Though Muggleton does not make much of this incident, it appears to have been a very important one in the early history of the sect, for from this moment the numbers of Muggletonians began to increase, and they began to absorb a small army of wandering monomaniacs who were roaming about London and talking about _religion_, and visions, and revelations, and attaching themselves first to one body and then to another, according as they could get admission to the meeting-houses and be allowed to preach and harangue. Astrologers too, came and conferred with the prophets, and drunken scoffers laid bets that they would get the prophet's blessing; and on one occasion a company of "Atheistical Ranters" made a plot to turn the tables upon Muggleton, and damn him and Reeve. Three of "the most desperatest" agreed to do it. "So the time appointed came, and there was prepared a good dinner of pork, and the three came ready prepared to curse us." Part of the agreement was that the dinner should follow upon the cursing. But whether it was that the rogues could do nothing until they were fortified with drink, or that a sudden spasm of conscientiousness came upon them, or that they were like superstitious people who with blanched lips loudly protest that they do not believe in ghosts, but decline on principle to walk through a churchyard after dark, these three fellows all ran away from their engagements at the eleventh hour. "So they departed without their dinner of pork."
The prophets were becoming notorious. The Ranters and John Robins had been vanquished; their first book was published and was selling; they were advertising themselves widely, and being advertised by friends and foes; but as yet they had not been persecuted, and as yet they had not put very prominently forward any distinctive or special theology. They claimed to be prophets, but their mission, What was it? What were they charged to proclaim?
It was just about this time that the works of Jacob Boehm had begun to exercise a very great influence upon the visionaries in England. The _Mercurius Teutonicus_ was first published in an English translation in 1649, and the _Signatura_ _Rerum_ had appeared in 1651. Muggleton had certainly read these books, and as certainly turned them to account. The jargon of the German mystic was exactly what he wanted in his present state of mind, and there was that in the new philosophy which commended itself vastly to him. Not that he, as an inspired prophet, could for one moment admit that he had received any light from man or was under any obligation to anything but the divine illumination enlightening him directly and immediately; but the obligation was there all the same, and to Jacob Boehm's influence we must attribute the evolution of the distinctive doctrine of the Muggletonians, which just about this time comes into obtrusive prominence.
It was at the beginning of the year 1653 that the prophets made their first important convert. Up to this time they had been heard of only in the back streets of London. But now a New England merchant named Leader, who had made a fortune in America, and had come back in disgust at the intolerance and persecution that prevailed among the colonists, made advances to Muggleton. Leader was in a despondent state of mind, and on the lookout for a religion with some novelty in it. He too had, it seems, been a student of Jacob Boehm, and the _Signatura Rerum_ had opened out a new line of speculation to him. "His first question was concerning God--whether God, that created all things, could admit of being any form of Himself?"
Prophets are never at a nonplus, and never surprised by a question; the more transcendental the problem, the more need for the prophetic gift to solve it. In fact, the prophet comes in to help when all human cunning is at fault.
Accordingly Mr. Leader's question led to a discussion which is all set down at full for those who choose to read it, and as the result of that discussion comes out into clearness the astounding declaration which henceforth appears as the main article of the Muggletonian theology.
"God hath a body of His own, as man hath a body of his own; only God's body is spiritual and heavenly, clear as _christial_, brighter than the sun, swifter than thought, yet a body."
Hitherto the prophets had been groping after a formula which might be their strength, but they had not been able to put it into shape. Jacob Boehm's mysticism, passing through the alembic of such a mind as Leader's, and subjected to that occult atmosphere which Muggleton lived in, came forth in the shape of a new theology, transcendental, unintelligible, but therefore celestial and sublime. The prophets from this moment made a new departure.
Meanwhile, the unhesitating and authoritative damning of opponents exercised a strange fascination over the multitude. Reeve and Muggleton lived among the blackguards at their first start, and they damned the blackguards pretty freely. In numberless instances the blackguards were to all intents and purposes damned before Muggleton's sentence was pronounced. They were fellows given over to drink and debauchery, sots who had not much life in them, scoundrels who were in hiding, skulking in the vilest holes of the city, whom the plague or famine would be likely to rid the world of any day. They died frequently enough after the sentence was pronounced, and it is quite conceivable that the sentence may have hastened the end of many a poor wretch who had nothing to live for. Nay, in more cases than one a timid man, when the sentence was passed, was so terrified that he took to his bed there and then, and never rose from it, or became insane, neglected his business, and so was ruined; and as the number of the damned was always increasing, the chances of strange accidents and misfortunes would go on increasing also. People heard of these, and of these only.
What the prophets themselves did, it was only natural that their followers would try to do also; indeed, it is wonderful that the damning prerogative was not invaded much oftener than it was. It was very rarely intruded upon, however. Once, indeed, a misguided and too venturous believer named Cooper took upon him to usurp authority, and pronounced the sentence of damnation upon a small batch of fifteen scoffers who had jeered at him and the prophet's mission. The precedent was a dangerous one, there was no telling what it would lead to if such random and promiscuous damning was to go on. Next day Cooper fell grievously sick, and conscience smote him; he could not be at peace till he had confessed his fault and been forgiven. He was forgiven accordingly, but he was admonished to lay to heart the warning, and to presume no more. "Not but that I do believe," says Muggleton, "they will all be damned," all the whole fifteen!