as for my part, who am one of the least of the thousands of Israel, I could willingly have been silent as toward you at this time, but the Lord, whom I serve in my spirit, hath laid it upon me to warn you once more, for whose sakes I have borne a barden, in the true sight and sense of your sad estate, and of the day of thick darkness, wrath and distress, which is hastening upon you from the Almighty.

'Wherefore be not proad nor rebellions, but hear, and obey the word of the Lord; for thus saith the Lord God that made heaven and earth, let my innocent people alone, and touch them not any more, as ye have done; for they are mine, and I have called them, and chosen them, and redeemed them; they are my jewels, which I am making up, they shall show forth my glory before men to the whole world: I have anointed them, and I will preserve them and deliver them, and crown them with an everlasting salvation. I will rebake kings and miers for their sakes, and distress nations, and dethrone die mighty from their seats that rise up against them,, as I have done a let my everlasting gospel have a fire passage in these nations; and do not repeach and afflict my servants and messengers so any more, whom I have chosen and sent to preach and declare the way of life and salvation to the ends of the earth, but bow your ear and your heart unto them and their testimony, that it may be well with you, and prolong your days; for he that blesseth them shall be blessed, and he that curseth them shall be cussed, and every hand shall wither that opposeth them, as liath been, and shall be, henceforth for ever: I the Lord have spoken it.

'But and if you will not hear, but will still persist, and go on, as ye have done, to oppress my heritage, and harmless people, and make war and opposition against my power and truth, and thus set yourselves and your power against me, the living God, I will bring you downm denly, to the astonishment of nations, and I will t day short, and turn your pleasures into mentation, and shame and contempt shall morial as a garment. Thus will I work VOL. II.

ance of my seed, and none shall let it; for the year of my redeemed is come, and the day of vengeance is in my heart, to plead its cause with all flesh.

Therefore, consider your ways, and see what ye are doing, and what the effect of this your work will be; ye are but men, and the children of men, who were but as yesterday; your breath also is in your nostrils, and your life is but a vapour, which will soon vanish away: you labour in the very fire, and bring forth wind, which blows up the flame of that which will consume you, and deprive you of all happiness for ever: O that ye had but hearts to consider it! For the more you strive with the Lord, and oppress his people, the more will they multiply, and grow stronger and stronger and you shall wax weaker and weaker, and your works shall be your heavy burden; for life and immortality is risen, and the power of God is stirring in the hearts of thousands, and light and understanding, the excellent spirit which was in Daniel, is breaking forth like the lightning, which shines out of the east into the west, in the sight of many people, whereby they know, it is the day of the coming of the Son of Man, with power and great glory, that every eye may see him, and they that have pierced him shall mourn bitterly: so, your labour is in vain, and your works for the fire, and your striving with your Maker to no purpose, as to effect your end and aim. And of these things you have been often forewarned, and the Lord hath been very long suffering towards you, in sparing you thus long, and suffering you thus far to act against him and his dear people; and his mercy and forbearance hath been evidently showed in a large measure unto you, in deferring his heavy judgments thus long, which must have been confessed to be just upon you. And will you thus requite the Lord, by increasing your tasks of oppression upon his tender innocent people? O unwise and ungrateful generation! Hath not God yet showed you, that you should do justly, and love mercy, and walk humbly? But are these your fruits and practices, fruits of mercy or justice? Or if there be any tincture or

k of love, or humility in them, let God's witness, the

all your consciences, and in people, answer. I tell

you plainly, that such fruits and doings among you, that profess yourselves Christians, have made the very name of Christ and Christianity, a proverb of reproach through nations, and have caused the God of heaven to be blasphemed; and how could it be otherwise, seeing you who profess the most knowledge of God, and have talked of converting the heathen, as some of your leaders have done, are found the least in the life and fruits thereof. But to what would they convert them? to pride and swearing, and drunkenness, and oppression, and all manner of excess, and to persecute people for their good conscience? They have no need of that; for, some of them have said, they did not use to swear and be drunk, &c. till they came among the Christians, and learned of them; they did not do so in their own country: ye are so far from converting them, being out of the life of what ye profess and talk of yourselves, that the very heathen or infidels, (as ye call them,) do judge and condemn you, who are making inquiry, concerning these your proceedings against this harmless people, among whom some of them have been kindly entreated, who visited them at the Lord's requiring, though contrary in opinion and religion; and this doth rise up in judgment against you.

'But, friends, have you yourselves been under sufferings, and some of you been driven into strange countries, or lands, for your cause, as it was called? Nay, did not the king himself once flee for refuge to a tree, to save himself from his enemies' hands? If not, why are there such representations made of it, in so many places in the nation? And was not this as great a mercy and deliverance from God, so to obscure and preserve him, from them who pursued him, and many of you also? And are these things forgotten? Can mercy be loved, except it be remembered? And do you remember and love his mercies, by doing justly, and walking humbly with him, as he doth require? Or do you boast in a vain glory, as if your own arm had done it, or your own strength or deserts had delivered you? If so, then God must needs be forgotten, and his mercies trodden under foot, and his visitations and counsels cast behind your back; and so, all

that forget God, shall be torn in pieces, and there shall be none to deliver them, as it is written.

'And were these your sufferings, which you sustained by them ye opposed, unjust and unequal? And if you should say, they were; then I say, it is much more unjust and very unequal in the sight of God, and all sober people that fear him, for you, thus to inflict such cruel sufferings as imprisoning, and stifling up to death in your noisome jails and holes among thieves and murderers, and to pronounce sentence of banishment upon an innocent, harmless, peaceable people, that do not oppose you in the least, with any outward force, neither do so much as the thoughts of it lodge within our breasts, as the Lord God knoweth, who hath called us to peace, but on the contrary have sought and do seek your welfare and happiness, both in this world, and in the world to come, which in time shall be manifest to the whole earth.

And if you say, your sufferings were unjust and unequal, though you did oppose them, and make war against them so long as you could, because they deprived you of your rights and privileges, and just liberties, and natural birthrights, &c. which were your due to enjoy, as being free-born of the nation: then how much more is it unjust, and unequal, and unrighteous, thus to inflict sufferings upon your friends, and oppress your peaceable neighbours, who are free-born people of the same nation, and do not oppose you, but are tender towards you, as aforesaid, and subject to all wholesome just laws, and tributary to you, for which causes we ought to have our just liberty, and enjoy the privilege of our birthright, which is our due so long as we live peaceably and harmlessly, but if it be not a privilege to be pleaded for, then are all your own grounds and reasons, and cause, without a foundation, and you and the whole nation may be swept away by any that are able to do it, without being charged with injustice or oppression, which is contrary to the just balance, the light of Christ in all people's consciences. And as we are the dearly beloved people of the most high God, who doth bless us with his presence, and manifest his everlasting love and good will towards us daily, and

overshadows us with his power and tender mercies, whom he hath gathered out of the evil ways and spirit of this world, and all the vanities thereof, unto himself, to walk with him who is invisible, in the upright, blameless, undefiled life, in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation; I say, considering these things, how greatly and unrighteously do our sufferings appear to all sober people, whose eyes are open, and will be more open to discern and savour the bitterness of that proud, envious, wrathful spirit, which thus hath acted and deceived you and its end is numbered by them that have wisdom from above.

For friends, set aside the reproachful name of Quakers, and the other titles of derision and scorn, which the envious and blood-thirsty spirit hath invented to render the people of God odious in all ages, and tell me what ye have justly to charge against this people, whom you so furiously pursue to the dens and caves of the earth, to the loss of the lives of so many of them; by which children are made fatherless, and tender-hearted women, mournful widows, and let it come forth to open view, and declare it abroad, as your articles against them, to the whole world, and speak the truth, and nothing but the truth, as you use to tell one another, that all people may rightly know and understand the very ground and most secret cause, who do inquire, of these your present proceedings against them; for notice is taken by many, and ere long it must be manifest to all men, as the folly and madness of Jannes and Jambres were, that withstood Moses; for you withstand no less than him of whom Moses wrote; who said, "I am the light of the world," against whom Saul was once exceedingly mad, and had thoughts to do very much against that way, which was then as well as now, called Heresy, till the light of Jesus, whom he persecuted, met with him, with his letters, or warrants, to hale men and women to prison, as your servants do, and smote him to the ground, and made him tremble, who, from that time, became such a Quaker as you now persecute and imprison till death; but the light of Jesus Christ, the Son of the living God, will meet with all persecutors, and oppressors about religion, let them be never