ets them again to God, which is the
regeneration and new birth, without which there is no coming into the
kingdom of God: and to which whoever comes, is greater than John; that
is, than John's dispensation, which was not that of the kingdom, but the
consummation of the legal, and fore-running of the gospel-times, the time
of the kingdom. Accordingly several meetings were gathered in those
parts; and thus his time was employed for some years.

In 1652, he being in his usual retirement, his mind exercised towards the
Lord, upon a very high mountain in some of the higher parts of Yorkshire,
as I take it, he had a vision of the great work of God in the earth, and
of the way that he was to go forth in a public ministry, to begin it. He
saw people as thick as motes in the sun, that should in time be brought
home to the Lord, that there might be but one shepherd and one sheepfold
in all the earth. There his eye was directed northward, beholding a
great people that should receive him and his message in those parts.
Upon this mountain he was moved of the Lord to sound out his great and
notable day, as if he had been in a great auditory; and from thence went
north, as the Lord had shown him. And in every place where he came, if
not before he came to it, he had his particular exercise and service
shown to him, so that the Lord was his leader indeed. For it was not in
vain that he travelled; God in most places sealing his commission with
the convincement of some of all sorts, as well publicans as sober
professors of religion. Some of the first and most eminent of those that
came forth in a public ministry, and who are now at rest, were Richard
Farnsworth, James Nayler, William Dewsberry, Thomas Aldam, Francis
Howgil, Edward Burroughs, John Camm, John Audland, Richard Hubberthorn,
T. Taylor, T. Holmes, Alexander Parker, Wm. Simson, William Caton, John
Stubbs, Robert Withers, Thomas Low, Josiah Coale, John Burnyeat, Robert
Lodge, Thomas Salthouse, and many more worthies, that cannot well be here
named; together with divers yet living of the first and great
convincement; who, after the knowledge of God's purging judgment in
themselves, and some time of waiting in silence upon him, to feel and
receive power from on high to speak in his name, (which none else rightly
can, though they may use the same words,) felt its divine motions, and
were frequently drawn forth, especially to visit the public assemblies,
to reprove, inform, and