That God did not absolutely irrespectively unconditionally decree the everlasting misery of any one but in a foresight and intuition of their refusing his profer That he sent his Son to die for all the sins of the whole world inviting and commanding all men every where to repent and be forgiven Acts 17. 30. but that most like the slave in Exodus are in love with their bondage and will be bored through the ear That everlasting fire was prepared especially not for men but for the Devil and his Angels nor for them by a peremptory irrespective Decree but in praescience and respect of their pride and Apostasy That Christ came to save that which was lost and to call sinners to repentance and to have gather'd them as a Hen gathereth her Chickens under her wings but they would not That God gave his law his rule his promises to all and excepted none in the publishing of either but so as he expected they should be willing as well as he for he would not save any whether they would or no That God Almighty made no man on purpose to torment him but that he might participate of his goodnesse * That so many as perish may thank themselves and that so many as live for ever are beholding to nothing but the grace of God That God decreed the fall of none but the raising up of those were down and that those very men who are reprobated had been predestin'd to salvation if they would have return'd and remain'd in truth and holinesse Gods Decrees being to many the cause of their rise but to none of their downfal Lastly that they who have despis'd the will of God wch did invite them to repentance shall feel the terrors of his will wch is to execute vengeance upon the children of Disobedience 20. From all this together which hath been said from Scripture from Reason from the authority of the Ancients who are the fittest of any to interpret Scripture I thus conclude within my self That God Almighty is the Author of men and Angels That wicked Angels and wicked men are the Authors of sin and that the sin of men and Angels is the Author of unexpressible and endlesse punishment That sin is rebellion against the Majesty of God that hell was made to punish Rebels and that God never decreed any rebellion against himself Upon which it follows that as I look for the cause of my election in the sole merits of my Redeemer so for the cause of my Reprobation in the obliquity of my will because the Reason of my punishment is to be taken from my sin and the Reason of my sin is to be taken from my self From whence there follows and follow it will do what I can a second Inference from my first compared with my first Principle viz. CHAP. III. 21. That every Reprobate is praedetermin'd to eternal punishment not by Gods irrespective but conditional Decree GOD doth punish no man under the notion of a Creature but under the notion of a Malefactor And because he does not create a malefactor but a man he hateth nothing that he hath created but in as much as it hath wilfully as it were uncreated his image in it So that no man is sinful because ordain'd to condemnation but ordain'd to condemnation because he is sinful Sin is foreseen and punishment is foreappointed but because that sin is the cause of punishment and that the cause is not after but before the effect in priority of nature though not of time it follows that the effect is not foreappointed untill the cause is foreseen So that God damns no man by an absolute decree that is to say without respect or intuition of sin but the praescience of the guilt is the motive and inducement to the determining of the Iudgement And yet however my second Inference is depending upon my first by an essential tye which gives it the force and intrinsick form of demonstration yet because some Readers will assent much sooner to a plain Reason lesse convincing than to a more convincing Reason lesse plain and that some are wrought upon by an argument exactly proportion'd to their capacities or tempers rightly levell'd and adopted more by luckiness than design whilest another argument is displeasing they know not why but that there is an odnesse in the look and meen which betokens something of subtilty and makes them suspect there is a serpent though they see not the Ambush in which it lurks I will gratifie such a Reader by a proof of this too first from Scripture then from Reason grounded upon Scripture and last of all by an addition to my former suffrages of Antiquity in which S. Austin more especially shall speak as plainly and as strongly in my behalf as any man that can be brib'd to be an Advocate or a witness 22. That my proof from Scripture may be the more effectual I shall first desire it may be considered that since God is affirmed to have a secret and a revealed will we must not preposterously interpret what we read of his revealed will by what we conjecture of his secret one for that were to go into the dark to judge of those Colours which are seen only by the light but we must either not conjecture at that which cannot be known as Gods secret will cannot be but by ceasing to be secret or if we needs will be so busie we must guesse at his secret will by what we know of his revealed one that so at least we may modestly and safely erre Upon which it follows that we who meekly confesse we have not been of Gods Counsel must onely judge of his eternal and impervestigable Decrees by what we find in his Word concerning his Promises and his Threats which are fitly called the Transcripts or Copies of his Decrees Such therefore as are his Threats such must needs be his Decrees because the one cannot praevaricate or evacuate the other but his Threats as well as Promises are all conditional therefore his Decrees must be so too Thus in his Covenant with Adam and indeed the word Covenant doth evince what I am speaking he threatens Death or decrees it not with that peremptory Reason which is the redoubling of the will onely I will therefore because I will but on supposition of his eating the forbidden fruit Which was not therefore forbidden that Adam might sin in the eating man was not so ensnared by the guide of his youth but Adam sinned in the eating because it had been forbidden Such immediately after was Gods language to Cain If thou do well thou shalt be accepted and if thou doest not well sin lyeth at the door Again saith God by the mouth of Moses Behold I set before you this Day a Blessing and a Curse A blessing if ye obey and a Curse if ye will not obey That is the form of making Covenants betwixt God and man every where throughout the Scripture and
Presbytery should invent strange slanders against the innocent then that a man of the Church of England should proceed to conviction against the guilty It will appear to all Readers from the first to the last of these following Tracts that my principal intention hath been to vindicate my God both in his Essence and in his Attributes from the publick calumnies of evil doers whilest one doth teach that God willeth sin and another that he ordaines it and a third that it is one of Gods works the desperate sinner is taught to say I have done the will of God and what God appointed me to do 2. Whilest some affirm that Gods willing of sin doth make it cease to be a sin and others say he willeth all sins a third sort conclude that there are no sins at all 3. Whilest they say with eagerness that God must be such or there is no God at all they teach as many to be Atheists as cannot believe with the Libertines that God doth will and work sin 4. Whilest they say that the Regenerate cannot possibly fall away nor become notoriously ungodly by their commission of Crimson and Scarlet sins they teach the Ranters to live accordingly I can name the persons who have taught such things and experience hath taught us what they are who have reduced their knowledge of the several Lessons into Practice Towards the remedying of this I have in singleness of heart considered what should be the cause and as God hath enabled me us'd my endeavours to remove it I have been most of all intent upon clearing the Holiness of God that men may think of him with Reverence and Love unfeigned A wrong apprehension of the Deity is apt to breed a wrong worship and so I have pitch't upon the subject wherein it primely concerns us to set men right The holiness of God is his Soveraign Attribute and dearer to him then his power The Cherubims and Seraphims do continuaily cry out in honour to him Not high and mighty and unresistible but Holy Holy Holy Lord God of Hosts As if God esteemed more of this then of all his Attributes besides And Bishop Andrews of precious memory thought fit to make it his observation that in God Holy Holy is before Lord of Hosts His Holiness first his Power after May all that hate me upon the earth but follow the method of the Angels which are in Heaven speaking so honourably of God to a peevish world as not to miss of his favour in the word to come I shall not fail of their Love and shall receive the best recompence for all my Labour Fiat Fiat THO. PIERCE Directions for the placing of the ensuing Tracts I. The Correct Copy of Notes II. The Divine Philanthropie defended III. The Divine Purity defended in answer to Dr. Reynolds IV. The Self-Revenger exemplified in Mr. B. V. Self-Condemnation exemplified in Mr. W. and others A brief Table to the five ensuing Tracts immediately to follow the General Preface I. In the Correct Copie Two General Principles 1. That no moral evil is from the evil of God but of the Creature p. 6. 11. 2. That all good is from the free grace of God p. 6. 55. The distinction of Gods secret and revealed will as contrary to one another blasphemous p. 12. God permits sin only so as not to hinder it by sorce p. 15. Man is the sole efficient cause of his own destruction p. 17. Absolute Reprobation contrary to all the antient Fathers p. 25. 45. Even to S. Aug. p. 28. 44. The judgment of the Church of England p. 29. Gods Decree of Reprobation is not irrespective but conditional p. 32. Knowledge and Fore-knowledge in God p. 48. Gods Antecedent and Consequent will p. 51. All good is from Gods free Grace p. 56. Gods free Grace doth not destroy mans Free-will p. 57. Irresistible Grace not reconcileable with Choise p. 59. Distinction between Infallible and Necessary p. 61. Sufficient Effectual and Irresistible Grace p. 61. Taking and Chusing p. 62. Voluntary and Spontaneous p. 64. Gods Grace the Cause of Good Mans will the Instrument of Choise p. 63. Gods Decree of Election Conditional and Respective p. 68. II. In the Divine Philanthropie defended Post-destination p. 4. Eternal Praedestination Receptive p. 7. Pelagianisme p. 8. Arminius and Arminianisme p. 12. chap. iv p. 35. The judgment of the Church of England p. 19. Literal and Figurative Interpretations of Scripture p. 21. ch. iv p. 47. Absolute and Conditional will of God p. 56. Faith not the Cause but the Condition of Election p. 63. Negative and positive Reprobation p. 65. ch. iv p. 4. Hell prepared for Devils not for Men p. 70. Special Grace p. 83. and Redemption p. 84. Christ died not only for the Elect p. 85. Christ died for all not only sufficienter but intentionaliter p. 93. Grace of Perseverance p. 101. chap. iv p. 17. not irresistible p. 102. Vniversal Tradition p. 105. The cause of Punishment eternal p. 108. 117. The cause of sin not Deficient but Efficient p. 113. Gods permission of sin p. 129. 139. Gods Decrees Absolute Conditional chap. iv p. 1. Praeterition p. 4. Fundamentals p. 10. Synod at Dort p. 13. Gods Soveraignty and Justice p. 20. Plea for Infants p. 25. Vniversal Redemption p. 28. Esficacious Permission p. 33. Act and Sinsull Act p. 43. Twofold command of God p. 52. God hath not two contrary wills p. 57. III. In the Divine Purity Defended The Judgment of King James p. 6. Making God the Cause of Sin is blasphemy in the judgment of the Antients p. 22. and Modern learned men p. 26. even the Calvinists p. 30. Gods hardening Mens hearts p. 66. Gods Allmightiness p. 81. Gods way of working on the will p. 92. Free grace not unconditional p. 112. IV. In the Selfe-Revenger Abuse of the Tongue p. 1. Selfe-deceiving p. 2. Adams Sin p. 22. Original Sin p. 23. Born in Sin p. 24. Innocency p. 32. Christian Perfection p. 35. Excommunicating and Murthering Kings p. 77. Dangerous effects of Presbyterian Discipline p. 80. Vniversal and special Grace p. 87. Grotius his temper and Designe p. 92. Episcopacy and Liturgy approved by Calvin p. 95. Rigor of Presbytery advances Popery p. 98. In the Appendage Vniversal Grace and Vniversal Redemption p. 128. Extent and Intent of Christs death p. 138 142. Application of it p. 145. V. In Selfe-Condemnation Irrespective Decrees founded in the mistake of Gods Prescience Introd p. 3. Conditional Decrees p. 15. Order of Time and Order of Nature p. 20. Gods Promise Conditional p. 28. Gods glory not advanced by irrespective Reprobation ch. 1. p. 3. Act and obliquity of the Act p. 11. Efficacious permission p. 22. Hebraisme p. 39. Actions Natural and Vnnatural p. 72. 77. 81. Sin and the sinfull Action inseparable p. 84. Sin makes not for Gods glory p. 87. The Nature of Knowledge and Degree p. 122. Foreknowledge p. 123. doth not necessitate p. 126. nor presuppose
adigit cogit compellit He makes us willing who are unwilling but does not force us to be willing whilest we are un willing that is to say to be willing against our wils or whether we will or no 12. But I find that I have shot somewhat farther then I aimed it being onely my design and the proper business of this place to shew that the words of the Apostle he worketh all things are infinitely far from being meant either of sin or Reprobation So far from that that God Almighty does not permit sin as permission signifies connivence or consent but he permits it as that signifies not to hinder by main force If I see a man stealing and say nothing to him I so permit as to be guilty but if I warn and exhort if I promise and threaten and do all that may avert him besides killing him I so permit as to be innocent In like manner all that is done by God Almighty by way of permission is his suffering us to live and have that nature of the will with which he made us Whereas to destroy us for the prevention of sin or to make us become stocks as Beza phrases it or like wooden Engines which are moved only by wires at the meer pleasure discretion of the Engineer were by inevitable consequence to * uncreate his creature which to do were repugnant to his immutability as Tertul. shews This is all that I am able to apprehend or pronounce that God permits our sins in this sense onely and that he disposes and orders them to the best advantage 13. Having proved my first Principle by Scripture and Reason it will be as easie to confirm it by the common suffrage of Antiquity and to avoid the repetition of so long a Catalogue which I suppose will be as needlesse as I am sure it will be nauseous to a considerable Reader I REFER him to the CITATIONS which will FOLLOW my FIRST INFERENCE SECT. 18. I will content my self at present to shut up all with a that Article of the Augustan Confession to which our 39. Articles have the greatest regard and conformity and which for that very reason is to me the most venerable of any Protestant Confession except our own That though God is the Creator and Preserver of Nature yet the only cause of sin is the will of the wicked that is to say of the Devil and ungodly men turning it self from God to other things against the will and commandements of God b And the Orange Synod doth pronounce an Anathema upon all that think otherwise If any will not subscribe to this Confession I will leave him to learn modesty both from Arrian the Heathen and from Philo the Iew {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Arrian in Epictet {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Philo {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} p. 325. CHAP. II. 14. MY first Demand being fully granted as in the Mathematicks 't is usual to build upon certain Postulata it doth immediately follow that Man himself is the sole efficient cause of his eternal punishment I say the sole Cause as excluding God but not the Devil whom yet I also exclude from the efficiency of the Cause because he can onely incite and propose objects and adde perswasions to sin but cannot force or cause it in me without my will and consent so that the Devil being onely a Tempter and Perswader cannot for that be justly stiled an efficient Or if he were sure for that very Reason God himself cannot be so but onely Man and the Devil must be the Concauses of mans destruction Which is the second thing I am to prove both by Scripture and Reason and the whole suffrage of Antiquity 15. And here I shall not be so solicitous as to rifle my Concordance but make use of such Scriptures as lye uppermost in my memory and so are readiest to meet my pen These I find are of two sorts negative on Gods part and affirmative on mans God gives the first under his oath Ezek. 33. 11. As I live saith the Lord I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked but that the wicked turn from his way and live turn ye turn ye from your wicked waies for why will you die O house of Israel In the 18. ch. of the same Prophesie the Latine translation is more emphatical than the English for there it is not non cupio but nolo mortem morientis noâ— that he doth not will the death of a sinner but that he wils it not he doth not only not desire it but which makes the proof more forcible he desires the contrary even that he should turn from his wickednesse and live chapter 33. vers. 14. not willing saith S. Peter that any should perish but on the contrary that all should come to Repentance And so 1 Tim. 2. 4. He will have all men to be saved and to come unto the knowledge of the truth Where it appears by the Context that the Apostle does not onely speak of all kindes of particulars but of all particulars of the kindes too For he first of all exhorts them that prayers and supplications and giving of thankes be made for all men verse 1. secondly he does instance in one sort of men for Kings and all that are in Authority verse 2. thirdly he addes the Cause of his exhortation for this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour who will have all men to be saved verse 3 4. And if the Spanish Friar said true that few Kings go to Hell giving this reason because all Kings are but few the Apostles way of arguing will be so much the stronger for when he speaks of all men in general he makes his instance in Kings in all Kings without exception thereby intimating Nero the worst of Kings under whom at that time the Apostle lived And he uses another argument verse 6. because Christ gave himself a Ransome for all This is yet more plain from Rom. 2. 4 5. Despisest thou the riches of his goodness and forbearance and long-suffering not knowing that the goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance but after thy hardness and impenitent heart treasurest up unto thy self wrath against the day of wrath Observe who they are whom God would have to repent even the hard-hearted and the impenitent But I have stronger proofs out of Scripture and lesse liable to cavil than any of these which yet I thought fit to use because I find they are the chief of those that Vossius relies upon and expounds to my purpose from the Authority of the Ancients I will adde to these but three or four Texts more of which the one will so establish and explain the other as to leave no place of evasion to the gainsayer First our blessed Saviour is called by the Apostle the Saviour of all men especially of them that believe 1 Tim. 4. 10. As if
and not as man for whilest he hath a will to hang the murderer he hath a merciful woulding to save the man He doth not hang the man but only because he is a murderer and if it lay in his power he would destroy the murderer to save the man Both the one and the other is not an absolute but a conditional will he would save the man with an if he were not a murderer and doth destroy the murderer with a because he is a Malefactor Just so Gods antecedent will is that every man would repent that they may not perish it is his consequent will that every one may perish who will not repent both the one and the other is respective and conditional Thirdly I distinguish with Prosper of an inviting and revenging will The inviting will is that by which all are bidden to the Wedding Feast his revenging will is that by which he punisheth those that will not come Or fourthly I distinguish with reverend Anselme of the will of Gods mercy and of the will of his Iustice It is the will of his Mercy that Christ should die for the sins of all but 't is the will of his Iustice that all should perish who come not in to him when they are called or who only so come as not to continue and persevere unto the end 41. All these distinctions come to one and the same purpose and being rightly understood as well as dexterously used doe seem to me a Gladius Delphicus sufficient to cut asunder the chiefest knots in this Question For the first will of God may be repealed whereas the second is immutable which is the ground of that Distinction betwixt the Threats and Promises under Gods Oath and those other under his Word only of which saith the Councel of Toledo Jurare Dei est a seipso ordinata nullatenus convellere poenitere vero eadem ordinata cum voluerit immutare When he is resolv'd to execute his purpose he is said to swear and when it pleaseth him to alter it he is said to repent for there are some decrees of God which being conditional do never come to passe as he thought to have done an Evil of punishment unto Israel which yet he did not Exod. 32. 14. And the reason of this is given us from that distinction before mentioned which also serveth to reconcile many seeming repugnances in Scripture For when it is said that God repenteth 1 Sam. 16. 35. it is meant of the first will and when it is said he cannot repent 1 Sam. 16. 29. it is meant of the second In respect of the first we are said to grieve to quench to resist the Spirit of God 1 Thess. 5. 19. but when it is said who hath resisted his will Rom. 9. 19. it is meant of the second God's Mercy is above and before his Iustice and therefore that is his first will that all should be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth 1 Tim. 2. 4. but yet so as that his Iustice is not excluded by his Mercy and therefore that is his second will that so many should be damned as hated knowledge and did not chuse the fear of the Lord Prov. 1. 29. The will of his Mercy that all should live is from nothing but his goodnesse whereas the will of his Iustice that some should die depends upon something in the Creature So that both parties may be gratified they that are for the dependence and the independency of his Will That the Reprobate is invited is from the mercy of Gods Will but that he is punished for not accepting is from the obliquity of his own In respect of the first it is the man that refuseth God Ier. 8. 5. but in respect of the second it is God that doth reprobate man Rom. 1. 28. The free love of the Creator is the only motive to his first will but mans ingratitude and rebellion is his impellent to the second The first shews him a tender and compassionate Father the second speaks him a righteous and impartial Iudge both proclaim him a powerful and a provident God Now can any distinction be better chosen can any word that is aequivocal be more safely understood can any Opinion of Gods will or mans be more rationally or more warily or more religiously entertain'd than that wherein Gods Mercy doth greet his Iustice and wherein his Love doth kisse his Power I appeal to any man living whether this be an Error or if it is whether it is not a very safe one and if it is so whether it is not a very small one and if so safe that no body can suffer by it if so small that no body can see it whether the Author of this Appeal is not very excusable both for not being able to see his own Eyes nor to see his own Errour with other mens As much as in me lies I would live peaceably with all men with those especially who when I speak unto them thereof make them ready to battel And in order to that Peace I desire them to lay this one thing to heart that as if I were as they I would quit my Opinion so if they were as I they would not long keep their own CHAP IV. Free and special Grace defended against the Pelagians and Massilians in the second Principle proposed 42. HAving proved hitherto that Sin is really the cause of Punishment that Man is really the cause of sin and therefore that Man is the grand cause of Punishment as being the cause of the cause of his Damnation intending thereby to secure my self against the errours and blacker guilt of the Manichees the Marcionites the Stoicks and the Turks who do all affirm some directly some by necessary consequence That Gods absolute Will is the cause of sin and mans onely the instrument the second part of my Task is to be an Advocate for the pleading and asserting the Cause of God too and that against the Opiners of the other Extream to wit the Pelagians and the Massilienses who to be liberal to Nature do take away from Grace and to strengthen the Handmaid do lessen the forces of the Mistress And though I think the later to be the milder Heresie of the two it being lesse dangerous to ascribe too much goodness to the Power of Nature which very power is undoubtedly the gift of God than the very least evil to the God of all Grace and this according to the judgement of the Synod at Orange which pronounced an Anathema upon the first Heresie whereas it did but civilly reject the second yet in a perfect dislike and rejection of this later extremity aswell as of the former my second Principle is this That all the good which I do I do first receive not from any thing in my self but from the special Grace and Favour of Almighty God who freely worketh in me both to will and to do of his good pleasure Phil. 2. 13. 43.
THE Christians rescue FROM THE GRAND ERROR of the HEATHEN touching the fatal Necessity of all Events AND The Dismal consequences thereof which have slily crept into the CHURCH In several Defences Of some Notes writ to Vindicate the Primitive and Scriptural Doctrine of Gods Decrees By THOMAS PIERCE Rector of Brington in Northamptonshire LONDON Printed by J. G. for Richard Royston at the Angel in Ivy-lane 1658. The general Preface to the ensuing Tracts 1. I cannot but think it very expedient and very agreeable to Reason that Altercations and Controversies in every kind those especially in Religion should be made to acknowledge their mortality as well as the Controverters themselves by whom the dissensions are kept alive This concerning Gods Decrees of Reward and Punishment as it is much stricken in years and even decrepitly aged so by the blessing of God it is drawing the faster towards its end too The Erroneous side of the controversie is grown so feeble and dispirited what with its wounds and bruises and putrifying sores which in its desperate encounters it hath received and is become so gastly to lookers on that even they who are ashamed to see it falling are more ashamed to hold it up 2. There is not sure a more effectual or shorter course for the putting a period to a Dispute then by proceeding from such principles as are assented to and granted by men of all sides 3. There are not any two Principles more universally received throughout the world then that God is the Author of every thing that is good and that he cannot be the Author of any thing that is evil I mean the evil of sin which is properly evil in it self for the evil of punishment is in it self very good and doth onely seem evil to them that suffer it 4. In these preceding Considerations I began to reason on those two * grounds And supposing my self to be of neither or at least of both parties I was resolved to state the Question between me and my self as I should finally be conducted by those infallible guides religiously intending to go as far and withal resolving to go no farther then those granted Maxims should either carry or allow me 5. I have had the happiness to observe that none of those whom I displeased in the course I took have either dared in †plain terms to deny the truth of my Principles or adventured to discover wherein my deductions could seem illegal but only talking at Rovers they have largely expressed their dislikes without exhibiting to the Reader a reason why except the contract they had made with some vulgar Errors with which my Principles Deductions were very equally inconsistent 6. What deductions they have made from their fanciful notions of Gods praescience and decrees I have abundantly proved to be blasphemous And my proofs have been taken not from Scripture only and Reason and the whole suffrage of Antiquity and the most eminent of the Moderns for Life and Learning but over and above from their own Confessions which in their soberest intervals have happily falne down from their publick Pens So unadvised was * M. Baxter in charging Grotius and others with uncharitable censures and odious inferences for the odious inferences are made by his own dear Brethren and Praedecessors who have avowedly deduced them from those grounds of Theology on which they go whereas Grotius and others have but recited them to their Authors out of their publick works 7. The head spring of their Doctrines is known by the * streams which issue from them as the †tree is known by its fruit * It cannot be a good tree which bringeth forth evil fruit much less is that a good Doctrin whose very Patrons and Abettors have often acknowledgâ—d it doth infer what a thousand times they have themselves inferred from it that God is the natural cause of sin 8. The head-spring of their Doctrines is that of irrespective praedestination or praedetermination of all events antecedent to praescience 9. If Gods eternal Decrees concerning the final estate of man cannot possibly be absolute or irrespective of those respective qualifications by which alone he can be qualified for reward or punishment it cannot chuse but follow by the confession of all that those Decrees are respective or as some express it conditional that is according to Gods prâ—science of such and such qualifications There being clearly no medium of participation or proportion no nor so much as of abnegation betwixt the respectiveness and irrespectiveness of the very same act as they both relate to the very same object For what implies a contradiction is very happily exploded by men of all sorts So as the ruine of the one is the establishing of the other And they that are beaten from the hold of irrespective praedestination must fly to the tenet of the respective by way of refuge there being nothing betwixt them but the pit of Atheism 10. It is confessed by Mr. Whitfield Wollebius and Dr. Twisse against Moulin to name no more that there is parity of reason in the decrees both of Election and Reprobation And the respectiveness of the later doth evince the former to be respective 11. That I have spoken on these subjects according to Gods revealed will and not proceeded a step farther then I was warranted to go by unavoidable deductions from clearest Scripture not enduring their boldness who interpret Gods revealed word by those Caprices of their brains which they presumptuously call Gods secret will alwayes implying this contradiction that it is secret and not secret the following Tracts will make apparent 12. As for those mysterious Questions 1. Why the word of God is preached rather to one sort of men then to another and sometimes to a more impious people then those to whom it is not preached 2. Why the means of conversion perseverance unto the end are not afforded alike to all to whom the Gospel is daily preached and many times in greater measure to an exceedingly evil people then to a people less evil 3. Why some mens lives are prolonged to a happy opportunity of true repentance whilest others are speedily cut off like Corah and his complices in a state of impenitence I never yet have inquired I never will * The secret things belong unto the Lord our God but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children 13. I shall conclude with an Admonition to the unstable and unlearned among the people that they beware of those Teachers who prefer the interest of their Faction before the honour of their God and will rather take part with a Presbyterian in making God to be the Author and cause of sin then live in any kind of charity with an Episcopal Divine who proves that Doctrine to be blasphemous Some have made themselves examples of this prodigious partiality whilest even in Print they have thought it fitter that a Brother of the
for the first was not destroyed and the second did not die at that determinate time when God had threatned they should Of which no reason can be given but that Gods Purposes and Decrees Threats were conditional on supposition of their Impenitence he threatned to destroy and therefore on sight of their Repentance he promis'd to preserve And from hence it is natural to argue thus Is God so merciful to bodies and is he lesse merciful to souls Does he decree temporal Iudgements conditionally because he is pitiful and will he decree eternal ones absolutely meerly because he will Is he so unwilling to inflict the first death and will he shew his power his absolute power in the second Did he spare the Ninevites in this life because they were penitent and will he damn them in the next because they were Heathens by his peremptory Decree Is he milde in small things severe in the greatest Is there no other way to understand those Texts in the 9. to the Romans than by making those Texts which sound severely to clash against those that sound compassionately Is it not a more sober a more reasonable Course to interpret hard and doubtfull Texts by a far greater number more clear and easie than perversly to interpret a clear Text by a doubtfull one or an easie Text by one that 's difficult which is to shew the light by the darknesse Or if some Texts have two senses if some Texts are liable to many more must we needs take them in the worst and that in meer contradiction to the universall Church If I had no other argument against an absolute Reprobation this one were sufficient to prevail with me That that Father of mercies and God of all consolation who spareth when we deserve punishment did not determine us to punishment without any respect to our indeservings He that had mercy upon wicked Ahab meerly because of his Attrition did not absolutely damn him before he had done either good or evill before the foundations of the world were laid He doth not afflict willingly nor grieve the children of men Lam. 3. 33. much lesse doth he damn them for his meer will and pleasure When God doth execute a temporall punishment upon such as already have deserv'd it he comes to it with reluctation {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} and therefore calls it his * strange work a work he loves not to be acquainted with a work which he doth sometimes execute because he is Iust but still * unwillingly because he is compassionate And he therefore so expresses it as we are wont to do a thing we are not us'd to and know not how to set about How shall I give thee up Ephraim how shall I deliver thee Israel how shall I make thee as Admah how shall I set thee as Zeboim Mine heart is turn'd within me my repentings are kindled together I will not execute the fiercenesse of mine anger for I am God and not man Now that God doth professe to afflict unwillingly and many times to repent him of the evill which he thought to do unto his people is a demonstrative argument of his Conditionall decrees in things Temporall by a greater force of Reason in things Eternall 30. My eighth Reason is taken from the little flock which belongs to God and the numerous herd which belongs to Belial which would not have been if they had both been measur'd out by a most absolute Decree For when it pleas'd the Divine goodnesse to suffer death upon the Crosse for all the sins of the world the every drop of whose blood had been sufficiently precious to have purchased the Redemption of ten thousand Adams and ten thousand worlds of his posterity he would not yield the major part unto his Rival Rebel the black prince of darknesse reserving to himself the far lesser portion and all this irrespectively meerly because he would He would not absolutely determine such a general harvest of wheat and tares as freely to yield the Devil the greater crop He would not suffer his Iustice so to triumph over his Mercy who loves that his Mercy should rejoyce against Iudgement It was not for want of a new Instance to shew his Power or his Iustice for they were both most eminent in the great Mystery of Redemption Much greater instances and arguments than an absolute Decree as I could evidently shew if I were but sure of my Readers patience My ninth Reason is taken from the Reprobation of Angels which was not irrespective but in regard to their Apostasie as is and must be confessed by all who place the object of Reprobation in massa corrupta For the overthrowing of which tenent in all the Sublapsarians Dr. Twisse himself does thus argue Si Deus non potuit Angelos reprobare nisi ut contumaces ergo nec homines nisi ut in contumacia perseverantes De Praedest Digres 4. Sect. 4. c. 2. 31. My tenth Reason is taken from the absurdities which have and still must follow if Gods eternal decree of mans misery is not conditional but absolute And those absurdities are discernable by this following Dilemma Let Dives be suppos'd to be the man that is damn'd It is either because he sins or meerly because God will have it so If for the first Reason because he sins then sin is the cause of his damnation and consequently before it From whence it follows that Dives is not damn'd meerly because God will have it so but that God will have it so because he sins Which plainly shews the conditional Decree But if it be said that it is for the second Reason meerly because God will have it so then that absolute Decree to have it so doth either necessitate him to sin damnably or it does not First if it does then how can Dives be guilty of that thing of which Gods absolute Decree is the peremptory Cause Or how can that be guilt which is necessity Dives could as little have cherisht Lazarus as the Tower of Siloe could have spared the Galileans if his will had been no more free than that Tower had a will And secondly if it does not necessitate him to sin damnably then Dives who is damn'd might possibly have not been damn'd From whence it follows that Dives is not damn'd absolutely but in regard to his sins Which had they not been his choice they had not been his but his that did chuse them And it is a contradiction to say a man chuses any thing without a free will or by an absolute necessity which is whether he will or no Besides if God did absolutely decree the end which is damnation and consequently the means which is final impenitence these Absurdities would follow First it would be a Reprobates duty to be damn'd And to endeavour his salvation would be a sin because it were striving against the stream of Gods absolute Will If all men are to
by which a man shall be damn'd if he die Impenitent The later necessity though not the first does extreamly well consist both with the liberty of mans will and Gods conditional Decrees E. G. I am now writing and God foresaw that I am writing yet it does not follow that I must needs write for I can chuse What God foresees must necessarily come to passe but it must come to passe in the same manner that he foresees it He foresees I will write not of necessity but choice so that his fore-sight does not make an absolute and peremptory Necessity but infers a Necessity upon supposition We must mark in a Parenthesis how great a difference there is betwixt the making and the inferring of a Necessity Whatsoever I do there is an absolute Necessity that God should foresee yet God foreseeing my voluntary Action does not make it necessary but on supposition that it is done If all things are present to God as indeed they are his fore-sight must needs be all one with our sight As therefore when I see a man dance as he pleases it is necessary that he do what I see he does but yet my looking on does not make it necessary so Gods foreseeing that man would sin implyed a certainty that so it would be but did not make it an absolutely necessary or involuntary thing For that a thing may be certain in respect of its event and yet not necessary in respect of its cause is no news at all to a considering person who will but duly distinguish Gods Omniscience from his Omnipotence and his Foresight from his Decree and infallible from necessary and spontaneous from voluntary and that which follows as a Consequence onely from that which follows as a consequent If I may judge by those errours which I convince myself to have been in when I was contrary-minded to what I am I see as many mistakes in other men arising from the misfortune of confounding those things which I just now distinguisht as from any one unhappinesse that I can think of And from all that I have spoken upon this last subject it seems inevitably to follow that a suppositive Necessity and none else is very consistent with a free and contingent Action Whilest I see a man sitting it is necessary that he sit but upon supposition that I see him sitting his posture is still a voluntary contingent thing For he sate down when he would and may arise when he pleaseth but still vvith a proviso of Gods permission I desire to be taught vvhat is if this is not exact speaking viz. That God by his prohibition under penalty makes my disobedience become liable to punishment and by his Decree to permit or not hinder me he leaves me in the hand of mine own counsel so in the state of peccability that I may sin perish if I will So that by his prescience that I will sin he hath no manner of influence or causality upon my sin vvhich infers my destruction to be entirely from my self I am a little confident that vvhosoever shall but read Boethius his fifth book and reading shall understand it and understanding shall have the modesty to retract an errour he vvill not reverence the 4. Section of the 23. chapter of the 3. book of Institutions because it is Mr. Calvins but vvill suspect Mr. Calvin because of that Section The question there is Whether Reprobates vvere predestined to that corruption vvhich is the cause of Damnation To vvhich he ansvvers vvith a Fateor I confesse that all the sons of Adam by the expresse vvill of God fell dovvn into the misery of that condition in vvhich they are fetter'd and intangled And a little after he professeth that no account can be given but by having recourse to the sole vvill of God the cause of vvhich lies hidden vvithin it self And that vve may not think he speaketh onely of the posterity of Adam he telleth us plainly in the close of that Section that no other cause can be given for the defection of Angels than that God did reprobate reject them In this place I vvould ask Was the Angels Defection or Apostasie their sin or no If not vvhy vvere they reprobated and cast into chains of darknesse and if it vvere hovv then is Gods Reprobation not only the chief but the onely Cause of such a sin This is the sad effect of being enslaved to an opinion and of being asham'd of that liberty vvhich looks like being conquer'd I believe the love of victory hath been the cause of as many mischiefs as have been feigned to leap forth from Pandora's Box Whereas if every one that writes would but think it a noble and an honourable thing to lead his ovvn pride captive to triumph over his own conceitednesse and opiniastrete and to pursue the glory of a well-natured submission there is perhaps hardly an Author of any considerable length but might think he had reason to write a book of retractations And sure it will not be immodesty for a young man to say That many old men might have done it with as much reason as S. Austin 40. But as I have learnt of Boethius that most excellent Christian aswell as Senator and profound Divine as well as Philosopher who lived a Terrour to Heresie and died a Martyr for the Truth to distinguish of Necessity so have I learnt from other Ancients to distinguish better of Gods will than I was wont to do before the time of my Retractation First I distinguish with S. Chrysostome of a first and second Will Gods first will is that the sinner shall not die but rather return from his wickednesse and live his second will is that he who refuseth to return receive the wages of iniquity Secondly I distinguish with Damascene of an antecedent and a consequent will The antecedent is that by which he wils that every sinner should repent his consequent is that by which he preordaineth the damnation of the impenitent Which distinction is not made in respect of Gods will simply in which there cannot be either prius or posterius but in respect of the things which are the object of his will For every thing is will'd lâ—y God so far forth as it is good Now a thing consider'd absolutely may be good or evil which in a comparative consideration may be quite contrary E. G. To save the life of a man is good and to destroy a man is evil in a first and absolute consideration But if a man secondly be compared with his having been a murderer then to save his life is evil and to destroy it good From whence it may be said of a just Iudge that by his antecedent will he desires every man should live but by a consequent will decrees the death of the Murderer and even then he doth so distinguish the murderer from the man that he wisheth the man were not a murderer whom he condemns as murderer
infallibility of coming to passe is inferr'd from his prescience only by way of consequence It is one thing to follow as the effect of a Cause in order of Nature and quite another to follow as the sequel of an Antecedent in way of Argumentation The short and plain upshot of all is this The precious vessels of Election do very certainly and infallibly persevere unto the end and that by reason of Gods omniscience which cannot be deceived but not of necessity and irresistibly by reason of his omnipotence which cannot be frustrate nor defeated What God foresees shall come to passe shall infallibly come to passe and that because he cannot erre who is omniscient On the other side what God decrees shall come to passe must come to passe of necessity because he cannot be resisted who is omnipotent 49. Hence it is easie to distinguish betwixt the other two things which have been so often so unhappily confounded I mean sufficient effectual and irresistible applied to Grace 1. Sufficient Grace is that which possibly may produce that effect for which it is given 2. Effectual is that which certainly will 3. Irresistible is that which necessarily must That wch is irresistible doth carry away its object to what it pleaseth like a mighty Torrent by indisputable force maugre the greatest opposition that can be made and therefore cannot take place in the elections of the will which ceaseth to elect after the nature of a will in case it be made to do any thing whether it will or no as hath already been shew'd from no lesse a concession than that of Doctor Twisse but that which is only effectual is quite another thing and doth prevail upon the will not ineluctably but infallibly It doth so strongly and effectually incline the will at such critical opportunities and by such congruous means as that the will doth very certainly and undoubtedly assent but it doth not so irresistibly and compulsively necessitate as to take away the freedome and possibility of assenting by making it do what it doth even whether it will or no 50. I discern the truth of this distinction with greater ease by having alwaies in my prospect the very great difference betwixt the generical notion of acting or taking and the specifical notion of willing or chusing God indeed if it please him can by his absolute power over his Creature make him act this thing or take that thing by ineluctable Necessity and whether he will or no but then that acting is not volition and that taking is not choice for the very word choice cannot be apprehended but it must carry along with it a sound of freedome Optio must be optimorum and so duorum at least It is of two things or more that we chuse the best whether in reality or in appearance And this liberty of the will by which we chuse being acknowledged on all sides as well by Mr. Perkins and Dr. Twisse as by Bellarmine and Arminius as every man knows that hath but read and compar'd them that famous {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} of a twofold Necessity the one of coaction and the other of infallibility being built upon a manifest and grosse mistake both of the word Necessity and the word Infallibility seems to me to be serviceable to no other end than to cover a wound which 't is impossible to cure But admit of that distinction of a twofold Necessity or admit a Necessity be twenty fold yet still it ceaseth not to have the nature of a Necessity If it is absolutely necessary that I must go to London it doth not cease to be Necessity because I am drawn rather than driven Coaction and infallibility if they do both imply an absolute and peremptory necessity and so by consequence an irresistibility and so by consequence are opposed to the elective faculty of the Will it is no matter how they differ in their syllables and their sounds Shall I declare my judgement then although in weaknesse yet in sincerity how free-will is necessary to the chusing of good to which without Grace it is altogether insufficient My judgement is that it is necessary not as a Cause but as a Condition not as that by vertue of which we can do any thing that is good but as that without which we cannot chuse it God's Grace alone is the cause of the good but man's will is as really the instrument of the choice We can do good as God's Engines without a will and so did Balaams Asse without a Reason but we cannot chuse good without a free-will as that Asse could not possibly understand what she spake without a Ratiocination This seems to me to be as plain as the light And now I speak of the light if my Reader please by that light I will make it plain We know the Sun is the fountain or cause of light and light the onely means by which we see But yet the opening of the Eye-lid is a necessary condition because if I wink I am dark at noon And if my Eye-lid is held open by such a power as I cannot resist my Eye in that case cannot chuse but see and therefore cannot chuse to see My sight may be with delectation but not properly with that which is call'd election Thus if a man be never so much delighted in doing good but by reason of necessity cannot possibly but do it it is God that chuseth that good and the man doth onely act it I say God chuseth by a catachrestical way of speaking meerly the better to shew my thoughts For though God did chuse to make a world and one world because it was in his power to have made many worlds or none at all yet I conceive it absurd to say that God did chuse to be good or that he chuseth to do good in opposition to evil because he is good and doth good by an absolute necessity he cannot chuse to be or to do any otherwise And so he loves but doth not chuse it For if that were true speaking it would be as true speaking to say That God doth will his being and doing good whether he will or no or that he cannot chuse but chuse which is sure very childish untoward speaking Onely he chuseth to enable us to do it because he can chuse whether he will so enable us or not When he giveth us his Grace he hath the power to withhold it when he continueth his Grace he hath the power to withdraw it therefore doth he chuse both to give and to continue it The goodnesse of his essence is not arbitrary and elective but spontaneous and natural whereas the goodnesse of his effects in all his Creatures is not naturally necessary in respect of him but arbitrary and elective meerly depending upon his choice and pleasure for he gave us our goodnesse when he would and may take it away when he plcaseth To understand this the better and to hold it the faster
doth run this way And not to trouble my Reader with such a Catalogue of particulars as I gave in before for a Conditional reprobation which yet I think were very easie upon a very small warning I will content my self at present to prove what I say from the confessions of Beza and Doctor Twisse First Beza in his Comment upon Rom. 11. 2. rejects the Iudgement of the Fathers because they are not as he would have them for the absolute irrespective unconditional way And Dr. Twisse confesseth that all the Ancients before St. Austin did place the object of God's Election in Fide praevisa At which St. Austin was so far from being any way displeased as that with very great reverence to their Authority he made it appear to be an innocent and harmlesse Tenent He affirmed that all the Fathers who lived before himself agreed in this That the Grace of God is not prevented by humane merits Which one profession he thought sufficient for the asserting of the free Grace of the Divine praedestination To which saying of St. Austin because I find that Dr. Twisse doth very readily subscribe I ought in reason to be secured from any very hard censure because I am not an affirmer of humane merits much lesse do I place them in a precedency to Grace 60. I conclude with a desire of so much liberty of conscience as to believe with St. Paul That God is a respecter not of * Persons but of * Works That my sins are perfectly and entirely mine own And that if I do any thing that is good it is not I that do it but the a Grace of God that is in me Yet so as that I can b do all things through him that strengthens me And who doth so strengthen as that I may do them but not so force me as that I must In this and every other thing I have been long since taught by Vincentius Lirinensis whom I shall ever observe to the utmost of my discretion to opine with the most and most judicious rather than with the fewest and least discerning Opiniastrete is a fault but Fallibility is none If my Teachers are in the right they have knowledge enough to make me moderately instructed if they are anywhere in the wrong they have authority enough to make me pardonably erroneous if I have not perspicacity to comprehend them as they deserve it seems they have Depths enough to prove I am invincibly ignorant The End A Post-script HAving been many times desired and at last prevailed with to permit these Notes a second time unto the Presse I somewhat more than intended for I had made some preparations as well by adding many things as by omitting some * * I mean the things that are personal onely by way of Remonstrance or Apologie and not exactly material to the Questions under Debate few to have improved and advanced them into the dignity of a Volume to which in justice as well as modesty they have not hitherto pretended But I was prompted by second thoughts to which I commonly submit my first onely to add such running Titles over the heads of the Pages with such notifications of the chapters and sections relating to them as seemed to be of advantage to common Readers neither inlarging nor diminishing the things themselves but taking care to have them printed not onely page for page but line for line as they were before And to this course I was led by two reasons more especially First that no correptory Correptor might have any pretence for new Inventions and not onely no cause but no occasion to accuse me of Tergiversation Next that the Reader might discerne with his greatest ease in what an incomparable manner both my words and pages had been misquoted by my Correptor in his Aspersions and how truly cited by me in my Defence Whosoever shall have the patience to view the structure here laid and those unquestionable Pillars on which it lies or shall be at the pains to compare the Rivulets with those * * p. 6. two Fountains from whence they stream He will think it more than strange that any man should be transported with such exorbitancies of passion as to load me with dirt for no other reason than that he hated to see me clean that so much money and sweat and time and conscience should be so lavishly laid out in such impure and cheap stuffe as Pelagian Socinian Jesuitical Atheistical Dragon Devil Impudent Diabolical Satanical Blasphemer and a world of merchandize besides fetcht from the same place of Traffick and all for no other cause or provocation than my clearing God's Will and laying blame upon mine own This kind of usage puts me in mind of what was said by King Iames in that Preface which he made to his Basilicon Doron * * {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} in Praes. ad lect. p. 6 7. If the charitable Reader will advisedly consider both the method and matter of my Treatise he will easily judge what wrong I have sustained by the carping at both I would have thought my sincere plainness in the first part should have dâ—tted the mouth of the most envious Momus that eveâ— hell did hatch they are the Kings own words from â—aâ—king at any other part of my Book upon that Ground except they would alledge me to be contrary to my self which in so small a Volume would smell of too great weakness s 〈…〉 pperiness of memory * * Ibid. p. 16. Some fraughted with causelesse envy at the Author did greediâ—y search out the Book thinking their stomach fit enough for turning never so wholsome food into noisome and infective humors which hath inforced the untimous divulgating of this Book far contrary to my intentions as I have already said * * p. 20. Well leaving these new Baptizers and Blockers of others mens Books to their own Follies I return to my purpose This again puts me in mind of what was said by another King to whom King Iames was but a Subject ††Mat. 10. 24 â—5 If they have called the Master of the house Beelzebub how much more shall they call them of his household The Disciple is not above his Master nor the servant above his Lord it is enough for the Disciple that he be as his Master and the servant as his Lord So that I have no reason to afflict my self with any Calumnies already past or to flatter my self with any hopes that I shall be able to prevent them for the time to come for when the children of Men are set upon it to be injurious neither the Serpent nor the Dove nor both together can escape them Had there been place of evasion either for innocence or circumspection innocence giving no cause and circumspection cutting off occasions sure Iohn the Baptist had not been slander'd much lesse our Saviour Yet were they each of them slander'd not onely upon