deserved it And so you lose your cause Thirdly the Apostle saith Lust when it hath conceived it bringeth forth sinne and sinne when it is finished bringeth forth death Jam. 1.13 14. To avoid the force of this Scripture you tell us That sinne doth not bring forth death as lust doth bring forth sinne sinne is lusts natural seed but death hath no conceptions by any seed of sinne page 94. But Sir I would entreat you to leave all windings and shifts deale plainly with the words of the text The Apostle saith sinne when it is finished bringeth forth death I do here put it upon you to give a down-right answer seeing the words of the Apostle are so plain If sinne doth any way bring forth death then we must needs conclude that sinne is the cause of death and this is the true meaning of the Apostle But seeing you bind so much upon the Lords institution who hath threatned death to the sinner let us come to the original text In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt dye the death And here setting the Lords prohibition aside I do willingly yield that there was no evil in the tree of knowledge of good and evil if we go to evil in the intrinsecal nature thereof but the Lord having forbidden it it was evil to go against his Command In this sense I say though death was threatned by God yet Adams own personal sinne was the meritorious cause of death to himself and to all his posterity And this is the ground of the Apostles speech By one man sinne entred into the world and death by sinne and death hath past over all men unto condemnation You labour in many pages together to prove that Adams sinne was no cause of his condemnation and when all comes to all This is your chief ground that the Lord in his institution did ordain to punish sin and sinners with death and therefore sinne is not the meritorious cause of death Good Sir may not both stand together as social causes what do you think of the two Malefactors that were hanged upon the Cross the one on the right hand and the other on the left hand of our Saviour Were they not both put to death by the sentence of the Law yet for all this they were the cause of their own condemnation The converted thief will tell you as much Doest thou not fear God seeing thou art in the same condemnation And we indeed justly suffer for we receive the due reward of our deeds Luke 23.40 41. In like manner I say though death was inflicted upon Adam as the just judgment of God yet Adams sinne was the cause of his own condemnation Now whereas you call death a righteous branch It is true if you look to the sentence of the just Judge who hath appointed death as the punishment of sinne yet if you look unto the nature of death he is an enemy The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death 1 Cor. 15.26 Further in the book of the Revelation we read that after the Beast the false Prophet and the Dragon were cast into the lake of fire then death it self was cast into the lake of fire Rev. 20.14 What is the meaning of this but that the Lord Christ is Head and King of the Church and will tread down all his enemies in the several and respective times appointed for their destruction and then last of all death it self shall come to be destroyed If death then be an enemy the last enemy and shall be destroyed as an enemy how can you affirme that it is a righteous Branch Further you argue That death cannot be the fruit of sinne seeing God hath pleased to punish sinne with death sinne and punishment for sinne agree no more than light and darknesse page 91. If this be your opinion I pray you tell me what do you think of that case where God doth punish one sinne with another He gave up the Gentiles to vile affections that they might receive in themselves that recompence of their error which was meet Rom. 1.23 24. If one sinne may be the punishment of another why do you put such a difference betwixt sinne and punishment as betwixt light and darknesse you have another evasion to help you our you say The very voice or death is enough to scare a sinner from his sinnes therefore death is not the natural fruit of sinne page 95. Give me leave to observe the same way of reasoning The Devil if he should visibly appear the very sight of him would be enough to scare a sinner from his sins Therefore a wicked sinner when he doth commit sinne doth not fulfill the lusts of his father the Devil which is to go point blank against the Scripture John 8.44 After this you come to answer a weak and incongruous objection of your own making you feign an adversary to reason in this wile If there had been no sinne there had been no punishment therefore pun shmext must be produced by sinne page 949. In this you deceive your self we do not argue so loosely to make every antecedent a necessary cause of that which cometh after for then by the like reason you might argue as you do If there had been no Law there had been no transgression therefore transgression is produced by the Law We say that sin doth not go before death as a meet antecedent or occasion only but as the meritorious cause of death the Apostle saith sinne bringeth forth death as the cause doth the effect and the wages of sinne is death when the work is done the wages is to be paid Last of all you come to the particular examples of Corah of Herod of Ananias and Sapphira and from thence you reason If death be the natural fruit of sinne why are not all Rebels punished as Corah all proud men as well as Herod all guilty of the sinne of equivocation as well as Ananias This is the substance of your argument page 99 100. To all which I make this answer unlesse they repent they shall meet with the same righteous judgment of God The Lord is free in the execution of judgment as upon those eighteen on whom the Tower in Siloah fel yet that it may appear to you that death is the natural fruit of sinne and that sinne is the meritorious cause of death our Saviour shuts up the matter with these words unlesse you repent you shall all likewise perish Luke 13.1 2 3 4 5. But you go on and strike still upon the same string If I should allow as much demerit in Adams disobedience to bring death as Christ had merit in his obedience both active and passive to bring life into the world yet it would not amount to such a pitch to be the onely cause For though the obedience of Christ was the cause of the coming of life into the world yet the appointment of God was as principal a cause as the obedience of Christ And so though sinne
had been ten thousand times more sinful yet without an Ordinance from God death could never have seized upon the world page 101. 102 103. What is all this but a palpable and grosse mistake of the question or as Logicians call it an ignorance of the elench We do confesse as shrist brought life into the world he brought it in by the institution of his Father so when sinne brought death into the world it was by the just appointment of God to punish sinne with death The question that is in debate betwixt us is whether sinne be the 〈◊〉 cause of death as the obedience of Christ active and passive is the meritorious cause of life If you yield this as yield it you must we have as much as we do desire Next you enquire how sinne may be the cause of condemnation supposing that it cannot be the principal cause you demand whether it may be a cause in subordination And here you tell us that sinne will not be found neither seeing such causes are good in their own nature Well then what is the cause you tell us seeing sinne is an invention of man and the Devil a meere accident that cleaveth to the subject man we may call sinne an accidental cause of condemnation seizing upon man found sinful page 105. If this way of reasoning be good why may not I proceed in the like manner Heat is an accident in the subject fire therefore the heat of the fire is a meere accidental cause of the boyling of the water The force of your reason is no better when you say sinne is a meere accident in the subject man therefore it is onely the accidental cause of condemnation If you well observe the expression you shall find it to be very absurd to call sin a meere accidental cause of condemnation Condemnation is alwayes set in relation to the guilt of some sinne that doth deserve it how then can you call sinne an accidental cause of condemnation The Scriptures say that the Lord will render to every one according to his works that they who commit such things are worthy of death And many passages of the like kind What will you say to all this Here you have a pretty shift to help you out Sinne say you puts a man in a sutable disposition and qualification for death page 106. Indeed our Divines when they speak of eternal life that the Lord will render to every man according to his works they take the word worthy onely for a sutable qualification According to that of the Apostle he hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the Saints in light Col. 1.12 Though this may be affirmed of the Saints that they are made meet for eternal life it were too short and too diminuent an expression to affirme that wicked men onely are made suitable to receive vengeance for then the wicked are no more worthy of eternal death then the Saints are worthy of eternal life ☞ which is plainly to crosse the Apostle the wages of sinne is death but the gift of God is eternal life I cannot then but mention your words with a kind of horrour with which you close the Chapter speaking of the wicked they are say you a sutable matter to receive vengeance as Gods people are sutable to receive all the joyes of eternal life Now the joyes of eternal life are the free-gift of God All qualifications dispositions frames of spirit though never so evangelical in the abundance thereof do not abate the worth of an hair of eternal life to be the free-gift of God For there was not the least desarts in a holy life to the procuring of eternal salvation but onely it was the will of God to make eternal life as a Crown to put upon the head of those men that lived holy here which were fit or sutable for the Crown of honour So men that have lived never so notoriously wicked rebeling and blaspheming against God day after day to their lives end are no otherwise worthy than persons fitted as the true subjects sutable for wrath and God is as simply and intirely the authour of the one as the other And so farre you Now I leave it to all tender consciences to understand and to give sentence We do willingly confesse that we cannot merit any thing by our own works in the way to salvation there being such a disproportion between them and the glory to come But I do detest and abhorre that speech of yours when you say that the greatest sinner who continues so all his life long is no otherwise worthy of death than a person fitted or a subject made sutable for wrath and that God is as much the cause of the damnation of the one as the salvation of the other If this doctrine of yours be sound and Orthodox why may not the wicked in hell cast all upon God as the sole Authour of their misery as well as the Saints in heaven ascribe all to the glory of his free grace I will use your own words though to farre better purpose If a man should study many years for a destroying Principle to dishonour his Creator he could not parallel this which is the sharpest Sword that was ever drawn against the righteousnesse of God I have staid the longer upon this point because you have used so many arguments to prove sin to be no meritorious cause of condemnation I have more carefully endeavoured to vindicate the truth because this is one of the first fundamentals that is put into the heart of the Gentiles They knowing the judgment of God against them which do such things that they are worthy of death not only do the same but have pleasure in them that do them Rom. 1.32 That sinne is the meritorious cause of death and that a sinner is worthy of death is graven in the heart of every man alive and God at seasons doth stirre up the confideration of the guilt of sinne in the conscience of the Gentiles to look after pardon and to make their peace with God The first convictions of the Spirit do begin with considerations of the Godhead and the guilt of sinne that so men may be brought to see their misery And yet you teach us here in this Chapter that sinne is not the meritorious cause of condemnation Now we proceed to your next Chapter CHAP. XII What Adam retained of his forfeiture till his death HERE also you teach such things as do little lesse then strike at the foundation You tell us that Adam after the fall for his body had all the parts and lineaments thereof He had his senses and retained his knowledge And further you adde I make no question but God had so ordered the imployments that he had for Adam some of them to be more spiritual than ever he had to do before his fall and then that he should utterly disable him from the performance thereof will never be made good by any man under
greater caution The Treatise of Luther de servo arbitrio is questionlesse in it self a worthy work yet I think that Calvin in his answer to Albertus Pighins did not speak amisse This also is true some things which Luther wrote in a Scholastical kind of way and in a lesse popular style Philip Melancthon by his prudent and dextrous bending it to the milder part did more fitly apply to the ordinary capacity of men and to the common use of life Yet for all this in other places that great instrument of reformation doth so abundantly speak of the freenesse of the grace of Christ to every broken-hearted sinner that he doth satisfie all tender consciences and leave a solid foundation for the endeavour of man Now every one cannot do this for they that follow the asperity and the rigour of Luther in some positions of his cannot with the same spiritual evidence set forth the grace of the Gospel And so it comes to passe that the harshnesse and the incongruity imputed to the doctrine is indeed and in truth no other but the sole defect of the Teacher By right spiritual truths should have spiritual Teachers and spiritual hearers and then a true judgment may be made of the real excellency and worth of them These things considered I do intend to observe these rules in the ensuing discourse First laying aside all nice and curious speculations to retain so much of the termes of the School-men that will serve onely to explaine the doctrine of the Gospel that spiritual things may be set forth in a spiritual manner Secondly my scope the Lord enabling shall be as to speak the pure truth so likewise the whole truth of God When I speak of the impurity of the natural birth then I will take occasion to shew also how this doth referre immediately to the grace that doth regenerate and when I shall have occasion to speak of Adam as a root of corruption to all his branches I shall as carefully remember that this is a counterpane to Christ being a root of grace and spiritual life also to all his branches When it shall come in my way to mention the imperfection of man and the spirituality of the command I shall be as careful to inculcate that which doth answer to it viz. that all help is to be had from the Word of promise When I shall say that a man hath no free-will by nature to that which is spiritually good I shall be as willing to recite the true cause where the freedome is to be had to wit from the Son of God if the Sonne will make you free you shall be free indeed Further where I shall speak of a certain number of elect which the Lord doth decree curtainly and infallibly to bring to glory I shall demonstrate also that this necessity of infallibility doth not nor cannot whatsoever men may think overturne the liberty of the will For those that the Lord hath certainly appointed to salvation he will as certainly first or last sooner or later draw their wills so effectually that they shall freely choose the way and meanes that lead to salvation as the end Those and such liketruths that are usually misunderstood through inconsiderate handling I shall endeavour to represent them in their true beauty For as it is with the members of the body so it is with these myseries of salvation Being considered apart they seem to be deform'd but being put together there is an excellent correspondence and symetry in the whole Finally according to our Saviours rule I shall endeavour I hope without detriment to either part to give to grace that which doth belong to her and to the will that which doth belong to her I would not take the least dramme from the true grace of God so on the otherside I would have the will to work under the grace received These are the reasons of publishing the treatise in these times I rest thine in the Lord N. S. The Arguments of each Book The first Book in Mr. Everards Method Chap. 1. WHat were the causes that gave Adam his being Chap. 2. Wherein Adams abilities did consist Chap. 3. Whether righteousnesse and holinesse be Gods image Chap. 4. Wherein that image did consist that God did create Adam in Chap. 5. Concerning the power that God gave Adam and what is the definition thereof Chap. 6. Adams entertainment in the garden Chap. 7. Free-will in the nature thereof unfolded Chap. 8. How far God assisted Adam or assisteth other men that they might be such free-willers as hath been described Chap. 9. Though God gives power he gives not the actions of obedience Chap. 10. Concerning divers questions with their solutions Chap. 11. Whether Adams sinne or any other mans sinne doth produce death in a natural way Chap. 12. What Adam retained of his forfeiture till his death Chap. 13. Whether Adam did dye the same day that he eate of the forbidden fruit Chap. 14. Whether Adam did dye a spiritual death yea or no Chap. 15. Whether Adams posterity were guilty of his transgression This point is more fully debated The Second Book in the method of the Examiners Sect. 1. WHat places of Scripture they bring to prove the purity of the natural birth Sect. 2. What answer they endeavour to make to the texts alledged by us The third Book in the method of Dr. Taylor Sect. 1. OF Concupiscence and Original sin and whether or no and how far we are bound to repent of it Sect. 2. A consideration of objections against the former doctrine Sect. 3. How God punishes the fathers sinne upon the children Sect. 4. Of the causes of the universal wickedness of mankind Sect. 5. Of the liberty of election remaining after Adams fall The first Book containing the Answer to Master EVERARD concerning the Creation and fall of Man SIR OCcasion being given to me to read over your Treatise concerning the creation and the fall of Adam I shall now endeavour to give you an account what I judge of your doctrine I shall not stand upon every point but onely upon that which is of special moment In the end of your Introduction you signifie the cause of your undertaking in these words Whereby we may be the more enabled to vindicate the Righteous Creatour from many misconstructions which have been for a long time nourished for want of due consideration For the vindicating of the Righteous Creator I shall be no enemy to you so farre as you go according to the rule of the Word and the analogy of faith But I fear under the colour of this pretended Vindication you drive a designe to put Christ out of place Through the whole body of your Treatise you stand upon the purity of nature the denial of Original sin and the improvement of natural abilities We will go in your method and begin with your first Chapter CHAP. I. What were the causes that gave Adam his being HEre you debate the efficient material formal and final
depend upon your Institution I must tell you that neither Arminius nor Corvinus nor any other of that party to my knowledge did ever spin such a course thread as you do For though they stand upon it that Adam had not abilities to beleeve in Christ to raise himself from his fal yet none of them do utter such speeches as these that Adam was altogether destitute of the Spirit of God and that he was a meer carnal man before his fall This to my understanding doth cast a blurre upon the Creator himselfe Now I would intreat you to shew some further reason wherefore the Image of God did not stand in spiritual light You say it remaineth yet to prove that Adam had a supernatural light Which they will never be able to do unlesse they will prove that he was set about some spiritual employments For God giving light suitable to the employment he sets his creature about so suitably God proportions his light that it might be just suitable for his works and no more page 16. And for the works wherein Adam was employed you tell us what they were p. 17. He was to look after the Garden to dresse and keep it and to settle names and titles upon every creature to eat and drink with such like works as also to bear rule and dominion over the creatures But Sir in this point you are wonderful fallacious For first what warrant have you to take the height length and breadth of Adams abilities from his present employments There is many a true Christian man in these times that doth beleeve some truths who hath ability to receive more if it would please the Lord to reveal them So we may say in the like case concerning Adam he was able to receive more truths if they had been revealed and to do more duties if he had been commanded We are not absolutely to tie and confine mens abilities to their present employments Further what ground have you to affirm that Adams employment was only in those externals of keeping the Garden and giving names to all cattel c Will you argue because you reade of no more that therefore he had no more employment Thirdly suppose it should be granted to you that Adam was wholly taken up in these outward actions this doth not prove that he was destitute of spiritual abilities When the Apostle speaks to servants to obey their Masters according to the flesh Eph. 6.5 There is no man doubts but he speaks of an outward work but when he saith that they should do it with singlenesse of heart as unto the Lord Christ and not unto men Here is the performance of an outward service in a spiritual manner Even so Adam might be spiritually employed in those works of his of dressing the Garden and of giving names to all cattel c. And thus we have tried your Reasons how far you are able to prove that the Image of God in Adam did not consist in righteousnesse and true holinesse and that he was not a spiritual man before his fall This also is the doctrine of the Thirty Separate Congregations who place the Image of God only in Lordship and dominion over the creature Next you come to enquire Whether the Image of God in dam did consist in degrees of light And here say you if this be admitted upon such a supposition not one in all the world can tell what it is to beare the title for how can they tell of what height length and breadth this knowledge should be of page 17.18 To ease you of all the pains of searching out the several degrees of longitude or latitude I say precisely at that time when a man doth receive the true light of the Spirit he doth resume more or lesse that Image of God which Adam lost And look by how many degrees this light doth increase by so many degrees proportionably this Image of God is renewed The Apostle speaketh very properly to the purpose We all with open face beholding as in a glasse the glory of the Lord are changed into the same Image from glory to glory even as by the Spirit of the Lord 2 Cor. 3.19 Here these foure things are to be noted First the pattern or the Idea we are changed into the same Image to wit into the Image of the Lord Christ himself Secondly the degrees or the several stages we are changed from glory to glory Thirdly the mean or the instrument of the change we all with open face beholding as in a glasse the glory of Christ revealed in the Gospel by prying into it and gazing upon it we are altered and translated into the same image Fourthly the principal cause of the transmutation even as by the Spirit of the Lord by the inward work of the Spirit men come to be enlightned and so more and more to put on the Image of God From these several particulars it is clear that the Regenerate are renewed after the Image of Christ and the excell noy thereof doth stand in spiritual light And this light in substance we say that Adam had before his fall They are the words of the Apostle as we have formerly said renewed in knowledge after the Image of him who created him Further you endeavour to shew that the Image of God did not stand in holinesse You say If it had layen in holinesse never so Evangelical and spiritual surely the woman that beleeved in the Lord Jesus would not have been deprived of that title but the Apostle expostulateth the cause of the difference 1 Cor. 11.7 where he clearly ascribeth that title scil the Image of God to reside only in preheminence page 23. But this will not serve your turne neither for when God created the woman in the beginning she was not only created after his Image in righteousnesse and true holinesse but she was also created in a state to have Lordship over the creature These are the words of the Text So God created man in his own Image in the Image of God created be him male and female created he them And God said unto them be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea Genes 27.28 These words were not only spoken to the first man but to the first woman also and to all mankinde whether male or female that should come of them that they should people the world and bring it in subjection If this be so the man and the woman were both created in that state to have preeminence over the Creation And for the words of the Apostle they do not deny the woman to be made after the Image of God though this Image was more immediately and fundamentally in man the head and lord of the Creation If you look narrowly into the text you shall finde a reason wherefore man doth more immediately bear the Image of God and is a more lively representative of his Majesty because the woman was
Scripture In the beginning you agree that we bear the punishment of another mans sinne But say you that children have any spawn of sinne cleaving to them as seed to hatch and gender in and by any thing received from Adam as we sprang from his loynes this I deny page 136. This also is the judgement of the Examiners in many pages together Now if this be so that infants have no such spawn of original sinne in them why do the Scriptures speak so largely of the pollution of nature why is it said of man in general that the thoughts of the imaginations of his heart are onely evil from his childhood Why doth the Lord Christ so earnestly presse a necessity of regeneration Why doth he urge it upon such a ground as this that which is born of the flesh is flesh There is nothing more clear than that the nature of man is wholly defiled from the very birth And for the Psalmist in his particular though it be true that he did bear the burden of Adams sinne yet it is not the whole nor the full truth The full truth is this that he was conceived in sinne that in the conception his nature was defiled and the natural defilement was the cause of the two great sinnes of murther and adultery And hereupon in relation to his natural pollution he doth pray unto the Lord to give him a new heart he went to the true root and cause of all the evil I must needs acknowledge that the Authors of the Examen when they speak of fallen man they render true causes of his not willing of good First the ignorance of that which is good the second a depraved judgment the third a want of due remembrance the fourth the power of temptation the fifth the habit and custome of sinne page 132. These are indeed true causes but they are too short and too narrow in their determination they do not come to the root of the evil to the inherent perversenesse of the will it self and the pollution of the natural birth When the bottome of a wound is not searched such Mountebanks must needs make a palliate cure Next you say If you will take from Davids particular example the general condition of all infants why do not you take the text concerning John his being sanctified from his mothers womb and argue that all the children of the world are sanctified in that sense as John was sanctified And if this were so there would not be so many lazy Priests and others in the world as there be page 135. For the parallel between David and John there is no equality betwixt them in the present collation For whereas it is said of John that he was sanctified from his mothers womb this was by a peculiar priviledge granted to him And whereas David saith I was shapen in iniquity and in sinne did my mother conceive me he doth not speak this as a King or a Saint or an Israelite but in the most general relation as one of the lost sonnes of men fallen in Adam and born in the corrupted masse and this is the reason why from the particular example of David we draw a general conclusion of the pollution and the defilement of nature in all But the Authours of the Examen do stifly maintain that the nature conveyed from Adam to all his posterity in the way of ordinary generation is not defiled with sinne For say they some are sanctified from the womb as Jeremiah and John the Baptist were and the Virgin Mary might possibly be page 65. Though this may be admitted that some of the Saints may be sanctified sooner then others and the work of sanctification may begin in them from their childhood yet what is all this to the purpose It must necessarily be supposed that corruption will have a being in certain moments of time before the grace of God can have its being Jeremiah was sanctified from his mothers womb yet he did curse the day of his birth he did resolve to speak no more to the people in the name of the Lord he did shew many fruits of the flesh as well as he did manifest many fruits of the Spirit And therefore to the particular case as he did consist of flesh and spirit in him the flesh the Old man had its being before the Spirit and the new man This I beleeve none can rationally deny though they will acknowledge also that he was sanctified from his mothers womb But Mr. Everard to return to you again For the trouble you have with the lazy Priests I fear Sir the more godly the more conscientious the more laborious any Minister is the worse he is in your opinion and in the opinion of such as you are if he oppose the innovations and errors of the times But I pray God give you repentance else you will have an heavy account to make one day for all your hard speeches against the godly Ministry For the text Mat. 18.3 Except ye be converted and become as little children ye cannot enter into the Kingdome of heaven Here say you If infants be so filthy why doth our Saviour set such a pattern before us And the Authours of the Examen also page 70 speak much to the same effect doth not our Saviour say they declare the state of children both to be innocent and blessed when first he makes it terminus ad quem the mark unto which in our conversion and regeneration we must return And then tells us that the Kingdome of heaven belongs to such and is replenished with such I answer in parables and similitudes we are to look onely to the scope Our Saviour speaketh of the unjust Steward of putting the talent to the exchanger of his own coming like a thief in the night What then is it his intent to approve of the evil of these wayes No he doth onely point to something wherein the force of the similitude doth stand And so in the present case when he speaketh of humbling our selves and becoming like little children it is not his purpose to ascribe such perfection to them as though all infants were free from original sinne or that their innocency were the terminus ad quem the terme to which our conversion and regeneration must return These are very strange deductions The words of our Saviour are therefore to be taken only in a restrained sense that in affectation of worldly glory we should be like little children There is no such distance between the children of Princes and the children of beggars but all are one The mind of the Lord is onely this that we should come to act the same things by the power of grace as little children do thorough the weaknesse and infirmity of age We should not look upon Lords and Ladies upon learning or parts or upon any other external excellency in comparison of the grace of God Commonly men that have these things are very proud of them and do look upon them
obedience of one many were made righteous Rom. 5.19 The comparison would be of no value at all if that which is peculiarly spoken to Adam might be applied to any other parent whatsoever in respect of his posterity And of the sinnes which Adam did commit we are not to admire why all are set upon the score of the first sinne When he received original righteousnesse in the beginning he received it not onely for himself but also for his whole posterity And therefore if he had stood he had conveyed it to all his branches but falling he lost it from himself and all his off-spring And this is the reason why all is charged upon the first sinne because that was the sinne of a fiduciary or trustee The parent was entrusted with the whole stock which was not only his own peculiar but also the publick losse of all his posterity If we might suppose that Adam did commit ten thousand sinnes afterward the hurt could not redound to any other but to himself onely For how could he bring dammage to small or great by any disobedient act seeing he was trusted no more You now come to declare your judgment why say you might we not have thought it more safe that that which gave the first occasion to sinnes being was yet the original cause of all other sins committed by him What need we yet to say that sin had any other father or mother than its first parents viz the Devil and temptation Joh. 8.44 Answ I do not deny but in a sense the Devil and temptation may be called the parents of sinne because wicked men are led by the temptations of Satan and do imitate his example But strange it is that you would have no other parents but the Devil and temptation This is in plain termes to excuse men and to make them without blame when any sinne is committed The Apostle doth otherwise state the true cause of sinne every man is drawn away with his own lust and enticed and lust when it hath conceived bringeth forth sinne Jam. 1.13 The sinful will of man and the lust of his heart may be a cause that doth procreate sinne as well as the Devil and temptation And more specially to speak in the case we are now upon concerning the sinne of the first man and the traducing of original sinne to all posterity I do not doubt but the Devil and temptation had a great stroak in the fall of man but we must go to other causes as well as to them Adams own defective will was a chief cause And therefore we read of the great judgments that were inflicted upon him for his disobedience to the command And for that place of Scripture which you alledge Joh. 8.44 He that committeth sinne is of the Devil it is most true that men commit sin by the temptation of the Devil but how doth this prove the point which you undertake that the Devil is the onely parent of sinne and that we need go to no other but to him onely Besides in the case of original sinne as the corruption of nature doth passe by propagation the Apostle saith we must go to one man as the fountain by one man sinne entred into the world and death by sinne c. And therefore if to salve your Tenet you shall alledge that speech you are of your Father the Devil the lusts of your father will you do By this I do confesse that the Devil is proved the first parent of sinne by infusion and suggestion but he is not the father by generation And therefore when the Apostle saith put off as concerning the former conversation the Old man which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts Ephes 4.22 Here by the Old man we are to understand the Old Adam like disposition as it hath passed from Adam to all his posterity This old disposition the Saints are to put off and they are to endeavour to put on the Christ-like nature So then if you will say that the Devil was the first father of sinne by temptation and seduction we will not gain-say it Onely we do intreat you to remember that Adam is the cause of the conveying of original sinne to all his posterity by generation and traduction You have yet more evasions if it might be possible to illude the truth If Adam say you had sinned afterwards how can we say that he had a way to communicate it to all his posterity It is more then the Devil can do to infuse sinne into any man without a mans consent page 142. This is true if you speak in the case of actual sinne onely but for the derivation of original sinne the case is otherwise The corruption of nature is derived from the disobedience of the first man His personal disobedience was sufficient to deprave and vitiate the whole nature ☞ This may be proved by the harmony of Scripture and there is no harshnesse in the point so long as there is such an effectual remedy prepared by the second man for the lost sonnes of men And yet further though the first man by his fall did vitiate the nature without any individual or personal consent of ours yet the lying and living in the sinfulnesse of nature is not without our deliberate and free consent This is the condemnation that light is come into the world and men love darknesse more than light Joh. 3.18 19 20. God doth at sundry seasons open the eyes of men that they may see their natural pollution but they have not a desire to see that which they may see Further you adde some say the want of pure nature is the cause of our sinne but it is plain that the purity of nature exempts not a man from sinne for if it had then Adam had not sinned page 142. We would not have you to mistake our meaning we do not stand so much upon the want of the purity of nature as upon the pollution and depravation of nature And this since the fall is no onely the cause of sinning but also is the true cause why we can do nothing else but sinne And this begins to appear to those who are sanctified by the Spirit and therefore the Apostle saith in me that is in my flesh dwelleth no good thing For other kind of men they do not feel the burden of a carnal mind As a bucket of water weighs nothing in the Well but when it is removed from its proper element then the weight thereof is discerned Pride of heart and other secret lusts are not burdensome to a carnal man who is in his proper element but a spiritual man feels the enmity of these against the command of God and sees by experience that according to the flesh he can do nothing else but sin Further you alledg that it is like that Adam would not have sinned again because he sped so ill page 142. I beleeve it was with him after his fall as it was with David after
natural say you were to have acted such actions as might have testified to the world that they had been lovers of God because those actions were wanting they are said to be unnatural So it may appear that nature was not improved to those ends to which God assigned it page 146. It is true that in these Scriptures the word nature is taken in the better sense yet not in such a sense as will furnish your intention First I do acknowledge that God hath left reliques or remainders of his Law in the hearts of the Gentiles This is commonly called the Law of nature and by this men know that God ought to be worshipped that parents ought to be honoured and that every man is to have his own c. Secondly I yield also that they who go against this Law may rightly be called unnatural because they go against the dictates or principles of of nature Thirdly they who do thus deviate from natural principles do not improve nature to those ends which God hath made it All these things I do allow so far I wil go along with you But how do you prove from hence the purity of nature and that a meer natural man as such is able to understand the things of the Spirit of God You do in the next page distinguish natural men into two kinds these are your words Who requireth no other way to be glorified but by those principles that he had furnished them withal And because they opposed their own nature resusing the counsel of God they are called unnatural because they imployed their nature wholly to satisfie their lusts Such natural men percieve not the things of God The same matter in substance is spoken by the Examiners in the Chapter of free will for the Synod having rightly determined according to the Scriptures that a natural man being altogether averse from that good and dead in sinne he is not able by his own strength to convert himself or prepare himself thereunto Against this passage the men take great offence and as their manner is accuse the Synod for their defects and falshoods For their defects they blame them because they do not distinguish the several kinds of natural men and for their falshoods they accuse them for saying that the fallen man hath lost all ability to spiritual good They distinguish also several kinds of will and tell us in the third place as the will of our first parents so of all men else doth stand in a kind of aequilibrium pag. 128.129 130. Now to take off these several Objections I would entreat both you and them to consider these two points First if you look to the better sort of natural men to those who are no Backbiters no Covenant-breakers c. Whether may not many of these in the most essential vital and spiritual parts of the Law be great enemies against God and be lovers of themselves more than lovers of God If the most refined natural men may be secret enemies why do you and they speak of pure nature and of the improvement of natural abilities when it is certain that men can do no good without the help of the Spirit Natural men may be distinguished into a thousand kinds according to the different circumstances of time and place yet all of them do agree in this that they are natural and without the help of the Spirit they are not able to judge of the things of God Secondly when the Apostle speaketh of the Gentiles who having no Law do by nature the things contained in the Law their thoughts in the mean while accusing or else excusing one another Romans 2.14 When the Gentiles do make use of the Law written in their heart as they do at certain seasons to judge themselves doth not this proceed from the general convictions and workings of the Spirit If the act of self-judging be from the conviction of the Spirit this is no praise to natural abilities but the glory belongs to the grace of God And the words of the Confession are very sound that a natural man cannot convert himself or prepare himself thereunto In which words they do distinguish between conversion it self and the antecedaneous works before conversion In neither of these they say that a natural man is able to do any thing of himself but all his ability is from the help of the Spirit I wonder then what reason the Examiners had given them to cavil at such an innocent expression But if you shall stand upon the letter of the text that the Gentiles do by nature the things contained in the Law Here you may observe that the Apostle doth onely oppose the natural Law to the Law written in tables of stone and communicated to the Church by revelation He never meant that any of the Gentiles meerly by their own strength were able to keep that Law which was made known to them Only at seasons the Spirit did excite and stirre up strong convictions in their consciences to apply those principles and dictates which they had by the light of nature The most common and universal maxime of all men in the world is this that there is a God Why then doth the consideration of the Godhead so forcibly and powerfully awake at some intervals of time more than at others We can give no other reason but this that the truth in the hearts of the Gentiles is like a cinder in the Smiths forge which by the operations and stirrings of the Spirit is enlivened and being once enlivened men have more power to judge themselves and to look after God in those seasons than at others And from hence also we might take occasion to answer that great difficulty in the Epistle to the Romans The Apostle in the first Chapter speaking of the knowledge of the Gentiles and how naturally they hold the truth in unrighteousnesse and that for this cause the Lord doth give them up to a reprobate sense yet in the next Chapter he doth shew that the Gentiles do by nature the things contained in the Law and do shew 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the work of the Law written in their hearts when their thoughts do at sundry times accuse or excuse one another To the resolution of the difficulty we say that the Gentiles so farre forth as they are principled by the corruption of nature are prone to no other but to imprison the light but as they are under and do submit unto the convictions of the Spirit they are helped sometimes to go so farre as to judge themselves and to cry out in their misery O being of beings have mercy upon us The main drift of the Apostle is to shew that Jewes and Gentiles are both under sinne and how by the sight of the misery of nature such of them as are saved come to be saved onely by looking after the grace and the free-mercy of God If this be the meaning of the Spirit what shall we think of pure nature or
this Scripture First seeing they will not have the nature of man to be defiled in Adam how is this common nature called by the title of one man seeing it containeth such an infinite number of men Secondly how did sin by this one man enter into the world For this common nature of one man must either be nature pure or nature impure If they will have this to be meant of nature pure then this necessarily must be the meaning of the text by one common pure natural man sin entered into the world and death by sin c. As this is a strange and wild interpretation in it self so it doth cast the blame only upon God for making such a nature that by it generally death should passe upon all men to condemnation But if to amend the matter they shall say that he made the nature of Adam in creation and the nature of every man pure in natural generation but it is their own fault that they corrupt themselves Here the plaister is not wide enough for the sore for the Apostle gives the reason why death passeth upon all men because in one all have sinned But now if it be true as these Censors say that in one common nature all have not sinned but those only that fall through their personal disobedience Here I would have them to shew why doth death passe upon all men and how will this satisfie the sense of the Apostle By their account then only they should be lyable to death who were guiltie of disobedience in their pure nature But let us suppose that they say by one common nature impure sin entred into the world and then this will be a grosse tautologie Besides if the whole nature of man be impure there must be some cause of the general depravation of nature which will bring us to the disobedience of the first man and so they will lose their cause Further I demand if by one man they understand the common nature of all how will they preserve the Emphasis of the Apostle in opposing one man to all men He plainly saith that death hath passed upon all men but how thorough the means of one man Again how will they make it good that by the disobedience of one many were made sinners in case they take one man for the common nature of men The acts of obedience or disobedience are usually attributed to particular persons that live under some Law But they have a better faculty to cavil at the truth than positively to maintain their own heterogeneal doctrines Let us hear then what cavils they have against the true interpretation of the words First say they this one by whom sinne entred into the world is not meant by our first parent Adam for the Apostle shews that he was not the original or first sinner 1 Tim. 2.14 For Adam was not deceived but the woman being deceived was in the transgression According to your doctrine then the Apostle should have said by one woman sinne entred into the world page 78. Indeed the scope of his doctrine in that text is to shew that the woman was more immediately tempted by Satan and she was first in the transgression yet in the matter of propagating original sinne it is as true also that by one man sinne entred into the world For Adam and Eve make but one root in the propagation of the kind and therefore in the institution of marriage it is said for this cause shall a man leave father and mother and cleave to his wife and they twain shall be one flesh Gen. 2 24. In the case then of Propagation Adam and Eve go but for one and Adam is here immediately opposed to Christ so farre forth as he is the root of all his posterity Secondly say they these words And death passed upon all men 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 are thus to be rendred in as much or so farre forth as all have sinned page 78. Well let the words be rendred which way they will the scope of the text and the connexive particle for do plainly shew that they contain the reason of the general passage of death upon every individual man And therefore we must necessarily and unavoidably come to the disobedience of the first man in whom as in the common root all have sinned Thirdly they thus except If the Apostle had beleeved any such thing as the reigning of death upon all men by the first mans sinne he would not have omitted that and onely mentioned from Adam to Moses page 81. Though he doth speak of the reign of death from Adam to Moses he doth not hereby restrain it to that particular time onely For he plainly saith that death passed upon all men absolutely and universally in all times but he doth mention the time from Adam to Moses in special because then it seemed to be more rational and congruous that sinne should not be imputed because no Law was then publickly delivered yet in this time he affirmeth that all universally were under the reign of death not onely Cain the builders of Babel the people of the old world and the Cities of Sodom all which were destroyed for their personal sinnes but he plainly affirmeth that death reigned over infants in all that interval of time though they never sinned after the similitude of Adams transgression If infants be under the raign of death we must necessarily suppose that sinne must be the cause thereof but infants cannot commit any sinne personally Therefore they must be supposed to be guilty of sinne through the disobedience of Adam And this makes good the main argument of the Apostle by one man sinne entred into the world he doth argue from the effect to the cause because death hath universally past upon all by the disobedience of one therefore all were involved in the guilt of that disobedience Fourthly say they the nineteenth verse is more plain against universal corruption by the first mans disobedience for there the Apostle useth the word many and saith by one mans disobedience many not all were made sinners therefore all did not fall in the first individual Adam page 82. Though the word many be equivocal yet in the sense of the text it must necessarily be meant of every individual man because death hath absolutely passed upon every man no one excepted therefore it necessarily followeth that this passage by the disobedience of one many were made sinners must be meant of every individual man But here they have a cavil the word many in the latter part of the verse must have the same latitude allowed for the Apostle setteth down a full comparison of equals in that verse Here the verse must be thus interpreted that as by one mans disobedience all were made sinners so by one mans obedience all were made righteous page 82. Neither will this help the matter for it is not necessary that there should be the same latitude in the collation betwixt the first and the second
much exercise by and through which men think to come to the habit of virtue So on the contrary part let us see what principles the Apostle doth lay down for the attaining of the divine nature and let us compare them with those which our Author brings out of Horace and Seneca First the Apostle points to the promises there are given to us exceeding great and precious promises that by these ye may be made partakers of the divine nature What these promises are we finde mentioned in the Scripture I will put my law in their heart and write it in their inward part Jer. 31.33 A new heart and a new spirit I will give them I will take out of their bowels the heart of stone and will give them a heart of flesh Ezek. 36.26 These are called exceeding great promises because they containe the greatest things for what greater thing is there than to change the nature of a man It is as great a work as to bring Israel out of Egypt to divide the sea and to make the sun stand still They are called also honourable or precious promises to a spiritual understanding they are of an higher value than the greatest treasures of the earth Secondly the way to come to the divine nature is not by the promises alone but by faith in the promises The Apostle doth direct his speech to such that had obtained like precious faith with us verse the first And againe his divine power hath given us all things pertaining to life and godlinesse But how not absolutely but through the knowledge of him that is through faith in him that hath called us to glory and vertue And as it is in another place we are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation 1 Peter 1.5 We are kept by the power of God to salvation but through faith Thirdly the way to come to the divine nature is by the power of God there can be no coming to the divine nature but by the divine power his divine power doth give us all things that doth pertaine to life and godlinesse So then the inward work doth proceed after this method First the promise is freely made Secondly faith apprehendeth the promise Thirdly the promise being apprehended by saith doth engage the power of God to performe that which is promised and so the Saints come to be partakers of the divine nature Lastly the encrease of the nature is by mortification of lusts having escaped the pollution of the world through lust If we speak properly it is neither profit pleasure honour or any thing else that can corrupt the soul were it that she were free in her selfe These are the particulars that concerne the divine nature or the nature of vertue in general The Apostle after this speaks of particular vertues adde to your faith vertue and to vertue knowledge By all these particulars we may discerne for the cherishing of endeavour what little need we have to fly to the rudiments of heathen Philosophy to the purity of the natural birth and to such like dictates of Seneca and Horace These are the things which the Apostle doth admonish us Beware lest any man spoile you through Phylosophy and vaine deceipt after the rudiments of the world Col. 2.8 They that do this do not hold Christ for a head but do go directly against the principles of baptisme and circumcision as all do that deny original sin and plead the purity of the natural birth having gone so far we will returne to our Author againe as he expounds the words of the text By this saith he we may the better understand the following words I will not againe curse the ground for mans sake for the imagination of mans heart is evil from his child-hood Gen. 8.21 Concerning which note that these words are not two sentences For this is not the reason wherefore God gave over smiting for if it had been the reason it would have come to passe that the same cause that would have moved God to smite would also move him to forbeare which were a strange Oeconomy Reply There is no such strange Oeconomy in the words if the scope of both texts be diligently considered In the sixth of Genesis the Lord saith that he would destroy the world because the thoughts of the imagination of mans heart are evil continually Here we have a plaine reason given why the world is destroyed all flesh had corrupted their wayes and this corruption did arise from the common pravity of nature from the first root But in the eighth of Genesis the matter is otherwise The Lord did not look so much to that which man had deserved as to the merit of the blood of Christ figured in the sacrifice of Noah And therefore the words do best go after this tenour I will not curse the ground any more although the thoughts of mans heart are evil from his childhood And therefore we agree with our Author that these words are an aggravation of the kindnesse and mercy of God as if he had said though men be continually evil yet I will not for all that drown the world for mans being so evil The former text doth shew what God might do respect being had to his justice The latter doth shew what he will do with reference to the merit of his Son and his own mercy These things are no way contrary to our assertion We come to the second Scripture I was borne in iniquity and in sinne did my mother conceive me Psalm 51.5 To this he doth endeavour to frame sundry answers First saith he These words are an Hebraisme and signify nothing but an aggrandation of his sinfulnesse and are intended for an high expression meaning that I am wholly and entirely wicked Rely There are I confesse as in other Authors so in the Scriptures some such formes and wayes of expression which are true in the figure but false in the letter But whether this expression is of that nature we cannot easily admit For he prayeth that God would create in him a cleane heart This plainly sheweth that the evil was in his heart from the very beginning Besides other Scriptures do abundantly confirme the litteral interpretation of the words That which is borne of flesh is flesh Joh. 3.6 Borne not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man but of God Joh. 1.13 were by nature the children of wrath as well as others Eph. 2.3 All these plainly expresse the impurity of the natural birth and that the words of the Psalmist are to be taken according to the letter And that Scripture which he seemeth to build so much upon if it be well considered doth not make for his purpose one jot The like saith he is that saying of the Pharisees Thou wert altogether borne in sin and dost thou teach us Joh. 9.35 Which phrase and manner of speaking being plainly a reproach of the poore blind man and a disparagement of him did meane
cannot understand the justice of it because we were not personally guilty why by the same reason doth he not wholly exclude us from having any part of share in the benefit of the death of Christ For what personal act or concurrence have we to the suffering of that death And whereas he alledgeth the ensamples of Pausanias the Grecian General Avidius Cassius and others that would not punish the children for the fathers offence We acknowledge the rationality and the equity of such proceedings but what is this to the case in hand The Law was so given to Adam that was never given to any else but to Christ alone It was given to him as the Headman and the root of the nature If he fell all must fall with him Neither is there any hardnesse or harshnesse in this doctrine as long as the misery by one doth open a door for the grace by the other He goes on If God saith he inflicts this evil upon Adams posterity by using his own right of power and dominion which he hath over his creatures then it is a strange anger which God had against Adam that he still retaines so fierce an indignation as not to take off his hand from striking after five thousand six hundred years and striking him for that of which he repented him and which in all reason we beleeve he then pardoned or resolved to pardon when he promised the Messiah to him Answ If he would but remember himself what he speaks elsewhere he shall finde that he saith the same in effect as we do For though in his further explication page 453. He affirmeth that Adam was made mortal and proves it by his eating and drinking his sleep and recreation by ingestion and egestion by breathing generating and the like which immortal substances never do Though by these and such like mediums he endeavours to prove the mortality of the state in which he was made yet in the same and other places he doth acknowledge that the untimelinesse and infelicity of death came in by the fall By the fall he tells us that Adam was cast into a place of labour and uneasinesse of bryars and thornes ill aire and violent chances The woman was condemned to hard labour and travell and that which troubled her most obedience to her husband c. Now let us take the misery brought in by the fall in such a low and diminutive sense that he would take it It is now above five thousand six hundred yeares that mankind hath been under the miseries and infelicities of death all this while they have continued in a place of labour and uneasinesse of ill aire and hard chances the woman also besides the paines and peril of child-birth hath been subject to her husband for five thousand six hundred years and yet she knows no end of her apprentiship As strange as the anger is against Adam and his posterity he must needs say the same in effect as we do But to give a positive answer These miseries brought in by the fall of Adam have continued and must continue to the end of the world Neither is it a strange thing that the Lord should continue his anger seeing by the continuation thereof he doth continue to drive men to Christ If he pleased he could immediately take away all these miseries brought in by the fall But for most excellent ends to humble men to pluck down their pride to beat them out of their carnal security he doth rather suffer them to abide And for the case of the woman The Apostle doth not deny her pains and perill of child-birth to come in by the fall but then he addeth they shall be saved in child-bearing if they continue in the faith 1 Tim. 2. last Notable to this purpose is that speech of Augustine to Julian the Pelagian est enim aliquid in â—bdito alto ejus consilio c. There is therefore a reason in his hidden and deep counsel why so long as we live in this mortal flesh there is something in us against which our mind may conflict there is something that we may say forgive us our trespasses And a little after therefore it is done in the place of our infirmity that we should not live proudly but should live under a daily need of remission of sinnes Much more to the same purpose What he addes is monstrous false It is not easily saith he to be imagined how Christ reconciled the world unto his Father if after the death of Christ God is so angry with mankind so unappeased that the most innocent part of mankind may perish for Adams sinne and the other are perpetually punished with a corrupted nature a pronenesse to sinne a servile will a filthy concupiscence and an impossibility of being innocent that no faith no Sacrament no prayers no industry can obtain pardon from this punishment Answ It were a very happy thing if this learned man would once think that there were a ninth commandment and that he would make conscience of bearing false-witnesse against his neighbour We say as the case now standeth men are pestred with a corrupted nature with a pronenesse to sinne with a servile will but that there is no remedy to bring us out of this evil this was never affirmed by us There is in the blood of Christ that which will take away the guilt of sinne in the Spirit of Christ to free us from the bondage of corruption and also in his power to raise our bodies at the last Onely it is the good will and pleasure of God in the whole Oeconomy of the salvation of man that we should wait till all these things be fulfilled That is a most sweet passage of Bede taken from some ancienter Authour No man saith he taketh away sinne which the Law although holy and just and good could not take away but he in whom there was no sin Now he taketh away sinnes by pardoning those that are done and by assisting us that they may not be done and by bringing of us to the life where they cannot at all be done and so we are come to an end of this Section SECT 4. Of the causes of the universal wickednesse of mankind In the beginning he doth take upon him to propound an objection If there were not some common principle of evil introduced by the sinne of our parents upon all his posterity how should all men be so naturally inclined to be vicious To this he endeavours to frame many answers First saith he if we will suppose that there must be a cause in our nature determining us to sinne by an unresistible necessity I desire to know why such a principle should be more necessary to us than it was to Adam Repl. As I have said before Adam had onely a possibility to sinne he did sinne so that he had liberty and freedome not to sin But as the case now standeth we can do nothing else but sin It is true in the particular
to that which is spiritually good In this sence our Saviour saith He that commits sin is the servant of sin Joh. 8.36 While they promise themselves liberty they themselves are the servants of corruption 2 Pet. 2.19 But he further saith Men sometimes by evil habits and by choosing vile things along time together make it morally impossible to choose that which is good and to love that in particular which is contrary to their evil customes Heraclitus saith custome is that devil that bringeth in new natures upon us Answ It is most certaine true that many fall under the power of evil by long custome But the maine question is Whether is evil custome the whole and adequate cause of the evil This we deny men by ill custome may intend the habit of original sin as varnish may make colours more orient and God in his just judgement may justly harden men in their sin so that they may be worse than the ordinary sort of natural men This we do willingly confesse but then also we must consider that the bottome and the ground of all the evil doth lye in a sinful nature This doth naturally descend upon us all from Adam the root of corruption and is only to be done away by Christ the root of all grace life spiritual nature as the Scriptures do abundantly testifie Next he cometh to the testimony of the Philosophers Seneca saith nature doth not engage us upon a vice she made us entire she left us free but we make our selves prisoners and slaves by vicious habits Answ It is no way to be doubted but we make our selves slaves by vicious habits of our own acquiring But whereas Seneca saith nature hath made us free nature hath left us free these are those rudiments of the world of which the Apostle speaketh beware least any man spaile you through Philosophy Col. 2 7. If nature hath made us free what need is there of Christ of the freedome of the Spirit of the grace of regeneration of all those things that are held forth to us in the principles of baptisme and circumcision In this sence the Apostle is to be understood when he saith beware lest any man spoile you through Philosophy he doth not speak of the knowledge that the Philosophers have of the motions of the heavens and the measures of the earth and such like speculations but he speaks of Philosophy as it doth not hold Christ the Head and is contrary to the very principles of baptisme and circumcision as may be see by the context Of this kinde are those sayings of Seneca nature hath made us free nature hath left us free such doctrines are contrary to Christ the Head He further proceedeth The Saints saith he love God so fully that they cannot hate him or desire to displease him And in hell the accursed spirits so perfectly hate him that they can never love him But in this that is status viae a middle condition between both or a passage to one or the other it cannot be supposed to be so unlesse a man here also be already saved or damned Answ We do agree that the Saints in heaven do so perfectly love God that they cannot hate him and the damned spirits in hell do so absolutely hate him that they cannot love him But what of all this The case of sinners upon the earth is not all one with the damned in hell The damned in hell do absolutely and irrecoverably hate God but so do not sinners upon the earth Though they are borne in sin and lye under a natural necessity of sinning yet they do not hate God absolutely and irrecoverably but so far only as they are naturally corrupt and do remaine in their natural condition Though Ministers in the general do know that all shall not be saved yet personally and individually no Minister can say that this or that man shall not be saved They can say as long as men continue in such wayes they are in the way to damnation but cannot certainly and infallibly pronounce of the final and eternal estate of this or that particular man Now it is not so with the damned in hell But he further saith Men can choose that which is commanded and abstaine from that which is forbidden for if they could not they ought no more to perish for this than infants for that Answ Though we stand upon it that a man cannot naturally choose that which is spiritually good yet his case is not all one with the state and condition of an infant For an infant cannot actually understand will nill choose refuse but a natural man hath a power to will that which is in his own compasse he may performe many outward duties abstaine from many outward evils and fly many occasions of sin And for his willing the good that is spiritual though he cannot choose it so far forth as is natural yet doubtlesse his condemnation shall be that he did not go so far as he might go by the help of the Spirit At some seasons the Spirit doth convince accuse reprove terrifie and put him upon a way of judging and condemning of himself that so he might look after pardoning and healing mercy But his fault is that he will not see that which he may see and doth obstinately harden himselfe against the light But he further sheweth This is so necessary a truth that it is one of the greatest grounds and necessities of obedience and holy living and if after the fall of Adam it be not by God permitted to us to choose or refuse there is nothing left whereby a man can serve God or affer him a sacrifice Answ Though the Divines do maintaine a necessity of sinning and the losse of the liberty of the will to spiritual good at least they are not cast upon such a strait as our Author thinks they are Indeed some of them are more cleare and distinct and do give lesse offence than others do yet I know none do absolutely take away the power from the will to choose or refuse To what purpose then would exhortations admonitions and reproofes be given But leaving all others we will cite a testimony out of one of the chiefest of our Authors for he may serve as a patterne for the rest Mr. Calvin in his book of Institutions Lib. 2. Chap. 2. doth shew that the foundation of all sound learning is grounded upon the knowledge of a mans selfe But how not upon the knowledge of a mans own excellencies perfections natural liberties for so the Philosophers do vainly trifle But upon the knowledge of his own misery thraldome under sin and this he affirmes to be the bottome of all saving knowledge to bring men to Christ By the former kind of learning men are set up and by the latter they are pluckt down He speaks of two dangerous extreames to be avoided on either side some when they heare that a man hath no ability no freedome of will they give over all care of