the Laws of earthly Marriages and Suretiship c. the only answer I can get from Dr. Owen and his Friends is That Christ is not such a Husband and Surety and Mediator as men are but is all this in an eminent manner that there is something peculiar in him which cannot be affirmed of any other Now this is the answer I desired but could not hope that they had so little wit as to give it for this is plainly to acknowledge that all their Arguments are fallacious for if there be such a vast difference between the Notion of a Husband and Surety and Mediator and the several Duties and Offices of these Relations as applied to men and as applied to Christ then we cannot argue from one to the other this is plainly to give away the best Arguments they have for the Imputation of Christs Personal Righteousness in their sense and with them to yield up the Cause For now before they argue from Christs being our Husband that therefore we have a title to his Personal Righteousness as a Wife has to her Husbands Estate they must prove from express Texts of Scripture that this is the Law of our spiritual Marriage before they argue from Christs being our Surety that therefore we are but one Person with him and that whatever he did as our Surety is accounted as much ours as if we had done it our selves they must prove that this is the Scripture-notion of Christs Suretiship and had they taken this course I dare say I might have looked long enough for an Answer before it had come And here as not finding a fitter place for it I shall briefly take notice of that Defence which Dr. Owen has made for his way of Reasoning from Christs being our Mediator to prove the Imputation of his Personal Righteousness to us Though I must recal that word Defence for indeed he has made none but appeals to the ingenuity of his Readers and leaves his Book to defend it self which it may be supposed to be very well able to do at the age of twenty years especially against a young Adversary And first he would willingly insinuate that I had not truly or fairly related his words but then on a sudden he takes courage and roundly asserts whatever I had charged him with That the Lord Christ fulfilled all Righteousness as Mediator and that what he did as Mediator he did it for them whose Mediator he was or in whose stead and for whose good he executed the Office of a Mediator before God And here he first very nicely distinguishes between these two Propositions Christ as Mediator fulfilled all Righteousness in our stead and Christ being Mediator in our stead fulfilled all Righteousness for us and very truly observes that I do not understand the difference between them and it would have been charitably done of him to have shown the difference for I am still so dull as not to perceive it If Christ as Mediator in our stead fulfilled all Righteousness for us then he must fulfil it in our stead for he is therefore supposed to fulfil Righteousness for us because he acted in our stead which can be no reason unless he acted in our stead in fulfilling Righteousness which I think is much the same with fulfilling Righteousness in our stead And indeed the Doctor himself does expresly assert this in so many words That this Obedience was performed by Christ not for himself but for us and in our stead So that it seems He himself did not understand the difference of these expressions then and I am sure can show no difference now Though I cannot blame the Doctor for being willing to shift off this expression That Christ fulfilled all Righteousness in our stead as fore-seeing the consequence of it that this must needs discharge us from the Obligations of a Personal Righteousness For if Christ have fulfilled the Righteousness of the Law in our stead the Law can no more exact Obedience from us than it can inflict Punishment on us a perfect Righteousness is all the Law can require of us and since we have perfectly obeyed the Law in Christ our Mediator it can make no farther Demands of us Which is to set up the personal Righteousness of Christ in opposition to his Laws and Religion Now as bad a consequence as this is if Dr. Owen would speak consistently with his own Principles he can never avoid it for the foundation of all his Arguments to prove that Christs Righteousness is made ours in a Law-sense is that Christ as our Surety and Mediator fulfilled all Righteousness in our stead for take away this and there is no more reason why the Righteousness of Christ should in his sense be reckoned ours than why the Righteousness of Abraham or Moses or St. Paul should be imputed to us And yet supposing this true That Christ fulfilled all Righteousness in our stead it necessarily overthrows their fundamental Notion of our Justification by the Imputation of Christs Righteousness to us for if he did it in our stead it becomes ours without an Imputation It would be necessary indeed that God should accept of Christ as our Surety and Mediator to act in our stead which may be reckoned an act of favour and accordingly that Christ should fulfil all Righteousness in our stead but when this is done there needs no imputation to make it ours Whatever is done in our stead by a Proxy or Substitute appointed and allowed to act for us becomes ours according to strict Law and Justice and needs not the acceptation of Grace and Mercy which is the Scripture-notion of Imputation to make it so Christs Righteousness would become ours by his acting in our stead without any consequent Imputation And yet to see how Absurdities multiply suppose we take it in Dr. Owen's sense that Christ is only a Mediator in our stead this is a manifest contradiction for it supposes that the Middle may stand in the place of either of the Extreams for a Mediator is a middle Person between two contending Parties and therefore his Office is to act between them both and not in the stead of either And to say that Christ is a Mediator in our stead supposes that we ought to have been Mediators that is middle Persons between God and our selves nay indeed that we are so in the Person of Christ for otherwise though he may be a Mediator on our behalf and for our good yet he cannot mediate in our stead In the next place I made it appear that we cannot argue from the general notion of a Mediator that his Personal Righteousness shall be imputed to those for whom he is Mediator for a Mediator is one who interposes between two differing Parties to accommodate the difference but it was never heard of yet that it was the Office of a Mediator to perform the terms and conditions himself which I shewed particularly in the example of Moses And here the
must understand all the difficulties of Quantity and whether it consist of Divisibles or Indivisibles and must understand the differences of Matter and the reason why he can bite one sort of Matter with his Teeth but can make no impression upon another and how the parts of matter hang together and the like There is a more general indistinct apprehension of things which is sufficient to govern our Actions though we do not understand all the Niceties and Philosophy of them But if our Author can find such subtilties in those plain matters which are taught Children in the Church-Catechism which are objections that will indifferently lie against the plainest Instructions what does he think of those sublime matters of the Eternal Decrees and Counsels of God Election and Reprobation and such-like Mysteries which are so familiarly thrust into Catechisms What subtilty is required in Children to understand these deep Points and to comprehend the subtil and artificial Schemes of Orthodoxy This is much like another Cavil against the intelligibleness of our Union with Christ I am sure says our Author that our Union with Christ is an Union No doubt Sir and if it be so it cannot be very easie to be understood because the Metaphysical notion of Union is as difficult as any other transcendental term Why then let the Metaphysicians dispute it out but for all that I can easily understand and I believe any one else can what it is to be related to Christ as Subjects are to their Prince and Disciples to their Master and Wives to their Husbands c. This is enough to give the Reader a taste of our Authors Skill and should I add any more it might bring my own discretion into question for next to making foolish and cavilling Objections it is an argument of a very little Wit to answer them And therefore to proceed Dr. Owen observes that I have writ against his Book which was writ and published near twenty years since I confess I do not well understand the force of this Objection unless he imagine that his Book is now grown venerable for its antiquity but where-ever the force of it lies I am sure it answers another grand Objection against me which is so often repeated that I am a Young Man a defect which time will mend and which Industry will supply However I suppose the Doctor was not very old twenty years ago and it argu'd some Modesty in the young Man rather to attack a Book writ by the Doctor when he was a young Man too than rudely to assault his Writings of a later date which may be presumed to be the effects of a more mature Judgement and riper years and I hope this consideration will plead my excuse with him for not undertaking that task which he has so kindly allotted me right or wrong to answer all his late voluminous Treatises which I think I may as soon be perswaded to do as to read them that magnificent Title of Exercitations which used to be prefixed before some learned Discourses invited me to take a little taste of them till I found my self mistaken and deceived with some jejune or trite Observations which has so put me out of conceit with flattering Titles that I shall never again believe the Titles of Books or Chapters for his sake But this Book has had the approbation of as Learned and Holy Persons it may be as any the Doctor knows living in England or out of it who owning the Truth contained in it have highly avowed its Usefulness and are ready yet so to do I fear that either the Doctor 's Acquaintance with Learned and Holy Men is not very great or that this is not true for I cannot conceive how very holy men should so approve a Book which is so little a Friend to Holiness or that learned men should be pleased with such loose and inconsequent Reasonings but let that be as it will I am sure there are as learned and as holy men who do as little approve it unless the Doctor thinks that Learning and Holiness are confined to his own Party or that the approbation of his Writings is the only sure test of Mens Learning and Holiness But the great charge of all which runs thorow his whole Book is that I have mis-represented his words and perverted his sense which sometimes he attributes to ignorance sometimes to malice sometimes he calls it an impudent falshood sometimes flagitiously false and shows very great Skill at varying phrases which he is much better at than at writing Controversies Whether this Charge be true or not shall be examined particularly as far as I can reduce the several particulars of this Charge into any order But to abate the wonder a little I must inform my Reader that this is Dr. Owen's way of answering Books to deny those Doctrines which he dares not own or cannot vindicate I am not the first who have been charged with such falsifications Mr. Baxter was taxed with it long since in a whole Book written for that very purpose intitled Of the Death of Christ and of Iustification the Doctrine concerning them formerly deliverd vindicated from the Animadversions of Mr. R. B. where this grave man is corrected as magisterially as if he had been such another Stripling as my self Towards the conclusion of that Discourse I meet with a very excellent Prayer If I must engage again in the like kind I shall pray That He from whom are all my supplies would give me a real humble frame of heart that I may have no need with many pretences and a multitude of good words to make a cloak for a Spirit breaking frequently thorow all with sad discoveries of Pride and Passion and to keep me from all magisterial insolence pharisaical supercilious self-conceitedness contempt of others and every thing that is contrary to the Rule whereby I ought to walk It is great pity that Forms of Prayer are not lawful for this is too good a Prayer to be used but once in a mans life which I doubt is one reason why we see no better effects of it in the Doctors Writings But there is a heavier Charge than all this behind which is frequently hinted by Doctor Owen and more expresly managed by Mr. Ferguson who in his Preface tells his Readers That I treat the sacred Writers with as much contempt as I do T. W. and Burlesque the Scripture no less than others have done Virgil's Poems This would be a terrible Adversary were he as good at his proofs as he is bold and daring in his Charge This is a crime of a very high nature to burlesque Scripture and the foulness of the imputation might justly have provoked a tamer man than my self did not his weak and ridiculous proofs more deserve contempt than any serious resentment He waves the proof of this in his Preface but in his second Chapter where he entertains his Readers with a tedious impertinent Discourse about Metaphors and
which as he observes very well was my design in Writing as well as I could to give them a shameful baffle for I never thought my self concerned to be tender of the reputation of dangerous though popular Errors And that I do not attempt a grave and solemn confutation of Non-sense or absurd forms of speech is no fault Mr. Ferguson himself being Judge who tells us That Non-sense is not to be refuted but exposed For he betrays the Weakness of his own Reason who undertakes to encounter an absurd phrase with Arguments And that the Reputation of Persons is concerned in the Reputation of Doctrines and that the scorn which I bestow on one reflects upon the other I cannot help though they may My only design was to confute their Doctrines and there is not any expression which they call scornful which was levell'd against the personal weaknesses and infirmities of Men but against the fulsome and palpable absurdities of Opinions and when such absurd notions are cried up for great and venerable Mysteries there is the greater reason to speak very plain that they may appear absurd to the meanest apprehension This is the only Reason why my Book is accused of Scorn and Contempt and I do not deny but they have some reason to be angry at this though I shall never be perswaded to like my Book ever the worse for it But the Doctor observes farther That the Discourse which I thus rave against is Didactical and accommodated unto a popular way of Instruction and it hath hitherto been the common ingenuity of all learned men to give an allowance unto such Discourses so as not to exact from them an accuracy and propriety in expressions such as are required in those which are Scholastical and Polemical c. I cannot understand the reason of this Exception when the Doctor pag. 7. had so expresly affirmed That he could not find any Thing any Doctrine any Expressions any Words reflâ—cted on which the Exceptions of this man do give him the least occasion to alter or desire that they had been otherwise either expressed or delivered Now if his Discourse be writ with such accuracy what matter whether it be Didactical or Polemical But as for the thing it self it must be acknowledged that it is very disingenuous to expect a Polemical Accuracy in Popular Discourses for it is not fit to instruct people in terms of Art borrowed from the Schools of Plato or Aristotle which we may be sure the people understand not nor it may be these Polemical men neither But there is another kind of accuracy very necessary for Popular Discourses which I should be very glad to find in Dr. O. and some late Writers that is strict Truth and plainness of expression and when Popular Discourses are defective in these it is no disingenuity to take notice of it for there is nothing does more mischief to Religion than to teach the people a Set of unintelligible and ambiguous Phrases which how-ever they may be forc'd to some tolerable sense by men of Art and Skill yet to the generality of Readers either signifie nothing or that which is very bad But by this the Doctor would fain insinuate that my Book consists only of some cavilling Exceptions about Words and Phrases and improper forms of Speech which if it could be proved would be a more effectual confutation of it than any I have yet seen and yet the Looking-Glass-Maker proceeds upon this supposition and therefore to requite me picks quarrels with my Words and discovers great improprieties contradictions nonsense and writes just such a Confutation of my Book as I should have expected from a Court-Jester or a Prevaricator I shall give some few instances of this nature which may be sufficient to divert the Reader and that is the only reason I know why I should take any notice of them Except for fear the Author should think himself slighted and judge me of the same morose humour with Mr. Hickman who uses to punish such Scriblers with not buying nor reading their Books Thus sometimes I use some popular forms of Speech the sense of which is generally very well understood but they will not down with our Author because they cannot be reconciled to strict Rules of Logick or terms of Art thus he observes that I say in one place some men where-ever they meet with the word Christ in Scripture alway understand by it the Person of Christ and this I doubt not is true of a great many private Christians and some ignorant Preachers but then in another place I affirm that it is acknowledged by all that Christ sometimes signifies the Church of Christ now this is a contradiction that all sometimes understand by the name Christ the Church of Christ and some always understand the person of Christ But pray what need is there that all should include those some Why could not he by all understand all men of any knowledge and skill in the use of words which some and a great many have not How comes it to pass that he has so soon forgot their beloved distinction of singuli generum genera singulorum whereby they prove that Christ died for all without dying for all Thus I observe that Christ hath told us in the Gospel whatever he intends to do for us and hath charged us to expect no more from him which the circumstances of the place determine to the terms and conditions of our Salvation by Christ but nothing will serve our Author unless whatever be supposed to signifie all the particularities of Christs Providence towards the Church as the very particular time when Kingly and Episcopal Government should be restored here in England Though I doubt not but our Author had much rather know when they shall be pulled down again Thus when I say That now the only true Medium of knowing God is the knowledge of Christ who came into the World to declare God to us that is as I soon add That the only certain way of attaining to the knowledge of the nature and will of God is by knowing Christ whom God sent into the World to publish the everlasting Gospel who hath made more perfect Revelations of Gods will than ever the World had before c. Because I say that Christ is the only true Medium of knowing God he concludes that I am a Fanatick who reject the Light of Nature and the Works of Creation and Providence as false Mediums of knowing God which must be thrown away or not made use of But does he know what a true Medium is It is that which gives us a clear and certain and perfect knowledge as a true Medium of sight is that which conveys the perfect images of things with clearness and certainty now will he say that the Light of Nature c. can give us such a clear and perfect and certain knowledge of the nature of God and his will concerning our Salvation as the
it is some question whether the Doctor smiled at the Argument or at his own Answer however I had rather he would smile still than admire which would be the more effectual Confutation of the two But his Answer is worth considering That the Grace of Duty and Obedience in all Relations is the same the Relations only administring an external occasion unto its peculiar exercise And what our Lord Iesus Christ did in the fulfilling of all Righteousness in the Circumstances and Relations wherein he stood may be imputed to us for our Righteousness in all our Relations every act of Duty and Sin in them respecting the same Law and Principle The meaning of which Answer is this That Christ is said to fulfil all Righteousness for us not because he did fulfil all Righteousness but because he would have done it had he been in such Circumstances and Relations as had required it and thus he has found out a way how Christ may fulfil all Righteousness without doing any thing at all for by the same Reason that he may be said to fulfil the Righteousness of any particular Duties and Relations without doing it he may be said to fulfil the Righteousness of all Duties and Relations without doing any thing for the Grace of Duty and Obedience is the same in all and that does not consist in external Actions for then it will equally oblige to every particular act of Righteousness as to any but in an inward Principle and thus the Doctor must return to what he had before expresly rejected That the habitual Righteousness of Christ as Mediator in his Human Nature is the only Righteousness which can be imputed to us Christ did not fulfil all the particular Duties of Righteousness in his actions because he was not in such circumstances and relations as required it and therefore those at least who are in any condition or relation in which Christ never was as the generality of Mankind upon one account or other are must of necessity be justified not by the imputation of Christs actual but habitual Righteousness And now let me reason a little with the Doctor in his own way Why should Christ live here in the World so long as he did in perfect Obedience to all the Laws of God Had he died before as soon as he had been born there had been perfect Innocency and perfect Holiness by his habitual Grace and thismade him fit to be a Sacrifice to expiate our sins and would as well serve for a perfect Righteousness to cover them and should he have lived to the end of the World unless he could have run through all the several Relations and Conditions of Life he could never actually fulfil all that Righteousness which is required of all Mankind and therefore the perfect habitual Righteousness of his Nature may as well serve for the whole as for a part The Doctor in the place to which I now alluded can find no other reason why Christ should live so long in the World in a perfect Obedience to the Laws of God but only a necessity of an actual fulfilling all Righteousness for us which supposes that an habitual Grace is not enough and yet when he is told that Christ could not and did not fulfil all Righteousness for us because he could not discharge the Duties of our several Relations for us when he never was in most of these Relations could not possibly be in all he answers that there is no need of it because the Grace of Duty and Obedience is the same in all and now how the Doctor can reconcile these two that it is necessary actually to fulfil all Righteousness and that it is not necessary actually to fulfil all Righteousness let him consider for I am sure there must be the same necessity of fulfilling all Righteousness that there is of fulfilling any and he himself describes that Righteousness which Christ was to fulfil for us as our Mediator to be whatever was required of us by vertue of any Law though I suppose when he thus stated it he had not met with this Socinian Objection which he will never be able to answer otherwise than by smiling or admiring In the next place I considered those Arguments whereby the Doctor proves that Christ fulfilled all Righteousness for us as our Mediator And the first is That Christ was under no Obligation to obey those Laws himself and he instances both in the Law of Creation and in the Ceremonial Law given to the Jews First to begin with the Law of Creation that is all those Duties which necessarily result from the frame and constitution of Human Nature and because the Doctor in his Vindication hath represented the force of his Argument in fewer and plainer words I shall quit the advantages which his perplext and intricate arguings in his Book of Communion give an Adversary which I dare venture any man to make sense of without a comment and deal with him at the fairest Weapon He proves then that Christs Obedience to the Law of Creation was designedly for us by two Arguments First because the way whereby the Lord Christ in his own Person became obnoxious and obedient to the Law of Creation was by his own voluntary antecedent choice otherwise than it is with those who are inevitably subject unto it by natural generation under it The meaning of which is that he considers Christ antecedently to his Incarnation when it was in his choice whether he would become Man or no and so consequently whether he would be subject to the Laws of Human Nature and I say still the force of this Argument is no more but this That Christ had not been bound to live like a man had he not voluntarily chose to become man and the reason of that is this that he could not have lived like a man had he not been a man It was in his choice whether he would become Man but when he had chose this it was not at his liberty to choose whether he would submit to the Laws of Human Nature and it is a new way of reasoning to argue that Christ was not bound to obey those Laws for himself because he voluntarily chose such a state which necessarily and without any further choice brought him under those Obligations Which is just as if I should prove that no man is bound upon his own account to discharge the Duties of a Husband because it was at his own choice whether he would have entered into that Relation which when he is in it necessarily exacts such Duties from him The discharge of his Mediatory Office necessarily required that he should become man that he might be our Prophet and Example and Guide our Priest and our Sacrifice our King and Governour and when he was Man his Nature required that he should obey the Laws of Creation and live like a reasonable Creature But the Doctor adds That the Hypostatical Union in the first instant whereof the
put to it when they are forc'd to take Sanctuary in the Authority of that Church which they so much reproach and vilifie when they dare not trust to any other Weapon to defend their Cause but the despised name of the Church of England Those I am sure must be very blind who cannot see through so transparent a Cheat. The meaning then of all this noise about the Church of England is no more but this They are conscious to themselves of a bad Cause which they can no longer defend by plain Scripture and Reason and therefore shelter themselves in the Authority of the Church and would fain perswade the Bishops and the Church of England to defend them since they cannot defend themselves and having little else to say they make long Harangues about Articles and Homilies and pretend a mighty Zeal for the True Ancient and Catholick Doctrine of the Church of England And now methinks the Church of England and the Reverend Bishops are very much beholden to me for they have not had so many good words from these men in many years before and must never expect the like again but upon such another occasion and I hope the People will begin to consider what a Church they have forsaken whose Authority is much greater than all other Arguments with their own Teachers But I see it is very dangerous to be too much in love with any thing for this great zeal and passion for the Doctrine of the Church of England has betrayed the Doctor and his good Friend the Author of the Speculum to some hasty Sayings of which it may be they may see cause to repent when they are better advised They are great Friends you must know to Liberty and Indulgence and take it very ill if they may not only think and act as they please in matters of Religion but make Parties and Factions too and controul the Commands of Secular Powers and yet these very men who so much extol and magnifie an Indulgence and so much need it give plain intimations how far they would be from granting that Liberty to others which they challenge to themselves The Doctor tells me There is great reason to pity the People committed to my Charge what regard soever ought to be had unto my self i. e. though I should starve for want of my Rectorship as he expresses himself elsewhere Had this man in their days treated this Doctrine with his present scoffing petulancy he had scarce been Rector of St. George Buttolph-Lane c. Nor should I be so now could he hinder it But what becomes of Liberty and Indulgence then in matters of Religion Must the Conscience be set free in matters of External Order and Government but tied up in Doctrines and Opinions This indeed is the Doctors avowed Principle as great a Friend as he is to Liberty He would be excused himself from subscribing Three of the XXXIX Articles but as for the other XXXVI he would have no man suffered to live in England who will not subscribe them and the Doctor can remember when he proposed this very unseasonably The Author of the Speculum desires his Friend to bid me consider whether if the Parliament should meet they might not find leisure enough to censure my Discourse as they did Mr. Mountague ' s who in vain pleaded for himself that he had writ against the Puritans and was left alone to suffer though others had instigated him to write The Commons of England will scarce endure to find the Doctrine of the Church of England struck at though it be through the sides of Dr. Owen and Dr. Jacomb But now suppose the Commons of England should think it as reasonable to secure the Government and Discipline as the Doctrine of the Church what would become then of Indulgence Would not our Author then change his Note and repent of such Intimations as these Or if the Commons of England should happen to have other thoughts of that Discourse than our Author has and should think it necessary to prevent the Debauching of Mens Minds by such corrupt Doctrines as are there opposed what would become of most of the Conventicles in England Could he with any Confidence then cry out of Persecution when he himself hath sounded the Alarm to it This it is to fence with a two-edged Sword which cuts both ways and may wound a Friend as soon as an Enemy This is sufficient in answer to my Adversaries who are well skill'd at drawing up a Charge but have no faculty at proving it But I think my self upon this occasion concerned to vindicate the Doctrine of the Church of England from the mis-representations of these men as if it favoured such uncouth and absurd notions as besides the ill consequences of them have no foundation in Scripture or Reason which I doubt may represent the best Church in the World to great disadvantage with many I mean with all wife and considering men The principal thing which these Men object against me is the Doctrine of Justification as it is explained in the Articles and Homilies of our Church And I am contented the Controversie should be put upon this issue whether they or I speak most consonantly to the Doctrine of the Church of England in this matter The Doctrine of Justification is contained in Article XI which is this We are accounted Righteous before God only for the Merit of our Lord and Saviour Iesus Christ by Faith and not for our own Merits and Deservings Wherefore that we are Iustified by Faith only is a most wholsom Doctrine and very full of comfort as more largely is expressed in the Homily of Iustification The Article is plain and expressed in a few words without any Scholastical Subtilties we are not clogged here with the several Modes of Causality with the Efficient Formal Material Instrumental Causes of Justification which fill up every Page in the Books of Modern Divines All that our Church requires us to profess is only this that we are accounted Righteous before God only by Faith and for the Merits of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ that neither Faith nor Works are the Meritorious Cause of our Justification but that all the Merit of it is to be attributed to Christ who died for our sins and fulfilled the Law so that whoever acknowledges the Merits of Christ and denies the Merits of Good Works answers the end and design of this Article For this was the great Controversie of those days between the Papists and Protestants whether we were Justified freely by the Grace of God and the Merits of Christ or by the Merits of our own Works and the principal design of this Article was to oppose the Popish Doctrine of the Merit of Good Works But we are referred to the Homily of Justification for a larger Account of this Doctrine and thither I willingly appeal And to proceed with all possible ingenuity I readily acknowledge that there are several Expressions in
when he did openly bind himself by Covenant to do it viz. in that first Promise which he made to Adam after his Fall Put then God laid Iniquity on Christ by way of execution as he in time served the execution upon Christ which may be considered as it was virtual or as it was actual and real The execution was served upon Christ in the virtue of it from the first instant that ever there was a transgression committed and not only at that time when sin was first committed and from thence to the time of his suffering but also afterwards from the time he had suffered to the end of the world For you must know that Christ was to bear the sins of the Elect from the beginning to the end of the world and he was to discharge this debt at once and therefore he does not actually do this either at the beginning or at the end of the world but in the fulness of time Christ came and reckoned with the Father and the Father hath so much of him for all that is past and as much for all for after-times to the end of the world Saith Christ to the Father here is so much for every one of mine that they have run out for the time that is past and here is so much for every one of my Members that shall come after they will commit so many sins in time to come here is so much for all that sin they shall commit And this is Gods serving execution actually upon Christ when he died upon the Cross in the fulness of time But thirdly as for Gods laying Iniquity upon Christ by way of particular application of it to this and that man You must observe That concerning the Elect in general as they were in the eye of the Lord before they had a real Existence and Being so all their Iniquities were laid upon Christ from Eternity But the particular application of this grace to persons must be in time and this done either secretly or manifestly As for this secret application which is so called because it is a secret thing for a time to these for whom he does it it is at the very instant that such a person hath a being in the world the manifest application is when the sinner actually believes and thereby knows that God hath laid his sins on Christ. In the secret application of this grace unto a person this person hath a full discharge and in the manifestation he hath the comfort of this discharge So that every elect Sinner is justified from Eternity as Christ died and bore his sins from Eternity viz. in the Counsel and Decree of God His sins are actually paid for and removed from his Surety too from the time of Christ's suffering upon the Cross. From that time there was not one sin to be reckoned either to Believers who are Christ's Members or to Christ himself he having them made satisfaction and upon it given out unto the world it is finished And this discharge is actually though secretly applied to them as soon as they have any being and they know that they are discharged as soon as they believe This is the Antinomian account of Justification and supposing their first Principle that Christ did represent the persons of the Elect and do all in their name and stead I cannot see how it is possible to confute it I confess I cannot answer Dr. Crisp's reasoning That God hath not one sin to charge upon any Elect person from the first moment of conception till the last minute of his life because the Lord hath laid it on Christ already He did lay sins on him When did he lay them When he did pay the full price for them Now suppose this person uncalled commits Iniquity and that this Iniquity is charged upon him seeing that his iniquities are laid upon Christ already how comes it to pass that they are charged upon this Elect Person again How come they to be translated again from Christ and laid upon this Person Once they were laid upon Christ it must be confessed for the bloud of Christ cleanseth us from all sin Was there by one act of Christ the expiation of sin and all at once that are committed from the beginning of the world to the end thereof how comes it to pass that this and that sin should be charged upon the elect persons when they were laid upon Christ long before And I profess I cannot see one hairs breadth difference between Dr. Owen and Dr. Crisp in this matter unless it be that Dr. Crisp speaks his mind plainly and honestly and Dr. Owen endeavours if it be not a natural infirmity to cloud his sense with a multitude of words and to lose himself and his Readers in a labyrinth of distinctions as to give some plain evidences of it Dr. Owen in his Book entituled Salus electorum sanguis Iesu or The death of death in the death of Christ p. 145. Printed 1648. lays down these Propositions First That the full and due debt of all those for whom Christ was responsible was fully paid in to God according to the utmost extent of the Obligation Secondly That the Lord who is a just Creditor ought in all equity to cancel the Bond to surcease all Suits Actions and Molestations against the Debter full payment being made to him for the Debt And since he ought to do this we need not doubt but he being a just Creditor does do it Thirdly That the Debt thus paid was not this or that sin but all the sins of all those for whom and in whose name this payment was made Fourthly That a second payment of a debt once paid or a requiring it is not answerable to the justice which God demonstrated in setting forth Christ to be a propitiation for our sins and therefore it is not just with God to require the payment of that Debt again of us which Christ hath already paid for us And fifthly That whereas to receive a discharge from further trouble is equitably due to the Creditor who hath been in Obligation his Debt being paid the Lord having accepted of the payment from Christ in the stead of all them for whom he died ought in justice according to that Obligation which in free grace he hath put upon himself give them a discharge And Sixthly considering that relaxation of the Law which by the Supreme Power was effected as to the persons suffering the punishment required such actual satisfaction is made thereto that it can lay no more to their charge for whom Christ died than if they had really fulfilled in the way of obedience whatever it did require Now I can by no means understand what all these Propositions can signifie else but to prove that those for whom Christ died are discharged upon his payment of their Debt and so are justified from Eternity as Christ paid their Debt from Eternity in the Decree of God and are