say thus but not others Our Divines say Faith is the Condition or the Instrument but not the Form or formal Cause of our Justification This I acknowledge and Answer that the Reason is apparent because our former Divines did apprehend that it is by the Law of Works that we are to be justified and there being no Righteousness but Christs which Answers that Law it must be his alone that can justifie us But this being a mistake the fundamental mistake of our Divines formerly Protestant and Papist and it being not by the Law or according to the Law of Works but by the Law of Grace or according to the Gospel that we are to be judged and justified it is impossible that Christ's Righteousness which is a Righteousness according to the Law should be that Righteousness that justifies us according to the Gospel It is impossible that Christs Righteousness should be that Righteousness of God which in opposition to Works does justifie us according to the Apostle or that Righteousness of God which without the Law is manifested seeing this is a Righteousness with the Law being perfectly conformable to it And it is impossible Logically impossible but Faith which is that which the Gospel requires as the Condition of Life instead of the perfect Obedience of the Law when performed and imputed for Righteousness should be and must be that Righteousness which is the Form or formal Cause of our Evangelical Justification I will now speak to a Passage that put me to many Thoughts in another Letter in regard to our speaking of Justification as passively taken You seem say you to make Justification Active and Passive two things The former Gods imputing the latter Faith imputed for Righteousness If they are different you make two Justifications which you condemn in me If they are one they must both have the same Form or formal Cause But Justification is Gods Act and it is impossible Faith or any thing should be the formal Cause of Gods Act it may be the Condition not formal Cause As for this Passage I did wonder to see you so much in earnest which may be objected against Christs being the meritorius Cause as well against our Faith being the formal Cause and against its being the Condition of our Justification What Because I am not for making a double Justification which are of two kinds one by the Law another by the Gospel do you think I may not therefore distinguish Justification into Active and Passive when we mean nothing else by it but that Justification may be Actively and Passively taken And as for the Metaphysical Point you are concern'd alike with me It is the Will of God by giving us his Law of Grace that when a Man believes he shall by that Law be Made Accounted and Used as a righteous Person and so be free from Punishment and Saved Of this Will of God now ex parte Agentis we must know there is nothing without him can be Cause or Condition God is Actus purus God acts only by his Essence and his Essence is immutable yet does that Will which is one and the same cause all Diversity and he that is immutable cause Mutations And as that Act of his Will or Will which is all one is terminated on the Object and recipitur in passo it causeth its effects and is extrinsecally denominated by them In these Effects there is an Order and one thing the cause of another according to that of Aquinas Deus vult hoc propter hoc tho' propter hoc he does not velle hoc Now when in our Justification which is Gods Act the Will of God by his Law of Grace does make that Change of State in a Believer or of his Relation toward God so as to have thereby a Right conferred to Pardon and Life there are Causes of that Change and Right which being new in the Object Ex connotatione Objecti Effectus denominate Gods Act. It is impossible say you that Faith or anything should be the formal Cause of Gods Act. Very good that were absurd indeed But what is Gods Act here His Act here is exprest in the word Imputing and who thinks Faith the Form of that Nothing in us can be the cause of Gods Act it 's true but something in us may be the Object upon which Gods Act is terminated and that here is our Faith as he imputes it for Righteousness and this being the Effect of that Act in passo this Faith so imputed is the formal Cause of our Justification so effected As for the Question Whether Justification Active and Passive Justificare and Justificari be one or two Justifications it is a nicer Matter I thought than need be answered but seeing it falls in and must I say There is no distinction without a difference and where things differ and are diverse their Form and Definition must be diverse Justification Active and Passive therefore must have two Forms but the Matter is the same Faith in the Imputation of it and in its being imputed to us for Righteousness is the same So that formally they are two materially they are one and the same Justification Well Justification to proceed upon what hath been said tho' Gods Act yet passively taken as other things in the sense shewn must have its Causes Sanctification is an Act of Gods Grace as well as Justification and you will not deny our inherent Grace to be the formal Cause of Sanctification for all that But how Not as Actively but Passively taken As for the Causes then of Passive Justification Of the Efficient the Final the Meritorious there is no dispute but of the Material and Formal there is and it is fit to be considered Mr. Baxter hath taught that Christs Righteousness is not only the Meritorious but Material Cause of our Justification And you have cited Mr. Anthony Burgesse holding Christs Active Obedience as well as Passive to be the Matter but denying that we are formally justified by it Where he speaks after Amesius I suppose seeing it is upon the same Reason that if it were so we must be as righteous as Christ which I have mentioned before as Bellarmine's Objection against that Doctrine and which by Ames his waving it he acknowledges unanswerable when yet we know that Doctrine to have been the Common Protestants formerly as Davenant before tells us and some more weighty Divines than Mr. Burgesse tells us yet thus much further Mirum hic videri non debet Christi justitiam non Meritoriae solum sed Materialis immo formalis causae rationem habere cum id fiat diversimodè nempe qua illa est propter quod in quo sive ex quo per quod justificamur So the Leiden Divines For my own part I have in my Book taken up with Mr. Baxter upon trusting to his profounder Judgment but I will now shew also my Opinion The Meritorius Cause comes under the Efficient and is the
have no right to Heaven we cannot be freed from the poena damni also the loss of the Reward but we must have right to Heaven together with our freedom from Condemnation It may be said further a man may be forgiven but yet not reputed never to have broken the Law God cannot account any thing other than it is and the man was a sinner This now being true it appears how Christ's Righteousness therefore cannot be thus imputed as our formal Righteousness because then as he we should be look'd on as if we had never sinned when we shall ever even in Heaven be judged as such that once had sinned but now forgiven The root of the Errour as I have said ever lies here to think we must be justified by the Law of Innocency as Christ himself which does subvert the Gospel Your assured Friend and loving Brother John Humfrey To Mr. Humfrey Reverend and dear Sir THAT you have taken so much pains to open my Understanding and to make an Eye-salve to clear my sight I count a great favour and take my self to be much obliged to you for it For I desire to understand my Errors in every sense I am willing to open my eyes and all my Powers to let in Light which is so sweet and grateful Eccles 11.7 I say not vale as he but salvelumen amicum Some points indeed are clog'd with Interest which dims the sight or bribes and biasses the Judgment that either it cannot discern the Truth or at least not entertain and embrace it Either secular Interest lies in the way as in the Controversie about Conformity or carnal Interest as in the Antinomian Opinions which serve to gratifie Persons in a Licentious Course of Life and so they find it agreeable to espouse them for as what we would have to be true we are easily perswaded that it is true so what we would have not to be true we are hardly convinc'd that it is true Here it must be a strong and a clear Light that will pierce a Mans eyes which he purposely shuts against it But that is not the case here There is nothing but the power of Truth to sway the Judgment either one way or other which unto those that dig and delve for it as for bid Treasures that do 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Heb. 12.14 hunt and pursue after it by an impartial Examination and Consideration it will be found one time or other and manifest it self in its native Beauty Prov. 2. v. 1 5. How far forth the Light in your Papers has cleared my Eye-sight and contributed towards a cure of my Mistakes will be seen in what follows Only premising this That besides what I have said by way of Answer or Reply I have added some Figures at the beginning of every Break in your Letter without reference to the sense and not considering whether that will bear them or no but only for convenience of Quotation that the Passages I reply to may be more readily found out In the beginning you tell me that my Discourse is very concordant in the main with my Sentiments I am sure we did not confer Notes nor play the Plagiaries one with another my Discourse being writ almost twenty Years ago and with little assistance from Books more than the Bible and Concordance as is exprest in the Epistle § 1. You observe my shiness to admit of Faith or Gospel-righteousness to be the Form of Justification I granted it may be Formal-righteousness or Gospel-righteousness and yet not the formal Cause of Justification for Love Hope Fear of God c. are gospel-Gospel-graces and consequently Gospel-righteousness and yet none of our Protestants say that they are the formal Cause of our Justification though you say Faith working by Love is and therefore I thought there might be a distinction between them and that one did not necessarily infer the other But upon further consideration of what you say upon that point I don't see at present how I can evade or avoid the dint and force of your Reasoning to prove that Faith is the formal Cause of Justification But however I would not lay too much stress upon a Logical Notion or Term of Art He that will grant we are justified by Faith in a plain sense without Tropes or Figures shall pass for found in the Faith with me whether he will call it the Form or formal Cause of Justification or no I 'll contend with no Body about such Terms and why you should insist so vehemently upon that Term I know not This serves for Answer also to § 2. and § 3. which do but persesecute the same point § 4. Herein you seeing more I believe than Mr. Baxter there is one thing that he saw and you see not Justification you say is Gods accounting and using us as just but you have not taken in what he saith further That it is also the making of us just How is that Not by Infusion as the Papists nor by Non-imputation as Mr. Wotton but by Imputation God imputing our Faith for Righteousness To this I Reply In my Explication of Justification Active as you call it or bestowed by God say I I took in every thing that I found any ground in Scripture for for I fetch'd it wholly out of those places of Scripture there quoted And whereas it is commonly said to be a Law Term and therefore we must have recourse to Lawyers to understand the true sense of it I have there I think fully opened the nature of it purely out of Scripture and if I mistake not more fully and plainly than was done before and I have sometimes thought that that was one of the clearest things in all my Book If you think my account defective and would have any thing else added to it give me your Scripture for it as I have done for what I say and I 'll add it Till then here I stick But to make my sense more plain I 'll give you a Scheme according to my conception of the whole Matter There are these several things which must be carefully distinguish'd and considered as distinct in this case 1. Christ has obtained at Gods hands That Faith should be accounted for Righteousness This is enacting the Law fixing and establishing the Rule according to which Judgment must pass None can say that this is either making us just or justifying us because it is but a General as all Laws are 2. There is the bestowing of Faith upon us which is our Gospel righteousness and this now is making us just with the righteousness of Sanctification or enduing us with the Righteousness of God whereby we become conformable to the Rule Neither is this Justification but Sanctification or effectual Calling Regeneration Conversion Forming Christ in us all which with some other such Expressions I take to be Synonymous and to signifie the first Grace 3. Then comes Justification which is judging us conformable to the Rule or to have performed the
obeyed and suffered both in our stead That Notion I cannot swallow I cannot apprehend that we are bound to obey and suffer both But I think this is spoken to in the Thesis whither I refer you Thus I have gone through the several Paragraphs in your Letter whereby you will find your labour has not been in vain but has had some success upon me I am a Searcher after and a Servant of Truth and don 't count my self too old to learn especially of you who have look'd so throughly into and round about this Point of Justification How far forth my Reply in those things wherein we differ will approve it self to you and find acceptance with you must be left to the Tryal In the whole I have design'd nothing but words both of Truth and Kindness and so do hope that you will find no reason to judge otherwise of me than that I am Your respectful Friend and Fellow-labourer Samuel Clark To Mr. Clark Dear and worthy Brother JUstification is Constitutive and Sentential Juris and Judicis Constitutive is making accounting and using us as just Sentential declares us so at the great day This I hold to be good from Mr. Baxter who in all his Books says the like but in his own manner and words See Cath. Theol. Book I. Part. II. Pag. 69 70. Life of Faith Pag. 326. End of Controversies Pag. 242. Justification then with us is Making Esteeming and Using us as Righteous which are distinguished but not to be divided Constitutive Justification you say is a phrase of Mr. Baxter's coyning and the word Justifie which you have so throughly canvased neither in the Hebrew or Greek will bear it For my part so long as the English and Latine word Justify as Sanctifie Glorifie does speak making just and we have the very term expressed Rom. 5.19 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 made righteous which is all one as to be justified I think that place alone ground enough for Mr. Baxter's word Constitutive and whether the word will or no the matter will bear it When I read Contarenus de Justificatione I admired to see the Doctrine of the Protestant so fully embraced by a Cardinal who telling us of a twofold Righteousness we attained by Faith a Justitia inbarons and a Justitia donata imputata Christi and proposing the Question Utra num debeamus niti existimal nos justificari coram Deo id est sanctos justos haberi an hac an illa he cleaves to the last with these words I have quoted Pacif. p. 15. Ego prorsus existimo And moreover he tells us Fide justificamur non formaliter but †It is false that Faith justifies us Efficiently but it is true that Faith justifieth Constitutively so far as it is it self our personal inherent rightcousness Bax. End of Cont. p. 270. Efficienter which is directly against my Judgment yet do I observe that this he lays down at first as a thing unquestionable that Justificari is Justum fieri propterea justum haberi I confess my self was long before I could assent to Mr. Baxter in this because he seemed to me uncertain or confused when by making just he sometimes understands as you Regeneration sometimes Pardon after Mr. Wotton from whom I believe he took it and sometimes both as appears in the place you cite Cath. Theol. Book II. Pag. 239. By and upon believing we are first made just by free-given Pardon and Right to Life and true Sanctification with it and we are sentenced just because so first made just The Papist say Justification makes us just by the infusion of inherent Holiness and that this infused Grace or inherent Holiness is therefore the formal Cause of our Justification which we know confounds Justification and Sactification The Protestant in opposition to this have generally said that we are made just Rom. 5.19 by Christs Righteousness and that his Righteousness imputed must be consequently our formal Righteousness tho' several of late more cautious take heed how they say that Sententia illorum qui Christi Obedientiam justitiam nobis imputatam statuunt esse formalem causam justificationis communis est nostrorum omnium sententia says Davenant Mr Wotton that Scholastically deep Man in opposition to both does say that it is Pardon makes the sinner righteous and consequently that Pardon is the Form or formal Reason of our Justification Mr. Baxter you see before accounts we are made righteous by Regeneration and Pardon both our Evengelical Righteousness must be with him both the formal Cause though the Righteousness of Christ be the material he says and meritorius Cause of it Leading Calvin hath gone before our Assembly and tells us Nos Justificationem simpliciter interpretamur acceptionem qua nos Deus in gratiam receptos pro justis habet Eamque in peccatorum remissione ac justitiae Christi imputatione positam esse dicimus Inst l. 3. c. 11. For my own part I am here exactly for neither of these but say that it is the Righteousness of God revealed in the Gospel that makes us just and that this is the formal Reason of our Justification I will recite it The Infusion of inherent Grace is Justification Active with the Papist and this inherent Grace infused Justification Passive The Imputation of Christs Righteousness is Justification Active with the Protestant and that Righteousness imputed Justification Passive Pardon with Mr. Wotton Both Pardon and a Righteousness subordinate to Christs with Mr. Baxter But as to me I continue and say the Imputation of the Righteousness of God or of Faith for Righteousness is Active Justification and the Righteousness of God or Faith so imputed is Justification Passive or the formal Cause as Passive of it This one thing I take to be certain that the Righteousness of God which the Apostle tells us is now revealed and therefore before tho' occult in the World as Austin hath it is that Righteousness in opposition to any other whereby we are justified and you having given us so good an account and right Notion of it in your Annotations on the Old and on the New Testament besides what you have said in your present Book it is fit you go thro' and perfect it By this Righteousness of God you understand not the Righteousness of Christ with the Protestants ordinarily nor yet the Righteousness Inherent the Papists contend for whereof indeed you are over-afraid Not by the Works of Righteousness we have done says the Apostle in one place where he means the Righteousness according to the Law of Nature or our Natural Righteousness which is Mans not this Righteousness of God but that which by Adam's Fall we have quite lost insomuch as there could be no Righteousness in the Earth any more as I say in my Books if it were not for another brought in and there is one brought in by the Messiah and as slain in Daniel that is procured by Christs Death and which you in your
just by bestowing Faith is Regeneration which I distinguish from Justification as you and all Protestants do Justification makes just otherwise In the next place you tell me of Relative Grace being founded on Real Grace but I see not wherein that serves you or opposes me Real Grace I take it is that which makes a change on the Person but Relative Grace only on the State giving right to the benefits which belongs to the Person I apprehend so of that Distinction and if I do not apprehend you right you must help my Understanding Well now Regeneration I count with you must precede Justification that is Real Grace Upon this Real Grace then is founded that making us righteous which is Relative There is Faith already wrought and presupposed and God in justifying us does by his Gospel-Law I count constitute or make that Faith to be a Righteousness which otherwise it was not that gives right to the benefits that a perfect Righteousness if performed would give The Regenerate Man I say believes Upon his believing the Gospel-Law or God by that Law does impute that believing to him for Righteousness By which Imputation be is made accounted and used as a righteous Person and so reaps the benefit All which together is his Justification Let us here set our Horses together There is a Righteousness or the Grace of Regeneration or a Righteousness or the Grace of Justification One is Real Grace and the other Relative you say and therefore two Nevertheless when you say the Righteousness that makes us just is Regeneration you do not see that this Righteousness must not therefore be that which justifies us or that which I say is the formal Cause of our Justification It is true that our Righteousness or Faith wrought in us by Vocation Regeneration or Sanctification is the same Righteousness materially but not the same formally with this Righteousness of Justification for if a Man were the most righteous Person upon Earth there were no reward due to it being imperfect and it could not be this Righteousness in Gods sight giving right to the benefit that is this Relative Grace but for the Law of Grace and his Institution by it A right to Impunity and Life is Righteousness and that is not the Righteousness of Regeneration You say God Regenerates us and that makes us righteous Very well and I tell you that this is the Righteousness of the Person which justifies not and so I am no Papist but it is a Righteousness of the State the Righteousness I say which is made so by the Gospel-Law or that Relative Righteousness which does give right to the reward or benefit when the other imperfect cannot is the Righteousness we intend When a Man then is made righteous by God or by his Law upon his believing who was made righteous before by Regeneration or when a Man hath Faith bestowed on him in his effectual Vocation and that Faith after is imputed to him for Righteousness it is not his Faith and Righteousness as inherent but as so imputed is that Righteousness which justifies him or that Righteousness that is the Form or formal Cause of his Justification You may see here how by going to avoid Popery by denying that we are made just by Justification you take away that Medium which by the granting and maintaining we must obtain our purpose God says Mr. Baxter as Law-giver above his Laws maketh us just by his pardoning Law or Covenant and as determining Judge be justifies us by Esteeming and Sentencing us just and as Executioner he uses us as just All know such things are spoken in order of nature not of time which I need not mention before or now but to avoid Cavil You deny this Constitutive Justification but what say you to the Matter Does God by his Law of Grace make a Man just upon his believing To be made righteous is to be justified in Law-sense and justifiable by Sentence If God do so as the Law is general then must a particular Man believing be in the applying only that Law to him made righteous made so in order to his being accounted and used as such And if God by that Law applyed to him makes the Person righteous it is that Righteousness must be and is the formal Cause of his Justification This my dear Brother you did not perceive nor as I think Mr. Baxter quite who came so near it He never let the right understanding of the Righteousness of God preceding actual Pardon sink into his Thoughts if he had he would have set it into such a Light as there would have been no need of my Book and if he had roundly told you as I what is the formal Righteousness that justifies the Believer notwithstanding other Protestants say it not you might have received it Though as to that Particular Justification or Part of Justification against the Gospel-charge that a Man is an Unbeliever and Impenitent and hath no right to Pardon and Life he accounts that his Faith and Repentance is that Subordinate Righteousness which justifies him and that must be formaliter as I say And to satisfie Mr. Baxter fully there is and there can be no charge but this against any for the Gospel-Law it self the Universal Pardon or Grace of the Gospel it self which in the Righteousness of God as to Gods part is included does alone take off or answers all others But now seeing I am yet in doubt that your fear of me and therefore of other Friends is not yet gone in regard to my allowing that we are justified by a Righteousness within us or by our inherent Grace for that I percieve it is you fear even as rank Popery under the present apprehension when Justification yet by Works you maintain without scruple I will endeavour over again to deliver you and them out of it Faith you know and conceive to be Grace inherent and a Righteousness in us and you are not afraid I hope to affirm that we are justified by Faith Well then there is according to your Self before and the Truth a double Grace Real Grace and Relative Grace and Justification you say is Relative Grace Regeneration Real I say again accordingly there must be a double Righteousness the Righteousness of Sanctification or Regeneration and the Righteousness of Justification 0103 0 The one entitles to no Reward being short of perfect the other through the imputation of Christs Merits entitles to Impunity and Life for the imputing Christs Merits to our Faith or inherent Grace to make it accepted as hath already been intimated for Righteousness which else were none is to be understood in Gods imputing our Faith for Righteousness It is the Righteousness of the last now be it known and not of the former by which we are justified It is the Righteousness of the last not of the former which is the formal Cause of our Justification Here then do I at once discharge you from your Fear The Papists say
Efficient Protatarctick or Impulsive Cause according to my first Oxford-Learning and the Efficient Material Formal and Final Causes being the different Species of Cause in general I cannot but think they are to be so held in this Point of Justification The Efficient Cause then I say is God The Meritorius is Christs Righteousness The Material is not the same with that coming under the Efficient but is I count our inherent Grace or Faith as infused in our Regeneration The Formal then is the imputing this Faith or Grace inherent as the Evangelick Condition is performed by it to us for Righteousness when being imperfect otherwise it were none Inherent Grace is the Matter and the Form is brought into it by this Imputation This I have before though transiently fuller explained I think and as for my giving way to Mr. Baxter I am sensible that he understanding how nothing ab extra not Christs Merits is possible to move God or be impulsive to any Act in him who is uncapable of Mutation did apprehend Christs Merits to fall under the same Cause as our Merits would if we had them which is only a Dispositio Recipientis according to him and so the Material Cause because there can be no impulsive Cause in regard to God But seeing our Divines do commonly and the Holy Scripture speak of God Justifying Pardoning Saving and continually Blessing us for the sake of Christ or his Merits for all that there is nothing indeed ab extra can move him and this kind of speaking is warranted by the extrinsick denomination of Gods Law yea his Will by meer Connotation of the various and new Effects it causes it was I think but an over deep curiosity in this excellent Man which turn'd him from the obvious and right Notion as commonly received that it is per modum Causae Efficientis Protatarcticae when we say Meritoriae and not per modum Materialis or Formalis that Christs Righteousness does conduce to our Justification It is true I will say again that Ex parte Volentis what Christ himself hath done for us procures no new Act of Grace toward us because the simplicity of the Divine Nature is not capable of any but Ex parte rei volitae to say it procured no new Effects of his Grace for us but only disposes and qualifies us for the receiving those Effects is a mater so nice so subtle and out of the way that if it were true it could not be taught and is most likely to be untrue both therefore and because it seems derogatory to Christs Satisfaction and Merits to his Sufferings and Obedience which the Scripture speaks of as a Price as a Ransom a Purchase not to dispose us for but to obtain for us our Redemption and consequently those other Effects of his Grace likewise our Justification and Salvation I have now no more to answer and it is time for me to have done Only I must summ up what I have here wrote as to the matter between us You and I my dear Brother agree in the main Doctrine of Justification by Faith but have been differing in two Points about it which you say are but little but I say are very momentous Matters The two Points are these One is Justification I say makes us just and does not only sentence us so You say or have said Justification is the accounting but not making us just The other Point is this As Justification makes us righteous I say there is a Righteousness within Faith or our Evangelical Righteousness which justifying us must therefore be and is the Form or formal Cause of our Justification And this you receive not or have very hardly received I will speak it more short Justification I say makes us righteous and that righteousness whereby we are made righteous is and must be the formal Cause of it Here are both Points wrapt together and you do or have questioned both I will offer you therefore one Argument and that is Ad hominem for your conviction You maintain Justification by Faith as our Evangelical Righteousness as I do Now if Justification do not make us righteous then must we be justified by that inherent Righteousness which is the Righteousness only of Regeneration there being with you no other And then are you the strongest Papist as to me as ever writ for here is a most convincing Book of yours which is all almost Scripture and yet maintains Justification by inherent Grace and Faith as the Papists do Here then you can by no means extricate your self from them when I thus say we are made righteous by Justificationâ— and by that Righteousness only justified do escape As for the Consequence now of these two Points I think fit before I come to it that it be first considered how these consist how necessary they are to and indeed sustain and infer one another For if Justification makes us just then must there be a Righteousness so made that is the Form of our Justification and the Righteousness which is that Form is the Righteousness that constitutes us just or justifies us This being asserted there are these two things then as the consequence of these two Points appears and has been shewn in this Letter One is for I must recal them that whereas our late Protestants who have been more wary and come to see the Absurdity of our former Divines who in opposition to the Papists making our inherent Grace the formal Cause of our Justification would put Christs Righteousness in its room so making the Righteousness of another our formal Righteousness are convincedly brought off from their Opinion they have been and are ever since at a loss and must be to pitch upon that which is indeed the formal Cause of our Justification And when you or I or you and I together have been so happy to have found out that Righteousness even the Righteousness of God which is this formal Cause for them Is this in earnest with you but a little matter What! And is the clearing the difference of your and my way from the Papists which was the great difficulty lay upon you before a little matter also It was otherwise at your first writing to me and it is an Archeivement now worthy our mutual Letters The other Consequence is That when the Protestants I say and have said and our Brethren are among themselves at difference so much about this Great Article there is by this means some thing found out yet further as may reconcile them and that as it were I say in my first Letter by a Word For if we can but tell any thing in such short Terms as does Characterize or is a Characteristical Note to distinguish the Sound Protestant from the Unsound then may the Sound presently Unite and Drop the other if they still will be Absurd Now here is such a Characteristical Note and let the World that please know the same Justification by Christs Righteousness and not our
Own per modum meriti is Sound Protestantism Justification by Christs Righteousness and not our Own formaliter is fundamentally Antinomianism This many of our Brethren having not understood so well as they should hitherto have been but wildred and not found their way out to an Orthodox Coalition Not that I say such a Union a Union in Doctrinals is to be sought in the present case of our Brethrens many of whom have scarce thought of this Term formal Cause so far have they been from the use of it in this Point The Form of a Thing is illud per quod res est id quod est and denominates the Thing If we know not the Form of Justification we know not what Justification is and how then can we tell when we say any thing right about it To be justified hath a Form passively denominating a Man just from some Righteousness according to all Divines that understand themselves Protestants or Papists What that Righteousness is is the Question The Papists say one thing the Common Protestants another You and I come between them and what it is we have shewn Christian Righteousness says Luther on Gal. 3.6 consists in two things Faith in the Heart and Gods Imputation Faith is indeed a formal Righteousness yet this Righteousness is not enough it is imperfect wherefore the other part of Righteousness must needs be added to finish the same to wit Gods Imputation There are more the like words from whence I have been thinking since I wrote my Book See Righteousness of God Pag. 10. and 20. that it was happily such a kind of Notion as ours that Luther had in his first Thoughts arising from the Scripture howsoever himself or others after him came to run it up to that exorbitancy as from an Acceptation of our Faith and inchoate Obedience so long as it is sincere through the Merits of Christ unto Life instead of the Righteousness of the Law it is come or came to the cloathing the Person with the Righteousness of Christ which is a Righteousness according to the Law Meritorious and Perfect so that he does stand as just in the sight of God and as in Christs Person to be justified by the Law of Works altho' the holy Prophet does tell us Ps 143.2 that in the sight of God and the holy Apostle Gal. 3.11 by the Law shall no Flesh living be justified This Opinion therefore being so carried as to subvert the Gospel we leave it Your assured Friend And loving Brother John Humfrey To Mr. Humfrey Reverend and Dear Sir THere hath passed many Letters and there hath been long Debate between us about two Points One is of Constitutive Justification the other is of the Form or the formalis Causa of it This Letter shall speak of those two Points there being little or no Disagreement in regard to others I will begin with the last as having cost more pains in regard to the many Arguments and Answers bandied and tossed to and fro concerning it The result of all which is contained and will be found in what follows 1. We are fully agreed as to the Nature of Justification only differ about applying this Term Formal Cause as to the Point 2. You grant that Faith or Gospel-righteousness is not accounted by other Divines that are Protestants to be the Form or formal Cause hereof so that this is I have said a Vestrum as some Physitians have their Nostrum and therefore requires so much more caution 3. You apply it to Justification Passive and make our Faith to be only the Form of Justification passively taken and assign another Form or formal Cause to Justification Active for you say Gods making or constituting us just by the imputation of Faith to us for Righteousness is Justification Active Our being made just or constituted righteous by that imputation is Justification Passive Which you further explain thus Justification may be taken either Subjectivè as in God so it is his gracious condescention to accept our Faith or imperfect Obedience unto Pardon and Life Or Terminativè as in us and so it is nothing else but this Faith imputed for Righteousness as so imputed and this is the Causa formalis of our passive Justification 4. Against this I argue thus 1. a Hereby you make two Justifications or Justification Active and Passive to be two different Things because they have two Forms one Gods imputing or accepting Faith for Righteousness the other Faith imputed or so accepted for Righteousness Of which more anon a It is true and if you hold there and when you cite me as saying Faith is the formal Cause of our Justification you will supply what you find here that I mean Faith only as so imputed and also that I understand Justification passively taken I shall have little to answer to all that follows for Justification Active and Passive have indeed two Forms and must have or else they could not be distinguished and it is your fundamental if not only Mistake that you have a belief to the contrary 2. Justification is Gods Act but nothing in us can be the Causa formalis of Gods Act. To this you return several Answers 1. Sanctification is Gods Act as well as Justification But I hope you doubt not to say our inherent Grace is the formal Cause of our Sanctification But how Not as actively but passively taken The same is to be said of the other Answ God is the Efficient Grace infused the Material the Act of infusing or bestowing the b Formal b Right And if the infusion or bestowing of Grace or Holi-Holiness on a Man be the Form of Gods Sanctifying Act then must this Grace or Holiness infused or bestowed be the Form of his Sanctified State Vocabulum formae usurpari solet non modo de formis substantialibus quae dant esse simpliciter sed de Accidentalibus quae dant Esse tale Hoc sensu dicimus Doctrinam esse illam formam per quam homo Doctus justitiam per quam Justus efficitur I hope you can trust Davenant thought 〈◊〉 me for this Information Dav. De. Jus Val c. 27. 2. You answer further thus God is Actus purus and nothing is the Cause or Condition of his Will Ex parte Agentis but as Gods Acts are denominated in regard of the effects upon us these Effects must have their formal Cause or else be nothing Answ The formal Cause is Gods c Imputation c Right again The Imputation of our Faith for Righteousness is the Form of Gods Justifying Act and Faith imputed for Righteousness is therefore the Form of our justified State It is strange that the Intus existens should keep out such open Evidence 3. Another Answer you give is this It is impossible say you that Faith or any thing in us should be the Cause of Gods Act. Very good That were absurd indeed Nothing in us can be the Cause of Gods Act. True but something in us may be the Object about which
Gods Act is conversant and that here is Faith as he imputes it for Righteousness and this being the effect of that Act in passo this Faith so imputed I say is the formal Cause of our Justification so effected Answ The Object of Gods Act is Faith or the Believer The Effect of it in us Justification Imputation is the formal Cause as has been (d) And already satisfied already said 5. The Arguments which you produce for the proof of it I have gathered together out of the several places of their dispersion and they are these Argu. 1. All our Divines both Protestant and Papist do agree upon it that that Righteousness whatever it be that denominates and makes us righteous in Gods sight is and must be the Form or formal Cause of Justification And certainly these Divines understood this Metaphysical Term better than you or I. And when wee use it in their Sense and no otherwise there can be no fear But neither Regeneration nor Christs Righteousness nor Pardon is that which justifies us per modum causae formalis and therefore it must be (e) As imputed for Righteousness that is with Luther Faith and Gods Imputation together not Faith of its self Faith Not Christs Righteousness for that is the meritorious Cause Not Regenerating Grace for that must precede Justification not Pardon for that comes after it And therefore if Justification has any formal Cause which it must have or it is nothing for forma dat esse it must be one of these or something else What is that Why the Righteousness of God revealed in the Gospel as that Righteousness alone which justifies the Believer Answ It is something else viz. Gods f Imputation f To this and the former Answer I say that is true it is Imputation as to Active Justification or as to God justifying us Therefore something imputed must be the formal Cause of the Persons being Justified And what is that Christs Righteousness or the Righteousness of Faith We agree as to the last Argu. 2. As Adam if he had perfectly obey'd his Obedience had been his formal Righteousness in regard to the Law so is this ours in regard to the Gospel Right of God p. 20. So again Works were the formal Righteousnest of Justification by the Law Therefore Faith is the formal Righteousness of Justification by the Gospel Right of God p. 20. Again presently after Two things go to this formal Righteousness Faith and the Imputation of it To these I answer in order Answ To the first and second 1. It 's without doubt that Adams Obedience was g formal Righteousness and so Faith is now but so it might be and yet not be the Form of his Justification as I at first said The formal Cause of Adam's Justification was Gods owning accounting or judging him righteous upon the account of his perfect Obedience as Gods Imputation of Faith for Righteousness is the Formal Cause of our Justification g To be our formal Righteousness and to be the Righteousness and to be the Righteousness that is the Form of our Justification is all one so spoken and understood by Divines Gods accounting Adam perfectly righteous was Active Justification Adam's being righteous and so accounted was Justification Passive and Gods imputing our Faith for Righteousness and our Faith imputed is the same likewise Here is nothing but what is prevented already 2. I deny the Consequence in the first Assertion That if Adam's Law-obedience was his formal Righteousness then our Gospel-Obedience is our formal Righteousness because though Faith comes in the room of Law-Works in some respects yet not in all for it doth not h merit the reward as Law-Works would have done h Whether the reward be of Grace or Merit that is nothing to the purpose so long as Faith is the Condition of the Covenant of Grace as perfect Obedience was of the Covenant of Works The Performance of the Evangelick Condition is the formal Righteousness of the one The Performance of the Legal was the formal Righteousness of the other The formality lies in the Condition performed not in the Meritoriousness or Nonmeritoriousness of the Performance Answ To the third If Faith and Imputation i both go to this formal Righteousness then Faith alone is not the Form of it i By this you see that we are agreed I say and you say that Faith is the Matter as will appear more hereafter and Imputation that which brings the Form into the Matter so that it is not Faith alone but Faith as imputed for Righteousness is the formal Cause of Justification Argu. 3. If Justification has a Form and that Form must be some Righteousness Justificationis formam justicia constare certum est What Righteousness is that It is Gods counting or judging us Righteous say you But is this an Answer to the Question What Righteousness is it whereby we are justified When I ask What Righteousness it is whereby we are justified or what Righteousness that is which is the Form of Justification I ask What Righteousness that is whereby or wherewith or by reason of which God accounts or judges us righteous It is not regenerating Grace infused but regenerating Grace imputed that is Faith imputed for Righteousness That which makes a Man righteous in Gods sight according to the Gospel is that which justifies us so as to be the Causa formalis of it Per formalem Justificationis causam justi constituimur What then is that Righteousness which makes or constitutes us just It is Gods imputing this Faith before infused that makes us righteous and consequently is the Causa formalis of our Justification Answ 1. I say the Causa formalis of Justification is Gods counting or judging us righteous so say you too Your Words are these Gods judging us righteous upon believing is the k Form k The Form of a thing does constitute and denominate the thing If Gods judging us righteous or imputing our Faith for Righteousness does actually make and denominate God our Justifier then must our being judged righteous and our Faith imputed for Righteousness make and passively denominate us justified There is the same Efficient and Material Cause in both but the Form double Answ 2. I answer directly The Righteousness whereby we are justified as the meritorious Cause of our Justification is the Righteousness of Christ The Righteousness of Faith the material Cause But the formal is l Gods judging us righteous as you agree l Here you are plainly gone I ask what Righteousness that is and you Answer Gods judging There is some Righteousness as all our Divines agree that does make and denominate us righteous and that which so makes and denominates us according to the Gospel is that which justifies us When you don't tell this you are gone I say as I have said It is true that Gods judging or imputing something to us for Righteousness is the Form of Gods justifying Act but that something that is judged and imputed to
us for our Righteousness is the Form of our justified State or Condition Argu. 4. Divines do generally fix it upon some Righteousness The Righteousness of Inherent Grace say the Papists The Righteousness of Christ saith Davenant and the Protestants generally The Righteousness of Pardon saith Mr. Wotton Answ 1. I do not pretend to compare my self in the least with those Learned Men who maintain any of the former Particulars to be the formal Cause of Justification but I am willing to suspect my own Judgment rather than theirs Perhaps it may be my m Ignorance in the proper Notion of a formal Cause that hinders me from assenting to them And yet m The Form of a thing you know is that whereby the thing is that which it is that which differences the thing defines denominates it A Defini-nition is made of a Genus Differentia call'd by others the Form a Genus and a Form to wit that which specifies and differences the thing from others that which makes the Ens unum Vnum is indivisum in se divisum ah aliis The Form makes the thing divisum ab omnibus aliis and whatsoever differs from another must have its Form its Deffinition that makes it differ or else it is nothing It is not for want of Knowledge of this but the want of Consideration of it makes you here disagree with me for so long as there is no Distinction without a Difference and Justification is thus distinguished into Active and Passive they must have their different Forms and if that be acknowledged our Contest is at an end 2. You n agree with me that it is Gods Imputation or judging us Righteous But yet that I may yield to you as far as I can I add n How I agree with you it is manifest as to justification Active and that you may agree with me as to Justification Passive you say enough in that which follows 3. That upon the o same ground that any of these may be said to be the formal Cause of Justification I see not but that the Righteousness of Faith or the Righteousness of God by Faith may be allowed to be the formal Cause of it If it be proper in any of the other Cases or Instances for ought that I know it is proper also in this If it be proper to call Christs Righteousness the formal Cause or Pardon the formal Cause of Justification it is proper I think to call Faith so too There is the same Reason for one as for the other in my apprehension o As for what you yield here to me it is but honest and tho' condescending no more than what cann't be denyed If we use the Terms of other Divines we must use them in their sense or we cannot else be in the right I thank you for your sincerity in this Argu. 5. But the most plausible Argument of all because it is Scriptural you have omitted which is That the Scripture saith expresly p We are are justi-fied by Faith p This is what is to be understood in my Book all over when I say that tho' the Id propter quod be Christs Righteousness the Id per quod we are justified is Faith and Faith therefore as imputed for Righteousaess is the formal Cause of our Justification Here then we must consider What interest Faith has in our Justification This I have said in my Book is as the q Condition Way or Means whereby we come to have an interest in this Priviledge q That Faith Repentance and New Obedience are the Condition and Way of Life as to the Exercise and Practice of them does not hinder but that performed and imputed by God for Righteousness they become the Form its self of our Justification You say As the formal Cause but at last upon mature deliberation you make it to be the material Cause and Imputation the formal and so at last you seem to r give up the Cause you are contending for your words being these The Efficient Cause is God The Meritorious Christs Righteousness The Material is not the same with that coming under the Efficient but is I count our inherent Grace or Faith infused in our Regeneration The formal then is the imputing this Faith or Grace inherent as the Evangelick Condition performed by it to us for Righteousness when being imperfect otherwise it were none Inherent Grace is the Matter and the Form is brought in by this Imputation s This is not well observed that when I set my Cause in its true Light and evince the truth of it so to your self that you cannot but assent to it you should count that I give you my Cause when I give you my Light and when the Cause which I and you intend and defend is the same in this particular altogether And why do you contend Do not you know that in such Collisions that are only for Light whenever there is struck one Spark that does take the work is done for what is but rightly said in one place is to regulate all that is said besides otherwhere when the Reader deals ingenuously with him he Reads But then to s bring your self off you make it to be the formal Cause only of Justification Active and Faith to be the formal Cause of Justification Passive and so you make two Justifications distinct from each other because they have different Forms So that all the Controversie between us now is reduced to this one single Point whether there be two Justifications distinct from each other For if Faith be the formal Cause only of Justification Passive and there be no such thing as Justification Passive distinct from Justification Active then Faith is cashier'd and put out of its Office of being Causa formalis of Justification s It is not to bring my self off but to keep the truth on foot that I distinguish as other Divines do Who knows not that Justificare Justificari are distinguished or that Justification is actively and passively taken Alas that you should not consider that all the Disputes of our Divines Whether we be justified by Faith or Works are and can be about Justification no otherwise but as passively taken As for the Question Whether Justification Active and Passive be one or two I have given a brief determination in this second Letter as now printed p. 28. and did not do so in my Cursory Letter because I was indeed puzzled with it at first starting and could not at present tell what well to say to it It is very true and judiciously declared here by you that upon this one would have thought but nice thing does depend all our difference so that if Justification Passive have a distinct Form from Justification Active then my all you say be true as it is of the One and what I say to be true too of the Other Now whether they have two Forms or no seeing you and I were at present in doubt and came very strangely to be resolved
on a contrary Judgment let us appeal to one that can tell us Justification says Mr. Baxter taken actively as the Act of the Justifier hath one Form Justification passively taken for the State of the Justified hath another Form And each of these are subdivided into many Acts and many Effects which have each their Form End of Contro p. 263. This was the reason of the variation in what I writ When I first propounded this Objection and thereby discovered this Consequence you wrote to me thus This distinction is a distribution of a Subject into its Adjuncts where the Form I apprehend to be the same only applyed diversly as the Subject is actively or passively taken But in your very next Letter you revoke this and say That upon further consideration Justification Active and Passive are two Things in earnest and have two Forms Seeing therefore this is that you stick to I will try my skill to drive you out of this hold 1. How t can Faith be the material Cause of one and the formal of the other t Very well Faith as infused and a part of our Regeneration is the Matter you agree to this Faith imputed for Righteousness is the Form I say of our Passive Justification 2. What u is the Efficient and Material Cause of Justification Passive u The Efficient and Material Cause is the same in Justification Active and Passive I say both but the Form is diverse and must be so long as they differ from one another 3. You x are certainly in the right when you make Justification Active and Passive to be but a distribution of a Subject into its Adjuncts and that they have the same Form Therefore the Subject is the same only diversified by its different respects to its Agent and Object x You are certainly in the wrong in your understanding this thus In a distribution of a Subject into its Adjuncts the Subject is one and hath one Form Vnius rei unica forma and the Adjuncts partake of that Form but their own Forms are diverse and must be as that by which they differ from one another I am sorry here I gave you occasion to be confirm'd in your mistake But this good shall come of it I will shew my Reason why I admit of two Justifications Active and Passive and not two by the Law and by the Gospel Justification by the Law and by the Gospel is a distribution of a Genus into its Species But Justification Active and Passive is a distribution of a Subject into its Adjuncts only When I can admit but of one kind of Justification only that is by the Gospel I may allow that to have diverse Considerations 4. When y I say God justifies Paul and Paul is justified of God can any one be so void of sense as to say these are two Things Is not the Act the same tho' the Agent and Object be different When I say the Sun enlightens the Air and the Air is enlightned by the Sun is not the enlightning the same in both The Propositions indeed are distinct in a Grammatical Construction but they are the same in a Physical Sense For y When you say God justifies Paul and Paul is justified of God here is a Justificare and a Justificari that is Justification Active and Passive and they must have two Forms But seeing the Matter is the same wherein you and I agree they are formally two but materially one and the same Justification 5. Justification z is only of a Person The Person to whom this Act of God is applyed is the Subject or Object of Gods Act about whom it is conversant Justification cannot possibly be considered but as referring to some Person and therefore there cannot be two Justifications z The Subject the Efficient the Material Cause are the same but the Form different in Active and Passive Justification I pray turn to my Determination at first I had not then thought enough and I did not think it so necessary as now you make it to determine this in my Cursory Letters which you must forgive You see then Brother where the deficiency of Sense does lye which seeing you have been able to say so much for and have so much presumption for may be excused even with some applause though you have been mistaken in it There is one thing in the forgoing Discourse that perhaps will need a little farther Explication and that is where Faith is said to be the (†) It is worth our Observation that in this Notion that our Faith or inchoate Grace is the Materal and Imputation the formal Cause of our Justification you and I should both in our Letters coincidere without any Item one from another material Cause of our Justification Those Terms in Matters of Morality are subject to much uncertainty as appears by the Learned in assigning the Material and formal Causes of Justification I apprehend it thus When Faith is said to be imputed for Righteousness here Imputing is the Act and Faith the Object Now we agree that this Act of Imputing is the Form and this Act falling upon this Object is the Form falling on the Matter as you express it very well or introduced into it The Act applyed to the Object is the Form introduced into the Matter For why may not the Act and Object in Morality correspond or be the same with the Form and Matter in Naturality I know some make the Righteousness of Christ to be the Material Cause of Justification but against that Assertion I have this Argument The Meritorious cannot be the Material But Christs Righteousness is the Meritorious Cause none can deny that Therefore it cannot be the Material The Major I prove thus The same thing cannot be both an External and Internal Cause But the Meritorious is an External Cause for it belongs to the Efficient as you have also observed the Material is an Internal Cause Therefore the Righteousness of Christ which is certainly the Meritorious cannot also be the Material And this Argument will also hold against its being the Formal Cause Mr. Banter seems to make Faith to be the Material Cause End of Cont. p. 250. This I have long inclined unto which may be illustrated thus When a Malefactor is Arraigned and Tryed the Law is the Efficient Cause of his Acquittal or Condemnation the Sentence pronounced by the Judge is the Formal Matter of Fact or what hath appeared upon Tryal is the Material So here Gods judging us righteous according to the Law of the Gospel is the formal Cause of our Justification and our Gospel-righteousness or Faith which is as it were Matter of Fact seems to be the Material But as I said there is no certainty in affixing or appropriating these Logioal Term in Morality at least in all Cases and therefore for my part I will contend with no Body about them I will add but one word more about this point Justification is Gods judging us righteous there 's the