The True Flattener's Gouthfane Put Forth

The True Flatteners Gouthfane Put Forth (ordinary English: The True Levellers Standard Advanced) was written in 1649 by Gerrard Winstanley, leader of the Diggers, who called themselves the "True Levellers."

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The True Flatteners Gouthfane Put Forth: Or, The Shape of Fellowship Opened, and Given to the Sons of Men.

In the beginning of Time, the great Maker God made the Earth to be a Common Treasury, to keep the Deer, Birds, and Fishes, and to keep Man, the lord that was to oversee the World; for Man had lordship given to him over the Deer, Birds, and Fishes; but not one word was spoken in the beginning, that one bough of mankind should rule over another.

And the grounds therefor are this: every single man, Werely or Wifely, is a perfect being of himself; and the same Ghost that made the World, dwells in man to oversee the World; so that the flesh of man being under God, his Maker, has him to be his Teacher and Lord within himself, therefore needs not run abroad after any Teacher and Lord without him, for he needs not that any man should teach him, for the same Holiness that ruled in the Son of Man, teaches him all things.

But since men’s flesh began to take gladness in the things of the World, more than in the Ghost Thought and Righteousness, who manifests himself to be the indweller in the Five Feelings, of Hearing, Seeing, Eating, Smelling, Feeling; then he fell into blindness of mind and weakness of heart, and runs abroad for a Teacher and Leader: and so selfish fathomings, taking possession of the Five Feelings, and becoming King in the room of Thought therein, and working with Greed, did set up one man to teach and lord over another; and thereby the Ghost was killed, and man was brought into bonddom, and became a greater Thrall to such of his own kind, then the Deer of the field were to him.

And hereupon, The Earth (which was made to be a Common Treasury for all, both Deer and Men) was hedged to paddocks by the teachers and lords, and the others were made Handmen and Thralls: and that Earth that is within this World made a Common Store-house for all, is bought and sold, and kept in the hands of a few, whereby the great Maker is mightily unworshipped, as if he were an upholder of persons, taking gladness in the comfortable Livelihoods of some, and finding happiness in the wretched unwealthiness and struggles of others. From the beginning it was not so.