greatly by them mistaken excepted ADVERSARIES Adams posterity as they came to understanding had a law And again the law is given to a man when he comes to understanding and when his conscience gives him peace by keeping it and war for breaking it and not till then which qualities say they are not in babes for they discern not earthly things and how then should they discern heavenly c. seeing there must be a conscience unto which the Law is given which infants haue not DEFENCE THis errour in the latter part of their speech must the more carefully be observed and cleerly refuted by us because it is laid down as the ground of divers other errours and the same not small as will appear hereafter Neither needs there in truth more nor can there be any thing more cleere against them then that which themselvs bring from Rom. 2 their words are The law is written in the hearts of men in nature who haue a conscience to excuse them if they doe the things of the Law c. This form of speech used by the Apostle of the Law as written in mens hearts is borrowed from Gods writing the Law in tables of stone which had first and by creation been written in mens hearts out of which it was almost quite blotted by sin Now what is it for the Gentiles to haue had the Law written in their hearts in or by nature as the Apostle speaks This must needs be in nature created for in nature as corrupted there is no writing in but blotting out of the Law If by nature created then as infants haue this nature so haue they this naturall manuscript or writing of Gods hand This also the very word nature imports signifying that which is born with a man or with which hee is born comming of a word in Greek that signifies to beget or produce as parents doe children and each living creature its kind And seeing the Apostle here speaks of a Law by which men discern the differences between right and wrong good and evill honest and dishonest in morall and main matters whence and with what hand should all and every man and woman living in the world even there where is no Law otherwise written or preached haue this law and conscience thus written in their breasts saue by the finger of God in creation This knowledg and conscience being the remainders of that image of God in which all men in Adam were made By all which it appears evidently that infants bring into the world with them this law of nature and those foot-steps of Gods image in their reasonable soules who having in them the faculties of understanding and will cannot possible be devoyd of all law for the ordering of the same to whâ—ch â—aw they are necessarily either disposed or indisposâ—d 〈◊〉 it â—â—â—not be that the reasonable faculties of understanding and â—â—ll â—â— any of mankind should be voyd of all vertuous or vitious â—â—sposition and inclination at least to the things of the law of nature that is of God the effects whereof they shâ—w forth actually in their time And this truth themselues elsewhere confirm undenyably though they think it not where they say that Adams posterity originally for of that state they there speak haue weak natures by the which when the commandement comes they cannot obey This originall weakness then is a contrary disposition to the Law of God and to that which they were created else it could not hinder them from obeying God actually afterward at least internally and in their hearts Surely nothing but the Law of sin is contrary to the Law of God warring against it and against the law of the mind agreeing with it as the Apostle speaketh Neither follows it that Infants haue no Law because they haue not peace or warre of conscience in them nor can discern of earthly or heavenly things The shewing the workes of the Law and doing the things contained in the Law and so the having a conscience excusing or accusing for the contrary as the Apostle speaks are not simply requisite for the having of the Law nor for being conformable to it but for the actuall obedience therunto in particular actions Persons are in three respects conformable to the law of God first in habite and so a godly man is a godly man and conformable to Gods law when hee sleepeth secondly in disposition or inclination and so infants considered either in state of creation or regeneration are conformable thereunto thirdly in performance of particular acts of obedience by men of discretion for which the conscience excuseth and accuseth for the contrary As well may these men deny that infants are reasonable creatures as that they are lawlesse They can perform the works of neither but haue the faculties and dispositions of and to both which in time and in their effects they manifest ADVERSARIES IN the next places follows their promised proofs that Christ hath been and still is offered to all that haue sinned and that they haue put him away and that the fault is their own and condemnation from themselvs and Good freed from partiality DEFENCE BElike then if God shew that mercy to one in calling him to his grace in Christ which hee doth not to another it is partiality with them from which to free him they take this pains as if the Lord stood in need of their patronage wheras in truth they but forge lies for God as Iobs friends did and talk deceitfully for him Let us consider of their proofs admitting of such as haue in them either apparant truth or probability and reproving the rest as there is cause And first they erre in saying that the generation of Adam and Eve took notice of Christ as they took notice of their sin seeing the notice of sin specially of that which is more grosse is naturall and the effect of the law of nature written in all mens hearts whereas the notice of Christ is by supernaturall revelation The like vain presumption and apparant falsifying is in the words following that all the sonns of Noah could doe no lesse but take knowledg of Christ to convey it by tradition to all their generations If it be meant that indeed they did so How many 1000 thousands are there at this day which never so much as heard of Christ at least as God and man and Redeemer of mankind by his death For this their presumption of the ages before Christs coming in the flesh they bring not any shew of reason or testimony divine or human Onely they alledg the sacrifices of the Gentiles which say they they either had from their ancestors in their generations or as being moved by a troubled conscience which must be quieted by sacrifice And these sacrifices they tell us were remembrances of Christ and kinds of acknowledgings of him though in the end they account them no better then remembrances of a false Christ in stead of him As their opinion
a necessity which takes away freedom and voluntarinesse from men but then they rather suffer then doe For example the striking or thrusting of a man with such violence as that he is compelled thereby to stagger or fall this necessity of compulsion depriues me of all freedom to this bodily motion so as I stagger or fall unwillingly but this comes from an externall principle or beginning working violently and from without me But this is nothing to that other necessity in regard of God causing and effecting the good in and by the creature according to its kinde and suffering and ordering the evill person and thing according to its kind with which mans freedom may well stand And first whatsoever God doth he doth it both most freely and most necessarily well So the elect Angels doe the will of God most voluntarily and yet most necessarily So did Christ as man the will of his Father so freely as none can doe any thing more and yet as necessarily as it was necessary for God not to sinne On the contrary the devils doe evill both most necessarily being by these mens own grant unchangeably evill and yet most willingly as carryed thereunto withall their power Christ saith it must needs be that offences come and the Apostle that there must be heresies in the Church If then freedom of will can stand with no manner of necessity the authours of these heresies and offences sinne not therin for all sinnes specially of this kinde are voluntary I add in the last place that the better any man or Angell is he doth good the more both necessarily and willingly and the worse any evill both waies Neither will it seem strange unto us that one and the same action comes under so divers considerations as in one regard to be voluntary contingent and casuall and in another necessary if we consider how divers agents concur and meet together in producing it No work of man is so mans alone as that God hath not some hand in it in sustaining and ordering the person and work yea in effecting that which is good in it as all that is which hath in it any created being or order What hinders then but that the same thing may in regard of man as the particular and immediate cause be voluntary and contingent and yet in regard of God the highest and generall cause necessary We daily see the truth of this in proportion amongst men the meeting of Ahab and Eliah was in respect of Ahab casuall but in respect of Eliah of destinate counsell These things thus cleered we will come to the exposition of the words of Ezechiel so oft and vehemently urged by these men and others which are that God takes not pleasure in the death of a sinner but that he turn from his way and liue I answer first that the Lord takes no delight in the death of a sinner that repents and turns from his wicked way but otherwise if the sinner repent not the Lord takes delight in his death not for the misery of the creature but for the glory of his justice shining therin Of such the Lord testifies that he wil laugh at their calamity mock when their fear cometh And considering that the death and destruction of the wicked is Gods own just and holy work for their sins who will deny that God delights in it Secondly for sinne who was ever so wicked as to imagine that God takes pleasure in it It pleaseth him for his holy ends to suffer sin and to order the creature sinning by his own freewill election of evil as hath been formerly proved Thirdly it must be noted that the Prophet speaks there of such sinners onely as to whom the word comes saying Turn yee turn yee from your evill waies for why will yee die ô house of Israel Whence we doe gather evidently these two particulars First that the Prophet doth not here speak of all men universally as they conceiu but onely of the house of Israel or of such as to whom he◠sends his Prophets to call them to repentance secondly that he speaks not of that decree of the Lord willing which is accompanied with the powerfull work of his grace by which hee will giue repentance to wicked men instructed in the truth by his servants but onely of that degree of his will which stands in commanding that which is good and in approving of it if it be performed And so we grant it to be the Lords pleasure and will that all repent to whom the Word is preached It is true which they add that Adam and others sinned against the will of God but not that any ever sinned against the secret will of God as they affirm The will of God is no law to man till it be revealed and where there is no law there is no transgression It is also truely sayd that the Iewes unwillingnesse to be gathered to Christ was against Gods and Christs will that is his commanding will for he would that is commanded and they would not but disobeyed but that it was against that decree of Gods willing which sets his almightie power awor◠that I deny For God could if thus he would haue giuen them repentance and drawn them to his son Whatsoever he thus wills he can do That which they add as an eye-salue to cure our blindnes namely that we haue nothing to do with Gods secret wil not revealed in his word is true in regard of our obedience to God expectation from him but not absolutely as they conceiue The particular events of things in the world though not so much as insinuated in the scriptures concern us when they come to passe so as we may and ought to say it was the will of God they should so be either his will to work them if good or to suffer and order them and their doers if evill ADVERSARIES NExt comes into consideration a speciall distinction of ours which is that God is the author of the action or fact but not of the sin of the fact or crime Over which they insult and in it over all learned men though they mention Calvin onely with high contempt and great triumph before the victory calling it a merely fabulous ridle and marvellous sophistication telling us that a spade is a spade c. but in truth shewing themselues sitter to medle with a spade and a mattock then with those high mysteries Let us see their reasons In the first whereof they make us say that God is the author of the very fact and deed of Adams sin yea of adultery theft murder c. DEFENCE WE deny their charge and answer by distinction that Adams taking and eating the forbidden fruit Davids adultery Ioahs murther and the like are to be considered two waies First naturally and as they are motions in nature performed by mans natural created faculties and powers of soul and body secondly morally as
he suffered them to enter into them Math. 8. 31. 32 Mat. 5. 12. 13 Luk. 8. 32. DEFENCE BVT first I would know how they can proue that though in one place where no punishment is directly intended suffering and sending be all one therfore they are all one in all other places where the Lord properly and professedly intends a punishment Secondly I deny that sending and suffering are here all one but as we find in many other places so in this that which one Evangelist relates though truely yet not so fully that another sets down more throughly with all the parts Luke saith He suffered them and this is true Matthew saith He sent them and this is the same which Luke saith and more namely together with the suffering of them the directing and determining also of their malice this way for the Lords most holy though unknown ends And if the Lord in this case onely suffered them and let them alone then it should follow that the creature doth some actions wherin he is wholly left to himselfe without Gods medling with him or ruling of him But to come neerer the matter I would know of these men when two Evangelists or Prophets set down the same thing in divers words the one in more sparing and strait and the other in more large termes whether we be not to expound the strayter by the larger and not the larger by the strayter except there be some apparant restraint The Evangelist Matthew relating the miracle done by Christ upon Peters mother saith He touched her hand and the fever left her Marke saith He took her by the hand and the fever left her Should we now say that to take her by the hand and lift her up were nothing but to touch her hand Or say we not truely that Mark said the same thing which Mathew doth and more also so is it in Christs suffering and sending the divels More plainly yet We reade how upon the death of Absolom Ahimaz the Priest being very desirous to be the messenger therof to David importunes Ioab greatly to let him run and again to let him run Ioab at the last condiscends and saith to him run and so v. 29 Ahimaz expresly affirmes that Ioab sent him to David He therfore both suffered him to goe and sent him He suffered him as having a desire of himselfe and sent him also as his messenger to the King So Christ both suffered the devils as desiring to possesse the swine rather then to be cast into the deep and also sent them as ordering their malice to that object and none other for the tryall of the Gergesenes In the next place followeth to be considered of the sending of Ioseph into Aegypt touching which let these two things onely be added to the things spoken for the opening of the former instances First that Ioseph expresly saith not onely that God sent him into Aegipt but that he sent him thither to preserue life which was Gods end and not his brethrens and therfore depends upon Gods work not upon theirs but withall that it was not they that sent him thither but God Ioseph here makes God in a respect a greater doer then his brethren these men shut God quite out and makes him onely a sufferer or one that left others alone and meddles not with them His brethren sold him but God sent him that is used their envious injury to his own gracious work both towards him and them and much other people whom by his meanes he kept aliue Secondly and for conclusion let this be observed that Ioseph speaks of Gods sending him to comfort his brethren in their sorrow and fear for the evill they had done to him But I would know what comfort it could be to their perplexed hearts to think that God suffered them to doe wickedly that is hindred them not Can any man having grace yea common sense take comfort in this that God leavs him to himselfe to doe wickedly and hinders him not A miserable comforter would this miserable exposition haue made Ioseph to haue been Whereas by the other and true sense though their sin were nothing the lesse yet Gods providence appeares the greater and more gracious in ordering their envy and malice to such an event as it had whence no small comfort did accrew unto them Of the death of Christ and Gods work in giving him thereunto even to the cursed death of the crosse by the hands of the wicked I haue formerly spoken at large and will not repeat the same things Onely I cannot but tax their allegation of Vrsinus as most vain who in the place notâ—d by them opposeth Gods permission to his willing and working of sinne as sinne and so God indeed onely permits and neither wils nor works sin as sin Otherwise all that haue but once lookt â—nto Vrsinus know how vehemently he impugneth that imagination of bare permission avowing the effectuall work of Gods providence in and about sin as both working the actions themselues which he cals the materials of sin and withdrawing his grace and withall destinating directing and bringing to their ends the same actions That of Amos 3. 6 is misapplyed if by any alledged and so easily answered The last place which they take upon them to answer is Ioh. 12 39. 40 Therfore they to wit the Iewes before whom Christ had done so many miracles could not beleev because that Esaias had said He hath blinded their eyes and hardened their hearts that they should not see c. ADVERSARIES THeir answer after divers incongruous forms of speech and some truths among is that this and the like places affirm that they winked with their eyes lest they should see for which cause God gaue them up to this reprobate sense DEFENCE THat is they being interpreters for winking with their eyes lest they should see God gaue them up to wink with their eyes lest they should see Thus by this untoward construction the same thing is the cause and effect of it selfe their winking with their eyes of their winking with their eyes It is certain that this reprobate minde in wilfull ignorance and obduration was their proper sin and as certain that it was Gods just judgement upon their former sins by his ordering therunto their corruption and therfore Christ spake to them in parables which were dark without exposition and expounded them when he was alone to them which were about him rendring thereof this reason because it was given to them namely to his Disciples to know the mysteries of the Kingdom of God but unto them that were without all things were done in parables that seeing they might see and not perceiv c. and so Mathew saith this was given to the one and not given to the other wherof also elsewhere he rendreth the highest reason because so it seemeth good in Gods sight who hath mercy on whom he will haue mercy and whom he will hee
purposed in himself accordingly to loue the one and hate the other seeing whatsoever God in time doth by way of emanation or application to and upon the creature that he purposed to do as he doth it from eternity If the Apostle v. 13 Iakob haue I loved and Esau haue I hated confirm his former doctrine as they say then he confirms the doctrine of Gods eternall and stedfast election from eternity And their boldnesse is excessiue in calling them perverters of the words of Paul which will haue this to be before Iakob and Esau were born seeing the Apostle adds this Scripture out of Malachy to shew the reason of that contained in the former which both Moses and Paul with him expresly affirm to haue been before the children were born namely that the highest cause of the elder to wit Esau his serving the yonger to wit Iakob was Gods loue to Iakob and hatred of Esau. That following is partly true namely that v. 12. 13 is not shewed for what cause God loved Iakob and hated Esau for that is shewed so far as God would haue us see v. 15. 18. But fals where they say that they shew not when this was For this loue and hatred was and before when God said The elder shall serv the yonger and this he said when the children were not yet born the effect of which was that the purpose of God according to election might stand in after time and that both in respect of the two persons themselvs and of the bodies of the Nations to come of them though not of every particular And so indeed they are to be considered both as instances in their persons and heads of their Nations the Scriptures accordingly every where testifying that God loved and chose from the rest the Israelits in their fathers Abraham Isaak and Iakob according to the tenour of his gracious promise and covenant of being their God and the God of their Seed expressing his eternall and most stedfast purpose of will That which they adde in the last place of Gods not hating to wit actually and destroying without desert is most true But when we speak of Gods loving or hating any before the world we mean onely of his decree of loving which he actually exerciseth in time for Christs righteousnesse by faith applyed upon the so loved and so of his decree of hating which hatred he comes not to exercise actually but for sin deserving it God from eternity purposed in time to glorifie his justice in the deserved destruction of Esau and not of Iakob Of this different decree of God touching Esau and not Iakob and his leaving him in and to his own corruption and hardning him in the same rather then Iakob our reason is the will of God but of Gods actuall hating and destroying of him rather then the other the Scriptures shew sufficient reason to wit his obstinacy in sin the onely cause of his destruction Vers. 14 upon the premises that God of two alike in themselvs and without respect of good or evill in the one or other had loved the one and hated the other an objection is framed that by this injustice might seem to be with God which the Apostle denyes with God forbid This objection our Adversaries understand to be upon Gods rejecting the fleshly Israelites for contemning their salvation offered them by faith in Christ as Esau was rejected for contemning his birth-right But herein as children skip where they cannot reade they leav out the principall part of the objection which is not onely moved upon Gods rejecting some but withall upon his receiving of others The Apostle in the words before going which occasion the objection mentions not onely Esau the elder hated and serving but also Iakob the yonger loved and served so in answering the same objection he speaks first and most of Gods shewing mercy and compassion and last and least of his hardning any Now whether they have omitted this part of the objection in cunning or inconsideratenesse themselves best know This is certain that the adjoyning it qutie overturns their exposition For comparing together two such persons as whereof the one glories in his own righteousnesse as perfectly answering to the holinesse and righteousnesse of the Law justifying himselfe when the Law condemnes him despising the grace and mercy of God in Christ offered and making him a lyar in not receiving the testimony which he gives of his Son and joyning with these blasphemy and persecution and all injurious dealing against them that doe receive this grace of Christ all which those proud justiciaries and carnall Israelits did and the other as honoring Gods justice and holinesse in the sense and confession of sin and misery due therefore flying to the mercie of God in Christ and by receiving the testimony of his Sonn setting to his seal that God is true and therewith repenting with all his heart which every true beleever doth that God now should shew mercie upon the latter of these and not upon the former cannot minister to any man indued with common sense occasion of objecting injustice to God seeing the light of nature teacheth every naturall man the reason of a difference And if any should be so senselesse as to object injustice to God in such a case as they conceive the objecter to be yet was not the Apostle so witlesse as to fly for answer to the absolute will of God and to plead that God will doe so because he will or pleaseth to doe it as v. 15. 18. I will haue mercie on whom I will have mercie c. Which answer of the Apostle also ministers matter of further and more difficult objection as appeares v. 19. 20. Whereas if the objection had been cast in their mould a child could have answered it and sayd that it had been a most just and equall thing for God to have received and loved the one rather then the other considering how the one honored the holynesse justice truth and mercy of God which the other dishonored and despised They erre therefore in applying to this purpose Rom. 2. 4. 5. Neither doth the Apostle there speak of a mercy and bounty to be shewed to them that beleeve and repent as they conceive but of that which goes before repentance as a means to lead unto it But here he speaks of a higher work of Gods shewing mercy namely the purpose of his will according to election to glory and the means thereunto And truely these mens boldnesse is too great in putting for God hath mercy on whom he wil have mercy God hath mercie on them that seek him by the means that he himselfe appoynts For though it be most true that God hath mercie on such yet the Apostle here speaks no more of Gods appoynting or commanding will for his shewing of mercy then of his appoynting or commanding vvill for his hardening v 18 whom he will he hardens He speaks of that will
according to which he himselfe works in loue or hatred not of that according to which he commands and appoints men to worke These men in truth confound all things setting mans will where Gods should stand God saith on whom I will they say on him that himselfe wils or seeketh as he ought c. The same Idol of mans wil they advance set up v. 16 where in stead of Gods shewing mercy they put mans beleeving mercy The Lord by willing and running v. 16 excludes whatsoever is of or in man and either within or without him and draws all to himselfe alone In the stead of God shewing mercy they put themselvs and their free will receiving mercy by God offered as the proper cause of difference between man and man The 17 vers For the Scripture saith unto Pharaoh c they handle very sleightly saying something such as it is about Gods hardening Pharoahs heart but not medling at all with the place according to the coherence which it hath with the words going before unto which yet the Holy Ghost strongly tyeth them in saying For the Scripture saith c. And herein they are in truth wise in their generation These words must needs answer to the latter part of the objection of unrighteousnesse with God in hating that is as they interpret it in rejecting such as seek righteousnesse by the works of the Law as did the fleshly Israelits But wherein I wonder did Pharaoh so How sought he justification by the works of the Law Who so professedly despised the God therof saying Who is the Lord that I should obey his voyce Did they see that this example of Pharaoh and their exposition of the place could not stand together and therfore chose to cut off the coherence so firmly tying the words together rather then to let fall their preconceived erroneous exposition Whatsoever they intend herein we know it is brought for an example of Gods absolute but righteous power of hardening rather then another whom he will and not whom he finds most deserving it for whom finds he not too much deserving it if he would deal in like manner with all as it is said whom that is which rather then other he will he hardneth v. 18. And let it be diligently minded that the Apostle here opposeth Gods shewing mercy to some and his hardening of others and not his shewing mercy to some and his condemning of others The adversaries by Gods shewing mercy would haue us understand his saving of such as beleev and repent And then on the contrary by Gods hardening should onely be meant his not shewing mercy to but punishing condemning such as doe not beleev nor repent But we know that the not hearing God voyce not beleeving and repenting follow upon hardnesse of heart Wherupon the Lord promiseth that in the day of his mercy and pittie he will take from his people their stony and hard hearts And so touching Pharaoh the Scriptures expresly shew that his hardnesse of heart was the cause of his unbeliefe and disobedience Whereupon I conclude evidently that the Apostle here speaks not of such a mercy onely as follows faith as the Adversaries would haue him but as goes before it also as he speaks of such a hardening as goâ—s before unbelief Note we here also that the Apostle in this place propounds Gods will as the cause of his dealing diversly with divers persons and not of his saving such as are to be saved after a divers manner from that which some namely the carnall Israelites imagined ADVERSARIES NOW to return to them They lay down a question thus What is the meaning of the hardening of Pharaoh And in their answer wholly passe by God as no doer in the businesse They make Pharaoh a doer in hardening his own heart which is true and Satan a doer in hardening Pharaohs heart and this is true also but God no doer but a sufferer only in giving him up that is as else where they expound it in leaving him to himselfe and to Satan to be hardened DEFENCE BVT first the Text imports a further thing in God whom it brings in thus speaking For this same purpose haue I raised thee up that I might shew my power in thee and that my name might be declared through all the earth Is Gods raysing up which is his hardening v. 8 nothing but his letting a man lie still and fall down lower then he was before Besides the end which was the glory of Gods power and name shews God to be a worker Every end must haue an efficient or working cause The glory of God was not the end of Satans work nor of Pharaohs work and therefore of Gods work in it Thirdly God hardened Pharaohs heart by sending Moses and Aaron unto him as by an occasion though not a cause as the Law is the occasion of sin and the Gospell the occasion of strife and variance Fourthly God deprived Pharaoh of the use of common sense and reason otherwise it could not haue been that after so many experiments by him taken of Gods powerfull hand against him and for the Israelits he should so furiously as he did haue followed them into the middest of the Sea Lastly besides and aboue all these God in whose hands the hearts of Kings are as the rivers of waters to turn them whether he will hardened Pharaohs heart by ordering his pride cruelty and contempt of God to this effect of obstinacy appearing in his most desperate course without which powerfull and unerring hand of God all the former notwithstanding it might haue come to passe that Pharaohs heart might haue been softned by the miracles and means used and so Gods word which before had foretold his hardening might not haue taken effect which is contrary to the truth and drift of the Apostle in this place God therefore was not onely a sufferer but a doer in the hardening of Pharaoh ADVERSARIES THeir next question is How consider you these words Who hath resisted his will v. 19. Vnto which they frame this untoward Answer viz. that those Iews seeking salvation by those works of the Law did not resist Gods will and so gaue him no cause to complain DEFENCE NOthing lesse as we haue shewed and shall further manifest by and by from the Apostles answer v. 20. The meaning is plain The words v. 19 Thou wilt then say unto me why doth he yet finde fault for who hath resisted his will are an objection against that which immediately went before whom he will he hardeneth Now against this it may colourably bee objected that if God hardens whom he will hee hath then no reason to complain of mens being hardened in disobedience for Who can resist his will if he will harden them A piece of an eie is sufficient to see the plainnesse of this exposition and coherence Their discourse then following that God would saue all and haue all repent amend and beleev
into question 2. He justifies the Lords doing by his absolute power over the creature as the potter hath power over his clay And by this answer of the Apostle it appeares how these men mistake his meaning in the question His answer is not at all of this or that manner of saving men as they imagine and maintain but of the saving of this person rather then that they being both alike in themselves and as the clay of the same lump If Pauls answer should be shaped according to their misformed question then the meaning must be that the potter might chuse which way he would make a vessell of honor whether by the workes of the Law or by faith and obedience to the Gospell and so not of the same lump but of two contrary lumps the one beleeving and obeying the other not turning from hiâ— wicked way and yet seeking salvation by his workeâ— The Apostle here plainly pleads the Lords power over the creature to make him a vessell of honor or dishonor they plead the Lords power over the means onely by which he will do this He the Lords power over the clay of the same lump but they over clay of clean contrary qualities Besides if Paul meant here to bring in the Iewes defending themselves that God had no cause to complain that they stuck to the Law that is looked to be justified by it seeing Gods will was that men should obey his Lawes and so live in them what needed he to haue sought so farre for an answer as the absolute power of God seeing he had an answer at hand which might have stopped all mouthes and which he ever presseth when question is of justification by the works of the Law which is that they could not fulfill the Law and therefore could not possibly be justified by it Lastly their exposition of these words Why hast thou made me thus that is that I cannot obtain salvation by the workes of the Law directly crosseth the Apostle who grants that God made men as is there objected and justifies him in so making or framing them both in his decree and work of holy providence by the power which he hath over men as the potter over his clay Hath not the potter power over the clay c. Besides men make themselves uncapable of salvation by the Law in that they keep it not But the Apostle here speaks of Gods making men vessels unto dishonor and not of mens making themselves and of the potter making the vessell and not of the vessels making it self thus or thus It is plain Paul grants the objection that no man can resist Gods will and yet justifies his complaining considering his power over his creature to decree and so to bring unto most contrary estates by just and convenient meanes persons in themselves alike and as the clay of one lump v. 21. 22. 23. ADVERSARIES IN the opening of these verses they follow their usuall but ill custome of carrying the Reader away to other places and things and enter upon a tedious discourse upon Ier. 18. from whence they affirme the Apostle hath these words and so speaks of the same making of a vessell of dishonor with the prophet in that place DEFENCE I Deny their peremptory assertion and require their proof If they say the same words are there first that is not simply true for part of them onely are there to be found and so are they in other places by name Esay 45. 9. where it is evident the Prophet speaks of another matter It is too weak a collection that because the like phrase or form of speech in part is to be found in two places that therefore the one is taken out of the other and that to the same purpose And to put the matter out of doubt it is evident that the Prophet and Apostle speak of clean divers things the Prophet speaks of marring the vessell and making it again that is of destroying persons or peoples if they repent not or doing good to them which repent The Apostle of making the vessell out of the masse or lump honourable or dishonourable The Prophet speaks of the making or marring of one and the same vessell the Apostle of divers vessels and the making of one to honour and another to dishonour Lastly the Apostle here speaks of the Lords purpose and work without respect to good or evill done by the persons and considering them as clay of the same lump the Prophets of Gods dealing with persons according to the good or evill which hee finds in them and so being divers yea clean contrary lumps And where they insinuate that we hold the making of the clay to be in creation which they affirm to be in vocation they speak untruely in both No man ever held that God in or by creation made any vessell to dishonour neither can they ascribe this as they doe to vocation Gods calling men is not to dishonour but to honour onely It is the divell and his instruments and not God who call men to dishonour which these men also proue against themselvs at large in the two pages following and therin pull down with the one hand what they haue built with the other as children use to doe with their cob-castles That which followeth v. 24. 25 c. is not to the thing in hand The disputation about election ends v. 23 and that of vocation followeth which latter is an effect of the former declaring indeed the persons but not confounding the things And thus if these men may be their own Iudges and may haue the praise which their own mouth giues them they haue very sufficiently explaned the ninth chapter to the Romans and to full satisfaction of him that doubts resolving him in every difficult place therof as they blow the trumpet or rather the bladder of their own praise But if the Scriptures in their true sense and scope may be judge and giue sentence they will be found neither to know them nor the power of God over his creature Which power yet v. 22 is declared not to be tyrannicall but most just never punishing but after the induring of the vessels of wrath having sinned as is his mercy also richly glorious in the salvation of the vessels of mercy v. 23. ADVERSARIES THE last place which they take upon them to answer is Act. 13 So many as were ordained to eternall life beleeved that is say they So many as beleev and obey the truth are ordained to eternall life DEFENCE A Strange perverting of the Scriptures setting the head in the feets place and the feet in the heads For although the thing which they affirm be in it selfe true yet is it not the Evangelists meaning Luke descends from the cause to the effect they crosly ascend from the effect to the cause The Evangelists meaning is that Pauls preaching in Antioch had a divers event with divers of whom so many as were pre-appointed or ordained