Faith of it from being confounded Hence we see the difference betwixt mens frame in their Disputes and Doctrine about these points and their own sense and pleadings with God in Prayer 4. This Doctrine of Justification by Faith without any mixtures of man however and by what Names and Titles soever they be dignified or distinguished hath this undoubted advantage that it is that which all not judicially hardened and blinded do or would or must betake themselves unto when dying How loath would men be to plead that Cause on a Death-bed which they so stoutly stand up for with Tongue and Pen when at ease and that evil day far away They seem to be jealous least God's Grace and Christ's Righteousness have too much room and Men's Works too little in the the business of Justification But was ever a sensible dying person exercised with this jealousie as to himself Even bloody Stephen Gardiner when a dying could answer Dr. Day Bishop of Chichester who offered comfort to him by this Doctrine What my Lord will you open that Gap now then farewel altogether To me and such other in my case you may speak it but open this Window to the People then farewel altogether Book of Martyrs V. 3. p. 450. In which words he bewrayed a conviction of the fitness of the Doctrine to dying persons and his knowledge that it tended to the destroying the Kingdom of Antichrist As Fox in the same Book of Martyrs Vol. 2. p. 46. gives this as the reason of Luther's success against Popery above all former attempts of preceeding Witnesses But saith he Luther gave the stroke and pluckt down the soundation and all by opening one vein long hid before wherein lieth the touchstone of all Truth and Doctrine as the only Principal Origine of our Salvation which is our free Justification by Faith only in Christ the Son of God Consider how it is with the most holy and eminent Saints when dying Did ye ever see or hear any boasting of their works and performances They may and do own to the praise of his Grace what they have been made to be what they have been helped to do or suffer for Christ's sake But when they draw near to the Awful Tribunal what else is in their Eye and Heart but only Free-Grace Ransoming Blood and a Well-ordered Covenant in Christ the Surety They cannot bear to hear any make mention to them of their Holiness their own Grace and Attainments In a word the Doctrine of Conditions Qualifications and Rectoral Government and the distribution of Rewards and Punishments according to the New Law of Grace will make but an uneasie Bed to a dying Man's Conscience and will leave him in a very bad condition at present and in dread of worse when he is feeling in his last Agonies that the Wages of Sin is Death if he cannot by Faith add but the Gift of God is Eternal Life through Jesus Christ our Lord Rom. 6.23 He is a wise and happy man that anchors his Soul on that Rock at which he can ride out the storm of Death Why should men contend for that in their life that they know they must renounce at their death Or neglect that Truth now that they must betake themselves unto then why should a man build a House which he must leave in a Storm or be buried in its ruines Many Architects have attempted to make a sure House of their own Righteousness but it is without a Foundation and must fall or be thrown down sorrowfully by the foolish Builder which is the better way It is a great Test of the Truth of Doctrine about the way of Salvation when it is generally approv'd of by sensible dying men And what the Universal Sense of all such in this case is as to the Righteousness of Christ and their own is obvious to any man He was an ingenuous Balaamite who being himself a Papist said to a Protestant Our Religion is best to live in and yours best to die in But notwithstanding of these great advantages and they are but a few of many that this Doctrine is attended with There are not a few disadvantages it labours under which though they are rather to its commendation than reproach yet they do hinder its Welcome and Reception As 1. This Doctrine is a Spiritual Mystery and lyeth not level to a Natural Understanding 1 Cor. 2.10 14. Working for Life a man naturally understands but believing for Life he understands not To mend the Old Man he knows but to put on the New Man by Faith is a Riddle to him The study of Holiness and to endeavour to square his Life according to God's Law he knows a little of though he can never do it but to draw Sanctification from Christ by Faith and to walk holily in and through the force of the Spirit of Christ in the Heart by Faith is meer canting to him A new Life he understands a little but nothing of a New Birth and Regeneration He never saw himself stark dead Nay not only is it unknown to the Natural Man but he is by his Natural State an enemy to it he neither doth nor can know it nor approve of it 1 Cor. 2.14 Wisdom that is Christ's way of saving men revealed in the Gospel is justified of all her Children and of them only Matth. 11.19 Luke 7.29 30 35. This Enmity in Men to the Wisdom of God is the cause not only of this contempt of its Ministry but is a Temptation to many Ministers to patch up and frame a Gospel that is more suited to and taking with and more easily understood by such men than the true Gospel of Christ is this Paul complains of in others and vindicates himself from 1 Cor. 1 17. and 2.2 he warns others against it Col. 2.8 2 Cor. 11.3 4. Gal. 1.6 7 8 9. And it is certain that doing for Life is more suited to corrupt Nature than Believing is 2. Our Opposers in this Doctrine have the Many for them and against us as they of old boasted John 7.48 This they have no ground to glory in though they do not we to be ashamed of the Truth because we cannot vie numbers with them With our Opposers are all these sorts and they make a great number though I do not say or think that all our Opposers are to be ranked in any of these Lists for some both Godly and Learned may mistake us and the Truth in this matter 1. They have all the Ignorant People that know nothing of either Law or Gospel They serve God they say but most fasly and hope that God will be merciful to them and save them To all such both the clear explication of God's Law and the Mysteries of the Gospel are strange things Yet sincere obedience they love to hear of for all of them think there is some sincerity in their hearts and that they can do somewhat But of Faith in Christ they have no knowledge except by faith you
Contrariety Inconsistency and Incompatibility betwixt these two But the Nature of the things in themselves and the sense and conscience of every serious person doth witness to the same that our own Righteousness and Christs Righteousness do comprehend all the pleas of men to Justification one or other of them every man in the world stands upon and that they are inconsistent with and destructive one of another in justification if a man trust to his own Righteousness he rejects Christs if he trusts to Christs Righteousness he rejects his Own If he will not reject his own Righteousness as too good to be renounced if he will not venture on Christs Righteousness as not sufficient alone to bear him out and bring him safe off at God's Bar he is in both a convicted Unbeliever And if he endeavour to patch up a Righteousness before God made up of both he is still under the Law and a despiser of Gospel-Grace Gal. 2.21 That Righteousness that justifies a Sinner consists in aliquo indivisibili and this every man finds when the case is his own and he serious about it 5. These different Sentiments about Justification have been at all times managed with a special Acrimony They that are for the Righteousness of God by Faith in Jesus Christ look upon it as the only foundation of all their hopes for eternity and therefore cannot but be zealous for it And the contrary side are as hot for their own Righteousness the most admired and adored Diana of proud Mankind as if it were an Image fallen down from Jupiter when it is indeed the Idol that was cast out of Heaven with the Devil and which he hath ever since been so diligent to set up before sinful men to be worship'd that he might bring them into the same condemnation with himself And by true Sin and false Righteousness he hath deceived the whole world Rev. 12.9 6. As the Holy Ghost speaking in the Scriptures is the Supreme and Infallible Judge and Determiner of all Truth So where he doth particularly and on purpose deliver any Truth there we are specially to attend and learn And tho in most points of Truth he usually teacheth us by a bare Authoritative Narration yet in some Points which his Infinite Wisdom foresaw special Opposition to he doth not only declare but debate and determine the Truth And the Instances are two especially One is about the Divinity of Christ's Person and Dignity of his Priesthood reasoned argued and determined in the Epistle to the Hebrews The other is about Justification by Faith exactly handled in the Epistles to the Romans and to the Galatians In the former of these two the Doctrine of free Justification is taught us most formally and accurately And tho we find no Charge against that Church in Paul's time or in his Epistle for their departing from the Truth in this Point yet the Wisdom of the Holy Ghost is remarkable in this That this Doctrine should be so plainly asserted and strongly proved in an Epistle to that Church the pretonded Successors whereof have Apostatized from that Faith and proved the main Asserters of that damnable Error of Justification by Works That to the Galatians is plainly written to cure a begun and obviate a full Apostasy from the purity of the Gospel in the point of Justification by Faith without the Works of the Law And from these two Epistles if we be wise we must learn the Truth of this Doctrine and expound all other Scriptures in a harmony with what is there so setly determined as in Foro contradictorio Lastly It is not to be denied nor concealed That on each side some have run into Extreams which the generality do not own but are usually loaden with The Papists run high for Justification by Works yet even some of them in the Council of Trent discoursed very favourably of Justification by Faith The Arminians have qualified a little the grossness of the Popish Doctrine in this Article And some since have essayed to qualifie that of the Arminians and to plead the same cause more finely Again some have run into the other extream as appeared in Germany a little after the Reformation and some such there have been always and in all places where the Gospel hath shined and these were called Antinomians But how unjustly this hateful Name is charged upon the Orthodox Preachers and sincere Believers of the Protestant Doctrine of Justification by Faith only who keep the Gospel-midst betwixt these two Rocks is the design of this Paper to discover What we plead for is in summ That Jesus Christ our Saviour is the fountain opened in the House of David for Sin and for Vncleanness wherein only men can be washed in Justification and Sanctification And that there is no other fountain of mans devising nor of God's declaring for washing a Sinner first so as to make him fit and meet to come to this to wash and to be clean As for In herent Holiness Is it not sufficiently secured by the Spirit of Christ received by Faith the certain Spring and Cause of it By the Word of God the plain and perfect Rule of it By the declared necessity of it to all them that look to be saved and to justifie the sincerity of a mans Faith Unless we bring it in to Justification and thereby make our own pitiful Holiness sit on the Throne of Judgement with the precious blood of the Lamb of God Though I expect that a more able hand will undertake an Examination of the New Divinity yet to fill up a little room I would speak somewhat to their Achillaean Argument that is so much boasted of and so frequently insisted on by them as their Shield and Spear Their Argument is this That Christ's Righteousness is our Legal Righteousness but our own is our Evangelical Righteouness that is when a Sinner is charged with Sin against the Law of God he may oppose Christ's Righteousness as his Legal Defence But against the Charge of the Gospel especially for Unbelief he must produce his Faith as his Defence or Righteousness against that charge With a great deference to such Worthy Divines as have look'd on this as an argument of weight I shall in a few words effay to manifest that this is either a saying the same in other odd words that is commonly taught by us or a Sophism or a departing from the Protestant Doctrine about Justification 1. This Argument concerns not at all the Justification of a Sinner before God For this end no more is needful than to consider what this charge is against whom it is given and by whom The charge is said to be given in by God and a charge of Unbelief or disobeying the Gospel But against whom Is it against a Believer or Unbeliever And these two divide all mankind If it be against a Believer it is a false charge and can never be given in by the God of Truth For the Believer is justified already
2. p. 181. to p. 192 where ye will find the Old plain Protestant Truth about Law and Gospel delivered without any School-Terms To this add in your reading in the same Vol. 2. p. 497. to p. 509. Heresies and Errors falsty charged on Tindal 's Writings Where ye will see the Old Faith of the Saints in its Simplicity and the Old Craft and Cunning of the Antichristian Party in sland ering the Truth I must for my part confess That these plain Declarations of Gospel-Truth have a quite other Savour with me than the Dry Insipid Accounts thereof given by Pretendders to humane Wisdom But passing these things let us look to Principles and that with respect to their Native and Regular Influence on Sanctification And I am willing that that should determine the Matter next to the Consonancy of the Principles themselves to the Word of God It can be no Doctrine of God that is not according to Godliness Some think that if Good Works and Holiness and Repentance be allowed no room in Justification that there is no room left for them in the World and in the practice of Believers So hard seems it to be to some to keep in their Eye the certain fixed bounds betwixt Justification and Sanctification There is no difference betwixt a Justified and a Sanctified Man for he is always the same person that partakes of these Priviledges But Justification and Sanctification differ greatly in many Respects as is commonly known But to come a little closer The Party here suspected of Antinomianism do confidently protest before God Angels and Men That they espouse no New Doctrine about the Grace of God and Justification and the other coincident Points but what the Reformers at home and abroad did teach and all the Protestant Churches do own And that in sum is That a Law-condemned Sinner is freely Justified by God's Grace through the Redemption that is in Jesus Christ that he is Justified only for the Righteousness of Christ imputed to him by God of his free Grace and received by faith alone as an Instrument which faith is the gift of the same Grace For guarding against Licentiousness they constantly teach out of God's Word That without Holiness no man can see God That all that believe truly on Jesus Christ as they are Justified by the sprinkling of his Blood so are they Sanctified by the effusion of his Spirit That all that boast of their Faith in Christ and yet live after their own Lusts and the course of this World have no true Faith at all but do in their profession and contradicting Practice Blaspheme the Name of God and the Doctrine of his Grace and continuing so shall perish with a double Destruction beyond that of the openly Profane that make no Profession And when they find any such in their Communion which is exceeding rarely they cast them out as Dead Branches They teach that as the daily Study of Sanctification is a necessary exercise to all that are in Christ so that the Rule of their Direction therein is the Holy spotless Law of God in Christ's Hand That the Holy Ghost is the Beginner and Advancer of this Work and Faith in Jesus Christ the great Mean thereof That no Man can be Holy till he be in Christ and united to him by Faith and that no Man is truly in Christ but he is thereby Sanctified They Preach the Law to Condemn all Flesh out of Christ and to shew thereby to people the necessity of betaking themselves to him for Salvation See the savory words of blessed Tindal called the Apostle of England in his Letter to John Frith written Jan. 1533. Book of Martyrs Vol. 2. Page 308. Expound the Law truly and open the Vail of Moses to condemn all Flesh and prove all Men sinners and all deeds under the Law before Mercy have taken away the condemnation thereof to be Sin and Damnable and then as a faithful Minister set abroach the Mercy of our Lord Jesus and let the wounded Consciences Drink of the Water of him And then shall your Preaching be with Power and not as the Hypocrites And the Spirit of God shall work with you and all Consciences shall bear record unto you and feel that it is so And all Doctrine that casteth a mist on these two to shadow and hide them I mean the Law of God and Mercy of Christ that resist you with all your power And so do we What is there in all this to be offended with is not this enough to Vindicate our Doctrine from any tendency to Licentiousness I am afraid that there are some things wherein we differ more than they think fit yet to express And I shall guess at them 1. Is about the Imputed Righteousness of Christ This Righteousness of Christ in his Active and Passive Obedience hath been asserted by Protestant Divines to be not only the Procuring and Meritorious Cause of our Justification for this the Papists own But the Matter as the Imputation of it is the Form of our Justification Though I think that our Logical Terms are not so adapted for such Divine Mysteries But whatever Propriety or Impropriety be in such School-Terms the common Protestant Doctrine hath been That a convinced Sinner seeking Justification must have nothing in his Eye but this Righteousness of Christ as God proposeth nothing else to Him And that God in justifying a Sinner accepts him in this Righteousness only when he imputes it to him Now about the Imputed Righteousness of Christ some say That it belongs only to the Person of Christ He was under the Law and bound to keep it for himself that he might be a fit Mediator without Spot or Blemish That it is a Qualification in the Mediator rather than a Benefit acquired by him to be communicated to his People For they will not allow this Personal Righteonsness of Christ to be imputed to us any otherwise than in the Merit of it as purchasing for us a more easie Law of Grace in the Observation whereof they place all our Justifying Righteousness Understanding hereby our own Personal inherent Holiness and nothing else They hold That Christ died to merit this of the Father viz. That we might be Justified upon easier Terms under the Gospel than those of the Law of Innocency Instead of Justification by perfect Obedience we are now to be justified by our own Evangelical Righteousness made up of Faith Repentance and sincere Obedience And if we hold not with them in this they tell the World we are Enemies to Evangelical Holiness slighting the practice of all Good Works and allowing our Hearers to live as they list Thus they slander the Preachers of Free Grace because we do not place Justification in our own inherent Holiness but in Christ's perfect Righteousness imputed to us upon our believing in him Which Faith we teach purifies the heart and always inclines to Holiness of Life Neither do we hold any Faith to be true and saving that