And that it may be so with this whole audience, now, and to all eternity; is my sincere desire, and prayer to the Lord God; who hath thus mercifully invited all mankind to

APPENDIX.

4

A SERMON preached by GEORGE FOX, at a General Meeting held at Wheeler Street, in London, on the first of the fourth month, 1680.*

BLESSED be the Lord God of heaven and earth! who hath preserved his people to this day, and hath given us this blessed opportunity, that every one may be sensible of his mercy, and may feel the blessed power and spirit of life and glory!

God placed man in a blessed habitation, in the beginning-in a blessed and happy state. He taught him how to serve God, when he made him, and made him good, and blessed him, and made him perfect, and set him in dominion over all the works of his hands.

* The meeting in Wheeler Street has been long since discontinued. See it mentioned in Fox's Journal, 3d Edition, p. 564, (under date 1683.) "Being come to London," says G. F. "I went to the meeting at Wheeler Street, near Spital Fields; which that day proved very large; "and a glorious, blessed meeting it was: for the Lord's power and truth was over all; and many "deep and weighty things were opened to the people."

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No mention is made, in the Journal, of his being at Wheeler Street, at the date of this sermon: but it appears that he was at that Yearly Meeting: "To which," he 66 says, many friends came out of most parts of the nation, and a blessed opportunity the Lord gave us together; 6 wherein the ancient love was sweetly felt, and the heavenly life flowed abundantly over all." (p. 542.) See also Shewell's History, 2d Ed. p. 552.-Editor.

And not only set him in dominion, but bid him have dominion and keep dominion. God said unto them "Have dominion:" he did not say "Do thou have dominion-without thy wife;" but he said to them "Have dominion"-to them, " Be fruitful." And to them all was blest and good, and they good also.

Here was a blessed concord and amity. Man was blessed, and so was woman, and all things blest unto them. Man was perfect. God is perfect. All that he made was perfect. God is holy, and pure. How came the loss then?" Why by the Serpent. He said What he?'-An Enemy, Satan, an adversary to man's prosperity, a Devil, a destroyer. He came after God Almighty made man and woman, and had blessed them above all the works of his hands; and set them in paradise, his garden of pleasure; and gave to man liberty to eat of every tree of the garden freely, excepting the tree of knowledge. "In the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt “die.”—Here God taught man, and limited him from this tree.

Now this Serpent, Adversary, Enemy, Devil and Destroyer, he came to the woman first. The Serpent said to the woman, "Hath God said, ' In the day ye eat thereof ye shall die?" When he had got the woman-that was a rib of man-then man entering into the temptation also, they both lost the blessed estate, the concord, and the dominion. Adam and. Eve had dominion over all that God made; then very well might they have [had] dominion over him that was out of the truth. "In the day thou eatest thereof "thou shalt die❞ saith the God of truth. "In the day ye eat thereof "ye shall not die" saith the God of the world, that is out of the truth. Oh! false liberty. Here came the false liberty. The Serpent's doctrine is contrary and opposite to God's. Now man, whom wilt thou believe? thy Maker who created thee, in his own image, and clothed thee with righteousness, and holiness; or the Serpent, the Adversary?

So man did eat-the eye out-the ear out, at last-the mouth went out too: But before they came to this, there was a farther

thing "Ye shall be as Gods"-high-up higher; puffed up above their condition. Now how much higher would they be, than to be in the image of God, above all things that God made? “You shall "be as Gods, knowing good and evil." So see the Serpent's doc. trine, and his text. He did not make this his text, "Be fruitful "and multiply, and have dominion, &c." He did not make any of God's commandments his text; but he made that his text, which he thought would destroy them-kill, and destroy them.

So, after a time, you see, the eye went out to the tree, thinking to be made wise. But here was another wisdom gone into, beside that wisdom [which] Adam had, to know all [things] that God made, and to give names to them. So they got this wisdom, by which the world knows not God.

Now after Adam and Eve had eaten, they were naked, and hid themselves, among the trees of the garden. Then they heard the voice of the Lord God, in the cool of the day, " Adam, where art "thou? While thou kept'st in my image, thou wert my friend (as "Abraham was called God's friend) Where art thou now, Adam? "Hast thou eaten of the tree?”—The woman gave me.'—" Woman-what sayest thou?"—The Serpent beguiled me.'-Then God passed sentence upon them.

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So here you see Adam died, Eve died, according to God's word. They did not come to be as Gods, according to the Serpent's word, but he begat a wisdom, by which, in process of time, they knew not God. And here came the lamb to be slain, from the foundation of the world. (THOUGH THERE BE MORE IN THAT.) Man and woman came to be driven out of the garden, and a flaming sword placed every way, with two edges, to keep the way of the tree of life. So every one must come through this two edged flaming sword, before they can come into the paradise of God again. They must know this sword to cut down the transgressing life, and earthly wisdom, and to burn it up, before man can come to inherit life. And this I knew by experience, before I went out

to declare the truth; as it is said, "He that overcomes shall inherit

"all things."

So here Adam died, and Eve died. Thou mayest say, 'They 'did live, and they had children. How could they be dead, and 'have children?"-Yes, inwardly dead. What died they from?' From the purity, holiness, innocency, pure and good estate, in which God placed them. So Adam died, and Eve died; and-all died—in Adam. Sad words! All are baptized into the death of Adam, into death [or separation] from God, by their unclean spirit:- Baptized? What is that?' Plunged into Adam's death, and imperfection, and darkness. Here all are baptized into Adam's death.

Now it is said, "the seed of the woman-" not the seed of the man (for the woman was first in the transgression) "shall bruise "the Serpent's head." Now the Serpent was got [to be] head in man, and not God, for he was gone from God, and his ordinance "The seed of the woman shall bruise the Serpent's head." This was the first gospel promise, which all the faithful did believe inhope in, that this should come to pass. Therefore you see the apostle, in the 14th of the Hebrews, reckons up Enoch, Abraham, Abel, [who] died in the faith, not receiving the promise; that is, the seed was not come. But to us, and in our day, the apostles' day, the seed did come, that inherits the promise. And the saints in the apostles' days enjoyed the seed, that was come to bruise the Serpent's head.

And by faith in this seed, every age had access to God, and came a-top of the Serpent's head. And so through Christ we are reconciled to God, and therefore he is called the Rock of Ages. And Abraham saw his day and Jacob saw his star; and the Rock that followed Israel was Christ. So "the Seed" came, in the days of the apostles-" A virgin shall conceive a son, &c."

The apostle said, "I permit not a woman to speak in the church," but the law did not keep down Deborah, and Huldah (though there