Selected quad for the lemma: death_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
death_n	become_v	law_n	sin_n	4,033	5	5.1718	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A86612	The pagan preacher silenced. Or, an answer to a treatise of Mr. John Goodwin, entituled, the pagans debt & dowry. Wherein is discovered the weaknesse of his arguments, and that it doth not yet appear by scripture, reason, or the testimony of the best of his own side, that the heathen who never heard of the letter of the Gospel, are either obliged to, or enabled for the believing in Christ; and that they are either engaged to matrimonial debt, or admitted to a matrimonial dowry. Wherein also is historically discovered, and polemically discussed the doctrin of Universal grace, with the original, growth and fall thereof; as it hath been held forth by the most rigid patrons of it. / By Obadiah Howe, A.M. and pastor of Horne-Castle in Lincolnshire. With a verdict on the case depending between Mr. Goodwin and Mr. Howe, by the learned George Kendal, DD.	Howe, Obadiah, 1615 or 16-1683.; Kendall, George, 1610-1663.	1655 (1655)	Wing H3051; Thomason E851_16; ESTC R207423	163,028	140

act of divine justice Rom. 3.26 that he might be just and the justifier of them that believe So also to punish sin is divine justice hence it is called the just recompence of reward Heb 2.2 Heb. 2.2 The justice of God looks not all one way upon sinners his justice binds him as well to punish as to pardon sinners according to his owne prescribed rule that is to pardon penitent sinners as well as to punish obstinate sinners Hence John saith Epist 1.1.9 If we confesse he is just to forgive These premises I would improve thus far 1. To discover Mr. Goodwins improvident expressions in making Gods justice and his being bent upon severity against sin to be termes equipollent when his being bent against severity is equally his justice if his wisedome prescribe and to so many as he is pleased to doe it 2. To prove that seeing the justice of God takes place from the prescriptions of his wisedome and declarations of the same I say that till such prescriptions and declarations be known we cannot divine what is just or unjust for him to doe Therefore until Mr Goodwin can prove that the heathen which never had the letter of the gospel doe yet know those prescriptions and declarations of the Almighty whereby he prescribes himselfe to be bent in severity against sin I shall conclude they cannot by the meere light of nature come to know God to be either just or bent in severity against sin And that they are not so intimately acquainted with Gods secrets by the light of nature I am enduced to conclude because the Apostle telleth us that his righteousnesse is revealed in the gospel his wrath against sinners is revealed from heaven but I am taught to think that the spirit of God was never found so to daily with his owne Oracles as to say that that which is discovered by the light of nature is either revealed in the gospel or from heaven Rom. 2.15 2. The second parcel of this his rational discourse is this they know themselves to be sinners I shall not make much stir about this because in general sense it may be granted and that from Rom. 2.15 their consciences excusing or accusing one another now accusing consciences imply a guilt and acknowledgement of some delinquency against the law of God But yet the businesse will be something more difficult as to this pretended discourse of a heathen man for it is not enough for him to know that he is a sinner against the law of nature but against some positive law of God which was attended with such a severe penalty as dying the death He must know that this law was so broken by him as that he becomes guilty of eternal death and lyeth now concluded under an irrecoverable curse without a Saviour and a forfeiture of all that he can call good which can never by himselfe be regained otherwise how shall Gods providences appear to him under the notion of patience Rom. 1 2 3 4 5 and so the Heathen man must be distinctly acquainted with the history of Adams integrity fall and ruin Gods law mans sin and mans curse and is this to be done meerly by the light of nature Certainely then the Apostle took too much paines to convince them that both Jewes and Gentiles were under sin In the first part of his Epistle to the Romanes how he beateth the ayre to read such superfluous Lectures to them as he doth in the 5th Chapter that by one man sin entered and by sin death in whom we all have sinned when all this and much more is knowne by the meer light of nature and common providences Againe certainely then the words of the Apostle want weight when he saith Rom. 3.19 What the law saith that is the positive it saith to them that are under the law that all mouths may be stopped and the whole world become guilty before God Rom. 3.19 if that all mens mouths may be stopped they be found guilty before God by the dictate and light of nature 3. The third parcel of this discourse They see him expresse himselfe in patience goodnesse and bounty I suppose still he intends this by the light of nature but then I wonder why he thus fallaciously shuffles in termes of a Heterogenious nature that may well be admitted in his sense underhand to gaine credence to that which cannot upon the interest of truth be received goodnesse and bounty he sheweth in the creation Praedestinatio non tantum facta est ex bonitate simpliciter cōsiderata cujus est seipsū cōmunicate cum creaturis sed ex modo misericordiae in miseros patientiae longanimitatis erga reluctantes ex eadem bonitate prodcuntis Armin. examen Perkin pag. 16 and by the creation it selfe onely we may come to see his bounty and goodnesse in communicating himselfe unto the creatures but patience and longsuffering are gifts of another nature Goodnesse simply considedered was reached out to Adam in innocency but patience is not extended to any but to sinners this Arminius granteth when hee treateth upon predestination saying thus Predestination is not made out of meer goodnesse absolutely considered which is a communicating of himselfe to the creatures but it is after the manner of mercy issuing from compassion towards men in misery and of patience and longanimity towards them that hang back and hearken not to his call So that goodnesse and patience are distinguishable in their owne judgement therefore it will not follow that because they may discover goodnesse therefore they may discover patience and forbearance by the light of nature This hath such a dependence upon the former that I say onely thus much here that except an heathen man can see himselfe a sinner and so concluded under the weight of such a cursed death he cannot see any act of God to be Patience 4. The fourth step in his pretended rational discourse is this This testifieth and delareth that his justice and severity against sin hath been satisfied and that he hath received an attonement But I say on the other side that let him take all the forementioned particulars for granted yet how do they rationally declare a satisfaction or an attonement There is no smal difference between these two though patience did argue an attonement yet it doth not satisfaction but I say it doth neither First not attonement execution is sometimes deferd not because the malefactour is pardoned but only reprieved A provoked master is long ere he take an accompt and smite not because he hath remitted the crime but rather because he would have the rounder score and give the greater stroak I contractial into this one argument which I prove by one scripture If the patience of God afforded to obstinate sinners doth not infer that he hath received an attonement for their obstinacy then the patience of God extended to heathens cannot infer that God hath received an attonement for their sins But the

he calleth on all men to repent and believe in Christ without exception B●t had he either discovered or considered what call they mean I perswade my selfe he would have waved their testimony He would make us believe that they affirm that God calls all to repentance by such a call as is without the letter of the gospel otherwise what is their testimony to his cause But in so doing he is guilty of manifest subornation for as for Calvin he witnesseth no such thing and that I cleare thus 1. He is so far from testifying to Mr Goodwins assertion that he saith that no man is sufficiently enabled to the knowledge of the Creatour without the familiar ducture of the Scriptures it is the adequate subject of the sixt chapter of the first book of his Institutions and if he say that man cannot come to the saving knowledge of his creator without the help of the written word we cannot rationally conceive that he whom Mr Goodwin calleth one of the best of the Protestant Divines should also say that a heathen man can come to the knowledge of his redeemer without the help of the written word or if he doe his testimony doth not agree with it selfe and so I shall lay it aside as not to bee taken in so weighty a cause 2. A second reason is this because I find him sometimes treating of that call whereby he saith God calls all without exception but in a sense far different from Mr. Goodwins dreames for in his discourse upon that text Many called but few chosen he saith thu● Nothing is ambiguous if we hold that there is a double kind of calling Nihil erit ambiguum si teneamus duplicem esse vocationis speciem un versalis una quâ ●mnes pariter ad se invitat deus perexternam verbi praedicationem et am quibus eam in mortis odo em proponit Ca●v institut lib. 3o. c. 24. § 8 there is an universal call by which he calleth all alike to him in the external preaching of his word even them to whom it becomes the savour of death and the matter of more severe condemnation Now this is clearely Calvins meaning in his general cal so much relyed upon by Mr. Goodwin viz. by the express preaching of the gospel orally n●t at all any such universal cal by the creatures without the letter of the Gospel and until he can produce one place in all the workes of Calvin wherein he mentioneth any other call to Jesus Christ then by the letter of the gospel he must with me lye under the censure of a wil●ull and shamelesse pervertour of mens words for his owne purpose and if he thus meane by his general call then what strength this testimony contributeth to Mr. Goodwins cause let any judg who holds that all have a sufficiency for faith in Christ without the letter of the gospel And at the same rate runneth the testimony of Musculus As for the suffrage of the British divines at the Synod of Dort I cannot conceive that any who had his vote in the suffrage of that Synod about the five controverted points can produce any pertinent testimony for him my reason is because I find them thus speaking point blank against him Cap. 4o. of conversion Sect. 4. In man there are some remainders of the light of nature whereby he retaineth some principles of God c. But so far is he from being enabled by this inbred light to come to the saving knowledge of God and to turne himselfe unto him that he doth not make use of it in natural things And againe in that chapter of conversion one of the errors concerning that article which they rej●ct is as followeth that man can so use the common grace the light of nature that by it he may receive evangelical grace and that God hath for his part shewne himselfe ready to reveale Christ to all men seeing he doth sufficiently afford to every man necessary meanes for the making of Christ knowne and for faith and repentance Now if they reject that as an errour which is the adequate subject of Mr. Goodwins assertion certainely these are no probable or likely men to add any strength to his cause and I expect in his next that he produce the words and place where any of these men speake of a faith grounded onely upon the sound of the heavens or that the heathen are enabled by the light of nature to believe in Christ or else to judge himselfe whether it be not an unchristian course to force such a sense of mens writings contrary to the stresse and current of their judgement that so he may have the more plausible way for his causeless calumny of inconsistencies and contradictions and when he hath so barbarously broken their heads so childishly to give them a plaister by anking them in the number of the best Protestant Divines because he thinks they speake of his side Thus have I examined all his proofes both divine and humane and I cannot but adjudg them far short of proving his tenent and therfore I advise him either to send out new or to take a review of these in a second and better examination for they are all impertinent to the question first propounded some of them necessarily inferring the letter of the gospel the rest not inferring at all either repentance or faith in Jesus Christ therefore no proper testimony for this doctrine that all men without exception are bound to believe in Christ though they never heard the letter of the gospel And thus I have indeavoured to satisfie his owne desires and have taken the weapons out of his hands pag. 6. by which he thus unhandsomely digladiates against the truth and I shall conclude I have done it until I see in his next how hee doth reassume them or else surrender up to me this his first hold to which I finde him something inclined because as suspecting the strength of that which he hath all this while spoken he retreateth to a second which hath no coherence at all with this which I shal examine In the 15. Page of his Treatise we find him thus speaking Suppose we grant for Arguments sake that the heathen to whom the gospel was never orally preached were not in an immediate capacity of believing it in those terms of believing lately expressed yet this proves not but that they may be in a remote capacity of believing such a capacity I meane which by a regular and conscientious exercise of those worthy abilities which God hath conferd upon them might by the ordinary blessing and by the standing course of providence of God in such cases have risen up to an immediate capacity in this kind so that a heathen man who never heard of Jesus Christ may yet by the effect of the law written in their heart quit himselfe to such a degree of well pleasing to God that he will not fayl to reveale his son Christ to him after some