Christ alone Exalted IN Dr. Crisp's Sermons Partly confirmed in Answering Mr. Daniel Williams's Preface to his Gospel Truth stated by alledging Testimonies from Scripture and the Doctrine of the Church of England in the Book of Homilies establish'd by Law and other Orthodox Authorities SHEWING How he hath wronged as well the Truth as the said Doctor in the great Point of Justification by the Neonomian Doctrine Hom. of Salvation fol. 17. Justification is not the Office of Man but of God we be justified freely by Faith without Works not that this our Faith in Christ which is within us doth justifie us that were to count our selves justified by some Act within our selves Of Fasting fol. 82. Good Works go not before in him which shall afterward be Justified but good Works do follow after when a Man is first Justified and are Testimonies of our Justification this spoyls Neonomianism on the Sacrament fol. 200. It followeth for Communicants to have a sure and constant Faith that he Christ hath made upon his Cross a full and sufficient Sacrifice for thee a Perfect cleansing of thy sins Where is the sin of a Believer now Passion Serm. 177. for in this death of Christ standeth the continual pardon of our daily Offences in this resteth our Justification If so then Faith doth not procure it but only receive and evidence it and so away flies Neomanism with Arminianism Humbly offer'd by S. C. an unworthy Son of the said Doctor Author of a Book Entituled Christ made Sin Reflected on by Mr. Williams London Printed for William Marshall at the Bible in Newgate street And Henry Barnard at the Bible in the Poultry 1693. Where is to be Sold at the same place the same Authors Book Entituled Christ made Sin Errors besides false Pointings to be amended Folio 2 Line 47. for assume read affirm 12 36. for or read our 24 40. for of sin read if sin  41. for participation read propitiation 26 5. for thus read this 28 24. for as read of at the last as 32 22. for other read object 34 7. for faces read fails 38 47. for pampering read tampering 40 38. read But saith 42 33. f. God's Righteousness r. our sanctification 43 20. Blot out that 44 last line put in is after Holiness 47 34. for Mercies read Mines 47 45. read 1642. 48 20. read then God believes To the Eminent Assertors of the Free Grace of God in Christ whereby Christ alone is exalted in the Salvation of Sinners viz. To the Reverends Mr. Cole Mr. Griffith Mr. Mather Mr. Beverly Mr. Barker Mr. Mead Mr. Chauncey Mr. Trail Mr. Woodcock Mr. Laurence of Stepney Mr. Brag. Mr. Bearman Mr. Terry Mr. Crusoe Mr. James of Wapping Mr. White Mr. Moor Mr. Wavel Mr. Tailor of Pinners-Hall Mr. Cross Mr. Grace Mr. Nisbet Mr. Fincher Mr. Lob Mr. Glascock Mr. Mence Mr. Ford Mr. Owen Mr. Jennings Mr. Roe Mr. Wressel Mr. Clark Mr. Goodwin Mr. Gamon Mr. Powel Also to several of the surprized Subscribers to Mr. Williams late Book as Dr. Bates Mr. How Mr. Alsop Mr. Bures and others Also to those of the Episcopal Clergy who preach the Doctrine of Justification as it is established by Christ in the Gospel and by our Statute Law in the Homilies as Mr. Meriton of Old Fish-street and others REjoyce thou Heaven the Church of Christ and ye holy Apostles and Prophets Rev. 18. The Evangelical Preachers that blessed be God there are many Seven thousands that have not bowed to the Bayal of Man's Holiness joyning with Christ to Justification But Mr. Williams having in the judgment of many in his Gospel Truth stated warped that way witnâ—ss his interpreting the Righteousness of Christ in Phil. 3.9 to be a Believers Gospel Holiness I hereby appeal to your Consciences if such a Star of the first Magnitude in the Firmament of the Scriptures ought with the silence of the By-standers to be so obfuscated Though in many respects I look on my self one of the unworthiest of those that name the Name of our blessed Lord Jesus in sincerity yet I cannot but bear my Testimony against the Preface of the said Book as unsound according to my sence of the Truth after above 50 Years investigating it and tasting a sweet Relish in Divine Things and I humbly apprehend I have in the ensuing Collection made it so appear which I leave to the Spirit of the Prophets in the Prophets to judge and hope you will all agree to declare he hath much wronged the said Text. As for his stigmatizing my dear Father as a dethroner of Christ because he exalted him alone without Works in the business of our Salvation I beseech the Lord Mr. Williams may see his Mistake and that God would forgive him as I and I hope all mine freely do This I pass by But when the Mother of us all the Truth as it is in Jesus is wounded by him when not of Works lest any Man should boast Eph. 2.9 is turned by him into God promiseth Liâ—e to imperfect Man by Forgiveness yet insists on some degree of Obedience And hence the use of Faith Holiness c. To these Benefiâ—s is not from their Conformity to the Precept but their Conformity to the Rule of the Promise Then on such an invasion all from 16 to â—0 should be alarum'd then all hearts and heads that love the Lord Jesus should be engaged iâ— vindicating his Royalties that he is Alpha and Omega Wisdom Righteousness Sanctification and Redemption all and in all in our Salvation that no Flesh should glory In particular I find my self though the meanest obliged to bear witness against this piece being censured by many for my silence in regard my Preface to my Fathers reprinted Sermons they say occasioned this Pudder What I did therein was in the simplicity of my heart to exalt the Lord Jesus and refresh Souls thereby which I still desire by taking off Mr. William's Evidence against the said Sermons by shewing his disagreeing from Scripture and Orthodox Authority as well as from my Father I hope you will all candidly accept this Service and upon this occasion give me leave to beg that as the Lord Jesus hath sent you to preach the everlasting Gospel glad Tidings to sinners through Christ in which many of you have been renowned so that ye abound more and more That you will determine to know nothing among your people but Christ and him Crucified that he may be magnified in your Bodies by life and by death that you may shew in every Sermon that to you to live is Christ and not to labour with a Scheme of some degree of Obedience in the business of our Salvation and this supposes the death of Christ as if his death were only a Sub-intelligitur business in his Rectorship O that we could be more warm for our Lord Jesus who poured out his Soul and warm Blood for us and if when warm you please to remember me a poor worm at the Throne
conformity to the Gospel Promise even as perfect obedience had in conformity to the Precept or Covenant of works I shall shew farther by the opinion of sound Orthodox Writers and begin with that famous Martyr in Scotland burned Anno 1532. for adhering to salvation by Jesus Christ without works in his Treatise set forth by Mr. John Frith an English Martyr in the same Cause Burned in 1533. he hath these Expressions viz. No manner of works make us right wise and no works make us unright wise if any evil works make us unrighteous then the contrary works should make us righteous the proof is we believe that a man shall be justifyed without works Rom. 3. and we believe in Jesus Christ that we may be justified by the faith of Christ and not by the deeds of the Law good works make not a good man nor evil works an evil Man but a good man bringeth forth good works and an evil man evil works good Fruit makes not the Tree good nor evil Fruit the Tree evil but a good Tree beareth good Fruit and an evil Tree evil fruit If works make us neither righteous nor unrighteous then thou wilt say it maketh no matter what we do I answer if thou do evil it is a sure Argument thou art evil and wantest Faith if thou do good it is a sure Argument thou art good and hast Faith Here is no sophistication of Faith Holiness Obedience c. answering the Rule of the Gospel promise as perfect Obedience answered the Law and moreover he gives the reason why we are so saved by Christ Because saith he Thou madest the fault and he suffered the pain and that for the love he had for thee before thou wast born now sith he was punished for thee thou shalt not be punished Finally he hath delivered thee from Condemnation all evil and desireth nought of thee mark that but that thou wilt acknowledge what he hath done for thee and bear it in mind and help others for his sake as he hath helped thee for nought Thou wilt say Shall we then do no good deeds I say not so but I say we should do no good works for the intent to get the Inheritance of Heaven or the remission of sin Thus this blessed Martyr asserted the Gospel in these truths worth laying down ones life for but I hope none will be put to lay down their life for asserting our imperfect Obedience answers the Gospel as Adams perfect Obedience If he had had it would have answered the Law for any to die upon such a point would be to be a Martyr for his own Righteousness not for asserting Christs now comes Mr. Frith and gives his Observations as full of Antinomianism as his Author Mr. Hamilton or as Dr. Crisp and just such an Antinomian as the A. Paul was and saith Therefore wheresoever any question or doubt ariseth of Salvation or our justifying before God there the Law and All good Works must be utterly excluded and stand apart that grace may appear free the Promise simple and that Faith may stand alone which faith alone without Law or Works worketh to every Man particularly his Salvation through meer promise and the free grace of God this word particularly I add for the particular certifying of every Mans heart privately and particularly that believeth in Christ so Faith is the instrumental Cause by which every Man applyeth the Body of Christ particularly to his own Salvation so that in the action and office of Justification both Law and Works all good Works above be here utterly secluded and exempted as things having nothing to do in this behalf The reason is this for seeing that all our Redemption universally springeth only from the body of the Son of God Crucified then is there nothing that can stand us in stead but that only wherewith this body of Christ is apprehended now for so much as neither the Law nor Works but Faith only is the thing that apprehendeth the Body and death of Christ therefore Faith only is that matter which Justifieth every Soul before God through the strength of that Object which it doth apprehend for the Object only of our Faith is the body of Christ like as the brazen Serpent was the other only of the Israelites looking by the strength of which Object through the promise of God immediately proceeded health to the Beholders so the Body of Christ being the Object of our Faith striketh righteousness to our Souls Thus far Mr. Frith Here 's good sound strong home-spun Divinity that came from the heart of an early English Martyr in the days of Hen. VIII It came not from Rome or Amsterdam or Poland and because the Book of our blessed Martyrs is in few hands I 'll transcribe some more of Mr. Frith's contrariety to our new way of stating Gospel Truth hoping it may tend to the establishing Souls whom the Sophistry of some Men may amuse with their Connexions of c. to Faith and Holiness in the business of pardon of sin to which Mr. Frith saith as follows In a Christian mans life there 's the Law there 's Repentance there is Hope Charity all which in mans Life and Doctrine are joyned and yet in the action of justifying there is nothing else in man that hath any Part or Place but only Faith apprehending the Object which is the body of Christ Jesus for us Crucified in whom consisteth all the worthiness of our Salvation by Faith that is by our apprehending and receiving of him according as it is written John 1. Whosoever received him he gave them Power to be made the Sons of God even all such as believed in his Name For so much therefore as the Truth of the Scripture in express words hath included our Salvation in Faith only we are enforced necessarily to Exclude all other causes and Means in our Justification and to make this difference between the Law and Gospel between Faith and Works affirming with the Scripture and Word of God that the Law condemneth us our Works of all sorts do not avail us and that Faith in Christ doth only justifie us and this ought diligently to be learned of all Christians especially in all conflicts of Conscience between the Law and the Gospel Faith and Works Grace and Merits Promise and Condition Gods Free Election and Mans free Will so that the light of the Free grace of God in our Salvation may appear to all Consciences to the Immortal glory of Gods holy Name Amen Thus said this blessed Servant of the Lord Jesus and this he sealed with his Blood and this was good Doctrine in those days among the Reformed this was thought worthy to be inserted in our famous Book of Martyrs and approved by the whole Body of Christians in the Nation and not scandalized as the same expressions are in Dr. Crisp's Sermons I would fain know what more stabbing words can be said against Mr. Williams Thesis or Position than both Mr. Hamilton and
shalt be saved I have heard and read that in Ephes 1. and Col. 1. the Apostle saith in him we have Redemption through his Blood forgiving of sins so that as soon as I have him by faith I have forgiveness and I am bid to fly for Refuge to the hope that is set before me which I take to be Jesus my City of Refuge and not my Gospel Holiness Now good Sir may this poor Soul say what shall I do under the load of my sins may I take the Apostles words and Christs call Come to me and you shall find rest for your Souls as soon as ever you find your selves weary and heavy laden or must I stay till I find by a long seven or ten or 38 years lying at the Pool searching if I can find Mr. Williams draught agree with me that I have attained to a full compleat answering the Rule of the Gospel which he calls conformity to the rule of the promise Must I stay till I can understand Mr. Williams School terms of a Judicial Act of Pardon by that promise to the Person thus conformed to the Rule that is to say must I stay till I can love my Enemies they being my Neighbours as well as my self till I can turn my left Cheek patiently to him that smites me on my right till I can having two Coats give one to him that hath none till I can hate Father Mother sell all and follow Christ and in every thing conform to Gospel Rule in a word till I am perfect as my Father which is in Heaven is perfect before I may dare believe my sins are forgiven Or may I satisfie my self with Dr. Crisps quotation Look to me and be ye saved as the Serpent was only lookt to for healing I say if a poor Soul should put this to a Gospel Minister would he not answer the plain short Scripture way is best hearken to Jesus saying come take the Water of Life freely this is the work of God that ye believe in him the Father hath sent If you have me you have Life as many as receive me that is believe on my Name are Sons of God As for Mr. Williams distinctions Connexions Judicial act of Pardon he may please the Schools with them but there is more nourishing food in one calâ— of Christ Come to me come come buy Wine milk and honey without money without price in such a promise well prest than in a thousand of Mr. Williams distinctions Next I must attack an odd expression savouring of God's dispensing with the breach of his righteous Law without satisfaction which is the back door of Arminianism wherein creeps in mans free will and his good works concurring to his salvation the expression which I cannot digest is this Mr. W. saith a continuance in a state of death with a bar to the blessing are not threatned in the Gospel against every degree of sin as the Covenant of Works did This is Mr. Williams sense of the Gospel and its differing from the Law or Covenant of Works viz. the Law condemned for every sin but there are some degrees of sin the Gospel allows or doth not threaten Death for which I suppose without wronging him I may instance thus The Law condemned a Man for killing his Brother and for hating his Brother and for ill will to his Brother but the Gospel hath compounded the matter and made God reconcileable through Faith in Christ for a mans murdering his Brother but God will take no notice of a man's ill will to his Brother that degree of sin there is no threatning of Death for if this be his sense I take it to be far wide of the Apostles sense when he said the blood of Christ cleanseth from all sin that is to say there is as real need of the vertue of the blood of Christ to cleanse from a vain thought as from murder though I do not say both are alike heinous yet both need the blood of Christ to wash them away or there is no standing Justified at God's Bar. Oh we should have a care of letting this poyson down that any sin can be pardoned but by the blood of Christ cleansing it for he that is guilty of one sin is guilty of all so that to say there is any degree of sin under the Gospel against which death is not threatned will amount in the conclusion to render the blood of Christ not needful to take away that degree of sin O sin sin how small soever must not be so treated for if the grain of Mustard seed small faith but true will grow to a great Tree and reach to Heaven this grane of Henbane the smallest degree of sin if not accounted for in the Gospel by the blood of Christ will grow to a vast depth even the Regions of darkness and Hell Upon this dangerous position of Mr. Williams That a continuance in a state of death and a bar to the Blessing are not threatned against every degree of sin as the Covenant of works did Mr. Williams propounds a splendid question Can any doubt this to be the grace of the Gospel Promise O profound grace of the Gospel promise it doth not bar from blessing nor continue in a state of death for every degree of sin a Heaven-born Soul that lives day by day on the Blood and Flesh of Jesus and feasts on the infinite love of God in Jesus would have thought that an eminent Minister of the Gospel a Gentleman of great parts supported by some of the greatest names in our Israel would havâ— thought that when Mr. Williams was rescuing the Lord Jesus as he intimates from the dethroning Principles of Dr. Crisp as he pleases to call them and when he is bringing back the Lord Jesus to his Throne one would think I say when Mr. Williams is celebrating the glory of the Grace of the Gospel promise he should have called for the aid of the holy Spirit to help him and have said somewhat to this purpose O the heighth and depth O the superlative Excellency of the Love of God in Christ that he should love us and wash us from our sins in his blood that the blood of Christ cleanseth us from all sin that he hath blessed us with all spiritual Blessings in heavenly places in Christ Thus our Lord Jesus is to be enthroned though it comes too near Dr. Crisp his way of dethroning Christ no this is not his Clue or way to raise Monuments of Glory to our Blessed Lord but thus he celebrates him by sniping off a Lap of his Garment as David did Sauls can any doubt but this the not being in a state of Death for every degree of sin is the grace of the Gospel promise If he had said this is a grace of the Gospel it had been a degree of modesty in Mr. Williams to the Gospel though it were not a truth but to say 't is the Grace and so the grace that none can doubt of it
of Grace as I do ye I doubt not but I should be highly recompensed for this labour of love and should find refreshment under many rufflings from the Lord on my Person and Family Thus beseeching the Lord to pour out abundance of his Spirit on you all and the unhappily engaged Mr. Williams whom I truly love and respest That the people may be prepared for the Lords glorious appearance now hastning To him I recommend you and subscribe Your Servant and an unworthy Son of Dr. Crisp S. C. Clapham January 21st 1692 3. Christ alone Exalted IN Dr Crisp's Sermons Partly Confirmed in Answer to Mr. Williams Preface to his Gospel Truth stated and Vindicated by Comparing some of his unfair Accusations of the said Doctor with the Scripture and the Doctrine of the Gospel Established by Law in the Homilies c. WHEN Peter who seemed to be a Pillar was come to Antioch I withstood him to the Face because he was to be blamed saith the Apostle Gal. 2.9 10. And if an Apostle who seemed a Pillar might Err in Ceremonies and be blamed so may our seeming Pillars some of them Err in Substance conjoyning our Gospel Holiness with Christs Righteousness and be blamed Now I perceiving what I suppose will appear a great Error in the Preface of Mr. Williams to his Arraignment of Gospel Truths in Dr. Crisp's Sermons and supposing none will mind the Preface that design to Answer the Book but pass it over as a Cursory Discourse I think it not ungrateful to studious Christians to animadvert on the brief Systems of Religion which Mr. Williams hath there given the World in opposition not so much to Dr. Crisp as to the plain express Scripture and the sound sense thereof held out by the great Orthodox Divines that were Staunch against Aâ—minianism upon our first coming out of Popery when Zeal for Christ alone in Salvation was warm Wherein I beseech the Lord so to guide my Thoughts and Pen that I may mind only his Glory in and through our Lord Jesus The Meek he will guide in Judgment which meekness I beg of the Lord though a Golden Calf of Mans Gospel Holiness to be set up in the place of Christs Righteousness would provoke a Moses Yet I hope to retain as well Meekness as Integrity till I die It is beyond all doubt Man since the Devil deceived him that upon eating he should be as God doth think with himself he can tho' dead do something which is proper only to God that is he can quicken his own dead Soul he can Convert himself he can be a God to himself hereupon there is a great Outcry against any that assert That our Lord Jesus Christ is all in all in the Salvation of poor Sinners and Dr. Crisps Sermons because fuller than ordinary of the free Grace of God in Jesus Christ are singled out to be battered and with them the Gospel of our Salvation is run down into terms utterly Forreign to the Scripture and because the Doctor adheres and sticks close to the Scripture terms of our being dead dead dead in sins and our sins our very sins Christ bare in his Body on the Tree as the Apostles Peter and Paul expresly say he is exclaimed against And that this great Champion might appear compleatly armed in opposing Dr. Crisp he puts on the great shield of being solicited to this Work by several worthy Ministers and that this may appear true he hath emblazoned his honour in this great Atchievement by the Hands of several indeed worthy Ministers who are most of them in my Experience eminent Servants of our Lord Jesus however their Zeal for Gospel Holiness may have been imposed upon to countenance Mr. Williams making Christ's Righteousness to be our Gospel Holiness Though I have a great honour for all those of them whom I know yet I suppose they will not think themselves dishonoured to say I think most of them were imposed upon in getting their subscribing to what they never throughly examined I am sure one of them tho' next the first yet nulli secundus for a sweet Christian Spirit among them said a few Weeks before Dr Crisps Sermons were reprinted to an Eminent Mininister in a great Company If Dr. Crisp be an Antinomian so am I and I am sure he said in a Sermon December 12. 1669. We are first made active by Christ in order to his bringing us to God and September 24. 7. 1672. Christ hath brought the Law to its end it hath no more to require be is the abolishing end the Law is quite out of doors as to justify plant a Crab-Tree in the best Soil it brings forth crabs till planted in Christ so that there must be Vnion to Christ by Gods planting us in Christ before any good Fruit. So this Gentleman and so Doctor Crisp in his Faith the Fruit of Union contrary to Mr. Williams and yet this excellent person is by Mr. Williams Art taught to say with the rest We judge our Reverend Brother hath in all that is material fully and rightly stated the Truths and Errors mentioned as such and do account he hath in this work done considerable Service to the Church of Christ and so will I say when by it he hath ingaged Able Pens to vindicate the truth from Sophistical Glosses that he hath done considerable service against his will I reckon this Preface is the marrow of his Book and I shall begin with as great a point as any I know of in the Bible next to the Deity of the Lord Jesus and yet 't is that which is the chief Fruit of his Deity which is his Righteousness as God-Man made ours by Faith by Mr. Williams his treating this he discovers his whole Soul concerning Justification that great Article stantis vel cadentis Ecclesiâ—â— of the standing and falling of that Church that holds it as Luther said in that a little Leven here leveneth the whole lump Here Mr. Williams hath made very bold with the expression of the Apostle Paul in Phil. 3.9 That I may be found in him not having mine own righteousness which is of the Law but that which is through the Faith of Christ the righteousness which is of God by Faith here Mr. Williams instead of extolling this righteousness of Christ and the rich Grace of God to impute this to us he runs Counter to the stream of the Gospel and dashes to pieces all the comfort that thousands have found in this Scripture as signifying Christs Righteousness our cloathing before God and gives his Romish gloss upon it in these words I exclude not this Righteousness Christs imputed when I affirm that the Righteousness of God Phil. 3.9 Principally intends the Gospel Holiness of a Person Justifyed by Christs Righteousness which in plain Words is this When I Daniel Williams say in the preceding words his Righteousness imputed is the cause for which we are justifyed and saved when we do answer the Gospel Rule now I explain
looketh for the righteousness of God by Faith Phil. 3. Here is not a word of our Gospel Holiness brought in but a total contempt of his own righteousness call it what you will the righteousness of the Law or Gospel holiness if it be his own 't is contemned and somewhat plainer is Mr. Perkins on the same Text in fol. 659. Vol. 1. who saith thus The Apostle Paul in desiring to be found not in his own righteousness but in Christs desired nothing else but that he might be accepted of God for Christs sake and be esteemed righteous in his righteousness and this very Obedience which is in Christ and not in us is the very matter of the Justice of the Gospel and this is made ours by Faith the Gospel requires not the conditions of Merit or of any work to be done on our parts in the Case of Justification Toletus writing on the Rom. 10.3 the not submitting to the righteousness of God which is the same righteousness of God by Faith as is in Phil. 3.9 he hath this expression upon it and saith it is Justitiam partam morte Christi quam Deus Credenti imputat donat and Pareus saith 't is Justitiam Christi and Vatablus on Rom. 10.4 concerning Christs being the end of the Law for righteousness saith Vt qui credit in Deum reputetur Justus à Deo perinde ac si totam legem impleverit finis legis per se est ut ex ejus prestatione Justificentur homines hunc finem lex obtinuit in solo Christo qui legi penitus satisfecit per Christum in nobis quoque obtinet quibus data ei legi satisfactio per fidem imputatur thus Vaâ—ablus Gomarus gives in his Testimony very plainly against Gospel holiness being the righteousness of God and saith on Rom. 1. on the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith in this Question Quid sit justitia non qua Deus Justus est sed effectivè quod à Deo data est Estius Quâ nos revera in oculis ejus Justos facit Tirinus Quâ nos Deus à Peccatis absolvit And Zanchy on the Righteousness of God without the Law Rom. 3.21 saith Quomodo fides Justificat assert fides justitiam non effectivé quasi habitualiter Justos efficiat nec materialiter quasi ipsa sit illud quo justi censemur sed objectivè quatenus in Christum qui est Justitia nostra dirigitur organicè quatenus Justitiam Christi nobis imputatam fides apprehendit And on this very Text Phil. 3.9 but the righteousness which is of God by Faith Id est Justitia quae est ex Deo quae tota penitus omnibus suis partibus merum est Donum Dei gratuitum venit haec Justitia è Caelo unde cadit Super fidem 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 non dicit hic 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 quasi fides prout opus est nostrum vel sit pars hujus Justitia vel illud promereatur sed tantum 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Thus these Worthies on this Text agree with Dr. Goodwin who saith p 40. of Election which righteousness by Faith to be Christs Righteousness all sound Protestants profess wherein they are as far from saying the righteousness of God by faith is our Gospel holiness as that it is our Gospel unholiness I suppose it might easily be shewn whence Mr. Williams had this unsound Interpretation of this glorious Text even from Grotius as he from the Mother of Harlots Rome who Joyns mans works with Christs for Justification But methinks every true Lover of the Lord Jesus and honourer of him with his Righteousness made ours should rise in Arms against such an Exposition of this Text and say Sir I would rather the Pen though Steel should be thrust into the Ball of my right Eye than thus to pierce again the side of the Lord Jesus and let his righteousness run waste while 't is joyned so corruptly with our Holiness But what need the suffrage of these Worthies be called in to oppose this exposition they may as well be called in to say White is not Black and black not white for 't is positively against the express word of God and such an Interpretation is to make the Word a Nose of soft Wax to turn it which way one will the Spirit of God saith expresly 't is the righteousness of God by Faith that is 't is the righteousness of him who is God blessed for ever and 't is ours by Faith No saith this bold Pen 't is our Gospel Holiness that is 't is our conformity to all the Rules of the Gospel From such Divinity the Lord Deliver us By this preface it may be guessed how he will attack the free Grace of God set forth in the Gospel and held up to the light by Dr. C. ex pede Herculem ex ungue Leonem This is the first part of the proof of his opposing Dr. C. in order to bring in our righteousness to concur with Christs in our Justification by his perverting the Text in calling the righteousness of God by Faith our Gospel Holiness which is near a kin to the Quakers Light within being their Christ so if our Gospel Holiness be the righteousness of God then 't is our Christ for Christ is called by Thomas his God and by the Apostle Paul he is made of God our Righteousness and by Mr. Williams this Christ our righteousness is our Gospel Holiness So that by this Clew or Thread at the entrance into his Book we are led into the Mystery of his laying so great Blame on Dr. C. for renouncing all our Righteousness in the matter of Justification before God But to trace him from the beginning he enters on the Stage with so much heat against Errors of his own forming that he forgets himself and the first dash in his Preface is a trip of nonsense making his beginning to sound as if it were his ending saying the Revival of those Errors whereas he had named no Errors before but Zeal and his Passion puts and begins on these Errors which hath no reference and instead of saying the Errors which I have proved against Dr. C. he saith the revival of these Errors Well what will the revival of these Errors in the air do they must not only exclude that Ministry as Legal which is most apt in its Nature and by Christs Ordination to convert Souls but also renders Vnity amongst Christians a thing impossible But what if they be found sound Gospel Truths what you take for Errors then the Ministry excluded as Legal will be found not very apt in its nature to Convert Souls and not of Christs Ordination so to do Whether they be Errors or no will be seen when Examined in the mean time this expression looks like Legal and Ungospel to say the Ministry he pretends to hath an aptness in its own nature to convert Souls and is Forreign to the Apostle's account
he gives of converting Souls for the Gospel it self preacht by the Apostles themselves had no aptness in its Nature to convert Souls nay it was so far from that in its own nature that it became a savour of Death to the non Elect the Apostle did not Preach a deal of trumpery qualifications must be found in Men to prepare them to true Conversion but he preacht Christ Crucified to the Jews a stumbling Block and to the Greeks Foolishness but to them which are called both Jews and Greeks Christ the Power of God 1 Cor. 1.25 and in 2 Cor. 2.16 the Apostle saith We are of God a sweet savour of Christ in them that are saved and in them that Perish to the one the savour of Death to Death Where is the aptness of the Gospel in its own nature to convert Souls when you find it is the occasion of stumbling and is a Savour of death where there doth not go forth the same Almighty Power with it as raised up Christ and now though the Apostles preaching was far from having any thing in its own nature of aptness to convert Souls yet a human Invented way of Preaching the Gospel with threats and promises you say is apt nay 't is most apt in its Nature to convert Souls what doth this tend to but the taking off the effectual Irresistible Grace of God in calling some by the same word which hardens others I fear the conversion that is wrought by the natural aptness of a certain Ministry is only a Conversion to a natural Religion not to that which is from above Well you say your Ministry is not only apt in its nature but by Christs Ordination to convert Souls If it be by Christs Ordination it must have a tendency to what Christ hath ordained it for but the Ministry of Christs Ordination is not to set up any thing in Man to convert him unless deadness in a Man is a Qualification to make him live he saith the Dead shall hear the Voice of the Son of God and live and you who were dead in sins hath he quickned you may tell a dead Man of many Qualifications that be necessary to make him live but 't is all in vain till Christ by his Omnipotent Power say the word and with the word speaks life But this aptness of a Ministry in its nature and then hooking in Christs Ordination of it without any Proof shews we must take things for granted because you say it though the Scripture say just the contrary in saying When thou wast in thy blood I said to thee live Ezek. 16. What Threats and Promises were here what aptness in denouncing the Terrors of the Law when even the Promises of the Gospel have not a natural aptness till Christ speaks the word and say Lazarus come forth The other side ignorantly set up the Name of Christ and Free Grace he says 'T would be good Manners first to prove 't is done ignorantly and next it would help your cause to prove that the Name of Christ and free Grace are not of more value in the Case than your Promises and Threats O have a care of a fling at the Name of Christ for by Faith in his Name the Apostle made the Cripple to go This is set up against the Government of Christ and the rule of Judgment D. W. No 't is set up by the Authority of the Apostle who desired to know nothing among the Corinthians but Christ and him Crucifyed not a rag of Mens Righteousness to cover the least speck would the Apostle know As for the Government of Christ he needs none of your stating I believe many Abettors of these mistakes are honestly Zealous for the honour of Free Grace M. W. Again he comes with his these mistakes before he names any so positive in his Nonsense through Zeal of Opposition is he they are honestly zealous But if they be in the right as will appear if the Word of God be right then 't is to be feared the Opposer will not be honestly a Dictator and to calumniate before he prove is no sign of over much modesty nor discretion If he had said I suppose the Reader will find Dr. C. guilty of mistakes by the following Discourse he might have acquitted himself of modesty But presently these Errors and these Mistakes without a tittle of Proof requires a reproof he taught his venerable Vouchers Dr. B. c. modestly to say he hath rightly stated the Truths and Errors mentioned not these Errors and these mistakes they may be rightly stated and yet come far short of being sufficiently proved and whereas they modestly say they account he hath in this work done considerable service to the Church of Christ. I am of their mind too by many considerable Pens being engaged in answering it and will say what an excellent Christian told me I bless God with all my heart every day I rise for the oppposing Dr. C's Doctrine at Pinners Hall for it hath occasioned the light to break forth more gloriously thereby in illustrating and confirming what was opposed I suppose they refer'd to the Reverend Mr. Coles Discourses They have not light sufficient to see how God hath provided for this honour of Free Grace in his Rectoral distribution of benefits by a Gospel Rule Mr. W. If he had said they have not confidence sufficient to prescribe God a Rule as some others have I had agreed but for light Let us to the Law and Testimony when we come to the point but this Rectoral Distribution is the business Men have coyned an Office for God they prescribe him a model of Government he must distribute Benefits by a Gospel Rule but this Gospel Rule is of their own Scheme whereas the Apostle said to the Jaylor reeking in his sin going about to kill himself Believe in the Lord Jesus and thou shalt be saved this Rectoral Distribution must have been by threats and Promises you Jailor what have you to do with the Free Grace of God in Christ sure you have heard of Dr. C. Doctrine that Christ saves the worst Sinner that comes to him by believing no hold a while the Apostle Paul runs too fast he hath made abundance of such Antinomians as Dr. C. stay a little consider have you gracious Qualifications Have you wept and mourned and given full proof of your Humiliation Godly Sorrow Repentance and the like Don't tell us these are the Fruits of Faith and follow Faith but when you have found these then come to us for Comfort shew us your Gospel Holiness and then we can tell you Believe in the Lord Jesus and you shall be saved Many of our Ablest Pens were engaged against these Errors as Mr. Gataker c. The Provincial Synod at London As for Able Pens God gives various Light and if Paul and Barnabas contended much likelyer for Mr. Gataker and Dr. C. but 't is easier refuting a dead Man than a living one for one cannot answer what
the other opposes Peter and Paul contended but Free Grace Paul was too hard for Legal Peter who complyed too far Gal 2.11 and so at last will Dr. Crisp's Doctrine be to those that as it were bring in somewhat with Christs righteousness for Justification As for the provincial Synod that opposed by Name Doctor Crisp I fear much of their Spirit is in those that pretend to moderation while they oppose this Doctrine they were for bloody Bonners Argument against Dr. C. Fire and Faggot it would have come to I remember I went when a Boy to Prison to see an Eminent Christian whom that Synod had secured there for promoting the Publishing Doctor Crisp his Works a rare way of Rectoral Distribution of Benefits by a Gospel Rule and were Power in the hands of those several worthy Ministers that Doctor Williams saith oft solicited him to engage in this Work I question not but they would at length prevail with him as well to imprison Doctor Crisp his Defenders as to aver those things to be Errors that he hath not proved so We are engaged in a new Opposition to the grief of such as perceive the tendency of these Principles Here 's new Nonsense in the great Champion for Man's Righteousness to fit him for Christ's here 's a these without naming any well and what are we engaged in Truly 't is to grieve such as consider these things To the grief of such as perceive the tendency of these Principles we are ingaged in a new Opposition he saith and I am of his mind he or they that assisted him did ingage therein to the grief of such as saw the tendency of the Principles he opposed But to take his meaning if it can be hit 't is thus to their grief we are by them engaged in a new opposition but will it not be more to their grief to find your Opposition is to the Truth which by your opposing will be more radiant I believe many abettors of these Notions have grace to preserve their minds and Practices from their Influence D. W. Here 's great Concession first these Errors then these mistakes and now these Notions at last I hope it will be these pure streams of Gospel Grace I perceive your Eyes begin to dazle by long poring on the Truth the Lord grant a clear sight you believe the Abettors have Grace O blessed be God that gives to the most unworthy But they ought to consider that the generality of Mankind have no such Antidote D. W. That is the generality of Mankind have not Grace to preserve them from the influence of Errors and mistakes I doubt so too but methinks this word the generality of Mankind not having such an Antidote savours as if the generality of Mankind had some Antidote or as the Arminian says all have still sufficient by nature if they would improve it to preserve them O how apt are we to refer somewhat of good to the generality of mankind whereas in truth not only the generality have not Antidotes to keep them but the contrary is most true no man whatsoever unconverted hath any Antidote to keep himself from the Poyson of any Error ever broached I must encounter another Plunder I see and pick out the meaning Who can wonder at the general abatement of Humble walking when so many affirm I sins are not to be feared D. W. I have heard of fearing God by every Christian and Christ saith I 'll tell you whom you shall fear but I never heard of fearing sins or a complaine that sins are not feared The Pagans do fear the Black Devil they say lest he should do them hurt but never any Christian I think had any such reverence in him toward sin probably he means many affirm they ought not to be afraid to commit sin if he mean so he was unhappy in his expressing himself and he would do well to cite some of his many that say so as for Dr. Crisp I suppose he will not offer at it though his words look very uncharitable that way which the Dr. flatly denies fol. 510. and saith Let me not be mistaken I do not say we must not be afraid to sin but they need not be afraid of their sins But as to his meaning that no Believer ought to fear any hurt can be done him by his sin as Dr. Crisp his assertion when he quotes any thing of Dr. Crisps tending that way I will prepare for an Answer in the mean time I suppose he will not deny but God often turns that which seems most dreadful to be most beneficial as the Small Pox to Cure a Consumption so sin the worst of Evils to the advancing God's glory and best of goods but he wont say Dr. Crisp taught that therefore we ought to sin that Grace may abound an old objection of Satan answered by the Apostle and Dr. Crisp in his Sermon 8. Christian Liberty no Licentious Doctrine God hath no more to lay to the Charge of the wickedest Man if he be Elected than he hath to lay to the Charge of a Saint in glory M. Williams in his Charge This harsh Expression when compared with the Scriptures quoted by Dr. Crisp will be better reconciled to our Spirits than that Christ the Holy Jesus in his most perfect state of most perfect holiness as God the Father is Holy was made sin and a Curse and yet God blessed for ever is it more astonishing that a Sinner in his blood in his highest Sins as Manasseh should be lookt upon in Christ as chosen in him loved in him from all Eternity to all Eternity and look'd on by God in Christs righteousness should have nothing to be laid to his Charge is this more harsh than for Christ in his most compleat holiness to be lookt on by God to be a Curse for us Dr. Crisp will be found not to have spoken of sinners as in themselves but as lookt on in Christ and then the time of being in blood was a time of Love And a little Charity in D. Williams might have lead not to make a scare-crow of such an Expression but if the Apostles Opposers fetch'd wrong conclusions from his Blessed premises of Free Grace so it will be to the end of the World by self Justitiaries but of this in its more proper place Again The Elect are not governed by fear or hope M. W. charge No why should they be governed by any but their Lord Jesus who is both their fear and hope For the Laws of Christ have no promises nor threats to rule them by W. This is a most false Charge for Dr. Crisp owns they are under the Law to Christ and inforces it and saith expresly in fol. 561. Do not mistake me I have no thoughts as if Wrath and Vengeance were not to be preached and made known even to Believers yea Beloved wrath and Vengeance is to be made known to them and that as the Deserts of sin and as the means to
in no sense it can hurt him and that it is not a sting and terrour to the Conscience even of a Believer while his Faith is unactive and under a Cloud he wrongs him for he saith in fol. 512. The Torments of Hell is the merit of the least sin in the World I speak not to Extenuate any sin such as look upon these sins as uncancelled So long these sins may work an horror and trembling in Persons and Mr. Williams will not say but this is harm to a poor Souls peace and comfort and this Dr. Crisp holds nay he saith in fol. 513. Before Men come to see the light of the Gospel of Christ their sins stare in their Faces seeming to spit fire at them and is this no harm and this is to the Elect till they believe so that this is no good charge of Mr. Williams But if Mr. Williams mean 't is an error of Dr. Crisp to say there is no sin the People of God commit can possibly do them any hurt if it be taken in the sense the Doctor expresses calling it real hurt in fol. 510. This may be matter of debate but will doubtless issue on the Doctors side or rather on the Apostle Paul's who saith all things work together for good to them that love God If so then the Affliction that the Lord chastens withal for sin doth not argue that sin brings a real hurt If sin could do real hurt to a Believer such as to take away his Title to Heaven or cause him totally to fall from Grace then Christ did not for ever by one Sacrifice of himself save us and wash us from our sins in his Blood and perfect those that are sanctified but if he did make an end of sin and brought in everlasting righteousness for all that the Father gave him then he having purged our sins by himself on the Cross nailing them there never to be able to rise in Condemnation to those that are in Christ then this stingless Serpent sin will never do real hurt to Believers as the Doctor saith But if Mr. Williams mean that sin doth hurt even Believers because it brings natural death the Wages of sin being Death to Believers yet the sting of that being taken out by our Lord Jesus that is so far from real hurt that it is the Inlet to Eternal glory and if that be hurt the Lord grant Mr. Williams and I may be so hurt or rather Blessed with it in our exits Several other such hurts come by sin not from its own Nature but from Gods Ordination as that where sin abounds grace much more abounds not that any should think sin the less dreadful and terrible and as sin hath reigned to death so Grace reigns to eternal Life by Jesus Christ our Lord and yet still sin is to be avoided as the greatest horridest evil in the World but notwithstanding this the Apostle encourageth poor Souls when they do fall into sin not to be afraid of their sins but to flie for Refuge to the Mercy-Seat the hope sure and stedfast set before them saying if any man sin we have an Advocate with the Father Jesus Christ the Righteous and thus I hope this grand Cavil is evaporated and that it appears groundless for any to think Dr. Crisp had slight thoughts of sin when he saith it cannot do a Believer any real hurt yet he saith the Torments of Hell is the merit of the least sin and they will work an horrour and trembling till we see them Cancelled The next is Nor can God afflict them for any sin saith Mr. Williams against the Doctor This expression is no where quoted but inferred from the Doctor and it is put here contrary to the Doctor 's sense in which he speaks of Affliction and seems harsh Mr. Williams might see that what the Dr. saith is spoken by way of punishment that all the Afflictions that God lays on his People are in love and not by way of punishment for their sins seeing their sins were laid on the Lord Jesus and he bare them and all punishment due for them and if those that scruple saying Christ bare the very sins of the Elect will yet allow he bare the punishment for them sure then they must grant that God doth not lay affliction on his People by way of punishment God saith indeed you only have I known therefore will I punish you for your Iniquities but this cannot be taken properly for punishment unless Men will make God worse than the foolish Servant who made him a hard Master viz. an unjust Oppressor to punish sins on his Son and to punish them also on the sinner and besides that affliction which a man bears in this life be it never so great is so far from punishment proper for sin the least of which deserves as Doctor Crisp saith eternal Hell Torments that it is not so much as a flea-biting compared with a stab at the Heart but I take the ground why persons will call afflictions on God's Children punishments for sin is on this double account First they would make God an easie tender-hearted Judge that will commute Penance and for a great Crime as every sin is he will take a small amends as a little temporal Affliction and next they will be as kind to our Lord Jesus Christ and reckon he bears the less if the sinner bear part with him but without any mincing this must be owned that all afflictions on Gods people are in love all I love I rebuke and chasten and 't is for our profit that we may be partakers of his holiness and it is fatherly to deter from sin I do not mean that sin hath no hand in many Afflictions for as the Apostle said of the disorderly Corinthians for that cause many were sick and weak But what the Dr. insisted on was that Affliction for sin was not proper punishment but pure love to their Souls though I cannot see but afflictions are a Fruit or effect of sin in many yet I may not from thence conclude that those Afflictions are from Wrath in the Father or for punishmenr proper on the Child but the effects of a Fatherly love for if ye be without Chastisement whereof all are partakers then are ye Bastards and not Sons so that this Exception against the Doctor is a small one but because it hath some seeming harshness to say God doth not afflict the Elect for sin therefore it must be hookt in to fill up the Charge though the Charge in the Preface be varying and harsher then it seems Mr. Williams could lay in his Book for there is no such word as nor can God afflict them for any sin Mr. Williams having laid the Charge in the next words he comes with a deadly thunder-clap conclusion full of Indignation saying All the rest of his Opinions follow in a Chain to the dethroning of Christ which if true then say I let his memory for ever perish and his
Posterity be blasted as to this World But if this Charge look like sublimated malice every candid Reader will say Mr. Williams for charging falsely with High Treason a great admirer and advancer of the Lord Jesus Christ with dethroning him deserves not a stab no nor an outragious word from his Posterity or the lovers of the Doctor 's memory But the Answer of the Angel to the Devil The Lord rebuke thee Satan is not this a Brand pluckt out of the Fire Zech. 3.2 How can any thing but that which looks like Canker'd Venom against Free Grace Charge him or his Doctrine point blank with no less than Dethroning Christ when every Sermon tends chiefly to the Exalting Christ and Christ alone under the Father in opposition to the grand Idol or Christ of self Justitiaries setting up mans righteousness If the whole stream and almost every Page of his Book flows with mighty zeal for Christ and jealousie of Joyning any thing with Christ in our salvation for fâ—ar of robbing Christ of any of the honour and Glory due to him If this be dethroning Christ I wish Mr. Williams would so dethrone him in every Sermon and that all that name the dear and blessed name of Christ would so dethrone him Then we should not have the righteousness of Christ by faith called our Gospel Holiness I would ask the greatest Enemy that is to Justification only by the blood of Jesus who is the dethroner of Christ Dr. Crisp who in all his Sermons is for Christ alone exalted Crying out none but Christ none but Christ to the ravishing the Hearts of thousands of lovers of Christ Or Mr. Williams who sets up a rectoral Government for the Lord for saving sinners in a sapiential way joyning our Gospel Holiness with Christ's imputed Righteousness nay in plain terms boldly affirming that the righteousness of God by Faith which the Apostle just before had called the Righteousness of Christ Phil. 3.9 That this is a Believers Gospel Holiness Mr. Williams cannot have the confidence to say Dr. Crisp was for dethroning the Christ the Son of the most high the Christ the eternal Son of God made man But in truth he was for dethroning Mr. Williams Christ of Phil. 3 9. that is Mans Gospel Holiness from getting in the Throne of the true Christ the ever blessed Son of God for justification of a sinner or to have any thing to do therein he was for Gospel holiness in Doctrine and practice as much as any Person living keeping it in its due place a Friend of the Bridegroom but not a Co-partner with the Bridegroom and as eminent Mr. Christopher Fowler said twenty and twenty times so in effect say the Doctors Sremons I would not for this Room full of Gold open my mouth against Evangelical holiness or true holiness one grain of it being more worth than all the World but hold it must not sit on the Throne with Christ It is a good Hand-maid to wait on the Queen but it is not to lye in Bed with the Queen or in effect our Gospel Holiness must not affront the Lord Jesus Christ to take his Crown and dignity from him Now in any impartial mind it may easily be judged who is the Dethroner of Christ O whether will Passion and Prejudice lead men and how will it blind them when their Conscience cannot but tell them that they themselves come short of him in Exalting Christ they cry out against others that are of a far more elevated strain in the honouring the Lord Jesus O you dethrone Christ because you do too much magnifie him in opposition to Gospel Holiness coming in for any share in our salvation This is his first link in the Chain dethroning Christ as much as to say I 'll lay load enough but the first stroak shall do his business the Dr. Opinions have been to the dethroning Christ would any one but such as Solomon speaks of who casteth about Firebrands Arrows and Death Prov. 26.18 have uttered such language without one tittle of proof without saying I have proved his Opinions Dethrone Christ or I am of Opinion his Notions tend to dethrone Christ none of this softness is in his Iron strain but point blank all his Opinions follow in a Chain to the Dethroning Christ his preaching that Christ is the only way is dethroning Christ his Preaching Man's Righteousness is the grand Idol is dethroning Christ Any one may guess 't is the rubbing that Sore makes such out-cry O you dethrone Christ when you unhorse Men from their own righteousness But if for every idle word that men shall speak they shall give an Account can they think they shall not also for every false uncharitable charge they give in accusing a grand Asserter of the Alone Rights of the Lord Jesus in the matter of our Salvation to be in that very thing a Dethroner of the Lord Jesus What shall be done to thee thou false Tongue Psal 120.3 I hope the Lord will incline such Arguers not to adhere to their own Arguments but fling down their strong Reasonings and submit to the alone righteousness of God for Salvation without our Gospel Holiness sharing in it being overcome by the Almighty overpowering sweet drawing of the Spirit and cry before it be too late as Julian did Vicisti Galilae thou hast overcome me O Galilean by thy Blood and Spirit freely given to me for my righteousness and Life to ascribe all the glory to thee none to my Gospel Holiness this is all the harm I wish and pray for the uncharitable censurer of Dr. C. for for that he had by his Opinions dethroned Christ cujus contrarium The next is Enervating his Laws and Pleadings This flows from the other if Christ be dethroned his Laws must be enervated But if Christ alone is exalted his Holy and Pure word is established as the Dr. often asserts from the Apostle do we make void the Law by Faith nay we establish it by bringing in Christ fulfilling the Law for us and writing it in our Hearts as holy just and good teaching us by his Spirit to deny all ungodliness as in the Sermons on that Text. Dr. Crisp shews 't is not the exalting the Blood of Christ that Enervates the Laws of God and Christ but 't is the making our Righteousness which is every jot defiled to stand in the place of the abrogated Moral Law to say that in regard we are not able to fulfill the moral Law God accepts of our Evangelical Righteousness that is our own Gospel Holiness and so making it in some sense a Co-partner with Christs Righteousness denying it in words but establishing it in deed this is the real enervating Christs Laws else how comes the righteousness of God by Faith Phil. 3.9 to be called Gospel Holiness I am sure the Righteousness of God by Faith justifies a Believer and if this Righteousness of God be our Gospel Holiness then our Gospel Holiness justifies a Believer and this
and Son and Spirit delighted in during all eternity past and will in all Eternity to come is this vanisht into nothing in present being I may say God's Decree is so far from putting nothing into present Being that it puts all things into past present and future being for if God be one Eternal act and all things past present and to come are ever in being in his Eye or knowledge so he puts every thing into present being with himself to be manifest in their proper Seasons according to his eternal purpose which he purposed in himself Ephes 1.11 And accordingly the Election of Sons to glory is in present being when there are such Sons in being This putting nothing into being by God's Election is the way these Men take to evaporate God's Election into Man's Election 't is not God doth absolutely Elect any Man to salvation except the man Christ I hope they grant that but man Elects himself to Salvation and then Election hath put somewhat into present being But though Mr. Williams say of Election it puts nothing into present being I hope all Orthodox Protestants will say that Election hath put the Elect into an happy state for Election hath obtained though the rest are blinded and nothing can be laid to the charge of God's Elect and they are loved with an everlasting love and is God's love nothing in present being So it bars not God as a Governour to fix a connexion between Benefits and Duties No but it bars man from framing a Model for God and from making God's Righteousness to be Mans Gospel Holiness and it baâ—s man from putting in any leven into the lump of being Justifyed freely by his Grace through the Redemption that is in Jesus it bars man from ploughing with an Ox an Ass and from wearing a Linsey Wolsey Garment and from putting new Wine into old Bottles and from thinking a Branch can bring sorth any good Grapes except it be first in the Vine the Lord Jesus there being no gathering Grapes of Thorns or Figs of Thistles or any good work from any Soul till he is in Christ and though there is a blessed Connexion of Benefits and Duties yet no good Duty is done till the Benefit of being united to Christ be first bestowed by God God fixes a Connexion 't is true he makes the Tree good first and then the Fruit good and this was eternally in the Decree but man must not fix the connexion by making Duties Procurers of Benefits or making Gospel threats and promises to have in their own Nature a tendency to Convert Souls without the Operation of the Holy Spirit Mr. Williams saith If the Doctor had animadverted that Christs sufferings were the foundation of our Pardon but not formally our Pardon This intimates that the Dr. saith Christs sufferings were formally our Pardon I can shew how far our great Reformers went beyond Mr. Williams in asserting the vertue of the sufferings of Christ in the Pardon of sin which if Mr. Williams had consulted he would not have reflected as he doth on the Dr. they say in the Doctrine of the Church of England that which is tantamount to a formal pardon in Christs Sufferings they do not amuse the World with Mr. Williams his Rectoral distribution that he allows to God in pardoning sinners upon account of their being found in their Gospel Holiness joyning Faith and Holiness together as they entitle to Gospel Benefits which Benefits he saith are not from the conformity of Faith and Holiness c. to the Precept but from their Conformity to the rule of the Promise and so plunging poor Souls in his deeps and amazing them with his rules and Connexions But these Homilists give a certain sound of the Gospel and say upon the Sermon of the Passion of Good Fryday fol. 177 Such favour did he purchase by his Death of his heavenly Father for us that for the merit thereof we are now fully in Gods grace again and clearly discharged from our sin These are plain wholsome intelligible Gospel Truths such as suit with the Doctors Testimony they are not Bombasted with If we continue to repent and believe to our Death then our Evangelical Righteousness shall justifie us at the great day from Satans Charge of unbelief But they speak home against all Arminianism and say that by the merit of his death we are in Gods grace again nay we are now in God's grace and that fully not we shall be and we are discharged from sin nay we are clearly discharged from sin and in the next words they put it home and say to the confounding all the mincers of the vertue of the death of Christ as to the pardon of sin thus No tongue surely is able to express the worthiness of this so precious a death For in this standeth the continual pardon of our daily Offences Had such a passage as this been found in the Notes taken from Doctor Crisp that there is a continual pardon standing firm in the death of Christ of our present daily Offences this would be accounted dethroning Christ by giving more honour to him than some distinguishers can allow or if Reverend Mr. Cole had said that in Christs death stands the Pardon of our daily offences nay there stands a continual Pardon and this mentioned without naming Faith and Repentance but be our Offences what they may be there stands a continual pardon if we be Christians indeed say these holy Reformers this had been Dangerous Doctrine as an eminent Divine said of as harmless expressions of his as these in Pinners Hall I wish those worthy Gentlemen who are so exceptious against the freeness of God's Grace in and through Christ and must eke it out by our Gospel Holiness would seriously consider in the simplicity of the Gospel Spirit of these Homilists such expressions as these of theirs before they pass their hard Censures of crying dethroning Christ enervating his Laws because some who may be clearer than themselves Preach we are justified freely by his Grace through the redemption that is in Jesus without any thing of Mans works cooperating therein or thereto nothing can be plainer than these Reformers newly come out of the School Terms of Popish justification for renouncing every thing in man to have any concurrence into our Pardon But now the simplicity of the Gospel must be lost by some Mens Distinction of our Pardon by Christs death his sufferings were not our formal Pardon but the foundation of it I believe none of his Publishers of Free-Grace too freely ever said Christs sufferings were the formal Pardon of a sinner it being perfect Nonsense but I hope they may say his sufferings were a real Expiation of the sins of all the Elect without offending most of the Subscribers to Mr. Williams his Book else how could the Apostle say by one offering he for ever perfected those that are sanctified and he loved us and washed us from our sins in his blood having made
peace by the Blood of his Cross But in regard plain Scriptures will not go down but Christ's Righteousness must be our Gospel Holiness I proceed with the Testimony of those blessed maintainers of the absolute irreversible vertue of the sufferings of Christ which sufferings contained in them the daily pardon of our offences and yet these I hope Mr. Williams will not say have laid down Doctrines to the dethroning Christ though the same with Dr. Crisp they say in the same Passion Sermon in fol. 177. In this Death of Christ resteth our Justification How Sure Arch-Bishop Cranmer and Bishop Ridley and you famous Martyrs you will be Antinomians by and by have a care Mr. Williams do not see this he 'll get 49 and 49 and more if the Press be not in too much haste to subscribe a Paper to countenance his accusing you for enervating Christs Laws what our justification rest in Christs death what justified in the sight of God who calleth things that are not as though they were Rom. 4.17 before we believe Sure either you are mistaken or Mr. Williams must retract his black Titles he hath given to this Doctrine however Mr. Williams take it the Doctrine is good stands firm is allowed nay commanded by many Acts of Parliament to be read and by Queen Elizabeths Letter to be read again and again by all Parsons Vicars and Curates that our justification resteth in the Death of Christ and if so having the Apostle Paul on my side Being Justified by his blood Rom. 5.9 and the Apostle John Who washed us from our sins in his Blood and our Statute Law and the Queens Letter to the Bishops that our Justification resteth in his Death I will oppose it against all Gospel Mincers though 1000 times 49 and will say that on God's part all the Elect were justifyed when Christ died or rather rose again for our justification that is for the Declaration of it tho' on man's part no man is personally justified 'till Christ come and unite himself to him and work Faith in him which is always accompanied with all other Graces in Faith the Seed and Root planted by Christ with himself in the Soul the Homilists go on for the farther ascertaining the benefits that accrew to the Elect in the Death of Christ and say In this death we be allowed how will Mr. Williams and his Friends take this In this we be allowed will they say in Christs death there is only a Foundation for Pardon or a Foundation for our being allowed O 't is much more doubtless 't is thus we now are allowed or accepted in that death of his that death had such an efficacy that we being justified by it are allowed or accepted in it he don't say we are accepted for it or allowed for it but in it we are allowed in it God looks on nothing else but that Death of his Son in which he allows or accepts of those Sheep his Son dyed for and that this is the meaning the next words shew they saying In this is purchased the everlasting Health of our Souls Ay saith Mr. Williams now they lean on my side Christ purchased this for them that is to say provided they repent believe walk holy no 't is not with that connexion tho' God works all those Graces where Christs death is imputed But they say everlasting Health is purchased and it is in this death of Christ there 't is firmly fixt on that unmoveable Rock without mentioning any previous Qualifications as terms or conditions to concur to our Title for the Title is freely given in the Purchase and the Qualifications are wrought by the Purchaser all of Grace and as sure as he laid down his life for his Sheep so surely they shall come to him the Father drawing But without any limitation to any Condition 't is asserted plainly by above 49 of these holy Reformers that in this Death of Christ I say in it which is more than by it in this is purchased the everlasting health of our Souls and we may not think that Christ will lose his Purchase he having paid the Price Salvation is sure and secure without any Ifs and And 's and connexions and distributions as their next words plainly say Yea there is none other thing than the death of Christ that can be named under Heaven to save our Souls but this only work of Christs precious Offering of his Body upon the Altar of the Cross Here are words without Sophisticating connexions saving our Souls is the thing aimed at now say they he hath not only purchased it so will say most Arminians but nothing else out the Death of Christ saves us name what you will name Repenting Believing Gospel-Holiness blessed graces all but what have they to do with Salvation they are found in the Subjects saved they being the free gift of God but as for Salvation as for the everlasting Health of our Souls that was wrought out long before our complying with the Gospel rule and made firm to all the Seed the foundation of God standing sure this work was over and so allowed by these great men when Christ died and so well and effectually done that nothing can be named under Heaven to have any thing to do in saving our Souls but this Death of Christ tho' I grant many things tend to the manifesting of it to us and making us meet for it as Faith and Holiness being the things that must and will accompany Salvation Are you for works for Conditions 'T is this only work say they saves our souls Christs precious offering of his Body upon the Altar of the Cross then and upon that Altar the material Cross on which our Lord Jesus hung and died upon that the work of saving our Souls was finished when he cryed out it is finished so that here is more than a Foundation for pardon for here is Justification nay more than Justification here is everlasting Health and Salvation of our Souls wrought upon the Cross of Christ 1657 years ago or thereabouts this was good Divinity in our great Grand-Father's days and in Dr Crisps Eyes and Lips that our Justification and Salvation was really actually in Christs Death as they say and so confirmed by every Parliament that ever Confirmed the Book of Common Prayer but now a poor sinners salvation must be tortured with our personal holiness coming in with an as it were as the Apostle saith Rom. 9.32 that is to say with our inherent Righteousness concurring complying with conformity to Gospel Rule under threats and promises or else we are for the Dethroning Christ for enervating his Laws and the Rabble that know nothing of either Justification or Sanctification shall be let loose upon asserters of Free Grace by Mr. Williams crying out O these be men against Gospel Holiness when their Opposers know in their Conscience there is such a strain of Holiness all along in Dr. Crisps Book that though it be against the grain they
cannot but own they believe him a holy Person and well they may if they compare his Sermons on Free Grace teaching to deny Ungodliness with his other Sermons on our sins laid upon Christ in the last side of which Vol. fol. 444. the Dr. saith For my own part I abhor nothing in the World so much as this namely a licentious undertaking to continue in any sin because that such fulness of Grace hath abounded and I shall recommend to them if any such be here the reading of the Epistle of Jude where they may see the fearful wrath of God upon such persons as abuse the Grace of God to sin O Beloved let not the love of the Lord God in Jesus Christ thus manifested be so basely requited at your hands seeing the Lord hath so freely loved you and given Christ to you that you might be to the Praise of the Glory of his Grace in a Godly and Christian Conversation whereunto you are Ordained for you are Created in Christ Jesus to good Works that you should walk in them and I beseech you always to remember that you cannot answer the free love of God toward you any other way but by shewing it in a fruitful Conversation in the World and considering that one end for which the Lord did redeem you was that you might be a peculiar people to himself zealous of good Works Titus 2.24 Thus ends the third Volume To stop the mouths of Gain-sayers especially Mr. Williams who accuses the Dr. to be for Licentious Doctrine but because our holiness must not come in to concur to our Justification this is to enervate Christs Laws But to our purpose again The Homily saith as to the respect Christs sufferings have to the Pardon of our sins though his sufferings be not a formal pardon as saith Mr. Williams as a piece of nonsense charged upon Dr. Crisp yet his Sufferings are tant-amount to a Pardon in the Account of those holy compilers of the Homilies who say in fol. 178. His Passion is the Ransom and whole amends for our sin If so then with submission I may say this whole amends for sin is in the Eye of a just and gracious God tant-amount to a Pardon for God cannot but acquit where amends is made though the Person acquitted is never the better for it as to his Conscience till he believe in the Lord Jesus no more than a Criminal in New-gate condemned for Treason is the more at peace in his mind when his Friend hath got a Pardon for him in his Pocket till he see it or believes it but will any man in his senses say this Criminal is not really benefited by the Pardon his Friend got him till he see and plead this Pardon much less may Mr. Williams say that an Elect person is not benefited by the Justification by Christs Resurrection because 't is not applyed to him till believing They go on in fol. 185. and say Christ being perfect God and the Son of God gave his Body to be bruised and broken on the Cross for our sins this Mr. Williams will grant but they go on and say our Saviour Christ hath delivered us from sin this Mr. Williams must temper with ifs and Connexions they proceed Yet not so that we shall be free from committing sin but so that it shall not be imputed to our Condemnation So they have allowed a benefit to Believers before they believe though Mr. Williams questions it and affirm Christ on the Cross delivered from sin bearing it away so as it shall not be imputed to them and whether this be not more than a bare foundation of our Pardon it being a real making amends for sin a real justification a real saving our Souls in these great mens account and in the Nations account let Mr. Williams ponder and not conclude that Dr. Crisp entertained these Opinions which dethrone Christ as he calls it by not animadverting that Christs sufferings were barely a foundation of pardon and let him muse what his vilifying this Doctrine of the Church of Englamd will amount to To proceed he saith that the sins of the Elect They are not forgiven immediately upon nor meerly by his enduring those sufferings this is directly contrary to the Doctrine in the Homily 177. which saith In this death of Christ standeth our continual Pardon I hope he will allow that Christ did put away sin by the Sacrifice of himself because God saith it without any Trope or Ifs or Connexions Heb. 9.26 Also he will allow that before Christ sat on the right hand of God he purged our sins by himself Heb. 1.3 And that at the end of seventy Weeks he made an end of sin and brought in everlasting righteousness Dan. 9.24 and bare our sins in his Body and was the Lamb of God that took away the sins of the World John 1.29 If so that sins be satisfyed for and if put away and if purged and made an end of and born away and took away then what will remain to be forgiven even nothing and yet still neither the Dr. or any I know of hold that the Conscience of a sinner is acquitted hereby or at all by Christs death till Christ be applyed by Faith with all his Benefits to the Soul so that though with Mr. Williams our sins be not forgiven immediately upon Christs death as pertaining to the Conscience of the Elect sinner dyed for yet by Mr. Williams leave God is not so hard a Creditor to keep the Debt upon Record when he is satisfied for it and when 't is blotted out by the Blood of Christ sure he will allow that in the Court of Heaven the Book is crost and no debt appears against the Elect after Christ made payment sure this will not be gainsaid but by those who deny Christs satisfaction which many will nibble at tho' 't is too plain Popery to say downright that Christ did not make full satisfaction to God by his Death for the sins of all the Elect. Sins are not forgiven meerly by his enduring Sufferings W. What is our Gospel Holiness to help our Faith Holiness c. Yes for saith he There were to intervene a Gospel Promise of pardon the work of the Spirit for a Conformity to the rule of the Promise in the person to be pardoned and a Judicial act of Pardon by that promise on the Person thus conformed to the Rule thereof here 's a tedious lesson for a poor terrified Soul to get by heart when the Spirit of God hath convinced him of his miserable condition by sin when he cries to a Gospel Minister good Sir for the Lords sake tell me how I may get a pardon into my Bosom I have heard may he say God saith there is forgiveness with him 't is now ready by him that he may be feared I have heard that when the Jaylor cryed out What shall I do to be saved The Apostle bid him only believe in the Lord Jesus and thou
this needs a remark and the chief that I shall make is that I will beg of God and now do that I and Mr. Williams also may have the grace of the Gospel promise in a more full stream than that a continuance in a state of Death and a bar to the blessing are not threatned against every degree of sin as the Covenant of works did but that we may swim in the Rivers of infinite Love that God chose us in Christ before the World and gave us to the Lord Jesus that no sin should pluck us out of his hand and that by one offering he hath for ever perfected those that are sanctifyed so that now there is no more conscience of sin because where sin abounds grace doth much more abound and yet still for every sin and for every degree of sin we may not think our selves freed from Condemnation for it by vertue of the Gospel promise relaxing the Covenant of Works but I beg that he and I may for our cleansing our Consciences from the least degree of sin make use of the Apostles remedy If any man sin be it in any the least degree we have an Advocate with the Father Jesus Christ the Righteous who is the propitiation for our sins ay that 's the business that 's it we must trust to he is the propitiation for our sins of sin in the least degree it must have this participation or wo unto us this I implore of God in the name of Jesus that I and Mr. Williams may by a daily applying to this propitiation get our Consciences free from every degree of sin Before I leave this clause I reflect that the greatest Grammarian may make blunders which I note that Mr. Williams in the next Edition may mend this that so the World may not think Mr. Williams allows false Grammar as this Clause gives suspicion or I must go to School again The false Grammar in this clause is in these words At the Covenant of Works did which follows these words And a continuance in a state of death with a bar to the blessing are not threatned against every degree of sin as the Covenant of Works did so that the sentence in brief by Mr. Williams ordering runs thus Death and a Bar are not threatned as the Covenant of Works did and if this be sense or Grammar it must be by some Outlandish Figure and Rule I suppose he means thus Death and the Bar are not threatned as in the Covenant of Works they were and not as the Covenant of works did Mr. Williams next makes his Queries to confirm â—is assertion that every degree of sin is not threatned under the Gospel with Death and for confirmation of it saith Doth it the Gospel promise Life to all men however vile and impenitent they be I confess this rimes like brains and stairs he propounds that every degree of sin doth not bar the blessing of the Gospel and Confirms it by this the Gospel don't promise Life to the vilest and impenitent If it don't promise life to the vilest and impenitent doth it follow that any degree of sin can be so small as not to deserve death under the Gospel A strange Inference and stranger Doctrine as if he had said thus there are some sins under the Gospel do not deserve death because the Gospel doth not promise life to the vilest and most impenitent But to leave the Illogicalness of his Argument I 'll consider his Question as a positive Assertion single and by it self The Gospel doth not promise Life to all men however vile and impenitent they be saith Mr. Williams and I never heard of any that ever said it did that all men of all Nations since the World began to the end of it had promise of Life by the Gospel and then Mr. Williams rambling Question supposes some such Universalians there are but to help and amend the question it may be Mr. Williams intends thus Doth the Gospel promise Life to all that hear it however vile c. I answer none that he opposes ever asserted it as I see they with every good Christian say it promises life to all that truly believe in the Lord Jesus nay it promises life to all the Elect But the grand Question is still if it promise Life to the Elect however vile and impenitent they be this I take to be Mr. Williams Question now if he mean that the Gospel do not promise life to those that continue vile and impenitent to those that are never effectually called by the grace of God I am satisfied he must fight with the Air for none disputes him in that point but if he mean that the Gospel doth not promise Life to the chief of sinners to thâ— most vile and most impenitent which cannot be worse than the chief of sinners if they be elected chosen Vessels if he asserts this he mistakes but I will not question his Integrity to the Gospel in this point I fear there lies somewhat at the Bottom that wiâ—â—â—â—t bear the standard or touchstone of the word that is that God promises Life and Salvation upon our repentance and growing from vile to good for he doth not promise it to the vile and impenitent If this be his meaning that there is no promise of life to an Elect person till he return from vileness and till he repent this is as near Arminianism as four pence is to a groat and as far from the scripture as the West is from the East for that saith in Titus 1.2 In hope of Eternal life which God that cannot lye promised before the World began so that I conclude against Mr. Williams with the Apostle that the Gospel promise was before the foundation of the World for Life and Salvation to all the Elect according to the Promise of God though they be the chief of sinners however vile and impenitent they are till the Gospel comes and turns them from darkness to light from dumb Idols to serve the living God and the Gospel promise when it first touches their Hearts by the Spirit of God though it finds them so vile and impenitent it does not leave them so but first puts in a new spiritual life and carries it on in sanctification more and more every day and in this sense I give my Judgment the Gospel promises life to all men that are Elected that is all that are by vertue of their Election effectually called which promise was before the World began this cannot be too much insisted it because it is for the praise of the glory of his grace and hath no tendency to lessen the true value of the blessed graces of Repentance and new obedience which flow from and do give life to the promise His next Question is or doth it the Gospel threaten damnation or a continuance of it on any true Penitent believing Godly man because he is imperfect This is as wild a question as the former that was doth the Gospel
save all thus doth it damn all for what man lives and sins not So that every true Penitent is imperfect and this question needed not be askt but only to insinuate that true Penitence believing and godliness come in equal sharers in intituling Men to salvation by Christ that they go hand in hand to give an Interest in the promise only Repentance must take the Right hand and go next the Wall though the Apostle say justified by Faith we are saved by grace through Faith yet Repentance and Godliness will crowd in for a little boasting though it rob Christ whereas true faith gives him the glory of all by being the hand that receives all from Christ In the next place we have the yet most dangerous position for establishing our works in the business of our Salvation in this long sentence to bring in a degree of obedience a little finger we must have in the Pye or it will not be well made he brings it in thus This change of the Sanction that is of Life from Gospel Obedience instead of the Law Obedience supposes the death of Christ and his honouring the Law by his perfect Obedience wherein God hath provided for his own glory while he promises Life by forgiveness to imperfect man and yet he insists on some degree of Obedience to which of his meer grace he enableth us Here 's a long series or train to bring in a degree of Obedience first the sanction is changed this needs pondering next this supposes the death of Christ O fit what only supposes the death of Christ is his death to have no better encomium upon it one would think that glorious price and ransom of our redemption should have been set off with a glorious title as thus this is owing to the infinite love and mercy of God in the Unvaluable purchase by the blessed death of Christ But repenting believing a godly life that must have the high praises the Death of our blessed Lord Jesus must come off with a supposition this supposes the Death of Christ 〈◊〉 the next place it supposes the honouring the Law and is that all doth it not suppose the satisfying the Law I find not a word of that that Christs death satisfyed the Law O there is care taken that string must not be harped upon it would drown the sweet melody of some degrees of Obedience and our repenting believing and godliness which though excellent in their place yet are not to eclips the glory of our Lord Jesus in becoming the end of the Law I must say 't is a mean business to say Christs death honoured the Law so Cranmers death honoured the Gospel but Christs death to all sound Protestants was the end of the Law by his fulfilling our Righteousness but there must come in with it some degree of our Obedience this seems pretty broad compounding the matter with God for the sin of man Christ honoured the Law by his Obedience yet God insists on some degree of our Obedience this looks like a linsey woolsey Garment but it must be laid aside for it will not prove the wedding Garment the Bridegroom will scorn that any of his Guests shall sit down with the glorious Garment of his righteousness patcht up with the degrees of our Obedience If the King should send a Garment for Mr. Williams to come to Court in and stand before him I am confident he would wear that and that only and not go about to clap a patch here and a patch there of his own Coat much less will he do it to the Lord Jesus on serious thoughts Wherein God hath provided for his own Glory But it is but a mean provision if Christ have only honoured the Law and not fully satisfyed it and if our Obedience must come in with his Sons Obedience can is be thought that our imperfect obedience provides for God's glory by joyning it with Christs most perfect Obedience God indeed hath provided well for his glory in mans Salvation only from his own free Grace through the Blood of Christ but Mr. Williams makes but a slender providing for God's glory while he leaves room for the flesh to glory in his presence by his own obedience is this that no flesh may glory in his sight But Mr. Williams takes care to prevent that he 'll say by the last clause that God of his men grace enables us to this our Obedience I answer not in the least doth this take off from glorying for though 't is Gods grace inables to Obedience yet the Obedience is still our work and the Scripture saith plainly not of works lest any boast Every breath I breath is of God's grace and if God should enable me to speak for two hours together to the King Lords and Commons in Parliament so as to perswade them to imploy none but those that truely fear God in any place of trust should I not be apt to applaud my self though I should still own the ability and efficacy to perswade them was of God how much more will any poor Creature boast if his Obedience hath any hand in the salvation of his Soul O that we could cry grace grace not to us but to thy name be the praise and as for our Obedience cry all our righteousness is as filthy Raggs and so let us set the Crown on the head of our Lord Jesus say continually To the King eternal immortal invisible the only wise God be honour and glory for ever for his being all in all Author and finisher Alpha and Omega in our Salvation He promises Life by forgiveness to imperfect Man This is the next step to bring in some degree of our obedience but a false step if by promising Life by forgiveness he excludes Christs satisfying Gods Justice as that which leads to forgiveness of which there is not a word in this Paragraph and doth God promise life barely by forgiveness this is a sorry and nonsensical account of mans Redemption and Salvation And yet he insists on some degree of Obediences saith Mr. Williams Here comes the great master wheel by which our Salvation is secured Christs death is supposed the Law hath honour by Christs Obedience life is promised but yet God insists in our Obedience at least on some degree of it That God insists on our obedience and on more than some degree of it must be owned by all for God insists on our being holy as he is holy God insists on our loving him with all our heart God insists that we be blameless and unreproveable in his sight this is more than some degree of Obedience and it is our duty doubtless to endeavour to be perfect as our Father which is in Heaven is perfect But this hath nothing to do in our obtaining Life and is not such an Obedience as Mr. Williams saith God insists on He is more easie in his terms to poor sinners than to run it so high well what is it God insists on he in
effect told us before 't is a true penitent believing Godly Man this God insists on this is his some degree of Obedience that God insists on while he promises Life by forgiveness and is this the true Interpretation of these Texts Whileâ— we were Enemies we were reconciled and he justifies the Ungodly but from such glosses I desire to be delivered Well we must be true Penitent we must have Faith that Christ honoured the Law and we must be Godly persons that is we must walk in all godliness and honesty or we be not godly persons and when that is done then we may come to God and say Lord we have done what thou commandest we repent believe and are Godly though we are not perfect yet we are truly penitent believing and Godly 〈…〉 life if this be nor dividing shares with the Lord Jesus in the honour of salvation what is No mortal man will say that our perfect Obedience must come in toward our justification there being no such thing in the World and to say that Christ merited that our imperfect Obedience should be accepted for perfect is to say Christs death was needless for God might as well have saved the honour of his Righteousness and justice when Man had broken his Law by an absolute Forgiveness without Christs death as to make his death of no more value than to purchase that our lame Obedience should pass for firm perfect Obedience But God is Just in Justifying God hath received full compleat satisfaction from the Lord Jesus and now saith Come take the Water of Life freely and by a Holy Conversation glorifie me and do good to your selves and others I pass by examining his next cloudy expression in these words viz. This life on some degree of our Obedience the Covenant of Redemption secures to the Elect tho the grant therein is pleadable only by Christ as the Stipulating Party for us and our personal claim depends on the Gospel Covenant wherein Christ is Mediator which is liable enough to Exception for his saying Gods grant is not pleadable by us but only by Christ whereby Mr. Williams makes way to bring in the Gospel Covenant of our degree of our Obedience before we can claim any thing of Christ as Mediator this I pass and If come to his plain downright opposing the way of Salvation according as it is delivered us by the Apostle by holy Martyrs by the Homilists by famous Divines besides Dr. Crisp which follows in these unscriptural words of Mr. Williams his Gospel Sanction saith he determins as certain a Rule as happiness and misery as the Law of Works did though it be not the same 〈◊〉 it fixeth true repentance and Faith unfeigned to be the terms of Pardon so when it promiseth Heaven to the sincerely holy persevering Believer it fixeth sincere Holiness and Perseverance in Faith as the terms of Possessing Heaven Hence the Vse of Faith holiness c. to those benefits is not from their conformity to the Precept but their conformity to the rule of the Promise This long Paragraph of the Gospel Sanction of Mr. Williams his drawing I take to be as clearly opposite to the Apostle Paul as Arminius was to our Reformed Orthodox Divines for Mr. Williams his Faith Holiness and the bottomless boundless endless c. are brought in as the terms of possessing Heaven and not only so for that they might be as fruits of Union to Christ but they are so the terms as they are a Conformity to the Rule of the Promise even as the Law of works was to the Rule of the Precept that is as the Law of works required a perfect Obedience in Conformity to the Precept for obtaining Life So the Gospel Sanction requires Faith Holiness c. in conformity to the promise for obtaining Life which in our ordinary Dialect is that what perfect Obedience obtained under the Law that imperfect Faith and holiness c. doth under the Gospel which in plain terms is Christ hath purchased that our Faith Holiness perseverance in new obedience under the Gospel should pass instead of perfect Obedience under the Law which is as diametrically opposite to the Apostles not of Works lest any boast as East is to West and though Mr. Williams say these are not Works of the Law yet they are works and good works and such as if brought in for answering the Gospel Sanction as perfect works did the Law is the homest stab to the true Gospel that ever was printed by any Arminian for there is not a tittle in all the Gospel that our Faith and holiness are so our terms of happiness in conformity to the Rule of the Promise as obedience to the Law of works was in conformity to the Rule of the Precept the Apostles sanction is quite otherwise he faith not by works of righteousness but by his grace he hath saved us and not of works lest any boast if of works then grace is no more gâ—â—â—â— is not Faith a work holiness is it not working perseverance in Obedienc◠〈◊〉 it not working and must these come in to answer the Promise as perfect Obedience answered the Law What becomes then of Christs Obedience for us to answer the Law 't is quite shut out of doors and his Satisfaction too by this Scheme and Sanction this is so far from giving Christ the sole honour of being our perfect compleat alone only Saviour Wisdom Righteousness Sanctification and Redemption that it quite excludes him in every part of Salvation but only his making way that we should save our selves his obtaining by his Life and Death imputed to us that God would be so kind to us and unjust to himself that our Faith Holiness c. should answer the promise as unsinning Obedience should have answered the Law this is making God a very cheat to himself to set up a pure holy Law the perfect Copy of his will and mans breach of it should be made up by our imperfect weak faith and holiness which hath no more proportion to the infinitely holy Law than a brass Farthing hath to a World full of Diamonds nor so much and yet so easie a Merchant this Doctrine would make God by making our pretended conformity to the Promise to answer the enjoyned perfect conformity to the Law But because those of this Opinion cannot for shame bring it in to stand alone that our Conformity to the Promise should answer instead of obedience to the law therefore they bring in Christ to purchase this priviledge that is that Christ purchased that God should cheat his holiness and righteousness with a sham of Mens invention whereas the Doctrine of the Gospel is that God is just and the justifier of those that believe in Jesus who in our stead fulfilled all righteousness for us and so became the end of the Law for righteousness sake And that our Faith and Holiness with the unmeasurable c. have nothing to do in our justification or Salvation as a
regenerate and Justified and indued with true Faith and regarding the Order of Nature it follows Faith and Justification O these are strong battering Rams against setting up mans Righteousness and in fol. 468. he gives account whence this new Doctrine of repentance having a hand in our Salvation comes viz. from Rome and saith thus The Church of Rome hath Corrupted the Antient Doctrine of Repentance saying That a Sinner hath in him a Natural disposition which being stir'd up by God's preventing Grace he may and can work together with Gods Spirit in his own Repentance But indeed all our Repentance is to be ascribed to Gods grace wholly Eph. 2.4 The Soul of man is not weak but stark dead in sin and therefore it can no more prepare it self to repentance than the body being dead in the Grave can dispose it self to the last Resurrection O these are weighty words and O that they might prevail in the hand of the Spirit of God to weaken mans apprehensions of something practicable in and by himself in order to bring about his Salvation that so we might all put our Mouths in the dust and give glory to God for of him and through him especially in the matter of our Salvation and to him be all things to whom be glory in the Churches for ever thus much for Mr. W. Sanction of the Gospel giving pardon on our Conformity to the Rule of the Promise In the next place Mr. W. asserts a profound benefit by Gospel grace and yet it carries Poyson in it I fear Hence by Gospel grace there is a great difference between imperfect Faith and utter Vnbelief The Poyson in the head of this Snake I fear is that this imperfect Faith is intended to be the upshot of Gospel Grace A little to descant upon this I would offer That if so mean a Lover of the Lord Jesus as I am should have been telling the World the benefit of Gospel Grace I should have flown a little higher in celebrating the Love of God therein than to say by it imperfect Faith differs greatly from utter Vnbelief which without Gospel Grace any Child of four Years Old will grant That can tell there is a great difference between a little mess of Milk and none at all I should have said By Gospel Grace there is a great difference between our Lord Jesus freely given us and with him all things even himself to be our Wisdom Righteousness c. And being slaves of Satan sold under sin without this gospel grace I should have invited the World to rejoyce in this Benefit by Gospel Grace That Christ was made sin for us that he might be made righteousness to us or become the Lord our Righteousness And that by Gospel Grace God comâ—s to justify the Ungodly to save Sinners of whom the Apostle saith He was chief and a Pattern of them who should afterward believe to everlasting life this is right gospel grace worthy of the Father Son and Spirit to give Purchase and Communicate I should scarce have flamm'd the World off with such a dead Carcass of Divinity as to say If you look for the glorious Priviledge and Benefit of Gospel Grace which the Father Son and Spirit have been contriving and rejoycing in from all Eternity and which the Eternal Blessed Son of God took Man's Nature for and for which he was under the Curse of God and died for which all the Angels and Saints of God for ever adore him It was that this should be published That there is by the Gospel Grace a great difference between imperfect Faith and utter Unbelief or which is much at one between an Essentiality and a Nullity between something and nothing there is so great difference as is between Heaven and Hell and this difference is eternal and so would have been without any thing of the Gospel I suppose Mr. W. means though he is unhappy in not expressing it that by Gospel Grace imperfect Faith is accepted for perfect Obedience that is to say if it be joyned with sincere Holiness true Repentance and Perseverance c. but this is still wide from the mark of Gospel Grace for the Apostle saith It brings Salvation and teaches Godliness But Mr. W. will make the World amends it may be hoped in the next Benefit by Gospel Grace which take as follows By gospel grace there is a great difference between sincere Holiness and formal Profaneness or Wickedness one would wonder how gospel grace comes to be hookt into this Difference which all the World would own to be infinitely different without any grace of God in the Gospel Did our Lord Jesus shed his Blood for this Notion to be asserted which was as true without any grace of the gospel as with it but it may be he means that by gospel grace there is a Purchase made that sincere Holiness shall stand instead of perfect Holiness which Wickedness could not do And this he must mean or nothing and if he means this he perfectly overthrows the gospel and if he do not mean it he abuses the World with an Amusement The next is True Love to God and prevailing Enmity There is by Gospel Grace he saith great difference between these But this is another great mistake which I am confident he will he ashamed to own What hath the gospel to do to make this great difference By the law is the Knowledge of sin and the gospel shews grace but to say the gospel makes this difference is to roh God of the Holiness of his righteous Law But supposing this Nonsense to be current Divinity with some that by gospel Grace there is great difference between God and the Devil or Love to God and prevailing Enmity What is this to the point Mr. Williams is labouring to make good that there is to be a Conformity to the Rule of the Promise in the person to be pardoned for proof of which he saith There is great difference between Love of God and prevailing Enmity Would he have his meaning to be that love of God is conforming to the Rule of the Promise therefore an ingredient to Pardon which Enmity is not I answer Love of God is as much conforming to the Rule of the Law as of Gospel grace and so his Argument faces had he said the Law commands us to love God and the Gospel promiseth to write this Law in our hearts though not as an ingredient to our Pardon there might be some Edification by it but to assert there is a difference between these two which was ever so is of no more force for his Argument than to say Black and White differ or I and Doctor C. dâ—ffer His next is like the three former Differences viz. by Gospel grace there is a great difference between in perfect spiritual Duties and Rebellious Negleâ—ts Now he hath spun a fine Thread here 's the end of his Gospel grace it hath made this difference and would not this difference have been if
we had never heard of the Gospel What Riches of grace is this in Mr. Williams's gospel the sum whereof is It hath made a difference between Faith and Unbelief Holiness and Profaneness Love and Enmity Duty and Rebellion O what Encomiums must the World raise to such a Discoverer of that which Nature without either Law or Gospel teaches every man But some hidden Treasure must lye under this Rubbish of Divinity 't is not for nothing that Gospel grace is dignified with procuring these four Blessings therefore Mr. W. must mean that Conformity to the Rule of the Promise is in our imperfect Faith sincere Holiness love of God and spiritual Duties and these are the Conditions on which the gospel promiseth pardon now how correspondent Mr. Williams gospel is to the Prophet Isaiah's Account the world may judge from Isaiah 43.25 I even I am he that blotteth out thy Transgressions for mine own sake This is the Rule for Pardon in the sense of Doctor Crisp and of all that love the Lord Jesus for obtaining this gospel grace and for those that differ I beseech the Lord to open their Eyes and subdue their Hearts to the simplicity of the gospel that they may lay down their strong Reasonings which indeed are foolishness not only with God but to every Child of seven Years old that hath learnt his Assemblies Catechism But now I think on 't Mr. Williams hath slur'd that by his new unsound one come we next to his Conclusion of his great point of our Conformity to the Rule in order to obtain pardon wherein he saith thus God in dispensing of gospel promised Blessings doth judicially determine a conformity to THIS Rule of the Promise We must observe that decisive word this Rule no gospel Blessing without a Conformity to this Rule that is the four Pillars of his Babel to build Pardon upon our imperfect Faith our sincere Holiness our love of God our spiritual Duties which include every Precept Counsel and Direction in the Bible as much as to say Stand by blessed Jesus I have heard of thy pretious Blood a Ransom I have heard of thy saving to the uttermost all that come to God by thee I have heard of thy passing by when poor Sinners lay in their Blood dead in Sins and saying Live I have heard thou didst say Publicans and Harlots go into the Kingdom of God before you Pharisees that justify your selves Mâ—â—h 21 3â— But there is risen up in this last Age a Generation of strong Reasoners that say Our formal Pardon is not in thy Blood but we must get it as it were by the VVorks of the Law by Faith Holiness Perseverance Love Spiritual Duties and this Doctrine O Jesus I must adhere to or I shall be accounted a Dethroner of thee and an enervater of thy Laws though there is not one word either in the Law or Gospel that enjoyns these as Conditions to obtain Pardon But thy Righteousness is by them interpreted to be our gospel Holiness and upon this they ground our obtaining Pardon not by the one work of the Law Thou shalt love the Lord with all thine heart but by the many works of the gospel O that ever mens Learning and Parts should be so vitiated as to decry the simplicity of the Truth as it is in Jesus Believe in the Lord Jesus and thou shalt be saved set up their Scheme of a gospel Promise of Pardon upon a Conformity to this prescribed Rule of Duties innumerable besides Repentance Faith Love sincere Holiness Perseverance Obedience and when all this is mentioned there comes in a boundless c. O to the Law and to the Testimonies let t is say which directs us plainly Look to me and be ye saved all the ends of the Earth come unto me and ye shalt find rest for your Souls After all this Pudder Mr. Williams comes to himself and also Doctor Crisp and though he had been setting up his Connexions and Conformity in Faith Holiness Obedience c. At last he comes to Bellarmins's Tutissimum to the Sheet Anchor To the alone true Gospel way of Salvation true uniting Faith in Christ I was in an Amazement to find that God extorted this Confession from him after his long Deviation That true uniting Faith was the Wedding Garment This is like a Minister of the gospel of our Lord Jesus if he can stay here but alas the next Page throws this good Mist down however we will make much of this for here he Centers with the choicest Christians when he saith thus God upon a View of his guests he cast out him that had not on the Wedding Garment viz. true uniting Faith Then I quaere What 's become of the Long Bed-Roll of Spiritual Duties Faith Love Repentance Holiness Obedience c. If true uniting Faith be the Wedding garment sure this Wedding garment was not worn without Pardon of Sins through the Blood of Christ washing them off from this guest if this were by true uniting Faith and nothing else was lookt after by the Master of the Feast but that his Guests owned him by wearing him their Righteousness by Faith then avoid the Scheme of our holy Performances from having any thing to do in our being admitted to fit with the King at his round Table But what shall we say unstable as water Reuben was no sooner hath Mr. Williams writ clear gospel that nothing but true uniting Faith kept a Man from being cast out but the next Clause brings in persevering Holiness with the Train of all spiritual Duties to give admittance to the wise Virgins so that one while we are justified by Faith another while by persevering Holiness If you are to go to the Wedding Feast you are to put on true uniting Faith If you are to enter with the Bridegroom to the Marriage then 't is the Spirit of grace and persevering Holiness gains you admittance these are his words As by keeping out the foolish Virgins for not having Oyl in their Lamps viz. the Spirit of grace and persevering Holiness so by admitting the wise Virgins he judicially declared they had a Spirit of grace and persevering Holiness Here 's not one word of Faith or of Christ or of his Righteousness for these poor Virgins to get into the Wedding House by not one syllable of being justified by Faith But according to his sense they said to Christ Lord we have the Spirit of grace and persevering Holiness we have prophesied in thy Name against too much exalting Free Grace we have done many wonderful Works we have persevered in our Holiness till thy coming But will Christ give them admission on this Plea of a Spirit of grace and holiness without a word of Faith in our Lord Jesus No sure he will say I know you not you would not know me to be your Righteousness You come in your gospel Holiness I know you not This is to make the gospel yea and nay 'T is yea to day true uniting
Faith gains admittance to day 't is nay to morrow now persevering Holiness doth it This is giving an uncertain Sound whereas the Promises are the same to day yesterday and for ever and all yea and Amen in Christ Jesus If true Faith be the Wedding Garment our wearing Christs Righteousness the same true Faith is that which receives the Oyl into our Vessels the blood or righteousness of Jesus ours by Faith or the Spirit of Life which is in Christ Jesus Rom 8.2 This Christ dwelling in our Hearts by Faith Christ dwelling in us by the holy Spirit is the true Oyl that the Wise Virgins gain admittance by His next Clause is the advancing into our Justification God's terms of forgiving adopting glorifying as Rector by believing c. This c. hath a great hand in forgiving I suppose it wonderful to every Judicious Râ—ader that a Gentleman of great Parts and sense should blend the Gospel thus as to make the Gospel Blessings to be disperst by God with regard to our being Believers c. that is to our being Believers and performing all the Duties prescribed in the Gospel he puts it only God hath a regard to it but the plain English must be God doth so regard our performing this Act of believing c. and that till death and not only so but all other Gospel Duties that if we do not perform them God dispenses no gospel Blessing so that we are still under a Covenant of Works but let us see the true lineaments of this new Gospel which is in these words of Mr. Williams Thus Can any think that Forgiving Adopting Glorifying or the conveyance of every other promised Benefit given on Gods terms are not Judicial acts of God as Rector if so doth he dispense these blindly and promiscuously without any regard to our being Believers c. or no I suppose Mr. W. will be accounted more hold than becomes him to insinuate that God dispenses his Blessings blindly if he do not bestow them in his way upon his terms of our being Believers c. O that men were humble and in pretending to oppose Dr. Crisp they did not speak indecently of God by calling him a blind giver of Benefits if he give them not according to our prescriptions of his rectoral Government God gives freely God gives before we have done good or Evil God shews mercy because he will shew mercy God saves the chief of sinners in the Career of sin God therefore speaks comfortably because Israel went after her Lovers and pardons sin because it is great his ways in shewing mercy are past finding out justifying the Ungodly and not calling the Righteous and yet God dispenses not blindly and promiscuously though he do not do it in Mr. W. way of having some regard to our being Believers Repenters Perseverers c. Vain man would be wiser than God when God saith Not for your sakes do I this be it known unto you but for mine holy Names sake which ye have prophaned among the Heathen Will Mr. W. be so bold as to think God dispenses his Blessings blindly because he doth not give them on those terms he hath prescribed We see Gods terms here are for his Names sake which they prophaned prophaning Gods Name was all that God had regard to on their part it was his own holy name was his only inducement his holy free gratious Covenant in which his holy name was engaged not our being believers Perseverers in spiritual Duties c. The like ground God looks at and regards in his delivering Israel in Deut. 7.7 not their being more excellent than other People but his own love of them The Lord did not set his love upon you and châ—se you because you were more than other people for you were the fewest of all People but because the Lord loved you these are Gods Terms he loved and chose because he loved Sure Mr. Williams will not say God had regard to their holiness in dispensing his blâ—ssings to them before the gospel shined in its lustre through our Lord Jesus and must God be charged with blind promiscuous dispensing blessings now under clear gospel light if he now shew mercy in a soveraign way of grace to gross sinners without regard to any good they do while he suffer the Righteous in their own Eyes to perish in their own righteousness O let us not prescribe rules and terms to God for his bestowing mercy but thankfully accept his grace and mercy in our Lord Jesus freely given because he will have mercy on whom he will have mercy and whom he will he hardens Well but Mr. W. will confirm his Position and that by Scripture too though strained thus With respect to what 's above declared the gospel is called a Law of Faith a law of liberty It is true the gospel is called in opposition to the Law of works a Law of Faith but I think in the stream of the whole Bible David could not find a fitter stone to sling into the Head of this great Goliath mans righteousness to joyn with Christs than this Scripture Mr. Williams is setting up a righteousness of Works or gospel Holiness for ushering in pardon and to prove it saith the gospel is called a Law of Faith but let us see how 't is so called in Rom. 3.26 27. To declare his righteousness that he might be just and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus where is boasting then it is excluded by what Law of Works Nay but by the law of Faith Here the Apostle setly and solemnly treats of excluding works and of our being justified by Faith without works of all sorts and positively asserts God is just in justifying the Believer God could not be just in justifying according to the Arminian way for our imperfect holiness or having any regard to it in the matter of Justifying but God is just in justifying a Believer because the Believer hath a perfect compleat righteousness of Christ put upon him to answer the Law by and God looking upon him compleat in Christ is just in Justifying him The Apostle having laid this ground work to damn all self-righteousness or works even Faith as a work in the matter of Justification he comes and makes a challenge directly against Mr. Williams's Doctrine of our sincere holiness concurring to pardon and saith where is boasting then Where are all these great Advancers of mans righteousness which tends to boasting and he gives the stabbing answer It is excluded God hath not lest the least Crevice for it to enter by 't is wholly excluded 't is shut out from ever having any thing to do in our salvation yet may one say 't is shut out by the Law of Works the old Moral Law do and live we grant that but there is a gospel holiness will let in boasting again I must repent believe be sincerely holy and persevere therein all my days and God hath regard to this in my Justification no no 't
is wholly shut out there is to be no boasting and 't is shut out by the law of Faith by that Faith I just now mentioned all you have to do in the point of Justification is Believe in the Lord Jesus and you shall be saved Do these Men seek a Law here 's the Law this is his Commandment that you believe in the name of the Lord Jesus John 3.23 when they said What shall we do that we might work the works of God Jesus answered and said unto them This is the work of God that ye believe in him whom he hath sent so the Apostle here do you seek a Law that excludes from boasting I 'll tell you the Law 't is the law of Faith to believe on him that is just and the justifier of the Ungodly upon his believing and yet this Mr. W. brings for confirmation of his sincere holiness that God regards in his giving pardon But thus it pleaseth God to confound the wise by quoting a Text in order to adulterate it when in the Issue no Text is more sharp upon him A farther Confirmation of his setting up works for concurring to pardon is in the next words thus And it the gospel specially insists on that sincerity of grace and holiness which the rule of the Promise makes necessary in its description of the Person whom it makes partaker of its included Benefit sure never was the free grace and love of God to Man so fetter'd and obscured by dark expressions had any Sophister industriously set himself to vitiate the true meaning of Gods Love in these words God so loved the World that he gave his only beloved Son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life he could not possibly I think have done it worse than to explain hem in Mr. W. expressions of the gospel insisting on grace and that sincere and on holiness and that such as the rule of the Promise makes necessary and that rule of the Promise is in its description of the Person to be benefited by it which description must needs be the whole word of God and when this person hath all that holiness that we find the word of God recommends then this person by this rule with this holiness is partaker of an included benefit God of his rich mercy pour out his Spirit and grant his Servants may be inabled to deliver his clear plain Scripture offers of life and Salvation by Jesus Christ with clearer Evidence than this Is this the way of confuting Dr. C. who asserts Gospel Grace in plain Gospel Terms That Christ came to seek and save the lost that he seeks and finds his lost sheep and brings them home upon his Shoulders that he carries the Lambs in his Arms and gently leads those with young and instead of such Soul-saving encouragements to poor sinners to put them off with our grace and holiness and not a word of Gods saving them in Christ but our coming up to the rule which the promise makes necessary And who shall be able to say when he hath done all that he comes up to Mr. Williams rule of believing c. his Obedience c. his persevering c. from such stating of Gospel Truth O Lord deliver thy People Now we come to the Use Mr. Williams makes of his premises of salvation from our conformity to Gospel rule of new obedience c. which he summs up in few words viz. And the main of our Ministry consists in pressing men to Answer the Rule of the Gospel Promise But the main of the Apostles was to know nothing but Christ and him crucified and to press men to be found in him and so Mr. W. once did when he preach'd that Christ indured the utmost God bated him nothing the atonement was so compleat that God can demand no other from Christ or from any Soul this Atonement is applyed to This he deduced from this Doctrine The reconciling of sinners to God is effected by the concurring influence of the Priestly and Kingly Office of Christ Well then Christ hath effected this reconciliation what remains for poor man to do but accept it and be thankful not to come in with his Gospel Holiness for God to have regard to in our reconciliation to God But it seems this stream of Gospel grace must not run so clear now in his Book here must be conformity to Gospel Rule before we have any benefit by Christ which consists in Repentance Faith c. to all the rest and now this is prest and the main of our Ministry consists in this whereas the main of the Apostles was to beseech Men to be reconciled to God because God was in Christ and when upon the Cross reconciling the world to himself when by one Offering he for ever perfected the Work and cryed out it is finished and then after Union after engrafting into Christ after being in a blessed state of Salvation secured so as never to fall away then the Apostle presses to walk worthy of this Gospel of this free Salvation by Jesus Christ Mr. Williams proceeds viz. We call men to be reconciled to God upon which we know God will be at peace with them This I thought it would come to at last First we must come to God and be reconciled to him and then God will be at peace with us which is just contrary to the Apostle when we were Enemies we were reconciled Rom. 5.10 But when Men will be pampering with our holiness for God to look to in our acceptance in Christ they will fall into a Covenant of Works and call it Gospel Grace that our works are accepted in order to our Justification and Salvation we must first be reconciled to God saith Mr. W. that is we must first comply with the gospel rule of not only Faith but Holiness Repentance and perseverance in new Obedience and having thus brought our selves to that reconciled posture then God will be at peace is this fulfilling Christs commission Go Preach the gospel to every Creature he that believeth shall be saved Is this proclaiming the acceptable year of the Lord When thou wast in thy Blood I said to thee Live and for mine own Name sake I will remember their sins no more God waits to be gracious knocking at the Door of poor sinners hearts crying Open to me let me come in I bring my Supper I bring my Son only let him in only receive him by Faith God don't say my Son and I will be at peace with you after you have washt you and made your selves clean but he comes to tell you he loved you and washt you from your sins in his blood on the Cross and you that believe in me are the Persons I was reconciled to you then and am come now to offer it to you and beseech you to be reconciled to me Thus with these words of his first love he draws poor sinners to be reconciled to him and do not damp
their Comforts by telling them I will be at peace if you be reconciled to me but revives their hearts by telling them that the peace is already wrought in God and for sinners by Christ at his death for that he made peace by the Blood of his Cross and by him reconciled all to himself Col. 1.20 Christ did not stay till we were reconciled to him as Mr. W. seems to intimate when he calls men to be reconciled to God upon which he knows God will be at peace with them This I take to be setting the Cart before the Horse to invite Men to be reconciled thereby to get God to be at peace whereas the sweet heavenly strain of the gospel is Come for all things are ready come to Jesus who is already made of God to you that come Wisdom Righteousness Sanctification and Redemption who is the Author and finisher of your Faith O Jesus thus draw and we will run after thee and thus he hath drawn thousands by the Prophets and Apostles preaching and his faithful Servants after him to come to God and to holy Obedience in Love whereas the legal drawing of walking holily and then God will be at peace keeps poor Souls in perpetual doubts and works the Soul but to a Spirit of Bondage Next comes the Top-stone of this New system of gospel Truth which looks as if it were hewed and squared at Rome with only a little Varnish at Amsterdam viz. These things Gods promising life by forgiveness and yee insisting on some Degree of Obedience will help thy Conceptions still remembring that the merit of Christ are the cause of this gospel Ordination Can any spiritual inlightned mind read this and not blush for Mr. W. and think he is hard put to it to support his cause of laying our salvation on our gospel holiness joyned with Christs righteousness when he flies to such an Assertion as the Papists have been forced to forsake being beaten out of that Trench by our great Divines That Christ merited that we should merit this they asserted but found it would not hold water therefore Bellarmin flies to his Tutissimum and saith in his Book de Justif l. 5. ch 7. pro. 3. Propter incertitudinem propriae Justitiae periculum inanis gloriae Tutissimum est totam fiduciam in sola Dei misericordia benignitate reponere Because of the uncertainty of our own righteousness and the danger of vain glory it is safest to put all our trust in the alone mercy and bounty of God Here the Jesuit flies from the gospel Ordination that Christ merited that God should have regard to our gospel holiness and our conformity to gospel Rule for obtaining gospel promise this chimed well with him in his long arguments for Justification by works but upon his review of his strong reasons he flies from it and betakes himself to Gods meer mercy and bounty which must be in Christ and so I hope the great opposer of Dr. Crisp will do But in regard this is so broad and wide a gap to let in the whole body of self Justiciaries with their good works to come in for sharing with Christ in salvation I must make some opposition to it both from Scripture and sound Protestants The merits of Christ saith Mr. W. are the cause of this Ordination that is that our answering the gospel rule obtains us interest in the gospel Promise or which is all one Do and live Christ merited that if we do we shall live the only difference is the first doing and live was perfect Obedience to the Law and this doing and live of Mr. VV. is sincere obedience to the gospel in all its commands counsels c. which every true Christian trembles to think on Is this the upshot of Christs Death to merit that our Gospel Obedience should be the ground of our obtaining Benefit by Christ then I say again it must come to this that Christ merited that we should merit for there can be no benefit to a Sinner but by merit Christ did not absolutely merit the Benefit for us say they but merited that we doing so and so should obtain the Benefit then our doing so and so must merit it for it is injustice of God to himself and his Righteous broken Law to give a Sinner that deserves Hell any good unless that good be merited and this is left to the Sinner to obtain by Gospel Obedience which therefore must of necessity be from merit So that here it must rest or we make God unjust to himself and so say Christ purchas'd this that we should do so is Nonsense Mr. Williams can hardly assoyle himself from this Charge till he retract this Assertion That the merits of Christ are the cause of that Gospel Ordination he had laid down As for the Scriptures that oppose this Divinity those already mentioned are abundantly more than sufficient to throw down the House built on this Sandy Foundation as that God so loved the World that whosoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life Here is nothing required but believing to everlasting life So the Apostle Acts 16. Believe in the Lord Jesus and thou shalt be saved Here 's complying with no other Gospel Rule for Salvation but believing in the Lord Jesus To which I may add the whole Stream of the New Testament to come and take the Water of Life freely Rev. 22. They that hunger and thirst after this Righteousness of Christ they shall be filled If God by his grace have begot a true hunger a true desire after it they shall have it Come to me if weary if laden cast your self on me and you shall find rest for your Souls But the great Scripture is Not to him that worketh not to him that thinks to obtain gospel Benefits by complying with gospel Rule of walking in holy Obedience to obtain pardon by it but to him that believes on him that justifies the Vngodly This Scripture is enough to confound the whole Scheme of the new fashion'd stating of gospel Truth The Apostle states gospel Truth thus Not to him that worketh no Works at all must come in in the business of our Salvation as concurring to it Thus the Apostle held saith Mr. Williams This lets in Licentiousness I have found a better way of staring gospel Truth that is To him that worketh to him that complies with gospel Rule to him that is godly not his Faith alone but his Faith with sincere Obedience That is his gospel Holiness which the Apostle intends when he speaks of being found in the Righteousness of God by Faith this gives right to gospel Benefits O what heart touched with love to the Lord Jesus and poor Souls but must ake to see the gospel thus mangled and the Crown upon our gospel Obedience jointly with Christ If this be not Evacuating and Invalidating the compleat Mediation and Atonement of the Lord Jesus then what can do it For he will not have any
Co-workers with him for Justification and Salvation Though by his Spirit he makes all his Regenerate ones Co-workers with him in the carrying on the Work of Sanctification Not to multiply Scriptures in a matter so strenuously contended against by the Apostle of our Works concurring to our Salvation I shall only add at present that great Text 2 Tim. 1.9 who hath saved us and called us not according to our Works Here 's a perfect Renunciation of VVorks even VVorks of all sorts before Faith and after Faith He don't say VVho saved us not for our VVorks but not according to our VVorks our VVorks have no accordingness in them to our Salvation they have no concurrence in that point they are left quite out Here 's no room for Gospel Obedience in complying with Gospel Rule to obtain life No not a word of that 't is so far from being for our Works that 't is not according to our works God hath no regard to them in saving and calling He hath saved How He saved by calling us How is that Did he not call us to Salvation upon seeing us comply with the Gospel Rule No he saved us and called us not according to our Works How then Then it is in a way that amazes the Scholastick World a way that will not go down with the wise and prudent of this world It is according to his grace not our grace according I say to his own grace given us in Christ before the world began O be amazed and confounded all that would state Gospel Truth any other way than God hath stated it for the everlasting comfort of all those blessed ones whom God hath shewed their Election to by their effectual Call to come to Christ he hath saved 't is already done and that not according to humane stating Gospel Truth not according to our Works that way would leave us always under Suspitions and Jealousies to our dying day but according to his ancient everlasting Love and that given to us as lookt upon in Christ when chosen in him before they had done good or evil before the world began that the purpose of God according to Election might stand Here the Apostle leaves it and so will I as to Scripture Confutation of his Gospel Ordination and because Mr. Williams may not say This is but one Doctors Opinion when he saith Doctor Crisp Dethrones Christ by rejecting holy Works from concurring to Salvation I shall spend some pains and time begging it may be acceptable Service in the Lord in shewing what several Servants of God of good Name say to this point I begin with Mr. Veale a Gentleman not in the least inclining to Antinomians in his Sermon against Merits Morn Lect. fol. 437. He shuts out gratious Works from having any hand or concurrence in our Salvation by this expression viz. It is muche that he God doth not damn you for your good Works seeing they are all defiled and have something of Sin cleaving to them What becomes of our Gospel Holiness now and sincere Obedience in the case of Salvation What all good works sin then they are dung Well but hath not Christ merited such a Gospel Ordination as our answering the Gospel Rule of holy Obedience though imperfect it shall interest us in Gospel Blessings To this Mr. Veale saith in fol. 417. It is in vain to say that Christ hath merited for the Saints a power of meriting The Papists can never prove that Christ merited any such Power for Believers It is really more for his honour to purchase all for them himself but Mr. Williams will say I do not say Christ merited that we should merit no but he saith Christ merited God should regard our works in Justification and in our Salvation What 's that but coming in as it were by Works not with a down-right rejecting of Christ but with a side-wind bringing in our works Christ merited that we should do something in our salvation And what 's that In plain English they give us a right to the Gospel Benefits which in some sense is worse than down-right Popery in as much as Popery makes our works meritorious of life in that Christ hath put an infinite value on them by his merits and so makes our works so valuable as to compensate the Justice of God for our sins and so still maintain the honour of God's Righteousness in forgiving sin on a valuable consideration of our works made by Christ meritorious of it Whereas the middle way found out by some makes God so gracious as by virtue of Christ's Mediation God accepts of imperfect defective gospel Holiness as perfect for Christ's sake and thereupon Forgives How near this comes to Mr. W's stating the gospel Ordination may be easily be judged Mr. Veale leaves Mr. Williams to stand by himself as to Gospel Holiness giving an Interest in the Blessings and saith 't is only an evidence of Faith and gives no Title in fol. 421. Hope of Life saith he may be helped on by Obedience and good Works because they are an Evidence of his Faith and so of his Interest in Christ but there is a vast difference between a man's taking comfort in his Obedience as the evidence of his Title to glory and Trusting in it as that which gives him Title I come next to Mr. Doelittle fol. 195. of Morning Lecture who gives an account of the Protestants and Papists Doctrine of Justification First he sums up the Apostles Doctrine of Justification not to him that works as Dâ—vid describes the blessedness of the Man to whom the Lord imputes Righteousness not imputing their Trespasses to them for he made him to be sin for us that we might be the Righteousness of God Then he quotes the Protestant Doctrine thus We are accounted righteous before God only for the merit of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ by Faith and not for our Works Those whom God effectually calls he freely justifies not by infusing Righteousness into them mark that against the Gospel Ordination of God's regarding our Holiness but by pardoning their Sins and by accounting and accepting their Persons as righteous not for any thing wrought in them or done by them but for Christ's sake alone imputing the Obedience and Satisfaction of Christ to them they receiving and resting on him and his Righteousness by Faith I think nothing can be more opposite than this Account of Protestant Faith where is not a word of our Holiness to Justification and Mr. Williams's which is made up of Gospel Obedience Gospel Rule Gospel Ordination of sincere Holiness regarded by God in our Justification This Protestant Doctrine he confirms by referring to a cloud of Witnesses against our new Divinity viz. The Helvetian Confession the Bohemian Gallican Augustane Belgick Wittemberg and Basil Then follows the Popish Trent Justification Justification is not only forgiveness of sin but also Sanctification of the sinner whereby a Man of unjust is made just and Mr. Williams like this complying
with gospel Rule gives right to gospel Blessing The Papists go on and say the only formal Cause of Justification is the Righteousness of God not wherewith be himself is righteouâ— but whereby he makes us righteous I know Mr. Williams in words denies our Sanctification to be a part of our Justification but in the whole scope of his Argument he makes our gospel Holiness to be lookt upon by God as having a concurrence in our Justification and this is his gospel Ordination and in full conformity to the Popish Justification by God's Righteousness whereby we are renewed His last clause of the Popish Article about Justification suits extremely with Mr. Williams's fling at Doctor Crisp as dethroning Christ for making Christ the alone cause of our Salvation without any thing of our works concurring And thus saith the Council of Trent If any one shall say that a Man is justified by the sâ—le imputation of the Righteousness of Christ or in the sole remission of sin excluding grace and charity which is shed abroad in their hearts by the holy Spirit and is inherent in him or that the grace whereby we are justified is only the savour of God let him be accursed This I take to be asserted by the Papists in opposition to the Protestant Doctrine so that the Protestant Doctrine was what they accurst and what Mr. Williams in effect accurseth saying the holding it is dethroning Christ VVell then the Papists curse those that say a man is justified by the sole imputation of Christ's Righteousness without any grace or charity VVhat 's become then of Mr. Williams's gospel Holiness sincere Obedience that God looks at in the gospel Rule to obtain the gospel Promise again they curse those that say our Justification is by the alone savour of God or freely by his grace Rom. 3.25 VVhat doth Mr. Williams less in falling foul on Doctor Crisp and all that wholly exclude every thing of man in the business of Justification and say they enervâ—te Christ's government and open a door to all Licentiousness Whereas the contrary is most true that the grace of God appearing teaches to deny all ungodliness My next Opposer of Mr. W's Gospel Ordination is a great maul to Arminianism that is the Learned Pious Mr. Perkins who saith in fol. 576 of Vol. 1. Thus the Papists say Christ merited that our good Works merit And answers This is a dotage of their devising for Christ merited pardon for sin impuation of his Righteousness and Life eternal And fol. 104. To say Christ merited that our works merit this takes away Christ's Intercession I may add to say our Holiness comes in toward our Justification doth the same Mr. Perkins comes closer in Vol. 2 fol. 205. It may be objected saith he there is a co-operation of works and faith I answer That this co-operation is not in the Act of Justification nor in the Work of our Salvation but in the manifestation of the truth and sincerity of our Faith and for the declaration of this Faith and Works jointly concur Here then is a pestilent and damnable Doctrine of the Papists when they teach Justification by the Woâ—ks of the Law And what is it to teach Justification by the Works of the Gospel which never had a Promise of Justification to it whereas the Works of the Law once had before Adam's Fall In Fol. 236. He turns perfect Antimonian with our Homilists if some men may censure him and saith thus The Gospel promises Life to him that doth nothing in the cause of his Salvation but only Believes in Christ This is dangerous Doctrine in Doctor Crisp because it spoils Mr. W's Gospel Ordination of Works and Faith going together in Justification but hath for this 100 years been good sound Doctrine in Perkins and the Homilies too He proceeds in fol. 237. and saith thus Believing and doing are opposed in the Article of our Justification In our good Conversation they agree Faith goes before and doing follows but in the Work of Justification they are as Fire and Water This is a fatal stroke to the new Gospel Ordination and a full concurrence with Dr. Crisp though Mr. Williams call this a dethroning Christ Mr. Perkins could not expect to be taken for an Oracle so that by his ipse Dixit that every one should receive his Positions tho' he grounded them on plain Scripture therefore he strengthens his Assertion by the sayings of the Fathers with which I farther oppose Mr. W's Gospel Ordination and confirm Dr. C. in fol. 537. Mr. Perkins saith The Fathers do hold Faith only to be requisite to Justification even without the Works of Grace Chrysostom saith in Hom. 7. in Cap. 3. Rom. What is the Law of Faith saith he To be saved by Grace here he sheweth the Power of God in that he not only saved us and that without use of any works exacting only Faith of us And Theodoret on Eph. 2. We have not believed of our own accord but came being called and when we are come he doth not exact Purity and Innocency of Life but hath Pardoned our sins accepting of Faith only And Basil Ser. de hum This it is to glory in the Lord when a man is not puffed up with his own righteousness but acknowledgeth himself destitute of all true righteousness and Justified by Faith alone in Jesus Christ They are justifyed before God saith Ambrose on Rom. 4. Without any labour or Toyl by only Faith no Works of Penitence being hereto required but only that they believe This Cloud of Witnesses is enough to cover and wholly extinguish the Gospel Ordination of Mr. Williams without any Comment on them Mr. Williams next Assertion is a Chip of the same block thus His Christs Righteousness imputed is the cause for which we are Justified when we do answer the Gospel Rule Here 's no mincing the matter of bringing in our Sanctification into our Justification for Mr. Williams tells us plainly what our answering the Gospel Rule is viz. Some degrees of Obedience Repentance Love imperfect Faith Persevering c. Thus while in words he pretends to separate Sanctification from Justification yet here he really joyns them and confounds them making our justification to be by Christs Righteousness imputed when we are holy when we be sanctifyed inferring that it is not till then and not only so but that that is the Condition of our justification Is this the Apostles justifying the Ungodly to be justified when we answer Mr. Williams Gospel Rule Whereas the Gospel makes no such Rule as he lays down of our sincere Obedience concurring to justification or God's having regard to our Gospel Holiness which is Mr. Williams own word I will not stand to refell this but do aver nothing can be clearer to me than this that by this expression we are justified when we answer that Gospel Rule which Mr. Williams laid down there is a downright mingling our Sanctification with our justification which the Apostle strenuously
denies 'T is not of Works only of Faith that it might be by grace not Gods grace in us working holiness but his grace to us in Christ The next is that which is the ground work of all Mr Wâ—â— building 〈…〉 that glorious Text which I so often have harped upon and which I must again say somewhat to now in its course for that I am not able to bear that such an outwork should treacherously be delivered up and say that this Text in Phil. 3.9 Is allowed by all sound Protestants to be meant as 't is said that the Righteousness of God that the Apostle desired to be found in by Faith is only the imputed Righteousness of Christ and not at all concerns our Gospel Holiness nay this Gospel Holiness thus put in the room of Christs Righteousness is a term Foreign to Scripture Language and is brought in to jostle out Gospel Grace 'T is Holiness we are to walk in but 't is Grace we are to be saved by which grace is this that the Rigâ—â—â—â—â—ness of Christ is made ours wrought out by Christ for us and imputâ—â—◠〈…〉 to us without any thing of that which men call our Gospel Holinâ—â—◠〈…〉 to do therein Now if the Church of God will be content to lose 〈…〉 â—f Phil. 3.9 and suffer a Disputer to make this breach in our Bank agâ—â—◠〈◊〉 Popish Sea of Justification by Gospel Holiness all the rest of our Banks and â—arriers will soon be run down Then they that hunger and thirst after Righteousness shall be filled must be interpreted of our Gospel Holiness If we be hungry for holiness in conformity to Gospel Rule our Souls shall be filled with eternal happiness and then if we take to us the Brest Plate of Righteousness that is a holy walking with God that will defend us from all Temptations of the Devil as for Faith in Christ that must come after our own Righteousness by this Doctrine whereas the Apostle in that place Eph. 6. Brings in that Breast Plate as our chief first piece of Armour after Truth when the Soul is enlightned with the knowledge of God's love to give Jesus Christ for us The first thing he doth is he puts on Christ's Righteousness as his Breast-Plate Alas if the Soul puts on his own Righteousness the Devil's Darts would soon pierce through it but every sensible Soul will say with Job Though I were righteous yet would I not answer I would make Supplication to my Judg. I suppose Job had as much to say for his close holy walking with God as any that now call for Gospel Holiness to make us partakers of Christ's purchase yet he renounces all and saith farther for the confounding our new Grotian Divinity If I wash my self with Snow Water of the best Gospel Holiness that ever meer Man had and make my hands never so clean with close walking with God yet shalt thou plunge me in the Ditch of self Condemnation and eternal misery and mine own Cloaths of self righteousness shall abhor me O what clear gospel grace had this good man acquaintance with when he flies from all the trash of his being clean to make way for his justification and betakes himself to his Days-Man his Redeemer who though he had not actually taken flesh yet was then living and living as his Redeemer For I know that my Redeemer liveth though he slay me I will trust in him If I justifie my self with my close walking or Gospel Holiness in part or in the whole mine own mouth would condemn me nay though I were perfect yet would I not know my Soul Here was a right gospel Spirit like the Apostle Paul concerning the Law blameless yet my Righteousness is Dung so Job If I be righteous I will not lift up mine head Job 10.15 I will not glory in my Breast-Plate of mine own Righteousness Again if with Mr. Williams the Righteousness of Christ by Faith be our own gospel Holiness why may not Esa 45.24 In him have I Righteousness and strength he our gospel Holiness too and Jer. 23.6 Jehovah our Righteousness be the same and then Have not submitted to the Righteousness of God Rom. 10.3 shall have the same usage and mainly intend our Gospel Holiness though the Apostle brings it in in opposition to our own righteousness But blessed be God if Mr. W. or an Angel should undermine these Foundations of a sinner's salvation yet on this Rock God will build his Church that Christ was made sin for us that we might be made the Righteousness of God in him I say in him not in our gospel holiness and if on this foundation any man builds hay and stubble as our gospel holiness compared with Christs Righteousness his work shall be burnt and he shall suffer loss but he himself shall be saved so as by fire it being a dangerous thing to mingle our gospel holiness with Christs Righteousness Again if Christ Righteousness Phil. 3.9 be our gospel Holiness Mr. W. may as well say by the Righteousness of one the free gift came upon all Men to justification of life Rom. 5.18 doth principally intend not so much the Righteousness of Christ imputed to us as the gospel holiness of every one of us If we give this Inch he may take an Ell but we are bid earnestly to contend for the Faith once delivered to the Saints of which this is as great a part as any I know next the Deity of our Lord Jesus therefore we must not part with it to let in a sham Model of Schematical Divinity of God's regarding our holiness as a ground to justify us we complying with the Gospel Rule of sincere Obedience to qualify us for Christs Righteousness to be Imputed to us By this unsavory gloss of Mr. W. any Judicious Person may see how unmeet he is to Arraign and by his Arguments to come in Evidence against the Doctrine delivered by Dr. C. If he would have convinced him he must do it with stronger and better Reasons than Human even with opposite Scriptures if his Bible have any such as are repugnant to the plain force of express Scriptures that the Dr. insisted on such as the Lord laid on him the Iniquity of us all to prove sin really translated on Christ and the Children being yet unborn having done neither Good nor Evil he said Jacob have I loved and Esau have I hated to prove that God loves us and imputes the Righteousness of Christ to his Elect without respect of good or Evil done by them But he having no Scriptures to overthrow those Maxims he may not think to do it with plausible Sophistry of the suitableness of it to God's holiness to justifie none but the Holy when the Scripture saith expresly he Justifies the Ungodly and so I beseech the Lord to do to him as well as to my self else woe unto us Next comes the exact Copy of Paul a Pharisee thus The grace of God is hereby stated as free as is consistent
with his Government or rather I may say as free as is consistent with Justification partly by Works and partly by grace I wonder that any man should say none need the riches of grace more than I as he doth in the next words and yet tell the World a little before that Gods Government and Rectoral distribution of rewards and punishments require our complying with Gospel Rule in some degrees of Obedience and the Gospel Sanction fixeth sincere holiness and perseverance in Faith as the terms of possessing Heaven and so by bringing in our Gospel Holiness into our justification totally make void the grace of God and then in effect this is all the grace that I need that when I have persevered in the Gospel Rule I may tell God now I have done what thou requirest now Heaven is due to me for Christ hath purchased this Gospel Ordination O that God would un-horse lofty Spirits and make us cry out with the poor Publican smiting on our Breasts Lord be merciful to me a sinner not Lord be merciful to me a complyer in Gospel Holiness if I could hear him say so it would be with me an Argument that he thought he needed the Riches of grace but the Righteous need not grace for he came not to call the Righteous but sinners Is this the only grace you will allow God to glory in that when men have lived sincerely holy all their days then they may come to God and say I demand my Penny I have laboured for I crave Heaven for Christ dyed for this end that I should save my self by my Evangelical righteousness and this is consistent with thy Rectoral distribution of Rewards and Punishments viz. rewards to the holy and punishments to the unholy as for Christs Righteousness and my justification by that I must name it for fashion sake but my darling Holiness with perseverance are the terms of possessing Heaven To which our Lord Jesus hath already answered and so will to every Self-Justitiary as in Matth. 21.31 Verily I say unto you that the Publicans and the Harlots go into the Kingdom of God before you When the holy Pharisee comes with his God I thank thee I am not as other Men I am none of those sinners that trust to be saved by the meer grace of God in the merits of Christ I am none of St. Pauls Antinomians who said those that are of the Law are accursed I fast twice a week I give Alms I have sincere Obedience I have Gospel holiness I hope I shall scape well Then the poor Publican the poor self-condemned sinner cries Grace grace unclean unclean I am a chief sinner I fly for refuge to the Hope set before me the blood of Christ only to free me from my sins sure this Man will go down justified rather than the other and such a sort of justification I beg of God for my Soul and that Mr. W. that saith he needs the riches of grace and the more because he brings in gospel holiness to concur with Christs Righteousness in Justification I hope and pray he may seek the Publicans and not the Pharisees justification and leave Gods rectoral distribution to his own holy determinations in his Word Come ye blessed and go ye cursed as they were chosen before the foundation of the World or past by in Gods eternal Decree yet still the chosen were chose to Faith and holiness tho' not as those Terms which give a right to Heaven Mr. W. goes on thus Reader note that in this â—ook I speak of the Adult and not Infants and why Infants saved one way and Adult another if Infants be sanctifyed in the Womb by infusing the new Nature what is that but the seed of Faith and all grace in Christ and if so he not they saved as the Adult though their grace shine not out must Infants be saved by the merits of Christ alone but not so the Adult who must have Gospel holiness to Joyn with Christs righteousness for God to have some regard to in their Salvation If this be his meaning then the Garments of Infants must be all of pure fine white Linnen and of those grown to 15 or 20 it must be Linsey Wolsey the warp of Linnen and Woof of the Wollen of gospel holiness and so Infants may be buried in Linnen and the others in Flannel this is the rectoral distribution of threats and promises not according to Gods way he that believeth shall be saved and he that believeth not is condemned But the Adult that is sincerely holy God is so just as to save him and he that thinks to be saved only by Faith in the Lord Jesus bringing forth fruits of Holiness is an Antinomian dethrones Christ enervates his Laws he must be exposed to scorn Mr. W. proceeds Thou must expect to take up my fall sense by a view of several Chapters and not only one because sundry Chapters refer to the same points more or less We use to say that which is sawce for a Goose is sawce for a Gander but 't is too common for men to look through red angry Spectacles on the Authors they oppose but would have their own writings lookt on in green ones would it not have been becoming Mr. W. to have dealt with the Dr. as he thou's his Reader to do by him to take up his full sense by a view of several chapters then he would not have charged the Dr. with enervating Christs Laws by pleading the free justification of sinners without works if he had compared his Sermons on Esa 53. with those on Titus of denying ungodliness Is not our Lords Rule good here What you would that Men should do to you do ye the same to them If Mr. W. would have People compare one part of his Book with the other 't is equal he should have done so by the Dr. which would have taken off a great part of his Acrimony in making the Dr. a Dethroner of Christ His next look's invidious and is a clear contradiction to his last desire of comparing one part with another for he puts a sense by force on the Doctor thus and forget not saith Mr. Williams that though the Dr. oft in his Book speaks of Men as Believers yet every thing is true of the Elect viz. They have as much Title to saving Blessings only they do not know it this was his Judgment Here by head and shoulders he brings in this as the Drs. judgment of the Elect without one Tittle of Proof forget not this that whatever the Doctor saith of saving Blessings that Believers have a title to he means it of the Elect this 〈…〉 Well but what if that be forc'd on the Dr. as his judgment that all saving Blessings belong to the Elect tho' before believing they do not know it How much more is this than what Mr. Williams grants in fol. 39. in saying Christ merited for all the Elect that they should certainly partake of the saving
benefits of his Righteousness Where is the Drs. enervating Christs Laws if this was his judgment Doth not this Correspond with that of the Apostle Eph. 1. He raised us up together and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus doâ—h not this evince that all the Elect were raised up with Christ and do now sit with him in Heaven being in his Heart as the twelve Tribes were upon Arons Breast-Plate when he went into the Holy of Holies Are they not in the Heart of Christ and doth he not pray for those that God gave to him if so then all saving Blessings belong to them only the Doctor had not the happiness to word it to please Mr. W. therefore is quarrell'd at But next he sweetens all and having broken the Doctors Head gives him a Plaister thus I have carefully avoided any Reflection on Revereâ—d Dr. Crisp whom I believe a Holy Man For which respect I return many thanks and bless God for fulfilling his word that when a mans ways please the Lord he makes his Enemies at peace with him But may I not wonder that those that have uttered so great Invectives that he was for dethroning Christ should yet be convinc'd from the strain of his writings that he was a Holy Man This is agreeable to what treatment he met with in the Heat of Peoples flocking by thousands to hear him which he was much maligned for yet there was not a man of all his detractors that ever charged him with the least immorality or indecency or neglect of exactest holiness though there was scarce ever seen a wrinkle in his Brow he being chearful in Conversation even to admiration yet as solemnly devout in the Worship of God on Lords days and Fast days as the greatest legalist so that his Enemies gave him his due Character for exact holiness But now for Mr. W. to say Dr. C. was holy and Reverend Dr. C. and but a few Lines before to say all the rest of his Opinions follow in a Chain to the dethroning of Christ c. seems strange but without doubt it is from a mighty over-ruling Providence of God not only out of the mouths of Babes and Sucklings the unlearned to perfect praise to his Name but to still the Enemy and Avenger Mat. 11. Ps 8. Not only do the simple Celebrate the Praises of God for the opening the Rich Mercies of Free-Grace by the Dr. but the Learned that seem to be his Enemies and come out against him with Vengeance God doth still them nay after high reproach he engages them to acknowledge this Dethroner of Christ I believe was a holy Man this is like Bellarming propter incertitudinem tutissimum est c. 'T is absolute Sovereign grace in Christ nothing in us that saves us when all is done Before I leave Mr. W. in this good temper I hope it may be useful as well for setling the wavering as confirming the sound To quote a passage or two I met with occasionally out of unquestionable Authority for Orthodoxy in the Faith for a suffrage to Dr. Crisp in what he is opposed by Mr. W. and that is out of the Reverend Dr. Harris of Hanwell an eminent member of the famous Assembly of Divines Anno 1652. I begin with his asserting That Christ sustained the Person of a sinner This is a grand charge against Dr. C. that Christ was a reputed sinner but this eminent Dr. H. makes no scruple to Assert it roundly without any ambiguity and saith directly in his Sermon called Absaloms Funeral in fol. 215 Christ he stood in our room and sustained the Person of a sinner though in himself sinless could not he though he was the Heir and first born escape until his Blood was shed and flesh rent and Soul poured forth as an Offering Then make good that thou art in Christ and so a new Creature or else take thy leave of all hope and comfort I add if this were not true that Christ sustained the Person of a sinner how could God punish him or how could the Apostle say to the seven Churches He loved us and washed us from our sins in his Blood sure those us were in Christ when he shed his Blood and iâ— his own Person as head he sustained them and all other sinners that he shed his Blood for else how were they Crucified with him and raised with him and made sit with him in Heavenly places now because Reason and Philosophy cannot fathom this shall we reject plain Scripture and say that the Elect have no interest in Christ till they believe though God say plainly grace was given them in Christ before the World was and they were chosen in him before the World Dr. H. gives his Testimony against the new sort of Divinity which may look better from him than Dr. Crisp and may reconcile to his Doctrine or rather Christs that nothing must come in of ours to joyn with Christ for Justification and saith in fol. 36. from Rom. 8.1 No Condemnation to those in Christ the Doctrines of later Editions Arminians drive mostly at this to wrest you from your Estate in Christ hence the superadding of our Righteousness to Christs ad Corroborandum look to your standing find all your Hopes Joys Life in him alone owe to him all Wisdom Righteousness Sanctification Redemption and Salvation This is far from the New Scheme of Gospel Ordination of Christs purchasing that Faith Holiness c. have their use in Gospel Benefits from their Conformity to the Rule of the Promise not of the Precept this taking us off from our superadded Righteousness ad corroborandum to strengthen our Title clearly evinces that he was not for Faith and holiness giving a Title no Faith can only receive it and Holiness Evidence it Dr. H. answers for Dr. C. as being charged that if God acts us in beleiving and God beleives and God repents and saith in fol. 64. Not only the power but the Act too is from God Phil. 2. He works in us to will and to do if it be thus say the Jesuits and others then Man shall not be master of his own Acts then God shall be said to repent and believe Man shall do nothing but all shall be resolved unto God Answ May not Man be said to understand though God do powerfully inlighten so also to hate love c. They the Jesuits yield that God worketh upon the Vnderstanding and the Affections and yet man understands and affects and why should not the same be true of the Will Secondly God first works all things in us and then by us he prevents and acts us and then we work under God Object This takes off all endeavour nay this quickens our Care and endeavour if St. Paul may be heard Phil 2.13 Therefore we must work out all because we depend on God for all saith the Apostle neither doth God only work in his People a power of willing but the very Act also and indeed the acting of the will of man is more than giving him a power only to will The Covenant of grace is this be content to accept of anothers Obedience and to lay hold of the Righteousness of Christ for Justification he soars as high as Dr. C. and saith there is nothing required of us more than this to disclaim our selves and to make Christ alone our Teacher our head and all-sufficient Saviour nay in fol. 35. he is clear and saith What can we do toward the getting of a new Heart Answ Man cannot concur to the renewing of himself as a Cause or an Agent If this be good Divinity in Dr. H. and the Assembly of Divines why should it be quarrel'd at in Dr. C. Would it not be more becoming the greatness of Mr. W's Spirit to have encountred the Assembly in these particulars than Dr. C. yea doubtless But there was a new Scheme to be erected and this would more easily obtain against a single Person than the established Religion of the Nation which in the chiefest points objected against Dr. C. concurs with him yea after all when Mr. W. finds by the strong Proofs brought against him that his Scheme will not take he betakes himself to the Substance of what he Objects against the Dr. as in time may be made evident in the mean time I humbly conceive I have made it appear that his Preface hath not only wronged the Dr. but the truth which I doubt not but in a great measure he sees Thus begging of the Lord that some glory may rise to his Name by some few hours investigating the Truth I conclude as well for Mr. W. and all that desire the Truth as it is in Jesus may take place as for my self let the Words of my Mouth and the Meditation of my Heart be acceptable in thy sight O Lord Tzuri ve Goeli my Rock and my Redeemer Amen FINIS