he lays down in the remaining part of the Text. 1. That this Righteousness proceeds from Faith The righteousness of God from faith to faith 2. That this principle of Righteousness was mentioned in the Old Testament As it is written the just shall live by faith And therefore we are first to enquire 1. What is the meaning of that Passage from faith to faith In what sense is the Righteousness which God requires said to be from faith to faith I answer that the meaning is this The Righteousness which pleaseth God is that which must begin from Faith which must still proceed from Faith and which at last must end in Faith For this is a saying like to that in Rom. 6.19 As ye have yielded your members servants to uncleanness and to iniquity unto iniquity even so yield your members servants to righteousness unto holiness For by serving iniquity unto iniquity is meant adding one sin to another and daily growing worse And by serving righteousness unto holiness is meant adding one degree of goodness to another and growing better And thus here the Righteousness which is from faith to faith is a Righteousness which first proceeds from Faith and is always built upon it afterwards and is at last perfected by it For that which the Apostle intimates by these words is That the Righteousness of a good Christian having Faith for the ground and reason of it does encrease as his Faith encreases and that the more he is rooted and strengthned in Faith the better he grows and he pleases God the more This seems to be the most natural interpretation of these words viz. That Faith is all along the Principle and Ground of that Righteousness which God expects and is pleased with But then 2. What relation hath that Passage out of the Old Testament to this matter As it is written the just shall live by faith I answer That the Apostle does hereby design to shew that though the Promises of the Gospel are incomparably more excellent than those that were made under the Law yet it was the belief of God's Promises then that held good men to the performance of their duty and intituled them to the favour of God The words are taken out of Habakk 2.4 God had promised the Jews that they should return from their Captivity in his appointed time v. 3. therefore says he though the vision tarry wait for it because it will surely come but the just shall live by his faith that is to say The sure belief of this Promise would support good men in the service of God under the Captivity in an Idolatrous Land and their Faith should be rewarded with a return into their own Country in God's appointed time In like manner Christians who have better promises viz. of an Heavenly Countrey do in this Faith work that Righteousness which the Gospel requires and for thus living by Faith in this World they shall live for ever in their Heavenly Countrey Faith was the foundation of the Jews observing their Law of outward Works and it was rewarded with such Blessings as that Law promised But the Gospel of Christ as we read in the foregoing Verse is the power of God unto salvation and therefore it is still true but in a much higher sense that the just shall live by faith because the Gospel requires an inward and spiritual Righteousness to which we are brought by the belief of promises of spiritual and eternal good things and because such Faith shall bring us to everlasting life Thus much for the Explication of the Text. And now my work shall be to enquire upon what ground it is that the Scriptures do attribute so much to Faith as they do and to shew that this is done without any disparagement at all to Godliness and Virtue And I have chosen this Argument to discourse upon that it may appear how unreasonably we of the Reformation are charged by our Adversaries as we often have been with Solifidianism as they call it that is with attributing all to Faith and leaving no necessity for Righteousness and good Works We do indeed with the Scriptures say That we are justified by faith and that the just do live by Faith but we do with the Scriptures also affirm Faith to be the principle of obedience and there is a righteousness from faith to faith without which we cannot please God nor be justified before him We do also renounce the merit of good Works and resolve the acceptance of them into the Grace and Mercy of God in not imputing our sins to us and when we have done all they are the gracious Promises of God and it is not the dignity of our own Righteousness that we rely upon but then we say it is the faith of these Promises that maketh us live to God by Repentance and good Works which are so necessary that we are dead without them Now from hence indeed it follows That where there is that faith which God requires holiness will follow For if we are justified by faith if he that believes shall be saved and yet without holiness no man shall see the Lord then they that believe are holy which if it be found true then we not to say the Scriptures are justified in attributing so much to Faith as we do that it is by Faith we please God that we live by Faith and that we are saved by Faith On the other hand it seems hard to understand how those great things should be spoken of Faith when there are many that do not hold faith and a good conscience but hold the truth in unrighteousness And since it follows more certainly That a man believes because he is holy than that he is holy because he believes it should rather have been said that a Believer shall live by his Righteousness than that the just shall live by faith and yet following the Scriptures we say that we live by faith and are justified by faith To clear this difficulty it will be requisite to consider well these two things 1. What the Nature of Faith is And 2. What power it has or what efficacy must necessarily be granted to it and when it hath that power and efficacy I shall not only aim at making the notions of these things clear but also profitable unto Godliness 1st then As to the Nature of Faith I do not see that the Scripture means any thing by Faith but a persuasion of the truth of something that is affirmed upon the Testimony of one that affirms it or upon some other reason besides sensible evidence or immediate knowledge And thus Divine Faith is a persuasion of the truth of those things which we have God's testimony for And that we are thus to understand these words Faith or believing in the Scriptures is very plain because otherwise the Scriptures must have altered the common sense and signification of words But can we think that when our Blessed Saviour required believing under the penalty of
godly life because there are many men of clear and active thoughts and conversant in the study of Religion that do not live by Faith for as the Faith of such men cannot in reason be thought to be a confused and indeterminate persuasion so it is too plain by experience that some such do retain the Faith but make shipwrack of a good conscience And therefore let us consider the third thing wherein the power of Faith consists viz. 3. The permanence of it upon the mind or a constancy of frequent consideration upon what we believe That is to say let us suppose a man that doth not only believe all matters of Faith that are needful and apprehend them distinctly and particularly and with application to himself but likewise by very much consideration of these things hath made them present and habitual to himself and of such a man I say That he is under the whole power of Faith and he it is that overcomes the world For such a Believer has two advantages which cannot fail to make him a good man 1. His Persuasion or his Faith is present to his mind when he most needs it i.e. upon all occasions of temptation so that he will be ready in the strength of it to say with Joseph How shall I do this great wickedness and sin against God But now though one believes all the awakening Doctrines of Religion yet if he does not think of them nor lay them to heart when the Devil the World and the Flesh are busy with him t is all one with him at the time as if he had never heard of the Articles of Christian Faith and for the present he is as much without the Operation of Faith as if he had none at all It is with him as it is with a man in a swooning fit there is indeed life in him but it is without sense and motion and for the time he differs not from one that is dead or rather as there is a principle of sense and motion in the one without any act of either so is there indeed in the other a Principle of Faith but no Act of it and it is therefore as if it were not at all Distinct and particular application of what we believe will do much towards the restraining of a man's lusts and this is properly Faith but then that Faith which once was and now is not can do nothing at present which is the case of too many persons professing Christianity That their belief of Divine Truth is oftner absent than present because they do not think of those things which should govern them and assist them under Temptations but by chance or when they cannot help it their business is to put those things out of their minds and not to fix them there And this is the first advantage of one that is constant in his consideration of the Truths whereof he is convinced that they are present to him when he stands in need of their help and indeed never at any great distance from him The 2d Is this and that is the greatest of all That he hath a true and lively sense of these things as often as they return to his mind and he always believes them as he should do under a vigorous apprehension of his own great concernment in them To believe that there is a God and a Life to come and that the Son of God came to be our Saviour and will come to be our Judge that through the Infinite Mercy of God and through the Death and Passion of our Saviour we may obtain Forgiveness of Sins and Eternal Life to believe these things I say according to their nature and our concernment in them is to have a due sense of them and to be justly affected with them more than with all other interests whatsoever because these indeed are the greatest of all Now it is by a Constancy of Believing i. e. of Considering these things and making them present to us that we come to that Faith which consists in a right apprehension and a just sense of them Nor will any other means do without this and indeed all means of Grace are ineffectual without it and they are then effectual when they bring us to this degree of Faith The Prayers that we make are unprofitable if they do not help to fix our minds upon God and Divine Truth and by their frequent returns make a sense of Religion natural and familiar to us Our reading the Scriptures and hearing good Doctrine and Exhortation and our assembling for the worship of God is unprofitable to Godliness otherwise than by accustoming of us to think as we should do that is to be affected with the Doctrines of our most holy Faith Good education and good examples do no otherwise promote the work of God in our minds than by awakening our consideration of that Truth which is to renew us in the spirit of our minds Afflictions and Judgments the Fears and Apprehensions of Death the amazing Calls of God's Providence cannot of themselves work the reformation of an evil heart and life if they do it it is by beginning to bring men to that Consideration which they continue afterwards till they come to a Faith that answers the nature of the things they believe which consists in a just sense and apprehension of them but this is not to be gained but by a constant Consideration because they are spiritual things or future things after this life which are the main Objects of our Faith If a sick man believes that he shall gain his health by such a method or a poor man that he shall get an estate or a prisoner that he shall recover his liberty or any man that he shall come to his end in this world by such a course of means there is no need of much Consideration to persuade himself to try it because without any pains taken with himself he is naturally possest with a lively persuasion of his concernment in things of this nature But in Religion it is otherwise tho the interest be great nay the greatest of all yet it is not a sensible nor a present interest in comparison and so our Faith must be renewed day by day that we may be affected with it as reasonable creatures ought to be and by much thinking of it i. e. by many Acts of Faith arrive to such a sense of God and our interest in Religion as the nature of the thing deserves And this is that Faith which overcomes the world which purifies the heart and makes a man a new creature I deny not That wicked men believe and do contrary to a sense of their duty and of their obligations to God I acknowledge that they have so much Faith as makes them uneasie under their guilt somewhat loth to commit sin and ashamed and afraid when it is committed I grant that they have Faith truly so called but then they want Faith too that Faith which is properly
persuaded to secure all the good things to our selves we have been considering either by keeping always a good Conscience or by unfeigned Repentance This indeed were a good application and this ought to be the conclusion of the whole matter But time would fail me to insist upon even this Exhortation as the case would bear which I shall therefore reserve to the next opportunity intending then also to pursue some other Points viz. How this Doctrine doth consist with Prayers and Endeavours against Adversity and how far it is a Rule to such Prayers c. How it ought to influence the judgment we make of the happy or wretched estate of man in this life How true and profitable a point of Wisdom it is to reckon upon the uncertainties of this World Why a righteous man only can do it without sollicitude and losing the comfort of present Enjoyments And lastly How seasonably a vehement Exhortaion to Piety may be grounded upon all these Considerations The Sixth Sermon ROM VIII 28. We know that all things work together for good to them that love God THE remaining Points are now to be pursued the first whereof was this 1. How this Doctrine doth consist with Prayers and Endeavours against Adversity and how far it is a Rule to such Prayers and Endeavours 1. How it consists with them For if outward pains and troubles work for a good much greater than the evil that belongs to them and if we have so great an assurance of this as we pretend why does the Church pray against all Adversity Why do religious men avoid it as well as they can no less than the rest of the World It should seem more agreeable to their faith in God in general and to their belief of this Principle in particular to force miseries upon themselves or at least to desire God to send them But they as well as others provide for their health and send for the Physician when they are sick for their livelihood and use the Law to secure or recover their Rights for their welfare every way and in all their distresses take counsel and use means for their relief depending all along upon God for success by continual prayers So that none seem to believe in good earnest what we pretend to know unless perhaps something of this may be seen in those who affect poverty renounce all propriety in worldly Goods impair their Health by a sparing and ill Diet and at certain times whip their own Bodies And yet we are apt to think there is more noise than truth in these appearances we are sure there is superstition in the practice and we suspect hypocrisy in the pretence and that men do these things more to amuse the World than to benefit themselves Since therefore we know that evil works for a greater good why do we avoid evil I answer 1. When all things are said to work together for good though Evils are principally meant because the design of the Apostle was to administer comfort under them yet as I shewed at first the good things of this life are by no means excluded And therefore the good that comes of evil can be no reason of running into adversity or pulling it upon our selves unless good could come to us no other way which is contrary to what the Text affirms which says All things shall work together for good 2. One principal Reason why all things work together for good is this Because it is God that out of all things chuses that which he sees is the best for us Now the avoiding of Adversity is so far from being inconsistent with this belief that on the other hand to bring it upon our selves would destroy a main reason of it viz. That it is of God's chusing and not our own If by any wicked way I compass a worldly end the good thing is not properly of God's giving If by my own folly and wilfulness I fall into misery the evil is not properly of God's sending in both cases I have been my own Carver and therefore have no reason to expect good from either I cannot hope for Gods's blessing upon the one or the other since I did not commit the issue of my Affairs to his Providence and Wisdom but was resolved to be my own Chuser So that the Operation and Grace of God being one indispensable cause of the profit which good men make of the evils of this life the good that comes of them can be no reason why they should expose themselves voluntarily to Evils but 't is a very good reason why they should not and that because we cannot expect God's Blessing where we lean to our own Wisdom altogether and will not submit our affairs to the Wisdom of God But now if it be said That by this Arguing a man that contrives for his own welfare and prosperity cannot hope that it will work for his good when he has compassed it because he chuses for himself as absolutely as if he pulled Calamities upon his own head 'T is easily answered That he is not his own chuser in that case as he would be in this for he that brings evil upon himself or neglects what is necessary to prevent it does absolutely chuse it but so does not he chuse the good things of this life that contrives for them within the bounds of Honesty and Religion for he still leaves the issue to Providence This can only be said of them that by ways of Injustice or any kind of sin grasp at worldly Prosperity it is of these truly said that they will be rich and great and make their Fortunes here that they trust not in God but lean to their own Wills that they refer nothing to his Wisdom but will dispose absolutely of themselves And no less true would this be of a man who on the other side should abandon himself to Adversity And as I said before in both cases God's Wisdom being no way acknowledged and submitted to his Grace cannot be expected 3. To both these Considerations let us add that of the natural aversion we find in our selves to pain and want and other evils of the Body and it will be very evident that the Doctrine of the Text infers no obligation to inflict them voluntarily upon our selves but is very well consistent with our Prayers and endeavours to avoid them As to these Evils it could never be required that we should not fear them when we are in danger nor feel them when they are present nor desire to deliver our selves from them because these are the necessary results of our Nature All that could be expected was that we should fear them moderately in proportion to what they are and bear them patiently admitting those comforts under them which they do not exclude and removing them by all such means as will not bring greater mischiefs upon us But let no man think that because Religion does not pretend to extinguish the sense of bodily Good and Evil
hence Not to judge of this case by the outward appearance only or by the present state of mens circumstances in this World As to this point whether it be well or ill with a man it is not by any means so considerable what his outward Condition is as what use he makes of it now and how it will end hereafter Take him with all the worldly Prosperities about him that the heart of man can wish but do not presently pronounce him blessed nor wish thy self as he is There are other things of greater concern than those that appear which ought to come under consideration Does not his fulness lead him to forget God Do not his Pleasures carry him away into Intemperance Does not his greatness lift him up with pride Are not his Affections captivated by this World Are his Fortunes made to administer to Piety towards God and Charity to men or to provide for the Lusts of the Flesh And will he be the better or the worse for them in the end These are the material Questions No man is to be envied that abuses good things to his own hurt and undoes himself with prosperity And certainly he is in the much happier condition who converts all Adversities to a good use and grows better within by being worse without who turns himself to God more effectually by Repentance and Prayer upon ever pain or loss that he sustains who cleaves faster to his God for being forsaken by the World and when all things are unquiet without him takes the more care to keep all quiet and calm within and to make his true happiness fast and firm to himself Such a man may seem unhappy to the eye of the World But happiness is a thing that dwells within doors and does not often shew it self abroad we can seldom tell where it lives by outward signs Therefore do not seek for it any where but in God and in thy own mind Think not that thou hast found it when thou seest a man encompassed with all kinds of outward prosperity It does not pass from one man to another with Silver and Gold it neither goes nor comes with House and Lands it does not descend with Titles and Inheritances it does not wait in a retinue of Servants nor mingle it self with Flatterers It is not served up at a plentiful Table nor is it put on with fine Cloaths no nor kept or lost with the health of the body nor does it always go along with a chearful Countenance It is no visible Estate but a secret Treasure and when thou hast found all the former things about a man still thou must look into his mind to know infallibly whether he has gained this or not and so much reason and no more thou hast to believe all is well with him as thou hast to take him for a good man one who loves God and is beloved by him So that we are not to judge of our whole estate here in this World by outward things because all the true happiness of men which they have in present possession lies in the mind and if they have it not there they have it not at all Much less are we to measure it by outward appearance when we consider that the greatest part of it is in reversion When it is once seen to what account the good or the evil of this life turns at last how a man has improved himself in Patience in Charity in Faith in dependance upon God and in dependance upon the World then we can more certainly pronounce whether it has been well or ill with him all along And all will understand it clearly when 't is once seen who shall appear with Christ in glory In the mean time they are in good Circumstances who do not only in all Conditions repose themselves upon God and a good Conscience but to whom all things that befal them are working for a good that is yet unseen but will certainly be manifested in due time Especially since it is a good that will shortly begin and never end For the things that are seen are temporal but the things that are not seen are eternal But then 3. If all things shall work together for good to them that love God then may a good man without any abatement of his present Comfort reckon upon all the uncertainties and Vicissitudes of this World For he knows that future Ills will as certainly work for his good as if they were present and though they are supposed and as yet uncertain yet the good is certain upon supposition that the evils happen And it is no small advantage to be able to count upon adversities without disturbance for this is one way to reap all the comfort of present enjoyments without suffering them to do us any hurt We shall not stake our contentment and satisfaction upon them when we consider how uncertain they are nor let our Affections cling too much to them because they may slip from us before we are aware We shall use them with sobriety and charity and thankfulness not knowing but in a little time this may be all the comfort we shall take in them But most men do not care to think of the future any other way but in that of Self-flattery To morrow shall be as to day and much more abundantly They put away the evil day far from them and cannot endure to consider it till 't is upon them and 't is impossible to put it off any longer And then how can comfort find a way into their Hearts whose beloved enjoyments are suddenly gone and nothing is left but the guilty remembrance of having abused them to Folly and Lust I know not what difference there may be upon other accounts between the satisfaction which the good things of this life yield to a wise man on the one side and those pleasures which fools reap from them on the other But there is this difference sufficiently to the good man's advantage that the comfort he finds in them is consistent with Principles of Truth he does not conceal the Truth from himself he does not go on in a vain presumption as if these things would always last but uses them as things that perish in the using and loves them as things that may be lost and without trusting them does from time to time take all the reliefs and pleasures that a reasonable man can desire from them In the mean time the uncertainty of these things does not sit uneasy upon his spirit because he knows that while they last they shall work for his good and when they fail that shall do so too But on the other hand how extravagantly soever a licentious man pleases himself and indulges his Appetites in his prosperity he is all the while beholden to ignorance and mistake and foolish presumption for his present Enjoyments Tell him of the fickleness of his Fortunes and the changeableness of the World in its best estate that he is well to day but
and therefore to be sure when it brings little or none at all And upon this account it had doubtless been a true saying if it had been said Notevery one that in other things doth the Will of my Father shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven but he that also saith unto me Lord Lord i. e. who doth moreover make an outward profession of being my Disciple This I say had been true but then it had not been so instructing and useful an Admonition as it is in the Text because it is incomparably more certain that he who doth the Will of God in all other things will out wardly profess the truth of the Gospel than that every one who doth profess it will live according to it And therefore our Saviour laid his Caution where the danger was and so I come to the 2d Point That an outward profession of Christianity is not of it self sufficient in order to our Salvation inasmuch as it is moreover necessary that we should do the Will of God i. e. that we should do his Will in all other things and in general that our Affections and Practices should be answerable to the truth we profess which is a thing so plain if we once come seriously to consider it that there is as little need of proof to make it out as one would think there was of this Caution of our Saviour not to trust in outward profession when our hearts and lives are contrary to what we profess What is a professed Christian but one that declares himself to believe That the unrighteous the unmerciful the unclean the ungodly shall never enter into the Kingdom of Heaven one that declares to the World that his chief business is to be saved and that without holiness no man shall see the Lord And therefore whilst himself lives in ungodliness and is led away by worldly Lusts he is the most absurd person in the World and so much more ridiculous than a man that has skill in any thing but the proper business of his Calling by which he must live as the Concerns of another World are above all our Interests in this For such a man to maintain the hope of Everlasting Life is a contradiction to his own Faith and Profession such a contradiction to his Profession that he exposes himself to have the lie given him by the World such a contradiction to his Faith that his own Conscience one would think should give him the lie too But yet as plain a case as it is that meer profession without doing the Will of God is not enough to save us our Saviour nevertheless thought fit here and elsewhere plainly to admonish us of it that we might not deceive our selves And the Apostle foretold there would be men having a form of godliness and denying the power thereof and therefore it should seem that how plain soever the mistake is of trusting to profession without a practice answerable to it yet men would be very apt to fall into that mistake There are these two things which I shall hereupon take occasion to speak to 1. That Experience has proved the proneness of Mankind to this folly of presuming upon mere profession that God is pleased with them 2. What are the causes and occasions of so wretched a conceit so void of all shadow or pretence to reason 1. As to the proof of it that it has been so I shall need to insist but little upon it because alas the thing is too apparent in our own days and every man that is guilty has a testimony of it from his own Conscience if he will hearken to it too plain to be denied Our Blessed Saviour himself found a great deal of this folly and madness among the Jews especially amongst the Scribes and Pharisees when he came into the World Their Fathers had for 400 years been cured of Idolatry and the fondness of the gods of their Neighbours round about them they had smarted too severely for that ever to return to it again But they soon fell to make the Profession and Worship of God according to the Law a dispensation for Luxury and Injustice and Unmercifulness and wicked living instead of a restraint from it plainly shewing thereby that their Fathers did not like the True Religion because it was too good for them since their Posterity not daring to revolt from the outward profession of it yet soon learned to reconcile it with a licentious practice Nay if we will take St. Paul's word who did not use to reprove without cause they thought that the same sins which they were guilty of with the Gentiles would not have so bad a construction made of them nor be so displeasing to God as they were in the Gentiles For as it appears from Rom. 2. they judged the Gentiles for doing evil things and did them themselves thinking all the while to escape the righteous judgment of God And what was the reason of all this They had the Temple of God amongst them the Promises made to Abraham and to his Posterity God's Service according to the Law of Moses Sacrifices according to the Law and Washings and divers Ordinances in the observation of which they put their trust and believed that no Israelite should go without his portion of happiness in the life to come In this state our Saviour found them they trusted in Moses and said we have Abraham to our Father they built and garnished the Tombs of the Prophets those very Prophets that had been so ill entertained by their Forefathers for declaring against their sins and because they did this external honour to the Monuments of those good men they excused themselves from following their Instructions being full of hypocrisy and iniquity and all uncleanness Now this being so notorious in our Saviour's time and having been so for some Ages before it seemed needful that his Disciples should be warned against the like fatal mistakes into which there was no little reason to be jealous they would fall For by how much a greater Person Jesus was than Moses and his Sacrifice more excellent than the Sacrifices of the Law and his Religion a more rational and perfect Religion than any that had been before so much greater danger there might be least men should trust to their relation to Christ and to the Sacrifice of Christ and to the profession of the Faith of Christ without an holy heart and life If the Jews could say We have Abraham to our Father and this were enough to quiet their guilty fears it was to be feared Christians would say We have Christ Jesus our Lord and Master our Deliverer and Saviour and make the same use of it If they trusted in Moses there was some reason to suspect that others would hereafter lay hold upon Christ and think themselves safe enough by making their boast of him no less than the Jews had done before of Moses and consequently great reason for this earnest admonition Not every one