A VINDICATION OF THE Protestant Doctrine Concerning JUSTIFICATION And of its Preachers and Professors From the unjust charge of ANTINOMIANISM In a LETTER from a Minister in the City to a Minister in the Countrey LONDON Printed for Dorman Newman at the King's-Arms in the Poultrey in the Year 1692. A LETTER FROM A Minister in the City to a Minister in the Countrey about the present Difference concerning JVSTIFICATION YOUR Earnest Desire of Information about some Difference amongst Nonconformists in London whereof you hear so much by flying Reports and profess you know so little of the Truth thereof is the Cause of this Writing You know that not many Months ago there was a fair-like appearance of Vnity betwixt the two most considerable Parties on that Side and their Differences having been rather in practice than principle about Church-Order and Communion seemed easily reconciliable where a Spirit of Love and of a sound Mind was at work But how short was the Calm For quickly arose a greater Storm from another Quarter and a Quarrel began upon higher Points even on no less than the Doctrine of the Grace of God in Jesus Christ and the Justification of a Sinner by Faith alone Some think that the Reprinting of Dr. Crisp's Book gave the first Rise to it But we must look further back for its true Spring It is well known but little considered what a great Progress Arminianism had made in this Nation before the beginning of the Civil War And surely it hath lost little since it ended What can be the Reason why the very Parliaments in the Reign of James I. and Charles I. were so alarmed with Arminiamsm as may be read in History and is remembred by Old Men and that now for a long time there hath been no talk no fear of it as if Arminianism were dead and buried and no man knows where its Grave is Is not the true Reason to be found in its Universal prevailing in the Nation But that which concerneth our Case is That the Middle way betwixt the Arminians and the Orthodox had been espoused and strenuously defended and promoted by some Nonconformists of great Note for Piety and Parts and usually such Men that are for middle ways in points of Doctrine have a greater kindness for that Extream they go half way to than for that which they go half way from And the Notions thereof were imbibed by a great many Students who laboured through the Iniquity of the Times under the great Disadvantage of the want of grave and sound Divines to direct and assist their Studies at Universities and therefore contented themselves with studying such English Authors as had gone in a path untrod both by our Predecessors and by the Protestant Vniversities abroad These Notions have been preach'd and wrote against by several Divines amongst our selves and the different Opinions have been till of late managed with some Moderation to which our being all born down by Persecution did somewhat contribute It is a sad but true Observation That no Contentions are more easily kindled more fiercely pursued and more hardly composed than those of Divines sometimes from their Zeal for Truth and sometimes from worse Principles that may act in them as well as in other Men. The Subject of the Controversie is about the Justifying Grace of God in Jesus Christ Owned it is by both and both fear it be abused either by turning it into Wantonness hence the Noise of Antinomianism or by corrupting it with the mixture of Works hence the Fears on the other side of Arminianism Both Parties disown the Name cast upon them The one will not be called Arminians and the other hate both Name and Thing of Antinomianism truly so called Both sometimes say the same Thing and profess their Assent to the Doctrinal Articles of the Church of England to the Confession of Faith and Catechisms composed at Westminster and to the Harmony of the Confessions of all the Reformed Churches in these Doctrines of Grace And if both be Candid in this Profession it is very strange that there should be any Controversie amongst them Let us therefore first take a View of the Parties and then of their Principles As to the Party suspected of Antinomianism and Libertinism in this City it is plain That the Churches wherein they are concerned are more strict and exact in trying of them that offer themselves unto their Communion as to their Faith and Holiness before their admitting them in the Engagements laid on them to a Gospel-walking at their Admission and in their Inspection over them afterwards As to their Conversations they are generally of the more Regular and Exact Frame and the Fruits of Holiness in their Lives to the Praise of God and Honour of the Gospel cannot with modesty be denied Is it not unaccountable to charge a People with Licentiousness when the Chargers cannot deny and some cannot well bear the Strictness of their Walk It is commonly said That it is only their Principles and the tendency of them to loose Walking that they blame But waying that at present it seems not fair to charge a People with Licentious Doctrines when the Professors thereof are approved of for their Godliness and when they do sincerely profess that their Godliness begun with and is promoted by the Faith of their Principles Let it not be mistaken if I here make a Comparison betwixt Papists and Protestants The latter did always profess the Doctrine of Justification by Faith alone This was Blasphemy in the Papists Ears They still did and do cry out against it as a Licentious Doctrine and destructive of Good Works Many sufficient Answers have been given in to this unjust Charge But to my purpose the Wonder was that the Papists were not convinced by the splendid Holiness of the Old Believers and by the Visible Truth of their holy Practice and their professing that as long as they lived in the Blindness and Darkness of Popery they were profane and that as soon as God revealed the Gospel to them and had wrought in them the Faith thereof they were sanctified and led other Lives So witnessed the Noble Lord Cobham who suffered in K. Henry the 5th his Time above an 100 Years before Luther His Words at his Examination before the Archbishop of Canterbury and his Clergy were these As for that Vertuous Man Wickliff for with his Doctrine he was charged whose Judgment ye so highly disdain I shall say of my part both before God and Man that before I knew that Despised Doctrine of his I never abstained from sin but since I learned therein to fear my Lord God it hath otherwise I trust been with me So much Grace could I never find in all your glorious Instructions Fox's Book of Martyrs Vol. 1. p. 640. Col. 2. Edit 1664. And since I am on that excellent Book I intreat you to read Mr. Patrick Hamilton's little Treatise to which Frith doth Preface and Fox doth add some Explication Vol.
rather for that they are not done as God hath willed and commanded them to be done we doubt not but they have the Nature of Sin So Confession of Faith Chap. 16. Art 7. Calvin Instit Lib. 3. Cap. 15. Sect. 6. They saith he speaking of the Popish Schoolmen have found out I know not what moral good works whereby men are made acceptable to God before they are engrafted into Christ As if the Scripture lyed when it said They are all in death who have not the Son 1 John 5.12 If they be in death how can they beget matter of life As if it were of no force whatsoever is not of Faith is Sin as if evil trees could bring forth good fruit Read the rest of that Section On the contrary the Council of Trent Sess 6. Cannon 7. say boldly Whosoever shall say That all Works done before Justification howsoever they be done are truly sin and deserve the hatred of God Let him be Anathema And to give you one more bellowing of the Beast wounded by the Light of the Gospel see the same Council Sess 6. Can. 11. Si quis dixerit Gratiam quâ justificamur esse tantùm favorem Dei Anathema sit This is fearful blasphemy saith Dr. Downham Bishop of London-derry in his Orthodox Book of Justification Lib. 3. Cap. 1. Where he saith That the Hebrew words which in the Old Testament signifie the Grace of God do always signifie favour and never grace inherent And above fifty Testimonies may be brought from the New Testament to prove that by God's Grace his favour is still meant But what was good Church of England Doctrine at and after the Reformation cannot now go down with some Arminianizing Nonconformists If then nothing will satisfie our quarrelling Brethren but either Silence as to the Main Points of the Gospel which we believe and live by the faith of and look to be saved in which we have for many years preached with some seals of the Holy Ghost in converting sinners unto God and in building them up in holiness and comfort by the faith and power of them which also we vowed to the Lord to preach to all that will hear us as long as we live in the day when we gave up our selves to serve God with our Spirit in the Gospel of his Son If either this Silence or the swallowing down of Arminian Schemes of the Gospel contrary to the New Testament and unknown to the Reformed Churches in their greatest purity be the only terms of peace with our Brethren we must then maintain our peace with God and our own Consciences in the defence of plain Gospel Truth And our Harmony with the Reformed Churches and in the comfort of these bear their Enmity And though it be usual with them to vilifie and contemn such as differ from them for their fewness weakness and want of Learning yet they might know that the most Learned and Godly in the Christian World have maintained and defended the same Doctrine we stand for for some Ages The Grace of God will never want for it can and will furnish Defenders of it England hath been blessed with a Bradwardine an Archbishop of Canterbury against the Pelagians a Twiss and Ames against the Arminians And though they that contend with us would separate their Cause altogether from that of these two pests of the Church of Christ I mean Pelagius and Arminius yet judicious observers cannot but already perceive a coincidency and do fear more when either the force of Argument shall drive them out of their lurking holes or when they shall think fit to discover their secret sentiments which yet we but guess at Then as we shall know better what they would be at so it is very like that they will then find Enemies in many whom they have seduced by their craft and do yet seem to be in their Camp and will meet with Opposers both at home and abroad that they think not of Our Doctrine of the Justification of a Sinner by the free grace of God in Jesus Christ however it be misrepresented and reflected upon is yet undeniably recommended by four things 1 It is a Doctrine savoury and precious unto all ser ous Godly Persons Dr. Ames his observation holds good as to all the Arminian Divinity that it is contra communem sensum fidelium against the common sense of Believers And though this be an argument of little weight with them that value more the judgment of the Scribes and the Wise and Disputers of this World 1 Cor. 1.18 19 20 21. than of all the Godly Yet the Spirit of God by John gives us this same argument 1 John 4.5 6. They are of the World therefore speak they of the World and the World heareth them We are of God he that knoweth God heareth us he that is not of God heareth not us Hereby know we the Spirit of Truth and the Spirit of Error How evident is it that several who by Education or an unsound Ministry having had their Natural Enmity against the Grace of God strengthned when the Lord by his Spirit hath broke in upon their hearts and hath raised a serious Soul-exercise about their Salvation their turning to God in Christ and their turning from Arminianism have begun together And some of the greatest Champions for the Grace of God have been persons thus dealt with as we might instance And as it is thus with men at their Conversion so is it found afterward that still as it is well with them in their inner man so doth the Doctrine of Grace still appear more precious and savoury On the other part all the ungodly and unrenewed have a dislike and disrelish of this Doctrine and are all for the Doctrine of doing and love to hear it and in their sorry exercise are still for doing their own business in Salvation though they be nothing and can do nothing but Sin and destroy themselves 2. It is that Doctrine only by which a convinced sinner can be dealt with effectually When a man is awakened and brought to that that all must be brought to or to worse What shall I do to be saved Acts 16.30 31. We have the Apostolick answer to it Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved and thy house This Answer is so old that with many it seems out of date But it is still and will ever be fresh and new and savoury and the only Resolution of this grand Case of Conscience as long as Conscience and the World lasts No Wit or Art of Man will ever find a crack or flaw in it or devise another or a better answer nor can any but this alone heal rightly the wound of an awakened Conscience Let us set this man to seek resolution in this case of some Masters in our Israel According to their Principles they must say to him Repent and Mourn for your known Sins and leave and loath them and God will have mercy on
understand a dream of being saved by Jesus Christ though they know nothing of him or of his way of saving men nor of the way of being saved by him 2. All Formalists are on their side People that place their Religion in Trifles because they are strangers to the substance thereof 3. All proud secure sinners are against us that go about with the Jews to establish their own Righteousness Rom. 10.3 The secure are whole and see no need of the Physician the proud have physick at home and despise that that came down from Heaven 4. All the zealous devout people in a Natural Religion are utter enemies to the Gospel By a Natural Religion I mean that that is the product of the remnants of God's image in fallen man a little improved by the Light of God's Word All such cannot endure to hear that God's Law must be perfectly fulfilled in every tittle of it or no man can be saved by doing That they must all perish for ever that have not the Righteousness of a man that never sinned who is also God over all blessed for ever to shelter and cover them from a holy God's anger and to render them accepted of him That this Righteousness is put on by the Grace of God and a man must betake himself to it and receive as a naked blushing sinner That no man can do any thing that is good till Gospel Grace renew him and make him first a good man This they will never receive but do still think that a man may grow good by doing good 3. Natural Reason is very fertile in its Objections and Cavils against the Doctrine of the Grace of God And especially when this corrupt Reason is polished by learning and strong natural parts When there are many to broach such Doctrines and many so disposed to receive it is it any wonder that the Gospel Truth makes little progress in the World Nay were it not for the Divine Power that supports it and the promises of its preservation its enemies are so many and strong and true friends so few and feeble we might fear its perishing from the earth But we know it is impossible And if the Lord have a design of mercy to these Nations and hath a vein of his Election to dig up amongst us we make no doubt but the Glory of Christ as a crucified Saviour shall yet be displaid in the midst of us to the joy of all that love his salvation and to the shame of others Isa 66.5 4. I might add the great Declension of some of the Reformed Churches from the purity and simplicity of that Doctrine they were first planted in The new Methodists about the Grace of God had too great an increase in the French Churches And which was very strange this Declension advanced amongst them at the same time when Jansonism was spreading amongst many of the Church of Rome So that a man might have seen Papists growing better in their Doctrine and Protestants growing worse See Mr. Gale's Idea of Jansenism with Dr. Owen's Preface What there is of this amongst us in England I leave the Reader to Mr. Jenkyn's Coleusma and to the Naked Truth Part 4. And if there be any warping toward Arminian Doctrine by some on our side in order to ingratiate themselves with that Church that hath the secular advantages to dispense and to make way for some accommodation with them I had rather wait in fear till a further discovery of it than offer to guess at Lastly It is no small disadvantage this Doctrine lies under from the Spirit of this Day we live in A light frothy trifling temper prevails generally Doctrines of the greatest weight are talked of and treated about with a vain unconcerned frame of Spirit as if men contended rather about Opinions and School-points than about the Oracles of God and matters of Faith But if mens hearts were seen by themselves if Sin were felt if mens Consciences were enlivened if God's Holy Law were known in its exactness and severity and the Glory and Majesty of the Law-giver shining before mens eyes if men were living as leaving Time and launching forth into Eternity the Gospel Salvation by Jesus Christ would be more regarded Object 1. Is there not a great decay amongst Professors in real practical Godliness Are we like the Old Protestants or the Old Puritans I answer That the Decay and Degeneracy is great and heavily to be bewailed But what is the cause and what will be its cure Is it because the Doctrine of Morality and Vertue and Good Works is not enough preached This cannot be For there hath been for many years a publick Ministry in the Nation that make these their constant themes Yet the Land is become as Sodom for all lewdness and the Tree of Prophaneness is so grown that the Sword of the Magistrate hath not yet been able to lop off any of its Branches Is it because men have too much Faith in Christ or too little or none at all Would not faith in Christ increase Holiness did it not always so and will it not still do it Was not the holiness of the first Protestants eminent and shining And yet they generally put assurance in the definition of their faith We cannot say that Gospel Holiness hath prospered much by the correction or mittigation of that harsh-like definition The certain spring of this prevailing Wickedness in the Land is peoples ignorance and unbelief of the Gospel of Christ and that grows by many Prophets that speak lies to them in the Name of the Lord. Object 2. But do not some abuse the Grace of the Gospel and turn it into Wantonness Answer Yes Some do ever did and still will do so But it is only the ill-understood and not-believed Doctrine of Grace that they abuse the Grace it self no man can abuse for its power prevents its abuse Let us see how Paul that blessed Herald of this Grace as he was an eminent instance of it dealeth with this Objection Rom. 6.1 c. What doth he to prevent this abuse Is it by extenuating what he had said Chap. 5.20 that Grace abounds much more where Sin had abounded Is it by mincing Grace smaller that men may not choke upon it or surfeit by it Is it by mixing somthing of the Law with it to make it more wholesome No But only by plain asserting the power and influence of this Grace wherever it really is as at length in that Chapter This Grace is all treasured up in Christ Jesus offered to all men in the Gospel poured forth by our Lord in the Working of Faith and drunk in by the Elect in the exercise of Faith and becomes in them a living spring which will and must break out and spring up in all holy conversation He exhorts them to drink in more and more of this Grace by Faith And as for such as pretend to Grace and live ungodly the Spirit of God declares they are void of Grace
which is always fruitful in good works 2 Pet. 2. and Jude's Epistle The Apostle orders the Churches to cast such out 1 Cor. 5. 2 Tim. 3.5 And to declare to them as Peter did to a Professor Acts 8.20 21. That they have no part nor portion in this matter for their heart is not right in the sight of God though the Doctrine be right that they hypocritically profess But if our Brethren will not forbear their charge of Antinomianism we entreat them that they will give it in justly As 1. On them that say that the sanction of the Holy Law of God is repealed so that no man is now under it either to be condemned for breaking it or to be saved by keeping it which to us is rank Antinomianism and Arminianism both Yea that it doth not now require perfect holiness but indeed what can it require For it is no Law if its Sanction be repealed 2. On them let the charge lye that are ungodly under the name of Christianity And both they and we know where to find such true Antinomians in great abundance who yet are never called by that name And is it not somewhat strange that men who have so much zeal against an Antinomian principle have so much kindness for true Antinomians in practice 3. Let him be called by this ugly name that judgeth not the Holy Law and Word of God written in the Old and New Testament to be a perfect rule of life to all Believers and saith not that all such should study conformity thereunto Rom. 12.2 4. That encourageth himself in Sin and hardneth himself in Impenitence by the Doctrine of the Gospel No man that knows and believes the Gospel can do so What some hypocrites may do is nothing to us who disown all such persons and practices and own no principle that can really encourage the one or influence the other 5. That thinketh holiness is not necessary to all that would be saved We maintain not only that it is necessary to but that it is a great part of Salvation 6. Whoever thinks that when a Believer comes short in obeying God's Law he sins not and that he ought not to mourn because of it as provoking to God and hurtful to the new creation in him and that he needs not renew the exercise of Faith and Repentance for repeated washing and pardoning Lastly That say that a Sinner is actually justfied before he be united to Christ by faith It 's strange that such that are charged with this of all men do most press on Sinners to believe on Jesus Christ and urge the damnation threatned in the Gospel upon all Unbelievers That there is a decreed Justification from Eternity particular and fixed as to all the Elect and a Virtual Perfect Justification of all the Red emed in and by the Death and Resurrection of Jesus Christ Isa 53 11. Rom. 4.25 Heb. 9.26 28. and 10.14 is not yet called in question by any amongst us and more is not craved but that a Sinner for his Actual Justification must lay hold on and plead this Redemption in Christ's blood by Faith But on the other hand we glory in any name of Reproach as the honourable reproach of Christ that is cast upon us for asserting the absolute boundless freedom of the Grace of God which excludes all merit and every thing like it The Absoluteness of the Covenant of Grace for the Covenant of Redemption was plainly and strictly a conditional one and the noblest of all conditions was in it the Son of God's taking on him man's nature and offering it in Sacrifice was the strict condition of all the Glory and Reward promised to Christ and his seed Isa 53.10 11. wherein all things are freely promised and that Faith that is required for sealing a mans Interest in the Covenant is promised in it and wrought by the Grace of it Ephes 2.8 That Faith at first is wrought by and acts upon a full and absolute offer of Christ and of all his fulness an Offer that hath no condition in it but that native one to all Offers acceptance and in the very act of this Acceptance the Accepter doth expresly disclaim all things in himself but Sinfulness and Misery That Faith in Jesus Christ doth justifie although by the way it is to be noted that it is never written in the Word that Faith justifieth actively but always passively that a man is justified by faith and that God justifieth men by and through faith yet admitting the phrase only as a meer instrument receiving that Imputed Righteousness of Christ for which we are justified and that this Faith in the Office of Justification is neither condition nor qualification nor our Gospel-Righteousness but in its very Act is a renouncing of all such pretences We proclaim the Market of Grace to be free Isai 55.1 2 3. It 's Christ's last offer and lowest Rev. 22 17. If there be any price or mony spoke of it is no price no money And where such are the terms and conditions if we be forced to call them so we must say that they look liker a renouncing than a boasting of any Qualifications or Conditions Surely the Terms of the Gospel-Bargain are God's free giving and our free taking and receiving We are not ashamed of teaching the ineffectualness of the Law and all the works of it to give Life either that of Justification or of Regeneration and Sanctification or of Eternal Life That the Law of God can only damn all sinners that it only rebukes and thereby irritates and increaseth sin and can never subdue it till Gospel Grace come with power upon the heart and then when the Law is written in the heart it is copyed out in the life That we call men to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ in that case the first Adam brought them to and left them in in that case that the Law finds and leaves them in guilty filthy condemned out of which case they can only be delivered by Christ and by believing on him That we tell Sinners that Jesus Christ will surely welcome all that come to him and as he will not cast them out for their sinfulness in their Nature and by past Life so neither for their Misery in the want of such Qualifications and Graces that he only can give That we do hold forth the Propitiation in Christ's Blood as the only thing to be in the eye of a man that would believe on Christ unto justification of Life and that by this faith alone a sinner is justified and God is justified in doing so That God justifieth the Vngodly Rom. 4.5 neither by making him godly before he justifie him nor leaving him ungodly after he hath justified him But that the same Grace that justifies him doth immediately sanctifie him If for such Doctrine we be called Antinomians we are bold to say that there is some ignorance of or prejudice at the known Protestant Doctrine in the hearts of the
by an Ignorant Flattering Minister though it may be the poor creatures never did in the whole course of their Life nor at their Death imploy Jesus Christ so much for an Entry to Heaven purchased by his Blood and only accessible by Faith in him as a poor Turk doth Mahomet for a Room in his Beastly Paradise How common and fearful a thing is this in this Land and City When we come to deal with a poor awakened sinner who seeth his lost state and that he is condemned by the Law of God we find the same Principles working in him for they are Natural and therefore Universal in all Men and hardly rooted out of any We find him sick and wounded we tell him where his Help lies in Jesus Christ what his proper work is to apply to him by Faith What is his Answer Alas saith the Man I have been and am so vile a sinner my heart is so bad and so full of Plagues and Corruptions that I cannot think of believing on Christ But if I had but Repentance and some Holiness in Heart and Life and such and such gracious Qualifications I would then believe When indeed this his Answer is as full of Nonsense Ignorance and Pride as words can contain or express They imply 1. If I were pretty well recovered I would imploy the Physician Christ 2. That there is some hope to work out these good things by my self without Christ 3. And when I come to Christ with a Price in my hand I shall be wellcome 4. That I can come to Christ when I will So ignorant are people Naturally of Faith in Jesus Christ and no Words or Warnings repeated nor plainest Instructions can beat into mens heads and hearts that the first coming to Christ by Faith or believing on him is not a believing we shall be saved by him but a believing on him that we may be saved by him And it is less to be wondered at that ignorant people do not when so many learned men will not understand it When we deal with a Proud Self-Righteous Hypocrite we find the same Principles of Enmity against the Grace of the Gospel A Profane Person is not so enraged at the rebukes of Sin from the Law as these Pharisees are at the discovery of their ruin by Unbelief They cannot endure to have their Idol of Self Righteousness touched neither by the Spirituality of God's Law that condemns all Men and all their Works while out of Christ nor by the Gospel which Reveals another Righteousness than their own by which they must be Saved but they will have God's Ark of the Covenant to stand as a Captive in the Temple of their Dagon of Self-Righteousness until the Vengeance of God's despised Covenant over throw both the Temple and Idol and Worshippers There is not a Minister that dealeth seriously with the Souls of Men but he finds an Arminian Scheme of Justification in every unrenewed Heart And is it not sadly to be bewailed that Divines should plead that same Cause that we daily find the Devil pleading in the Hearts of all Natural Men And that instead of casting down 2 Cor. 10.4 5. they should be making defences for such strong holds as must either be levelled with the dust or the Rebel that holds them out must eternally Perish It is no bad way of Studying the Gospel and of attaining more Light into it that may be us'd in dealing particularly with the Consciences of all sorts of Men as we have occasion More may be learned this way than out of many large Books And if Ministers would deal more with their own Consciences and the Consciences of others in and about these Points that are most properly Cases of Conscience we should find an increase of Gospel-Light and a growing fitness to Preach aright as Paul did 2 Cor. 4.2 By manifestation of the Truth commending our selves to every mans Conscience in the sight of God Let us keep up in our Hearts and Doctrine a reverend regard of the Holy Law of God and suffer not a reflecting disparaging word or thought of it The Great Salvation is contrived with a Regard to it and the satisfaction given to the Law by the Obedience and Death of Christ our Surety hath made it glorious and honourable more than all the Holiness of Saints on Earth or of the Glorified in Heaven and than all the Torments of the Damned in Hell though they do also magnifie the Law and make it honourable But if men will teach that the Law and Obedience unto it whether perfect or sincere is the Righteousness we must be found and stand in in our pleading for justification they neither understand what they say nor whereof they affirm 1 Tim. 1.7 They become Debters to it and Christ profits them nothing Gal. 2 21. and 5.2.5 And we know what will become of that man that hath his Debts to the Law to pay and hath no Interest in the Suretys Payment Yet many such offer their own Silver which whatever coin of Man be upon it is reprobate and rejected both by Law and Gospel Let us carefully keep the bounds clear betwixt the Law and Gospel which whosoever doth is a right perfect Divine saith blessed Luther in his Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians A Book that hath more plain sound Gospel than many Volumes of some other Divines Let us keep the Law as far from the business of Justification as we would keep Condemnation its contrary For the Law and Condemnation are inseparable but by the Intervention of Jesus Christ our Surety Gal. 3.10 14. But in the practice of Holiness the fulfilled Law given by Jesus Christ to Believers as a Rule is of great and good Use to them as hath been declared Lastly Be exact in your Communion and Church Administrations If any walk otherwise than it becometh the Gospel if any abuse the Doctrine of Grace to Licentiousness draw the Rod of Discipline against them the more severely that ye know so many wait for your halting and are ready to speak evil of the Ways and Truths of God The Wisdom of God sometimes orders the Different Opinions of Men about his Truth for the clearing and confirming of it while each side watch the extreams that others may be in hazard of running into And if controversie be fairly and meekly managed this way we may differ and plead our Opinions and both love and edifie them we oppose and may be loved and edified by them in their Opposition I know no fear possesseth our side but that of Arminianism Let us be fairly secured from that and as we ever hated true Antinomianism so we are ready to oppose it with all our might But having such grounds of jealousie as I have named and it s well known that I have not named all men will allow us to fear that this Noise of Antinomianism is raised and any advantage they have by the Rashness and Imprudence of some Ignorant Men is
Contrariety Inconsistency and Incompatibility betwixt these two But the Nature of the things in themselves and the sense and conscience of every serious person doth witness to the same that our own Righteousness and Christs Righteousness do comprehend all the pleas of men to Justification one or other of them every man in the world stands upon and that they are inconsistent with and destructive one of another in justification if a man trust to his own Righteousness he rejects Christs if he trusts to Christs Righteousness he rejects his Own If he will not reject his own Righteousness as too good to be renounced if he will not venture on Christs Righteousness as not sufficient alone to bear him out and bring him safe off at God's Bar he is in both a convicted Unbeliever And if he endeavour to patch up a Righteousness before God made up of both he is still under the Law and a despiser of Gospel-Grace Gal. 2.21 That Righteousness that justifies a Sinner consists in aliquo indivisibili and this every man finds when the case is his own and he serious about it 5. These different Sentiments about Justification have been at all times managed with a special Acrimony They that are for the Righteousness of God by Faith in Jesus Christ look upon it as the only foundation of all their hopes for eternity and therefore cannot but be zealous for it And the contrary side are as hot for their own Righteousness the most admired and adored Diana of proud Mankind as if it were an Image fallen down from Jupiter when it is indeed the Idol that was cast out of Heaven with the Devil and which he hath ever since been so diligent to set up before sinful men to be worship'd that he might bring them into the same condemnation with himself And by true Sin and false Righteousness he hath deceived the whole world Rev. 12.9 6. As the Holy Ghost speaking in the Scriptures is the Supreme and Infallible Judge and Determiner of all Truth So where he doth particularly and on purpose deliver any Truth there we are specially to attend and learn And tho in most points of Truth he usually teacheth us by a bare Authoritative Narration yet in some Points which his Infinite Wisdom foresaw special Opposition to he doth not only declare but debate and determine the Truth And the Instances are two especially One is about the Divinity of Christ's Person and Dignity of his Priesthood reasoned argued and determined in the Epistle to the Hebrews The other is about Justification by Faith exactly handled in the Epistles to the Romans and to the Galatians In the former of these two the Doctrine of free Justification is taught us most formally and accurately And tho we find no Charge against that Church in Paul's time or in his Epistle for their departing from the Truth in this Point yet the Wisdom of the Holy Ghost is remarkable in this That this Doctrine should be so plainly asserted and strongly proved in an Epistle to that Church the pretonded Successors whereof have Apostatized from that Faith and proved the main Asserters of that damnable Error of Justification by Works That to the Galatians is plainly written to cure a begun and obviate a full Apostasy from the purity of the Gospel in the point of Justification by Faith without the Works of the Law And from these two Epistles if we be wise we must learn the Truth of this Doctrine and expound all other Scriptures in a harmony with what is there so setly determined as in Foro contradictorio Lastly It is not to be denied nor concealed That on each side some have run into Extreams which the generality do not own but are usually loaden with The Papists run high for Justification by Works yet even some of them in the Council of Trent discoursed very favourably of Justification by Faith The Arminians have qualified a little the grossness of the Popish Doctrine in this Article And some since have essayed to qualifie that of the Arminians and to plead the same cause more finely Again some have run into the other extream as appeared in Germany a little after the Reformation and some such there have been always and in all places where the Gospel hath shined and these were called Antinomians But how unjustly this hateful Name is charged upon the Orthodox Preachers and sincere Believers of the Protestant Doctrine of Justification by Faith only who keep the Gospel-midst betwixt these two Rocks is the design of this Paper to discover What we plead for is in summ That Jesus Christ our Saviour is the fountain opened in the House of David for Sin and for Vncleanness wherein only men can be washed in Justification and Sanctification And that there is no other fountain of mans devising nor of God's declaring for washing a Sinner first so as to make him fit and meet to come to this to wash and to be clean As for In herent Holiness Is it not sufficiently secured by the Spirit of Christ received by Faith the certain Spring and Cause of it By the Word of God the plain and perfect Rule of it By the declared necessity of it to all them that look to be saved and to justifie the sincerity of a mans Faith Unless we bring it in to Justification and thereby make our own pitiful Holiness sit on the Throne of Judgement with the precious blood of the Lamb of God Though I expect that a more able hand will undertake an Examination of the New Divinity yet to fill up a little room I would speak somewhat to their Achillaean Argument that is so much boasted of and so frequently insisted on by them as their Shield and Spear Their Argument is this That Christ's Righteousness is our Legal Righteousness but our own is our Evangelical Righteouness that is when a Sinner is charged with Sin against the Law of God he may oppose Christ's Righteousness as his Legal Defence But against the Charge of the Gospel especially for Unbelief he must produce his Faith as his Defence or Righteousness against that charge With a great deference to such Worthy Divines as have look'd on this as an argument of weight I shall in a few words effay to manifest that this is either a saying the same in other odd words that is commonly taught by us or a Sophism or a departing from the Protestant Doctrine about Justification 1. This Argument concerns not at all the Justification of a Sinner before God For this end no more is needful than to consider what this charge is against whom it is given and by whom The charge is said to be given in by God and a charge of Unbelief or disobeying the Gospel But against whom Is it against a Believer or Unbeliever And these two divide all mankind If it be against a Believer it is a false charge and can never be given in by the God of Truth For the Believer is justified already