ambagibus si in coelo in terra sicut veritas dicit qucunque voluit fecit profecto facere noluit quaecunque non fecit Let it saith hee be understood after what other manner soever it may be construed so that wee be not constrained to maintaine that the Almighty God would have something come to passe which notwithstanding comes not to passe For without fetching any further compasse if he hath done whatsoever hee will both in heaven and in earth as the truth witnesseth certainly hee would not doe whatsoever he hath not done 2 But you proceed to shew that both this duty of ours to pray for all sorts and for every man of what sort soever and also that Gods will is that all without exception should come unto the trueth and be saved are expresly included in the praiers appointed by the Church of England And the Collects whence you gather this are in number three they are I take it all appointed for Good Friday In the first wee pray that God would graciously behold this his family for â—he which our Lord Iesus Christ was contented to be betraied Now this family being the present congregation wherein the prayer is made it is very strange that hereby should be signified all sorts of men and every man of what sort soever throughout the world And what expresse signification doe wee finde here that Gods will is that all without exception should come unto the trueth and be saved To helpe your argument drawn herehence as if you should reason thus Wee must pray for this family therefore wee must pray for every one throughout the world You tell us that The tenour of this petition if wee respect onely the forme is indefinite not universall but being in a necessary matter it is equivalent to an universall as every logician knowes To which I answer first that the tenour of the petition is not indefinite but definite to follow you in your owne language for therein wee pray definitely for that family which is before us Now that family is a particular family and never any Logician was so simple as to thinke it law full to inferre an universall out of a particular Againe here is no necessary matter in it For to use such a forme of prayer is meerly the arbitrary constitution of our Church Suppose God had bid us to pray in this forme to wit for this family present yet this makes not the matter necessary absolutely but meerely upon supposition of the will of God and yet in this particular onely As for example Our Saviour prayed for them that his father gave him and for all those that should afterward believe through their word will you inferre herehence that therefore he was to pray for the world also Againe God hath expresly bidden us to pray for them that sinne unto death and therefore unlesse I may be assured that there is none in the world that sinneth a sinne unto death I have no reason to pray for all and every one though I were bound to doe so it would nothing pleasure and advantage you Hitherto I have followed you in your owne most unlogicall discourse the absurdity whereof every simple Logician may easily discover Where have you beene taught that petitions indefinite in a necessary matter are universall we were taught indeed that propositions indefinite in a necessary matter are as good as universall but for petitions indefinite to be counted universall in a matter necessary is one of the absurdest notions that ever I heard to proceede from the mouth of a Logician You proceede to prove that the forme of the petition is in the intention of the Church of England to be extended to all and every one of the congregation present But erst you told us the matter indeed was universall but not the forme which you acknowledged to be indefinite Now the very forme you say is to be universally extended this is not to extend but to destroy But this that you labour for in so uncouth a manner I never doubted of namely that by this family is understood all and every one of the Congregation there present onely I deny that herehence it followeth that our Church bindes us to pray for all and every one throughout the world and if it doth wee must comprehend even those that sinne sinnes unto death amongst the rest unlesse wee believe that there are no such sinners in the world and hee had need bee of a strong faith and have some extraordinary revelation that believeth that So that your second place tending to no other end but to prove that which wee never doubted to be comprehended in the first wee need not trouble our selves about any answer thereunto save onely this though we are bound to pray not onely for the congregation present but for the whole Church and every member of it yet there is a great gulfe of separation betweene the Citie of God and the citie of the Devill which makes me remember what Abraham answered Dives and therefore wee can no way approve this consequence We are bound to pray for all Christians therefore we are bound to pray for all Atheists and heathens Wee are bound to pray for Christs members therefore wee are bound to pray for Antichrist and his members Therefore you tell us the third and last prayer will cleerly quit this exception and free both the foremr petitions from these and the like restrictions But in this last clause you overlash miserably I see no reason but I may as well say that the restrictions in the former prayer will quit this latter prayer for its extension Certainly two of the three prayers you proposed to evince your Tenent are nothing to the purpose Herein indeed we pray unto God to have mercy upon all Jewes Turkes and Heriticks which in effect is no more then to pray that the fulnesse of the Gentiles may come in and thereupon the calling of the Iewes And whereas you desire to inferre herehence that it is Gods will that all these should come to his truth and knowledge and be saved As the consequence you shall never bee able to make good so the consequent is directly contrary to the word of God for it is not nor ever was it the will of God that all this should be done together but one after another namely that the fulnesse of the Gentiles shall come in first and after that the calling of the Iewes Rom. 11. Luc. 21. 24. Hence you conclude That if God will not the death of any Turke Jew or Infidell because of nothing he made them men wee may safely conclude that he willeth not the death of any but the life of all whom of men or infidels he hath made Christians In reading your antecedent I wondred at your boldnesse in supposing that which you are never able to gaine by force of argument but when I view your consequence I wonder what giddinesse possessed you to take so wilde a course in
will yee die yee house of Israel And the whole proceedeth by way of answer to their murmuring against the providence of God in saying The fathers have eaten sower grapes and the childrens teeth are set on edge and hereupon God proceedeth to justifie the course of his providence unto their face Now when God doth not take men upon the hippe as soone as they have sinned against him but spares them and not onely gives them space of repentance but useth meanes to bring them unto repentance by sending Prophets unto them to admonish them to admonish them of their sinnes and to denounce the judgements of God against them is not this a manifest evidence that God is not delighted in their death but rather in their repentance although he still reserves libertie to himselfe to bestow the gift of repentance on whom he will And therefore all this is only in respect of his church not in respect of those who are strangers from the common wealth of Israel and aliens from the covenants of promise then concerning those within the church All are not Israel that are of Israel Rom. 9. And though the meanes of grace have their course withall yet God intends to make them effectuall onely with his elect according to that As many as were ordeined to eternall life believed and whom he hath predestinated them hath he called and justified and glorified For as Austine saith Quantamlibet praebuerit patientiam nisi Deus dederit quis aget poenitentiam And speaking of the Non pradestinatis Istorum neminem saith hee adducit Deus ad salubrem spiritatemque poenitentiam qua homo reconciliatur Deo in Christo sive illis ampliorem patientiam sive non imparem praebeat Therefore we say that as concerning the elect though they sinne yet God willeth not their death but willeth their repentance and their salvation But as touching others who are mixt amongst them as tares amongst the wheat and are partakers of the same meanes of grace and invitations unto repentance in as much as he spares them and giveth them not onely time to repent but admonisheth them of their sinnes and affords them the outward meanes of repentance it is sufficient to justifie that God doth not willingly bring judgement upon them neither for their sinnes because hee comes not hastily thereunto but upon wilfull despising of the means of grace used to reclaime them like as before I shewed in what sense God is said not to afflict the sonnes of men willingly And as for this present place your selfe elsewhere hath interpreted it thus I will not the death of an impenitent sinner but that God wills undoubtedly the death of an impenitent sinner To quash this construction in this place you say this oath of God proceeds as concerning those who all their life long have hated him Here I am perswaded wee shall finde no little inconsideratenesse To hate God all a mans life time what is it but to hate him from the first hower of comming to the use of reason unto the last even unto the moment of death now I pray consider Will not God the death of such a one as dieth in impenitencie The text I confesse runnes thus I will not the death of him that dieth But doe you thinke indeed the meaning is that as for such a man as now dieth and hath lived all his life time in the hatred of God God will not the death of such a one Like enough you are content your Reader should entertaine such a conceite But I cannot bee perswaded you take this to be the meaning The text is manifestly against it for it followeth But rather that he returne and live so that it is spoken of a man living and such as is capable of repentance And wee know the whole Chapter is to justifie Gods providence in afflicting men with his judgements so that to die in this place is to be under the afflicting hand of God and so in the way to death and to destruction Our living is reputed a continuall dying for as much as nature consumeth and wasteth as the Poet wittily expresseth it Childehood ends in youth And youth in old age dies I thought I lived in truth But now I die I die I see Each age of death is one degree Whereupon he concludes his resolution to correct his former phrase of speech saying Farewell the doating score Of worlds Arithmaticke Life I le trust thee no more But henceforth for thy sake I le go by deaths new Almanaeke For while I sing A thousand men lie sick a thousand bells doring And would you know what is the difference between me and them They are but dead and I dying So that I guesse your meaning according to the articles of your owne creed is but this That Gods love is such to them that all their life past not simply all their life but all their life past have hated him that He will not their death but rather that they returne and live And I grant that this is true of many in most proper speech namely of all the elect of God though it bee long ere God calleth and converteth some of them Of others also that live in the Church I have shewed how it may have course in the same sense that God is said not so much willingly to afflict them for their sinnes as for refusing to repent and turne unto God after they have sinned When you tell us of infinite places more of sacred texts and those most perspicuous in themselves and also that The whole ancient Church with some small exception which yet may bee counterpoised is ready to give joynt verdict for you it savoureth hotly of Smithfield eloquence Pessima quò vendas opus est mangone perito Qui Smithfieldensi polleat eloquio Yet it was an old observation Multa fidem promissa levant cum plenius aequo Laudat venales qui vult extrudere merces If you had some about you to justfie you in cleanly manner by some prety qualification it had beene absolute As the Gentleman who professed that he had certaine ponds wherein Carpes were taken as big as that Somer-pole which hee then rode by and withall askt his man that rode with him whether it were not so Sir quoth his man though they were so big yet I am sure they were nothing like so long and indeed the dimension of length is more suitable to the proportion of an Eele then of a Carpe As Cicero answered him that told a strange tale concerning the length of certaine Eeles which he had seene for Tully handsomely to convince him of his vanity made shew of going beyond him in his owne element of tossing and forthwith replied saying That is nothing strange for I know a place where Eeles are taken of such a length that they use to make their Angling-rods of them And this assertion of yours may come as heere to the trueth as an Eele is to an Angling rod. CHAP. XV.
of his sinnes by your opinion Pharaoh had beene saved though he neither had faith nor repentance For till their soules be betroathed unto wickednesse God doth not hate them this is your dialect whence it followeth that either all infants of Turkes and Saracens dying in their infancy are saved or else all men as soone as they are borne are betrothed unto wickednesse and consequently all reprobates from their birth unto their death continue the same objects of Gods decree without alteration And then againe I pray consider if God hates them not and wils not their damnation untill by filling up the measure of their sinne they are betroathed unto wickednesse as you speake then surely hee did not hate them nor will the condemnation of them in their infancy much lesse did hee will it before they were borne much lesse did hee will it before the world was made yet you have already plainly professed that God willed the death of Pharaoh from all eternity and if from all eternity then sure he willed it before the world was made much more before Pharaoh was borne much more before Pharaoh had filled up the measure of his iniquity Yet I confesse that though God from all eternity willed the death of Pharaoh and consequently before Pharaoh was borne and much more before he had filled up the measure of his iniquity Yet God did not will that Pharaoh should be damned before he had filled up the measure of his iniquitie much lesse that he should be damned in his infancie much lesse before he was borne much lesse before the world was So that these two propositions may well stand together without contradiction God from all eternity willed that Pharaoh should be damned but God did not will that Pharaoh should bee damned from all eternity or before hee was borne or in his infancy or before he had filled up the measure of his sinnes But the propositions which you take upon you to free from contradiction are of a farre different nature and indeed directly contradictious God did from all eternity will the death of Pharaoh God did not from all eternity will the death but rather willed the life of Pharaoh And for clearing it you onely tell us that Pharaoh was not the same object of Gods decree though he continued the same man A proposition both very obscure in it selfe and void of all efficacie to free your selfe from contradiction neither doe you take any paines to accommodate it but leaving that as a blanke for your propitious reader to fill up after his owne judgement or affection rather And the issue of all is to professe that God did indeede from all etetnity will the life of Pharaoh and so continued to will it untill such time as hee had filled up the measure of his sinne and that from thenceforth hee hated him as he doth all reprobates having once betrothed themselves unto wickednesse which assertion manifestly betraying your opinion as touching the making of Gods will mutable your desire to satisfie your reader with calling Gods will immutable and saying that the object of Gods decree is not still the same Sed quid ego verb a audiam facta cum vidiam You manifestly maintaine that Gods love and will to save doth cease upon the filling up the measure of sinne and betrothing a mans selfe to wickedness and thereupon and from thenceforth hee hates them and wills their death and damnation whereas till that time he willed their life and salvation These propositions God loves all men God doth not love all men I say are contradictories All rules of contradiction justifie these to be contradictions And your selfe confesse as much in effect when going about to cleare them from contradiction you quite alter the forme of them by shaping them thus in effect God loves all men till they have filled up the measure of their sinnes but when once they have filled up the measure of their sinnes he loves them not Now these propositions are quite different from the former neither doe we charge these with contradiction as wee charged the former But that wherewith wee charge these is this they make the will of God mutable contrary to the expresse testimonie of the holy Ghost saying I the Lord am not changed Mal. 3. 6. And Saint Iames professeth that with the Lord there is no variableness nor shadow of change which you perceiving are loath to speake your minde plainly but to avoide so grose an untruth had rather cast your selfe upon a manifest contradiction in saying God loves all men and God loves not all men and to free your selfe from contradiction betray your corrupt opinion another way in making Gods love to change into hatred after a certaine time to wit after the measure of sinne is filled up and the onely shift you have to charme it is to confound the difference of time which alone avoides the contradiction and expressing it thus God loves all men as men or as men which have not made up the full measure of iniquity but having made up that or having their soules betrothed to wickednesse hee hates them But this will not serve your turne for seeing this contradiction of making up the full measure of sinne did not belong unto man from the beginning but onely after a certaine space of time the difference specified must necessarily resolve it selfe into a meere difference of time thus God did love them till they had made up the full measure of sinne but after that he hated them And this is further proved For if the difference onely consisted in respect of different considerations at the same time then the distinction should have place as well after this full measure of sinne is made up as before And so Pharaoh after the filling up of the full measure of sinne might bee said to be loved of God as a man and hated as having filled up the measure of sinne but no where doâ— you make use of any such distinction Nay much more should it have use in this case and indeed onely in this case for untill a man hath filled up the measure of his sinne this distinct consideration hath no place for a body may bee considered as Ens or Naturale or as Quantum because hee is both Ens and Naturale and Quantum But a man connot be considered at any time as having filled up the measure of his sinne but onely after that time comes hee may bee so considered for to consider him to bee that which hee is not is not to consider him what hee is but to faine him to be what he is not Againe when you say God loves all men as men What is the meaning of this What doâ— you denote by this love of God For wee commonly say love is not in God Quoad affectum but Quoad effectum at least Quoad affectum it is nothing at all different from Gods will Now I desire to know what that thing is which God wills to man as a
but yee shall cry for sorrow of heart and house for vexation of spirit Yea and in making one piece rained upon sometimes and not another yet I nothing doubt but you will acknowledge God to bee as holy in these waies as in any other yea in causing two Beares to come out of the wood upon Elisha his cursing in the name of the Lord and teare fourty two children Yea in revenging Achans sacriledge not onely with his owne death but with his childrens also and in destroying suckling children and children in the wombe both in the generall deluge and in the conflagration of Sodome and when for the sinne of Saul hee caused seven of his sonnes to bee delivered into the hands of the Gibeonites to bee put to death for God is righteous in all his waies and holy in all his workes And the equity of Gods courses though sometimès discernable by man as in the case you put out of Ezechiel 18. 25. yet not alwaies so but that wee are driven sometimes to cry out with the Apostles Oh the depth of the riches of the wisedome and knowledge of God how unsearchable are his judgements and his waies past finding out 5 I confesse that if to dictate like a positive Theologue be to instruct us you have thus farre instructed us That those paternes of holinesse or perfection which we are bound to imitate in him are not to be taken from his bare commandement or revelation of his will but from the objects of his will revealed or from the eternall practises which he hath exhibited as so many expresse and manifest proofes that his will is alwayes holy and just The paterns of holinesse which wee are bound to imitate are not to be taken you say from Gods bare commandement I finde what you say but I had rather finde what you prove When our Saviour exhorteth us to be holy as God is holy and perfect as God is perfect he speaketh it with a particular reference to a particular course in Gods providence taking thereby not an obligation to imitate him but onely an inducement to bee so much the more forward in doing that which God commands us in loving our enemies And unlesse wee have a commandement from God for the rule of our obedience it is nothing safe to imitate God For what shall Magistrates spare malefactors because God spareth them a long time Or because God causeth the children to be put to death sometime for the sinne of the father shall we do so too Or because God makes his sunne to shine as well upon one as upon another shall we therefore put no difference betweene such as are of the houshold of faith and others Wee may not imitate Elisha in cursing little children that mocked him nor the zeale of Phinees in killing Zimri and Cosbi in their lust much lesse must wee alwaies imitate God who hath greater power over mens lives then Elisha or Phinees had Yet why you should call the workes of God in the course of his providence eternall practises I know no reason or coulour of reason It may be that in stead of eternall it should be externall practises God no doubt is holy in all his waies and workes but herehence it followeth not that wee must imitate him in all his courses but rather wee must have an eye to his commandements And what I pray are those perfections whereof our generall duties are the imperfect representations Our generall duties are such as these We must not deale unjustly with any we must deale justly with all or wee must be holy Holinesse becomes thine house for ever and in the Priests forehead was wont to bee written Holinesse unto the Lord. Now are these the perfections wherein God as you say is holy and just Then t is as if you should say God is eminently and apparantly holy in the perfection which is called his holinesse God is eminently and apparantly just in that perfection which is called his justice Of all his morall commandements not one there is you say whose sincere practise doth not in part make us truely like him and we are bound to be conformable to his will revealed that we may bee conformable to his nature without conformity whereunto wee cannot participate of his happinesse for happinesse is the immediate consequent of his nature You proceede to cut out work for your Readers as many as are willing to Try the spirits and not hand over head to receive all for gold that glisters That the practise of Gods commandements maketh us like him is a plausible speech And it is true in the generall for as God is wise and holy so our obedience to his commandements is that which mades us wise and holy And as God doth nothing but that which very well becomes him so in obeying the will of God wee shall doe nothing but that which very well becomes us But as for particular duties there is little or no correspondency betweene the carriage of superiours and inferiours Wee have a God to worship by reverence and feare and by praying unto him these are moralities no way incident unto God Wee have parents both naturall and spirituall and masters and magistrates whom we must honour God hath none such to honour Wee by our authoritie may not take away the life of any be he never so great an offendor God may take away the life of any bee hee never so innocent without any blemish to his holines Matrimoniall chastitie is a vertue commendable in a Christian but this vertue is of so base a condition that the divine nature is not capable of it as who hath no lusts at all to order like as on the contrary the very Devills themselves being Spirits are no way obnoxious to unchristitie The like may bee said of temperance and intemperancie in the use or abuse of Gods creatures through gluttony and drunkennes T is theft for us to take any mans goods from him against his will it is not so with God who can send any man as naked out of the world as hee brought him into the world without any prejudice to the repuration of his justice And seeing he is not capable of any manner of concupiscence either of the eye or of the flesh for hee is a Spirit and not a body or flesh nor in the way of pride of life the contrary conditions cannot be in the way of any commendable vertues attributed unto God In a word all the goodnesse that is in God is essentiall unto him our goodnesse whatsoever we be is but accidentall unto us and therefore when we are exhorted to be holy as he is holy and perfect as God is perfect it tends onely to this even to set before us certaine actions of God as patternes and precedents to imitate him therein and that onely so far forth as they are suitable and congruous inducements to the performing of Gods commandements not to affect any conformity
that he had cursed them already And equally and indifferently as God is made the Author of blessing to the obedient so is he made the Author of a curse to the disobedient and therefore calls heaven and earth to witnesse that hee hath set before them life and death blessing and cursing So that death and cursing is indifferently attributed to God as the Author of them like as life and blessing and both are in due proportion to the behaviour of man as it is found either in the way of obedience or in the way of disobedience And in this respect perhaps you may say that man is the cause of cursing not God To this I answer 1. By the same reason man is the cause of blessing suitable to this cursing and not God 2. If in this respect cursing be to be derived from sin it is onely in the way of a meritorious cause so doth not fruit proceed from trees but onely in the way of an efficient cause God and none but God can be the Author as of happinesse so of misery as of eternall life so also of everlasting death And as none is truly blessed but whom God blesseth so none is truly accursed but whom God curseth Yet no man I thinke that hath his wits in his head will say that this cursing proceedeth from Gods love but rather from his hatred Gods love towards the creature is essentiall his love to the creature is not so no more then to be a creator is of Gods essence And love is no more of Gods essence as a Creator then hatred is of Gods essence as a revenger And the blessing and cursing attributed unto God in the Scriptures before alledged belong to God onely as a Iudge to execute the one by way of reward and the other by way of punishment Albeit there is another course of Gods blessing and of his cursing though you love not to distinguish but to consound rather as all that maintaine bad causes love darknesse rather then light I come to the second point wherein you insist In that he is the Author of being he is the Author of goodnesse to all things that are And this is very true for God saw all that he had made and lo it was very good And as it is very true so it is nothing at all to the purpose For when we enquire whether Gods love be extended towards all and every one wee presuppose their beings in their severall times and generations And secondly we speake of a love proper to mankinde which consisteth not in giving them their being for God hath given being unto Angels even unto Devils as well as unto men and as to men so to all inferiour creatures be they never so noysome and offensive unto man And it is a strange course of yours to magnifie the love of God to man in giving him being which is found in the basest creature that breathes or breathes not I have heard a story of a great Prince when one of the prime subjects of the land being taken in a foule act of insurrection and yeelding upon condition to bee brought to speake with that Prince presuming of ancient favour whereof hee had tasted in great measure and which upon his presence might haply revive he found nothing answerable but imperious taâ—ts rather and dismission in this manner Know therefore that we hate thee as we hate a toad Yet you magnifie the love of God to mankinde in as comfortable manner when you say that hoe hath given us being which wee well know God hath given to lyons rigers and beasts of prey yea to snakes and adders to frogges and toads and fiery serpents Herehence you proceed to the third point and do inferre That because he hath made us therefore hee loveth us for He hateth nothing that he hath made as saith the wise man and to give the greater credit to the authority alledged by you you use an introduction of strange state for you say The wiseman saith this of him that is wisest of all of him that can neither deceive nor be deceived that He hateth nothing that he hath made But to what purpose tends all this pompe Is the sentence any whit of greater authority because it is spoken of him that is wisest of all and can neither deceive nor be deceived May not fooles speake of him that can neither deceive nor be deceived as well as wise men and have their sayings any whit the greater credit and reputation for this If the author of that sentence had beene such a one as neither could deceive nor be dedeceived then indeed the sentence had beene of greatest authority and infinitely beyond the authority of Philo the Iew. Or did you presume that your Reader inconsiderately might swallow such a gull take the author of it for such a one as could neither deceive nor be deceived If you did this were very foule play and no better then a trick of conicatching Yet we except not against the sentence but pray you rather to take notice of an answer to this very objection of yours taken from the same ground above two hundred yeares ago You shall finde it in Aquinas his summes where his first objection is this Videtur quod Deus nullum hominem reprobet Nullus enim reprobat quem diligit sed Deus omnem hominem diligit secundum illud Sap. 11. Diligis omnia quae sunt nihil odisti eorum quae secisti Ergo Deus nullum hominem reprobat It seemes that God reprobates no man For no man reprobates him whom hee loveth But God loves every man according to that Wis. 11. Thou lovest all things that are and hatest nothing that thou hast made Therefore God reprobateth no man And the answer hee makes unto this objection followeth in this manner Adprimum dicendum quod Deus omnes homines diliget etiam omnes creaturas in quantum omnibus vult aliquod bonum non tamen quodcunque bonum vult omnibus In quantum igitur quibusdam non vult hoc bonum quod est vita aeterna dicitur eos habere odio velreprobare To the first is to be answered that God loves all men yea and all creatures for as much as he willeth some good to them all but yet he willeth not every good to all There-fore in as much as unto some he willeth not this good which is life everlasting he is said to hate them or to reprobate them And you might have beene pleased to take notice not onely of that wise man though as wise as Philo who speakes herein of him that can neither deceive nor be deceived but of that wise God who is wiser then men and Angels and can neither deceive nor be deceived and affirmeth openly that He hath loved Iacob and hated Esau as also of the Apostle Saint Paul who by the infallible direction of Gods Spirit applies this to the disposition of God towards them before they were borne
as well that it is extended to frogges and toads to Angells and Devills as well as to mankinde This is onely to professe that it extends to all Now this is a very improper interpretarion of infinite love for lesse love and lesse liberality may extend to more then greater love and greater liberality for he that gives ten shillings to one person is more liberall then that divides five shillings amongst threescore persons in giving them a peny apiece Lastly the fruit of this love can be but being and is it not a proper commendation of Gods infinite love towards mankinde to say that he gives being unto all And doth Gods love to man appeare more herein then to the vilest creature that is 2 In the next Section you discourse at large after your manner of the amplitude of Gods love in comparison which is nothing at all to your purpose whose chiefe aime is to insinuae that Gods love is alike to all Yet having proceeded thus farre my resolution is to go on and to consider what you bring What thinke you of Adams love in the state of innocency was it perfect or no Though without sinne awhile yet hee fell into sinne so did the Angells before him so should wee though as perfect as they if God should not uphold us Yet our love in greatest perfection could not be so much as a shadow of Gods love there being no resemblance betweene them our love being a love of duety Gods love to us of meere grace and mercy Besides betweene the fruits of Gods love to us and the fruits of our love towards God no colour of resemblance Man is bound heartily to desire the good of all but God is free and hath mercy on whom he will and whom he will he hardeneth Many widowes were in Israel in the daies of Elias when heaven was shut three yeares and six months and great famine was throughout all the land But unto none of them was Elias sent save unto Sarepta a city of Sidone unto a certaine widow Also many lepers were in Israel in the dayes of Elesaeus the prophet yet none of them was made cleane but Naaman the Syrian And if Gods will had beene to doe the best that might be hee could have cured no doubt all other lepers as well as Naaman and succoured other widows as well as the widow of Sarepta Yet I confesse Gods good will exceeds ours not intensively onely but extensively also for not a sparrow falleth to the ground without the providence of our heavenly Father hee saveth both man and beast and heareth the young Ravens that call upon him the eyes of all doe wait upon the Lord and hee gives them their meat in due season And as touching the conferring both of grace and glory therein hee saveth more then wee know or are acquainted with The number of the children of Israel is as the sand of the sea that cannot bee counted for multitude As touching temporall blessings all partake of his goodnesse therein in their naturall preservation and consolation therein wee must imitate him in doing good to all as it lieth in our power though chiefly to the houshold of faith yet not to them onely but to others also But though he causeth his sun to shine and his raine to fall upon the just and unjust yet pronounceth not the sentence of salvation on all promiscuously whether they be just or unjust And whereas all are equally corrupt in state of nature yet he doth not equally shew mercy on all or bestow the meanes of grace on all or where he doth bestow these meanes of salvation he doth not make them effectuall unto us He blindes the eyes and hardens the hearts of some that they should not see with their eyes nor understand with their hearts and be converted that he might heale them Whereby it comes to passe that the word of God though it be the savour of life unto life unto some yet it is the savour of death unto death unto others and the Ministers of God are a good savour unto God in both even both in them that are saved and in them that perish For God made all things for himselfe even the wicked against the day of evill Mercie you say is not restrained from ill deservers in distresse so long as the exercise of it breeds no harme to such as are more capable of bountifull love and favour This is a consideration which I confesse hath place among men sometimes and in some cases Yet hardly can I devise how to suit with a fit instance For no states for ought I find doe take notice of any such distinction of times wherein the exercise of mercy will not breed harme and wherein it will but they execute condigne punishment upon malefactors according to the lawes that all may see and feare to doe the like not be encouraged malorum facta imitari but rather eorum exitus perhorrescere God doth not so His patience and long suffering is exceeding great yet if hee should give every man repentance in his death bed and save their soules what one in the world should be the worse for this And though the wicked many times spend their daies in mirth and sodainly goe downe to the grave yet by the grace of God we shall be nothing the worse for this nor provoked hereupon to condemne the generation of Gods children Yet what is it that makes one man more capable of bountifull love and favour then another I know not what makes him more capable of love in the execution of reward I know but what makes him more capable of love in the communication of grace and in shewing mercy towards him I know not Sure I am that woman who had many sinnes forgiven her loved so much the more the ninety nine just persons that thinke they need no repentance like enough love so much the lesse It is true the lawes of States take order for the just execution of punishment upon offenders for the common good yet by your leave Kings on earth by their absolutenesse doe give pardons to whom they will respecting more their own pleasure then the common good And withall I thinke Princes doe lesse offend if at all offend in refusing to pardon malefactors then in granting pardons unto them As for God to whom you say the execution of justice is unnaturall he being the Father of mercy I pray consider if God should give repentance to all on their death-beds and consequently save all what common good of mankinde would be hindred by this And as God is the father of mercy so is he also the Iudge of all the world and I conceive the execution of justice punitive to be as naturall to him as he is Iudge of all the world as the execution of mercy is naturall unto him as he is the Father of mercy Yet you seeme to have a place of Scripture to prove a
as for others Againe if sinne hath made them hatefull is there not sinne enough in the world in Iewes Turkes and Infidels to make them hatefull Wherefore though in case they were in the same state wherein God made them then they should not be hatefull to God and thereupon be thought fit matter of prayers yet seeing they are in the state of sinne and consequently hatefull to God for the same cause in just proportion of reason they are no fit matter for our praiers Though a full measure onely of enmitie against God exempt men from Gods love yet will you denie that such a full measure is found in many throughout the world and will not this be sufficient to forbid our praiers for all and everie one Sure I am if there be anie in the world that sin a sinne unto death we may not pray for such an one 3. From the authorized devotions in our Church you proceed to the Catechisme and aske what can be more cleare then that as God the Father doth love all mankinde without exception so the Sonne of God did redeeme all mankinde not onely some of all sorts but all mankinde universally taken And I thinke indeed that the one is as cleare as the other Throughout the Scriptures shew me one passage wherein the love of God is expressed to Reprobates If the Sonne of God did redeeme all and everie one then all and everie one have redemption in Christ through his bloud and consequently the forgivenesse of their sinnes For in Scripture phrase remission of sinnes is that redemption which we have in Christ so is reconciliation also all one with forgivenesse of sinnes Sure I am Christ professeth Iohn 17. 9. that he would not pray for the world but for those whom his heavenly Father had given him and for those that should beleeve through their word And for their sakes did he sanctifie himselfe for whom he prayed and to what did he sanctifie himselfe but unto his death and passion by the consent of as many Fathers as Maldonate had seene as the Iesuit himselfe professeth on that 17. of Iohn and he had seene very many as there hee signifieth namely Chrysostome Cyril Austine Theodorus Mopsuestenus and Heracleotes Leontius Beda Theophilact Enthymius Rupertus But to proceed out of our Catechisme you alledge that God the Father made us and all the world now the Church our mother hath taught us that God hateth nothing that hee hath made The booke of Wisedome saith so indeed but because of the little authority that booke hath in matter of faith from God our Father therefore you charge us with the authority of the Church our Mother Now you are not ignorant I suppose whence the Church our mother taketh this which hath its course amongst Papists as well as amongst us And you know of what authority Aquinas is amongst Papists and what interpretation he makes of this place though received to bee canonicall Scripture amongst them I have already shewed out of his Summes God saith he loves all things in as much as he willeth unto them some good or other but in as much as he willeth not a certaine good to some to wit eternall life he is said to hate them and reprobate them And indeed God saveth both man and beast as the Psalmist speaketh and so he may bee said to love them all and so the Apostle acknowledgeth him to bee the Saviour of all men but especially of them that beleeve And to professe ingenuously what I thinke I see no cause of controversie hereabouts if so be the question be rightly stated For when we say Christ died for mankinde our meaning is that Christ died for the benefit of mankinde Now let this benefit bee distinguished and considered apart and forth with contentious hereabouts will cease For if this benefit be considered as the remission of sinnes and the salvation of our soules these being benefits obtainable onely upon the condition of faith and repentance As on the one side no man will affirme that Christ died to this end namely to procure forgivenesse of sinne and salvation to all and every one whether they beleeve or no so on the other side none will deny but that he dyed to this end that salvation and remission of sinne should redound to all and every one in case they should beleeve and repent For this depends upon the sufficiency of that price which Christ paid to God his Father for the redemption of the world But there be other benefits which Christ merited for us also even the very grace of faith and of repentance For all Gods promises are Yea and Amen in Christ and amongst these promises one is the circumcision of the heart the healing of our waies of our rebellions These promises doe include the grace of faith and of repentance Now consider ingenuously did Christ die to this end that the grace of faith and repentance should bee bestowed absolutely or conditionally Not conditionally for before the grace of faith and repentance and regeneration comes there is nothing to bee found in man but workes of nature Now it is meere Pelagianisme to affirme that God bestoweth grace on man upon the performing of a worke of nature And the Apostle clearely professeth that God doth not call us according to our works Therefore it remaines that albeit remission of sinnes and salvation are conferred unto us conditionally to wit upon the condition of faith and repentance yet the grace of faith and repentance cannot be so conferred and consequently they must be conferred absolutely If then Christ died for the purchasing of faith and repentance to all and every one absolutely it would follow herehence that all and every one should beleeve and repent But this being found to bee a notorious untruth it followeth that Christ died for the purchasing of these graces onely unto some and who can those bee other then the elect of God Accordingly as our Saviour professeth that for those who were Gods and whom he had given unto Christ or should in time to come give unto him the rest excluded for those he sanctified himselfe that is offered himselfe upon the Crosse which interpretation of Christs sanctifying of himselfe Maldonate professeth was received by all the Fathers whom he had seene Now to goe along with you Secondly we are taught you say by the same Catechisme to beleeve in God who hath redeemed us and all mankinde What I pray is this more then to say He hath redeemed us and all men Is all mankinde more then all men and in the straining of this phrase we have tried your strength and the issue of all was to prove but this that God willeth not the death of any but the life of all whom of men and Infidels he hath made Christians By the way I observe an incongruity Of Infidels wee are made Christians as whereby we cease any longer to bee Infidels but I hope of men we are
not made Christians so as to cease any longer to be men Yet you couple them together under one yoke though very unequall heyfers you should have said rather of meere men we are made Christians All that are redeemed are unfainedly loved but if all mankinde signifie no more then all men and all men no more then all sorts of men what are you the nearer to that you reach after And you know I suppose that this was Austins interpretation of that universality and hee gives reasons for it though you magisterially will have your owne way in spite of the pie without answering his reasons Againe consider whether to pay a price which is sufficient for the redemption of all and every one be not in a faire sense to redeem all every one And what one of our Church will maintaine that any one obtaines actuall redemption by Christ without faith especially considering that redemption by the bloud of Christ and forgivenesse of sins are all one I would you would speake plainely and tell us what is meant by redemption which you say every one hath in Christ denying that every one hath sanctification So that whereas the Apostle joynes these two together where hee saith Christ is of God made unto us wisedome righteousnesse sanctification and redemption you divide them telling us that Christ is made redemption to all and every one but not sanctification And truely I had thought that Christ had deserved the one as well as the other for all those for whom he died And it is very strange that God should be said to love them whom he never meanes to sanctifie But I pray answer me Doth he unfainedly love the Devils I thinke you will say he doth not what reason have you then to say that hee loveth all men though you will easily perswade your selfe that the most part of them are reprobates and whom hee never will bring unto wholesome and spirituall repentance whereby a man is reconciled unto God in Christ as Austine writes lib. 5. cont Iulian Pelag. cap 4. and whether you meane to contradict Austine in this also I know not as yet yet one word more with you before wee part How long doth God continue to love them till the measure of their sinne is at full t is your owne oracle in the former Section And then belike hee beginnes and continues to hate them But I pray consider how can this change this alteration stand with the nature of God that his love his will to save them should bee changed into hatred into a purpose to damme them considering that Gods will is his essence And the Lord professeth of himselfe saying I the Lord am not changed and yee sonnes of Iacob are not consumed Mal. 3. 6. All that are baptized in your opinion are not sanctified yet some others much agreeing with you in other opinions maintaine that all that are baptized are regenerate and they alledge a better testimony out of the book of Common prayer then any you have brought to serve your turne namely the profession that is made by the Minister thus Now this childe is regenerate and grafted into the body of Christs congregation Yet that hath beene answered by a Bishop of our Church and that out of the doctrine of Austine Yet I grant baptisme is the seale of redemption and of forgivenesse of sinnes also but to whom to none but such as believe for God hath not ordained that the benefit of Christs bloud shall redound to the redemption and forgivenesse of the sinnes of any man unlesse hee believeth For God hath set him forth to be a propitiation for our sinnes through faith in his bloud But your inferences you conceive to bee as cleere as christall so that the consideration of them makes you doubt whether such amongst us as teach the contrary to these have at any time subscribed to the booke of Common prayer And no question is to be made of your subscription which deny all them to bee sanctified that are baptized though in plaine termes the booke of Common prayer professeth of every baptized childe that hee is regenerate And now you have plaide your part so well in working our authorized devotions as you call them and Catechisme to serve your turn you promise to performe as much touching the book of Homilies but wee must expect your performance therein untill you come to the article concerning Christ in the meane time you will give us space to breathe and take notice of your concludent proofe as you call it thus God wills the salvation of all that are saved and all that are not saved therefore hee wills the salvation of all and every one Now the second part of the Antecedent which alone is called in question is proved out of that of Ezech As I live I will not the death of him that dieth I had thought you had done with this but if it bee your course to tautologize in repeating former arguments I may take liberty to repeat without tautologie my former answer First therefore I say the words as they lye in proper speech are contradictions to your tenent in two respects First because in another discourse of yours you maintaine that hee whose death God wills not is the penitent but here you professe that God willeth not the death of them that are not saved when they die which as as much as to say that God willeth not the death of impenitent sinners Secondly there is a time you confesse in the former Section when God hates sinners to wit when the measure of their sinne is full and if then he hates them he may then as well be said to will their death and damnation as he was said to will their salvation while he loved them In the second place the words as they lye in proper speech are contradictions to manifest reason for seeing God is he that inflicts death and damnation upon them hee must needes will their death and damnation because whatsoever God doth hee doth it according to the counsell of his owne will Eph. 1. 11. Secondly if God doth not will the death which he inflicts then neither doth he will the punishment that he inflicteth nor the chastisement that he inflicteth and so indeed it is said Lam. 3. That he doth not punish willingly nor afflict the children of men which cannot bee understood in proper speech for then it would follow that God doth afflict and chastise the children of men against his will Therefore I say this must be understood by a figure of speech to wit by a metaphor and God said not to will or this or that which hee doth because in the doing of it hee is similis nolenti as first when hee doth it not according to the Latine phrase animi causa for his pleasures sake but being provoked and yet not hastily neither though provoked but after long forbearance and giving time of repentance upon the despising of this goodnesse of God as
Ezek. 14. 23. They shall comfort you when you see their way and their enterprises and ye shall know that I have not done without cause all that I have done in it saith the Lord God Secondly when God doth chastise not as parents for their owne pleasures but with an eye to the good of those whom hee chastiseth Rom. 12. 10. According thereto is that of Augustine Qui trucidat non considerat quemadmodum laniet sed qui curat considerat quemadmodum seret This is my answer following the course of your owne reading of the place whereas Piscator blames the vulgar translation in this place which you follow for saith hee in the Hebrew it is not I will not the death of a sinner but this I am not delighted in the death of a sinner But saith he A man may will that wherein he takes no delight as a ficke man may will to drinke a bitter potion wherein he takes no delight For he may will to take it not for it selfe but for something else to wit to recover his health And so God willeth the eternall death of reprobates for his owne glory to wit for the manifestation of his just wrath in punishing of their sinnes And Iunius reades it and translates it in like manner and with these accordeth our last English translation As I live saith the Lord God I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked but that the wicked turne from his way and live Ezek. 33. 11. And the 18. of Ezekiel doth cleare the meaning of the Holy Ghost where the same phrase is used and in the same manner translated by our worthiest Divines and followed in our last translation vers 23. Have I any pleasure at all that the wicked should dye saith the Lord God and not that hee should returne from his waies and live and verse 32. I have no pleasure in the death of him that dieth saith the Lord God wherefore turne your selves and live ye Now in this chapter the Lord justifieth himselfe against an imputation of harsh if not unjust dealing as if hee punished the children for the sinnes of their fathers which in a proverbiall manner was delivered thus The fathers have eaten sowre grapes and the childrens teeth are set on edge which might occasion a desperate disposition in them and provoke them to cast off all care of amending their waies and turning to God by repentance because all was one whether they repented or repented not because the sowre grapes which their fathers had eaten were enough to set all their teeth on edge Against this the Lord made a solemne protestation that all soules were his even the soules of the children as well as the soules of the fathers and that the soule that sinned that should dye and hereupon expostulates with them thus Have I any pleasure in the death of a sinner to wit so as to bring death upon him notwithstanding his repentance because forsooth his father had eaten sowre grapes No no the Lord hath no delight in their death but if they returne and live hee delights in that and therefore concludes with exhorting them to returne unto the Lord that they may live Now when you forsake the translation of our Church and slicke unto the Vulgar corrupt translation to hold up your odde conceits doth it become you to make question whether they that oppose you in your extravagant tenents and proofes have subscribed to the booke of Common Prayer Piscator proceedeth further and saith that the meaning is not simply that God delights not in the death of the wicked but in case he ceaseth not from his iniquity as appeares saith he by comparing of it with that which goeth before and with that which commeth after for otherwise God takes delight in all his workes like as Lyra upon Ezech. 18. Punitio improbitatis bene est à Deo volita quia justa In Proverbs 1. 26. thus we reade I will laugh at your destruction and mocke when your feare commeth How are these places to bee reconciled Piscator answereth God is not delighted in the death of man as it is the destruction of the creature but is delighted therein as it is the just punishment of the creature which is as much as to say he delights in the execution of his owne Iustice like as wee reade Ier. 9. 24. Let him that glorieth glorie in this that he understandeth and knoweth me For I am the Lord which shew mercy and judgement and righteousnesse in the earth for in these things I delight saith the Lord. 4. Now as if you had made all sure on your side partly out of our authorized devotions wherein you make choice of three prayers whereof two are nothing to the purpose and the third at your uttermost straining of it doth but encourage you to conclude finally that God wils not the death but the life rather of them that of Infidels are made Christians and partly out of the Catechisme where you finde that Christ hath redeemed all mankinde which hath no coloutable extent further then all men and without manifest opposition to Austin you finde this phrase will not serve your turne whom yet you oppose so as without answering any one of his arguments one whereof was drawne from analogie of Scripture phrase another from manifest reason professing therewithall that your construction of this place contradicts the prime Article of the Creed And last of all driving the naile of your discourse home with a concludent proofe depending upon a translation of the text quite different from the most authentique translation of our Church which yet must be without prejudice to your conformity having a sound heart of your owne and therefore some peccadilies may bee well borne withall and you take liberty to question others your opposites whether they have subscribed or no to the booke of Common Prayer such is the height of your imperious cariage bearing downe all before you Now you come to enquire By what will God doth will they should be saved that are not saved and you demand whether God doth will their salvation by his revealed and not by his secret will As if this were our opinion whereas neither Calvin embraceth it nor Beza nor Piscator but all concurre upon that interpretation which Austin gave many hundred yeares agoe and which you impugne and how judiciously we have already considered Peter Martyr proposeth it amongst divers others but embraceth it not neither doe I know any Divine of ours that embraceth it Cajetan indeed embraceth it and Cornelius de Lapide and Aquinas amongst other interpretations As you doubt whether your opposites have subscribed to the booke of Common prayer so if you take a liberty to put upon us the opinions and accommodations of distinctions used by Papists you may in the next place make doubt whether wee have not subscribed to the Councell of Trent We plainly deny that God doth will the salvation of any but of his elect For to
onely voluntate signi that he doth not will it is voluntate beneplaciti and this will which is called the will of good pleasure is onely the will of God in proper speech and that S. Paul speakes of when he saith Who hath resisted his will the other to wit voluntas signi is improperly though usually called the will of God It being indeed nothing else but Gods commandement in which sense he willed Abraham to sacrifice his sonne yet who doubts but that it was Gods will in proper speech that Isaak should not be sacrificed And because you perceived how easily the shew of contradiction might be washed off if it were proposed in this manner therfore you made bold upon dame Logicke and without her leave and in despight of her faine a contradiction under another forme by way of consequence which indeed proves most inconsequent Thirdly you speake in a strange language when you say that the affirmation and negation of salvation falling upon the personall being of men containes contradiction implying that it might fall otherwise then upon the personall being of men and in that case it would not prove contradictious both which are not onely untrue but absurd also For the affirmation of the salvation of man cannot fall otherwise then upon the person of man and consequently upon the personall being of man whatsoever be the cause of it which cause you most preposterously conceive to give unto man a being different from his personall being whereupon and not upon his personall being his salvation should fall Againe no distinction of personall being and other being will serve your turne to save the affirmation and negation of salvation of one and the same man from contradiction I say of one and the same man which is of principall consideration in the course of contradiction and yet wholly permitted by you in this proposition though therein you talke of the strictest point of contradiction Straine your invention while you will you shall never be able to free these propositions from contradiction Peter shall be saved Peter shall not be saved But to change the nature of these propositions and of absolute to make them conditionall thus Peter shall be saved if he beleeve and repent Peter shall not be saved if he beleeve and repent not is neither to affirme nor deny the salvation of Peter For to affirme or deny the salvation of Peter is categoricall not hypotheticall What you want of force of argument you supply with devotion as if you came to enchant your reader and not to informe him as when you say Farre be it from us to thinke that God should sweare to this universall negative I will not the death of him that dieth and yet beleeve withall that he wils the death of some men that die as they are men or as they are the sonnes of Adam This is proposed by way of an holy and confident asseveration but consider how sottish it is and most averse from sobriety For first what if God had not sworne it but onely said it had there been the lesse truth in it for this Is not Gods word sure enough without an oath yet before wee heard that in things determined by divine oath the distinction of voluntas signi and voluntas beneplaciti could have no place Secondly where were your logicall wits when you said this was an universall negative I will not the death of a sinner I pray examine your rules well and see whether it bee not a singular will you measure the quantity of a proportion by the predicate and not rather by the subject Yet if you should doe so it would not serve your turne For both Aristotle of old hath taught us that it is absurd to put an universall signe to the predicate and here is no universality added either to the whole predicate which is Nolens mortem peccatoris nor to any part of it which you seeme to confound For he that dyeth is a terme indefinite Neither is it in a necessary matter For the most holy Angell God could turne into nothing if it pleased him And in the 18. chapter of Ezekiel it is apparant that this is restrained to him that repenteth without any mentall reservation but by plaine evidence of the Text it selfe Thirdly you harpe upon a false string and an erroneous translation as it were in spight of the most authorized translation of our owne Church and follow the vulgar Latine herein And withall in opposition to manifest reason to the contrary for seeing God doth inflict death and damnation upon every one that dyeth and is damned and he doth all things according to the counsell of his owne will Eph. 1. 11. it is impossible he should doe any thing and not will it that he should inflict death on him that dieth and not will it Fourthly be it as you will have it that God doth not will the death of him that dieth will you herehence inferre that God willeth not the death of him that dyeth as man or as the son of Adam implying that notwithstanding hee may will the death of him that dieth in some other respect without any prejudice to his oath what a senselesse collection and interpretation is this You may as well say God willeth the life of him that liveth ergo farre be it from us to say that hee willeth not the life of him that liveth as he is a man or as he is the son of Adam implying that for all this God may be said not to will the life of him that liveth in some other respect But I say that if God willeth not the death of any man that dieth as you will have it and to be confirmed also with the Lords oath then in no respect can it be said that hee willeth the death of any man that dieth For it is both ad idem death is the same in both and it is secundum idem for we speak of the same man in both and it is eodem modo for we speake of the will of God in the same sense in both and it is at the same time and must be for Gods will is everlasting and therefore willing whatsoever he doth everlastingly he cannot bee said at any time not to will it As for the cause of death and damnation willed by God we maintaine that God willeth not the death of any man or the condemnation of any man but for sinne But I pray what thinke you of infants perishing in originall sin If Goth doth not will their death as the sonnes of Adam how doth he will it Or had you rather shake hands with Arminius in this also and professe that no man is damned for originall sinne onely but that all the children of Turkes and Sarazens and Iewes and Caniballs that die in their infancie are saved and enjoy the joyes of heaven as well as the children of the faithfull You proceede in your devout asseveration and will have it to bee farre from us to thinke
that God should by his secret or reserved will recall any part of his will declared by oath We are so farre from thinking that God recalls any part of his will declared by oath that wee doe not believe that hee doth or can recall any patt of his will that hee hath declared by his bare word And wee thinke it equally impossible for God to lye and to perjure himselfe for he is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Neither when hee kept Abraham from sacrificing his sonne Isaac doe wee say that he recalled any part of his will which he had formerly declared by his word although he commanded Abraham to sacrifice his sonne for Gods will of commandement signifieth onely what God will have to be our duety to doe not what hee hath determined to be done though you confound these usually and that as wilfully and unlearnedly as Arminius himselfe because it serves your turne and advantageth your cause to confound them But looke you to it how you free your selfe from maintaining that God doth recall something which hee hath properly willed and determined to be done For that God willeth the death of no man that dieth you make to bee the word of God confirmed by oath and you understand it of Gods will properly so called and yet you maintaine that God willeth the death of him that dieth though not as man and as the sonne of Adam yet in some other manner which either is flat contradiction or else God doth recall and change his will The last part of your devout asseveration is Farre be it from us to thinke that God should proclaime an universall pardon to all the sonnes of Adam under the seale of his oath and yet exempt many from all possibilitie of receiving any benefit by it Here you seeme to shew your teeth but I had rather understand your meaning for to proclaime pardon to all is ambiguous for it may bee done absolutely as kings on earth grant pardons and usually our kings grant pardons at the end and conclusion of parliaments I doe not thinke this is your meaning for then all should be pardoned for to proclaime pardon is to signifie his Majesties pleasure that hee doth pardon them But if conditionally it is true God proclaimes that whosoever believeth shall be saved this is a knowne truth no man takes exception against it And how doe we exempt any from all possibility of receiving it You will say that this we doe in exempting many from all possibility of performing the condition to wit of believing I answer that your owne opinion is to be charged with this ours is not for you maintain that Pharaoh after the seventh wonder was exempt from all possibility of repentance and the like you avouch of all reprobates and such as have filled up the measure of their sinne which according to your opinion may be many yeares before their death and in the seventh Section following you expresse it thus Having their soules betrothed unto wickednesse such undoubtedly was Ahab that sold himselfe to worke wickednesse and many such like And in this case you professe in your owne phrase that the doore of repentance is shut upon them But wee like not this opinion of yours wee know no measure of sinne nor continuance of sinne that doth prescribe unto the grace of God and forbids the banes of matrimony betwixt him and his Church but that in a due time the power of Gods grace shall breake through all obstacles even through the furious idolatry of Manasses in giving his children unto Devills and that sealed with bloud wherewith hee filled Ierusalem from corner to corner yea and through his sorcery and witchcraft also and through the rage of Saul persecuting Gods saints and making havocke of the Church of God And for as much as wee maintaine it to be possible for every one to believe and repent through Gods grace it is manifest that we exempt no man from all possibility of believing and repenting to wit in consideration of the power of God But in consideration of the power of man wee exempt not many onely but all and every one from possibility of beleeving and repenting by power of nature And dare you avouch the contrary It is apparant that whatsoever you thinke you dare not openly professe thus much And therefore are content to hide your head and lurke under generalities So that the case is cleare that you doe us wrong in saying wee exempt many from all possibility of repenting I say it is a notorious slander for we exempt men from possibility of repenting onely by power of nature and so we exempt not onely many but all and every one from possibility of repenting But perhaps you may say that withall wee maintaine that God doth not purpose to give the grace of faith and repentance unto all but to deny it unto many yea unto most and upon this supposition we exempt them from all possibility of repenting But I pray consider to exempt some from possibility of repenting upon supposition is this to exempt from all possibility without supposition For you have delivered this without all supposition And then the issue is to enquire whether God hath decreed to give the grace of faith and repentance unto all or rather to deny it to many yea to most And dare you affirme that God hath decreed to give the grace of faith and repentance unto all It is apparant you dare not openly professe this and therefore carie your selfe in the clouds without any cleare and distinct proposing of your meaning In S. Pauls daies there was a remnant amongst Israel which are called Gods election Rom. 11. and these had obtained this grace of faith and repentance as there the Apostle signifieth but the rost were hardned And if God hath purposed to give grace unto all you may as well say God hath elected all But the Holy Ghost witnesseth that many are called and but few are chosen Many I say are called not all neither nor the most part as all experience and the histories of the world doe manifest and therefore though God proclaimes in his word pardon of sinne to all that beleeve yet he doth not proclaimethis unto all By the way I observe that whereas you say that God doth proclaime an universall pardon to all the sonnes of Adam under the seale of his oath this of Gods oath which you adde doth draw us to conceive that the meaning of those words As I live I will not the death of him that dies containes this sense in your construction that God will pardon the sinnes of all and since these words as you understand them doe not runne conditionally but absolutely herehence it followeth that according to your opinion God hath sworne absolutely to pardon the sinnes of all men the absurdity whereof I leave to everie mans sober consideration 7. Hitherto you have told us in what matters the distinction of voluntas signi and voluntas beneplaciti cannot
much lesse in their sinnes whereby they bring destruction upon themselves but God delights both in the faith and repentance of his elect and in their salvation But this signification of good pleasure is nothing to the purpose in this distinction for no Schooleman understands it in this sense And I well know Arminius considering the usuall acception of Voluntas beneplaciti amongst Divines professeth he had rather call it Voluntas placiti then Voluntas beneplaciti If such lettice like your lips you may make your selfe merry with them A second extent and accommodation of this distinction of Uoluntas signi and Voluntas beneplaciti you allow of applyed to men after they have made up the full measure of their iniquity and are cut off from all possibilitie of repentance I had thought no man had filled up the full measure of his sinne untill his death like as on the other side no man hath fulfilled the measure of his obedience untill hee hath finished his course as Revel 11. 7. When the witnesses had finished their testimonie the beast that came out of the bottomlesse pit made warre against them and slew them You seeme to speake it of a certaine measure whereupon the doore of repentance is shut upon them and thereupon excluded from all possibility of repentance as here you say it was with Pharaoh especially after the 7. plague upon Aegypt whereupon you have taken great paines to discourse at large in another Treatise which I have well considered and examined your reasons throughout and that following you 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 yet there you confesse that it must have beene so with Pharaoh at Moses first comming unto him yea and was possible to have beene so when he was but 3. yeares old And indeed I doe not see how it can bee avoided but that as many as depart this life in their infancy are excluded from all possibility of repentance But it may be you will apply this only to men of ripe years but by your leave such Pharaoh was not at three yeares old And though God willed Pharaoh to let his people goe and sent Moses and Aaron to him to that purpose yet you say It was no branch of Gods good will and pleasure that Pharaoh should now repent Rather it was his good will and pleasure to have the heart of Pharaoh hardned though you restraine this to Pharaohs condition after the seventh plague for which I see no reason So that in such a case you will have it lawfull for God by his reserved will to recall that part of his will which hee hath declared by his word or oath and therefore as touching your holy asseveration mentioned in the sixth Section it must be restrained to them that have not yet filled up the measure of their sinne as Pharaoh had after the seventh plague For in such a case God may will their death notwithstanding his oath in shew to the contrary For his meaning is this As I live I will not the death of him that dieth that is I will not his death as a man or as the sonne of Adam neither doe I herein deifie Iesuiticall equivocations or mentall reservations for I take libertie to charge that upon mine adversaries and therefore you may well think I would not be so simple as to transgresse in the same kind my selfe And I thinke so too if God had not confounded your wits but it is Gods course and most just to strike with confusion those that build Babel and he makes the Aegyptians to erre in their counsels as a drunken man erreth in his vomite the issue whereof is to defile himselfe and his owne favourites even those that sit next unto him In the same spirit you professe that God did punish Pharaoh for not letting his people goe as though it had beene free and possible for him to repent though indeed in your opinion it was not But Pharaohs case was extraordinary you say and not to be drawne into example But by your leave if God did so but once it is no unjust thing for God to do so oftner and therefore pray looke unto it that whensoever it is your lot to oppose your adversaries in such a point you doe not lay to their charge that they make God to be unjust if not for conscience sake of the truth yet at least for feare of contradicting your selfe As for the Apostles intimation you touch upon by the way that it was an argument of Gods great mercy and long suffering to permit Pharaoh to live any longer upon earth after he was become a vessell of wrath destinated to everlasting punishment in hell I professe I am not so quicke or accurate as to observe any such intimation of the Apostle What if you devised this to make good some fictions of yours to that purpose in another Treatise of yours which I have already weighed in the ballance and found them a great deale too light of worth to move any sober man to concurre with you in opinion thereabouts But whatsoever it be that the Apostle intimates you seeme to expresse strange conceits when you talke of Gods providence in suffering Pharaoh to live longer on earth after hee was become a vessell of wrath destinated to everlasting punishment in hell I had thought every reprobate had beene destinated to everlasting punishment in hell before hee was borne For Gods destination of them is the ordination of his will and that I had thought you had not denied to be everlasting But you referre it to a certaine time as in speciall to Pharaoh after the seventh plague and in speciall to all after they have filled up a certaine measure of iniquitie and shall not men in like sort be destinated to everlasting joies in heaven after they have filled up a certaine measure of obedience And so a little after you tell us that men doe not become reprobates till a certaine measure of iniquitie bee filled up and so in proportion men are not elect till a certaine proportion of obedience bee filled up Yet the Apostle plainly telleth us that the elect are elect of God before the foundation of the world Eph. 1. 4. and consequently so are reprobates reprobated before the foundation of the world for the word election of some doth connotate the reprobation of others Yea Iacob was loved of God before he was borne and was not Esau hated also before he was borne Rom. 9. Did God wait till the measure of Esaus sinnes was full and the measure of Iacobs obedience before he did elect the one and reprobate the other And if destination unto the punishment of hell and on the other side destination unto the joyes of heaven beginne in time after the obedience of some and disobedience of others what is the meaning of predestination for what is that but the destination of some to the joyes of heaven and others to the sorrowes of hell No doubt but if you proceed as you beginne we shall have a
reprobate untill hee hath made up the full measure of his iniquity and that this measure being full God ceasing to love him God is changed for Gods love is an act in God and is made to cease after a certaine time by your doctrine and be turned into hatred More probable it is to say that God hates all men seeing they are borne and bred in sinne untill they are regenerate and grafted into the body of Christ. Yet this is untrue For Gods love is an everlasting love as without end so without beginning If you had distinguished of love as Aquinas doth 1. q. 23. art 4. and said that God may be said to love all things that he hath made in as much as he wisheth some good unto them but for as much as he wisheth not unto them a certaine good to wit eternall life therfore he is said not to love but to hate some your discourse had beene more specious Touching a necessity laid upon them by Gods decree to fill up the measure of sinne Arminius acknowledgeth Deum voluisse Achabam mensuram scelerum suorum implere God would that Ahab should make up the full measure of his iniquity which is as much as to say that God decreed it and the Scripture professeth that both Herod and Pontius Pilate with the Gentiles and people of Israell were gathered together to doe what Gods hand and his will had determined before to be done so then in betraying condemning and crucyfying of Christ they did but that which God determined should come to passe And upon supposition that God will expose any man unto temptation and leave him therein destitute of his grace all which it is but to harden him wee say it is necessary that men shall goe on in sinne without repentance as your selfe acknowledge was verified of Pharaoh after the seventh plague onely wee say this is necessity onely secandum quid and not simpliciter and hinders not our liberty for it is necessary that such a thing should come to passe but not necessarily but contingently and freely like as upon supposition of Gods decree to make the world it is necessary that God should make it but how not necessarily like a naturall agent but freely like a voluntary agent Yet once again to take a view of your uncouth tenents obscurely delivered whē you say Pharaoh did not continue one the same object of Gods decree It is a very strange speech for was not the man Pharaoh the object of Gods decree If he was so continued the same man doth it not follow that he continued the same object of Gods decree notwithstanding his person altered much in the space of his life You may as well say of one of Gods elect as of David and Paul that neither of them continued the same object of Gods decree if the alteration of their natures made them become different objects of Gods decree Nay much more may you say so because farre greater alterations are found in the elect of God then in the reprobate for in the elect there is found an alteration from the state of nature to the state of grace no such alteration is found in the reprobate the reprobate onely growes from bad to worse the elect have growne so too before their calling but by their effectuall calling they are changed and of the children of this world they are made the children of God And after their calling though after the committing of one sinne they fall into another as doe the reprobate yet withall againe they returne unto God by repentance no such alteration is found in the reprobates but still prosiciunt in pejus they grow worse and worse Againe if because the person of a man altereth therefore the object of Gods decree altereth seeing that a mans person altereth not only in the course of manners but in the course of nature from childehood to youth from youth to middle age from middle age to old age as also from health to sicknesse from sicknesse to health therefore the object of Gods decree in this respect altereth also If you say the case is not alike I say you might then have prevented this objection by plaine dealing and told us not onely in what case but why in the case you meane the object of Gods decree altereth whereas wee are now driven to fish it out as well as wee can and bring your opinion to light and set it forth in the proper and distinct lineaments thereof Now the reason of the difference I conceive to be this to wit because God doth not will the death of a man according to his naturalls but according to his moralls and considered in his moralls As if you should say God did not will the death of Pharaoh but of wicked Pharaoh But say I Pharaoh did alwaies continue wicked Pharaoh from his birth to his death never altering from wickednesse to goodnesse and therefore even in this respect he still continued the same object of Gods decree to damne him Perhaps you will further say that Pharaoh as wicked was not the object of Gods decree of condemnation but as having filled up the measure of his iniquity But I say againe from the first time that he thus became the object of Gods decree of condemnation hee still continued the same for your selfe confesse after once they have filled up a certaine measure of iniquity all possibility of repentance is taken from them The last refuge for you is to say that this speech of yours in denying Pharaoh to continue the same object of Gods decree is to be understood not in respect of one and the same decree but in respect of different decrees thus Though Pharaoh were wicked all his life yet he was not all along the object of Gods decree of condemnation but untill he had filled the measure of his iniquity he was the object of Gods decree to save him For in the consequence you acknowledge that God doth unfainedly love all men untill such time as they have filled up the measure of their sinne And accordingly in another Treatise of yours you acknowledge that men may change from the state of the elect to the state of reprobates And immediately before you professe that God from all eternity did not will the death but rather the life of Pharaoh This you might have expressed in plaine termes without faultering but you were loath as it seemes to alienate mens mindes with so foule a Tenent touching the change not of the object of Gods will and decree onely but of Gods verie will and decree also which manifestly appeares by this opening your Tenent though in termes you professe Gods will is immutable and would have your reader conceive that all the alteration is in the object of Gods will and decree not in the will and decree of God himselfe And over and above herehence it followeth that if Pharaoh had died before the seventh wonder for till then he had not filled up the measure
man or what is the effect of this love and I doubt not but when you say God hates them as having made up the full measure of their sinne your meaning is that God wills their damnation and that for this measure of their sin In proportion your answer should be this That God wills the salvation of all men as they are men yet here is very great disproportion for when you say God wills the damnation of men having filled up the measure of their sin I finde herein a manifest difference between the reprobate the elect as touching the cause of damnation and that on mans part namely the making up the full measure of their sin which is found onely in reprobates not in the elect But when you say on the contrary side God wills the salvation of all men as they are men I finde no difference at all betweene the reprobate and the elect as touching the cause of salvation either on mans part or on Gods part for as touching Gods will that passeth you say upon the salvation of all without difference then on mans part likewise there is no difference at all if they are considered onely as men for the reprobates are men as well as the elect To help this you rest not in this consideration of them as men but adde a clause unto it very inconfiderately as touching the forme thus Or at having made up the full measure of their sinne Now the disjunctive argues that these two considerations are equivalent which is untrue for the first consideration proceeds in abstraction from the second But I conceive the weakenesse of your cause urgeth you to take hold of all helpes and thereupon you confound things that differ for in some cases the first consideration usually hath place as when t is said God hateth nothing that hee hath made therefore he hateth not man true say some he hateth not man as man and this distinction seemes plausible to some and therefore you seemed willing to help your selfe with this by the way for it might stirre some propitious effection in a pliable reader But then finding this bed a great deale too short to stretch your selfe thereon you added by way of disjunctive another consideration which is this As not having made up the full measure of sinne And because you rest upon it I thinke good to consider it Now against this I have already excepted on the part of reprobates and in the particular of Pharaoh and argued that then Pharaoh had beene saved had he died before the seventh wonder for till then in your opinion hee had not made up the full measure of his sinne yet we doe not finde that Pharaoh before this time had either faith or repentance Now I will propose another exception on the part of Gods elect Paul never filled up the measure of his sinne for if he had then had hee beene a reprobate but hee was an elect therefore if hee had died immediately after the sâ—oning of Steven hee had beene saved though accessary to his death For he kept the garments of them that slew him as himselfe confesseth In a word all the elect though dying before ever they were called unto faith and repentance should notwithstanding bee saved also My third exception is against the disproportion that neverthelesse is found in these propositions for when t is said God wills the damnation of them that have filled up the measure of their sinne the filling up the measure of sinne is noted here as the cause of their damnation but in saying God willeth the salvation of all not having filled up the measure of their sinne the not having filled up the measure of their sinne cannot be noted as the cause of their salvation And therefore to mend this foule disproportion the Genius of your tenet drives you in conscience to proceede and professe plainely that God willeth the salvation of all men that believe and repent and accordingly God willeth the damnation of all that doe not believe and repent and such indeed alone are they that fill up the measure of their sinn Now herein wee agree with you namely in justifying the truth of both these propositions But like as from the latter it followeth not that God willeth the damnation of all but of some onely namely of those that doe fill up the measure of their sinne and breake not off their sins by faith and repentance so from the former it followeth not that God willeth the salvation of all but onely that hee willeth the salvation of those that believe and repent And if you please further to infer that because perseverance in sinne of infidelitie and impenitencie as they are the meritorions causes of damnation so they are the meritorious causes of the decree of damnation also I thinke I may with as good reason take liberty to inferre from the former that seeing faith and repentance yea and good workes also are the disposing causes of salvation therefore they are to bee accounted the disposing causes of the decree of salvation that is of our election also And so your opinion shall appeare at full and to life in his proper coulors not an haires breadth different either from the Arminian heresie of late or from the Pelagian heresie of old 8 The deductions you speake of in my judgement deserve to be called dictates rather then deductions As for moderne Catechismes you are not the first that nibble at them it is a point of imperious learning now a daies from on high to despise such performances But to speake as a free man the lesse they shall consort with these your deductions as you call them the lesse shall they differ from the truth As for your concurrence with Bishop Hooper in his preface upon the commandements which you glorie of now a second time In this place it is hard if not impossible to discerne by your text what that passage is of Bishop Hoopers which you rest upon with ostentation of your concurrence with him as if your opinions were confirmed by his martyrdome In the close of the second Section of this chapter you told us That it was not every degree of mans hatred or enmity unto God but a full measure of it which utterly exempts man from Gods love and withall that this was observed by Bishop Hooper But in stead of alledging any passage in him to this purpose you referred us there to the fourth paragraffe of this chapter which is this present section Yet concerning that sentence I see a good construction may bee made of it taking love quoad effectum as usually passions are in such sense attributed unto God and not quoad affectum and the chiefest effect of Gods love is salvation Now it is most true that nothing but finall perseverance in sinne doth bereave men of salvation of glory nothing but finall perseverance in sinne stands in opposition to the possibility of grace succeeding in the same subject Now albeit in that which followeth it
not all possibilitie of amendment being taken from him My opinion to the contrary is that no man hath filled up the full measure of his iniquity till death As touching the possibility of amendment I acknowledge none in man without the regenerating grace of God whereby he gives man repentance Neither do I know any time in the course of mans life wherin any man is excluded from possibility of repentance by the grace of God We know God gave the thiefe repentance upon the crosse Our Saviour gives us to understand that God calleth some at the very last houre of the day Paul admonisheth Timothy to carrie himselfe gently towards them that are without 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 if so be God at any time may give them repentance that they may come to amendment out of the snare of the devill by whom they are led captive to doe his will Of old it was wont to be said Inter pontem fontem and the like is usuall amongst us Betweene the stirrop and the ground Mercy I askt mercy I found All this which followeth and which you have transcribed out of Bishop Hooper I finde nothing that contradicteth any of these assertions of mine or that justifieth any of your opposite assertions not in this which immediately followeth thus Every man is in Scripture called wicked and the enemy of God for the privation and lacke of faith and love that hee oweth to God Et impij vocantur qui non omnino sunt pij that is They are called wicked that in all things honour not God beleeve not in God and observe not his commandements as they should doe which we cannot doe by reason of this naturall infirmity or hatred of the flesh as Paul calleth it against God In this sense taketh Paul the word wicked So must we interpret S. Paul and take his words or else no man should be damned In all this I finde nothing to that purpose whereto you alledge it Yet by the way I am not of Master Hoopers opinion in saying that They were called wicked meaning in holy Scripture that in all things honour not God beleeve not in God and observe not his commandements as they should which wee cannot doe by reason of this naturall infirmity c. For all this is verified of the very Saints and children of God here on earth and I doe not finde that the Saints of God in holy Scripture by reason of their infirmities not honouring God not beleeving in God not observing his commandements in such measure as they should as God knowes and our consciences well know that in many things we offend all are therefore called wicked Especially considering that the Greeke word which Master Hooper aimes at and which hee renders by the word wicked in English is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as appeares by his reference to Rom. 5. 8. In this sense saith Bishop Hooper taketh Paul this word wicked when he saith that Christ died for the wicked Now this state noted by S. Paul in these words is not the state of grace but the state of sinne precedent to justification and the state of enmity against God as appeares by the two next verses Much more being justified by his bloud we shall be saved by his life 10. For if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Sonne c. Whereby it is manifest that the state of sinne in which we were when wee were reconciled to God by Christs death was the state of enmity against God And indeed otherwise there were no place for reconcilement which consists in making them friends which before were enemies Neither doe I know any Divine of master Hoopers opinion in construing S. Paul in this manner as if these sinners 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which he cals wicked for whom Christ died were onely such as doe not honour God beleeve in God and observe his commandements as they should which wee know is incident to the very children of God and to the most righteous Saints that are on the earth who yet are never accounted in holy Scripture for ought I know the enemies of God Yet such are they termed for whom Christ died and who S. Paul saith are reconciled to God by the death of his Sonne I willingly grant that Christ died to procure the salvation of none but such as sooner or later should become the Saints of God to honour him beleeve in him and observe his commandements though not in such measure as they should by reason of the flesh which they carie about them still lusting against the spirit and this seemes by this place undoubtedly to be the opinion of Bishop Hooper though he erreth in the interpretation of S. Paul who in this place considereth not what shall be their condition sooner or later for whom Christ died but only sheweth what was their condition when Christ died for them thereby the more to commend the love of God towards us who sent his Sonne to die for us when wee were sinners and reconciled us to himselfe by the death of his Son what time we were his enemies And I am perswaded your selfe are of the same opinion with me in this though I will not say that the evidence of S. Pauls text seemed so plaine unto you this very way I have interpreted it that therefore you concealed S. Pauls passage mentioned by master Hooper thus When he saith that Christ died for the wicked and in the margent referres us to Rom. 5. 8. all which you have handsomly left out to what end I know not But hereby it comes to passe that the reader may be to seeke of that passage of S. Paul in case he have no other meanes to judge thereof then your transcribing it As for the reason of Bishop Hooper to justifie this interpretation of S. Pauls text it is nothing consequent as when he saith So we must interpret Saint Pauls words or else no man should be damned If S. Paul had said Christ died for all the wicked or for all sinners then indeed we should be driven to seeke out some such interpretation of the word wicked or sinners or else none should bee damned But S. Paul doth not say Christ died for all that are wicked or for all sinners but for us sinners his words are these God commendeth his love to us that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us Now he writes unto Christians and for such onely hee died though they were not Christians when Christ died for them but rather in the state of enmity against God And thus to appropriate Christs dying for mankinde doth manifestly appeare to bee master Hoopers meaning as before I shewed albeit he deviates from the right interpretation of S. Pauls Text in the place mentioned by him That which followeth doth in my judgement carie a greater shew of justifying your former assertions and yet but a shew neither as when he saith Now we know that Paul himselfe S.
Iohn and Christ damneth the contemners of God and such as willingly continue in sinne and will not repent Those the Scripture excludeth from the generall promise of grace It may seeme that The contemners of God and such as willingly continue in sinne and will not repent in master Hoopers phrase are the same in your judgement with those whom you account to have filled up the measure of iniquity But what ground have you for that Master Hooper saith not that all such whom he accounts contemners of God and such as willingly continue and sinne and will not repent have hereupon filled up the measure of their iniquitie or that hereupon all possibility of amendment is taken from them these are your assertions they are not master Hoopers Again all contemners of God and such as willingly continue in sinne and will not repent master Hooper saith the Scripture excludes from the generall promise of grace and this he utters without any distinction as well he may to wit for the present and so long as they continue in this their contempt and hardnesse of hart For as much as the promise of grace both for the pardon of sinne and salvation of our soules belongs to none but such as breake off their sinfull courses by faith and repentance But you distinguish betweene such contemners of God and presumptuous sinners and tell us that some of them have arived to the full measure of their iniquity and that there is no possibility of their amendment such as Pharaoh was after the seventh plague others though contemners of God c. yet in this their course of contempt have not filled up the measure of their iniquity such as Pharaoh was before the seventh plague who undoubtedly was a contemner of God before that time and one that willingly continued in sinne and would not repent and of all such you professe that God doth unfainedly love them Now there are no tracks or footsteps of such strange assertions as either of these to be found in Bishop Hooper Of all contemners of God he professeth according unto Scripture that they are excluded from all promise of grace to wit for the present he doth not say God unfainedly loves any of them but as for the time to come he doth not affirme that all possibility of amendment is taken from them Had hee thought so then he should acknowledge them to bee in a desperate condition But hee is so farre from this that hee accounts Desperation to bee a principall let and impediment unto godlinesse chap. 18. fol. 90. The first let saith hee or impediment is desperation when as men thinke they cannot be saved but are excluded from all mercy and a little after Of the contrary nature to presumption is desperation it taketh from God his mercy For when they offend and continue in sinne they thinke there is no mercy left for them and that as in the next sentence he sheweth specially because of custome and long continuance in sinne Then he proceeds saying This discourse and progresse in that knowledge of sinne beareth him in hand that it is impossible to returne unto God This is as much as in your phrase to affirme that all possibility of amendment is taken from him But doth Mr. Hooper justifie this Nothing lesse for this is a maine let or impediment to repentance which he desires to remove out of the way of sinners and to that hee proceeds in this manner Moses saith he like a good Physitian teacheth a remedie against this dangerous disease and sheweth the way unto God declareth that God is full of mercy and ready to forgive and beginneth his oration in this manner unto such as bee afflicted and oppressed with sinne When there commeth upon thee all those things when God hath afflicted thee for thy sinnes and thou returnest unto him with all thy heart he shall deliver thee from captivity and receive thee to his mercy againe Of the which text learne this doctrine that God will alwaies forgive how many and how horrible soever the sinnes bee and learne to feare presumption and to beware of desperation So that hoe acknowledgeth no just cause of desperation no not in respect of custome and long continuance in sinne The next sentence in Mr. Hooper transcribed by you in this eighth Section of yours conteines no more then that which wee all acknowledge Thou seest saith he by the places before rehearsed that though wee cannot believe in God as undoubtedly as is required by reason of this our naturall sicknesse and disease yet for Christ sake in the judgement of God wee are accounted as faithfull believers for whose sake this naturall disease and sicknesse is pardoned by what name soever Saint Paul calleth the naturall infirmity and originall sinne in man This is something concerning the nature of originall sinne in the opinion of Mr. Hooper nothing at all touching a certaine state of sinne wherein all possibility of amendment is taken from a man to which purpose Mr. Hooper is alledged by you in this place Yet because I doe not know what reaches you have in this also I answer that Mr. Hooper speakes of originall sinne as it is found in the regenerate and as it is in them hee calls it onely A naturall sicknesse and disease And indeed when wee are once regenerate wee are no longer dead in sinne no longer estranged from the life of God But herehence it followeth not that Mr. Hooper was of opinion that originall sinne was even in the unregenerate to bee accounted onely A naturall sicknesse and disease and not rather a death in sinne especially considering that the holy Apostle acknowledgeth A law in his members rebelling against the law of his minde and leading him captive to the law of sinne and calleth it A body of death crying out against it and saying Who shall deliver me from this body of death Rom. 7. 1. The last clause as I take it makes more for your present purpose as when hee saith And this imperfection and naturall sicknesse taken of Adam excludeth not the person from the promise of God in Christ except wee transgresse the limits and bounds of originall sinne by our owne folly and malice and either of a contempt or hate of Gods word wee fall into sinne and transforme ourselves into the image of the devill Then wee exclude by this meanes ourselves from the promises and merits of Christ who onely received our infirmities and originall disease and not the contempt of him and his law This passage I confesse is somewhat strange and of my knowledge hath troubled some concâ—iving it as an assertion of yours and not so much as dreaming that it was delivered by Mr. Hooper I answer therefore First of all that this serves not your turne for the present that in two respects First you distinguish the contempt of Godsword and of his law according to different degrees eithersuch as was in Pharaoh before the seventh plague or such as was in
meaning comes to this that God would never have suffered them thus to have walked in their owne wayes and to treasure up wrath against the day of wrath if so be they had repented Now the question is whether they had power to repent or no you seeme to imply they had but you dare not expresse so much because you see how manifestly contradictious that were to the text it selfe where it is expresly said But thou after the hardnesse of thine heart which cannot repent treasurest up wrath against the day of wrath So that you what by taking up pieces of Scripture at pleasure and leaving out pieces as you list make up a patcht coat contrary to the Scripture which yet you commend unto us as Scripture it selfe Nay what will you say if God did not so much as admonish them to repent Doth not the same Apostle plainly signifie so much Act. 17. 30. where hee saith And God regarded not the time of this ignorance but now hee admonisheth all men every where to repent Againe consider I pray you what is to be accounted the time when this ceasure deserved to be fastened upon them namely of despising the riches of his bounty It seemes by your former discourse it is not till they have filled up the measure of their iniquity for till then Gods infinite love was towards them according to your opinion and hee did not give them over to their owne lests Now I pray consider did hee not even afore this time suffer the Gentiles to walk in their own waies according to the Apostles meaning Act. 14. 16. although as the same Apostle saith even at that time Hee left not himselfe without witnesse giving them raine and fruitfull seasons filling their hearts with food and gladnesse And this you take hold of in the next place and tell us that these were unquestionable earnests of Gods everlasting love and to prove it you adde by way of reason for thou so lovedst the world still holding up your deyout Soliloquies as if you would enchant your Readers with an affected straine of devotion that thou gavest thine onely begotten Sonne that whosoever believeth in him should not perish If this be not like capping of verses I doe not know what is for will it follow by any Logicall method that because the giving of Christ for everlasting life to all that believe in him is an evidence of Gods love to all therefore the giving of raine from heaven and fruitfull seasons is an unquestionable earnest of Gods everlasting love to all Yet I grant it is an evidence of Gods love as touching the preservation of their state temporall but you urge it as an evidence of Gods love as touching the state of their soules spirituall and eternall otherwise your discourse were nothing to the purpose Yet to speake according to the Apostles drift in that place hee proposeth them not as witnesses of his love but as of his providence which wee know extends even to bruit beasts and to the very lillies of the field Onely man is capable of deserving this testimony of divine providence and so accordingly should be moved to seeke the Lord and to worship him as God who governes all and provides for all and not as a corruptible thing thus wee interpret the Apostle Act. 14. 16. according to the Apostle Act. 17. 27. and Rom. 1. 23. and not at randome as you doe fashioning his meaning in such a manner as may best accord with your extravagant opinions Lastly who seeth not that if these be unquestionable earnests of Gods love towards them then notwithstanding they have filled up the measure of their iniquity yet Gods love continueth towards them the same still and therefore cannot be said to give them over to their owne lusts and to treasure up wrath against the day of wrath For these and the like temporall blessings they enjoy still and that in greater measure then is usually the portion of Gods owne deare children To conclude this wee make no doubt but that if all and every one should believe in Christ all and every one should bee saved by Christ. But the question is whether God gives faith to all it is apparant he doth not but onely to those whom hee hath predestinated Rom. 8. 30. to those whom hee hath ordained to everlasting life Act. 13. 45. to such as shall be saved Act. 2. last Perhaps your meaning is that though God doth not give faith to all but only to some the reason is because some fit themselves for faith and others doe not And I verily believe this is your opinion but it seemes you are ashamed to professe it and speake it out plainly Yet the texts mentioned are directly against you which confine the giving of faith not to mans disposition but to Gods predestination like as those other also Rom. 9. God hath mercy on whom he will and whom he will hee hardeneth and it is not of him that willeth or of him that runnes but of God that sheweth mercy and 2 Tim. 1. 9. the Apostle professeth that God calleth us not according to our workes but according to his owne purpose and grace To the prosecuting of every which place and making it good against any exceptions that you shall bring I shall be willing to condescend so long as God affords mee life and opportunity But as yet you dissemble your Tenet and play least in sight and discover your meaning onely by insinuation I know there is no greater argument of Gods love then the giving of his Sonne whence it manifestly followeth that unlesse Gods love to reprobates bee as great as his love to his elect Christ was not given to the reprobates like as our Saviour signifieth that Hee sanctified himselfe unto his death and passion not for the world but for those for whom he praied which were partly those whom God had already giuen him and partly those who hereafter should believe through their word Yet I confesse you are audacious enough to resist this argument and openly to professe that Gods love to the reprobate is as great as his love to the elect which no Arminian was ever yet knowne to professe yet you take upon you to prove that this love was tendred to all A strange phrase which I thinke was never heard of before as if love were like an ointment in a box that might be offered and received if a man would Of tendering grace I have heard to wit the grace of remission of sinnes and salvation upon our beliefe but of tendring love I never heard And of the tendring of this grace in Christ unto all that heare it preached who ever doubted For this is no more then to say that It is tendred unto all to whom it is tendred And are you well in your wits to addresse your selfe to the proving of this with some notable argument which should be like a thunderbolt and therefore no great marvell if some great noise preceed it But
still I perceive your meaning reacheth further then you dare as yet to professe for your meaning is to prove that All that heare the Gospell and doe not believe it seeing they shall bee guilty of greater sinne and incurre greater condemnation at the day of judgement therefore they could believe it if they would This is the point that sticks in your teeth and which you dare not openly and plainely professe as indeed it is manifest Pelagianisme and which the Arminians dare not at this day openly avouch but rather professe that no man can believe or repent without grace Whereas yet like as your selfe maintaine that no man in state of nature can doe otherwise of himselfe then sinne yet is he justly condemned for sinning none compelling him in like sort no man of himselfe can believe the Gospell yet hee may be as justly condemned for not believing For as for that naturall impotency unto that which is good which is in all derived unto us from our father Adam that is of it selfe sufficient to condemne us and therefore most unsufficient to excuse us And that impotencie being in all alike the condemnation therefore shall be unto all alike but the increase of it by actuall transgressions which are freely committed is not in all alike for neither doth inclination naturall or tentations spirituall or occasions temporall hinder a mans libertie in doing or refusing to doe any act so likewise neither can it hinder the aggravation of his sinne But neither can this naturall impotency bee cured in any part but by the grace of God habituall neither any good act according to this grace habituall he performed without another grace both prevenient and subsequent actuall If your minde serves you to deale plainly in opposing ought of this you shall not want them that will bee ready to enter with you into the lists and scholastically to encounter you Yet I confesse the providence of God especially in ordering and governing the wills of men is a misterious thing and the operation and cooperation of his will with the operation and cooperation of the will of man But I am a long time inured unto this and now I feare no bugbeares least of all from your selfe with whom I have beene of old acquainted in our private and familiar discourse on these and such like arguments and to tell you plainely my opinion I doubt you have written so much that you have had time to read but litle And truly as for my selfe as I have written little so also I have not read much But in these points I have spent not a little time in searching after truth and examining arguments As for the place of the Apostle Act. 17. 30. it seemes your meaning is it pleads for universall grace now after Christs death yet your selfe immediately before profested that onely they that heare it and doe not believe are guilty of greater sinnes implying manifestly that since Christs death all doe not heare it Yet if you have any other meaning and will deale roundly in propounding it I will be ready to consider this or any other place that you shall bee able to produce to what purpose soever if orthodox in my judgement to subscribe unto it if otherwise to doe my best to confute it 3 In the next place you are so farre from maintaining universall grace that you undertake to give causes why all men in the world have not heard of this love of God in Christ. But these causes to be assigned by you are put off till hereafter and that not of certainty neither you onely say They may bee assigned T is your usuall course to feed your Readers with expectation as it were with empty spoones If you doe not gull them in putting them off to expectation t is somewhat the better The reason you give why many might have heard of Christ which yet have not heard of him and might have beene partakers of his death I thinke you meane of the benefit of his death which yet have not beene partakers of it is starke naught For that evill courses of men cannot hinder them from the participation of Christs death appeareth by the calling of the Gentiles and casting off of the Iewes For were the deeds of Babylon thinke you better then they of Sion Wee Jewes by nature and not sinners of the Gentiles saith the Apostle Gal. 2. 15. The Apostle in divers places puts no difference betweene them that are called and them that are not as touching their manners before grace 1 Cor. 6. 11. Eph. 2. 23. Tit. 3. 23. God sindes us weltring in our bloud when he saith unto us Live Ezech. 16. and Saul was taken off from his bloudy courses to be made a member of Christ. And your doctrine to the contrary tends shamefully to the obscuring and disparaging of Gods grace and to the advancing of the power of nature and liberty of will the trick of the Pelagians of old of whom Austine professed thus Inimici gratiae Dei latent in commendatione naturae The enemies of Gods grace welter themselves under the commendation of nature And Austine professeth it to be impiety and madnesse to deny that God can convert any mans will when hee will and where hee will And you blush not to professe in another discourse of yours that humility is the disposition which prepares us for grace I doubt you will finde little comfort in such humility and that at the day of judgement such humility will be found abominable pride What you meane by pledges I know not you love to walk in cloudes and in the darke if you mean the fruits of Gods temporall blessings how will you prove that these were evidences of that love which God man fested in the death of his Sonne And if it were so then this evidence should be manifested to all of ripe yeares for all are partakers of Gods temporall providence even they that have filled up the measure of their iniquity Yet then you usually professe God withdrawes his love from them but how can that bee if hee afford them the unquestionable earnests thereof as before you called these pledges whereas in the close you say that many are not acquainted with this manifestation of Gods love and that out of meere mercy it may well passe for one of your paradoxes I never doubted but that it was a mercy to know Christ and the love of God to the world in him but that it was a mercy to want Christ I never read nor heard till now Neither is it necessary that men though reprobates should be enraged to evill by the Gospell for God can make even reprobates to profit by it ad exteriorem vitae emendationem quà mitius puniantur To the outward emendation of their lives to the end their punishment may be the milder And we finde by experience that all were not enraged against it CHAP. XVIII Want of consideration or ignorance of Gods unfained love to such as perish a
this Such an hight of sinne implyeth a contradiction to infinite justice to vouchsafe them any favour Now of this proposition of yours I see no reason Nay I seeme to observe manifest reason to the contrary For justice consists in giving to every one his owne Now seeing the wages of any sinne is death even everlasting death Not to condemne him that hath deserved to be condemned seemes as contradictory to justice as not to condemne him that is come to an hight of impiety And which is more many thousand infants perish in Originall sinne and yet we beleive that Manasses who unto Originall sinne added many abominable sinnes was notwithstanding all this saved and will you say there was any contradiction unto Gods justice in all this And I wonder you so much beate upon the contradiction unto Gods justice and take no notice of Gods mercy whereas we doe not consider the pardoning of sinnes as an act of Gods justice but rather as an act of his mercy and without quest on it is not contradiction to Gods mercy to pardon any sinne And God is mercyfull as well as just and it is very absurd in my judgment to say that God in performing an act of mercy contradicts his justice as well as to say that in performing an act of justice he contradicts his mercy And the reason is because it is indifferent to God to exercise eyther his mercy in commiserating whome he will or his justice in hardening whome he will And therefore when the Apostle proposeth such an objection against his former doctrine of election reprobation as this What shall we say then is there any injustice with God He answereth it by this that God is free and hath a lawfull power to exercise mercy and compassion on whome he will God forbid sayth he we should thinke so For he sayth to Moses I will have mercy on him to whome I will shewe mercy and will have compassion on him on whome I will have compassion And yet I pray consider what colour of contradiction to Gods justice in pardoning the sinnes of them be they never so many never so fowle for whome the sonne of God as you say hath suffered the sorrowes of death and therby made full satisfaction for all theire sinnes unlesse you will say that Christ dyed to make satisfaction for originall sinne only and not for sinnes actuall or for some of theire actuall sinnes and not for all to which strange and uncouth opinion You seeme to incline in the end of your 15. Chapter where you say that Christ only receaved our infirmities and originall disease and not the contempt of him and his law I have cause to suspect that you concurre with Arminians in maintayning that all Infants the very children of Pagans Turkes and Saracens that perish in theire infancy are saved For how can it be conceaved that any improvement of evill inclinations is made in them unto such an hight as that it should imply contradiction to Gods justice to shew them any favour And where such an hight of impiety is not you professe they cannot be excluded from all fruits of his love Yet I confesse theire soules have a being and that eternall and if this be a fruit of Gods love then though the hight of impiety be never so greate yet is no man or devill excluded from this fruite of Gods love For they shall continue for ever and that to theire everlasting wo. As touching your manner of expressing your meaning this increase of sinne you call the sinister use of contingency that God hath bestowed upon them your meaning must be the sinister use of the liberty of theire wills which in your phrase is the sinister use of contingency wherof I am perswaded you can give no example And by the way I observe you suppose in every naturall man a power to use the liberty of his will eyther will or ill I had thought and doe still thinke there is no power in carnall man to use theire naturall liberty well but only to use it either in this or that subject but so as still the use of it shall be evill For the affection of the flesh is not subject to the law of God nor can be sayth the Apostle and every man is dead in sinne till God quickneth him Ephesi 2. 2. And a dead man can performe no action of life naturall if dead naturally no action of life spirituall if dead spiritually But whether naturall inclinations unto evill may be thus farre improved in the children by theire Forefathers on no you say is disputable but in another place that is it is a disputable question whether children may not by the sinnes of theire Father be so farre corrupt that it implyeth contradiction to Gods justice to shew them any favour You might as well say it is a disputable question whether there be any God or no For that there should be a God and yet not able to cure the naturall corruption wherein any man is borne is contradiction And if he were then sure he were able to shew them no small favour And as for contradictions to Gods justice there is so litle colour herof in the saving of Infants that on the contrary there is nothing the condemnation of the Sonne of God alone excepted wherin the justice of God is more obscure then in the condemnation of Infants I thinke you have litle minde to come to an accoumpt how you doe accommodate this your doctrine unto Infants yet you must be called hereunto whether you will or no unlesse you clippe the wings of your generall propositions as when you say None can be excluded from the fruits of Gods love untill the improvement of inclinations naturally bent to evill come to that hight of impiety as to imply a contradiction for infinite justice or equity to vouchsafe them any favour Yet by the way you put in an exception concerning Infants and that is in case there be a neglect of duties to be performed to them by theire Elders why doe you not speake plainly and say saving in case they are not baptized And what thinke you in this case Are they damned I cannot beleive you thinke so yet the face of your discourse lookes this way I say I cannot beleive it and that for two reasons The one is because the tenour of your tenet caryeth you rather to maintayne with the Arminians that all children dying in theire Infancy though they dye without the Church are saved My second reason is because herein you should directly contradict the discourse Kinge Iames had with certaine Divines a litle before his death and his apparent profession to the contrary not as his private opinion but as the opinion generally of our Divines whome he had learned in his younger dayes to have censured Austine for his opinion to the contrary as one that was Durus Pater Infantum Now I am so well perswaded of you that I thinke you would not
neyther incident to the divine nature nor to any other imaginable I would we were worthy to know 3. things First who they are whom you oppose in this Secondly what those 3. so grosse transformations are which you speake of out of Austine Thirdly to what end tends all this on which you spend so many words But to take it as we find it No Christian I think ever doubted but that all sinne is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a transgression of Gods law accordingly contrary to the commaundment of God which is usually called the will of God But that any sinne should be committed contrary to the will of God as it is taken for the decree and determination of God I had thought no sober man would have affirmed Austine I am sure plainly professeth that Non aliquid sit nisi omnipotens feri velit vel sinendo ut fiat vel ipse faciendo And albeit Aquinas seemes concealedly to oppose Austine in this in q. 9. 19. art 9. Yet notwithstanding concludeth thus Deus igitur neque vult mala fieri neque vult mala non fieri sed vult permittere mala fieri Ibid. ad tertium Yet I willingly graunt that every sinne is against Gods will and pleasure as it signifieth his pleasure what shall be our dutie to doe which is nothing els but his commaundment And it is as true that herein are no degrees every sinne is equally against the commaundments of God And the will and pleasure of God whereby he will have this or that to be our duty to doe or leave undone hath no degrees For Gods simplicity freeth him as well from composition of degrees as from any other composition But yet some transgressions are greater then others in as much as God may be more or lesse wronged by us or our selves or our brethren It is neyther incident to the divine nature nor to the humane to punish any more then it is ones will and pleasure to punish But to a man it is incidēt to punish for those crimes wherein themselves take delight For a man may be condemned and punished for adultery by them who are adulterers themselves as appeares in those that brought unto our Saviour a Woman taken in adultery For when our Saviour sayd Let him that is amoungst you without sinne cast the first stone at her the text sayth herupon being accused by theire owne conscience they went out one by one beginning at the eldest even to the last Iohn 8. 7. Wherfore you doe overlash in not contenting your selfe to affirme this of the divine nature but extending it to every nature imaginable Agayne what meane you to call that a way wardnesse of men whereof you professe the humane nature is uncapable as namely to be offended at that which doth not offend them What is a wilde manner of discourse if this be not Nothing inferiour in absurdity is that which followeth as when you say that To punish any which doe not contradict theire wills is an injustice scarce incident to the inhabitans of Hell If the Divills punish any as you say they doe doe they punish them for sins committed in contradiction to theire wills And how many Magistrates doe punish even such sinnes wherof themselves are guilty They are bound by law to punish profane swearers to punish drunckerds is it necessary that every such Magistrat should be free from such sinnes themselves But the Divills themselves you say doe not vexe the wicked but the Godly this being a most absurde conceyte at first sight you have taken a course to charme the absurdity of it by adding concerning the wicked Till Gods justice overtake them might you not as well adde concerning the Godly Till Gods will and pleasure is and so farre as his pleasure is the Divill shall vexe them as appeares in the example of Iob But ordinarily in the course of Gods providence who are more vexed by the Divill the godly or the wicked rather Now because it it apparent that in your opinion the Divill torments infernally the damned and hath no power over the Saints of God though they are more prone to vexe the godly then the wicked as you thinke therefore you put your selfe to devise a reason why the Divills torment the damned wheras the sinnes of the damned men were committed only in following the will of the Divill too much But the reason you give is of the wildest and most contradictious nature that ever any I thinke was heard of For the reason you give is this Therfore the Divills cease not to torment them because they can find no ease in tormenting them Whereas if they could finde any case in tormenting them then you say they would be lesse displeased with them and consequently torment them lesse which if it were true the Divills should be as arrant fooles as ever lived as namely in ceasing to doe that by the doing whereof they should finde ease by this supposition of yours And in the meane time you represent unto as a proper modell of Gods providence while you conceave the tormenting of the damned to be put over by God to the will of the Divill as if the dispensation of the degrees of punishment therby to justifie Gods proceeding were remitted to the discretion and equity of those Angells of darkenesse And who I pray shall be the dispenser of that punishment that in justice belongs to the Divills themselves Yet as if you had performed some greate exployte against some body you demaunde bravely Whether they did not rather dreame then thinke of God that some times write as if it were not as much against Gods will to have men dye as it is against mans will to suffer death In writing this you thinke they did rather dreame then thinke on God in writing of the former sure I am you did if not dreame yet thinke of the Divill But which writing yours or theirs be like unto a sicke mans dreame let not the indifferent only but the unindifferent also judge For you show as litle sobriety in the impugning of these in theire writing concerning the will of God then in inventing your former fancies concerning the Divill Is it not by the will of God appoynted that all must dye And is it probable then it should be against Gods will that any should dye O but you speake belike of the second death I answere Is it not as well appoynted by the will of God that all that dye the first death in sinne shall dye the second death of everlasting sorrow as it is appoynted by the will of God that all shall dye the first death And will it not by the same reason follow that looke in what sense it is impossible that any should dye the first death against the will of God in the same sence it is impossible that any should dye the second death against the will of God and if they suffered death as you say to this end that Gods will may be
to be angry But if you take it for voluntas vindicandi this must needs be as everlasting as Gods will and if you deduce any cause herof from the creature you were as good to derive from the creature the cause of Gods will which Aquinas professeth never any man was so madde as to doe And Gods hatred of Esau is in Scripture made suitable to Gods love of Iacob and if this love be the will of election then hatred must be the will of reprobation And if the everlasting purpose of God to give both grace and glory be deservedly accoumpted Gods love why should not the everlasting purposu of God to deny unto others both grace and glory be as deservedly accoumpted Gods hatred You undertake to shew how Love and anger being passions or linkt with passions are rightly conceaved to be in God but I hope you will not attribute them unto God either a◠passibus or linkt with passions For albeit love and joy mans formally be attributed unto God because they include no imperfection yet not as passions saith Aquinas in the place lately alleaged out of him CHAP. XXI How Anger Love Compassion Mercy or other affections are in the divine nature II is true some Schoolemen thinke that distributive justice may be properly enough attributed unto God but not commutative not because this includes rationem dati accepti but rather because it includes aequalitatem dati accepti Yet others are of opinion that justice distributive can be attributed unto God with no greater propriety then justice commutative as may be seene in Vasque 1. in 1. part disput 86. Likewise I know none that thinke mercy is more properly to be attributed unto God then anger For voluntas vindicandi as properly and formally belongs to God as voluntas miserandi that being as easily abstracted from greife as this from compassion As for revenge there is no colour why that should not in greatest propriety be attributed unto God like as also reward To say that affections or morall qualities may be contayned in the divine essence eminently is a very poore justification of them to be the attributes of God For to be eminently in God is no more as your selfe heretofore have explicated it chap. 4. sect 2. then God to be the Author of them and produce them Now in this sense you may attribute the name of any body or beast unto God and say God is such or such a thing is God to wit eminently But who can doubt but voluntas miserandi and voluntas vindicandi are in God not eminently but formally Yet notwithstanding the very will of God is infinitly different from the will of man No passion as a passion is in God though that name which signifieth a passion in man may be truely verified of Gods signifying the nature of God in a certayne reference unto his creatures without all passion So there is a will and understanding in God but nothing like to the will and understanding of man For will and understanding in man are accidents they are not so in God Our anger at the best as being displeased only with such things that displease God though in some litle thing it be like Gods anger yet in many things it is very unlike For it is a passion in us not in God it riseth in us which before was not no such innovation in God Gods anger is vindicative ours ought not to be so but only in case we are his ministers For vengeance is myne I will repay sayth the Lord. I cannot justifie you in so speaking when you say that mercy is more reall and truly affectionate in God then his anger For taking them sequestred from theire imperfections each is formally attributed unto God though not as passions and not eminently only as you have delivered it As for the execution of each more or lesse that receaveth moderation merely from the pleasure of Gods will For he hath mercy on whom he will and whom he will he hardneth and farre more hath he made vessels of wrath amongst the nation of men then vessells of mercy though it be reputed otherwise amongst the nation of Angelis Mercy consists in pardoning sinnes and saving sinners and no passion at all is required unto this in the nature of God but passion enough even unto death upon the crosse in the nature of man person of the Sonne of God The better use men have of reason the lesse are they subject to perturbation but no whit lesse doe they participate of affection for vertues are not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Aristotle hath taught us but the right ordering of them Christs soule was heavy unto the death at the approaching of his passion and wept often before this yet had he never a whit the worse use of reason For all this But no passion at all can be in God for passions rise and fall upon new occasion but no such alteration is incident unto God I know not what you meane by devouring affections They may be concealed or restrained not in a vertuous manner but vitious only to keepe the rankor of theire hearts from discovery as Absolon a long time sayd nor good nor bad to Amnon after he had defloured his sister Thamar he was not any whit the more charitable in that but playd the foxe in waiting opportunity to doe mischeife Likewise when Haman saw Mordecai in the Kings gate that he stood not up nor mooved for him then was hee full of indignation at Mordecai Neverthelesse Haman refrayned himselfe though hee had plotted the destruction both of him and all his natiō To say that passions are moderate in matters which men least affect is as much as to say that affections are moderate in matters which men least affect And indeede affections must needes be moderate when they are least in motion But perpetuall minding of a thing should argue strength of passion in my judgement rather then moderation To my thinkinge now you are in a vaine of writing essayes Yet I find no greate substance of truth in them How secret cariages can be violently opposed I conceave not For if opposed then no longer secret And the more cunning men are the more notice I should thinke they take of violent opposition unlesse they doe apparently see such opposites are like to overshoote or come short which is a very race case and comes ofter into a schollars fancy then into reall practise I finde no greate passion in Achitophel but rather as Caesar came soberly to the ruinating of his country So Achitophel proceeded soberly to the destroying of himselfe To have the mastery of his passions like enough is a greate poynt of pollicy undoubtedly to have a gracious mastery of them is true Christianity not allwayes to restraine them but even profusely to enlarge them whatsoever the World thinkes of them As Moses in the cause of God was mooved so farre as to breake the