pour out my Spirit," Joel ii. 28, 29. And, blessed be his name, so he does; many servants and handmaids have received this invaluable blessing and soul-satisfying testimony, even under my poor feeble instrumentality as a preacher. When the next Lord's day arrived I went to church as usual, but could not join with them in their prayers; for I had enough to do to observe the behaviour of the congregation, and listen to what they said. And it appeared very shocking to me to hear people in Egyptian darkness say that their eyes had seen the Lord's salvation; and no less absurd for wanton graceless souls, to beseech God not to take his holy Spirit from them; for the righteous pharisees to call themselves miserable sinners; for free agents to declare there was no health in them; for haters of God and godliness to pray for their persecutors and slanderers; for spiritual criminals to tell God that his service is perfect freedom; and, for my part, I could not say that I was tied and bound with the chain of my sin. In short, the whole service appeared a string of shocking contradictions, and no less than a solemn mockery of God Almighty; nor could I join in it in any respect. The people who sat next to me observed me very particularly, as I thought, because I did not perform my exercise as usual; I mean that of kneeling down and standing up at the word of command, sitting down when bid, and then wheeling to the east. I had lost all my motions, and the people took notice of it; for I used to be as active at my discipline, and as quick to rehearse my parole, as the best of them: but now I only sat in the tent, and looked on. I imagined they all looked at me, and I longed to get out; for I thought, and thought right, that I was in the congregation of the dead. At last the irksome task was performed; the minister went into the pulpit; and I was determined not to lose a syllable of his performance, if possible, but to hear him with all the ears of a critic, His text was, "This is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith." He attempted to prove that the Jews were all unbelievers; but that we, being brought up in a country where Christianity had been long established, were, consequently, all believers! And, when he came to the conclusion (to which he made hasty strides), he said, If faith will overcome the world, then what will good works do? This last clause he spoke with peculiar emphasis; as though he meant to say it was easy to describe the victories of faith, but that the heroic feats of human merit were past all description! And indeed so they are, and cannot possibly be guessed at, unless we could see the multitudes which Kuman merit has captured and imprisoned in hell. I never till then knew what the prophet Isaiah meant by these words, " His watchmen are blind: they are all ignorant, they are all dumb dogs, they cannot bark: sleeping, lying down, loving to slumber. Yea, they are greedy dogs, which can never have enough; and they are shepherds that cannot understand," Isa. lvi. 10, 11. I found he was blind, for he could see nothing of the devil or his works, and therefore he had no beasts to bark at but the poor Jews; and he could not bark at them, unless he barked by notes. Such are blind guides indeed, as the dear Redeemer says; and they guide thousands into the ditch as well as themselves. Blessed be the Almighty, who has promised to teach his own elect himself, and to open our eyes to see our teachers; as it is written, "Yet shall not thy teachers be removed into a corner any more, but thine eyes shall see thy teachers," Isa. xxx. 20. And, blessed be God, that teacher was not hid from me. Jehovah held him forth to me in his true colours; and I tried him by the word of God, as we are commanded to do; Try the spirits, whether they are of God," 1 John iv. 1. And I found him in God's balance to be lighter than vanity. When I came out of the church I shook off the gown, the cassock, the building, and the discipline; and left all behind. I then experienced in reality, what I had often confessed, that God's service is perfect freedom. In my way home I was beset with this temp tation; that it was impossible for me, a man who could not read a chapter in the Bible with propriety, to have such an understanding in the spiritual meaning of God's word, while these men of eminent learning appeared more ignorant than infants. I asked, What is it then?' The temptation answered, 'You are asleep, and in a dream.' I stood still and listened to it, and said, 'I am awake, and it is real.' 'No,' replied the suggestion, you are asleep, and in a dream.' I was so perplexed that I felt my arms, my knees, my head, my coat, and cried out, There is 'Squire Boehm's house; there is my master's house; there is the sign of the Magpie; and I am in the horse road. It is really so; I am awake, I know I am awake.' And this scripture settled the matter, "I have more understanding than my teachers, for thy testimonies are my meditation," Psal. cxix. 99. I have often since thought of the confession of poor Zion when God proclaimed her enlargement; as it is written, "When the Lord turned again the captivity of Zion, we were like them that dream. Then was our mouth filled with laughter, and our tongue with singing: Then said they among the heathen, The Lord hath done great things for them," Psal. cxxvi. 1, 2. 66 Having proved myself awake, I walked home, examined the Whole Duty of Man, and some other old stuff, of the same linsey wolsey manufactory, and passed sentence upon them, agreeably to what is written in the Acts of the Apostles, Many of them also which used curious arts brought their books together, and burned them before all men: and they counted the price of them, and found it fifty thousand pieces of silver. So mightily grew the word of God and prevailed," Acts xix. 19, 20. I examined the doctrinal articles of the church of England, and found I had the substance of them in my heart. And indeed they seem to be almost all that the establishment has got, that appears from scripture to be of the apostolic plan; the greatest part of the rest seems entirely of human model. What it may be to patch up an outer court, to protect the invisible church, or hidden ones of Christ, I know not; the end will shew that. As for the articles, I never heard of them till I was twenty-five years of age. Our clergy act wisely in keeping them concealed from the people; for they would be a candle to the congregation, if they were to be read, and a flash of lightning in the face of a blind guide while he was reading them. I told my wife that the church people seemed to be all wrong; they were not born again, nor did they know any thing about a spiritual birth. |