This was written by a Quaker divine in the 17^th century concerning the controversy over whether a Christian could live without sinning—the doctrine of sinlessness. Much, if not most, of the Church said it was impossible to so live—and still do.

Sin is that scandal which must be rooted out from the great spiritual household over which the Divinity rejoices. Strange administration, indeed, for sin to be so hateful to God as to lay all who had incurred it under death, and yet, when [the person is] readmitted into life, that sin should be permitted; and that what was before the object of destroying vengeance should now become the object of an upheld and protected toleration.

Now that the penalty is taken off, think you it is possible that the unchangeable God has so given up His antipathy to sin as that humanity, ruined and redeemed humanity, may now perseveringly indulge, under the new arrangement, in that which under the old destroyed it? Does not the God who loved righteousness and hated iniquity six thousand years ago bear the same love to righteousness and hatred to iniquity still?

I now breathe the air of loving-kindness from heaven, and can walk before God in peace and graciousness; shall I again attempt the incompatible alliance of two principles so adverse as that of an approving God and a persevering sinner? How shall we, recovered from so awful a catastrophe, continue that which first involved us in it? The Cross of Christ, by the same mighty and decisive stroke wherewith it moved the curse of sin away from us, also surely moves away the power and the love of it from over us.

There is nothing so contrary to God as sin, and God will not suffer sin always to rule His masterpiece, humanity. When we consider the infiniteness of God's power for destroying that which is contrary to Him, who can believe that the devil must always stand and prevail? I believe it is inconsistent and disagreeable with true faith for people to be Christians and yet to believe that Christ, the eternal Son of God, to whom all power in heaven and earth is given, will suffer sin and the devil to have dominion over them.

But you will say none of us by all the power we have can redeem ourselves, and no person can live without sin. We will say "Amen!" to it. But if anyone tells us that when God's power comes to help us and to redeem us out of sin, it cannot be effected, then this doctrine we cannot accept; nor I hope you neither.

Would you approve of it if I should tell you that God puts forth His power to do such a thing, but the devil hinders Him? That it is impossible for God to do it, because the devil does not like it? That it is impossible that any one should be free from sin, because the devil has got such a power in them that God cannot cast him out? This is lamentable doctrine, yet has not this been preached?

Such doctrine does in plain terms say that though God does interpose His power, it is impossible for God to set anyone free because the devil has so rooted sin in the nature of humanity. Are not we God's creature, and cannot He new make us, and cast sin out of us?

If you say sin is deeply rooted in humanity, I say so, too. Yet not so deeply rooted but Christ Jesus has entered so deeply into the root of our nature that He has received power to destroy the devil and his works, and to recover and redeem us into righteousness and holiness. Or else it is false where it is written that: "He is able to save to the uttermost all that come unto God by Him." We must throw away the Bible if we say that it is impossible for God to deliver us out of sin.

We know that when our friends are in captivity, as in Turkey or elsewhere, we pay our money for their redemption; but we will not pay our money if they be kept in their fetters still. Would not we think ourselves cheated to pay so much money for their redemption, and the bargain we made so that they shall be said to be redeemed and be called redeemed captives, but  must wear  fetters still? How long? As long as they have a day to live. This is for bodies, but now I am speaking of souls. Christ must be made to me redemption, and rescue me from captivity.

Am I a prisoner anywhere? Yes, verily, verily, he that commits sin, said Christ, he is a servant of sin, he is a slave of sin. If you have sinned, you are a slave, a captive that must be redeemed out of captivity. Who will pay a price for me? I am poor. I have nothing. I cannot redeem myself. Who will pay a price for me? There is One who came who has paid a price for me. That is well. That is good news. Then I hope I shall come out of my captivity. What is His name? Is He called a Redeemer? So, then, I do expect the benefit of my redemption and that I shall go out of my captivity.

But no, say they who teach that lamentable doctrine—you must abide in sin as long as you live. What! must we never be delivered? Must this crooked heart and perverse will always remain? Must I be a believer, and yet have no faith that reaches to sanctification and holy living? Is there no mastery to be had, no getting victory over sin? Must it prevail over me as long as I live?

What sort of a Redeemer then is this, or what benefit have I in this life of my redemption—and what surety of it in the next?

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