which washes and makes you clean, and justifies, whose bodies are his temple. Though He suffers you to be imprisoned, yet in bis power your bodies are kept, and your spirits also; ye standing witnesses for your Master, for your King, for your Prophet, for your covenant of light, for your wisdom of God, (Him by whom all things were made,) for the word and power, by which all things were made and upheld against the powers of darkness, which cannot bind, stop, nor limit the unlimited power, which is over it, and comprehends it. Therefore mind the word of God, ye children of the Light, mind the word of the Lord, which is as a hammer, and as a fire, and sharper than a two-edged sword. And ye who are the Lord's, are not your own; but they who are in their own time, see not the time which is in the Father's hand; their time is always, and they do their own works, and not the works of God, which the Son of God did.

G. F.

To Friends, to gather up their sufferings, and lay them before the Judges.

1657.

All friends every where, that are in any sufferings, let your sufferings be gathered up together in every county, ye that have suffered by justices, or constables, or bailiffs; let your names be set to your sufferings, and a name or two to witness them, and the names of them that caused you to suffer. And after that ye have gathered up your sufferings in every county, in the county where the judges come, let your sufferings be laid before them who are sent forth from the head and heads of the nation; (for a nation is to be governed as a family in justice, and truth, and judgment, and righteousness :) for he that is the head in the nation, gives forth his charge to the judges; for they are all as his servants. The judges come forth into the several counties, and the counties are as their families; and they give forth their charge to the justices, sheriffs, juries, bailifs, constables. The justices and sheriffs of the counties are to look to their places, as to their families; chief constables and other constables in their places, as to their families; and the constable

to look to his town, as to his family. The judges give charge to all in their places. Now, where these do not judge and do justly, where sheriffs, juries, constables, do not do justly, righteously, or equally; let the sufferings be gathered together, short and true, and an account of their actions that have not been just and righteous, who caused the righteous to suffer, and truth to fall in the gates, and in the streets, that equity cannot enter. Gather up such your sufferings in every county, that suffer by the unjust and unrighteous, and deliver them to the judges, that they may see it; that they may judge justly, and see what is done in the family, to whom they give their charge, and what their master's servants have done, justices, sheriffs, constables. And if the judge that sits in the gate, will not judge righteously, nor plead the cause of the innocent, nor help the helpless, nor break the jaws of the wicked, that tear and rend the innocent, God, who is just, is ready to plead their cause, and to judge and cast out the unjust judges.

And let a copy of all your sufferings, which are delivered to the judges in every county, be kept, and sent up to him that is the head

in the nation, who sends forth the judges as his servants, that he may see, measure, and weigh, how unrighteously they have judged, and what his servants have done, who cause the dividing of his family. So that these things being laid upon the heads of the nation, they may feel and see that God's judgments are just; and will come upon them, if they do not judge justly, and do not measure righteously, and do not weigh truly.

An Exhortation to fervent Prayer and steadfast Faith, in time ofthe greatest Troubles and Exercises.

1657.

O my dear friends and brethren every where! let all your cries and prayers be to the Lord in singleness of heart, in his Spirit and power, and in belief in God through Christ, to receive what ye pray for! For the Lord's ears are open to the cries of his poor and afflicted ones. So, day and night let your cries be to Him, who will keep you in all distresses. For in your afflictions Christ is afflicted, and in all your oppressions He is

oppressed, and in all your imprisonments He is imprisoned, and in all your sufferings He suffereth, and in all your persecutions He is persecuted : Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou Me? said Christ.

And be moderate and chaste in all your families, and in all your imprisonments keep in the fast to the Lord, which breaks down the bond of iniquity, by which every one's health groweth. And ye may also see, how Christ Jesus encourages to pray, Mark xiii. "Take ye heed, watch and pray: and what I say unto one, I say unto all, watch." And in Luke xi. 5-13, wherein He further encourages to pray, where Christ saith: "Which of you shall have a friend, and shall go unto him at midnight, and say unto him, Friend, lend me three loaves, for a friend of mine in his journey is come to me, and I have nothing to set before him. And he from within shall answer and say: Trouble me not, the door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed, I cannot rise and give thee. I say unto you, though he will not rise, and give him, because he is his friend, yet because of his importunity he will rise, and give him as many as he needeth. And I say unto you,