may as well walk as a Man Spiritually Dead come to Christ Now then I ask have all Men such a vital Principle If you affirm it you oppose the Scripture Ephes 2.1 if you deny it then you either give me the Cause or affirm a Dead Man can walk And further in all Corporal Motion there is the Term from which and to which so in the Spiritual Motion of the Soul to Christ we come from Sin to Christ And now I have proved this from Scripture I shall cite some Authors of my Judgment that so my Reader may see it is not only my Opinion And I shall only cite such as the Patrons of this Opinion seem to admire as well as I that so you may see how they not only oppose the Scripture and me but also those Authors which they seem to confide in more than either that so you may see how these like Mad-Men even tear themselves The Learned Pemble is of my Mind in his Treatise of Grace and Faith and there spends many Pages to prove that the habits of all Grace are infused into the Soul in Regeneration before an Act of Faith can be put forth by that Soul and why these Men should not as well believe him in this as well as in his Notion of Eternal Justification especially since he hath clear Scripture on his side for the former but not a word for the latter seems strange to me But indeed I need not wonder since they that thus pick and cull this Author taking what suits with their Opinion and rejecting the rest do serve the unerring Word of God no better And if they dare serve Paul so 't is no wonder if they deal so with Pemble Dr. Goodwin is on my side in his Treatise on the Ephesians he hath these words 'T is affirmed saith he by Sound and Able Divines and that on good Ground that the Principles of all Grace are infused into the Soul before the Soul can put forth an Act of Faith with several passages to the same purpose which for brevity sake I omit Dr. Owen gives abundant Testimony to the same Truth in his Treatise on Justification he saith thus Justifying Faith is not to be found in any but those whose Natures are renewed and in whom there is a Principle of all Grace Thus you may see in a little how far these Divines were from this Error But because I have not to do with professed Arminians but with such as privily bring in this Erroneous Doctrine I shall therefore come to consider what their Pleas are and in Answering of them I shall further clear the Point I am upon and then I shall answer some Questions 1. Some I have heard say by coming in Sin we mean such must be sensible of Sin and so come Ans If such mean as they say why do they not always explain their meanings And sure I am if this is all such mean such Preachers are miserably mistaken by their Hearers who hereupon conclude they must come without any Change 'T is well known how with some Ignorance is the Mother of Devotion and I am well satisfied this is but a Jesuitical Shift that when they cannot justifie that rotten Notion of coming to Christ in their Sin then they tell us if we will believe them they mean only sensible of Sin but this Notion shall never be heard of till no other Answer will serve But what Soul-cousening is it to say one thing and mean another suppose they do mean so Pulpits should be places to to Explain things in But that this Cobweb may not cover such Deceit consider when they say we must be sensible of Sin they mean either that they have some Sin adhering to them or else that they are sensible they are in that Moment in a Sinful Unchanged State If they mean the former only they give away the Cause for we are enquiring into the State and certainly if not in a Sinful State 't is because in a Changed State unless some do not come into the World in such a State and so need no Change but if by being sensible of their Sin they mean a Sinful State then they are sensible of that which is or is not if sensible of that which is then they openly declare such are in an Unchanged State only add a Sence to the thing it self if they say they are sensible of a sinful State when their State is not so then this is no less than to affirm that a Delusion is the only Qualification prerequisite in order to our coming to Christ 2. But some may say we own 't is Christ that brings us and so we do not rob Christ of his Honour or Arrogate any thing to our selves as you suppose but we affirm he brings us unto himself in our Sins To which I answer 't is not enough to honour Christ to say he doth a thing unless the thing done be well done 't is far from being an Honour to Christ to make him the Author of Sin But to come to a more direct Answer I lay down this Proposition That some things are impossible to be done by God himself the Scripture affirms 't is impossible to God to Lie and that he cannot deny himself whatever is sinful cannot be done by that God that is Goodness it self nor doth this inability arise from weakness but strength Some things are contrary in Nature and so cannot be done as to make it Dark and Light at the same time and in the same place to make a Man Dead and Alive at the same time and in the same respect Now I shall enquire whether 't is not impossible under one or both of these Considerations for a Soul to be brought to Christ though by the power of Christ in his Sins as aforesaid I shall not now insist on the former how far such a Work would savour of Sin but sure I am in the latter Sence it is impossible and for the clearing this Consider our coming to Christ is an Act of the Will we are willing to renounce all confidence in the Flesh and to rely alone on Christ Now I would ask whether this Will is in all Men by Nature if such deny it then where this Will is there is a change wrought in that Soul and a great change too Psal 110.3 A willing People in the Day c. If such say this Will is in Men by Nature then they not only prove themselves Arminians but virtually deny what before they affirmed that they come by the power of Christ But if they say tho' unwilling by Nature yet they are made willing by the Power of Christ to come yet without a Change in the Will this is a grand contradiction in Nature to say that a Person who is unwilling should be made willing and yet no change made in his Will and yet this gross absurdity my Opposers will unavoidably hereby pluck down upon their own Heads I think it is safest to
gathering of the People should be unto Christ But now though it was their Priviledge that they might Worship yet it must needs be burdensome to come from all Parts of the Nation to Worship at the Temple and at such expence But now God hath eased us of this burden while he hath appointed Particular Churches where we enjoy all the Worship of God with as great a Promise of the Presence of God as they had in the Temple Matt. 18.20 So that we only want if I may so say the Inconveniency of the Worship God hath not now confined us to Places John 4.20,21 The hour cometh when ye shall neither in this Mountain nor yet at Jerusalem Worship the Father that is with respect to Places And yet though we are not confined to their Place of Worship yet we are said to be graffed into their Olive and as for such as lay such stress on this as if it was impossible we should come in the Jews room unless we were a National Church I would ask them this Question Do you believe that the Jews shall in time be brought home again and Ingraffed into their own Olive from which they have been so long broken off And further Whether you think at that Day they shall Worship God in the Temple and offer Gifts and Sacrifices as once they did Now that they shall be restored and brought home again is clear from Rom. 11.12,15,26 Now if the Fall of them be the Riches of the World and the Diminishing of them the Riches of the Gentiles how much more their Fulness For if the casting away of them be the Reconciling of the World What shall the receiving of them be but Life from the Dead From these and the following Verses it is most clear that the Jews shall be one Day restored and it is that which we now are expecting but that they shall then Worship at the Temple when it hath been demolished so many hundred Years and that they shall offer Sacrifices after they come to Believe that Christ the great Sacrifice is offered or that the Tribe of Levi should only Minister before the Lord when all the Tribes have been so shattered and confused in this Dark and Gloomy Day all seem to me to be things incredible Now if they shall be graffed again into their own Olive as the Scripture affirms notwithstanding so many and so great alterations in their VVorship as we have good ground from Scripture to believe there will be VVhy may not we Gentiles be said to come in their room though we are not confined to all the Circumstances of their Worship and since we want nothing that was a Priviledge And more especially if we consider that we have good ground to believe that their graffing in again will be no more than to bestow those very Priviledges on them which we Gentiles do now enjoy as seems clear to me from Rom. 11.31 Even so have these also now not believed that through your Mercy they also may obtain Mercy Mind that through your Mercy or the Mercy of God to you they also may obtain Mercy As if he had said the consideration of your Mercies or the Priviledges which you enjoy under the Gospel shall be a means not only to convince them that the Messiah is come but shall also stir them up to imbrace the same Faith that so they may partake of the same Mercies with you So that it seems evident not only from Scripture but Reason it self that when the Jews come to be Restored it will only be to share with us Gentiles in our Priviledges And yet this is called in Scripture a graffing in again So that there is no more necessity for us to be confined to all the Circumstances of their VVorship in order to our coming in their room than for them to be confined to all the Circumstances of their wonted Service when graffed in again Nor doth it seem credible that when they are graffed in again they shall injoy neither Circumcision nor any other Seal in its room and that their Priviledges should be less under the New Testament Dispensation than under the Old that God should own their Seed then and reject them now Sure I am this would in all probability be a great Block in their way to prevent their embracing the Gospel Circumcision was an Ordinance of high esteem with them as we may judge by their chearful undergoing so much pain and smart as it occasioned as we may gather from Ex. 4.26 A Bloody Husband thou art because of the Circumcision But now if we can convince them that we have a milder Ordinance and Seal in its room this may have a great Influence upon them by tsie Bleffing of God in order to the bringing them in Thus I have finished my first Argument and should I add no more in Defence of the Doctrine of Infant Baptism it might suffice unless Persons are resolved to shut their Eyes that they might not behold the Light since I have clearly proved from Scripture that we Gentiles do come in the Jews room and Baptism in the room of Circumcision But to the end there may not be left one Stone upon another of that Strong Hold which the Anabaptists have raised against this Truth which may not be thrown down I shall raise one Argument more as a Battery against it and shall add no more And indeed I think I need add no more being satisfied these Arguments will be as a twofold Cord that will not easily be broken Now the great Objection of the Anabaptists against Infant Baptism is founded on such Scriptures as hold forth Faith as necessary in order to Baptism as Mark 16.16 He that Believeth and is Baptized shall be saved Acts 8.37 And Philip said if thou Believest with all thy Heart thou mayest Acts 18.8 And many of the Corinthians hearing Believed and were Baptized And from these and such like Texts confidently conclude that because none but Adult Persons have or can have Faith therefore none but such ought to be Baptized And if I mistake not here lays the stress of all their Arguments Now for the preventing any mistake that none may suppose the Difference to be wider than it is if it be enquired ther some Adult may not be Baptized I grant they may provided they never have been Baptized in their Infancy and yet this may rationally be Inferred from such Texts for those that Believed and were Baptized had never before been Baptized nor had they made any Profession of Christ before then that we know of the Text seem to prove they were Baptized immediately upon their Confession of Faith and should I meet with such I should think my self bound from such Examples to Baptize them So that we agree with the Anabaptists in this that some Adult ought to be Baptized But the Grand Question in Debate is whether some Infants ought not to be Baptized as well as Adult this the Anabaptists deny and I affirm and
is like to infect the more But I shall not stay you any longer at the Threshold but lead you into the Point before us But that our Differences may not seem greater than they really are I shall lay down some things as Cautious to prevent mistakes for I am perswaded that most of our unhappy Differences do arise from a want of a right Understanding of each others Terms and therefore observe carefully 1. The Enquiry is not concerning the State and Condition which Christ finds the Soul in when he first comes to take hold on us by his Spirit in order to Regenerating of us if it was I would readily grant he then finds the Soul wreeking in Sin indeed without the least propensity or inclination to do Good yea to every Good Word and Work Reprobate with a strong inclination to Evil in a Dead Blind Ignorant Senseless and Stupid Condition in the Snere of the Devil In this State we all are by Nature and consequently in this State he must find all when he comes to Change their Nature our Natures being all the same as derived from one Common Root though our Actions may differ according to the various Temptations we may meet with But 't is about the Souls coming to Christ between which a clear distinction must be made for though Christ enable us to come to him or believe in him yet he doth not Believe for us to excuse us The Act of coming is ours and till the Soul thus come the union is incompleat I grant when Christ comes thus to the Soul that Soul shall come to Christ yet his coming to us is not our coming to him though the Cause of our coming Things that are inseparable must not be confounded the Humane and Divine Nature are inseparable in Christ yet the Divine is not the Humane nor the Humane the Divine So in Marriage the Man consents to the Woman and the Woman to the Man but yet the consent of the Woman is not the consent of the Man So in this Case Christ is first willing and he makes us willing yet his Will and our Will are distinct 2. Nor are we Enquiring by what Power the Soul is enabled to come to Christ for tho' I have just cause to question whether those that differ from me in the other will agree with me in this yet for my own part tho' I plead for a mighty Change wrought in order to our coming to Christ yet I freely acknowledge this Change to be of God and that the very Seeds of our Life of Sanctification are from Christ working as a most free Agent in us and that it is a mighty and irresistible Power by which he works 3. Nor are we Enquiring what Virtue there is in this Act of coming in order to our Justification or Glorification For though I believe and the Scripture affirms that unless we Believe we shall never be Justified nor Glorified yet I believe both are according to the Riches of God's Free-Grace It is Free-Grace that works this Change enabling of us to come and it is Free-Grace that we are accepted when we do come But positively the Enquiry is whether there is such a thing as a Change wrought in the Soul in order to our coming to Christ Or whether we must come as we are in a Natural and Unregenerate State wreeking in the Filth of Sin and Power and Dominion of our Lusts Or whether the Drunkard Swearer c. can or ought without any Change to come in those Lusts to Christ So that the Question is whether a Sinner can or ought to come to Christ in his Sins But before I affirm or deny I must further explain if possible what we mean by coming and what by coming in our Sins lest my Opposers when not able to stand their Ground should slip out at some Back-door Now by coming to Christ I understand believing in Christ according to Scripture Dialect Isa 55.1 Mat. 11.28 and to put all out of doubt I have been assured again and again from the Mouths of those that differ from me in this Point that they mean nothing else and by coming in Sin I understand it for one utterly devoid of any Principle of Grace one in the Gall of Bitterness and Bonds of Iniquity and not one that only falls into Sin And so I have also been assured by my Opposers they mean and indeed we cannot understand it otherwise for tho' the best of Saints have Sin yet the least of Saints is not a Sinner I distinguish between Actions and a State a Sinner in this Sense is not opposed to Perfection but to Sincerity So that in the most plain Terms the Question lyes thus Whether a Person utterly devoid of all Grace and under the Power and Dominion of Sin can or ought to believe in Christ in that State before any Change be wrought in him This some affirm and I deny And in speaking to this Point I shall prove none can come thus in their Sins to Christ and then that none ought to come thus in his Sins to Christ I prove the former from most express Scripture Eph. 1.19 And what is the exceeding greatness of his power to us-ward who Believe and if we cannot believe without this Power then not as we are for all are not acted by this Power John 6.44 No man can come unto me except the Father which hath sent me draw him Now I would ask if all Men are thus drawn If not you give away the Cause if you say they are then it follows that all must actually be Saved or else some are able to resist those drawings the latter of which is Grand Arminianism the former many degrees worse So John 15.5 For without me ye can do nothing Now I would ask if coming to Christ is not something Nay is it not the most noble act the Soul can put forth and that which is most pleasing and acceptable to God And if so the Text says without Christ we cannot do it Now I would ask if every Man hath Christ in him as the Quakers affirm If you say he hath you shew what you are if not then when assisted by Christ we do not come as we were Thus you see how expresly the Scripture is on my side and whether we may most safely trust that Word of God or the Deluded Fancies of Men judge ye And as I have proved it from most express Scripture so I shall further prove it from those Metaphors the Scripture uses to express it As first It is frequently stiled a Coming a Metaphor or borrowed Expression from a Man walking from one place to another And from this two Considerations offer themselves for the confirming and illustrating the Truth I have affirmed for as no Man can act corporally till he is first alive so no Man can put forth such a vital Act as believing in Christ till Christ hath first infused into him a vital Principle and till then a Dead Man
Circumcision was first instituted to Believing Abraham I think it would have been unanswerable because there is nothing of Christ appears in such Parents no not so much as a Profession and how such Infants can be supposed to stand in the Place or partake of the Priviledges of Abraham unless one of their Parents stood in Abraham's room I see not But since the Objection is made against such as only Baptize such as have Believing Parents I must further Answer The forecited Scripture seems not in the least to oppose the Truth I have laid down as will appear if we consider the Apostle is there speaking to Adult Gentiles and doth assure them that though they were not the Natural Seed of Abraham and so could not on that account lay claim to the Promise either to themselves or Children as they might have done had they been so and their Conversations had been becoming the the Gospel of Christ yet by Virtue of their Relation to Christ or their believing in Christ though not of Abraham's Natural Seed they shall partake of Abraham's Priviledges And as at the first the Promise was made to Abraham and his Seed so when the Gentiles came to initiate the Faith of Abraham the Promise should be to them and their Seed as it was to Abraham Now the Promise at first reached unto Abraham's Natural Seed as is clear from Gen. 17.7,8,9,10 Now we cannot suppose the Seal to be applied to any but such as the Promise was made to But such as were Eight Days Old were Circumcised therefore to such the Promise was made For though I grant that all in Abraham's House were Circumcised both Old and Young the Adult being such as we may suppose were at least Professors For 't is said of Abraham he would teach his House yet it is evident none were excepted if but Eight Days old So that this Text strongly confirms my Argument for if upon our Believing we come to be Abraham's Seed and to partake of his Blessedness as in Gal. 3.9 then it follows by an undeniable consequence that as the Promise at first was made to Believing Abraham and his Natural Seed so it must he continued to us Believers and our Seed or else we are not Blessed as Abraham for it was no small part of his Blessedness that the Promise extended to his Seed But to put all out of doubt if the Promise was made to a Spiritual Seed then it must be to such as we are sure are Spiritual or to such as we have good ground to hope are so If you say the former then we must Baptize none either Old or Young because as I have proved we can-never infallibly tell who are Spiritual it being only proper to God who is the Father of Spirits to know that But if you say the latter that is such as we have good ground to hope are Spiritual then the Infant Seed of Believers must come in since I hope I have sufficiently proved we have good ground to hope such are inwardly renewed and if such as are renewed and born again by the Spirit and have the Image of God Engraven on their Hearts may not be reckoned for a Spiritual Seed I know not who must So that till my former Argument is overthrown concerning the necessity for Infants to be Regenerated and the good ground we have to hope some are so on the account of the Promises made to them I say till then all that is here added is of no Force Object 5. But we have no Instance in Scripture of any Infants ever Baptized therefore we have ground to think such ought not to be Baptized for we cannot suppose the Apostles were wanting in their Duty in that Case To which I answer Tho' we have no express Instance of any Infants Baptized yet we have some Texts that will I conceive infallibly prove either that some then were Baptized or at least now ought to be Baptized 'T is said of the Jaylor Acts 16.33 He was Baptized he and all his straightway Now we have good Ground to believe that all his takes in Children and that some of these all were little Children or at least so small as not to be able to make a Profession of their Faith but suppose they were able yet there is no express mention made that they did so before they were Baptized 'T is said indeed he spake to them the Word of the Lord but we cannot from thence conclude they that heard believed 't is said indeed after that he rejoiced believing in God with all his House but this was after he and all his were Baptized But there is one Text more that will be as a sharp two-edged Sword which will wound the Anabaptists let them defend themselves with all the Subtilty they can Acts 16.15 of Lydia And when she was Baptized and her Houshold c. Now the Enquiry is who this Houshold were But let them be who they will yet the Anabaptist will not reckon little Children among them because none such are mention'd but if so then because neither Husband Servant nor Kindred are mentioned therefore there was none And thus the Anabaptists have by an Art never before heard of reduced this Houshold to just no Body but Lydia and her self but I will suppose and I can do no other that in this Houshold there were more than Lydia And First I will suppose some of them Children as I have good ground to do from the use of the Word in Scripture and I find some of the Anabaptists do not deny this only say Lydia was too old to have young Children Now if there was any young Children in this Houshold as we have ground to suppose then here we have an Instance of such Baptized but I will suppose those Children of Lydia's as the Anabaptists affirm to be grown up then I ask by what Claim they were Baptized Now that her Houshold were Baptized the Word expresly affirms if they say as they were Professors I deny that and it lyes on them to prove it there is not one Word of their believing or any of them either before or after they were Baptized and had they made any Profession we have ground to think some mention would have been made of it but since the Scripture is silent tho' the Anabaptists should never so boldly affirm it yet I am confident scarce any but those of their own Perswasion will in the least regard what they say If they were Baptized as being related to Lydia tho' they made no Profession themselves then this overthrows the Practice of the Anabaptists since here are some Baptized that made no Profession of their Faith and also it gives us the Cause by an undeniable Conclusion for if such Children as are Adult but no Professors yet have a Right to Baptism on the Account of their Relation to a Parent that did believe then it follows that what belongs to any Child meerly as the Child of such a Parent