nothing for never man was nor ever shall be the better for this supposed Will of God precisely of not punishing for if it produce us any good it is either from eternity or in time Surely from eternity we are never the better for it if in time what is that good I suppose it will be said freedome from punishment Well But doth it effect this freedome mediately or immediately mediately it can do nothing for it is determined precisely to a non-punition and containes not a preparation of any subordinate cause for the effecting of our deliverance Election indeed may very well concurre to our discharge wrought by the death of Christ because it is a pre-ordination of Christ himself and of all other more immediate causes that work in their several orders and dependances for our dâ—scharge If immediately then the death of Christ interposeth no cauâ—ality for the effecting of the said freedome of which notwithstanding Mr. Eyre asserts it to be the adequate and immediate cause in his next Proposition 3. To give a peculiar name to the volition of one part of the meanes as distinct from the volition of all the rest unlesse there be some special reason of such denomination is but to impose upon our understandings for why may not Gods Will of sending Christ of publishing the Gospel of renewing our natures of raising our bodies of glorifying our whole man each of them deserve a more proper and significant name then Election as well as his Will not to punish for as to the act of this Will eâ—dem mâ—do se habet circa omnia objecta volita it respecteth all the meanes willed equally and in the same manner the persons to whom this impunity is willed lay under no other consideration as the objects of this will then as they are the objects of the will of calling sanctifying glorifying so that neither from the act nor the object is there any reason of such denomination Indeed the objects I mean the media volita of election and reprobation being contraries in the utmost degree and irreconcileable in the same person our weak understandings do therefore conceive of those acts as differing specie and accordingly we diversifie their names But the objects of Election being amongst themselves consentanies and subordinate in their execution one to the other and having no other entity or modality before their own existence in time then precisely ut volita it is altogether beyond the reach of my understanding to imagine any reason why the volition of one meanes should have a name proper to it self incommunicable to the volition of any other means willed by the same act to the same end 4 But the answer yields as much as the objection seeks for it grants Justification to be part of election namely Electio ad impunitatem Whereas 1. Scripture-Justification is a forensical act say all our Protestants against the Papists I spare quotations because the thing is too well known to be denied This cannot be affirmed of Election 2. The object of Election is neither a sinner nor a righteous person precisely but one that is not for we are chosen before the foundation of the world Eph. 1. 4. before we have done good or evil Rom. 9. 11. but the object of Scripture-Justification is a sinner Rom. 4. 5. whether believing or unbelieving we dispute below 3. Election is not properly an act of mercy but of absolute dominion and liberty Scripture-Justification is every where reported as an act of mercy Psal 51. 1. Luke 1. 78 79. Matth. 18. 33. Luke 18. 13 14. Heb. 8. 12. Eph. 2. 4 5. Ergo Justification is not Election nor any part of it If it be said that the name of pardon and Justification in these and other places signifies not the act but the effects I shall refer to my vindication of the next objection which is as followeth SECT VI. THe second objection therefore is this Justification imports a change in a persons state ab injusto ad justum Which cannot be §. 15 attributed to the decrees of God I shall divide Mr. Eyres answer into two parts First saith he if Justification be taken for the thing willed viz. the delivery of a sinner from the curse of the Law then there is a great change made thereby he that was a childe of wrath by nature hath peace and reconciliation with God But if we take it for the Will of God not to punish then we say Justification doth not suppose any such change as if God had first a Will to punish his Elect but afterwards he altered his Will to a Will not to punish them Rep. Plain dealing is best in a good cause If Mr. Eyre had told me roundly that the effects of Justification make a change in a persons state but the act doth not I had then known what I had to do But I know not very well what to make of these lines 1. The objection in forme is this Justification imports a change in a persons state ab injusto ad justum But velle nen punire or any other eternal purpose of God makes no such change of a persons state Ergo To say now that the Will of God not to punish supposeth no such change is to yield the Conclusion that therefore it is not Justification 2. What means he by a sinners delivery from the curse of the Law either it supposeth that a sinner doth actually suffer the curse of the Law or some part of it till Justification deliver him but this he denieth of such persons for whom Christ hath satisfied namely the Elect page 60. 61. § 2. or it supposeth an obligation of such persons by Law unto future punishment till they be justified But this he denieth too of the same persons page 110. 111. § 2 3 5. and what it is to deliver a sâ—nner from the curse which he neither suffers at present nor is obliged to suffer for future I want an Interpreter to tell me 3. Nor can I tell in Mr. Eyres sense what it is to have peace and reconciliation with God If he meane it of peace of conscience through the sense of reconciliation himselfe will deny that that is the immediate effect of our delivery from the curse for faith apprehending reconciliation doth intervene and that as a true proper cause of such a peace If he mean it of a state of peace and reconciliation before God he should not need to ascribe that to the thing willed seeing the erernal Will of God is most sufficient unto that according to him as being a real discharge from condemnation an actual and compleat non-imputation of sin and he layes it down for an undeniable truth That the Elect were in Covenant with God before the foundations of the world page 170 171. 4. The great change which he speaks of made by this delivery from the curse of the Law viz. That he that was a childe of wrath by nature hath peace and reconciliation with
genere causae with the blood of Christ Answ 1. The merits of Christ do not concur in our Justification as any part of that formal act by which we are justified It is God as Supreme Lawgiver and Judge and Christ as King under him who is our Justifier The merits of Christ are a cause of themselves moving God to put forth that act 2. I would ask Mr. Eyre whether the death of Christ be no more then a condition without which we are not justified if it be he doth ill to talke of my putting faith in the same kinde of cause with Christs death for I ascribe no more to faith then that it is a condition without which not If it be not Mr. Eyre I doubt will be found guilty of degrading the blood of Christ more then I of advancing faith beyond its due place 3. By faith we concur to our own Justification not causally but objectively terminativè as the earth concurs to my going as the thing I walk upon a visible object to my sight as the thing seen and other objects to the acts that are conversant about them 4. And the Argument at last begs the question for it supposeth that we ascribe to faith a causal influxe into our Justification which is the thing I dispute against SECT IV. THe fifth Argument succeeds That interpretation of this §. 21. phrase which makes works going before Justification not only not sinsul but acceptable to God and preparatory to the grace of Justification is not according to the minde of the Holy Ghost But to interpret Justification by faith that faith is a condition qualifying us for Justification doth so Ergo. The tree must be good or else the fruit cannot be good Luke 6. 43 44. Mat. 12. 33. John 15. 5. So Augustine Parisiensis the Articles of the Church of England c. Answ The substance of this is answered already chapt 5. works are taken largely or strictly in the former sense faith is a work in the latter it is opposed to works The Authours whom Mr. Eyre mentioneth as e Aug. Serm. 96. de Temp. Nemo bono operatur nisi fides praecesserit de Spirit lit c. 8. opus non fit nisi à Justificato Justificatio autem ex fide impetratur Augustine c. Take works as they are opposed to faith whereof the words quoted are an uncontrollable evidence If Mr. Eyre had shewed us that his legion of Orthodox Writers did as much oppose the antecedency of faith as of works to Justification he had spoken to purpose The tree indeed must be good before the fruit can be good But the tree is made good by faith and the Spirit of Sanctification which is the good treasure of the heart which bringeth forth good works Luke 6. 45. John 15. 5. I never heard before that Justification which is a grace without us was the roote and inward principle of good actions The sixth and last Argument is this To say that faith is a passive §. 22. condition that doth morally qualifie us for Justification implies a contradiction Answ I deny it Mr. Eyre proves it thus To be both active and passive in reference to the same effect is a flat contradiction and yet this also should be delivered with a little more caution a Christian is both active and passive in all the good works he doth but I stand not on it A condition is a moral efficient cause of that which is promised upon condition in the use of the Jurists though in the logical notion of it it hath not the least efficiency Answ And why may not we be permitted to use it in its logical notion the most logical sense is the most rational And seeing Mr. Eyre confesseth that in its logical notion a condition hath not the least efficiency he must give me leave to account his Argument illogical that is irrational that proceeds upon supposition of the contrary 2. It is also notoriously false that a condition is a cause in the use of the Jurists for they do perpetually distinguish a cause from a condition as appears by the very title of the thirty fâ—fth book of the Digests De Conditionibus Demonstrationibus Causis Modis eorum quae in Testamento scribuntur Which the f Dyon Gotho â—red Not. in hunc tit Wâ—semb paratit in eund Cujac l. 2. observ c 39. G. Tholos Syâ—t juris l. 42. c. 32. Jurists thus distinguish Causa exprimit rationem quae nos movet ut alteri legemus Demonstratio rem ipsam legatam notat designat §. 51 52 53. Azor. Instit mor. par 3. l 4. c. 24. ao dâ—pingit Conditio suspendit transmissionem legati c. Which differences they fetch out of the Law it selfe 3. If all conditions be causes then such as the Law calls g C. de caduc tollend §. Sin autem contingent and casual are causes also as having as much of the nature and use of a condition as that which they call arbitrary or potestative But that a condition meerly casual should be the cause of a giâ—t is that which the h Vide P. Nic. Moz de contract c. 2. de do nat p. 141. Ratio est quia cum conâ—itio dependet à caâ—u fortuito non censetur donaâ—s moveri ad donandum contemplatione illius casus sed ex suâ liberalitate non tamen donare vult nisi casus eveniat De quo etiam Riminal Instit de donat in princip n. 59. Jurists will never endure As if Titius promise Seius five hundred if the ship called Castor and Pollùx come into the river of Thames by July next Or if he give him the same summe with a Proviso that if he die before the age of twenty one then it shall come to Caius his younger brother That an accidental effect should be a meritorious cause is not imaginable 4. The case is the same again in all arbitrary or voluntary conditions If they be meerly such and have nothing beyond the nature of a condition added or concurring for the distribution of conditions in casuales potestativas is not generis in species but subjecti in adjuncta for a condition is one and the same in its nature and use whether the act or event which is made the condition be meerly casual or voluntary And therefore when Mr. Eyre sayes that if a man do any thing for obtaining a benefit he is active in procuring it if he mean physically I grant it if morally I deny it because a voluntary act when it is a condition contributes no more to the obtaining of a benefit then a contingent act being also a condition and yet by such a casual condition doth a man obtain a benefit and yet acts nothing toward it Let us for clearing and concluding this dispute again resume the §. 23. instance given before Philemon promiseth Onesimus that if he will confesse his fault he will pardon him and
just the effect which follows upon it is that we shall therefore be saved from wrath It seemes the distinction between the velle and the res volita in the matter of Justification was unknown to him 5. And his discourse supposeth that the love and grace of God is nothing so much commended by giving the effects as by putting forth the act of Justification for herein God commends his love towards us that while we were yet sinners he gave his Son to death for our Justification and then as a lesser matter he infers much more being now justified we shall be saved from wrath So also ver 10. Now if by Justification in Christs blood be meant the effects and not the act of Justification then the love and grace of God is nothing near so great in justifying us through the blood of Christ as in justifying us before without his blood But this is most notoriously false as is manifest not from this text only but from all the Scriptures which proclaim that temporal Justification which we have through the blood of Christ to be an act of greatest love and richest grace Rom. 3. 24 25. and 5. 20 21. Eph. 1. 6 7. and 2. 4 5 6 7. 1 Tim. 1. 14. Tit. 3. 4 5 6 7 6. The effects of Justification follow upon the act by moral necessity and without impediment Ergo the Justification here spoken of is not the effect precisely but the act The reason of the consequence is because the Justification mentioned in the text follows not upon any simple precedent act of Justification but is set forth as an act of such moral difficulty that it required no lesse then the precious blood of the Son of God to remove the obstructions and hindrances of its existence and to make it to exist The Antecedent is proved from his manner of arguing à majori ad minus being now justified much more shall we be saved implying that salvation follows as it were necessarily upon the position of the act of Justification Yea and I appeal to Mr. Eyre himselfe or any man else whether that act be not unworthy of the many glorious titles and epithets which are every where in Scripture put upon Justification and consequently unworthy of that name which being put in actu completo can yet produce no good effect to a sinner nor set him one degree farther from wrath then he was before unlesse some other more sufficient cause do interpose to midwise out its effects This mindes me of another Argument and that is this 7. Justification is not an act of grace simply but of powerful grace or of grace prevailing against the power of sin for this is that which creates the difficulty and so commends the excellency of the grace of Justification that it is the Justification of sinners Were it the Justification of such as had never sinned but had been perfectly righteous there were no such difficulty in that And therefore in the following part of the Chapter the Apostle expresly declares the quality of this grace in justifying us in that it abounds and is powerful to justifie above the ability of sin to condemn ver 15 17 20 Ergo the Justification here spoken of is the very act of Justification or there is no such thing at all for if we place it in a simple eternal volition there could be no moral difficulty in that no more then in the will of creating the world because from eternity there could be no opposition or hindrance for an act of grace to overcome 8. The Justification merited by Christ is not the effect but the act The reason we shall shew anon because it is absurd to make Christ the meritour of the effects when the act is in being before his merit But the Justification here spoken of is that which is merited by Christ Ergo I might also argue out of the following part of the Chapter from the opposition between Justification and the act of condemnation which passeth upon all men by vertue of the first transgression and therefore sure cannot consist in any eternal act of Gods will and from the method there used in comparing Adam and Christ and of our partaking first in the image of the first Adam in sin and the effects thereof before we be conformed to the image of the second Adam in Justification and the effects thereof but these Arguments out of the text it self shall suffice Other Scriptures also there are in abundance which testifie that Justification §. 18. doth make a change in a persons state ab injusto ad justum As Col. 2. 13. You being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh hath he quickened together with him having forgiven you all trespasses To be dead in sins in this place is clearly to be dead in Law that is to be obliged by Law to the suffering of death for sin for it is opposed to that life which consists in remission of sin or Justification so 1 Cor. 6. 11. such were some of you but ye are justified of which place more hereafter See also Rom. 3. 19 20 21 22 23 24. and 5. 18 19 20 21. Eph. 2. 12 13 14 15 16. And indeed all the places of Scripture which speak of Gods justifying sinners If there be found out a new Justification which the Scriptures are not acquainted with may they have joy of it that have discovered it But I hasten to the second part of Mr. Eyres answer The change of a persons state ab injusto ad justum ariseth from the Law and the consideration of man in reference thereunto by whose sentence the transgressour is unjust but being considered at the Tribunal of grace and cloathed with the righteousnesse of Christ he is just and righteous which is not properly a different state before God but a different consideration of one and the same person God may be said at the same time to look upon a person both as sinful and as righteous as sinful in reference to his state by nature and as righteous in reference to his state by grace Now this change being but imputed not inherent it supposeth not the being of the creature much lesse any inherent difference c. Answ These words are mysteries to me and I confesse have occasioned §. 19. me more perplexity and vexation of thoughts then all the book besides Before I can give any answer to them I must make some enquiry into the meaning of them And for avoiding of confusion in the words just and unjust their importance in this place is no more then to have or be without a right to salvation and life Now to be unjust by nature or in our selves may be understood in a threefold sense 1. Positively and then the meaning is that for the sin of nature or for mens sinfulnesse in themselves they stand obliged before God to the suffering of eternal punishment This is so far from being Mr. Eyres meaning that I suppose
because the merits of Christ themselves are the effects of the same love and the cause of the cause is also the cause of the thing caused But if our Lords death had been only from his own will not pre-ordained of God in the decree of election all the benefits purchased by it must have been ascribed to it as the first cause and Gods Will of bestowing them had not been causal but meerly concomitant or consequent Now his will not to punish containes not a preparation of any subordinate cause for the effecting of this impunity Ergo if Christ merited it it must be ascribed to him as the principal and only cause and not to Gods Will of not punishing because that Will of God is not the cause of the merits of Christ as being determined precisely to a non-punition And so there will be the effects of Justification without an act or the act of Justification produceth its own effects but by accident or rather doth not produce them at all but stands by without efficacy whiles another cause doth the work Therefore herein also the comparison halts The fourth and last objection which Mr. Eyre makes against himself §. 24. is this We may as well call Gods Will to create Creation and his Will to call Calling and to glorifie Glorification as his Will to justifie Justification His answer is Creating calling and glorifying import an inherent change in the person created called glorified which forgivenesse doth not it being perfect and compleat in the minde of God Rep. 1. The answer contradicts it selfe for it yields it to be a proper speech to say that God doth will or purpose to justifie even as proper as to say he doth will or purpose to create to call to glorifie and yet beares us in hand that Justification is perfect and compleat in the minde of God Whatsoever is purposed is future If it have already an actual existence it is not capable of being purposed to exist But the immanent acts of Gods minde are not future but from eternity 2. Though Justification do not make an inherent change yet it makes an adherent change as was largely proved from Scripture but now even as if a Malefactour be condemned and afterwards pardoned his condemnation and pardon make an adherent change that is a relative though he remain the same man that he was and be not changed inherently and really And I wonder why the purpose of an act which makes an adherent relative change should be called by the name of that act rather then the purpose of such an act which makes an inherent real change should be called by its name Ars posterior utitur prioris operâ— Morality supposeth nature 3. It is true that Creation c. do make an inherent change But the question is whether we have not as much ground from Scripture to understand those words as signifying not the act but the effect of Creation c. as Mr. Eyre hath to interpret the word Justification in Scripture for the effects not for the act Suppose a man should be so void of sobriety as to say the words Creation Vocation Glorification and what of like nature signifie not those several acts but their effects what could Mr. Eyre say against it To say Creation c. makes an inherent change is to say nothing for it will quickly be answered that the effects of Creation Vocation c. do make an inherent change not the acts If he tell me the words are never used in Scripture but as importing such a change I answer still as he doth of Justification that the words where-ever they are to be found in Scripture are to be understood of the effects not of the act If he yet say that it is contrary to all our Protestant Divines I say so too Et nomine mutato narratur fabula de te Thus much for the vindication of the foure objections which Mr. Eyre proposeth against himselfe He concludes this discourse thus SECT VIII HOwever were it granted that there was in God from everlasting §. 25. an absolute fixed and immutable will never to deal with his people according to their sins but to deal with them as righteous persons this controversie were ended Answ Such a purpose I acknowledge in God to justifie his Elect when they should beleeve and being justified not to deal with them as sinners but as with righteous persons yet so as that they are equally with others obliged by the Law to punishment till they do beleeve and subject actually to the bearing of the temporal penalties of sin If this will satisfie Mr. Eyre let him make his most of it But let us see how it ends the controversie First saith he Gods non-imputation of sin to his Elect is not purely negative but privative being the non-imputation of sin realiter futuri in esse as the imputation of righteousnesse is Justitiae realiter futurae in existentia 2. This non-imputation of sin is actual though the â—â—n not to be imputed be not in actual being So is the imputation of righteousnesse 3. This act of justifying is compleat in it selfe Answ If the begging of the question be the ending of a controversie we have done It is here supposed that the aforesaid Purpose of God is the imputation of righteousnesse and the non-imputation of sin which should have been proved and not begged And therefore the foundation failing there needs no more to be done to demolish the superstructure yet a word or two of that also 2. I say therefore that an eternal actual privative non-imputation of future sin is either non-sense or a contradiction let Mr. Eyre take his choice and consider withal what he is like to make of Justification at last for that which is only future can be deprived of nothing but its futurity and if it be ab aeterâ—o deprived of its futurity then it is ab aeterno non futurum and if ab aeterno non futurum then it is ab aeterno undepriveable of its futurity for that which is never future is never capable of being made non-future unlesse we could in eternity concâ—â—e one moment wherein it is made future and another moment wherein it is made non-future which cannot be because in eternity there is neither prius nor posterius Now this privative non-imputation of future sin what doth it privare Not the futurity of sin for then there never was nor shall be any such thing as sin in the world for nothing exists in time which before its existence was not future That then which this non-imputation is privative of must be the imputation of sin to a person cui debitum est imputari for that is the habit which only is contrary to it for as the privative non-imputation of sin present and in actual being is privative only imputationis nunc debitae so the like non-imputation of sin future is privative only imputationis futurae debitae The Argument therefore returnes for if this
Brookes Heaven upon earth page 65 66. heard of in such a condition If it be said we may be mistaken in men I acknowledge it But withal I am not bound to beleeve impossibilities and contradictions If I must beleeve that it is possible for them to have true faith even whiles they have not the least spark or twinkling evidence of Gods justifying pardoning love then I cannot beleeve Mr. Eyres affirmation to be universally true That wheresoever there is faith there is some evidence of Justification And me thinks he should not have expected that we should take his word against Scripture and experience both 2. Yet if all this were granted it comes not up to our case when the Scriptures say He that believes shall be justified it surely speaks of a Justification which is the same equally unto all that beleeve And for Mr. Eyre to say every one that believes hath some evidence of Justification though it may be not so much as another is to say one believer may be more justified then another which we desire him to prove the Scriptures imply the contrary Romanes 3. 29 30. and 4. 23 24. and 10. 12. The second Argument to prove that we are not said to be justified §. 13. by faith in respect of faiths evidencing our Justificarion as an effect was because faith is not the effect of Justification for if it be then we may as truly be said to be faithed by our Justification as to be justified by our faith and in stead of saying Beleeve and thou shalt be justified we must say hence-forward Thou art justified therefore beleeve Mr. Eyre answers That he sees no absurdity at all in saying That faith is from Justification causally That grace which justifies us is the cause and fountain of all good things and more especially of faith 2 Pet. 1. 1. Phil. 1. 29. Rep. Is it then no absurdity to set the Scriptures upon their heads we are said in Scripture to beleeve unto righteousnesse or Justification Rom. 10. 10. and were it no absurdity to say we are made righteous or justified unto believing when the Apostle saith Heb. 10. 39. we are not of them who draw back unto perdition but of them that beleeve unto the saving of the soule Surely the particle unto doth in both sentences denote the issue and consequence in the former perdition of drawing back in the latter salvation of believing 2. Faith cannot be the effect of Justification if Justification be what Mr. Eyre sayes it is namely the eternal Will of God not to punish precisely for a Will determined precisely to a non-punition is not the cause of faith unlesse Gods not punishing be our believing 3. And what an Argument have we to prove faith to be the effect of Justification That grace which justifies us is the cause of all good things and particularly of faith Ergo Justification is the cause of faith This is Logick of the game The grace that justifies us is also the grace that glorifies us shall I therefore infer that glorification is the cause of faith I did therefore truly say that according to this doctrine we must §. 14. not say Beleeve and thou shalt be justified but rather thou art justified Ergo beleeve No saith Mr. Eyre because 1. It is not the priviledge of all men 2. We know not who are justified no more then who are elected Though faith be an effect of Election yet we may not say Thou art elected therefore believe 3. When the cause is not notiâ—r effectu we must ascend from the effect to the cause Rep. Indeed to be justified is not the priviledge of all men yet Justification is to be preached as a priviledge attainable by all men if they will beleeve which yet it cannnt be if Justification be the cause of faith and not the consequent 2. It is also true that we cannot say Thou art elected therefore beleeve neither may we say Beleeve and thou shalt be elected But we may and must say Beleeve and thou shalt be justified therefore the case of Election and Justification is not the same The third answer I understand not nor I think no man else at least how it should be applied to the present case and therefore I say nothing to it My last and indeed the main Argument for proof of the position §. 15. namely that we cannot be said to be justified by faith in respect of faiths evidencing our Justification as an Argument or particularly as an effect is this because then it will unavoidably follow that we are justified by works as well as faith works being an effect evidencing Justiâ—ication as well as faith Mr. Eyre answers 1. By retortion That this follows from my opinion for if we be justified by the act of beleeving we are justified by a work of our own For answer to which I refer the Reader to the second and third Sections of this chapter If works be taken largely for any humane action faith is a work but it is as I may so call it an unworking work for to beleeve and not to work are all one with the Apostle as we have shewed before out of Rom. 4. 4 5. His second answer is a large grant that works do declare and evidence Justification and therefore I take notice only of the last line of it wherein he quotes Rom. 1. 17. and Gal. 2. 16. as proving faith to declare and evidence Justification to conscience Of Gal. 2 16. I have already spoken largely and have proved that the Apostles words We have beleeved that we may be justified cannot have this sense we have beleeved that we may know our selves to be justified And I wonder Mr. Eyre doth not see how he stumbles again at the common rock of contradicting himself in alleging that text He here acknowledgeth that works do evidence our Justification but the Apostle there doth altogether remove works from having any hand in the Justification there spoken of Ergo The Justification there spoken of is not the evidencing of Justification The words in Rom. 1. 17. are these Therein namely in the Gospel is the righteousnesse of God revealed from faith to faith That is as the Apostle expounds himself chap. 3. 21 22. In the Gospel is manifested the righteousnesse of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all that beleeve from beleeving Jewes to believing Gentiles for that questionlesse is the meaning of those words from faith to faith as is manifest by comparing them with the foregoing ver 16. The Gospel is the Power of God to salvation to every one that belâ—eveth to the Jew first and also to the Greek But how this proves that to be justified by faith is to have the evidence of Justification in our consciences I cannot divine At last Mr. Eyre gives us his direct answer or rather something §. 16. like an answer and denies that works do evidence Justification as well as faith where
notion includes shame and sorrow and self-abhorrency c. which faith precisely doth not As to the Conclusion of this paragraph which concernes my subscription to the testimony to the truth of Jesus Christ a book so called I do not remember that ever I subscribed it in this or any other County The second Argument is this To interpret Justification by faith §. 9. that faith is a necessary antecedent condition of Justification gives no more to faith then to works of nature as to sight of sin legal sorrow c. for if these be conditions disposing us to faith and faith a condition disposing us to Justification then are they also conditions disposing us to Justification for causa causae est causa causati Answ This Argument at the long run overthrows all humane contracts at least it fights as strongly against them as against us Titius gives a hundred pounds per annum to Sempronius upon conditon he give two pence a week to Maevius This two pence cannot be paid unlesse the silver be digged out of the mines and melted and stamp't and delivered out of the Coyners hand c. Ergo Sâ—mpronius his giving two pence a week to Maevius is not the condition of his holding his 100. li. per annum at least no more then the mine or bank is Is not this gallant Logick 2. I deny that legal sorrows and the sight of sin c. are necessary conditions disposing to faith because God hath not promised to give faith if we be convicted or legally sorry These Preparations are necessary physically not morally because the soule cannot seek out for life and salvation in another while it hath confidence of sufficiency in its selfe If any man beleeve without these he shall be saved notwithstanding 3. The answer therefore is that the things which are necessary naturally are not the conditions of gift but those only which are made necessary by the will of the Donour h L. conditiones eztrinsec F. de cond demonstr and so doth the Civil Law determine Caius gives Seius all the fruits that grow upon his farme the next year it is necessary that fruits grow upon the farme or else Seius cannot have them yet Caius his gift is not conditional but absolute 4. As to that logical axiome Causa causae est causa causati Mr. Eyre knows it must have more limitations then one or else 't is dangerously false But in the present case 't is altogether impertinent for neither are legal preparations the cause of faith nor faith the cause of Justification but the condition only and so the causa causatum may go whistle The third Argument is this that by which we are justified is the §. 10. proper efficient meritorious cause of our Justification Faith as a condition is not so Ergo. Answ I deny the major Mr. Eyre proves it by a threefold Argument 1. By the use of these Propositions particles he would have said by and through in ordinary speech which note a meritorious or instrumental cause As when we say A souldier was raised by his valour a tradesman lives by his trade 2. From the contrary phrase as when the Apostle denies that a man is justified by works and by the Law he excludes works from any causal influxe into our Justification Now that which he denies to works he ascribes to faith 3. From other parallel phrases in Scripture where we are said to be redeemed justified and saved Per Christum per sanguinem per mortem per vulnera Answ These are i De Justif l. 1. c. 17. Bellarmines wise Arguments to prove that faith doth justifie per modum causae dignitatis aut meriti by way of causality worth or merit which it seems Mr. Eyre accounts unanswerable otherwise he would not have brought them again upon the stage in an English dresse when our Protestants have beat them off so often in Latine 1. To the first I deny that the particles By or Through are alwayes the notes of a cause meritorious or instrumental How many times do we finde them in one Chapter where they are not capable of any such signification Heb. 11. 5. By faith Enoch was translated that he should not see death and ver 11. Through faith Sarah received strength to conceive seed ver 30. By faith the walls of Jericho fell down ver 33. By faith they stopped the mouthes of Lions ver 35. Women by faith received their dead raised to life again with many other passages in that Chapter That it is the grace of faith which is here spoken of appears from the description of it ver 1. will Mr. Eyre grant the Papists that faith was the meritorious cause of these effects I hope then he will no more reproach me as popishly affected It may be he will say it was the instrumental cause But let him shew how What instrumental efficacy did faith put forth in Enochs Translation did it either subtilize or immortallize his body or how was faith an instrument in throwing down the walls of Jericho It is naturally impossible agere in distans to act upon an object which the Agent toucheth not formally or virtually or what efficiency did faith put forth upon dead bodies to raise them to life again These effects are no otherwise ascribed to faith then as the condition upon which they were wrought and without which they could not have been wrought according to Gods ordination As it is said concerning the Lord Jesus That he could not do many mighty works in his own countrey because of their unbelief Mark 6. 5 6. with Matth. 13. 58. Not that their faith had contributed any thing to his ability but that their unbelief by vertue of Gods ordination made them uncapable of being the subjects for and amongst whom those works were to be wrought To the second I deny that Justification is ascribed to faith in the §. 11. same sense in which it is denied to works though it be the same Justification as to its common nature which is ascribed to that and denied to these and therefore cannot be meant of a Justification manifested to conscience as Mr. Eyre interprets it when he comes to particular places 'T is confessed that when the Apostle denies that a man is justified by works he excludes works from any causal influx into our Justification But it will by no means follow that when he ascribes it to faith he doth therefore acknowledge faith to be a cause No more then the like opposition in Scripture doth denote the same kinde of cause on both sides Râ—m 9. 8. Nâ—t the children of the flesh but the children of the Promise are counted for the seed and ver 11. Not of works but of him that calleth and ver 16. Not of hâ—m that runneth but of God that sheweth mercy and Rom. 11. 6. Not of works but of grace Estne inter Pontisicios quisquam tam excors â—t audeat affirmare in istis oppâ—sitioniâ—us
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or the Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which we are wont to render Covenant or Testament may be taken in such a signification which appeare not either in the Old or New-Testament unlesse where they are used Metonymically or Metaphorically or other wayes tropically in any other sense then of a Law or a Testament or a Convention And most strange that he should also tell us gratis that it is called an everlasting Covenant 2 Sam. 23. 5. not onely a parte post but a parte ante not onely as hauing no end but also as not having beginning when the Hebrew word will by no means enforce it and it is most certaine that that Covenant made with David had a beginning recorded 2 Sam. 7. 16 19. and all the places mentioned in the margine as Gen. 17. 7. c. Do also speak of such everlasting Covenants as we know were not without beginning And whereas Mr. Eyre doth afterwards acknowledge that notwithstanding this Covenant be eternall yet there are more especially three periods of time wherein God may be said to make this Covenant with us As 1. Immediately upon the fall of Adam 2. At the death of Christ 3. When God bestowes on men the benefits of the Covenant If we are properly in Covenant from eternity there is no act of God in time by which we are brought into Covenant nihil agit in simile therefore these three periods of time are but three degrees of manifestation that we are in Covenant Accordingly as I argued before in the matter of Justification so now in the matter of the Covenant If the Covenant of grace consist essentially in Gods eternal purpose of blessing the elect then is not the word Covenant that Covenant I mean by which the elect are saved taken properly in all the Scriptures forasmuch as it no where signifies the foresaid purpose A thing as incredible and abominable as the former But let us farther examine this undenyable truth If the foresaid §. 14. purpose of God be the Covenant of grace then Christ did not obtaine by his death that God should make a Covenant with the elect But the consequence is false and Socinianisme Ergo so is the Antecedent Mr. Eyre answers Though we do not say that Christ procured the Covenant he might have added and therein we agree with the Socinians yet we say the effects of the Covenant or the mercies themselves were all of them obtained by the blood of Christ as deliverance from the curse inherent holinesse c. Rep. Such a salve for the honour of Christs merits I remember we had before in the matter of Justification viz. That Christ merited the effects of Justification not the act even as he merited the effects of election but not the act As if the reason were the same between a particular univocall cause such as Justification is determined to a particular kind of effect which causes do alwayes produce their effects immediately without the intervention of any other cause and an universal cause of severall heterogeneous effects such as election is and therefore produceth nothing but by the sub-serviency of those severall kinds of causes ordained to their severall kinds of works But the like distinction here between the Covenant and its effects is of worse consequence if I mistake not Therefore against Mr. Eyres answer I have these things to object 1. It makes void the death of Christ for if the elect before the death of Christ haue a foederall right to the blessings of the Covenant then they are righteous before his death for to be righteous by righteousnesse imputed and to have right to blessednesse are inse parable But Christ is dead in vain if righteousnesse comes by any other way or cause then his death Gal. 2. 21. 2. If the Elect are in Covenant before the death of the Mediatour they must have the blessings of the Covenant whether he die or no for every Covenant induceth an obligation in point of faithfulnesse at least upon the Covenanter to fulfill his Covenant If then God have made a Covenant before the death of Christ with the Elect what should hinder their receiving these blessings without his death Either God is unable to fulfill his covenant but he is Almighty or he is unfaithful but he is a God that keepeth covenant or our sin hinders but he hath covenanted before the death of Christ that sin shall not hinder for pardon of sin is a special branch of the covenant Or finally he hath covenanted to give us these blessings through the death of Christ and no otherwise But then we are not in covenant before the consideration of Christs death and besides which I most stick at then the whole reason why God should punish his deare and only Sonne so grievously is this it was his pleasure so to do But surely he that doth not afflict men meerly because he will Lam. 3. 33. would much lesse deal so with his Son 3. Either Christ and his merits are part of the blessings of this covenant or no. If they be then it is false that Christ merits all the effects and blessings of the covenant for he did not merit that himself might merit or be by his death the meritorious cause of our blessings If not then the New-Covenant is never a whit better or more excellent then the Old The first covenant was faulty because it could not bring sinners to perfect happinesse Heb. 8. 7 8 9. and 7. 19. Rom. 8. 3. If the New-Covenant cannot give us the blessednesse it promiseth unlesse Christ merit and bring forth the effects thereof then is it altogether as impotent and unprofitable as the old a faire advancement of the Covenant of Grace 4. Nor can I conceive how this eternal Covenant can consist with what Mr. Eyre hath hitherto been disputing for viz. That the New Covenant was made with Christ he performed the conditions and we receive the benefit Christs death was either the condition of the Covenant or of the effect of it Not the former if it consist in Gods purpose Mr. Eyre knows how our Divines disgust a conditional purpose in God And how it should be the condition of the effects when it is not the condition of the Covenant it self I cannot reach I know Mr. Eyre will tell me that there are no conditions of Gods purpose and yet there may be and are conditions of the things purposed But then that purpose is not a covenanr properly so called Metaphorically it may be it may so be called but then it is such a Covenant as is neither made with man nor with Christ but with God himself being no more then his own resolution within himself And yet the foresaid position viz. That there are no conditions of Gods purpose though there are causes of conditions of the things purposed had need of a distinction too for so farre forth as they are the effects of purpose they have no other cause or condition and
by the Law or Constitution of grace the immediate effect whereof is to give the sinner a right to impunity and to the heavenly inheritance or by the sentence of the Judge at the last day by which he is adjudged unto the immediate full and perfect possession of all those immunities and blessings which were given him in right by that grand Promise of the Gospel John 3. 16. He that believeth on me shall not perish but shall have everlasting life Even as amongst men an Act of grace and pardon gives imprisoned rebels a right to deliverance from their present and legally future punishments though the effects of this right he do not possesse any otherwise then in hope till his cause be tried and himself absolved in Court by the sentence of the Judge In reference to the former a sinner is justified presently upon believing in reference to the latter he is not justified till the day of judgement Therefore Peter exhorts the Jewes to repentance that their sins may be blotted out when the times of refreshing shall come from the Presence of God And he shall send Jesus Christ Acts 3. 19 20. And Paul prays for Onesiphorus that God would grant him that he may finde mercy of the Lord in that day 2 Tim. 1. 18. which questionlesse is meant of the day of judgement of which himselfe also speaks a little before ver 12. I am perswaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed to him against that day And in the name of all Christians he tells us Gal. 5. 5. That we by the Spirit do wait for the hope of righteousnesse by faith that is Justification through faith as it stands in opposition to Justification by works ver 4. and throughout the whole Epistle So doth the Lord Jesus promise to him that overcometh a white stone Rev. 2. 17. c Vid. Paraeum Aretium Brightman Dâ—od Eng. Annot in loc which having allusion to the custome of the Romanes in judgement condemning by a black stone and absolving by a white doth therefore signifie that eminent eternal and universal absolution from all guilt which shall be given to the Saints that overcome and continue faithful to the end So Rom. 2 13 16. Not the hearers of the Law but the doers of the Law shall be justified In the day when God shall judge the secrets of meâ— by Jesus Christ the 14. and 15. verses are to be read in a parenthesis This is my opinion in this matter which I have therefore set down the more distinctly that Mr. Eyre may understand how ignorant or impudent his Informer was that told him I maintained that we were not justified till the day of judgement page 19. Now to Mr. Eyre he gives us a threefold sense of the sight of §. â— God in the Question 1. As it signifies Gods knowledge 2. As it signifies his legal justice 3. As it signifies his making of us to see To which I shall need to give no other answer then his own words in the same paragraph of the last thus he speaks This phrase must have some other meaning in this debate for else that distinctiction of Justification in foro Dei in foro Conscientiae would be a meer tautology Of the first thus Although in articulo Providentiae in the doctrine of divine Providence seeing and knowing are all one yet in articulo Justificationis in the doctrine of Justification they are constantly distinguished throughout the Scripture and never promiscuously used the one for the other Thus of three senses of the phrase himselfe rejects two as impertinent to the matter in hand and yet states his answer thus If we take Gods sight in the last construction viz. for his making us to see then we are not justified in Gods sight before we believe 2. If we referre it to the justice of God we were justified in the sight of God when Christ exhibited and God accepted the full satisfaction in his blood 3. If we referre it to the knowledge of God we were justified in his sight when he willed or determined in himselfe not to impute to us our sins c. As who should say If you take Gods sight in such a sense in which it is never taken in all the Scripture by Mr. Eyres own confession such is the first sense which is here the last then thus But if you take it in such a sense in which it may not be taken in the present question such is the last of the three which is here put first then so If some other senses of the sight of God as when it signifies his favour his assistance his approbation and witnessing c. had been set down that we might have known when we are justified in Gods sight in those senses it had been every whit as conducible to the clearing of the Question As first to tell us that Gods sight doth never signifie his knowledge in the matter of Justification and then to adde in the same breath that to be justified in Gods sight is to be justified in his knowledge 2. Nor is it a lawful distinction because the members thereof do interferre for Justification in the death of Christ and in our own consciences is Justification in Gods knowledge for surely he knows both these no lesse then his Purpose and Determination within himselfe 3. We shall see by and by that Mr. Eyre maintaines that the righteousnesse of Christ is imputed to sinners by the eternal Act of Gods Will I ask then whether that imputation be Justification in Gods legal justice if it be then there is a farther implication in the members of the distinction if it be not I would know how God doth justifie us in his legal justice and yet not by imputing the righteousnesse of Christ to us 4. God knows us not to be justified till we be justified for it is impossible that the same thing should be and not be Indeed he may well know that he intends to justifie us but if he know that then he knows we are not yet justified for he knows that what he intends to do is not yet done But because Mr. Eyre refers us to his following discourse for the better understanding of these mysteries I attend his motion that I may spare tautologies as much as I can SECT II. He therefore delivers his judgement in three Propositions The first is this Justification is taken variously in Scripture §. 4. 1. For the Will of God not to punish or impute sinne unto his people 2. For the effect of Gods Will to wit his not punishing or his setting of them free from the curse of the Law That Justification is put for this latter act he supposeth none will question The only scruple is concerning the former which he confesseth he hath been sparing to call by the name of Justification because some grosse mistakes have sought for shelter under the wings of that expression As 1. That absurd conceit that Christ
came not to satisfie the justice but only to manifest the love of God whereas saith he we say that notwithstanding the Will of God not to punish his Elect the Law must needs be satisfied for their sins no lesse then for the sins of others And 2. Their notion who upon this ground have asserted the eternal being of the creature c. Answ Here is the foundation of all the following obscure discourse which I perceive Mr. Eyre had rather we should take for granted then he be put to prove I do therefore deny 1. That Justification doth any where in Scripture signifie Gods eternal Will or Purpose not to punish of which more presently 2. That it is any where in Scripture put pro re volitâ for the thing willed formally and under that habitude or relation Justification is the discharge of a sinner from his obligation to punishment whether it were willed or not willed from eternity is but extrinsecal and accidental to the Act it selfe 3. That Justification is any where used in Scripture for the effects of Justification though I deny no man the liberty of making use somtimes of such a trope but we are now enquiring de nomine concerning the use of the Word The Apostle makes that one Act of Election the cause of all spiritual blessings Eph. 1. 3 4. of which our Justification is one ver 6 7. no lesse then Adoption ver 5. which is an Act of the same common nature with Justification and by some eminent d See Dr. Reignolds Life of Christ page 402. Divines made a part of it and that suitably enough to Scripture phrase even when it is made consequent to our faith John 1. 12. Gal. 3. 25. with 4. 5 6. 4. Our discharge from the curse is either our discharge from an obligation to it or from our actual suffering it In this latter sense it is indeed an effect of Justification but in the former sense it is the very life being and forme of it unlesse it be understood passively and so that also may be called an effect of Justification because the immediate effect of a discharge active is a person discharged These observations Reader thou wilt finde useful in the following debate That absurd conceit as he calls it that some have inferred upon §. 5. an eternal Justification viz. that then Christ came not to satisfie the justice but only to manifest the love of God is so natural a consequence of his doctrine that it will never be put off with a cold Negatur And I presume Mr. Eyre is not ignorant that it is a maine principle upon which the Socinians deny the satisfaction of Christ And if he will owne what himselfe hath wrote in this book he must joyne with them He affirmes that Gods eternal Will not to punish is the very essence of Justification page 64. 2. That by this Will men are secured from wrath and discharged and acquitted from their sins that it is a real discharge from condemnation an actual and compleat non-imputation of sin page 67. § 6. upon which premises I demand Whose debt did Christ pay his own That 's little lesse then blasphemy Ours why our bond was cancelled long before and our selves discharged and acquitted from all sinne and death really actually compleatly if Mr. Eyres doctrine be true And where then is any place left for satisfaction e De satisfact p. 119. Grotius hath well observed Obligationis destructio liberatio dicitur Hanc praecedere potest solutio sequi non potest quia actus nullus versari potest circa id quod non existit amplius To the same purpose f In tert Tho. tom 1. disp 4. sect 8. p. 58. edit Venet. Suarez Propriè non dicitur satisfactio quae post remissionem debiti sit sed quae fit ad debiti remissionem Est enim remissio debiti terminus satisfactionis non principium ut communi sensu omnium hominum constat Nec dici potest eandem peccati remissionem quae facta fuit gratis ante satisfactionem postea etiam fieri per satisfactionem quia repugnat idem debitum gratis remitti per justam solutionem But what need we the testimony of man the testimony of God is greater The text is plain Heb. 10. 18. where remission of sin is there is no more offering for sinne Ergo if sin were remitted from eternity Christ neither did nor could make any satisfaction If it be said that God did discharge us upon the foresight of Christs satisfaction I beleeve it to be most true of all the godly that lived before Christ but Mr. Eyre that makes this discharge to be an immanent not a transient act in God will not may not endure that it should be caused by the foresight of Christs satisfaction The next grosse mistake which Mr. Eyre tells us some have fastened §. 6. upon the doctrine of eternal Justification is theirs who upon this ground have asserted the eternal being of the creature thus If men are justified from eternity they are from eternity And I confesse Mr. Eyre hath well removed this consequence if his principle be good that esse justificatum is a terme of diminution But verily if the Scriptures have rightly informed us in the nature of Justification I do not see how the consequence can be avoided for Justification is one of the most eminent blessings contained in that Promise I will be their God So Paul Rom. 3. 29 30. Is he the God of the Jewes only and not of the Gentiles also yea of the Gentiles also seeing it is one God who shall justifie the circumcision by faith and the uncircumcision through faith Now God is not the God of the dead but of the living Matth. 22. 32. And if not the God of the dead who yet live as to their soules then much lesse is he the God of them that are not nor never were Ergo he doth not justifie them that are not Again He that is justified is blessed Rom. 4. And he that is blessed from eternity is from eternity for he that is not is neither blessed nor miserable To say he is blessed from eternity in Gods intention is no more then that there was a preparation of blessednesse for him in Gods intention which I readily grant and it profits Mr. Eyre nothing But it little concernes me to make good the foresaid consequence something more of it the Reader shall finde a little below in the mean time we come to the great Question whether Justification consist formally in the Will or Purpose of God not to punish SECT III. THe Will of God as Divines are wont to distinguish is either §. 7. voluntas beneplaciti or voluntas signi The former is the Intention Decree or Purpose of God concerning some Act of his owne to be done by himselfe in his due time The latter to confine it to our present use is his signal legislative revealed royal Will by which
told them If Christ were not risâ—n they were yet in their sins seeing they were discharged and acquitted from them so long before 3. His intercession is also vain for he lives to intercede for us to save us from wrath Rom. 5. 9 10. Heb. 2. 17. and 7. 25. We are secured from wrath before sayes Mr. Eyre 4. Our preaching is vain for we are to preach to every creature under Heaven That except they beleeve they shall be damned Mark 16. 15 16. and multitudes even all the Elect are secured from wrath before 5. It doth also imply a contradiction that a man should be acquitted from sin who was never a sinner or discharged from condemnation who was never condemned If it be said the Elect were sinners and condemned in Gods fore-knowledge Mr. Eyre is better read in Dr. Twisse then to be ignorant of what inextricable inconveniences that answer is liable to But let us heare Mr. Eyres proofes of his Assumption God saith he loved the Elect from everlasting and his love is velle dare bonum c. Answ Which as was observed before is one of the g Vid. Croll Cont. Grot. cap 5. par 6. 7. cap. 1 p. 1. Socinians weapons by which they attempt the ruine of Christs satisfaction against which our Divines have provided sufficient armour A love of benevolence or good will moving God to seek out a way of satisfaction to his own Justice and of Justification of a sinner we readily grant h Vid Joh. Cameron oper p. 361. f. But his love of friendship and well-pleasednesse with a sinner was not from everlasting but in time as being a consequent of the death of Christ in whom he hath made us accepted Eph. 1. 6. as Mr. Eyre doth not only yield but contend below from Mat. 3. 17. and so saith the Apostle Rom. 9. 25. I will call her beloved who was not beloved out of the Prophet Hos 2. 23. and as for the text which Mr. Eyre quotes Ezek. 16. 6. I cannot divine to what end it is unlesse it be to finde me work seeing the love there spoken of is manifestly temporal ver 8. and the life mentioned ver 6. in the latter is the flourishing and honourable condition unto which God had raised Israel both in respect of their Politick and Church-State who were originally the fewest and meanest of all people and in a spiritual sense is the life which he breaths into sinful soules But what Mr. Eyre would inferre from hence himselfe best knows In short I readily grant that Gods eternal love doth concurre ut causa universalis prima as the first universal cause not only to our Justification in time but to all other our spiritual blessings but an universal cause produceth nothing without particulars and the quality of the effect is not to be ascribed to the universal but to the particular cause 2. Mr. Eyre is proving that Gods velle non punire is that act by which we are discharged and acquitted from sin and secured from wrath I wish he had shewed me how this Conclusion issues from these premisses His Argument in forme must run thus Gods eternal love discharges the Elect from sin and secures them from wrath Gods velle non punire is his eternal love Ergo. The major is already disproved The minor if understood of the love of God in whole confounds Election and Justification which yet Mr. Eyre is careful to distinguish a little below for what is Gods Election but his Love or his velle dare bonum If of the Love of God in part the Argument will run thus That which is part of Gods eternal love is a sinners discharge from sin Gods velle non punire is part of his eternal love Ergo. If the major be true Gods purpose of giving Christ of calling sinners of sanctifying them yea of afflicting them and of administring any Providence towards them which in the issue proves for their good may as well be called their Justification as his velle non punire 3. Mr. Eyre hath already granted at least verbo tenus that notwithstanding the Will of God not to punish the Elect the Law must needs be satisfied for their sins no lesse then for the sins of others If this be true then the eternal act of Gods Election in it selfe considered gives the Elect themselves no more security from wrath then if they had not been elected Surely that concession will never be reconciled with the doctrine here delivered But we come on to Mr. Eyres second proof and that is from §. 10. Scripture Rom. 8. 33. Who shall lay any thing to the charge of Gods Elect The Proposition is either an universal Negative No Elect person can be justly charged with sin or an universal affirmative All elect persons are free from the charge of sin Answ Mr. Eyre should have put in the Apostles answer to the Question and then he had prevented mine The words are these Who shall lay any thing to the charge of Gods Elect It is God that justifieth Hence it follows either negatively that no elect person being justified can be effectually charged with sin or affirmatively that all the elect that are justified are free from such a charge free I say not because elect but because justified for the charging of sin is manifestly opposed not to their Election but to their Justification but that their Justification is their Election or any part of it or contemporary with it as I may so speak is an inference without any foundation in the text 2. Yea it cannot be inferred according to Mr. Eyres principles though we should grant the Election here spoken of to be that which is from eternity of which presently for the Justification here spoken of is that which is grounded in the death of Jesus Christ Who shall condemn it is Christ that died But the eternal Justification which Mr. Eyre is pleading for from the text is not grounded in the death of Christ for it is an Act in God from eternity Now observe Reader that Mr. Eyre denies Christ to have merited the Act of Justification but only the effects I would know then whether the Apostle speak of the Act or effects of Justification in those words Who shall lay any thing to the charge of Gods Elect if of the Act then the Elect were from eternity unchargeable and whose charge then did Christ beare and why doth Mr. Eyre all along tell us that our discharge from the curse is the fruit of Christs merits yea and what more as to the tâ—rminus à quo of our salvation I say what more could Christ merit possibly then that we should not be chargeable with sin And if that were done before by an eternal act there will be no effects of Justification left for Christ to merit as to our deliverance from sin But if the Justification here spoken of be meant not of the act but of the effects Mr. Eyre will grant me without
as the righteous But I will puzzle my selfe no longer with these ambiguous Oracles SECT VII THe third objection succeeds and that is this If justification be §. 22. an immanent act in God it is antecedent not only to faith but to the merits of Christ which is contrary to many Scriptures that do ascribe our Justification unto his blood as the meritorious cause Mr. Eyre answers That although Gods Will not to punish be antecedent to the death of Christ yet for all we may be said to be justified in him because the whole effect of that Will is by and for the sake of Christ As though electing love precede the consideration of Christ John 3. 16. yet are we said to be chosen in him Eph. 1. 4. because all the effects of that love are given by and through and for him Reply Here again I must complain of Mr. Eyres mincing Had he said the Act of Justification goes before the death of Christ but the effects follow he had spoken plainly But when we are disputing that Gods Will is not our Justification because our Justification according to Scripture is a fruit of Christs merit which an immanent act of Gods Will cannot be to tell us now that indeed Gods Will is antecedent to Christs merits is to yield the Argument that therefore it is not our Justification for nothing more certain from Scripture then that our Justification is the fruit of the merits and blood of Christ Rom. 3. 24 25. and 5. 8 9. and 4. 25. and 8. 3 4. 2 Cor. 5. 19 21. Gal. 3. 13 14. Eph. 1. 7. Col. 2. 13 14. Heb. 9. 12 22. and 10. 14 18. and sundry other places 2. It is also unworthy of the precious blood of the Sonne of God to ascribe no more to it then that it merits the effects of our Justification seeing it is a farre lesse matter to purchase the effects then to purchase the act which is the cause of them as I have before observed from the Apostles manner of arguing Rom. 5. If while we were sinners Christ died for us much more then being now justified shall we be saved from wrath 3. It is also no little undervaluing of the glorious blessing of Justification to suppose it so impotent as that it cannot produce its own effects nor do the sinner any good at all unlesse the Son of God interpose by his death to make it effectual I desire to speak of spiritual things with feare and trembling But I am not afraid to say such a Justification as this is not worth grammercy If it be objected that I may say as much of Gods electing love for neither doth that produce its effects without the death of Christ I answer no such matter for the death of Christ it selfe and all other particular causes of our salvation are the effects of election which it selfe produceth in their respective subordinations But Justification is a particular cause determined precisely to a non-punition which yet it cannot effect Nor doth Mr. Eyre himself make the death of Christ an effect of Justification and if he did he must reade the Scriptures backward but of this more by and by 4. I deny that the effects of Justification can be merited without the act for this eternal Justification according to Mr. Eyres theologie is an actual and real discharge from all sin and condemnation a compleat non-imputation of sin and imputation of righteousnesse Therefore it is impossible but that by this act the Elect must have a right given them to deliverance from wrath which is so evident that himselfe contendeth that the Elect even whiles they are in actual rebellion against God have a right to salvation grounded in the Purpose of God page 122. And what then did Christ merit for them Not a right to deliverance from wrath for that they have already and o Vid. Aquiâ— 1. q. 62. 4. â— 12. q. 1 â—4 5. â— 3. q. 19. 3. â— Nullus meretur quod jam habet what one hath already that cannot be afterwards merited Christ is dead in vain as to the purchasing of this right if they had it before Upon this ground do our p Jun. Animad in Bell. l. 5. c. 10. Divines deny that Christ merited any thing for himselfe because there was no advancement of soule or body but was due to him upon an antecedent title Nor yet doth Christ merit the continuance of this right for it is impossible it should be forfeited for a man can forfeit nothing with God but by sin and sin if it be pardoned as here it is supposed to be even all sins and that from eternity hath no strength to work such a forfeiture no more then if it never had been committed Nor doth he merit the possession of that which they have a right to for the effect of merit is properly acquisitio juris the acquiring or obtaining of the right it selfe q Duranâ— â— 2. dist 5 q 3. 8. Nullus meretur id quod est suum sed per meritum facit quilibet ut aliquid efficiatur ei debitum per consequens suum quod ei prius non erat debitum nec suum Indeed men may by violence be kept out of the possession of that which is their own But God is not wont to deny possession where himself hath given a right and if sinners have from eternity a firme and valid right to life and salvation Christ should not need to have put himself to the expence of his blood to have purchased possession Wherefore the effects of Justification being inseparable from the act Christ merited the act as well as the effect or else he merited neither The comparison brought in for illustration makes the matter worse §. 23. then it was before For 1. It is utterly false that all the effects of Gods electing love are given for the merits of Christ for the giving of Christ to death is an effect of Gods electing love and yet Christ did not merit his own sending into the world 2. That the parallel may consist it must be first supposed that the intention of particular meanes have particular names as so many particular acts or causes and then determined that Christ merited not those acts but their effects As for example That Gods intention to make us his children is our Adoption and Christ merited not our Adoption but the effects thereof His intention to sanctifie us is our sanctification and Christ merited not our sanctification but the effects of it His intention to glorifie us is our glorification and Christ merits its effects even as his intent to pardon us is our Justification and Christ doth afterward merit the effects but not the act Thus must the comparison run or it leaves the matter darker then it found it If Mr. Eyre will not allow of this let him acknowledge his doctrine to be without parallel 3. The effects of Christs merits are also the effects of Gods electing love
and not acquitted discharged and not discharged what can be more contradictorious or who can conceive what is that security discharge and acquittance from all sin wrath punishment condemnation which yet leaves a man under the power of a condemning Law and without freedome from punishment till Christ buy it with the price of his blood 3. Our discharge from the Law and freedome from punishment may be understood either de jure in taking off our obligation unto punishment and this cannot be the effect of the death of Christ for Mr. Eyre doth over and over deny that the Elect did ever stand obliged by the judgement of God to the suffering of punishment as the Reader shall largely see below in the debate of John 3. 18. and Eph. 2. 3. or it may be understood de facto in the real and actual removal of all kindes and degrees of punishment but neither can this be the effect of the death of Christ by it self or with the former The Purpose of Gods Will saith Mr. Eyre chap. 10. § 10. pag. 108. secures the person sufficiently and makes the Law of condemnation to be of no force in regard of the real execution of it So that what is left for the death of Christ to do I must professe I cannot imagine seeing the act of our Justification and our disobligation from wrath and our real impunity do all exist by vertue of another cause But for further confirmation of this Proposition Mr. Eyre refers us to chap. 14. where we shall wait upon him and say no more to it till we come thither His third Proposition is this Justification is taken for the declared sentence of absolution and §. 27. forgivenesse and thus God is said to justifie men when he reveales and makes known to them his grace and kindnesse within himselfe Answ Understand Reader that when we say Justification is a declared sentence of absolution it is not meant of a private manifestation made to a particular person that himself is justified or pardoned but of that publike declared Law of faith namely the Gospel it self which is to be preached to every creature under heaven He that believeth shall not perish but shall have everlasting life By which Promise whosoever believeth shall receive remission of sin 2. I wonder Mr. Eyre will not give us throughout his whole book so much as one text wherein Justification must signifie a manifestation or declaration made to a person that he is justified and yet tell us here that Justification is so taken If he mean it is so taken in Gods language let him shew where if in mans I will not dispute with him how men take it And as to that text Gen. 41. 13. me he restored but him he hanged which Mr. Eyre doth here instance in to prove that things in Scripture are said to be when they are only manifested if he had consulted Junius he would have told him that the word He relates not to Joseph but to Pharaoh Me Pharaoh restored but him that is the Baker he hanged The following part of this Chapter is spent in a discourse concerning §. 28. the several times and wayes in which God hath manifested his Will of non-imputing sin to his people In which there is nothing of distinct controversie but what hath its proper place in the following debate some where or other And most of what he sayes may be granted without any advantage to his cause or prejudice to thâ— truth there being no act of grace which God puts forth in time but declares something of his gracious purpose as every effect declares and argues its cause And so our Justiâ—â—cation it selfe declareth that there was a purpose in God to justifie because he acteth nothing but according to his purpose I shall not therefore make any particular examination of this remnant of the chapter though there be many things therein which I can by no meanes consent to but set down in the following Propositions how far I consent to each of his 1. I consent that God hath declared his immutable Will not to impute sin to believers in his Word and particularly in the Promise given to our first Parents The seed of the woman shall break the Sâ—rpents head 2. That Gods giving of Christ to the death for our sins and his raising of him up for our Justification doth manifest yet more of the same purpose 3. That baptisme sealing to a believer in act or habit the remission of sins past and entring him into a state of remission for the future doth also further declare something of the same purpose 4. That the same purpose of God is sometime or other in some measure manifested to most true Christians by the work of the Spirit But whether every true Christian hath a full assurance of this purpose of God towards himselfe or any immediately upon their first believing at least in these dayes I am in doubt 5. And that our Justification in the great day of judgement doth most fully perfectly and finally declare the same purpose as being the most perfect compleat and formal justification of all And so much for a discovery of the genius and issues of Mr. Eyres doctrine I come next to a vindicaiton of my own CHAP. III. My Reply to Mr. Eyres fifth Chapter His exceptions against the beginning and ending of my Sermon answered Rom. 5. 1. vindicated And the Antecedency of faith to Justification proved from Gal. 2. 16. and Rom. 8. 30. and Rom. 4. 24. and other places of Scripture SECT I. FOr proof of our Justification by faith the doctrine §. 1. insisted on in my Sermon I advanced several places of Scripture to which Mr. Eyre shapes some answer in his fifth Chapter which we shall here take a view of that the Reader may yet better understand how unlike Scripture-Justification is to that eternal Justification which Mr. Eyre pleads for But before he gives his answer to particular places he thinks fit to informe the Reader that I began my Sermon and concluded it with a great mistake The mistake in the beginning is that I said the Apostles scope in the Epistle to the Romanes was to prove That we are justified by faith i. e. that we are not justified in the sight of God before we beleeve and that faith is the condition on our part to qualifie us for Justification which is a mistake I intend to live and die in by the grace of God The Apostle tells us himself that his scope is to prove that both Jewes and Gentiles are all under sin Rom. 3. 9. and that by the deeds of the Law neither Jew nor Gentile shall be justified in Gods sight ver 20. that so he may conclude Justification by faith ver 28. and if this be not to prove that men are unjustified but by faith I know not what is And that faith here is to be taken properly we prove at large below If this be not the Apostles scope
and Glorification But Justification in conscience is the act of conscience reasoning and concluding a mans selfe to be just and as for the expression of Justification terminated in conscience let me here once for all declare against it not only as not being Scriptural but as not being very rational For that upon which Justification is terminated is that which is justified But it is the man and not his conscience which is justified Erge it is the person and not the conscience properly upon which Justification is terminated Passio as well as Actio is propriè suppositi SECT IV. ANother text which doth manifestly hold forth Justification to §. 10. be consequent to faith is Rom. 4. 24. Now it was not written for his sake alone that righteousnesse was imputed to him but for our sakes also to whom it shall be imputed if we beleeve Mr. Eyre answers that the particle if is used sometimes declaratively to describe the person to whom the benefit doth belong as 2 Tim. 2. 21. If a man purge himself from these he shall be a vessel unto honour And Heb. 3. 6. Whose house are we if we holdfast our confidence and the rejoycing of hope c. Rep. Which observation is here misplaced for I am not yet disputing the conditionality but meerly the antecedency of faith to Justification Now suppose the particle if be used sometimes declaratively yet is it alwayes antecedent to the thing which it declares or rather to the declaration of that thing As suppose which yet I do wholly deny that a mans purging himself do only manifest and declare that he is a vessel of honour yet surely his purging of himself is antecedent to that declaration or manifestation As the holding fast our confidence is also antecedent to our being declared to be the house of God Yea and Mr. Eyre himself interprets the imputation of righteousnesse in the text of our knowing righteousnesse to be imputed to us of which knowledge himself will not deny faith to be the antecedent yea and more then an antecedent even the proper effecting cause And therefore to tell us before-hand that the particle if doth not alwayes propound the cause when by his own interpretation it must signifie the cause which is a great deal more then a meer condition or antecedent was a very impertinent observation His sense of the text he thus delivers His righteousnesse is imputed to us if we believe q. d. Hereby we may know and be assured that Christs righteousnesse is imputed to us if God hath drawn our hearts to believe Rep. To whom righteousnesse shall be imputed if we beleeve saith §. 11. the Apostle We shall know that righteousnesse was imputed to us before we believed saith Mr. Eyre for that is his sense though I do a little vary the words This is an admirable glosse Whereas 1. Our knowledge that righteousnesse is imputed to us is our own act but the imputation of righteousnesse in the text is Gods act not ours ver 6. Yea saith Mr. Eyre himselfe page 87. § 13. it is the act of God alone and that in opposition to all other causes whatsoever whether Ministers of the Gospel or a mans own conscience or faith But it is like when he wrote that he had forgotten what he had said before in this place 2. Nor doth the text say righteousnesse is imputed to us if we beleeve as Mr. Eyre renders the words but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Quibus futurum est ut imputetur To whom it shall come to passe that it shall be imputed if we beleeve 3. And that this imputation of righteousnesse cannot signifie our knowing it to be imputed should methinks be out of question with Mr. Eyre He disputes against me a little below that when the Apostle pleads for Justification by faith the word faith must be taken objectively for Christ because otherwise faith could not be opposed to works forasmuch as faith it selfe is a work of ours And saith the Apostle in this chapter ver 4. To him that worketh the reward is not imputed of grace but of debt Hence it follows that that imputation is here meant which hath no work of ours for its cause But faith is clearly the cause of our knowing righteousnesse to be imputed and that as it is a work of ours Ergo the imputation of righteousnesse here spoken of is not our knowing or being assured that it is imputed 4. To impute righteousnesse in this verse must have the same § 12. sense as it hath ten or eleven times besides in the chapter and particularly when it is said that Abrahams faith was imputed to him not for righteousnesse as we render it but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 unto righteousnesse ver 3. 9 22 23. and unto every son of Abrahams faith ver 5. 11 24 Now what is it to impute faith unto righteousnesse I know that learned and godly men give different Expositions I may be the more excusable if I am mistaken I conceive therefore that to impute faith unto righteousnesse is an Hebraisme and signifies properly to reward the believer with righteousnesse or more plainly i Vid. R Sol. Jarchi in Gen. 15. 6â— Maymon more Nevoch 3. 53. Oâ—cum in Rom. 4. 5. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Et Tertull advers Marcion lib. 5. 3. Abraham Deo credidiâ— deputatum est justitiae aâ—que exiâ—de Pater multarum Nationum meruit nuncupaâ—i Nos autem credendo Deo magis proinde justificamur sicut Abraham vitam proinde consequimur to give the believer a right to blessednesse as his reward the word Reward being taken in that more laxe and metaphorical sense in which the Scriptures use it when they call Heaven by glory and eternal life by that name And as the whole salvation of believers is expressed by its two termes to wit They shall not perish but shall have everlasting life John 3. 16. so in Justification there is a right given to deliverance from punishment which is the terminus à quo in which respect it is called the pardon and non-imputation of sin of which the Apostle gives an instance out of David ver 6. 7 8. and a right to the more positive blessings of heavenly and eternal life by the Promise which is the terminus ad quem in which respect it is called Justification of life Rom. 5. 18. of which also he giveth us an instance in Abraham ver 13. for the Promise that he should be heire of the world c. In reference to which part or terme of Justification it is in special manner that Abrahams faith is said to be imputed to him unto righteousnesse for though those Promises were things which in the letter were carnal yet in substance and signification they were spiritual and so did he understand them Heb. 6. 12 13 14 15. and 11. 12 13 14 15 16. Now that this is the true notion of the phrase imputing faith unto righteousnesse namely a
this It is an unsound Assertion that we are said to be justified by faith because that faith doth evidence our Justification before faith The proof of this is the manifest tendency of every branch of this Argument and of each Argument under each branch And I am apt to think Mr. Eyre himself so understood me when he comes to particulars for he doth not once charge them with impertinency which he might have done with advantage enough if it had not been clear that they were all levelled at another scope then simply to prove that faith is of no use to evidence Justification As to the thing it self I am so far from denying faith to evidence our Justification that I do assert as followeth 1. As the word evidence signifies that which is affected to argue another thing so faith doth â—vidence our Justification yea and is the first thing that doth evidence it 2. Faith doth also evidence Justification axiomatically to all those that have a particular testimony from God that they are justified As those whom Christ tells in the Gospel that their sinnes were forgiven them Matth. 9. 2 5. Luke 5. 20 23. and 7. 47 48. If any man now living hath the like testimony from God that his sins are forgiven he hath no better way to evidence it to himselfe then without any more ado to beleeve that they are forgiven 3. Faith doth also concurre to the evidencing of Justification syllogistically but then the whole evidence is not of faith as we shall shew by and by I do therefore acknowledge the use of faith in evidencing Justification in all those wayes by which it may be evidenced though not of faith only in the last nor at all in the second unlesse there be any man that hath heard God saying to him Thy sins are forgiven thee Come we on then to the proof of particulars And first that we §. 12. cannot be said to be justified by faith in respect of faiths evidencing our Justification as an Argument or particularly as an effect thereof To evidence Justification as an Argument is no more then for faith to have such a relation unto Justification as that where the one is the other must needs be also and he that knows the relation they have to each other cannot but know that where faith is there Justification must needs also be Even as laughing and crying may be said to evidence reason in a childe though it may not evidence it to the childe himself because he knows not the dependance of these actions upon his reason so we say where there is smoak there is some fire Groanings argue some ill affection in the body and generally every effect doth argue and evidence its cause to them that know the connexion between the cause and effect Mr. Eyre disclaims faiths evidencing in this way though in answer to Rom. 4. 24. above debated of his Book pag. 44. § 6. he hath as plainly yielded it as can be in these words Hereby we may know and be assured that Christs righteousnesse is imputed to us that we whether Jewes or Gentiles are the persons to whom this grace belongs if God hath drawn our hearts to beleeve and obey the Gospel in regard that none do or can beleeve but such as are ordained to life and to obtain salvation by Jesus Christ What is this but that faith doth evidence our Justification as an Argument seeing that where one is the other is also where there is faith there is Justification It seems the same thing is good Divinity out of Mr. Eyres mouth but out of mine an errour Yet though Mr. Eyre will not owne that faith doth evidence Justification in this way he thinks fit to give his Reader his sense of my Reasons There are therefore three Reasons in my Sermon why we cannot be said to be justified by faith in respect of faiths evidencing our Justification as an Argument The first is this Because then Justification by faith is not necessarily so much as Justification in conscience A Christian may have faith and yet not have the evidence that he is justified As a childe may laugh and cry and yet not have the evidence or clear knowledge that himselfe hath reason c. Mr. Eyre answers 1. By intimating that this agrees not with what I allege out of the Apostle 1 John 3. 20. to prove that if our hearts condemn us God doth much more condemn us 2. If faith did evidence only as a signe it would be a dark and unsatisfying evidence 3. Nothing that precedes faith doth prove a man justified nothing that follows it is so apt to prove it as faith it selfe 4. Wheresoever there is faith there is some evidence of this grace In the least spark of fire and the least twinkling starre there is some light Rep. To the first I say that it never came into my minde to prove that God condemns every one whom his own conscience condemns but that if conscience condemns truly then the judgement thereof is according to the judgement of God and so God condemns as well as conscience But if a beleevers heart shall tell him that he is not justified and his sins not pardoned his conscience is erroneous and judgeth otherwise then God judgeth 2. The two next answers are like chips in pottage that do neither good nor hurt as I see When I can understand whether they make with me or against me I shall consider them farther 3. The fourth answer that whosoever hath faith hath some evidence of his Justification for that he meanes by grace or else it s nothing to the purpose I deny utteâ—ly if by evidence he mean not that which would prove it if it were rightly understood but a mans actual knowledge that he is justified And how doth Mr. Eyre prove it why the least spark of fire hath some light and the least twinkling starre True So the least degree of true faith hath that in it which if it were rightly apprehended would make some discovery that a man were justified But these sparks of fire give no light at all when they lie buried under heaps of ashes and such black and dâ—smal clouds may cover the face of the Heavens that we cannot see not only the lesser stars but not those of greatest magnitude And the Scripture testifieth not only positively that a gracious soule may walk in darknesse but to expresse the greatnesse of this darknesse addes an universal negative And may see no light that is as f Childe of light page 5. 6 8 9 10. Dr. Godwin hath excellently proved he may be without all evidence of his Justification of which the said Doctor gives several instances in David Job Heman and Christ himself and proposeth largely the causes and cure of such darknesse in all which he hath bestowed a great deal of excellent and acceptable paines to no purpose if Mr. Eyres doctrine here be true How many soules have I known and g See Mr. Tho.
is every whit as proper yea and more proper to say we know by faith that we are justified then to say we know by God that we are justified the former expressing the effect from its relation to its particular cause the latter to the universal I cannot see unlesse God give me an eye and concurre with it in the act of seeing yet is it more proper to say I see then that God sees so neither can I know that I am justified unlesse God give me faith and concurre with the act of it to discover it to me yet am I more properly said to justifie my self then God to justifie me if by my Justification be meant my knowledge that I am justified And whereas Mr. Eyre granteth faith to be the instrumental cause §. 35. of our knowing our selves to be justified I see not how it can consist with his Divinity It is a principle with him as we shall see anon that no act of Gods can be an act of free grace which hath any cause in the creature But to manifest to me that I am justified is an act of free grace Ergo my faith cannot be the cause of it no not instrumentally The Assumption is proved from all the places mentioned in Chap. 3. to prove that we are justified by faith All which speak of Justification by free grace and Mr. Eyre interprets every one of them of the manifestation of Justification And now we should dispute the great Question Whether faith be the condition of Justification But because there is one and but one Argument more proving that Justification by faith cannot be understood of the manifestation or knowledge thereof I shall first make good my ground there and then try out the other by it self SECT IX MY last Argument therefore was this If Justification by faith §. 36. must be understood of Justification in our consciences then is not the word Justification taken properly for Justification before God in all the Scriptures for the Scriptures speak of no Justification but by faith or works the latter of which is Justification before men and the former in our consciences according to Mr. Eyre To this Mr. Eyre answers chap. 9. § 10 11 12. and his answer is 1. That Justification in conscience is Justification before God Yet himself told us Page 61. before that the sight of God in this Question may not be understood of Gods making it as it were evident to our sight that we are justified for then the distinction of Justification in foro Dei in foro conscientiae would be a meer tautologie Secondly saith he If faith be taken metonymically then Justification by faith is Justification before God for it is a Justification by the merits of Christ to whom alone without works or conditions performed by us the Holy Ghost ascribes our Justification in the sight of God Rom. 3. 24. Eph. 1. 7. Rep. I deny that faith is any where in Scripture put for Christ in the Argument of Justification though it include him as its object whether his name be mentioned or no. In universalibus latet dolus Give us some particular place or places where the word must be necessarily so understood and we will beleeve it 2. Rom. 3. 24. speaks not of any Justification by Christ without faith but most expressely and syllabically of Justification by Christ through faith ver 25. whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood And that faith here cannot be taken objectively is already proved Yet if it had not been mentioned it will by no means follow that it must be excluded seeing there are multitudes of places besides where it is mentioned The same I say to Eph. 1. 7. That the remission of sins there spoken of is by faith for the Apostle having said that we have remission of sins through the blood of Christ according to the riches of the grace of God he shewes the way in which grace communicates this blessing both to Jew and Gentile namely by the efficacy of the blessed Gospel calling them both to one and the same faith and thereby to a common interest in the same blessings ver 8 9 10. though these blessings be given to the Jew first and afterward to the Gentile ver 12 13. and therefore Paul Bayne observes from ver 8. That God giveth pardon of sins to none to whom he hath not first given wisdome and understanding that is whom he hath not taught to know and beleeve on his Christ Howbeit if faith had not been here mentioned it must yet needs have been supposed because the Apostle writes to those Ephesians as unto Saints and faithful in Christ Jesus ver 1. To whom as such do all spiritual blessings belong ver 3. according to the purpose of Gods Election ver 4. So that hitherto we have no intelligence of any Justification before God mentioned in Scripture but by faith His third answer is by way of retortion upon that expression of §. 37. mine That the Antinomians may reade their eyes out before they produce us one text for it namely where there is any mention of Justification before God but by faith He retorts That I acknowledge a threefold Justification and yet neither of them by faith in my Sermon page 23. Rep. But I do not acknowledge that either of them is properly and formally the Justification of a sinner before God Nor yet that either of them is called by the name of Justification in Scripture but only that our Justification may be considered as purposed of God merited by the death of Christ and exemplified in his Resurrection 2. He tells us That we have no plain text for many of our dictates As 1. That justification doth in no sense precede the act of faith Answ Mr. Eyre knows well enough that this is a dictate of his own and that it is no part of the quarrel between him and me as I observed page 1. and in his very last words mentions three senses in which I yield Justification may be before faith But we seek a text of Scripture wherein the true proper formal Justification of a sinner is made antecedent to faith If there be any such text why is it not produced if there be none why is it not yielded Our second dictate is That Christ purchased only a conditional not an absolute Justification for his Elect. But where is this said or by whom it is by vertue of the Purchase of Christ that we are justified when we have performed the condition of believing The third that our Evangelical Righteousnesse by which we are iustified is in our selves Answ This refers to Mr. Baxter whose judgement Mr. Eyre represents as odiously as he can But he knowes Mr. Baxter hath produced many Scriptures and reasons for proof of it which Mr. Eyre should have answered before he had complained for want of a text The fourth that the tenour of the New Covenant is If thou
idem planè genus causae utrinque notari Is any man amongst the Papists so sottish saith k Bell eneâ—v Tom 4. c. 4. p. 3â—6 dued Dr. Ames as that he will dare to affirme that in these oppositions the same kinde of cause is signified on both sides The like I say to the third when we are said to be justiâ—â—ed by Christ by his death by his blood c. the particle By doth denote the proper meritorious cause of our Justification But that it may not in other sentences signifie some other Argument as well as a cause must remain to be proved till the time when we are to expect Mr. Eyres Rejoynder SECT III. THe fourth Argument succeeds To make faith a condition morally §. 12. disposing us to Justification makes us at least concurrent causes with God and Christ in our Justification Answ I deny it utterly A double Argument Mr. Eyre presents us with for proof 1. We should not be Justified freely by his grace if any condition were required of us in order to our Justification for a condition whensoever it is performed makes the thing covenanted a due debt which the Promiser is bound to give and then Justification should not be of grace but of debt Answ Gladly am I come to this objection and I shall give it a large answer not for any strength there is in it but because Mr. Eyre pretends in his title-page and the inscription of his book throughout to oppose the ancient Protestant doctrine of Justification by faith upon the quarrel of free grace And it is upon the point the total summe of all he hath to say for his neoterick notion but they may be taken with words that will The place which he alludes to in the objection is Rom. 3 24. Being justified freely by his grace But which of these two words is it that excludes conditions 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 grace or freely 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 l Vide â—rist Rhet. l 2. c 7. Grace as it is a vertue or affection in man is that which enclines us to bestow of what we have to them that are indigent and necessitous not for any thing we have received nor for any profit and advantage we expect by what we give from him to whom we give but that he may be beneâ—â—ted by us Accordingly it is accounted great and the Scriptures amplisie the grace of God from the same Arguments either in respect of the persons that receive our gratuities if they be extream m Ezek 16. pertot Rom. 5. 6. indigent and impotent or in respect of the things given if they be Eph 7. Rom. 5. 7 8. and v 6. 0 1 John 4. 19. John 3. â—6 great difficult or seasonable or in respect of the giver if â—e be the first or only or principal But surely this grace doth not exclude all manner of conditions Jacob sent a present to Esâ—u that he might sinde grace â—â— in his sight Gen. 32. 5 21. and 33. 8. the LXX 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and Prov. 3. 3 4 Let not mercy and truth forsake thee So shalt thou finde 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 grace in the sight of God And the Apostle exhorts that we come to the throne of grace that we may finde grace Heb. 4. 16. Is grace any whit the lesse gracious because we are required to seek it that we may finde it Rom. 4. 16. Therefore it is of faith that it may be by grace And more places which we shall mention below The Adverb 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is but a qualification of the former and expresseth §. 13. the freenesse of grace by removal of worth and sufficiency in the person who of grace receives a benefit Thus Mat. 10. 8. Freely you have received freely give 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 As their power cost them nothing but was freely given them so should they do good with it freely without payment or recompence So the Hebrew 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 expresseth an act which is only from the will and inclination of the Agent without any sufficient external meritorious cause Psal 35. 7. Without cause have they hid for me their net Psal 69. 4. They hate me without a cause and 119. 161. Princes have persecuted me without a cause David saith He will not offer to God gratis or of that which cost him nothing 2 Sam. 24. 24. Thus servants went out freely when they did not purchase their liberty but it was given them without price Exod. 21. 2 11. as also the p L. mandatum F. mand contra C. L. 6. 7. §. Non est ignotum Civil Law determines And what in Isa 55. 1. is called a buying without money is expounded Rev. 22. 17. A taking of the water of life freely So that unlesse it can be proved of which more presently that all conditions whatsoever are meritorious causes proportionable in value to the benefit a man obtains upon performance of the condition the name of free grace will prove but an empty noise and a cloak of errour We must therefore with our Protestants distinguish of conditions §. 14. Thus q In disp de satisfact p. 365. Cameron Si multae conditiones requiruntur in justificandis quae habent proportionem cum justitiâ Dei concedo Sed si conditiones quae requiruntur in justificandis nullam habent proportionem cum justitiâ Dei nego inde effici justificationem non esse ex mera gratia nam non excluduntur conditiones omnes sed eae quae possunt habere rationem meriti The sense of which words is given us by r Comment in Ep 250. Paul Bayne There are some conditions whereon they only interceding we promise and undertake to do a matter or bestow a kindnesse on any As Go with me to such a place and I will give thee hidden treasure or come to me to morrow and I will give thee a hundred pounds There are other conditions which have the reason of a cause meritorious such do not only intercede but deserve upon contract as much as we promise As Do my work well and I will pay you truly c. Thus he s Gerhard de Evang. cap. 3. §. 26. Quando Evangelicas promissiones conditionales esse negamus non quamvis conditionem sed in specie conditionem nostrorum meritorum excludimus Alia igitur est conditio fidei à conditione operum illa non opponitur gratuito dono haec verò opponitur In eundem seâ—sum Rolloc de vocat p. 16. and others to the same purpose A distinction which we are necessitated to make use of though it distinguish rather the matter of a condition then the formal nature of it for if any condition be proportionable to the reward promised that is not because it is a condition but because it is t Aliae sunt conditiones praeter causas efficientes Ames contra Bellarm. de neces oper ad salut
give him his whole estate which condition Onesimus performes I ask now whether his performance of this condition be the cause of his pardon and of the gift promised him If not then Mr. Eyre must confesse this Argument to be nothing if so then let us know plainly what cause it is for Mr. Eyre holds me altogether in generals and determines without one syllable of proof that it is a cause but tells me not what cause it is nor what its causality Is it a meritorious cause That cannot be because there is nothing in his confession that can countervaile the greatnesse of the injury or hold proportion with the reward or doth it move meerly objectively as we say poverty moves a liberal man and misery a merciful man But this is very improperly called a motive cause being indeed no cause at all but the exiigency or moral capacity of a person to be the object of an act of mercy or liberality otherwise by how much the greater mans misery is by so much the lesse praise-worthy is Gods mercy in relieving us because by how many the more causes concur to an effect by so much the lesse praise is due to each That faith moves in this manner I will not deny but this will not make it a cause at least no other then à causa sine qua non and how a meer condition such as in the instance given should be any other I cannot conceive Briefly if the condition aforesaid performed by Onesimus be the cause of his Masters gift then either of the Promise or of the execution of it But the said condition is neither the cause of the Promise nor of fulfilling it Ergo. Not of the Promise for Philemons will is the cause of the condition Ergo the condition is not the cause of Philemons will signified in his Promise for the effect cannot be the cause of its cause A condition as such cannot move the Donour to promise because it is his will and nothing else that makes it a condition though I deny not but there may be something in the condition which may move the will quoad specificationem that is encline it to pitch upon this rather then that or to make this the condition rather then that Not of the performance of the Promise for the same reason for it is most absurd that the will should make its own motive causes As if we should suppose Philemon saying thus I will make his confession the condition of my gift and then I will be moved by it to bestow it upon him If there be not attractive vertue enough as I may so call it in the condition till the will resolve to be moved by it then surely the motion of the will is from it selfe not from it Wherefore the cause both of the Promise and Performance is Philemons good will who of his own accord obligeth himself to give such a gift such a condition being performed and will not be obliged without it if he would he might give it presently without any condition but as it is his will that the Donee shall be uncapable of receiving any benefit by him unlesse such a thing be done so is it his will which makes him capable of receiving it when it is done SECT V. THis I did illustrate in my Sermon by a double comparison of §. 24. an offendor pardoned by reading the book or upon condition that he accept of the pardon by neither of which can he yet be said to pardon himselfe To the latter instance I do not finde that Mr. Eyre speaks a word but invades the former resolutely and sayes That an offendor saved by his Clergy is not passive but active in saving his life he may properly be said to save himself Yea he doth more in saving his life then either the Law or the Judge as the welch man that cried God blesse her father and mother that taught her to reade Rep. Supposing that the reading of the book be a meer condition such as is the acceptance of the pardon in the second instance abstracted from all considerations of the worth and benefit of learning I answer 1. That whereas Mr. Eyre sayes He that reades may be properly said to save himselfe I would have granted it if he had left out the word properly Because he may be said to save himselfe who doth that without which he should not be saved though his doing do not cause it and therefore the speech is improper Nor doth the Scripture abhorre from the like manner of speech for thus saith the Lord Luke 7. 50. Thy faith hath saved thee go in peace which salvation is before called forgivenesse of sin ver 48. and Mark 5. 34. Thy faith hath made thee whole go in peace So Luke 18. 42. which though it were a bodily cure yet was it a representation and assurance of spiritual blessings and the faith by which she received it the very same by which we obtain remission of sins as our i Aâ—â—s Bâ—ll enerv tom 4. l. 5. p. 319. 12º Miracula istiusmodi fuerunt singularia Dâ—i beneficia quibus Justificationis bâ—nedictio fuit adumbraâ—a Luke 4. 18. 3. Beneficia ista saepe conjunctâ— fuerunt cum Justificatione Gerh. de Justis per sid §. 158 p. 956. Marc. 5 36. Luc. 8. 50. Quamvis veâ—ò ibiâ— non agatur propriè de side Justificante maniâ—estum tamen est fidem stâ—tui unicum illud medium per quod divinoâ—um beneficiorum ac pâ—oinde â—eâ—issioâ—i peccatoâ—um justâ—tiae reddamur participes credenti enim omnia possibilia Mark 9. 23. Sâ—e also Down of Justif l. 6. c 15 â— 11 1â— Protestants prove against the Papists And yet no question but the speech is improper for in propriety of speech it was the power and grace of God that healed the one and saved the other In the same phrase of speech are the Jewes exhorted to save themselves Acts 2. 40. and Timothy to save himselfe 1 Tim. 4. 16. And the Patriarchs by faith to have done such things as are quite above all created power as was hefore observed out of Heb. 11. 2. And whereas the welch man blesseth his father and mother that taught him to reade A Christian may with seriousnesse blesse God in like manner and give thanks unto the father for making of him meet 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be one of the Partakers of the inheritance of the Saints in light Col. 1. 12. That we performe the condition is from the grace of God no lesse then the blessings we partake in upon performance of it and therefore the praise of all is due to him only Yet the grace is greater in giving the latter then the former by how much the end is better then the meanes And if the welch man did indeed think that he was more beholding to his reading then to the courtesie of his Prince for his life his Logick was as ridiculous as his language for though the Law would
not have saved him without his reading and much lesse would his reading have saved him without that favourable Law yet his life is a thousand fold more worth then his reading of two or three lines and therefore he owes a thousand times more thanks to his Prince for giving him his life upon such a condition then to himself for reading supposing his reading to have been the purchase of his life If a man sell a farme to his friend for five hundred for which another would have given him a thousand what more common then to say He hath given his friend five hundred in the buying 3. But in sober sadnesse doth Mr. Eyre think the welch man speaks §. 25. properly in his God blesse her father c That were a jest indeed How comes it then to be a ridiculous object if there be not some h pleasing deformity in it that flatters the fancie and surprizeth k See Sie râ—de la Câ—ambre Charact. of the Passions ch 4. of laughter p. 210. the soule so moving laughter And what can that deformity be except the welch idiome but the fallacy of non causa pro causa putting that for the cause which is not the cause as we are wont out of Cicero when we see a little man girt with a great sword to transplace the Subject and the Adjunct and say who tied that man to that sword Had the welch man cried as he was bid God blesse the King and the Judge the propriety of the speech had spoiled the jest and deprived it of that facetiousnesse and lepidity which now causeth us to make merry with it A certain discovery that the speech is not proper nor the condition of reading the cause of his pardon the speech becoming ridiculous upon no other account but because it would insinuate that to be the cause which was no more then a condition But the serious judgement of all offendors who escape death by this means and the wisdome of our statâ— determining it to be an act of royal grace and favour to pardon a man on this condition might one would think be of as much authority as one welch mans word It is true indeed the Law nor the Judge could save him unlesse he read nor will God save us unleâ—â—â— we believe Heb. 3. 19. They could not enter in because of unâ—eliâ—f Not through defect of power or mercy in God which are both inâ—inâ—te but because he hath confined himself in the dispensation of pardon and salvation that he will bestow it upon none but them that believe Is it therefore not of grace because not without faith Whereas the Apostle sayes It is of faith that it might be of grace Rom. 4. 16. In that which followes I finde nothing which is not answered already §. 26. or must not be answered in due place for whereas Mr. Eyre sayes that the performance of the condition makes the conditional grant to become absolute the words are ambiguous If he mean it makes it absolute as that without which it had never been absolute I grant it if he mean it makes it absolute by contributing any direct causality I deny it for upon performance of the condition the conditional grant doth indeed become absolute not by the worth or efficacy of the condition but by the will of the Promiser that upon the existence of such a thing or action will be obliged and not without it We have already given several instances of conditions which have nothing of worth in them to engage the Donour and therefore cannot be the cause of the gift for nothing can produce an effect more noble and excellent then it selfe Nor doth it receive any addition of intrinsecal worth by being made the condition otherwise we might work as rare feats by the influence of our wills as l Magnet cure of wounds Van Helmont thinks may be wrought by the magick of the fancie 'T is but willing a pin to be worth a pound and it shall be done And when he addes in the next place that if faith be the condition of the New Covenant in such a sense as perfect obedience was the condition of the old man must needs be his own Justifier if he mean such in the matter and particular nature of the condition It is true if he mean such in the common nature of a condition it is false for we have shewed before both from Reason and Scripture Divines and Lawyers that some kinde of conditions are so far from being inconsistent with grace as that they advance it rather As suppose some benefit of very great value be bestowed on a worthlesse person upon condition that he acknowledge the rich superlative grace and love of the Donour to be the only cause of it Finally thus he speaks As in the old Covenant it was not Gods threat that brought death upon the world just so in the New if it be a conditional Promise it is not the Promise that justifies a beleever but the beleever himself The answer is ready Death came into the world by sin as the culpable meritorious cause but sin could not have slain us but by the Law 1 Cor. 15. 56. Rom. 5. 13 14. Ergo. It is not warily said that Gods threat did not bring death upon the world 2. And when Mr. Eyre hath proved that our performance of the Gospel-conditions hath the same proportion to our salvation as sin hath to our destruction the Papists shall thank him Rom. 6. last The wages of sin is death but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Mens not-accepting of the grace of God may make that grace without effect as to themselves 2 Cor. 6. 1. Rom. 3. 3. But that therefore their acceptance is the cause of Gods being gracious to them is wilde reasoning And as to worthy Dr. Kendal out of whom Mr. Eyre quotes these passages he hath publickly enough and in Mr. Eyres hearing for one declared himself to be no enemy against conditions of Justification or salvation That he that is pardoned upon his reading doth not pardon himself §. 27. I proved thus because then he must concurre either to the making of the Law which gives pardon upon such a condition or to the pronouncing of the sentence of absolution upon himself according to that Law This Mr. Eyre saith is an impertinent answer because the question is not whether a man did concur in making the Law and Rule of his Justification but whether he had any causal influxe in producing the effect thereof Rep. My answer if he will call it so was very pertinent as to the case of an offendor saved by his Clergy whose pardon is perfected by a Law which gives the remote right and sentence passed according to that Law which produceth his immunity it selfe If then the said offendor cause his own pardon it must be by concurring some way or other to the production of one of these The case is altogether
adde Dâ—ut 30 from v. 11. to the end of the chapter §. 17. 4. And whereas Mr. Eyre tells us again that the Purpose of Gods Will doth sufficiently secure the sinner and make the Law of condemnation to be of no force as to the real execution of it we have before shewed at large the mischievous consequences of this doctrine If this be so to what purpose imaginable did Christ die at least there was no need he should die to redeem us from the curse of an abrogated Law which by an eternal Act was made of no force at all to condemne Before when the satisfaction and merits of Christ lay at stake for the credit of an eternal Justification Mr. Eyre was content to yield them this honour that they purchased the effects though not the act of Justification which effect he told us was our non-punition But here he tells us that the purpose of Gods Will doth sufficiently secure us from punishment which though I confesse it be more rationally spoken because that act is most unworthy to be called the cause of our non-punition or non-condemnation which is not able to effect it without the help of another more sufficient cause yet is it most perniciously spoken as not leaving so much as the effects of our Justification and by consequence excluding both act and effects from any dependance upon the merits of Christ for their existence 2. Were Adam and Eve either or both obliged by the Law to punishment upon their disobedience or no If not their sin did them no harme nor was there any truth in that severe commination In the day you eat thereof you shall surely die and it is past dispute they died by force of that Law and all their posterity to this day Rom. 5. 12 13 14. 1 Cor. 15. 22 56. And if so then was not that Law made of no force by the eternal purpose of God for if that Purpose of God do not hinder but that men are legally obliged to condemnation upon breach of the Law neither will Gods Justice and Faithfulnesse permit that they go unpunished unlesse his Law be satisfied some other way Numb 23. 19. God is not a man that he should lie neither the Son of man that he should repent hath he said and shall he not do it or hath he speken and shall he not make it good Therefore it is that we have before denied that there is in God any purpose precisely of not punishing 3. The Supreme Magistrate may neglect the execution of Laws with impunity to himselfe because if he be Supreme he is not accountable to any other humane authority but not without such a Prostitution of the authority of his Lawes and the honour of his own Government to contempt and obloqâ—y as God will never endure to be cast upon Himselfe or his Law by men or devils His Honour and his Lawes are dearer to him then a thousand worlds M. Eyre answers thirdly the publishing of an act of grace is for the § 17. comfort of an offendor rather then for any need the Magistrate hath thereof as the act of Oblivion was a real pardon when it passed the House So the publication of the New Covenant was for the comfort of Gods Elect and not for their security in foro Dei Rep. Our question is not precisely what is the end of promulgation but what is the effect of the Law promulged which say I is to give offendors a right to impunity which Mr. Eyre cannot deny though it be very true that such a Law be also for the comfort of an offendor namely secondarily and consequenter for it comforts him in that it gives him a right to deliverance from deserved punishment His right and his comfort are not opposites but both the effects of the same Law and the latter subordinate to the former so that hitherto there is nothing that contradicts me 2. It is also true that it is not the Magistrate who needs an act of grace but offendors need it for if the same authority which bound them under punishment do not also discharge them from it they cannot legally escape it 3. When it is said the Act of Oblivion was a real pardon when it passed the House it hath reference to what I said in my Sermon That a Vote in the House or a Declaration that an Act of Pardon shall come out is no legal security to a Delinquent by which I intended to declare that neither the Purpose of God within himself but the Law of grace which in time he established according to his eternal purpose was that act which pardoned the sinner which if Mr. Eyre would have contradicted he should have affirmed that the meer purpose or resolution of the House to make such an Act is that very pardon which dischargeth Delinquents The Act it self being once passed may be yielded to be a Law as being the declared will of the Lawgivers constituting a right to impunity though by printing writing or proclamation it be afterwards made more publick Neverthelesse I expected some proof that it is a compleat Law before publishing if after the pâ—sâ—ng it had been i Nic. vig. de Drâ—is Iust Jur. c. 1. p. 8. c. 2 p. 1â— ordered not to be published till some moneths or a yeare after I much question whether in that interim it had been Law or no though I am not so well acquainted with the customes of our own Nation as to determine peremptorily The Senatus-Consulta amongst the Romanes had not the force of a Law before publishing But it is quite besides our question to debate what promulgation is necessary to the compleating of a Law It cannot be denied but that when subjects are involved in common guilt as all the world is before God their pardon must be by Law which is as much as I needed or intended for illustration of the way and manner of Gods forgiving us by the Gospel or Law of grace He that believeth shall not perish but shall have everlasting life which because Mr. Eyre denies not disproves for that 's impossible it being a truth of God we shall yet farther evince by the following Arguments SECT III. ANd first from Mat. 28. 18 19. compared with Mark 16. §. 18. 15 16. And Jesus came and spake unto them saying All power is given to me in heaven and in earth Go ye therefore into all the world and preach the Gospel to every creature He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved but he that believeth not shall be damned from hence I inferre 1. That God hath given unto Christ the Kingdome and Government over all men 2. That this Government containes a power of remitting sins 3. That this power is exercised in enacting that gracious Law He that believes shall be saved for so doth the Lord speak Go ye therefore into all the world c. which particle therefore I have borrowed from Matthew ver 19. and put it into
the words of Mark arguing manifestly from the right and authority which he had received to the lawful exercise of it in making and ordering to be published that Law or Act of Pardon whereof he doth then and there appoint his disciples to be Ambassadours I confesse I cannot imagine what can here be said unlesse it be one of these two things Either 1. That remission of sin is not contained in that salvation which is here promised to them that believe But this me thinks should be too harsh for any Christians eares to endure seeing it must contain all that good which is opposed to condemnation and therefore primarily remission of sins which is also expresly mentioned by the other Evangelists Luke 24. 47. John 20. 23. and by the Apostles in the execution of this their commission as a prime part of that salvation which they preached in the Name of Christ Acts 2. 38. and 3. 19 c. Or 2. That those words He that believes shall be saved are a meer description of the persons that shall be saved which I think is the sense that Mr. Eyre somewhere doth put upon them but this to me is more intolerable then the former partly for the reasons mentioned before chap. 5. and to be mentioned hereafter partly because according to such an interpretation the words will be no more then a simple affirmation or relation of what shall come to passe whereas by their dependance upon the foregoing All power is given to me in heaven and in earth it is manifest that they are an authoritative Sanction of the Lord Christ's an act of that jurisdiction and legislative power which he hath received from the Father and so the standing rule of remission of sins 2. If it be by the Promise of the Gospel He that believes shall not perish §. 19. but shall have everlasting life If I say it be by this Promise that God gives sinners a right to impunity and eternal life then by this Promise he justifies them But by the foresaid promise doth God give sinners a right to impunity and eternal life Ergo. The Proposition I passe as manifest by its own light The Assumption is delivered in several Scriptures Thus Paul Gal. 3. 18. God gave the inheritance to Abraham by Promise Ergo it is by Promise also that a right to life is given to all that have it This Promise is either particular or general The former it is not for God doth not now make any particular Promises to particular men such as was his Promise to believing Abraham Ergo it must be the general Promise wherein the same blessings as were given to Abraham are proposed to all men to be obtained by the same faith that Abraham had and by the same Promise given them when they believe which Promise is that before mentioned of life and salvation by faith in Jesus Christ the Apostle himself being Interpreter ver 22. But the Scripture hath concluded all under sin that the Promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe The same doth he assert at large Rom. 4. 13 14 16 23 24. 3. The Lord Jesus sayes expressely John 12. 48. That the §. 20. Word which he spake shall judge unbelievers at the last day If a judgment of condemnation be ascribed to the Word in reference to unbelievers how can it be denied a judgement of Justification in reference to believers Non potuit magis splendido elogio extolli Evangelii authoritas quà m dum illi judiciâ— potestas defertur Conscendet quidem ipse Christus Tribunal sed sententiam ex verbo quod nunc praedicatur laturum se asserit saith Calvin upon the place Yea the Lord ascribes to the same Word a judgement of Justification ver 50. And I know that his Commandment is life everlasting that is the cause of it as Moses also speaks Deut. 32. 47. i See also Deuâ— â—â— v 15 â—â— It is your life though God be the principal cause and the Word but the k Vid. Synops pâ—r theol disp â—3 §. 10 Down of Jâ—stif c. â— â— 5. â—libi passim instrumental and therefore the power which it hath of judgement it hath from hence that it is the Word of God ver 49. For I have not spoken of my selfe but the Father which sent me he gave me a Commandment what I should say as the instrumental cause works not but in the vertue of the principal To this plain testimony let me adde an Argument as plainly deduced from it If judgement shall passe at the last day according to the Word then the Word is that Law which is the rule of judgement and by consequence to one is given by the Word a right to life and another is obliged to condemnation by the same Word But the antecedent is most true Ergo so is the consequent It is the work of judgement to give unto eâ—ery one according to what is due to him by Law if then a judgement of Justification passe upon any some Law of grace must be supposed according to which it becomes due for such a gracious sentence to passe upon him 4. And this is that which the Apostle James saith chap. 4. 12. §. 21. There is one Lawgiver who is able to save and to destroy Beza observes that in foure ancient Greek Copies l As also in the Kings MS. See Dâ— Hammond Annot. in loc as also in the Syriack and the Latine Interpreter the word Judge is extant There is one Lawgiver and Judge who is able to save and destroy that is to whom pertaines the soveraign right and power of saving and destroying But whether the word be expressed or no it is surely implied for the Apostles scope is to disswade us from judging one another ver 11. because there is one Lawgiver to whom the power of judgment and so of absolving and condemning of saving and destroying doth appertain Now he that saves as a Lawgiver saves by absolution and he that absolves as a Lawgiver absolves by Law Ergo God absolves men that is pardons and justifies them by Law And when he shall judge all men at the last day his judgement whether of salvation or destruction shall proceed according to Law 5. Adde to this that the Apostle commends the excellency and glory §. 22. of the Gospel that God doth thereby justifie 2 Cor 3. 9. For if the ministration of condemnation he glory much more doth the ministration of righteousnesse exceed in glory The ministration of condemnation is that which ver 7. he calls the ministration of death written and engraven in stones His scope is to shew the excellency of that Gospel which himself and other Apostles did preach and publish to the world above the ministration of the Law committed to Moses As then the ministration of death and condemnation was the ministration of that Law which did condemn unto death the effect being put for the cause so the
ministration of righteousnesse is the ministration of that Law or Word that justifies the effect being put for the cause in like manner Ergo Justification is by Law 6. To this purpose speaks the same Apostle Rom. 1. 16 17. I §. 23. am not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth â—o the Jew first and also to the Greek for therein is the righteousnesse of God revealed from faith to faith That which I observe is 1. That the Gospel is here called the Power of God to salvation that is a mighty and effectual instrument of salvation as Expositors agree 2. That the power for which the Apostle here extolls it is in that it saves them that beleeve 3. That Justification is here included yea and primarily intended in salvation in which large sense the word salvation is often taken elsewhere Rom. 10. 9 10. Eph. 2. 8. Tit. 3. 5. Luke 7. 48 50. for the reason why he calls it the Power of God to salvation is because it reveales the righteousnesse of God upon all that beleeve Hence 4. The Gospel is the Power of God unto Justification as it is the revealed declared Will of God concerning the Justification of them that beleeve m Vid Calv. Com. in loc Quia nos per Evâ—ng lium justificat Deus because God justifies us by the Gospel I cannot better expresse my minde then in the words of Beza Hoc ita intelligo c. This saith he I so understand not as if Paul did therefore only commend the Gospel because therein is revealed and proposed to view that which the Gentiles before were ignorant of namely that by faith in Christ we are to seek that righteousnesse by vertue of which we obtain salvation of God and the Jewes beheld afar off and under shadows but also because it doth so propose this way of Justification as that it doth also really exhibit it that in this way it may appear that the Gospel is truly the Power of God to salvation that is a mighty and effectual instrument which God useth for the saving of men by faith Thus he simply and historically to declare that some men are justified is not enough to denominate the Gospel the Power of God to salvation but it is required withal that it have authority to give right to salvation to them that beleeve it Therefore the Gospel wherein is manifested the righteousnâ—sse of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ is called the Law of faith Rom. 3. ver 21. 22 27. compared 7. Justification by works should have been by that Law Do this §. 24. and thou shalt live and if those words cannot be denied to have authority to give a right to life to them that fulfilled the Law upon what pretence of reason is the same authority denied to the word of faith Beleeve and thou shalt be saved Rom. 10. 5 8 9. To conclude Therefore is the Gospel called n Heb. â— 8. a Scepter of Righteousnesse o 2 Cor 5. 19. a Word of reconciliation p Eph. 1. â—3 a Gospel of salvation q Rom. 8. 2 3. Dav Par. ibid. a Law of the Spirit of life that makes free from the Law of sin and death r Isa 61. 1 2 3. an opening of Prisons s See the Reverend and most incomparable Dr Reynolds in Ps 110. p. 140. and a proclaiming of liberty to Captives because God doth thereby justifie sinners I had also drawn up foure Reasons from the nature of Justification proving that it must be by Law but because I since finde the substance of them in Mr. Baxter Red. Digr page 141. 142 143. I shall therefore desire the Reader to have recourse to him for his farther satisfaction herein and shall excuse my selfe from the paines of transcribing my own Argâ—ments CHAP. VII A Reply to Mr. Eyres eleventh Chapter John 3 18. and Eph. 2 3. vindicated All unbelievers under condemnation Ergo none justified in unbelief SECT I. MY second Argument by which I proved that men are not justified before faith was this They that are under condemnation cannot at the § 1. same time be justified But all the world are under condemnation before faith Ergo none of the world are justified before faith Mr. Eyre first enters a caution against the major which I had briefly and as I thought and yet think sufficiently proved in my Sermon in these words Justification and Condemnation are contraries and contraries cannot be verified of the same subject at the same time Justification is a moral life and condemnation a moral death a man can be no more in a justified state and a state of condemnation both at once then he can be alive and dead both at once or a blessed man and a cursed man both at once What that the Apostle describes Justification by non-condemnation Rom. 8. 1. and opposeth it to condemnation as inconsistent with it on the same person at the same time ver 33 34. and are at as moral enmity one with another as good and evil light and darknesse Upon these grounds I said that the Proposition must needs be true This as if I had not so much as pretended any reason for it Mr. Eyre tells his Reader is my confident assertion but in the mean time never goes about to remove the grounds upon which it stands This is a sad case but who can help it Yet he will grant the Proposition with this Proviso That these seeming contraries do refer ad idem i. e. to the same Court and Judicatory not otherwise for he that is condemned and hath a judgement on record against him in one Court may be justified and absolved in another He that is cast at common Law may be quitted in a Court of equity He that is condemned in the Court of the Law may be justified in the Court of the Gospel Rep. Which is very true otherwise our Justification were no pardon But I would ask Are these two Courts coordinate and of equal power or is the one in power subordinate to the other If the former how shall a man know whether he be cast or absolved as in our own case If the Law be of as much power to condemne as the Gospel is to justifie how shall a man know whether he be condemned or justified or what sentence shall a poor soul expect when he is going to appear before Gods Tribunal if of absolution why the Law condemnes him if of condemnation the Gospel justifies him and which of these two shall take place But if the one be subordinate to the other then the sentence of the superiour Court rescindes the judgement of the inferiour and makes it of no force and so the man is not absolved and condemned both at once This is the very ground of u L. 1 ss de Appellâ—â— L. Si qâ—is 〈◊〉 appeales from any inferiour Judicatory to a higher
doth afterwards expresse himself they are as lyable to such an arrest of the Law after they believe as before even by Mr. Eyres concession And that word is not like to move a sinner very hastily to seek a change of his condition which will pursue him as much after his condition is changed as before When it is said that the elect are never under the execution of the §. 15. threatnings of the Law that is that the punishments threatned in the Law are never executed upon them if it be meant of the punishments reserved to the world to come it is true but if it be meant of those which are proper to this life it is utterly false Isa 57. 17. and 47. 6. and 54. 7 8. Job 36. 7 11 12. Rom. 5. 12. and 8. 10 20 21 23. 1 Cor. 11. 30 31 32. and 15. 22 26. Jam. 5. 15 16. 1 Joh. 5. 16. and hundreds of other places And this section I have written to follow Mr. Eyre what is his intent in all this himself best knows His conclusion is that the consciences of the elect before faith are under wrath not their persons though it be a rule in Logick that e omnis actio passio est proprie totius compositi and therefore to say the conscience is under wrath e Vid. Ames Thes Log. thâ— 76 in distinction from the person is none of the neatest expressions and then tells his reader that against this I have several exceptions Whereas I never excepted against it at all in the generall but onely as not being sutable to that particular text in John 3. 18. Which I had urged to prove that all unbelievers are in a state of condemnation Nor doth Mr. Eyre answer this text by this distinction though I think I was informed that he was wont so to do which was the reason that I laid in the following Arguments against it and therefore Mr. Eyre might have spared his paines of attempting to answer the said Arguments as not prejudicing that interpretation which he gives of the text Neverthelesse it may be usefull to examine his answers SECT IV. THe first Argument then proving that the condemnation mentioned §. 16. Joh. 3. 18. cannot be meant of condemnation in conscience meerly was this The condemnation which the unbelievers there spoken of are under is the condemnation of the Law which pronounceth all men guilty not only in their own conscience but before God Rom. 3. 19. Mr. Eyre answers that the voyce or sentence of the Law shews not who are condemned of God but who are guilty and damnable in themselves if God should deal with them by the Law But the elect are discharged from this rigorous Court their cause is judged at another Bar. Rep. The words of the text are these Whatsoever the Law saith it saith to them that are under the Law that every mouth may be stopped and all the world may become guilty before God The thing which I inferre from this Text compared with Joh. 3. 18. for illustration of which I mentioned it is this That every unbeliever elect or not elect stands guilty that is obliged to punishment in the sight or judgement of God and not only of his own conscience Which to be the true sense of the place is manifest from the importance of the Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which we render guilty not only as being the same with the Hebrew 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which properly signifies a debt or f Vid. Eli. Thisb in verb. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Joh. Sâ—lden do Jure Naâ— Gent l. 1. cap. â— p. 46. obligation but also as being constantly used in the same sense in Greek Authors Therefore g Comment Graec. Ling p. 166. Budaeus expounds it as of the same significancy with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Qui est obnoxius è re judicatá 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A man condemned or adjudged to punishment though he have not yet suffered it Accordingly Beza upon the place notes well 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 non tantum declarat judicium quo vel â—bsolvi vel damnari possit aliquis hac enim significatione ipsi etiam filii Dei sunt 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in quibus tamen nulla est condemnatio sed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. condemnationem declarat sicut 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Now to what Mr. Eyre sayes that the Law doth only declare who §. 17. are damnable in themselves not who are condemned of God it is contrary 1. To himself 2. To sense 3. To reason 1. To himself for remember Reader that I brought in this place as an explication of that in Joh. 3. 18. He that beleeveth not is condemned already Which condemnation Mr. Eyre hath already acknowledged to be by the Law and makes it the condemnation of finall unbelievers onely I did rightly infer if the condemnation there spoken of be that which is by the Law then is it condemnation before God Rom. 3. 19. and not in conscience only which was the thing I was there proving To this Mr. Eyre tells me the Law shews not who are condemned of God but who are damnable in themselves How hath it already condemned and that remedilesly the greatest part of the world and yet doth it no more then shew who are damnable in themselves not who are condemned of God me thinks he should at last suspect the truth of that cause which doth so often dash him upon contradictions 2. To sense for I appeale to the experience of all Christians who have felt the work of the Law driving them out of themselves to fly unto Christ whether it have not convinced them not only that they are damnable in themselves for that it will do after they are in Christ as well as before but that they are while out of Christ condemned that is under an obligation and tendency to the suffering of wrath and out of a state of salvation That it doth so is manifest from the first question which a soul upon whom the Law comes with power will aske What shall I do to be saved Act. 2 37. and 16. 30. A question which supposeth him to be convinced by the Law that he is a condemned creature needing not only comfort but salvation that is deliverance from condemnation in which only he can be comforted Now if this be the worke of the Law when brought home by the power of God then must it needs be most true that such a soul is indeed in the state of condemnation till by faith he be passed from death to life and accordingly the Law must be acknowledged to declare not only who are damnable in themselves but who are condemned of God It is also against reason for demonstration of which we must enquire §. 18. what it is for a man to be damnable in himself It implies that there is on his part
grounded in his displeasing quality viz. Of unbelief and on the contrary Enoch is here said by faith to please or to be pleasing unto God v. 5. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Seeing then the word imports such a delight in or approbation of a person as supposeth him endued with lovely and amiable qualities and nothing in man is lovely in Gods eyes without faith for God delights not in his physical substance or natural perfections of any sort Psal 147. 10. it follows that when we are said by faith to please God or to be pleasing to him or that it is impossible to please him without faith it must be understood of the pleasingnesse of the person as well as of the action Indeed there is in God a love of benevolence towards the elect even while they are most displeasing to him but a love of complacency or approbation he hath not towards them till they beleeve They that are in the flesh cannot please God Rom. 8. 8. 2. Nor can I imagin how God can be perfectly well-pleased with men and yet perpetually displeased with every thing they do which yet he must be supposed to be if faith do only commend our actions not our persons unto God Amongst men it is unconceivable how a total displeasure with another mans actions can consist with well-pleasednesse with the person That which commends the work doth also commend the worker and if the work be unacceptable the worker also is so far unacceptable if all his works be unacceptable himself also is wholly unacceptable 3. I aske whether faith it self be pleasing unto God principally out of doubt Joh 6. 29. Then when we are said by faith to please God it is a great deal too slender to interpret it of pleasing him in obedience onely 4. And though it be most true that our obedience is not acceptable to God without faith yet cannot Mr. Eyre owne it if he will be true to his doctrine that sins are pardoned before the sinner hath a being for that obedience wherein God seeth no sin is acceptable to him The obedience of the elect is such wherein God seeth no sin I speak of those works which they may performe before they beleeve as prayer hearing of the word c. Ergo it is acceptable to God The assumption is manifest for not to see sin and to pardon it are all one and God hath from eternity pardoned the sins of the elect as saith Mr. Eyre In the following part of this answer he gives us a reason why our §. 10. works without faith cannot please God for saith he bonum est ex causá integrá Now what is not done in faith is not done in love Gal. 5. 6. and consequently is not fruit unto God Rep. Against which I have no great matter to except onely 1 I wonder he should not account the Apostles reason worth taking notice of who when he had said without faith it is impossible to please God presently gives this reason for he that cometh unto God must beleeve that he is and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him 2. Whatsoever effect there be in the obedience of the elect unregenerate yet are their works never a whit the more unacceptable for it upon any other account then because that defect is sinful and the sinfulnesse being supposed to be pardoned and that from eternity it cannot make the work unacceptable pardoned sin and no sin are much of the same strength as to any harme it can do us 3. If works cannot please God while there is something wanting which should make them entirely good how comes it to passe that the person should be so hugely well-pleasing while there is nothing in him but evil mens persons are under Law as well as their actions Ars est in fabrica rei c See John Yates Mod. of Divin pag. 8. Ex viro verè magno Aâ—exand Richardsono Divinity was at first impressed in the very frame and constitution of mans nature If an action materially good be yet displeasing because of its deformity to rule in respect of manner surely the person cannot be well-pleasing while he is every whit as much out of frame and fallen all in pieces as I may so speak and not so much as begun to be repaired againe by a spirit of renovation In the next place Mr. Eyre offers us two Arguments to prove §. 11. that Gods well-pleasednesse with the elect is the immediate effect of the death of Christ If he mean immediate in respect of time and exclusively of every qualification in us without which God will not be well-pleased with us let us see his Arguments The former is from reason the latter from testimony of Scripture First saith he That which raised a partition-wall between God and the elect was the breach of the Law Now when the Law was satisfied for their sins this partition was broken down his favour had as free a current as if they had not sinned Answ The Argument supposeth that the satisfaction of Christ was no more and needed to be no more then a removens prohibens of our good which Mr. Eyre chargeth upon Mr. Baxter though most unjustly as a very heinous errour and exagitates it with aâ—rimony sufficient Therefore I shall not need to confute it yet one thing I shall offer to the Readers consideration If the reason of Gods well-pleasednesse with sinners be this onely that Christ hath removed that which separated between God and them then the elect are upon the same terms with God as Adam was and all mankind in him before the fall and Christ by his death hath not made a new Covenant but established the old But this is most notoriously false Ergo. The reason of the consequence is plaine for what follows immediately upon the removal of a hindrance had all its causes in being before as if my house be lightsome immediately upon letting down of â—he shuts of the windows it supposeth the sun to be up Now the only means and instrument of the communication of life before the death of Christ was the Covenant of works made with Adam and all mankind in him Ergo if Gods well-pleasednesse follow immediately upon the death of Christ as that which hath removed the hindrance it follows by virtue of that Covenant or by none at all 2. But if the well-pleasednesse of God do not follow necessarily and immediately upon the death of Christ Mr. Eyre himself will acknowledge his Argument to be null My answer therefore is That the death of Christ did indeed immediately undermine and weaken the wall of partition so as that it could not long stand but it did not totally demolish and throw it down presently because it was not so agreed upon between the Father and the Sonne in his undertaking for our redemption which because I am purposely to prove by and by I shall desire the reader to have a little patience till he come to
the non-imputation of their sin in the death of Christ but they were not therefore presently reconciled and their sin non-imputed as we have shewed from the text before God laid the foundation of a future reconciliation in the death of Christ The sixth That what I grant yields the question viz. The immediate reconciliation of sinners upon the death of Christ For if Christ by the shedding of his blood paid the total and full price for our deliverance from the curse of the Law then were we actually set free from the obligation of it for when the debt is paid the debtour is free in Law Answ I deny the consequent and the proof of it Christ purchased our Glorification must we therefore needs be glorified as soon as he was dead that is to say many hundreds of years before we are borne And if he purchased one benefit to follow not till many yeares after the price was paid might he not also purchase another and particularly our deliverance from the curse of the Law to follow after a like distance of time 2 The reason or proof is most impertinent Christ cannot purchase our deliverance from the curse unlesse the said deliverance follow presently and immediatly because the debt being paid the debtour is presently discharged As if I should say the payment of the debt doth presently discharge the debtour Ergo men cannot purchase reversions 3. The payment of the debtour doth presently discharge him but if it be not the debtour himself which makes the payment but some other he is not discharged ipso facto as we shall shew anon And now Reader I shall acquaint thee with the Reasons why §. 19. I interpret those words Rom. 5. 10. We were reconciled to God by the death of his Sonne not of our actual and compleat reconciliation but of that which is purchased and so the meaning of the words we were reconciled will be this that our reconciliation was then purchased yea and also perfect ex parte causae on Christs part so that nothing can now hinder our actual personal and perfect reconciliation with God but our own refusing to be reconciled God having constituted a most sufficient cause of our reconciliation in the death of Christ 1. From ver 8. and 9. While we were yet sinners Christ died for us much more then being justified now by his blood c. What in ver 9. is called Justification that in ver 10. is called reconciliation and for Christ to die for us while we were sinners ver 8. is all one with what is said ver 10. When we were enemies we were reconciled by his death But the time of their Justification is expressely separated from the time of Christs death for them by the particle now While we were yet sinners Christ died for us but we are justified now which particle now though it have several senses in Scripture as we shall shew by and by yet here being put after the participle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and separated from the Conjunction ◠by the interposition of two entire words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and expressely opposed to the time past when we were yet sinners must therefore needs be an adverbe of time And the time it notes is their present time of Conversion and believing opposed unto that whole time wherein they were yet sinners And so the whole sentence runs thus most pertinently to the Apostles scope If while we were yet sinners under the power and condemnation of sin Christ died for us much more then being justified now that we are believers by his blood c. Accordingly if the particle now be borrowed from ver 9. and repeated in ver 10. the whole sense of the verse will be this If while we were enemies we were reconciled sc causaliter quantum ad meritum unto God in the death of his Sonne much more being now viz. since we are believers reconciled quoad effectum we shall be saved by his life and so the first reconciled signifies that which is ex parte Christi and the second that which is ex parte nostri the former reconciliation in the cause the latter in the effect Just as this same Apostle distinguisheth the same word 2 Cor. 5. 19 20. God was in Christ reconciling Be ye reconciled And surely faith must be supposed to the reconciled in the second part of the verse or it is of no use at all to salvation for the Apostles discourse supposeth that there is a necessary and immediate connexion between reconciliation and salvation so that he that is reconciled is immediately capable of being saved Much more being reconciled we shall be saved But no unbeliever is immediately capable of being saved though Christ have died for him for he must believe first as Mr. Eyre himself will grant If it be said that faith it selfe is part of our salvation the Objector must suppose that the Apostle speaks of himselfe and the Romanes as of unbelievers to this sense much more being reconciled we shall have faith given us which is unreasonable to suppose 2. And that our being reconciled in the death of Christ is to be understood §. 20. in reference to the sufficiency of what Christ hath done in order to our reconciliation appears farther from the comparison of contraries by which the Apostle illustrates this whole doctrine from v. 12. to the end of the chapter Look then as by vertue of Adams disobedience death passed upon all mankinde as soon as they are the children of Adam so by the obedience of Christ is reconciliation obtained by which all that are borne of Christ by faith are reconciled unto God Now if a man should say All men are dead in Adam as in ver 15. though he speak of the effect as wrought yet he must be understood as intending no more then that the cause of all mens death was in being as soon as Adam sinned for surely men cannot be dead before they are borne or have a being so when it is said men are reconciled in the death of Christ the word reconciled must be understood in like manner as noting the vertue of the cause not the effect as already produced I know Mr. Eyre thinks that all men were actually quoad effectum condemned in Adam But I would he would make this probable yea or conceivable for I confesse my dull head cannot apprehend it though I do easily conceive how we may be said to be condemned in him causally for the common sin of our nature namely that the causes of our condemnation were then in being which do certainly produce the effect of condemnation upon us as soon as we exist But condemnation is a real transient act Ergo it supposeth its object really existing but it is unconceivable how men should really exist five or six thousand yeares before they are borne Seeing then our reconciliation in the death of Christ by the Apostles own Explication is
of the same kinde with our condemnation in Adam it is manifest it must be understood of reconciliation in the cause not in the effect Nor let it trouble the Reader that the Apostle speaks as if the effect §. 21. were wrought we were reconciled for nothing more common in Scripture then to speak of the effect as wrought when provision is made of a sufficient cause by which it shall or may be wrought Ezek. 24. 13. I have purged thee and thou wast not purged that is there was nothing wanting on Gods part that might conduce to her purging though the effect did not follow Col. 1. 23. the Gospel was preached to every creature under heaven not that every person and Nation had then heard the Gospel for they have not yet heard it but that by Gods permission and commandment they might hear it Christ hath abolished death 2 Tim. 1. 10. namely he is the authour and cause of its abolition or he hath abolished it quoad meritum for death is not destroyed de facto quoad effectum till the Resurrection 1 Cor. 15. 26 54. so in verbs of active signification Heb. 4. 12. The Word of God is powerful piercing to the dividing asunder c. Psal 19. 7 8. converting making wise rejoycing the heart enlightening the eyes all which do not so much signifie the act as the vertue and sufficiency of the cause In like manner when Christ is said to be the propitiation for our sins and not for ours only but for the sins of the whole world 1 John 2. 2. it is to be understood of the vertue and sufficiency of his blood to take away sin not of a propitiation then presently wrought and effected for there is none such before faith if the Apostle may be beleeved Rom. 3. 25. Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood Multitudes of like instances are obvious A third Argument is that mentioned in my Sermon out of v. 11. §. 22. By whom we have now also received the atonement which in plainer termes is this That now that is since we are believers we are actually reconciled unto God Mr. Eyre answers 1. That I might as well argue that because the Apostle saith 1 Cor. 15. 20. Now is Christ risen Ergo he was not risen before he wrote that Epistle Or from Eph. 2. 2. The Spirit that now worketh in the children of unbelief Ergo he did not work in them before Rep. Doth Mr. Eyre then think that the particle now in this place is to be taken in the same sense as in those if he doth his next answer is a nullity if he doth not he might have spared this The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 now hath several uses sometimes it is a meer supplement or redundancy Psal 39. 7. sometimes a note of transition as when it is said Now it came to passe sometimes of a continued act as Eph. 2. 2. Heb. 9. 24. sometimes of a supposition Rom. 8. 1. 1 Cor. 7. 14. sometimes of opposition or of assumption 1 Cor. 15. 20. Heb. 11. 16. but most commonly and naturally of time and particularly of the time of mens being converted Rom. 6. 19 21 22. and 1â— 30. Gal. 2. 20. and 4. 9. and elsewhere often so is it taken here as being distinguished from the time of the death of Christ ver 10. and superadding some other benefit then what was effected immediately in his death namely the receiving of reconciliation neither of which are to be found in either of the places mentioned by Mr. Eyre nor will any of the other sense of the word comport with this place His second answer therefore is We cannot receive or apply reconciliation to our selves but by faith yet it follows not that God did not account it to us before Rep. The accounting of reconciliation to us is an expression I never heard before 2. Justification and reconciliation are here used to signifie the same thing Ergo to receive the atonement is all one with the receiving of Justification or pardon of sin as Acts 26. 18. and 10. 43. which we have shewed before cannot be meant of our knowing our sins to be pardoned SECT V. FOr farther Explication of the difference between our reconciliation §. 23. in the death of Christ and after our believing I observed out of Grotius a distinction of three periods of the Will of God 1. As it may be conceived immediately after sin committed before the consideration of the death of Christ And now is the Lord at enmity with the sinner though not averse from all ways and meanes by which he may returne to friendship with him again 2. As it may be conceived after the death of Christ and now is the Lord not only appeasable but doth also promise that he will be reconciled with sinners upon such â—â—â—mes as himself shall propose 3. As. the same Will of God may be considered after an intercession on Christs part and faith on the sinners part and now is God actually reconciled and in friendship with the sinner Against any of these particulars Mr. Eyre excepts nothing but exclaims against the whole as extreamly grosse and why forsooth because it makes God changeable But as grosse as it is not our Protestants only but the Scriptures also own every syllable of it nor will the satisfaction of Christ stand without it God was in friendship with Adam while he continued righteous and without sin I conceive it is next to an impossibility that the righteous Lord should be at enmity with a righteous man who neither is a sinner nor in the room of a sinner After Adam had sinned was not God at enmity with him Yes surely unlesse Christ be dead in vaine by his death we were reconciled while we were enemies After the death of Christ God is reconciled unto sinners Lo here God is a friend an enemy and reconciled again and is this such monstrous Divinity with Mr. Eyre But for the Readers farther information I shall endeavour to shew how God may be first a friend then an enemy then reconciled without any variablenesse or shadow of changing in himselfe and then shall adde a word or two more concerning our reconciliation in the death of Christ and so return to Mr. Eyre Reconciliation is the redintegration or renewing of friendship §. 24. g Vide Arist ad Nichom 8. 2 7. and friendship is either 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 between those who may be equally serviceable one unto another in any office of love and friendly communication of good in a way of arithmetical proportion or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 between those that are of unequal condition the one excelling the other in dignity or age or power between whom there cannot therefore be any reciprocal communication of good but in a way of geometrical proportion he that is of low degree and meaner rank imparting love and honour and observance to him that is of high
hence follow that sinners were reconciled immediately in the death of Christ without the intervention of a Covenant that is without the ministry of reconciliation Yea rather the just contrary follows for making of peace in Christs death is here made the means and cause of a future reconciliation that follows when even when by the Gospel sinners are converted unto God As is evident in the example of these Colossians v. 21. And you that were sometimes alienated and enemies by wicked works yet now hath he reconciled As also by that place altogether parallel to this Eph. 2. 15 16 17. Having abolished in his flesh the enmity even the Law of commandments so making peace And that he might reconcile both unto God in one body by the crosse and came and preached peace unto you c. Here we see 1. What is meant by making of peace viz. A plucking up the bounds and throwing down the wall that separated the Gentiles from the Jews and by consequence from God or an obtaining of a Covenant of peace that might reach even unto the Gentiles who before wâ—re afar off and strangers from the Covenants of promise v. 12 13. that they also might be fellow heires and of the same body and partakers of the promise in Christ by the Gospel chap. 3. 6. 2. Here is the end of this peace made by the crosse viz. That both Jews and Gentiles in one body might be reconciled to God that is through the same faith in the same Lord Jesus Christ in whom there is neither Jew nor Gentile neither circumcision nor uncircumcision but all are one in him through the same saith Gal. 3. 28. and 5. 6. 3. The means by which they came to be of the same body namely by the preaching of peace v. 17. Can any thing be spoken more fully against the immediate reconciliation of sinners in the death of Christ or for proofe that Christ obtained that Covenant of peace through the preaching of which the Gentiles were converted and so reconciled unto God Gal. 3. 13. saith that Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the Law that is paid the price of our redemption or obtained eternal redemption for us as Heb. 9. 12. but doth it say that we are delivered without a Covenant made in the same blood and death of Christ nay the Apostle supposeth the just contrary namely that blessednesse whereof sure our reconciliation with God is no small part is given to us by Covenant v. 11 14 15 16. Even that which he calls the promise by faith in Jesus Christ v. 22. The last text is that mentioned in my sermon Matth. 26. 28. Christ saith Mr. Eyre doth not say that he shed his blood to procure a conditional promise but for the remission of the sins of many Ans But he sayes his blood was the blood of the New-Testament which was shed for the remission of sins Of which former words Mr. Eyre is content to take no notice But out of doubt they teach us this or they teach us nothing that by the blood of Christ was the Covenant of remission obtained and sealed or that Covenant by which sin is pardoned to them that beleeve for the blood of Christ pardons not sin immediately but unto them onely that drink it by faith Joh. 6. 53 54 55 56 57. Hence the Apostate from the faith is said to count the blood of the Covenant by which he was sanctified an unholy thing Heb. 10. 29. SECT VII HAving thus shewed from the Scriptures that sinners are not immediately §. 31. reconciled in the death of Christ I proceeded farther to shew the grounds of it and they are two partly because the death of Christ was noâ— â—olâ—â—â—ejujdem but tantidem not the payment of that which was in the obligation but of the equivalent and therefore doth not deliver us ipso facto partly the agreement betwixt the Father and the Son of which more by and by Mr. Eyre answers to the former Whether the death of Christ be solutio ejusdem or â—antidem as it is a satisfaction or payment of a debt so the discharge thereby procured must needs be immediate for that a debt should be paid and satisfied and yet justly chargeable implies a contradiction Rep. Yea Then the Lawyers abuse both themselves and us for there is scarcely a determination more common in the Law then o L. mutuum §. 2. ff de reb cred l. cum â— de sol l. Debitor ff de sol ubi pro debitorem legendum creditorem l. si â—c §. 3. ff de re juâ— that a debtor is not discharged ipso facto upon the payment of any other thing then of that same which is in the obligation Titius is bound to pay Sempronius a hundred pounds in current mony of England when the day of payment is come he brings the full value in corne or he is bound to pay silver and he brings gold is he hereby discharged No. But if he bring the very same thing which he was bound to he is discharged ipso facto Now if when he brings gold instead of silver or corne instead of mony some act of the creditour is requisite to admit the payment of one instead of the other that so the debtor may be freed then is it also in the creditors power especially the debtor also consenting to propose upon what tearms he will that the debtor shall be freed either presently or after some time either upon condition or without which is all I seek for at present the consequence of this we shall see by and by In the mean time Mr. Eyre will have me prove that the death of Christ is not solutio ejusdem A service which I little expected to be put upon by an English Divine p Vide librum â—vi mei reverendissimi Robertâ—â— arkeri de descensu l. 3. §. 57 58. p g. 108 109 The Assemb larg Catech. oâ— justi q. 2. 1. All our Divines acknowledge that Christ made a true proper satisfaction unto God for our sins q L. â—â—tisfact ff de solut Ergo his death was not solutio ejusdem the payment of the very same which was in the obligation but of the equivalent onely 2. Mr. Eyre himself but just before did intimate some kind of acknowledgement that the death of Christ was a payment of it self refusable Ergo it was not solutio ejusdem r L. quod in di em ff de sol l. quod quis 49. ff â—â— Action l. Accept 19. c. de usur for no creature can refuse to admit of that 3. It was not Christs death but ours that was in the obligation for the Law requires that he that sins dye and no man else If he that sinneth not dye that death cannot be the same which was in the obligation s Ut in contractu ersenali de facto Ulpian in l. inter â— rtif 31. ff de sol In corporal punishments which
if they be both in the very same bond and obligation hath some thing of truth in it though then also the surety hath the same action against the debtour which the creditor had before otherwise it is most notoriously false and the contrary determined frequently in the y I. in summa l. Si poenae D. de condict in deb l Si quid possessor ff de Pet. Haered l. Papin ff Maâ—d civil Law If the payment of the surety do presently discharge the debtour it is because he agrees with the creditour that the payment which he makes shall be accepted for the present and immediate discharge of the debtour which is the second thing I beganne to mention before and shall now farther explaine The death of Christ being not the very same which was in the obligation therefore that it may be effectual for our deliverance there is a double act required on Gods part to whom this payment is made the one is to admit or give way that satisfaction be made the other factam ratam habere to accept it when made and consequently to discharge and free the debtour for Christs satisfaction was admitted that our obligation might he destroyed by the intervening act of God the supream Governour of mankind Rom. 3. 25. Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation that he may be the justifier of him that beleeveth in Jesus Moreover Christ being not a sinner but a surety and his payment not the payment of the principal debtour but of a surety therefore it is in his power to agree whether his payment shall be accepted and be effectual for the discharge of the sinner presently or for some time to come absolutely or upon condition Whence by the way appears what little strength there is in Mr. Eyres second exception viz. That Christs payment is lesse efficacious then if we had paid our selves if we be not thereby discharged presently because Christs satisfaction produceth its effects according to the agreement between his Father and himself and no otherwise and the virtue of it is to be measured by the greatnesse of the effect which could not be wrought by any meer created cause whether it produce it sooner or later upon condition or without Wherefore if we prove that the Father and Son agreed that none §. 35. should have actual discharge by the death of Christ till they do beleeve we carry the cause by Mr Eyres owne judgement Yet in yielding thus much he hath not a little prejudiced the authority of his own determinations so I call them because he lays them downe so peremptorily and axiomatically as if they needed no proofe How often doth he tell us before and after this concession that our discharge in the death of Christ must needs be present and immediate as pag. 68. § 7. Our discharge from the Law was â— not to be sub termino or in diem but present and immediate And in this chapter § 13. The death of Christ as it is a satisfaction or payment so the discharge thereby procured must needs be present and immediate As if it were a contradiction in the nature of the thing that we should not presently be discharged if Christ hath made satisfaction And yet here yeelds that by a contract or agreement between the Father and the Sonne the discharge obtained in Christs satisfaction may be suspended It is therefore a thing possible that Christ may have satisfied and yet we the elect I mean not be presently discharged And what then means the must needs were it a thing denyed it were easie to give innumerable instances of satisfaction made when yet the person for whom it is made is not presently freed but because it is not denied I hasten to the service which Mr. Eyre challengeth me to performe with a promise that if it be performed he will yeeld the cause and that is to shew that it was the will of the Father and of the Sonne that none should have actual reconciliation by the death of Christ till they do beleeve For proofe of this I quoted the words of the Lord Jesus wherein §. 36. he gives us an account both of his own and his Fathers will in this matter Joh. 6. 40. This is the will of him that sent me that whosoever seeth the Sonne and beleeveth on him may have everlasting life To which Mr. Eyre answers This Text and others like it do only shew who have the fruition and enjoyment of the benefits of Christ to wit thâ—y that beleeve Rep. An answer which lets me see something of what the wit of man can do in darkening plaine testimonies whose sense is obvious at first view even to vulgar capacities This is not the first time we have met with this answer in Mr. Eyre and it hath been already convicted and cast by more then a jury of Arguments in â—hap 5. 8. two places and therefore here I shall speak but briefly to it 1. Iâ— this and the like Texts do only shew â—â—o are the persons that have the enjoyment of Christs benefits namely beleevers then either they shew that beleevers as such in seâ—s◠〈◊〉 are the subjects of that life which is here promised and then I have what I would have for if men as beleevers are the subjects of this life then the prooâ—â—s full that they do not begin to partake in this life before they are beleevers much lesse before they are borne and least of all at the time of the death of Christ nor was it the will of the Father or of the Sonne that they should so do Or the meaning is that the persons who enjoy this life are such whose property and priviledge it is to be beleevers some time or other sooner or later though they may not be beleevers when they first begin to partake therein and so they are described à câ—nsâ—quenti from their faith as a consequent of their first partaking in this life And if so I shall return Mr. Eyre his offer namely that if he will shew me but one place of Scripture from the beginning of Genesis to the end of the Revelation wherein persons that shall enjoy a benefit are described from the consequent of that benefit with a distributive particle preposed such as is the particle whosoever in the present Text and I will yeeld him the cause at lest so farre forth as it is concerned in these Texts But if Mr. Eyre cannot give one instance of the like phrase of speech in all the Bible as I know he cannot then let him take heed least he become guilty of that which he doth elsewhere groundlesly charge upon me I meane of attempting to suborne the spirit to serve his own turne And what I speak of the description of a person in order to his receiving of a benefit is true also in respect of any evil threatned How many hundreds of times are such sentences in Scripture As for example Matth. 5. 22. Whosoever is
to our Justification before God the contrary to which he had spoke but just before upon v. 5. Obj. Nulláne igitur utilitas erit circumcisionis Respondet in Christo nihil valere ideoque justitiam in fide sitam esse c. Perkins his words are these in answer to the objection of the Papists from those words Faith worketh by love Paul saith he doth not shew in this verse what justifieth but what are the exercises of godlinesse in which Christians must be occupied And he doth not shew how faith justifieth but how it may be discerned to be true faith namely by love But neither doth this intend any thing more then to shew the reason why Paul describes justifying faith as working by love viz. not that it justifieth as working by love though it be the property of that faith by which we are justified to work by love But he was far from thinking that faith was no whit available to our Justification before God It is his own observation upon this very verse not far before The second Conclusion Faith is of great use and acceptation in the Kingdome of Christ By it first our persons and then our actions please God and without it nothing pleaseth God And immediately after these words which Mr. Eyre refers to disputes for Justification by faith without works against the Papists The last place I mentioned was 1 John 5. 11. He that hath §. 40. the Sonne hath life he that hath not the Sonne hath not life Mr. Eyre answers He doth not say that all who have not faith except final vnbelievers have not the Sonne or any beneâ—t by him Rep. This upon the matter is to deny that the testimony is true 1. Life doth here signifie all that blessednesse which God hath given us in Jesus Christ ver 11. Ergo he that hath not the Son hath no benefit by him But he that believeth not hath not the Sonne for to have the Sonne is to believe on him Ergo he that believeth not hath not the Sonne nor any benefit by him That we have the Sonne by believing on him is manifest 1. From the Apostles own interpretation for having spoke in general He that hath the Son hath life he applies it particularly to those to whom he writes v. 13. And these things have I written unto you that believe on the Name of the Sonne of God that you may know that you have eternal life 2. From the perpetual sense of the phrase throughout all these Epistles as chap. 2. 23. Whosoever denieth the Sonne the same hath not the Father but he that acknowledgeth the Sonne hath the Father also suitable to what this John records in his Gospel chap. 12. 44 45. He that beleeveth on me believeth not on me but on him that sent me And he that seeth me seeth him that sent me And more expressely in his Epistle 2 ep v. 9. Whosoever transgresseth and abideth not in the doctrine of Christ HATH NOT GOD But he that abideth in the doctrine of Christ HE HATH both the Father and the Sonne Compare 1 ep 2. 24. 2. If we are said in Scripture any where to have the Son in any other sense then by believing or as excluding believing why have we no intelligence of it Mr. Eyre might very well think we should interpret his silence partly in that he declares not how we may be said to have Christ any otherwise then by faith partly in not attempting to justifie it from the phrase of Scripture as an argument that himself is conscious that the doctrine which he here suggests hath no footing in the Scriptures Briefly the Apostle speaks without distinction or limitation He that hath the Sonne hath life even that eternal life whereof he spake in the verse immediately foregoing If the Son may be had without believing then eternal life may be had without believing also wherefore we winde up the Argument If it were the Will of God that none should have the life which is in his Sonne till by believing he had the Sonne then was it his Will that none should be justified by the death of Christ till they did beleeve The reason is because the life of pardon or Justification is an eminent part of that life which God hath given us in his Sonne and virtually includes all that life we have by Christ But the antecedent is proved true from the text Ergo the consequent is true To these texts mentioned in my Sermon and now vindicated let §. 41. me adde one or two more If God hath set forth Christ to be a propitiation through faith in his blood then was it not the Will of God that any man should have actual remission or Justification by the blood of Christ till he did beleeve But God hath set forth Christ to be a propitiation through faith in his blood Ergo. The Assumption is the Apostles own words Rom. 3. 25. The reason of the Proposition is plain because if any man be pardoned and justified immediately in the death of Christ then is not Christ a propitiation z Inseriâ— fidem ut doceat fidem esse conditionem sub quà Christus nobis datus est propitiatorium Dav. Paraeus in loc through faith but without it Not that our faith contributes any degree of worth or sufficiency to the blood of Christ by which it may be made in its kinde a more perfect cause of our remission but because God hath so constituted that our remission shall not follow and so our sins not be propitiated quoad â—ffectum in the blood of Christ till we beleeve Again the Compact and Agreement between the Father and the Sonne in his undertaking the work of Redemption is set down at large Isa 53. throughout particularly ver 10. 11 12. where also the Justification of those for whom he died is mentioned as the fruit and effect of Christs offering himselfe for them and bearing their iniquities but not before their faith but through it ver 11. By his knowledge shall my righteous servant justifie many that is by the knowledge of him where knowledge as elsewhere in Scripture often signifies faith And what shall I say more we have proved from multitudes of Scriptures that God requires commands and exhorts all men to beleeve that they may be justified by the blood of Christ And what stronger evidence can we need then this that it was not the Will of God that men should be justified by that blood before they did beleeve even as under the Law there was no propitiation by sacrifice typical but supposed on the offendors part the concurrence of some act as a Lev. 5. 5. câ—nfession b Chap. 23. â—9 30. humiliation c â—b 1. 4 3 2 â—assim laying his hand on the head of the sacrifice d Lâ—v. â— 16. â—ide Joma Peâ—râ—k 8 8 â— or the like signifying that faith by which sinners should be justified when Christ the true sacrifice should
similitude So saith he the cloud of our sins being blotted out the beams of Gods love have as free a passage towards us as if we had not sinned What are these beams of love Is pardon of sin any of them if it be then behold the sense of the comparison viz. Christ having satisfied God can now pardon sin as freely as if men had no sin and so had never needed pardon This is a rare notion but there is yet something worse then non-sense included in it namely that sinners are discharged without pardon as having in Christ paid to the full the debt which they owed as swearers and drunkards are discharged upon payment of the mulct enjoyned by Law without the Magistrates pardon and become from thenceforth immediately as capable of the benefit and protection of the Law as if they had never broken it If immediately upon Christs satisfaction the elect become in like manner as capable of the blessings of the promise as if they had never sinned there is then no need that they should beleeve and repent in order to the obtaining of life and salvation The fifth Argument succeeds If it were the will of God that the §. 9. sin of Adam should immediately overspread his posterity then it was his will that the satisfaction and righteousnesse of Christ should immediately redound to the benefit of Gods elect for there is the same reason for the immediate transmission of both to their respective subjects for both of them were heads and roots of mankind But the sin of Adam did immediately over spread his posterity All men sinned in him Rom. 5. 12. before ever they committed any actual sin Ergo. Ans I deny both proposition and assumption First for the assumption I deny that any man is guilty of Adams sin till he exist and be a child of Adam He that is not is not under Law to be capable of breaking it or fulfilling it of receiving or enduring any good or evil effects of it And as to Rom. 5. 12. which M. Eyre quotes to prove that all men sinned in Adam before they had any being of their own neither doth the text say so but only that death passed upon all men fâ—r that all have sinned which if M. Eyre will render in whom all have sinned as I deny not but he may by the help of an ellipsis thus Death passed upon all men by him in whom all have sinned yet will it be short of his purpose Doth not the Apostle say in the same verse Death hath passed upon all men and v. 15. through the offence of one many be dead which many himself interprets of all v. 18. for as Beza notes well v. 15. many in this comparison is not opposed to all but to one Is it therefore lawfull to inferre that men are actually dead before they are borne Nothing lesse The meaning then of this speech All men are dead in Adam is no more but this That sentence of death passed upon Adam by virtue of which all that are borne of him eo ipso that they derive their being from him become subject unto the same death In like manner all are said to have sinned in him not that his posterity then unborne and unbegotten that is no body were immediately guilty of his fact but because by the just dispensation of God it was to be imputed to them as soone as they had so much being as to be denominated children of Adam His offence tainted the blood and according to Gods Covenant and way of dealing with him was interpreted as the act of the humane nature then existing in himself for tota natura generis est in qualibet specie but was neither imputed nor imputable to particular persons partaking in that nature before their own personal existence In short we sinned in Adam no otherwise then we did exist in him for operatio sequitur esse but to exist in Adam is not to exist simply but rather the contrary for when men are men and have a personal existence of their own they exist no longer in Adam but out of him as every effect wrought exists out of its causes but onely notes a virtue or power in him productive of us positis omnibus ad agâ—ndum requisitis So to sin or be guilty in him is not to sin or be guilty simply but onely notes the cause of the propagation of guilt together with our substance to be then in being If we apply this it will follow that as no man partakes in Adams guilt till he be borne a child of Adam so none partake in the righteousnesse of Christ nor the benefit of his satisfaction till they be borne unto him by faith And that doth the Apostle put out of question in this very dispute Rom. 5. 19. For as by one mans disobedience many were made sinners so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous which words were written many years after Christs death and yet then there were many who in times and ages to come were to be made righteous by Christs obedience Ergo they were not made righteous immediately in his death That for the minor The proposition comes next to be canvased where I deny that §. 10. there is the same reason for the transmission of Adams sin and Christs righteousnesse to their respective subjects for though both of them were heads and roots of mankind as the Apostle shews Rom. 5. 14. and so farre forth they agree both communicating their effects to their children Adam sin and death to his natural children Christ righteousnesse and life to his spiritual children yet the same Apostle in the same place shews that there is a divers dissimilitude or disagreement betwixt them and that in several respects v. 15 16 17 18. particularly in that he calls our justification by the obedience of Christ the gift and free gift in opposition to that judgement which by one came upon all to condemnation v. 15 16. implying the obedience of Christ to be so performed as that there is yet required an act of grace on Gods part to give us the effect of it as well as an act of faith on our part that it may be given to us or that we may receive it of which the Apostle speaks in the next verse v. 17. They that receive abundance of grace shall raigne in life for we receive the grace of God by faith 2 Cor. 6. 1. suitable to what this Apostle had said before chap. 3. 25 26. that Christ was set forth to declare the righteousnesse of God that he might be thâ— justifier of him that beleeveth in Jesus But the effects of Adams disobedience came upon his posterity by the necessity of the same judgement which passed upon himself as the natural father of all men so as there needs no other act either on Gods part or on our part but eo ipso that we are borne of Adam we become liable both to guilt and punishment But
of our first Justification but the first simple act of faith and perseverance in the faith to the end the condition of final Justification as Paul also doth 2 Tim. 4. 7 8. I have fought a good fight I have finished my course I have kept the faith From HENCEFORTH there is laid up for me a Crown of righteousnesse c. So Rev. 2. 17. To him that overcometh will I give a white stone c. of which we have spoken before Wherefore I deny that which should be Mr. Eyres Assumption viz. That it was the Will of God that the elect should be perfectly and compleatly reconciled or justified whilest they live in thâ—â— world The reasons of which denial I have already given at large and shall not now repeat them And whereas Mr. Eyre thinks much â—â—at the elect should be denied perfect reconciliation not only till they beleeve but not till death He may be pleased to understand that I deny them to be perfectly justified or reconciled till the resurrection For as long as any enmity remaines undestroyed they are not perfectly reconciled But all enmity is not destroyed till the resurrection 1 Corinth 15. 25 26. And what hath Mr. Eyre against it words and nothing else §. 23. 1 Saith he innumerable Scriptures declare that the Saints are perfectly justified Aâ—sw But doth not quote us so much as one and a good reason why 2. That nothing shall be able to separate from Gods love Answ Not for ever but for a time it may tilâ— all enemies be subdued the last of which is Death The happinesse which the soule enjoyes in the mean time is its own not the happinesse of the person as our Lords Argument supposeth Mâ—t. 22. 31 32. 3. Justification is as full and perfect as ever it shall be it doth not grow and increase but is perfect at first â—nsw Prove it it grows in the renewed acts of pardon Hâ—l 12. 17 1 Johâ— 2. 1. 2. â—or God doth multiply â—orgivenesses Isâ— 55. 7. It grows in the perfection of its parts whereof the most absolute and compleat is our Justification in the day of judgement It grows in the perfection of its effects which are begun in the soule first and so take place upon the body and the whole man Râ—m 8. 10 11 23. Paul expected a farther participation in the righteousnesse of Christ then he attained to in this life Gal. 5. 5. Phil. 3. 8 9 11. 4. Baptisme saith Mr. Eyre which seales to us the forgivenesse of all our sins is administred but once in all our life-time to shew that our Justification is done all at once Answ Baptisme seals that Promise by which all sins past are forgiven f Luke 3. 3. Mâ—rk 1. 4. and all sins future shall be forgiven when committed the sinner continuing in the faith of Jesus Christ from which if he fall away it is impossible that he should be renewed again to repentance Hebr. 6. 6. or be capable of having another Covenant made or sealed to him by which his sins may be remitted Heb. 10. 29. Mr. Eyre here addes some texts of Scripture Ezek. 16. 8 9. Acts 13. 39. 1 John 1. 7. Col. 2. 13 14. to what purpose I cannot imagine unlesse it be to prove that all sins are forgiven at once for neither of these texts speak a word of Baptisme If he mean all sins past are forgiven upon the first act of faith I have granted it but if he mean all sins to come also it lies upon him to prove it that is that sins not committed are sins SECT IV. THe eleventh Argument proceeds thus If it were the Will of §. 24. God that the death of Christ should certainly and infallibly procure the reconciliation of his Elect then surely it was not the Will of God that it should depend on termes and conditions on their part because that which depends upon future conditions is as to the event altogether uncertain Answ 1. Neither doth this Argument prove that we are justified immediately in the death of Christ or before we beleeve 2. I deny the consequence with the proof of it for although that which depends upon future conditions as to the event be uncertain as the word uncertain signifies the same with contingent for it is a true rule in the Civil Law f L. Si pupillus ff de N vat Conditio necessaria non suspendit dispositionem yet is this uncertainty or contingency to be understood in reference to man and the second and immediate causes of a things existence not in reference to God to whom even contingent events g Vidâ— doctisfimum D. Ramum Schol. Dialect l. 5 c 6. are as certain as if they were necessary we shall make strange work in Divinity if events shall be denied to be contingent in their own nature because in reference to Gods Will or knowledge they are certain and infallible and so far forth necessary for example God did will the certain and infallible saâ—ety of all those that were in the ship with Paul Acts 27. 24. yet neverthelesse it came not to passe but upon condition of their abiding in the ship without the performance of which condition they had perished ver 31. Except these abide in the ship you cannot be saved And Mr. Eyre might easily have foreseen that this Argument wounds himself as much as us He acknowledgeth the Covenant made with Adam to have been conditional and in that very thing placeth the main difference between it and the Covenant of grace obedience then was the condition of Adams continuance in life and sin of his death But did not God know that Adam would sin and will to permit it or will Mr. Eyre deny this because his death was suspended upon a future condition and therefore was altogether uncertain as to the event Physician heal thy selfe It is by the Will of God that contingent things come to passe contingently Nor is the twelfth argument more happy If God willed this §. 25. blessing to the elect but conditionally then he willed their reconciliation and Justification no more then their non-reconciliation and condemnation for if he willed their Justification only in case they should beleeve and repent then he willed their damnation in case they do not beleeve and repent Ergo he willed their Justification no more then their damnation contrary to John 6. 38 39. and 17. 21 22 24. Answ h Vide Amyrâ—ldâ—m Spâ—â—im Animâ—d Speciâ—l coâ—tra Spâ—â—hâ—m à p. 146. ad siuâ—m libri Out of doubt God willeth the damnation even of the elect themselves in case they do not beleeve and repent though that case supposeth what is not to be supposed without more dâ—stinctions then my present matter will permit me to digresse into but Mr. Eyres inference that therefore he wills their damnation as much as their Justification is meerly drawn in without any disposition in it selfe to follow for the Promâ—se of remission upon condition of faith
Indeed it were ridiculous to suppose that God should make any action which is wholly and immediately from himselfe the condition of any blessing he gives as that he should promise to glorifie us upon condition he raise us from the dead to raise us upon condition he justifie us to justifie us upon condition he give us faith But the same faith which God worketh in us is also our act for it is we that beleeve and not God though he make us to beleeve and as it is our act so is it performed voluntarily and a fit object of a command or promise I mean capable of being commanded or rewarded or of being made the condition of a reward And thus for example obedience was the condition of that life which was promised to Adam this Mr. Eyre grants Neverthelesse to the exercise of that obedience the concurrence of God was necessary as of the first cause for creatures essentially depend on God not only for their being but for their motion and operation Acts 17. 28. Ergo a voluntary act of ours may be the condition of our salvation though God work that act in us How many orders doth God give to Joshua Gideon David and others concerning the times and places when and whither they should remove their host that they might put their enemies to the rout or escape an overthrow by them These motions were the conditions of those special victories or deliverances which God would give them yet by the efficiency of Gods power and providence did they move from place to place Hundreds of like instances are obvious One thing more Mr. Eyre addes If saith he any shall say that §. 28. God did will that by Christ we should have faith and after that reconciliation yet 1. It will follow notwithstanding that our reconciliation is an immediate effect of the death of Christ as Owen proves against Baxter page 34. And 2. Then all the controversie will be about Gods order and method in conferring on us the effects of Christs death Answ That reconciliation is an immediate effect of the death of Christ may be understood in a double sense either 1. By comparing the effects with the cause and then the meaning is that the death of Christ contributes an immediate efficiency to our reconciliation whensoever it is that we are reconciled and this is all that Mr. Owen sayes in the place mentioned Meritorious causes saith he do actually ipso facto produce all those effects which immediâ—tâ—ly slow from them not in an immediation of time but of causality I doubt not but the death of Christ hath in its kinde an actual and immediate influence upon our eternal glorification which yet is the last effect or benefit we receive by him Or 2. By comparing the effects with the cause and one with another and so that is the immediate effect of the death of Christ which exists immediately upon the death of Christ without the interposition of any other cause to produce it Of this only is the Question as also Mr. Eyre himself hath hitherto understood it otherwise I am perswaded himself will grant that all the Arguments he hath hitherto used one or two at most only excepted come not within sight of the Conclusion they aime at As to the second thing that then all the controversie will be about Gods order and method in conferring on us the effects of Christs death though if there were nothing else but this in question it will be of very dangerous consequence to pervert and trouble that order which God useth in bringing sinners to life yet is there much more in question viz. whether upon supposition of Christs Purchase and Gods special purpose of giving faith to some the same faith as it is a voluntary act of ours may not by Gods Will of Precept be made the condition of our partaking in righteousnesse and reconciliation by the death of Christ This is the thiâ—g which Mr. Eyre should have disproved if he had intended his Argument should have concluded any thing We have already shewed at large the monstrous inconveniences that attend the denial of it and so much hath been spoken by those that are for the middle way of universal redemption especially the French Divines that I cannot think it worth my labour to adde any thing more The Lord Jesus hath put the matter out of Question to me John 6. 39 40. And this is the Fathers Will which hath sent me that of all which he hath given me I should lose nothing but should raise it up again at the last day And this is the Will of him that sent me that every one that seeth the Son and believeth on him may have everlasting life and I wil raise him up at the last day The former verse declares his own and his fathers special Will to save the elect The latter that yet the condition of beleeving is imposed on all men the elect as well as others that they through the performance thereof may be saved And so we are come to the last Argument which in brief is this §. 29. The imputing of our sins to Christ was formally the non-imputing of them unto us But our sins were accounted or imputed to Christ without any condition on our part Ergo they are discounted or non-imputed to us without any condition performed by us Answ I deny the Proposition namely that the imputing of our sins to Christ is formally the non-imputing of them unto us because 1. If this be true then doth not God for Christs sake forgive any mans sin as the Apostle saith he doth Eph. 4. 32. the reason is plain because it was not for Christs sake that himself was punished Our pardon is not the effect of Christs punishment but on the contrary his punishment is the effect of our pardon if the imputation of our sins to him be formally the non-imputation of them to us 2. What then is the meaning of Pauls prayer for them that deserted him 2 Tim. 4. 16. The Lord grant that it may not be imputed to them that is the Lord grant that Christ may be punished for them or what is the meaning The Lord grant they may be some of those for whom Christ hath been punished that were all one as to pray that they may be elected from all eternity Whatsoever sense M. Eyre will put upon the words it will either not agree with sense or not with himself or not with the text 3. Upon the same principle it will follow that the death of Christ as it was a satisfaction and his resurrection from the dead contributes nothing to our justification neither by way of influence nor by way of evidence for might it be supposed that the Lord Jesus had lyen for ever under the power of death that had been the best evidence to us that we should never be punished if his punishment were formally our nonpâ—nition and by way of influence it can do nothing because
Gods freeing or taking off punishment from us is in nature before his laying it on Christ if the imputing it to Christ be formally the non-imputing it to us many other inconveniences attend this doctrine but it is needlesse to insist upon the mention of them Besides these Arguments there are several testimonies of Scripture §. 30. which M. Eyre mentions to prove our reconciliation to be the actual and immediate effect of Christs death let us view them Colos 1. 14. Eph. 1. 7. Heb. 9. 12. 2 Cor. 5. 18 19. Heb. 1. 3. and 10. 12 14. Colos 2. 10 13 14. Rom. 8. 33 34. Ans 1. We have already answered at large to Rom. 8. 33 34. 2 Cor. 5. 18 19. Eph. 1. 7. and by consequence to Colos 1. 14. for the words are the same in both those places We have therefore here to answer no more then the texts out of the Hebrews and one out of the Colossians let us take them in order Heb. 9. 12. Christ hath obtained eternal redemption for us I cannot assure my self how M. Eyre understands this text but if he see no more in it then all men I can meet with he can conclude no more from it then what was never denyed namely that Christ hath purchased eternal redemption for us But he hath also purchased eternal life and glory for us will it therefore follow that our glorification is the actual and immediate effect of his death he gave himself to redeem us from all iniquity Tit. 2. 14. are we therefore freed from all sin immediately in his death The next is Heb. 1. 3. Christ by himself hath purged our sins and afterwards sate down as having finished that work Heb. 10. 12. Ans The former place according to the original saies no more then that Christ in his death made a purge of our sins 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is no more then we have often yeelded that Christ hath made a plaister in his own blood for the curing of our wounds that is in dying he performed that righteousnesse which is the cause of our remission his blood being that which washeth us from all our sins But that this purge had its effect immediately upon its own existence is that which M. Eyre must give us another Text to prove whereas he addes that he afterwards sate down as having â—inished that work Heb. 10. 12. and good reason because that one offering of himself was so perfect and sufficient for all those ends unto which it was ordained that there is no need that himself or any thing else should be offered a second time for those ends But if M. Eyre mean that he hath so perfectly reconciled us in his death not only quoad constitutionem causae but quoad effectum as that there needs nothing more to be done towards our reconciliation he may do well to reconcile the Apostle to himself who tells us his work in heaven is to make reconciliation Heb. 2. 17 18. Wherefore in all things it beboved him to be made like unto his brâ—thron that he might be a mercifull and faithful high Priest in things pertaining to God to make reconciliation for the sins of the people for in that he himself hath suffered being tempted he is able to succour them that are tempted compare Heb. 4. 15. and 7. 25. The like answer I give to Heb. 10. 14. By one offering he hath perfected §. 31. for ever them that are sanctified namely that Christs death hath perfected us quoad meritum not quoad efficaciam The death of Christ saith the l Dr. Godwin in Rom. 8. â—4 sect 5. pag. 177. Author often commended was perfect for an oâ—lation to which as such nothing can be added there needed no more nor any other price to be paid for us But hence to inferre that therefore we were perfectly reconciled quoad effectum in the death of Christ is point blank against the Text which tells us in the very next foregoing words v. 13. that Christ doth yet expect till his enemies be made his foot-stoole amongst which the Apostle reckoneth sin and death 2 Cor. 15. 26 55 56. which though together with Devils they were destroyed in some sense in the death of Christ Rom. 8. 3. Heb. 2. 14 15. Yet forasmuch as the holy Ghost witnesseth that Christ doth yet expect a farther destruction of them it lets us understand that these enemies and sin in particular was no farther destroyed in his death then as therein was laid the foundation and cause of a perfect and eternal remission which by virtue of that blood carried up and pleaded in heaven should be given unto them that by faith come for it unto the throne of grace as the Apostle explaines himself Heb. 4. 14 15 16. and in this very chapter v. 26. If we sin wilfully after we have received the knowledg of the truth there râ—mains no more sacrifice for sins implying that a wilful rejecting of Christ through unbelief which I conceive to be that special sin which the Apostle means deprives us of the benefit of remission of sins by his sacrifice which how it can be if sins were perfectly and absolutely pardoned immediately in his death I cannot conceive see also v. 38 39. The last place is least of all to purpose Christ saith M. Eyre §. 32. hath made us compleat as to the forgivenesse of our sins Colos 2. 10 13 14. Ans 1. The Apostle speaks to such who had already received the Lord Jesus v. 6. And of such no doubt it is true that all their sins are pardoned 2. But neither doth the Apostle limit our compleatnesse in Christ to the forgivenesse of our sins nor doth he say that we were made compleat in his death but rather in his exaltation And ye are compleat in him who is the Head of all principality and power His scope is to roote and establish the Colossians in the faith of Christ v. 7. in opposition to such innovators as would have introduced the worship of Gentile Daemons v. 8 18. or the observation of Jewish rites v. 20 21. as if without these Christ had not of himself been able to save them But ye are compleat in Christ saith the Apostle or be ye content with Christ as the words will beare to be rendred as who alone is most sufficiently able to give and increase you in all good and to deliver you from all evil and bestow on you the reward of eternal life v. 15 18 19. But what all this is to the purpose I know not It seems Mr. Eyre had a mind to bring it in for company CHAP. XI A reply to Mr. Eyres fifteenth Chapter of justification in Christ as a common person Justification not proved thereby to be before faith SECT I. WE are now come to the review of those two Arguments §. 1. mentioned in my Sermon which Mr. Eyre made use of to prove that the elect were justified before beleeving The former in short
I thus proposed If we are justified in Christ then we are justified before we beleeve But we are justified in Christ Ergo. This Argument Mr. Eyre proposeth more at large in his answer to my Sermon shewing withal how each part was proved in his conference with me concerning which I am able to give the Reader no account having so perfectly forgotten the method he used in proposing and prosecuting his Argument the summe is Christ was justified in his resurrection as a common person Ergo the elect were then justified in him My answer to this in my Sermon is large and distinct The summe is if justification be taken properly I deny that we were justified in Christ if improperly I deny that it will follow that we were justified before faith because we were justified in Christs resurrection no more then it will follow that because we are said to be risen with Christ Ergo men are risen from the dead before they are borne or dead or while they are lying in their graves But because M. Eyre hath taken my answer in pieces let us see what he doth animadvert upon each part of it First then I say we may conceive of a threefold justification 1. A justification purposed in the decree of God Gal. 3. 8. 2. A justification purchased and impetrated in the death of Christ Heb. 9. 12. 3. A justification exemplified in the resurrection of Christ who himself was justified in his own resurrection and thereby became the exemplary cause of justification to beleevers by virtue whereof themselves shall also be justified in due time c. What says Mr. Eyre to this 1. He infers in general that then by my own confession justification in a Scripture sense goes before faith The vanity of which triumph we have already discovered chapt 1. § 2. should I say that our glorification may be conceived as purposed of God as purchased by Christ as exemplified in his glorification I should not count him worthy of a reply that should inferre that I had therefore yeelded glorification to be before believing Mr. Eyre therefore foreseeing that I would deny either of these to be actual justification tells his Reader before hand that That were a poore put off because omnis justificatio simpliciter dicta congruenter exponenda est de justificatione actuali Analogum per se positum stat pro famosiori significato When we speak of justification simply there is no man but understands it of actual justification Which makes me beleeve his report concerning his book at least some parts of it that it had cost him but little paines for I cannot see how such observations could cost him much I mention justification cum adjecto with a limitation and in the close of my answer oppose each branch of my distinction to justification simply so called and this I may not be allowed to do because of Analogum per se positum c. Nextly He speaks something on each member of the distinction §. 2. and says 1. That which I called justification purposed in the decree of God is real and actual justification Ans Thou hast then thy choise Reader whether thou wilt beleeve the Apostle or M. Eyre The Text quoted Gal. 3. 8. says thus The Scripture foreseeing that God would justifie the Gentiles through faith preached before the Gospel unto Abraham The justification here spoken of is surely justification simply so called because it is put by it self without any Term of restraint or diminution and M. Eyres rule is Analogum per se positum stat pro famosiori significato And this justification according to the Apostle was a thing foreseen a thing that God would do a thing before the existence of which the Gospel was preached to Abraham all which notwithstanding M. Eyre will have the eternal decree of God to be our justification But of this we have spoken already as also of what he notes upon the second branch of the distinction The great exception is against the third branch wherein I say that §. 3. Christ in his resurrection being himself justified became thereby an exemplary cause of a justification future to them that should beleeve I did little expect so much vehemency and acrimony in opposing this as I meet with in M. Eyres answer to it 1. Saith M. Eyre there is not the least hint thereof in holy writ the Scripture no where calls our Saviour the example or patern of our justiâ—â—cation Rep. If the Question be concerning a name or term where doth M. Eyre find in Scripture the Term of a common person in which he so much delights attributed to Christ 2. If concerning that which is equivalent surely the Term of an exemplary cause is every whit as agreeable to Scripture as the other for in all spiritual and eternal blessing we beare the image of the heavenly Adam 1 Cor. 15. 49. and we are predestinated to be conformed to the image of Christ from the beginning to the end of our faith Rom. 8. 29 17. Now wherin we bear Christs image therein was he an exemplary cause for to an exemplary cause no more is required then that another thing be conformed to it as its image and exist by virtue of it which I desire the Reader to observe because M. Eyre doth often confound an example with an exemplary cause as if there were no difference between them If then we in our resurrection and justification bear the image of Christ then he in his resurrection and justification was the exemplary cause of ours And whereas M. Eyre says that Christ in his works of mediation was not an exemplary but a meritorious cause it is not universally true For the resurrection and ascension of Christ were acts of Christs as Mediatour and yet in them he was not the meritorious cause of any thing He proceeds thus It was needlesse Christ should be a patern §. 4. of our justification for this patern must be of use either unto us or unto God Not to us because we do not justifie our selves not to God because he needs no patern to direct him Rep. The disjunction is imperfect for it was needful for the glory of Christ as the Apostle expresly witnesseth Rom. 8. 29. Them he also did prâ—dâ—stinate to be conformed to the image of his Son that he might be the first born among many brethren It is no small part of Christs glory to be the first begotten from the dead and a person so farre advanced above all others that their highest glory shall consist in a conformity to him and in being fashioned according to his image 2. It is also of as much use to us in all respects as if we are said to be justified in Christs resurrection as a common person whether we respect the evidence which his resurrection gives or the influence which it hath upon our justification And whereas Mr. Eyre saies it can be of no use to us because we do not justifie our selves
it is a strange kind of reason Cannot a soul by faith behold the certainty and glorious effects of his justification notwithstanding all the opposition of sense and reason by looking on Christ justified as an exemplary cause to whom himself also shall be conformed in one time Secondly Mr. Eyre argues against it thus He that pays our debts §. 5. to the utmost farthing and thereupon receives a discharge is more then a paterne of our release Rep. More then a patern of our release Is this all Mr. Eyre contends for upon what pretence then doth he oppose me I acknowledge Christ to be the meritorious cause of our release in his death and not only the exemplary cause of it in his resurrection As to the thing which I think Mr. Eyre intends I have told him often that Christ entred into an obligation of his own to make satisfaction for our debt from which obligation he was discharged in his resurrection God acquitting him as having paid as much as was demanded But if Christ had power to do what he would with his own then was it in his power and his Fathers to give us the effect of this satisfaction when and upon what tearms they pleased and to suspend our discharge notwithstanding Christ were long before discharged till himself should sit down at the right hand of Glory and give it us with his own hand according as sinners in successive generations come to him for it M. Eyre hath often said the contrary but proves it no where His third Argument chargeth high magnis tamen excidit ausis §. 6. take it at large If Christ were only a patern and example of our justification then was he justified from his own sins and consequently was a sinner which is the most horrid blasphemy that can be uttered The reason of the consequence is evident for if Christ was but a patern of our justification then was he justified as we are Now we are justified from our own sins which we our selves have committed Rep. 1. This the charge this the proofe But because M. Eyre is so carelesse of what he speaks let us see whether the matter be mended according to his own principles He then doth not only acknowledge but contend that the elect were justified in Christ as a common person Now what is a common person It is a general tearm and should have been described more plainly then it is but something he speaks of him § 1. Whatsoever is done by or to a common person as such is to be attributed to them in whose steed he stands and § 4. 1. The act of a common person is the act of them whom he represents The summe is A common person is he that represents another both in what he doth and in what is done to him Now then thus I proceed If Christ were justified as a common person then was he justified from his own sins and consequently was a sinner which is the most horrid blasphemy that can be uttered The reason of the consequence is evident for if Christ was justified as a common person then was he justified as we are for a common person is he that represents another both in what he doth and in what is done to him Now we are justified from our own sins which we our selves have committed Ergo. Let M. Eyre answer this for himself and he hath answered for me But because he hath put me out of hope of the former I will do the latter presently 2. In the mean time I will propose one thing to M. Eyres consideration If the justification of Christ as a common person were actually and formally the justification of the elect then are not the elect justified of grace but of works which is the most horrid contradiction to the Gospel that can be uttered the reason of the consequence is evident because Christ was not justified of grace but of debt Ergo if that act of justification which passed upon him be that which justifies us then are not we justified of grace But to M. Eyres Argument if it may so be called I deny his consequence §. 7. as evident as it is and the proofe of it To the former I say that Christs resurrection was his discharge from his own obligation which he voluntarily undertooke to suffer and satisfie for our sins and therein he became the exemplary cause of a like discharge which should follow on them that beleeve from that obligation which comes upon them involuntarily and necessarily because of sin To the proof I say that Christs Justification was such as ours is in regard of its common nature and effects which is sufficient to the agreement of the example and counterpart as the sacrifices of old represented Christ dying though he were a man and they were beasts not in its principle and special nature Surely it will not be denied that we beare the image of Christ in our resurrection from the dead but then will Mr. Eyre say he was raised as we are now we are raised from corruption Ergo he also was raised from corruption which is as horrid a contradiction to Scripture as can be uttered Psal 16. 10. or he was raised by his own power John 2. 19. Ergo if we in our Resurrection are conformed to him then are we also raised by our own power which is blasphemy as bad as the other that makes Christ as bad as sinners this makes sinners as good as Christ Did M. Eyre think it possible to convince mens understandings by such Argumentations as these His fourth Argument is upon the point all one with this and hath been answered already over and over in that wherein it differs from this His fifth Argument is That I recede very far both from the §. 8. meaning and expressions of all our orthodox writers who do constantly call our Saviour a common person but never the exemplary cause of our justification particularly my Grandfather Parker de descens lib. 3. sect 49 50 53. Rep. 1. I did not think before nor do I now that the affirming of Christ to be an exemplary cause of all those spiritual heavenly blessings which God bestows on us had been to deny him to be a common person The Scriptures call him the first borne amongst many brethren Rom. 8. 29. The first borne of every creature Colos 1. 15. the first fruits of them that slept 1 Cor. 15. 20. phrases importing that there are many others who by his power shall be conformed to his image in all his heavenly perfections which is all I seek by the tearm of an exemplary cause But he that calls Christ the first borne the first begotten the first fruits is so far from denying him as that he doth suppose him to be a common person in regard that the proper import of these phrases is to teach us that he hath received excellent blessings not for himself but for others also The reason why I use the tearm of an
exemplary cause rather then of a common person I give the Reader a little below 2. And that our Divines do usually call Christ a common person is a thing so well known that M. Eyre should not need to have quoted my Grandfather Parker to convince me of it He should have shewed that they call him so in such a sense as cannot be expressed by the tearm of an exemplary cause So doth not my Grandfather at least in the point of Christs resurrection of which he there speaks not a word but m Do descens lib. 4 sect 75. elsewhere saies with Athanasius Anima Christi descensum suum ad inferos peregit ab inferis resurrectionem produxit ut nostrae resurrectionis imaginem concinnaret which in sense is the very same that I say concerning Christs becoming an exemplary cause in his resurrection 3. Nor are our Divines such strangers to the use of that expression as M. Eyre represents them n Sound Beleev pag 79. 80. edit 1653. M. Shepheard useth it verbatim There is saith he a merited justification by Christs death and a virtual or exemplary justification in Christs resurrection as our head and surety So o Med. Theol. l. 1. c. 23. th 16 17. Dr. Amese finis resurrectionis fuit ut se justificatum alios justificantem ostenderet 5. ut resurrectionis nostrae tam spiritualis quà m corporalis hypostasin exemplar initiatio fieret Christus enim exemplaris causa est nostrae resurrectionis ut à morte resurgens p Lud. Croc. s Theol. l. 2. cap. 12. p. 353. So others His last Argument is that this expression savours rankly of Pelagianisme §. 9. and Socinianisme For they make the second Adam a meer paterne and example of our reconciliation Rep. I have read indeed concerning the Pelagians that they deny the propagation of Adams sin any otherwise then by imitation and that the Socinians say Christ shews us the way of salvation by the example of his own life I know But if I who thankfully acknowledge our Lords merits and satisfaction and live by the faith thereof am yet guilty of Pelagianisme and Socinianisme for affirming that as in all things else so in his justification he had this preeminence above others as not only to be justified himself but to become the justifying cause of others after his own paterne and similitude I am content to beare the reproach of both SECT II. IN the next place I gave the Reader an account why I used the §. 10. tearme of an exemplary cause rather then of a common person in these words I use the tearme of an exemplary cause rather then of a common person because a common person may be the effect of those whom he represents as the Parliament of the Common-wealth but Christ is such a common person as that he is the cause of those whom he represents in every thing in which he represents them This excuse saith M. Eyre is both fallacious and impertinent Fallacious because it seems to intimate that an exemplary cause doth expresse as much as a common person which is clearly false for the act of the exemplar is not the act of the Imitator as the act of a common person is the act of them whom he represents Parents are examples to their children not common persons Rep. Know Reader first that we are not now speaking of our active voluntary imitation of Christ in duties of obedience but of our being passively conformed and fashioned like him in the participation of his spiritual blessings according to our condition and capacity Thus in our justification do we bear his image and partake in his likenesse who as he was the first borne from the dead so is he the first borne of them that are justified forasmuch as his resurrection was his justification And as our resurrection from death whensoever it shall be exists by virtue of his Joh 14. 19. He being risen as the first fruits of them that slept 1 Cor. 15. 20. So also doth our justification 2. This being premised I adde that to say that Christ in his resurrection was the exemplary cause of our justification is far more pertinent and significant then to say we were then justified in him as a common person especially according to M. Eyres use of that tearme of which more presently the reason is ready because the former phrase expresseth the influence which his justification hath upon ours and the dependance which ours hath upon his which the latter doth not for to be justified in another as a common person doth neither declare his justification to be the cause of ours nor ours the effect of his could we have delegated a person to have received from God that sentence of absolution in our names as Israel sent up Moses into the mount we had all of us been justified as immediately as himself nor had our justification had any dependance upon his though we had then been justified in him as a common person 3. Wherefore as to the tearme of a common person concerning which I have made a more toylesome search into the civil law and those few Civilians which I have then the moment of the matter requires it may be understood in a double sense either 1. fictione suppositi when a person by a kinde of civil metempseuchosis doth so represent another in what he doth or is done to him as that the same things are said to be done by or to the person whom he represents As Ambassadours represent the person of the Princes that employ them what they do as such is reputed the act of the Prince that sends them forth and what is done to them as such is reputed as done to him We do or receive that which our Attorney doth or receives in our name Or 2. Ex re gestâ when a person doth that in the effects of which be they good or evil others partake as well as himself Thus the punishment of high treason is common with the Traitour to his children though he do not represent them neither in offending nor in being punished Thus a Surety payes his money as a common person because the Debtour as well as himself if no compact hinder hath the benefit of a discharge though he do not represent the debtour in making payment In this latter sense I readily acknowledge that Christ was a common Person in his Death and Resurrection because we receive the benefit of both in our measure and kinde as well as himself And in this sense an exemplary cause expresseth as much and somewhat more then a common person But Mr. Eyre will have Christ to be a common person in the former §. 11. sense and that as well in his Death as his Resurrection That he was so in his death I deny roundly The reason is that for which Mr. Eyre chooseth to call him a common person rather then an exemplary cause because saith he the act of a
arguments advanced with my answers then given to them to which I do not intend to digresse so far as to reply 1. Because the Basis and foundation of his whole Argument as he hath now proposed in print is laid in this that we were justified in Christs Justification and therefore as to the summe is answered already 2. Because there is no proof of any particular branch of the Argument but is proposed again before he hath done and therefore must be answered hereafter 3. Because though I have altogether forgotten the order of his arguments and of my own answers yet I very well remember that as I understood his argument in no other sense then as it is set down in my Sermon printed so many things I spake by way of answer whereof his relation takes no notice but I must desire him to take more notice of before he and I part My answer then to the foresaid argument was double 1. That upon supposition that we were in Covenant before we beleeve yet would it not follow that we were justified before we believe because the blessings of the Covenant have an order and dependance one upon another and are enjoyed successively one after another To this Mr. Eyre replies in the second paragraph of this his sixteenth chapter and says That though a man be not sanctified and glorified before faith yet if he be in Covenant with God i. e. one of the elect he is certainly justified For 1. God from all eternity did will not to punish his Elect which is real Justification Rep. To this Reader thou must expect no other answer from me then what I have at large given already 2. Saith he Justification is the first benefit that doth accrew to us by the death of Christ for Justification goes before Sanctification and faith is a part of Sanctification Rep. I acknowledge that our English Divines whom I confesse in matters of this nature I preferre before any other are wont to place Sanctification in order after Justification which also is so plain from Scripture that it cannot be denied But Mr. Eyre also knows that they are wont to distinguish faith and sanctification as two things as the Scriptures also do 1 Tim. 2. 15. Acts 15. 9. and 16. 18. 1 Pet. 1. 13 14 15 16. though I do not finde that they do all expresse this difference in the same manner Should I interpose my own opinion it may be I should finde little thank for my labour and therefore I shall say no more then what others have said before me 1. It being plain that faith and holinesse are tâ—o things in the use of Scripture Mr. Eyre should have proved and not laid it down so rawly without any distinction that faith is a part of sanctification I deny it provided I may be tried by Scripture-language 2. As faith is in the understanding a perswasion of the truth of the Gospel and the Promises of life and glory contained therein so is it wont to be distinguished from sanctification 2 Thes 2 13. is not so much a part of it as a cause for by how much the more stedfastly we beleeve and see the glory of the Promises by so much the more are we changed into the image of Gods holinesse 2 Pet. 1. 3 4. 2 Cor. 3. 18. and 7. 1. 3. As faith is in the will an acceptance of Christ that by him we may be brought unto God it hath much the same difference for as God hath made Christ to us sanctification 1 Cor. 1. 30. so doth faith receive him and in that respect is not properly any part of our sanctification but the turning of the soul to Christ as unto a most sufficient principle and authour thereof Acts 26. 18. and so much for the exceptions against my first answer My second answer was a flat denial of the Assumption viz. that we are in Covenant with God before we beleeve if the phrase of §. 2. being in Covenant be understood properly for such an interest in the Covenant as gives a man right and title to the blessings of the Covenant Mr. Eyres proof is this Some benefits of the Covenant to wit the Spirit which works faith is given us before we beleeve My answer to this was large and distinct though Mr. Eyre reproach it sufficiently with a designe of darkening the truth and blinding the Reader but that 's no matter I shewed 1. That the word Give had a double sense in Scripture 1. When no receiving follows and so it signifies no more then the Will of God constituting and appointing Acts 4. 12. Eph. 1. 22. and 4. 11. 2. Sometimes it includes a receiving and possession of the thing given Thus the Spirit is given when we receive him and are as it were possest of him and he dwells in us In this sense is the Spirit never said to be given in Scripture but unto them that do beleeve Luke 11. 13. Gal. 3. 14. Eph. 3. 16 17. with Rom. 8. 10. 11. 2 I shewed also that the Spirit may be said to be given three ways essentially personally or in regard to some peculiar operations which he worketh in us Now there being no peculiar work of grace before faith it self which may not be wrought in an hypocrite which hath not the Spirit as well as in a childe of God therefore the Spirit is neither given nor received before faith be wrought but is given and received together with faith and not before This is the summe the further explication the Reader may see in my Sermon at leisure Mr. Eyre thus expounds the giving of the Spirit That God according to his gracious Covenant doth in his appointed time give or send his Spirit in the preaching of the Gospel to work faith in all those that are ordained to life Rep. Then see Reader what a proof we have that the Spirit is given us before faith Mr. Eyre should prove that we have some benefits of the Covenant before faith viz. the Spirit when he explains it he tells us the Spirit is given before faith not in that sense in which the word give or given includes our receiving but as it signifies the sending or constituting of the Spirit to be by way of specialty the efficient cause or worker of faith Mr. Eyre doth not so much as open his mouth against what I said before that the Spirit is said to be given to us in reference to some peculiar work of his upon or in us which work is faith Here when he should shew how he is given us before faith he says he is sent to work faith in which sense the Spirit may be said to be given in the first sense mentioned of that word but not given to us so as that we can be therefore said to receive him eo ipso because he is sent to work faith and therefore this is but a deserting of the Argument in hand nor are we yet proved to have received any benefit of the
Covenant I mean any saving benefit before faith Therefore Mr. Eyre answers secondly That though the Spirit be not given us one atome of time before faith yet it is enough §. 3. that it hath a precedency in order of nature though not of time and that faith is not before the Spirit Rep. Neither for if the Spirit be not said to be given to us but in reference to his working of faith in us then faith is wrought in nature before the Spirit can be said to be given to us as if the Sunne be said to dwell or be in my house because it enlightens my house then in order of nature my house is first enlightened before the Sun can be said to be or dwell in it There is but one thing more in this Chapter that needs answer and that is this I had said the Spirit is not given us but in reference to some peculiar operation of his working faith in us and added for illustration that as a man doth first build himself an house and then dwell in it so Christ by his Spirit doth build organize and prepare the soul to be a house unto himself and then dwells in it Mr. Eyre answers But is not that organizing preparing act of the Spirit one benefit of the Covenant and is not the Spirit in that act the cause of faith Rep. If these interrogations have the force of an affirmation Mr. Eyre should have proved them and not barely asserted them I have answered sufficiently already There is no peculiar work of grace before faith it self which may not be wrought in a hypocrite who hath not the Spirit as well as in a childe of God Ergo there can be no work of the Spirit before faith it self in reference unto which the Spirit can be said to be given to us Preparative works do not difference a beleever from an hypocrite and therefore in themselves are no fruit or benefit of the Covenant So much â—o thâ— sixteenth Chapter CHAP. XIII A Reply to Mr. Eyres Seventeenth Chapter Concerning the Covenant wherein faith is promised and by vertue whereof it is given to us SECT I. HAving thus shewed that we receive not the Spirit before we beleeve §. 1. it remains that we enquire whether faith it self be not given to us by vertue of the Covenant made with us for if we are in Covenant with God before faith be given us it is every whit as much to Mr. Eyres purpose to shew that we are in Covenant before we beleeve as if he had proved that the Spirit is given us before we beleeve For answer therefore to the question understand Reader that it may have a double sense 1. Whether the Covenant of grace that is the Gospel have any efficiency in converting the * â—id Dr. Ed. Reynold Sinful of siâ— page 337 Mr. bâ—lk 〈…〉 oâ— the Covenâ—â—â— pâ—â—t 4. page 318. soul and working it to beleeve and in this sense I readily grant that faith is given us by vertue of the Covenant Or 2. Whether God have engaged himself by Covenant to any sinner in the world to give him faith so that if God should not give him faith he were unfaithful and a breaker of his own Covenant In this sense is the question to be understood and my answer to it was a Faith is not given to us by vertue of the Covenant made with us but by vertue of the Covenant made with Christ God hath promised Christ that sinners shall beleeve on him Isa 53. 10. and 55. 4 5. Psal 2. 8. and 110. 3. Matth. 12. 21. Psal 89. 25 26. c. Hereupon Mr. Eyre disputes largely that faith is given to the Elect by vertue of the Covenant made with them the sense of which we have already explained that the Elect are supposed to be in Covenant with God before they beleeve and so God obliged to them by Covenant to give them faith I deny it See we what Mr. Eyre brings for proof of it First a similitude at the end of his first section If one promise §. 2. another that in case he shall bear so many stripes or perform any other condition he will then take care of and provide for his children doth not this promise made with the father most properly belong to his children The case is the same between Christ and us He performed the condition and we receive the benefits of the New Covenant Answ Whether the case be the same between Christ and us is the proper debate of the next Argument in the mean time this comparison is not to our case because the Promâ—se made to Christ that Jews and Gentiles shal come into him by faith is a promise that he shall have children spiritual that he shall have a numerous seed even like the stars of heaven for multitude But as the promise made to Abraham concerning the multitudes of children which he should have was no promise to them that they should becom children which were promise to nothing that it should become something so the promise to Christ that many Nations shall come unto him and becom children to him in a spiritual sense is no promise to them nor have they thereby any right given them to be made believers but unto him and in gratiam sui for his own honour and glory Much lesse doth such a promise hinder that that faith by which they become children unto Christ may not be enjoyned them as the condition upon which they are to partake in Christ and blessednesse by him The serond and great Argument is this If there be but one Covenant §. 3. of grace which is made both with Christ and us then faith is given us by vertue of the Covenant made with us But there is but one Covenant of grace made both with Christ and us Ergo Hence a little before I am bid to shew that there are two distinct Covenants of grace one made with Christ and the other with us or that there is any other Covenant made with the Elect then that which is made with Christ c. Answ Before we can give a distinct answer to this we must first enquire how we may conceive of the forme and tenour of the Covenant of grace The tenour of the Covenant of works is plain and intelligible Do this and live But it seems there is no Covenant of grace made with men at all though some men are the intended objects of the blessings therein contained but only with Christ with whom we are to conceive the father striking a Covenant to this sense If thou wilt make or do thou make satisfaction for the sins of the Elect and I will give them grace and glory where the condition is Christs death or rather his satisfaction for his death if it had not been satisfactory had availed nothing and the promise is that the Elect shall have grace and glory This being explained I do utterly deny that there is but one Covenant of
so farre forth as they have other conditions or causes they are not the effects of purpose The existence and order of the things purposed is from Gods purpose For example he did purpose that first he would give up his Sonne to death for us then call us then justifie us then glorifie us and had there been nothing else but Gods purpose these foure had been the simple successive effects of his purpose but had not had the relation of cause and effect amongst themselves That Christs death merits our salvation is not from Gods purpose but from the convention between the Father and him That faith is the condition of justification and glorification is from the promise of grace made with us That glorification is also a reward is from the same promise That it is not only a consequent but an effect of our justification ariseth from the nature of that act as being an adjudging unto glory that it is an inheritance is because it is given by Testament Wherefore all these purposed acts of God may be considered either simply ratione existentiae in respect of their existence and so they have no other cause but his purpose or quoad modum essendi according to that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 habitude or relation which they have one to another in their execution arising either from the nature of the things themselves or some Law Covenant and constitution of God and thus they are not the effects of his purpose But I have been two long in my reply to this answer of Mr. Eyres A word more to prove that Gods eternal purpose is not the New Covenant and I passe on That Covenant which is of the same common nature with those §. 15. Covenants that are wont to be made amongst men doth not consist ◠Vide Less de Iust jur lib. 2. cap. 13. D. 1. 5. Grot. dejure Belli lib. 2. cap. 11. 2. in the meer will or purpose of God The New Covenant or Covenant of Grace is of the same common nature with those that are wont to be made amongst men Ergo the New Covenant doth not consist in the purpose of Gods minde or will The proposition is certain Because whether Mr. Eyre will allow Gods Covenant to be a Covenant properly so called or will rather call it a promise it is certain there are no Pacts Conventions Covenants Stipulations Restipulations Testaments Pollicitations Promises or Contracts of any kinde made amongst men which consist in the internal purpose of the minde and therefore if Gods Covenant or Promise be of the same common nature with these neither can that consist in his purpose The assumption is supposed by the Apostle Gal. 3. 15. Brethren I speak after the manner of men though it be but a mans Covenant yet if it be confirmed no man disannulleth or addeth thereto and ver 17. And this I say that the Covenant which was confirmed before of God in Christ c. Where the whole strength of the argument lyes upon this supposition that the covenant made with Abraham was a true formall Covenant or Promise such as usually passeth between man and man See to the same purpose Heb. 9. 15 16 17. many more arguments I could adde if need were SECT III. The direct answer to the Argument and the proof of it out of §. 16. Heb. 8. I thus delivered in my Sermon In the Covenant as recorded in Heb. 8. There are three things of distinct consideration the confusion of which so it should have been printed not the conclusion and so it is printed in the second Edition of my Sermon is the only support of Mr. Eyres Argument 1. There is the matter and blessings of the Covenant on Gods part I will be their God and they shall be my people 2. The bond and condition of it on our part and that is faith in those words I will put my Lawes in their mindes c. In these two things is the tenor and formality of the new Covenant They that believe the Lord will be their God and they shall be his people 3. There is also a promise and declaration that God will work this condition by which men shall have an interest in this Covenant and a right and title to the blessings of it I will put my Lawes into their mindes that is I will give them faith which faith is not promised as an effect of the Covenant already made but as a means by which we are brought into Covenant and thereby invested in a right to all the blessings of it c. That this is the true meaning of the text Reader thou shalt see proved below In the mean time according to my promise take a farther Explication of the words which I shall set down in distinct propositions that Mr. Eyre may see what little ground my words afford him of all his wonderments and paratragediations Prop. 1. The Old and New Covenant so called ver 8. and 13. §. 17. are not two Covenants opposed in their nature and substance but one and the same Covenant of grace under an Old and New Administration This many learned men have proved and our Divines generally grant it and Mr. Eyre himselfe for one in this his seventeenth Chapter § 2. and therefore I set it downe without farther proof Prop. 2. Therefore that which is called the New Covenant and described ver 10 11 12. doth not containe the form and tenour of the Covenant of grace but only the differences between the Old Covenant and the New and the matter wherein the latter excells the former And that the name of a Covenant is given to it doth not alter the case it being so frequent in Scripture to use the name of Covenant when not the forme but the matter or quality and efficacy of it is signified 2 Cor. 3. 14. Rom. 9. 4. 1 King 8. 21. Hos 2. 18. Job 5. 23 c. Prop. 3. The differences between the Old Covenant on the one side and the new on the other are thus stated in the text The Old in generall is called faulty ver 7 8. and the faultinesse of it described in two particulars 1. That it could not give strength and ability to the people to fulfill it and by consequence 2. That it could not make them blessed in the favour and enjoyment of God ver 9. They continued not in my Covenant and I regarded them not saith the Lord. In respect of which it is elsewhere called weak and unprofitable and unable to make any thing perfect chap. 7. 18 19. compare also Rom. 8. 3. and Gal. 3. 21. On the contrary the New Covenant in general is called better ver 6. and its betternesse beare with the Anglicisme expressed in two opposite respects 1. That it should minister ability and strength to keep Covenant 2. And by consequence perfect the people in the favour and enjoyment of God ver 10. I will put my Lawes into their minde And I will be