And the Observation must be that “GOD is for new things.  GOD is for a new creature.  St. John xix, 41, Now in the place when he was crucified, there was a garden; and in the garden a new sepulchre, wherein was never man yet laid.  There they laid JESUS.  And again St. Mark xvi. 17.  CHRIST tells his disciples that they that are true believers, shall cast out devils, and speak with new tongues.  And likewise, the prophet teaches us, Isaiah xlii. 10, Sing unto the LORD a new song, and his praise to the end of the earth.

“Whence it is plain that CHRIST is not for old things.  He is not for an old sepulchre.  He is not for old tongues.  He is not for an old song.  He is not for an old creature.  CHRIST is for a new creature!  Circumcision and Uncircumcision availeth nothing, but a new creature.  And what do we read concerning SAMSON? Judges xv, 15.  Is it not that he slew a thousand of the Philistines with one new jawbone?  An old one might have killed its tens, its twenties, its hundreds! but it must be a new jawbone that is able to kill a thousand!  GOD is for the new creature!

“But may not some say, ‘Is GOD altogether for new things?’ How comes it about then, that the prophet says, Isaiah i. 13, 14, Bring no more vain oblations! &c.  Your new Moons, and your appointed Feasts, my soul hateth! And again, what means that, Deuteronomy xxxii. 17, 19, They sacrificed unto devils, and to new gods, whom they knew not, to new gods that came newly up....  And when the LORD saw it, He abhorred them! To which I answer, that GOD indeed is not for new moons, nor for new gods; but, excepting moons and gods, He is for the new creature.”

It is possible, Sir, that somebody besides yourself, may be so vain as to read this Letter:  and they may perhaps tell you, that there be no such silly and useless people as I have described.  And if there be, there be not above two or three in a country [county].  Or should there be, it is no such complaining matter:  seeing that the same happens in other professions, in Law and Physic:  in both [of] which, there be many a contemptible creature.

Such therefore as these, may be pleased to know that, if there had been need, I could have told them, either the book (and very page almost) of all that has been spoken about Preaching, or else the When and Where, and the Person that preached it.

As to the second, viz.:  that the Clergy are all mightily furnished with Learning and Prudence; except ten, twenty, or so; I shall not say anything myself, because a very great Scholar of our nation shall speak for me:  who tells us that “such Preaching as is usual, is a hindrance of Salvation rather than the means to it.”  And what he intends by “usual,” I shall not here go about to explain.