James Naylor, on page one of his Discovery of the First Wisdom from Beneath, and the Second Wisdom from Above (published 1656) writes of the will and the brain which is the Serpents seat View in Source Document. On page five he writes of that light shining into the conscience (the throne of Christ) View in Source Document. These quotes are revealing in context. In the first, Naylor is concerned that people focus on the Lord your guide and not stand in outward things, devised in the will and brain which is the Serpents seat. It is clear here that the Serpent is the process of reflection which drawns human being out to visible things1 (political, religious, and social, formalities, thoughts, insitutions, creeds, etc.) to guide their ways or human relations. In the second, Naylor is also concerned that people who profess Jesus Christ are taught by Christ, however, here he suggests a different way that is not seated in the process of reflection to guide human ways and relations. This different way anchors human relations in that light shining into the conscience (the throne of Christ). Understanding that the word conscience also assumed or carried the meaning consciousness in the seventeenth century (View Here), these words are a powerful testimony to the event of the coming of Jesus Christ into the conscience and consciousness which is human being's moral and conscious life founded upon or established in the Spirit itself. The coming of the light of Christ inshining upon and anchoring human relations through awareness or consciousness of this immanent Presence is literally a spiritual hack of the process of Reflection to guide human relations.
Naylor also writes of the kingdom of God and our faith in our conscience (View in Source Document) . In the same paragraph he hearkens to the seat of the Serpent or the process of reflection which politicians use to tempt us away in any way to deny him and own them in their wills which is the seat of the Serpent. That is, politicians seek to bind people to their own wills by drawing them into the process of reflection to guide and inform human relations.
Issac Penington in his The Authority and Government which Christ Excluded out of his Church writes that the conscience is the seat of faith (View in Source Document).
Secondly, Care must be had that the conscience be kept tender, that nothing be received, but according to the light in the conscience. The conscience is the seat of faith XR3340; and if it be not kept close to the light which God lighteth there, faith is soon made shipwreck of. Christianity is begun in the Spirit, which keepeth out the fleshly part, with all its fleshly wisdom and reasonings about spiritual things; and as the beginning is in the anointing, so must the progress be. As the Spirit begins in the conscience, by convincing that, by persuading that, by setting up his light there, and leading the soul by that light; so that light must still be eyed, and according to its growth and manifestation in the conscience, so must the soul stand still, or go on.
Pennington writes that the Spirit keeps out the fleshly (brain, the seat of the process of reflection?) reasonings. He goes on the Spirit begins in the conscience (and consciousness) through the coming of the Light and that light must be eyed (resting in awareness of) according to it's impulse in the conscience (and consciousness).
These testimonies of Naylor and Pennington place the seat or throne of the Kingdom of God, of Faith, of Christ, in the conscience. That is, faith, Christ, and the Kingdom of God are found in the conscience (and consciousness). The kingdom of God, Faith, and Christ, are found in the conscience and consciousness, through the shining (awareness) of the Light upon human being. This is a complete reorientation of human being. Christ, the kingdom of God and Faith are not established at a distance in the way of reflection or as a place or person apart from who we are. They are not anticipated, they are lived and experienced continuously, literally, and directly on earth; leading the soul by the Light itself in itself.
The process of reflection (manifested through the eating of the Tree of Knowledge of good and evil) is overcome or hacked in the coming or presence of the inshining Light and the enthronement and government of Christ in conscience and consciousness; without regard for reflected (political, religious, of social, outward forms) content to rule, guide, and inform, human relations.
- Reference the biblical story of the Tree of Knowledge of God and evil.↩
