a congruous way of disputing for Truth and Righteousness nor indeed is it tolerably ingenuous or modest If not then why doth he all along carry his professed agreement with me in a militant strain perswading his Reader that I savour of Socinianism or Popery or some dangerous Error by saying the very same that he saith O what thanks doth God's Church owe such contentious Disputers for supposed Orthodoxness that like noctambuli will rise in their sleep and cry Fire Fire or beat an Allarm on their Drums and cry out The Enemy The Enemy and will not let their Neighbours rest I have wearied my Readers with so oft repeating in my Writings upon such repeated importunities of others these following Assertions about Works 1. That we are never justified first or last by Works of Innocency 2. Nor by the Works of the Jewish Law which Paul pleadeth against 3. Nor by any Works of Merit in point of Commutative Justice or of distributive Governing Justice according to either of those Laws of Innocency or Jewish 4. Nor by any Works or Acts of Man which are set against or instead of the least part of God's Acts Christ's Merits or any of his part or honour 5. Nor are we at first justified by any Evangelical Works of Love Gratitude or Obedience to Christ as Works are distinguished from our first Faith and Repentance 6. Nor are we justified by Repentance as by an instrumental efficient Cause or as of the same receiving Nature with Faith except as Repentance signifieth our change from Vnbelief to Faith and so is Faith it self 7. Nor are we justified by Faith as by a mere Act or moral good Work 8. Nor yet as by a proper efficient Instrument of our Justification 9. Much less by such Works of Charity to Men as are without true love to God 10. And least of all by Popish bad Works called Good as Pilgrimages hurtful Austerities c. But if any Church-troubling Men will first call all Acts of Man's Soul by the name of WORKS and next will call no Act by the name of Justifying Faith but the belief of the Promise as some or the accepting of Christ's Righteousness given or imputed to us as in se our own as others or the Recumbency on this Righteousness as others or all these three Acts as others and if next they will say that this Faith justifieth us only as the proper Instrumental Cause And next that to look for Justification by any other Act of Man's Soul or by this Faith in any other respect is to trust to that Justification by Works which Paul confuteth and to fall from Grace I do detest such corrupting and abusing of the Scriptures and the Church of Christ And I assert as followeth 1. That the Faith which we are justified by doth as essentially contain our belief of the Truth of Christ's Person Office Death Resurrection Intercession c. as of the Promise of Imputation 2. And also our consent to Christ's Teaching Government Intercession as to Imputation 3. And our Acceptance of Pardon Spirit and promised Glory as well as Imputed Righteousness of Christ 4. Yea that it is essentially a Faith in God the Father and the Holy Ghost 5. That it hath in it essentially somewhat of Initial Love to God to Christ to Recovery to Glory that is of Volition and so of Desire 6. That it containeth all that Faith which is necessarily requisite at Baptism to that Covenant even a consenting-practical-belief in God the Father Son and Holy Ghost and is our Christianity it self 7. That we are justified by this Faith as it is A moral Act of Man adapted to its proper Office made by our Redeemer the Condition of his Gift of Justification and so is the moral receptive aptitude of the Subject or the Dispositio materiae vel subjecti Recipientis Where the Matter of it is An adapted moral Act of Man by Grace The Ratio formalis of its Interest in our Justification is Conditio praestita speaking politically and Aptitudo vel Dispositio moralis Receptiva speaking logically which Dr. Twiss still calleth Causa dispositiva 8. That Repentance as it is a change of the Mind from Unbelief to Faith in God the Father Son and Holy Ghost is this Faith denominated from its Terminus à quo principally 9. That we are continually justified by this Faith as continued as well as initially justified by its first Act. 10. That as this Faith includeth a consent to future Obedience that is Subjection so the performance of that consent in sincere Obedience is the Condition of our Justification as continued Secondarily as well as Faith or consent it self primarily And that thus James meaneth that we are Justified by Works 11. That God judging of all things truly as they are now judgeth Men just or unjust on these Terms 12. And his Law being Norma judicii now vertually judgeth us just on these terms 13. And that the Law of Grace being that which we are to be judged by we shall at the last Judgment also be judged and so justified thus far by or according to our sincere Love Obedience or Evangelical Works as the Condition of the Law or Covenant of free Grace which justifieth and glorifieth freely all that are thus Evangelically qualified by and for the Merits perfect Righteousness and Sacrifice of Christ which procured the Covenant or free Gift of Universal Conditional Justification and Adoption before and without any Works or Conditions done by Man whatsoever Reader Forgive me this troublesom oft repeating the state of the Controversie I meddle with no other If this be Justification by Works I am for it If this Doctor be against it he is against much of the Gospel If he be not he had better have kept his Bed than to have call'd us to Arms in his Dream when we have sadly warred so many Ages already about mere words For my part I think that such a short explication of our sense and rejection of ambiguities is fitter to end these quarrels than the long disputations of Confounders 4. But when be saith Works make not a Man just and yet we are at last justified according to them it is a contradiction or unsound For if he mean Works in the sence excluded by Paul we are not justified according to them viz. such as make or are thought to make the Reward to be not of Grace but of Debt But if he take Works in the sense intended by James sincere Obedience is a secondary constitutive part of that inherent or adherent personal Righteousness required by the Law of Grace in subordination to Christ's Meritorious Righteousness And what Christian can deny this So far it maketh us Righteous as Faith doth initially And what is it to be justified according to our Works but to be judged so far as they are sincerely done to be such as have performed the secondary part of the Conditions of free-given Life 5. His According but not ex operibus at the
of Justification to be the Remission of Sin Original and Actual or the Imputation of Christs Righteousness which he maketh to be all one or the Imputation of Faith for Righteousness Saith Bishop Downame of Justif p. 305. To be Formally Righteous by Christs Righteousness imputed never any of us for ought I know affirmed The like saith Dr. Prideâ—aux when yet very many Protestants affirm it Should I here set together forty or sixty Definitions of Protestants verbatim and shew you how much they differ it would be unpleasant and tedious and unnecessary And as to those same Divines that Dr. Tully nameth as agreed Dr. Davenants and Dr. Fields words I have cited at large in my Confes saying the same in substance as I do as also Mr. Scudders and an hundred more as is before said And let any sober Reader decide this Controversie between us upon these two further Considerations 1. Peruse all the Corpus Confessionum and see whether all the Reformed Churches give us a Definition of Justification and agree in that Definition Yea whether the Church of England in its Catechism or its Articles have any proper Definition Or if you will call their words a Definition I am sure it 's none but what I do consent to And if a Logical Definition were by the Church of England and other Churches held necessary to Salvation it would be in their Catechisms if not in the Creed Or if it were held necessary to Church-Concord and Peace and Love it would be in their Articles of Religion which they subscribe 2. How can all Protestants agree of the Logical Definition of Justification when 1. They agree not of the sense of the word Justifie and of the species of that Justification which Paul and James speak of Some make Justification to include Pardon and Sanctification see their words in G. Forbes and Le Blank many say otherwise Most say that Paul speaketh most usually of Justification in sensu forensi but whether it include Making just as some say or only Judging just as others or Nolle punire be the act as Dr. Twisse they agree not And some hold that in James Justification is that which is eoram hominibus when said to be by Works but others truly say it is thay coram Deo 2. They are not agreed in their very Logical Rules and Notions to which their Definitions are reduced no not so much as of the number and nature of Causes nor of Definitions as is aforesaid And as I will not undertake to prove that all the Apostles Evangelists and Primitive Pastours knew how to define Efficient Material Formal and Final Causes in general so I am sure that all good Christians do not 3. And when Justification is defined by Divines is either the Actus Justificantis and this being in the predicament of Action what wonder if they disagree about the Material and Formal Causes of it Nay it being an Act of God there are few Divines that tell us what that Act is Deus operatur per essentiam And Ex parte agentis his Acts are his Essence and all but one And who will thus dispute of the Definition and Causes of them Efficient Material Formal Final when I presumed to declare that this Act of Justifying is not an immanent Act in God nor without a Medium but Gods Act by the Instrumentality of his Gospel-Covenant or Promise many read it as a new thing and if that hold true that the First Justification by Faith is that which Gods Gospel-Donation is the Instrument of as the Titulus seu Fundamentum Juris being but a Virtual and not an Actual Sentence then the Definition of it as to the Causes must differ much from the most common Definitions But most Protestants say that Justification is Sententia Judicis And no doubt but there are three several sorts or Acts called Justification 1. Constitutive by the Donative Covenant 2. Sentential 3. Executive And here they are greatly at a loss for the decision of the Case what Act of God this Sententia Jucis is What it will be after death we do not much disagree But what it is immediately upon our believing It must be an Act as in patiente or the Divine essence denominated from such an effect And what Judgment and Sentence God hath upon our believing few open and fewer agreee Mr. Tombes saith it is a Sentence in Heaven notifying it to the Angels But that is not all or the chief some run back to an Immanent Act most leave it undetermined And sure the Name of Sentence in general signifieth no true Conception of it at all in him that knoweth not what that Sentence is seeing Universals are Nothing out of us but as they exist in individuals Mr. Lawson hath said that wihch would reconcile Protestants and some Papists as to the Name viz. that Gods Execution is his Sentence He Judgeth by Executing And so as the chief punishment is the Privation of the Spirit so the Justifying Act is the executive donation of the Spirit Thus are we disagreed about Active Justification which I have oft endeavoured Conciliatorily fullier to open And as to Passive Justification or as it is Status Justificati which is indeed that which it concerneth us in this Controversie to open I have told you how grosly some describe it here before And all agree not what Predicament it is in some take it to be in that of Action ut recipitur in passo and some in that of Quality and Relation Conjunct But most place it in Relation And will you wonder if all Christian Women yea or Divines cannot define that Relation aright And if they agree not in the notions of the Efficient Material Formal and Final Causes of that which must be defined as it is capable by its subjectum fundamentum and terminus I would not wish that the Salvation of any Friend of mine or any one should be laid on the true Logical Definition of Justification Active or Passive Constitutive Sentential or Executive And now the Judicious will see whether the Church and Souls of Men be well used by this pretence that all Protestants are agreed in the Nature Causes and Definition of Justification and that to depart from that one Definition where is it is so dangerous as the Doctor pretendeth because the Definition and the Definitum are the same § XX. P. 34. You say You tremble not in the audience of God and Man to suggest again that hard-fronted Calumny viz. that I prefer a Majority of Ignorants before a Learned man in his own profession Answ I laid it down as a Rule that They are not to be preferred You assault that Rule with bitter accusations as if it were unsound or else to this day I understand you not Is it then a hard-fronted Calumny to defend it and to tell you what is contained in the denying of it The audience of God must be so dreadful to you and me that without calling you to
might not be necessary to our Justification and this in the person of a Mediator and Sponsor for us sinners but not so in our Persons as that we truely in a moral or civil sence did all this in and by him Even so God reputeth the thing to be as it is and so far Imputeth Christ's Righteousness and Merits and Satisfaction to us as that it is Reputed by him the true Meritorious Cause of our Justification and that for it God maketh a Covenant of Grace in which he freely giveth Christ Pardon and Life to all that accept the Gift as it is so that the Accepters are by this Covenant or Gift as surely justified and saved by Christ's Righteousness as if they had Obeyed and Satisfied themselves Not that Christ meriteth that we shall have Grace to fulfil the Law our selves and stand before God in a Righteousness of our own which will answer the Law of works and justifie us But that the Conditions of the Gift in the Covenant of Grace being performed by every penitent Believer that Covenant doth pardon all their sins as Gods Instrument and giveth them a Right to Life eternal for Christs Merits This is the sence of Imputation which I and others asserted as the true healing middle way And as bad as they are among the most Learned Papists Cornelius a Lapide is cited by Mr. Wotton Vasquez by Davenant Suarez by Mr. Burges as speaking for some such Imputation and Merit Grotius de Satisf is clear for it But the Brethren called Congregational or Independant in their Meeting at the Savoy Oct. 12. 1658. publishing a Declaration of their Faith Cap. 11. have these words Those whom God effectually calleth he also freely justifieth not by infusing Righteousness into them but by pardoning their Sins and by accounting and accepting their persons as Righteous not for any thing wrought in them or done by them but for Christs sake alone not by imputing Faith it self the act of believing or any other evangelical Obedience to them as their Righteousness but by Imputing Christs Active Obedience to the whole Law and Passive Obedience in his death for their whole and sole Righteousness they receiving and resting on him and his Righteousness by Faith Upon the publication of this it was variously spoken of some thought that it gave the Papists so great a scandal and advantage to reproach the Protestants as denying all inherent Righteousness that it was necessary that we should disclaim it Others said that it was not their meaning to deny Inherent Righteousness though their words so spake but only that we are not justified by it Many said that it was not the work of all of that party but of some few that had an inclination to some of the Antinomian principles out of a mistaken zeal of free Grace and that it is well known that they differ from us and therefore it cannot be imputed to us and that it is best make no stir about it lest it irritate them to make the matter worse by a Defence give the Papists too soon notice of it And I spake with one Godly Minister that was of their Assembly who told me that they did not subscribe it and that they meant but to deny Justification by inherent Righteousness And though such men in the Articles of their declared Faith no doubt can speak intelligibly and aptly and are to be understood as they speak according to the common use of the words yet even able-men sometimes may be in this excepted when eager engagement in an opinion and parties carryeth them too precipitantly and maketh them forget something that should be remembred The Sentences here which we excepted against are these two But the first was not much offensive because their meaning was right And the same words are in the Assemblies Confession though they might better have been left out Scriptures Declaration Rom. 4.3 What saith the Scripture Abraham believed God and it was counted to him for Righteousness Ver. 5. To him that worketh not but believeth on him that Justifyeth the Vngodly his Faith is counted for Righteousness Ver. 9. For we say that Faith was reckoned to Abraham for Righteousness How was it then reckoned Ver. 11. And he received the sign of Circumcision a seal of the righteousness of the Faith which he had yet being uncircumcised that he might be the Father of all them that believe that Righteousness might be imputed to them also Ver. 13. Through the Righteousness of Faith Ver. 16. Therefore it is of Faith that it might be by Grace vid. Ver. 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24. He was strong in Faith fully perswaded that what he had promised he was able also to perform and therefore it was Imputed to him for Righteousness Now it was not written for his sake alone that it was imputed to him but for us also to whom it shall be imputed if we or who believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead Gen. 15.5 6. Tell the Stars so shall thy seed be And he believed in the Lord and he counted it to him for Righteousness Jam. 2.21 22 23 24. Was not Abraham our Father justified by Works And the Scripture was fulfilled which saith Abraham believed God and it was imputed to him for Righteousness Luk. 19.17 Well done thou good Servant Because thou hast been Faithful in a very little have thou authority over ten Cities Mat. 25.34 35 40 Come ye blessed For I was hungry and ye gave me Meat Gen. 22.16 17 By my self I have sworn Because thou hast done this thing Joh. 16.27 For the Father himself loveth you because you have loved me and have believed that I came out from God Many such passages are in Scripture Our opinion is 1. That it is better to justifie and expound the Scripture than flatly to deny it If Scripture so oft say that Faith is reckoned or Imputed for Righteousness it becometh not Christians to say It is not But to shew in what sence it is and in what it is not For if it be so Imputed in no sence the Scripture is made false If in any sence it should not be universally denied but with distinction 2. We hold that in Justification there is considerable 1. The Purchasing and Meritorious Cause of Justification freely given in the new Covenant This is only Christ's Sufferings and Righteousness and so it is Reputed of God and Imputed to us 2. The Order of Donation which is On Condion of Acceptance And so 3. The Condition of our Title to the free Gift by this Covenant And that is Our Faith or Acceptance of the Gift according to its nature and use And thus God Reputeth Faith and Imputeth it to us requiring but this Condition of us which also he worketh in us by the Covenant of Grace whereas perfect Obedience was required of us by the Law of Innocency If we err in this explication it had been better to confute us than deny
God's Word Scriptures besides the former Declaration 1 Joh. 2.29 Every one which doth Righteousness is born of God 3.7 10. He that doth Righteousness is Righteous even as he is Righteous Whosoever doth not righteousness is not of God 2 Tim. 4.8 He hath laid up for us a Crown of Righteousness Heb. 11.23 Through Faith they wrought Righteousness Heb. 12. The peaceable fruit of Righteousness Jam. 3.18 The fruit of Righteousness is sown in Peace 1 Pet. 2.24 That we being dead to sin should live unto righteousness Mat 5.20 Except your Righteousness exceed the Righteousness of the Scribes and Pharisees c. Luk. 1.71 In Holiness and Righteousness before him all the days of our Life Act. 10.35 He that feareth God and worketh Righteousness is accepted of him Rom. 6.13 16 18 19 20. Whether of sin unto death or of Obedience unto Righteousness 1 Cor. 15.34 Awake to Righteousness and sin not Eph. 5.9 The fruit of the Spirit is in all Goodness and Righteousness Dan. 12.3 They shall turn many to Righteousness Dan. 4.27 Break off thy sins by Righteousness Eph. 4.24 The new-man which after God is created in Righteousness Gen. 7.1 Thee have I seen Righteous before me Gen. 18.23 24 25 26. Far be it from thee to destroy the Righteous with the Wicked Prov. 24.24 He that saith to the Wicked thou art Righteous him shall the people Curse Nations shall abhor him Isa 3.10 Say to the Righteous it shall be well with him Isa 5.23 That take away the Righteousness from the Righteous Mat. 25.37 46. Then shall the Righteous answer The Righteous into life eternal Luk. 1.6 They were both Righteous before God Heb. 11.4 7. By Faith Abel offered to God a more excellent Sacrifice than Cain by which he obtained witness that he was righteous God testifying of his Gifts By Faith Noah being warned of God of things not seen as yet moved with fear prepared an Ark by which he became heir of the Righteousness by Faith 1 Pet. 4.18 If the Righteous be scarcely saved Math. 10.41 He that receiveth a Righteous man in the name of a Righteous man shall have a Righteous mans reward 1 Tim. 1.9 The Law is not made for a Righteous man but for Many score of texts more mention a Righteousness distinct from that of Christ imputed to us Judg now Whether he that believeth God should believe that he Imputeth Christs Obedience and Suffering to us for our Sole Righteousness That which is not our sole Righteousness is not so Reputed by God nor Imputed But Christs Obedience and Suffering is not our sole Righteousness See Davenant's many arguments to prove that we have an Inherent Righteousness Obj. But they mean our Sole Righteousness by which we are Justified Answ 1. We can tell no mans meaning but by his words especially not contrary to them especially in an accurate Declaration of Faith 2. Suppose it had been so said we maintain on the contrary 1. That we are Justified by more sorts of Righteousness than one in several respects We are justified only by Christs Righteousness as the Purchasing and Meritorious Cause of our Justification freely given by that new Covenant We are Justified by the Righteousness of God the Father as performing his Covenant with Christ and us efficiently We are justified efficiently by the Righteousness of Christ as our Judg passing a just sentence according to his Covenant These last are neither Ours nor Imputed to us But we are justified also against the Accusation of being finally Impenitent Unbelievers or unholy by the personal particular Righteousness of our own Repentance Faith and Holiness For 2. We say that there is an universal Justification or Righteousness and there is a particular one And this particular one may be the Condition and Evidence of our Title to all the rest And this is our case The Day of Judgment is not to try and Judg Christ or his Merits but us He will judg us himself by his new Law or Covenant the sum of which is Except ye Repent ye shall all perish and He that believeth shall be saved and he that believeth not shall be condemned If we be not accused of Impenitence or Vnbelief but only of not-fulfilling the Law of Innocency that will suppose that we are to be tryed only by that Law which is not true And then we refer the Accuser only to Christ's Righteousness and to the Pardoning Law of Grace and to nothing in our selves to answer that charge And so it would be Christ's part only that would be judged But Matth. 25. and all the Scripture assureth us of the contrary that it 's Our part that it is to be tryed and judged and that we shall be all judged according to what we have done And no man is in danger there of any other accusation but that he did not truly Repent and Believe and live a holy life to Christ And shall the Penitent Believer say I did never Repent and Believe but Christ did it for me and so use two Lyes one of Christ and another of himself that he may be justified Or shall the Vnholy Impenitent Infidel say It 's true I was never a Penitent Believer or holy but Christ was for me or Christs Righteousness is my sole Righteousness that is a fashood For Christs Righteousness is none of his So that there is a particular personal Righteousness consisting in Faith and Repentance which by way of Condition and Evidence of our title to Christ and his Gift of Pardon and Life is of absolute necessity in our Justification Therefore Imputed Righteousness is not the sole Righteousness which must justifie us I cited abundance of plain Texts to this purpose in my Confession pag. 57. c. Of which book I add that when it was in the press I procured those three persons whom I most highly valued for judgment Mr. Gataker whose last work it was in this World Mr. Vines and lastly Arch-Bishop Vsher to read it over except the Epistles Mr. Gataker read only to pag. 163. and no one of them advised me to alter one word nor signified their dissent to any word of it But I have been long on this to proceed in the History The same year that I wrote that book that most Judicious excellent man Joshua Placaeus of Saumours in France was exercised in a Controversie conjunct with this How far Adams sin is imputed to us And to speak truth at first in the Theses Salmuriens Vol. 1. he seemed plainly to dispute against the Imputation of Adam's actual sin and his arguments I elsewhere answer And Andr. Rivet wrote a Collection of the Judgment of all sorts of Divines for the contrary But after he vindicated himself shewed that his Doctrine was that Adam's fact is not immediately imputed to each of us as if our persons as persons had been all fully represented in Adam's person by an arbitrary Law or Will of God or reputed so to be But that our Persons being
as fulfilled or from the Reatus Gulpae in se but by Christ's whole Righteousness from the Reatus ut ad paenam 2. But if this be his sense he meaneth then that it is only the Terminus à quo that Justification is properly denominated from And why so 1. As Justitia and Justificatio passive sumpta vel ut effectus is Relatio it hath necessarily no Terminus à quo And certainly is in specie to be rather denominated from its own proper Terminus ad quem And as Justification is taken for the Justifiers Action why is it not as well to be denominated from the Terminus ad quem as à quo Justificatio efficiens sic dicitur quia Justum facit Justificatio apologetica quia Justum vindicat vel probat Justificatio per sententiam quia Justum aliquem esse Judicat Justificatio executiva quia ut Justum eum tractat But if we must needs denominate from the Terminus à quo how strange is it that he should know but of one sense of Justification 3. But yet perhaps he meaneth In satisfactione Legi praestitâ though he say praestandâ and so denominateth from the Terminus à quo But if so 1. Then it cannot be true For satisfacere Justificare are not the same thing nor is Justifying giving Satisfaction nor were we justified when Christ had satisfied but long after Nor are we justified eo nomine because Christ satisfied that is immediately but because he gave us that Jus ad impunitatem vitam spiritum sanctum which is the Fruit of his Satisfaction 2. And as is said if it be only in satisfactione then it is not in that Obedience which fulfileth the preceptive part as it bound us for to satisfie for not fulfilling is not to fulfil it 3. And then no Man is justified for no Man hath satisfied either the Preceptive or Penal Obligation of the Law by himself or another But Christ hath satisfied the Law-giver by Merit and Sacrifice for sin His Liberavit nos à Lege Mortis I before shewed impertinent to his use Is Liberare Justificare or Satisfacere all one And is à Lege Mortis either from all the Obligation to Obedience or from the sole malâ—diction There be other Acts of Liberation besides Satisfaction For it is The Law of the Spirit of Life that doth it And we are freed both from the power of indwelling-sin called a Law and from the Mosaical Yoak and from the Impossible Conditions of the Law of Innocency though not from its bare Obligation to future Duty § 7. He addeth a Third Ex parte Medii quod est Justitia Christi Legalis nobis per fidem Imputata Omnem itaque Justificationem proprie Legalem esse constat Answ 1. When I read that he will have but one sense or sort of Justification will yet have the Denomination to be ex termino and so justifieth my distinction of it according to the various Termini And here how he maketh the Righteousness of Christ to be but the MEDIVM of our Justification though he should have told us which sort of Medium he meaneth he seemeth to me a very favourable consenting Adversary And I doubt those Divines who maintain that Christ's Rigâ—teousness is the Causa Formalis of our Justification who are no small ones nor a few though other in answer to the Papists disclaim it yea and those that make it but Causa Materialis which may have a sound sense will think this Learned Man betrayeth their Cause by prevarication and seemeth to set fiercly against me that he may yeeld up the Cause with less suspicion But the truth is we all know but in part and therefore err in part and Error is inconsistent with it self And as we have conflicting Flesh and Spirit in the Will so have we conflicting Light and Darkness Spirit and Flesh in the Understanding And it is very perceptible throughout this Author's Book that in one line the Flesh and Darkness saith one thing and in the next oft the Spirit and Light saith the contrary and seeth not the inconsistency And so though the dark and fleshy part rise up in wrathful striving Zeal against the Concord and Peace of Christians on pretence that other Mens Errors wrong the Truth yet I doubt not but Love and Unity have some interest in his lucid and Spiritual part We do not only grant him that Christ's Righteousness is a Medium of our Justification for so also is Faith a Condition and Dispositio Receptiva being a Medium nor only some Cause for so also is the Covenant-Donation but that it is an efficient meritorious Cause and because if Righteousness had been that of our own Innocency would have been founded in Merit we may call Christ's Righteousness the material Cause of our Justification remotely as it is Materia Meriti the Matter of the Merit which procureth it 2. But for all this it followeth not that all Justification is only Legal as Legal noteth its respect to the Law of Innocency For 1. we are justified from or against che Accusation of being non-performers of the Condition of the Law of Grace 2. And of being therefore unpardoned and lyable to its sorer Penalty 3. Our particular subordinate Personal Righteousness consisting in the said performance of those Evangelical Conditions of Life is so denominated from its conformity to the Law of Grace as it instituteth its own Condition as the measure of it as Rectitudo ad Regulam 4. Our Jus ad impunitatem vitam resulteth from the Donative Act of the Law or Covenant of Grace as the Titulus qui est Fundamentum Juris or supposition of our Faith as the Condition 5. This Law of Grace is the Norma Judicis by which we shall be judged at the Last Day 6. The same Judg doth now per sententiam conceptam judg of us as he will then judg per sententiam prolatam 7. Therefore the Sentence being virtually in the Law this same Law of Grace which in primo instanti doth make us Righteous by Condonation and Donation of Right doth in secundo instanti virtually justifie us as containing that regulating use by which we are to be sententially justified And now judg Reader whether no Justification be Evangelical or by the Law of Grace and so to be denominated for it is lis de nomine that is by him managed 8. Besides that the whole frame of Causes in the Work of Redemption the Redeemer his Righteousness Merits Sacrifice Pardoning Act Intercession c. are sure rather to be called Matters of the Gospel than of the Law And yet we grant him easily 1. That Christ perfectly fulfilled the Law of Innocency and was justified thereby and that we are justified by that Righteousness of his as the meritorious Cause 2. That we being guilty of Sin and Death according to the tenor of that Law and that Guilt being remitted by Christ as aforesaid we are therefore justified
from that Law that is from its Obligation of us to Innocency as the necessary terms of Life and from its Obligation of us to Death for want of Innocency But we are not justified by that Law either as fulfilled or as satisfied by us our selves either personally or by an Instrument substitute or proper Representative that was Vicarius Obedientiae aut poenae 3. And we grant that the Jews were delivered from the positive Jewish Law which is it that Paul calleth The Law of Works And if he please in all these respects to call Justification Legal we intend not to quarrel with the name though what I called Legal in those Aphorisms I chose ever after to call rather Justitia pro-legalis But we cannot believe him 1. That it is only Legal 2. Or that that is the only or most proper denomination § 8. He proceedeth thus And it will be vain if any argue That yet none can be saved without Evangelical Works according to which it is confessed that all men shall be judged for the distinction is easie which the Author of the Aphorisms somewhere useth between the first or Private and the last or Publick Justification In the first sense it is never said That Works justifie but contrary That God justifieth him that worketh not Rom. 4.5 In the latter we confess that Believers are to be justified according to Works but yet not Of or By Works nor that that Justification maketh men just before God but only so pronounceth them Answ 1. This is such another Consenting Adversary as once before I was put to answer who with open mouth calls himself consequentially what he calleth me if the same Cause and not the Person make the Guilt Nay let him consider whether his grand and most formidable Weapon So also saith Bellarmine with other Papists do not wound himself For they commonly say That the first Justification is not of Works or Works do not first justifie us Have I not now proved that he erreth and complyeth with the Papists If not let him use better Arguments himself 2. But why is the first Justification called Private Either he meaneth God's making us just constitutively or his judging us so and that per sententiam conceptam only or prolatam also 1. The common distinction in Politicks inter judicium Privatum Publicum is fetcht from the Judg who is either Persona privata vel publica a private Man or an authorized Judg judging as such And so the Judgment of Conscience Friends Enemies Neighbours mere Arbitrators c. is Judicium privatum and that of a Judg in foro is Judicium publicum yea or in secret before the concerned Parties only in his Closet so it be decisive If this Learned Doctor so understand it then 1. Constitutive Justification which is truly first is publick Justification being done by God the Father and by our Redeemer who sure are not herein private authorized Persons 2. And the first sentential Justification as merely Virtual and not yet Actual viz. as it 's virtually in the Justifying Law of Grace as norma Judicis is publick in suo genere being the virtus of a Publick Law of God or of his Donative Promise 3. And the first Actual Justification per Deum Judicem per sententiam conceptam which is God's secret judging the Thing and Person to be as they are is secret indeed in se yet revealed by God's publick Word but publick as to the Judg. 4. And the first sententia prolata the fourth in order is someway publick as opposite to secresie for 1. it is before the Angels of Heaven 2. And in part by Executive demonstrations on Earth But it is certainly by a publick Judg that is God 5. And the first Apologetical Justification by Christ our Interceding Advocate is publick both quoad personam and as openly done in Heaven And if this worthy Person deny any Justification per sententiam Judicis upon our first Believing or before the final Judgment he would wofully fall out with the far greatest number of Protestants and especially his closest Friends who use to make a Sentence of God as Judg to be the Genus to Justification But if by Private and Publick Justification he means secret and open 1. How can he hope to be understood when he will use Political Terms unexplained out of the usual sense of Politicians But no men use to abuse words more than they that would keep the Church in flames by wordy Controversies as if they were of the terms of Life and Death 2. And even in that sense our first Justification is publick or open quoad Actum Justificancantis as being by the Donation of a publick Word of God Though quoad effectum in recipiente it must needs be secret till the Day of Judgment no Man knowing anothers Heart whether he be indeed a sound Believer And so of the rest as is intimâ—ted Concerning what I have said before some may Object 1. That there is no such thing as our Justification notified before the Angels in Heaven 2. That the Sententia Concepta is God's Immanent Acts and therefore Eternal Answ To the first I say 1. It is certain by Luk. 15.10 that the Angels know of the Conversion of a Sinner and therefore of his Justification and publickly Rejoyce therein Therefore it is notified to them 2. But I refer the Reader for this to what I have said to Mr. Tombes in my Disputation of Justification where I do give my thoughts That this is not the Justification by Faith meant by Paul as Mr. Tombes asserteth it to be To the Second I say Too many have abused Theology by the misconceiving of the distinction of Immanent and Transient Acts of God taking all for Immanent which effect nothing ad extra But none are properly Immanent quoad Objectum but such as God himself is the Object of as se intelligere se amare An Act may be called indeed immanent in any of these three respects 1. Ex parte Agentis 2. Ex parte Objecti 3. Ex parte effectus 1. Ex parte agentis all God's Acts are Immanent for they are his Essence 2. Ex parte Objecti vel Termini God's Judging a Man Just or Unjust Good or Bad is transient because it is denominated from the state of the Terminus or Object And so it may be various and mutable denominatively notwithstanding God's Simplicity and Immutability And so the Sententia Concepta is not ab Aeterno 3. As to the Effect all confess God's Acts to be Transient and Temporary But there are some that effect not as to judg a thing to be what it is 3. Either this Militant Disputer would have his Reader believe that I say That a Man is justified by Works in that which he called making just and the first Justification or not If he would such untruth and unrighteousness contrary to the full drift of many of my Books and even that which he selected to oppose is not
Controversie is about a Civil personating 3. That God judgeth not falsly 4. That Christ was not our Delegate and Instrument sent by us to do this in our stead as a man payeth his debt by a Servant whom he sendeth with the money 5. That therefore Christs Righteousness is not Imputed to us as if we had done it by him as our Instrument 6. That all the fruits of Christs Merits and Satisfaction are not ours upon our first believing much less before But we receive them by degrees we have new pardon daily of new sins We bear castigatory punishments even Death and Denials or loss of the greater assistance of the Spirit Our Grace is all imperfect c. 7. That we are under a Law and not left ungoverned and lawless and that Christ is our King and Judge And this Law is the Law or Covenant of Grace containing besides the Precepts of perfect Obedience to the Law natural and superadded a Gift of Christ with Pardon and Life but only on Condition that we thankfully and believingly accept the Gift And threatning non-liberation and a far sorer punishment to all that unbelievingly and unthankfully reject it 8. That therefore this Testament or Covenant-Gift is God's Instrument by which he giveth us our Right to Christ and Pardon and Life And no man hath such Right but by this Testament-Gift 9. That this called a Testament Covenant Promise and Law in several respects doth besides the Conditions of our first Right impose on us Continuance in the Faith with sincere Holiness as the necessary Condition of our continued Justification and our actual Glorification And that Heaven is the Reward of this keeping of the new Covenant as to the order of Gods Collation though as to the value of the Benefit it is a Free Gift purchased merited and given by Christ 10. That we shall all be judged by this Law of Christ 11. That we shall all be judged according to our deeds and those that have done good not according to the Law of Innocency or Works but according to the Law of Grace shall go into everlasting life and those that have done evil not by meer sin as sin against the Law of Innocency but by not keeping the Conditions of the Law of Grace shall go into everlasting punishment The sober reading of these following texts may end all our Controversie with men that dare not grosly make void the Word of God Rev. 20.12 13.22.12 2.23 12. That to be Justified at the day of Judgment is to be adjudged to Life Eternal and not condemned to Hell And therefore to be the cause or condition that we are Judged to Glory and the Cause or Condition that we are Justified then will be all one 13. That to be Judged according to our deeds is to be Justified or Condemned according to them 14. That the great tryal of that day as I have after said will not be whether Christ hath done his part but whether we have part in him and so whether we have believed and performed the Condition of that Covenant which giveth Christ and Life 15. That the whole scope of Christ's Sermons and all the Gospel calleth us from sin on the motive of avoiding Hell after we are reputed Righteous and calleth us to Holiness Perseverance and overcoming on the motive of laying up a good Foundation and having a Treasure in Heaven and getting the Crown of Righteousness 16. That the after-sins of men imputed Righteous deserve Hell or at least temporal punishments and abatements of Grace and Glory 17. That after such sins especially hainous we must pray for Pardon and repent that we may be pardoned and not say I fulfilled the Law in Christ as from my birth to my death and therefore have no more need of Pardon 18. That he that saith he hath no sin deceiveth himself and is a lyar 19. That Magistrates must punish sin as God s Officers and Pastors by Censure in Christs name and Parents also in their Children 20. That if Christs Holiness and perfect Obedience and Satisfaction and Merit had bin Ours in Right and Imputation as simply and absolutely and fully as it was his own we could have no Guilt no need of Pardon no suspension or detention of the proper fruits of it no punishment for sin specially not so great as the with-holding of degrees of Grace and Glory And many of the consequents aforesaid could not have followed All this I think we are all agreed on and none of it can with any face be denied by a Christian And if so 1. Then whether Christs perfect Holiness and Obedience and Sufferings Merit and Satisfaction be all given us and imputed unto us at our first believing as Our own in the very thing it self by a full and proper Title to the thing Or only so imputed to us as to be judged a just cause of giving us all the effects in the degrees and time forementioned as God pleaseth let all judge as evidence shall convince them 2. And then whether they do well that thrust their devised sence on the Churches as an Article of Faith let the more impartial judge I conclude with this confession to the Reader that though the matter of these Papers hath been thought on these thirty years yet the Script is hasty and defective in order and fulness I could not have leisure so much as to affix in the margin all the texts which say what I assert And several things especially the state of the Case are oft repeated But that is lest once reading suffice not to make them observed and understood which if many times will do I have my end If any say that I should take time to do things more accurately I tell him that I know my straights of time and quantity of business better than he doth and I will rather be defective in the mode of one work than leave undone the substance of another as great July 20. 1672. Richard Baxter The Contents CHap. 1. The History of the Controversie In the Apostles days In the following Ages Augustine and his followers Opinion The Schoolmen Luther Islebius The Lutherans Andr. Osiander The latter German Divines who were against the Imputation of Christ's Active Righteousness Our English Divines Davenant's sense of Imputation Wotton de Reconcil Bradshaw Gataker Dr. Crisp Jo. Simpson Randal Towne c. And the Army Antinomians checkt by the rising of Arminianism there against it Jo. Goodwin Mr. Walker and Mr. Roborough Mr. Ant. Burges My Own endeavours Mr. Cranden Mr. Eyres c. Mr. Woodbridge Mr. Tho. Warren Mr. Hotchkis Mr. Hopkins Mr. Gibbon Mr. Warton Mr. Grailes Mr. Jessop What I then asserted Corn. a Lapide Vasquez Suarez Grotius de Satisf Of the Savoy Declaration Of the Faith of the Congregational-Divines Their saying that Christs Active and Passive Obedience is imputed for our sole Righteousness confuted by Scripture Gataker Usher and Vines read and approved my Confession of Faith Placeus his Writings and trouble
the Maledictory Sentence of the Law Answ 1. If this be untrue it 's pity so worthy a Man should unworthily use it against peace and concord If it be true I crave his help for the expounding of several Texts Exod. 23.6 7. Thou shalt not wrest the Judgment of thy Poor in his Cause Keep thee far from a false Matter and the Innocent and Righteous slay thou not for I will not justifie the wicked Is the meaning only I will not absolve the wicked from the Maledictory Sentence of the Law of Innocency Or is it not rather I will not misjudg the wicked to be just nor allow his wickedness nor yet allow thee so to do nor leave thee unpunished for thy unrighteous judgment but will condemn thee if thou condemn the Just Job 25.4 How then can Man be justified with God or How can he be clean that is born of a Woman Is the sense How can Man be absolved from the Maledictory Sentence of the Law Or rather How can he be maintained Innocent Psal 143.2 In thy sight shall no Man living be justified Is the sense No Man living shall be absolved from the Maledictory sentence of the Law Than we are all lost for ever Or rather no Man shall be found and maintained Innocent and judged one that deserved not punishment Therefore we are not judged perfect fulfillers of that Law by another or our selves Object But this is for us and against you for it denyeth that there is any such Justification Answ Is our Controversie de re or only de nomine of the sense of the word Justifie If de re then his meaning is to maintain That God never doth judg a Believer to be a Believer or a Godly Man to be Godly or a performer of the Condition of Pardon and Life to have performed it nor will justifie any believing Saint against the false Accusations that he is an Infidel a wicked ungodly Man and an Hypocrite or else he writeth against those that he understood not But if the Question be as it must be de nomine whether the word Justifie have any sense besides that which he appropriateth to it then a Proposition that denieth the Existentiam rei may confute his denyal of any other sense of the word So Isa 43.9 26. Let them bring forth their Witnesses that they may justified Declare thou that thou mayest be justified that is proved Innocent But I hope he will hear and reverence the Son Matth. 12.37 By thy words thou shalt be Justified and by thy words thou shalt be Condemned speaking of Gods Judgment which I think meaneth de re nomine Thy Righteous or unrighteous words shall be a part of the Cause of the day or Matter for or according to which thou shalt be judged obedient or disobedient to the Law of Grace and so far just or unjust and accordingly sentenced to Heaven or Hell as is described Matth. 25. But it seems this Learned Doctor understands it only By thy words thou shalt be absolved from the Maledictory Sentence of the Law and by thy words contrarily condemned Luk. 18.14 The Publican went down to his House justified rather than the other I think not only from the Maledictory Sentence of the Law of Innocency but by God approved a sincere Penitent and so a fit Subject of the other part of Justification Acts 13.39 is the Text that speaketh most in the sense he mentioneth And yet I think it includeth more viz. By Christ 1. we are not only absolved from that Condemnation due for our sins 2. but also we are by his repealing or ending of the Mosaick Law justified against the Charge of Guilt for our not observing it and 3. Augustine would add That we are by Christ's Spirit and Grace made just that is sincerely Godly by the destruction of those inherent and adherent sins which the Law of Moses could not mortifie and save us from but the Spirit doth Rom. 2.13 Not the Hearers of the Law are just before God but the Doers of the Law shall be justified Is it only The Doers shall be Absolved from the Maledictory Sentence c. Or first and chiefly They shall be judged well-doers so far as they do well and so approved and justified so far as they do keep the Law which because no Man doth perfectly and the Law of Innocency requireth Perfection none can be justified absolutely or to Salvation by it Object The meaning is say some The Doers of the Law should be justified by it were there any such Answ That 's true of absolute Justification unto Life But that this is not all the sense of the Text the two next Verses shew where the Gentiles are pronounced partakers of some of that which he meaneth inclusively in doing to Justification Therefore it must include that their Actions and Persons are so far justified more or less as they are Doers of the Law as being so far actively just Rom. 8.30 Whom he justified them he also glorified And 1 Cor. 6. â—â— Ye are justified in the Name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God Many Protestants and among them Bezâ— himself expound in the Papists and Austins sense of Justification as including Sanctification also as well as Absolution from the Curse And so Arch Bishop Vsher told me he understood them As also Tit. 3.7 That being justified freely by his Grace And many think so of Rom. 4.5 he justifieth the Vngodly say they by Converting Pardoning and Accepting them in Christ to Life And Rom. 8.33 Who shall condemn it is God that justifieth seemeth to me more than barely to say God absolveth us from the Curse because it is set against Man's Condemnation who reproached slandered and persecuted the Christians as evil Doers as they did Christ to whom they were predestinated to be conformed And so must mean God will not only absolve us from his Curse but also justifie our Innocency against all the false Accusations of our Enemies And it seemeth to be spoken by the Apostle with respect to Isa 50.8 He is near that justifieth me who will contend with me Which my reverence to this Learned Man sufficeth not to make me believe is taken only in his sense of Absolution Rev. 22.11 He that is Righteous let him be justified still 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which not only our Translaters but almost all Expositors take as inclusive of Inherent Righteousness if not principally speaking of it To speak freely I remember not one Text of Scripture that useth the word Justifie in this Doctor 's sense that is Only for the said absolution from the Curse of the Law For all those other Texts that speak for Justification by Christ's Grace and Faith and not by the Works of the Law as Rom. 3.20 24 28 30. and 4.2 5 25. 5.1 9 16 18. 1 Cor. 4.4 Gal. 2.16 17. 3.8 11 24. 5.4 c. do all seem to me to mean not only that we are absolved from the
out all sin that he might confirm what he said both from the Faith of Abraham by which he was justified and from our Saviours Death by which we are delivered from sin But this is on the by 2. But saith Dr. T. The Orthodox abhor the contrary in sensu forensi Answ How easie is it to challenge the Titles of Orthodox Wise or good Men to ones self And who is not Orthodox himself being Judg But it seems with him no Man must pass for Orthodox that is not in so gross an error of his Mind if these words and not many better that are contrary must be the discovery of it viz. That will not say that in sensu forensi God esteemeth Men to have done that which they never did The best you can make of this is that you cover the same sense which I plainlier express with this illfavoured Phrase of Man's inventing But if indeed you mean any more than I by your sensus forensis viz. that such a suffering and meriting for us may in the lax improper way of some Lawyers speaking be called Our own Doing Meriting Suffering c. I have proved that the Doctrine denied by me subverteth the Gospel of Christ Reader I remember what Grotius then Orthodox thirty years before his Death in that excellent Letter of Church-Orders Predestination Perseverance and Magistrates animadverting on Molinaeus saith How great an injury those Divines who turn the Christian Doctrine into unintelligible Notions and Controversies do to Christian Magistrates because it is the duty of Magistrates to discern and preserve necessary sound Doctrine which these Men would make them unable to discern The same I must say of their injury to all Christians because all should hold fast that which is proved True and Good which this sort of Men would disable them to discern We justly blame the Papists for locking up the Scripture and performing their Worship in an unknown Tongue And alas what abundance of well-meaning Divines do the same thing by undigested Terms and Notions and unintelligible Distinctions not adapted to the Matter but customarily used from some Persons reverenced by them that led the way It is so in their Tractates both of Theology and other Sciences and the great and useful Rule Verba Rebus aptanda sunt is laid aside or rather Men that understand not Matter are like enough to be little skilful in the expressing of it And as Mr. Pemble saith A cloudy unintelligible stile usually signifieth a cloudy unintelligent Head to that sense And as Mr. J. Humfrey tells Dr. Fullwood in his unanswerable late Plea for the Conformists against the charge of Schism pag. 29. So overly are men ordinarily wont to speak at the first sight against that which others have long thought upon that some Men think that the very jingle of a distinction not understood is warrant enough for their reproaching that Doctrine as dangerous and unsound which hath cost another perhaps twenty times as many hard studies as the Reproachers ever bestowed on that Subject To deliver thee from those Learned Obscurities read but the Scripture impartially without their Spectacles and ill-devised Notions and all the Doctrine of Justification that is necessary will be plain to thee And I will venture again to fly so far from flattering those called Learned Men who expect it as to profess that I am perswaded the common sort of honest unlearned Christians even Plowmen and Women do better understand the Doctrine of Justification than many great Disputers will suffer themselves or others to understand it by reason of their forestalling ill-made Notions these unlearned Persons commonly conceive 1. That Christ in his own Person as a Mediator did by his perfect Righteousness and Sufferings merit for us the free pardon of all our sins and the Gift of his Spirit and Life Eternal and hath promised Pardon to all that are Penitent Believers and Heaven to all that so continue and sincerely obey him to the end and that all our after-failings as well as our former sins are freely pardoned by the Sacrifice Merits and Intercession of Christ who also giveth us his Grace for the performance of his imposed Conditions and will judg us as we have or have not performed them Believe but this plain Doctrine and you have a righter understanding of Justification than many would let you quietly enjoy who tell you That Faith is not imputed for Righteousness that it justifieth you only as an Instrumental Cause and only as it is the reception of Christ's Righteousness and that no other Act of Faith is justifying and that God esteemeth us to have been perfectly Holy and Righteous and fulfilled all the Law and died for our own sins in or by Christ and that he was politically the very Person of every Believing Sinner with more such like And as to this distinction which this Doctor will make a Test of the Orthodox that is Men of of his Size and Judgment you need but this plain explication of it 1. In Law-sense a Man is truly and fitly said himself to have done that which the Law or his Contract alloweth him to do either by himself or another as to do an Office or pay a Debt by a Substitute or Vicar For so I do it by my Instrument and the Law is fulfilled and not broken by me because I was at liberty which way to do it In this sense I deny that we ever fulfilled all the Law by Christ and that so to hold subverts all Religion as a pernicious Heresie 2. But in a tropical improper sense he may be said to be esteemed of God to have done what Christ did who shall have the benefits of Pardon Grace and Glory thereby merited in the manner and measure given by the free Mediator as certainly as if he had done it himself In this improper sense we agree to the Matter but are sorry that improper words should be used as a snare against sound Doctrine and the Churches Love and Concord And yet must we not be allowed Peace § 4. But my free Speech here maketh me remember how sharply the Doctor expounded and applyed one word in the retracted Aphorisms I said not of the Men but of the wrong Opinion opposed by me It fondly supposeth a Medium betwixt one that is just and one that is no sinner one that hath his sin or guilt taken away and one that hath his unrighteousness taken away It 's true in bruits and insensibles that are not subjects capable of Justice there is c. There is a Negative Injustice which denominateth the Subject non-justum but no◠injustum where Righteousness is not due But when there is the debitum habendi its privative The Doctor learnedly translateth first the word fondly by stolide and next he fondly though not stolidè would perswade the Reader that it is said of the Men though himself translate it Doctrina And next he bloweth his Trumpet to the War with this exclamation Stolide O
earnestly presseth me with his Quem quibus who is the Man I profess I dreamed not of any particular Man But I will again tell you whom my Judgment magnifies in this Controversie above all others and who truly tell you how far Papists and Protestants agree viz. Vinc. le Blank and Guil. Forbes I meddle not with his other Subjects Placeus in Thes Salmur Davenant Dr. Field Mr. Scudder his daily Walk fit for all families Mr. Wotton Mr. Bradshaw and Mr. Gataker Dr. Preston Dr. Hammond Pract. Cat. and Mr. Lawson in the main Abundance of the French and Breme Divines are also very clear And though I must not provoke him again by naming some late English men to reproach them by calling them my disciples I will venture to tell the plain man that loveth not our wrangling tediousness that Mr. Trumans Great Propit and Mr. Gibbons serm of Justif may serve him well without any more And while this worthy Doctor and I do both concord with such as Davenant and Field as to Justification by Faith or Works judg whether we differ between our selves as far as he would perswade the World who agree in tertio And whether as he hath angrily profest his concord in the two other Controversies which he raised our Guilt of nearer Parents sin and our preferring the judgment of the wisest c. it be not likely that he will do so also in this when he hath leisure to read and know what it is that I say and hold and when we both understand our selves and one another And whether it be a work worthy of Good and Learned men to allarm Christians against one another for the sake of arbitrary words and notions which one partly useth less aptly and skilfully than the other in matters wherein they really agree 2 Tim. 2. 14. Charging them before the Lord that they strive not about words to no profit but to the subverting of the Hearers yet study to shew thy self approved unto God a workman that need not be ashamed rightly dividing the word of Truth Two Sparks more quenched which fled after the rest from the Forge of Dr. Tho. Tully § 1. DId I not find that some Mens Ignorance and factious Jealousie is great enough to make them combustible Recipients of such Wild-fire as those Strictures are and did not Charity oblige me to do what I have here done to save the assaulted Charity of such Persons more than to save any Reputation of my own I should repent that I had written one Line in answer to such Writings as I have here had to do with I have been so wearied with the haunts of the like Spirit in Mr. Crandon Mr. Bagshaw Mr. Danvers and others that it is a work I have not patience to be much longer in unless it were more necessary Two sheets more tell us that the Doctor is yet angry And little that 's better that I can find In the first he saith again that I am busie in smoothing my way where none can stumble in a thing never questioned by him nor by any Man else he thinks who owns the Authority of the second Commandment And have I not then good Company and Encouragement not to change my Mind But 1. He feigneth a Case stated between him and me who never had to do with him before but as with others in my Writings where I state my Case my self 2. He never so much as toucheth either of my Disputations of Original Sin in which I state my Case and defend it 3. And he falsly feigneth the Case stated in words and he supposeth in a sense that I never had do do with Saying I charge you with a new secondary Original Sin whose Pedegree is not from Adam I engage not a syllable further And pag. 8. You have asserted that this Novel Original Sin is not derived from our Original Father no line of Communication between them a sin besides that which is derived from Adam as you plainly and possitively affirm I never said that it had no Pedegree no line of Communication no kind of derivation from Adam 4. Yea if he would not touch the Disputation where I state my Case he should have noted it as stated in the very Preface which he writeth against and yet there also he totally overlooketh it though opened in divers Propositions 5. And the words in an Epistle to another Mans Book which he fasteneth still on were these Over-looking the Interest of Children in the Actions of their nearer Parents and think that they participate of no Guilt and suffer for no Original Sin but Adams only And after They had more Original Sin than what they had from Adam 6. He tells me that I seem not to understand my own Question nor to know well how to set about my Work and he will teach me how to manage the Business that I have undertaken and so he tells me how I MUST state the Question hereafter see his words Reader some Reasons may put a better Title on this Learned Doctors actions but if ever I write at this rate I heartily desire thee to cast it away as utter DISHONESTY and IMPUDENCE It troubleth me to trouble thee with Repetitions I hold 1. That Adams Sin is imputed as I opened to his Posterity 2. That the degree of Pravity which Cains nature received from Adam was the dispositive enclining Cause of all his Actual Sin 3. But not a necessitating Cause of all those Acts for he might possibly have done less evil and more good than he did 4. Therefore not the Total principal Cause for Cains free-will was part of that 5 Cains actual sin increased the pravity of his nature 6. And Cains Posterity were as I opened it guilty of Cains actual sin and their Natures were the more depraved by his additional pravity than they would have been by Adams sin alone unless Grace preserved or healed any of them The Doctor in this Paper would make his Reader believe that he is for no meer Logomachies and that the difference is not in words only but the thing And do you think that he differeth from me in any of these Propositions or how this sin is derived from Adam Yet this now must be the Controversie de re Do you think for I must go by thinking that he holdeth any other Derivation than this Or did I ever deny any of this But it is vain to state the Case to him He will over look it and tell me what I should have held that he may not be thought to make all this Noise for nothing He saith pag. 8. If it derive in a direct line from the first Transgression and have its whole Root fastened there what then why then some words which he sets together are not the best sense that can be spoken It is then but words and yet it is the thing What he may mean by a direct Line and what by whole Root fastened I know not but I have told the World