'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.
1. 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.
2. '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.
3. 'Wherefore gird your garments well up from the ground.' A
well-dressed man, a well-dressed woman, is a beautiful sight. Not over-
dressed; 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.
4. '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!
5. But the Prince Emmanuel is persuaded better things of all His livery-
men, though He thus speaks to them to put them on their guard. Yes,
sternly and severely and threateningly as He sometimes speaks, yet, in
spite of Himself, His real grace always breaks through at the last. And,
accordingly, his fifth command runs thus: But, it runs, if you should
sully them, if you should defile them, the which I am greatly unwilling
that you should, then speed you to that which is written in My law, that
yet you may stand, and not fall before Me and before My throne. Always
know this, that I have provided for thee an open fountain to wash thy
garments in. Look, therefore, that you wash often in that fountain, and
go not for an hour in defiled garments. Let not, therefore, My garments,
your garments, the garments that I gave thee be ever spotted by the
flesh. Keep thy garments always white, and let thy head lack no
ointment.--Signed in heaven, EMMANUEL.