, soul, spirit, and life to Him.
Let every creature have your love.
Love with its fruits of meekness, patience, and humility, is all that we can
wish for to ourselves, and our fellow creatures; for this is to live in God,
united to Him, both for time and eternity.
To desire to communicate good to every
creature, in as big a degree as we can, and as it is capable of receiving from us,
is a divine disposition; for thus God stands unchangeably disposed towards the
whole of creation: but let me add my request, as you value the peace which God
has brought forth by His Holy Spirit in you, as you desire to be continually
taught by an unction from above, that you would on no account enter into any
dispute with anyone about the truths of salvation; but give them every help,
but that of debating with them; for no man has fitness for the light of the
gospel, till he finds an hunger and thirst, and want of something better, than
that which he has and is by nature. Yet we ought not to check our inclinations
to help others in every way we can. Only do what you do, as a work of God; and
then, whatever may be the event, you will have reason to be content with the
success that God gives it. "He that has ears to hear, let him hear";
may be enough for you, as well as it was for our blessed Lord.
The next thing that belongs to us, and
which is also Godlike, is a true unfeigned patience, and meekness, showing
every kind of good will and tender affection towards those that turn a deaf ear
to us; looking upon it to be as contrary to God's method, and the good state of
our own hearts, to dispute with anyone in contentious words, as to fight with
him for the truths of salvation.
"Come to me, all you that labor
and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest," says our blessed Lord. He
called no one else, because no one else has ears to hear, or a heart to receive
the truths of redemption.
Every man is an ineffective disputer,
till such time as something has disturbed his state, and awakened in him a
sensibility of his own evil and miserable nature. We are all afraid, both of
inward and outward distress; and yet, till distress comes, our life is but a
dream, and we have no awakened sensibility of our own true state.
We are apt to consider intellect and
abilities, as the proper qualifications for the reception of divine truths; and
wonder that a man of a fine understanding should not immediately embrace just
and solid doctrines: but the matter is quite otherwise. Had man kept possession
of his first rich and glorious state, there would not have been any foundation
for the gospel redemption; and the doctrine of the cross, would have appeared
quite unreasonable to be pressed upon him: and therefore says our Lord,
"To the poor the gospel is preached." It is solely to them, and no
one else: that is, to poor fallen man, that has lost all the true natural
riches and greatness of his first divine life; to him is the gospel preached.
But if a man knows and feels nothing of this poverty of his nature, he is not
that person to whom the gospel belongs: it has no more suitableness to his
state, than it had to the un-fallen man: and then the greater his intellect and
abilities are, the better he will be qualified to show the folly of every
doctrine of that salvation, of which he has no need.
Such a man, though he may be of an
humane, ingenuous, generous and frank nature, of lively intellect and have much
candor, is nevertheless entirely ignorant of the depth of the heart of man, and
the necessities of human nature. As yet (though he knows it not) he is only at
play and pastime, pleasing himself with supposed deep inquiries after strict
truth, while he is only entertaining himself with lively, and wandering images
of this and that, just as they happen to occur in his mind. Could but he see
himself in the state of the poor distressed prodigal son, and find that he,
himself is the very person there recorded, he would then, but not till then,
see the fitness and need of that redemption, which is offered him by the mercy
of God in CHRIST JESUS. But such a one, is rich; he is sound; light is in his
own power, goodness is in his own possession: he feels no distress or darkness;
but has a crucible of reason and judgment, that on every occasion separates
gold from dross: and, therefore, he must be left to himself, to his own sweet
bliss, till something more than argument and disputation awakens him out of
these golden dreams.
Let us beware also of the religious
Pharisee, who raves against spiritual religion, because it touches the very
heart string of all systematical divinity, and shakes the very foundation of
every BABEL in every country; for not a system of divinity, since systems were
in being, whether popish or Protestant, deserves a better name.
All preachers of the true spiritual
mystery of the gospel, of a birth, light and life from above, in and by JESUS
CHRIST (which are the mystic writers of every age) were, and will be, treated
by the reigning fashionable orthodoxy, as enemies to the outward gospel, and
its services, just as the prophets of God (who were the mystic preachers of the
Jewish dispensation) were by the then reigning orthodoxy, condemned and
despised, for calling people to a spiritual meaning of the dead letter, to a
holiness infinitely greater than that of their outward sacrifices, types, and
ceremonies.
Whoever he is that has any situation
of his own to defend, be it that of a celebrated preacher, a champion for
received orthodoxy, a head, a leader, or follower of any sect, or party; or
that seems, both in his own eyes, and in the eyes of others, to have made
himself significant in any kind of religious distinction; every such person,
sooner or later, will find, that he has much of that very same to give up,
which hindered the zealous, and eminently religious Pharisees from being
converted to CHRIST, in the spirit of a little child.
Nor does it help the matter, that such
an one abounds with piety and excellency; for Paul was governed by a spirit of
great piety, great excellency, and zeal for God. He says of himself, that when
he was persecuting the disciples of Christ, he "lived in all good conscience,
as touching the Law blameless, and according to the straightest sect of the
Jewish religion": for the Pharisees, though many of them had all that
hypocrisy and rottenness which Christ laid to their charge, yet as a sect, they
were an order of confessed and resplendent sanctity; and yet the more earnest
and upright they were in this kind of zeal for goodness, the more earnestly
they opposed and condemned the heavenly mystery of a new life from CHRIST, as
appears from St. Paul.
This sect of the Pharisees did not
cease with the Jewish church; it only lost its old name; it is still in being,
and springs now in the same manner from the gospel, as it did then from the
Law: it has the same place, lives the same life, does the same work, minds the
same things, has the same goodness at heart, has the same religious honor, and
claims to piety, in the Christian, as it had in the Jewish church; and as much
mistakes the depths of the mystery of the gospel, as the Pharisees mistook the
mystery signified by the letter of the Law and the prophets.
It would be easy to show in several
instances, how the leaven of that sect works amongst us, just as it did amongst
them. "Have any of the rulers believed on Him?" was the orthodox
question of the ancient Pharisees. Now we Christians readily and willingly
condemn the weakness and folly of that question; and yet who does not see,
that, for the most part, both priest and people, in every Christian country,
live and govern themselves by the folly and weakness of the very same spirit which
put forth that question: for when God, as He has always done from the beginning
of the world, raises up private and illiterate persons, full of light and
wisdom from above, so as to be able to discover all the workings of the mystery
of iniquity, and to open the ground, and truth, and absolute necessity of such
an inward spirit and life of CHRIST revealed in us, as time, carnal wisdom, and
worldly policy have departed from; when all this is done, by the weakest
instruments of God, in such a simplicity and fullness of demonstration, as may
be justly deemed a miracle; do not clergy and laity get rid of it all, though
ever so unanswerable, merely by the strength of the Pharisees' good old
question, saying with them, "Have any of the rulers believed and taught
these things? Has the church in council or convocation? Has Calvin, Luther,
Zwinglius, or any of our renowned system-makers, ever taught or asserted these
matters? "
But hear what our blessed Lord said,
of the place, the power, and origin of truth: He refers us not to the current
doctrines of the times, or to the systems of men, but to his own name, His own
nature, His own divinity hidden in us: "My sheep," says He,
"hear My voice." Here the whole matter is decisively determined, both
where truth is, and who they are that can have any knowledge of it.
HEAVENLY truth is nowhere spoken but
by the voice of CHRIST, nor heard but by the power of CHRIST living in the
hearer. As he is the eternal WORD of GOD, that speaks forth all the wisdom, and
wonders of GOD; so He alone is the Word, that speaks forth all the life,
wisdom, and goodness, that is, or can be in any creature; it can have nothing
but what it has in Him and from Him: this is the one unchangeable boundary of
truth, goodness, and every perfection of men on earth, or angels in heaven.
Literary learning, from the beginning
to the end of time, will have no more of heavenly wisdom, nor any less of
worldly foolishness in it, at one time than at another; its nature is one and
the same through all ages; what it was in the Jew and the heathen, that same it
is in the Christian. Its name, as well as nature, is unalterable, i.e.,
foolishness with God.
I shall add no more, but the two or
three following words.
1. Receive every inward and outward
trouble, every disappointment, pain, uneasiness, temptation, darkness, and
desolation, with both Your hands, as a true opportunity and blessed occasion of
dying to self, and entering into a fuller fellowship with Your self-denying,
suffering Savior.
2. Look at no inward or outward
trouble in any other view; reject every other thought about it; and then every
kind of trial and distress will become the blessed day of Your prosperity.
3. Be afraid of seeking or finding
comfort in anything, but God alone: for that which gives you comfort, takes so
much of Your heart from God. "Quid est cor purum? cui ex toto, et pure
sufficit solus Deus, cui nihil sapit, quod nihil delectat, nisi Deus."
That is, what constitutes a pure heart? One to which God alone is totally, and
purely sufficient; to which nothing relishes, or gives delight, but God alone.
4. That state is best, which exercises
the highest faith in, and fullest resignation to God.
5. What is it you want and seek, but
that God may be all in all, in you? But how can this be, unless all creaturely
good and evil become as nothing in you, or to you? "Oh anima mea, abstrahe
te ab omnibus. Quid tibi cum mutabilibus creaturis? Solum sponsum tuum, qui
omnium est author creaturarum, expectans, hoc age, ut cor tuum ille liberum et expeditum
semper inveniat, quoties illi ad ipsum venire placuerit." That is, Oh my
soul! abstract Yourself from everything. What have you to do with changeable
creatures? Waiting, and expecting Your bridegroom, who is the author of all
creatures, let it be Your sole concern, that He may find Your heart free and
disengaged, as often as it shall please Him to visit you.
Be assured of this, that sooner or later, we
must be brought to this conviction, that everything in ourselves by nature is
evil, and must be entirely given up; and that nothing that is creaturely, can
make us better than we are by nature. Happy, therefore, and blessed are all
those inward or outward troubles, that hasten this conviction in us; that with
the whole strength of our souls, we may be driven to seek ALL from, and in GOD,
without the least thought, hope, or contrivance after any other relief: then it
is, that we are made truly partakers of the cross of CHRIST; and from the
bottom of our hearts shall be enabled to say, with St. Paul, "God forbid
that I should glory in anything, save the cross of our Lord JESUS CHRIST: by
which I am crucified to the world, and the world is crucified to me."
Give up yourself to God without
reserve. This implies such a state or habit of heart, as does nothing of
itself, from its own reason, will or choice, but stands always in faith, hope,
and absolute dependence upon being led by the Spirit of God into everything
that is according to His will; seeking nothing by designing, reasoning, and
reflection, how you shall best promote the honor of God, but in singleness of
heart, meeting everything that everyday brings forth, as something that comes
from GOD, and is to be received, and gone through by you, in such an heavenly
use of it, as you would suppose the HOLY JESUS would have done, in such
occurrences. This is an attainable degree of perfection; and by having CHRIST
and His Spirit always in your eye, and nothing else, you will
never be left to yourself, nor without the full guidance of GOD.
To a Clergyman of Westmoreland
By William Law
Sir,
Concerning the following texts, God
hardened the heart of Pharaoh; "He has mercy on whom He will have mercy,
and whom He will he hardeneth"; "Good and evil are from the
Lord"; "I create light, and I create darkness"; you ask, how
these things can be consistently affirmed of a God, all love and goodness to
His creatures?
I would ask you also, is there any
difficulty of admitting the truth of this scripture, "In God we live, and
move, and have our being"? Does this clash with the idea of a God all love
and goodness to the creatures? Now take all the contrary things that are said
of God, with relation to that which passes between God and man, and they all
imply no more, affirm no more, than the single foregoing text, namely, that in
every state of the life of man, be it what it will, either under a sense and
enjoyment of good, or the power and pain of evil, it is all owing to this
divine, original, essential relation between God and man, or because in Him we
live, and move, and have our being. For man, thus come from God, must through
the whole course, or endless ages of his life, neither know, nor find, nor feel
anything of good or evil, life or death, happiness or misery, but solely
because of that, which God is in him, and to him, and because of that, which he
is in God, and has from Him, by his original birth or creation.
The earthly animals, whose birth is only in and from this world, can have no evil of sin, or misery in their state, from God; and that only for this one reason, because they are not born of God, or partakers of the divine nature. Therefore God's creating evil in man, is the same thing, as if it were said, the divine birth in man, is that which creates his evil, because he could have no sin of a wrathful, proud, hardened heart, these things could neither exist in him, or be known by him, but because he came into being by a divine birth. Angels could not be a diabolical spirit of darkness, fiery dragon of wrath, fury, malice, vengeance, envy, hatred, but, because they were all born of God, to live and move and have their being in Him. This has created all the evil of every kind, that they can feel or know in their whole state.
All the difficulty of reconciling such
contrary things as are said of God, that he wills only life and good, and yet
that evil and death, are said to come from Him, arises from our considering the
operations of God, in a creaturely manner, or as we should understand the same
contrary things, if they were affirmed of any creature. Whereas the operation
of God, in its whole nature, is as different from anything that can be done by
creatures, as the work and manner of creation, is different, in power, nature,
and manner, from that which creatures can do to one another. For the operation
of God is never in or with the creature in any other manner, or doing any other
thing, but that which it was and did in the creation of them. This, and this
alone is the working of the deity in heaven and on earth; nothing comes from
Him, or is done by Him through all the eternity of His creatures, but that
essential manifestation of Himself in them, which began the glory and
perfection of their first existence. Now from this one, single, immutable
operation of God, that He can be nothing else in, or towards the creature, but
that same love and goodness, that He was to it, at its creation, it necessarily
follows, that to the creature that turns from Him, God can be nothing else to
it, but the cause of all its evil and miserable state. Hence is that of the
apostle, that "sin comes by the Law, because where there is no Law, there
is no transgression." Now God, or the divine nature in man, is the one
great Law of God in man, from which, all that is good and all that is evil in
him, has its whole state and nature. His life can have no holiness or goodness
in it, but as the divine nature within him, is the law by which he lives. He
can commit no other sin, nor feel any kind of hurt or evil from it, but what
comes from resisting, or rebelling against that Spirit of God, which is in him;
and therefore the good and evil of man, are equally from God. And yet this
could not be, but because of this ground, i.e., that God is unchangeable love
and goodness, and has only one will and work of love and goodness towards the creature.
Just as the Law could not make sin, or evil, because it has no sin or evil in
itself, but is immutably righteous, holy, and good, and has only one will and
one work towards man, whether he receives good or evil by it. Therefore the
righteous, holy Law, that is so, because it never changes its good will, and
work towards man, can truly say of itself these two contrary things, I create
good, and I create evil, without the least contradiction. In the like truth,
and from the same ground, it must be said, that happiness and misery, life and
death, tenderness and hardness of heart, are from God, or because God is that
which He is, in and to the birth and life of man.
This is the one true key to the state
of man before his fall, to his state after his fall, and to the whole nature of
his redemption. All three states, are in a few words of our Savior, set forth
in the clearest and strongest degree of light. "I am the true vine, ye
are the branches. He that abides in Me, and I in him, bringeth forth much fruit."
This was man's first created state of glory and perfection, it was living and
abiding in God, such a birth and communion of life with Him, and from Him, as
the branch has from the vine.
The nature of man's fallen state, and
where he has all the evil that is in it, is set forth in the following words,
"If a man abide not in Me" (the true vine) "he is cast forth
as a branch, and is withered, and men gather them, and they are cast into the
fire and burned." This comprehends the whole of man's fallen state,
namely, being broken off from the life of God, and therefore becoming such a
poor, withered, helpless creature, as may have all that done to him, as a
firebrand of hell and devils, which men may do to a broken off, withered branch
of the vine. And his state is as different from that of his creation, as a
withered branch, smoking and burning in the fire, is different from its first
state of life and growth in the rich spirit of the vine. Again, the whole of
man's redeemed state, is in the following words, "I am the bread of
life, that came down from heaven; He that eats this bread shall
live for ever; Who ever eats my flesh and drinks my blood, has eternal life,
dwelling in Me, and I in him."
This is our whole redemption, it
consists in nothing else, but having the full life of God, or birth of Christ
begotten, and born in us again. And thus do these three states of man fully
show, that our first perfection, our miserable fall, and blessed redemption,
have all that they have in them, whether of glory, or misery, merely and solely
because God alone is all that is good, and can be nothing else but good towards
the creature; and that neither angel, nor man can be happy or miserable, but
because it either has, or has not, this one God of goodness essentially living
and operating in it.
What a number of things called
religion, are here, at once cut off? Since nothing is life, happiness, and
glory, but the one essential operation of the triune God of love, and goodness
within us; nothing is death, evil, or misery, but the departure, or turning
from this essential God of our lives, to something that we would have from
ourselves, or the creatures that are about us. And how greatly is he deluded,
who living among the throng of religious schemes, thinks this, or that, or
anything in nature, can be his atonement, his reconciliation, and union with
God, but the Spirit, the body, and the blood of Christ forming themselves into
a new creature within Him! Then, and then only is he that first man that God
created, in whom alone He can be well pleased. But until then, he is that man,
whom the cherub's two-edged flaming sword will not allow to enter into
paradise. How is it now, that we are to regain that first birth of Christ? In
the same way, as Adam had it at first. What did he then do? How did he help
forward God's creating power? Now creating again, or restoring a first life in
God, it is just the same thing, and the same sole work of God, as did create us
at first; and therefore we can have no more share of power in the one, than in
the other. Nothing lies upon us as creatures fallen from God, or is required of
us with regard to our growth in God, but simply not to resist that, which God
is doing towards a new creation of us.
That which God is doing towards the
new creation of us, had its beginning before the foundation of the world.
"In Christ Jesus," said Paul, "We were chosen before
the foundation of the world"; the same as saying, that God out of His
great mercy, had chosen to preserve a seed of the WORD and SPIRIT of God in
fallen man, which through the mediation of a God incarnate, should revive into
that fullness of stature in Christ Jesus, in which Adam was at first created.
And all this work of God towards a new creation, is by that same essential
operation of God in us, which at first created us in His image and likeness.
And therefore nothing belongs to man in it, but only to yield himself up to it,
and not resist it.
Now who is it, that may be said to
resist it? It is everyone who does not deny himself, take up his cross daily,
and follow Christ. For everything but this, is that flesh that wars against the
spirit. The whole life of the natural man, resists all of the essential
operation of God, which would create him again in Christ Jesus. Further more,
every religious man resists it, in and by and through the whole course of his
religion, who takes anything to be the truth of piety, the truth of devotion,
the truth of religious worship, but faith, and hope, and trust, and dependence
upon that alone, which the all-creating WORD, and all-sanctifying SPIRIT of
God, inwardly, essentially, and vitally works in his soul.
Would you like to know, how you are to understand this essential operation of the triune holy deity in our souls, and why nothing else is, or can be that grace or help of God, which brings salvation, take this earthly equivalent of the matter. The light and air of this world, are universal powers, that are essential to the life of all the creatures of this world. They are essential, because nothing sees, until the light has brought forth a birth of itself in the essence of the creature, which birth of light can last no longer, than it is essentially united with the operation of that universal light which brought it forth: Air is also essential to the life of the creature, because nothing lives, until a birth of the air is born in it, nor any longer, than its own in-born air, is in essential union with that universal air, and operation of air, that first brought it forth. Now from this essential, unalterable relation between light and air, and seeing, living creatures, it plainly follows, that darkness and death, may be ascribed to them, as well as seeing and life.
Thus, if light and air could say
anything of themselves in outward words, of that which they are, and do to all
animals; if the light was to say, It is I that make seeing and blind eyes; if
the air was to say, I create life, and I create death; could there be any
difficulty of understanding, or allowing the truth of these words? Or could
they be true in any other sense, but because where light is not, there is the
cause of darkness, and where air is not, there is the cause of death. And so in
the strictest truth of the words, seeing and blind eyes are from the light;
living and dead bodies are from the air. Because darkness could not be, but
because light does not shine in it, nor the body be dead, but because the
breathing of the air is not in it.
It is thus, with the essential
operation of the triune holy God, in the life of all divine and godly
creatures, whether men or angels. The light and Holy Spirit of God, are
universal powers, and essential to the birth of a godly life in the creature;
which creaturely birth of a divine life, can begin no sooner, than the WORD and
SPIRIT of God bring forth a birth of themselves in the creature, nor subsist
any longer, than it is united with, and under the continual operation of that
Word and Spirit, which brought it forth. Hence it is truly said, that spiritual
life, and spiritual death, spiritual good and spiritual evil happiness and
misery are from God, and it is, for this one reason, because there is no good,
but in God, nor any other operation of God in, and to the creature, but that of
heavenly life, light, love, and goodness.
When man, created in the image and likeness of God, to be an habitation and manifestation of the triune God of goodness, had by the perverseness of a false will, turned from his holy state of life in God, and so was dead to the blessed union, and essential operation of God in his soul, yet the goodness of God towards man, was not altered, but stood in the same good will towards man as at the first, and willed, and could will nothing else towards the whole human nature, but that every individual of it, might be saved from that state of death and misery in an earthly nature, into which they were fallen.
Hence, it is, from this unchangeable
love of God towards man, which could no more cease, than God could cease, came
forth that wonderful scene of providence, of such a variety of means, and
dispensations, of visions, voices, and messages from heaven, of law, of
prophecies, of promises and threatenings, all adapted to the different states,
conditions, and ages of the fallen world, for no other end, but by every skill
of divine wisdom, and contrivance of love, to break off man from his earthly
delusion, and bring about in him a sense of his lost glory, and so, make him
capable of finding again that blessed essential operation of Father, Son, and
Holy Spirit in his soul, which was the essential glory of his first creation.
Now, as in this scene of a divine and
redeeming providence, God had to do with a poor, blind, earthly creature, that
had lost all sense of heavenly things, as they are in themselves, so the wisdom
of God, must often, as it were, humanize itself, and condescend to speak of
Himself after the manner of men. He must speak of His eyes, His ears, His
hands, His nose, etc., because the earthly creature, the mere natural man,
could in no other way, be brought into any sense of that, which God was to him.
But now all this process of divine
providence, was only for the sake of something higher; the mystery of God in
man, and man in God, was still laying hid, and was no more opened, than the
mystery of a redeeming Christ, was opened in the type of a passover lamb.
Pentecost alone was that, which took
away all veils, and showed the kingdom of God, as it was in itself, and set man
again under the immediate, essential operation of God, which first gave birth
to a holy Adam in paradise. Types and shadows ended, because the substance of
them was found. The cloven tongues of fire had put an end to them, by opening
the divine eyes, which Adam had closed, unstopping the spiritual ears, that he
had filled with clay, and making his dumb sons to speak with new tongues. And
what did they say? They said all old things were gone, that a new heaven and a
new earth were coming forth, that God Himself was manifested in the flesh of
men, who were now all taught of God. And what were they taught? The same which
Adam was taught by his first created life in God, namely, that the immediate,
essential operation of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, was from now on, the
birthright of all that were become true disciples of Christ. And so ended, the
old creation, and the fall of man, in a God manifested in the flesh, dying in
and for the world, and coming again in spirit, to be the life and light of all
the sons of Adam.
Look now at all God's dispensations to
the day of Pentecost, in this true point of view, as so many schools of
different discipline and education of the natural man, until by a birth from
above, he could bear the language of heaven, and be taught of God, then you
will sufficiently see the childish folly of those gray-headed doctors, who,
forgetting that the last times are come, when God will be known only as a
spirit, worshipped only in spirit, because everything else is but shadow, and
not the truth, yet set up themselves as masters, or rabbis of new schools of
their own, which can only keep up that doting learning, and wisdom of words,
which compelled the learned Jews, for the sake of God, and goodness, for the
sake of Law and prophecy to crucify the Christ of God, as a Beelzebub, and
blasphemer. This old logic and criticism of scribes and Pharisees, is that
which robs disputing Christians of the truth as it is in Jesus, and instead of
the true bread that came down from heaven, feeds their unregenerate hearts with
the dry husks of that, which can be received from text set against text in the
outward letter. No, so wise are these verbal proficients, as to think the
gospel must be false, and the Bible itself only fit to be burned, if all that,
is not to be ascribed to God, as true of Him, as He is in Himself, which in
condescension to the poor, ignorant, fallen, earthly creature, He speaks of His
eyes, His ears, His hands, His turning His back, and turning His face, His
coming down, and going up, His fiery wrath, His destroying fury, everlasting vengeance,
etc., Whereas all these things are said, not because of that, which God is in
Himself, in His holy, supernatural being, but because of that, which man is, in
the blindness of his fallen state, so ignorant of God, so averse to godliness,
as only capable for a time, to be instructed by the impressions of such
language: That is, until the threatenings of the Law, and the word of prophecy
have done their work, and that day star arises in the heart, which knows, and
teaches, that CREATOR, REDEEMER, and LOVE, are the one true unchangeable,
triune God, that Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, which from everlasting to
everlasting have only one will, and one work of heavenly life, light, and love
in, and towards the creature. And as true as this is, so true is it also, that
from the first to the last man, no one was, or ever will be any further from
this essential operation of the holy deity in his soul, but so far as he has
withdrawn himself from it. “God hardened the heart of Pharaoh";
this says neither more nor less, than that Pharaoh had withdrawn his heart from
God. When God said to Moses, "I will harden his heart, that he will not
let the people go"; it had no other meaning, than to give to Moses
that same full assurance of Pharaoh's state, which he gave to Jeremiah at
another time. "You shall" (says God) "speak all these
words to them," "But they will not listen to you, you shall
call to them, but they will not answer you." Jer. 7:27. God helped
Pharaoh to his hardened heart, just as he helped Adam not to be afraid of
eating of the evil tree, by assuring him, that certain death was
hid in it. But Adam's turning from God, to hear the voice and instruction of
his own reason and imagination, and the suggestions of a satanical serpent, was
that which created in him a new hardened heart, bold enough to eat of the
forbidden tree. Now here, sir, I would have you observe, that this rise of the
first sin, fully demonstrates how the matter unalterably stands between God and
every sinner, to the end of the world; there cannot be the smallest variation,
either on the side of God, or on the side of the sinner. The whole nature of
God, His one unalterable will and work, stands in the same full opposition and
contrariety to every work of sin in every man, as it did to Adam's first
transgression. Nothing new will ever be in any sin, it has but one way of
coming into the world, it must always be born out of self and Satan, as the
first was. And that which God did to prevent the first sin, saying to Adam,
“Eat not,” that same miraculous voice of love, keeps saying, and saying to
every son of Adam, Do not Sin.
Yet so wise in the ways of God, are
some divinity-students, as to teach and preach, that the whole world, through
its thousands of years, has been bringing forth its millions of myriads of
sinners all round the globe, who as soon as they have finished with the vanity
and misery of this world, are to be roaring in the hottest fire of an eternal
hell. For what? Why, because they have been just as wicked, as the decrees of
God required and forced them to be. And also through every age of the world,
there has always been a little number of righteous, who were to go to heaven,
which number had no littleness in it, but because God would not suffer it to be
greater. Can a charge like this be brought against Satan? No, does it not even
free Satan from all the evil that is charged upon him, and make him, though
going about as a roaring lion, to be as insignificant a tool in the work of
sin, as the preacher is in the work of godliness, though with ever so loud a
voice, he begs the reprobate to be reconciled to God, or with tears in his
eyes, exhorts the elect not to depart from him?
You once, I remember, said to me, that
you thought I over did the matter, in my censure upon learning. Let learning
therefore speak for itself. Let its own works praise it. What has it done? What
has brought forth a multiplicity of churches, but that very same acuteness of
learning, which asserts and proves there is but one? From what source comes
transubstantiation, election, reprobation, justification of several sorts,
necessity and insignificancy of works, Socinianism, Arianism, etc., but from
that knowledge of history, and critical skill in words, which is the glory of
the learned world.
"Without me you can do nothing,"
said Christ. "That which a man soweth, that shall he reap,"
said the apostle. Truths like these, of which the scripture is full, would keep
all believers in the true church, attentive to the one thing needful, had not a
learning, falsely so called, filled all eyes with the dust of darkness.
Now, sir, be as sober as you will
about the use and power of learning, logic, and eloquence, in the doctrines of
salvation; condemn the bad use that heretics, schismatics, Arians and Socinians
have made of them; yet let me whisper this truth into your ear, that you will
never be delivered from the delusion and cheat of your own learning, until by a
light of life risen up within you, you come to see, and know, that you need no
more learning, to change you from a sinner into a saint, than Mary Magdalen
did.
God said to Abraham, "Walk before me, and be perfect."
This was the Hebrew school, in which the Father of the faithful, was to learn
to be perfect. But here now comes the scholar-critic, and finds, that matters
stand not thus now, because the glorious light of the gospel (he says) has
discovered that all is in an election and reprobation, and that salvation and
damnation come from nothing else, the apostle expressly saying, "It is
not of him that wills, nor of him that runs, but of God that shows mercy."
What a learned strife has there been about the meaning of these words? And yet
they mean not one jot, more or less, than when the apostle said, "The
natural man does not know the things of the spirit, neither can he know them."
All that is in the one text, is in the other; and both of them say only this
one great and good truth, namely, that the creature can have no divine life,
light, goodness, and happiness, but from that, which the holy triune God is,
and operates by a birth of His holy nature in it.
Farewell. William Law
FINIS.
To a Clergyman in the North of England
Letter 5
My dear Brother,
Live as you now do, in such activity
of spirit, and multiplied ways of being good, and though you were to live fifty
years longer, you would stick in the same mire, and end your life with the same
complaints, as filled your last letter to me. You tell me, that after all the
great change you have made in your life, you find nothing of that inward good
and satisfaction, which you have so much expected, and more especially since
you have been a reader of the books, recommended by me.
But, sir, you quite mistake the
matter, you have not changed your life; for that which is, and only can truly
be called your life, is in the same state as when I first knew you. Nothing is
in your life, whether it be good or bad, but that which WILLS and
HUNGERS in you; and your own life neither is, nor can be anything
else but this. Therefore nothing reaches your life, or can make a real change
in it, from bad to good, from falseness to truth, but the right will and the
right hunger. Practice as many rules as you will, take up this or that new
opinion, be daily reading better and better books, follow this or that able
man, the bread of life is not there. Nothing will be fed in you, but the vanity
and self-conceited righteousness of your own old man. And thus it must be with
you, until all that is within you is become one will, and one hunger after that
which angels eat in heaven.
But now, if will and hunger are the
whole of every natural life, then you may know this great truth with the utmost
certainty, namely, that eating is the one preservation of every life, from the
highest angel in heaven, to the lowest living creature on earth. That which the
life does not eat, that the life does not have. Now everything that lives on
earth, is a birth or production of the astral, elementary fire, light, and
spirit, to which water is always essential, and it continues in life, tastes
and enjoys the good of its life, no longer than these powers and virtues of the
stars and elements are essentially and continually eaten by it.
It is just so with the immortal,
heavenly life of the soul, it is a birth of those same powers, in their highest
glory, in the invisible world; a world, where the triune deity of Father, Son
and Holy Ghost, brings forth a triune glorious habitation for itself, of fire,
light, and spirit, opening an infinity of wonders, births, and beauties in a
crystal transparent sea, called the kingdom of heaven.
Out of these powers, or out of this
kingdom of heaven, are the births of all holy, angelic creatures; nothing lives
or moves in them, but that fire, light, and spirit, which comes as a birth from
Father, Son, and Holy Ghost; and nothing feeds, keeps up, and exalts this
heavenly fire, light, and spirit, but the hidden, inconceivable, supernatural
Trinity, which is before, and deeper than all nature, and can only manifest
itself, and communicate its goodness, by such an outward birth of its own
unapproachable glory. And here you may find a glorious meaning of those words
of our Lord, saying, "My kingdom is not of this world," because
it is a kingdom of those heavenly powers of the triune God, which give food and
nourishment, purity and perfection to the fire, light, and spirit of those
divine creatures, which are to be holy as He is holy, perfect as He is perfect,
in His own heavenly kingdom.
Here therefore, in this spiritual
eating of that same invisible good, which gives life, and perfection of life to
all the angels of God, and not in any human contrivances, or activity of your
own, are you to place your all, as to the change of your life; it all consists
in the right hunger, and the right food, and in nothing else!
The fall of Adam, and the origin of
all sin and misery, began in his lust and hunger after the knowledge of good
and evil in the kingdom of this world. By this, he left, and lost the food
which heaven gives. He died to all the influences and enjoyments of his first
fire, light, and spirit, which was his vital union with God, in the kingdom of
heaven. All the evil that was hid in this earthly creation, and its numerous
creatures, opened, and diffused itself with all the power of a poisonous food,
through his whole soul and body. But in all this, nothing more came upon him,
or was done to him, than that which his own hunger had eaten. Here you have the
fullest demonstration, how every change in the life of man is, and only can be
made, namely, by hungering, and eating. Adam had not fallen, had known no
death, or extinction of that heavenly fire, light, and spirit, which was his
first birth in God, but because he hungered after the state of the animal life
in this world, which has no other fire, light, and spirit in it, but that which
gives a transitory life, or varied, contrary lusts and appetites, to all the
beasts, birds, and insects.
This is the doctrine of the Old
Testament, concerning the power of hunger and eating in the first Adam. On the
other hand, in conformity to this, and in full proof of the truth of it, that
it must have been so; the second Adam, the Lord from heaven, in the New
Testament, has declared, that hunger and eating is that alone, which can help
fallen man to that first heavenly fire, light, and spirit, with the spiritual
flesh and blood that belonged to it; saying again and again, in a variety of
the strongest expressions, this great truth, that except a man eat his
flesh, and drink his blood, he has no life in him, that is, no life of that
celestial body and blood, which Adam lost, and which alone can live in the
fire, light, and spirit of heaven.
Every spirit that is creaturely, and
every desire of the spirit, has always something bodily, as its own birth. No
spiritual creature can begin to be, but by beginning to be bodily. For
creaturely existence, and bodily existence, is the same thing; the spirit is
not, and cannot be in the form of a creature, until it has its body; and its
body is the manifestation of spirit, both to itself, and other beings.
Live in the love, the patience, the
meekness, and humility of Christ, and then the celestial, transparent,
spiritual body of Christ's flesh and blood, is continually forming itself, and
growing in and from, and about your soul, until it comes to the fullness of the
stature in Christ Jesus; and this is your true, substantial, vital eating the
flesh, and drinking the blood of Christ, which will afterwards become your body
of glory to all eternity. And though your astral reason, and outward senses,
while you are in Adam's bodily flesh, you know nothing of this inward body of
Christ, yet there it is, as surely as you have the love, the patience, the
meekness, and humility of Christ; for where the true Spirit of Christ is, there
is His true spiritual body.
On the other hand, live to
selfishness, to diabolical pride, wrath, envy, and covetousness, and then
nothing can hinder these tempers, from forming within you such a spiritual body
to your soul, as that which devils have, dwell, and work in.
Be as unwilling as you will, through
learned wisdom, or fear of fanaticism, to believe this, your unbelief can last
no longer, than until Adam's flesh and blood leave you, and then, as sure as
your soul lives, you will, and must have it living, either in the spiritual
body of fallen angels, or in the spiritual body of the redeeming Jesus. Oh,
sir, trifle away no more time in many matters, your first spiritual body must
come again. Without it, you are the very man that came to the marriage feast,
not "Having on a wedding garment." He was bound hands and
feet, and cast into utter darkness, that is, he was the chained prisoner of his
own dark, hellish, spiritual body, which had been growing up in him all of his
life, from that which his soul had daily eaten, and hungered after; and so was
become those very chains of darkness, under which the fallen angels are
reserved unto the judgment of the great day.
Now there is no being saved or
preserved from this body of chains and darkness, but by the one hunger and
thirst after righteousness that is in Christ Jesus, and by eating that, which
begets heavenly spiritual flesh and blood to the soul. The two trees of
paradise, with their two fruits i.e., of death, to the eater of the one, and
life, to the eater of the other, these were infallible signs, and full proofs,
that from the beginning to the end of the world, death and life, happiness and
misery, can proceed from nothing else, but that which the lust and hunger of
the soul chooses for its food. Now spiritual eating is by the mouth of desire,
and desire is nothing else but will, and hunger, therefore, that which you
will, and hunger after, that you are continually eating, whether it is good, or
bad, and that, no matter which it is, forms the strength of your life, or which
is the same thing, forms the body of your soul. If you have many wills, and
many hungers, all that you eat is only the food of the many spiritual diseases,
and burdens your soul with a complication of inward distempers. And under this
working of so many wills, it is, that religious people have no more good, or
health and strength from the true religion, than a man who has a complication
of bodily distempers, has from the most healthful food. For no will or hunger,
be it turned which way it will, or seem ever so small or trifling, is without
its effect. For as we can have nothing but as our will works, so we must always
have some effect from it. It cannot be insignificant because nothing is
significant, but that which it does.
Do not now say, that you have this one
will, and one hunger, and yet can’t find the food of life by it. For as sure as
you are forced to complain, so sure is it, that you do not have it. "Not
my will, but thine be done"; when this is the one will of the soul,
all complaints are over, then it is, that patience drinks the water of life out
of every cup; and to every craving of the old man, this one hunger continually
says, "I have meat to eat, that you know nothing of."
"Thy kingdom come, thy will be
done," is the one will, and one hunger, that feeds the soul with the
life-giving bread of heaven. This will is always fulfilled, it cannot possibly
be sent away empty, for God's kingdom must manifest itself with all its riches
in that soul, which wills nothing else; it never was, nor can be lost, but by
the will, that seeks something else. Therefore you may know with the utmost
certainty, that if you have no inward peace, if religious comfort is still
wanting, it is because you have more wills than one. For the multiplicity of
wills, is the very essence of fallen nature, and all its evil, misery, and
separation from God lies in it; and as soon as you return to, and allow only
this one will, you are returned to God, and must find the blessedness of his
kingdom within you.
Give yourself up to ever so many good
works, read, preach, pray, visit the sick, build hospitals, clothe the naked,
etc., yet if anything goes along with these, or in the doing of them you have
anything else, that you will and hunger after, but that God's kingdom may come,
and His will be done, they are not the works of the new-born from above, and so
cannot be His life-giving food. For the new creature in Christ is that one
will, and one hunger that was in Christ; and therefore where that is wanting,
there is no new creature, which alone can have his conversation, which alone
can daily eat and drink at God's table, receiving in all that it does,
continual life from "Every word, that proceeds out of the mouth of God."
From what word, and from what mouth of
God? Why only from that hidden, supernatural power of the triune deity, which
speaks, and breathes continual nourishment to that heavenly fire, light, and
spirit, in and from which, all that are about the throne of God, have their
inward joy above all thought, and their outward glory, that can only be
figured, or hinted to us, by pearls, sapphires, and beautiful rainbow.
It is from this power of the triune God, working in the fire, light, spirit, and spiritual water, or body of your new-born creature, that all the good, and comfort, and joy of religion, which you want, is to be found, and found by nothing, but the resurrection of that divine, and heavenly nature, which came forth in the first man.
Do not take these to be too high flown
words, for they are no higher, than the truth; for if that which is in you, is
not as high as heaven, you will never come there. That heavenly fire, light,
and spirit, which makes the angelic life to be all divine, must as certainly be
your inward likeness to God; and that which God is, and works in angels, that
He must be, and work in you, or you can never be like to, or equal with them,
as Christ has said. To be outwardly glorious, as they are, you must stay until
this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, but to have the same inward
glory of the same celestial fire, light, and spirit, burning, shining, and
breathing in your inward man, as angels have, belongs to you, as born at first
of the triune breath of the living God, and born again of Christ, out of Adam's
death, to have, and be, all that by a wonder of redemption, which was your
divine birthright at first by a wonder of creation.
And now, my dear friend, choose your
side: would you like to be honorable in church, or state, put on the whole
armor of this world, praise that which man praises, clothe yourself with all
the graces and perfections of the world, and be an orator, and critic, as fast
as you can, and above all, be strong in the power of flattering
words.
But if the other side is your choice; would
you be found in Christ, and know the power of his resurrection; would you taste
the powers of the world to come, and find the continual influences of the
triune God, feeding and keeping up His divine life in your triune soul, you
must give up all for that one will, and one hunger, which keeps the angels of
God in the full feasts, of ever new, and never-ceasing delights in the
nameless, boundless riches of eternity.
Do not think it too hard, or too
severe a restraint, to have but one will, and one hunger; it is no harder a
restraint, than to be kept from all that can bring forth pain, and sorrow to
your soul; no greater severity, than to be excluded from every place, but the
kingdom of God. For to have but this one will, and one hunger, is to have every
evil of life, and all enemies put under your feet. It is to be finished with
everything, that can defile, betray, disappoint, or hurt that eternal nature,
which must have its life within you. On the other hand, everything that is not
the effect and fruit of this one will, and one hunger, must sooner or later, be
torn from you with the utmost pain, or become food for that gnawing worm, which
will not die.
Do you ask, how you are to receive
this one will, and one hunger? I refer you to no power of your own, and yet
refer you to that which is within yourself. Angels in heaven, are not good and
happy by anything they can do to themselves, but solely by that which is done
to them. Now that Holy Spirit, which does God's will in heaven, and is the
goodness and happiness of all its inhabitants, that same Spirit is every man's
portion upon earth, and the gift of God within him. It is but lost labor, to
strive by any power of your reason, or self-activity, to work up this one will
and one hunger within you, or to kindle the true ardency of a divine desire, by
anything that your natural man can do. This is as impossible, as for fallen
Adam to have been his own redeemer, or a dead man to give life to himself. The
one will, and one hunger which alone can eat the true nourishment of the divine
life, is nothing else but the divine nature within you, which died in Adam no
other death, but that of being suppressed and buried for a while, under a load
of earthly wills.
Hence it is, that nothing can put an
end to this multiplicity of wills in fallen man, which is his death to God,
nothing can be the resurrection of the divine nature within him, which is his
only salvation, but the CROSS of Christ, not that wooden cross,
on which he was crucified, but that cross on which he was crucified through the
whole course of his life in the flesh. It is our fellowship with Him on this
cross, through the whole course of our lives, that is our union with Him, it
alone gives power to the divine nature within us, to arise out of its death, and
breathe again in us, in one will, and one hunger after nothing but God.
To be like-minded with Christ, is to
live in everything that is contrary to self, the world, the flesh, and the
devil, as He did; this is our belonging to Him, our being one with Him, having
life H, and washing our robes in the blood of the Lamb. For then, and then only
are we washed, and cleansed by His blood, when we drink His blood, and we drink
His blood, when we willingly drink of the cup that He drank of.
Again, not to be like-minded with
Christ, is to be separated from Him. To have another mind than He had, is to be
in the state of those, who crucified Him. Such as the redeemer was, such are
they that are redeemed. As Adam was, such are they that are born of him. Life
from Adam, and life from Christ, is the one single thing, that makes the one
our destroyer, the other our redeemer. But to finish, cast not about in your
mind, how you are to have the one will, and one hunger, which is always eating
at God's table, and continually fed with the bread of life; the thing is
already done to your hands. "I am the way, the truth, and the life,"
says Christ, the same as if He had said, the way is nowhere, the truth is
nowhere, the life is nowhere, but in me. What room therefore for any learned
contrivances, or further enquiry about the matter? Follow Christ in the denial
of all the wills of self, and then all is put away that separates you from God:
the heaven-born new creature will come to life in you, which alone knows, and
enjoys the things of God, and has his daily food of gladness in that manifold
BLESSING, which Christ preached on the mount.
Tell me then no more of your new skill in Hebrew words, of your Paris editions of all the ancient fathers, your complete collection of the councils, commentators, and church historians, etc., etc. Did Christ mean anything like this, when he said, "I am the way, the truth and the life"? Did the apostle mean anything like this, when he said, "No man can call Jesus Lord, but by the Holy Ghost"? Great, good, and divine teachers, you say, were many of the fathers: I only say this, that much more great, good, and divine is He, who is always teaching within you, ever standing and knocking at the door of your heart, with the words of eternal life.
You perhaps may ask, why I go on
writing books myself, if there is but one true, and divine teacher? I answer,
though there is but one bridegroom, that can furnish the blessing of the
marriage feast, yet His servants are sent out to invite the guests. This is the
unalterable difference between Christ's teaching, and the teaching of those,
who only publish the glad tidings of Him. They are not the bridegroom, and
therefore have not the bridegroom's voice. They are not the light, but only
sent to bear witness of it. And as John the Baptist said, "He must
increase, but I must decrease"; so every faithful teacher says of his
doctrine, it must decrease, and end, as soon as it has led to the true teacher.
All that I have written for near
thirty years, has been only to show, that we have no master but Christ, nor can
have any living divine knowledge, but from His holy nature born and revealed in
us. Not a word in favor of Jacob Behmen, but because, above every writer in the
world, he has made all that is found in the kingdom of grace, and the kingdom
of nature, to be one continual demonstration, that dying to self, to be born
again of Christ, is the one only possible salvation of the sons of fallen Adam.
But I will have finished, as soon as I
have given you a little piece of history, which your friend Academicus, has
given of himself: "When I had," says he, "taken my degrees in
the university, I consulted several great divines to put me in a good method of
studying divinity. It would take up nearly half a day to tell you the work,
which my learned friends cut out for me. One told me, that Hebrew words are
all; that they must be read without points, and then the Old Testament is an
opened book. He recommended to me a cart load of lexicons, critics, and
commentators upon the Hebrew Bible. Another tells me, the Greek Bible is the
best, that it corrects the Hebrew in many places, and refers me to a large
number of books learnedly writ in defense of it. Another tells me that church
history is the main matter, that I must begin with the first fathers, and
follow them through every age, not forgetting to take the lives of the Roman
emperors along with me, as striking great light into the state of the church in
their times. Then I must have recourse to all the councils held, and the canons
made in every age: which would enable me to see with my own eyes, the very
great corruptions of the Council of Trent. Another, who is not very fond of
ancient matters, but wholly bent upon rational Christianity, tells me, I need
go no higher than the reformation; that Calvin and Cranmer were very great men;
that Chillingworth and Locke ought always to lie upon my table; that I must get
an entire set of those learned volumes wrote against popery in King James's
reign; and also be well versed in all the discourses, which Mr. Boyle's, and
Lady Moyer's lectures have produced; and then, he said, you will be a match for
our greatest enemies, which are popish priests, and modern deists. My tutor is
very liturgical; he desired me, of all things, to get all the collections, that
I can, of the ancient liturgies, and all the authors that treat of such
matters, who, he said, are very learned and very numerous. He has for many
years been making observations upon them, and is now clear, as to the time,
when certain little particles received entrance into the liturgies, and others
were by degrees dropped. He has a friend abroad in search of ancient mss.
liturgies; for at times, said he, at parting, I have had some suspicion, that
our sacrament of the Lord's Supper is essentially defective, for want of having
a little water mixed with the wine. Another learned friend told me, that the
Clementine Constitution is the book of books; and that all that lies loose, and
scattered in the New Testament, stands there in its true order and form. And
though he will not say, that Dr. Clarke, and Mr. Whiston, are in the right, yet
it might be useful to me to read all the Arian and Socinian writers, provided I
stood upon my guard, and did it with caution. The last person I consulted, advised
me to get all the histories of the rise and progress of heresies, and of the
lives and characters of heretics. These histories, he said, contract the
matter, bring truth and error close in view; and I should find all that
collected in a few pages, which would have cost me some years to gather
together. He also desired me to be well versed in all the casuistical writers,
and chief schoolmen, for they debate matters to the bottom, dissect every
virtue, and every vice, and show how near they may come together without
touching. And this knowledge, he said, might be very useful, when I came to be
a pastor.
"Following the advice
of all these counselors, as well as I could, I lighted my candle early in the
morning, and put it out late at night. In this labor I had been sweating for
some years, until Rusticus, at my first acquaintance with him, seeing my way of
life, said to me, had you lived about seventeen hundred years ago, you would
have stood just in the same place, as I stand now. I cannot read, and therefore,
says he, all these hundreds of thousands of doctrine and disputing books, which
these seventeen hundred years have produced, do not stand in my way; they are
the same thing to me, as if they had never existed. And had you lived at the
time mentioned, you would have escaped them all, as I do now, because, though
you are a very good reader, there were then none of them to be read. Could you
therefore be content to be one of the first Christians, who were as good as any
that have been since, you may of spared all this labor. It is not easy for me,
says Academicus, to tell you how much good I received from this simple
instruction of honest Master Rusticus. What a project was it, to be grasping
after the knowledge of all the opinions, doctrines, disputes, heresies,
schisms, which seventeen hundred years had brought forth, through all the
extent of the Christian world! What a project this was, in order to be a
divine, that is, in order to bear true witness to the power of Christ, as a
deliverer from the evil of earthly flesh and blood, and death and hell, and a
raiser of a new birth and life from above! For as this is the divine work of
Christ, so he alone is a true and able divine that can bear a faithful
testimony to this work of Christ. How easy was it for me to have seen, that all
this labyrinth of learned enquiry, into such a dark, thorny wilderness of
notions, facts, and opinions, could signify no more to me now, to my own
salvation, to my interest in Christ, and obtaining the Holy Spirit of God, than
if I had lived before it had any beginning. But the blind appetite of learning,
gave me no leisure to apprehend so plain a truth. Books of divinity indeed, I
have not quit reading, but will esteem none to be such, but those that make
known to my heart, the inward power and redemption of Jesus Christ. Nor will I
seek for anything even from such books, but that which I ask of God in prayer,
i.e., how better to know, more to abhor, and resist the evil that is in my own
nature, and how to obtain a supernatural birth of the divine life brought forth
within me. All besides this is worthless."
God be with you. William Law, March 5, 1753.
The
Truth Of The Atonement
Letter 4
In Answer to a Scruple.
That you may have a full answer
to your scruple, concerning these words, "The folly of debtor and
creditor," in the second part of the Spirit of Love, I will set forth the
doctrine from the place it was taken. A great part of that book, is to clear
up, and assert the true scripture doctrine of the nature, necessity, and merit
of our Lord's sufferings and death, as an atonement, and satisfaction before
God, in the work of our redemption. No point of Christianity has been more
mistaken, in our common systems of gospel doctrine, or given greater offense
than this, and yet nothing clearer, or more reasonably to be believed, when it
stands in its own scriptural manifestation.
Now the right ground of understanding
the true meaning of every different expression, relating to Christ as our savior,
or salvation, lies in these two things:
1.
What Christ is in Himself.
2.
What He does, or intends to do for us.
The scripture says, "God was
manifested in the flesh"; this describes His whole nature, what He was in
Himself, i.e., the deity become man. What He is, and does in us, and for us, is
expressed in the following words, "He was manifested to destroy the
works of the devil"; and again, "As in Adam all die, so in
Christ, shall all be made alive."
Now according to this ground, every expression concerning our Savior, is to have its true infallible meaning fixed. Everything that is said of His birth, His life, His sufferings, His death, His resurrection and ascension, are all, both with respect to God, and ourselves, of one and the same efficacy, full of one and the same merit, and all for one and the same end, i.e., to destroy in man the works of the devil, and to make all that died in Adam, to be alive again in Christ.
Suppose now, any one of these to still
be needed, and the same will follow from it, as if they were all needed. Had
His birth been otherwise than it was, He not being God as well as man, he could
not have effected a beginning of the divine life in us. Had not His life been
without sin, His death upon the cross could not have done us any good, nor
could it have been the one mediator between God and sinful man. Had His
sufferings been less than they were, had there been any evil, trial, or
temptation, which had not attacked Him, through the whole course of His life,
with all its force, He could not have been said, to have overcome them. So sure
therefore as Christ, as a son of man was to overcome all that the world, the
flesh, and the devil, could do to fallen man; so sure is it, that all the
evils, which they could possibly bring upon fallen man, were to be felt, and
suffered by Him, as absolutely necessary in the nature of the thing, to prove
His victorious superiority over them. Had He not given up His body to an
humiliating death, in all the horrors of a soul, that had lost its God: He
could not have suffered that in, and for man, which every man must have
suffered, who had died in his fallen state. But Christ dying, and sacrificing
Himself, as He did, in and through that horrible death, which was fallen man's
gate to eternal misery, and conquering this state of man, as He had every evil
power of the world, the flesh, and the devil, then it was, that He could say to
those, who were all their life in fear of this death, be of good comfort, I
have overcome death, and that upon the same ground, as He said to His
followers, under a sense of worldly tribulations, "Be of good comfort, I
have overcome the world." And thus His death, had no other nature, with
respect to us, than every other part of His process, that was a precursor to
it, only as it was the last, and greatest, and finishing part of that redeeming
work, which was begun by His divine birth, and carried on in, and through His
sinless, perfect life. And as I said, that the death of man unredeemed, was his
gate into an eternal separation from God, so Christ's entrance into this gate
of damnation, and pouring out His blood, thus forsaken of God, had a suffering
in it, that thoughts can no more conceive, than can words express.
Hence it is, by way of eminence,
justly said, to be the highest price, that He paid for us; and that by His
blood it is that we are washed, and redeemed, not only because of its greatness
in itself, but because it finished, and for ever completed the whole redeeming
work, which He had to do for us in the flesh. Therefore it was, that through
the Old Testament, this sacrifice of His death, is the great thing mostly
pointed at in all its sacrifices, types, and figures; hence also is all the
boast of it in the gospel. Well therefore may the church, through all ages, have
ascribed so much to the merit of His blood shed for us; well may it have been
celebrated, as the one great price, by which we are ransomed from the power of
death and hell; because though all that He was, and did, antecedently to it,
was equally necessary to our salvation, yet all had been without any effect,
unless by His so dying, this damnable death had been swallowed up in victory.
In short, had not Christ been God, as well as man, He could not even have made a beginning in the work of our salvation, and had He not ended His life in such a sacrifice, as He did, He could never have said, "It is finished." He therefore, who denied the truth, the certainty, and absolute necessity of these two essential points, is in the abomination of Socinianism[2], and is that very liar and anti-Christ described by John in his first epistle.
Again, though Christ's death was
absolutely necessary in the very nature of the thing, so very great in its
merits and effects, yet unless His resurrection had followed, we would have
been still in our sins, nor could He, until risen from the grave, have
purchased a resurrection for us. Lastly, had He not ascended into heaven, He
could not have had the power of drawing, as He said, all men to Himself. Every
part therefore of our Savior's character, or process, has its full and equal
share in all that, which is said of Him, as our peace with God, our
righteousness, our justification, our ransom, our atonement, our satisfaction,
our life and new birth; for all these different expressions, have no difference
in doctrine, but whether separately, or jointly taken, signify nothing else,
but this one thing, that He was the true and full destroyer of all the works of
the devil in man, and the true raiser of a divine life, in all that died in Adam.
And here, sir, it is well to observe,
that all that Christ was, did, suffered, and obtained, was purely and solely on
the account, and for the sake of altering, or removing that which was wrong,
evil, and miserable in man, or in scripture words, "God was in Christ
Jesus, reconciling the world to Himself," that is, taking away from man
every property, or power of evil, that kept him in a state of separation from
God. Thus it was, and to this end, that "God was in Christ Jesus" in
His whole process.
Unreasonably therefore have our
scholastic systems of the gospel, separated the sacrifice of Christ's death,
from the other parts of His process, and considered it as something chiefly
done with regard to God, to alter, or atone an infinite wrath, that was raised
in God against fallen man, which infinity of just vengeance, or vindictive
justice, must have devoured the sinner, unless an infinite satisfaction had
been made to it, by the death of Christ.
All this, is in the grossest ignorance
of God, of the reason and ground, and effects of Christ's death, and in full
contradiction to the express letter of scripture. For there we are told, that
God is love, and that the infinity of His love was that alone, which showed
itself towards fallen man, and wanted to have satisfaction done to it; which
love-desire could not be fulfilled, could not be satisfied with anything less
than man's full deliverance from all the evil of his fallen state. That love,
which has the infinity of God, no, which is God Himself, was so immutably great
towards man, though fallen from Him, "That He spared not His only begotten
Son"; and why did He not spare Him? It was because nothing but the
incarnate life of his eternal Son, passing through all the miserable states of
lost man, could regenerate His first divine life in him. Can you possibly be
told this, in stronger words than these, "God so loved the world, that He
gave His only begotten Son"; how did He give Him? Why, in His whole
process. And to what end did He give Him? Why, "That all who believe in
Him, might not perish, but have everlasting life." Away then with the
superstitious dream, of an infinite wrath in God towards poor fallen man, which
could never cease, until an infinite satisfaction was made to it. All scripture
denies it, and the light of nature abhors it. The birth, the life, the death of
Christ, though so many different things, have but one and the same operation,
and that operation is solely in man, to drive all evil out of his fallen
nature, and delight the heart of God, that desires his salvation. God is love,
and has no other will towards man, but the will of love. That love, which from
itself began the creation of an holy Adam, from itself began the redemption of
a fallen Adam. The death of Christ was a sacrifice from the love of God the Son
towards man, to overcome thereby that damnable death, which, otherwise, every
son of Adam must have died; it was a sacrifice offered to the same love, in God
the Father; a sacrifice, equally loved and desired by both of them, because, in
the nature of the thing, as absolutely necessary to alter and overcome that
evil, which belonged to man's state of death, as the incarnation of the WORD,
was absolutely necessary in the nature of the thing, to make man to be alive
again in God.
This is the one only true, and full
confutation of Socinianism.
But to have recourse to a supposed
wrath, or vindictive justice, in a God incensed towards fallen man, in order to
confute the Socinian, who denies the necessity, and effects of Christ's death,
is only opposing one great falsity with another. For wrath has no more place in
God, than love has in the devil. Wrath began with devils, hell, and fallen
nature, and can have no possible existence anywhere, or in anything, but where
devils, hell, and fallen nature, have their power of working.
Do not, my friend, be here so furious, as to say, that if it was strictly true, that there was no wrath in God, you would burn your Bible: for if it was strictly true, you would never have had a Bible to burn; nor any more messages from heaven about man's salvation, than from hell. For if you will have wrath in the most high God, you can have no other, or better a God, than that which the atheistical Spinoza invented.
For if wrath is in the supreme God,
then nature is in God, and if so, then God is nature, and nothing else; for
nature cannot be above itself. Therefore if nature is in the most high God,
then the lowest working of nature, is the true supreme God. And so instead of a
supernatural God, who created heaven and earth, then heaven and earth, and all
things else, are the only God.
This is the atheistical absurdity,
that necessarily follows from supposing a wrath in God; for wrath can no more be
anywhere, but in nature, than storms and tempests can be, where there is
nothing that moves.
Let me here, sir, observe to you the
barefaced slander, that Dr. Warburton has ventured to cast upon me, in charging
my writings with Spinozism, though all that I have written for these last
twenty years, has been a full contradiction of it, as is not to be found in any
book, that had been purposely written against it. Had I only proved, as I have
done, by a variety of proofs, that wrath cannot possibly be in the true God, I
would have sufficiently confuted Spinozism; for if not wrath, then nothing of
nature is in God. But I have gone much further, and have, in my books, The
Appeal, the book of Regeneration, the Spirit of Prayer, the Spirit of Love, and
the Way to Divine Knowledge, opened the true ground of the unchangeable
distinction between God and nature, making all nature, whether temporal or
eternal, its own proof, that it is not, and cannot be God, but purely and
solely, the WANT of God, and can be nothing else in itself but a
restless, painful want, until a supernatural God manifests Himself in it. This
is a doctrine, which the learned of all ages have known nothing of; not a book,
ancient or modern in all our libraries, has so much as attempted to open the
ground of nature, to show its birth and state, and its essential unalterable
distinction from the one abyssal, supernatural God; and how all the glories,
powers, and perfections of the hidden, unapproachable God, have their wonderful
manifestation in nature and creature. This is a blessing reserved by God for
these last times, to be opened in His chosen instrument, the poor, illiterate
Behmen. And this I will venture to say, that he who will declare war against
him, has no choice of any other weapons, but raillery and reproach. To call the
blessed man, a possessed cobbler, will be doing something; to call his
writings, senseless jargon, may stand his learned adversary in great stead; but
if he tries to overcome him any other way, his success will be like his, who
knocks his head against a post. But no more of this here.
And now, sir, what shall I say of my
learned, accusing doctor? Why only this, that if he knows how to forgive
himself, then there will be one thing at least, in which we are both like-minded.
A word or two now to yourself and
friends, who are so loath to own a God who is all love: let me tell you, if you
will have wrath in the supreme God, you must have a God, in whom is
selfishness, envy, and pride, with all the properties of fallen nature. For as
it is impossible for one of these to be without the other in the creature, so
if any one of them was in God, all the other must be there. They are the four
essential elements of hell, or fallen nature, which mutually beget, and are
begotten of one another; where one is, there are all of them, and where all are
not, there cannot be one of them. Every pride consists of three things,
selfishness, envy, and wrath. And so of every one of them, take which you will,
it consists of the other three, so that to separate them, is to separate a
thing from itself.
Divine love is just as contrary to
them, as God is to the devil; and where love is not, there God is not, and
where the work is not wholly the working of love, it is not a work of God, but
the selfish, wrathful, proud, envious working of the diabolical nature, fallen
from its first blessed subjection to, and union with the supernatural God of
love.
To talk (as some do) of a good wrath
in God, which is only so called, because it has a likeness to, and produces
like effects to those that come from wrath in the creature, is but calling that
a good wrath, which is like a bad wrath, and is no better, no wiser, than to
talk of a good envy, a good pride in God, which are only so called, because
they have a likeness to that, which is a bad pride, and a bad envy in the
creature. Can anything be more profanely absurd than this? Which yet is the
best that can be said by those, who will have it the glory of God, to be
wrathful, who think all is lost, that the gospel salvation is blasphemed, if
the same love that created man in glory, should be his only redeemer, when he
had fallen from it. Not considering, that salvation could never have come into
the world, but because, all that good and blessing, which love can be, and do
to the creature, must be done, and doing for ever and ever, by that first
creating God, whose name and nature, whose will and working, is love, the same
yesterday, today, and forever.
And now, sir, need I say more, to
remove your scruple about the following passage in the Spirit of Love, "No
wrath in God, no fictitious atonement, no folly of debtor and creditor, no
suffering for suffering's sake, but a Christ suffering and dying, as His same
victory over death and hell, as when He rose from the dead and ascended into
heaven." {Spirit of Love, Second Part.}
I said folly of debtor and creditor,
because Christ's overcoming man's damnable death, by His victorious passage
through it, has nothing in it that has any likeness to the transaction of a
debtor paying his creditor; nothing was done in it by way of payment of a debt,
any more than Christ paid a debt for Lazarus, when he raised him from the dead,
or paid a debt for the man born blind, whom he helped to seeing eyes. For the
good that is done us by the death of Christ, is a good that relates solely to
ourselves. Nothing in it, is given to, or received, but by ourselves; it
overcomes, and saves us from our own evil of death, just as that, which Christ
did to Lazarus, and the blind man, overcame the death that was in the one, and
the darkness that was in the other.
You appeal to a parable of our Lord's,
which has no more relation to the nature and efficacy of Christ's death, than
the parable of the tares of the field. St. Peter said, "How often shall
my brother sin against me, and I forgive him, until seven times?"
Christ answered, "Not until seven times, but until seventy times
seven." And then he sets forth this doctrine of continual forgiveness
in the following parable.
"The kingdom of God is likened to
a certain king, who would take account of his servants," etc. Read the
whole parable, and you will be forced to see, that nothing else is intended to
be taught by it, but that one conclusion, which Christ draws from it: "So
likewise shall my heavenly Father do unto you, if you from your hearts, forgive
not everyone his brother their trespasses." All that the parable said, is
neither more nor less, than is said in these other words, "Be merciful, as
your Father which is in heaven is merciful": again, the doctrine of this
parable, quite overthrows that, which systematic doctors intend by debtor and
creditor; for their doctrine is, that the injured authority of God must have
full satisfaction made to it, and then it is, that they ground the necessity of
so great a payment, as Christ made to it. Whereas this parable of the kingdom
of God, sets forth a king, frankly forgiving, and not requiring any payment at
all, either from the debtor himself, or from anyone else for him. Can there
therefore be a greater folly, than to appeal to this, and the like scriptures,
to make God a creditor, whose vindictive wrath against his debtor, will not be
appeased, until full payment is made to it? And what a blind persisting is it
in the same folly, to urge the petition in the Lord's Prayer, "Forgive us
our debts, as we forgive our debtors," as another proof, that God is that
creditor, who will be fully paid the debts, that are due to Him? For surely, if
God requires us to expect, and pray for the forgiveness of our debts, it is
badly concluded from this, that therefore full payment of them, must be made.
The truth is, this petition teaches the same forgiveness, as the foregoing
parable, and is utterly inconsistent with the doctrine of an infinite
satisfaction, necessary to be made; for, if so, then the petition ought to have
been thus, "forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors, BUT ONLY,
when full payment is made, either by themselves, or by someone else for
them."
In a word, vindictive wrath in God, that will not forgive, until a satisfaction equal to the offense, is made to it, sets the goodness of God in a lower state, than that which has been found in thousands of mankind. The truth of the matter, is this, the divinity of Christ, and His whole process through life and death, was absolutely necessary in the nature of the thing, to raise man out of the death of sin, into a heavenly birth of life. And the necessity of all this, is grounded upon the certainty of man's fall, from a divine, into a bestial life of this world. The Socinian blasphemy consists in the denial of these points, the deity of Christ, and the fall of man, and the necessity of Christ's death. Our scholastic doctors, own the fall of man, but know nothing of the true nature and depth of it. They own the truth of Christ's divinity, and the necessity of His sufferings; they plead for the certainty of these things from scripture words, but DO NOT see into the ground of them, or in what, the absolute necessity of them consists. Therefore it is, that when opposed by Socinian reasoning, they are at a loss of how to support these great truths, and are forced to humanize the matter, and to suppose a vindictive wrath in God, as usually breaks forth in great princes, when a revolt is made, against their sovereign authority.
What a paltry logic, to say, God is
righteousness and justice, as well as love, and therefore His love cannot help,
or forgive the sinner, until His justice, or righteous wrath has been given
satisfaction? Every word here, is in full ignorance of the things spoken of.
For what is love in God, but His unchangeable love of His own goodness, His
impossibility of loving anything else but it, His impossibility of suffering
anything that is unrighteous, to have any communion with Him? What is God's forgiving
sinful man? It is nothing else in its whole nature, but God's making him
righteous again. There is no other forgiveness of sin, but being made free from
it. Therefore the compassionate love of God, that forgives sin, is no other,
than God's love of His own righteousness, for the sake of which, and through
the love of which, He makes man righteous again. This is the one righteousness
of God, that is rigorous, that makes no abatements, that must be satisfied,
must be fulfilled in every creature that is to have communion with Him. And
this righteousness that is thus rigorous, is nothing else but the unalterable
purity and perfection of the divine love, which from eternity to eternity can
love nothing but its own righteousness, can will nothing but its own goodness,
and therefore can will nothing towards fallen man, but the return of his lost
goodness, by a new birth of the divine life in him, which is the true
forgiveness of sins. For what is the sinful state of man? It is nothing else,
but the loss of that divine nature, which cannot commit sin; therefore the
forgiving man's sin, is in the truth and reality of it, nothing else, but the
revival of that nature in man, which being born of God does not sin. Lastly,
let me ask these dividers of the divine nature, what different shares, or
different work, had the righteousness, and the love of God in the creation of
man? Was there then something done by the love of God, which ought not to be
ascribed to the righteousness of God? Who can be so weak, as to say this? But
if the love and the righteousness of God, is one, as God is one, and had but
one work in the creation of man, it must be the highest absurdity, to say, that
in the redemption of man, the love, and the righteousness of God, must have,
not only different, but contrary works, that the love of God cannot act, till
the righteousness of God, as something different from it, is first satisfied.
All that which we call the attributes
of God, are only so many human ways of our conceiving that Abyssal All, which
can neither be spoken, nor conceived by us. And this way of thinking, and
speaking of God, is suitable to our capacities, has its good use, and helps to
express our adoration of Him, and His perfections. But to conclude, and
contend, that there must therefore be, different qualities in God, answerable,
or according to our different ways of thinking, and speaking of His
perfections, is rather blaspheming, than truly glorifying His name, and nature.
For omnipotent love, inconceivable goodness, is that unity of God, which we can
neither conceive, as it is in itself, nor divide into this, or that. The
importance of the subject I have been upon, has led me further than I intended.
But for the full illustration of it, I refer you to the Second Part of the
Spirit of Love. And so committing you to a God, who has no will towards you,
but in, and through the life, and death, the Spirit and power of the holy
Jesus, to deliver you from all your natural evil, and make you His beloved son,
in whom, He can be well pleased to all eternity, I bid you farewell.
July 18, 1757. William Law.
The
Taking Of Communion At Church
This is another response to a letter sent to Brother William Law, I believe that it will be as good a help to any other soul that is not fully in Christ, as it was to the soul that it was addressed to. Editor.
To Mr. J. L.
My dear and most worthy
friend,
I shall speak directly to
the matter that is causing you difficulty, the taking of communion at Church. First
of all, true religion, or church communion, is in its true nature, both
external and internal, which are united, and so, distinguished; the one is the
outward sign, the other the inward truth signified by it: the one never was,
nor ever can be, in its true state without the other. The inward truth, or
church, is regeneration, or the life, spirit, and power of Christ, quickened
and brought to life, in the soul.
The outward sign, or church, is that
outward form, or manner of life, that bears full witness to the truth of this
regenerated life of Christ, formed or revealed in the soul. The inward truth
gives forth its outward proper manifestations of itself, and these
manifestations bring forth the true outward church, and make it to be visible,
and outwardly known. As so, everything in the inward life, spirit, and will of
Christ, when it becomes living, dwelling and working in the spirit of our
minds, or inward man, is the inward church, or kingdom of God set up within us:
and everything in the outward behavior, and visible conversation of Christ,
while dwelling among men, when practiced and followed by us, in the form and
manner of our life, makes us the members of that outward church, which he set
up in this world. Inwardly nothing lived in Christ, but only the will of God, a
perpetual regard to His glory, and one continual desire of the salvation of all
mankind. When this spirit is in us, then are we inwardly one with Christ, and
united to God through Him.
Outwardly Christ exercised every kind
of love, kindness and compassion to the souls and bodies of men; nothing was
visible in the outward form of his life, but humility and lowliness of state in
every shape; a contented want, or rather total disregard of all worldly riches,
power, ease or pleasure; a continual meekness, gentleness, patience and
resignation, not only to the will of God, but to the haughty powers of the
world, to the perverseness, and contradiction of all the evil and malice of
men, and all the hardships and troubles of human life: now this, and such
outward behavior, like that of Christ, thus separate from, and are contrary to
the spirit, wisdom and way, of this world, and is that very outward church, of
which He willed all mankind to become living members of. And whoever in the
spirit of Christ, lives in the outward exercise of these virtues, lives as to
himself in the highest perfection of church unity, and is the true inward and
outward Christian. He is all that he can be, he has all that he can have, he
does all that he can do, and enjoys all that he can enjoy, as a member of
Christ's body, or church in this world.
For as Christ was God and man, come down from heaven, for no other end, but fully to restore the union that was lost between God and man, so church unity is, and can be nothing else, but the unity of this, or that man, or number of men with God, through the power and nature of Christ. And therefore it must be the truth, and the whole truth, that nothing more is required, nor will anything less be able, to make anyone a true member of the one church of Christ, out of which there is no salvation and in which there is no condemnation, but only and solely his conformity to, and union with the inward spirit, and outward form of Christ's life and behavior in this world. This is the one fold under one shepherd; though the sheep are scattered, or feeding in valleys, or on mountains ever so distant, or separate from one another. On the other hand, not only every unreasonable unjust action, be it done to whom it will, not only every unkind, proud, wrathful, scornful, disdainful inward thought, or outward behavior to any person, but every un-readiness to do good of all kinds, to all that we can; every unwillingness to rejoice with them that rejoice, and to weep with those that weep, and love our neighbor as ourselves; every aversion to be inwardly all love, and outwardly all meekness, gentleness, courtesy, and condescension in words and actions towards every creature, for whom Christ died, makes us schismatics, though we be ever so daily gathered together, into one and the same place, joining in one and the same form of creeds, prayers and praises offered to God, and truly breaks that church unity, which makes us one with Christ, as our head, and unites us with men, as the members of His body. That the matter stands like this; that true church unity consists in our walking as Christ walked, fully appears so from these words of our Lord Himself: "You are not of this world, as I am not of this world, but I have chosen you out of the world." Therefore to have this contrariety to the world, which Christ had, is the one necessary and full proof of our being His, of our belonging to Him, and being one with Him.
Again, "Abide in me, and I in
you, if you abide in me, you shall ask what you will, and it shall be done to
you. If a man does not abide in me, he is cast forth as a branch withered, etc.
For without me you can do nothing."
Therefore the one true proof of our
being living members of Christ's church on earth, or only dead branches, fit
for the fire, is nothing else but our being, or not being inwardly of that
spirit, and outwardly of that behavior, which Christ manifested to the world.
Again, "This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved
you, and by this shall all men know that you are my disciples." Therefore
the true and sufficient mark of our outward church membership, is there fully,
outwardly known, and found in every man, where the outward form of Christ's
loving behavior to all men, is outwardly seen and known to be in him. These and
like passages of Christ and His apostles (though quite overlooked by most
modern defenders of the one church) are the only places that speak truth, and
reality of what true church unity is.
It may now be reasonably asked, What
is the divine service, or worship in this church? For every church must have
its divine service and worship which is the life, strength, and support of
it. It is answered: "That no man
can call Christ Lord, but by the Holy Ghost." Therefore nothing is, or can
be a divine service in that church, which has Christ for its Lord, but what has
the Holy Spirit for its beginner, doer, and finisher. For if it be certain that
no one can own Christ as his Lord, but by the Holy Spirit, then it must be
equally certain, that no one can serve or worship God through Christ His Lord,
in any other way, help, power, or means, but so far as it is done, in, and by
the power of that same Holy Spirit. Whatsoever is born of the flesh is flesh;
that is, whatsoever proceeds from, or is done by the natural powers of man,
from his birth of flesh and blood, is merely human, earthly, and corrupt, and
cannot do anything that is heavenly, or perform a service or worship that is
divine, than our present flesh and blood can enter into the kingdom of heaven.
Thus the apostle says, "You are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so
be, the Spirit of God dwells in you. Now if any man has not the Spirit of
Christ, he is none of His." And consequently if not His, he can perform no
divine service to Him. Nor can any worship cease to be carnal, or become
divine, but by its being all that it is, and doing all that it does, by the
power, and presence of Christ dwelling in our souls, and helping us by His Holy
Spirit to cry in truth and reality, Abba Father.
The New Testament never calls us to
do, or offer, or allows anything to be done or offered to God, as a divine
service, or worship, but what is done in the truth, and reality of faith, of
hope, of love, and obedience to God.
But through all the New Testament, no
faith, no hope, no love is allowed to be true, and godly, but only that faith,
that hope, etc., which solely proceeds from, and is the fruit of the Holy
Spirit, living, dwelling, and working in our whole heart, and soul, and spirit. This spirituality of the Christian religion,
is the reason why it was first preached to the world under the name of the
kingdom of God, because under this new dispensation, freed from veils, shadows,
and figures of good things absent, or to come, God Himself is manifested,
ruling in us and over us, as an essential light of our lives, as an indwelling
Word of power, as a life-giving Spirit within us, forming us by a new birth, to
become a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices
to God, through a new and living way which Christ has consecrated for us. The
truth and perfection of which state, is plainly set forth by the following
prayer of Christ, "That they all may be one, as You, Father, are in Me,
and I in You, that they also may be in Us, I in them and You in me, that they
be made perfect in one, and that the love wherewith You have loved Me, may be
in them, and I in them." Now for the truth and certainty of this spiritual
kingdom, in which are made up only, spiritual worshippers, baptized from above,
into a union, and communion with Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, through the
mysterious union of God and man in the one mediator Jesus Christ; for the
truth, I say, of this spiritual state of Christianity, we have the plainest
words of Christ, expressly declaring that the Jerusalem service, and
consequently everything, or service that has the nature of it, was to have its
end in the establishment of His church.
"Believe me," He said,
"The hour comes when you shall neither in this mountain, nor yet at Jerusalem,
worship the Father: but the hour comes and now is, when the true worshippers
shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth: for the Father seeks such to
worship Him."
Therefore it must be certain in the
highest degree, that Christ cannot set up any other kind of worship, or
worshippers, but such as the Father seeks; because He and His Father were one,
both in will and work. And the reason and necessity of this kind of worship, is
added by Christ in the following words, "God is a spirit, and they that
worship Him, must worship Him in spirit and in truth." Therefore if Christ had not solely set up
this truth of spiritual worship, He would not have been anything else than
another Moses, and though a better teacher, yet still, but as a schoolmaster,
to some higher state of religion, that was yet needed, and must be revealed,
if man was to be restored to his true
state of life, union, and happiness in and with the divine nature. For as God
is a spirit, and our life is spiritual, so no religious worship can be in its
true perfection, or bring us into the possession of our highest good, till it
raises all that is spirit and life in us, into union and communion with spirit
and life in God. If it should be asked, how are we to become and continue worshippers
of the Father in spirit and truth? It is answered; all consists in turning
inwards, in attention to that, which is daily and hourly stirring, living, and
working in our hearts. Now though the scripture nowhere gives this direction in
these very words, yet, since it is said in the scripture, that God dwells not
in temples made with hands, but in the temple of our hearts, since the kingdom
of God is said to be within us, and not to come with outward observation, but
to be in us, as a secret, living seed of the incorruptible Word; since our
heart is our whole life, and we are said to live, and move, and have our being
in God, it is directly telling us that we are to turn inwards, if we would turn
to, and find God. It is directly
telling us, that in what manner we are within, as the worship is done there, so
is God in such manner within us; and that he is no otherwise our God, our life,
our rest and happiness, than so far as the working of our hearts, is a willing
and choosing, a hungering and thirsting to find, feel and enjoy the life-giving
power of His holy presence in our souls.
To be inwardly therefore attentive to
God, showing the good and the evil, distinguishing the light from the darkness
in our own souls; to listen to the voice of His ever speaking Word, and to
watch the moving of His ever sanctifying Spirit within us, waiting and longing
in the spirit of prayer, of faith and hope, of love and resignation, to be
inwardly quickened and revived in the image, and according to the likeness of
that Son, in whom He is well pleased, is the worshipping of God with our whole
heart and soul, in spirit and in truth.
It is living to God, in and through
the power of Christ, as He lived; it is praying with Him, and by His Spirit,
that continual prayer which He always had, whether speaking to the multitude,
or healing their diseases, or alone by Himself in the stillness of nights, and
loneliness of mountains. For this inward prayer, in which the whole heart, and
soul, and spirit, loves, worships, and applies to God, not absent or distant,
but to a three fold of goodness and mercy, of light and love, of glory and
majesty, dwelling, and working within us, willing and desiring to do all that
in the temple of our hearts, which is done and always doing in His own temple
in heaven, is a prayer, that only needs outward words for the sake of others;
and of which it may be said, as Christ said: "Father, I knew that You
always hear me, but because of the people, which stand by, I said it."
I believe that you will think I have
gone too far, and have not come close enough to the matter at hand. But I hope
it is not so: I have gone through all that I have said, only to show, that
church unity or communion, is not a matter that depends on any particular
society, or outward thing, but is complete, or defective, in such degree, as we
live in unity with, or contrariety to the inward spirit and outward example of
Christ. For no union signifies anything to us, or our salvation, but union with
God, through Christ, and nothing unites us to Christ, or makes us to be His,
but His Holy Spirit dwelling, and working inwardly and outwardly in us, as it
did in Him.
This is the only church unity that concerns the conscience, and when we are in this unity, we are in union with Christ, and with everyone who is united to Him, however distant, or separated from us, by human enclosures.
I come now to consider the church
under another, and more common idea of it, namely as external, and about which,
all the Christian world is at enmity, strife, and debate. After Christianity
had been in the world for a few hundred years, it became national, and obtained
the protection, and patronage of the princes of this world.
Hence it was enriched with many gifts
and privileges, and strengthened by powers, that were foreign to the nature of
it; and churchmen, beginning to quarrel about Christian doctrines, were
supported in their strife and division from one another, by the temporal
powers, under which they lived.
This state of the church has continued
to this day, where almost every age has multiplied the number of divided
churches, brought forth, by the union of the civil and ecclesiastical power.
This state therefore of external
churches, has the nature of things merely human, and is subject to such
alterations, changes, and corruptions, as the forms and revolutions of temporal
government all over the world are. And therefore the private Christian, who, as
such, is a member of a kingdom, that is not of this world, has little or no
concern in it.
Without entering into the merits of
divided churches, which I shall not do here, or anywhere else; this much I
think, and it may with truth be affirmed, that where the church and state are
incorporated, and under one and the same power, all the evil passions, corrupt
views, and worldly interests, which form and transform, turn and overturn all
outward things, must be expected to come to pass often, as well in the church,
as in the state, with which it is united.
But as private Christians have no
power, or call to govern the world, or set up thrones according to the
principles of truth and righteousness, but are by the spirit of the gospel
obliged to submit to, and be contented with that state of government, good or
bad, under which the providence of God has placed them, so are they in like
manner, to exercise a patient submission, and resignation under such an
imperfect state of the outward church, which providence has not prevented, and
to take care, to be inwardly found such worshippers in spirit and in truth, as
the Father seeks.
I do not mean by this, as some have,
that any evil, however great in the beginning,
either in the church or state, loses its evil nature, and may be called
right and good, as soon as providence has suffered it to become successful. No,
by no means. Success, though always to be owned to have God's permission,
leaves all things in their own nature, neither good because successful, nor
bad, because defeated and suppressed.
The wickedness of the Jews conspiring
and effecting the death of Christ, was not only permitted, but suitable to the
designs of providence, in the redemption of mankind. But that the evil nature
of their wickedness did not lose its guilt, because God allowed it to be
successful, but it still continues to be evil, and this is plain from the curse
of God still abiding upon it to this day.
The duty of private Christians, with
regard to providence in such cases, is not to call that good which before was
evil, or that evil which before was good, but patiently to suffer, and humbly
acquiesce under all that bad outward course of things, either in church or
state, which the providence of God has not thought fit to prevent, and that for
these reasons: first, as fully knowing that all things must work together for
good, to those who love God; secondly, as piously believing that in all
successful wickedness, whether of princes against their people, or of people
against their princes, there is always something hid under it, which in its own
way and degree, will like the successful wickedness of the Jews towards Christ,
help forward that salvation, for which Christ has laid down His life. Who can
say, what good, and what blessings, the Christian world had been deprived of,
had the righteous providence of God not permitted the princes of the heathen
world, to make such bloody havoc of the first Christians.
But suppose errors of the following
kind had got into the church,
1 The scripture baptism of the whole
body under water, only as it were mimicked, by scattering a few drops of water on
a new-born child's face.
2. The Supper of the Lord in one church, held to be bread and wine changed into the real flesh and blood of Christ: in another, as bread and wine, not changed into, but substantially united with the real flesh and blood of Christ: in another, mere bread and wine, only made memorials of the body and blood of Christ. In one church this, in another that form and manner of consecration held to be essential; in another, all consecration rejected, as superstition.
3. Suppose the original apostolical
constitution of church assemblies, were all meeting together, so that all in
their turns, might prophesy one by one, that all might learn, and all be
comforted, should it be that in some churches things have so changed, that all praying, speaking or
prophesying, from the power, and presence of Christ, should be prohibited; so
that one and the same, long, tedious, humanly-contrived form of worship, be
daily, from year's end to year's end, read by one, who is become their only
speaker and instructor, not because he alone is daily full of faith and of the
Holy Ghost, but because he is either hired to that office, or because, by some
means or the other, the church and churchyard have become his own property
until he dies. Is not such a state of church assemblies, in full contrariety to
the first assemblies, and to the apostle's injunction; "Quench not the
Spirit, despise not prophesying"?
4. Suppose again, that in the settled
service of the church, certain prayers and petitions, not according to truth
and righteousness, or suitable to the goodness of the evangelical spirit, are
read, as prayers for success in un-Christian wars, prayers for the destruction
of our Christian brethren, called our enemies, thanksgivings for the violent
slaughter and successful killing of mankind: when these are made parts of the
church service, are we in obedience to the providence of God, allowing things
in church assemblies to come to pass, to unite and bear a part in such church
service?
My answer to all this, shall be only
personal; that is, what I would do myself, in these supposed cases.
First, as to any defects, mutilation,
or variations in the outward form, and performance of baptism and the Supper of
the Lord in the church, I am under little, or no concern about them; and that
for this very good reason, because all that is inwardly meant, taught, or
intended by them, as the life, spirit, and full benefit of them, is subject to
no human power, is wholly transacted between God and myself, and cannot be
taken from me, by any alteration made by man, in the outward celebration of
them.
If the church, in my baptism, should
sprinkle a little milk, or wine, instead of water, upon my face it would be no
defective baptism to me, if I had all that inward disposition of repentance, of
faith in Christ, to be born again of Him, which was meant, figured, and implied
by such immersion into water, as was the first baptism.
The same may be said of the Supper of the
Lord, however altered, or varied in its outward manner from what it was at
first, if the inward truth, pointed at by it, is in me, is loved and adhered to
by me, I have all the benefit that was meant, or could be had by it, when it
was kept to a tittle in the same outward form, in which the first church used
it.
And therefore the outward celebration
of these sacraments is reverenced by me, wherever they are observed, as
standing in the same place and significant of the same inward blessing, as in
their first institution.
As to the fore-mentioned supposed
prayers, though I am present when they are read in the church, I neither make,
nor need I make them, any more my own prayers, than I make, or need to make all
the curses in the psalms, to be my own curses, when I hear both priest and
people reading them in church, as a part of divine service. Nor is there any
more hypocrisy, or insincerity, in one case, than in the other.
I join therefore in the public
assemblies, not because of the purity, or perfection of that which is done, or
to be found there, but because of that which is meant and intended by them:
they mean the holy, public worship of God; they mean the edification of
Christians; they are of great use to many people; they keep the world from a total
forgetfulness of God; they help the ignorant and un-learned to such a knowledge
of God, and the scriptures, as they would not have without them.
And therefore, fallen as these church
assemblies are, from their first spiritual state, I reverence them, as the
venerable remains of all that, which once was, and will, I hope, be again, the
glory of church assemblies, the ministration of the spirit, and not of the dead
letter. And there are two very great signs of the near approach of this day, in
two very numerous, yet very different kinds of people in these kingdoms. In the
one sort, an extraordinary increase of new separations, particularity of
opinions, methods, and religious distinctions, is worked up to its utmost
height. And we see them almost every day running with eagerness from one method
to another, in quest of something, by the help of a new form, which they have
not been able to find in the old one.
Now, as the vanity and emptiness of
anything, or way, is then only fully discovered and felt, when it has run all
its lengths, and worked itself up to its highest pitch, so that nothing remains
untried, to keep up the deceit; so when religious division, strife of opinions,
invented forms, and all outward distinctions, have done their utmost, and have
no further place to go, nor anything more to try, then is their inevitable fall
at hand; and if the zeal was simple and upright, all must end in this full
conviction, that vanity and emptiness, burden and deceit, must follow us in
every course we take, until we have finished with all our own running, to
expect all, and receive all, from the invisible God dwelling in, and blessing
our hearts with all heavenly gifts, by a birth of His eternal, all-creating
Word, and life-giving Spirit brought forth in our souls.
The other sign I mentioned, is to be
found in another kind of a much awakened people, in most parts of these
kingdoms, who in the midst of the noise and multiplicity of all church-strife,
having heard the still, and secret voice of the true Shepherd, are turned
inwards, and wholly attentive to the inward truth, spirit and life of religion,
searching after the mystical, spiritual instruction, which leads them from the
outward cry, of a "Lo here," or "there, is Christ," to seek
Him and His redeeming Spirit within them, as the only safe guide from inward
darkness to inward light; and from outward shadows into the substantial,
ever-enduring truth; which truth is nothing else, but the everlasting union of
the soul with God, as its only good, through the Spirit and nature of Christ
truly formed and fully revealed in it. But to go no further; I shall only add,
that as yet, I know of no better way of thinking or acting, than as above, with
regard to the universal fallen state of all churches; for fallen they all
are, as certainly as they are divided.
Every church distinction is more or less in the corrupt state of every selfish, carnal, self-willed, worldly minded, partial man, and is what it is, and acts as it acts, for its own glory, its own interest and advancement, by that same spirit, which keeps the selfish, partial man solely attached to his own will, his own wisdom, self-regard, and self-seeking. And all that is wanting to be removed from every church, or Christian society, in order that it may be a part of the heavenly Jerusalem, is that which may be called its own, human will, carnal wisdom, and self-seeking spirit; which is all to be given up, by turning the eyes and hearts of all its members, to an inward adoration, and total dependence upon the supernatural, invisible, omnipresent God of all spirits; to the inward teachings of Christ, as the power, the wisdom, and the light of God, working within them every good, and blessing, and purity, which they can ever receive, either on earth, or in heaven.
Under this light, I am neither
Protestant, nor papist, according to the common acceptation of the words. I
cannot consider myself as belonging only to one society of Christians, in
separation and distinction from all others. It would be as hurtful to me, if not
more so, than any worldly partiality, and therefore as the defects,
corruptions, and imperfections, which, some way or other, are to be found in
all churches, hinder not my communion with that, under which my lot is fallen,
so neither do they hinder my being in full union, and hearty fellowship with
all that is Christian, holy, and good, in every other church division. And as I know, that God and Christ, and holy
angels, stand disposed towards all that is good in all men, and in all
churches, notwithstanding the mixture in them, is like that of tares growing up
with the wheat, so I am not afraid, but humbly desirous, of living and dying in
this disposition towards them.
I am, worthy Sir, With much Truth of
Love and Respect,
Your faithful Friend, And hearty
Servant.
King's Cliffe, Feb. 28, 1756.
The Prevention Of Suicide
Letter 16
To the same.
My dear L.,
You have communicated to me several
letters, that you have written to your friends, and I much approve of the spirit
in which you have written them. Only I must repeat, what I have often said, be
careful of too much eagerness to set other people right, lest it lead you too
far from home, or too much exhaust that breath, which is to keep up the
strength of your own inward life. I believe you understand me.
You want a remedy, to prevent the growth of
suicide, and madness. They are not to be remedied by a new way of setting forth
the folly, and extravagancy of them. When the fruit is evil, there is no
remedy, but in putting the root of the tree in a better state.
Pride, is the father and mother
of suicide and madness. Would you have a share in removing these evils, you
must not cast about for high speculations, there is but one step to be taken,
and that is, to show the necessity of dying to pride, and seeking for salvation
only in humility. JESUS CHRIST is the only peace, and rest, and satisfaction of
human life. This is absolute, and admits of no exception. John the Baptist was
the true preparer of the way to CHRIST; if you think of any other way, it is
labor lost. This point is absolutely determined when CHRIST said, "They
have Moses and the prophets, let them hear them. If they believe not Moses, nor
the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one arose from the
dead."
Miracles and demonstrations, you see,
are in vain, until Moses, and the prophets are believed.
Now Moses is sin, made known by the
Law, and the prophets, are faith and hope in God. And these two things must
have their state, and work in the soul, before it can have any benefit from
CHRIST and His miracles. If you would therefore give some check to the growth
of suicide and madness, it cannot be by attacking them in themselves, or
speaking to the unreasonableness of their particular nature, this is as
useless, as a miracle to him, that would hear neither Moses, nor the prophets.
Now as Moses and the prophets were of
necessity, before the coming of CHRIST, so it must be in every human soul.
And this proves the truth, of what has
been so often asserted, of the importance of apprehending the fall of man, in
its true and full depth. For to hear Moses and the prophets is in reality only
this, i.e., man becoming truly sensible of his impure, and fallen nature, and
looking up to God to be delivered from it. Then, whether he has, or has not,
ever seen the Bible, he is a true believer of Moses and the prophets, he is
that lost sheep, that is sure of being found, that one who is weary and heavy
laden, that must find rest and refreshment in CHRIST.
It matters not therefore, my friend,
what the problem is, whether you would save a man from deism, debauchery, or
suicide, you must begin in the same place, from one and the same ground, and
this as unavoidable, as every fruit must have its beginning from the root, and
from the root in its right state.
The amiableness of any virtue, or the
horrid nature of any vice, while only considered as in themselves, are but as
pictures, set before our eyes, and have no other effect upon us. And this is
the un-profitableness of all moral instructions, whether heathen, or Christian.
If you can help a man to seek, and
find, and know himself, and his real relation to God; to know that he has
neither inward, nor outward evil, but only because he has lost his true state,
and place in God; and that therefore nothing can be his peace and happiness,
but being born again to his first divine life, or nature quickened again in
him, then you have done all that you can for him, whatever his malady is. But
enough of this.
Dear Soul,
Adieu. William Law Aug. 4, 1753.
To the same.
My dear L.,
I heartily thank you for your last.
Talk no more of obtruding upon me with your letter. Everything that comes from you
is welcome. I have no need to write anything to you, for you know all that I
have to say. You stand upon the same ground, that I do. And you have nothing to
do, but to be steadfast and un-moveable in that light, which God has vouchsafed
to you.
But, my friend, take notice of this, no truths, however solid and well grounded, help you to any divine life, but so far as they are taught, nourished, and strengthened by an unction from above; and that nothing more dries, and extinguishes this heavenly unction, than a talkative, reasoning temper, that is always catching at every opportunity of hearing, or telling some religious matters.
You have found enough, to prove to
you, that all must be found in God, manifested in the life of your soul. And I
must say again, shut your eyes, and stop your ears, to all religious tales.
My dear Soul,
Adieu. William Law Feb. 12, 1753.
Letter 18
To the same.
My dear friend,
The variety of trials, you have lately met with, are but a specimen of what you are to expect, in some form or other, so long as you breathe the air of this fallen world. The longer we are without them, the more our need of them is increased. And they never give great smart, but where something is to be torn off, that sticks too close to us. One reflection upon these sacred words, "My kingdom is not of this world: The Son of Man has no where to lay His head," are sufficient to take not only the sting out of every cross, that can here befall us, but even to make us afraid, and ashamed of being pleased with anything, that has the name of worldly honor, and prosperity.
You have no reason to wonder at anything you see, or hear, of the partiality, selfishness, envy, and enmity, that so often breaks out between brothers and sisters of the same blood. For if blood- relations, considered as such, could have any true goodness, or unselfish regard to one another, we should not be under the necessity of being born again from above.
Will it do you any good to tell you,
that thus says my heart, without speaking a word. "Let nothing live in me,
but the redeeming power of my holy Jesus, nothing pray in me but thy Holy
Spirit." This is my ship, in which, I would be always at sea. All that I
seek, or mean, either for myself, or others, by every height and depth of
divine knowledge, given us by God in His illuminated Behmen, is only for this
end, that we may be more willing, and glad to become such little children, as
our Lord has told us, are the only heirs of the kingdom of God.
The piercing critic may, and naturally
will grow in pride, as fast as his skill in words discovers itself. And every
kind of knowledge, that shows the scholar, the orator, the disputer, the
commentator, the historian, his own powers, and abilities, are the same temptation
to him, that Eve had from the serpent; and he will get no more good by the love
and relish of such knowledge, than she got by her love of the tree, that was so
desirable to make one wise.
But he whose eyes are opened, to see into this mystery of all things, sees nothing but death to himself, and to everything, that he had called, or delighted in as his own. This is the bold depth of his knowledge. And if you would know its aspiring height, it consists in learning to know, that which the angels and twenty-four elders about the throne of God, knew, when they cast down their crowns, before Him that sat on the throne, saying, Holy, holy, holy, Lord God almighty, Thou art worthy to receive glory, and honor, and power; for thou hast created all things, and for Thy pleasure they are, and were created. It is to know that the triune majesty of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, are the threefold power, life, glory, and perfection of every creature, that sings praises to God, in heaven and in earth. This is the proud knowledge of those, who are let into the holy of holies, opened by the Spirit of God in his chosen instrument, Behmen. Which goes no deeper, than to see the nothingness of man, ascends no higher, than to know that God is all; which begets nothing in man, but that which was begotten in Paul, when he cried out, "God forbid, that I should glory in anything, but the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ."
To Mr. S.
My dear friend and brother,
I hope my long silence has not
occasioned your being offended at me, or to suspicion, that I have disregarded
you, or the matter you wrote upon. If I were to offer a reason in excuse of it,
it would be an invented one, for it has never been known to myself. But I was
contented to know, that my heart was right towards you, full of all good will
and desire to serve you, in the way that God should lead me to. And so it is
come to pass, that you have not heard from me sooner. It is a great pleasure to
me to think (as you say) that my letter to you, will also be to two of your
brethren, who stand in the same state of earnestness, to know how to be
faithful and useful in their ministry, as you do: I hope God will increase your
number.
The first business of a clergyman
awakened by God into a sensibility, and love of the truths of the gospel, and
of making them equally felt, and loved by others, is thankfully, joyfully and
calmly, to adhere to, and give way to the increase of this new-risen light, and
by true introversion of his heart to God, as the sole author of it, humbly beg
of Him, that all that, which he feels a desire of doing to those under his
care, may be first truly and fully done in himself.
Now the way to become more
and more awakened, to feel more and more of this first conviction, or work of
God within you, is not to reflect and reason yourself into a further and deeper
sensibility of it, by trying to find arguments to strengthen it in your mind.
But the one true way is, in faith and love to keep close to the presence and
power of God, which has manifested Itself within you, willingly resigned to,
and solely depending upon the one work of His all-creating Word, and
all-quickening Spirit, which is always more or less powerful in us, according
as we are more or less trusting to, and depending upon it.
And thus it is, that by faith we are
saved, because God is always ours, in such proportion as we are His; as our
faith is in Him, such is His power and presence in us. What an error therefore,
to turn one thought from Him, or cast a look after any help but His; for if we
ask all of Him, if we seek for all in Him, if we knock only at His door of
mercy in Christ Jesus, and patiently wait and abide there, God's kingdom must
come, and His will must be done in us.
For God is always present, and always
working towards the life of the soul, and its deliverance from captivity under
flesh and blood. But this inward work of God, though never ceasing, or
altering, is yet always, and only hindered by the activity of our own nature,
and faculties, by bad men through their obedience to earthly passions, and by
good men through their striving to be good in their own way, by their natural
strength, and a multiplicity of seemingly holy labors and contrivances.
Both these sorts of people obstruct
the work of God upon their souls. For we can cooperate with God no other way,
than by submitting to the work of God, and seeking, and leaving ourselves to
it.
For the whole nature of the fallen
soul, consists in its being fallen from God, into itself, into a self-government
and activity, under its own powers broken off from God, and therefore dying to
self, as well to our reason, and our passions and desires, is the first and
indispensable step in Christian redemption, and brings forth that conversion to
God, by which Christ becomes formed and revealed in us. And nothing hinders
this conversion from being fruitful and good, and gaining all that we want from
God, but the retaining of something to dwell in, as our own, whether it be
earthly satisfactions, or a righteousness of human endeavors.
And therefore all the progress of your
first conviction, which by the grace of God you have had from above, consists
in the simplicity of your faith, in adhering to it, as solely the work of God
in your soul, which can only go on in God's way, and can never cease to go on
in you, any more than God can cease to be that which he is, but so far as it is
stopped by your want of faith in it, or trusting to something else along with
it. God is found, as soon as he alone is sought; but to
seek God alone, is nothing else but the giving up ourselves wholly unto Him.
For God is not absent from us in any other respect, than as the spirit of our
mind is turned from Him, and not left wholly to Him.
This spirit of faith, which
not here, or there, or now and then, but everywhere, and in all things, and at
all times, looks up to God alone, trusts solely in Him, depends absolutely upon
Him, expects all from Him, and does all it does for Him, is the utmost
perfection of piety in this life. The worship of God in spirit and truth, can
go no higher, than it does that which is its duty to do; it has all that it
wants, it does all that it will, it is one power, one spirit, one will, and one
working with God. And this is that union or oneness with God, in which man was
at first created, and to which he is again called, and will be fully restored
by God and man being made one with Christ.
"Stephen was a man full of faith
and the Holy Ghost." These are always together, the one can never
be without the other.
This was Stephen's qualification for
the deaconship, not because of anything high or peculiar in that office, but
because the gospel dispensation was the opening a kingdom of God amongst men, a
spiritual theocracy, in which as God, and man fallen from God, were united in
Christ, so a union of immediate operation between God and man was restored.
Hence this dispensation was called, in distinction from all that went before it
in outward types, figures, and shadows, a ministration of the Spirit,
that is, an immediate operation of the Spirit of God itself in man, in which
nothing human, creaturely, or depending upon the power of man's wit, ability or
natural powers, had any place, but all things begun in, and under obedience to
the Spirit, and all were done in the power and strength of faith united with
God.
Therefore to be a faithful minister of
this new covenant between God and man, is to live by faith alone, to act only,
and constantly under its power, to desire no will, understanding, or ability as
a laborer in Christ's vineyard, but what comes from faith, and full dependence
upon God's immediate operation in and upon us.
This is that very thing, which is
expressly commanded by Peter, saying, "If any man speak, let him speak as
the oracles of God, if any man minister, let him do it as of the ability which
God gives." For all which he gives this reason, which will be a reason as
long as the world stands, "That in all things God may be glorified through
Jesus Christ." A plain and sufficient declaration, that where this is not
done, there God is not glorified by Christians through Christ Jesus.
God created men and angels solely for
the glory of His love; and therefore angels and men, can give no other glory to
God, but that of yielding themselves up to the work of His creating love,
manifesting itself in the several powers of their natural life, so that the
first creating love, which brought them into being, may go on creating, and
working in them, according to its own never-ceasing will, to communicate good
for ever and ever. This is their living to the praise and glory of God, namely
by owning themselves, in all that they are, and have, and do, to be mere
instruments of His power, presence, and goodness in them, and to them; which is
all the glory they can return to their creator, and all the glory for which He
created them. We can no otherwise give religious glory to God, than by
worshipping Him in spirit and in truth, seeing Christ has said, that "The
Father seeks such to worship Him."
But we can no other way worship God in
spirit and in truth, than as our spirit in truth and reality, seeks only to,
depends only upon, and in all things adores, the life-giving power of His
universal Spirit; as the creator, upholder, and doer of all that is or can be
good, either in time or eternity. For nothing can be good, but that which is
according to the will of God, and nothing can be according to the will of God,
but that which is done by His own Spirit. This is unchangeable, whether in
heaven, or on earth. And this is the one end of all the dispensations of God,
however various, towards fallen man, to bring man into an union with God.
Comply with all the outward modes and institutions of religion, believe the
letter, own the meaning of scripture facts, symbols, figures, representations,
and doctrines, but if you stand in any other use of them, or seek to gain some
other good from them, than that of being led out of your own self, from your
own will, and own spirit, that the will of God, and the Spirit of God, may do all
that is willed, and done by you; however fixed, and steadily you may adhere to
such a religion, you stand as fixed and steadily in your own fallen state. For
the restoration of fallen man, is nothing else but the restoration of him to
his first state, under the will and Spirit of God, in and for which he was
created.
You may here perhaps, my dear friend,
think that I am speaking too much at large, and not closely enough to the
particular matter of your inquiry. But my intention has been, so to speak to you
on this occasion, as to lay a ground for a proper behavior, under every
circumstance of the outward work of your ministry. All things must be set right
in yourself first, before you can rightly assist others, towards the attaining
to the same state.
I do not mean, that you must be first
in a state of perfection, before you can be fitted to teach others. But I mean
that you must first see, in what you place your own perfection, and have the
witness in yourself of the truth of it, before you can rightly direct others in
the way to it; otherwise your instruction would be of such practical things, of
which you had no practical knowledge.
For this reason, I have said all that
is said above, to help you to set out under a right sense of all that, which
religion is to do for yourself, the why, and the how, it can be done in you.
When these two things are not notionally but practically known, and adhered to,
then you are enabled, according to your measure, to speak of things, and truths
of religion, to those that are ignorant, or insensible of them.
Hence you may learn, what you are
chiefly to drive at, in all your discourses from the pulpit, and conversation;
namely, to turn the attention of men to a power of good, and a power of evil,
both of them born and living within them. For in these two things, or states of
the soul, lies the full proof of the whole nature, both of the fall, and
redemption from the fall.
Were we not naturally evil, by a birth
of evil essentially born and living in us, we would need no such redemption;
and had we not a birth of something divine in us, we could not be redeemed.
Inward evil can only be cured, or overcome by an inward good.
And therefore, as all our salvation is
an inward work, or struggle of two births within us, so all the work of your
outward instruction, must be to call everyone home to himself, and help every
heart to know its own state, to seek, and find, and feel his inward life and
death, which have their birth, and growth, and strife against one another, in
every son of Adam.
And as this is the only proper way of
preaching, so it is, of all others, the most powerful, and penetrating into the
hearts of all men, no matter what condition they are in.
For as these two states are certainly
in every soul of man, however blended, smothered, and undistinguished, in their
operations for a time, yet they have each of them, in some degree, their
hearing ears, which though ever so sunk into dullness, will be forced, more or
less, to feel the power of that voice, which speaks nothing but what is true,
and must be heard within themselves.
And this is the true end of outward
preaching, namely, to give loud notice of the call of God in their souls, which
though unheard, or neglected by them, is yet always subsisting within them. It is
to make such outward sounds, as may reach and stir up the inward hearing of the
heart. It is so to strike all the outward senses of the soul, that from
sleeping in an inward insensibility of its own life and death, it may be
brought into an awakened and feeling perception of itself, and be forced to
know, that the evil of death which is in it, will be its eternal master, unless
the good of life that is in it, seeks for victory in the name and power and
mediation of Christ, the only Prince of life, and Lord of glory, and who alone
has the keys of heaven, of death and hell in His hands.
Thus far, and no further, goes the
labor and ministry of man, in the preaching of the Word, whether it be of Paul,
or Cephas. Therefore you will be well qualified, to open in your hearers, a
right sense and knowledge of the truth and reality of every virtue, and every
vice, that you are discoursing upon.
For since all that is good and evil,
is only so to them, because it lives in the life of their heart; they may
easily be taught, that no virtue, whether it be humility, or love, has any
goodness in it, but as it springs in, and from the heart, nor any vice, whether
it be pride, or wrath, is any further renounced, than as its power, and place
in the heart is destroyed. And thus the insignificance and vanity of an outward
formality, of a virtuous behavior, and everything short of a new heart, and new
spirit in, and through the power of Christ, dwelling vitally in them, may be
fully shown to be self-delusion, and self-destruction.
Your next great point, as a preacher,
should be to bring men to an entire faith in, and absolute dependence upon, the
continual power and operation of the Spirit of God in them. All churches, even down
to the Socinians, are forced, in obedience to the letter of scripture, to hold
something of this doctrine. But as the practice of all churches, for many ages,
has looked to education, art, and science, to qualify ministers for the
preaching of the gospel, as if it was merely a work of man's wisdom, so
ecclesiastics, for the most part, come forth in the power of human
qualifications, and are more or less full of themselves, and trusting to their
own ability, according as they are more or less proficient in science, and
literature, languages and rhetoric.
To this, more than to any one other
cause, is the great apostasy of all Christendom to be attributed. This was the
door, at which the whole spirit of the world, entered into possession of the
Christian church. Worldly lusts, and interests, vanity, pride, envy,
contention, bitterness, and ambition, the death of all that is good in the
soul, have now, and always had their nourishment, power, and support, from a
sense of the merit, and sufficiency of literal accomplishment.
Humility, meekness, patience, faith,
hope, contempt of the world, and heavenly affections (the very life of Jesus in
the soul) are by few people less earnestly desired, or more difficult to be
practiced, than by the great wits, classical critics, linguists, historians,
and orators in holy orders.
Now to bring man to a right practical
knowledge, of that full dependence upon, and faith in the continual operation
of the Holy Spirit, as the only raiser and preserver of the life of God in their
hearts, and souls, and spirits, is not enough, you sometimes, or often preach
upon the subject, but everything that you inculcate, should be directed
constantly to it, and all that you exhort men to, should be required, only as a
means of obtaining, and concurring with, that Holy Spirit, which is, and only
can be, the life and truth of goodness. And all that you turn them from, should
be as from something that resists, and grieves that blessed Spirit of God,
which always wills and desires to remove, all evil out of our souls, and make
us again to be sanctified partakers of the divine nature.
For as they only are Christians, who
are born again of the Spirit, so nothing should be taught to Christians, but as
a work of the Spirit; nor anything sought, but by the power of the Spirit, as
well in hearing, as in teaching. It is owing to the want of this, that there is
so much preaching and hearing, and so little benefit either of the preacher or
hearer.
The labor of the preacher is, for the
most part, to display logic, argument, and eloquence, upon religious subjects;
and so he is just as much carried out of himself, and united to God by his own
religious discourses, as the pleader at the bar is, by his law, and oratory
upon right and wrong. And the hearers, by their regarding such accomplishments,
go away just as much helped, to be new men in Christ Jesus, as by hearing a
cause of great equity well pleaded at the bar.
Now in both these cases, with regard
to preacher and people, the error is of the same kind, namely, trusting to a
power in themselves; the one in an ability, to persuade powerfully; the other
in an ability, to act according to that which they hear.
And so the natural man goes on
preaching, and the natural man goes on hearing of the things of God, in a
fruitless course of life. And so it must be, so long as either preacher or
hearers, seek anything else but to edify, and be edified in, and through the
immediate power and presence of the Holy Spirit, working in them.
The way therefore to be a faithful,
and fruitful laborer in the vineyard of Christ, is to stand yourself in full
dependence on the Spirit of God, as having no good power, but as His
instrument, and by His influence, in all that you do; and to call others, not
to their own strength or rational powers, but to a full hope, and faith of
having all that they want, from God alone; not as teaching them to be good by
men, but by men and outward instruction, calling them to Himself, to a birth of
essential, inherent living goodness, wisdom and holiness from His own eternal
WORD and Holy Spirit, living and dwelling in them. For as God is all that the
fallen soul needs, so nothing but God alone, can communicate Himself to it; all
therefore is lost labor, but the total conversion of the soul, to the immediate
essential operation of God in it.
As to the other parts of your office,
whether they relate to things prescribed, or to such things as are to be done,
according to your best discretion, there will not be much difficulty, if you
stand in the state as described above.
As to several outward forms, and
orders in the church, they must be supposed to partake, in their degree, of
that spirit, which has so long borne rule in all church divisions. But the
private man, who has sufficient call to the ministry, is not to consider, how
outward things should be, according to the primitive plan, but how the inward
truth, which is meant by them, may be fully adhered to.
Baptism and the Lord's Supper, as
differently practiced in almost every particular church, may give ground of
doubt about them, since almost every church in these matters, is condemned by
all other churches.
But the way to be above, and free from
these scruples, is to keep yourself, and your people wholly intent to that
spiritual good, of which these institutions are the appointed outward figures,
namely to that spiritual regeneration, which is meant by baptism, and to the
spiritual living in Christ, and Christ in us, which is meant by the Supper of
the Lord. And then, though the sacraments practiced by you should have any
outward imperfection in them, they would be of the same benefit to you, as they
were to those, who used them in their first, outwardly perfect form. And thus
you will be led neither to overrate, nor disregard such use of them, as is
according to the present state of the church. It is only the inward regenerate
Christian, that knows how to make a right use of all outward things. His soul
being in such a state of union with God, and man, as it ought to be, it takes
everything by the right handles, and turns everything into a means of carrying
on this love towards God and man. To the pure, all things are pure.
When you visit the sick, use no
pre-contrived knowledge, or rules, how you are to proceed with them, but go as
in obedience to God, as on His errand, and say only what the love of God and
man suggests to your heart, without any anxiety about the success of it; that
is God's work. Only see that the love the tenderness, and patience of God
towards sinners, be uppermost in all that you do to man. Think not, that here
severity, and there tenderness, is to be shown; for nothing is to be shown to
man, but his want of God; nothing can show him this so powerfully, so
convincingly, as love. And as love is the fulfilling of the whole Law, so love
is the fulfilling of all the work of the ministry.
I am, with my best wishes To you and
your Brethren,
Your most affectionate Friend, And
willing Servant.
William Law, April 19th, 1756.
To a Clergyman of Bucks.
I am much surprised, my friend, that
you should still want more to be said, about the doctrine of imputation,
whether of Adam's sin, or the righteousness of Christ to His followers. Our
polluted sinful birth of Adam, is all the sin we can have from him; and our
supernatural birth of Christ, is all the righteousness that we possibly can
have from Him. Imputation neither has, nor can have anything to do in either
case; sin and righteousness are both inward and innate things, and the sole
work of the spirit, that lives in us. That which is born of God, is godly, and
cannot sin; and that which is born of sinful man, cannot be without a sinful
nature and sinful attitude. Cain could not possibly have any other natural
life, than that which was in Adam; and therefore so sure as Adam in soul,
spirit, and body, was all sin and corruption, so sure is it, that all his
offspring must come from him in the same depravity of soul, spirit and body.
And to talk of their having this disordered fallen nature, not from their natural
birth, but by an outward imputation of it to them, is quite absurd, as to say,
that they have their hands and feet, or the whole form of their body, not from
their natural birth, but by an outward imputation of such a form, and members
to them. Suppose it was said, that Adam's evil and polluted condition of body
and soul, was not the natural effect of his transgression, but independently of
that, that it came upon him from God's imputing it to him, as his, though it
was not his. What blasphemy this would be? And yet not less than that, of
saying, that his children have their evil nature, the sinful state of their
wills and affections, not by their natural birth from him, but independently of
that, solely from God's imputing Adam's sinful nature to Cain, though he was by
birth free from sin, and born in the purity and perfection, in which Adam was
created; for so he must have been, if his birth had nothing of sinful Adam in
it. But if Cain was not so born, then he had his sin, not by an imputation of
another's sin to him, but plainly in the same way of natural birth, as every
man has his natural life and form of his body, from parents of the same nature
and form. And indeed, to speak of sin imputed to a person that did not have
sin, is the same absurdity, as speaking of will and affections, imputed to a
person that did not have them. For sin is nowhere but in, and from the will and
affections, and therefore to make sin to be there by imputation, where it is
not, has no more sense in it, than to make will and affections, to be by
imputation in a creature that has them not.
"As in Adam all die,"
says the text: is not this the same, as saying, that all men have their fallen
nature, because they are born of Adam? Say, this does not follow, and then the
matter will stand thus: "In Adam all die" : but why, or how? Why
because no man has the evil of a mortal fallen nature from his birth from Adam,
but merely by God's free imputation of it to him.
But such a free imputation of Adam's
sinful state to his children, when they did not have it by natural birth, is
quite blasphemous, and leaves no room for magnifying the free grace of God in
Christ Jesus; since from this erroneous doctrine, free grace comes only to help
man out of a sinful state which he did not have from natural birth, but which
came upon him, by God's free imputation of it to him. Thus, the adorable love
of God in his free grace in Christ Jesus, is quite destroyed, upon supposition,
that mankind does not have their sinful state from their natural birth from
Adam, but by an imputation of it by God to them.
Take now the other part of the text,
so "In Christ shall all be made alive." Is it not a flat denial of
all this, to say, they are not made alive by a birth of that to which Adam
died, brought to life again in them, but are accounted as if they were alive,
by the imputation of Christ's life to them, but not born in them? Could dead
Lazarus have been said to have been made alive again, if still lying in the
grave, he would have only been accounted as alive, by having the nature of a
living man, imputed to him?
Our Lord said to a leper, whom he had
cleansed, "Go, show yourself to the priest," etc. But if instead of
cleansing him, he had bid him go to the priest, to be accounted as a
clean man, by the imputation of another's cleanness to him, would he not have
still been under all the evil of his own leprosy? Now this is strictly the case
of the righteousness of Christ, only outwardly imputed to us, and not inwardly
born within us. A fiction, that runs counter to all that Christ and His
apostles, have said of the nature of our salvation. We need Christ's
righteousness, because by our natural birth, we are inwardly full of evil;
therefore says Christ, "Except a man be born again, he cannot enter into
the kingdom of God." Does not this place all in a birth? But a birth, and
outward imputation, are inconsistent; that which is born in us, cannot be said,
to be outwardly imputed to us. "I am the vine," said Christ,
"you are the branches." Now if this be a true representation of the
matter, then these two plain doctrines of Christ, affirming, (1) the absolute
necessity of a new birth from above, and (2) declaring this birth to be as
really brought forth in us, as the life of the vine is really in the branches,
do, as far as words can do it, entirely reject the notion of a righteousness
imputed to us from without; a righteousness, that has no more to do with our
own life, after it is imputed to us, than it had a thousand years before we
were born. For that which is not in us, or ours, by a birth of itself in us,
can never be any nearer to us, or have a
real union with us, after it is called ours, than before it was so
called. I say called, for imputation, whether of sin, or righteousness, if its
power is not living in us, is no more than mere calling that ours, which
is not ours.
It is needless to cite places of
scripture, affirming that all consists in a Christ revealed, begotten, formed
and living in us. Let this one word of Paul suffice, "Yet not I, but
Christ that lives in me." He does not say, a Christ who is only called
his, or outwardly imputed to him, but quite the contrary, a Christ who lives
in him.
Again, if Christ's holy
nature, is not a birth in us, but only outwardly imputed to us, then no virtue,
or power of a holy life, can have any more real existence, or vital growth in
us, than in the devils, but are only outwardly imputed to us, and not to them,
only called ours, and not theirs, though we have no more of them within us,
than they have. Thus, be ye "holy, for I am holy; be ye perfect, as your
Father, which is in heaven, is perfect; you shall love the Lord your God with
all your heart," etc. All these are but vain exhortations to do, and be,
that which is not within our sphere, but entirely inconsistent with it. For
these virtues are, in their whole nature, nothing else but the very
righteousness of Christ, therefore if that can be only outwardly imputed to us,
the same must be said of all those virtues, that they can have no real life or
growth in us, but only outwardly imputed to us. And indeed, unless Christ be
truly and essentially born in us, we can have no more of any Christian virtue,
but the empty, outward name of it: for neither man, nor angel ever did, or can
love God with all his heart, be holy because God is holy, be perfect as He is
perfect, but because there is a spirit born and living in them, which is of
God, and from God, and partakes of the divine nature.
Further, say that the Holy Spirit is
not born and living in us, that His operation is not inwardly in us, as the
spirit of our spirit, the life of our life, but only outwardly imputed to us,
as if he was in us, though he is not there: what a blasphemy this would be! And
yet full as well, as to say the same of Christ, and his righteousness. For if
Christ was only outwardly imputed to us, the same must, of all necessity be
said of the Holy Spirit; for where and what Christ is, there and that is the
Holy Spirit. How constantly are we told in scripture, that they only are sons
of God, "Who are led by the Spirit of God"; that unless "a man
has the Spirit of Christ, he is none of His; that if Christ is not in us, we
are reprobates." Now I would ask, can any man be truly said to be led by
the spirit of the world, the flesh and the devil, who has nothing of this
spirit of the world living in him, but only outwardly imputed to him? Can any
creature be said to be led by the spirit of man, who has not the nature of man
within him, but only outwardly imputed to him? Yes, just as a beast may be said
to be a Newtonian philosopher, by having Sir Isaac's system outwardly imputed
to him.
Take notice, sir, that if Christ's
righteous and holy nature is only outwardly imputed to Christians, then all of
them, whether they are called good, or bad, are without any difference as to
their inward man, and all are under the same unaltered evil of their fallen
nature, as much after, as they were before Christ's righteousness was imputed
to them. When a good man has anything falsely laid to his charge, is not this outwardly
imputing something to him, that is not his, and does not belong to him? But is
not his own inward goodness just in the same fullness of truth in him, after
such an imputation of evil to him, as it was before it was so imputed. Now this
is the whole nature of imputation; and therefore if the righteous nature of
Christ is only outwardly imputed to the sinner, it leaves him in all the evil
of his fallen nature, and can no more make him inwardly good, than a good man
can be made inwardly evil, by having an evil, outwardly imputed to him, that is
not his.
The relation between Christ and the
fallen soul, is thus: Christ is the one mediator between God and man, and that
which his mediation consists in, is the restoring God’s life in man, which was
his first created union with God. Nothing separated man from God, or made him
want a mediator, but the loss of his first divine life; and therefore nothing
can mediate, or be a means of union again between God and man, but that which
can, and does raise again in man, that divine life which was his first union
with God. Everything therefore, that is said of this one mediator, as
redeeming, ransoming, justifying, sanctifying, making peace, or reconciliation,
etc., however variously expressed, has no other nature, or meaning, but that of
making fallen man, inwardly alive again in God. He in whom Christ is the way,
the truth, and the life, has just that same change made in him, just the same
is done to him, as he that has his sins washed and cleansed by the blood of the
Lamb. For these different expressions mean only one and the same thing, and
that one thing, is Christ in us, our hope of glory. This is justification,
sanctification, redemption, peace, reconciliation, and everlasting union with
God. Trifling therefore, to the last degree, is their orthodoxy, who raise
disputes, and set up different doctrines, on the different meaning of these
words, and the danger of not knowing, or not stiffly contending for the blessed
difference between justification and sanctification, etc., full as trifling, as
to raise disputes, and set up different doctrines on the different names given
to Jesus Christ, as the Word of God, son of man, Lamb of God, alpha and omega,
mediator, Emmanuel, atonement, reconciliation, resurrection, etc., and the
great danger of ascribing that to Christ, as our reconciliation, which only
belongs to Him, called the resurrection and the life. Figure to yourself such
an orthodox dispute as this, and then you will see the importance of that pious
zeal, which will not suffer justification and sanctification to encroach upon
one another.
What an egregious[3]
folly, to be learnedly laborious in dividing and distinguishing those different
names of Christ, or the different effects of his purchasing, justifying, or
sanctifying our souls, etc., when all that these things are told us for, and
all the benefit that we can receive from them, lies solely in this one word of
Christ, "if anyone will be my disciple" (that is, if anyone
will have the benefit of all that I am, and of all that is said of me) "let
him deny himself, take up his cross and follow me." Then, and then
only, all the different names of Christ, and all the different powers ascribed
to Him, will be, not critically, but blessedly known and understood to be one,
as God is one, whether he be called I AM, or the creator of heaven and earth,
or the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.
But to proceed: all that is said of
the nature, office, and qualities of Christ, in order to be our redeemer, is so
much said of the necessity of their being essentially found, and realized in
every soul, that is to partake of his redemption. If "Christ be not in
us, we are none of his." But how can Christ be in us, but because all
that which Christ was, in the Spirit and nature of his whole being, is in us,
as it was in Him? If the same mind is not in us, which was in Christ Jesus; if
that which loved, that which willed, that which suffered in Him, is not the
same spirit in us, we shall never reign with Him. He may be truly called a redeemer,
but we are not His redeemed, for such as the redeemer is, such are they that
are redeemed.
"To him that overcomes,"
said Christ, "will I grant to sit with me on My throne, even as I
overcame, and am set down with My Father on His throne." What becomes now
of the vain fiction of an outward imputation? Is Christ's victory here imputed
to us? Is not the contrary strongly taught us, as words can teach us? "To
him that overcomes, even as I also overcame."
Can we have fuller proof, that
Christ's righteous nature must be inwardly born, living and manifesting Itself
in us, as it did in Him; how else can we overcome, even as He overcame? That
Spirit which overcame in Christ, was manifest in the flesh, for no other end,
but that the same conquering Spirit might be born in us. And when that is done,
then all is done, by that grace of God, which brings salvation, justification,
sanctification, or the new creature. For whether you call it by one, or by all
of these names, it is the white stone with the new name written in it, which no
man knows, but he that has received it. And for this reason, because it is no
outwardly imputed thing, but is the new name, the new nature and Spirit of
Christ, become all in all in us, and so only to be known by those, who have it
brought to life in them.
Again, "This is my blood,
which is shed for many, for the remission of sins"; what follows? Why,
"Drink ye all of this. If we suffer with him, we shall also
reign with him. The blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin. who
has washed us from our sins in His blood." Now to show you, that all
these different sayings have but one and the same doctrine, you need only read
the following decisive words: "These are they that came out of the
great tribulation," (that, is have trodden the wine press with Christ)
"and have washed their robes in the blood of the Lamb." Here you see
is no outward imputation of the sufferings of Christ, but "their coming
out of great tribulation," or passing through the whole process of
Christ, was that alone, which made their "robes to be washed in the
blood of the Lamb." And no other doctrine is in this text, than if it
had been said, "these are they, who having denied themselves, taken up
their cross daily, and followed Christ, have thereby washed their robes in the
blood of the Lamb." Through all the New Testament, this is the one
doctrine of salvation through the blood of Christ, it is "drinking the
cup, that he drank of," and not the bitterness of his cup outwardly
imputed to us.
You tell me, my friend, that the
seraphic Aspatio is quite transported with the thought of the imputation of
Christ's righteousness to the sinner, and that it should in the account of God,
be esteemed as his. It may be so, transport seems to be as natural to Aspatio,
as flying is to a bird. But surely, a more transporting, a more glorious thing
it is, both to the glory of God, and the good of man, that the sinner is,
through the righteous nature of Christ, born and brought to life in Christ, set
up again in his first likeness and image of God. For if man's righteousness is
not essentially restored in him, as it was essentially in him at the first, has
he not less of God in him, by his redemption, than he had at his creation? Is
it to the happiness of man, and the glory of God, that God has not obtained
that dwelling in man, for which He alone created him?
Is it a matter of transport to think,
that fallen man will to all eternity live destitute of his first heavenly
nature, his first divine life, which he had from God? But this must be the
case, if Christ's righteousness is only outwardly imputed to him, and not
essentially born in him.
Transports, my friend, are but poor
proofs of truth, or of the goodness of the heart, from where they proceed.
Martyrdom has had its fools, as well as its saints, and zealots may live and
die in a joy, that has all its strength from delusion.
You may see a man drowned in tears, at
beholding, and kissing a wooden crucifix, and the same man condemning another,
as a wicked heretic, who only honors the cross, by being daily baptized into
the death of Christ. No, so blind is opinion-zeal, that some “Christian
pastors” will not hesitate to tell you, they could find no joy in their own
state, no strength, or comfort in their labors of love towards their flocks,
but only for this reason, they are assured from St. Paul, that God never had,
nor ever will have, mercy on all men, but that an unknown multitude of them,
are through all ages of the world, inevitably decreed by God to an eternal
fire, and damnation of hell, and an unknown number of others, to an
irresistible salvation.
Do not wonder about the inquisition,
about how it has had its pious defenders, for inquisition-cruelty, no, every
barbarity that must have an end, is mere mercy, if compared with this damnable
doctrine. And to be in love with it, to draw sweet comfort from it, and wish it
God speed, is a love that absolutely forbids the loving our neighbor, as
ourselves, and makes the wish, that all men might be saved, no less than a
rebellion against God. It is a love, with which, the cursed hater of all men,
would willingly unite and take comfort; for could he know from St. Paul, that
millions, and millions of mankind, are created and doomed to be his eternal
slaves, he might be as content with this doctrine, as some preachers are, and
cease "going about as a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour";
as knowing, that his kingdom, was so sufficiently provided for, without any
labors of his own.
Oh, the sweetness of God's election,
cries out the ravished preacher! Oh, the sweetness of God's reprobation! might
the hellish Satan well say, could he believe that God had made him a free gift
of such millions, and millions of men, of all nations, tongues and languages,
from the beginning to the end of the world, and reserved so small a number for
himself.
This is the
blessed fruit of the imputation doctrine.
What a complaint, and condemnation is
there made in scripture, of those who sacrificed their sons and daughters unto
devils? And yet, this reprobation doctrine, represents God, as sacrificing
myriads of His own creatures, made in His own image, to an everlasting hell.
There is not an absurdity of
heathenish faith and religion, but what is less shocking than this doctrine,
and yet so blindly are some zealous doctors of the gospel bigoted to it, as to
set it forth, as the glorious manifestation of the supreme sovereignty of God.
My friend, let any old woman preach to
you, rather than these doctors.
But to end in one word, Christ's
righteousness is ours, in our redemption, just in the same manner, as it was
Adam's in his first holy birth. For Adam then had no righteousness of his own,
but that which was created in Christ Jesus. And that is the only reason, why there could be no other
redeemer but Christ, because the loss of Christ, was that death which Adam died
by his fall; and therefore no possibility of coming out of his fallen state,
but in, and by a birth of Christ's righteous nature, essentially born and
living in him, as it was living in him before he fell.
"Little children," said John, "let no man deceive you; he
that does righteousness, is righteous, even as he is righteous."
Therefore to expect, or trust to be made righteous, by the righteousness of
another, only outwardly imputed to us, is, according to the apostle deceiving
ourselves.
Either man, by the mediation of
Christ, is united again with God, or he is not; if he is not, then he has no
more of the divine life in him, after his redemption, than he had before he was
redeemed. But if he is again united with God, as he was at his creation, then
his redemption must wholly consist in the birth of a divine nature and Spirit,
essentially brought to life in him. That which is spirit in man, must be
godlike, before it can be united with that Spirit, which is God. And if there
had not been a divine Spirit in man, truly born of God, proceeding from the
Spirit of God, as his real offspring, no union of will, love, or desire, could
be between God and man. For this is a truth, that extends itself through all
that is natural, or supernatural, that like can only unite with like. There is
not separation between things, but that which is effected by contrariety. If
therefore nothing in man was a partaker of the divine nature, man must in his
whole nature, be forever separated from God, and stand in the impossibility of
being united with him. So sure, therefore, as the mediation of Christ, is by
Himself declared to be for this end, "That they all may be one, as You,
Father, are in Me, and I in You, that they also may be one in Us; I in
them, and You in Me, that they may be made perfect in one"; so sure is
it, that an outwardly imputed Christ, is as absurd in itself, and as contrary
to scripture, as an outwardly imputed God.
Farewell, William Law
To Mr. T. L.
My dearly beloved Friend,
I begin, as I did my last, with
assuring you, that I love to hear from you.
I am in some concern about the
activity of your religious spirit, which I have often cautioned you against.
You have seen, and as I think deeply apprehended, the true ground, on which
man's redemption stands. This ground has been shown you, not only from the
plain letter of scripture, but confirmed by the whole frame of nature.
Everything in heaven and earth, everything
that you inwardly or outwardly feel, or know of your own soul, and body, are
all shown to bear infallible witness to these two fundamental truths of the
gospel: that our first father died to his first life in God; and that nothing
in the whole nature of things, can be our redemption, but the first life of
God, born again of God in the soul. You have had the fullest proof, that man
was created in this high perfection of life. You have had the fullest proof,
that Adam had no other way of dying to heaven, or losing his first state in
God, but by the working of his will; and that every son of Adam, is to this
day, only that which his faith, or the working of his will, or the desire of
his heart (for they are all the same thing) makes him to be. Jesus Christ is
the divine nature, which must be alive again in man. But the life of the deity
can only arise by a birth in us, by the hunger and faith and desire of the
heart, or the working of the will turned to it; and this is the faith in Christ
that does all.
To what purpose therefore, is so much
anxious enquiry about this or that? Why this running after everyone, to hear
the history of himself, and the secrets of his own fancied experience?
If you know a man to be a fatalist, do
you not enough know, that he cannot explain the mysteries of the gospel, all
which have a quite contrary ground.
If a man has no notion, or belief of
the fall of man can he tell you either the nature, or the necessity of
Christian redemption? What room could there be for the divine philanthropy, if
it could be supposed, that man and the world had not a better state, and life
from Him at first, than they have now?
If a man denies the necessity of the
new birth from above, will you believe that this proceeds from an intimate
familiarity with Christ, teaching him in private, the disbelief of that which
He taught publicly when on earth? What folly to tell you, that you are only in
a legal state, unless he could prove to you, that you have no aversion to
wickedness, nor abstain from any sin, but so far as the fear and dread of
punishment keep you from it. For this is the truth of the legal state; but when
sin is disliked, and the commandments kept through a love of God, and a desire
of divine goodness, there is the man in Christ a new creature, no longer under
the yoke of the Law, but living in the freedom, and Spirit of God.
If a man tells you that Jesus is not God, surely it is time to have no fellowship with him. If he tells you, you are not to pray to God, but to Jesus, only, who is only a creature, is not this telling you, that it is unlawful for us to pray, as Jesus taught His disciples? And if it was wrong to pray to God, the Old and New Testament are, from the beginning to the end, full of false religion? Or will he say, that though under the Old Testament men might rightly pray to the deity, yet we, by being Christians, have lost this privilege of relation to, and dependence upon God? But surely, I need not expose the extravagancy of these things, nor exhort you to be weary of such entertainment.
You tell me, that you cannot help
thinking with Mr. S. "That all partial systems of salvation, are greatly
derogatory to the goodness of God:" but that you would say this to very
few, but myself. But dear soul, why should you say this to me? I have without
any question, openly declared to all the world, that from eternity to eternity,
nothing can come from God but mere infinite love. In how many ways have I
proved, and asserted, that there neither is, nor can be any wrath, or
partiality in God, but that every creature must have all that happiness, which
the infinite love and power of God can help it to. Can I, or any creature,
possibly say more of an impartiality in God? And is it not quite unreasonable,
to ask more about it, or to carry it further? You say "The seeming
impossibility of the Spirit and light of God, arising up again in any creature,
that has been extinguished in it, is, you presume, the strongest argument that
can be offered, in support of everlasting misery." And therefore you say,
"You have chosen, with submission, to examine the force of this principle
argument, which runs through the APPEAL, and my other writings." But, my
dear friend, how did you come to say this? For this is so far from being the
principle, or any argument that runs through my Appeal, and other books, that
there is not one single word, in all the Appeal, nor any other of my books,
that touches upon this matter, until you come to the last book, i.e., The Way
to Divine Knowledge; and even in that book, the impossibility is so far from
being asserted, that it is there affirmed, that this impossibility is not
proved, nor ever likely to be so. Will you therefore charge me with proving a
thing, that I show cannot be proved? It is my main doctrine, that God is all love,
and merely a will to all goodness; that He must eternally will that to the
creature, which He willed at its creation.
But, my dear soul, debate not such
matters as these, either with me, or anyone else. Stop your ears to all that
you hear about them, and turn from everyone that will lead you into them. The
perplexity that you make to yourself in such matters, is death to the divine
life within you, it is a great abuse of God's goodness towards you, and is a
likely way for you to lose the peace and joy of that divine light, which has so
largely opened itself within you.
Mr. G. and Mr. S. both of them (as
they say) come out of the depths of hell, full of a new risen divine light
within them. The first makes me a greater blasphemer of God, than the devils are,
because I say, God has no other nature, or will towards every creature, but
love and goodness.
The other calls me blind, and
ignorant, because I have not a self-evident knowledge of the salvation of
devils. Now were you to find out a third, laying claim to the same certainty of
divine light, as these two do, you might perhaps have them both condemned by
one who had a self-evident knowledge of absolute election, and reprobation, and
who knew with as great certainty, that God damns some eternally to make His
power to be known, as Mr. S. knows Christ to be only a creature, and that
prayer is not to be made to God, but solely to this creature.
Dear L. son of my love, I do not know
that ever I wasted my spirits in writing, or thinking in the manner of this letter
before, and trust I never shall again. But love towards you, and a hearty zeal
for your true growth in the spiritual life, has compelled me into this
wrangling.
Put away all needless curiosity in divine matters, and look upon everything to be so, but that which helps you to die to yourself, that the Spirit and life of Christ may be formed, and revealed in you.
As for the purification of all human
nature, either in this world, or some after ages, I fully believe it. And as to
that of angels, if it is possible, I am glad of it, and also sure enough, that
it will then come to pass.
Dear Soul,
Adieu, William Law.
To the same.
My Dear Friend,
I thank you for the favor of yours. In the two extracts, you have sent, the writer says twice, he cannot adopt the dark side of my system. If what I have written may be called a system, it has put a full end to all that was dark, and partial, in every other system. It makes all the universe both of nature and grace, to be an edifice of love, kept up and governed by love. For I allow of no other God but love, who from eternity to eternity, can have no other will towards the creature, but to communicate good; and that no creature can have any misery, from which infinite goodness can deliver. Where then is the dark side? Must I assert God to be more than infinitely good?
Dear Soul,
Adieu. William Law. June
9, 1752.
My dear L.,
I cannot tell you how much I love you.
But that which of all things I have most at heart, with regard to you, is the
real progress of your soul in the divine life. Heaven seems to be awakened in
you. It is a tender plant. It requires stillness, meekness, and the unity of the
heart, totally given up to the unknown workings of the Spirit of God, which
will do all its work in the calm soul, that has no hunger or desire, but to
escape out of the mire of its earthly life, into its lost union and life in
God.
I mention this, out of a fear of your
giving in to an eagerness into so many things, which though seemingly innocent,
yet divide and weaken the workings of the divine life within you. For a
multiplicity of wills, is the one evil, disease, and misery, both of our souls
and bodies. That which can make the soul to have only one will, and one love,
is the universal tincture, both for soul and body. And nothing else is it. That
alone can take the fall, or curse out of the body, which can take it out of the
soul. For the curse through all nature, and creature, is but one and the same
thing, i.e., the absence of the heavenly power. Heaven is dead in gold, just as
it is dead in man; and its heavenly tincture can only be made alive, in the
same manner, and from the same power, as in the inward man is born again of the
water, and Spirit from above.
Our outward man must be tormented,
crucified, mortified in the fire of our own flesh and blood; and then it is as
gold in the crucible, heated by earthly fire. But as no fiery torments of our own
flesh and blood, can glorify our inward man, and set him in his first angelic
state, so no outward fire can torment gold into its first heavenly state. Our
Lord said to the crucified thief, Today, you shall be with me in paradise.
Now no one is a divine magus[4],
until he is thus qualified to say to his subject, Today you shall be with me in
paradise. If he himself is not in paradise, he can do no paradisaical work.
But, my friend, let not what I here say, put you upon disputing this point with
anyone, for I say it for quite a contrary end, to show you the vanity of all
such discourse.
My dear Soul,
Adieu. William Law Oct. 16,
1752.
To a Person of Quality, Madam,
I had the honor of your Ladyship's letter, and have true regard for your Ladyship, and the subject, has been the occasion of my delaying this answer so long. I am in some hopes, that the person that wanted it, may, by this time, have found something better than it, by being left to God and himself, and that I have done more for him by my silence, than I should have done by my writing.
To be always calling physicians, upon
every occasion, is the way to lose all natural soundness of health; and to be
continually talking, and enquiring about the nature of sicknesses, and the
powers of medicines, for the head, the heart, the spirit, and nerves, is the
way to lose all true judgment, either of our own sickness or health.
It is much the same, with regard to our spiritual health and constitution, we do great harm to it, by running after spiritual advice on every occasion, and wanting the help of some human prescription, for every fear, scruple, or notion, that starts up in our minds, and to weaken the true strength of our spiritual constitution, would do all that we need to have done. If it is asked, What this soundness of our spiritual constitution is? It may be answered that it is a state or habit of such humble, total resignation of ourselves to God, by faith, and hope, and to expect all from Him alone. This is the health, and strength of our spiritual constitution, and nothing is health in the soul, but this state.
And if we left all our incidental,
accidental, sickly notions, and imaginations that so frequently attack our
minds, if we left them to be overcome, and done away by the strength of our
spiritual constitution, we would never fail to be successful.
How this pious and worthy person came
to think of leaving his parish, or what scruples occasioned his doubting,
whether he should stay in it, I cannot guess, and therefore can say nothing
about them. I would have thought, that such a change as he found in himself,
his parish, and neighborhood, should have everything in it, that could render
his situation comfortable to him.
The greatest danger that new converts
are liable to, especially if they are young, arises from their conceiving
something great of their conversion, and that great things are to follow from
it. Hence they are taken up too much with themselves, and the supposed designs
of God upon them. They enter into reasonings, and conjectures as to how they
shall be, and think that they will do something extraordinary, and so lose that
simplicity of heart, which should think of nothing but of dying to self, that
the Spirit of God might have time and place to create, and form all that is
needed in their inward man.
There is nothing more plain and simple
than the way of religion, if self is but kept out of it; and all the
perplexities, and scruples which pious persons meet with, chiefly arise from
some idea they have formed, of a progress they ought to make in order to be
that, which self would be. But piety makes little progress until it has no
schemes of its own, no thoughts or contrivances to be anything, but a naked
penitent, left wholly, and solely in faith and hope to the divine goodness.
Every contrivance for human help, from this, or that, no matter what it is, is
at best but dropping some degree, of that fullness of faith and hope, and
dependence upon God, which only is, and only can be our way of finding Him, to
be the strength and God of our life.
Nothing but the life of God, opened by His Holy Spirit within us, can be the renewal of our souls, and we shall look for this renewal no longer, than while we are seeking it in something, that is not God. The faith that ascribes all to God, and expects all from Him, cannot be disappointed. Nothing could hinder the centurion from having, that which he asked of Christ, because his heart could thus speak, "Lord I am not worthy, that You should come under my roof, speak the word only, and my servant shall be healed."
He that has this sense of himself, and
this faith in God, is in the truth and perfection of religion: if we knew the
goodness of this state, we should always be contented with the simplicity of it,
and let everything else come, and go, as it would; all is well and safe, so
long as the heart rests all upon God alone. Your Ladyship says, this worthy
person fears his zeal, and yet dreads the abatement of it. It would be better,
not to indulge a thought about his own zeal, or to speak a word of it to any
person. For if it is godly zeal, it is no more his than it is mine, nor comes
any more from him, than it does from me; and therefore when he thinks, or
speaks of it as his, or as something he would be glad to keep in its right
state, he is giving way to delusion, both with regard to himself, and the
nature of true zeal: for as the "wind blows where it desires," so it
is with him, who is driven by true zeal. I do not wonder, that his audience is
so much affected, and increased, since he has preached up the doctrine of
regeneration amongst them. All other preaching passes away as a tale that is
told, and indeed is nothing better, until it enters into the things within man,
brings him to a sensibility of the state of his heart, and its need of God's
Holy Spirit therein. How far it may be right for him to comply with their
request of visiting, reading, and expounding the scripture to them, I will not
say; but only this much, that it seems to be right to be in no anxiety about
it, or to put himself under any stated rules about it, but leave it to be done,
as he finds himself inwardly stirred up to it, and able out of the abundance of
his heart to perform it.
Expounding the scriptures, has a fine
sound, but I should rather advise such persons, to read only in love, and
simplicity of heart, such scriptures as need no expounder, but their own heart
turned to God. Persons who have come to this inward conviction, that they must
live, and die, under the power of Satan, and of fallen nature, unless by a
fullness of faith in Christ, they be born again from above, have nothing more
to enquire about, where, or how Christ is to be found.
They have no other use to make of the
scripture, but that of being refreshed, and delighted with such passages, as
turn, and stir up the heart, to a fullness of faith, love, and resignation to
the blessed guidance, and operation of the Holy Spirit of God.
January 10, 1754. WilliamLaw
To the same.
My dear Friend,
I do not know how to write to the most illuminated person upon
earth, for advice, or instruction. And the more dark, and distressed my state
should be, the more I should be averse to seek counsel of any creature; not
from an opinion of any sufficiency in myself, but from a fullness of
conviction, that I run away from relief, and deprive myself of the true light,
and comfort, by not seeking, and depending upon God alone for it.
All my writings have no other end, but to communicate this
conviction to my readers, and consequently to teach them to be finished with
me, as soon as I have convinced them, that GOD and CHRIST and the kingdom of
heaven are only to be found by man, in his own heart, and are only capable of
being found there, by his own love of them, faith in them, and absolute
dependence upon them.
What room, therefore, for calling out for help and direction,
when once it is known, that all consists in an implicit blind faith, in purity
of love, and total resignation to the Spirit of GOD? For where can these be exercised,
but in the states and trials through which human life must pass. And to
acquiesce in God, when things are inwardly, and outwardly easy with us, but to
cast about for help from something that is not God, when distress and darkness
come upon us, is the error of errors, and the greatest hindrance to our true
union with GOD in CHRIST JESUS.
I am with much Truth and Sincerity, Your affectionate Friend.
Sept. 22, 1754
Madam,
The passage in the letter from a pious
and very excellent clergyman, as you style him, calls for no regard, either
from your Ladyship, or me. More insignificant words cannot well be put
together: "I think," says he, "Mr. Law has gone half a bow shot
too far." If I have shot so far beyond, or beside the truth, he should
have shown where, and why, and how. Without this, his words are but a random
shot at nothing. His reason for this censure, is still worse, i.e.,
"Because I have touched the heart-string of all systematical
divinity." As grievous a charge, as if he had said, that I had shook the
very foundation of every Babel of every country. For not a system of divinity,
since systems were in being, whether popish, or Protestant, deserves a better
name.
His next reason is, "Because it
should not be touched without skill from above."
If this gentleman ever preaches from
the pulpit, concerning the ways of God, and the doctrines of redemption,
without skill from above, all he says, will be a whole bow-shot beside the
matter. If, therefore, in touching this point, I have touched that, which ought
not to be touched without skill from above, I have taken no bolder a step, than
he does, every time he mounts the pulpit, to give forth the doctrines of
Christ.
His third reason is this, "I
choose in my present ignorance, as touching the necessity and virtue of an
outward atonement, to bow down before the awful subject."
But in truth, he should have said, I
choose to bow down before the awful heart string of all systematical divinity,
which resolves all the atonement into an infinite wrath, and vengeance, raised
in the holy deity itself, and which would not be appeased, or satisfied by
anything else, but the sacrifice of an infinite Son of God. It is by reason of
his attachment to this heart string, or rather his having so constantly
preached according to it, that he cannot bear a demonstration of the most
glorious truth, that either heaven or earth can proclaim, i.e., that God from
eternity to eternity, is mere, unchangeable, and ever-overflowing love; and
that nothing but this infinity of never-ceasing, never- changing love, gave the
birth, the life, the sufferings, the death, resurrection, and ascension of
Christ, for the salvation of all mankind; because in the whole possible nature
of things, nothing else but this whole process of a God made man, could have
any ability to extinguish the hell and wrath of a fallen nature, and give man a
second birth of such a life from above, as could for ever and ever, have union
and communion with the un-beginning, never-ending, never-changing Trinity of
love.
To G. W.
The large account you have given of
yourself, is very affecting, and I hope God will turn all the variety of your
past distress, into a means of a future peace, and rest in His divine love. To
be weary and heavy laden, is to have the highest fitness to receive that rest,
that Christ alone can give. These are the persons that he called to Himself,
when he was upon earth. They, who are content with themselves, are in the
utmost danger of never knowing that happiness, for which they were created.
For a while, consider yourself in such
solitude, as if there was only God and you in the world, free from every
thought, but that of desiring to be wholly and solely His, and looking wholly
to His goodness, to be delivered out of the misery of your fallen state.
Stand firmly in this faith,
that God and the kingdom of heaven, are certainly within you, and within you
for this reason only, that they may become your salvation. As all therefore is
within, so let all your care be turned inwards, in loving, adoring, and praying
to this GOD and CHRIST within you.
Do not be eager about reading a great deal. Nor read anything,
but that which nourishes, strengthens, and establishes this faith in you, of an
inward savior, who is the life of your soul. To grow up in this faith, is
taking the best means, of attaining to the best knowledge in all divine
matters.
Cast away all reflections about yourself, the world, or your past
life. And let all be swallowed up, or lost in this joyful thought, that you
have found the Messiah, the Savior of the world, not in books, not in history,
but in the birth, and the bottom of your soul. Give yourself up to this birth
of heaven within you, expect all from it, let it be the humble, faithful,
longing desire of your heart, and desire no knowledge, but that which is born
of it, and proceeds from it. Stand only in this thirst of knowledge, and then
all that you know will be spirit and life.
With a Heart full of good Wishes to you, I am, Yours, William
Law. May 8, 1750.