Christ's Incarnation and Death should in the fulness of time demonstrate his Justice and make it agreeable to the ends of his Government to dispence with the Law of Innocency and to pardon Sin And therefore not Christ's Death it self but God's Decree of the Death of Christ Incarnate was the cause of the Promise and of the New Covenant made with Adam and of the Salvation of Believers then Which Will or Decree is called by some the interpellation or undertaking of the eternal Word A. But at least Sin fore-seen is causa sine qua non B. Call it by what name you please as long as you confess it to be no Cause for causa sine qua non is called Causa fatua and is none But it is not Sin which is Causa sine qua non for it is no sin from eternity A. It is the futurity of sin that is Causa sine qua non B. Yet more notions what is futurity any thing or nothing nothing certainly For quoad ens it is terminus diminuens and nothing is no cause But it is Gods knowledge that Sin will be which is to be called the Cause of Gods Decree as sine qua non if any be But I must deal most about futurition with the Calvinists when I come to save you from Dr. Twisse his Ferula A. I pray you then open me the matter as it is your self B. I will make your Cause better than you have made it But not by making other mens worse but by opening the reconciling truth 1. I shall tell you in what sense Gods Will and Decrees may and must be said Predestinatio nihil ponit in praedestinato inquit Aquin. 1. q. 23. a. 2. to have an extrinsick cause without change in God 1. Know therefore that Gods Essence is his Will but not as Essence To say that God is God and that God willeth this or that are not terms of the same signification 2. Gods Will is his Essence denominated from some amiable good as the Object and so there is ever quid respectivum in the notion of Will 3. As God willeth himself the Act being perfectly immanent his Will is called himself much more properly than his Will of things extrinsick which is ever either effectively or at least objectively transient Because it is God that willeth and that is willed or loved which made many Ancients say That this was the third Person in the Trinity 4. But as God willeth things ad extra though it is his Essence that so willeth them yet it is unfit to say simply that this Will is God e. g. that to will Peter's Salvation is God because the name Will here includeth the thing willed 5. And therefore when we speak of Gods Will in the universal notion as abstracted from all particular Objects and Acts it is less inconvenient to say simply that this Will is God than when we speak of his Will in act ad extra By this time you may see that though Gods Will as his Essence hath no cause yet his Will as denominated extrinsecally from the Object may have some kind of Cause that is * Alvarez himself saith that by a Cause he meaneth also any objective condition or reason of the Act. Objective which is quasi materia actus and the terminus sine quo non that is Gods Will is not denominated a complacency in Christ existent or in Peter regenerate * This is all that Ruiz his Reasons prove De Vol. Dei disp 115. Sect. 4. p. 102 Who saith that there is more than extrinsick denomination Et relatio rationis â—um realis formalitas But he doth but shew by his quodammodo that he knoweth not what to say or his understanding a seeing that the World was good before any of these things did exist So that by extrinsick denomination without any change in God he may and should be said de novo to know things to be existent to be past to will things as existent with complacency or will them with displicency But not to will the futurity of mens damnation de novo but yet his Will of the futurity of mens damnation hath several degrees of the Objective Cause from whence it is denominated As in esse cognito the person who is the Object is in order of nature first a man a subject and then a Sinner and a Despiser of Mercy and then a damnable Sinner And so these are indeed conditions in the Object or Causae sine quibus non or Objective material-constituent causes not in themselves but the fore-sight of them not of Gods Will as his Essence nor of his Will as a Will but of his Will as extrinsecally denominated a Decree to damn Judas e. g. because no otherwise is Judas an Object capable of giving such an extrinsick denomination to Gods Will. II. Both you and I hold and must hold that God decreeth to damn all that shall be damned * Vasquez in 1. Tho. q. 23. a. 3. p. 709. Conclusio quod Deus aliquos reproâ—at est de fide constat â—nim ex scriptura multos a Deo reprobari Vid. Ruâ—z de prâ—de fin Tract 2. per totum But it is false that we hold that he doth it without any respect to fore-seen sin For 1. He fore-seeth this Sin as the only meritorious cause of their damnation what he doth in time that is it which he decreed to do from eternity But in time he damneth no man but for Sin therefore from eternity he decreed to damn no man but for Sin For sin I say as the cause of damnation which Dr. Twisse doth frequently profess 2. And though this Sin can be no proper efficient cause of Gods Volition or Decree yet it is a presupposed necessary qualification in the Object as fore-seen in the Mind of God and so as aforesaid is an Objective Cause as fore-seen III. The execution of Justice and glorification of it and Gods Holiness thereby is good and fit to be the Object of Gods Volition or Decree But in the word Reprobation is in most mens sense included much which we hold not which is to be opened further anon IV. And as to the absoluteness of Gods Decree to damn those that are dammed I think you will not deny it your self supposing them to be fore-seen finally impenitent Sinners God doth not only will that all the finally impenitent shall be damned nor only that e. g. Judas shall be damned if he be finally impenitent But also that Judas as fore-seen finally impenitent shall certainly be damned So that when the condition is fore-seen in the Recipient or Object it is no longer a meer conditional Decree but absolute supposing that condition In all this we are agreed The second Crimination A. II. But that 's not all But you hold That God eternally decreed mens sin yea all the sin of Men and Devils some say That he decreed to predetermine men insuparably to the forbidden Act and
every Man his Right and Due is included 338. It is not Gods will without the sign as is said nor the sign without his will but the sign as notifying and his will as notified that is a Law and Jus the Effect Gods will is the principal Cause and quasi Anima Legis and the sign is the instrumental Cause and quasi Corpus 339. The Sign reâ—pecteth these things 1. The matter due 2. The dueness or right 3. The will of God concerning or constituting it 4. The mind and will of man to whom this is signified Or 1. Gods will as the Efficient of Right 2. The matter and form of Right as Constituted 3. The mind and will of man as the terminus 340. These signs of Gods will are 1. Natural called the Law of Nature which is the Natura ordo rerum especially ipsius hominis as before described 2. By extraordinary Revelation The latter have the great advantage of plainness significandi rem praeceptam The former hath the fuller evidence of its Author and Original that it is indeed of God Both are his Laws to man 341. Laâ— Judgement and execution the three parts of Government differ in that 1. Law maketh the Debitum or Jus 2. Judgement determineth It is of great use for a Divine who handleth Gods Laws to understand the nature of Laws in genere as Suarez in praes de Legib. sheweth which Book is one of the best on that Subject that is extant among us of it by decâ—sive application 3. Execution distributeth according to it 342. The Jus vel Debitum instituted by the Law is twofold 1. A Subditis What shall be Due from the Subjects the Debitum Officii 2. Subditis what shall be Due to the Subjects viz. 1. Antecedently to their merits which is 1. The act of our Governing Benefactor 2. Or a Divider such was the Law for dividing the Israelites inheritances 2. Consequently which is by the Retributive part of the Law commonly called the Sanction which is 1. By the Premiant part what Reward shall be due 2. By the Penal what Punishment 343. Accordingly Laws have several parts 1. Precept and Prohibition making Duty 2. Retributive 1. Premiant 2. Penal called Gods Promises and Threats 3. And subservient or accidental 1. Narratives Historical Chronological c. 2. Pure Donations 3. Prophesies 4. Doctrinal 5. Exhortatory 6. Reprehensive c. 344. Though Debitum vel Jus facere be the formal operation of a Law which is to be Fundamentum Relationis yet the Act of the chief parts preceptive or penal is commonly called Obligation And so many say that obligare aut ad obedientiam aut ad poenam is all the action of a Law But Obligare is a Metaphor and therefore in dispute to be laid by or to give place to the proper terms And the Premiant act is not properly called obligation nor the penal act save in a secondary notion as he is â—bligatus ad poenam ferendam if judged who is first Reus poenae or to whom it is made Due by the Law 345. The â—bligation aut ad obedientiam aut ad poenam is not of equality in the disjunctive As if God were indifferent which we chose But it is primarily ad obedientiam and but subserviently ad poenam as a means against future disobedience and a securing the ends of Government in case of sin 346. But the Preceptive and the Premiant parts are each chief or final in several respects God Commandeth us a Course of Duty or Right action to this end that we may be Happy in his Love And he promiseth us first and giveth us after in foretaste this Happiness to draw us to Duty 347. But here is a wonderful inseparable twist and in the main an Identity God Ruleth us as a Father or Regent Benefactor All his Benefits are Free-gifts as to the Thing and Value But given 1. In an Order 2. And the rest as means to the ultimate In which respects they are a Reward or means to it His very Law is a Gift and a great Benefit Duty is the means to keep his first Gifts and to receive more The very doing of the duty is a receiving of the Reward the object of duty being felicitating As if feasting or accepting offered wealth or honour were our work Holiness is happiness in a great part And in our End or state of perfection all will be one To Love God Rejoice in Him and praise him will be both our duty and felicity means and end as it were in one 348. Whereas some say that if there were no Law sin would deserve punishment it is an errour For it is due only by Law But it 's true Of all the following distinctions note these words of Bonavent in 1. d. 4â— a. 1. q. 1. Voluntâ—â—em Dâ—i Antecedentem sâ—â— Conditionalem possiblâ—e â—â—â—â— non impleri at consequentem absolutam nequâ—â—uam Sâ—â—unâ—um Daâ—â—sc Voluntas benâ—pâ—aciti â—t â—apl Antecedens seu Conditionales consequous qua vult quantum in sâ— est omnium salutem alsoluta sive consequens quâ— determinate vult aliquid qâ—â—d noâ—it certitudin 〈…〉 Intelligendum â—â—â— nâ—llam Dei Voluntatem pâ—sse superari aut cassari Aliquam tamen posse non impâ—eri â—t antecedentem Aliqâ—â—m ut consequentem impossibile â—sse noâ— impleri â—â—â— impediâ—i Non â—tiam possibilâ— est Voluntatem Dei cassari Nam cassam diâ—itur aliquid dum priâ—â—tur eâ—â—ectu pâ—â—â—â—io ad quem est Voluntas autâ—â— nullo privatur esseciu ad quâ—m est pâ—â—pâ—ie Nam quod dicitur quod Deus vult omnes homiâ—â—s salvos fieri quantâ—m in sâ— est haec Voluntas non connotat salutem nec proprie est ad effectum salutâ—s sed connotat ordinatioâ—â—m naturae sive naturâ—m ordinabilâ—n ad salutâ—n â—â—â—â— niâ—il plus est diâ—â—re Deus vult istum salâ—â—â— fieri quantum in se est qâ—â—m Deâ— placuit dare isti â—â—â—â—ram per quam posset pâ—â—â—â—â—ire ad saâ—uâ—em quod Deus paraâ—â—â— esset juâ—â—re ita quod salus non deficit propâ—er deseâ—tum à pâ—nte Dei Therefore it connoteth also all the helps which God affordeth men that it 's due by the meer Law of Nature without any superadded Positive Laws 349. Gods will called Legislative or Governing is ever fulfilled in strict sence that is So much as is Gods part and the Laws part to do is ever done e. g. God saith Perfect obedience c. shall be Adams duty and it is done It is his Duty whether he will or not He saith To steal shall be sin and it is sin He saith He that believeth shall have right to Justification and Glory and he that believeth not shall be Filius mortis that is Death and Hell shall be his Due and so it is Thus strictly all Gods Will is done 350. But in the secondary remote sence every sin violateth the Will of God by breaking his Law For when he saith Obedience shall
case 661. I intreat the Reader that is inclining to any extreams but to read â—over first those short answers of Prosper ad Capitulâ— Gallorum and ad Objectiones Vincent And most of the Sententiae de Capit. I shall think it worthy my labour to recite to force them on the Readers observation and let him see the highest old Doctrine of Gods Decrees Sent. 1. Whoever saith that by Gods Predestination as by fatal necessity men compelled into sins are constrained to death is not a Catholick For Gods Predestination doth by no means make men bad nor is the cause of any mans sin Sent. sup 2. He that saith that the Grace of Baptism received doth not take away Original sin from them that are not predestinated to life is not a Catholick For the Sacrament of Baptism by which all sins He meaneth that those that sincerely covenanted with God in Baptism were truly pardoned though he thought some of them fell away and perished are blotted out is true even in them who will not remain in the truth and for them that are not predestinated unto life Sent. sup 3. He that saith that they that are not predestinated to life though they were in Christ regenerated by Baptism and have lived piously and justly it profitteth them nothing but they are so long reserved till they fall to ruine and they are not taken out of this life till this happen to them as if the ruine of such men were to be referred to Gods constitution is not a Catholick For God doth not therefore prolong the time of any mans age that by long living he should fall to ruine and in his long living fall from the right â—aith seeing long life is to be numbered with the gifts of God by which a man should be better and not worse Sent. sup 4. He that saith that all are not called to Grace if he speak of such as Christ is not declared to is not to be reprehended Sent. sup 5. He that saith that they that are called are not equally called but some that they might believe and some that they might not believe as if to any man the Vocation were the cause of his not believing saith not right For though faith be not but by Gods Gift and Mans Will yet Infidelity is by mans will alone Sent. 6. He that saith that Pree-will in Man is Nothing but it 's Gods predestination which worketh in men whether it be to good or to evil is not a Catholick For Gods Grace doth not abolish mans choice or free-will but perfecteth it and revoketh and reduceth it into the way from error that that which was bad by its own liberty may by the operation of Gods Spirit be made right And Gods predestination is alwayes in Good which knoweth how either to pardon with the praise of mercy or punish with the praise of Justice the sin which is committed by mans will alone Sent. 7. He that saith that God for this cause giveth not Perseverance to some of his Children whom he regenerated in Christ to whom he gave faith hope and Love because by Gods fore-knowledge and predestination they were not differenced from the mass of perdition If he mean that God endowed these men in Goodness but would not have them remain in it and that he was the cause of their tâ—rning away he judgeth contrary to the Justice of God For though Gods Omnipotence could have given the grace of standing to them that will fall yet his grace doth not first forsake them before they have forsaken it And because he foresaw that they would do this by a Voluntary desertion therefore he had them not in the Election of Predestination Sent. 8. He that saith that God would not have all men saved but a certain number that are predestinate speaketh hardlier of the altitude of Gods unsearchable grace than he should speak Who would have all men to be saved and to come to the acknowledgement of the truth and fulfilleth the purpose of his will on them whom being foreknown he predestinated and being predestinate he called being called he justified and being justified he glorified Losing nothing of the fulness of the Gentiles and of all the seed of Israel for whom the eternal Kingdom was prepared in Christ before the foundation of the World For all the World is chosen out of all the World And out of all men all men are adopted So that they that are saved are therefore saved because God would have them saved and they that perish do perish because they deserve to perish Sent. 9. He that saith that our Saviour was not Crucified for the Redemption of the whole World looketh not to the Virtue of the Sacrament that is Sacrifice but to the part or participation of the unbelievers When as the blood of our Lord Jesus Christ is the Price of the whole World From which Price they are Aliens who being either delighted in their Captivity will not be redeemed or when they are redeemed return again to the same Captivity For the Word of the Lord falleth not nor is the redemption of the World evacuated For though the World in the vessels of wrath knew not God yet the World in the vessels of mercy knew him Which God without their preceding Merits took out of the power of darkness and translated into the Kingdom of the Son of his Love Sent. 10. He that saith that God substracteth from some the preaching of the Gospel lest perceiving the preaching of the Gospel they should be saved may decline the envy of the objection by the paâ—â—onage of our Saviour himself who would not work Miracles with some that he saith would have believed had they seen them And he forbad his Apostles to preach to some people and now suffereth some Nations to live without his Grace Sent. 11. He that saith that God by his Power compelleth men to sin is deservedly reprehended For God who is the Author of Justice and Goodness and all whose Statutes and Commands are against sin is not to be thought to compell any to sin and precipitate them from innocency into crimes But if there be any of so profound impiety as that they are reckoned to be beyond the remedy of correction they receive not an increase of their iniquity from God but are made â—â—â—â— by themselves because they deserved to be left of God and given up to themselves and to deceivers for their former sins that so their sin should be a punishment of their sin Sent. 12. He that saith that obedience is withdrawn from some that are called and live piously and righteously that they may cease to obey doth think ill of Gods Goodness and Justice as seeming to constrain the godly to ungodliness and to take away good mens innocency from them When as He is the Giver and Keeper of godliness and innocency He therefore that adhereth to God is acted by the Spirit of God but he that departeth from God doth fall from his obedience
37. Sect. IV. Of the Law of Grace or New Covenant in the last Edition The Nature Conditions and yet free Donations of it pag. 42. Sect. V. Of the giving of the Holy Ghost His common and special Works The extent of the New Covenant Of the state of those that have not the Gospel And what Law they are under pag. 45. Sect. VI. How far Christ died for all and how far not pag. 51. Sect. VII The antecedent and consequent Will of God explained Of Justification by Faith What faith it is and what it doth pag. 54. Sect. VIII Of Justification by Christ's Righteousness imputed The false sense of Imputation opened and fully confuted The true sense asserted Whether Christ paid our Idem or Tantundem Whether he made his Satisfaction to God only as to a Rector or as Dominus vel pars laesa or how pag. 59. Sect. IX Of the sorts of Justification And first of constitutive Justification Of Righteousness How far it is or is not in our own habits or acts What Right the Covenant giveth the baptized to following helps and degrees of Grace Further what must be in our selves Mans holiness is no dishonour to Gods Grace How far Christ strippeth us of our own Righteousness More against the false sense of Imputation Objections answered pag. 69. Sect. X. Of Merit The case plainly and briefly decided The Gospel-Condition or Merit is but the accepting a free Gift according to its nature Whether we may trust to our own Faith Repentance Holiness The last Argument for the false sense of Imputation answered pag. 79. Sect. XI How Faith justifieth whether as an Instrument pag. 82. Sect. XII How far Repentance is a Condition of the Covenant And what it is Whether Faith or it be first How Faith and Love differ pag. 83. Sect. XIII Of the degrees of Pardon and Justification Whether losable And whether future sins be pardoned pag. 85. Sect. XIV Of Justification by Sentence of the Judge What it is ibid. Sect. XV. Of initial executive Pardon or Justification in Sanctificatiâ— How far necessary yet imperfect pag. 86. Sect. XVI Of assurance of Pardon Of doubting Whether it be Dâ—â—â— Faith to believe ones own Justification or Salvation The Spâ—â— Testimony pag. 88. Sect. XVII Of love to God as the end of Faith and foretast of Heâ—â—â— pag. 91. Sect. XVIII Of Perseverance and its certainty in order to the comfortâ—â— certainty of Salvation Few certain of Justification and â—â—â—â— of Perseverance The words of the Synod of Dort The â—â— ther 's Judgment about certainty of perseverance pag. 93 Sect. XIX Of mortal Sin or such as will not stand with the love of Gâ—â— and a state of Justification pag. 103. Sect. XX. What Repentance for particular sins is necessary to parâ—â— pag. 106. Sect. XXI Some solution of all the former difficulties in twenty Propâ—â—ons 108. Sect. XXII Few certain of Salvation The reconciling consequents of â—â—â— pag. 112. Sect. XXIII The case of Perseverance further opened and applied pag. 113. Sect. XXIV The sum and scope of this Discourse of Certainty pag. 116. Sect. XXV Degrees of falling and danger pag. 118. Sect. XXVI Of final Justification at Judgment More of the Agreemâ—â—â— Paul and James about Justification by Works pag. 119. Sect. XXVII Of the number of the glorified and the damned pag. 123. A PREMONITION MY work at present is but to lay down so much of the Christian Doctrine briefly as is necessary to be understood for the reconciling of the Controversies about Predestination Providence Grace and Free-will And therefore pass over â—any other weighty Points and must not stand largely to prove all â—s I go which carrieth its own evidence The true nature of the first â—aw or Covenant deserveth a more accurate discussion than I can here â—ake and much passeth as certain with some which hath but little â—roof And here I meet with these different Opinions 1. Some say that the â—ondition of the first Covenant was not Innocency but sincerity And â—at Innocency was only a Duty necessary necessitate praecepti but not â—edii or that it was ut medium necessary ad melius esse or to some cerâ—â—in degrees of felicity whereof it was a condition but not to felicity it â—â—lf And that the Covenant of Grace doth herein agree with it both â—f them damning man only for mortal sin and punishing them tempoâ—â—lly only for venial sin And he seemeth to be of this mind who saith â—â—at Do this and live or Innocency or Works was the Condition only â—f Moses Law but that Adhere and Vanquish was the Condition of the â—rst Covenant But these are ambiguous unsatisfactory terms If the â—eaning be Adhere to God and his Law by perfect Innocency and vanâ—uish all temptations to Sin this is the same with that Innocency which â—e say was the Condition But if he mean only Adhere to me sinâ—erely by love as thy Ultimate End and vanquish all temptations which â—ould draw thee from me to another Ultimate End or God this is â—he same with the first opinion which many Papists seem to hold 2. But the more common Opinion is that which I assert That Innoâ—ency was the Condition not only of Life eternal but of all the beâ—efits of Gods Covenant and the least sin the forfeiture of all They that are for the first Opinion think that if Adam had committed â—ut a small or venial sin as a sinful thought or desire after the forbidden â—ruit without the act or full consent it had been against Gods natural Goodness and Justice to have condemned him to Hell for it And conâ—quently that Christ died not to pardon the pains of Hell as due for such â—â—ttle sins but only temporal smaller punishments But God best knoweth his own Nature And nature telleth us That â—ll sin deserveth punishment And he that sinneth so far removeth his â—eart from God and forfeiteth his Spirit or Grace And he that hath â—nce so turned from God in the least degree cannot of himself return â—or heal himself and had no promise of Gods Grace to do it And â—herefore it is not to be supposed that he should sin no more but such a â—inute sin for greater will come in presently at that breach unless God â—ecover him which he was not in Justice bound to do And no one knowâ—th so well as God how much malignity is in the smallest sin And it was as â—asie for sinless Adam to have continued sinless as for carnal men now â—o forbear gross sin And he that sinneth deserveth not Heaven or Life â—nd there are divers degrees of punishment in Hell according to the degrees of Sin And Christ died for all our sins therefore they dâ— every one deserve death which consisted not with a right to Life therefore not with a right to Heaven And an immortal Soul was not naturally to be annihilated therefore to live in some punishment as separated And Rom. 3. 9. all were under Sin yet all had not gross Sâ—â—
Rom. 6. 23. The wages of Sin is Death Rom. 5. 12. Death passed on alâ— for that all have sinned Rom. 2. 12. As many as have sinned withâ—â—â— Law shall perish without Law And we must pray for the pardon of aâ—â— Sin And unpardoned Sin will damn men These are the reasons â—â— this side They of the other Opinion say That the Gospel-Covenant sheweâ—â— Gods Nature as well as the first Law That God had not been unjust iâ—deed if he had permitted him to fall into great Sin and so to periâ—â— who committed the least for he so permitted Adam to commit the first that was before innocent But the Justice of God bound him not so it do nor would have damned a Lover of God for a small Sin no more than now That we must not feign a Law which we cannot prove That God changeth not his holy Nature and therefore not that Law which is the expression of it That Christ died for all Sin and all needs pardon but that proveth not that the least deserved death much less Hell but that by Christ's Death the deserved punishment must be remitted that all even Infants are guilty of mortal Sin in Adam The Death is the wages of that Sin which brought it but not of the least That Adam's Law was not severer than that by Moses which saith Dâ— this and live and yet condemned not men for smaller sins That God proclaimeth pardon of some Sin in the very Law of Nature as from his Nature Exod. 34. and the Second Commandment That Nature teacheth all the World to believe it That God said not to Adam â—â— the day that thou thinkest a vain thought but That thou eatest c. That mortal Sin is pardonable by Christ which else could not by the first Law but God could otherwise have pardoned a vain thought if he would That no Text of Scripture saith that every Sin deserveth Hell nor is threatned with Death And as the condition of the Penalty so the condition of the Promise to Adam is here also controverted by Divines 1. Some say that the condition of Life was personal perfect perpetual Obedience till â—â—â— change which God would make as he did by Henoch when it pleased him which seemeth to me the probablest Opinion 2. Others think that Adam was to have continued in Eden for ever under that same conditional Law which is less probable 3. Others think that had he over-come the first temptation but so far as to adhere and vanquish that is to continue the love of God and not to eat that Fruit or commit any other mortal Sin which of its nature killeth Love he had been confirmed as the promised Reward 4. I have lately met with an exceeding ingenious M. S. written partly against my self after others which asserteth 1. That the Glory of Justice is the end of Gods Government 2. That Do this perfectly and live or Sin at all and die are the constant terms of Justice under every Covenant 3. That if Adam had performed but one â—â— of Obedience by that Law he should have been rewarded with confirmation or the Holy Ghost as the Angels and with everlasting life 4. That now all our Reward is only the Act of Gods Justice giving â—â— life as merited by us in Christ on the terms of the Law that saith Do this and live Sin and die in whom we are perfectly innocent and rewardable and we have no rewardable Righteousness nor any to justifie us but perfect Innocency imputed because as not to be a Sinner is no merit of a Reward so pardon of Sin is no Title to a Reward c. It is not my present task to clear up all these Difficulties having done more towards it in my Methodus Theologiae but only so much as our present conciliatory work requireth But yet because I and the matter in hand are nearly concerned in the M. S. I shall briefly animadvert on all the substance of it having first said of the condition of the penalty but a few words I. I am loth to confound the certainties with the uncertainties in this matter 1. It is certain that Gods Law of Nature was mans first and principal Law to which the supernatural Revelations were added and comparatively few 2. It is certain that Gods Law was perfect and that both as the impress and expression of Gods perfect Wisdom and Holiness and as the Rule of Perfection to Adam And therefore that it obliged him to perfection 3. But this Perfection to which he was obliged was not at first all that his nature would be capable of at last It was not his duty the first hour of his life to Know or Do as much as after the longest time and experience and as much as in heavenly perfection But he was bound to Know and Love and Do at first as much as at that time his nature was capable of supposing necessary Concauses and Objects 4. This is summed up in Loving God with all the Heart Mind and Might But the All in maturity and after full experience and in Glory is more than the All in unexperienced juniority To know love and obey God to the utmost intention of his present natural Power supposing due Objects media and concauses was Adam's duty and all defectiveness herein was culpable or sin 5. All sin of its own nature deserveth punishment Therefore so would the least culpable thought or word in Adam or the least culpable defect in the extent or intention of any holy affection in him 6. It is certain that Adam's eating the forbidden Fruit or any one such sin as consisteth not with the predominancy of his Love to God as God in habit such as is now inconsistent with true Grace and is called mortal was to be punished with death temporal and eternal according to the Justice of that Law 7. They are different questions 1. What God might do 2. What he would do as decreed 3. What he must do as necessary because of Justice or Veracity to the breaker of that Law And it is clear that God might as an Act of Justice punish the least culpable thought or remissness of degree of Love with Annihilation or with any pain-everlasting which to the Sinner were no worse than Annihilation Because 1. Antecedently to his Law he might have done that much as an affliction without sin 2. And after he did no way that I know of oblige himself to the contrary to a Sinner before the Covenant of Grace 3. And having threatned punishment in general he might choose what punishment he saw fit 8. What God would do as decreed the prediction or the event only can tell us 9. That God must by necessity of Justice and Truth punish the least sinful thought or remissness with some degree of punishment according to that Law seemeth to me somewhat clear 1. And yet it is more clear that it is various degrees of punishment which are comprized in the word Death or Filius mortis
committed And the obligation to duty goeth before the obligation to punishment for that same action because the action cometh between and the first is an act of Gods antecedent Will and the second of his consequent Will that is of the Retributive and not the Preceptive part of the Law And they note not that the question is not what obedience a man is bound to but what he performeth or must be reputed to have performed If they will speak so unaptly as to say that the Law commandeth Lapsed man not to have sin or imperfect man to have been perfect that is that the Command to day bindeth Adam ad praeteritum not to have sinned yesterday or bindeth to Impossibility in nature that existent sin should not be existent in all which I leave them to their â—iberty of words yet it is certain that no man hath perfectly obeyed for one year or day And therefore if Christ's perfect obedience and â—oliness be imputed to them from their first being then they are reâ—uted not-lapsed nor-sinners from the beginning and so not pardonaâ—le But if it be only for the time after sin that Christ's perfection is â—theirs after what sin must it be If after Adam's then we need no pardon of any but Adam's sin If after conversion then we need no pardon for sins after Conversion If after our last sin then Christ's perâ—ection is not imputed to us till after death 126. Others would come nearer the matter and say that we are â—eputed Righteous as fulfillers of the Law and yet reputed Sinners as Breakers of the Law and that though there be no medium in naturals between light and darkness life and death yet there is between a â—reaker of the Law and a fulfiller of it viz. a non-fulfiller and beâ—ween just and unjust that is not-just But this is a meer darkness There â—s a medium negative in a person as not obliged but none between Posiâ—ive and Privative in one obliged as such A stone is neither just nor â—rivatively unjust Nor a man about a thing never commanded or forâ—idden him But what 's this to the matter God's Law is pre-supposed we talk of nothing but Moral acts The Law forbiddeth Omissions and Commissions both are sin Do these men think that he is not reputed Positively just and not only not-unjust who is reputed never to have committed a sin nor left undone a duty in his life Can â—he Law be fulfilled more than so What is Righteousness if that be not Obj. Adam was neither just nor unjust in his first moment no nor till he sinned say some because till then he was not obliged to obey or at least to any meritorious act that is to love God Ans 1. Adam was in his first instant but Habitually just and not by Act because not obliged to impossibilities any more than an Infant or a stone But we speak only of obliged persons 2. It is not true that Adam was not obliged to obey and Love God before he sinned or that he never Loved God as God Obj. At least Adam merited not the Reward though he sinned not till then Ans 1. He merited what Reward he had viz. the continuance o his blessings first freely given but not an immutable state 2. It is yet unresolved what that was by which Adam must merit Immutability and Glory whether 1. Once obeying or consent to his full Covenant 2. Or once loving God 3. Or conquering once 4. Or eating of the tree of Life 5. Or presevering in perfect obedience to the end that is till God should translate him which is most likely His not Meriting Immutability before the time was no sin we confess 3. And we maintain as well as you that Christ hath not only satisfied for sin and merited pardon but also Merited Immâ—table Glory But consider 1. That Adam's not doing that which was to merit Glory was his sin of omission and to pardon that omission is to take him as a meriter of Glory 2. Therefore it must be somewhat more than he forfeited by that omission and his commission which cometh in by Christ's merit above forgiveness 3. That Christ merited all this both by his active passive and habitual Righteousness by which he merited pardon 4. That it was not we that merited it in him but he to give it us only on the terms of a Law of Grace 127. Yet some come nearer and say that To punish and not-Reward are not all one And so the respect that Sin hath to the deserved punishment needed pardon and satisfaction But our deserving the Reward needed Christ's perfect Obedience to be imputed In this there is somewhat of truth But you must avoid the errors that lie in the way and aâ—â— by most supposed truths 1. Remember that man can have nothing from God but what is a meer Gift as to the matter though it be a Reward as to the order and ends of collation And in this case punishment is damni as well as sensus And so the loss of the Reward is the principal part of Hell or Punishment So that if Christ's death hath pardonâ— our sins of Omission we are reputed to have done all our duty And if so we are reputed to have merited the Reward And if he pardon our â—â—â—â— as to all punishment of sense and loss he pardoneth them as to thâ—â— forfeiture of Heaven as a Gift if not as a Reward 128. But say they remission of sin is but part of Justification because a man may be forgiven and yet not reputed never to have broken the Law To put away guilt and to make one righteous are two thing Ans Still confusion Guilt is either of the fault as such or of the punishment and of the fault only as the cause of punishment If all gâ—â— both culpae poenae were done away that person were reputed poâ—â— righteous that is never to have omitted a Duty or committed a â—â— But indeed when only the Reatus poenae culpae quoad poenam is doâ— away the Reatus culpae in se remaineth And this Christ himself never taketh away no not in Heaven where for ever we shall be judged once to have sinned and not to be such as never sinned 129. And this seemeth the very core of their error that they thâ—â— Of this see wotton de Reconcil at large we must be justified in Christ by the Law of Innocency which justified Christ himself and that we are quit or washed simply from all guilt of fault as well as obligation to punishment which is a great untruth contrary to all the scope of the Gospel which assureth us that we are justified by the Law of Grace or Faith and not by the Law of Works That Christ freeth us from the curse and penalty of the Law which he could not do if we were reputed never to have deserved it as never being Sinners If we are reputed such as fulfilled the Law of Innocency by another in our civil
all his Benefits are ever free Gifts â—â— to the matter and value first and then the relation of a Reward is bâ— secondary as to the Order of collation and the reason comparative whâ— one man hath them rather than another as a thankful Child hath the Gift which the Contemner goeth without 2. And that here Not to have this Gift forfeited by our sin is to be punished And so hâ—â—â— non-donari is puniri materially though the relations differ 3. And that it is the same Righteousness of Christ which meriteth our Impunity quoad damnum sensum and which meriteth our Right to the Gift of Life both sub ratione doni as a Gift and sub ratione condonationis as a forgiveness of the forfeiture and of the poena damni So that here â—â— no room for the conceit that Christ's death was only to purchase Pardon and his Righteousness to merit Life That which confoundeth men here is their taking the divers Respects and Connotations and Coâ—ceptions of one and the same thing to be divers separable things Thâ— same Law hath the Preceptive part to do and not do and the Retributing part penal and rewarding The same Obedience of Adam was â—â— doing what was commanded and a deserving what was promised â—â—â—â— more was promised to persevering Perfection than to the first act of Obedience One Sin deserved death but one act of Obedience desernâ—â— not immutable Glory And as the same Act is formally Obedience related to the Command and formally meritorious or praemiandus â—â— related to the Promise And the same Act is sin and punishable as related to the Precept or Prohibition and Threatening so the same Glory is a free Gift in one respect as related ut bonum to God as Benefactor and a Reward in another as related quoad ordinem conferendi to God â—â— Rector And the same loss of Glory is poena related to the Threatening and it is the loss of a Reward as related to the Promise And so the sâ—â—â— Merits of Christ's active and passive and habitual Righteousness because our Glory both by giving us pardon of our forfeiture and by Covenant-Donation and as a Reward to Christ and to us when â—â— perform the conditions of his Gift 133. And it is certain that Christ's Sufferings are first satisfactory and then meritorious being a part of his Active that is voluntary Oâ—dience And Christ's Holiness and Obedience are meritorious of pardon â—â— Sin as well as of Salvation 134. If there be as there is any thing which is given us througâ—â— Christ more than our own Innocency or Obedience would have mâ—â—â—ted the Gift of that is more than remission of Sin And is to be ascribeâ— accordingly to the Purchase of Christ's Merits But yet both his Holiness and Sufferings though not as sufferings did merit it And that was not a fulfilling of the Law in our stead 135. This superadded Gift what-ever it is seemeth in Scripture to be included in Adoption and not in Justification But yet it may in this sense be called Justification in that when our Right to that Gift is questioned that Right must be justified by the Covenant-Donation and by Christ's meritorious Purchase of it But this is only de nomine We are agreed of the thing 136. It is greatly to be noted that as a Reward is in the formal notion more than not punishing where materially they are the same so Christ hath not at all merited that eternal Life should be ours by way of Reward for our fulfilling the Law in him but that it should ours by his free Gift as a Reward to Christ for his own Merits So that the Relation of a Reward for Perfection belongeth only formally to Christ who taketh it as his benefit that we are saved through his love to Souls but not at all to us And to say as too many hold that Heaven is our Reward for our perfection of Holiness and Obedience in and by Christ is a Humane Invention subverting Christ's Gospel or unfit speech if better meant 137. Yet a Reward it is to us to be glorified but that is not for our fulfilling the Law of Innocency by Christ but for our believing in Christ and performing the conditions of the Covenant of Grace which giveth us Life as a free Gift but yet in the order of the condition it hath the relation and name of a Reward to us in the Scripture 138. So that here are three rewarding Covenants before us 1. The Covenant or Law of Innocency rewarding man for perfection to the end And this rewarded none but Christ And it is false that we are rewarded by that Covenant or justified by it for Christ's fulfilling it But it All the stir of the Papists is to prove that we have inherent Righteousness as well as pardon which Protestants are as much for as they The rest is de nomine justificationis Malder 1. 2. q. 113. a. 2. p. 572. Apostolus 2 Cor. 5. non aliud vult quam Christum cui nullum debebatur supplicium factum fuisse hostiam pro nostro peccato ut nos qui apud Deum nihil merebamur praeter supplicium justitia Dei fieremus in ipso id est gratis sine nostris operibus consequeremur per ipsius merita justitiam coram Deo What doth this differ from the Doctrine of the Reformed Churches Idem ibid Quando Apostolus dicit multos constitui justos per unius obedientiâ—â— significatur causa meritoria non autem formalis And so say we But some call Christ's Righteousness the causa materialâ—s meaning no more but that it is the matter of that Merit for which we are justified As if Adam had perfectly fulfilled the Law his fulfilling it had been meritorious of his sentential Justification and yet the matter of his constitutive Justification that is of his Righteousness And some uâ—â—ptly call it the formal cause But an unapt logical notion is not an error in Faith or Theology Idem ib. p. 573. Quamvis â—x omnino rigida justitia solus Christus Dominus satisfactat de condigno tamen ita ut merces operi â—ono debeatur post Dei promissionem meretur justus coronam justisiâ— quam reddet in illa die justus judex Est nostra justitia tota totum meritum tota satisfactio dependens a meâ—ito satisfactione Christi Still here is a wordy Controversie justified Christ 2. The Law or Covenant made only to and with Christ the Mediator And this Covenant further rewarded Christ as Mediator giving him all that it promised to himself and us for his performing the mediatorial conditions And so our Life is Christ's Reward 3. The Covenant or Law of Grace for it is the same thing in several respects that 's called the Law and the Covenant which giving Life on the condition of Faith doth justifie and reward Believers And we are justified and rewarded by no other Law 139. When Rom. 4. oft saith and other Texts that we are
circumstantially but by the Immediate Physical efficient adequate predetermining Premotion of Gods Omnipotency as the first Cause besides his Influx by which he sustaineth their natures and concauses and affordeth them his general Concurse or premotion to the act as an act in genere only And it is Impossible for any Agent so predetermined by physical premotion not to act in all the circumstances that it is so moved to act in II. To say that any creature can act without this physical predetermination to all the circumstances or can forbear to act when so predetermined is by consequence to say that such a creature is God the first cause For it is as impossible as to be God or to make a World III. Yea the creature that will forbear any act which God so predetermineth him to must be stronger than God and overcome him or do contradictions IV. And if God had not decreed so to predetermine by physical efficient premotion he could not have known any future acts No though with Scotus we say that he willed all those Acts antecedently to his prescience it would not serve unless he willed so to predetermine the agent in causing them V. Yet we will say that the Will is free but we mean only that to will and to will freely are words of the same sense For a man is said to will freely in that he willeth and his Willing is not a Nilling VI. Free-will then is nothing but Facultas Voluntatis rationis â—d utrumlibet agendum vel non agendum ad agendum unum vel alterum sed tantum prout à prima causa physice praedeterminatur That is it is such a faculty as God can predetermine to act which way he will by making it will yet its Indifferency is not only objective or passive but also Active because it is an Active Power of the will which God predetermineth God predetermineth the will to determine it self VII We will call this the wills Power but it is but hypothetically a Power viz. It can act if God physically predetermine it else not at all As the Wheels of the Clock can move if the Poise or Spring move them or rather as the hand can move if the Will and the Spirits in the Nerves do move it VIII The will is said to be free partly by reason that its active power is capable of being determined by God and then by it self ad utrumlibet and partly in that it is not lyable to coaction IX The will that is by Omnipotent physical premotion efficiently predetermined by God is not constrained because it willeth not unwillingly that is so far as it is willing it is not unwilling and reluctant X. Yet the will that was one way enclined habituated and acted in the precedent instant is oft physically premoved and predetermined by Omnipotency to the contrary act in the next instant which it could not resist As he that in this instant wilâ—eth Chastiâ—y may in tâ—e next instant be predetermined by unresistible Omnipâ—tency to will fornication or he that Loved God may be predetermined and premoved by God to hate him the next moment But we will not call this irresistible efficiency coaction because it is ad Volendum and so in ipso actâ— there is no reluctancy or resistance XI When God hath given man a Power with liberty to will or nill or not will to will this or that and also giveth him all necessary objects and concauses and also as the first cause of natural and free action giveth him all that Influx which is necessary to an Act as such yet the moral specification of that Act to this proposed object rather than that as to hate God rather than to hate sin or to this Act rather than to that as to hate God rather than to Love him or to speak a lye rather than the truth hath so much Entity in it that it is a blasphemous deifying man to say that man can do it without Gods fore-described unresistible predetermining physical premotion XII God made the Law which forbiddeth sin and God made mans nature Intellectual and free to be ruled by Law and God made and ordereth all the objects temptations and concauses and God by the said efficient physical premotion causeth irresistibly every act of sin in all its circumstances As when David was deliberating Shall I do this Adultery and Murder or not God first by omnipotent motion determined his will to it or else he could not possibly have done it And sin in its formale is nothing but the Relation of Disconformity to Gods Law which can have no cause but that which causeth the subjectum fundamentum terminum nor can it possibly be but it must exist per nudam resultantiam hisce positis And yet though God make the man the Law the act the object and all that is in the world from whence sin resulteth as a meer relation we are resolved to say that God is not the Author or Cause of sin XIII Yea though the Habits of sin are certain Entities and therefore God must needs be their first cause in their full nature according to our principles who account it proper to God to be the first and principal cause of any such entity yet we are resolved to say that God is not the Cause or Author at least of sin XIV Yet we will say that he is an enemy to Gods Providence that holdeth that man can possibly do any wickedness unless God thus predetermine both Will Tongue Hand and every active part to every act which he hath forbidden with all its circumstances XV. Sin is caused by God as to the circumstantiated Act which is the materiale but not as to the formale And yet we must confess that the Relation is caused by causing the subject foundation and term all which God principally doth and can be caused no otherwise XVI But the formale of sin is but a defect or privation which is nothing Therefore man and not God is the cause of it For God cannot be a deficient cause nor have any privation And yet we cannot deny but that 1. There is as much positivity of Relation in disobedience as in obedience in curvity as in rectitude in disconformity as in conformity 2. Nor that God can be a Cause of Privations such as death is though not a subject of them even such a cause as they can have 3. Nor that some of ours even Alvarez say that sins of commission and habits are positive in their formale 4. And sin is such a Nothing as is mans misery and he is damned for and by And if it be such a Nothing as can have no cause man can no more be the cause of it than God 5. And that the Reason of non existences negations or privations is as notoriously resolved into the will or non-agency of the first necessary cause of the contrary as existences and positives are resolved into his will and agency And if a man cannot
he will not cause cannot be And this is the beautiful variety and harmony in the Universe In God himself is nothing but perfection but the Greature being the shadowy Image of God defectibility and imperfection is essential to it so that he reduceth Morality to the frame and necessity of physical motion and maketh Moral Good and evil to be indeed as much natural good and evil and of the same kind except as in another subject as Summer and Winter heat and cold day and night health and sickness life and death animate and inanimate the unavoâ—dable diversifications of the will and work of God And that every permission of his will is accompanied with a positive volition of the thing permitted And yet that Will is not properly in God but so called after the manner of man That sin is considered as related to the Principle of action which is God and so it is good or as in the terminus Man and so it is horrid devilish odious evil as blindness death darkness caused all by Gods desertion or not operating otherwise than he doth § 7. To the quieting of the mind that cannot digest this but thinketh God is thus dishonoured being made more than Satan the cause of sin and misery for sin which the Scripture contradicteth and that man is excusable at the barr of Justice that could no more in innocency forbear to sin than to make a world To them that think it hard that no one in all the world could ever possibly do more or less Good or Evil than they do but that is all done by physical motion as in an Engine c. he hath a great deal to say and more than ever I elsewhere met with and with great modesty proposed § 8. As to the Law whose transgression is sin he supposeth that Whatsoever imposeth on us any thing to be done by us as an antecedent condition to any consequent good is the Law opposed to the Gospel Pag. 173. Yea that the proposal or pressing of any Truth or Goodness on us in a literal or moral way only or the word as written in Letters is the Law and the spirit operating the thing it self on the soul is the Gospel the first is the old Covenant and the second the New That the proper and next ends of the Law or letter are sin condemnation death and the Divine wrath To let in sin and heighten it that it might abound and to bring on us spiritual death These flow not from the Law of it self but by accident from the weakness of the flesh and creaâ—ure But both Law and sin are brought in ultimately for good viz. God having a design which he intended to enrich with the fullest the highest glories of his Godhead brings forth in the course of this design a dark scene of all evils sin death wrath The evil in this scene is carryed on to its utmost extent and height Thus the variety becomes more full in the whole design and the chief design is heightned in its greatest Glory God in his Infinite wisdom so bringeth in this scene of sin and evil that himself is perfectly pure and good in the contrivance and conduct of it He setteth up a Law good holy and spiritual but such that sin inevitably may take occasion from it through the frailty of the flesh and of the creature to spring up as an overflowing flood to display it self over all things in its fullest foulest birth This Law is to convince us of the frailty and mutability in mans primitive state c. viz. that he is a creature For Pag. 175 176. man is composed of the light of God and his own proper darkness These two the Schools call the Act and Potentiality the form and the matter being and not being which constitute every Creature The darkness or nothingness which is the Creatures own is the proper ground of sin The Law comes and distinguisheth the Light from the Darkness Pag. 177. so that to see sin is to see that we are Creatures God withholds his Pag. 178. Divine presence appearances and influences from man and so the darkness discovereth it self in man and predominateth and captivateth him entirely and becomes his choice and Lord. so that sin is but an Imperfect Creature and the Law to cause and shew it § 9. Pag. 113 114 c. He saith The Immediate cause of the first change made in the understanding at the fall was the Divine Glory withdrawing or withholding it self Darkness is the privation of Light Privations have no proper Causes but accidental only Thus the Divine Glory retiring from the understanding or ceasing to shine in it is by accident the cause of the darkness there as the Setting or departing of the Sun is the cause of Night which is not a blemish to the Sun but its glory that in its presence are all the beauties and joyes of light in its absence all the disagreeableness and melancholies of night and darkness Pag. 115. All evil is from the absence of God c. P. 117. The fault in man is the deficiency which ariseth from the defectibility or nothingness of the Creature in its shadowy state in the purity of its first Creation Pag. 122. The fall springs from the Harmony of the eternal design in the Divine mind being comprehended in it as a part of it § 10. And yet he makes man Guilty and unexcuseâ—ble and God just iâ— this because Guilt is but our being really bad And he that cannot deny himself to be bad is unexcuseable And the opening of this causeth shame And Justice is to Judge and use all creatures as they are § 11. To be short he maintaineth that man can have no freedom from necessitating predetermination If he should it would cross the nature of God of the creature of the soul and the unity and harmony of all things But that God causeth all sin negatively as necessarily as he causeth darkness or any natural privation But then he doth with a torrent of Rhetorick so Praise Gods design in it and the beauty and harmony of all things made up of good and evil unities varieties diversities and contrarieties and sheweth so largely the glory that cometh to God by sin and the good to the Universe and that it 's but our narrowness and weakness of sight that maketh us take it to be any other than a part of the glory of the universe though bad in and to the person that sinneth that I confess I never found my self more tempted to Love sin or to cease my hatred of it than by his florid Oratory § 12. And withall as he resolveth all the rest of Morality into Physical conceptions so he seemeth to judge suitably of Hell and of Redemption supposing that all this darkness that God brings on sinners is but to prepare for their resurrection to a life of unity and glory and that it shall go well with them in the end § 13. And as
Which privation is the greatest punishment here 2. They are hereupon left to the power of their own Corruption which desertion is a grievous punishment 3. They have pain and sorrow 4. And they die And if they have all this suffering here it is unlikely that they are wholly free hereafter if not pardoned Because 1. They have immortal Souls that are capable 2. And future as well as temporal death or misery is the wages of sin And that their suffering is for sin is undoubted from Rom. 5 c. And the Pelagians scarce deny but that Adam's sin caused it And if it be proved that they have moral pravity or sin of their own then it is for their own sin And if so it is their own punishment All the doubt then is Whether all Infants are forgiven And for that 1. We see that the temporal punishment is not forgiven them 2. We see as soon as they come to action that to many at least the foresaid penal desertion and privation of the Spirit of Sanctification is not forgiven them And 3. Without holiness none can see God 4. They that affirm it must prove it which they neither do nor can do There is no word of Scripture which telleth it us How then should that be part of our Faith which is no part of Gods Word If you say that Christ being the second Adam saveth the World from all the sin and misery brought on them by the first Adam I answer 1. Conditionally he doth He hath purchased Salvation to be given men on the terms of the Covenant of Grace and all that perform the Conditions shall have Salvation But 2. His bare Sacrifice it self without such application saveth none any further than to bring them under the terms of the said Covenant It is apparent by experience that Christ doth not undo all the hurt that Adam did immediately to all or any one in the world no not till death no nor till the Resurrection Sin and misery is still upon us Infants shew as soon as they come to the use of reason that they were not brought to the Innocency that Adam had before the Fall You your selves distinguish the Impetration from the Application of Salvation as to the adult and the reason is the same as to Infants though the condition be not the same Shew us a promise of the Salvation of all Infants and we will believe it 5. Indeed they are saved conditionally as the adult are and the condition is expressed in Scripture That they be the Children of the Faithful dedicated to God The Parents and their Seed are in the same Covenant And this is all that God revealeth of them * Saith Twisse Cont. Corvin pag. 136. c. 2 De Infantibus infantia sua morientibus falsum est quod nobis obtrudit Neque enim dicimus ullos Infantes credentium foederatorum Dei in infantia decedentes ad exitium destinatos Sanctos enim eos pronunciat Apostolus Et una cum parentibus fidelibus in foedere Dei comprehenduntur But I doubt he befriendeth the Anabaptists more than he was aware of when he addeth Obsignant Sacramenta credentibus remissionem peccatorum vitam aeternam At Infantibus quoties administratur Baptismus non tam credentibus quam credituris obsignat promissiones istas Non credituris autem nihil obsignant If so then to them that die in Infancy or yet are Infants no pardon is delivered and sealed by Baptism which is not sound Of our guilt of nearer Parents Sin Let them that reject me in this hear Augustine in Enchirid. c. 46. Paâ—entum quoque peccatis parvulâ—â— obligari non solum primorum hominum sed etiam suorum de quibus ipsi nati sunt non improbabiliter dicitur Illa quippe divina sententia Râ—ddam peccata patrum in filios tenet hos utique antequam per regenerationem ad testamentum novum incipiant poenitere Reperiuntur plura peccata alia parentum quae etsi non ita possunt mutare naturam reatu tamen obligant filios nisi graâ—uita gratia miserecordia divina subveniat But whether God do also without a Promise save any of the Children of the Heathen World or of wicked Parents and how many and with what Salvation and also what degree of punishment they have in the life to come we take for unrevealed things which we are so far from making Articles of our Faith that we take it to be presumptuous arrogancy to dispute it and meddle with the Secrets of the Almighty The Papists themselves are not agreed whether Infants have only the poenam damni as shut out of Heaven or also poenam sensus Jansenius and many more yea most have written for the first and Petavius and others for the latter But secret things belong to God A. We cannot prove that all Infants are saved nor do we presume to tell you what Salvation it is that they shall have But we hope the best And I am glad to find that you take the Salvation of true Believers dying Infants to be sure by the same Covenant which pardoneth their Parents and that you do not peremptorily condemn all the rest B. You know that the Synod of Dort have said the same that I do of true Believers Children Art 1. Sect. 17. and the rest they meddle not with A. But I pray you tell me your thoughts Whether Infants themselves do perish for Adam's sin alone And what remedy is provided for them B. The whole tenor of the Scripture putteth me past doubt that Divines have strangely erred by over-looking the common Interest and Communion of all Parents and Children and appropriating our Original Guilt to Adam's sin alone But this requireth a larger Disputation by it self At present consider 1. That no Text of Scripture doth so appropriate it or make Adam only the Corrupter of our Natures But only maketh him the Original of our Guilt and Pravity as he was the Original of our Nature And so he only is the Original of our Death and Punishment 2. That the whole scope of Scripture containeth Promises and Penalties to Children with the Parents for and by the Parents sins more plainly than any was antecedently expressed of Adam's Posterity as his Yea the very Moral Law in the Second Commandment and in the Proclamation of Gods Name and Nature to Moses Exod. 34. 6 7. which nothing but prejudice and partiality can deny to be a valid proof of a secondary Birth sin derived to us And he that will read the Sacred History from the Curse on the Seed of Cain and Cham of the Case of Ishmael Esau Moab Amnon Sauls Grand-Children hanged and so on to Matth. 23. 38. On this Generation shall come all the righteous blood c. And His blood be on us and on our Children with all the Promises to the Seed of the Righteous only and Threatning to the Houses and Seed of the Wicked with the reason of Infant-Baptism it self 1
getteth a right to any benefit by his fault What then Why the Precept to that man is past into a Virtual Judiciary Sentence condemning him as disobedient even as it is with those in Hell 239. Therefore since the fall the Law of Innocency in it self is the same which once said Thou shalt continue perfectly Innocent but it doth not properly oblige us as a Law to that Innocency or perfection which we were born without because we are become uncapable subjects Much less is that Innocency now the Condition of any Promise or Covenant of God as if he still said Be personally and perpetually Innocent and thou shalt live and that thou maist live But the Law being still the same we that are uncapable of the duty are not uncapable of the guilt and condemnation Vid. Bellarmin de Grat. lib. aâ—b li. 5. per totum c. 30. de dist necessitates And therefore the Law and Covenant are now become a Virtual Sentence of Condemnation for not obeying personally perfectly and perpetually to the death For he that hath once made Innocency Naturally Impossible to him is Virtually in the case of one that hath persevered to the death in sin 240. But if the contracted Impossibility be not Physical but Moral the case is quite different For then the thing is a threefold sin in it self as aforesaid 1. The disabling sin 2. The vicious Disability or Malignity of the Will 3. And the after sin thereby committed and omission of duty More of Physical and Moral Impotency 241. 1. No righteous Law forbiddeth Physical Impotency as such nor commandeth men Physical Impossibilities as is said But Gods Laws primarily forbid the malignity of the Will which is its Moral Impotency Bradwaâ—dine plainly saith li. 3. c. 9. p. 675. that Nullus actus noster est simpliciter in nostra potestate we grant not absolutely and independently sed tantum secâ—ndum quid respectu Caâ—sarum secundarum Nihil est in nostra potestate nisi subactiva subexecâ—tiva subservienâ—e necessariâ— necessitate naturalitâ—r praecedente respectu â—oluntatis divinae Quod ideo in nostra dicitur potestate quia cum volumus iliud facimus voluntarie non inâ—iti So that by him no creature was ever able to do more or less than it doth except you call him able to do it that can do it when God makes him do it but that is not to be able before or when he is not caused to do it 242. 2. Rulers use not to make Punishments for Physical Impotency But for the Wills Malignity God doth 243. 3. Rulers use not to propound Rewards for Physical Impossibilities But for the fruits of Moral Sanctity or Habits and for themselves God doth 244. 4. No just Judge condemneth men for Physical Impotency But for Moral God and man do 245. 5. No Good man hateth another for Physical Impotency But for Moral malignity God and man do 246. 6. An inlightned Conscience accuseth and tormenteth no man for meer Physical Impotency and Impossibilities But for the Wills Malignity Conscience will torment men So that it is evident that one sort of Impotency maketh an act no sin in its degree and the other maketh it a greater sin For Nature and common notices teach men to judge that the More Willingness the more culpability But he that hath Actual and Habitual Wilfulness and is as some Adulterers drunkards revengeful persons proud covetous c. who are so bad that they say I cannot choose are the worst of all the sorts of sinners by such disability 247. It is most probable that God overcometh Moral Impotency and giveth Moral Power by Moral Means and Operations For though God can give it by a proper Creation without Moral Means and we cannot say that he never doth so nor how oft he doth or doth not yet it is most probable that his special Grace doth by his Trine Influx of Power Wisdom and Goodness Life Light and Love suscitate the natural faculties of the soul to the first special Act and by it cause a holy Habit which he radicateth by degrees And this is Metaphorically a Creation 248. This is certain that since the sall we have the same essential faculties that Original sin is not as Illyricus so long and obstinately maintained though an excellently good and Learned man a Substance though it be the Pravity of a substance And that sin changed not the humane species Nor doth Grace change our species It is certain that the Acts of these same natural faculties are commanded to all men even the unregenerate under the names of Faith and Repentance And so these are their duties And it is certain that a Course of Moral means preaching reading meditating conference threatnings promises mercies afflictions are appointed and used to the procuring the said faculties to perform these commanded acts It is certain that these Means have an Aptitude to their end And that God worketh by his own means And appointeth not man to use them in vain And that in working Grace God preserveth and reformeth Nature and worketh on Man as Man and according to the Nature of his means 249. And I think none dare deny but that God is Able by his Spirits powerful operation without any Antecedent new Habit or disposition to set home these same means so effectually on the Natural powers of the soul as shall excite them to the first Acts of Faith and Repentance And by them imprint a Habit as is said and shall be said again in Part 3. And if he Can do so and Can do otherwise which then is likest to be his ordinary way I leave to the observers of Scripture and Experience 450. This is the Common sense of Divines who place Vocation exciting the first act of Faith and Repentance before Union with Christ and before Sanctification which giveth the habit till Mr. Pemble Vind. Grat. taught otherwise whom Bishop G. Downame confuted in the Appendix to his Treatise of Perseverance 251. As to the question How this Grace is called Infused and not Natural I answer It is called Infused and Supernatural because 1. It is not wrought by any Natural-moral means only but by Supernatural-moral means viz. Revelation in and by the Gospel of Christ 2. And this supernatural Revelation cannot work it without the special extraordinary operation and impression by the Holy Ghost above the common concurse of God with all his Creatures as he is fons naturae This the Schools have Metaphorically called Infusion 252. But it may be called Natural 1. In that mans Natural faculties receive Gods Influx 2. And perform the act 3. And are perfected by it as the Natural body is by Health 253. And what the difference is ex parte Dei agentis ex parte effectus between Gods Natural and Gracious operations I shall after open in the third Part. 254. The Schoolmen especially the Scotists and Ockam and many Franciscans Benedictines and other Fryers yea such Oratorians as Gibieuf
just so here the question is Whether Gods Causation and Mans be more than Gods alone And I will not say that Gods is a Part nor yet that Mans is none nor that it is the same with Gods But that Gods acting and concurse are quite above the reach of Mortals 568. But here again note what I said even now 1. That it is no more sign of finiteness in God nor dishonour to him to be a limited or Partial Cause than to be no Cause and limited totally by suspension of the whole act And yet so he is as to all Possibles which he doth not make or move 2. And that it is his own free will only that thus limiteth him As it doth from giving all men more grace c. So that really here is matter of satisfaction 569. Though he offend me by making God the Cause of sin I will here cite the words of our Countrey-man Holkot Quodl lib. 2. qu. 1. Est sententia omnium Theologorum quod Deus est Causa immediata omnis rei productae sic quod omni creaturae agenti sive sit Natura sive Voluntas Deus coagit sic imaginandum est quod in omni actione creaturae qua aliquid producit Deus Creatura sunt duae causae Partiales illius producti Non sic imaginando quod Deus producit unam partem effectus creatura aliam ob hoc dicatur Causa partialis sed ideo quia concurrunt in agendo vel causando Unde tam causa universalis quam particularis dicitur communiter causa partialis ideo etiam Sol Homâ— sunt duae causae partiales hominis generandi similiter Vir Mulier Quia ad hoc quod aliquid dicitur causa partialis sufficit quod sit tale quod propter ipsum quoddam aliud vel quaedam alia res ponatur in esse sit quod illis positis res est aliquo istorum ablato res non fiet 570. Further I desire that it may be specially noted that God is our Creator in order of Nature before he is our Ruler And that Nature is before Morality obedience or sin And that God as Creator first setled the order of Nature so as that the Alteration of that Law or setled Order should not be ordinarily expected by us though he can alter it And therefore that man is man and hath a Natural Power of Self-determination and that God upholdeth him and concurreth as an Universal Cause belongeth to this fore-setled natural order and is presupposed to moral determinations and specifications either as from God or man 571. And note that to Good Acts we have need of more Help from God than this meer Natural Causality and Concurse And therefore God affordeth us more accordingly but not to all alike 572. It is further objected against this way that our making Reprobation to Infidelity Permission of sin not-giving faith c. to be no Acts of God cometh all to one as to mens sin and damnation because man cannot believe nor avoid sin without those Acts of Grace which God withholdeth Answ I confess it were all one if the supposition were true as it is not For we have proved after that man hath power without those acts of Grace which God suspendeth by that Common Grace which he giveth to do more good and forbear more evil than they do Of which in due place 573. It is objected also that while we make Gods Providence to fill the World with occasions of sin which he fore-knoweth men will take to their damnation yea as long as God could prevent all sin and save all souls and yet will not it cometh all to one which way soever you go in these Controversies I answer 1. Undoubtedly Gods Judgements are unsearchable But when we come into his Light we shall be perfectly reconciled to them all 2. And undoubtedly God doth whatsoever he will and all that he thought meet to Decree or Will shall come to pass in despight of sin 3. And when we have said all flesh and blood will be unsatisfied till faith and the will of God do satisfie us 4. But yet be it known to you that there is a great difference between Gods permitting sin after great means against it and his causing it Between the making of a free agent and putting life or death in his choice and his causing men unavoidably to sin and then to damn them for it The Holiness of Gods Nature will stand with the Being of sin by mans causing but not with Gods causing it And the Truth of Gods Word must be considered 574. If this were all one to Damn men unavoidably and to give them their free choice of Heaven or Hell in the means it is strange that so many Learned men as among the Jesuits Arminians Lutherans and Greeks do hold no other Grace at all but what leaveth man to such a free Choice could ever be so satisfied when others hold that the Elect have more SECT XVIII A Confutation of Dr. Twisse 's Digr 5. l. 2. sect 1. Vind. Grat. 575. I Come now to consider of what is said by them that go further about Gods will or Causality as to sin And because Dr. Twisse hath a peculiar Digression Vindic. Grat. li. 2. p. 1. Digr 4. I will somewhat animadvert upon it He beginneth Sententia nostra haec est Deum hactenus dici posse Velle peccatum quatenus vult ut peccatum â—iat viz. ipso permittente And so he maketh the question An Dens Velit ut peccatum eveniat ipso permittente Arminius thought God willed only his own Permission of the sin Twisse saith that he willed that sin should come to pass God permitting it Arminius his concession cannot be proved as I have shewed But Twisses must be disproved And 1. I will give you our Reasons against it Bonavent in 1. d. 46. q. 3. resolveth this question very plainly and truly Mala â—ieri nullatenus bonum esse potest sed bene occasio boni And shewing the difference between Causa Casus Occasio he saith that Causa est procedens intendens Casus pâ—ivat Intentionem sed non operationem Occasio privat utrumque And he distinguisheth Occasion into that which hath ratioâ—â—m Actiâ—i excitat agentem and that which hath but rationem passivi as one by anothers evil exciteth himself to do good And also between the evil and the ordinability to good And saith the evil is but the occasio passiva of the good and the ratio boni quod substernitur is occasio aliquo modo activa Vide locum 576. Let the Reader remember that what the Author saith of Gods Willing he also in the point of Predetermination saith of his working viz. that he Causeth as much as he willeth But I pass that by now because I have largely confuted it elsewhere And to speak to One is to speak to both 577. 1. All sober Christians are agreed on what side
soever that God is not the Cause of sin except some odd presumers who are condemned by the generality One or two spoke some hard words that way in Belgia whom the Synod of Dort rejected Mr. Archers Book was burnt for it by the Parliament or Westminster Synod Beza himself in Rom. 8. 28. passim abhorreth it as intolerable blasphemy But this Doctrine in question plainly maketh God the Willer and Cause of sin Yea more very much more than wicked men or Devils are which is not true 578. For they make Men and Devils to be but a second pre-moved predetermined Cause of the Act of Volition and Execution whence the formal obliquity necessarily resulteth But 1. God is certainly the Cause of the Nature which is the Agent 2. He is the Cause of the Law which maketh the act in specie to be sin His saying Thou shalt not commit Adultery or Murder maketh Adultery and Murder to be sin when they are committed which they would not be without the Law 3. God causeth and ordereth all the objects and occasions 4. And now they also say that God willeth ut peccatum fiat and is the first predetermining Cause even the total Cause of all that is in the act and all its circumstances without which predetermination it could not be So that man doth but will what God first willeth and act what God first moveth him unavoidably to act as the pen in my hand 5. And the Law and the Act being put in being the Relative obliquity is but the necessary result and hath no other cause 579. And note here what Estius before cited after Aquinas saith that to Will that peccatum sit vel fiat is all that the Sinner himself doth when he willeth sin And therefore it 's a vain thing here to distinguish between willing sin and willing the event futurity and existence of it ut peccatum fiat vel eveniat Though I confess I was long detained in suspense if not deceived by that distinction For he willeth sin who willeth the existence of it or that it be or come to pass 580. And note that it is both matter and form Act and obliquity which they say God willeth ut fiat For it is sin And forma dat nomen It is not sin but by the form of sin But if they had said otherwise it had been all one For he that willeth the fundamentum relate and correlate Saith Twisse Vindic. Graâ— li. 1. P. 1. Sect. 7. p. 137. Posito quod velit perâ—ectiones istas manifestare necesse est non impediat ingressum peccati sed permittat 1. As if he had proved that God was not able to manifest his Mercy and Justice by Laws and Illuminating men to know them without execution by the occasion of sin 2. Yet doth he make Christs death unnecessary and his satisfaction to Justice so far as that God could have accomplished our pardon and salvation another way if he would And is sin better or more necessary than Christs satisfaction 3. And methinks they that lay so little on Moral means and operations of Grace in comparison of Physical should not give so much to sin which were it a means as it is not but a Passive and opposite occasion is but a moral means And himself saith page 136. Permissio peccati proprie medium est assequendi â—inem à Deo praefixum At peccatum non est Medium proprie dictum sive manifestandae Dei misericordiae sive justitiae Media enim ejus sunt naturae ut ad ea facienda movâ—atur quis ex intentione finis Would the Reader have a better confuter of him than himself But he there addeth that it is Materia etsi non medium as stone and Timber to an House And yet sin they say hath no matter besides the subject and object but is a meer Privation of moral Rectitude But if it be to the Devils Kingdom loco materiae it is not so to Christs Rather if a beggar Want a house is that Want the Materia domus no nor the Materia of his mercy or bounty that buildeth it Thus the defectiveness of the subtilest wits abuseth God and his Church when the Christian simplicity of modest souls with a holy life would honour him So Sect. 9. pag. 137. Peccatum mihi videtur propriâ— dicendum esse materiam manifestandae Dei sive misericordiâ— sive iâ—stitiâ— potiâ—s quam medium Permissionem vero peccati medium esse ejus manifestandae proprie dictum But 1. how oft elsewhere doth he forget and contradict this 2. Permission it self is nothing being but non-impedire And is nothing or non-agere a proper means But especially I intreat the Reader to observe that in that very place Twisse and Arminius are herein professedly agreed that it is the Permission of sin and not the sin that is the Divine medium only one saith Praedestinationis and the other providentia And yet they will differ while they agree And I that differ from both would agree with both willeth the Relation 581. There is nothing left to be said then but that God willeth that sin be done but not as sin or because it is sin But this is nothing For 1. Either none or few of the Reprobate do will sin because it is Sin but because of the pleasure of sense or imagination or for seeming good 2. And if a man or Devil do maliciously Will sin as sin because it is against God so doing is but one of their sins which they say God willeth ut fiat before they willed it and predetermined them to it so that here is nothing in it but what is first and chiefly of God 582. If they say that God willeth it for the Glory of his Justice and so do not wicked men but for wicked ends or in enmity to God I answer That proveth that God hath a will which the wicked have not but not that the wicked have any will which God hath not For that Will and that Enmity to God still is but one of their sins which they say God first willeth ut fiat 583. Obj. But it is only ut fiat ipso permittente non faciente Answ The hypocrisie of that addition maketh it but the worse in the assertors For 1. They usually make Gods will effective of the thing willed 2. They maintain that there is nothing in the act as circumstantiated which God is not the total first efficient Cause of 3. They confess that the formal relation necessarily resulteth from the act and Law And why then do they put in the word permittente Would not that deceitfully insinuate to the Reader that the sinner doth something which God doth not do but only permit when they mean no such thing For that is my second reason against them 584. 2. By their doctrine God never permitteth sin which is false For that which he Willeth and Causeth as the first total Cause he cannot be said to Permit To do a thing and
no warning take what thou gettest by it Can you prove that it is his Will that this man eat the poyson prohibited 608. Next he citeth Augustines thred-bare sayings and blameth Aquinas and Arminius for denying his Authority and commendeth the greater reverence of Bellarmine And so Anselm Hugo c. Answ 1. We stick not on one mans Authority God holdeth not his Holiness and the Church its Religion on Augustines authority 2. Augustine hath ten times more plain enough for what I hold See the places cited in Paul Eiren. Triad Patrum 3. He knew it's like that Estius and many more expound Augustines words as terminating Gods Volition on his own permission and not on the sin or fieri 4. I think plainly that Augustine there spake not of inward Volitions but outward Acts and that not as Agentis but in passo or the effects And so it is true that no murder theft treason or other effect is produced in the world but what God positively decreeth shall be produced either by doing some effects himself as drowning the world or permitting sinners to do them while he causeth not their act but the Receptivity of the Passum and so the effect c. 609. Pag. 194. Retorting on Aquin. he thus argueth Because God doth will his own Goodness therefore it is necessary that God will that sin be done he permitting it For it is not to will his essential Goodness which needeth no acquisition but he willeth to manifest his Goodness But the evil of sin is not opposite to the manifesting of Gods Goodness Yea nothing is more * * * So Twiss contr Armin. pro Junio pag. 91. dissenteth from Jâ—niuâ— that saith peceatum ad rationem universi facere per accidens and saith Mibi vero dicendum videtur Peceatum conducibile esse per se ad bonum universi quatenus conducit ad illustrandos tales divinae majestatis radios And if so it must per se be Loved of God as Good Yet contr Corvin he saith that No sober man saith that sin is a medium of the execution of Reprobation but only the Permission of sin Reconcile them that can conducible to it than this I say to the manifesting of Gods Goodness by way of mercy in sparing or by way of Justice in punishing Answ Horresco recitans 1. Gods Volition of his Essential Goodness is his Necessary Volition 2. God hath no End to acquire but alwayes hath his end and is never without it 3. If God had necessarily willed the particular way of manifesting his Goodness then he doth all things necessarily and could do no otherwise and it seems by you could not manifest it without sin 4. Doth he not manifest his Goodness as much to the Innumerable Glorious Angels who never sinned And would it not have been as much manifested to us if we had been as they 5. The very indetermination of the will and its mediate Liberty is not the highest excellency of his Creatures It is better than the sensitive Necessity of Bruits and lower than the confirmed Necessity of the blessed It is our defectibility And the excellentest or Best of his works most honour Gods Goodness 6. Is it not the strongest temptation that men have in this world to doubt of or dishonour the Goodness of God to think how he permitteth the world to be drowned in wickedness and be so like to hell 7. Doth not Christ turn the Prayers of all Christians against your doctrine viz. that Gods name may be hallowed his Kingdom come and his will done on earth as it is in Heaven which is not by any sin 8. Do not your words tempt men to be indifferent to sin if not to love it if nothing be more conducible to honour Gods Goodness 9. Is not that conclusion a great wrong to Christ Scripture Ministry and Holiness as being no more conducible to manifest Gods Goodness than sin is 10. It is not true that sin is any Cause or true Means at all of glorifying God or doing any good It is but a presupposed Evil by delivering us from which God is glorified As your eating poyson may occasion the honour of an Antidote and Physicion It is no Cause or proper medium of it but only an occasion and mischief sine quo non But if God had not saved us from sin committed he could have glorified himself in saving us from committing it God loveth and is glorified most in that which is most like him as his Image which is the Holiest sinless soul To be a medium to Gods glory is to be good To be as conducible to it as any thing is to be as good as any thing save God and his glory But sin hath no Good much less such good Why else doth not God equally delight in sin and in the death of the wicked as in holiness repentance and our life seeing all things are for himself and that which glorifieth him most is best 11. Here also confusion causeth mischief one distinction might have scattered this mist viz. Between sin indeed and sin in notion Sin indeed or essence and existence never did good nor honoured God Sin in notion or in esse objectivo is no sin but the Matter of Vertue and 80 Joh. Ã Combis compend Theol. l. 3. c. 1. tells us that sin is profitable three wayes 1. Ut bene ordinatur ut fur in patibulo 2. Propter co-actionem amaritudinem 3. Propter mall considerationem And many popular Books say the like But this is but abusive language tending to deceive As if sin did good because punishing sin and repenting of it and hating it do good As if hating sin were sin Thus unhappily is the world troubled by abused words Holiness and doth much good When you say God knoweth sin from eternity you 'l say with Scotus that in esse cognito sin was in God from Eternity But so sin is not sin David saith My sin is ever before me Psal 51. And we daily Repent of it and confess it But this is but to have the Idea or conception of it in the mind and so it is not sin indeed but the notion of it which is in esse objectivo Else it would defile us to think of it and repent of it whereas thus sin objectively is the matter of the grace and duty of Repentance Hatred fear watchfulness prayer confession c. And so sin in esse objectivo as a grace may glorifie God 610. To Aquin. that saith Malum non est appetibile he saith that Malum moris quod opponitur bono est proprium uniuscujusque meum malum bono meo Though the sin of a man willing that which is forbidden him be his sin yet it followeth not that God may not will this Evil of another The Reason is because it is not forbidden to God to will it wherefore though it be evil and dishonest in man to will it to whom it is forbidden yet not to God And seeing
of the effects and consequents of them But doth this signifie God willed your malice or your act God did bruise Christ which signifieth that he was a concause of his death but not that he willed or Caused the Jews to will or act his death And so of the rest 629. The rest of his instances are such as I have answered before or as the former answers fully invalidate And therefore I will not weary my self and the Reader with them 630. Cap. 18. p. 230. he asserteth that Sin is a Medium to Gods Glory and that not per accidens but per se Because sin by how much the worse it is in genere mali inhonesti by so much the better and fitter means it is in genere boni utilis conducibilis to Gods glory c. All which I have before confuted and think not his defence of it worth repeating 631. Many assertions he hath cap. 18. which all depend on the false supposition that Sin is a medium per se of Gods glory and the unproved supposition that God positively willeth the Permission of it which is nothing whence he inferreth that God Intendeth it in this and that order and much other vanity And still they confound sin in esse reali which is no medium with sin in esse objectivo which may be a part of holiness and no sin at all 632. Cap. 19. he argueth God useth men and devils in the very act of sinning as his instruments viz. to punish to try to humble c. ergo he willeth the event that they sin Resp Here is deceitful ambiguity in the words instruments and useth Properly an Instrument is an efficient cause moved by the principal to an effect above its proper virtue And so a sinner in and by the Act of sinning is no Instrument of God For God moveth him not to that Act as specified or circumstantiated so as is prohibited And being not at all so moved by him as David to murder Urias and to vitiate his Wife he is not properly thus his Instrument But sometimes the word Instrument signifieth a presupposed Agent whose Action another can improve to his own ends As the wind and water are improperly called the Millers Instruments of turning his Mill and the spring and poise are the Clock-makers Instruments of moving his Clock or Watch and a Mastiff Dog is my Instrument to keep away Thieves and a Greyhound is my Instrument to kill a Hare and a Ferret to catch a Rabbet and a Hawke to catch a Partridge c. And yet we cause not at all the Nature or Motion of the Wind or Water but we can hinder the Water nor the nisus of the spring nor the gravitation of the poise but set the recipients so as that the effect shall be done as we would have it nor cause we the fierceness of the Mastiff the inclination or motion of the greyhound ferret hawk c. but only tye them up and let them loose as our ends require But zeal maketh some men deride that God should be said to be no more the cause of sinning and they cannot allow him the skill of every dull Artificer or at least a will to use it without willing and causing the thing which he forbiddeth 2. And the word using signifieth sometime using by motion as I do my pen and sometime by ordination and adjoyning some concause or fitting the receptivity of the patient to the effect as aforesaid as we use wind water dogs hawks Thus only sinners by sinning are Gods used instruments supposing his natural concurse and support And they are not his Instruments thus neither in the same sence as these creatures are ours For their fierceness craft inclination action is good and we do and may will it for our ends But sin is not good And therefore God willeth not it at all but only the consequent of it or effect And that Effect is not Good as it is the effect of sin but as God setteth in and causeth the same effect which a sinner causeth as in generation per concubitum illicitum But when God willeth and causeth the effect and foreseeth and permitteth the sinful Volition and act which concurreth to that effect such a sin is improperly called his used instrument or medium but properly is none 633. To Gibieuf and others saying that God acteth not by sin as an instrument and willeth it not but the effects he answereth that It 's absurd because the sin it self is castigatory and hath such like effects and therefore God need not will that effect as after it But all this is from the fore-noted confusion It is not only the distant effect but the very immediate effect which is the Act it self ut recipitur in passo which God sometime is said to Will As he willed that Jobs Cattle were taken away and that Christ were killed and that Malchus eare be cut off and that Paul be scourged and smitten on the mouth and that the Apostles were oft imprisoned c. And yet God only foreseeth but willeth not that will and act of the agent which he forbiddeth 634. And here note that when the name of the Effect or Passion connoteth the sinfulness of the Act then it is less meet to say that God willeth it As to say that he willeth that we be persecuted murdered slandered belyed c. But if any will so speak they must mean only the Passion as distinct from the action And then the difference is but in nudo loquendi 635. To those that object that thus he maketh God the chief author of sin the effect being more to be ascribed to the Principal Cause than to the instrument he first ill-applyeth some frivolous distinctions and instanceth thus The hangman as the Judges instrument hangeth a man in malice or revenge Ergo the Judge much more in revenge Non sequitur Putting in Revenge which is but a Cause as if it had been the Effect which was in question And thus The Sword that killeth a man is not culpable ergo nor the striker Non sequitur As if the question had been of the Negation of an effect and not of the position of it And thus If two servants role a stone one being commanded and one forbidden one being father to the other The Son forbidden roleth it unlawfully ergo the father commanded much more non sequitur Resp 1. As if the act of the Father and the Son were the same act because the effect is the same which is notoriously false unless de specie 2. Whose Instrument do you suppose the Son to be If the Fathers it is because the Father commanded him contrary to the Master And if so the argument is good The Sons act was a fault who obeyed ergo the fathers more who commanded him saving that commanding maketh another no necessary Instrument because he can disobey But Gods premotion is supposed by you unavoidably to predetermine us 636. But pag. 255. he giveth the true
or cease it by his own will Sent. 13. He that saith that some men are not made by God to this end that they might obtain eternal life but that they might be the ornaments of their times and for the good of others would speak better if he said that God who is the Creator of all men maketh not them in vain who he foreseeth will not be partakers of life eternal Because even in bad men nature is Gods good work and Justice in their damnation is laudable But he cannot well be blamed that saith that even by the condition of such the World is adorned * * * But not by their sin i◠self and that those that hurt themselves by their own iniquity are born for the good of others For the multitude of the ungodly though innumerable is not disgraceful or a deformity to the World or unprofitable to the Kingdom of God seeing that by their propagation cometh the generation that is to be regenerate and by tolerating and loving them Gods people become the more illustrious Sent. 14. He that saith that they that believe not the preaching of the Gospel are unbelievers by Gods predestination and that God so decreed that they that believe not be unbelievers by his appointment or decree is not a Catholick For as Faith which worketh by Love is Gods gift so unbelief is none of Gods constitution Because God knoweth how to ordain Punishment for sin but not sin it self And it followeth not that what he remitteth not he committeth The predestinate therefore liveth by the faith which is given him The non-predestinate perish by Voluntary and not constrained infidelity Sent. 15. He that saith that Foreknowledge is the same with predestination doubtless in our good works conjoyneth or mixeth those two For what we have of Gods gift and is said to be foreknown must needs be predestinate And what is said to be predestinate must needs be foreknown But in our evil works only the foreknowledge of God must be understood Because as he foreknew and predestinated the things which he doth himself and giveth us to do so he FOREKNEW ONLY and DID NOT PREDESTINATE the things which he neither doth himself nor requireth us to do SECT XXI Prosper 's answers ad Object Vincent 662. I Will crave the Readers patience while I add the summ of hi◠Answers also to some of the Objections of Vincentius Obj. 1. That Christ died not for all Resp His death is a remedy in it self sufficient to profit all but if it be not taken it will not heal Obj. 2. That God would not have all saved though they would Resp We must sincerely believe and profess that God would have all saved That many perish is by the merit of them that perish That many are saved is the gift of him that saved them For that the guilty are damned is Gods inculpable justice that the guilty are justified is Gods unspeakable grace Obj. 3. That God made most of mankind that they might perish for ever Resp God is the Creator of all men but No man is made by him that he might perish For the cause of being born is one and the cause of perishing is another That men are born is Gods gift that they perish is the sinners desert He maketh men that they may be men Obj. 4. That the most of men are made of God not to do Gods will but the Devils Resp It is madness and against reason to say that it is by Gods will that Gods will is not done and that the damner of the Devil and his servants would have the Devil served Obj. 5. That God is the author of our sin in that he maketh mens wills evil and maketh a substance which by natural motion cannot but sin Resp This objection they make because we hold original sin and misery But we hold that whatever is of Nature is of God and none of that which is contrary to Nature But sin is contrary to nature from whence cometh death and all that is of death God is the author of no mans sin but the Creator of his Nature which voluntarily sinned when it had Power not to sin and by his own will man subjected himself to the deceiver And it is not by Natural but by Captive Motion that he liveth in sin till he die to sin and live to God which without grace he cannot do Obj. 6. That God maketh in men such a will as is in Devils that of its own motion can and will do nothing but evil Resp The whole world lyeth in wickedness But even very bad men may be reconciled and Devils cannot And God put not evil affections in men Obj. 7. That it is Gods will that a great part of Christians neither will nor can be saved Resp If you speak of them who forsaking the Godliness of a Christian conversation and faith do irrevocably pass over into prophane errours and damnable manners it 's doubtless that having such a will they will not be saved and as long as they will not be saved they cannot be saved But it is by no means to be believed that such men fell into this desperate case by the will of God when rather God lifteth up all that fall For no man is raised or established but by his Grace It is therefore Gods will that they continue in a good will And he forsaketh no man before that man forsake him and converteth many that do forsake him Obj. 8. That God will not have all Catholicks to persevere in the Catholick faith but will have a great part of them to apostatize from it Resp The same answer serveth to this blasphemy as to the former Obj. 9. That God would have a great part of the Saints to fall from the purpose of holiness * * * The Reader must note that their common opinion then was that some true Saints do fall away and perish Resp This madness also needeth no other answer Obj. 10. That Adulteries and corrupting consecrate Virgins do come to pass because God predestinated them to fall Resp It is a detestable and abominable opinion which believeth God to be the author of any mans evil will or evil action whose predestination or decree is never without Goodness and Justice †††That is of nothing but good and just For all the wayes of God are mercy and truth Adulteries and Corruptions of Virgins God knoweth not how to institute but to damn not to dispose * * * That is ut sint but to punish Which evils when men commit they serve their own lusts Gods predestination neither exciteth perswadeth or impelleth the fall malignity or lusts of sinners but plainly predestinateth his own Judgement by which he will reward every one according to what he hath done whether good or evil which Judgement would never be if men sinned by the will of God But be it will And every man whom the discerning of Gods knowledge shall set
do Gods will and yet pray Let thy will be done are heard in that which is Gods will that the imitaters of the Devil be judged with the Devil For they that have despised Gods inviting will shall feel his revenging will SECT XXII The words of Fulgentius to the same sence 663. I Must crave of the Reader that he remember that my reciting the Judgement of these Fathers for the falling away and perishing of many that were in a state of Life is not at all as declaring my own judgement but Theirs none then that I read of thinking otherwise * * * Except Jovinian be truly accused by Hierome the brevity and obscurity of whose accusation and confutation leaveth us very uncertain what it was that Jovinian held But we are sure that the spirit oâ— uncharitableness and concention though in a good â—â—â—â— learnâ—d man had no â—â—all hand in the stigmâ—â—zing of him and Vigilantius as Hereticks I shall for the End sake be yet a little more â—edious in citing some of the sayings of Fulgentius Fulg. l. 1. de Verit. praedest cap. 6. To good men God giveth what good they have and keepeth it But to the wicked and ungodly God neither ever could prepare or give evil works which they should damnably serve nor did he ever put into them evil wills by which they should culpably will things unjust but he prepared for them the punishment of Hell that they might feel revenging justice in endless fire An evil will is not of God And therefore the just Judge doth punish it in men because the good Creator findeth not in it the order of his Creation And perseverance and contumacy in sin and pride because it is not of Gods giving is condemned by God revenging Et l. 1. ad Monim c. 26. He will punish in the wicked that they are bad which he gave not nor did he predestinate them to any iniquity and that they willed unjustly was none of his gift And because the persevering iniquity of an evil will ought not to remain unpunished he predestinated such to destruction because he prepared just punishment for them Observe that God predestinated wicked and ungodly men to just punishment not to any unjuâ—â— work to the penalty not to the fault to the punishment nâ—â— to the transgression to the destruction which the anger of a just judge requiteth sinners with not to that destruction or death by which the iniquity of sinners provoketh Gods wrath against them The Apostle calls them Vessels of wrath not Vessels of sin Cap. 27. The wicked are not predestinated to the first death of the soul but to the second death they are That which followeth the sentence of a just Judge not that which preceded in the evil concupiscence of the sinner Ibid. c. 23. It beseemeth believers to confess that the good and just God fore-knew indeed that men would sin for all things to come are known to him For they were not future if they were not in his fore-knowledge But not that he predestinated any to sin For if he predestinated man to any sin he would not punish man for sin For Gods predestination prepareth for men either the godly remission of their sins or the just punishment of them God therefore could never predestinate man to that which he had resolved both to forbid by his precept and to wash away by his mercy and punish by his justice God therefore predestinated to eternal punishment the wicked who he foreknew would persevere to the death in sin Wherein as his fore-knowledge of mans iniquity is not to be blamed so his predestinatioâ— of just revenge is to be praised That we may acknowledge that he predestinated not man to any sin whom he predestinated to be punished deservedly for sin And ad Monimum li. 1. pag. edit Basil 68. reciting Augustiâ—â—â— words he saith He taught that only pride was the cause of mans iniquity and that God predestinated not men to sin but to damnation and that they are not helped by God the cause is in themselves and not in God The same he reciteth again ex lib. 2. Aug. de baptis parvul that their wills be not helpt by grace the cause is in themselves and not in God The same he again repeateth pag. 69. 70 71 72. and that Augustine's mind was that good works God both fore-knew and predestinated But evil works that is sin he foreknew indeed but did not predestinate or decree For there is not Gods work but his judgement Therefore in sin Gods work is not because that sin should be done was not decreed by him But therefore there is his judgement because it is not left unrevenged that an evil man worketh without God working And ib. li. 1. pag. 15. That which is not in his work never was in predestination Therefore men are not predestinated to sin So p. 29. And p. 31. and forward And p. 29. No man justly sinneth though God justly permit him to sin For he is justly forsaken of God who forsaketh God And because man forsaking God sinneth God forsaking man keepeth justice 664. I am loth to weary the Reader with more Should I do the like by Augustines words it would be too wearisome His judgement is the very same as theirs I will only cite one passage out of him about mans Power to believe Tract 53. in Johan having shewed that God only foreknoweth mens sin and foretelleth it as the Jews but causeth it not he cometh to answer John 12. 39. They could not believe c. If they could not how was it their sin saying You hear the question brethren and see how deep it is But we answer as we can Why could they not believe If you ask me I quickly answer Because they would not For God foresaw their evil will and foretold it by the Prophet He blinded their eyes c. And I answer that their own wills deserved this also For God blindeth and hardeneth by forsaking and not helping which he may do by a judgement secret but not unjust This all religious piety ought to hold unshaken Far be it from us then to say that there is iniquity with God If he help he doth it mercifully if he help not he doth justly 665. By all this the Reader may see past all doubt that Augustine and his two disciples than whom none known to us in the whole world then went higher for Predestination and Grace did plainly take up with this that 1. GOD NEITHER CAUSED OR WILLED SIN no not ITS BEING or the forbidden ACT. 2. That OUR SIN was of OUR SELVES 3. That ALL GRACE and perserverance was OF GOD. 4. That ELECTION was ABSOLUTE of GOD's meer will and not upon his foreknowledge of any merits of mans 5. That God predestinated none to sin but predestinated men to Punishment ONLY ON THE FORESIGHT of their wilful sin 6. That he hardened men but by deserting them 7. That he never forsook them till they forsook him first
and deserved it by sin In a word that mans destruction is of himself but his help of God who resolvedly chooseth some to salvation and helpeth them accordingly with that effectual grace and especial perseverance which he justly giveth not to others though if he would he could SECT XXIII Healing Principles and Concessions of the Synod of Dort c. 666. I Know not how to conclude this discourse more suitably to my ends than by opening to the Reader who is sensible of the Churches sin misery and danger by our contentions and divisions how much the parties whom I endeavour to reconcile are agreed in judgement about these matters and that in their own words Remember still that it is not some few that run further than the rest either Episcopius Curcellâ—â—â— c. on one side or Maccovius Rutherford or Dr. Twisse or Alvarez and other Predeterminants on the other side whose particular opinions I cannot undertake to reconcile But only the generality of the Calvinists who go no further than the Synod of Dort which is my test of the party and the moderate Arminians Lutherans and Jesuits in these points on the other side And let none reproach me for putting in the Jesuites for as I know that very few Calvinists fly near so high for Predetermination as the Dominicans do so I know that though Arminius himself was a sober man and Episcopius is cryed up by some as Volkelius and other Socinians are by others as most clearly rational yet there is none of them all that equal in accurateness of search and clearness of reason either many of the ancient Schoolmen or Suarez Ruiz Vasquez Albertinus and many other latter School Jesuits 667. The first thing that I will desire of the Reader is to peruse those many healing concessions contained in the writings especially Irenicons of many Learned Calvinists already extant Especially Davenants two dissertations Dr. Sam. Wards works the Judgements of Davenant Morton Hall to Dury about this Bishop Robert Abbots and Bishop Carltons works oft on the by Bishop Usher of Redemption c. Mr. Fennâ—r of wilful Impenitency and Hidden Manna Joh. Bergius for Reconcil Iâ—dov Crocii Syntag. Conrad Bergii Praxis Can. Junii Irenicon and of predeterm Paraei Irenicon Amyrald Defens doct Calv. Irenicon Testard de nat Grat. Hotton de toler Theses Salmur but above all Le Blanks Theses Vossii Thess Histor Pelag. Musculi Loc. Commun And the geral Irenicons as all Durie's Hall's Peacemaker and Pax terris Burroughs Iren. Acontii stratagem Satana an excellent book c. 668. Next I will insert some words to this end in the Synod of Dort I. About the first Article of Predestination they open free election but mention no other Reprobation but Gods not-electing or passing by some whom he found in sin and in the misery in quam se suâ culpâ praecipitarunt c. and not giving them effectual grace of Conversion but leaving them in their sin And can any doubt of this or do any Jesuits or Arminians deny it Where also they declare that God is no cause of mens sin but themselves And that the Children of the faithful are by Covenant so holy that their salvation who dye in infancy is not to be doubted of And that those that find not saving grace in themselves but yet use the means have no cause to be cast down at the mention of Reprobation 669. II. About Christs death they say that His satisfaction is of infinite value and price abundantly sufficient to expiate the sins of all the world And that the promise is that whoever believeth shall not perish which is to be preached to all And that many yet repent not believe not but perish is not through any defect or insufficiency of Christs sacrifice but by their own fault And that others believe is of undeserved grace 670. III. In the third and fourth Art sect 8 9. they say that the fault is not in Christ or the Gospel that many that are called are not converted and come not nor in God that calleth them and giveth them many gifts but in the called themselves that receive not the word of life c. And that you may see that they hold a conditional will or decree not only of future but of non-future contingents they say that As many as are called by the Gospel are seriously called and God seriously and truly sheweth by his word what would be acceptable to him viz. that the called come to him So that here is a serious declaration of Gods will to those that never will come to him conditionally if they would come These kind of notions please or displease men as the interest of their opinions requireth 671. And the confession of Pet. Molinaeus received by the Synod is worthy observation pag. 290 291. where he saith Sin is the Meritorious Cause of Destination to punishment And Though natural corruption be cause sufficient for Reprobation as we kill new spawned Not only of punishment it self Serpents before they hurt any yet there is no doubt but that for what cause God damneth men for the same he decreed to damn them But he damneth reprobates for sins committed For they suffer in hell not only for original sin but for all actual sins whence is the inequality of punishment Therefore God Decreed to damn them for the same sins For nothing hindereth but that God who considereth men in natural corruption and pravity may consider them also polluted in the actual sins which they will thence commit And among the sins for which any one is Destinated to punishment no doubt is unbelief and rejection of the Gospel No reason suffereth that he should be Reprobated for rejecting of the Gospel to whom the Gospel was never revealed That God destinated any to eternal punishment without consideration of impenitence and unbelief we neither say nor think And though God predestinate the Elect to faith he doth not predestinate the Reprobate to unbelief For we must distinguish the media which God findeth in men from those which he maketh He findeth in men unbelief the means of damnation But faith he findeth not but maketh Therefore he predestinateth to faith but not to unbelief For he predestinateth but to that which he decreed to make Lastly Impenitence in order goeth before Reprobation but faith is after Election as being its effect Is not here enough to reconcile And next of Christs death he saith that It is abundantly sufficient to save all men in the world if they would believe And that all are not saved by it is not through the insufficiency of Christs death but of their pravity and unbelief 672. And pag. 295. he saith that Arminius holdeth irresistible grace and that the Elect are drawn of God by effectual grace whose effect is most certain and infallible by Congruity 673. The Brittish Divines in their Suffrage say that Pag. 11. Th. 1. Expl. God in the decree of Election prepareth Glory
still have heard Obey and live or Sin and die And if Adam â—ad obeyed till his translation to Glory or confirmation in the Reward I find not in Scripture any Promise that this should have been imâ—uted to his Posterity as the full performance of the Condition of their Life or confirmed Happiness but that still their own sinning would have been a possible thing and death would have been the wages of their Sin You seem not to set Adam's Merits and imputed Righteousness any â—igher than Christ's And I am too sure that the justified Members of Christ do sin and must ask daily pardon And whether or not they be confirmed against total Apostasie I am sure few if any of them are confirmed against the possibility or existence or futurity of Sin And if you say that Adam's Posterity though confirmed should have sinned too but should have been pardoned as we are It would be another presumptuous addition and contradiction of Scripture to assert Pardon without a Saviour and a pardoning Covenant 3. Adam's Obedience would have justified his next issue from this false Accusation You are born of a sinful Parent or not of a righteous Parent But it would have justified no man against this Accusation You are personally a Sinner or have not personally loved God and obeyed him Therefore it would have justified any man against this Charge You are to be condemned for Adam's sin But it would have justified no man against these Charges You are to be condemned for your own personal Sin or you have no right to Glory by Gods Promise to the adult which maketh their personal Obedience the Condition 4. And though I cannot again here have time to deal with Confounders who think that Imputation or Justification are words which have but one sense I must say that even so Christ's Righteousness is not so imputed to any man as to be to him in stead of his personal Obedience to the Law or Covenant of Grace which he is under But it will justifie any Believer from these Accusations You must be cast into Hell for breaking the Law of Innocency or you must be shut out of Heaven because you deserved it not by perfect Obedience or you have no perfect or sufficient Saviour or you are such as God cannot pardon without wrong to his Truth Wisdom or Justice It will justifie no man from any of these Charges You are Sinners you deserve condemnation by the first Law you are Impenitent or Unbelievers or Hypâ—crites or have not performed the conditions of life in the Law of Grace The two first we must confess and not justifie our selves by a denial And against the last we must be justified by our own Repentance Faith and sincere Obedience He that will say to the Accuser that chargeth him with final Infidelity Impenitency or Unholiness I am justified by the Imputation of Christ's Righteousness will but add to his sin 5. There are all these differences between our Justification according to the first Law had we been capable of it and that which we now have 1. One would have been by God as Creator and Legislator to the Innocent The other by Christ as Redeemer and Legislator to the sinful World 2. One would have been for personal perfect persevering Obedience The other for Christ's Merits as purchasing a free Pardon Grace to penitent Believers and upon our own Faith and Repentance as the Conditions of the new Covenant 3. One would have been without pardon and the other chiefly or much by pardon In one if our Publick Root had perfectly obeyed we must also have perfectly obeyed or die In the other because our Publick Root did perfectly obey Faith and sinceere Obedience to the end is all that is required of us to ouâ— Glory 4. In one the personal matter of worthiness or merit must have been all that perfection which God in justice could require of man In the other it is only The acceptance of a free Gift according to its nature and use and after the thankful use and improvement of it with other such differences § 34. M. S. What Christ did as surety is imputed to us but not his Suretiship or being a publick Person Ans This is true if you understand Imputation in Scripture sense or soundly and not in their sense who presumptuously say That God reputeth us to have done all by Christ which he did for us in his Obedience to the Law § 35. M. S. Christ did not all that he did as Surety but only that which answered the Law An. I suppose you mean that which the Law requireth of us But the word Surety is ambiguous and after here explained and whether you understood it sano sensu I know not He did all that he did as the Mediator and Sponsor for mans Redemption And we are pardoned and justified by the merit of all his own Covenant-keeping with the Father even of such acts as the Law required not of us And some which the Law required of many he did not because it required them not of him § 36. M. S. The Law said not That Christ must be a holy Husband or Father c. The Imputation of one Act of Christ's Obedience is sufficient to our Justification and Merit of life though it need not be curiously set in this or that part of his life § Still more presumption 1. Where saith the Scripture so 2. You must not assert absurdities or presumptions and then think to put off the detection of them by calling it curious If this be true doubtless it was Christs first act of Obedience which merited Glory for us And so it is that first only that must be imputed to us to that end And who ever thought so before you The Fryars have some of them said That minima guttula sanguinis Christi One drop of his blood was enough to redeem all the World And our Divines say Why then was the rest shed So I ask you 1. Why did Christ do all the rest of his Obedience after the first Act Hath none of it the same end and use 2. How shall we be sure that a Sinner must not plead or trust to any of Christ's Righteousness but the first act for his Justification and Reward or must he trust for it to that which was never by Christ intended for it 3. This is contrary to the Scripture which layeth our Justification on his whole Righteousness as meritorious and on his Obedience to the Death and on his rising again and on other parts first Rom. 4. 24. 5. throughout c. 4. Sure they that are so curious as to tell us which physical act of Faith justifieth in specie numero for some say only the first instantaneous act doth justifie will not think it curiosity to enquire which one Act of Christs Obedience justifieth us when according to your Doctrine it is evident that it must be the first And they that say It is Justification by Works to
Will or Power as if he could do no more But it is his Delight thus to govern the creature according to the nature and rank which he hath made it in and his non-volitions and non-operations of a higher sort are agreeable to his Perfection Wisdom and Liberty Higher action being used on higher creatures 3. Yet hath God placed and kept these free Agents not only under his Moral Government but also under his Dominion and disposal so that he will do with them as his own what he lift and none shall frustrate his disposing Will. 4. It pleased him first to make man perfect under a Law of Perfection making innocency or perfection the only condition of Life and the contrary of Death 5. When Man had sufficient Grace to have kept this Law not sufficient to ascertain the event but sufficient Power to have stood that is as much Grace as was necessary to his standing sine qua non esse potuit cum qua esse potuit he broke it and sinned against that sufficient Grace before God either denyed him any thing necessary or withdrew any from him 6. From whence it is clear that the Nature of Man's Will is such as that it is made to use a Power which doth not necessitate or determine it self or is determined necessarily but freely And that it is no Deifying of the Will nor extolling it above its Nature to say that it can act or determine it self without Gods pre-determinating premotion or by that same measure of help which at another time doth not determine it Though its Nature and its Act as such be of God yet so is its Liberty too and therefore by the Power and Liberty given by God the Will can act or not act or turn it self to this object or to that without more help than the said natural support and Concurse And this Power and Liberty is its Nature and Gods Image 7. From hence also it is evident that there is such a thing or operation of God as Grace Necessary called sufficient which is not effectual For God took no Grace away from Adam before he sinned nor let out any temptation upon him which he was not able to resist nor did he sin for want of necessary Grace but by that same degree of help might have overcome 8. God passing Sentence on faln Man for sin would not forgive him the temporal death nor common calamities of this life but cursed the creatures which he was to use as part of his penalty 9. But the Great evil which sin brought on man was the loss of Gods approbation and complacency and of his Spirits saving Communion and help and of Gods Image on man's Soul and of Communion with God herein and also his right to life eternal All which man 's own sin cast away and man was both the Deserver and Executioner without any change in God 10. Yet was all this privation penal in that God made Man such a creature as that his own sin should become his punishment or ruine if he committed it so that all Punishment is not determinatively of God though Gods Antecedent Will did make that which by man is made a Cause As in argument God saith antecedently If thou sin thy own sin shall be thy torment and misery and man saith I will sin Therefore it is Man that is the determining Cause of the Conclusion My own sâ—â— shall be my torment and misery So it is in Causation God antecedently to man's sin doth resolve I will make Man such a Creature with such a Mind Conscience and Will as that his Holiness shall be his Health and Joy and his immediate Receptive capacity of my favour and of his Communion with me and of his title to my spirit and Glory And that if he forsake me and his Holiness in the very Nature of the thing he shall lose all this Life Light and Love Joy and Communion and title to my Grace and shall feel the torments of his own Conscience telling him of his sin and loss This is Gods Antecedent Law Nay this is Gods Antecedent Creation to make man such a Creature Now if man sin his owâ— sin doth ipso facto become his misery and yet is not caused at all by Gods But yet that his Nature was made such as sin should prove a misery to was Gods Work And from that Antecedent Creation or Constitution the Relative form of a Punishment resulteth to the Sinner Even as God saith If thou Murder it shall be thy sin or Thou shalt not Murder And man doth Murder Here the Act that is sin is of man but that the Relation of sin belongeth to that act resulteth partly from the Law which forbiddeth it and yet God is not the Cause of sin though he Antecedently decreed Murder shall be sin if thou commit it So is it also with this sort of Punishment which is either sin it self or the effect or result oâ— sin immediately By which we see that when sin and punishment are found in one thing God is the Cause Antecedently of the formal Relation of a Punishment without being a Cause of the sin yea antecedently is some cause of the formal relation of the sin by his Law without causing any of the sin it self as the author of it As if God make man of such a temper as that surfetting drunkenness lust will make him sick and hazard his life Here God did no otherwise punish him than by making him such a man which he turned to his own destruction by his sin If a man make a thorn Hedge about his Garden that men may not steal his fruit and those that will shall â—rick themselves it is they that prick and punish themselves If God say He that will leap into the fire shall be burnt or into the water shall be drown'd it is they that do it that cause the evil and yet some formal relation of penalty may result to it from Gods conditional antecedent Law I say not that God executeth no other kind of punishment But these are the most common 11. Man having thus cast away Gods Image and his Innocency could beget a Child no purer holier or better than himself For he could not communicate that which he had lost So that our Nature is vitiated with Original sin and unhappy in the miserable effects Bradwardine hath a shift which serveth them that say man could do no good in Innocency without supernatural Help viz. Making that Help to be Gods Will that it shall be done But is not Gods Will called our natural Help when it is the foundation of Nature working by natural means It 's true that free will without Gods Will could do nothing 12. The promisory part of the Covenant or Law of Innocency became null or ceased with man's first sin cessante subditorum capacitate and so the Condition which is its modus So that no man ever since was under the Obligation of that Law as a Covenant of life
saying Be Perfect or Innocent and Live nor obliged to perfect personal perpetual obedience as the condition of Life for it was become naturally impossible And God maketh not Promises and Covenants upon Natural impossibilities whatever we say of Moral ones If the Devils before their fall were under this Covenant Be Perfect and Live Yet now they are not under it Here some worthy Divines go into both extreams Some say that all the Law of Innocency is ceased Precept Promise and Threatning Others say that all still are in force or being The Truth I think is between them as followeth 1. God still commandeth perfect obedience so far as that the least violation of his Law is sin 2. This Law bindeth us as the Creator's Law but not as meer Creator But as put with Nature into the hand and power of the Redeemer to whom all Power or Government is committed and so all Laws are now both the Creators and Redeemers 3. These Precepts bind us not now in so full a sort as they did Adam even to obedience Though the Law be as perfect Because there is some Dispositio Recipientis necessary to the effecting an Obligation upon us And where any Natural Impossibility hath befaln us though by sin it will make some alteration in the obligation 4. The Commination of the said Law is so far still in force as to make Punishment even perpetual to be our desert for every sin and so far to oblige us to Punishment that if we are not pardoned we shall not escape for it is natural for sin to deserve Punishment 5. This obligation is not only Remediable or pardonable but conditionally as well as by the Fundamental Merit of Christ Remedyed and pardoned to all men immediately and actually pardoned to penitent Believers 6. The Promissory Covenanting part was not properly Abrogatedly God For he was not the Changer 7. The Promissory part is now really ceased and is No Promise noâ—â—â— Covenant of God And this was done by Man's ceasing to be a capable subject which because some few worthy Divines deny I prove 1. If it be yet a Promise it is Absolute which none saith or Conditional And if so either the Condition is quid praeteritum quid praesenâ— vel quid futurum But none of these 1. A Past and Present Condition are not proper Conditions of the thing but forms of speech And either that Condition already is or is not If it be the Promise is absolute in sence If it be not the Promise is No Promise iâ— sence but equivalent to a Negation as common reason as well as the civil Law confesseth If it be quid Ignotum the notice may be Conditional still but not the proper Donation But here it is quid notissimuâ— and God is feigned to say If Adam and his Posterity have no sin I will justifie and bless them which is equivalent to I will not If the Condition be supposed Future e. g. If Adam and his seed sin no more they are just it is false because they are already guilty 2. The essence of a Condition is to suspend the effect till performed But here the effect is not suspended Ergo there is no conditional promise Total loss is no suspension 3. When the Condition is once totally violated and become impossible all sence and civil Law saith Res transit in judicatum Lex in Sententiam and the Promise ceaseth Cessante capacitate Promissarit And so it is here 4. That which is a Promise is also a Law and is essentially the Expression of Gods Will for the Government of his Subjects and for a conditional Rule of Right to the thing promised This is its very definition But it is unworthy of God to say that he doth ever since the fall tell the world If you are not faln or Sinners you shall be justified or on condition that you be such as never did sin you shall live This were to threaten or condemn us ironically or with derision under the name of a Promise or Covenant or Law Yet the change as I said is made by man who hath made himself uncapable to be the object of such a Promise or subject to such a Law And I know that it is a Question of no small Difficulty whether any proper promise of life was made to Adam himself and so whether this was properly a Promising Covenant But I can presume to say no more than I can prove which is 1. That as Natural there seemed to be in it an intimation of the Will of God to give Adam perpetual felicity if he obeyed 1. In that God made his Soul Immortal Not such as could â—â—t cease to be but such as in its Nature was fitted to perpetuity And a perpetual Soul must be perpetually happy or unhappy And God would not subvert the Nature of Spirits nor make Souls unhappy for nothing 2. Because Holiness it self would be and infer Happiness to a perpetuated Soul To love God perfectly is to be perfectly happy And God would not have taken away man's holiness from him 3. Because God having voluntarily become man's Rector that Justice which consisteth in doing as a Rector ob fines regiminis secundum mores subditorum seemeth to be a virtual Promise that it shall go well with the obedient 4. Because God put into man's Soul a natural inclination to its own perpetual felicity 5. And also a holy Inclination perpetually to Love his God and to know him 6. And God commanded Man in the very Law of Nature and positively certain means to be used no doubt in order to such felicity as the end which man by nature was obliged to intend And doubtless God would not do all this in vain His command to seek Life is a kind of Promise that faithful seekers shall obtain it 7. And as Nature made Punishment due to the sinner so it seemeth implyed in that very threatning of Nature that the obedient shall speed better Whoever is angry with me for it I must say that these Natural Evidences are no inconsiderable perswaders of my judgment and directors of it about the certainty and nature of the Promise to Adam 2. But besides these though the Scripture be very silent here yet the same seemeth implyed 1. In the threatning of death to Adam 2. In the titles of Redemption Reconciliation Remission c. given in the Gospel to the acts of our Salvation by Jesus Christ which seem to import that they restore us into that state of Heavenly hope which we fell from in Adam when we all sinned and came short of the Glory of God Rom. 3. SECT II. The first Edition of the Law of Grace 13. When God judged man for sin at once he promised him a Saviour and through him as promised made a new Law of Grace with man 14. This Law giveth pardon of the Spiritual and Eternal Punishment and of all save what was excepted in the Sentence foregoing But pardon not to be absolutely and immediately
If in any of these points men of less accurateness use not the same words take not therefore the old way of proclaiming them Hereticks till you have tryed how far they erre indeed Most of our lower Divines of all parties would be made Hereticks for want of Skill in the denominations allowable or not allowable by the Communication of idioms if the Schoolmens accurateness must be the test e. g. If the question were whether the Humanity be part of Christ or Christ be compounded of a Divine Nature and Humane c. â—â—â—â— would affirm it that mean well But saith Alliac Camerar 3. q. Neque persona neque natura divina est composita nec â—â—â—â— est compositus ex duabus naâ—â—â—is divina scilicet humana sive ex tribus rebus Corpore scilicet anima divinitate sed â—â—â—â— ex duabus secundum humanitatem scilicet corpore anima essentialiter ex infinitis partibus quantitativis integraliter â—â— non est concedendum quod humanitas sit Pars Christâ— Nam ficut homo non est compositus ex albidine substantia 〈…〉 est Compositus ex humanitate persona divina How many have gone for Hereticks for want of the Language of â—â—â—â— and the Schoolmen his Soul the deep sense of Gods displeasure with Sinners and of his â—â—â—â— of sin though no sence of Gods hatred to himself For it is conceiveable how Christ being the Lover and surety or Sponsor for Sinners and undertaking to suffer as a Sacrifice for their sins and in their stead might have on his own Soul the sorrowful sense of Gods hatred of sin and wrath against Sinners though not properly terminated on himself and so he bore the sorrow of our transgressions and was so far forsaken of God for that time and not further 52. The true Reason of the satisfactoriness of Christ's sufferings was that they were a most apt means for the demonstration of the Governing Justice Holiness Wisdom and Mercy of God by which God could attain the ends of the Law and Government better than by executing the Law on the world in its destruction as in general was before intimated 53. The measure of the satisfaction made by Christ was that it was a full salvo to Gods Justice and demonstration of it that he might give Pardon and Life to Sinners upon the new terms of the Covenant of Grace and give what he after gave 54. The matter of Christ's meritorious Righteousness was his perfect fulfilling the Law given him as Mediator or the performance of the Conditions of his mediatorial Covenant From which resulted the Merit so the Dueness of all the Benefits which God had promised in that Covenant as to Christ though mostly for men This was the Righteousness of Christ for man and hence arose his Merit for us 55. The matter of his Law of Redemption required of him was threefold 1. That he should by habitual and actual perfect Holiness fulfil the first Law of Nature or Innocency which Adam broke not just as it obliged Adam in every point but as it was common to man and belonged to Christ as Man 2. That he should fulfil all the Law of Moses given only to the Jews 3. That he should perform the great things peculiar to himself as Mediator which were to be a Sacrifice for Sin to do his Miracles to teach the Church as its Head to Rule it and to appoint Orders and Officers for it to rise again to conquer Satan Death and Sin c. 56. That Christ did not fulfil all the Law in our persons so as that we did it in and by himself and are thereby justified is further evident in that he did not all the Duties which the Law bound us to perform and for not doing of which we are truly Sinners He did not do any of the proper Offices of a Husband to a Wife or of a Wife to a Husband of a Father to Children of a Servant or a hired day-labourer to a Master of a Magistrate King Judge c. to Subjects of a Captain to Souldiers or Souldiers to their Captain of a Landlord to Tenants of such as have great riches towards the poor of the sick the imprisoned and abundance such like Besides the personal Laws given to Adam in the Garden to Noah to Abraham to David â—â—â—â—â—olomon the Prophets and such others Christ did not these same â—â—â—â— for us nor we fulfilled not these particular Laws in him 57. The Disputes whether it be Christ's Divine his habitual his active or his passive Righteousness that is made ours to our Justification seemeth to be but the Off-spring of the error of the undue sense of Christ's personating or representing us in his Righteousness And the parcelling out the uses and effects that one is imputed to us instead of habitual Righteousness another instead of actual and the third pardoneth our Sins is from the same false supposition It 's well that they suppose not that his Divine Righteousness is imputed to our deification But the case is plain 1. That Christ's whole Humane Righteousness habitual active and passive are meritorious for us not as being the very same things all which we should have done and suffered and had as if we had did and suffered them our selves by one that had did and suffered them in our persons in a Law-sense But as being the parts of that one Righteousness of Christ as Mediator which consisteth in the full performance of the Law of Redemption or of his own Covenant with his Father undertaken for our sakes Having been and done and suffered what he promised he is Righteous 2. And his Divine Righteousness by virtue of the hypostatical Union dignifieth his Humane to its meritorious value 58. By his Satisfaction or Sacrifice and this Merit Christ did procure all that Pardon Life and Benefits whatsoever that consequently are given us of God And so is the true meritorious cause of all 59. That Sacrifice and Obedience Righteousness and Merit which was directly given to God for man by performance of Christ's undertaking may yet be consequently said to be given unto man In that it was given to God for man and in that the Benefits merited are given to man and so relatively as to those Benefits the Sacrifice Obedience Righteousness and Merit may be said to be given us As the Ransom is given to the Captive which is given for him because the liberty purchased by it is given him Of which more after SECT IV. Of the New Covenant or the Law of Grace in the Second Edition 60. The New Covenant is Christs Law of Grace his Instrument by which he giveth Title or Right to the Benefits promised and conveyeth Right to the Fruits of his Sacrifice and Merits And his Law by which he governeth the Church as a Saviour in order to Recovery and Salvation It hath greatly scandalized the Papists against us to find some old Prâ—testants deny Christ to be a Law-Giver and
but so far yield to as they can have a tendency to thâ—â—â— recovery All these twenty sorts of means and mercies Christ giveth to all or to more than the Elect. 96. It being certain de re that Christ so far died for all as to procure them all such Benefits as he giveth them the question remaining iâ— de nomine whether it be a fit phrase to say that Christ died for all And this is put out of question by the Scripture which frequently useth it as is proved by the fore-cited Texts We may well speak as God ordinarily there speaketh 97. There are certain fruits of Christ's death which are proper to the Elect or those that are in a state of Salvation As 1. Grace eventually Rom. 8. 30 31. Act. 26. 18. 1 Joh. 5. 11 12. Joh. 15. 1 2 6. Eph. 1. 22 23. Col. 1. 19. Eph. 3. 17. Act. 5. 31. 13. 38 39. Col. 1. 13 14. Rom. 5. 1 c. Tit. 3. 5 6 7. 1 Pet. 1. 3 4. Psal 50. 15. 46. 1. Rev. 22. 9. Heb. 1. 14. effectual working them to true Faith Repentance and Converâ—â—on 2. Union with Christ the Head as his true living members 3. The actual forgiveness of sin as to the grand spiritual and the eternal punishment Rom. 4. 1. 7. 8. 1. 33 34. 4. Our actual Reconciliation with God so as to be beloved as his peculiar people 5. Our Adoption and Right to the heavenly Inheritance Psal 4. 6. 8. 16 17 18. 6. The Spirit of Christ to dwell in us and sanctifie us by a habit of Divine Love Rom. 8. 9 13. Gal. 4. 6. Col. 3. 10. 1 Pet. 1. 16. 2 Pet. 1. 4. 1 Joh. 4. 15. Joh. 3. 5 6. 1 Cor. 6. 19. Gal. 5. 17 18 22. 2 Cor. 6. 1. 7. Imployment in sincere holy acceptable Service where they and their duties are pleasing to God Heb. 11. 5 6. 1 Pet. 2. 5 9. 8. Access in prayer with a promise of being heard in all that 's good for us in Gods measure time and way through Christ Joh. 14. 13 14. Heb. 10. 19 20 22. 9. Well-grounded hopes of Salvation and peace of Conscience thereupon Rom. 5. 1 2 3 4 c. 10. Spiritual communion with the Church-mystical in Heaven and Earth Heb. 12. 22 23 24. Eph. 2. 19 20 21 22. 1 Cor. 3. 22. 11. A special interest in Christ's Intercession with the Father Rom. 8. 32 33 c. 12. Resurâ—ection unto Life and Justification in Judgment Glorification of the Soul at Death and of the Body at the Resurrection Phil. 3. 20 21. â— Cor. 5. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7. Rom. 8. 17 18 30 32 35 36 37 c. All these Benefits Christ hath made a conditional Deed of Gift to all the world But only the Elect accept them and possess them From whence we certainly infer that Christ never absolutely intended or decreed that his death should eventually put all men in possession of these Benefits And yet that he did intend and deâ—ree that by his death all men should have a conditional Gift of them As Dr. Twisse doth frequently assert 98. Christ therefore died for all but not for all equally or with the same intent design or purpose So that the case of difference in the matter of Redemption is resolved into that of Predestination and is but Gods different Decrees about the effects of Redemption 99. The particle For when we question whether Christ died For All is ambiguous 1. It may mean In the strict representation of the â—ersons of all as several so that they may be said to have died or satisfied â—n and by him as civilly in their own persons though not naturally And thus Christ died not for all or for any man which yet is in some mens conceits who thence say that Christ died not for all because he did not so personate all 2. It may signifie to die by the procurement of all â—ens sins as the assumed promeritorious cause And thus Parâ—â—â— himself in his Irenicon saith That the sins of all men lay on Christ and so he died for all that is for all mens sins as the cause of his death And you may tell any wiâ—ked man Thy sins killed Christ what-ever the deniers say to excuse them 3. Or it meaneth that Christ died finâ—lly for the good of all men And that is true as afore explained He died for the good of all but not equally that is not with the same absolute Will Decree or Intention of attaining their Salvation 100. But the conditional New Covenant without any difference in the tenor of it doth equally give Christ Pardon and Life to all Mankind antecedently to mens rejecting the offer on condition of acceptance And Christ equally satisfied Gods Justice for all the lapsed Race of Adam so far as to procure them this Gift or Covenant and the other foresaid common mercies But not equally as to his Decree of the success For there Election differenceth 101. It is a thing so contrary to the nature of Christianity and the Spirit of Christ in his Saints to extenuate Christ's Merits Purchase Interest or Honour or rob him of his due that doubtless so many sincere Christians would never be guilty of such injurious extenuations and narrowing of Christ's successes but that they cannot reconcile special Grace with universal and mistakingly judge them inconsistent Nor durst opprobriously reproach his universal Grace as they do by calling it vain lame imperfect a mockery c. if the conceit of their defending some truth by it did not quiet and deceive their Consciences Whereas indeed universal Grace and special do as perfectly and harmoniously consist as Nature and Grace do and as the foundation and the building and as any generical and specifick Natures And so doth a general Decree that All who will believe shall be saved and that this Promise shall be made to the world with a special Decree that Paul shall believe and be saved But on two accounts I pass by all the rest about the extent of Redemption 1. Because I must give you a special Disputation or Tractate on that subject 2. Because the most Judicious of English Divines so far as I can know them by their works Bishop Davenant hath said so much in his two Posthumous Dissertation de Redempt Praedestinat Published out of the hands of Bishop Usher as might suffice to reconcile contenders on these two points were not men slothful in studying them or partial or incapable in judging of these matters SECT VII The Antecedent and consequent Will of God c. 102. The distinction of Gods Antecedent and Consequent Will used by Damascene is by many applyed to this controversie but by none that I have read sufficiently explained which is the cause that so many good men reject it because they misunderstand it It 's truly said that by his Antecedent Will God would have all men to believe repent and be saved but by his Consequent Will
he will have all condemned whom he doth condemn But then it must be understood that this distinction iâ— not applyed to the Will of God as he is meerly an Absolute Proprietary or Benefactor but as he is the King or Rector of the world and so his Legislation is his Antecedent Will and his Judgment is his Consequent Will And no man of Religion can deny either that Gods Law is the signification of his Will or his Will signifyed or that his Judgment and â—â—cution is his Will declared or that Gods Law of Grace doth conditionally give pardon and salvation to all antecedently to man's performance or rejection of the condition or that God condemneth Infidels consequently to their Infidelity The Law Antecedently to Mans part acted saith He that believeth shall be saved and the Sentence consequently to his fact saith Judas an unbeliever or impenitent shall perish And thus the distinction hath no doubt or difficulty 103. God by commanding faith and repentance and making theâ— necessary conditions of Justification and by commanding perseverance and threatning the Justified and Sanctified with damnation if they fâ—â— away and making perseverance a condition of Salvation doth thereby provide a convenient means for the performance of his own Decree of giving Faith and Repentance and perseverance to his Elect For he effecteth his ends by suitable moral means and such is this Law and Covenant to provoke man to due fear and care and obedience that he may be wrought on as a man 104. To be justifyed by Faith in general agreeth to the ages before Of Justification by Faith c. Christ's Incarnation and those since But so doth not the special kind of faith by which they are justifyed For much more is Essential to that faith which we must be justifyed by to them that are under the last edition of the Covenant of Grace than was or is to them that were under the first alone Abraham believed not all our essential Articles of faith 105. To be justified by faith in Paul's sence is all one as to be justified What that Faith is by becoming Christians To be a Believer a Disciple and a Christian are all one in the Gospel sence 106. The faith by which we are justified as is aforesaid is best understood The Controversie between the Papists and us about Justification is agitated iâ— vain till we agree of the sence of the words Justification and Remission As I said elsewhere they take not only Justification for a qualitative change such as we call Sanctification but Remission of Sin for they know not what themselves most of them talk as if it were a putting away the Sin in its essence which can be meant of nothing but the Habit for the fact cannot be infectum Others seem to take it for remitting the punishment also with that change Malderus most plainly in 1. 2. q. 113. a. 1. and p. 567. saith that Remission of Sin is Ablatio Reatus culpae At esse longe aliud quam Nolle illud punire non enim tantum facit Hominem non puniri sed etiam non esse Poena dignum Minus tamen est quam in amicitiam recipi though yet no man is in a middle state neque Dâ—i amicus neque inimicus yet cogitations possunt seterari Peccata Remittere idem est quod non imputare si hoc non accipias pro dissimulare sed pro desinere esse offensum cum per Remissionem Deo non imputante est quasi non fuerit By this you may see that these Papists hold the same with those Protestants whom they seem most to resist and cannot hide it But 1. It will be true to eternity that Peter sinned 2. To say so is to blame him 3 His sin deserv'd death 4. The Law and the nature of sin past are the same after pardon as before 5. God doth not change his mind of sin 6. Gods offence or displeasure is not a passion or mutable but his essence as denomina ed from the object to be his Velle punire and Justice that must punish 7. For God to be appeased and no more offended is but his Nolle punire peccatorem and not to be obliged in Justice to punish him but by his Covenant related to him as one that will not punish 8. This change is in the sinner becoming not punishable 9. That is not worthy of it in the Gospel-sence though worthy by the Law of Innocency 10. All this is but that the Reatus pâ—na culpae quantum ad poenam is remitted but not the Reatus culpae simpliciter in se And thus we are all agreed by the Baptismal Covenant and is essentially a Believing Fiducial consent to our Covenant relation to God the Father Son and Holy Ghost as our Reconciled Creator and Father our Saviour and our Sanctifyer connoting the forsaking of all inconsistents For it must needs be the same faith by which we have right to the benefits of that Covenant and by which we are justified because we have our remission and justification by the Instrumental donation of the Covenant it being one of the benefits given by it But Practical Faith or Believing-consent is our condition of receiving our Covenant right to all the benefits in general therefore to Justification in particular 107. The Phrases of Justifying faith and Faith justifying us are humane and not Scriptural at all And though they may be well used with explicatory caution as being well meant yet they are more lyable to mislead men than the Scripture phrase that we are justified by Faith Because the former phrases are apter to insinuate an Efficiency than the other whereas faith is no efficient cause of our Justification nor any other act of Man And the Scripture that speaketh of Justification by Faith sometime useth the phrase 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which no more signifyeth any Instrumental efficiency of Justification than 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ex operibus And though sometime 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 be used it is to signifie no more than that God hath appointed it to be the Medium of our Justification as a condition but not as any efficient cause 108. The Faith by which we are justified as I touched before hath God the Father for its object as essentially as Christ the Saviour as the said Baptismal Covenant sheweth and that not only secondarily as Christ being the Mediator and way to the Father our faith in Christ connoteth the final object but also directly and primarily as the Father is the first in Trinity and as Creator first related to us and as the end is first in our intention Joh. 17. 3. This is life eternal to know thee the only true God and Jesus Christ whom thou bast sent Joh. 13. 1. Let not your hearts be troubled you believe in God believe also in me 109. And as essential is it to this Faith to believe in Christ as the Purchaser of Holiness and Heaven as to
elect and should persevere So that they denied all certainty of Salvation by ordinary means And that none of all the Greek or Latin Fathers then or long after went further from the Pelagians than Augustine did I think I need not perswade any that hath read them 259. This historical Truth is useful to be known From whence I infer that it is possible for Christians to live in setled peace and comfort in respect to their heavenly Felicity without a certainty of perseverance and Salvation For to think that no Papists no Greeks no Arminians no Protestant Lutherans nor any of the ancient holy Doctors nor any of all the Martyrs or other Christians of their judgment did attain to such holy peace and comfort is unreasonable and contrary to all Church-History and to experience 260. And though it were a far more joyful state to have proper certainty yet reason and experience in other cases tell us that without certainty a man may live a joyful and peaceable life where probability is strong enough to remove all reasonable cause of fearfulness though there be a possibility of the worst As we see that men in youth and health though they may possibly die or fall into torments the next hour yet do not therefore cast off comfort and live in such trouble as they would do if they had probable cause to expect it There is no wife living is certain that her own Husband will not murder her the next night nor no Child certain that the Parents will not cast them off or kill them nor no Friend certain that his dearest Friend will not do so And yet few but melancholy people will therefore take up sorrow and cast away all their comfort in life and peace and in these Friends Even these persons are their trust and joy There is no man sure but he may be executed among Malefactors And yet while there is no reason to expect it a man may live a comfortable life There is no man certain that he himself shall not fall into a particular crime of Murder Theft Perjury or the like And yet we live not therefore uncomfortably For mens affections follow the powerfullest cause 261. Hence also I conclude that certainly the denial of certainty of persevering and Salvation is not a thing that should break the love peace or concord of the Christian Churches or for which they should cast off or revile each other For what sober man could do so by all those that I have instanced in 262. It is a shameful self-delusion of some Disputers who think when they have once believed that certainty of Salvation may be had that they are then certain themselves or next to certain of their own Salvation But he that hath no more certainty to be rich or healthful thaâ— to believe that Health and Riches may be got is far from having them 263. Who was more full of confidence and joy than Luther who speaketh more against the Papists commanding men to doubt of the pardon of sin who speaketh of a higher Faith than he on Galat. Yet he with Melancthon and all the first Protestants in the August Confess Art 11. saith They damn the Anabaptists who deny that those that are once justified can again lose the Holy Ghost 264. If Adam in Innocency had neither solid comfort or cause of such the state that we fell from was not so good as we commonly believe But Adam had no assurance of his perseverance in that state For he fell from it 265. No man as is said is certain that he shall not fall into such a Vid. Judic Theol. Palat. de persever in Synod Dord p. 1. pag. 208. pr. 3. hainous sin as Peter David c. did 266. The Synod of Dort saith By such enormous sins they greatly offend God they incur the guilt of death they grieve the Holy Ghost they interrupt the exercise of Faith they most grievously wound Conscience sometimes they lose the sense of Grace for a time till by serious Repentance returning into the way Gods fatherly countenance again shine upon them And the Brittish Divines in their Synodic Explic. say They contract damnable guilt and lose their present aptitude to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven Adding So that while they remain in that state of Impenitence they neither ought nor can perswade themselves otherwise than that they art obnoxious to death Rom. 8. 13. If ye live after the flesh ye shall die For they are bound in a capital Crime by the desert whereof according to Gods Ordination they are subject to death though they be not yet delivered to death nor shall be if we respect Gods fatherly love but shall be pluckt out of this sin that so they may be pluckt out of the guilt of death Lastly For their present condition they lose their aptitude to enter into Heaven c. And Thes 4. p. 193. Gods unmovable ordination requireth that a Believer thus exorbitant do first return into the way by renovation of Faith and the act of Repentance before he can be brought to the ways end which is the heavenly Kingdom By the Decree of Election the faithful are so predestinated to the end that they can no otherwise be brought to it than by Gods instituted means as by the Kings high way And Gods Decrees of the means and of the end and order of events are as firm and certain as those of the end and of the events themselves If any man therefore go on in a way contrary to Gods Ordination as the broad way of uncleanness and impenitence which directly leadeth to Hell he can never come that way to Heaven Yea if death surprize him wandering in Luk. 13. 3 5. 1 Cor. 6. 9. Heb. 12. 14. 2 Tim. 2. 19. Act. 27. 31. that out-way he cannot but fall into everlasting death This is the constant and clear voice of the Scripture As Paul said of those in the Ship c. Act. 27. 31. It is certain that David and Peter Gods Elect Servants were to come to Heaven But it is as certain that if one had remained impenitent in his Adultery and Murder and the other in his denial of Christ and perjury neither of them could have been saved Providence and Mercy unty this knot by providing that no elect person die in that state in which according to any Ordination of Gods Will he should have been shut out of Heaven And Thes 5. In that interspace which is between the guilt of sin contracted by a grievous sin and the renewed act of Faith and Repentance such a Sinner standeth a person to be damned by his own desert but by Christ's Merit and Gods firm purpose a person to be saved but not before by excited Faith and Repentance he hath obtained pardon is he actually absolved But in such guilt the condition of the Faithful and of the Wicked is not the same To the Unbelievers is wanting the inward principle of Faith without which the
to be damned to Hell but to be glorified in Heaven or to be sentenced to endless life and acquit from this Accusation that we are damnandi or to be punished in Hell And in order to this to be sentenced such as have the true causes and conditions of Right to Impunity and Life which are 1. Immediately the gift of this Right by God himself in his Covenant with Christ the Fountain of it 2. A true Right and Relation to Christ as our Head and Saviour and the only Meriter of this Covenant-Gift and Justification and Adoption by his habitual active and passive Righteousness and Sacrifice advanced in dignity by Union with his Divine perfection 3. True Faith and Repentance with Love Obedience and Perseverance as the title-conditions required by the donative and condonative Covenant 358. As I have before said that a man must be justified at that Day from the charge of Infidelity by his Faith it self and not by Christ's Merits and from the charge of Impenitence by his Repentance it self So I add that he must be justified from the charge of Hypocrisie by his sincerity and from the charge of Rebellion by his subjection and from the charge of wickedness by final godliness and obedience and from the charge of Apostacy by perseverance But from the charge of his wickedness before Conversion and his pardoned sins and weakness since only by Christ's Sacrifice and meritorious Righteousness and the Pardon purchased thereby and given in the New Covenant And from the accusation that we are Sinners in general we have no Justification at all 359. Judgment is the Genus and Justification and Condemnation are the Species Therefore to be judged according to our Works is to be justified or condemned according to our Works 360. As I said that it is God's Justice and Mercy and Christ's Redemption of us which are chiefly to be glorified at that Day but it is our personal Gospel-Righteousness or performance of the Conditions of the New Covenant which is then to be tried and we and not Christ that are to be judged So I add that the New Testament referring to this fore-seen doth usually speak accordingly of justifying us by Faith by our words or by our works that he that doth righteousness is righteous c. And it speaketh of that same Righteousness as constituting us just first by which we must be judged just at last 361. It is very easie therefore where prejudice blindeth not men to see the concord of Christ's saying We are justified by our words and Paul's by Faith and not by Works and James by Works and not by Faith only Christ speaketh of a particular Justification from a common great Crime a wicked Tongue as the sign or product of a wicked Heart And this must be part of the personal material Righteousness by which we must be justified as true Christians * * * Tolet in Rom. 3. Annot 17. Estius in Rom. 3. 28. Vega de justiâ— qu 3. p. 899. say of Justification by Faith as the Protestants do Vid. Stapleton de Justifi li. 8. c. ult Bellarm. de Justif l. 2. c. 7 10 11. Suarez de Grat. l. 7. c. 7. n. 29. Topper art 8. de Justif p. 25 26 27. Vasqu in 1. 2. disput 202. c. 6. n. 45. Coster Enchir. p. 292. Paul speaketh of our being justified by being Christians and not by keeping Mose's Law or doing any Works which will be to us instead of a Christ or a free-given Pardon and Righteousness by him And James speaketh of the full condition of Justification as continued final and compleat as it consisteth of its essential parts 362. The Key of Understanding Paul's Discourses of Justification is to know 1. That the grand question which he first manageth is Whether the Gentiles may not be saved without keeping the Jewish Law as well as the Jews with it 2. To prove the Affirmative he proveth that the Jews themselves cannot be saved or justified meerly or primarily by the Law notwithstanding the divinity and great excellency of it but must be justified by a Saviour and free-given Pardon and Right to Life and to which the sincere keeping of Mose's Law was intended to be but subservient 3. That therefore it appeareth that the Jews did so fondly admire the Law and their national priviledges under it that they thought that the exact keeping of it was necessary and sufficient to Justification and Salvation And they thought the Messiah was not to be their Righteousness as a Sacrifice for Sin and Meriter of free Pardon and the Gift of Life but only a great King and Deliverer to redeem them by Power from all their Enemies and Bondage 4. That it was not Adam's Covenant of Innocency or Perfection which the Jews thus trusted to or Paul doth speak against as to Justification though a minore ad majus that also is excluded For the Jews knew that they were Sinners and that God pardoned Sin as a merciful God and that their Petavius de Leg Grat. li. 1. c. 7. Well openeth the various senses in which the Law doth or doth not promise life eternal And through his two Books is much worth the reading of the difference of the Law and Gospel See Mr. Allen's Treat of the Two Covenants with my Preface And Mr. Truman's Great Propitiat with the Append. Law had Sacrifices for Pardon and Expiation with Confessions c. But they thought that so far as God had made that Law sufficient to political ends and to temporal Rewards and Punishments it had been sufficient to eternal Rewards and Punishments and that of it self and not in meer subordination to the typified Messiah Therefore they thought that he that kept the Law so far as to comit no sin which the Law punished with death or abscission and that for all his other pardonable sins performed the required Penances and Sacrifices was by this which is called The Works of the Law that is the keeping of the Law a righteous justifiable person 5. That the thing therefore which Paul disproveth them by is 1. That the Law was never made for such an end 2. That even then it stood in subordination to Redemption and free-given life 3. That the free Gift or Covenant of Grace containing the Promise of the Messiah and Pardon and Life by him was before the Law and justified Abraham and others even without it 4. That their Law was so strict that no man could perfectly keep it all 5. That every Sin deserveth death indeed though their Law punished not every sin with death by the Magistrate 6. That their Law was never Obligatory to the Gentile world who had a Law written in their Hearts and therefore not the common way of Justification * * * Jansenius Aug. To. 2. c. 4. asserteth That the chief difference between the old Law and the new is that the old was written in Stone and Tables and the new only in memory and
Conditional Covenant of Grace for I talk of no other extendeth not universally to all men but that any men are yet lest under no other Law or conditional-promise or Covenant than that of Innocency For if that were true 1. Then God should be supposed to make men a promise of Life on a condition of present natural impossibility And to say to sinners If you be not sinners you shall live 2. And to oblige men to the same Impossibilities as the means of their salvation saying still to sinners I require you sinners that you be no sinners that you may be saved 3. Which is indeed to say that the case of all that are under the first Law of Innocency only is desperate and they have no more hope or remedy than the Devils 4. And then Christ had mistaken the matter himself when he commanded his Ministers to Preach this Gospel or Covenant to all the world and every humane Creature and tell them that If they believe they shall be saved and to offer them Baptism if they consent 5. And either Preachers must preach an untruth to many or else not know what man to preach to 6. But the actu-al force and obligation of the Covenant puts all out of doubt that the world is under a Law of Grace For what man that by siding hath not his understanding utterly distorted to look only on one side can say that none but the Elect are bound to Believe in Christ or to Repent of sin or to turn to God and this as a means of their salvation What man dare say that any Heathens in the World are under no obligation to use any means at all for the pardon of their sins or the recovery and saving of their souls What man dare say that it is no sin in them not to use any such means And what duty or sin can there be without a Law And what Law can bind men to accept of Grace and to seek it and use means for pardon renovation and salvation but the new Covenant or Law of Grace Sure the Law of Innocency hath no such obligation 7. Lastly And Gods usage of all the world puts the case past Controversie For he useth no man according to the meer Law of Innocency All the world have a great proportion of the Mercies of the New Covenant and therefore are not under the Covenant of Innocency alone Yet we maintain that the preceptive part of the Law of Innocency as to the future is still in force to all men Obey perfectly And that the penal part is so far in force as to make death in the first instant due for every sin But we add 1. That the Remedying pardoning Law being in force with it doth immediately dissolve that obligation and make it uneffectual to the punishment of believers 2. And that the Promising part of the Covenant of Innocency is utterly ceased by the cessation of mans capacity And therefore that the Preceptive part for perfection is now no Condition of Life to any man Two things I was wont in my Ignorance to say against the universal tenour of the new Covenant 1. That God distinguished and excluded some at the first making of it under the name of the Seed of the Serpent But 1. No Scripture giveth us the least ground to think that men equally guilty are some called the Seed of the Serpent and some of the Woman meerly as denominated from or distinguished by Gods own will or decree without any real difference in the persons 2. And if the Image of Satan in Original sin were it that denominated the Seed of the Serpent then all the world should be excluded because all are such before they are regenerate 3. Therefore it is plain that it is not meer Original sin that denominateth any one the Serpents Seed in the sence of that Text but a consequent rejection and opposition of the Mediator or Grace of the new Covenant 2. I was wont in my great Ignorance in my youth to think that All men were meerly under the first Covenant till Conversion and then they came under the second only But this was but Confusion To be under a Law or offered Covenant as the terms of life or death is one thing And so all are under a Law or Covenant of Grace and no man under the meer Law of Innocency obliged to perfection as the sole condition of life And to be obedient to this Law and a Consenter to this Covenant and so to be in the Covenant as Mutual is another thing And this is the case of Consenters only So that I may take it for granted that we are agreed that as to the first Edition of the Law of Grace to Adam and Noe it extendeth or is in force to all the world at least till by enmity against Grace they have made themselves desperate as the Serpents seed Yea then the Law of Grace is in force to them though they reject the Grace of it 2. And as to the last Edition of the Covenant of Grace by Christ 1. The tenour of it extendeth to all as is visible Matth. 28. 19. Mark 16. 16. Joh. 3. 16. 2. And Christ hath made it the office of his Ministers by his commission to promulgate and offer it to all 3. And whereas providence concurreth not to the universal execution we must all confess that Christ came not to put the world into a worse condition than he found them in If he did any no good by his Incarnation he would do them no harm Therefore they that never hear the Gospel are still under the first Edition of the Covenant made with Adam and Noah so far as it is unaltered I add that word because that so far as the Promise was to give salvation by the Messiah hereafter to be incarnate none is now bound to expect his future Incarnation because it is past But the same benefits that were due to believers before Christs incarnation are due since upon the true performance of so much of the condition as is still in force and not repealed 3. And we must needs agree that the Ignorance of the Apostles before Christs sufferings of his death sacrifice and resurrection doth shew that the faith of the Godly Jews then was far more general and less particular than the faith now required of Christians 4. And also that more was required then to be known particularly by the Jews that had the Scripture and Tradition to acquaint them with the Messiah to come than of the rest of the world that had not those distinct discoveries nor Abraham's promises made known unto them And how much Gen. 3. 15. might cause them to understand we may conjecture by the words At least this much was required of all that they believe that their sin deserveth punishment and misery and yet that God of his abundant mercy by his Wisdom securing his Truth and Justice will pardon sin and grant salvation to all that truly Believe and Trust in
become parties in such daring medlings with the Consuming Fire Notes on some passages of Mr. Peter Sterries Book of Free-will § 1. IT is long since I heard much of the name and fame of Mr. Peter Sterry long Chaplain to Robert Lord Brook and after to Oliver Cromwel when he was Protector as then called His common fame was that his Preaching was such as none or few could understand which incensed my desire to have heard him of which I still mist though I oft attempted it But now since his death while my Book is in the Press unfinished a posthumous tractate of his cometh forth of Free-will upon perusal of which I find in him the same notions for so far as he meddleth with the same subjects as in Sr. H. Vane and somewhat of what Dr. Gibbon seemeth to deliver in his Scheme but all handled with much more strength of parts and raptures of highest devotion and great candour towards all others than I expected His Preface is a most excellent Perswasive to Universal Charity Love was never more extolled than throughout his Book Doubtless his head was strong his wit admirably pregnant his searching studies hard and sublime and I think his Heart replenished with holy Love to God and great charity moderation and peaceableness toward men In so much that I heartily repent that I so far believed fame as to think somewhat hardlier or less charitably of him and his few adherents than I now hope they did deserve Hasty judging and believing fame is a cause of unspeakable hurt to the world and injury to our brethren § 2. But I find that it is no wonder that he was understood by few For 1. His sublime and philosophical notions met not with many Auditors so well studied in those things as to be capable of understanding them It is a great inconvenience to men of extraordinary discoveries and sublimity that they must speak to very few 2. And though he cloud not his matter with so many self-made names and notions as Behmen Paraâ—elsus Wigelius and some others yet those few that he hath do somewhat obscure it 3. But above all the excessive pregnancy of his wit produceth so great a superabundance of Metaphors or Allegories that about the description of Christ especially they make up almost all his style so that to any ordinary Reader his matter is not so much cloathed in Metaphors as drowned buried or lost And though I confess my wit being to his but as a barren Desart to a florid Meadow may be apt to undervalue that which it attaineth not yet I do approve of my present judgement in thinking that seeing all metaphorical terms are ambiguous he that excessively useth them befriendeth not the Truth and the hearers intellect but while he is too much a Rhetorician he is too little a good Logician aâ—d as he is hardly understood by others I should fear lest he feduce his own understanding and can scarce have clear mental conceptions of that matter which he utters by a torrent of ambiguous Metaphors if he think as he speaketh and his words be the direct expressions of his mind I had rather be instructed in the words of the most barbarous Schoolman adapted to the matter than to be put to save my self from the temptation of equivocations in every sentence which I hear and to search after that Truth which is known only naked under so florid a disguise and paint § 3. But I cannot deny that though my temptations before were very great to doubt whether the Doctrine of Universally-necessary Predetermination as delivered by Bradwardine the Dominicans Dr. Twisse Rutherford and Hobbes were indeed to be rejected the Reading of Mr. Sterry increased my temptation not by any new strength of argument which he hath brought but by the power of his pious florid Oratory by which while he entitleth God to the necessitating causation of all sin and misery he seemeth to put so honourable and lovely a cloathing on them from their relative order to God to the Universe and to their End as that I felt my hard thoughts of both to abate and I was tempted to think of them as part of the amiable consequents of the Divine Love and of the Harmâ—nious order caused by the manifold wisdom of God § 4. And by this I see of how great importance it is in the world not only what Doctrine is taught and with what proof but who speaketh it and in what manner For as I found the same things reverenced in Dr. Twisse and Rutherford which were not so in Alvarez or Jansenius or Thom. White so I found the same Doctrine of Predetermining Necessitation almost commonly brought into greater dislike by Hobbes and Benedictus Spinosa's owning it and applying it to it s too obvious uses than all In Tract Polit. Theol. argumentations had ever before brought it And I see it as likely to recover its honour by the pious and florid dress put upon it by Mr. Sterry as if some new demonstrations for it were found out § 5. If I should recite Mr. Sterries mind in his own Metaphors the Reader may not understand it If I Epitomize him and change his words some may say that I misunderstand and wrong him But I will not do it willingly and if I do it necessarily his stile is my excuse He that would be seen must come into the light § 6. The summ of that which I am now concerned in in Mr. Sterry's Treatise is That the Freedom of all things is to act according to their natures and so is that of the will of man and that in God and man Necessity and Liberty concurr and that whatever we do or will we do or will it necessarily as being moved to it by the first causâ— and a chained connexion of necessitating causes by which all things in the world are carryed on That a will not determined by God but left to a self-determination without Gods predetermining causality is not to be asserted as contrary to Gods Goodness Wisdom power c. That sin is a privation formally and all that is positive in it is directly and not by accident of Gods positive causation else with the Manichees we must hold two first causes And that the formal privation is from the wiâ—lidrawing of necessary Divine causation of the contrary and God is the Negative necessitating cause of it Even as he causeth Light by the shining of the Sun and causeth darkness by its setting or not â—hining or as he causeth substances and shadows Life and death And that all sin thus as necessarily followeth Gods not giving the contrary or his leaving the defectible Creature to itself as the darkness folâ—oweth the Lights removal And this was the entrance of sin into the world the Woman being Necessarily deceived necessarily sinned and all good and evil is thus as to necessity equally to be resolved into Gods causing and not causing Will what he will cause cannot but be and what
to the work of Redemption his notions are too floridly or ambiguously delivered for me to undertake with confidence to unriddle But this seemeth the summ 1. That God is the fountain of Being by Emanation as the Sun of light And that his eternal Wisdom is Jesus Christ in the first instant or nature 2. That the first â—reature that he made or emaneth from him is a perfect universal mind the platform of all the rest of the Creation such as the old Philosophers called the soul of the world or an universal Intelligence And that this is Jesus Christ in his second nature and notion which Arius knew but did ill deny his divine nature 3. That this Universal Spirit or Mind maketh all the world besides and is in them all And so the whole Creation else was Christs first shadowy Image or body 4. That the Angels are the noblest parts of this and that the Deity first and Christs superangelical nature next is one in them all and they one with him as the beams with the Sun and as the lower part of the Sun-beams with the parts next the Sun 5. That the soul of man is the next part of Christs shadowy Image into which he descended 6. And so into all Bodies 7. And as into a special Branch into that Body born of the Virgin Mary 8. And in that and in other Bodies he dyeth and descendeth to his lowest state and 9. Then as the Sun doth rise again and bring all back to the state of pure spirituality in his superangelical nature whence all sprang And this is their Redemption which is most floridly set forth § 13. This doctrine seemeth to reconcile Philosophy or Gentilism and Christianity For what is it almost but names that are left in difference That which a Philosopher will call an universal Intelligence or soul of the world he calleth Christ And if such a soul there be no one will deny but that it floweth into all particular souls and bodies and is united to them or is to individuals as the soul in the head to the soul in the hand and foot § 14. And if I did believe that sin death hell and holiness life Glory are in the world but as Winter and Summer Night and Day and as Origen that the wicked are but in a state of Revolution and shall come about again into a state of hope or as he here seemeth that their sin and misery is but like the dying of a flower in the fall that shall in the Spring again be as before or rather another in its stead and that it is but the retiring of Christ from the Creature as the spirit of the Tree in Autumn from the Leaves I should then be ready to receive his Necessitating Predetermination to sin and fit all the rest of my opinions hereunto § 15. There is among many others one Joh. Jessenius à Jessen Doctor Eques Hungarus who in a Tract de Anima Corpore Universi hath written much to the like purpose save as being a Peripatetick he differeth from the Platonists viz. The world is one Animal and hath one soul and body which all Creatures are parts of That Stars are Intellectuals or Angels and all intuitively know each others minds loving the good and hating the evil here and are our chief friends and Keepers That Death befalleth only us lower Creatures Mors continua singulis nulli tamen aeterna Nam post longissimum temporis excursum quem Plato triginta insuper aliquot annorum millibus determinare ausus est removebitur factâ iterum aliquâ secundùm naturam solutione redintegratione And the Intellectus Agens he describeth as Mr. Sterry doth Christ in his second or middle nature pag. 165. Intellectum agentem substantia primae atque Dei fulgorem esse Non accidens sed substantiam Intelligeâ—tem quaeprimò propriéque Intellectus dicitur agens Primae substantiae adhaerens ab ea excurrens indivisus indivisibilis non aliter ac Lumen à Lucido emanat and so in many other particulars § 16. To all this my short time will allow me to give you but these short observations following 1. The doctrine of Redemption is so much of meer supernatural Revelation as that we must not easily receive that concerning it which is not in the Scriptures And where Christs person hath such a description in Scripture as he giveth I am not satisfied e. g. in pag. 232. where he thus saith The Word made flesh is the whole Tree of Being Uncreated and Created the Root the Body with all the Branches putting forth themselves into one little top branch now withering that through its death they may renew all to a fresh and flourishing spring I am loth to say that the Universe is Christ that his Divinity is the soul and the world his body and every Man and Beast and substance part of it and that he dyeth in all that dye and that his body born of the Virgin Mary was but one top branch of the Tree which Christ thus animateth and so that all other bodies are as truly personally united to the Word as that § 17. I will not deny that the Opinion of a Threefold nature in Christ looketh very plausibly viz. that the Divine eternal word the first nature produced and united it self to the prime created superangelical Mind the second nature and that this second nature in the fulness of time produced and united it self to the humane third nature 1. There are many texts which seem to countenance it 2. It seemeth to give Christ the greatest honour as being the most excellent of all Gods Creatures which is not so easily believed of him as Man 3. It seemeth to expound those texts of the Old Testament which mention such appearances of God to Adam Abraham and others which many of the Ancients say was Christ And it seemeth to some more probable that some pre-existent created nature should assume a body than the Divine nature only and immediately 4. And it smileth on us as an opinion likely to reduce and reconcile the Arians once too great a part of the Christian World as called Christians as not only Philostorgius and Saudius shew but also Petavius de Trinit who holding the prime-created super-angelical nature and denying the Divine it 's like would the more easily be brought to acknowledge the Union of the Divine Nature with the super-angelical if the super-angelical it self were first granted them For they might the sooner be convinced that the eternal wisdom or word which made that first creature was intimately united to it I know some pious worthy persons who upon such reasons incline to this opinion of a threefold nature in Christ Though some of them think that this second nature was the humane soul assuming only a body and others that it assumed both soul and body I am not forward to take men for unsufferable Hereticks that differ from me or hold that which seemeth to me hard and
comparativa ita de adultis 4. Non solum comparative sed etiam absolute loquendo nulla datur causa reprobationis quantum ad omnes effectus Where note that he granteth that there is in man a cause of Reprobation as to some effects viz. punishment For by a cause he meaneth any prerequisite condition For no doubt there is no efficient cause of any thing in God And all his stress is laid on this that the permission of the first sin is the first effect of Reprobation and this permission hath no cause in man Ergo Reprobation quoad omnes effectus hath no cause in man But the truth is 1. A man may put such a sence on the word Reprobation as to include what he please But it 's usually taken for Gods Decree to damn men and to deprive them of somewhat necessary to their salvation and so is 1. A positive Act as a Volition 2. And privative objectively and 3. Some unfitly extend it to that which is objectively negative and not privative 4. And some most ineptly extend it to that which is negatio actus no Act that is to nothing And so a man that will play with words may say that 1. Gods non-agere nonâ—igere is an Act. 2. That his non-impedire is an effect which is nothing and therefore no effect And Alvarez utterly faileth iâ— this proof either that non-eligere is an Act or permittere vel non impedire an eâ—â—ect or that it is fitly called Reprobation which hath â—â— privation but a negation for its Object e. g. that Judas shall not be an Angel nor iâ—â—eccabilâ— but have natural free-will is no act of his Reprobation And so of the permission of the first sin Arminius himself exam Perâ—ins pag. 568. saith Voleâ—et Deus Israelem punire Achabum mensuram scelerum suorum implere Propria â—mmediata adâ—quata causa cur permiserit ut Achaâ— iâ—â—â— cadem perpetraret est illa quam dixi mensâ—ra sâ—elerum implenâ—â— erat â—â—â—â— Dâ—â—â—â—â—tra peccatum hominis per aliam â—â—em Nabothum ad se evocare Which Dr. Twisse useth through all his Writings against him ad hominem in stead of argument â—â—-thinks this concession should seem enough which is too much And I conjecture that Arminius wrote it by over-sight and woâ—ld have said that God permitted Ahab to kill Naboth because he would â—â—â—â— him to â—â—â—â— up the measure of his sin making permission the res Voâ—â—ta But all theiâ— assigning Causes of Gods â—â—â—â— are â—â—â—â—â—â—ld God being above all causeâ— B. I wonder not that Dr. Twisse holdeth that God willeth it when he holdeth that he efficiently premoveth and predetermineth the Will to every forbidden act clothed with all its circumstances That which God causeth he must needs will But when he saith Nostri Theologi affirmant he must mean but some few such as Maccovius Spanhemius Rutherford and perhaps Piscator or Beza of his own mind But the generality of Protestants either are against him or meddle not with it He that will read Davenant and such others shall find the difference I remember but few English Divines at all that own it besides the forenamed and Mr. Norton But having written both an answer to this Digression of Dr. Twisse and to his and Alvarez and other mens Doctrine of physical predetermining premotion I may pretermit that here C. But by this they make God an idle Spectator of sin in the World and so deny a great part of his Providence or Works B. 1. This belongeth not directly to the Point of Reprobation but of Gods Works 2. Take heed of such unreverent words of God Who will not hold him guiltless that taketh his Name in vain Dare you reproach God as Idle if he do not all that your shallow thoughts will cut out for him C. The blasphemy is theirs that give the cause by their unsound Doctrine and not mine that do but denominate their consequents B. Let us try that Do you believe that God doth as much as he can do that he made the World as soon as he was able and could have done it no sooner or that he is able to make no one Man or Beast or Plant or Atome more than he hath made nor to do any one action more than he doth C. No I hold no such thing For God is Omnipotent and Free B. I pray you then study it and tell me if God be not to be blasphemed as Idle for such a total Non-agency or Free-suspension of his own Acts as to all such possibles why should you call him Idle if by the same Wisdom and Free-will he only suspend some degree of his co-operation with man in the case of sinning And if God freely decree that man shall be made a free Agent able by Gods common generical concurse as the cause of nature to determine or suspend his own Volitions without any predetermining efficiency of God If God will delight himself in making such a Creature will you dare to say that he is Idle because he moveth him not in another manner you will not so reproach a Watch-maker for not moving the Watch all day with his finger C. I confess I cannot answer that But how then is God the Governor of the World if so much sin be done without his Will and Operation B. The Work of a Governor as such is only 1. By Legislation to make the Subjects Duty 2. And by Judgment to try and decide the case of each Subject whether he do that Duty 3. And to see to the execution of that Judgment But not to be the determining cause of all the Subjects Volitions and Actions C. It is so with man because he can do no more but not with God B. Indeed God governeth all meer Naturals and Bruits by physical motion as Engins are moved as a Clock or Watch by natural necessitation And so he doth the meer naturals of man As his Concoction Pulse circulation of Blood generation in the Womb c. But God having made man an Intellectual free Agent ruleth him as such agreeably to his nature even by moral Agency by Laws and Judgment And this is that Regency of which we speak If you believe not that God is thus the moral Ruler of Mankind or King of the World you deny him to be God and overthrow all Religion and Morality C. But what say you to all the Texts that tell us that God willed and caused that which wicked men did as in the case of Pharaoh Sihon Rehoboam Absolom the death of Christ and many others B. One of the greatest over-sights of them that thus Object is that they distinguish not between the sin and the effect of the sin or the forbidden Will and Act of the Sinner as of him and the reception of this Act in passo in the recipient God can many ways concur to the causing of the reception and the effect without causing the Volition or Act as Agents by a specifying determination Especially
when Custom comprizeth both in one name dull wits are easily here deceived As the words Murder Theft Adultery Drunkenness c. do signifie both the Volition and Act of the Agent and the Reception or Effect Now God can many ways make the sinful Volition and Act of every such Sinner to produce that effect which the word Murder Theft Adultery Drunkenness c. connoteth or includeth without causing the Volition or Act forbidden determiningly C. I pray you shew me how B. 1. He can by Providence order or set the Object in their way 2. He can fit the Receptive disposition of the Patient to the effect Most of the wonderful Varieties in the World are à diversa recipientium dispositione That Act will produce an Effect on a disposed matter which will not on another 3. He can rule the Sinners Instruments of Action 4. He can remove other Objects out of the way 5. He can remove Impediments 6. He can put in some good thought or desire into the Sinners mind which shall determine the Effect 7. He can suspend some concurse of his own which will tend to this effect rather than another C. Give me some Instances to make it plain B. You need no other than the instance of the Murder of Christ 1. When his time was come he that before oft retired into the Wilderness and lived in Galilee came up to Jerusalem in their way 2. He was willing himself to die for man and so did not avoid it And he went into the place where Judas could find him And he spake the words which he knew that they would call Blasphemy c. 3. God directed the Souldiers Spear to the Region of Christs heart which their intent or aim alone else had not done And he provided a Cross and a Simon to bear it c. 4. God did not open to them effectually those Reasons which should have moved them more to desire the death of Barrabbas 5. Abundance of Impediments God could have set in their way as the peoples tumult Pilate's resistance c. which yet he did not 6. God put into their minds by moral means at least the true apprehension of the probability that the Romans hearing of a King of the Jews would turn their jealousie and fury against them and take away their place and Nation 7 He suspended that preserving operation by which he could have kept Christ alive on the Cross and healed his Wounds and caused him to come down from the Cross when they promised him then to believe in him and he restrained the Souldiers from breaking his bones c. And in all this there is no Decree Volition or Causation of their sinful Wills or Deeds So in the case of Absalom's Incest or any sinful Generation 1. God order'd it so that his Fathers Concubins were just in his way 2. They had an inviting pulchritude and an impotency of resisting 3. The state of his affairs was such as that the action had an appearance of tendency to his ends by making him seem unreconcileable to his Father 4. And for Achitophel and Absalom to know the truth of this was no sin 5. Other diverting Objects and occasions are kept out of the way c. Yet in all this God neither willeth nor causeth that Will and Act of Absalom in specie but the effect C. But by all this you do describe God as plotting and doing the same thing that they do And but for different words this cometh all to one B. 1. If you think this enough why doth it not satifie you while it is granted by them that you oppugn 2. It is not the same thing Is it the same thing for Christ to be killed and for the Jews to will and perform his Murder Is mans Will and Act and Christs Death the same thing 3. God did fore-know their sinful Will and Action and permit it only but did not cause it but was a concause of the Effect So God may to a Drunkard 1. Cause strong Drink or Wine to be in his way 2. And remove some smaller Drink that would have satisfied him 3. And remove Disswaders and many impediments 4. And give him money and facility of obtaining it 5. And cause him truly to know that the Drink is pleasant to the tast exhilerating spiritful 6. And cause it when he hath drunk it to make him drunken And none of this is quid prohibitum or sin in man But his sinful Will and Act which are forbidden are presupposed or fore-seen C I cannot see but that it cometh all to one for God to permit that which he fore-seeth and could easily hinder if he would B. 1. Your conceits that it cometh all to one must not over-rule our certain knowledge of Gods Holiness and his true and holy Word and all the certainty of Religion in the World 2. We are sure that God is Holy a hater of all sin and a righteous Judge c. And are you as sure that it cometh all to one And must all men else say that they are sure of it too or else be back-bitten and called Arminians Jesuites c. 3. Do you consider what Gods permission is It is far from a full permission He doth all that belongeth to a Rector to hinder it He strictly forbiddeth it by Laws He openeth the malignity of it He threatneth misery here and everlasting damnation hereafter to them that will not forbear it or forsake it He promiseth all blessings in this life and endless Glory in Heaven hereafter to them that will He sendeth his Ministers first with Miracles after with sealed Doctrine and Gifts to proclaim all this to the World and to perswade them He gave his own Son to condemn sin in the Flesh on the Cross and by his holy Life and Doctrine and Suffering to declare the malignity and hatefulness and hurtfulness of it to the World He sets up all his Ordinances Magistracy Ministry Sacraments Worship and Discipline to this end He warneth the World by many Judgments and especially by the Messengers of each mans death and the constant Afflictions which are the fruits of Sin He obligeth them to Obedience by multitudes of Mercies He sets Heaven and Hell before them daily and is this permitting it He doth indeed in this sense permit it in that he doth not all that he can against it or doth no more than as aforesaid 4. If this permitting be all one as loving or causing it then when God made man a free Agent and resolved to rule him by moral means and leave Adam to his own Will it was a loving and a causing sin And is every King or Parent a lover of Vice who doth not all that he could do to restrain it C. We do not hold that God loveth sin though he will the event and cause the act circumstantiated B. I know you say that neither God nor man loveth sin as sin But whether Dr. Twisse Rutherford say not in equipollent terms that God
Pardon and Salvation on condition they will repent and believe but he died moreover for the Elect to procure and give them Faith and Repentance also Know you not that Paraeus in his Irenicon saith That the Sins of all the World lay on Christ on the Cross as the cause of his Death Know you not that it is the commonest Doctrine of the Protestants That Christ died for all men as to the sufficiency of his death but for the Elect only as to the efficiency of Salvation And what can you say more or less than those few words signifie Know you not that the Synod at Dort it self saith That Christ's satisfaction is of infinite value and price abundantly sufficient to expiate the Sins of all the World and that the Promise is That whosoever believeth shall not perish And this is to be preached to all And that many yet repent not believe not but perish is not through any defect or insufficiency of Christ's Sacrifice but by their own default Musculus his words for Universal Redemption are Loc. Commun c. de Redemp Gen. hum p. mihi 326. c. Redemptio est generis humani Geâ—â—s humanum Complectitur non unam aut alteram Gentem sed mundum â—niversum omnes viz. totius orbis nationes cunctos homines à primo usque ad novissimum Generaliter est omnium Scimus non omnes Redemptionis hujus fieri participes Verum illorum perditio qui non servantur haud quaquam impedit * It seems there were but few in Bradwardin's days who were of his mind in confessing the antecedent natural impossibility of any ones Salvation or any good act which cometh not to pass seeing li. 3. c. 29. p. 735. he answereth them that say why should the Opinion of a few trouble the Church and the far greater number that is against it by referring them to the paucity of wise men and Believers and saying that truth must be preached for the few Elect that will receive it And p. 737. tells us how Aristophanes contrary to the six Judges appointed by Ptolomy did adjudge the Crown to that Poet that the people liked worst quo minus Universalis vocetur Redemptio Resolutio illa telluris qua passim omnia ad germinandum astate solvuntur recte Universalis dicitur etiamsi multae arbores non germinent c. Anno Jubilâ—o Generalis omnium servorum liberatio erat etiamsi multi in servitute maâ—â—â—tes gratiam liberationis respuebant Ad eum modum habet Redemptio istageneris humani Quod illam homines reprobi deploratè impii non accipiunt neque defectu fit Gratiae Dei neque justum est ut illa propter filios perditionis Gloriam ac titulum UNIVERS ALIS REDEMPTIONIS amittat cum sit parata cunctis omnes ad illam vocentur c. sic cuim cavebimus ne Catholicae Gratiae Gloriam obscuremus in arctum Constringamus vel cum phanaticis hominibus neminem prorsus damnari dicaâ—us Bullinger A. You may spare your labour of citing Bullinger and Musculus or Melanchthon or Bucer or such moderate men But what are they to the rigid Calvinists B. Calvin saith in Rom. 5. 18. Communem omnium gratiam facit quia omnibus exposita est Non quod ad omnes extendatur reipsa Nam si passus est Christus pro peccatis totius mundi atque omnibus Indifferenter Dei benignitate offertur non tamen omnes apprehendunt And in 1 Cor. 8. 11. Dictum memorabile quo docemur quam Chara esse debeat nobis fratrum salus nec omnium modo sed singulorum quando prounoquoque fusus est sanguis Christi And in 2 Pet. 2. 1. Non immerito dicuntur Christum abnegare à quo redempti sunt And in 1 Joh. 2. 2. He saith That qui dicunt Christum sufficienter pro toto mundo passum esse sed pro elect is tantum efficaciter say true and that which commonly obtaineth in the Schools though he otherwise expound that Text. A. You need not cite Calvin Grotius said truly that he had his Lucida intervalla and though Amyraldus seek to defend him from self-contradiction Petavius calls him all to nought for it But what can you say for your high Antiarminians such as Paraeus Molinaeus c. B. Paraeus let all mark it saith Irenic cap. 24. pag. 142. Quod Christus pro solis electis satisfecit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 est vel falsa accusatio Omnium peccata Christus portavit dissolvit expiavit si magnitudinem pretii seu 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sufficientiam spectemus Non omnium sed tantum fidelium si 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 efficaciam fructum applicationem To which he citeth Ambrose Innocent Lyra adding Juxta hunc intellectum nulla est dissensio Art 6. itidem 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 est vel falsa accusatio Promissiones Gratiae sunt Universales pertinentque ad omnes quoad praedicationem invitationem mandatum credendi And on 2 Pet. 2. 1. Erant Redempti respectu sufficientiae 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Molinaeus Anatom Arminianis saith cap. 27. sect 8 9. When we say that Christ died for all men we take it thus that the Death of Christ is sufficient to save whosoever do believe yea and that it is sufficient to save all men if all men in the whole World did believe in him And that the cause why all men are not saved is not in the insufficiency of the Death of Christ but in the wickedness and incredulity of man Finally Christ may be said to reconcile all men to God by his Death after the same manner that we say the Sun doth enlighten the eyes of all men though many are blind many sleep and many are hid in darkness c. That most methodical acute Divine Georg. Sohnius saith Tom. 1. Thes de Justific mihi pag. 104. Satisfactio illa justitia pro omnium temporum hominibus omnium hominum peccatis peccatorum omnium cum culpa tum poena sufficit quia ab infinita persona dependet Matth. 18. 11. 12. 31. Rom. 5. 18. 8. 32. 2 Cor. 5. 15. 1 Tim. 2. 6. 1 Joh. 1. 7. 2. 2. Tit. 2. 14. Errant igitur qui Christum pro omnibus hominibus passum esse negant A. But such violent men as Zanchy the grand Patron of the impossibility of falling away talk not at this rate B. Zanchy saith Thes Vol. 3. fine Thes 13. 16. de Volunt Dei Eadem de causa dici non potest Dei voluntatem proprie simpliciter fuisse ut Christus pro salute omnium moreretur id est ut omnis per ejus mortem servaretur ac proinde Christum secundum propositum patris pro salute omnium mortuum esse sed tantum ut loquuntur sufficienter Caeterum damnari etiam illi non possunt qui spectata revelata voluntate Dei docent Deum velle omnes homines salvos
equally prepared as he did on Saul Doth he call all to follow him as effectually ex parte sui as he did Peter Andrew c. who presently left all and followed him Did Christ himself preach to all Nations or only to the Circumcision Were not the sins of the Jews as much aggravated as those of Tyre and Sidon Sodom and Gomorrah or the Indians why else should it go worse with them in the day of Judgment and why else would Tyre and Sidon have repented if they had but had their means were they not then as much prepard for mercy Doth God equally send the Gospel to all Nations and Persons equally unworthy Can you confute St. Paul Rom. 9. Or can you give any reason why God must shew equal mercy unto all A. Yes because else he is a respecter of persons * Ruiz a Jesuite confesseth de Vol. Dei disp 20. sect 6. p. 226. That according to Augustine Christ so died for all as that he had a special intent of saving his Elect for whose sake as being among the rest it is that he died and prayed for all in common Aug. in Tract 31. in Joan. c. 7. Non debebant desperare pro quibus Dominus in cruce pendens dignatus est or are videbat quosdam suos inter multos alienos Illis jam petebat veniam a quibus adhuc accipiebat injuriam Non enim attendebat quod ab ipsis moriebatur sed quia pro ipsis moriebatur He that would know Augustines mind herein may find it fully in Jansenius or in the Trias Patrum de gratia c. B. I fully confuted this before 1. Respecting persons is the fault of a Rector as such especially as Judge And so God dealeth equally his Law being Norma officii judicii as to all But no man ever yet took either 1. A Proprietor Dominus absolutus 2. Or a Benefactor to be obliged to equality to all Must you needs use all your Grounds Trees Goods Cattel c. equally Must you needs make all men equally your bosom-Friends your Heirs your Beneficiaries who are equally worthy in themselves Must you needs give equally to all the poor that are of equal need and merit All this is contrary to the common sense and usage of Mankind 2. And in a Judge respecting persons is the vice of them that deal unequally with men for some by-respect unworthy of such a difference As for Birth Beauty Wealth Power Eloquence Parts Wit Kindred or any selfish interest to pervert Justice or deal partially But God maketh no difference on such accounts Yea a Judge himself or a King when he acteth not as a Judge but as a King above Laws or as a Benefactor may reprieve or pardon one Thief rather than an other yea and choose that which is the most learned strong wise and capable of future Service to the Common-wealth A. This seemeth a wrong to the rest that are not so used B. Would it do the Thief that is hanged any good to have the other unpardoned Would it ease their pains in Hell to have the company of all those that be in Heaven If it be no wrong to them to suffer themselves nothing but envy can call it a wrong to them to have others escape Had they love to others as themselves it would be some comfort to them to think that others are in Joy and Glory A. At least this is a real difference between the Parties B. 1. The School-men and many learned Jesuites as I have proved Lib. 1. make it not a difference And will you called Arminians or Lutherans go further from your Protestant Brethren than the learned Papists and Jesuites themselves go Are you not ashamed of this 2. The Papists can bear with one another in these Points and live in communion in one Church though the Jansenists Case hath had more than ordinary heats and stirs And yet the Dominicans go higher and further in the Controversie of Predetermination from the Jesuites than the Synodists do And are you more fierce or unpeaceable than they 3. But remember here once for all that you were not able to name any one benefit which Christ's death procured for all other than the Synodists hold as well as you But only you charge them as asserting more to the Elect. They give more you say to some but not less to all 4. And all this lieth in the point of Intention and Divine Decrees which was sufficiently reconciled before But you have by all this entised me to mingle various Controversies and to anticipate that of Grace and Free-will which is to be handled by it self in due place But I have a word more to give you by way of caution if you will think on it A. What 's that B. What will you say if Episcopius Arminius Corvinus are the men that deny most Universal Redemption while the Synod maintaineth it How can Christ die for the sins of any Infants in proper sense if they have no sin and deserve no punishment Or be a Saviour to save them from sin and punishment that have none The second Crimination A. By denying common Redemption they deny the express words of 1 Joh. 4. 14. 〈…〉 guish of the phrase of dying for us that we may not cheat our selves by confounding things that differ To die for us or for all is to die for our benefit or for the benefit of all Now these benefits are of a different nature whereof some are bestowed only conditionally though for Christs sake and they are the pardon of sin and Salvation These God doth confer only on the condition of Faith and Repentance Now I am ready to profess and that I suppose as out of the mouth of all our Divines that every one who heareth the Gospel without distinction between Elect and Reprobate is bound to believe that Christ died for him so far as to procure both the pardon of his sins and Salvation in case he believe and repent But there are other benefits that Christ merited for us viz. Faith and Repentance c. Twisse against Hord li. 1. p. 154. Scripture which saith That Christ tasted death for every man Heb. 2. 9. That he is the Saviour of the World Joh. 4. 12. That he is the Lamb of God that taketh away the sins of the World Joh. 1. 29. That he died for all that they which live should live to him that died for them 2 Cor. 5. 14 15. That God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself 2 Cor. 5. 19 20. That he is the Saviour of all men especially of them that believe 1 Tim. 4. 10. That the Grace of God which bringeth Salvation to all men hath appeared Tit. 2. 11 12. That he is the Propitiation for our Sins and not for ours only but for the sins of the whole World 1 Joh. 2. 2. with much more to the same purpose And do these men deal sincerely with God and the Scripture that can distort all
in his first act of Faith is bound to believe that he is Elect or that Christ died for him any more than for lost Mankind But that he must first believe that Christ by his Death hath so far satisfied and merited for Mankind in general as to procure the universal conditional Gift of Christ Pardon and Life And that they must believe that this is procured for and offered to themselves as well as other Sinners And hereupon they are to accept this free Gift and so it is theirs What lye or unrevealed matter is in this or what difference about it among the Churches The sixth Crimination A. They disable Ministers rationally to preach the Gospel For if Christ died for none but the Elect and no Minister know the Elect they know not whom to offer and preach Christ to For the objective Gift must go before the offer And that which is to be offered to every Sinner is A Christ that hath already died and satisfied for him and not one that is to die and satisfie for him yet if he will believe Therefore the very offer is as much as to say Accept Christ as one that hath satisfied for thee And so they make the very preaching of the Gospel a lye to most B. I will not answer you as some that say they tell not men that they are Elect and that Christ died for them but that if they will believe then it is a sign that they are Elect and Christ died for them And they may offer him to all that some may accept him For I say as you do that it is a Christ that hath already made satisfaction and thereby is become a sufficient Saviour who is to be offered to men And the being of the Gift is before the offer of it in nature But I say again that you fight against straglers in a Cause which the Churches are not concerned in They say that it is a Christ who died for all as to sufficiency who is to be offered to men that he may efficiently save them The seventh Crimination A. They leave most men in the World as remediless as the Devils who had no Redeemer whereas God judgeth the wicked at last as Rejecters of his remedying Grace If Christ died not for them what differ they from the Devils in point of hope B. I will not answer you as some that though Christ died not for them yet they know it not and the offer differenceth their Case For still I confess that none is to be offered to men but a Christ that was already offered to God for them and hath made satisfaction But again I tell you that you fight with a shadow and feign the Churches to differ from you because some singular persons do so The eighth Crimination A. They harden men in impenitency for the most damning sin even denying the Lord that bought them For they tell all the Reprobates that they never sinned against a Christ that died for them B. All this is the old fiction and concerneth only some singular men The ninth Crimination A. They would exempt the Infidel World from much of the torments of Hell For he that in Hell knoweth that Christ never died for him especially adding that God unresistibly predetermined him to sin and unbelief cannot rationally have an accusing Conscience for his not accepting a Gift that never had a Being B. I will not repeat the same answer as oft as you call for it by the same false supposition Let them answer it that are concerned The tenth Crimination A. They teach the World abominable Ingratitude and reproachfully deny a great deal of the Grace and Mercy of Christ and the fruits of his Death and Sacrifice For they teach men that all the Mercies given to any besides the Elect were no fruits of the death of Christ for them nor were at all by him purchased for them yea that they are no Mercies to them at all because God eternally decreed that they should turn them into sin and suffer the more for the abuse of them for ever And so all the rest of the World may say that they are not at all beholden to the death of Christ for their Lives Liberties offers of Grace and all other Mercies B. Let them answer you that are concerned in the Charge The Reformed Churches hold That Mercy is to be judged of by its nature and tendency in it self and not by mans abuse and that God decreed no mans abuse of it and that all the Mercies given to Mankind since the forfeiture of all by Adam's sin are procured and given by Christ as the Intercessor and Redeemer of the World and that wicked men justly are deprived of life for rejecting it and suffer Hell for abusing Mercy and refusing Heaven The eleventh Crimination A. They are Anti-christian half-Infidels For they deny Christs Kingdom as to its far greatest part For when the Scripture telleth us That to this end he both died rose and revived that he might be Lord both of the dead and living Rom. 14. 9. And that the Father hath committed all Judgment that is Government to the Son Joh. 5. 22. And given him all power in Heaven and Earth Matth. 28. 18. And that his dying for all obligeth all men not to live to themselves but to him that died for them 2 Cor. 5. And so that he hath by his death acquired a jus Dominii Imperii over all Mankind they deny him his Crown and Dignity even this Right of Dominion and Empire as Redeemer and deny the World to be obliged to subjection to him as their Redeemer And so make that Rebellion for which they shall perish Luke 19. 27. to be no sin B. The Protestant Churches hold all that you charge them with denying It 's a pitiful work to caluminate that you may divide Tell those singular men of all this that are guilty of it The twelfth Crimination A. They make Christ to come on so narrow a design into the World as if they would tempt Unbelievers to despise him Even to die for none in all the World for 4000 years save a very few of the little Country of Judaea which was mostly wicked and even since the Church was Catholick but for a few called the Elect. B. 1. If you and they differ about the conditions of Salvation say so and tell the World the difference If you do not but are agreed that it is Faith Repentance and Holiness what are all these Objections but fighting by fictions against Concord and Peace They never held that none out of Judaea were saved And how many in the World are holy Believers they pretend not to judge They believe that all that are holy are saved by Christ in all Ages and Nations of the World And that all the Order and Government and common Mercies of the World with the offers of Grace and Salvation to them that wilfully refuse it are all to be ascribed to the death and procurement
of Christ And that his common Redemption is presupposed to our Faith and special Grace * See my Direction to sound Conversion Dir. 6. And now if this be all you have to say review it and tell me what disagreement you have found out about the commonness of Redemption THE Fourth Days Conference WITH a CALVINIST Of Common and Special REDEMPTION B. We are now to try what difference you can find between the Lutheran and Calvinist Churches or the Synodists and the moderate Arminians in the Article of Redemption by the death of Christ Name all that you have against them in this Point alone The first Crimination C. * These Objections are answered by Dallâ—us Amyrald Camero and Davenant Dissert de Morte Christi at large And I have a full disputation on this Subject by it self Lege Ephrem Syri Sermon de Passione Salvatoris Ambros in Psal 118. Serm. 8. Sol justitiae omnibus ortus est omnibus venit omnibus passus est omnibus resurrexit si quis autem non credit in Christum generali beneficio ipse se fraâ—dat Ut si quis clausis fenestris radios solis excludat Prosper de Vocat Gent. l. 2. c. 16. Nulla ratio dubitandi est Jesum Christum pro impiis mortuum â— quorum numero si aliquis liber inventus est non est pro omnibus mortuus Christus sed prorsus pro omnibus mortuus est Christus They make Christ to have shed his Blood in vain even for them that he knew were to perish for ever B. How prove you it to be in vain and that God can have no end in it but actual Salvation de eventu to each person for whom Christ died 1. When the Scripture most clearly telleth us de facto That Christ died for all even for them that perish and that he bought them that denied him be afraid of blaspheming God by telling him If Christ died for any that perish he died in vain I accuse you not but ex natura rei warn you I durst not tell God so 2. God made man in Adam capable of Salvation as the very perfection and end of his faculties and nature and put him under a conditional Covenant accordingly And will you say that God made Adam in vain in this capacity and made the first Promise of Life and the Tree of Life also in vain because Adam and all of us in him did sin and come short of the Glory of God Nay God made not the Devils in vain in a state of blessedness or the way thereto though he knew that they would forsake that state and perish It is dangerous reproaching the Counsels and unsearchable Works of God 3. By your own reckoning it is not in vain For you say that Gods Justice is glorified on Unbelievers and that this is his end And what is that Justice but the punishing of men for rejecting a Christ that died for them and Grace that was procured and tendered to them 4. But if you add all the other benefits and ends you will see that it was not in vain God demonstrated and so glorified his Love and Mercy to lost Mankind in the very greatness of the Gift of Christ Pardon and Glory which the Impenitent do refuse And Mercy is glorified notwithstanding the refusal God giveth the Covenant aforesaid or the conditional Grant of Pardon and Life to the World He reprieved them and gave them time of Repentance and exercised Patience toward them to that end Rom. 2. 3 4 5 6. Act. 17. Rom. 1. 19 20 21 c. Joh. 3. 16 18 19. He governeth the World on terms of Grace He giveth all men abundance of Mercies and Means of recovery and life He keepeth the World in order hereby and maketh the wicked serviceable to the Salvation of Believers In a word he will lose nothing by any mans sin against Nature or Grace Where then is the vanity of the Death of Christ if in a common degree it be for all The second Crimination C. They make Christ an imperfect Saviour by pretending that he died Cyril Hierosol Catech. 18. Multas aeternae vitae januas aperuit ut omâ—es quantum in ipso est absque impedimento illo potiri possent for some to some lower ends whom yet he saveth not B. This needeth no other answer than the last Is God an imperfect God to Adam because he saved him not by the way of Innocency at first made by God the way of Life Or was he an imperfect God and Salvation to the Angels because they kept not their first Estate Or is the Holy Ghost an imperfect Sanctifier because he giveth some but such common and temporary Grace and Faith as is mentioned in Heb. 6. 5 6. Matth. 13 c. Or dare you say that no man that perisheth had any Grace or Gifts of the Holy Ghost when some prophesied and cast out Devils in Christ's Name Must Christ do all that our muddy brains will dictate to him or else be reproached as an imperfect Saviour O take heed The third Crimination C. They cast that absurdity on Christ as to die for those that were in August de Symbol ad Catech l. 2. c. 8. saith Perhaps Christ keepeth his wounds to shew the wicked at the day of Judgment and say Videtis vulnera quae infixistis agnoscitis latus quod pupugistis quoniam per vos propter vos apertum est neque tamen intrare voluistis Hell when he was dying for them and to make a Medicine for the dead and desperate B. 1. As you would state the Supposition it would be as liable to your charge of absurdity to say That he died for them that were long ago pardoned and saved and to purchase Heaven for them that had possession of it long before 2. But when we speak of Christ's Death as a Sacrifice for the Sins of all the World we mean no more but that in esse cognito volito the undertaking was so far for all as that all should have the conditional Promise or Gift of Life by the Merits of it And so as all that were saved before Christ's Death had actual Salvation by it before-hand as undertaken so all that perished had a Gift of conditional Pardon and Salvation and perished for refusing it But at the time when Christ was dying we say that he was not then intending to offer the second Edition of his Covenant either to those in Hell or in Heaven But only that he purposed to do what he from the beginning undertook for the undertaken ends The fourth Crimination C. They make Christ to die for those that he would not pray for Joh. 17. I pray not for the world but for those that thou hast given me out of the world B. He maketh himself to die for them It is ofter and plainer said that he died for all than it is that he prayed not for all And many plain Texts yea the
believe so that Faith is a fruit of the Death of Christ in a remoter secondary sense And in all this Name me any Christian Churches that are disagreed C. To bring it only to a mans free will whether he will believe or not is not to give him Faith and to purchase no more is not to purchase it B. Do you not perceive that here you divert to the Controversies of the Decrees and of effectual Grace Of the first we have said enough already of the other after in due place The sixth Crimination C. They feign Christ to purchase only a conditional Pardon Justification and Salvation and so to leave it uncertain to the corrupt Will of man whether any shall be saved or not B. This also concerneth the Decrees and is fully answered before 1. That Christ hath purchased and God given a conditional Act of Oblivion or Pardon and Life to all is the very Gospel it self and to be questioned by no Believers 2. None of them all do suppose Christ to die at uncertainties as to the success for they suppose that he fore-knew the success from eternity 3. They suppose not that the success was undecreed For they that presuppose fore-sight of mans concurrence yet assert an * Episcop Instit Theol. l. 4. sect 5. cap. 6. Certum est posito decreto conditionato omnes ac singulos qui vel ad vitam electi sunt vel ad mortem reprobati recte ab aeterno praedestinatos dici posse debere eternal Decree of his Conversion upon such fore-sight And it is not on the fore-sight of Faith that they say God decreeth to give men Faith but on fore-sight that the will of the Sinner will concur or not obstinately resist the Spirit that is drawing him to believe And the Jesuites and Arminians by their Scientia media do hold God to be the chief cause of mens believing For they say That God foreseeing that man will believe if he have such a measure of help and such means and circumstances doth freely decree to give him that help of the Spirit and those means by which he knoweth it will be done So that here is no uncertainty but different thoughts of the ascertaining decrees and ways 4. And lib. 1. I have shewed you that not only the Schoolmen but Bellarmine Ruiz Suarez and many of the most famous Jesuites do assert effectual Grace to be such both ex voluntate operantis and ex vi operationis absolutely And where then is this feigned difference The seventh Crimination C. They make Christ to do no more for Peter than for Judas for those in Heaven than for those in Hell while they say that he died equally for all B. * Vasq in 1. Thom. q. 23. a. 8. disp 94. c. 2. Perantiqua Theologorum sententia quam ego Catholicam existimo est non solum Christum nobis meritum ut a Deo diligeremur praedestinaremur per gratiam ejus ad gloriam sed etiam ut eligeremur ex massa perditionis electione gratiae suae Note that he speaketh only of the effect of Gods Decree and so it is all one as to say that differencing Grace is merited by Christ which is that which you would have Equality here is meant either of his Intention or of the benefits given Those benefits are of several sorts 1. No doubt but they err who feign God equally to decree and Christ to intend the eventual absolute Salvation of all 2. And they err that say that he bestoweth equal benefits on all even in this life yea antecedently to mans Will But the New Covenant or conditional Promise doth equally as to the tenor of it give Pardon and Right to Life to all But who is it that holdeth this equality of Intention or Benefit Not the greater part of the School-men or other Papists no not the learnedst Jesuites Not the Lutheran Churches But some few Arminians that run into one extream as you do into the other Nay how can they hold an equality of Intention when they confess that upon foreknowledge of their Unbelief the condemnation of many was eternally decreed C. Yes they hold that antecedently to fore-sight Gods Intention is equal B. 1. That fore-sight it self is from eternity 2. Who can frame out Orders of antecedency in the mind of God between his fore-sight and his Will without confessing great darkness and impropriety of Speech 3. And he that first giveth man to believe and will doth not first foresee that he will believe and will before he decree to give it him The eighth Crimination C. They make Christ's sheep to know him before he know his sheep that is to believe before he decree to give them Faith B. This is but the same in sense with what is before answered And it belongeth to the controversie of Gods Decrees They all say that God decreeth to give them sufficient Grace to enable them to believe before he fore-seeth their belief And most say more as is aforesaid The ninth Crimination C. Some of them say that Christ's Death did actually deliver * Vid. Episcop Resp ad qu. 64. qu. 38. supposing the Salvation of all that die in Infancy all men in the World from the guilt of Original Sin and so that none perish for Original Sin because what Adam did Christ undid B. You can name no Church that doth hold such Doctrine And we have nothing to do with singular odd Persons 1. Millions were unborn when Christ died and were not guilty of Original sin till afterwards and therefore were not capable of Pardon 2. The Papists who damn unbaptized Infants cannot be of that Opinion 3. What Adam brought upon us Christ did deliver us from upon his terms and in his way and by his degrees but not immediately He hath given all men a conditional Pardon of Original Sin as he hath done of Actual and no other The Unregenerate are under the guilt of all Sin whatsoever 4. But it is certain that no man except Infants doth perish for Original Sin alone For all men at age have other sins And it being certain that God offereth all men a recovery or remedy mediately or immediately it is certain that Infants perish not meerly for Adam's sin iâ—puted as a remediless evil but that their non-liberation or not being pardoned and saved is long of their Parents Unbelief and not entering them into the Covenant of God who is the God of the Faithful and their Seed The tenth Crimination C. They make Christ to have died for the Serpents Seed against whom the enmity is proclaimed when the new Covenant was first made Gen. 3. 15. B. 1. If by the Serpents Seed you mean such as are Gods Enemies no doubt but Christ died for them Rom. 5. 1. to 12 c. What need reconciliation else 2. If by the Serpents Seed you mean Reprobates as such you can never prove it to be the meaning of the Text. 3. If you mean fore-seen final
pâ—â—supponit opus miserecordiâ— in ea â—undatur tanquam iâ— prima radice quia ne procedatur in infinitum deveniendum est ad aliquid quod ex sola bonitate divinae voluntatis dâ—pendeat B. I hope you have no malignant desire to extenuate Gods Grace but are willing to acknowledge it to be as great and large as indeed it is if you can discern the proof C. God best knoweth how to honour himself B. Quest. 1. Do you think that all the World or all that shall perish yea or any part of the World is under the meer Curse of the Law of Innocency as violated by Adam without any remedy or mercy C. I think they are without real Remedy though not without all Mercy for a delay of punishment is mercy B. Quest 2. Do you think that they are only under the Curse of that Law as the Devils are without any possibility or offers of a remedy or that they are also still under the Covenant-Offers of Life upon condition of Innocency C. I cannot suppose God now to offer a man Life on condition he be no Sinner whom he knoweth to be a Sinner For such an Offer is equivalent to a sentence of Death or denial of Life Nor can I say that they are as desperate as the Devils because they know not the desperateness of their case B. Quest. 3. Do you think all the difference between them and Devils lieth in delay and ignorance of their misery Then the most ignorant and presumptuous of them is the least miserable though the most sinful which cannot be Quest 4. But do you think that no Meâ—cy is to be offered â—o such C. Yes because we know not who are Elect and who not B. Quest. 5. Are we to offer men mercy only as Elect or rather as Sinners and miserable under a Law of Grace and as Subjects of God obliged by that Law to accept it C. We offer it to all Sinners that the Elect may receive it B. Quest. 6. Are none but the Elect under a Law of Grace as the rule of their Duty their expectation and of Judgment C. Others may be under the Obligations of it but not under the Gâ—aâ—e of it B. Remember then 1. That they are not lawless 2. That they are not under that meer violated Law of Innocency Be innocent and live 3. That they are under the Obligations of the Law of Grace Quest 7. Is there any of them that are not bound to use certain means appointed of God in order towards their own Salvation C. They are bound to intend their own Salvation and with that intention to use some means But God intends it not B. Quest. 8. Doth God command men on pain of damnation to any vain endeavours or use of means C. He commandeth it not in vain for it shall make them unexcuseable 2. They are not to judge their endeavours vain because they know it not 3. But in the issue all will be in vain to them B. Quest 9. Would it be in vain to them if they really did the utmost that common Grace enableth any men to do C. It is not properly Grace to them and so not common 2. It would be in vain to them B. Quest 10. Is that vain which bringeth a man into the nearest preparation for special Grace and nearest to the Kingdom of God C. To the Elect it is not vain Nor to others for their sakes Nor to others as to the lessening of their pains in Hell But as to their Salvation it is B. Quest 11. Who would it be long of or be reputed the Cause if it be in vain C. Of themselves who are born in sin from Adam and are Unbelievers B. You suppose it impossible for them to believe and impossible for them not to be the Children of Adam They made not themselves and you suppose that for want of Grace they cannot believe Quest 12. When Death shall acquaint them with the impossibility that they were under do you think 1. That it will be the way of glorifying the Justice of God in Judgment to have the World know that he condemneth Sinners meerly because he will condemn them for that which they never had any more true power to avoid than to make a World 2. Or will their Consciences in Hell accuse them or torment them for that which they then know was naturally impossible and caused by God C. We know not how God will glorifie his Justice or how their Consciences will torment them It may be they shall then be as ignorant of the necessitating cause as now B. 1. Do you know it now and shall not they know it then 2. God telleth us the contrary That all hidden things shall be brought to light and that God will justifie his own proceedings by proving that mens destruction is of themselves that every mouth may be stopped and all the World be guilty before God And he calleth it his Righteousness in judging to give to every man according to his Works and that mens Consciences shall then excuse them or accuse them when God shall judge the secrets of their hearâ—s and not when he shall torment them by deceiving them Rom. 2. 2 Thess 1. 6 7 8 9 10. Matth 25. 7. 23 24. 2 Tim. 4. 8 9. Rom. 14. 10. Gen. 18. 24 25. Quest 13. Do you believe that none but the Elect have now any real mercy besides a delay of their future misery and hopes of its abatement C. I do For all things are to be judged of by the end And that is really no mercy which is not intended to a mans happiness but his misery As Afflictions are no evils to the Elect because they are intended and work together for their good B. Is the offer of Christ and Life no mercy Is all Gods patience and forbearance as a means to lead them to repentance no mercy Is all the teaching perswading intreating condescension of Christ no mercy See what error here you run into and how contrary to Scripture and to nature it self 1. You contradict Gods Word which frequently calleth them mercies Psal 145. 9. 106. 7. 45. Neh. 9. 19 27 28 31. Jon. 4. 2. Rom. 2. 4. Matth. 18. 33. Isa 63. 9. Ezek. 16. 2. You deny the chiefest part of mens duty even to accept of mercy to improve mercy to be thankful for mercy to be led by Gods good-ness to Repentance to use mercies as Gods Talents to his Glory c. If you say They know not but they are mercies you feign God to bind men to duty but by deceit It is as mercies and not as that which for ought they know may be mercies that they are to be valued used c. 3. You excuse men from the greatest aggravation of their sin even sinning against Mercies How can they sin against them that have none 4. You feign Gods Justice to be stragely glorified by damning men in Hell for ever for sinning against mercy who never had any
by the habit of sensuality or the natural inclination to felicity as such which may bear down weaker particular habits or inclinations B. No doubt but the Will is quaedam natura and hath its natural inclination to good and felicity which is its pondus and radical disposition to its acts from which every act is caused that is done But I say not that ever it goeth contrary to these radical necessitating inclinations to goodness But de mediis it may have inferior particular habits which it oft goeth against C. That is because the Understanding conceiveth that another thing is best and so it is necessitated by the Understanding B. The Understanding guideth but doth not necessitate That we Will rightly is caused by the Understanding as that I hit the way is by my eye-sight but not that I exercise the Act it self Though we Will not without or against the last strongest dictate of the practical Intellect yet 1. Note that the Intellect hath divers perceptions at once which is not commonly noted It doth at once act a deep simple apprehension that e. g. bonum sensible is pleasant and good and amiable and that bonum spirituale which cometh into competition is yet better may be at the same time perceived with so low dull and weak an apprehension as that the Will may tenaciously so adhere to the first simple apprehension by a strong simple Volition as that the second weak comparate apprehension may not move it to Election 2. For we find that it is not the objective truth of an apprehension which turneth the Will without some answerable clearness and liveliness And as a Preacher that dreamingly speaketh of great things uncontroulably but coldly moveth not the hearers so is it with the Intellect it self And 3. The Will being principium exercitii can hinder the Understanding from perceiving truth by hindering it from thinking of the evidence 4. And the Will it self can suspend its own act contrary to the understandings fluggish dictate And not acting when it can towards God and true goodness is the beginning of all the disorders of the Soul C. But saith Camero c. the Will is appetitus rationalis And if it act against reason it acteth not as a Will And so also if it act without reason Therefore it cannot forbid the Intellect to think by nolition unless the Intellect first say Non cogitandum est Nor can it choose but velle cogitare if the Intellect say cogitandum est Otherwise the Will were a bruitish and not a rational appetite B. 1. The Will acteth by reason when it cleaveth to that good which is simply apprehended by the Intellect The simple apprehension goeth first e. g. That this Fruit offered Eve is good and desirable This is true and here the Will adhereth to it as good Then should the understanding think comparatively of a greater Good and say This is evil as forbidden and as it hindereth a greater Good And this it performeth not because the Will is here the beginner of the Sin not perhaps by a positive nolition or forbidding the Intellect the comparing Thought for that it doth not without shew of reason but by neglecting or omitting to excite the Understanding ad exercitium which it is brought to in Adam and Eve 1. By diversion being before taken up with the Creature 2. By voluntary neglect or sloth For the Will can omit its act without reason and yet be a rational appetite And the beginning of the Sin may be this omission of the Will or it s over tenacious adhering to sensible good apprehended truly by the Intellect 2. And we have not so much acquaintance with the faculties of our own Souls as to be sure that sense and passion and phantasie can do nothing immediately on the Will to help or hinder it We find that the Will easily followeth Passion and very hardly goeth against it 3. Nay we are not certain but there may be more bruitishness and less reason in many Sins than most imagine and that the violence of the sensitive appetite and passion may not prevail both with the Will to forbear the excitation of the Intellect and with the Intellect to omit its opposite Judgment though neither Will or Reason in the first instant give consent There are some also that think that we are scarce sure that the Will and the sensitive Appetite are two several faculties rather than one between two guides I say not as they But this I will say that I grow daily more confident that they that make the rational and sensitive Soul in man to be two and their Brethren that without all shew of proof magisterially face us down that the Soul at death puts off all sense because it exerciseth it not by the same Organs which were adapted to the Bodies use do both of them hainously wrong the Church and darken many Truths and open the way to Infidelity C. But you cannot lay the beginning of sin on the Wills omission to put the Intellect on the comparing thoughts for the Intellect can understand against our Wills as many know that which they had rather be ignorant of And therefore needs not the Will ad exercitium B. The Intellect may be forced But it is not so always Things sensible and near at hand may force the Intellect But things unseen and distant must be voluntarily thought on and studied or else they will not be understood C. If e. g. Eves Will had said to the Intellect Cogita Comparative either the Intellect must first have said to the Will Comparative cogitandum est or not If not then that Will would have been no rational Will If yea then the Will must have consented or else been unwilling against reason and so be bruitish still Therefore Sin must begin at the Intellect B. 1. The Intellect did not say Comparative cogitandum est not only because it was not commanded so to say by the Will but because the Will was so entangled before by the simple Love of the Creature as diverted the thoughts from the Creator 2. Suppose the Intellect did say coldly Comparative cogitandum est the Will did neglect it being not necessitated thereby and so the Intellect went no further C. If the Will do velle bonum qua bonum necessario it must needs necessarily velle bonum cognitum and so must follow the Intellect B. It doth necessarily velle bonum quando vult i. e. non malum but it doth not necessarily velle hoc vel illud bonum inter plurima Nay though the Intellect say nothing against it yea something for it the pre-engaged Will may neglect it And yet possibly Eves Intellect did perform one comparative act which occasioned her further sin viz. If thou turn thy thoughts towards Gods prohibition thou wilt lose the pleasant good before thee And this was true C. But if Eve's Will first over tenaciously stuck to the forbidden Creature when the Understanding never said It must do so In
so doing it was not a Will but bruitish Appetite B. The Understanding said truly It is pleasant and Appetible and so the Will in its initial desire sinned not But that it looked no further and excited not the Intellect to remember and it self to desire more to please God was by an abuse of its power and liberty of self-determining and so the sensible good prevailed because the superior good was forgotten and neglected And the Will may thus suspend its act after an intellectual perception without being bruitish though it so â—ar disobey Reason its guide C. These things are exceeding intricate and difficult for all that you say B. They are so * The same I say of objective and intellectual necessitation of the Will saith H. Kipping truly Inst Philos Nat. li. 9. c. 10. pag. 416. Errant Scholae reformatâ— doctores qui asserunt voluntatem ad actum suum determinari a judicio intellectus ita ut voluntatic libertas nulla sit constricta vero sit ad intellectus ductum a quo semper determinatur Joh. Camero Mart. Schogkius Hornbeck Maccovius Heerbord Hos prolixe bene refellit Episcopius But forget not that the great difficulty is between us and the Hobbists or Infidels and Fatists and not between the true Christians among themselves as to our present Controversies I confess that the confuting of their Opinion that all Volitions are necessitated unavoidably by Gods Operation is a far harder work than the reconciling of the Lutherans and Calvinists who go upon no such Principles Tell me Is this it that you would come to or not If you once perswade me that God causeth all sinful Volitions as necessarily as he causeth a Tree to grow and that man can no more avoid them and that liberty of Will signifieth no more than velle or not nolens velle and so that God is the prime irresistible cause of all Sin as much as of all Good so far as it is capable of a Cause I must needs next believe 1. That God hateth not his own Work yea that he loveth it 2. That he hateth no man for it 3. That moral Good and Evil is nothing in man but such as obeying or disobeying proportionably in a Horse or Dog 4. Yea far less because man doth â—ut as my pen which writeth as I move it in respect to God But so is not my Horse or Dog to me 5. And how then to judge of all the Scripture the Ministry of the Incarnation and Death of Christ of the Duties of a Christian life of Hell c. it 's easie to perceive viz. That as God differenceth Men and Toads meerly because he will do so even so doth he the good and the bad in the World and that Sin is no evil any way but to our selves and that God is as much the cause of it as of Sickness and is as well pleased with the Worlds Infidelity and Impiety as with the Churches Sanctity And that he will no otherwise damn men for Sin than erbitarily to make such baser than others as Dogs are than men Benedictus Spinosa hath given you the Consectaries more at large O how heartlesly should I preach and pray how carelesly should I live if once you brought me to this Opinion that all sin is the unresistible Work of God so far as it is a work as much as holiness is C. If there be no middle between Free-will and this Impiety as I confess I cannot disprove your Consectaries it's time for us to turn our studies against the common Enemies of all Religion and Morality instead of contending with one another specially when they have so much to say B. And do you think they do well and friendly by the Church who take these mens part and own their Cause in the foundation and entangle poor Souls in such intricate difficulties when we that know not the least of Gods Creatures or the mysteries of any of his Works do little know all the quick and intricate actions of our own Souls In a word man hath more power to good than he useth and that power is called sufficient or necessary Grace to the act though there be many difficulties which no one of either side can resolve The second Crimination C. But I fear many of them with Pelagius by GRACE do mean nothing So Dr. Twisse frequently repeateth that meeâ— posse credere is but Nature and not Grace because it is equally a posse non credere But 1. A natural power reprieved by Grace and preserved and given for gracious ends 2. And many and great helps of Grace to excite and rectifie it may be called an effect of Grace but Nature it self at least when they speak of the Heathens who they say have some kind of Grace B. Turn your eyes a little from the name of Pelagius and every thing else that useth to blind Disputers with prejudice and partiality and then answer me these following questions Quest. 1. Do you think that Mercy contrary to sinful Commerit is not properly Grace C. I confess it is B. Quest. 2. Is not the whole frame of Humane Nature and our Utensils put into the hand and power of Christ the Redeemer to be managed by him to his Mediatory ends Joh. 17. 2. Math. 28. 19 20. Joh. 13. 3. Ephes 1. 22 23. Phil. 2. 7 8 9 10 11 12. For this end he died rose and revived that he might be Lord both of the Dead and Living Rom. 14. 9. Joh. 5. 22 23 24. The Father judgeth no man but hath committed all Judgment to the Son c. And is not the very reprieval of the World from deserved ruine and misery so many thousand years an Act of Grace and Nature now continued used and improved by Grace and so far may be said to be of Grace C. This is plain truth and must not be denied B. Quest 3. Is it not undeserved Mercy to all Mankind that ever since Adam's Sentence Gen. 3. 15. they are all ruled by a Law of Grace and not the Law of Innocency alone and by that Law of Grace must all be judged C. If you before evinced that any thing is truly mercy to the Reprobate I must confess it But I have not before so much thought of this what Law the World is under as the case deserveth But I remember Camero in the fragments of his dispute with Courcellaeus taken by Testardus though he deny not that the Covenant of Grace was made with all mankind in Adam and Noah yet saith That by or for their nearer Parents sins the Infants of Infidels are out of that Covenant B. 1. It 's well you note that it is not only Augustine Enchir. ad Laâ—rent and I that are for the Imputation of nearer Parents sin in some Vid. Pet. Martyr in Rom. 5. confessing Augustine's judgment sort as well as Adam's 2. He speaketh there of the Covenant as mutual and not as a Law or an offered Covenant or Divine
commonest observation 3. All other Habits follow the Acts and therefore we have little reason to say it is otherwise here C. Doth the Soul believe before it is inclined or disposed to it B. Inclination is a hard word and belongeth both to Natural Inclination such as we have to Felicity and to Habits and to meer Dispositions And a pre-disposition we grant As when you spur your Horse you make him first the patient of your act and by suscitating his natural faculty you dispose him to a speedy motion though the similitude doth not quadrare per omnia because Gods influx is on the whole Soul it self But this Disposition to the present act is far less than a proper Habit or it 's another thing C. When I spur my Horse or whip my Dog I do but stir up a former faculty or slothful power But God giveth a new life and power to them that were dead in sin B. Yet I cannot take words for matter 1. It 's nothing but the natural faculty or power which you suscitate in the beast And hath not an unbeliever the Natural faculties or power Is he not a man Why do you not bury him if he be not alive 2. Death in sin is relative or real The Relative is Reatus mortis which denominateth men filios mortis and is done away by pardon The real is the Privation of a holy disposition to the act of Faith and Repentance c. or of the Act it self or of the Habit. You can name no other Now 1. the death which consisteth in the privation of the first disposition to act supposing all natural dispositions is taken away by the first influx or suscitation of the Holy Ghost 2. And by the same in secunda instanti is caused the Act and the death gone that lay in its privation 3. And in the third instant or afterward by degrees is taken away the death which lieth in the privation of the Habit. And this giving the Habit is called in Scripture and by Divines Sanctification as following Vocation and it is wrought in us by degrees and not all at once and that by the Spirits power with and by our exercised Acts. In my youth I was so prematurely confident of the contrary that the first Controversie that ever I wrote on was a Confutation of Bishop Downam Amesius Medall de Vocat Mr. Tho. Hooker c. in Defence of Pemble herein but riper thoughts made me burn that Script C. But the spur or rod putteth no new power at all into your Horse but Gods Spirit putteth a new Power into us B. I have talkt long enough to you about Power before and therefore would not turn back needlesly to say it over again Gods Spirit putteth no such thing into us as we call a faculty or natural power For that is the form or essence of the Soul and our Species is not chang'd by Grace But he giveth us that which is called a Moral Power which consisteth conjunctly in the concurrence of means and objects and the disposition of our faculties to the act Hear Dr. Twisse against Hord pag. 12. lib. 2. He secretly maintaineth that every man hath such a power by Grace by which he may repent if he will Concerning which Tenet of his we nothing doubt but every man hath such a power but we say it is nature rather Page 18. Truly I see no cause to deny this that even the wicked could do good if they would We may safely say with Austin Omnes possunt Deo credere ab amore rerum temporalium ad Divina praecepta servanda se convertere si velint Here is posse se convertere id est velte si velit But saith Twisse pag. 170. l. 1. But such is the shameful issue of them that confound impotency moral with impotence natural as if there were no difference which he oft sheweth is but the want of actual and dispositive willingness Now the rod or spur may cause both a present disposition and an act of will C. But is this all the new Life and Spirit and Divine Nature that is given us Sure it is much more B. No doubt but it is much more But that Spirit Life and Nature is promised and given to Believers and is promised on condition of our accepting Christ in whom is our life And therefore it is that habitual Grace which followeth the first act of Faith and is a nobler disposition to the following acts C. Will one act of ours cause a Habit B. Not as ours only But when the Spirit will work by it it will But even that Habit I told you is weak at first and increased by degrees But proceed and tell me Quest 7. Are you sure that in the Acquisition of Habits there is no immediate operation of God on the Soul that causeth them C. We all hold an immediate Influx necessary to the Being and Action of every Creature natural and free but not an immediate Infusion B. What 's the difference between Influx and Infusion C. The first is an universal operation the other a particular B. Do you mean that the difference of the acts or operations is at all ex parte agentis sen act us ut est agentis antecedent to the effect or only in the effect it self C. I dare not say that there is any difference in God for it is against his simplicity and his very will and act as in himself is his Essence though varioâ—sly related and denominated by cannotation Therefore I must needs confess that the diversity is only in the effect B. Do you not see then what a delusory and troublesome stir men make for and about meer words What 's the Crimination come to then about Acquired and Infused Habits when the difference is only in the effects You confess that all proper Habits Infused are by our cogitation and use of means and so are also acquired And you confes that all Acquired Aabits are wrought besides our cogitation and use of means by an immediate influx of God so that as to the Causes you can name no difference And yet the words Acquired and Infused signifie a difference in the Causes and their operation and not in the Effect by their notation Is not this deceit then C. Tell me what you take to be the difference your self B. 1. I suppose that ab uno omnia God without diversity causeth all diversity which is only in the Creatures and not in him 2. I suppose that God hath appointed natural means and second causes for common natural effects and his Will is that they shall operate according to their aptitude And that he hath appointed extraordinary means even Christ and supernatural Revelation for the production of saving Faith And it is his will that they shall work usually according to their aptitude 3. It is his command that we use these several means natural and supernatural accordingly 4. As these means are special extraordinary and for a special end
your mind A. That is because of some better Principles which they hold and because they see not the contradiction and inconsistence B. You come near to this truth Indeed there are Principles better than either of your controverted Opinions common to both sides which may afford us great Consolation and which sound Christians live upon And I doubt your Disputes on both sides do more disturb than comfort most But this must be granted that Opinions are not true because they are comfortable nor all false that have any thing in them apt to trouble men who have the sinful matter of trouble in themselves no more than Physick is naught that maketh men sick We must take our Comforts on Gods terms The truth is your Doctrine seemeth more comfortable in the respects which you have named as to the assurance of present Justification and theirs more comfortable in another respect viz. as to the continuance of it when they have it But if this Doctrine were to be chosen by the comfortableness yea and usefulness of it there is a middle way of some Schoolmen which would be preferred before both That is that neither any of the Elect nor any that have attained to confirmation â—r a fixed degree of Grace do ever fall away But that there are some not-Elect who are sincere and justified but weak and mutable as Adam in Innocency and not confirmed who fall away and perish And this Vossius thinketh was Augustine's Opinion And Grotius in his excellent Epistle against Molin lately translated into English by Mr. Barksdale affirmeth it to be the common judgment of the Fathers which will be no small advantage to it with me And 1. This avoideth the uncomfortable Doctrine which you charge on them For this holdeth that a weak Christian may have the comfort of present Justification that is not certain to persevere nor that he is any better than some that fall away 2. And it avoideth the uncomfortableness which they charge on you viz. that no man can be assured of his Perseverance and Salvation For these hold that all the consâ—med may be assured of it And that all weak Christians may possibly attain to confirmation 3. And it only leaveth weak unconfirmed Christianâ— uncertain of Salvation which both sides are agreed in For they confess that weak Christians are seldom if ever sure of their present sincerity and Justification And you hold that they are uncertain to persevere And so both of you hold them to be uncertain of Salvation But proceed The fourth Crimination A. They do reproach the Holiness of Gods people and his â—mage and encourage most horrid wickedness while they make all the sâ—â— that ever was committed by any man after his Regeneration to be consistent with Holiness and Justification not only Noah 's Drunkenness Lot 's being Drunk and Incestuous two nights together David's hâ—rrid Murder and Adultery Peter 's denying and forswearing his Lord but for instance Solomon they say was a Saint and justified when he gave up himself to all manner of pleasure and denied himself nothing and Paul saith The carnal mind is enmity to God and if ye live after the flesh ye shall die when he clave in love to many Idolatrous women having seven hundred Wives and three hundred Coâ—cubins and his Wives turned away his Heart after other gods and his Heart was not perfect with the Lord but he went after Ashtoreth the Goddess of the Sidonians and after Milcom the abomination of the Amorites and built an High Place for Chemoth the abomination of Moab and for Molech the abomination of Ammon and likewise did he for all his strange Wives which burnt Incense and sacrificed to their gods his Heart was turned from the Lord that appeared to him twice 1 King 11. 1 to 12. All this say the Calvinists you may do and yet be Saints and justified and saved * Bradwardine li. 3. c. 27. having maintained that all things come to pass by necessity and cap. 29. p. 734. answering the Objection that this will make men cast all their sin on God and be ungodly answereth that it will do so by none but the Reprobate and confesseth that so one of his Monastery did argue and turned thereupon to a wicked life but that he cannot help that for he cannot predestinate men that are reprobated All this may stand with Gods Image and true Holiness B. As to all the rest except Solomon the sin being one or two particular Acts contrary to the main bent and scope of their lives which were holy you seem 1. To deny an evident truth viz. that the habitual love of God was not extirpated by those Sins Can you think that habitually though the act was hindred Noah Lot David Peter did not then love God and Holiness better than sinful Pleasures And the Papists confess that Sin is not mortal that is an evidence of spiritual death till it conquer the habit of the love of God 2. You seem to take your offence at the Mercy of God himself because he will not disown men for such a particular sin contrary to their general will and life As if you provoked him to deal hardlier also with yourself lest he deal too easily or mercifully with others 3. But they are in these resolved that no man hath true Grace that loveth not God and Holiness above the World and sinful Pleasure And they and you are agreed in this And in the hypothesis if you can make them believe that any of these lost that predominant habitual love they would grant that they fell from saving Grace So that thus far you agree 4. And as for Solomon's case it is too hard for us all Some think that he had but common Grace till that Repentance which he published in Eccles And that so much might produce his Proverbs which say they were but spoken by him and written long after by others as some by Hezekiah's men Others think that he did but tolerate his Wives Idolatry and that he aggravated his own sensuality in hyperbolical words and so that his sin did stand with true Grace Others think that he fell into a state of damnation in which had he died he had been damned but yet neither totally from all feminal Grace nor finally and that others may do the like In a word the case is too hard for us But our comfort lieth not in being sure what condition Solomon was in either first or last And also as Means and Grace are greater under the Gospel than they were to Solomon and Life and Immortality more brought to light so more spirituality and heavenliness is now required of us than was then of them As long as Christ hath fullier described to us the title-conditions of Salvation we have better means to judge of our states than the deciding of these Difficulties about Solomon would be A. This is true but nothing to the purpose we prove by Solomon that a man may fall from Grace B.
Children and not to strive by needless disputes I pray you be you the Teacher and I will be the Learner and tell me what you would have us believe in these particulars which you have named And first of the first Lib. I. Men must be taught to come presently to Christ without staying for Preparations and not discouraged delayed or kept off The first Charge P. By Coming I suppose you mean Believing and Accepting I pray you teach me further then Quest 1. Must men believe in Christ before they Hear of him Lib. No How shall they believe on him of whom they have not heard P. Quest 2. Must they Believe that he is the Mediator between God and man before they have learned that there is a God and that this God is True and Just Quest 3. Or before they have learnt that man is a sinner and deserveth death and what sin is Quest 4. Or before they have learnt that we cannot redeem and save our selves Lib. No That were a contradiction P. Quest 5. Must men Believe that Christ is the Son of God and the Saviour of his Church before they have learnt what it is to be the Son of God or what a Saviour is and what is the salvation which he hath wrought and will vouchsafe us before they understand the Articles of the Christian faith that he was conceived born suffered was buried rose ascended is glorified and the like Lib. No man can Believe that which he doth not Understand P. Quest 6. Must men take Christ for their Saviour before they heartily peâ—ceive that they want a Saviour through sin and misery and that they are lost for ever if he save them not and that no other can do it Lib. No this is an impossibility and contradiction P. Quest 7. Must a man take Christ for his Saviour before he is willing to be saved Lib. Yes He must come to Christ to make him willing and not think that he must bring willingness with him This is your Legal doctrine P. Quest 8. Is not Accepting Christ an Act of the will a willingness that he shall be my Saviour And do you say that a man must be willing to have Christ before he is willing and not stay till he is willing Lib. You would make me ridiculous I say not that he must take Christ before he is willing But he must come to Christ for a will P. In despight of edification you will stick in the Metaphor Come to Christ What mean you by coming Lib. Poor blind soul If you had been taught of God you would have known what it is to Come to Christ But you will not come to him P. With such exclamations you cheat the ignorant Cannot you tell your own meaning What mean you by Coming to Christ Lib. I mean Believing in him and casting my self wholly on him P. Still you stick in Metaphors Can you cast your self upon him for a will before you are Willing Is not that casting your self the act of your will which we call Trust or Affiance Lib. You would hide your Lyes with words You teach that men must have good desires before they come to Christ as if they must bring with them good desires of their own or by Preparatory Grace P. Quest 9. Can a man Accept of Christ as a Saviour to save him from sin and punishment and Gods displeasure and to justifie sanctifie and glorifie him before he hath any desire to be saved from sin or punishment or Gods displeasure or to be justified sanctified or glorified Lib. He that hath no such Desires must come to Christ for them and believe P. Still Coming must hide your sense Doth Christ give these Desires to be saved before we Take him for our Saviour by Consent Or after Lib. You are catching me by craft If I say Before you will say Then it is Preparatory to our Consent If I say After you will say that it is impossible to consent to the Means till a man desires the end and to Accept a Saviour before he is willing to be saved But besides this you tell men that they must not come to Christ till they are broken hearted and sorrow for their sins You heat the Winâ— of the Gospel so hot that it shall burn mens lips and then invite them to it P. Quest 10. Is it possible for a man Heartily to perceive that he is a heinous sinner and hath displeased God abused mercy hilled Christ undone his soul and wronged others and not be sorrowful for it nor be vile in his own eyes or feel that he is a lost sinner Lib. No but all this he must come to Christ for or Believe for P. Do you mean that he must first Believe that the Gospel is True and that Christ is an Offered Saviour or else do you mean that he must first Accept him as offered for a Saviour or do you mean that he must first Believe that he is his Saviour accepted or do you mean that he must first Trust in him as his Saviour All these are different acts Lib. You would confound us with your distinctions to keep out the light This is the trick of such carnal Sophisters P. Saul You hear what this man hath to say against us You hear that when he hath cryed out against Preparations to Believing that here are ten several Preparations which he cannot deny I will now tell you what is our Doctrine and the truth about Preparations We hold that Christ is the True Light who lighteth every man that cometh to God but in various degrees by various means He is the Lord of Nature as its Restorer Rom. 14. 9. All power in Heaven and Earth is given to him and all things put into his hand Matth. 28. 18 19. John 17. 2 3. John 5. 22. He teacheth those that have not the Gospel and those that have it first by the Light of Nature many Natural Truths as that there is a God who is Almighty Wise and Good that we owe him our Love and duty that he is Just c. As the Sun enlightneth the earth at its rising before it appear it self so doth Christ the world By the Gospel he teacheth us more even supernatural truths about himself and our Redemption c. Some commoner co-operation of his Spirit goeth along with the Gospel convincing and moving many that are not yet or at all converted Those that Christ converteth savingly are first in order brought to understand the Meaning of the word and next to Believe the Truth of it and so to Believe what Christ is and what he hath done and suffered for us and what need we have of him by sin and misery and how freely he is offered to our salvation And they are moved so seriously to consider all this till it prevail with their wills first to desire not only their own deliverance from Hell and misery as all men may do but also from a state of sin and then to desire