George Fox (1624-1691)
Epistle 279
1670
"The Rest of the Living"
ALL Friends every where, who are Friends of Christ, the heavenly Man, by whom the World was made, and are become Friends of God through Jesus Christ, who are quickned by Jesus, and made alive by him . . . and have drank his Blood, through which you have Life, and by which you come from among the Congregations of the dead, who only talk of his Blood and his Flesh.
And now being gathered in the Name of Jesus, . . . whose Blood you have drank, yea even of the heavenly Man's, which is his Life; and so are come out of your native Countries, Religions and Worships, and left the old Stuff behind, who are gotten a top of the old House, and will not go down again to fetch out any of the old Stuff. I say, ye that are gathered in the Name of Jesus . . . Keep your Meetings in the Name of Jesus. . . . Then it is he, that is persecuted, if you be persecuted, and he, that suffers; for in all your Afflictions and Sufferings, he is with you. . . .
. . . And the Lord known to feed you a top of the Mountains with his heavenly Bread, and he hath set one Shepherd over you (the heavenly Man) . . . who is the Shepherd over all the Living that are made alive by him; and so the Lord hath the Glory of seeking and of gathering you out of the Wildernesses, Pits, Graves and Ditches of Old Adam and the Serpent, and from his Brambles and Briars; . . . and so Christ . . . is the Rest of the Living, that he hath made alive, and is their Shepherd, to feed them with Life, and with the Springs of Life, and is the Bishop of their Souls, that doth Oversee them, that they do not go out of the Pastures of Life . . . nor from the Fold of Life. It is a glorious Pastures, to be fed a top of all the Mountains in the Life, in the Pastures of Life, by the living Shepherd, and to be overseen by the living Bishop, and to be sanctified, to be presented to God by the living Priest . . . and everlasting Priest. . . .
