THE HOLY CITY; OR, THE NEW JERUSALEM:
WHEREIN ITS GOODLY LIGHT, WALLS, GATES, ANGELS, AND THE MANNER OF THEIR STANDING, ARE EXPOUNDED: ALSO HER LENGTH AND BREADTH, TOGETHER WITH THE GOLDEN MEASURING-REED EXPLAINED: AND THE GLORY OF ALL UNFOLDED.
AS ALSO THE NUMEROUSNESS OF ITS INHABITANTS; AND WHAT THE TREE AND WATER OF LIFE ARE, BY WHICH THEY ARE SUSTAINED.
'Glorious things are spoken of thee, O city of God.'-Psalm 87:3
'And the name of the city from that day shall be, THE LORD IS
THERE.'-Ezekiel 48:35
London: Printed in the year 1665
ADVERTISEMENT BY THE EDITOR
Reader, it will require the utmost effort of your powers of faith in perfectly well authenticated history to believe an almost incredible fact, but which certainly took place in England, under the reformed church in 1665. It is, however, true, that a number of eminently pious, loyal, sober, industrious citizens were immured, by the forms of law, within the walls of a small prison on Bedford Bridge, over the river Ouse, for refusing to attend the parish church or join in the service prescribed by Acts of Parliament, according to the Book of Common Prayer. The Ruler of the universe deigned to approve their conduct, and to visit these prisoners with his peculiar approbation. He made their prison a Bethel, the house of God, and the very gate of heaven-thus richly blessing their souls for refusing to render unto man the things that are God's.
On the Lord's day they were in the habit of uniting in Divine worship. Their prison chamber had received no prelatic consecration, but God was in their midst to bless them. It happened one morning that it came to the turn of a poor itinerant tinker, of extraordinary ability, to address his fellow-prisoners-he had neither written nor even prepared a sermon, and felt, for a time, at a loss for a text or subject. At length, while turning over the sacred pages, his eye was directed to the description of the Holy City-New Jerusalem, which in the latter day will gloriously descend from heaven. His soul was enlarged and enlightened with the dazzling splendour of that sacred city-his heart, which had felt 'empty, spiritless, and barren,' was baptized into his subject-'with a few groans, he carried his meditations to the Lord Jesus for a blessing, which he did forthwith grant according to his grace, and then the preacher did set before his brethren the spiritual meat, and they did all eat and were well refreshed. While distributing the truth, it did so increase in his hand, that of the fragments he gathered up a basket full, and furnished this heavenly treatise.' Such, in substance, is the author's interesting account of the circumstances under which he wrote this book. He adds, with humility, that the men of this world would laugh, in conceit, that one so low, contemptible, and inconsiderable should busy himself with so hard and knotty a subject, but humbly hopes, that though but a babe in Christ, these truths were revealed to him. To the real followers of the lowly Jesus, the poor carpenter's son, 'who had not where to lay his head'-of whom the Jews said, 'How knoweth this man letters, having never learned?' (John 7:15)-despised by princes, prelates, scribes, and Pharisees-to such, the poverty, the occupation, and the want of book-learning of our author needs no apology. It is all-sufficient to know that he was mighty in the Scriptures, and deeply taught of the Holy Spirit. These are the only sources of information relative to the New Jerusalem; and in this treatise the author has richly developed the treasures of the Bible in reference to this solemn subject. To the same prison discipline to which we are indebted for the Pilgrim's Progress, we owe this, and other of the labours of that eminent servant of Christ, John Bunyan. Little did the poor tyrants who sent him to jail think that, in such a place, he would have this blessed vision of the heavenly city, or that his severe sufferings would materially aid in destroying their wicked craft.
The subject is one of pure revelation. The philosopher-the theologian-the philologist-the historian, and the antiquarian, are utterly unable to grapple with that which is here so admirably handled by a poor unlettered prisoner for Christ, who, from the inexhaustible storehouse of God's Word, brings forth things new and old to comfort the pilgrim, whether in a prison or a palace, and to enliven his prospects on his way to this celestial city. The New Jerusalem is a sublime object, and we are bound humbly to adore that majestic mercy which has condescended to give us such a glimpse of the glory which, in its unbounded extent, passeth all the powers of our earth-bound souls to conceive.