2. 15 is the Originall though our Translation hath it and not by childbearing if shee continue in faith and charity and holines with sobriety The meaning is notwithstanding the Popish false glosse given it that although sorrow in Childbearing was first inflicted upon that sexe as a part of Gods Curse for sin yet as many as beleeve shall finde the Curse removed and a blessing in the place thereof It shall be made a happy furtherance to their salvation putting them in minde of their sin that first brought the sorrow and so filling them with self-deniall and self-abhorring that they shall cleave the faster to Christ for salvation by Faith as knowing themselves forlorn in themselves and stand the more fixed and stedfast in charity holines and sobriety The like is to be concluded of the rest of the sufferings which he particularizeth God so dispenseth them that they may be furtherances of salvation to beleevers by working in them humblednes and self-denyall bearing up themselves by faith in Christ alone both for salvation and increase of their sanctification The very pravity of our nature of which he speaketh is left in us not as a curse in wrath but as a means in Gods wisdome and love more to humble us to make us more to cleave unto Christ and an Antagonist against which fighting in the power and spirit of Christ we may overcome and having overcome may obtein the Crown So that these two Arguments are impertinent and nothing to the question To the third I answer that there is nothing els in it but a wresting of Scriptures from their proper sense that they may be subservient to Mr. Baxters ends First that of 1 Cor. 15. 21 22. maketh nothing to his purpose It onely testifieth that as by man came death i. e. by Adam so by man i. e. by Christ came the resurrection But how far both of the members of this proposition reach is manifest by the following words For as in Adam all dye i. e. all that live and die in Adam perish hopelesly and everlastingly So in Christ all shall be made alive i. e. All that are translated out of Adam into Christ The one man being the root of death to himself and all that are in him the other the root of life to himself and to all that by faith shall be ingraffed into him That this is the genuine meaning of the words is evident by the next verse which amplifieth what th'apostle had said in this viz. who are these all that shall be made alive in Christ First Christ saith the Apostle as the first fruits then they that are Christs at his coming Here is no mention of the resurrection of them that are not in Christ Not that these shall not also be raised by Christ but that the Apostle speaketh here not of resurrection in generall but of resurrection to life whereof those that are in Christ do alone partake Even as of those which dye in Adam he speakes of an everlasting death whereof the unregenerate alone partake So that there is not any mention here expressed of the death of beleevers much lesse of the curse and wrath in their death Touching the second Scripture which he quoteth and citeth Rom. 6. 23. The wages of sin is death who doubts but it is so to them that are under the guilt and dominion of sin But what is this to beleevers And the third Scripture is as pat as the two former For this caus many of you are sick many weak many sleep The Apostle here writes to a visible Church in which it appears there were some true and some but formall and temporary beleevers Christ is in the midst of this Church dispensing his discipline The true beleevers by the contagion of the formall professors had somewhat prophaned the Lords Table by resorting to it somewhat disorderly The other had totally violated it by coming to it drunken and so were worse than beasts from their own Tables here now had Christ inflicted chastisements of sicknes and weaknes for the humbling and amending of those that were his but death and vengeance upon them that while they professed faith in him yet were indeed despisers of him and his ordinances What is this to the Curse of the Law upon beleevers Therefore I shall add to Mr. Baxters And if so my and if so if so that wresting of Scriptures will serve the turn Mr. Baxter will surely have the water run in his ground and his fancy stand though Gods truth thereby fall to the earth To the fourth That his phrase is ambiguous and it is not easily understood what so cunning a sophister meaneth by evills Untill therefore he hath discharged his bushell of distinctions putting a difference after his manner between a naturall and a metaphysicall good whereof this evill is a privation between an evill physicall and an evill morall and an evill in a theologicall sense between the evill of sense and the evill of loss and a whole bundle more of evills that he can distinguish into their kinds we know not what he meaneth when he saith that sufferings are in their own nature evills to us If I should answer in one sense he hath the slight quickly to evade to another and to study out all his evills would cost more labor than a hundred such Arguments and all his evills to boot are worthy of As for that which he addeth Doubtles so far as it is the effect of sin it is evill and the effect of the Law also It is as much as if he had said doubtles so far as the Sun is made or is the effect of a thunder cloud it is black and dark and the effect of the Thunderbolt also We deny it to be the effect of sin as the meritorious cause thereof so that the suffering of a beleever should be the curse or revenging punishment of his sin Christ hath born that and so it shall not be in this respect evill nor the effect of the law neither We grant a beleevers sin to be oft the occasion never the proper cause of a beleevers sufferings To the fifth We deny not the sufferings of beleevers to be oft in Scripture ascribed to Gods Anger But it is so ascribed 1 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to set forth Gods dealings to mans dull understanding by a similitude of mans passions that they might be the more easily comprehended Because man in his anger and wrath doth correct most severely therefore the sufferings of the Saints when they are great and grievous are said to come from Gods anger and therefore said to be from his anger to speak out that they are great afflictions such as children receive from their parents when they are most hot in their passion Not that there is indeed any such passion in God 2 In respect of the sufferers apprehension who being weak in faith and too much prejudiced by sense is apt for a season sometimes in great tryalls to conclude himself
to be cast out of Gods favour and overwhelmed with his wrath and fury Not that it is so really For God hath forgiven their sinns Therefore after his forgiving to retain wrath and anger may be ascribed to malicious men whom we shall hear saying I will forgive but never forget him But in no wise to the most righteous God who so forgiveth the sinns of beleevers as that he will never more remember them To the sixth I will not fall into a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a strife and dispute about words and names Let Mr. Baxter agree with us in the matter and we will not stick to close with him in the name and words Let him deny all malignity and curse in the sufferings of the godly and to do him a pleasure we will call them punishments as he doth After that God had new named Jaakob calling him Israel he remained ever after indifferently called either Jaakob or Israel still the new name made it not a sin to make use of the old also So though the sufferings of the Saints which under the Law were usually termed punishments and judgments are now under the Gospel as it were baptized with new names which more set forth their nature such as are Chastisements and Tryalls yet is it no sin to use the old as well as the new names still for we see the penmen of the New Testament to have done it before us To the Seventh Mr. Baxter is here returned again to his evils and either I understand not what his meaning is or if I do understand him I find a pack of little sence and much arrogance a compound of absurdities and presumptions Absurdities in the Argument it self arrogance and presumption in that which he speaketh for the confirmation thereof First we have his absurd non-sense The very nature of affliction saith he is to be a loving punishment a naturall evill sanctified and so to be mixed of evill and good as it proceedeth from mixt causes Let him that can make sense and truth here meet together I cannot By evil I must needs conjecture he means the evill not of sin but of punishment For the evill of sin as sin cannot be mixt of evill and good being altogether evill By affliction ever since I understood words I have concluded to be meant any vexation trouble sorrow anguish or torment that a man hath inflicted upon him by God or the Creature If this be not affliction I never knew affliction If it be so it is a meer absurdity to affirm every affliction to be a loving punishment a naturall evill sanctified mixed of evill and good c. Pharaoh afflicted Israel and the Devill afflicted Job did either Pharaoh or the Devill mean or act love in afflicting or sanctifie the evill which they inflicted or had the evill which they inflicted either love or good in its own nature who but a man in a dream will affirm any of this gear It cannot be pronounced and concluded that the afflictions which are from the Creature as from the Creature to have such qualifications as Mr. Baxter ascribeth to them either from their own nature or from the will and infusion of the Creature inflicting them And no less absurd is it to attribute such qualifications to affliction universally as it proceeds from God either immediately or mediately by the Creature The torment of the reprobate men and Devils in Hell must be granted to be an affliction and that it is God which afflicts them To conclude hence because it is an affliction an affliction from God it is a loving punishment a sanctified evill mixt of good and evill as proceeding from mixt Causes is such an absurdity that although Mr. Baxter in words affirm it * Abhorret a sensu comuni ut benefiat ei a quo poenae sumuntur Cham. Panstr T. 3. l. 23. Cap. 6. Parag. 11. Monstrum judicij c. id ibid. Paragr 30. yet would he be as loath as any of the opposite opinion to try it If he had said Chastisements are in their own nature so qualified we should have born with it but he shunneth that word as a rock upon which he might have dashed the Curse against believers wherewith as with a treasure he hath laden the Barque of his disputation in this place From such false and absurd premisses therefore to inferr this Conclusion Therefore to say that Christ hath taken away the Curse and evill but not the suffering is a meer contradiction becaus so far as it is a suffering it is evill to us and the execution of the Curse is as fallacious as the premisses absurd Fallacious many ways 1 in jumbling in the execution of the Curs which was neither expressed nor implyed in the premisses 2 In couniting together evill and the curse as equipollent terms which are oft disparates No man besides Mr. Baxter will conclude every evill of suffering to be the Curse Christ mourned for the sins of Jerusalem Mat. 23. 37. Lu. 19. 42. Paul had continuall heavinesse and sorrow in heart for the unbelief of Israel Rom. 9. 2. Jeremy had his soul weeping in secret and his eyes running down with teares for the sin and afflictions of his people Jer. 13. 17. This mourning heavines and weeping were sufferings made impression of evill I mean with Mr. Baxter the evill of pain and sorrow upon them yet were not these sufferings the execution of the Curse upon them 3 In an implyed insinuation that we deny all evill of pain in the sufferings of believers so making them as stocks and stones insensible or as glorified persons impassible Which none ever held though Mr. Baxter would lay it as an absurdity upon all that dissent from him to make the truth which they maintein odious Now Mr. Baxter is not a Child he sees well enough these absurdities and fallacies and doth not either thorow ignorance or inadvertency commit them His use of them therefore doth insinuate to us two things 1 His abasing opinion of others in the superlative confidence that he hath of and in himself If he thought not almost all others to be meer Terrae filios Clods of clay in comparison of himself he would not thus shake out upon his very absurdities and grossest fallacies to be treasured up by us as Oracles becaus his 2 His suspending of conscience that while he pretends unto truth yet takes the reines by any absurd false tricks utterly to subvert it As for his arrogance against God in the Conclusion What reason can be given c. ut supra No marvell if he take the chaire to himself alone from thence to judge of all other Divines when we finde him here as it were usurping the throne of Heaven thence to sentence and censure the wisedome of God in his proceedings In answer to him I shall use no other but Mr. Pembles words against the like arrogance of the Papists Such Questions saith he are vain and curious prosecuted by idle and unthankfull men
but those of Mr. Baxter as far as they relate to it do follow justification 4 The scope of these Scriptures is to urge upon all that draw near to God in prayer to purge out all hatred and purposes of revenge against their brethren from their hearts and the argument by which this duty is pressed is that else it as also any other reigning sin allowed within the heart will make both their persons and prayers an abomination to the Lord. God will not hear will not forgive such as bring while they bring such a devill in their hearts before him they shall depart without any more answer of peace to their souls then they are disposed to give to their brethren against whom they are provoked From these Scriptures therefore we may gather how they are qualifyed which are forgiven and justifyed not by what qualifications and works they have obtained justification That whosoever hath tasted of the pardoning grace of God the same by beholding in Christ the glory of Gods grace as in a glasse is transformed into the same image of grace love mercy goodnesse pity c. towards his brethren as himself hath found in God and sees shining forth upon him from the face of God through Christ 2 Cor. 3. 18. That in whomsoever this mercy and goodnesse of God appears not whatsoever he boasteth of faith and devoutnesse in prayer yet it is certain that he is empty of justifying faith and of the justification which is by faith and so we have here some description of the justifyed and unjustifyed not a precept of duties by which the unjustifyed may attain to be justifyed 5 The three last quotations of Mr. Baxter do subvert utterly all that he built by the former quotations For these Scriptures affirming it to be not indefinitely prayer but the prayer of faith which saveth and obtaineth forgivenesse that not the asking simply but the asking of the faithfull in Christs Name is prevalent that not every one but we know that whatsoever we aske we have our petitions granted do manifest that whatsoever vertue is in prayer it floweth from faith prayer it self is a dead work unlesse faith enliven it and all our works of mercy and forgiving dead works untill faith becomes the living root from which they derive life or rather hath breathed out the life which it hath suckt from Christ our life into them That it is Christs name and mediation that makes all accepted with God and that not to all but to those peculiar ones of Christ that are in union and conjunction with Christ it being a priviledge peculiar to true beleevers that is here mentioned under the word we we have it saith the Apostle the world hath no part in it Esaus forgiving Sauls confession of sin and Simon Magus his prayer for forgivenesse may as in Mr. Baxters last quotation Act. 8. 22. perhaps be so far heard and forgivenesse obtained from the Lord as to the exempting of them from some temporall vengeance but not to interest them in the justification of the Gospell If the cryes and workes of any of these dogs bring them in to partake of the childrens bread it is but in mans judgement alone before God it was their faith and cleaving to Christ yea being in Christ by faith that of dogs made them children and partakers of the Gospell priviledges So these Scriptures in no wise prescribe as I said the duties by or for which we are but delineate the Acts and qualifications of those that are justifyed by Christ So much in generall to the summe of these Scriptures as for the meaning of the severall Scriptures and how Mr. Baxter argues from them as the Papists how the Sophisters for so our men fitly tearm the Papists endeavour from them to prove justification by works and the Protestants answer and confute them I leave to the Reader to fetch from the Commentators themselves whom they shall finde to speake fully as Mr. Baxter knoweth but concealeth not daring to enter the Lists with them The third duty which he brings as coofficiating with Pag. 236. faith to justification is a complexion of duties the whole swarm the vast mountain of duties all that men and Angels can devise to be duty yet that he might declare how he can measure and contain so huge an Ocean in his fist he crusheth them so together as that they may be held in the concave of two Eg-shels love and sincere obedience and their works Fain would he have followed Bellarmine as his shâ—ddow at every turne but he finds his genius somewhat differing from Bellarmines The Cardinall was for prolixity Mr. Baxter is for brevity Bellarmine puts love in the fourth place as operating to justification with faith and thence proceeds to more But Mr. Baxter follows him here to love and weary to go after him any further in particulars shakes hands in love with him and parts from him with good leave in respect of his method but in his matter to hold with him throughout the work The first Scripture which he quotes is the first which Bellarmine alleadgeth thus B. Luk. 7. 47. though I knew in Pinks interpretation of that It seems Pink hath given the right interpretation of that Text which all the Protestants give But Bellarmine interprets it otherwise and must not Christ mean as Bellarmine will have him The words of the Text are these Wherefore I say unto thee her sins which are many are forgiven for she loved much But to whom little is forgiven the same loveth litle What doth Mr. Baxter hence conclude the same with Bellarmine her much love was the ground of the forgivenesse of her many sins and so her love went before her justification and forgivenesse which followed as the fruit or consequent thereof Bellarmine and his fellowrs put authority and holinesse upon this interpretation else would not Mr. Baxter who makes right reason the foundation and rule of his Religion forswear his wit and reason to follow it For it is evident from the Text to all that are not sworn enemies to the truth that the Lord Jesus reasoneth here from the effect to the cause and not from the cause to the effect from the womans great love that many sins were forgiven her causing this love not from the greatnesse of her love as from the cause why so many sins were forgiven her So runs the Text Which will love most he to whom the creditor hath forgiven 500. pence or he Ve. 41 c. to whom he forgave 50 The answer was I suppose he to whom most was forgiven Thou hast well said saith the Lord so it is with this woman she loves much because much was forgiven her Who sees not here the forgivenesse to be the cause of the love not the love of the forgivenesse Or will Bellarmine which affirmes this woman to be Mary Magdalen or Mr. Baxter after him say that while she was yet a Harlot and had seven Devils in her that
he do so no more that he speaks here more orthodoxly than he purposed viz. the prisoners debt to be satisfied the prisoner to be delivered restored to his house to the inheritance again by the meer grace and purchase of the Son before God which implyes no less than a full justification with by God before ever the prisoner beleeved or had a new Lease a new Covenant of grace and faith made with him a doctrine which before Mr. Br anathematizeth to hell it self and will do so again though he thereby Curse himself for that which inconsiderately here fell from him These things granted and winked at we utterly explode all the rest in the Similitude not onely as uncoherent with but as contrary to the doctrine of Grace yea utterly destructive to the nature and working of grace in our Justification and that in these particulars as I promised above to specifie 1 That it maketh our Justification mercenary and held by yeerly rent for though it be but a pepper-corn that is payd yet that is rent and payment as shall be manifested before we passe from this similitude which is contrary to the Covenant of grace and doctrine of the Gospel which affirmeth that We are justified freely by his Grace through the Redemption which is in Jesus Christ Rom. 3. 24. And wholly agreeing with the doctrine of the Gospel is that of Austin Non enim gratia Dei Gratia erit ullo modo nisi gratuita sit omni modo The Grace of God shall not be grace in any respect except it be free in every respect But how is it free which is a debt acquired and held by rent and payment 2 That it maketh our Justification Conditionall if Articles of Covenant be performed then the Tenant abides in the inheritance the man is justified if through foolishnes or forgetfulnes unperformed then is the Tenant outted the man unjustified And to be thus conditionally Justified is no Justification When contrariwise the Gospel holds forth a reall and absolute Justification Son Daughter Be of good cheare thy sinns he forgiven Mat. 9. 2. Luk. 7. 48. He that is washed needeth not save to wash his feet but is clean every whit Joh. 13. 10. Being justified by faith we have peace with God and glory in tribulation Rom. 5. 1. 3. Is it not a reall and absolute but a conditionall forgivenes washing Justifying here spoken of then must the effects in these places added and attributed to such forgivenes washing Justifying be not reall but conditionall also A conditionall not reall chear comfort a conditionall not reall cleanness a conditionall not reall peace with God and glorying in tribulation But these effects are out of question reall Therefore Justification the Cause of these effects reall also 3 It delineats an unperfect Justification The Old Lease is not cancelled but kept firm to be put in suit against the Tenant after the New Lease is made The Old Covenant of works is kept in force against the beleever after he is entred into the New Covenant of grace to be put in suit against him upon occasion to his totall damnation When the Gospel pronounceth the justification of a beleever perfect the Old Covenant in respect of any power over him to be dead Rom. 7. 6. The hand writing against him and contrary to him blotted out taken out of the way and nailed to the Cross of Christ Col. 2. 14. So that he is no longer under the Law of workes to be pleaded or putt in suit against him Rom 6. 14. Nor is there now any more Condemnation to be inflicted on him Rom. 8. 1. 4 It points out a mutable justification While the Tenant payeth the rent he shall be acquit both from his debt and all other rent for the future but if he miss of payment then both the old dâ—bt and rent falls on him as a mountain again crushing him untill the pepper-corn intercede remove the mountain and then acquitt again untill the pepper-corn be lost in carriage or being round and full of volubility run besides the Landlords hand then on comes the mountain of debt upon the Tenant again c. Thus mans justification is made fast or loose according to the stedfastnes or mutableness of mans will and the grace of God in justifying of so little fixedness that a pepper-corn can weigh it and sway it up and down at pleasure When contrariwise the Scripture every where pronounceth the grace of God and Covenant of grace everlasting unchangeable and makes the Justification of man to rest not upon his own mutable and mad will but upon the stable and stablishing grace of God I will be mercifull to their unrighteousness and their sinns and iniquities will I remember no more Heb. 8. 12. I will make an everlasting Covenant with them that I will not turn away from them to do them good but I will putt my fear in their hearts that they shall not depart from me Jer. 32. 40. with a large heap of testimonies more to the same purpose which would be here impertinent to transcribe Thus is the similitude as here framed in all these respects proper indeed to illustrate the bugbear figment of Justification in Mr. Brs brain but altogether incoherent with the Justification which the Gospel holds forth to us Yet he addeth In this case the payment of the grain of pepper is imputed to the Tenant as if he had payd the Rent of the old Lease When contrariwise the reformed Churches affirm from most full and pregnant Testimonies of Scripture that to rest any thing at all upon the imputation of such pepper payments for righteousness doth utterly frustrate the offers of grace and benefits of Christs death unto us as hath been oft before manifested That which followeth doth not take off the Odium and falshood of this his doctrine but rather augments it declaring that he hath learned of the Papists not onely their falsifications of the Gospel nullifying of the grace and righteousness of God and extolling the crest of mans pride but also their fallacious shirts to dâ—fend his dealing herein Yet this imputation saith he doth not extoll the pepper-corn nor vilifie the benefit of his benefactor who redeemed him Nor can it be said that the purchase did onely serve to advance the value and efficacy of that grain of pepper The very language of the Papists and the Arminians for â—o they when they have mounted the righteousnes of mans faith and works to be a part or the whole of the righteousness effectuall to Justification they come after with a plausible varnish of words professing that they do not herein abase Gods grace nor heave above its own proportion mans righteteousness For say they we do not attribute any thing to mans righteousness either as it is mans righteousnes or to the price and value of it as if by its own worth merit it doth Justifie but partly saith Antoninus ex ordinatione Divina as God hath ordeined
the Apostles termes by which he freely and without necessity in relation to his justice willeth the salvation of one and willeth not the salvation of another loveth or hateth imputeth not or doth impute sinne according to his own free will But justification in the latter sense is an act of Gods righteousnes or faithfulnesse by which hee faithfully and righteously accomplisheth his promises of grace in just â—ying and absolving them which believe by the sentence of pardon pronounced to their conscience according to the Gospel promise made to beleevers No word of promise went before justification in the former sense to make it an act of justice to fulfill that promise neither could it be an act of his natural justice that by the necessity of his nature he should so justifie and love any for then should none be either loved or saved freely of God when contrariwise it was in his own free choice to love or to hate to save or condemn all or mutatis vicibus to have loved Esau hated Jacob to have willed the condemnation of the saved and the salvation of the reprobated But the word of promise preceded justification in the latter sense which it is righteousnesse in God to fulfill therefore is it an act as well of his justice or righteousnesse as of his free grace 3. That Justification in the former sense is antecedaneous or foregoing to all covenants whatsoever 1. In order of nature though not in time it goeth before that covenant between the father and the son mentioned before in the examination of the explication of Mr. Baxters fourteenth Thesis and consequently before Christs undertaking to make or the fathers Covenant to accept what he should offer in satisfaction for the sinnes of the elect For in order of nature the willing of the end alway goeth before the willing of the means conducing to the end so that Gods willing mans righteousnesse and immunity from sinne and loving him to salvation must needs goe before his willing of Christs satisfying of his justice which was but a mean appointed of God to the constituting of man righteous before him that he might be pure from sinne discharged from condemnation and partaker of salvation which was the end Not that there was any precedency or following after of these acts of God in time for they are both coeternal and before all times Whom God hath loved and forgiven their sinnes them hath he so loved and forgiven in and through Christ from all eternity and through and for the merit of his satisfaction Much more doth this immanent act of justification go before not onely in nature but in time also the other temporary Covenants both the Covenant of workes made with Adam and the Covenant of Grace made after by Gospel promise by Christ or God in Christ to us and with us For these had all their being in time But justification in its other acceptation is subsequent unto and followes after and is an effect of not onely the Covenant of Grace but of faith it selfe which the Covenant of Grace calls for as a mean to attain it None else but a beleiver nor he until he actually beleeveth is thus actually justified or hath pardon of sinnes and absolution from wrath declared and pronounced of God in his conscience And thus to be justified in Christ or in God is one thing and to bee justified in our selves by God through Christ is another The former is an antecedent the latter an effect or consequent of the Covenant of Grace 4. That neither the mediation satisfaction of Christ nor much lesse our faith in Christ nor any of the most noble gifts of grace received from Christ either in their habit or operation do move God to justifie us so as to put into him a will to pardon our sins and accept us as righteous or to change his affection from nilling to will our forgivenesse and happinesse and from hating to love and accept us because he is God and therefore immutable and there cannot be any cause of Gods will rendred any more than of God himselfe For the Will of God is God himselfe and these immanent acts of God are God himselfe acting So that the substration of all that Christ hath suffered and by his sufferings satisfied for us and of all that we doe or can doe to put our selves into union with Christ and a conformity with the Will of God are in no wise the causes or conditions or antecedents of Gods first loving owning and pronouncing uâ— righteous and pure from sinne imputed but the effects thereof For he so loveth and justifieth all that in a Covenant way have been or shall be justified in their own conscience before ever they beleeve or live But that the intervening of Christs satisfaction for our sinnes and our recumbency upon and embracing of Christ so satisfying by faith that we may be justified do ad nothing to God which was not nor alter any thing which was in his will before but do onely lay and make a way by Gods ordination how he from all eternity loving and justifying us in himselfe freely may in a course most convenient to magnify both his truth and righteousnesse and withal his grace and mercy at length actually declare us just in and to our own consciences and for ever acquit us from sinne and wrath to the admiration of Men and Angels And so the former justification is a pure simple free and irrespective act of God having no causality out of himselfe moving him to it but the latter is a foederal Gospel or Covenant justification respecting his own Covenant before made Christs satisfaction already given and pleaded in heaven by Christ and mans faith in the mediator and promiser pleading the promise and the blood of the mediator sealing it upon all which he doth he cannot but actually pronounce and declare to the conscience of the beleiver his perfect absolution from sin and vengeance This latter is indeed the justifying wherof the Scriptures primarily speak as oft as they speak of justification by faith but so as the former is also in such Scriptures implyed Neither is the Scripture silent in reference to the former as considered without the latter or apart from it 5. That although all that are or shall be justified by faith in time i. e. each onâ— in the time when he so beleeveth were justified also in Christ secretly in God before they beleived or yet lived even from eternity Yet is there no man justified by vertue of the New Covenant and promise of the Gospel proclaiming right to the Lord Christ to forgivenesse of sinnes freedome from condemnation heirship to Gods Kingdom and all other benefits of Christs Passion until he doth actually beleeve and embrace Christ thorow him to have all those pretious promises made good and effectual to himselfe Though in Christ he were Lord of all before yet differed he nothing in himselfe from a servant from a child of
Gods evidencing and manifesting to the beleever that he was really justified in God from eternity but also in Gods Actual and Judiciall pronouncing of the sentence of Absolution to the soul drawn to Gods Tribunal and gasping for pardon thorough Christ By means whereof the poor sinner is constituted as well as declared actually and personally righteous and that before God his Justifier 3. That as oft as the Gospel speaketh of Justification by Faith it is in reference to this Transient Act of God not that Immanent 4. That as I conceive the Covenant between God and Christ to be if I may so term it a fruit in order to that immanent act in God so I think also that the Covenant of Promise the Covenant under the Law the Covenant under the Gospel and the very Covenant of Works to be subservients to this Covenant made with Christ as a publick person representing us to work all coordinately to the advancing of the glory of Gods Grace to his Elect in justifying them in himself from Eternity Yet so that if I find a candid Teacher in any or all these to inform me better I hope I shall not be wanting to shew my docility I should have wholly forborn to touch upon this point so famous a Divine having lately taken upon him the Province but this was written before and it will not hinder his further prosecution thereof to which I hear hee will bee provoked As to Mr. Baxter let him pretend what he will of his zeal against this Doctrine because it is a Pillar of Antinomianism yet his conscience tels him that his rage against it is under this consideration as it is a slâ—dge to beat in peeces the conditional Justification Election Redemption and Grace together with the pride of mans Free-will Works and Righteousnesse uncertainty of Perseverance c. Which are the Articles of Faith common to Mr. Baxter with the Papists and Arminians If Justification as an immanent act in God from Eternity hold all these must fall and Master Baxter and his fellows bee crushed with the ruines thereof The worke of the next Chapter therefore shall bee to examine the force of his reasons and arts whereby he seekes to refute and subvert it CHAP. XXI Arg. Mr. Baxters Reasons and Dispute examined by which he endeavoureth to refute Justification as an Immanent Act in God and from Eternity B. A great question it is whether Remission and Justification be Immanent or Transient Acts of God The mistake of this one point was that that led those two most excellent famous Divines Doctor Twiss and Mr. Pemble to that errour and pillar of Antinomianism viz. Justification from Eternity For saith Doctor Twiss often All acts immanent in God are from Eternity But Justification and Remission of sins are Immanent acts Therefore c. By Immanent in God they must needs mean Negatively not Positively For Acts have not the respect of an Adjunct to its Subject but of an Effect to its Cause Now whether all such Immanent Acts are any more Eternall then Transient Acts is much questioned As for God to know that the world doth now exist that such a man is now just or sanctified c. Gods fore knowledge is not a knowing that such a thing is which is not but that such a thing will be which is not Yet doth this make no change in God no more then the Sun is changed by the variety of creatures which it doth enlighten and warm or the glass by the variety of faces which it represents or the eye by the variety of colours which it beholdeth For whatsoever some say I doe not think that every variation of the object maketh a reall chaâ—ge in the eye or that the beholding of ten distinct colours at one view doth make ten distinct acts of the sight or alterations of it much less doe the objects of Gods knowledge make such alterations But grant that all Gods Immanent Acts are Eternall which I think is quite beyond our understanding to know yet most Divines will deny the minor and tell you that Remission and Justification are Transient Acts which is true but a truth which I never had the happiness to see well cleared by any For to prove it a Transient Act they tell us no more but that it doth transire in subjectum extraneum by making a Morall change on our relatio though not a reall upon our persons as Sanctification doth But this is onely to affirme and not to pâ—ove and that in generall onely not telling us what Act it is that maketh this change Relations are not capable of being the patients or subjects of any Act seeing they be but meer Entia Rationis and no reall beings Neither are they the immediate product or effect of any Act but in order of Nature are consequentiall to the direct effects The proper effect of the Act is to lay the foundation from whence the Relation doth arise And the same Act which layeth the foundation doth cause the Relation without the intervention of any other Suppose but the subjectum fundam entuÌ„ terminus and the Relation will unavoydably follow by a meer resultancy The direct effect therefore of Gods actuall Justification must be a reall effect though not upon the sinner yet upon something else for him And thence will his passive Justification follow Now what Transient Act this is And what its immediate real effect who hath unfolded I dare not be too confident in so dark a point But it seemeth to me that this justifying transient Act is the enacting or promulgation of the New Covenant wherein Justification is conferred upon every beleever Here passing and enacting this grant is a transient Act. 2. So may the continuance of it as I think 3. This Law or grant hath a Moral improper action whereby it mâ—y be said to pardon or justifie which properly is but virtuall justifying 4. By this grant God doth 1. Give us the righteousnesse of Christ to be ours when we beleeve 2. And disableth the Law to oblige us to punishment or to condemn us 3. Which reall foundation being thus laid our relations of Iustified and pardoned in title of Law do necessarily result A matchlesse and egregious dispute able to tum all the immanent Acts of God into Transient yea if spell'd backward to turne all his Transient Acts into immanent of force enough to extort from Gods bosome all that waâ— in him from eternity that it shall abide in him or with him no longer Here is Doctrine fitted to purpose for his ignorant babes and tender lambs of Kederminster for whose sake and use this worke if wee will believe the Author was chiefly published No lesse proper for them than the Scripture in the Latine tongue by his holy mother appointed for the illumination of them that cannot read the English or their Country language What a supereminent measure of the Spirit hath this man received above Christ himselfe above Paul the most learned
of all Christs Apostles Christ was annointed with the Spirit to preach the Gospel to the poor Luke 4. 18. Isa 61. 1. And had received from the Lord God the tongue of the learned to speak a word in season to the weary Isa 50. 4. This mans Spirit carries him aloft in the Aire to clowd the Gospel from the poor and to darken with his vaporous Sophistry the things which God hath hidden from the wise and prudent but revealed to babes and useth the tongue of the learned to amaze and intangle not to refresh the weary Paul descended from all excellency of speech and of wisedom to the capacity or rather incapacity of the weak Christians in the Ministry of the Gospel 1 Cor. 2. 1 2. and fed the babes with milk 1 Cor 3. 1 2. And even then when he spake wisedom to the perfect because perfect it was not the wisedome of the World or of the Princes for learning of the World but the Mysterious and hidden wisedom of God and this he spake also not in the words which mans wisedome teacheth which the subtile Sâ—phistâ—rs made uâ—â— of but which the Holy Gost teacheth comparing spirirituall things with spirituall 1. Cor 2. 6 7. 13. This man casting away the words which the Holy Ghost teacheth and useth in the holy Scriptures sends his poore lambes to feed and seek spiritual pasture in the thorny Copses of his Master Aristotle and his Saint Suarez Saint Vasques Saint Fonseca's Metaphysicks and Metaphysical Jesuitical Divinity or in Seraphical Scotus his Quodlibetary learning all which understood just so much of the Spirit and mystery of the Gospel in this greatest point of Gospel Doctrine Justification as the unlearned people of Kederminster do of this and the like peeces of this tractate of Mr. Baxter As for the matter it self he that understands it not shall be as much endoctrined by it as he that understands it For my own part I professe I see nothing in it of any more force to refute the opinion which he here opposeth Eternal Justification or Justification as an immanent Act in God than there is in a Peacocks Feather to dash out all the teeth of a Lion For should wee grant to him all that he here saith the thing in question onely excepted That immanent in God must be understood not Positively but Negatively for that Acts have not the respect of an Adjunct to its subject but of an effect to its Cause that Gods justifying a man when he believeth argues no change in God any more than is found in the Sunne glasse or eye by the variety of creatures faces colours set before them as he mentioneth what of all this What will he conclude at length against that which he saith Doctor Twisse maketh the Major of his Argument vizt That all immanent Acts in God are from Eternity will he deny it Nay but distrusting the weaknesse of his reasoning he doth rather grant it But grant saith he that all Gods immanent Acts are eternal which yet I think is quite beyond our understanding to know This is the result of all his Argumentation as to the Major It is true notwithstanding any thing I have said or can say against it onely I think it is beyond our understanding to judge whither it be universally true or no. As to the Minor of Doctor Twisse his Argument vizt That Remission and Iustification are Immanent Acts he disputes with as little dexterity as to the Major Most Divines saith he will deny the Minor and tell you that they are but transient Acts. Be it so But what have those most Divines to say for the disapprâ—ving of the Minor 'T is true saith Mr. Baxter what they say but I could never have the happinesse to see or hear it well cleared by any For to prove it transient they tell us no more but that it doth transire in Subjectum Extraneum By making a moral change on our Relation c. But this saith he is to affirm and not to prove What then doth Mr Baxter himself to supply what is in his most famous Divines deficient This onely he tels us a tale of a Tubb about relations how they are made up and thence hee brings in his Conjectures to make clear how this change of our relation is made up that our Pactional Justification or Justification according to the New Covenant is a Transient Act of God which I was never so happy or unhappy in my slender reading to find any one that denyeth And all this being granted yet may it stand as a firm foundation that Remission and Justification are immanent Acts in God as hath been before and shall be if there be need more fully afterward shewed He that readeth Mr. Baxters dispute must acknowledge that I do him no wrong in this Epitomizing of it And let every rationall man judge whether the heat of the man in promising so confidently before pag. 93. and in charging all his impetus or impotent impetuousness here as against the Pillars of Antinomianism be answered with strength of reason to beat down what he would have down Gods Eternal acceptation and approbation of his beloved ones in Christ Jesus Thus feeble are the most Nervous armes in fighting against God and so vain in their imaginations as the Apostle saith do they become who whet their wits upon the threshold of humane literature to dispute against God But after this generall view of his dispute it shall not be impertinent to take notice of the particulars also therein enclosed And 1. Why doth he call Doctor Twisse and Master Pemble Most excellent famous Divines Doth he so stile them for the excellency of their Philosophick Scholastick learning He should then more properly have termed them Most excellent famous Philosophers or Schollars Except he will also make Aristotle because he in his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 makes the Treating of God one part of that Doctrine which is to be handled in that Science which is commonly called Metaphysicks to be a Theologer or Divine also Or for their abundant knowledge in the Doctrine of Christian Religion together with their great ability and faithfullnesse to teach and maintain it against the Adversaries thereof Much more proper had it been then for him to have followed the Genius and policy of the chief Priests as in other things he doth that would not say any thing to the Praise of Iohn that his Baptism or Droctrine were Divine and from Heaven fearing lest the Lord Jesus should then urge upon them Why then did yee not believe him Mat. 21. 25. For so Master Baxter here opens his bosome to the dint of the like reproof Were they excellent Why doth not he close with them in their excellency No one of the Papists or Arminians against whose Sophisms and impostures these two Champions so excellently and famously propugned the truth of Christ hath more deviated from their doctrine i. e. the Doctrine of Christ which they defended than Master
Baxter how is not then himself in famous in reference to that for which he pronounceth them famous Or in granting them at the highest the name of Theologers doth he not inure upon himself the brand of a Theologaster But peradventure he thus insignizeth them in respect of the opinion that others have of them though in his own accompt or in comparison with himself he knowes not whither to terme them Cranes or Pigmies Or it is a peece of that subtlety which elsewhere he useth frequently to abuse the ignorant with a conceit that all which he delivers is orthodox because of his pretending himself to be an admirer of such in whom verity and Godlines with profoundness in learning are met together Or lastly Ambition of popular glory and praise might invite him so to magnify them The greater the Champions are with whom he Combateth The more glorious he may conceive his victory to be if he return out of the field Conqueror And he might expect that the lesser and lower rank will be as mute as fishes when they see the Classicall Doctors of highest esteem once battered by his disputations Two Kings could not stand before him how shall we stand 2. Kin. 10. 4. so c. However it be all that know them and him will conclude certainly that hee doth in no wise so speak of them because he can say of them in the words of John whom I love in the truth 3. Jo. 1. But note ye out of the same mouth in the same breath come Blessing and Cursing The Kiss and the stab of Joab go together Majestically rather than Magisterially he mounts them to the top of the Stage to hurl them down thence in the same Momâ—nt headless Master Pemble long since while he was yet a young man slâ—pt in Christ But Doctor Twisse not untill of late in a venerable old age was laid in the grave and Master Baxter a Punie to him throwes his curses after him that he was erroneous hereticall yea one that set up the Pillar of that which he calls and detesteth as the worst of Heresies Antinomianism Dared he but to have whispered so while Doctor Twisse was yet living It is come to passe what I conceived and intimated to divers of my friends at the first coming abroad of Doctor Twisse his works that during his life we should finde none that would write against him but after his death there would be many censurers though never an answerer of him Our eyes have seene since his death brought forth into the light those Tractates which while he lived dared not come forth out of the womb of darknesse And those mouths now open after his death to snarl at him which for fear of him were as fast shut while he lived as the Egyptian doggs at the presence of an Israelite Exo. 11. 7. yet may some take it to argue an ignoble Spirit in Master Baxter so to tread on the neck of a dead Lion having not so much as looked thorow the Grate upon him while yet living and to seek honour by the Conquest of them Quorum Flaminiâ tegitur cinis atque Latinâ But there is but little harm where there is but barking onely without biting And how little impression upon Doctor Twisse his either Doctrine or reputation Master Baxters sugillation hath made we have in part and in generall seen already and may yet take notice more particularly 2. Then when in opposition to Doctor Twisse his Major proposition vizt All Acts immanent in God are Eternal he tells us that Immanent in God must needs be taken Negatively not Positively § To speake more scripturally than Metaphysically I answer I see no ground of such a necessity but that it may be understood as well positively as yea rather positively than Negatively What is immanent in God but abiding or residing in God or to use the Scripture terms hidden in God Eph. 3. 9. Col. 3. 3. Yet so that when it is revealed it abides notwithstanding and hath its immanency in God still Approbation Acceptation accounting us just and loving us in Christ are Acts of Gods Knowledge and will and both before and after we have the revelation thereof to our soules they are immanent and abiding in God fâ—om everlasting to everlasting Are there not immâ—nent Acts in the soul of man much more in the minde and will of God What man knoweth the things of a man but the Spirit of man which is in him Even so none knoweth the things of God but the Spirit of God saith the Apostle 1 Cor. 2. 11. By the things of God and the things of a man I doubt not but it will be granted that we must understand the apprehensions volitions purposes and affâ—ctions if I may so speak of God and of men And are not these things in God as well as the things of God So they are as properly termed Acts immanent in God in a positive sense as actually abiding in God as in a Negative in opposition to their Transiency and termination upon a subject without God The latter is not onely or so much denyed as the former affirmed And thus our justification is positively and depositively immanent in God from eternity Posited in the bosom of God the Father as in the Cabbinet of his counsells and deposited in the hand of God the Son as in the hand of a faithfull Mediator and surety for us upon his undertaking to make satisfaction which God the Father accepted as present satisfaction made for our sinns 3. The reason which he annexeth to prove that Acts are not positively immanent in God is insufficient and reasonlesse For Acts saith he have not the respect of an Adjunct to its subject but of an effect to its Cause As if Acts and effects could not also abide and remain in their cause Master Baxter no doubt hath read Bellarmine Arminius and Corvinus in their disputes against the Doctrine of the reformed Churches suppose now an act of approbation hath passed within him so far as that their Faith is become his Faith also but secretly and not fully yet manifested to the World Is not this approbation an Act of Master Baxter if so is it not also an immanent Act abiding in himselfe within his owne minde as well positively the râ—siding as negatively not transient upon those Writers to produce any new relation or passion in them Himselfe and his Master Grotius concurre That the effects of efficient voluntarie causes do not alway immediately follow them That God hath decreed from eternity the transient Justification of the Elect in their own consciences yet the execution thereof follows not untill they beleeve Thes 15. and its Explication and here againe pag. 177. I demand now where this decree this act lyeth hid untill the execution thereof It must be either no where and consequently null and annihilated or else abide still and bee Immanent in God and so what was in God from eternity is immanent in him from eternity
and continued untill the full execution thereof That very pactional Justification which is by Faith being nothing but the execution of the decree of God from eternity For besides our eternal Justification in Christ before mentioned we acknowledge also an eternall decree in God to declare and evidence his Elect justified in their own consciences i. e. in time to send forth his Spirit into them and by his Spirit to work Faith in them and so to draw them unto Christ and by the evidence of Faith and evidence of the Spirit to declare themselves to themselves to be justified and pardoned for ever As for that of the respect of the Adjunct to its Subject wee leave to Master Baxter and his friends the Arminians They indeed make Pardon and Justification to bear the nature of Adjuncts yea separable Adjuncts and Accidents of God which may adesse vel abesse sine destructione subjecti that God may hate one day even to damn and love the next day to save and the third day convert this love into hatred againe and so consequently change more frequently then the Moon and yet be Gâ—d still Such shall we find Mr. Baxters doctrine suckt out by kissing from the lips of the Arminians But I forbear to speak further of it here reserving it for its proper place 4. As to the instances which he giveth to make questionable whether Imanent Acts are eternall viz. For God to know that the world doth now exist that such a man is sanctified or just c. Gods foreknowledge is not a knowing that such a thing is which is not but that such a thing will be which is not I answer that foreknowledge doth still imply and connote knowledge though knowledge doth not so imply foreknowledge He that perfectly in every respect foreknew an Ecclipse in every point of its time measure c. knew it also perfectly and could as fully and perfectly contemplate and speak of it in its fruition as presence future and present it was and is one to him Much more in God who hath created time for the measure of his creatures not his own being and motion Past present and future are much to us whose existence duration and motions are spanned and spinned out by moments But to God who is eternall dwels in eternity is eternity not circumscribed with place or time there is nothing former or latter no succession of present to past of future to present but all at once and at one view apparent to his eye or knowledge So that albeit he speakes oft in Scriptures to our capacitie of succession of times as if he together with us did act within the bounds thereof else if he should speake stil in reference to things of old and things hereafter to us as the eternall I AM not I was or I will bee our weakness would be beneath the comprehension of what he saith Yet these circumstances of time doe adde nothing to take nothing from nor properly square with him that is above time without the precincts of time comprehends time and temporary things within himself and is not comprehended or touched by them The now existence of the world the now sanctification of such a man are nâ—w and new in the knowledge of the Creature not the Creator Or let Mr. Baxter deny the world in that form state extent fulness c. in which it doth now exist or the now either sanctified or just man or the measure and nature of his Justification to have been from all eternity as apparent to Gods knowledge as it is in this now or present time of us his creatures 5. The comparisons or similitudes which hee bringeth of the Sun the glass the eye though they may have some appearance of freeing God from change in taking new notions into his knowledge in time which notwithstanding is but an appearance yet is there nothing in them from which to argue to the acts in general which are immanent in God These do but set forth the respect of natural causes and their natural effects either to other therefore are in a capacity to illustrate onely those acts that flow naturally and therewithall necessarily from God Not those that proceed from the liberty and freedom of his will which Master Baxter call Morall Acts and Morall Causes For of these there can be no Cause assigned but the free will of God And if they serve not Master Baxters turn in this respect they become utterly unusefull to him in the point of Justification Yet to this end doth he drive that God doth justifie and unjustifie pardon and unpardon change his will from love to hatred and from hatred to love to will the salvation of the same man at one time and his damnation at another without any change of his will or in himself The absurdity and impossibility whereof we shall afterward shew when Master Baxter in his following Theses gives me cause to do it So much of what he saith by way of answer to the Major or more properly what he saith to leave it unanswered For after all he concludes But grant that all Gods immanent Acts are Eternall And this is as much as if he had said All that hath been said is of no force to refell it Therefore I grant it As for his answer to the Minor That Remission and Iustification are immanent Acts in God though he speak much yet is it nothing to the pupose First he tells us that most Divines will deny it and tell you that they are transient Acts which is true An irrefragable Argument most will say it Ergo it is true True because most Will say it though hitherto possible they have never said it And how knowes he they Will say it â—eradventure he puts so much confidence in his following dispute that he accounts all will be captivated by it into his opinion Oâ— if he mean the most Divines have said it hee questionlesse means partly the Jesuiticall Divines for so Bellarmine indeed with others of the same School asserts or else more primarily the Arminian Divines speaking in this point what they have learned of Socinus who is as great with them as was Simon Magus with the Samaritans Yet even these also though they someâ—imes deny yet do they also sometimes when it may make for their advantage affirme Justification to be an immanent Act in God 2. Who is there that sees not his sophistry in shifting from him this proposition in stead of answering it Doctor Twisseâ— his proposition is Justification is an immanent Act in God To subvert this Master Baxter bestirrs himself to prove a seemingly but not really contradictory proposition viz. That Justification is a Transient Act of God A fallacy which in the Schools is called Ignoratio Elenchi And the reasoning of Master Baxter here is as proper and powerful as if Master Baxter should affirm that Apollo was above a hundred years old and I to overthrow his conclusion should assert and prove that Apollo
after many hundreds perhaps thousands of years is at length fully justified or if he be a peece of knotty timber perhaps comes not at last to bee fully justified I shall leave the Reader to view the Aphorism in Mr. Baxters book I hold it not worthy the transcribing so iâ— seems doth Mr. Baxter too for reviewing his company of the whole number which are no less then tenne he retaines onely two viz. Justification in title of Law and that in sentence of judgement about which his former Thesis was occupant disbanding all the rest and so leaving the cause as raw and unconfirmed as he found it CHAP. XXIV Whether Justification be and remains to be conditional and that to beleevers during life and the justified and pardoned may be unjustified and unpardoned again Aâ—so whether and in what sense and respects there may be remission of sinnes before they be committed Thes 43. pag. 196. B. The Justification which we have in Christs own justification is but conditional as to the particular offenders and none can lay claim to it untill he have performed the conditions nor shall any be personally justified till then Even the Elect remain personally unjustified for all their conditional justification in Christ till they do bâ—leeve Thes 44. Men that are but thus conditionally pardoned and justified may be unpardoned and unjustified againe for their non-performance of the conditions and all the debt so forgiven be required at their hands And all this without any change in God or in his Laws See Ball of the Covenant page 240. Thes 45. pag. 198. Yea in case the justified by Faith should cease beleeving the Scripture would pronounce them unjust again and yet without any change in God or Scripture but onely in themselves Because their Justification doth continue conditionall as long as they live here The Scripture doth justifie no man by name but all beleevers as such Therefore if they should cease to be beleevers they would cease to be justified I joyn together these three Aphorismes partly because Mr. Baxter doth very little sever them by the interposition of very short Explications which might have been as well spared as used for any light they give to his Aphorisms But principally because they all treat upon one and the same Argument conditional Justification And here I could have desired that he had treated more Argumentatively and less Magisterially That hee had stated the questions which he here determines into Conclusions and by the best Arguments he could have assayed to prove his assertions which he doth here nakedly and peremptorily lay down only upon his own bare authority to be taken up as if it were holy and unerring He could not have wanted help to have handled these points more controversally having the Papists on the one hand and Arminians on the others suggesting matter and arguments to him it being their not Christs cause and doctrine which he bids and teacheth here to stand alone so that in case he had met with a learned adversary that had driven him out of this field he might have been sure to have been succoured with a whole brigade of these Sophisters that would either have laid in the place or recovered the field for him again But we must give leave to a man that is all wisdome sometimes for his recreation to be servant to his will And because we find him not here what we expected we must take him as he offers himself Stet pro ratione voluntas Only I think it fit to save the labour to answer Arguments when he refuseth to make it his task to bring them Bare negations of Conclusions being the best way of answering where they are peremptorily and fastuously posited without any premissed reasons from whence to draw them or following arguments to back them In matters of Faith asserted not proved Jack Straws negation being of equal validity to John Scotus his affirmation onely we shall view his words to see what shew of reason there may be found in them In the Explication of the first of these three Positions vizt the 43. He tels us This needs not explication He saw it and had acquaintance with it while it was yet but a notion in his brain therefore needs not any spectacles to clear up unto him his own formed of spring but for my part such is my dulness that whether I seek for his meaning in some part of the Position or for truth in the rest I professe my self unable to understand without an interpreter Let his words be not onely glanced over but well considered I might think there may be the like though not so great an incapacity in anothers braine as in mine The Justification saith he which we have in Christs own Justification is but conditional as to the particular offenders Let the acute wit here inform my stupidness what he meanes by the Justification which wee have in Christs own Justification What is Christs own justification or what the justification which we have in Christs own justification If we understand not what the subject of a proposition is we cannot judge at all of the truth of the proposition and do in vain enquire into the predicate We can go no further understandingly in this Thesis untill wee understand this of which all the rest speaketh Christs own justification may be understood actively or passively For the justification by which hee justifieth others or that by which God hath justified him If Mr. Baxter had meant the former I conceive he would have said plainly as he doth every where else Justification without adding to it Christs or Christs own which seems to be used to distinguish here between the justification here spoken of and the common Justification whereof he treateth throughout this Tractate If in the latter sense it may not suddenly appear how possibly we can bee justified in Christs own justification Neither can Christs own justification properly taken be possibly made our justification For all will apprehend without help by Christs own justification the justification proper to his person which none had or have in common with him Yet I conceive Mr. Baxter means here Christs passive justification Gods justifying of Christ and that these words here do relate to the words which he hath within the 4 number of the foregoing or 42 Thesis where he saith 4. His own Justification as the publick person at his resurrection which is not enough properly called Christs own because it is not the justification of Christ as personally alone but as mystically considered Taking this to be his meaning I shall first speak something of the meaning of the phrase and then examine the truth of the Position 1. For the meaning of the phrase As the first Adam sustained the office of a publick person in relation to that Commandement of not eating of the fruit of the tree of Knowledge of good and evil so that if he had obeyed we had all lived and been justified in him but
instrumentall cause also But this Mr. Baxter will answer anon and I shall wait on him to hear how satisfactory his answer is 2. Whether in his answer to the Question as he puts it when he makes a mans lease or deed of gift and a Kings pardon to have their force from the hand and seal annexed to it is it not much more implyed that the grant of the Gospell without hand and seal put to it is not a sufficient instrument to the justifying of any man For the grant of the Gospell is made to the world indefinitely but when faith as the impression of Gods hand upon the soul and the Spirit witnessing and sealing to the conscience thou art the person to whom the justification generally proposed in the Gospell doth particularly belong and so are applyed by God as true accessary evidences to the grant of the Gospell to terminate justification upon the soul of man can Mr. Baxter deny these being acts of God distinct from the word of promise to be instrumentall to justification as properly and fully as the said promise and grant 3. To his Procatarctick causes which in the Thesis he giveth viz. so far as God may be said to be moved by any thing out of himself speaking after the manner of men saith he I aske 1 Whether God may be moved in his will by any thing out of himself If so whether then something out of God do not give magis minus increase and diminution to God For every change of Gods will is a change of God himself and what shall it avail any to be justifyed by a mutable God that to day will justifie to morrow unjustifie againe being apt to take impression of change from things without him yea if a God mutable then in truth no God but one of the Pagans Idols or Puppets Or how little doth his additionall cause help him to speake after the manner of mâ—n he ought not to speak a lie for God to please men much lesse to lie against God to fashion himself to the manners of men foolish or wicked men If he say God cannot be moved by any thing out of himself how can he excuse himself from being a slanderer of the most high God by devising and asserting here 4. causes out of God moving him to justifie us having before wilfully suppressed in darknesse the riches of Gods grace within himself alsufficient without any auxiliary strength from the creature to move him How preposterous is he herein to the order of nature making the fruit to bear the tree and not the tree the fruit What lesse doth he in making Christs satisfaction and intercession the sinners supplication and desire of supply and the opportunity or advantage for the glorifying of his justice and mercie the causes of Gods will and gracious willings when contrariwise Gods gracious will is the cause of all these 2 Whether he jears at the invaluable means of our salvation or else that he thinks himself matching cocks for the game that he counterpoiseth the highest perfections of Christs mediatorship with mans vanity how unsufferable is it to see him putting into the one scale a precious pearl into the other a peppercorn or cherry stone To match Christs intercession with the sinners supplication To make the feeblenesse of man a collaterall and concause in the same order and degree of efficacy to justification with the vertue of Christ glorifyed It is to be acknowledged that the nothingnesse of the one is of as full validity as the omnipotency if I may so terme it of the other to beget new love new purposes new acts in Gods will This is that which God himself cannot do not because it is a work above his power but beneath his nature and perfection to work or to be capable of the working of any new impressions or changes in his will Neverthelesse this excuseth not Mr. Baxters vilifying of Christ in mating his intercession with the sinners supplication as if the former were a star of the same magnitude with the latter like that profane fellow that twisted together Religion and Cheese 3 Not to trifle away time upon every trifling word of Mr. Baxter I demand of him why seeing in the Explication pa. 215. he acknowledgeth that Procatarcticall or outwardly impulsive causes have properly no place with God he doth yet in his Thesis here fetch about again his four impulsive causes to marke them with severall names in their foreheads in Aristotles print is it not a testimony under his own hand that he will rather play and dance about God as if he were a meer may-pole then lose the ostentation of one least peece of his wit and art 4 Though I mean not to contend about the meritorious causality of Christs satisfaction because in this he hath as well many orthodox writers as Papists speaking in the same tone with him neverthelesse I should deny his assertion unlesse he he will grant me these 4. or 5. suppositions 1. That so far as justification is an act eternall and immamanent in God Christs satisfaction is not the meritorious cause of it 2. If in some other respect it be the meritorious cause that God doth therein merit from himself For the satisfaction made to him is of his own proper money himselfe paid the price in delivering his Sonne for our sinnes the body which Christ offered for us was given him by the Father to offer in our behalf 3. That this merit must in no wise hinder but that the entire benefit of justification must come to us freely without money and without price 4. That it is but unproperly termed merit even then when it respecteth the discharge which God giveth into a mans conscience it being so called metaphorically as our state in sin is considered as a state of debt which when Christ our surety hath paid for us he hath so far merited only as the payment of our debt may be said to deserve that we should receive a full acquittance from the debt In which Mr. Baxter goeth yet further that it was so paid that the Creditour might have chosen to accept it for satisfaction much more to have given us a full acquittance and discharge So that in relation to him and his principles it is lesse properly merit then to another 5. That Christs satisfaction is more properly to be called Gods foundation of this our new relation of justifyed persons upon which he hath inabled himself to justifie us in mercie without any seeming diminution of his justice and truth These things granted me I dismisse Mr. Baxter with his meriâ—orlous cause 5 When he cals Christs intercâ—ssion and the sinners supplication the morall perswading cause c. I demand whether there were such a totall deficiency or so great a scarcity of morall reason in God that it needed a begetting or quickning by perswasions from without him or whether he were so flinty aâ— that without strong perswasive reasons he could not be induced
or between the not accusing or condemning of a man and the not imputing any thing to him to his accusation and condemnation CHAP. XXV Arg. of the Causa sine qua non or the condition or the instrumentall cause and whether faith be the instrument And in what sense it is so The absurdities wherewith Mr. Baxter chargeth this doctrine removed and those that follow his doctrine in part particularized TO the first Question we must apply our selves somewhat more fully because in answer to the former Questions Mr. Baxter seems to me to have aimed chiefly to the ostentation of his wit and Logicall both acutenesse and profoundnesse to make himself thereby admired and formidable But in answering this and the next he collects in one all his subtilty and Sophistry â—o beguile and deceive if it were possible the very Elect. And indeed if he carry these two Questions in captivity to his own sense and purpose he shall thereby make at least a seeming way by which to introduce all his Popish soul-subverting errours about justification which follow and hang as at the tayle of these Questions His words in the Thesis are B. The Causa sine qua non is both Christs satisfaction and the faith of the justifyed As much as he thought would be objected against his putting Christs satisfaction in the same place and degree of causality as a collaterall with faith he hath spoken to in his answer to the second Question and the firmnesse of this his answer hath been there examined But what concernes faith that which he thinks he shall be opposed in he formes into two Questions Explication pa. 214. 1. Why he makes it not the Instrumentall cause 2. Why he makes it the Causa sine qua non The former which is his 5. Question he applies himself to answer pa. 219. in these words B. To the fift Question perhaps I shall be blamed as singular from all men in denying faith to be the instrument of our justification But affectation of singularity leads me not to it 1. If faith be an instrument it is the instrument of God or man Not of man for man is not the principall efficient he doth not justifie himself 2. Not of God for 1. It is not God that beleeveth though it 's true he is the first cause of all actions 2. Man is the causa secunda between God and the action and so still man should be said to justifie himself 3. For as Aquinas the action of the principall cause and of the instrument is one action and who dares say that faith is so Gods instrument 4. The instrument must have influx tâ— the producing of the effect of the principall cause by a proper causality and who dare say that faith hath such an influx into our justification Here I know not whether we have more of the subtle serpent or of the roaring Lyon 1. He useth his winding Sophistry to intangle 2. His daring threats to them that being not intangled will be so bold as to contradict him Let us examine what efficacy there is in either or both these and first in his Sophistry To insinuate or as the Apostle saith to creep into the hearts of his Readers to deceive them he tels us Perhaps he may be blamed as singular from all men in denying faith to be the instrument of justification It seems he doubted that some of his Readers for lack of acquaintance with many Authours upon this subject would not or could not take notice that it is a new doctrine which he here delivereth and so he should be robbed of the glory of his new invention That the praise thereof might therefore wholly redound to him he tels them he is the first of men that ever saw and taught Faith not to be the instrument of justification that herein he is singular from all men Bâ—t had he not rubbed his forehead that with open face he thus vindicateth to himself that which he hath received from the Priests and Jesuites Let him name himself singular and abhorrent from all Protestants yea from Christ and his Apostles not from all men he is singular and alone in this and most his assertions from the Orthodox from whom but holds it in common with the whole herd of Antichrist to whom he is fallen Doth not Bellarmine deny that faith can truly be said to justifie us except it doth obtain and in some sort merit Justification from God Do not all his brethren with one voice shake off the instrumentall causality of justification and make it as a perfect quality or good work to merit it A two fold subtlety yea falshood is there to be found therefore in this his insinuation 1. That he affirmes himself singular in this point to catch after an usurped praise to himself as if he had seen what none in the world before him had seen 2. In pretending it to be a new doctrine thereby to draw disciples after him in a time wherein the ears of men itch after new in disdain of sound and true doctrines But further to insinuate he tels us that affectation of singularity leads him not to it We beleeve him without oath or protestation It is not the desire of them that are of his hair to trudge single but accompanied with a whole Brigade of disciple under their conducting and seducing unto Rome But let us come to his Arguments B. If faith be an instrument it is the instrument of God or Man But of neither of these Ergo not at all an instrument His Proposition or Major we grant him And it were enough and full to that which can be expected to refell his reasons which he brings for the proof of the minor Yet because my drift is not so much to answer him as to stablish some weak and unwary Christians against his impostures I shall endeavour first to confirm what he denyeth and seeks to shiver and then to examine the strength of reason which he brings against us When he saith in the Minor that faith is the instrument neither of God nor Man in justification What if I should undertake to prove and defend it to be the instrument of both He speaketh here of Justification as taken Passively declared to and termined upon the conscience For if we should mention justification as taken meerly Actively for that internall eternall and immanent act in God not transient upon an extraneous subject but hid in God before the world was or any justifyed or unjustifyed persons began to live or be Mr. Baxter would be ready to deal with us as did the Jewes with Steven Act. 7. 57. stop his ears and cry out against us with a loud voice Blasphemy blasphemy Yet in this sense we acknowledge that saith is neither Gods nor Mans instument of justification But in that sense which alone Mr. Baxter here taketh justification for that gracious act of God by which he dischargeth for Christs sake the sinner from condemnation by vertue of the new
a corrivall with it 6. He at last deals no lesse sophistically in his comparisons You may as well call saith he a mans life his instrument of acting or the sharpnesse of a knife the knives instrument as to call our holinesse or habituall faith the instrument of receiving Christ The aptitude of a cause to produce its effect cannot be called the instrument There is no parity in the Comparison Life to acting and faith to receiving of Christ are not Mr. Baxter will not say they are in one and the same kinde and order of causes and effects Besides one of the effects is put with the other subtlely left without an object as if the receiving of Christ were no more then and altogether as naturall to man as receiving indefinitely any naturall object so that albeit this Comparison may stand in some parity with a naturall and civill faith without the object Christ annexed to it yet the divine faith whereof we hear speak is of an another an upper and higher region and agrees not in motion with the naturall life or with the naturall or civill faith The one moves its course and operation in a way that God by nature hath prescribed and the other in the way which God by grace hath prefixed Their orbs are severed and not confounded either with other As for the other Comparison the sharpnesse of the knife Nothing else undoubtedly but the sharpnesse of M. Baxters wit could have devised it Is then faith in man no more then sharpnesse in a knife What good then might a ship-load of whet-stones and grinding-stones do among the Turks to make them Christians The sharpnesse of the knife is not any thing really distinct from the knife it is otherwise with the faith of a man The knife is mans instrument the sharpnesse thereof is but the aptitude of the instrument by which man as the efficient produceth the effect How shall this square in the Comparatum Man must be the principall efficient cause what will he assigne to be the instrument whereof faith is the aptitude to produce the effect But I fear of transgressing by following him that Parvis compâ—nere magna solebat That dares with audacious arrogance to measure the bottomlesse ocean in his fist and to try Celestiall and Spirituall things in the scales of Nature and to compare not with the Apostle spirituall things with spirituall 1 Cor. 2. 13. but with carnall profanely making the Mysteries of Christ to be rather the whetstone of his wit then the object of his reverence and ballast of his conscience I shall forbear here to add my judgment concerning what faculty or faculties of the soul are the subject of faith Whether faith may be more properly said to receive Christ by the faculty or the faculty by faith How far faith in the habit and how far in the act may be said to justifie These and other things may come more properly to be handled afterward then in this place It shall suffice that here notwithstanding Mr. Baxters winnowings yet faith faileth not from being our instrument of applying or receiving Christ Eightly The latter which he maketh his sixth Question Why he maketh faith the Câ—usa sine qua non he thus endeavours to maintain as it followeth in the nâ—xt Chapter CHAP. XXVI Arg. Mr. Baxters further dispute upon the same Subject examined and answered B. Pag. 223. TO the 6. and last Qâ—estion I answer Faith is plainly and undeniably the condition of our justification The whole tenour of the Gospell shewes that And a condition is but a Causa sine qua non or a medium or a necessary antecedent Short and in compasse of words little is it which he here speaketh yet if we look to the matter thereof in it two things are principally to be examined 1. That he makes faith the condition of justification and what he means by that term 2. That he cals it the Causa sine qua non He means questionlesse the same thing by both but the words differ and he useth both as by both together so by either part to get advantage to his cause Therefore I shall examine them severally To the former I have spoke somewhat largely before in the examination of his 13 14 15 17 18 19 20 43 44 45. Theses as he gave me occasion in these severall positions to answer what he there asserted of conditionall justification I have therefore here the lesse to speak referring the reader to what hath been spoken before Yea in this point I should be totally silent because Mr. Baxter in words speaks no more here then what some of our most sound and godly Divines have spoken before him that faith is the condition of justification were it that Mr. Baxter meaneth as they mean For though in the best meaning of the best men the propriety of the terms or phrase may be much questioned and give occasion of much dispute yet traversing controversies about words when there is agreement in the substance to which both parties drive is in my apprehension a businesse so far tending to distractions and breach of union among the Saints that it is the last and least Trade I am confident that ever will befall me to drive But in this point though Mr. Baxter here speaks in words what some of ours have said and do say still and that without any detriment that I can see to the Gospell Yet his meaning and theirs are in no lesse antipathie then a Hawk and a Heron and that as in other lesser so principally in these particulars of moment 1. By faith they mena our application or faith as it is our instrument of applying Christ and the grace of God in Christ to our justification he by faith means not only the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 credere as a part of our inherent righteousnesse but as a generall and common word that compriseth within it self all good qualifications and good works whatsoever as elsewhere and specially in and under his 70 71. Theses he declareth himselfe so that he makes and under the word Faith understandeth all these as equall conditions with faith of our justification 2. By condition they mean that which being once attained and once fixed upon Christ speaks us absolutely justifyed for ever So that in calling faith the condition of justification they mean we cannot be justifyed without it but having once by faith apprehended Christ we are by it united and joyned to Christ and by force of our union with him are thenceforth absolutely and irrevocably pardoned and accepted as righteous in Gods fight He cals it so a condition as that it continues still a condition justifying us only conditionally and not absolutely so that it leaves our estate still one and the same no more justifyed and pardoned when beleevers then when unbeleevers For by the satisfaction of Christ we are before faith cometh conditionally justifyed if we beleeve and when faith is come we remain still but conditionally
expresse phrase of Scripture 3. From the nature of the thing For the effect is ascribed to the severall causes though not alike and in some sort to the conditions especially me thinks they that would have faith to be the instrument of justification should not deny that we are properly justifyed by faith as by an instrument For it is as proper a speech to say our hands or our teeth feed us as to say our meat feedeth us I shall not have need to speak much to this passage because Mr. Baxter hath before said and I have answered to the greatest part of it in examining his 23. Thes with the explication thereof Here as there I shall defend against him that it is not faith as it is righteousnesse but Christs righteousnesse by which we are said to be justifyed The first reason which he brings to evince the contradictory and contrary conclusion hath been there examined and I will not here actum agere To the second 1. He should have quoted that Apocryphal Scripture which saith He that beleeveth shall be justifyed as if he were not already justifyed I finde it not in the Canonicall 2. Those Scriptures which say we are justifyed by faith say not that we are justifyed by it as it is our righteousnesse or any part of our justifying righteousnesse and those that say it is imputed to us as Mr. Baxter will have it for righteousnesse have been sufficiently spoken to under Thesis 23. And by the way Mr. Baxter is not ignorant that the originall text may be more properly rendred unto or to righteousnesse then for righteousnesse and that the old translation and most of our Protestant Divines so render it neither have I met with any one that declares his dislike of that version And from the text so read what Mr. Baxter can suck out to stablish the righteousnesse of faith not as the same but as a collaterall with the righteousnesse of Christs satisfaction to justification I understand not 3. To his Only only and only I answer 1 That it is not the first time that Mr. Baxter hath taken the boldnesse to teach the holy Ghost to speak properly and fully 2 When the holy Ghost saith That the bloud of Christ cleanseth from all sin 1 Joh. 1. 7. that whosoever is washed therein needs no other washing Joh. 13. 10. that he is the Lamb of God that taketh away the sins of the world Joh. 1. 29. that by his one offering he hath for ever perfected them that are sanctifyed by taking away their sins and iniquities Heb. 10. 14 17. That he is made of God righteousnesse to us 1 Cor. 1. 30. that he was made sin for us that we might become the righteousnesse of God in him 2 Cor. 5. 21. That he is all in all Col. 3. 11. Will Mr. Baxter elude all these and a whole century more of the like Scriptures with this evasion yea Christ hath done and is all this in part to us leaving the other part of righteousnesse not perfected by him to be supplyed by faith his collaterall to our justification Or when it is said There is salvation in no other nor any name else given us under heaven by which we may be saved besides Christ Act. 4. 12. and the Apostle professeth it his whole labour to be found in Christ not having his own righteousnesse which is of the Law but the righteousnesse which is through the faith of Christ the righteousnesse which is of God by faith so making Christ put on for righteousnesse the righteousnesse which is through the faith of Christ the righteousnesse which is of God by faith not severall kinds of righteousnesse but one and the same righteousnesse which he opposeth there to his own inherent righteousnesse which he excludeth are not these speeches equipollent to that which Mr. Baxter requireth the Christ only or the righteousnesse of Christ only It is but a flourish wherewith he concludes this argument about the constant expresse phrase of Scripture For let him either produce one Scripture that affirmeth faith by any inherent righteousnesse in it self or of her own conveyed into us to contribute somewhat to our Justification or else confesse his errour to be derived from the scriblings of Bellarmine Socixus Grotius and Arminius where this Doctrine is to be found and not from the Scriptures of Gods inspiration that are wholly against it To his third reason I can say nothing because I understand nothing of his meaning therein or if I doe understand it nothing needs to be said because it hath nothing for himself or against us But to that which he addes of his thinking 1. Let him say whether by them that he saith would have faith to be the instrument c. he doth not mean all the Protestant Churches both Lutherans and Zuinglians or Calvinists as they are by some distinguished whether the best that have opposed them herein have not been the Arminians and from what Rome or Hell these first drank in their opinion he is not ignorant having fished in the same pools after them 2. When he thinks these should not deny that we are properly justifyed by faith as an instrument I answer 1 If they will not deny it will Mr. Baxter with them confesse it 2 The word properly is vox aequivoca a phrase may be said to be proper as it is enough fit and proportioned to declare the meaning of the speaker and in this sense we deny not that faith as an instrument subservient to the principall efficient doth so properly as an instrument can justifie us in our selves or to our own consciences Again it may be said to be proper in opposition to a tropicall way of speaking and in this sense we cannot say that faith doth so properly justifie specially in that extent wherein Mr. Baxter and his Masters will have it to justifie without a trope in the phrase of speaking which I would shew if it were pertinent to the question I shall spare to transcribe at large his next section which he puts under n. 4. of his Explication Because if he meant singly and precisely as he speaks all might be granted in a positive sense without prejudice to our cause or advantage to his viz. that faith doth directly and properly justifie in and to themselves those that were before justifyed in Christ as it is in a good sense the condition of the new Covenant and a means or instrument of Gods stamping by his commandement and promise to the attainment of this justification For this denyeth not that truth which before he kicked at that faith doth so justifie also in regard of that usefull and essentiall property which it hath above all other gifts of grace to be instrumentall to apprehend Christ for righteousnesse Nay even for this cause hath God either ordained and commanded faith to this end because it hath this property or because he hath ordained and given to it this property therefore he not only requireth but
Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall Rom. 10. 13 14. be saved How then shall they call upon him in whom they have not beleeved His argumentation runs thus Whosoever do rightly call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved but beleevers only call rightly upon the name of the Lord ergo beleevers only shall be saved He argues here from the effect to the cause from acceptable prayer to faith from whence it floweth concluding that salvation is promised to prayer not as it is an act performed in its self but as it is a fruit of faith ascribing all the furtherance unto salvation by prayer to faith that breaths it out and all the efficacy which faith hath to salvation to the Lord i. e. the grace of God or Christ the Mediatour beleeved in So making faith to be that which in the vertue of its object saveth and not prayer either in its act or in respect of the spirituall disposition of the heart to pray And with the Apostles argument from prayer to faith I might also argue to manifest that the Scriptures which Mr. Baxter quoteth to prove that forgiving of others is a collaterall condition with faith to justification or forgivenesse have no force in them to prove such a conclusion viz. Mat. 6. 12 14 15. Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtours for if we forgive men their trespasses your heavenly father will also forgive you but if ye forgive not men their trspasses neither will your heavenly father forgive your trespasses Mat. 18. 35. So likewise shall my heavenly father do to you also if ye from your hearts forgive not every man to his brother their trespasses The like also in Mar. 11. 25 26. When ye stand praying forgive c. as in the former Scriptures Luke 6. 35. Forgive and ye shall be forgiven Isa 5. 15. And the prayer of faith shall save the sick and if he hath committed sins they shall be forgiven him Joh. 14. 13 14. Whatsoever ye shall aske in my Name I will do it c. 1 Joh. 5. 15. Whatsoever we aske we know that we have the petitions that we desired of him The rest have nothing of sound much lesse of substance to the purpose for which they are quoted How much these Scriptures together with those of the former bunch that were intended by Mr. Baxter for the foysting in of Repentance and of the next bundle that he would have to force in all the works of love and obedience into the office of justification may prevail with some simple and ignorant persons I know not For these not being able to compare Scripture with Scripture and spirituall things with spirituall nor to search into the pith and bottom of Scriptures are carried as the Apostle saith with every wind and sound of doctrine whither their seducers will But I do not comprehend what Mr. Baxters designe is who having compiled this work chiefly if not only for the reading of the Learned should fardle up together these Scriptures to deceive such for the very quotations will send them not only to the Scriptures but also to the Commentators upon these severall Scriptures where they must needs find him and the Jesuits so wresting from them the same doctrine and Mr. Baxter so fully answered in their answer to the Jesuites that his Readers will not be able to decide which is the verier Jesuit he or those whom he followeth I had a thought therefore to transmit the Reader to the Commentators But to manifest to the simple how little there is in substance in these quoted Scriptures making for Mr. Baxter I shall interpose these few things 1 That the Scriptures are all of Gods inspiration concenting together in oâ—e harmony no where dashing either against other no more then God their Author dasheth against himself so that we must necessarily conclude that neither all nor any one of these Scriptures doth in its proper and genuine sense contradict those before alleadged Scriptures of justification by faith and not by works by faith without works by the righteousnesse of faith and not by our own righteousnesse by the law of faith in opposition to the law of works c. as before If then these Scriptures should bring in justification and remission but in part by our own works and righteousnesse Scripture would here be set in commotion against Scripture and God against God 2 Mr. Baxter doth here make this work of forgiving and praying for forgivenesse as also in the next place all love obedience and the works thereof not simply conditions of justification and forgivenesse which in some sense far from Mr. Baxters some of our Theologists admit but collaterally and in the same relation with faith and this is the highest toppe of Papall presumption not the worst of Jesuits speak more derogatorily to the depressing of Gods grace or more proudly to the exalting of mans works worth and righteousnesse 3 From this doctrine of his it would follow that praying and forgiving others must be such a condition of justification that where it is there is justification where it is not there is not justification the positing or not positing of the one including the summe of the other for so it is with faith He that beleeveth shall be saved he that beleeveth not shall be damned Mark 16. 16. so Joh. 3. 36. Will Mr. Baxter say so of forgiving others and praying for forgivenesse are all that do it justifyed dares he to say it No otherwise but with his caeteris paribus and sensu composito if he doth this and all things else which a Christian should do And thus I might also make every civill and indifferent Action the condition of justification A mans sleeping by night and working by day his eating when he is hungry and drinking when he is thirsty his improving of his groundâ— before he sowes them and sowing them when improved and reaping them when the crop is come to maturity all these and the like may be as well called conditions of justification for these also caeteris paribus when all things else are done which a Christian should do do stand as full in strength to justification as those works which Mr. Baxter particularizeth yea this caeteris paribus makes sin guilt ungodlinesse perdition c. more properly conditions of justification then any of those which Mr. Baxter nameth for without the actuall being of those none can be justifyed in Christ before God For Christ Came not to call the righteous but sinners to Repentance Mat. 9. 13. He hath shut up all under guilt under sin that the promise of righteousnesse by the faith of Jesus Christ might be upon all that beleeve Rom. 3. 19 22 23 24. He justifyeth the ungodly Rom. 4. 5. And saveth that which was lost Mat. 18. 11. Are these duties to be performed coordinately with faith that we may be justifyed surely rather then those which Mr. Baxter nameth for these still go before
Quere It is his doctrine that teacheth a soul-cozening Faith a Faith made up of a fardle of works and rags of our own righteousness as in his larger definition of justifying Faith he hath described it CHAP. XIII Mr. Baxters calumnie that this doctrine doth harden the Papists in their Popery and give occasion to many learned Protestants to turn Papists answered HIS fifth Quere hath no shew of weight in it deserving an examination savouring more of the Spleen than of the judgment of the Author Nevertheless though it declares only the stomach and indignation of the man against the truth rather then any strength in his hand to hurt it yet because it is formed for the deceiving of the simple and unwary upon whom sounds oft times take no less impression than actuall strokes to prevent damage to such I shall examine whatsoever may seem materiall in it as I have the rest B. pa. 329. 5. Lastly Is not this excluding of sincere Obedience from Justification the great stumbling-block of Papists and that which hath had a great hand in turning many learned men from the true Protestant Religion to Popery That by obedience he meaneth all morall qualifications and works as they are vertues and works we have before learned from his own words so his meaning is that the Doctrine of Paul and the Churches which follow him viz. Justification by Faith and not by works is guilty of the damnable and pernicious evills which he here chargeth upon it These evills are two 1 It is the great stumbling-block of the Papists 2 It hath carried back many learned men from the Protestant Religion to Popery To both these I shall speak in order 1 Of its hardning the Papists in Popery Is it not the great stumbling-block to Papists saith Mr. Br. I answer 1 Was not Christ and that in this very point of justifying the ungodly by an imputed righteousness without any inherent righteousness of their own a stone of stumbling and a rock of offence to the Jewes as which they were so offended that to their eternall ruine they reject the Gospel and salvation of Christ unto this day Rom. 9. 32 33. 1 Cor. 1. 23. 1 Pet. 2. 8. What then must Christ be anathematized Nay but let the truth of Christ stand and man be the lyar the transgressor It is scandalum acceptum non datum an offence taken not given And blessed is he who soever shall not be offended in or at Christ Mat. 11. 6. Lu. 7. 23. But if any will be offended and dash the Lord Christ admonisheth him of the danger Whosoever shall fall on this stone shall be broken but on whomsoever it shall fall it will grind him to powder Mat. 21. 44. 2 And as sound a reason is it that our doctrine of Justification hinders the Papists from turning Protestants as was that of some Statists that complained against the Church of Geneva that they hindered the conversion of Papists in those parts by forbidding dancing and the like grave consideration by some great Politicians in England that the forbearing of Bull and Bear-baiting and other sports on the Lords day hardned the Papists of Lancashire in their Popery When Religion is made a meer piece of policy and to have in it at the best no more than a dress of dreggish formality or morality no marvail if such dirty and unspirituall means are made use of to spread it 3 But how deep doth this effect lurk in its cause so that only this one mans sagacity can smell it out That the Papists in the least things will not turn Protestants except we in the worst turn Papists For this Article of Justification is the greatest of all the questions controverted between us and the Papists All the rest not ingredients of or meerly relating to this may the Papists continue in if not of malice or wilfulnesse with a possibility of salvation They are but wood hay and stubble built upon the foundation the very builders whereof may be saved but so as by fire saith the Apostle But a Trentified Papist by the coherent judgment of the best Divines cannot be saved because hee holdeth not the foundation sure and pure but mixeth mans works with the grace of God in Christ to Justification And their judgment is grounded upon the authority of the Apostle Yee are faln from grace Christ is become void or forfeyted to you whosoever are justified by works An ardent love to Romes shavelings out of doubt possesseth Mr. Br. that he doth not only wish himself as did the Apostle but would make himself and all us accursed that they might be not saved but damned with us For if they reject all other their errors and practically retain but this one by it they forfeyt all the salvation of the Gospel 4 Nay contrariwise as long as this Article of the Gospel was diligently preached and stoutly maintained in the Protestant Churches and that not with quiâ—ks and quidities of humane Art but by the nervous arguments of Scripture alone so long the Kingdom of Antichrist more and more decayed and they which were before marked up as slaves to that rivall of Christ brake the fetters and came in by thousands and ten thousands taking the Kingdom by a holy and violent force But since the time this Doctrine hath been less preached and patronized the Reformed Churches have been still in a languishing and the Antichristian Kingdom in a growing condition as Mr. Br. himself so great a Reader and so fully acquainted with the Ecclesiasticall Histories must necessarily grant And why hath this stop to the promoting of the Gospel befaln the Churches but that the Lord Christ doth herein declare his offence taken against us for not making him our all that hee also ceaseth so victoriously as in former times to vouchsafe his presence among us 5 But since Mr. Br. is leapt home to them and many foot beyond many of the more moderate sort of them in the point of justification by works and so hath removed the slumbling-block let him speak by experience how many of them are come in to him to be his Proselytes rejecting the Papacy and other their Popish errors Or whereas his Friends the Arminians have in this and many other of their Tenents so many decads of yeers closed fully with them where is the confluence of Papists to them seen that shaking off their former opinions and practices profess themselves Converts A Cardinals Hat perhaps hath been sent or a fat Bishopprick promised to some of the most deserving men among them in relation to the Romish Cause to allure them to further and higher deservings of this kind But the holy Mother Church I warrant you sticks where she was If shee should permit but one stone of her Fabrick to be loosed it might cause a crack in the whole This part of the Quere I shall therefore upon these Considerations leave as reasonless and examine the next whether there be any more reason in it
thing that firmly susteineth namely the Righteousness of Christ imputed to us and not on the holiness and grace inherent in our selves For this is unperfect c. therefore we cannot for it be counted Righteous before God But the imputed righteousness of Christ is a perfect righteousnes in which there is nothing that can offend the eyes of God but all things that can abundantly please him Vpon this alone therefore are we to rest as upon a thing sure and stable and to beleeve that by it alone we are justified 7 This may undoubtedly be affirmed and it is the opinion of all Divines that God can justifie men and make them pleasing and amiable to him without any inherent quality or habits infused 8 To the same purpose and somewhat more fully speaketh Bellarmine The guilt or obligation to punishment saith he may be taken away without the infusion of Righteousnes For nothing hinders by how much the less God can will the not ordeining to punishment and the pardoning of the offence and the not accounting him for an enemy to whom he hath not granted the gift of habituall Righteousness 9 The Scope of James in the second Chapter of his Epistle is to shew that we are justified not by a barren but by a fruitfull Faith 10 The meaning of James is not that Faith without works is dead c. For it is evident that we are justified by Faith even without works But his meaning is that Faith without works that is which refuseth to work or is noâ— disposed to work is a dead Faith vain and justifieth not What therefore James alleageth out of Gen. 15. Abraham beleeved God to this purpose he alleageth it that he beleeved being in readiness to work Therefore he saith that in the work of offering his Son the Scripture was fulfilled speaking of his Faith prepared to work It was fulfilled I say as to the execution of that great work to which his Faith was prepared 11 If any where in Scripture thou hearest reward or wages promised know that it is no otherwise due then by Gods promise freely he hath promised freely he gives If thou wilt abide in his Grace and Favour make no mention of thy Merits 12 All Papists consentingly make the Merits of Christ the foundation of mans merits as far as he can merit Neither Faith nor works nor doing nor sufferings say they have any other vertue to merit then what they receive from the merits of Christs death then as they are dipt in his blood this makes them acceptable to the Father 13 When Christ saith of the woman Luk. 7. 47. Many sins are forgiven her for she loved much it is to be understood not that she loved much and so her much love was the cause of her great forgiveness but contrarywise that because many sins were forgiven her therefore she loved much 14 To be given freely and to be a retribution to works are as much opposit as that which is free and that which is from Justice or as not due and debt And this way of inference the Apostle useth in the beginning of this 4th Chapter viz. speaking of Justification by Grace 15 The work of Justice is wages or Reward and this way of Justice Grace excludeth whose work is meer gift or Donation 16 In this verse the Apostle concludeth that Christ hath saved us from all the evill both of fault and punishment That there is nothing of condemnation remaining to them that are in Christ because all judgment is taken away both to the fault and the punishment 17 It is certain that when originall sin is remited that the evils which it brought are not remitted and taken away as all finde by experience Notwithstanding they remain not under the consideration of punishment because the fault being taken away there can be no desert as to punishment remaining 18 I will remember their iniquities no more saith the Lord i. e. I will neither in this world injoin any Penance for them nor in that which is to come inflict any punishment for them So hath the Holy Ghost promised that our sins shall be forgiven by the New Covenant of Grace 19 In regard of the uncertainty of our own righteousness and the danger of vain glory it is most safe to repose our whole confidence in the sole mercy and benignity of God Baxter THe bare act of beleeving is not the onely condition of the New Cardinall Contarenus in Rom. 4. Covenant but severall other duties also are parts of that Condition The Common opinion that justifying faith as justifying doth consist in any one single act is a Wretched Mistake by the one act of faith he means Faith in opposition to works Aph. p. 235 248. Faith it self is our righteousnesse viz. our Evangelicall as Christ is our Legall Righteousnesse It self Toletus a Iesuite upon Rom. 3. is imputed to us for righteousnesse Aph. p. 125 126. It justifieth as it is an act of ours and as it is a morall duty App. p. 80. 102. Both Faith and workes make up one condition one righteousness one perfect righteousness of our own by Cardinall Cajetan upon Rom. 3. which we merit to be justified by God by the legall righteousness which is in Christ And consequently Faith doth not lean upon anothers and works upon their own righteousness but both make up one compounded righteousness and goodness which make us righteous and good also and by this righteousness and goodness deservers of justification salvation Aph. Thes 17 18 19 20 23 24 26. and scatteringly throughout the whole Book Faith as an act of ours and of it self with other workes procureth Righteousness And God hath used Toletus the Iesuit up on Rom. 1. works to justifie as he hath used faith even in the same kinde of causality So we have found Mr. Br. oft affirming as may be seen in our former quotations Let him deny that he holds the consequents of these two Antecedents if he will It is so far from being an error to affirm that Faith it self is our righteousness that it is a truth necessary for every Christian to know yea it both is our Righteousnesse and is imputed to us for righteousnesse The very personall performance of faith shall be imputed to us for a sufficient personall payment of righteousnes Idem in Rom. 4. as if we had paid the full duty and righteousnesse which the Law requireth This is the substance of his words though not his very words which being continued in terms of a Metaphor cannot without the citing of the whole similitude be expressed to the understanding otherwise Aphor. p. 125 126 129. There is a two-fold righteousnesse attainable by Christ at least in words the one an inherent righteousnesse in our selves consisting in the seed and acts of Faith Love Holinesse c. the other in Christ but made over to beleevers by Gods Donation if not imputation Both of these are absolutely necessary to salvation neither is
required to justification Or Mr. Br. that without craving leave of Paul by such gross distinetions goes about to make him unsay what he hath said and the world to believe that in all what he wrote of Justification hee meant to be understood on the contrary to what hee speaketh 6. If we bring works at all to procure justification by Christ we do by evacuating the grace of God and merits of Christ to our selves oblige put a bondage upon our selvet to fulfil the whole Law legally in its perfection else can we never be justified but abide under the Curse for ever For he that worketh requireth the reward as a debt in law and not as a gift of grace therefore except his work be so perfect as that it can in strict justice save him hee can never attain salvation as by comparing together these Scriptures will be evident viz. Gal. 5. 3 4. 3. 10. Rom. 4. 4 5. 9. 30 31 32. 7. As to the rules or qualifications which he gives to covenanting and obedience that it may be sincere they are in substance meerly legal the Name of Christ being only put in stead of the Name of God And who is there not only of the Jesuits Socinians with the Arminians from whom he borroweth most of his principles but even of the reall Antinomians whom he pretends to oppose who in all those particulars thinks not himself or gives not cause to all to think them as sincere as Mr. Br what ground have we to conclude but that they know the ends nature and conditions of the Covenant so truly and obey with so much deliberation and as little fittishness and rashness so seriously without dissimulation and slightness so freely intirely and singly aâ— Mr. Br. doth Thus every stigmatized Heretick in his own way bringing with him such a sincerity of obedience shall thereby be possessed of the investiture of Christs righteousness though he seek it in his own not in Gods way by his own righteousness and not by Faith alone which alone God hath stamped with an aptitude and efficacy to this work B. 2. The Law saith he requireth obedience and doing by its own righteousness to justifie us but the Gospel requireth it as a Medium to acquire to us Christs Righteousness by which wee may be justified So that the one requires works to justifie us withoutt the other the same works to justifie us by a Mediator This he saith so frequently in substance that it were lost labour to quote the places And it hath been almost so oft answered as said Therefore I shall referr the Reader to the places where it hath been answered and specially to the examination of those his disputes in which he labours to cleer his doctrine from all tincture of Popery from all contradiction to Paul and from being derogatory to Christ his righteousnes Here only I add that this doctrine is the same with that of the most legal Pharisees against whom the Apostle so much inveigheth wishing them accursed cut off for troubling the Churches therwith Gal. 1 9. 5. 12. For they arrogated to themselves alone part in Christ his Righteousnes because of their own personall righteousness in the works and obedience which the Law requireth resisting the Gentiles denying to them all possibility to partake in the Justification which is by Christ by means of Faith alone except they also fulfilled the righteousnesse which the Law required to give them right to him and it Yea Mr. Br. with these ascribes more to works than the very unbeleeving Pharisees For these claymed Justification only by their works but he and the beleeving Pharisees challenged for their works right both in the Justifier and in his justification also For Causa causae est etiam causa causati As farr as they ascribe to their works a Causality to make Christ theirs they make them causal to render the Justification which is by Christ theirs also B. 3. That neither is his Doctrine legall nor doth he ascribe too much to works because he maketh Faith and obedience to be but a Condition or a Mâ—dium or a poor improper Causa sine qua non of our Justification Aph. pa. 223 224. and our doing no part of satisfaction for our unrighteousness for this hee seems to have ascribed before to our sufferings in bearing the Curse but to be our Gospel-Righteousness or the Condition of our participation in Christ who is our legall Righteousness so of all the benefits that come by him App. p. 78. I say that subjection and obedience justifie 1 Not as works simply considered 2 Nor as legall works 3 Nor as meritorious workes 4 Nor as good works which God is pleased with 5 But as Conditions to which the free Law giver hath promised Justification and life Nay your i. e. the Protestants doctrine ascribeth farr more of the work to man than mine For you make Justification an effect of your own Faith and your faith an instrumentall cause of it and so make your self your own Justifier And you say your faith justifieth as it apprehendeth Christ which is the most intrinsicall essentiall consideration of Faith so faith hath much of the Honour But while I affirm that it justifieth only as a condition which is an extrinsicall consideration and alien from its essence and Nature I give the glory to him that freely giveth mee life and that made so sweet a condition to his Covenant and that enableth me to perform the said Condition App. pag. 120 121. All this hath been oft and fully examined before in its place also and how little truth there is in any part or parcell thereof discovered It would be weariness to the flesh and vexation to the Spirit but to look so often upon his great Goddess his Queen of Heaven CONDITION as he blesseth her O that his conscience had been so well acquainted with Christ as his fancy is with this Idoll he would not then have pestered the Church with such an imaginary Deity nor prostituted all that is called God at the feet of such a Proserpina I am weary any more to attend to him making the will of God i. e. God willing conditional and so the immutable God a conditional God the salvation of Christ conditional so Christ a conditional Saviour or the witness seal of Christ a conditional seal and witness and so the Holy Ghost a conditional Spirit of Adoption or the gospel of righteousness forgiveness and life a conditional Gospel and consequently nulling all thâ—se and pronouncing them no God no Christ no Holy Ghost no Gospel For a conditional proposition doth Nihil ponere and after Mr Brs. principles it is in mans righteosness to give or destroy the actual existence of every of these But I leave to him that delights therein to bury himself in this guâ—ph I conceive my self obnoxious to censure for spending and spilling so many words already to shew the deformity and