Page:A Beacon to the Society of Friends.djvu/42

  pilot is that can do this for us. He told his followers that he was not the one that could do it; that it was expedient for them that he should go away,—that this pilot, this Comforter, this safe deliverer of the soul, would not come unless he did go away.—They had looked to him as an outward comforter, therefore he could be no more than an outward comforter to them, although comprehending in himself greater power than any that had gone before him, and by which he did many miracles to convince them, yet all these were outward, and only evident to their external senses;, otherwise than to relieve them from their outward afflictions and perils. That this was absolutely the case, is evident from the necessity of his departure, that so his followers should have nothing to depend on; that they should see their total want, and their inability to do any good thing, or to take one step in the right way; and by which they might see that it was in the wisdom of God that they were thus brought to feel their own insufficiency, and so to humble themselves, as never to seek to man, or any external thing that is mortal. For every thing that these external eyes see is mortal; and. And how correct—how blessed it was, that he had given them this direction to come out of all dependence on man, that so they might find out the Pilot, the Comforter, and that they must trust in him.'Tarry at Jerusalem.'—Now Jerusalem signifies a place of quiet. —'Tarry at Jerusalem, until ye shall receive power from on high." pp. 26-28.

In the preceding extract, the deity of Christ is kept out of sight, and the offices of the Son of God, and those of the Holy Spirit are confounded. With awful presumption it is then asserted, that was not the Saviour of the world.

These sentiments are at variance with the whole tenor