is called by Paul, the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus.

When revealed to the believer, it is called putting the law in his heart, and writing it in his mind, or on the fleshly tables of his heart, by the Spirit of the living God; which makes the saint a living epistle, known and read of all men.

Submission to the sovereign will of God in Christ is the saint's rule to which he first bows. When these things are written in his mind, he is "not without law to God."

When made free from bondage by the application of these things, he is "under the law to Christ."

When these things are enjoyed under the operation of God's Spirit, the righteousness of the law is fulfilled in him who walks, not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.

This is the man, and no other, who loves the law of God after the inner man; for it is written on his mind; and with the mind he serves the law of God, by serving in the newness of the Spirit, and not in the oldness of the letter. This is the man that knows righteousness, the man in whose heart is God's law; he is zealous for good works, and performs them; worships in Spirit and in truth; walks in newness of life; serves with spiritual service; and produces the works of faith, labour of love, and patience of hope. All other professors are nothing but empty trunk-makers;

criminals in chains, chattering about merit; bastards, jangling about the law; or sounding brass, and tinkling cymbals, giving sound without life. Holiness, righteousness, goodness, and love, are the weightier matters. Separate these, or attempt to fetch them from any other source than the purpose and promise of God, or from the Mediator's heart, the Spirit's hand, or the saint's mind, and you are no minister of the Gospel, but a vain jangler, or a spy, that entangles the saints in bondage; and, exclusive of these things in the purpose and promise of God, in the heart of Christ, or the hand of the Spirit, make the law any thing else but a covenant of works, a killing letter, or a yoke of bondage, if you can; I defy you. Let any rule of life be set before the saint but this, and the Spirit says you tempt God, subvert the souls of believers, bewitch them, imprison the children of the free woman, and render Christ unprofitable to them. Bring the believer under any other law to Christ; enforce any other law upon his conscience; set him to hold any other law to God; and to live, walk, or work, by any other rule than the above; and then publish it to the world; and, by God's help, I will undertake to prove that the whole of the performance is no more than vain jangling, vain philosophy, inconsistency, unconcluded, unaffirmed notions, unscriptural fancies, and downright nonsense.

That I might have an opportunity of disputing this point with you, I have addressed this letter to

your name; and shall subscribe it with my own, that you may know who your antagonist is, and where to find him; and that the Christian world may have an opportunity of judging between the taught of God, and those of man; ministers of the Spirit, and those of the letter; the learned philosopher, and the illiterate divine; the man of word, and the man of power; the master of arts, and the spiritual fool; the parson-maker, and the parson made. And, before you come forth again, take counsel, lay your schemes deep, and push your arguments home; lest God should enable me to speak like the piercing of a sword, and so get between the joints of your harness, and discover to the Christian world that this leading champion was never brought to Jehovah's banner, much less equipped for the front of the battle.

I have sufficiently proved, that what you term Antinomianism, which is involved with so much complicated guilt as to want a name to describe it, is the everlasting Gospel of the blessed God; and do you overthrow these arguments, prove me a liar, and make my speech nothing worth, if you can; and you may depend upon having the last word in this controversy, if you are the longest liver.

I am not ashamed of the Gospel that Christ hath taught me; I wish to publish the whole of it: and, if it appears that I am called and sent of God to preach his word, I must confess that I think nine parts out of ten that are called Gospel

ministers in our days, never were, either called of God to the knowledge of the truth, the fellowship of his Son, or to the ministry of the word. And, with reverence to the gentility and learning of Mr. Evans be it spoken, by this performance of his, it does not appear that ever he was either called by the Holy Ghost to a savoury knowledge of the truth, the fellowship of Christ, or to the ministry of the Spirit. I wish it may appear that he is. We are allowed of Christ, Sir, not only to judge them that are within, but to try the spirits, and even them that say they are apostles, and prove them liars if they are not. "The Spirit of the prophets is subject to the prophets." Let Mr. Evans publish, according to the oracles of God, his high vocation to the knowledge of the truth, the fellowship of Christ, the ministry of the Spirit, and to the higher office of qualifying vessels of mercy for the Master's use, or fitting out ministers of man and by man, which I know conscience and pride will never suffer him to do, lest he should be put to shame, if he does, I will, by the help of God, consider the performance, return an answer, and expose myself as an impostor for ever, if he disputes me either out of my rule, or out of the good hope through grace that God, in the multitude of his mercy, hath favoured me with.

If the law be no rule of life to a believer, what privilege can it be, any more than duty, to delight in the law of God after the inner man?

'Or what ground of pleasure can arise from the hope of awaking in the Divine likeness?'

If the law be the believer's rule of life, the tenor of which is, this do, and thou shalt live; it can be no privilege, for the law worketh wrath, and the strength of sin is the law; for, where there is no law, there is no transgression. And, as to the duty it requires, its demands are such a yoke as neither the apostles, nor the fathers, were able to bear. And this Mr. Evans would allow also, if ever the commandment had come to him, to revive his sin, rout the consequential, We, and slay his legal hope.

Nor can the believer ever delight in the law of God after the inner man, as a covenant of works, and as a killing letter; which is the unlawful way in which you have handled it with respect to believers. The substance of it must be viewed in the purpose of God, the promise of God, the fulness of the Mediator, the hand of the Spirit, and in the mind of the saint, before he can take any delight in it.

Nor can he ever expect to awake in the Divine likeness by that rule.

But, like the proud Pharisee, the blind legalist, the carnally-secure hypocrite, go on in a state of insensibility, hoping in the law, and bearing about that lamp without oil, till it goes out in obscure darkness: and he, instead of awaking in the Divine likeness, lift up his eyes in hell.