Insomuch that divers
fell into gross and enormous practices; pretending in excuse thereof,
that they could, without evil, commit the same act which was sin in
another to do: thereby distinguishing between the action and the evil of
it, by the direction of the mind, and intention in the doing of it.
Which was to make sin super-abound by the aboundings of grace, and to
turn from the grace of God into wantonness; a securer way of sinning than
before: as if Christ came not to save us from our sins, but in our sins;
not to take away sin, but that we might sin more freely at his cost, and
with less danger to ourselves. I say, this ensnared divers, and brought
them to an utter and lamentable loss as to their eternal state; and they
grew very troublesome to the better sort of people, and furnished the
looser with an occasion to profane.
CHAP. II.
_Of the rise of this People_, _their fundamental principle_, _and
doctrine_, _and practice_, _in twelve points resulting from it_: _their
progress and sufferings_: _an expostulation with England thereupon_.
At was about that very time, as you may see in George Fox's annals, that
the eternal, wise, and good God, was pleased, in his infinite love, to
honour and visit this benighted and bewildered nation, with his glorious
day-spring from on high; yea, with a more sure and certain sound of the
word of light and life, through the testimony of a chosen vessel, to an
effectual and blessed purpose, can many thousands say, glory be to the
name of the Lord for ever!
For as it reached the conscience, and broke the heart, and brought many
to a sense and search, so that which people had been vainly seeking
without, with much pains and cost, they, by this ministry, found within,
where it was they wanted what they sought for, viz.
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