ing Senfibility of the Thing that is known. There is no Light in the Mind but what is the Light of Life. So far as our Life reacheth, so far we understand, and feel, and know, and no farther. All after and befide This, however it may pafs for Knowledge in the Opinion and Talk of the ignorantWorld, is only the Play of the Imagination amusing itself with the dead Pic tures of its own Ideas. And this is all that the natural Man, who hath not the Life of GOD in him, can poffibly do with the Things of GOD. He can only fpeculate upon, and form Notions about, them, as Things foreign to himself, as fo many dead Ideas, which he has received, as he has other Ideas, from Books or Men, through the Medium of his outward Senfes. But he cannot know them, as the Apoftle faith, because they are fpiritually difcerned, that is, they can only be difcerned by that Spirit, which he hath not. For the Measure of our Life is the Measure of our Knowledge, and as the Spirit of our Life worketh, the Spirit of our Understanding conceiveth. If our Will worketh with GOD, though our natural Capacity be ever fo mean and narrow, we get a real Knowledge of GOD and heavenly Truths; becaufe every Thing muft feel that in which it lives. But if our Will worketh with Satan, and the Spirit of this World, then let our Parts be ever fo bright, our Imaginations ever fo foaring, yet all our liv ing Knowledge, or real Senfibility can go no higher, or deeper, than the Myfteries of Iniquity, and the Lufts of Flesh and Blood. For where our Life is, there and there only is our Understanding. all for this plain Reason, that as Life is the Beginning of all Senfibility, fo it is, and must be the Limit of it; and no Senfibility can go any farther than the Life goes, or have any other Manner of Knowledge, than as the Manner of its Life is. If And You You afk what Life is, or what is to be understood by it? It is in itself nothing else but a working Will; and no Life could be either good or evil, but because it is a working Will. Every Life from the highest Angel to the lowest Animal confifts in a working Will; and therefore as the Will worketh, as that is with which it uniteth, fo hath every Creature its Degree, Kind, and Manner of Life. And confequently as the Will of its Life worketh, fo it hath its Degree, Kind, and Manner of conceiving and understanding, of liking and difliking. For nothing feels, tastes, or understands, likes or diflikes, but the Life that is in us. And therefore the Spirit that leads our Life, is the Spirit that forms our Underfianding.* Agreeably to which Truth, and proceeding upon it as an acknowledged Principle, St. John faith, Hereby do we know that we know Him (Fefus Chrift the Righteous) if we keep his Commandments. John xi. 3. Which is directly faying, that there is no Knowledge of Him to be obtained any other Way than by a living Conformity to His Doctrine. Yea, we find that Our Bleffed Saviour Himfelf, in whom dwelt the Fullness of the Godhead bodily, and therewith All the Treafures of Wisdom and Knowledge, referred thofe that doubted the Divine Authority of His Commiffion, to a Divine Life in themfelves for their Proof and Affurance of it. My Doctrine, faith He, is not mine, but His that fent me. If any Man will do His Will, he fhall know of the Doctrine whether it be of God. John vii. 15, 16. It is then with the Divine Myfteries revealed in the Writings of this Extraordinary_Meffenger of God, 7. B. as it is with the Divine Truths revealed in the Holy Scriptures themselves. They are Mysteries and Truths Law's Spirit of Prayer. Part II. P. 109. Truths of a Practical, not merely Speculative, Nature, and apply less to the Head, than to the Heart of their Reader. They are open therefore only to the practical Student; they can be known only by the fpiritual Difcerner. And that because all Knowledge of Divine Things muft be, as Chrift faid of His own Words, Spirit and Life. For which Reason, all such Knowledge muft arife from a Birth as all Life does, and be gradual, or progreffive in its Growth, as all Life is. The Entrance then into the School of Christian Wisdom, is that very fame New-Birth of the Soul, which is the Entrance into Chriftianity itself; the Advancement of the Soul in Knowledge keeps exact Pace with its Progrefs in the Regeneration; and when it cometh, unto a perfect Man, unto the Measure of the Stature of the Fulness of Chrift, then will it also be given to it to know the Mysteries of the Kingdom of God. The Book of Jacob Behmen's here published, called The Way to Chrift, is a Direction how to make this Entrance into the School of Chrift, by Repentance; and how to advance in it fuccessfully by Refignation, Self-Denial, and earnest Prayer. It pointeth out every Step to be taken in the Chriftian Course, guardeth against every Danger that is likely to occur in it, and lendeth every Affiftance to avoid, or overcome the fame. And as it is thus one of the most useful and practical, fo is it likewife one of the plainest and most intelligible, of His Writings. What its Contents more particularly are, the Ufe to be made of it, and the Benefit to be expected from it, He himself hath declared in a Part of his Works where he had especial Occasion to speak of it. That little Book, faith he, teacheth the Way to Chrift very earnestly and fincerely. First, how a Man fhould go forth from the wicked Ways of this World, and enter into true Repentance. How he fhould put on Chrift in Faith, and be new-born in Chrift's Spirit; how he must be renewed in Mind and Thoughts, and follow or imitate Chrift. Secondly, it teacheth of True Refignation; how a Penitent Man must give himJelf up to God wholly and altogether, and begin and finifh all his Works in divine Truft and Confidence. It fheweth alfo, how the Devil layeth Snares continually for the Children of Christ, and that they cannot e/cape or get through them by any other Means, than Prayer and true Humility. How Chrift Himself affifts and delivers them by His Power in them; and how a Chriftian, if he would be truly fo, must ever abide in Chrift, as a Branch on the Vine, drawing Life and Nourishment from Him, by eating His Flesh and drinking His Blood, Thirdly, It teacheth very earnest penitential Prayers; fhewing how the poor Soul must with great Earneftnefs enter into Chrifi's Merits, His Suffering, Death, and Refurrection; how it muft daily die to itfelf, its own evil Will, and earthly Nature, and go to the Father through its dear Redeemer's Wounds and Blood fhedding, And Fourthly, in the Dialogue between the Mafter and the Scholar, concerning the Superfenfual Life, is fignified what our eternal Patri. mony, or Native Country, is, and how the Entrance into it is effected, All which Doctrine is the true Ground of the New Teftament, as taught and left to us by Chrift and his Apofiles.* The Four Treatifes above referred to, viz. 1. Of Repentance. 2. Of Refignation. 3. Of Regeneration. 4. Of the Superfenfual Life, make up the Book properly called The Way to Chrift, which is the only Book of the Author's that was printed in his Life-time. And as it even then, from the Simplicity of its Manner, yet Depth and Solidity of Mat Behmen's Apology to Gregory Richter, ter, ter, found its Way to the Hearts of many fincere People, who stood in fuitable Simplicity of Spirit, and Readiness to receive the Benefit of fuch a Bleffing; fo we have from himself fome Account both of the Success, and of the Oppofition, it met with. It is needlefs to fay any Thing here of the latter, it being no more than is ever to be expected, in one Form or other, from the Natural Contrariety that is found to fubfift, between the Flesh and the Spirit, the Kingdom of God and the Kingdom of This World, Chrift and Belial. Those who would know more of that Matter, may gratify their Curiofity by reading his Epiftles; his Apology for The Way to Chrift against the Libel of Gregory Richter; and the Relation of His Life, printed with His = Myfterium Magnum. But of the favourable Reception, and powerful Effect which This little Manual found among those who had Hearts to receive and relish it, fomething may be recited worth our Obfervation; as ferving to fhew how readily the Holy Spirit of GOD owned, accompanied, and bleffed this its Seed, when it fell into good Ground. You know, faith he, addreffing himself to Gregory Richter, the Primate, or Chief Minifter, of the Church at Gorlitz, who had in the Spirit of an ignorant, haughty, and envious Zeal, or rather Wrath, condemned this Book, and railed against it and its Author, in a printed Libel, You know that God hath converted Jome thereby, fo that they have entered into true Repentance, and attained that very Thing which Chrift hath promifed us, that is to fay, the Gift of the Holy Spirit. There are eminent Examples of it hard by.* In an Epiftle to a Friend he writes thus, The Caufe of this Rage (meaning that of the Primate) was the b printed Behmen's Apology to Gregory Richter. v. 24. |