'And to her was granted that she should be arrayed in fine linen, clean
there is nothing that we experienced and enjoyed in this house this
day that we may not experience and enjoy again to-morrow and every
day in our own house at home. All the mystics worth the noble name
will tell you that all true communicating is always performed and
experienced in the prepared heart, and never in any upper room, or
church, or chapel, or new heaven, or new earth. The prepared heart of
every worthy communicant is the true upper room; it is the true
banqueting chamber; it is the true and the only house of wine. Our
Father's House itself, with its supper-table covered with the new wine
of the Kingdom - the best of it all will still be within you. Prepare
yourselves within yourselves, then, O departing and dispersing
communicants. Prepare, and keep yourselves always prepared. And as
often as you so prepare yourselves your Prince will come to you every
day, and will cat and drink with you, till He makes every day on earth a
day of heaven already to you. See if He will not; for, again and again, He
who keeps all His promises says that He will.
Chapter 26 - EMMANUEL'S LIVERY
'And to her was granted that she should be arrayed in fine linen, clean
and white; for the fine linen is the righteousness of saints.' - John.
The Plantagenet kings of ancient England had white and scarlet
for their livery; white and green was the livery of the Tudors; the
Stuarts wore red and yellow; while blue and scarlet colours adorn to-
day the House of Hanover. And the Prince of the kings of the earth, He
has his royal colours also, and His servants have their badge of honour
and their blazon also. Then He commanded that those who waited
upon Him should go and bring forth out of His treasury those white
and glittering robes, that I, He said, have provided and laid up in store
for my Mansoul. So the white garments were fetched out of the
treasury and laid forth to the eyes of the people. Moreover, it was
granted to them that they should take them and put them on,
according, said He, to your size and your stature. So the people were
all put into white - into fine linen, clean and white. Then said the
Prince, This, O Mansoul, is My livery, and this is the badge by which
Mine are known from the servants of others. Yea, this livery is that
which I grant to all them that are Mine, and without which no man is
permitted to see My face. Wear this livery, therefore, for My sake, and,
also, if you would be known by the world to be Mine.
But now can you think how Mansoul shone! For Mansoul was fair
as the sun, clear as the moon, and terrible as an army with banners.
White, then, and whiter than snow, is the very livery of heaven. A
hundred shining Scriptures could be quoted to establish that. In the
first year of Belshazzar, King of Babylon, Daniel had a dream, and
visions of his head came to Daniel upon his bed. And, behold, the
Ancient of Days did sit, whose garment was white as snow, and the
hair of his head like the pure wool. My beloved, sings the spouse in the
Song, is white and ruddy, the chiefest among ten thousand, and
altogether lovely. Then, again, David in his penitence sings, Purge me
with hyssop, and I shall be clean; wash me, and I shall be whiter than
snow. And what is it that sets Isaiah at the head of all the prophets?
What but this, that he is the mouth-piece of such decrees in heaven as
this: Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as snow;
though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool. The angel, also,
who rolled away the stone from the door of the sepulchre was clothed
in a long white garment. Another evangelist says that his countenance was like lightning and his raiment white as snow, and for fear of him
the keepers did quake, and became as dead men. But before that we
read that Jesus was transfigured before Peter and James and John on
the Mount, and that His face did shine as the sun, and His raiment was
white as the light. And, then, the whole Book of Revelation is written
with a pen dipped in heavenly light. The whole book is glistening with
the whitest light till we cannot read it for the brightness thereof. And
the multitude that no man can number all display themselves before
our eyes, clothed with white robes and with palms in their hands, so
much so that we sink down under the greatness of the glory, till One
with His head and His hairs white like wool, as white as snow, lays His
hand upon us, and says to us, Fear not, for, behold, I have caused thine
iniquity to pass from thee, and I will clothe thee with change of
raiment.
'I also saw Mansoul clad all in white,
And heard her Prince call her His heart's delight,
I saw Him put upon her chains of gold,
And rings and bracelets goodly to behold.
What shall I say? I heard the people's cries,
And saw the Prince wipe tears from Mansoul's eyes,
I heard the groans and saw the joy of many;
Tell you of all, I neither will nor can I.
But by what here I say you well may see
That Mansoul's matchless wars no fable be.'
'And to her it was granted that she should be arrayed in fine linen,
clean and white; for the fine linen is the righteousness of saints.' We
need no exegesis of that beautiful Scripture beyond that exegesis
which our own hearts supply. And if we did need that shining text to
be explained to us, to whom could we better go for its explanation
than just to John Bunyan? Well, then, in our author's No Way to
Heaven but by Jesus Christ, he says: 'This fine linen, in my judgment, is
the works of godly men; their works that spring from faith. But how
came they clean? How came they white? Not simply because they
were the works of faith. But, mark, they washed their robes and made
them white in the blood of the Lamb. And therefore they are before the throne of God. Yea, therefore it is that their good works stand in
such a place.' 'Nor must we think it strange,' says John Howe, in his
Blessedness of the Righteous, 'that all the requisites to our salvation
are not found together in one text of Scripture. I conceive that imputed
righteousness is not here meant, but that righteousness which is truly
subjected in a child of God and descriptive of him. The righteousness
of Him whom we adore as made sin for us that we might be made the
righteousness of God in Him, that righteousness has a much higher
sphere peculiar and appropriate to itself. Though this of which we
now speak is necessary also to be both had and understood.'
Emmanuel's livery, then, is the righteousness of the saints. Emmanuel
puts that righteousness upon all His saints; while, at the same time,
they put it on themselves; they work it out for themselves, and for
themselves they keep it clean. They work it out, put it on, and keep it
clean, and yet, all the time, it is not they that do it, but it is Emmanuel
that doeth it all in them. The truth is, you must all become mystics
before you will admit all the strange truth that is told about
Emmanuel's livery. For both heaven and earth unite in this wonderful
livery. Nature and grace unite in it. It is woven by the gospel on the
loom of the law - till, to tell you all that is true about it, I neither can
nor will I. Albert Bengel tells us that the court of heaven has its own
jealous and scrupulous etiquette; and our court journalist and
historian, John Bunyan, has supplied his favoured readers with the
very card of etiquette that was issued along with Mansoul's coat of
livery, and it is more than time that we had attended to that card.
The first item then in that etiquette-card ran in these set terms:
'First, wear these white robes daily, day by day, lest you should at
some time appear to others as if you were none of Mine. - Signed,
EMMANUEL.'
Now, we put on anew every morning the garments that we are to
wear every new day. We have certain pieces of clothing that we wear
in the morning; we have certain pieces that we wear when we are at
our work; and, again, we have certain other pieces that we put on
when we go abroad in the afternoon; and, yet again, certain other
pieces that we array ourselves in when we go out into society in the
evening. After a night in which Mercy could not sleep for blessing and
praising God, they all rose in the morning with the sun; but the Interpreter would have them tarry a while, for, said he, you must
orderly go from hence. Then said he to the damsel, Take them, and
have them into the garden to the bath. Then Innocent the damsel took
them, and had them into the garden, and brought them to the bath.
Then they went in and washed, yea, they and the boys and all, and
they came out of that bath, not only clean and sweet, but also much
enlivened and much strengthened in their joints. So when they came
in they looked fairer a deal than when they went out. Then said the
Interpreter to the damsel that waited upon those women, Go into the
vestry, and fetch out garments for these people. So she went and
fetched out white raiment and laid it down before him. And then he
commanded them to put it on. It was fine linen, white and clean. Now,
therefore, they began to esteem each other better than themselves.
For, You are fairer than I am, said one; and, You are more comely than I
am, said another. The children also stood amazed to see into what
fashion they had been brought. William Law - I thank God, I think,
every day I live for that good day to me on which He introduced me to
His gifted and saintly servant - well, William Law used every morning
after his bath in the morning to put on his livery, piece by piece, in
order, and with special prayer. The first piece that he put on, and he
put it on every new morning next his heart to wear it all the day next
his heart, was gratitude to God. And it was a real, feeling, active, and
operative gratitude that he so put on. On each new morning as it came,
that good man was full of new gratitude to God. For the sun new from
his Almighty Maker's hands he had gratitude. For his house over his
head he had gratitude. For his Bible and his spiritual books he had
gratitude. For his opportunities of reading and study, as also for ten
o'clock in the morning when the widows and orphans of King's Cliffe
came to his window, and so on. A grateful heart feeds itself to a still
greater gratitude on everything that comes to it. So it was with
William Law, till he wakened the maids in the rooms below with his
psalms and his hymns as he went into his vestry and put on his
singing robes so early every morning. And then, after his morning
hours of study and devotion, Law had a piece of livery that he always
put on and never came downstairs to breakfast without it. Other men
might put on other pieces; he always clothed himself next to gratitude
with humility. Men differ, good men differ, and Emmanuel's livery-men differ in what they put on, at what time, and in what order. But that
was William Law's way. You will learn more of his way, and you will be
helped to find out a like way for yourselves, if you will become
students of his incomparable books. You will find how he put on
charity, 1 Cor. thirteenth chapter; and then how, over all, he put on the
will of God; till, thus equipped and thus accoutred, he was able to say,
as it has seldom been said since it was first said, 'I put on
righteousness, and it clothed me; my judgment was to me as a robe
and as a diadem. The Almighty was then with me, and my children
were about me. When I washed my steps with butter, and when the
rock poured me out rivers of oil!' So much for that livery-man of
Emmanuel, the author of the Christian Perfection and the Spirit of
Love. As for the women's vestry in the Interpreter's House, Matthew
Henry saw the thirty-first chapter of the Proverbs hung up on that
vestry wall, and Christiana making her morning toilet before it with
Mercy beside her. Who would find a virtuous woman, let him look
before that looking-glass for her, and he will be sure to find her and
her daughters and her daughters-in-law putting on their white
raiment there.
'Secondly, keep your garments always white; for if they be soiled,
it is a dishonour to Me. I have a few names even in Sardis which have
not defiled their garments, and they shall walk with Me in white, for
they are worthy.' Even in Sardis, with every street and every house full
of soil and dishonour to the name of Christ, even in Sardis Emmanuel
had some of whom He could boast Himself. Would you not immensely
like at the last day to be one of those some in Sardis? Shall it not be
splendid when Sardis comes up for judgment to be among those few
names that Emmanuel shall then read out of His book, and when, at
their few names, two or three men shall step out into the light in His
livery? Some of you are in Sardis at this moment. Some of you are in a
city, or in a house in a city, where it is impossible to keep your
garments clean. And yet, no; nothing is impossible to Emmanuel and
His true livery-men. Even in that house where you are, Emmanuel will
say over you, I have one there who is thankful to My Father and to Me;
thankful to singing every morning where there is little, as men see, to
sing for. There is one in that house humble, where humility itself
would almost become high-minded. And meek, where Moses himself
would have lost his temper. And submissive, where rebelliousness
would not have been without excuse. Mark these few men for Mine,
says Emmanuel. Mark them with the inkhorn for Mine. For they shall
surely be Mine in that day, and they shall walk with Me in white, for
they are worthy.
'Wherefore gird your garments well up from the ground.' A well-
dressed man, a well-dressed woman, is a beautiful sight. Not
overdressed; not dressed so as to call everybody's attention to their
dress; but dressed decorously, becomingly, tastefully. Each several
piece well fitted on, and all of a piece, till it all looks as if it had grown
by nature itself upon the well-dressed wearer. Be like him - be like her
- so runs the third head of the etiquette-card. Be not slovenly and
disorderly and unseemly in your livery. Let not your livery be always
falling off, and catching on every bush and briar, and dropping into
every pool and ditch. Hold yourselves in hand, the instruction goes on.
Brace yourselves up. Have your temper, your tongue, your eyes, your
ears, and all your members in control. And then you will escape many
a rent and many a rag; many a seam and many a patch; many a soil
and many a stain. And then also you will be found walking abroad in
comeliness and at liberty, while others, less careful, are at home
mending and washing and ironing because they went without a girdle
when you girt up your garments well off the ground. Wherefore
always gird well up the loins of your mind.
'And, fourthly, lose not your robes, lest you walk naked and men
see your shame'; that is to say, the supreme shame of your soul. For
there is no other shame. There is nothing else in body or soul to be
ashamed about. There is a nakedness, indeed, that our children are
taught to cover; but the Bible is a book for men. And the only
nakedness that the Bible knows about or cares about is the nakedness
of the soul. It was their sudden soul-nakedness that chased Adam and
Eve in among the trees of the garden. And it is God's pity for soul-
naked sinners that has made Him send His Son to cry to us: 'I counsel
thee,' He cries, 'to buy of Me gold tried in the fire, that thou mayest be
rich; white raiment, that thou mayest be clothed, and that the shame
of thy nakedness do not appear. Behold!' He cries in absolute terror,
'Behold! I come as a thief! Blessed is he that walketh and keepeth his
garments, lest he walk naked, and they see his shame.' Were your soul to be stripped naked to all its shame to-morrow; were all your past to
be laid out absolutely naked and bare, with all the utter nakedness of
your inward life this day; were all your secret thoughts, and all your
stealthy schemes, and all your mad imaginations, and all your
detestable motives, and all your hatreds like hell, and all your follies
like Bedlam to be laid naked - I suppose the horror of it would make
you cry to the rocks and the mountains to cover you this Sabbath
night, or the weeds of the nearest sea to wrap you down into its
depths. It would be hell before the time to you if your soul were
suddenly to be stripped absolutely bare of its ragged body, and naked
of all the thin integuments of time, and were for a single day to stand
naked to its everlasting shame. And it is just because Jesus Christ sees
all that as sure as the judgment-day coming to you, that He stands
here to-night and calls to you: I counsel thee! I counsel thee! Before it
be too late, I again counsel thee!
But the Prince Emmanuel is persuaded better things of all His