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.
serve to point forth the main things of difference and Mistakes Is it not a little provoking that some are so captious that no Minister can preach in the hearing of some of the Freedom of God's Grace of the Imputation of Christ's Righteousness of sole and single believing on him for Righteousness and Eternal Life of the Impossibility of a Natural Man's doing any good Work before he be in Christ of the impossibility of the mixing of Man's Righteousness and Works with Christ's Righteousness in the business of Justification and several other Points but he is immediately called or suspected to be an Antinomian If we say that Faith in Jesus Christ is neither Work nor Condition nor Qualification in Justification but is a meer Instrument receiving as an empty Hand receiveth the freely given Alms the Righteousness of Christ and that in its very Act it is a renouncing of all things but the Gift of Grace the fire is kindled So that it is come to that as Mr. Christopher Fowler said That he that will not be Antichristian must be called an Antinomian Is there a Minister in London who did not preach some twenty some thirty years ago according to their standing that same Doctrine now by some called Antinomian Let not Dr. Crisp's Book be looked upon as the Standard of our Doctrine there are many good things in it and also many expressions in it that we generally dislike It 's true that Mr. Burgess and Mr. Rutherford wrote against Antinomianism and against some that were both Antinomians and Arminians And it is no less true that they wrote against the Arminians and did hate the New Scheme of Divinity so much now contended for and to which we owe all our present contentions I am persuaded that if these godly and sound Divines were on the present Stage they would be as ready to draw their Pens against two Books lately printed against Dr. Crisp as ever they were to write against the Doctor 's Book Truth is to be defended by Truth but Error is often and unhappily opposed by Error under Truth 's Name But what shall we do in this case What shall we do for peace with our Brethren Shall we lie still under their undeserved Reproaches and for keeping the peace silently suffer others to beat us unjustly If it were our own personal concern we should bear it If it were only their charging us with ignorance weakness and being unstudied Divines as they have used liberally to call all that have not learned and dare not believe their New Divinity we might easily pass it by or put it up But when we see the pure Gospel of Christ corrupted and an Arminian Gospel new vanmpt and obtruded on people to the certain peril of the souls of such as believe it and our Ministry reflected upon which should be dearer to us than our lives can we be silent As we have a charge from the Lord to deliver to our people what we have received from Him so as he calls and enables we are not to give place by subjection not for an hour to such as creep in not only to spy out but to destroy not so much the Gospel Liberty as the Gospel Salvation we have in Christ Jesus and to bring us back under the Yoke of Legal Bondage And indeed the case in that Epistle to the Galatians and ours have a great affinity Is it desired that we should forbear to make a free offer of God's Grace in Christ to the worst of Sinners This cannot be granted by us for this is the Gospel faithful saying and worthy of all acceptation and therefore worthy of all our preaching of it that Jesus Christ came into the world to save inners and the chief of them 1 Tim. 1.15 This was the Apostolick practice according to their Lord's command Mark 16.15 16. Luke 24.47 They began at Jerusalem where the Lord of Life was wickedly slain by them and yet Life in and through his Blood was offered to and accepted and obtained by many of them Every believers experience witnesseth to this That every one that believes on Jesus Christ acts that faith as the Chief of Sinners Every man that seeth himself rightly thinks so of himself and therein thinks not amiss God only knoweth who is truly the greatest Sinner and every humbled Sinner will think that he is the Man Shall we tell men that unless they be holy they must not believe on Jesus Christ That they must not venture on Christ for Salvation till they be qualified and fit to be received and welcomed by him This were to forbear preaching the Gospel at all or to forbid all men to believe on Christ For never was any sinner qualified for Christ He is well qualified for us 1 Cor. 1.30 but a sinner out of Christ hath no qualification for Christ but sin and misery Whence should he have any better but in and from Christ Nay suppose an impossibility that a man were qualified for Christ I boldly assert that such a man would not nor could ever believe on Christ For Faith is a lost helpless condemned sinner's casting himself on Christ for Salvation and the qualified man is no such person Shall we warn people that they should not believe on Christ too soon It is impossible that they should do it too soon Can a man obey the great Gospel Command too soon 1 John 3.23 or do the Great Work of God too soon John 6.28 29. A man may too soon think that he is in Christ and that is when it is not so indeed and this we frequently teach But this is but an idle Dream and not Faith A man may too soon fancy that he hath Faith but I hope he cannot act Faith too soon If any should say a man may be holy too soon how would that saying be reflected upon And yet it is certain that though no man can be too soon holy because he cannot too soon believe on Christ which is the only Spring of true Holiness yet he may and many do set about the study of that he counts holiness too soon that is before the Tree be changed Matth. 12.33 34 35. before he have the new heart Ezek. 36 26 27. and the Spirit of God dwelling in him which is only got by Faith in Christ Gal. 3.14 And therefore all this mans studying of Holiness is not only vain labour but acting of Sin And if this study and these endeavours be managed as commonly they are to obtain Justification before God they are the more wicked Works still And because this point is needful to be known I would give you some Testimonies for it Doctrine of the Church of England in her 39 Articles Art 13. Works done before the Grace of Christ and the inspiration of his Spirit are not pleasant to God forasmuch as they spring not of Faith in Jesus Christ neither do they make men meet to receive Grace or as the School Authors say deserve Grace of Congruity Yea
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
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