he obtained our release but conditionally upon future Terms to be performed by us or some others for then his Suretiship was not for us but to purchase Conditions for us But whether we were joynt Parties in one and the the same Bond with him and so we were actually acquitted when he made satisfaction therefore God could enjoyn no Terms of Application to us for Justification and Glory nor suspend the same upon those Terms This I deny R. What mean you by joynt Parties in one and the same Bond do you mean the Bond of Debt to the Law by reason of the Obligation of Doing and Suffering there we stood bound as Principles and not being able to discharge Christ became bound as Surety we were never bound as Sureties nor Christ as the Principle But if you mean that both were bound to pay the same debt we do affirm it 2. What do you mean by an actual Acquittance Is it not meet that he that hath his Debt satisfied should have an actual Acquittance or their Surety for them there 's no Man pays a Debt his own or anothers but he will have an Acquittance according to the Terms of Payment if they were such as you suppose viz. to purchase a Discharge upon other Terms But you say If Christ were actually acquitted and the elect in him God would not come upon new Terms with the Sinner for Justification and Glory this is as much as to say Christ paid a Fine for Sinners that they might be brought to lower Terms with the Justice of God by a milder Law How false are you when you tell us Your meaning is That Christ's Righteousness is our only justifying Righteousness whereas here you own That it obtained not our full Discharge but only the bringing us under new Terms upon which Justification and Glory are suspended is not the Performance then of those purchased Terms our immediate justifying Righteousness 3. That which you affirm in this first part is pretty unintelligible but according to my Understanding it amounts to no more than that Christ dyed pro bono nostro only which is consistent with all the Socinian Notions of Imputation But as that which you say you deny I want it to be unriddled viz. That Christ was joynt Covenant Party with all the elect in Adam's Covenant so that they are legally esteemed to make Satisfaction and yield Obedience in his doing thereof R. You seem here to suggest as if some did hold That Christ was under Adam's Covenant so as the rest of his Posterity was and consequently fell in him as they did Or do you mean that all the Elect in Christ satisfied the Law as all Adam's Posterity brake it in him and this I suppose you deny Now as unto this Point if I have hit your Meaning I will tell you what a great Divine saith in answer to a Socinian The first Adam was by God's Institution a publick Person having shewed that God's Pleasure is the first Rule of Righteousness hence in him sinning the World sinned The second Adam is not only by God's Institution a publick person but also an infinite Person because God This publick Person doing and suffering was as much as if the World of the Elect had suffered If the first Adam a finite Person was by God's Institution in that Act of Disobedience a World of Men why should it seem strange that the second Adam being an infinite Person should be by God's Institution in the course of his Obedience as the World of the Elect He being infinite there needed no more than God's Pleasure to make him the World of Men yea ten thousand Worlds That which is infinite knoweth no bounds but God's Will The kind of his Obedience was legal the same in Nature and Measure which we by the first Covenant stood bound unto This his Obedience to the Law was more acceptable to God than the Disobedience of Adam was detestable yea more acceptable than the Obedience of Adam understanding both as publick Persons had he continued in the first Covenant Nort. against Pinch p. 6. 4. That which you affirm of the Imputation of Christ's Righteousness here is no more than what you say every where importing no more than as to its Effects but your Expression is strange in saying Christ's Righteousness is reputed by God as that which now plead for our Impurity c. which seems to import that it doth not actually plead but that God is willing to reckon it a kind of Plea So that the Imputation you here intend of Christ's Righteousness is to Christ himself and not to the Sinner But you tell us what you deny You say its this That it is imputed as our formal Righteousness and so we may truly plead that we our selves as Elect did legally by Proxy as our Christ satisfie and merit all and without the Interposal of the Gospel Rule we have a legal Title to glory by Adam s Covenant This I deny as that which excludâ—s Forgiveness makes Christs Sufferings needless denies any proper satisfâ—ction and destroys Christianity Rep. Here 1. You seem to deny Christ's imputed Righteousness to be our formal Righteousness for Christ's Righteousness we reckon to be as it were the Matter of our Justification and being imputed by an Act of Grace becomes our formal as well as material Righteousness for if it become not by Imputation our formal Righteousness it s not our perfect Righteousness for Matter and Form are the essential Causes of the Effect 2. That we in Christ satisfied the Justice of God I know no sound Protestant but will affirm and that legally Mr. B. saith over and over Christ's Righteousness was our legal Righteousness but you will deny that we legally satisfied in Christ May not a Debtor plead that he legally paid the Debt in his Surety tho' not with his own Mony 3. You cast Reproach upon the Suretiship and federal Headship of Jesus Christ by calling him a Proxy and Attorny as our Surety and Representative A Proxy is Vicarious an inferior Person that 's imployed to do Business in the Name and by the Authority of a Superiour so that he is his Vicar or Substitute But is a Father that pays a Sons Debts and purchaseth an Estate for him out of his meer Love Pity and Compassion the Sons Proxy Or if a Man purchase an Estate for his Heirs for ever is he a Proxy to the Children yet unborn And yet their Estate is bought and paid for in him the original Right and Title lies in him the Purchaser Or a rich Man who undertakes for the Debts of an hundred poor Prisoners in Ludgate suppose the King or another great Person out of meer Pity and Commiseration is he their Proxy Is he not their Benefactor and Patron I wonder how you can speak these things without suspecting your own Spirit when you do so manifestly cast Dirt upon Jesus Christ may not I justly say you banter the Doctrin of Imputation 3. But you say
but Works done by God's Grace may and are joyned with it as Causes of Salvation and in these Points the Protestants oppose them I could fill a Volume with it if need were but it s enough to say you are mistaken in telling us what the Protestants oppose them in You say also that I say That Pardon is rather the condition of Faith nay Pardon is the cause of Faith R. I say rather for if a federal condition must lye between giving and receiving giving is the causal condition of receiving and not receiving of giving 2. The Object must be before the Act of the Organ Pardon is the Object applyed by Faith Application before there is an Object is contradictio in adjecto 3. The Promise of Pardon is the Ground and Reason of our believing therein is the Grace brought therein doth the Truth and faithfulness of God appear and the Apostle saith Faith comes by hearing this Word of Promise i. e. is wrought by it Rom. 10. And he opposeth the Works of the Law and the hearing of Faith in Justification Gal. 3.2 5. And what is that acceptation but of Faith which the Apostle speaks of 1 Tim. 1.15 And what doth it accept but that faithful Gospel saying there mentioned That Christ came into the World to save Sinners and the chiefest It s the Grace of God working in this Promise that hath wrought Faith in the hearts of thousands 4. We say with all soundest Protestants That Justification in Nature is before Sanctification and the Cause of it and therefore of Faith because Faith as a Grace wrought is a part of Sanctification It s enough for you to hold up that you call Error and give it Name and so let it go 10. It is not whether Sanctification taken strictly do follow Justification this I affirm R. If you affirm this you should not make so strange of my saying Pardon is the condition of believing What you hide under strictly I concern not my self Sanctification is Sanctification and if Justification goes before it you allow it to be conditio ordinis at least Therefore I conclude Pardon is rather a condition yea I say not meerly of Order but such a condition as is an influential Cause But go on stating your difference But whether effectual Vocation make a real habitual change in the Soul and that this Vocation is in order of Nature before Justification This Mr. C. and the Letter and I affirm with the Assembly R. As to the Letter I must tell your Answer to it is short and ungenteel and as he did Bellarmine who said Bellarmine thou lyest when you say it was rather to serve a turn than to argue it spake Truth weakly and other things erroneously and ignorantly c. It justifies a necessity of dealing a little more roughly with Men of your Country and Kidney But to our Point in hand it need not be enquired whether you take effectual Vocation in the active or passive Sense seeing you say its such as makes a real habitual change in the Soul And seeing it makes such a change it must be a change of Sanctification and this you say is before Justification how can that be when you had said before that Justification is before Sanctification strictly taken What kind of Sanctification I pray is effectual Calling Is it not so in a strict sense when you say its a real habitual change in the Soul Is this not turning from Darkness to Light raising us together with Christ or being born again But all this must be done before the Relative change a Man must be free from the reigning Power of Sin and alive from the Dead without Jesus Christ our Lord. See what the Assembly saith in the larger Catech. Q. 67. That effectual calling is the Work of Gods Almighty Power and Grace whereby out of his free and especial Love to his Elect and from nothing in them moving him thereto he doth in his accepted time invite and draw them to Jesus Christ c. and they are hereby made able and willing freely to answer his Call and to accept and embrace the Grace offered and conveyed therein i. e. then they are effectually called when they have embraced the pardoning Grace of God offered and conveyed which shews the previousness of that Grace working the effectual Calling consummated in believing and embracing the Gospel offered the Gospel Grace in the Promise is always that which works first upon the Sinner moves his Heart and draws it forth in believing 11. It is not whether our sincere Faith and Love c. are imperfect and so can be no meriting Righteousness which I affirm R. You affirm they are imperfect and so do I but not therefore that they can be no meriting Righteousness for the Merit of Righteousness doth not depend upon the perfection of the Duty or Service in it self but its perfection in relation to the Law that requireth it if the Duty required be never so weak little and lame if I have such a degree as the Law requires its perfect as to that Law The Law requires a poor Man to pay a Shilling to a Tax it s as good obedience as another Mans that's required to pay twenty Many Instances might be given the Papists say Merit lies not in the value of the Action but in Gods Acceptation The Council of Trent saith Our Works are meritorious of eternal Life Quia a patre acceptantur per Christum yea saith S. de Clara Actus meus dicitur meritorium quia elicitus seu Imperatus a gratia ex pactione divina acceptatur ad premium Deus ab aeterno ordinavit hujusmodi actus esse dignos vita eterna quando eliciuntur a gratia habituali non igitur tota ratio meriti a gratia ipsa So Scotus Actus non est meritorius praecise quia perveniens ex gratia sed quia acceptatur a Deo tanque dignus vita aeterna But where 's the Question then Whether Faith and Love c. are disobedient even in a Gospel account and so uncapable of being Conditions of any of its promised saving Benefits R. In the sense of the Papists they be not but be accepted of God for this end to be federal conditions of a Law Covenant they are perfect in that kind and relation and merit the Benefit but we say tho' any of our Gifts of Grace or Duties are accepted in Christ yet they are not accepted to any Merit or Worthiness of any other Grace federal conditions and worthiness of all Grace and Blessings bestowed on us are only in Christ and hence Faith and Charity and other Gifts of Grace tho' they have a conditional connexion one to another yet they are all of Promise and can't be federal conditions of any promised saving Benefits Mr. C. saith I am against the Articles of the Church of England and the Assembly I am sure he'el never prove it and I profess the contrary but I am sure he 's against all the
is not this Meetness a material Cause in the Gospel Law of our receiving these Effects Why then hath it not â—he same Place in respect of the new Law as Christ's Righteousness hath in repect of the old Law so that there must be at least two Righteousnesses requisite to our compleat Justification one Righteousness to answer the Old Law and another to answer the New And indeed here Christ's Righteousness is made by you most properly the subordinate Righteousness because it is in ordine ad it 's only in order to anâ—ther Righteousness In the most favouraâ—le Sense you make the Righteousness of Christ to merit ex condigno and Evangâ—lical to merit ex congruo for all Law Meetness is meriting either in respect of the reâ—unerative or minatory part of the Law All that you say over and over helps not nor covers you from those that know your Dialect nor your saying That Christ is the foundation of your Plea I may found a Plea or Argument upon a thing that is not my Plea or at least my chief Plea and how do you found it Why for the sake of Christ accepted against excluding bars you say whereby you have Permission now to come in with your Evangelical Righteousness You speak here just as in your other Book to this Point and I understand you still as I did then and you know you mean as I have represented your Meaning but you would not have the People understand what you mean and therefore you throw in an abundance of Expressions thereby to hide your Opinion but instead thereof they lay it open What is more plain than this Repl. p. 3. The Terms of the Gospel by the Promise do make us capable of being justified and saved for the Merits of Christ Now here 's your true sense of being forgiven for the Merits of Christ i. e. when we are made capable by the righteous Meetness of another Law we shall be absolved in the old Law sense by the righteousness of Christ And mark that all along its forgiveness only comes from Christ's Merits there 's no positive righteousness of Christ in active Obedience is reckoned to us this positive righteousness whereby we stand just in the Eye of the Law in your sense lies wholy in Conformity to the Rule of that Promise which is the new Law righteousness And you use the word Merits still in the way of procuration not satisfaction You say we are justified only by Christ's Merits as the sole procuring cause or righteousness for which we are justified to which you should add that the Reader might take your full sense by the righteousness of the Gospel Law That which you call the fifth Misrepresentation and is your fourth I am not convinced of but that my Inferences are truly drawn according to your natural sense and meaning of what your Expressions and what your Principles must bear 1. That you make the great end and use of Christ's Righteousness to secure us from the old Law Mr. B. calls it our legal Righteousness and therefore our Justification is not an immediate effect of that Righteousness but of our evangelical Righteousness 2. That he merited only that we might Merit i. e. that he procured our Justification by evangelical Righteousness you will not call it Merit call it what you will it s a Law of Meetness and a Law meetness I think gives a claim and challenge of Pardon and if we should pray in your Dialect we should pray thus Lord I am meet to be pardoned for the Righteousness of Christ 3. That you make Faith and Repentance the meritorious cause of Pardon and Glory by the new Law and that 's true for all conformity to and complyance with the conditional Preceptive part of a Law gives right a legal right to Remuneration and the benefit becomes a reward of Debt and if so the meetness is a Merit ex Pacto All these tho you say you disown yet in what you declare you say but what you said before and from whence the same Consequences will follow viz. That God requires a meetness in a Sinner for Justification and that this meetness is a federal condition 1. You say Christ satisfied Justice and merited Pardon and Glory i. e. he satisfied Justice in respect of the old Law and merited Pardon and Glory to be bestowed as Rewards of Obedience to another Law And that 2. The Sinner thus partaking of them is as Fruits of his Death and this is all done for his sake 3. You say God in Christ hath declared a way and order how he will dispense his Benefits this way is by another Law in which he acts in a way of distribution of Justice upon performance of Law conditions p. 4. And therefore you say Gospel conditions have no other use to our Interest in these Benefits than a complyance with this stated Rule of the distribution of Pardon and Glory p. 4. Adam's obedience had no other use than a compliance with the stated Rule of Gods distribution of Life promised and Pardon and Glory is no other than Life promised So that you make your Law to be every whit the same in specie with a Covenant or Law of Works the condition works out the reward of Debt but this is all the difference that Man fell under the first Covenant of Works by Creation but under the second by Redemption he was redeemed from the Curse of the old Law that he might be justified by another Law Covenant and this is your plain meaning as you say And these things you do but say over and over again in this Book as in the former And what doth this conditional Grant of these Effects import but that we should have Justification Adoption c. upon the performance of obedience to another Law Which is as much as to say Christ purchased another Law and Obedience to it must let us into Pardon by Christ This purchasing conditional Grants and Propositions is a new sort of Divinity suiting the highest degree of Arminian Doctrin and will strike at the nature of absolute Election which gives ground of suspecting you also in that Point as well as what you say of the savability of the none Elect tho' I acknowledge you often assert absolute Election but how well that Principle will comport with indefinite Redemption upon a conditional Grant let the rational judge You go on again and say as from Chap. 10. Pag. 84. of your first Book When Sinners are pardoned the whole meritorious cause of that Pardon is that attonement and what is required of Sinners is only a meetness to receive the Effects You need quote no more to give us an account of what you mean in these things if the Reader desires to be further confirmed in the truth of my representation of your Principles let him read pag. 4 5. of your Reply You quote Passages in p. 30 31. of my Book for the first Head from whence you say I endeavour to