be sweetly handled and ought not to be terrified with examples of Gods wrath but Paul teacheth another thing 2 Tim. 2.3 when he saith The Scripture is profitable to rebuke to correction So Saltmarsh Crisp Den Del Town Randel preach a honey Gospel and a short cut to heaven and exclude all gall and vinegar from the law Let 's not fall to the madnes of Antinomians who remove the law out of the Church as if they were all holy that are in the Church the world loves such teachers and say preach to us pleasant things Antinomians teach that all sinnes are simple taken away and are not to be rebuked and that because they are pardoned and damnation is removed and sin is nothing so Honey-combe c. 3. p. 23. Saltm free grace 140. Towne asser gr 71.72 Beleevers are as cleane from all sinnes as Christ or the glorified Saints pardoned sin is no sin God cannot see adulteries to be sinnes in them 2 Conclusion Luther saith for justification the law is unpossible but it s given to show sin to worke wrath and to make the conscience guilty But lay aside the matter of justification saith he no man can too highly commend good workes commanded of God and Its necessary that Godly teachers presse as diligently the doctrine of good workes as of faith Satan is angry at both and resisteth with all his strength both k Faith onely is not sufficient and yet only faith justifieth for if it be true faith it obtaineth the spirit of love This Spirit fullfilleth the law and obtaineth the kingdome of heaven Except faith be without the least good workes it justifieth not yea it is not faith it is impossible that faith can be without assiduous and great good workes Faith justifieth not as our worke but as a worke of God for the promise is a worke of God not our worke in which we doe or give something to God but in which we receave something from God and that through his mercy Thou holdest in thine hand seeds of divers kinde but I aske not what seeds are conjoyned with these or these seeds but what is the proper vertue of every seed in this case shew plainly what faith it 's alone doth in justification but not with what other vertues it is conjoyned faith it alone apprehendeth the promise beleeveth God promising and puts to its hand and receaveth something that God promiseth this is the proper worke of faith only Love hope patience have objects about the which they worke and other bonds within which they consist for they embrace not the promise but fulfill the commandements So Luther in the matter of justification putteth reproach on good workes just as Paul Phil. 3. maketh all his priviledges and his very workes of righteousnesse that he doth by the grace of Christ dung and losse in the comparison of imputed righteousnesse Workes saith he cannot be taught except yee hurt faith seeing faith and workes in the matter of justification are extreamely contrary so that the doctrine of works must necessarily be a doctrin of Devils and a departure from faith Pernitiosi Doctores sunt qui hodie nescio quibus occasionibus adducti contendunt legem in ecclesiâ non praedicandam Tu legem non doceres ubi verus legis populus est scilicet avari supeâ—bi adulteri usurarii Idololatrae In Antinomorum dogmate erat haec propositio sigâ—is esset adulter tantum ut crederet se habitu rum Deum propitium Sed qualis quaeso Ecclesia in quâ tam horribilis vox sonat faciendum discrimen erat docendum quod adulteri sâ—u peccatores duplices sunt quidam qui agnoscunt adulterium seâ— pâ—ccatum suum alii securè indulgent Quomodo predicatio legis potest as debet ex Ecclesiâ ejici nonne simul excludis timorem Dei maximam partem operum Dei Luth. tom 2. in Ge. Antinomi novi isti prophetae contendunt homines tractandos suaviter nec terrendos irae divinae exâ—mplis sed diversum Paulus dicet 2 Tim. 2.3 Vbi dicet scripturam utilem ad objurgandum ad castigandum Ne in Antinomorum insaniam inâ—idamus qui legem ex Ecclesia tollunt quasi vero in ecclesia ommes siâ—t sancti mundus quidem tales doctores amat sicut apud Hierem. dicunt loquerâ— nobiâ— placentia Antino docent omnia peccata sublata nec arguenda esse nec homines terrendos lege pescatum esseremissum nibil damnationis igitur peccatum est nihil et prorsus sublatum Lex non tantum non est necessaria ad justificationem sed plane inutilis et impossibilis sed data est ut peccatum ostendat iram operetur hoc est conscientiam ream faâ—it Extra causam iustificationis nemo potest bona opera a Deo praecepta satis magnifice praedicare Aeque necessarium est ut pij doctores tam diligenter urgeant doctrinam de bonis operibus quám doctrinam de fide Satan enim utrique sensus est et acerrimé resistit Non sufficit sola fides et tamen sola fides iustificat quia si vera est impetrat spiritum charitatis sic legem implet et regnum Dei consequitur fides nisi sit sine ullis etiam mini mis operibus non iustificat impossibile est fidem esse sine assiduis et magnis operibus Fides justificat non tanquam opus nostrum sed tanquam Dei opus promissio enim non est nostrum opus cum nos Deo facimus aut damus aliquid sed accipimus aliquid a Deo idque tamen per ipsius miserecordiam Texes manu varia semina non autem quero ergo quae cum quibus conjuncta sint sed quae cuiusque propria virtus hic aperâ—e die quid faciat sola fides non cum quibus virtutibus conjuncta fit sola enim fides apprehendit promissionem credit promittenti Deo Deo porrigenti aliquid manum â—â—mâ—vet et id accipit hoc proprium solius fidei opus est charitaâ— â—pes patientia habent alias materias circa quas versaâ—tur habent alios limites intra quos consistant non enim amplectuntur promissionem sed mandata exequuntur Opus non potest doceri nisi laedas fidem cum fides opera in re justificationis extreme adversantur ita a fit ut doctrina operum necessario sit doctrina daemoniorum et discessio a fide Luther speaketh so of Good workes only in the matter of justification But our Antinomians speake so of the whole course of sanctification in order to heaven and as they are the way to the Kingdome not the cause of the crowne as both they follow the person already justified and as they goe before him who is yet to be justified for Crispe saith vol 1. ser. 4 pag. 89. But withall I must tell you that all
but a change of the endeavours to please God whereas before selfe was our God and an endeavour to turne from dead works 2. True repentance is sorrow according to God and hath acts different from Faith 3. To repent is out of godly sorrow to endeavour new obedience and amendment of life Faith is an apprehension of Divine truth to which wee give credit or an heart-dependance and recumbence on God through Christ 4. Wee are justified by faith never by repentance Wee thinke not that teares wash away sinnes Protestants speake not so 2. Nor that they make peace with God by teares they make way to sense of peace or awake us to runne to a promise the formall bottome of our peace in regard that the Lord promiseth to revive the contrite Spirit to accept broken bones to comfort mourners in Zion and wee thinke neither repentance nor good works proper and formall conditions of the covenant of grace but rather conditions of the covenanted CHAP. XXXVII How good works are necessary FOr good works 1. We call not these good works that are extorted by the terrours of the Law as a captive keepeth the high way because his Keeper leadeth him in an iron chaine Nor 2. these which flow from the sole authority of God as Lawgiver Or 3. which issue from meere morall principles without saving grace but these we call good works in an Evangelicall sense that not onely are done from the authority of the Law-giver but also from a mediatory and Evangelike obligation from the sweet attractions and drawing coards of the secrets of Christs love And 2. from Evangelike faith that purifieth the heart 3. From Physicall principles and supernaturall habits of grace good works are this way necessary 1. That as grace and glory differ not in nature but gradually as the morning dawning of twy-light and the noone-day-light so the good works done by the grace of Christ and that perfect love of God and our brethren in heaven are of the same nature different in degrees and the one degrees and waies to the other especially when from Gods free promise of the blessings of this life and that which is to come the Lord hath made a passe betweene the one and the other and the Lord hath tyed himselfe to himselfe not to us to carry on grace out of meere grace Every branch that bringeth forth fruit in me saith Christ my Father purgeth that it may bring forth more fruit unto every one that hath shall be given and he shall have abundance He that soweth to the spirit shall of the Spirit reape life everlasting There is a harvest promised to this sowing as to a speciall furtherance of our reckoning in the day of Christ hee that soweth bountefully shall reape bountefully yea sent once and againe unto my necessitie not because I desire a gift but I desire fruit that may abound to your account if ye through the spirit doe mortifie the deeds of the flesh yee shall live But being made free from sinne and become servants to God yee have your fruit unto holinesse and the end everlasting life Blessed are they that doe his commandements that they may have right to the tree of life and may enter in thorow the gates into the city And lest we should think the commands are all but one only precept of beleeving hee addeth for without are Doggs and Sorcerers and Whoremongers and Murtherers c. He that hath my commandements and keepeth them he it is that loveth me and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father and I will love him and manifest my selfe to him All these evidence to us that holy walking is a way to heaven as sowing is to harvest and that Christ maketh a promise of life eternall to him that doth his Commandements onely the question is in what tearmes the promise is made to the doer of Gods will as a doer or as a beleever whose faith is fruitfull and with childe of Evangelike doing But wee may say the formall promise of the covenant of grace is made to beleeving as the Law-promise is made to doing Legally and perfectly out of our own without grace and that the Gospel as it is larger then the covenant of grace and as it containeth the whole doctrine of grace taught by the Prophets and Apostles is a promise of life eternall made to Evangelike and unperfect doing through the strength of grace And that because 1. God commandeth good works through the whole New Testament 2. They are so necessary as without them our faith is a dead and vaine faith and cannot justifie us 3. They are the end for which Christ redeemed us that we should live to him bee redeemed from our vaine conversation from the present evill world that we should bee a purified peculiar people to him zealous of good works and in this title also they are commanded 4. They are conditions without which wee cannot bee saved For John Baptist taught this with the Gospel Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit shall be hewen downe and cast into the fire What shall we doe to be saved receiveth this answer Repent and be baptized every one of you Except yee repent yee shall all likewise perish 5. They are commanded as acts of the new creature and partly as contrary to sinnefull fiery and mighty temptations of Satan and the flesh as mortification to fleshly lust faith to unbeliefe Partly as expressions of thankfulnesse for the free redemption in Christ and commanded in the Law in the great Commandement of the loving of God with all our heart just as this Law of loving God did oblige Abraham to offer his Sonne Isaak for God and Judah to be thankefull to God for redeeming them out of the Babylonish Captivity though the Law neither commanded any father to offer his Sonne nor the people to returne from Captivity yet the eternall Law of love commandeth both these and us to doe what ever God-Redeemer commands us as well as what ever God the Law-giver injoyneth onely we cannot say Good works doe merit salvation or purchase right to life eternall Christs bloud is onely so a ransome of life 2. Nor have they any proper condignity to such a high reward being so imperfect 3. Nor can they have any effective influence or proper causality thereunto nor are they causes or conditions of justification but that which Crispe saith is not of God But withall saith he I must tell you that all this sanctification of life is not a jot of the way of a justified person to heaven it is true they are not the meritorious the efficient cause or way nor the formall covenant-condition but a way they are as sowing is to harvest running to the garland wrestling to the victory CHAP. XXXVIII The Gospel is conditionall ANtinomians deny all conditions of the covenant
that in the Gospell the word and the Spirit are alwayes joyned and therefore saith Christ the words that I speake are spirit and life that is they come from the spirit and carry spirit with them Then 1 the Gospell pâ—eached externally to Del and to Antinomians is not that word by which Christ converts soules faith is not from outward hearing as an instrument of our conversion the contrary of which we have proved It s from the inward word in the heart now the word in the heart is very faith it selfe the argument of both Swenckefel and Del is nothing for it is this the word outwardly preached except it come to the heart can never convert the soule because it is but a meere sound saith Swenckefeld it s but a very letter say Antinomians therefore the externall word is no instrument of our conversion but onely the internall word I utterly deny the consequence lay a pen well inked to paper a thousand times it shall never write except the hand of the writer draw the characters ergo the pen is no instrument of writing it followes not So bread except by the blessing of God it be turned into blood and flesh can never nourish ergo the bread that the Baker bakes is no instrument by which we are nourished It s an unjust consequence and distroyes all ordinances naturall and Spirituall It onely followes ergo the word without us is no efficacious cause of conversion and no principall cause and can do nothing except the Spirit inact and animate and concurre with the word which we with both hands yeeld and beleeve as a Gospel-truth The word is but a sound a letter I answer it is not a common sound such as the odes of Horatiâ—s and Epistles of Seneca render but it is in it selfe a sound filled with Majesty power heaven so as every word seemes to be with-child of grace and life yea and separate the word from the Spirit and in the stile conveyance method there is so much divinity majesty holinesse life gravity as the child bewrayes heaven in its forehead and lookes like the Father and Author God and therefore it s more then a sound to a deafe soule actu secundo it hath but a sound and whereas Antinomians say it s but a dead letter they speake of the paper inke and printed characters of the word but vvee take it not so but as the vvords do connotate and involve the things signified the precious promises and as the Lord saith Hose 8. The great things of my law and so they are not dead letters but the instrument chariot meanes of conveyance of Christ and the Spirit to the heart and though vvithout the Spirit the vvord vvorkes not as no instrument no toole nor hammer no axe can build a house except the Mason and Carpenter act and move them shall it follow they are not for that instruments at all 2 Del and Antinomians with Swenckefeld will have the Gospel preached to none but to those that have the internall word and Spirit in their hearts then when Christ and the Apostles Mat. 13. Act. 28. Act. 13. preach Christ and the Gospel in the letter as some other thing then the Law it is not the word of God nor the Gospell why it wants the Spirit to goe along with it and can never change nor reforme saith Del pag. 18. and begetteth but a literall and feighned faith saith Swenckefeld and the word and the Spirit are alwayes joyned saith Del pag. 19. now this is not the written read nor externally preached Gospel nor the Scripture so they must but coâ—sen us for they meane the internall word not verbum vocale And the preaching of faith that Saltmarsh speaketh of free grace pag. 146 is not the Scripture nor preached word which I demonstrate Del speaketh of such a word as hath the Spirit alwayes ioyned with it pag. 19. But the scripture and the externall vocall word hath not alwayes the Spirit joyned with it for when it is preached to Reprobates and to malicious obdured soules that stumble at Christ and the word being thereunto appointed 1 Pet. 2.7 Mat. 13 14 15. Ioh. 12.37 38 39. Ioh. 9.39 It hath not the Spirit joyned with it 2 They speake of such a word as hath the Spirit actually converting and which is therein differenced from the Law that is but a dead letter and cannot minister the Spirit so Del ser. pag. 18 19. So Saltmarsh free grace pag. 146 147 so Swenckfeld ibid. therefore all that Antinomians and Swenckfeldians say that they take not away Word ministery ordinances preaching are meere delusions for by the word of God that begets faith they meane the internall word not scripture nor the written and preached word and so they say nothing to take off this error justly layd upon them to wit that under the Gospell there is no need of Scripture Preaching Sacraments hearing nor doing of any duties to men nor abstinence from murthering killing whoring stealing c. all exterâ—alls are indifferent 3 You see how false it is that the Gospell is not to be preached to any but to those that are converted because it cannot be received by faith by any but by such contrary to Christs expresse commands to his Apostles Mat. 28.19 20. Goe teach all nations so Paul preached to the obstinate Jewes Act. 13 to the scoffing Athenians Act. 17. Is it not therefore the Gospel that they preachâ— 4 It is an undue arguing of Swenckefeldians and Antinomians The word is a literall carnall sensible thing ergo God workes not faith which is a spirituall grace thereby for it followes onely God workes not faith by the vocall word alone except he put to the pul of omnipotency of grace 2 The assumption is false the preached word though in its sound it be carnall literall bodily yet in its power Majesty and the thing signified which is the birth in the wombe of the word it is spirituall lively heavenly 5 Nor doth it follow that Iustification begins at man if the vocall word be the instrument thereof except they say that hearing and preaching did necessarily and effectually produce justification and conversion they are no parts no members no efficacious causes of conversion or Iustification 6 Iustifying faith and salvation both are in their nature things spirituall and yet have their originall from the word preached as an instrument yea from the foolishnesse of preaching 1 Cor. 1.21 Nor is the word altogether bodily because it incurres in the sense of hearing but taking the word preached as it includes the great things of God not as it is letters and sounds it is not carnall but spirituall 2 Cor. 10.5 Sharper then a two edged sword to save or kill on either edges Heb. 4.12 yea even when it is rejected the savour of death unto death 2 Cor. 2.16 17. And the Everlasting Gospell Rev. 14.6 7 Nor can it follow that justifying faith is a work of man
deliberation knowledge action from the soule in either supernaturall works of grace or sinne as if the soule were turned in a rock or a stone 5. All the sinnes of beleevers their Adulteries murthers lying cousening must be counted on the Lords score I tremble to speake it upon his honour be it if he will suffer perfect Angels to sinne more then he can suffer Angels and the glorified that stand before the throne to fall or transgresse CHAP. LXXII Glorifying of God in sanctification needfull ANntinomians tell us of a two fold glorifying of God one in the eyes of God primary immediate passive divine by faith in which God glorifieth himselfe in us justifying us Faith being the Creator as it were of a certaine divinitie as Rom. 4.20 Abraham gave glory to God whereas unbeliefe maketh him a lyar There is another glorifying of God that is outward more fleshly and humane secondary mediate in the eyes of men by good works in sanctification in which we are agents and glorifie God by the Spirit by which wee are partakers of the Divine nature 2 Pet. 1.4 and it is done in a grosser manner by declaring God glorified before men by our good works Math. 5. and greatly inclineth to the glorifying of man by this Abraham hath to glory and rejoyce in holy works but not before God Answ. 1. We are not meere passive in beleeving for then should we not be commended for beleeving nor should wee know rely and trust in an all-sufficient Saviour in beleeving on him though there be a passion in beleeving 2. These enemies of Sanctification abase all holy walking and works of sanctification calling holy walking 1. glorifying of God outwardly and before men in a fleshly manner Whereas God seeeth it and acknowledgeth it in his owne sight sincere unfained perfect in its kind with perfection of parts not of degrees they would have all Sanctification finer hypocrisie I know thy works saith Christ to Smyrna and tribulation and poverty but thou art rich That wee might serve him without feare in holinesse and righteousnesse 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 before him all the daies of our life And whatsoever yee Servants doe doe it heartily as to the Lord not to men Commending our selves to every mans conscience 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as in the sight of God Abraham walke before mee and bee thou perfect saith the Lord. How many of the good Kings did right in the sight of the Lord It s true our best works are polluted with sinne and in the matter of justification cannot endure the strict Law-censure of the Judge of the world if God narrowly marke iniquity But Antinomians are so at odds with holy walking that they will have all the sincere works of the Saints wrought by the grace of God to bee in their substance before God plaistered hypocrisie and yet in the justified these hypocriticall works are no sinne there being no more sinne in the justified nor any thing contrary to a Law which the Lord can see as a sinne more then in Jesus Christ. So here is holy sanctified and lawfull sinne and an innocent hypocrisie and holy and harmlesse corruption and flesh 3. A declarative glorifying of God in the eyes of men not of God must argue the beleever to be lawlesse and a Libertine before men and that he needeth not before men and in his conversation with wife brother children neighbours in his words promises covenants buying selling works of his calling doe all as in the sight and presence of God for if he walke rightteously in his conversation with men hee is behinde Gods backe the Lord seeth him not if he walke unjustly in fornication uncleannesse cousening lying God seeth not these to be sins 4. Why doe Antinomians exclude from works of sanctification the worke of beleeving Are we not to doe all good works in faith as well as for the glory of God and are we not to eat and drinke in faith Rom. 14. vers 22.23 are they not bastard works that come not from such a root as faith As the fruit is ill if the tree be ill and so we must glorifie God primarily immediatly in the sight of God passively in this declarative and active and secondary glorifying of God 5. The Antinomians exclude a third sort of glorifying God to wit in private when neither God seeth them nor men but they are done in a secret closet as praying praysing meditating and soliloquies of the soule with God almes given in private that men see not nor doe the poore know of it this is neither passive nor active glorifying of God and so the division is lame except Antinomians will have us comming with our secret prayers and almes to the streets and cause a trumpet to be blowne as Pharisees doe 6. The gloryfying of God by men that see our good works incline of it self to no glorifying of man more then Abrahams giving glory to God but onely as we either trust to our good works or vainely conceit we are justified by our good works and then being abused they incline to glorifie men and make us vainely rejoyce and boast in them before God So if Abraham should thinke his act of beleeving were his onely righteousnesse before God his beleeving in God should be as fleshly a glorifying of man as any his works of Sanctification CHAP. LXXIII Sanctification concurs as well as Justification to make Saints THough Sanctification say Antinomians make men Saints declaratively to men-ward yet the true cause that makes them Saints in the sight of God is justification To this wee say 1. Take Sanctification as Eaton and Saltmarsh and Denne say Protestant Divines whom they are pleased to call Legalists doe for such holinesse as they say is in Anchorits Eremits and Monks for externall works done without faith it makes men neither Saints before God nor men but meere faireded hypocrites such a sanctification wee disclaime But take Sanctification for holy walking in the strength of the grace of justification and grace inherent in us so we say Justification and Sanctification ought not to bee separated but both concurre to make us Saints the one as the cause the other as the unseparable effect And most false it is that Eaton saith That Sanctification is so farre from being the cause of making us Saints to God-ward that properly it doth but declare that we are Saints to man-ward for so Antinomians make Sanctification nothing but a poore shaddow like an Yvie bush that is no cause of wine but a meere signe to declare and shew in this there is wine Now sure by Sanctification we are partakers of the Divine nature and the Spouses beauty not onely in regard of imputed righteousnesse but also a holy and sincere walking and blamelesse profession of the truth in a chaine of the Spouses necke and in her personall acts of praying and praysing and the sweet ministery of the Gospel in regard of
stand before the Lord against such of the Kingdome of England for many generations who ingaged their faithfull and well-minded brethren in a blinde cause to establish abominable Liberty of conscience Familisme Antinomianisme Socinianisme Prelacy Popery c. And the righteous Judge of the world knowes wee never intended any such thing but we might have beleeved the words of King Charles who told us they minded not Religion in that war But now when we are wasted ruined dispeopled we are not only forsaken by these whose safety peace religion and happinesse we minded with losse of our owne lives I with many others dare appeale to the Sovereigne Judge of all the earth in the sincerity of our hearts but almost utterly destroyed yet divers of the Sectaries professe they had rather fight against the Scots as against Turkes O Earth cover not our blood arise O Judge of the world and plead the cause of the oppressed let all the Nations about and the Reformed Churches and all the generations not yet born bear witnesse to this oppression and violence For if such as did sweare the Covenant which was the only thing that engaged us had said ingenuously at that time we sweare to endeavour the extirpation of Popery Prelacie Superstition Heresie Schisme Prophanenes and whatsoever shall be found to be contrary to sound doctrine lest we partake in other mens sinne But in the mean time wee purpose to plead print write preach and in our places endeavour both in Parliament and out of it in the Assembly and out of it in our Ministery and Christian walking for toleration and brotherly forbearance of Popery Prelacie Superstition Heresie seperation and gathering of Churches out of true Churches judging the Presbyterians of Scotland whom by the oath of God they are to defend the Schismatickes and indulgence by Law and otherwise to be yeelded to Papists Arminians Socinians Arrians Familists Antinomians Seekers Antiscripturists Enthusiasts c. but none to Presbyterians at all we should have blessed your right down ingenuity yet have our Brethren really so sworne and so practised But saith Burton the Scots are the vilest of men p. 17. partakers with murtherers with rebels with Traitors Incendiaries underminers of Parliament and City c. Words of butter and oil soft and sweet would sooner convince us and arguments of iron and brasse that are strong hard invincible should more edifie and perswade The truth is fire but not passion Burton speakes fire not alwayes truth These are not the words of such as warre under the banner and colours of love and fight the battells of the Lambe Passion is a paper-wall to a weake cause your Brethren stood once in your bookes for talents and pounds but now for halfpennies consider where the change is we was at that time the same you call Presbyterians now and professed the same to you Deare brethren be humble and lowly to your old friends bee not perjured for ill will to us we shall mourne to God for that wicked revenge the Covenant will pursue you and God in it dally not with God they shall all be broken and splitted upon the Covenant of God who labour to destroy it Now when you have the sword the purse the Army the Parliament for you insult not over your brethren Quem dies vidit veniens superbum Hunc dies vidit fugiens jacentem summisque negatum stare diu He was but an Atheist and a mis-interpreter of providence who said Victrix causa diis placuit sed victa Catoni Successe in an evill cause is not happinesse beleeve it Heresie when shee is heire to her mistresse is a burden that the earth trembles under yee know Heresies goeth with broad Peacocke wings through the Land and takes in Townes and Castles but they had good helpe from Presbyterians their Antichristian brethren as they like to call them Sects are courted multitudes take hold of the skirt of a sectary now adayes But the Court is paved with glasse and to you all the faithfull Ministers of Christ are but Antichrists Priests The white golden breathings of successe may blow you asleepe but cannot secure you your Brethren have beene low in Scotland for your cause I shall be satisfied without recrimination The Scots are not the vilest of men they are not partakers with murtherers but I shall onely answer that I judge that in England the Lord hath many names and a faire company that shall stand at the side of Christ as his conquesse in the day when he shall render up the Kingdome to the Father and that in that renowned Nation there be men of all rankes wise valourous generous noble heroick faithfull religious gracious learned And I hope to reap more peace in naming England from the choisest part then M. Burton can find comfort in his passion in denominating the Scots or their Army from the worst and vilest part not to deny but there be too much wickednesse and prophanenesse in both the Nation and Army yet shall I desire all the Sects whom M. Burton and his brethren would have tolerated to look at their brethren as men compassed with infirmities and let these of such as thus accuse them that are without sin cast the first stone at them which were a good way to try if Antinomians would not arise and stone to death so many as they were able to master alleadging God cannot see such violence and bloodshed to be sinne in them also we professe to be orthodox and a strong Presbyterian is but a poore old rotten Coach to carry men to heaven there is more required of these who shall be heires of salvation but this cannot justly impeach the Presbyterian way of Antichristianisme And wherein is the Generall Assembly of Scotland Papall and set up above Kings and Kesars and may bring Presbyterians under a premunire Had M. Burton any arguments to make out this sad charge against his brethren but the stollen and reprinted not reasons but railings of Prelates and Oxford opposers of Reformation and particularly out of a lying Treatise called Issachers burden the father of which was the excommunicated Apostate Jo. Maxwel sometimes pretended Bishop of Rosse for M. Burton hath nothing in this passionate Treatise of his own but is an Echo in grammer and matter to Whitegift Bancroft to lying Spotswood to the flattering time-serving Balaams who to gratifie King James and Bishop Laud and these of the Prelaticall gang objected the same with more nerves and blood against the Scottish-Geneva discipline then M. Burton does That booke of discipline was the Prelates eye-sore and Mr. Burton must bring the weapons of his indignation out of the Armory of Babylon against Presbyterians I love not to compare men with men only good Reader pardon me to name that Apostolicke heavenly and Propheticall man of God Mr. John Welch a Pastor of our Church who for this same very cause was first condemned to death and then the mercy of King James changed the sentence to him
in all things sinne excepted Luk 24.39 40. Ioh. 20.26 27. 18 The second birth is the Godhead and Gods true being obtaineth the victory beareth rule with God and bringeth forth the name of Israel or Christ it selfe sect 12. 19 Christ is not true man nor Abrahams seed after the flesh but God only in so far as he followeth Abrahams faith 20 H. Nicholas and all his illuminated Elders are Christ all not of his way the Antichrist so some Antinomians now at Oxford Say 1 That Iesus Christ is not God essentially but in name 2 That his nature was defiled with sin aswel as ours 3 It is as possible for Christ to sin as for any of us 4 The Trinity of the Persons is a fiction 5 The fulnesse of the Godhead doth dwell bodily in the Saints as in Christ and that when this Godhead shall be manifested in them they shall have divine honour and have more power then Christ and doe greater workes then hee 6 The scripture is but a shadow and a fiction now the word saith 1 The father and Christ are one and he thought it no robbery to be equal with the father Phi. 2 and maintained he was the consubstantiall sonne of God Ioh. 7. Ioh. 10 else the Iewes would never have said he blasphemed in calling himselfe the sonne of God by adoption for they knew Godly men to be so the sons of God 2 By him the word the heaven and earth were created Ioh. 1.1 2 3. Col. 1.16 17. now God onely created the World Ier. 10 11 12. Esay 44.24 Gen. 1.1 Psal. 33.6 7 8. 3 Hee was anoynted above his fellowes with grace Psal. 45.2.7 and wee receave out of his fulnesse and light our halfe-penny candles at this sunne of righteousnesse Ioh. 1.14.16 and he giveth the Holy Ghost Ioh. 16.14 And hath received a name above all names Phil. 2 9 10. and God said to none of the Angells farre lesse to any man save to the man Christ sit thou at my right hand Heb. 1. 21 The Familists are perfect in this life and so are Antinomians Towne as p 77 78. Saltm free grace 140. 22 To say the three persons are one God is a foolish making three Gods Antinomians professe that Antitrinitarians Arrians Socinians are their brethren so they beleeve and love God as they doe 23 There is but one Spirit in all creatures and that is essentially God Epist to the the two daughters of Warwicke 24 Love and well doing and good workes are the cause of our re-reconciliation and the very saviours that beares our sins whereas Christ bare our sinnes in his body on the tree Esay 53.6 7 8. 1 Pet. 2.23 24. 25 Christs dying on the Crosse is nothing but H.N. and his illuminated Elders their obeying constantly the doctrine of H. N. so as no suffering could cause them to forsake it 26 Then is Christ put to death when any of the Family of Love is no longer led by the Scripture but by the Spirit of revelation that is as sure as the Scripture so said Mrs. Hutchison Rise reigne p. 61. er 27. 27 Mortification is to H. N· justification and removing of sinnes so doe Antinomians confound these two 28 The resurrection of Christ was but a passing out of the flesh or letter of the law to the spirituall being of illuminated Elders 29 Christ sitteth not in our flesh at the right hand of God but in the spirit 30 The comming of the Holy Ghost in cloven tongues was the comming of Christ againe from heaven in the Spirit 31 Christs ascending to heaven was his comming to heavenly mindednesse and fulnesse of knowledge 32 The resurrection of the body is a rising in this life from sin and wickednesse 33 In H. N. God this present day judgeth the world the family of love are the many thousands of his saints that Judgeth with him even now and reigneth on the earth Evang. c. 1. sect 9.10 34 The Marriages of all not enlightened are unlawfull 35 Men shall marry and have wives at the resurrection 36 The illuminated Elders cannot sin nor pray for forgivenesse of sinnes so Antinomians hony-combe c. 3. pag 25. c. 7 pag. 139 forgiven sin is not or hath no being before God Saltm free grace pag. 44. 37 Heaven and Hell are in this world Antinomians say we are fully and compleatly not in hope onely saved in this life 38 The family of love is under no law 39 All things are the act of God 40 Angels and Devils and wicked men are acted immediately by the Spirit of God 41 The Scripture is a shadow 42 Ordinances are for babes in their family of love only 43 The perfect are to live above all ordinances 44 Jf temptations lay hold on us and force us to sin and we cry to God for helpe and finde no helpe we are as guiltlesse as the maid forced in the field who cryed and had no helpe and is not for that a whore H.N. documentall sentences sect 13. sect 8. It is true the beleever shal not be charged to eternal condemnation for sins of infirmities that are his burthen and affliction aswell as his sin but sins of infirmities are essentially his sinnes who acts them and make him lyable to wrath If God should contend with David for his adultery and murther displeased the Lord but God cannot charge the sinne of whoredome on a maid that is forced and doth cry out if she doe cry out and have no helpe it is no whoredome on the maids part 45 All the scriptures are to be exponed by allegories This makes 1 The Scripture a masse of contradictions and lyes 2 This turnes our faith and knowledg into a phancie for the scripture it selfe cannot be a rule of exponing scripture if the glosse destroy the text 3 The scripture shall not Judge all controversies as Christ referres the gravest question that ever was Whether he be the sonne of God or no to this tribunall Search the Scriptures for they testifie of me Ioh. 5. 4 All the articles touching Christ his birth life death buriall resurrection ascending to heaven sitting at Gods right hand his second comming c. Creation providence histories shall teach nothing an Allegory shall cause scripture say the contrary Antinomians call all their allegories the spirituall sense of Scripture Bread may in an allegory signifie comfort then the love of God dwells in a brother who seeth his poore brother famishing and gives him neither cloathing nor bread but onely faith in good words Brother goe in peace and be warmed and cloathed an◠feed for he gives the poore man allegorically bread and cloathing contrary to Iames 2.14 15 16 17. 1 Ioh. 3.17 18. yea so all scripture shall be turned over in lyes dreames and phancies all covenants violated all faith private and publike among Christins may be broken and yet truth kept in an allegoricall sense according to scripture A man may murther his brother and have life eternall Contrary to 1 Io. 3.15
right to heaven of which the Law saith nothing 6. The Law gives a reward as a due debt though not merit the Goâ—pel giveth a reward against merit CHAP. IX Of the threatnings of the Law and Gospel TOuching the third part as the Law is in strict tearmes divided from the Gospel 1. The Law-threatnings are on the person for the actions and for the least faile in thought word or deed but the Gospel-threatnings are rather on the â—tate then the actions or if they be on the actions it is for the condition and state therefore the learned Pareus saith that the Gospel as the Gospel hath no threatnings at all For indeed the state of the kingdome of the beleever fenceth him from the curse he is free from condemnation because he is under another King then the man that is under the Law As the man in Scotland is free from Murther which he committed in Spaine not because his act of Murther deserveth not hee should die but because he is a member of the state of Scotland and no penal law of Spaine can reach him in that Sate Pareus thus farre saith true that it is the Law properly that curseth and that the Gospel as the Gospel curseth not but is properly glad tydings For 1. He that beleeveth not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is already condemned that is before his unbeliefe sentence is passed on him by the Law and the Gospel doth but ratifie the sentence For if we suppose there had never been a Gospel nor a Mediatour the sinner should have been a cast-away and sentenced man but now because he beleeveth not he shall not see life but the wrath of God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 abideth on him then it was on him before if hee should beleeve in the Sonne of God the sentence of the Law should be taken off the Prince offereth a pardon of grace to a man that hath 〈◊〉 hâ—s Sonne so he will accept of it he refuseth to accept of a Pardon and therefore dyeth rather for his bloud-shâ—d then for his not accepting pardon it would seeme among men too lâ—w a cause of death to put him to death for refusall of a pardon at 〈◊〉 the sentence was given out for killing the Kings Sonne onely he dyeth more deservedly that both he killed the Son and despised his Princes grace or rather his doome is aggravatâ—d and the chaines of Capernaum are made heavieâ— because they comparatively justifie Sodome and so the Gospel-vengeance is an addition to the Law-vengeance as he that dyeth of an extreame distemper of body and by a gracious Physitian may be cured but refuseth the medicine the distemper is the Physicall cause of his death his contempt of the art of the Physitian is the morall cause and a reason why he dyeth without the compassion of his friends and with greater torment of mind to himselfe Yea Faith is not properly the cause that hath any effective influence on so noble effects as are free pardon and free salvation farre lesse is it any meritorious cause Christ hath no joint causes with him in this excellent worke of saving a sinner unbeliefe is a morall cause non removens prohibens 2. The Gospel is an exception of grace against the Law for the Law saith He that sinnes shall dye the Gospel addeth except he beleeve or he shall certainly dye except he beleeve in him who justifieth the ungodly so that the Gospel saith Amen to the Lawes threatning and taketh them not off nor contradicteth them in their owne nature 3. What ever threatnings are executed against an unbeleever they are the Law-threatnings it s a Law-death that the unbeleever dyeth for all that eternally perish doe perish under the law and the covenant of works never man is lost under Christ if therefore the Gospel say Whoremonâ—ers Adulterers Murtherers Drunkards shall not inherite the kingdome of God this threatning doth necessarily presuppose a Law-state if they which doe such things remaine under the Law otherwise the Gospels intent is not that they perish but that they beleeve and be saved CHAP. X. Of Gospel feare 〈…〉 with Gospel-freedome to feare hell so wee 〈…〉 and punishment more then sinne for sinne is a 〈…〉 then punishment For 1. we are commanded to 〈◊〉 him who can cast both soule and body into hell 2. It s not a Law-spirit of bondage that some tremble at the word of 〈◊〉 nor for Josiahs hâ—â—rt to melt at the reading of the â—aw 3. Not to be affraid of judgement is a part of a heart rockie and hardened Though Felix his trembling at judgement did prove him to bee under the Law because hee feared onely â—udgement and judgement as a greater evill then sinne Nor is it mercinary to love the reward so it be not more in our intention then a holy communion with God For 1. Moses by Faith had an eye to the recompence of reward Paul set the garland before him as his end 2 Wee are commanded so to runne that we may obtaine to lay up a sure foundation that we may lay hold on life eternal Onely wee are not to make happinesse and our created blessednesse so much out formall end in running our race as holynesse and our objective happinesse which is God himselfe If Antinomians would difference betweene love of a hire and hireling love then should not Towne condemne the just nor can the Fathers under the Law be said to have served the Lord with an upright heart if they served him for hire which Satan judged hypocrisie in Job cap. 1. vers 9.10 See Psalm 73.25 Job 13.15 CHAP. XI Law-feare and Gospel-faith consistent NOr doth Master Towne and Antinomians inferre by good arguing because beleevers may bee stricken off sinnes upon the consideraton of Law-threatnings that their sinnes deserve not wrath as well as the sinnes of others as â— Job saith What then shall I doe when God riseth up and â— Destruction from God was a terror to me But it followeth not that therefore to obey God sub paenà for feare of the condemning Law is not free Gospel-obedience For it s most false seeing this obedience for feare of the desert of sinne was in Paul though he was perswaded that eternall wrath should never be inflicted on him as is cleare by his words Knowing therefore the terror of the Lord wee perswade mâ—n And we know if our earthly house be dissolved we have an house not made with hands but eternall in heaven 2. Law-threatning when Faith assureth the conscience of freedome from the wrath to come and love-perswading are most consistent For most cleare it is that Christ and his Apostles doe command and strictly charge in the Gospel So Antinomians erre who teach that the Gospel perswadeth rather then commandeth and reasons and argues us to duties rather then bindes and enforces and that holinesse and sanctification now is not such as is faâ—hioned by the Law of outward command but by
bloud he washeth us 4. Wee behoved to beleeve from eternity for wee are justified by Faith 5. All the justified have a reall union and interest in Christ to live by faith and wait on God in all their troubles by faith but though their be an union of love in Gods minde from eternity betweene the elect and God yet a compleat union betweene us and Christ without the Spirit and without any faith though it be boldly asserted by Familists is against the Scripture for then might wee bee borne againe and not receive Christ by faith contrary to the Scripture and be united to Christ as branches to the Vine-tree and not abide in Christ have Christ dwelling in our heart and not by faith contrary to Paul so might Christ live in us and we eat and drinke him as the true Manna have the Sonne and yet want faith contrary to the Scriptures All which or most of them prove that wee were not justified when Christ dyed on the crosse 6. All that are justified are unseparably sanctified and called â—nd the blessing of justification hath with it the receiving of the promise of the Spirit through faith and peace with God through the Lord Jesus Christ accesse by faith into grace whereby we stand rejoycing in the hope of the glory of God glorying in tribulation patience experience hope but many for whom Christ dyed have none of these till they be justified by Faith the distinction of justification in or before God or to our own sense by faith will not help this for the Scripture no where speaketh of justification but by faith onely the meritorious price of our justification is payed on the Crosse but that is not justification CHAP. XIX Gods love of good will and of good liking a warrantable distinction NOr can wee stand to that Antinomian ground that in Justification there is no change of our state and spirituall condition before God and that God hath the same love to us before and after conversion and that it is a vaine distinction of Gods love of good will called amor 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 vel benevolentiae and good liking amor complacentiae because God loveth because he loveth and for no cause in the creature not their most eminent works done by the influence of Gospel-grace But if this distinction bee right taken it hath an evident ground in Scripture We teach that the love of benevolence and good will is the liking free delight and choise of the person to glory and to all the meanes even to share in Christs Mediatory love and the fruits of his death in this love he willeth and ordaineth and layeth up good and happinesse for us expecting no payment at our hand the other love is onely denyed by Antinomians but without ground for this love of complacencie is of things not of persons and when we say God loveth his Saints for their inherent holynesse and delighteth in them for it we meane no other thing then that God loves the sparkles of his owne rarest worke his saving grace so farre as to make it a meanes to fulfill the love and gracious decree of good will of free election not that any new immanent act of love arises towards the person loved that was not in God toward that person from eternity but the truth is God first createth a lovely and love-worthy object and then out of that love that createth being and the lovely object hee goeth on to continue the former act of loving and delighting in that object and rendreth it more lovely Creatures cannot create the object of their love but find it created to their hand and expect to have some perfection added to them in an union of love with that excellent thing they love and they are often deceived and ever their love hath a cause and hire and reward in the thing loved Now when it is said that God loveth all that he hath made then he created his owne lover and his owne love 2. When hee loveth the chaines and bracelets about the neck of his Spouse Cant. 4. He there createth in his Christ a new rare piece liker to himselfe then the works of pure and simple creation this is not pure love but a continuation of his creating good will nor doth the creature engage God to love it but as divine love gave being to these ornaments of grace the inherent holinesse in his Bride so that the same love continueth it selfe in delighting in his owne worke 3. So he is said to love his Bride for or because of her excellency and beauty that he putteth on her and still he loveth his owne in Christ for his owne rare workmanship not that the creature was cause or begetter of that love and he crowneth his own gifts not our merits saith Augustine his owne worke not our worke for we are meere vessels to containe grace as grace and meere patients in this love and so he loveth Christs imputed righteousnesse in us and this righteousnesse imputed is not simply eternall but hath its rise in time If then Antinomians say we make our time-holinesse a cause and condition of eternall love they must remove this objection themselves for imputed righteousnesse which they make the cause of eternall love will stand against them more then against us For wee say both imputed and inherent righteousnesse are meere conditions no causes of eternall love and that not simply but as they are protracted and continued to carry us on to glory yea imputed righteousnesse is no more a cause of eternall love being onely a thing temporary and not eternall à parte ante nor inherent righteousnesse so must all these be expounded The Lord loveth the righteous The Lord loveth truth in the inward parts he taketh pleasure in them that feare him The Lord is ravished with one of his Spouses eyes with one chaine of her necke to him she is all faire and not a spot in her All these include not onely inherent holynesse but imputed righteousnesse and both have their use in time but can never prove that our time excellencie whether imputed or inherent is the cause condition reason merit or ground of the Lords eternall immanent and unchangeable love but the fruits thereof and the condition of its continuance And that our Lord loves us with the same love of complacency that is that he driveth on his chariot paved with love in sweet fruits of free election the same way with the same delight But that when the justified person whores swearers kils the innocent denieth the Lord Jesus as did Peter and David God loveth us as much as when they beleeve pray walke in all holy conversation and that God is not a whit displeased with the Saints for these sinnes because all his displeasure or revenging justice was drowned and swallowed up in Christs sufferings is to us abominable CHAP. XX. There
is to Papists who make justification the expulsion of the habit of sinne and the bringing in of habituall righteousnesse which expelleth all sinne except venials which indeed are no sinnes for sinne pardoned to Antinomians and Papists who are harmonious in this point are no sinnes 2. Nothing be it adultery or parricide or any worke of the flesh committed after justification can bee sinne for it is against no Law by this way and doth not so much as prâ—judge salvation by demerit it onely scandalizeth men but cannot offend God My soule enter thou not into these mens secrets 3. Sinnes against Christian conversation such as the adulteries of the justified are no sinnes before God because all sinnes as sinnes stand in the way as contrary to salvation then aske Antinomians is a justified person obliged to eschew Adulterie they shall answer Yea hee is obliged but how There is a two fold obligation one of Law another of the free Spirit the former is removed the justified man by no Law or Law-obligation is to eschew Adultery as a sinne against God 1. Because hee is freed from the Law and all directing and obliging power of the Law 2. Because it involveth a contradiction that his Adultery should be sin when committed by him and pardoned before it be committed for so it should be sinne and no sinne How then is he obliged to forbeare Adultery Onely by an obligation Physicall and of the Spirit such as we call an obligation of naked courtesie if he forbeare it is an act of love and arbitrary freedome but if hee commit it it is not sinne because it is in him against no Law-obligation no more then an Englishman committing felony against the Lawes in England it is the Antinomians owne comparison or killing a Swan in Thames which is forbidden by the Lawes of England does faile against the Lawes of Spaine So his sin is against love not Law as if the Law commanded not all love and love with all the heart and as if these two were contrary and the Law and the Gospel did involve two contrary and contradictory wills in God and the Lord should be changeable and unconstant in Law and Gospel and his Adultery should bee contrary to men and Christian conversation onely not to God 4. All acts and personall duties of sanctification which we must persue and follow else wee cannot see God are but degrees and parts of the compleat Sanctification that wee hope for in heaven and the path of the just is as the shining light that shineth more and more till the perfect day therefore they must be commanded as the way to salvation and not as arbitrary acts of good conversation before men but I shall here answer M. Townes objections tending to prove that good works are not so much as the way to salvation 1. If good works bee such necessary conditions that without them happinesse is not attainable then 1. though the grace of God doe save as the alone cause yet it doth not freely for what God doth freely it is without all condition or consideration of mans workes or worthynesse Answ. It is good that Towne granteth though good works be commanded in the Gospel yet grace may for all that bee the onely cause of salvation but contradicting himselfe hee saith If good workes be commanded in the Gospel then grace is not the onely cause of salvation but grace and works Law and Gospel must be confounded We say not they are so necessary necessitate medii by necessity of meanes but that any savingly beleeving at the nick of the extremity of his twelfth and last houre God taking away all opportunity of good works is undoubtedly saved but in the worke of that faith there is a seed and supernaturall disposition to good works Now that this mother never bringeth forth the birth hindereth not but good works are necessary to salvation necessitate precepti in regard of Gods commandement but Antinomians deny good works to be necessary by any commandement of God 1. Because to omit them maketh the justifyed partie lyable to no guiltinesse or sinne before God say they Because he is under no Law and where there is no Law there is no transgression nor guilt saith Saltmarsh 2. Wee being justified are under no Commandement so as wee can violate this Commandement be it of Law or of Gospel for it is pardoned before it be committed 3. What God doth freely is without conditon as a meriting cause or as a cause or condition slowing from the strength of our nature without grace Without a perfect condition free of all sinnefull imperfection adhering to it such as the Law required it is true but now the assumption of the objection is false What hee doth freely is without all condition Evangelicke wrought by the strength of grace and mixed with sinnefull infirmities so the major is most false for Faith should not then be a condition of justification good works are so conditions as they be graces also How often said Augustine with Scripture God crowneth his owne free gifts in us not our merits 4. The same way I distinguish the consideration of good works either Legall or Evangelike And 5. Towne doth conjoyne our worthinesse which is none at all with our good works which are something for they are conditions of meere grace Object 2 So saith he Yee make works the causes of salvation Answ. It followeth not that they are con-causes or joynt-causes with Christ but onely conditions just as a mans journeying on foot or horse to a City or a Kingdome to inherit it is the way condition of his entring the City But it is not his Charter or Law-title or right to enjoy the Crowne as his inheritance any effective influence to the title of the Crowne of heaven I dare not ascribe to any works in us or to any but to Christ but undeniably good works are not so much as conditions of justification they follow a man justified but goe not before justification no more then the Apple goeth before the tree or the cisterne before the fountaine nor are they the conditions of the Covenant of grace they are the conditions of covenanted ones not of the covenant Object 3. If salvation depended on condition of our good works or dignity it would be uncertaine and doubtfull Rom. 4.16 Answ. The Apostle Rom. 4.16 clearely is on the theame of Justification by faith and the condition of it which is faith onely 2. Wee say not that salvation dependeth on works as a condition but on the grace of God which worketh every good worke in us freely without hire or money neither works nor free will are our sure free hold of heaven Object 4. Yee confound Law and Gospel and runne on that common error that the Gospel is conditionall remission of sinnes dependeth not on works Answ. It is a new heresie of Antinomians to deny a conditionall Gospel it is all one as to bely
dreameth or that wee labour to draw assurance of a good spirituall estate from outward reformation which saith Towne Protestant Legalists labour for when the heart is naught Antinomians say that all our evidences are dung True they are not evidences of Legall perfect righteousnesse more they prove not Asser. 1. Love to the brethren sincerity and the like that have not grace for their stocke a right fountaine and principle the Spirit for their Father Christ for their Crowne and garland are no evidences at all that wee are in Christ for they rather darken then render justification evident Could wee looke over our selfe and abstract our thoughts from our selfe as if we were nothing and dead and behold the actings of grace and Christs love-raptures and the glancing of love on his members as on bits pieces and little images of a super-excellent transcendently glorious Christ and see these in the Spirit the worker then were surer inference to be made thus then when we eye our selves As beholding the excellencie of a Godhead in Sunne and Moone when we looke above the shaddow-creature and with senses abstracted and the elevation of the Spirit wee see these created excellencies in the deep and boundlesse Sea which hath no shoares nor coasts nor bottome in a vast and great God we are farther from Idolatry then when wee pore on and pine away in the minds restings in this side of an infinit Majestie and so is it here If it be naturall Logick and the light of our owne sparks that make the inference I love the brethren therefore I know I am translated from death to life it s but Moone-light of one halfe sleeping that is suspected to bee day-light but if naturall light by the day-light of saving grace make the inference it is sure arguing As And hereby doe we know that we know him if we keepe his Commandements and we know that we have passed from death to life because we love the brethren 2. All these are equivalent to the same But if we walke in the light as hee is light wee have fellowship one with another and the bloud of Jesus Christ his Sonne clenseth us from all sinnes And He that loveth his brother abideth in the light and there is none occasion of stumbling in him And if yee know that he is righteous yee know that every one that doth righteousnesse is borne of him This is written for our own personall security and knowledge of our owne state as all the Epistle aymeth at this and not so much as we may know one another as is cleare when John sheweth us the scope of his Epistle is to give marks and I nothing doubt but the Holy Ghost aymeth at the discovery of a dead faith and to refute the Antinomians as is cleare These things have I written unto you that beleeve on the name of the Sonne of God that yee may know that yee have eternall life and that yee may beleeve on the name of the Sonne of God So saith he 3. Putting a difference betweene the children of the world and the children of the devill in this the children of God are manifest and the children of the devill whosoever doth not righteousnesse is not of God neither hee that loveth not his brother Then certainely some hath said in Johns daies It is enough to salvation if a man beleeve in Christ he is obliged by no Law nor Commandement that is outward and written to doe righteousnesse John saith such a one is not borne of God And My little children let us not love in word neither in tongue but in deed and in truth and hereby by reall loving of the brethren we know that we are of the truth and shall assure our hearts before him And Whatsoever we aske we receive of him because we keepe his Commandements and doe the things that are pleasing in his sight Now sure this cannot make the keeping of his Commandements and our good works fellow-Mediators with Christ. Then John must argue from the effect to the cause and intimate that its false that some may bee borne of God who keepe not his Commandements as Antinomians say When one that walloweth in fleshly lusts is to beleeve without more adoe in Christ and he is a saved man So saith John Little children let no man deceive you he that doth righteousnesse is righteous as he is righteous he that committeth sinne is of the Devill Then some have deceived themselves and others in saying That doing of righteousnesse was neither condition nor way nor meane to salvation nor any infallible signe of a mans being in the state of grace Now who saith all these this day but the Antinomian Now if Antinomians as they doe say that a discourse by way of a practicall Syllogisme or naturall Logick can produce no Divine but onely a humane Faith And that all Logick is to be abeted the carnall and corrupt discoursings by Logick that exalt themselves against the knowledge of God are to be abeted but that the use of naturall reason not corrupt should be disclaimed is against the tenour of the Old and New Testament in which there bee Lawes Ordinances reasonings practicall Syllogismes to beget faith to cause us slee sinne follow holynesse which no man can say is a humane thing except Antinomians following their old Masters the Libertines who said to lay aside naturall reason discoursing to know neither good nor ill was true mortification and naturall reasoning and knowledge of sinne or righteousnesse sense of ill doing or feare of sinne or judgement are but the tastings of the old Adams forbidden fruit as wee shall heare afterward Asser. 2. Yea we may know our selves to bee in the state of grace by holy walking and acts of beleeving and we may know our holy walking to be true by other acts of holy walking and beleeving so John saith by the loving of the brethren we may know we are in Christ and so that wee beleeve and love God and againe reciprocally By this wee know that we love the children of God when we love God and keep his Commandements for this is the love of God that we keep his Commandements Then the loving of God that may argue that wee beleeve may also evidence our Justification and all dependeth on this as the Spirit joyneth the light and evidence of grace to cause us know our loving of God and translation into Christ by our loving of the children of God and againe our loving of the Children of God by our loving of God 1 Joh. 3.14 1 Joh. 5.2 Asser. 3. One and the same cloud that is the cause of our doubting whether we beleeve or no is not the cause of our doubting whether wee love the brethren or no and so they must furnish different evidences from a misty twylight or evening of desertion from some apprehension of the sinnes of youth often our faith is clowded
man at the same time in the same sense 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Aristotle taught us be both lame and whole in the legges blinde and seeing deafe and hearing dead and living it may be Antinomians who will have the beleevers Adultery no Adulterie have a way of Logicke of their owne to goe with Libertines who said knowing sinne to be sinne holynesse to be holynesse was a worke of the flesh and of old Adam who through eating the forbidden fruit knoweth good and evill But so you will say If God justifie the ungodly beleeving which is an act of sanctification must goe before justification then are wee sanctified and can doe that which is pleasing to God before we be justified and be in Christ then must we please God as beleevers ere we be in Christ and so exercise acts of the life of grace before we be in the Vine tree and before we be branches ingraffed in Christ for sure to beleeve is an act of the life of Christ in us Answ. If beliefe or faith be an instrument and so a cause in its kind or a condition call it as you will without which Paul in the Epistle to the Romanes and Galathians and Hebrewes c. saith we cannot be justified I see not any inconveniencie of this order 1. The sinner dead in sinne a sonne of wrath 2. A walker after the course of the prince Sathan who ruleth in the children of disobedience 3. The Gospel of free grace is Preached to the dead to the Elect heires of wrath but freely for Christs sake and with an intent on the Lords part of the same circumferance and spheare with the decree of the election to glory though they know not 4. The Law and curses of it preached to them with the Gospel lest they despaire to humble them 5. The sinner Legally humbled slaine in the dead throw Rom. 7.11 with a halâ—e-hope of mercy prepared for Christ though the preparation have no 1. promise of conversion 2. No ground nature or shaddow of merit 3. No necessary connexion with conversion save onely that God may intend the same preparation in an elect for conversion which he intendeth for no conversion in a reprobate 6. The stony heart of meere grace removed in the same moment a new heart put in him Ezech. 36.26 27. Zach. 12.10 Deut. 30.6 Jer. 31.33 or the habit of sanctification infused 7. In the same moment the soule beleeveth in him that justifieth the ungodly 8. In the same moment God for Christs sake of meere grace justifieth the beleeving sinner And every one of these necessarily presupposeth the former Nor can Antinomians free themselves or any with them of the pretended inconveniencie they would put on us to wit that we must beleeve before wee be actually joyned to Christ in justification for they will have us justified and so please God and actually injoy the fruit of election which is justification Rom. 8.29 before we beleeve that is before we feele and to our owne sense know that we are justified Now this feeling and knowledge is an intellectuall act of the life of God and the habit of an infused new heart of regeneration as well as our justifying Faith and so we yet exercise an act of the life of Christ which must bee an act of saving grace actus secundus or a life-operation flowing from the infused habit of sanctification before we be justified in the sense that Scripture speaketh of justification which saith all alongs Wee are justified by faith God justifieth the man that beleeves in him that justifieth the ungodly Now sure the Lord giveth to us faith to beleeve justification before he justifie in the sense that Paul speaketh of justification For the Lord giveth the Spirit of sanctification of grace of adoption of faith c. for all these are vitall and supernaturall acts of the same Spirit to these that have not the Spirit at first to the uncircumcised in heart Deut. 30.6 to the wildernesse and dry ground Esai 44. vers 3. to these who pollute his name among the heathen and have stony and rockie hearts Ezech. 36.21 26. to these that are a dying polluted in their owne bloud Ezech. 16.6 8. to those that are dead in sinnes and trespasses Ephes. 2.1 2 3 4 5. and this the Lord doth for Jesus Christs sake freely Gal. 4.4 5. then before we be actually in Christ by justification and branches in him by order of nature first wee so farre find favour in the Lords eyes or please him or rather he is of free grace pleased with us that he giveth his holy Spirit to us and upon the same ground may we being yet not justified and so in that sense not in Christ by order of nature first beleeve before we be justified nor is it justification that formally united us in this actuall union as branches to the Vine tree but union is a fruit of life as is the joyning of soule and body together and so a fruit of the infused life of God or of the habit of sanctification and thus it followeth not that we beleeve before we be united to Christ as branches to the Vine tree but onely that we beleeve by order of nature before we be justified which the Scripture saith But to returne we are not obliged to M. Saltmarsh who argueth against justification by faith slandering Protestants most ignorantly and the doctrine of Paul as if to bee justified by faith were to bee justified by a faith of our owne framing without the grace of Christ or by faith as a merit and hire that hireth and purchaseth Christ to be ours It is a curious and an unedifying question to search out as Cornewell doth Whether faith be active or passive in receiving Christs imputed righteousnesse though if hee speake of actuall beleeving to call it passive is an unproper speach i. we hold that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 credere to beleeve is not imputed as our righteousnesse which is Socinianisme 2. That for the dignity worth and merit of Faith Christs righteousnes is not imputed to us and therefore neither wee nor Scripture before us saith we are justified for Faith but by Faith 3. That Faith receiving Christ is the free grace of God given to us in the state of sinne They say The begger putteth forth an act or actions both of petitioning for almes and reaching out his hand to receive it and so it is not every way so of free grace as Christs imputed righteousnesse is to us But should we suppose the tongue and speach the arme and the act of stretching it forth to receive the almes the sense of poverty the opinion of the goodnesse of him from whom he seeks almes doth bow the consent and will to seek almes and receive it were bestowed on the begger of the same free grace and compassion of the giver of the almes by which he giveth the almes yee would say almes and stretching out of the hand were both
the Angel and prevailed he wept and made supplication to him Gen. 32.24 25 26. nor is this an old Testament-Spirit the parable of the unjust Judge and the Widdow is in scope a doctrine of prevailing with God by importunitie of prayer Iames bringeth the example of Elias for the prevailing of prayer and Christ This kinde of devill is not cast out but by fasting and prayer and so the Spirit of adoption worketh freely Object 2. Saltmarsh The Spirit worketh not freely when wee take in Christ but by the way and rest not wholy on him Answ. They looke on Christ by the by who take in their good works as fellow-fellow-causes with Christ thinking to be heard for them Christ is but a by-Mediator if he bee not whole Mediator it s a practicall error naturally in us to improve the the sufficiencie and incomparable weight of Christ to little purpose and dote more upon done duties then on Christ yet this is not our Doctrine but our sinne that we are to be humbled for Obj. 3. Saltmarsh When we are in bondage to some outward worship of circumstances as time place person the Spirit works not freely Answ. It may be Saltmarsh thinketh the Lords day under the New Testament legall men of his gang doe it 2. And not to pray but at such houres as the Spirit moves him because the Spirit onely and the Spirit acting and ravishing is the only obliging Law and command under the New Testament the Letter or written Scripture to pray continually in all things to give thanks to bee abundant in the worke of the Lord to be rich in good works and to make our selves friends with the Mammon of unrighteousnesse at any time ere we bee put out of our stewardship except when the Spirits wind bloweth faire that so they may receive us into the everlasting habitations is a law bondage yea to abstaine from adulterie murther swearing except the Spirits acting which is our onely obliging Law now is a legall not a Gospel-service nor can a beleever sin when he commits adultery murther for hee doth nothing against the only obliging New Testament Law the acting of the Spirit when the Spirit actually doth not act him and stirre him to duties of charitie and love of the brethren and doth not actually deterre and pull him back by his immediate impulsions and breathings from adulterie and murther I desire an answer intimating a difference between sins of Adultery and Murther and so sinfull omission of duties of Chastity and saving the life of innocent brethren for a Moneth which must involve a sinnefull not-loving our brother for a Moneth and the not praying to God for thirty dayes as the heathen Kings Law was upon supposition that the Spirit act not and stirre not up to prayer for thirty dayes and if so it is a question if Adultery be sinne and if abstinencie from Adultery upon the conscience of the seventh Command be not an impeaching of the free working of the Spirit of Adoption and a spece of legall bondage As for Saltmarsh his fourth ground of bondage to wit that to doe any thing from the power of an outward commandement or precept of the Word that it brings forth but finer hypocrisie and his seventh To take any outward thing to move them rather then apply Christ for strength life and Spirit is meere bondage I have answered alreadie it is an Enthusiasticall opposing of the working of word works and well grounded experiences of the Saints to the actings of the Spirit and a looseing of us from beleeving and obeying Scriptures from trembling at the Word and a most wicked way of Enthusiasme Object 5. Saltmarsh when they doe because of some vow or covenant they have made c. It is more properly the service of the Old Testament and part of their bondage for wanting the power and fulnesse of the Spirit of adoption to worke them to obedience freely from within they were under the power of outward principles to put them on from without Answ. 1. If nothing move men to doe but the Letter of the Covenant Vow or Promise not the Spirit of grace then can the Spirit never be said to worke Legally or not freely because the Spirit works not at all nor can this bee called properly the service of the Old Testament except Antinomians say the Spirit of grace wrought none at all in the Old Testament but onely the Letter contrary to all the heavenly Psalmes made by the Holy Ghost and the acts of faith in Moses David Job Jeremiah which every Page of Old Testament refuteth and we must say meere nature and the dead Letter without the Spirit acted them So Hebr. 11. Psal. 51.10 and infinite other places on the contrary 2. Nor can yee say by the same reason that a naturall conscience a desire of a name lest they should be reputed covenant-breakers moved these in the Old Testament to act for so none could have been tearmed men according to Gods heart nor perfect and upright men as David Job Ezechiah Noah because upon this Antinomian ground they were all but fine hypocrites If I mistake not Saltmarsh condemneth all who have taken the Covenant in the three Kingdomes and are moved for feare of the oath of God to stand to it as Legalists and Old Testament Spirits The Covenant that Asa Josiah caused the people to stand too was a Law-bondage that we are not now obliged to and upon the same grounds to keepe faith and promise upon lawfull contracts and oathes between King and people or made to God to keepe Marriage-covenants contracts legues and bargaines betweene man and man which we conceive to be of the Law of Nature must all be the proper service of the Old Testament and contrary to the Gospel to keepe my lawfull promise made to a man to pay my debt because I promised when I borrowed money To keepe the Covenant of God made in Marriage because it is an outward covenant is to doe because of some Covenant and to be in Law-bondage and to doe as being under the power of outward principles and Paul must writ to Philemon as under the bondage of the Old Testament If Onesymus hath wronged thee or oweth thee ought put it on my count if he should pay Philemon seeing he became his debter by an outward promise and covenant he did not pay him by the Spirit of adoption working freely but by a Legall Spirit as being under the Law not under grace by this learning A Jesuiticall way to loose men from all covenants promises bargaines in buying and selling treatise and Indentures betweene persons Nation and Nation to loose us from all the bonds of the Law of Nature and Nations and free us from that which is the Law and the Prophets Whatsoever yee would men should doe to you the same doe ye to them Then shall nothing bind us under the New Testament Doth the Spirit of
it Reader then judge how farre Antinomians differ in this from Libertines And M. Saltmarsh saith the same What ever promise there is which hath any condition into it it is ours in him in Christ who was the onely conditioned and qualified person for all promises And M. Towne Saltmarsh and all Antinomians in every page of their bookes say wee are freed from the Law as an obliging rule of holy walking and under grace that is under the Gospel because the Law is a killing dead Letter and can never give life nor Sanctification But the Gospel saith hee is like the Sunne caries along with it light and life But I pray is not the Gospel without the Spirit a killing Letter aswell as the Law and can it ever quicken or sanctifie without the Spirit more then the Law Then by this Argument the beleever is tyed to nothing as an obliging rule either of beleeving or holy walking but to that which doth effectually quicken and sanctifie so neither Commandement of Law nor Gospel without the Spirit is the beleevers rule but onely the Spirit and the Spirit effectually quickening and actually sanctifying then the Spirit must onely be our rule and we must onely be obliged to be ruled and to lye under the actings of the Spirit as dead creatures When then we neither beleeve nor repent nor abstaine from whooring robbing lying because the Spirit acteth not we sinne not for sinne is against some obligation Antinomians will not say we are obliged by any Law old or new to have the actuall breathings of the Holy Ghost when we omit good and commit evill then the holy Spirit must immediatly and onely act good in us and his non-acting immediatly must be the only cause of beleevers murthering whooring lying and is there not then a Spirit in all under the Gospel working in them all good and by no working causing all the sinnes they commit And what is sinne then but an opinion And can it be our worke or any thing but Gods worke in us CHAP. LXXVIII Libertines and Antinomians take away all sense or remorse of conscience for sinne Paral. X. LIbertines said We are to be troubled in conscience for no sinne because God worketh all in the creature and nothing is beside the will of God Libertines of our time say If God will let me sinne let him see to his owne honour And upon the same ground M. Archer saith Wee are not to bee troubled for our sinnes because they come from God and we may safely say that God is and hath a hand in and is the Author of the sinnefulnesse of his people So doe other Antinomians though they speake not out 2. Upon another ground Antinomians bury all conscience of beleevers sins 1. Because their sins are no sins being remitted before they be committed 2. Because say they it is against Faith and from unbeliefe the flesh and want of mortification to be moved or touched in conscience with sinne as I often have proved CHAP. LXXIX Libertines and Antinomians Parallel beleevers with Christ incarnate Paral. XI AS David Georgius and his cursed followers so Libertines said Christ in us dwelling was God manifested in the flesh or Christ is but a patterne type a representation or figure of patient suffering and of these vertues required in these that are to be saved So the Author of the Bright Starre makes Christ-man the patterne in the mount that in worship and conversation wee must follow And when this Author and Theologia Germanica take away God from us and say there is nothing in the creature but God they doe worse then Libertines Yea they fancie Christ incarnate to be a divine and holy man and so evert a principall Pillar of our faith that is that wee beleeve in the Sonne of God Christ-God made manifest in the flesh And the N. England Libertines teach That Christ is incarnate in every beleever So the English Antinomian saith I have nothing to doe with your Moses or the Law I am Christed and Goded And a late giddy phranticke Pamphlet which I should not honour to cite saith A man in Christ is baptized into a living active God and a dead passive creature And though Antinomians as yet seeme to grant that the Sonne of God was incarnate yet we know not how long for they equall a beleever most proudly with Christ making both his person and all his actions though Adultery Roberie Lying as cleane from sinne as Christ or his actions or as the glorified in heaven 2. Saltmarsh saith The Gospel commands rather by patterne then by precept and by imitation rather then command They deny all obligation either by Law or Gospel to lye on us 3. Because wee are in Christ they say all our sinnes all our sufferings are so drowned up swallowed and nothinged in Christ that we are neither to feare or be touched with the sense of either sinne or affliction and that the beleever is to remaine in Christ alwaies rejoycing triumphing being in heaven already and sorrow and sighing for evermore being banished away CHAP. LXXX To follow sense as a Law is our rule say Libertines and Antinomians Paral. XII LIbertines taught That any calling was lawfull and to follow callings was to follow their naturall inclination and to live as they pleased Quintinus the Libertine to one that asked how hee was in health said in wrath Can it be ill with Christ When hee was present at a solemne Masse with a Cardinall he said Hee saw the glory of God from this ground that Christians cannot sinne that their inclination and nature is their guide which they called the Spirit and they are loosed from all Law therefore with David Georgius they said A marriage-covenant tyed Christians no longer then the naturall temper and disposition of husband and wife would carry them on to agree to live together when inclinations of Christians did thwart they were free to marry another And so said they of goods that they might robbe and spoile calling inclination a calling as if it were their calling to robbe and oppresse So the same doe Antinomians teach in their beastly distinction in which Towne Eaton Denne and Saltmarsh say Beleevers are as cleane from sinne before God and as they live by faith as Jesus Christ himselfe but to men-ward declaratively and as they live by sense or seemingly as Saltmarsh meaneth or according to the flesh as Towne saith now the flesh is the Asse The beleevers sinne and may whoore kill but this following of the sense and the flesh is nothing but the Libertines following of his naturall inclination or calling Now the beleevers Adultery to Saltmarsh is but seeming Adultery then it is not in deed and before God Adultery and he followeth his sense and naturall inclination as the Libertine said in putting away his wife
hath undertaken to doe the powers of hell cannot hinder these that belong not to Christs care why should they heare pray knock or why should the Word be preached to them Saved they cannot be as not belonging to Christs care So saith the New England Familist If Christ will let me sinne let him looke to it upon his honour be it So Del yeeldeth to the Pelagian Arminian and Socinian that exhortations motives reasons preaching praying ought not to be for these that are absolutely reprobate and upon the same ground they need use no meanes who are absolutely chosen to glory Christs love and care is as great to reforme inwardly and to convert as to redeeme upon the same ground these whom God hath decreed shall live so many yeares sure God undertakes to fulfill all his decrees with alike strength of irresistible omnipotency they need not eate drinke sleepe plow eare labour for no power in hell can infringe one decree of God more then another all husbandmen sit idle all tradesmen buy and sell and labour with your hands no more be at rest and quiet take M. Dels word Gods undertaking takes away all reforming in men all undertaking in second causes the husband-man can no more feed your body with bread then he can redeeme your soules with his bloud both belongs to Christs care But though Paul knew it belonged to Christs care Rom. 9. To call whom he predestinate yet he had exceeding sorrow in his heart for his kinsmen the Jewes to save some of them that is to reforme them and the care of all the Churches lay on them M. Del hath more courage he will not be dismayed But wee heard that Libertines from Gods working all in all creatures said the creature cannot sinne cannot doe good sin is but an opinion And all good saith the Familist is onely God And God becommeth all things in man and nothing is or hath being but God and his will God is all and the creature nothing Del by this Argument inferres a cessation of all second causes of Ministery Ordinances Reformers converters of soules by Word and Gospel of Heaven and Earth Sunne Fire Water they may all sleepe God undertaketh to doe all and no powers of Hell can resist him no lesse then Christ redeemeth his alone Parliaments ought not to sit Assemblies should not dispute Ministers should not preach nor Print Sermons sure Christ shall make good his owne undertaking to reforme though Del and I both were buried and neither trouble our selves with Pulpit or presse But shall men therefore omit all dueties in outward reforming Stoicks can say no more Del Pag. 14.15.16 Holding forth the meanes of Reformation he saith Christ reformeth by the Word onely and doth all he calles rejects bindes looses terrifies comforts inlightens makes blinde saves damnes and does nothing in his kingdome without the Word Now are yee cleane through the Word The Word is quicke and powerfull he reformes not you with outward power but by his Word I will publish the decree the Spirit of the Lord is upon me My word shall not depart out of thy mouth When the time of Reformation was come he sent his Disciple to carry on the worke of Reformation he saith Goe teach all nations he sent them not out with Swords and Guns and this Word only truely reformes the outward power of the world sets up an image of reformation only Answ. 1. Del and Familists seeme to extoll the Word of God but they juggle with David Georgius and Henry Nicholas who understood by the word Verbum internum the Enthysiasticall inward word of the minde and the Spirit for he and Saltmarsh as they are sparing in citing Chapter and Verse of Scripture so they never expound this Word to bee the Scripture nor can I observe in all their writings that they call it the Scripture as Christ and his Apostles frequently say The Scriptures must be fulfilled as it is written in the Scriptures and in the Prophets The Antinomians in and about London Deny the Scriptures to be the word of God they say the Scripture is but the Letter not the Word of God 2. They say They themselves by the Spirit can write and dite Scripture Mistresse Hutchison with hers said That her particular revelations about events to fall out are as infallible as any parts of Scripture and that shee is bound asmuch to beleeve them as the Scripture for the same holy Ghost is the Author of both Some say they can worke Miracles as if the same immediatly inspiring Holy Ghost and in the same measure that was in the Prophets Apostles and Pen-men of Scripture were also the same sanctifying Spirit of grace that is in all beleevers whereas these differences are cleare betweene them 1. The immediately inspiring Spirit rendred the Prophets and Apostles in that they spake and wrot by such inspiration the immediate organs of the Holy Ghost and such as could not erre So that their word was formally Scripture which priviledge is not given to the most sanctified 2. The Prophets and Apostles were acted above the reach of free will humane doubtings discourses ratiotinations in searching and finding out the truth they needed not advise counsell teaching from men or Angels from flesh and bloud to come to the very knowledge of the Letter of the Gospel Gal. 1.11.12 Ephes. 3. vers 2.3 4. But the Saints need such helps though the Spirit teach them all things to come to know the Letter of Law and Gospel 3. What the Prophets spake God spake what holy men speaketh is Gods word secondarily and in so farre as it agreeth with the written Word of God and no otherwise Jeremiahs word was not secondarily the Word of God and so farre forth onely the Word as it agreeth with the writings of Moses and though Paul forbid Circumcision and Moses command it Pauls command is no lesse primarily and simply the formall object of Faith and the written Word of God then the word of Moses or the Ten Commandements written on Tables of stone by God himselfe But what Del and Antinomians say contrary to the Word of God is nothing else but the very word of the Devill 2 That Del and Libertines with him meane by the Word of God not the Scripture but the Spirit of God in his graces I prove because saith Saltmarsh This Law of the Gospel is not such as it was before a meere Law in the Letter but it is now under the Gospel a law of life spirit or glory it is a Law in the hand of Christ and with the promises of Christ to make it spirituall indeed therefore the word is called Scriptures given by Divine inspiration and the Spirit is called the annointing and teacheth all things and I will put my Law in their inward parts But the Gospel as distinguished from the Law and written by the Apostles is but a meere Law in the Letter
in our selves but that the justified must be as free of all indwelling sinne as Christ Jesus or as the glorified in heaven and so absolutely perfect in our person and our works maketh all sanctification no sanctification before God and that inherent holynesse rendreth us not a whit lovely and acceptable to God more then if wee were wallowing in our lusts and serving the Devill contrary to the Scripture that saith That our sanctification is the will of God that our service is holy living and acceptable that God is well-pleased with our sacrifices of almes in Christ Jesus And that a holy and sincere profession and walking doth take the love and ravish the heart of Christ yea by this way we sinne onely in dishonouring Christ and in not walking in him contrary to the end of Redemption which calleth us to sanctification not in the sight of God but meerely declaratively for Eaton tells us that if any more be ascribed to Sanctification but a meere declaration to the eyes of men that we are healed we goe on with Papists and Bellarmine to make sanctification the onely formall cause why we are justified But the man is farre out Bellarmine and Papists say that God so farre accepteth works of inherent holynesse that without Christs imputed righteousnesse we are justified for these works we acknowledge that God for Christ loveth and accepteth works of sanctification and obligeth us to them by a command to doe them except we would sinne in omitting them but that God loveth and accepteth them as the cause of our righteousnesse in part or in whole in the matter of our justification wee utterly deny Antinomians would have all acts of sanctification meerely arbitrary and of courtesie and to come from no obligation of a command or Law and so that these acts being omitted are no sinne before God and being omitted they are but arbitrary no declarations we are not healed or discourtesies to Christ no sinnes against a Law and being performed God loveth them no more then he doth Adulteries or Murthers acted by justified persons Master Eaton ignorantly objecteth That God by justification shall place us in two contrary states of salvation and damnation to bee the members of Christ and of the Devill that God shall come short of his end of Redemption if wee be sinners in our selves then cannot the bloud of Christ clense us from all sin divers other things that are Characters of weakenesse and poore Divinity he objecteth as all his gang doth Answ. Sinners are taken two wayes in Scripture 1. For wicked men servants of sinne sinne having a dominion and Lordship over the party as in many Scriptures is cleare So we say not that we are both righteous before God and sinners in our selves we should then be both sanctified and not sanctified members both of Christ and of Sathan as hee objecteth But we take sinners in this for these that are sinnefull and have sinne dwelling in them and for such as If they say they have no sinne they are lyars and so the Scripture also taketh sinners Now Antinomians deny the justified to sin at all or to have any sinne dwelling in them because Christ hath washed away all sinne But ignorant men they should know that justification is a forinsecall and judiciall freeing us from all sinne that is from the Law-guilt and condemnation of all sinne and so all our sinnes are removed as a cloud are taken away as if they were cast into the bottome of the Sea but justification is not a Physicall washing away and expulsion of all indwelling and inhabitation of sinne and an introduction of the contrary habit as when heat commeth in the same subiect in the place of coldnesse light in the place of darkenesse whitenesse in the subject in which blacknesse did reside as Antinomians with Papists fondly conceit this is sanctification which is imperfect and graduall in this life not justification and so it followeth not that one and the same person because sinne dwelleth in him after justification but subdued and having lost his dominion is now both under the dominion of Sathan and also a member of Christ. 2. Christ obtaineth his end in Redemption which is to free the sinner from sinnes condemnation in justification fully and in sanctification by degrees not fully while we be perfected in glory Christ can well dwell in the heart by faith where sinne dwelleth as an underling but not where it dwelleth as a King and Tyrant in its full dominion which dominion is not removed formally by justification though the state of justification and the full dominion of sinne cannot stand together in the same person but properly and formally by sanctification It s true God seeth sinne pardoned and the sinner freed from the guilt but he seeth it dwelling in us not to our condemnation for the Lord imputeth it not and therefore it followeth not that the Lord both seeth us righteous in Christ and not righteous in Christ but onely hee seeth us righteous in Christ by imputation of grace and freed from condemnation and sinnefull in our selves by the inherencie and in-dwelling of sinne pardoned and subdued which is the doctrine of Prophets and Apostles delivered in the Scripture CHAP. LXXXIX Antinomians are ignorant of Faith to dreame that its Faith to beleeve against sense that our sinnes are no sinnes IT is the true nature and essence of Faith say Antinomians To beleeve cleane contrary to that which we see and beleeve in our selves if God hath spoken the contrary as if God were not able to abolish that sinne which wee dayly feele dwelling in us out of his owne sight above our reason sense and feeling The Mystery is this as for the Adulteries Oppressions treacherous Covenant-breach Lying that justified Antinomians commit Faith is to beleeve they are no sinnes before God against no Law but meere nullities in the Lords Law-court as Towne saith though Lying and deceiving reason beleeveth them to be sins for its true faith To beleeve the contrary of what sense and reason apprehendeth because God so saith and giveth his Sonnes bloud to cleanse us from all sin and sweareth the same But this is a dead false lying faith of Antinomians 1. Because the light of faith discovereth the sinnes of a justified person to bee hainous provocations of the majestie of God so David I acknowledge my transgression and my sinne is ever before me And the Church For our transgressions are with us and as for our iniquities we know them And Paul in the New Testament I know that in me that is in my flesh dwelleth no good And I find then a Law that when I would doe good evill is present with me And I see another Law in my members rebelling against the Law of my minde and bringing me into captivity to the Law of sinne which is in my members these three words 〈◊〉