"And as the Lord is able to overturn you, so if ye mistake your work, mis-interpreting the passages of his providence, and erring in heart concerning the ground of his former displeasure: and so (through the error of judgment) set yourselves in opposition against him, replanting the plants which he will not have grow, and plucking up the plants of his planting do ye not in this case provoke the Lord, even to put forth the strength which is in him against you? We are poor worms. Alas, if ye had only us to deal with, we should be nothing in your hands! But if his strength stand behind us, we shall prove a very burthensome stone, and ye will hardly be able to remove us out of the place wherein God hath set us, and where he pleaseth to have us disposed of. And happy were it for you, if instead of persecuting us, ye yourselves were drawn to wait for the same begettings of God (which we have felt) out of the earthly nature into his life and nature, and did learn of him to govern in that; then might ye be established indeed, and be freed from the danger of those shakings and overturnings, which God is hastening upon the earth.

Now because ye may be apt to think, that I write these things for my own sake, and the sake of my friends and companions in the truth of God, that we might escape the sufferings and severity which we are like to undergo from

you, and not so mainly and chiefly for your sakes, lest ye should bring the wrath of God and misery upon your souls and bodies: to prevent this mistake in you, I shall add what followeth. Indeed this is not the intent of my heart: for I have long expected, and do still expect this cup of outward affliction and persecution from you, and my heart is quieted and satisfied therein, knowing that the Lord will bring glory to his name, and good to us out of it but I am sure it is not good for you to afflict us for that which the Lord requireth of us, and wherein he accepteth us and ye will find it the bitterest work that ever ye went about, and in the end will wish that the Lord had rather never given you this day of prosperity, than that, he should suffer you thus to nake use of it. Now that ye may the more clearly see the temper of my spirit, and how my heart stands in this thing, I shall a little open unto you my faith and hope about it, in these ensuing particulars.

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First, I am assured in my heart and soul, that this despised people (called Quakers) is of the Lord's begetting in his own life and nature.

Indeed had I not seen the power of God in them, and received from the Lord an unquestionable testimony concerning them, I had never looked towards them: for they were otherwise very despicable in my eyes. And this I cannot

but testify concerning them, that I have found the life of God in me owning them, and that which God hath begotten in my heart, refreshed by the power of life in them: and none but the Lord knows the beauty and excellency of glory which he hath hid under this appearance.

Secondly, "The Lord hath hitherto preserved them against great oppositions, and is still able to preserve them. Every power hitherto hath made nothing of over-running them yet they have hitherto stood, by the care and tender mercy of the Lord; and the several powers which have persecuted them have fallen one after another.

Thirdly, "I have had experience in myself of the Lord's goodness and preservation of me in my suffering with them for the testimony of his truth, who made my bonds pleasant to me, and my noisome prison (enough to have destroyed my weakly and tenderly educated nature) a place of pleasure and delight; where I was comforted by my God night and day, and filled with prayers for his people, as also with love to, and prayers for, those who had been the means of outwardly afflicting me, and others upon the Lord's account.

Fourthly, "I have no doubt in my heart that the Lord will deliver us. The strength of man, the resolution of man is nothing in my eye in comparison of the Lord. Whom the Lord loveth,

he can save at his pleasure. Hath he begun to break our bonds and deliver us, and shall we now distrust him? Are we in a worse condition than Israel was when the sea was before them, the mountains on each side, and the Egyptians behind pursuing them? He indeed that looketh with man's eye, can see no ground of hope, nor hardly a possibility of deliverance; but (to the eye of faith) it is now nearer than when God began at first to deliver.

Fifthly, "It is the delight of the Lord, and his glory to deliver his people, when to the eye of sense, it seemeth himpossible. Then doth the Lord delight to stretch forth his arm, when none else can help and then doth it please him to deal with the enemies of his truth and people, when they are lifted up above the fear of him, and are ready to say in their hearts concerning them, they are now in our hands, who can deliver them?

"Well, were it not in love to you, and in pity, (in relation to what will certainly befal you, if you go on in this course) I could say in the joy of my heart, and in the sense of the good will of my God-to us, who suffereth these things to pass, go on, try it out with the Spirit of the Lord, come forth with your laws and prisons, and spoiling of our goods, and banishment, and death (if the Lord please) and see if ye can carry it: for we come not forth against you in our own

wills, or in any enmity against your persons or government, or in any stubbornness or refractoriness of spirit; but with the lamb-like nature which the Lord our God hath begotten in us, which is taught and enabled by him, both to do his will, and to suffer for his name-sake. And if we cannot thus overcome you (even in patience of spirit, and in love to you) and if the Lord our God please not to appear for us, we are content to be overcome by you. So the will of the Lord be done saith my soul."

This the author concludes with a postcript containing a serious exhortation to forsake evil. Besides this he gave forth another paper, wherein he proposed this question to the king and both houses of parliament.

"Whether laws made by man, in equity, ought to extend any further, than there is power in man to obey. And if it were not cruel to require obedience in such cases, wherein the party hath not a capacity in him of obeying." And to explain this a little further, he said, "In things concerning the worship of God, wherein a man is limited by God, both what worship he shall perform, and what worship he shall abstain from, he is not at liberty to obey what laws shall be made by man contrary hereunto." Thus Pennington strove by writing, to shew the per