Though thou and I may differ widely in our sentiments on some points; my very soul bids " God speed" to those who believe and feel themselves thus called upon to devote their all, and go forth in the name of the Lord, with their lives as in their hands, to promote the Saviour's kingdom. Go forth in this thy might, and thou mayest sometimes prove, that man's extremity is the Lord's opportunity,-yea such it may prove to convince thee that "providential direction" and "Immediate Revelation are perfectly compatible, and are wisely adapted to rational beings.

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Providential impulse or restraint simply considered, 'is not only applicable to inferior animals, but to inanimate matter-"The winds and the sea obey Him." It may be of a like character when exerted on rational beings, especially on the wicked, and those who know not God. Yea, even the righteous who have not learned to listen to that revelation which J. W. represents as delusion,-have not learned to distinguish the voice of the Lord in the secret of their souls, may feel this Divine influence, without its affording them "discovery," any acknowledged "communication;" and hence the guidance of the Holy Spirit may very nearly resemble its influences on the "ravens and lions," if not that also on the waters of Jordan and the Red Sea. And it is, I apprehend, for want of knowing by true "faith" that Christ dwells in their hearts, and from not yielding in humble renunciation of SELF, and in a childlike disposition to be guided aright, that the righteous do not more often perceive the Divine guidance, and do not more frequently know and follow providential direction, and obey its impulse as an object of living "Faith," under a precious yet abasing sense of its Divine origin.

This experience presents no ground for self-exaltation; but rather for deep self-abasement, and for watching unto prayer. We have a striking instance of the necessity of deep watchfulness, against human weakness and fallibility, in the

experience of an eminently inspired apostle, Peter, not only in denying his Lord whilst personally with him; but evinced after the Holy Ghost had come upon him, in the supereminent display of its power on the day of Pentecost; for Paul says in his epistle to the Galatians: "When Peter was come to Antioch, I withstood him to the face, because he was to be BLAMED; for before that certain came from James, he did eat with the Gentiles; but when they were come, he withdrew and separated himself, fearing them which were of the circumcision; and the other Jews dissembled likewise WITH HIM; insomuch that Barnabas also, was carried away with their dissimulation." Are not "these things written for our admonition " "?

Unless the mind be reduced to the state of a little child, and, whether in greater or in lesser concerns, brought into a measure of that state which our blessed Lord experienced when he said: "Not MY WILL but THINE be done;" there is great danger of mistaking the workings of the natural mind. and understanding for a Divine impulse, revelation, or direction. The want of a habit of attentive obedience, may greatly dim the perception of Divine Light; and besides, let it not be supposed, that any rightly organized and instructed mind, imagines the doctrine of "Inward and Immediate Revelation" is exempt from the invariable liability of all the other grand Scripture Doctrines, that of weak, carnal, or froward minds educing error from TRUTH. "GOD IS ONE"-is an immutable Truth; and yet by the perversions of the human understanding and of carnal wisdom, this solemn truth conveys to some bewildered minds, an idea that militates against the divinity of "GOD manifest in the FLESH."

FIFTH POSITION-THE HOLY SCRIPTURES.

"The Holy Scriptures are the most efficient and primary means of those mediate revelations; being, through the mercy

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of God, the repository of Divine Truths; yet requiring the 'Divine Inward Light of Christ' to qualify and enable the mind of man, rightly to understand and comprehend them."

In the first section of this chapter, the notice of the Holy Scriptures is confined to a discussion of J. W.'s strictures respecting them. In the present discussion they are to be considered on a much broader basis; both as to their relative position to the doctrine of Inward and Immediate Revelation, and as to their intrinsic excellency, and the high estimation in which they are ranked, as a main constituent portion of the "Principles of Quakerism,” which J. W. says: “My whole soul

ABHORS."

To this fifth position might be added,-That the doctrine of “Inward Light and Immediate Revelation," so far from depreciating the value of the Sacred Records; is the very foun dation on which only, a true and just estimate of their high and real importance can be conceived.

"Means " is here used in its common or simple acceptation, of a medium or instrument for the obtaining of an end; and hence that the Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testament are the CHIEF OF PRIMARY outward means, by which the knowledge of salvation by Christ is now made known to mankind. Yet whilst the Holy Scriptures are the basis, who that reflects on the present state of things in the earth, and surveys them with an eye enamoured with the love of God, does not perceive that, at the present moment, the Father and Fountain of all our sure mercies, is pleased to work by a vast and complicated machinery of means, for the accomplishment of that prediction: "The earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea.”

A very important part of this "Machinery of Means," in my view, may be styled indirect; its object, and the aim of those who keep it in motion, being worldly advantage and pecuniary remuneration; but in the hand of the great Controller

of events, this very object, and this selfish aim, by opening intercourse between the nations of the world, may, (and is it not beyond a doubt that it will,) like "the earth which helped the woman," the Church, in her flight into the wilderness, be made very instrumental in promoting her return from thence, as well as her universal extension.

The multifarious institutions of the present day, whose object is, in very different ways, to promote the everlasting happiness of man, may be classed as being of the DIRECT portion of the "Machinery of Means ;" and of all these the Bible provides the foundation, and constitutes the groundwork of the respective fabrics.

When also we further reflect on the state of those generally, who have not been favoured with this inestimable boon; whether we cast our eyes on the dark ages of the professing Church of Christ, whilst she withheld the Holy Scriptures from the mass of the people; or whether we turn to the heathen, to whom the Holy Scriptures have been utterly unknown, we are constrained to acknowledge that a gracious God, who is pleased in the present day, in great measure to effect his purposes concerning us by "means," has owned the Sacred Records, as the most distinguished of all mediums, in conveying the knowledge of Himself, and of his dealings with his creature man. How important then is it universally to spread the sacred page!

There is however, abundant cause to believe, that the light afforded through the invaluable medium of the Holy Scriptures, like that Light which is immediately revealed in the heart and soul of man, is very diversly modified, according to the situations and circumstances under which either of them is extended to us. Hence it is that many who have been educated in unbelief of the Immediate Revelation of the Light of Christ, know not its Divine Origin; any more than the infidels Voltaire, Payne, and Newport, who were versed

in the Letter, knew the Divine authority of the Holy Scriptures. These infidels could not, however, always stifle the convictions of the Divine power in the secret of their own hearts; so those who are sincerely desirous to know the Lord, are doubtless at times made sensible of his quickening power within them; but in the very nature of things neither class could have a clear discernment of its true character; for want of belief, I might say of living "faith," in the manifestations respectively afforded them.

Unquestionably the outward rites and observances of the Mosaic Dispensation, were calculated to spread a veil over this perception; but being ordained by Him who doeth all things well, they must have been wisely adapted to the state of the people in that day; and such a veil was evidently in harmony with the circumstance of the " due time" not been then arrived, in which the Son and Sent of the Father should be "TESTIFIED as a ransom for ALL;" but "which vail is done away in Christ," to those who are truly imbued with the knowledge of "Christ in you, the hope of glory."

A conviction that the outward ordinances now practised in the Christian Church, have a like tendency to vail the true knowledge and perception of the Saviour in his Inward manifestation in the heart, induced our predecessors, as I apprehend, to forsake and lay aside, every form that was not of direct obligation, though, in condescension to the state of the nations just emerging from Judaism and Polytheism, some ordinances, not obligatory, were made use of by the disciples and apostles of our Lord; even as Paul "took the four men who had a vow upon them; and purifying himself with them, entered into the temple, to signify the accomplishment of the days of purification, until that an offering should be offered for every one of them." And this the apostle did professedly to show, as he was entreated to do, "that he himself walked orderly, and kept the LAW." Hence it is plain, that in con