Selected quad for the lemma: grace_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
grace_n	adam_n	covenant_n	fall_n	2,656	5	9.6090	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A45134	A letter to George Keith concerning the salvability of the heathen together with a testimony to the same doctrine, as long held and not newly taken up, out of several former books of him that writ it / by J.H.	Humfrey, John, 1621-1719.; Keith, George, 1639?-1716.	1700 (1700)	Wing H3684; ESTC R25550	27,967	37

them There is one thing remains which I remember you offered that requires some more large Considerations and it is this That though you were willing to allow that some Heathen may be saved you deny it to be by Covenant but only uncovenanted Mercy and you cited the Bishop of Salisbury for it That excellent Person Bishop Burnet in his Exposition of the Eighteenth Article of the Church which pronounces an Anathema to them that hold any Man may be saved by the Law or Sect he Professeth unless he be a Christian which seems to be the sense of the Article distinguishes between the word By and In. To be saved by a Law or Sect saith he signifies that by the Virtue of that Law or Sect such Men as follow it may be saved Whereas to be saved in a Law or Sect imports only that God may extend his Compassion to Men that are engaged in a false Religion And this he appears to own as not condemned by the Article The ingenuous Bishop proceeds And seeing Faith in Christ is in the Gospel required as necessary to Salvation there is no question he says to be made but that those that have the Gospel preached to them and believe not in him must be Damned The difficuly is only concerning those who never heard of the Christian Religion Here then the Bishop distinguishes again of Men in the Law and without the Law in the words of the Apostle that is between the Jew and Gentile Christian and Heathen and for the last though they have not the Law written they have it in their Hearts and shall be judged according to their Consciences This is fair but seeing Pardon of Sin is limited as he speaks to believing in Christ and Salvation is only through Christ's Name according to Scripture he distinguishes again thus It is on the account of the Death or Sacrifice of Christ that Men are Pardoned or Saved but it 〈◊〉 not so plainly ●aid that no Man can be saved unless he hath an ●●p●icit Know●●●g● o● 〈◊〉 together with a belief of it That is in effect the same I said before that the Redemption we have by Christ and the Knowledge of him is not to be reckoned Commensurate yet it is but unwarily said of him or too warily as one that is in the Water and feels not a bottom for his feet that Pardon of Sin is positively limited to believing in Christ and thereupon to be forced to mince the matter thus It is not so plainly said in the words fore-going Whereas Pardon of Sin is limited to a believer in Christ only as to such as have had a Preacher as is before understood by himself But the explicit Knowledge of Christ as the Gospel reveals him is not at all required of an Heathen Man nor of any Man as of necessity to Salvation before Christ came Upon this supposition then that this is not so clearly said in Scripture as the other he comes to another Distinction which he says is to be made as that which will clear the matter and all difficulties in it A great difference says he I will cite all his words is to be made between a Foederal certainty of Salvation secured by the Promises of God and of this new Covenant in Christ Jesus and the extent to which the Goodness and Mercy of God may go None are in a Foederal State of Salvation but Christians To them is given the Covenant of Grace and to them the Promises of God are made and offered so that they have a certainty of it upon their performing those Conditions that are put in the Promises All others are out of this Promise to whom the Tydings of it were never brought In this which is said by this worthy Bishop there is thus much of Truth to be acknowledged and noted That no Heathen or Jew under their Dispensations had or could have such certainty upon their turning to God so as to draw near to him in full assurance of Faith that they should be accepted and saved as Christians have or may have upon the Revelation of Jesus Christ and for that reason if there were no other the Dispensation the Christian is under is better than that of the Jew or Heathen to reflect again on your Objection before But to speak more fully to this matter otherwise I think fit to remember the Doctrine commonly received I suppose even by you and the Bishop if it be not out of your Minds There is a double Covenant the Covenant of Works and the Covenant of Grace The Covenant of Works was made with Adam in Innoceney which he broke and none can keep to be saved by it There is therefore the Covenant of Grace which was made with Adam faln in the Promise of the Seed of the Woman that is of a Redeemer and of Salvation upon the terms of it There is a Government consequently arises to God from the right of Redemption and that must be by this Law or Covenant seeing the other is of impossible performance There is no Government but by a Law and that must be such as the Subject is in a capacity of reward by the keeping as of punishment by the breaking it or else it is not righteous and meet There is a diverse Administration therefore of this Covenant or Law of Grace according to the Revelation God hath made of his Will to the Sons of Men. What God reveals as his Will must be believed and obeyed Under the Administration of this Covenant to us Christians God's whole design of Redeeming and Saving us by his Son is fully revealed and accordingly a Faith in him dying for our Sins and rising again for our Justification is required of us as necessary to our Salvation Under the Jewish Dispensation they believed a Messiah to come and some Deliverance by Worldly Pomp and Conquest Acts 1.6 but as for the Salvation of their Souls by his dying for them or making Satisfaction to God for their Sins by the Sacrifice of himself on the Cross they understood nothing as appears by the Disciples aforesaid Then he took the Twelve and said unto them Behold we go up to Jerusalem and all things that are written by the Prophets concerning the Son of Man shall be accomplished They shall put him to Death and the third Day he shall rise again And they understood not these things and this saying was hid from them neither knew they the things which were spoken Likewise it appears as much by their Rulers and Chiefest among them For they that dwell at Jerusalem and their Rulers because they knew him not nor yet the Voice of the Prophets which are read every Sabbath day they have fulfilled them in condemning him As for the Ancients before Abraham and Moses what Revelation they had of God's Will Who can tell A Law they had written in their Hearts which proves a Lawgiver and they had Tradition They believed a God and that he was gracious to forgive the Sinner

Man according to his present State so long as it is performed in Sincerity of Heart towards God and is called the Law of Grace As Man in Innocency had the Notices of the most Holy God and his Duty writ in his Heart or could gather it from the Light of his Reason being to live perfectly in that State So must the World after Man's fall and the loss of his Innocency have some the Like Notices implanted there or arising naturally from the Exercise of his Faculties that God is good and merciful and will not punish him if he Repent but consider him according to his frail Condition and consequently that he must now have no Government at all over him for Life and Salvation or else that he must be under another Law than that of Innocency or under other Conditions in obeying it for else must every Man on the Earth Everlastingly Perish Upon what account or upon what ground the Righteousness of God could stand in dealing with Man when fallen by another Law than that at first implanted in him in Innocency was a Mystery hidden from the Foundation of the World and not revealed but Darkly till the times of the Gospel But the Belief that God was good and would pardon the Sinner upon his Repentance though they could not tell how or upon what ground it was the way of Reconciliation through Christ being beyond the Ken of all Humane Understanding was General in the World as does appear in particular by the Ninevites as also by the Sacrifices for appeasing the Deity which have been in use in all Nations Not but they all are under the same Law as Adam was the Law that was for our Nature cannot be altered but we are not under it upon the same terms We are under it so as we are bound to live according to it but we are not under it so as to be Justified or Condemned by it We are under it as a Rule of Life but not under it as the Rule of Judgment There is One Religion therefore Law or Rule for all Mankind to obtain Life by which being the Law of our Lapsed Nature or Remedying Law containing God's Grace administred to all the Earth in a threefold State of such as were or are without the Law or before it and under the Law and under the Gospel As this Administration is threefold so hath the Faith which is the Condition thereof been diversifyed But now is the Righteousness of God revealed from Faith to Faith The Righteousness of God is the Righteousness of this Law which hath ever been a-foot in the World And though a Heathen hath not that Faith as is required of the Christian in the Third Edition of it or that which was required of the Jew under the Second yet hath he such a Faith as belongs to the First such as the Ancients before Abraham had And so long as that Faith he has does work by Love or by sincere Obedience to God according to the Light he has it will justifie him as well as that which is now farther required of us under the Gospel It follows that this Law being that which is given for Life and so the one only true Measure of Religion to all the World must belong to the Government of God which is Universal and that is the Natural Government of God The Government of God which is Conventional is that Government which he hath taken over some certain Persons as they are gathered or joyned together in Societies unto which they are called out from the World for the Glorifying his Name in that Worship or Service of him which he hath instituted by his Positive Law Precepts Ordinances I mean such as he hath any ways revealed to be his Will whether they be such as belong to the Law of Nature also or such as do not in order to the taking owning and acknowledging him for their God in a peculiar manner that is in opposition to the Worship of any other God or Idols and the serving him the true God in any other way but what he hath appointed and their becoming thereby a Peculiar People to him and so being under his Favour and Blessing in regard to all the good things of this Life and that which is to come I do observe here the Government of God which is Natural is over all the World This Government which is Conventional is over some Persons only called out of the World into a peculiar Relation to God That the One is over all but considered as single Persons taking in every Individual in the World the Other over some and so over Singulars also but considered as Incorporated for the publick Service of God That the One Government is by the Law of Nature I mean both of Lapsed and Innocent Nature The Other is by his Positive and Revealed Laws That these Laws and Ordinances of God therefore which he hath revealed as they are more and as they are revealed otherwise or farther than by the Light of Nature or Natural Reason only are a high Priviledge to such as they are vouchsafed to What advantage then hath the Jew above the Gentile Much every way chiefly because unto them was committed the Oracles of God Rom. 3.1 2. He hath shewed his Mind to Jacob his Statutes and Judgments unto Israel He hath not dealt so with any other Nation Ps 147.19 20. This giving to a People his Oracles or Positive Institutions are advantagious upon this account That they are means for obtaining his Blessing or else there could be no such advantages in them This Blessing of God must be look'd on not only to concern Temporal things but Spiritual and Eternal For seeing Man consists of a Body and a Soul and that Soul is Immortal he cannot be blessed but in both and the great and principal Advantage therefore that we have by these Ordinances or Government of God which is Conventional must and does lie in being Means for the bringing Men up to the performance of the Terms of that Law which God by his Government that is Natural and Universal hath made to be the Rule of Judgment to all Men for Everlasting Life or Condemnation Thus much as Introductory out of that Book I come now to another Out of a Book call'd Peaceable Disquisitions There is a threefold Government in one to speak accurately that God hath had in the World over Man in reference to his chief end the Salvation of his Soul The first was by the Law of Nature the second by the Law of Moses and the third by the Law of Christ Before God gave his Law unto Israel the whole World was under that Law which is written in the Heart God must govern Man by that only when there was no other This Law now writ in Man's Heart we are to know is two-fold for Nature coming under a double Consideration as Entire and as Fallen the Law must be double the Law of Innocent Nature or Law of

hath but one Anathema in all her Articles and that seems to be denounced here against all those who do or shall hold that any Persons can be saved that are not Christians by Profession as if the Death of Christ or the Benefits thereof and the Knowledge of him were Commensurate through the World But God forbid I am out of doubt that God hath a Government over all Mankind which is Moral in order to Life or Salvation and that the Instrument of that Government must be the Law of Grace the Law of Innoceney becoming in the State of Lapsed Nature uncapable to that end which being at first Promulgated to Adam after his Fall and to Noah must belong to all his Posterity insomuch as every one whosoever he be that lives up in sincerity to this Law according to the Administration of it he is under shall be saved For my Assent then to this Article I do desire the word By may be especially noted I could not assent to this Article if it were In in the Law or Sect he professeth but being By I hold plainly that if an Heathen or any Person that never heard the Gospel repents of his Sins and trusts to a good God and so lives up to the Law or Covenant of Grace according to the first Edition of it I say if any such indeed do Rom. 2.26 Acts 10.35 and thereby comes to be saved it is by the Christian Religion which he implicitly holds in Substance with us and not by the Law and Sect he professeth that he is saved And this Salvation of his is in and through the Name and Mediation of Jesus Christ no less than ours is who procured that Law for them and all the World as well as for Abraham and the Jews under the Old and for us under the New Testament A Note hereupon Note here that the Writer of this being a Non-conformist Minister Episcopally Ordained and holding Communion with his Parish-Church as the old Non-conformists did thought good to make a Trial for the recovery of the use of his Ministry in Preaching an Occasional Sermon when called though without Benefice or Emolument which requires farther Compliance did in order to obtain a License unto which an Approbation of the Thirty nine Articles is required by the Uniformity-Act propose a Subscribing to them with a Liberty of Explication if that might be granted his Judgment being That as all Impositions are to be taken in the Sense of the Imposers these Articles must be taken in the Sense of the Compilers or at least he must be construed so to take them if he did Subscribe them without that liberty first granted and declared Upon this account he made for himself his Explications of all the Articles he scrupled and the Bishop of Salisbury hath light upon the same Explication of this Eighteenth Article which is cited before as he Only this difference must be observed That this Explications is reckoned satisfactory in point of Conscience by him upon the supposition of a Liberty of Explication to be first granted but the Bishop proposes this Explication as satisfactory to a Clergy-Man for his Subscribing without the grant to him of a Liberty to make it There have been great Divines who looking on the Articles to be Articles for Peace and not Articles of Faith have thought it enough for their Subscription to them that they engage to bear with and not contradict them This worthy Bishop therefore does honestly show that this is a Sense too loose for the Clergy-Man who is to declare That what he Subscribes is his Opinion and is bound to take every Arti●●e in the Literal and Grammatical Sense of it as is enjoyned by the King's Declaration before the Articles Upon this account the Bishop's distinction between the words By and In is proper as easy if the Authentick Sense be not to be stood upon but a Literal and Grammatical Construction altogether I would fain therefore ask the Bishop whether a Literal and Grammatical Construction can be made to salve all the other Articles as well as this I will propose two words in two Articles The one is that word thorowly in the Eighth Article The three Creeds ought Thorowly to be received and believed If Thorowly then in every part then the beginning the middle and the end of the Athanasian Creed must be believed then must the Proem and the Conclusion be believed Does the Bishop believe so If he indeed does not then is that fair Grammatical Literal come-off to no purpose in the Eighteenth Article when he is gravell'd in the same matter in the Eight The common Answer says the Bishop of the most eminent Men of the Church is That these Expressions are only to be understood to relate to those who having the means of Instruction offered them have rejected them Upon such as do thus reject this great Article of the Christian Doctrine concerning One God and Three Persont and that other concerning the Incarnation of Christ are these Anathemaes denounced This is well exceeding well but is this a Literal Gramatical Construction Will the word thor●●ly so Literally and Grammatically be thus expounded The other word I have to propose is the word Only in the Eleventh Article That we are Justified by Faith Only is a wholsome Doctrine In the Literal Grammatical Construction this cannot be subscribed because it is Litterally and Grammatically contrary to St. James who says Not by Faith only but by Works also In the Authentick Sense one may believe the Compilers meant by Only what Paul says By Faith without Works which by distinguishing Works may be reconciled to St. James If the Articles then must be subscribed in the Literal Grammatical Sense what shall we do with them Subscribe them we cannot Why they must be let alone The Truth is these Articles if conscienciously Subscribed must be Subscribed in the Authentick Sense or Meaning of the Church and so of the Compilers and that construed Literally and Grammatically which makes them the harder They may remain therefore as standing still for the Articles of the Church but without the Injunction of her Sons to Subscribe them For no Man of a free Judgment that will Subscribe nothing but what he understands and believes will be able to bring his Ego libenter ex animo to do it O quando Oh when will the time come that we may have an Act for Comprehension which may provide for the forbearance of such Subscriptions Declarations and Oaths that the largest Exposition that can be made of them does but render a Noli me tangere to Conformist and Non-conformist and even to himself that makes or hath made it There is a Threefold Interpretation An Authentick a Usual and a Doctrinal Interpretation according to Suarez De Legibus The Authentick Interpretation of an Imposition is the Exposition of it according to the Sense and Meaning of the Imposer and the Authentick Interpretation of the Articles is to understand them according to the Meaning of those who compiled them and consequently of the Church which enjoyned them according to their Meaning The Usual Interpretation of these Articles who can tell But if any shall cite Chillingworth and Arch-Bishop Usher and say that any Interpretation of an Article as it pleaseth the Taker so long as he obliges himself not to contradict it is that which is Usual I think he speaks true But then this Usual Interpretation is not allowed the Clergy-Man by the Bishop as is noted before because it is loose and sinful as he shews upon clear Reason and in this the Bishop will have a good Conscience at the great Day A Doctrinal Interpretation is the Explication of any Doctor or Doctors of the Church concerning an Article which is but Rational and not inconsistent with the Scripture and the Analogy of Faith especially if it be ingenuous and candid and sit to be received Now if upon the Call of any Parliament there should be occasion for the Convocation to sit and they should make a Canon on purpose to authorize declare and signifie that the Subscription to the Articles which is enjoyned is be understood not in the Authentick or Usual but only in a Doctrinal Interpretation then would this Book of the Bishop be of singular use and highly to be approved But if it serve only to justifie the imposing this Subscription and continue it without a Liberty of Explication or any such Canon there being these two ways only I can think on to make the Imposition Conscionable I must declare what I apprehend That this Book of the Bishop will be and must needs be a Snare unto many I will add That if it were writ with the Intention to uphold and continue the Subscription which I believe not of this worthy Author or if it does but hinder the taking of it off which was designed in the Convention Parliament as this Bishop knows there is no Man will have more cause of regret and to be more deeply touched at the Heart about the Book than he himself that hath so ingenuously and exquisitely wrote it THE END