no more remains but our accepting of him for our Mediator and suffering his Spirit to do in us what he will a Self-denyal a doing nothing is our principal Duty The Sureness of our Salvation is to be next spoken to and the Suitableness of it consists in the strict Union between the Commands and Promises Holiness and Happiness must go together The Sixth Property is the Sureness of it so ordered and so guarded nothing can break it 1. The clear Assertions of the Spirit of Truth confirms this Isa 55.3 The sure Mercies of David Jer. 33.20 If my Covenant with Day and Night can be broken so that they should cease then may also my Covenant with David be broken 2. The Nature of the Covenant confirms this for there is nothing in the Matter impossible or unlawful Not the former for the Promises are so ordered that they render the Commands easie not the latter for the Will of God is the Measure of Duty to us and tho' its Duties are inconsistent with our praeingagements in a Covenant with Hell and Death yet that Covenant being unlawful and its works contrary to what 's our Duty antecedently to this it no way renders this Covenant unsure 3. The Party of the Covenant GOD the whole of it depending on Him not us if we consider his Mindfulness Psal 111.5 He will ever be mindful of his Covenant c. his Power Righteousness Wisdom nothing can fail that he has undertaken And if we consider the Form of the Covenant he has undertaken all Faith bears the room or place of a Condition in the Covenant of Grace but this very thing makes it lose the proper Nature of one that It is Gods Gift Eph. 2.8 1. The Beginning and Perfection of it Heb. 12.1 2. The Growth of it Lord increase our Faith 3. The Exercise of it I believe Lord help my unbelief But if Faith should fail the Unbelief of Man will not render the Faith of God of none effect tho' we believe not yet he abideth faithful he will not deny himself 2 Tim. 2.13 but that he secures that it shall not Jer. 32.40 They shall not depart from me Hos 14.5 He shall grow as the Lilly I have prayed for thee that thy Faith shall not fail 4. The Foundations of this Covenant demonstrates its sureness The Decrees of God The Love of God The Death of Christ 1. The Decrees of God Our duty is founded on his Legislative Will the Commands contain what we should doe but the Promises are Results of his Purposes what God will do Psal 2. This is Gods decree That the Heathen should be Christs Inheritance and the Ends of the Earth his Possession And since Promises and Purposes are of so nigh a Kindred it 's not so improper to say Purposes give a Right that needs to be stigmatiz'd with the Brand of Error and Heresie 2. The Love of God I have loved thee with an everlasting Love Nothing can hinder the impetuous Endeavours of Love among Creatures Love is strong as Death the Coals thereof have a most vehement flame If these shadows of divine Love have such an Influence and Power to remove all Impediments that obstruct its desire what can resist divine Love 3. The Death of Christ this was the Fruit of the former God so loved the World as to give Him to Redeem it and what then will he not do for it Eph. 1.13 Will ever he withhold the Inheritance or any part of the Purchase since he gave his Son to dye a Sacrifice that Love might communicate it self in a consistence with the Measures of Wisdom and Rules of Justice 5. The Sealing of the Covenant renders it sure The Death of Christ Heb. 9. the Oath of God Heb. 6. the Earnest of the Spirit Eph. 1.13 the external sealing Ordinances are all confirming Seals to render their Consolation solid and strong that have fled to this Covenant as a Refuge 6. The Covenant its having both Date and day of Payment annex'd Sacred Chronology contains the one and the Prophetical Aera's contain the other Psal 102.13 Hab. 2.2 1 Pet. 5.6 Rev. 22.12 There is a due Time a fit Time an appointed Time for every Person Measure of Grace and Condition of the Church and the Lord will never be slack concerning his Coming 2 Pet. 3. he will not let any time be lost The Knowledge of the time as to particular Persons he reserves as a Secret to himself but the Time of Deliverances and Fulfillments of the Promises to the Church he hath more communicated and the Neglect of studying them must flow from an unconcernedness about her Affairs There are two things certain about them 1. That there is a set time for great Promises to the Church 2. That many of them have their set times revealed the Four hundred thirty years from the Covenant made with Abraham to the Coming out of Egypt the Seventy Years from the beginning of the Babylonish Captivity to the end of it the Four hundred and Ninety to the Coming of Christ in the Flesh So the One thousand two hundred Sixty dayes Forty two Months the Time Times and half Time But such is our Infirmity and weakness that we may doubt of the time when it is on the very brink of fulfilment as our Fathers did 7. It is as sure as the Covenant of Redemption which was made between Infallible Persons For tho they may be considered as distinct Covenants yet the one is Foundation and Security for the other it is like a subsequent Surety entring a Covenant with the Creditor to pay for past Debt and engage as Surety for future Credit so that the Suretiship in the Covenants between God and Man is what he undertakes in his own personal Covenant with God He hath given him for a Covenant to the People It is more sure than the Covenant of Nature with Day and Night c. for by Miracles the one be disordered but all Miracles are to confirm the Covenant of Grace and assure us of its Truth The Seventh Property is its perfection or Allness as to Salvation and Desire There are two things to be premised to the proof of it 1. The difference between these two Alls. 2. In what respects the Covenant contains them 1. The All of Salvation is less than the All of Desire Pardon and Sinlesness will compleatly save us but not satisfie us Adam needed not Salvation before he perished but his Desire was not compleatly satisfied 2. They differ as Food and Physick as the Religion of sinless Angels and sinful Men the one is Vital and becoming a perfect Healthful State the other is Medicinal a remedial Religion to restore us to Life and Health the Desires of the one are often to be corrected mortified the other to be nourished and still strengthen'd the Desire or Appetite still increasing with the Reception 2. In what respects the Covenant contains them 1. The Revelation and Discovery of them 2. It 's the Instrument of
it is the Spirits Influences that keeps the Temper of Man in any better Condition than that of Devils There is a vast difference between what Man actually is and what he is De jure by Nature We are Children of Wrath by Nature our Understanding is meer Darkness and our Wills a meer Enmity We would sin designedly against God and designedly Dishonour him We would intend Rebellion in every act and this seems to be the Apostles Intention 1 Cor. 10.13 There hath no Temptation taken you but such as is common to Man to sin at this rate is not common to Man Man's Design is not higher than his own Profit or his Pleasure the Prosecution of which though he knows it is a Sin yet he wishes it were not Thirdly The Divinity of this Covenant appears in God himself his Attributes Personalities and Providential Operations being all the Promised Blessings of the Covenant for the Covenant is a Marriage Covenant wherein not as in other Covenants of Peace or War Trade or Commerce the Obligation is limited to some particular thing here the Party and all he hath comes under Obligation Hence is that Argument good Because he lives we shall live also and Christ's Proof for the Resurrection of the Body and Immortality of the Soul that Abraham Isaac and Jacob are alive because God is the God of the Living Nothing can utterly dye that is in this Covenant because God's Life is engaged to keep them alive Indeed this exceeds Marriage Contracts because the Husband hath not a Life to communicate nor a Power to preserve his own God's Omnipotency is ours I am the Almighty walk before me and be thou perfect We need not fear the Power of Enemies his Immutabillity I Change not therefore ye shall not be be consumed And all his Creatures 1 Cor. 3.22 The World Life Death things present or things to come all are yours Providential Operations Rom. 8.28 For we know that all things work together for good to them that love God Psal 25.10 All his ways are mercy and truth to such as keep his Covenant 2. There is the Personality of the Covenant Thou hast made with me Though God entered into Covenant with Abraham for himself and his Seed yet as soon as his Seed did exist in the World he did personally enter into Covenant with them first with Isaac and then with Jacob and the more Pious we find any Persons in Scripture the more frequent we find them in this Exercise David's first Michtam or Golden Psalm begins thus O my Soul thou hast said unto the Lord Thou art my Lord with his Expectation of the like Answer from God Psalm 35.3 Say unto my Soul I am thy Salvation God's Language is Providential so that it 's to the same purpose when he says Preserve me O God for in thee do I put my trust Our Faith is our Personal Covenanting and God's preserving is his Virtual Saying He will be Our Saviour this is Prophecyed to be more frequent and more formal under the New Testament State than it was under the Old Isaiah 44.5 One shall say I am the Lords and another shall call himself by the Name of Jacob and another shall subscribe with his hand unto the Lord Isaiah 45.24 Surely shall men say in the Lord have I righteousness and strength The Apostle doth most pathetically press this Personal Dedication Rom. 12.1 I beseech you therefore Brethren by the mercies of God ye present your Bodies a living Sacrifice holy acceptable unto God which is your reasonable service And the Practice of the Primitive Church answer'd their Apostolical Advice 1 Cor. 8.5 They first gave themselves to the Lord and to us by the Will of the Lord The different Constitution of the Visible Church under the New Testament from that under the Old and the different Administration of the Covenant have a considerable Influence to make the formal performance of this more our Duty for it is in part upon this Account that the Church is called Mat. 16. a Church de futuro I will build my Church as Camero observes It was a Building to be begun whereof the Foundations were not yet laid and the Covenant a new Covenant First For the Constitution of the Church we have a fair Account of it in the 18th of Matthew in Christ's Answer to the Disciples Question about the Kingdom of Heaven First There is the Qualifications of the Members Verse 3. Converted ones become as little Children Secondly Their formal Entrance into the Kingdom of Christ and their Reception in the Name of Christ by them that are in it Verse 5. Thirdly There is an account of the great Evil that doth any ways hinder or hurt this Constitution or these little Ones now received into it and therefore becomes the only Object of Church-Discipline that is Offence Sin is only against God's immediate Government Psal 51. Against thee thee only have I sinned He only can Forgive it he only can Punish it It is a Breach of his Law only Offence is against the Church as being that which occasions any Member thereof to sin or by which its Members may offend others but scarce any can Offend but them that are in the Church Injuries which hurt a Man's Body or Estate are the Objects of the Civil Government One Act may have all the three Evils in it and may be Punished by all the three Governments Fourthly There are the remedying Rules or Methods of Discipline about this Evil set down Verse 15 16 17. Fifthly There is the supream Court where the last Appeal lyes in Tryal of this Affair with the last and most severe Punishment this Court can Inflict The former is the Church the latter is an Exclusion from that Society for then he can Offend no more as a Dead Man in the State can injure no more The last thing is the way of the Constitution of this Court and the Reason why we ought to acquiesce in its Judgment about such Affairs The former is the stated and agreed Meeting of such Converts in the Name of Christ the latter is from Christ's being among them his Promise to hear them his Institution of them and Conserring Authority to the Ordinance now this Agreement to continue stedfastly in the Apostles Doctrine in mutual Fellowship in breaking of Bread and in Prayer Acts 2.42 doth formally Constitute a Covenant it is a Fulfillment of that Prophecy Jer. 50.5 Come and let us join our selves unto the Lord and it doth suppose their Personal Covenanting with God for they who come into it are to be received as little Children and as Converted ones and tho' Persons cannot give account when they were first Converted more than when they were first Conceived or Born without their Parents Information yet they may give Account of their Personal Covenanting with God and when it was tho' with great difference in Explicitness or Implicitness in the bare Exercise of Faith and Prayer and the secret Thoughts of
the Hearts or in external Words or Writing †Vide Mr. Baxter on Confirmation the way to Reformation Secondly In the New Administration of the Covenant which receives its Alteration very much from the New Constitution of the Church for in the former all Circumcised were in the Church here it 's only those that are Converted so all Abraham's Natural Seed through Isaac and Jacob were within the Covenant as to all its visible Priviledges but in this New Administration they are brought under the Covenant by the Lord 's pouring out his Spirit on them by his putting his Laws in their Minds and writing them on their Hearts Heb. 8. The very Import of having a Law in the Mind is a willing and ready Compliance with them known a being made willing in the day of his Power a hearty undertaking to perform them followed with some suitable Endeavours and what is this else but personal Covenanting Our satisfying our selves with a Virtual Performance of this is too common and too gross a defect to be indulged that is a complyance with the Duties of the Covenant in some measure without a serious setting about this Duty first and entring into it this is doing Violence to the Beauty and Order of this well ordered Covenant which requires our In-being before our Doing or our Receiving Secondly It is an Omission of a positive enjoyned Duty Thirdly It is very unbecoming God's transacting with us who has formerly drawn up the Covenant in all its Articles and has set his Name to it and has recorded it in his Word and has appointed a vast Number of Men under the Office of the Ministry to Publish it and has furnished them with the Spirit to Interpret and Inculcate it and their great Message is Be ye reconciled to God be at Peace with him enter into Covenant with him and faithfully keep and observe it Is this a suitable Correspondence to God's Transaction that we wo'nt come under Obligation but we will do as we find Opportunity and have Occasion or Convenience as it may consist with our other Interests and Concerns This is in effect to say we will not at all for the Covenant requires that we be wholly God's utterly denying our selves and all our Interests as he hath given himself wholly to us Fourthly The Manner of Persons entring into Covenant with Sathan who is God's Ape and who hath set up a Kingdom and a Covenant in direct Opposition to our Lord Jesus Christ may have some Influence both for Illustrating and Inculcating this Duty which the Learned Weems thus explains Sathan doth all he can to perswade his Subjects formally to Covenant with him to put one Hand under their Foot and another above their Head and give all between them to Sathan or to write a Bond of Resignation of themselves and Seal it with their Blood and if they be Baptized Christians that they formally Renounce their Baptism but if he cannot attain these things he has a set of Ordinances made up of Charms and unreasonable Arts as Astrology Chiromancy c. which he in his way Blesseth with Success as far as he can those who follow the Practice of them This is a Virtual Covenanting with him Now as we would not Judge all such Witches or Wizards who do too frequently Practise Charms either in Cures Prognosticks or Injuries so we ought not to think all true Christians who perform Christian Ordinances And if Covenanting with Sathan has such a Power to make us his that but very few are recovered from Hell who go to such a heighth in sinning what an Influence must Personal Covenanting with God have to make us his when there is so great difference in Contracting for we are gull'd and deceived in the one It is in great Ignorance we Covenant with Sathan Secondly Sathan deceives us and never fulfills the half of what he Promises Thirdly God has an antecedent Right and therefore our Covenanting with Sathan is Unlawful Fourthly God has a greater Power and he hath sent Christ on that very Office to destroy the Works of the Devil therefore there is a Possibility of Recovery out of that State but no final Relapse from the other for No man can pluck the Sheep out of the Father's hand Fifthly The Discouragements that hinder Persons from such a sacred Engagement are more from Ignorance of them than reality in the things themselves As first Some are frighted by the greatness of the Obligation and their Inability to perform To which I answer We are under all that Obligation already it rather relieves than oppresses Christ says his Burthen is light and his Yoke easie it is no more Burthen than Wings to a Bird for the Apostle says He that is not under the Law is under Grace and what things the Law says it is to them that are under the Law There is no Duty thou engagest to perform but thou wast obliged as a Creature to perform before and by this Covenanting thou getst a Right and Interest in Christ by which all thy past Disobedience is pardoned the burden of Guilt taken off and thou receivest strength to obey better for the future For the Providential Language of God in Covenanting with a Soul is the giving of his Spirit hence this is the Language of one that understandingly enters into Covenant with God Isa 45.24 Surely to him shall men come saying In the Lord have I righteousness and strength A second Discouragement is from the sense of Desertion and want of the Spirit from persons own unfitness and unholiness they say with Peter Depart from me for I am a sinful man Resp This is from a Mistake about the end of the Law the Lord blesses the Law or sends his Spirit to impower it Joh. 16. when the Spirit convinces of Sin so the end of this is to drive us to Christ to make us seek a shelter under Grace when we are scorched with the heat of the fiery Law Hence Christ calls Come unto me all ye that are weary and heavy laden Secondly How disorderly would we have God to act toward us to say If he will fill us with Comfort and Joy and give us Assurance the very top Blessings of the Covenant in this Life or rather the Earnest and Beginnings of the other Life if he will fulfill all the Covenant to me then will I enter Covenant with him A third is from the fear of Hypocritical acting with God and so rather sin and provoke him to destroy me than to receive me into this State of Salvation Resp I know no better Cure of Hypocrisie than to bring and keep the Heart in the View of God and under the Awe of his Presence In the 18th of Luke we see this wrought a considerable Cure upon a Pharisee tho' the greatest Hypocrites in the World Vers 11. God I thank thee that I am not as other men He did not speak suitably to his own Principles to own God the Author of that
are 1. Potestative in the Person 's Power to perform them 2. Casualis the other Party being uncertain whether we would Perform them or not 3. Causalis in respect of Right being of some Valuable Considerations and leaves a bare Necessary Connexion or Ordered Covenant instead of a Conditional Covenant and the many Ifs used in Scripture to be the Ifs of Demonstration used by Civilians in Testaments or Logicians in Arguing not the If of a proper Condition tho' it 's usual among Divines and Protestants to use it for Priority of Order and that is not inconsistent with Graciousness But I need not squeeze this Covenant so to bring Graciousness out of it by such Inferences when Rom. 4.14 the Inheritance is said to be of Grace the Covenant call'd a Covenant of Peace and its Blessings sure Mercies when all the Covenantees are Sinners Rebels when the greatest of them are often Chosen and that like Manasse in the Heighth of their Iniquity and when all their Sins are forgiven at once when the first Condition or Duty of the Covenant is meer Faith a Receiving and when to do that is the Work of the Spirit both as to first and last of it Heb. 12. The Author and Finisher of our Faith Eph. 2.8 It is the Gift of God And so long as one Spark of Life remains in that Appetite fixed or determined on God our right in the Covenant stands I believe Lord help my Vnbelief Faith as a Grain of Mustard-seed And tho' it shou'd lose sight of many of its Objects it ought to be receiving and trusting God for the Vnbelief of Man will not render the Faith of God of none effect We may sing Grace Grace to every Article of this Covenant and what can support a Man in sight of Death if Grace will not A Man cannot discern himself in a Covenant of Grace and not see God on a Throne of Grace and when a Soul apprehends God as gracious it apprehends him as 1. Good for that is the ground-work 2. As Love for that 's the Spring 3. As Merciful for the Object 's miserable 4. As Sovereign Free and Absolute in dispensing of Blessings and Benefits for to shew Grace is absolute Monarchy Hence all the Acts of Government are for Exalting this Throne to the Praise of the Glory of his Grace Eph. 1. I see my Guilt but I see Pardoning Grace I feel sin but I feel restraining and renewing Grace I see Death but I see over-ordering Grace This supports the Soul The Fourth Property is the Everlastingness of the Covenant Thou hast made with me an Everlasting Covenant Psal 103.17 The Mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting Isa 55.3 The sure Mercies of David are called an Everlasting Covenant The Covenant of Works was before the Covenant of Grace in Time and in Order of Execution as all Means are before their End but the Covenant of Grace was before it in Divine Intention Grace could not have been so branched forth in Mercy and Forgiveness if the former had not been both made and broken On this Account this Covenant of Grace was from Everlasting being founded on Everlasting Love With an Everlasting Love have I loved thee therefore with Loving-kindness will I draw thee It is founded on the everlasting Thoughts that did emanate from that Love Psal 40.5 The thoughts that were ever of Old they are more than can be numbred and on the everlasting Purposes that those Thoughts did result in 2 Tim. 1.9 According to his Grace and Purpose which was given us in Christ before the World began And as it was from Everlasting so it is unto Everlasting A Person once brought into it shall always remain in it Psal 89.33 If they break my Statutes c. then will I visit their Transgressions with the Rod c. nevertheless my Loving-kindness will I not utterly take from them There is a threefold ground of this Perseverance 1. Because of God's engaging his own Fidelity he will not suffer his faithfulness to fail the Unbelief of Men will not render the Faith of God of none effect 2. His Promise unto Christ Once have I sworn to David that his Seed should endure for ever 3. The Promise of persevering and securing Grace he will put his Fear in their Hearts that they shall not depart from him The Confederating Parties the Ever-living God and Immortal Souls are Everlasting and this Relation between them shall never be altered this is the Reason of Christ's proving of Abraham Isaac and Jacob's being yet alive Matth. 22.32 from God's being their Covenanted God I am the God of Abraham the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob God is not the God of the dead but of the living Psal 24.7 The Faculties of our Soul under the Figure of Doors or Gates are called everlasting for they are so many Capacities or Desires for seeking after receiving and enjoying of that King of Glory Hence is that explicatory Verse 5 6. This is the Generation of them that seek him that receive the Blessing from the Lord and righteousness from the God of his Salvation There is an everlasting God and an everlasting Soul an everlasting Appetite and an everlasting Satisfying that the Commerce among the Inhabitants of the holy Hill of the Lord consists in and this Covenant of Grace contains the Municipal Laws of that Traffick This is another Pillar that renders the Covenant of such a supporting Nature especially at Death for that cannot break an everlasting Tye tho we dye to this World and all the Relations founded by other Covenants whether Marriage Peace War Friendship Death is the Death of all of them but it makes not the least breach upon this Rom. 8.38 I am perswaded that neither Death nor Life shall be able to separate us from the Love of God We are still alive to God and must receive the Promises suitable to that separate State between Soul and Body and must perform the Duties proper to it whereof we know nothing so much as the God in that Covenant Relation we go to which contains Comfort enough against the loss of all the Relatives we part with The Fifth Property is its Harmonious Order and the greatest Controversies among Protestants are about this the different Methods and Systems of Divinity are so many different Orders they conceive divine Wisdom to have fram'd the Covenant in And no wonder we mistake in attempting to fathom the depth of divine Mysteries untill the Eyes of our Understanding be enlightned with Vision and we admitted to read the Divine Records in their Original in Heaven We but know in part and no man that knows but a part of a Book only can give a true Analysis of it for every new Notion that we attain alters somewhat of our former Method This Order is called the Form of sound Words the Form of Godliness Order is a Disposition of things according to their natural or useful Priority or Posteriority the former
holds in Speculatives the latter in Practicals There are three things in the Covenant whose Order is principally to be observed The Subjects the Matter the Ends. 1. As to the Subjects I shall but name them First God is concern'd about the Covenant before us he made it Secondly That the Order of the Trinity is observable in it 1. It flows from the Love of the Father and is contrived by his Wisdom 2. The Blessings of it purchased or way for the Execution of the Contrivance that it might consist with the Justice of Divine Government made by the Son 3. The Execution of it is by the Spirit Thirdly That Christ as our Mediator and Head was in Covenant for us before us as the first Adam was in the first Covenant before us so the second Adam was hence we receive all thorough him Eph. 1. He hath bless'd us with all spiritual Blessings in Christ Jesus He shall take of mine and give it unto you We eat his Flesh and drink his Blood we receive our Measures from that Immense fulness treasur'd up in him There was no new Covenant to intervene between the first Adam and his Seed in order to their partaking of the Priviledges promised to him or possess'd by him Fourthly Persons must first be in Covenant before they partake of its Priviledges Subjects must precede their Properties all the Promises of the Bible blotting out Sins and Iniquities cannot solidly comfort thee who art not in Covenant only thus far I may be in Covenant and then they are mine The Man must be first taken before any Right to what he has this is the one thing necessary to poor Sinners that they be in Covenant once Fifthly There is a great difference tho not in Right yet in Priority of Order as to Possession among the Subjects of this Covenant 1 Cor. 15.23 Every one in their own Order Isa 9. Of the Increase of his Government there will be no end and that Increase by Order There are Variety of Forms and Classes in Christs School the Lowest is in this World which is but a meer Initiation into it The greatest Blessings here bear the Nature of Titles or Earnests of the Future Eph. 1.17 tho so big as to enable us to live to maintain and propare us By vertue of this Order Sinlesness is as necessary a Condition of our entring Heaven as Faith is of our Pardon or Justification 2. There is the Order of the Matter of the Covenant which consists in the Promises and Precepts of it abstractly or in their mutual Aspect 1. Abstractly with respect to the Promises of the Covenant there is an Order among them there are some Promises whose fulfillment we may expect and do enjoy in this Life some not as that no Temptation shall befall us that shall totally conquer us in this Life but a perfection in Knowledge and Holiness a doing away of what is in part a being without Spot or wrinkle are Blessings proper to the future Life a being freed from all Suffering is proper to the other Life 1 Pet. 5.9 There is no Promise but what beiongs to the Covenant nor no Blessing but what comes thro' the Promises 2. There are some Promises absolute others conditional God gives a Stock before he requires any Improvement God required no Duty untill he had made a Creature and â—â—tted it with Faculties for performing of the Duties he required nor doth now the Covenant of Grace although the Law still keep up its Right and claim the exercise of Faith one of the first duties of the Covenant but the Gift of Faith is before it The Promise of the Redeeming Seed Gen. 3. was preventive of all Duties there was need of believing it in order to all saving Blessings by it Heb. 11. but the Nature of that Faith was such as no external Revelation or Motives could alone bring forth A clear Discovery ver 1. of invisible things realized to the Mind the Idea of them form'd in the Soul for Joh. 1. darkness could not comprehend the Light and the natural Man knoweth not the things of God 3. Legal Promises are before Evangelical Joh. 16. the Spirit convinces of Sin before it convince of Righteousness though there be great difference between the degrees of Conviction and Humiliation some are under yet no man will ever fly to a Refuge that is not sensible of need no man will trust to anothers Righteousness that doth not despair of his own when the Law came sin revived and I dyed 4. The Promises about the Being and exercise of Grace are before the Knowledge of them An Act presupposes an Object there are many things in our Souls we are ignorant of or doubtful about Whether Freedom be an Attribute of the Will or rather of the Man How far it is active or passive Whether it can form an Idea never impress'd Whether it be capable of Traduction or another Soul may be propagated from it or created out of it And how long may we be ignorant of the Accesses and Recesses of the Spirit of God with which is his Language to it and what Influences speak a State past the danger of final Relapsing 5. The Promises that give a Capacity before them that fill and satisfie it It is not orderly acting to put an Estate in a Minors power one under Age. Our Lord took two of the most ripe and early Children that ever this World afforded and gave the World an Experiment of their Unfitness for enjoying the Comforts and ravishing Enjoyments of the other World Peter and Paul they were both confounded they knew not what they said nor what they heard 6. The Promises suited to our Need rather than Desire Our Desire is corrupted and feverish we often long for what would injure us but our Saviour minds our Salvation first this is all my Salvation and all my Desire 7. The Lord reserves to himself some Monuments of his former despotical Right a Sovereignty in the disposal of some Blessings in the Covenant as about all outward Blessings Plenty Peace Prosperity about the Time of effectual Calling into the Covenant about the continuance under Legal Frames or a spirit of Bondage there is a May be as to many Mercies in the Fifth Command Honour thy Father c. that thy days may be long God may give another Mercy for long Life If a man give a pound of Gold for Lead he breaks not Promise especially where more need of it The Second Part of the Matter of the Covenant is its Precepts and Commands There is a beautiful Order also observable among them 1. In a suitableness to our Condition He lays not heavy Burdens and galling Yoaks on the Necks of Children but the most easie and facile the Work and Employ of Angels who perpetually praise God is not charg'd on us or such Personal War with Devils the chaining and restraining of them We are not fit to be God's Instruments in the great Revolutions and Messages they