desperateness of the Disease magnifies the skill of the Physician so the fatal and universal Degeneracy of the Sons of Men commends the transcendent love of God in their Recovery and Redemption Greater love than this can no Man show than to lay down his Life for his Friend but herein has God commended his love to us in that while we were Enemies to God and righteousness and strangers to his life Christ dyed for us Such is that Testimony and Witness which our Saviour bears to Divine Love and Goodness every word of which is strangely emphatical So in such a wonderful and transcendent manner God the great Lord of all Beings who stands not in need of any of his Creatures but is Infinite Fulness and Happiness to Himself loved first and without any Motive or Occasion of this love given from us herein is love not that we loved God but that he loved us the World not only the particular Nation of the Jews with whom formerly he entred into Covenant but the whole Race of Mankind Christ becoming a Propitiation for our sins says the Apostle the best Interpreter of himself 1 Joh. 2.2 and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole World that he gave delivered unto Death freely and that upon no other Motive or Invitation but that of his own Eternal Goodness and Love his only begotten Son not a Servant or an Angel not an adopted but his own Natural Son that Son who is one with himself and in whom he is well pleased as the obedience of Abraham was more grateful to God when he with-held not his Son his only Son from him The whole Gospel is a Design and Contrivance of Infinite Love and Goodness a palpable Pledge and Assurance of which was the sending of Jesus Christ from Heaven He that spared not his own Son says the Apostle as if he had said The delivering up of our Lord Jesus Christ to be an Expiatory Sacrifice for the sins of Men is so high a Demonstration of Infinite Love that it begets in us a confident Assurance and full Perswasion that the same goodness will not fail of bestowing upon us whatever may possibly contribute to our everlasting Happiness as far as our Natures are capable of The summe of all is this that to Infinite Goodness we owe not only the Production but the continual Preservation of our Beings not only the freeing us from a certain Misery and a just and deserved Punishment but the receiving us into grace and favour and investing us with a Happiness much bigger than our hopes and expectations even the Eternal enjoyment of Himself in Heaven And that this should be wrought and effected by Jesus Christ the only begotten Son of God who left the Sacred Mansions of Heaven and veiled his Glory under a clould of Flesh and Blood and while he lived upon Earth endured the contradictions of sinners the bitter reproaches of vile and ungodly Men and at last suffered an Ignominious and accursed Death upon the Cross What is it but an everlasting Monument of Divine Goodness such a high Demonstration of Infinite Love as may well make us cry out with wonder and amazement Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us 2. Secondly in the Frame and Mystery of the Gospel there is a clear Demonstration of Infinite Wisdome To them who are called says the Apostle Christ the Power and the Wisdom of God i. e. Though the preaching of the Gospel were a stumbling block to the Jews and accounted but foolishness by the Greeks the one expecting their Messiah to be an earthly Prince and dreaming of nothing but worldly Felicity and the other counting it not worth the hearing because not agreeing with the Principles of that vain Philosophy they had addicted themselves to yet to those who were docible tractable and obedient there appeared an Infinite Wisdome and an Eternal Understanding they could not look into it but they beheld as the same Apostle speaks the mysterious and recondite wisdome of God which he ordained before the World that is whose sacred plot and contrivance was not then framed or laid when it was first promulgated and manifested to the World but lay hid in the bosome of an Infinite Understanding from all Eternity 'T is true the loveliness and glory of this great Wisdome appears not so evidently to all partly from their own carelesness and negligence in not arriving to that measure and degree of Holiness which may fit and qualifie them for a clear discerning of it Hence the Apostle says that he speaks wisdome among them that are perfect such as were well grown in the practice of the Offices and Duties of Christianity such as had senses exercised to discern good and evil Heb. 5.14 and partly through the great Corruption Depravity and Degeneracy of the minds of others which put them into an utter Incapacity and Impossibility while they remain such of understanding Divine and Heavenly Truths for the natural animal or sensual man receives not the things of the spirit of God But where these Impediments are removed and the spirits of Men aptly disposed for the Reception of so great a Blessing such Persons behold with enravishment and joy the exact strokes and perfect lineaments of an Eternal Wisdome Which Wisdome appears 1. In the Admirableness of the Contrivance of the Gospel Christianity carries with it such evident Proofs of an Incomprehensible Wisdome that those sagacious Creatures the Angels imploy themselves in searching into it And surely it must needs be an admirable piece of Wisdome and a wonderful Contrivance that must draw those Blessed Creatures to look into it Now the Wonderfulness and Admirableness of the Evangelical Plot and Contrivance for the Salvation of Humane Souls shews it self 1. In finding out a way whereby God might demonstrate both his just and implacable hatred of sin and his exuberant Love and Goodness in saving Men. Sin is no part of God's Creation nor any thing of the true Nature of the Soul but an extraneous and adventitious Being brought first into the World by the Devil the great Enemy of Mankind It is the Destruction and Ruine of the Workmanship of God's own hands and being so infinitely contrary to his Sacred Life and Nature it is no wonder if he bear an irreconcileable hatred against it and seek by all means the driving it quite out of the World But although God by reason of the Infinite Purity and Holiness of his Nature could not look with any favourable eye upon sin yet his Almighty Love pitied his Creatures and his bowels yerned over them being as it were grieved and troubled at the heart that they should be miserable for ever Wherefore God through his Eternal Wisdome resolved upon a course which should both effectually extirpate and eradicate sin and evil out of the World and yet reduce those strayed souls which through it had revolted from his blessed
claps of Thunder together with the prodigious sound of a Trumpet rending and tearing the Heavens so that Moses himself exceedingly fear'd and trembled But the Gospel being wholly a design of Mercy and Love carries with it no terrors and affrightments but is composed of the kind invitations of Peace and comfort the Mount Sion wherein the resplendent glory of the first-born is displayed shining only with the gentle beams of an attractive and pleasing light and Jesus the blessed Mediator of this New Covenant with his extended Arms proclames his willingness to embrace and receive the World which he has reconciled to God with his own blood This is that Oeconomy which the Apostle calls the foolishness of preaching not as if it were so in it self but because 't is a way of condescending wisdome wherein God stoops down to our apprehensions and frames things so as we may understand them and receive an infinite benefit by them For Man partly from the frame and constitution of his Nature consisting of Body as well as Soul but much more from his fall and descent into this lower life becomes wonderfully affected with gross Phantasms and Exterior Representations Whence it comes to pass that we do more easily and frequently conceive of things as they appear to sense than as they are in themselves when apprehended by a more discerning Principle Wherefore the Infinite Wisdome of God that makes not its Operations in a way of Absolute soveraignty and immensity of Power forcing the Creatures against those inbred Principles she hath placed in them but sweetly and powerfully directs them in a steady way of congruity and proportionateness to the natures of things being to work out Man from this low contracted state the sad Region of sin and Death to a participation of Immortality and more free emanations of Divine life contrived a way most sutable and agreeable to the shallow capacities and faculties of Humane Souls God would not appear to us in a flame of fire nor speak by an Angel in a body of pure Air but in the Form of a Servant clothed with our Humane Flesh and subject to all the harmless Passions of our Nature that he might more kindly disenslave us from the cruel Tyranny of sin and Satan For let us but consult with our own Reasons whether this be not a greater Incitation and more powerful inducement to Men to believe and obey the Declarations of the Divine Will to exhibit to them some extraordinary and remarkable Person that should by the fullest demonstrations and sensible signs prove himself to be the Eternal Son of God and by sweetly compulsive Motives even to the suffering a barbarous and shameful Death attract Humane Minds to the Imitation of his Virtues and following his steps than that God should by any of those forementioned ways manifest himself in effects of Benignity or Displeasure The whole Nation of the Jews discover the sense of Mankind in such a case when being affrighted with the terrors accompanying the descent of God upon the Mount they said unto Moses speak thou with us and we will hear but let not God speak with us lest we dye For 1. Considering the world partly from themselves and partly from the cunning of Satan so much addicted and given over to the belief of sense had not Christ visibly appeared and conversed with Men the Gospel could never have captivated Humane Understandings with such irresistible evidence or wrought in them such a full perswasion of the things it taught as we see it hath done Should the great Pillars of the Christian Faith I mean the Apostles and Disciples of the Holy Jesus have laid its first ground-work upon the hearing of some voice or perswaded their Auditors as Numa Pompilius and some other Heathen Law-givers from the converse they had with some Angel that their Doctrine was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 delivered to them from Heaven and had God for its Author yet how hardly would Men have embraced it upon these accounts especially considering those imminent and apparent Dangers they were likely to incur upon the profession of it How ill resented is that great Doctrine of our Blessed Saviour Self-denyal and Resignation among vulgar spirits and how difficult a thing is it to bring off degenerated Hearts from the Interests of the World and is it likely then that Men should be so prodigal of their dearest Blood as to sacrifice it to an uncertain Rumour and Report which every Impostor is able to pretend But to see the meek Lamb of God made in our own likeness having left the sacred Mansions of Light and Glory and clothed himself with our frail Mortality to behold him I say testifying by many Miracles and irrefragable Arguments through the whole course of his abode on Earth and at last taking it upon his Death that he was the Son of the ever-living God and came down from Heaven to make known to Men that God was reconciled to the World through him this must needs strike our Imaginations more forcibly than whatever else the wit of Man could possibly conceive 2. The Gospel was intended to transform and work our Natures into that which is the flower and perfection of the Divine life that is an universal love to call off our minds from those little Interests they are apt to espouse by looking upon themselves as so many particular Beings divided and separated from the rest of the World and created only for themselves and their Private concernments and to beget in them an universally extensive charity by widening their Capacities to the Dimensions of the whole Creation By which we are taught not to think it enough that our love ascend in copious flames to Heaven unless it likewise descend in due measures and degrees upon all Mankind And indeed it is impossible for a Man that is throughly baptized into this spirit of Universal love to have any self designs in opposition to the general good of the whole World but he must needs be infinitely desirous and pleased to see the life and nature of God communicated to all Beings capable of receiving of it And this love is so strong and vigorous that it firmly unites it self to all in whom it finds any true likeness and resemblance of the Divine Image and so far endears them to it self as to constrain us to lay down our lives for the Brethren But certainly this Flame could never have burnt so bright if it had not been raised and quickned by that sensible demonstration of inimitable affection in the Death of the Holy Jesus For what greater incouragement could there be to oblige and unite Mens souls to one another than that their love should first be kindled from Heaven by that great and unparallel'd Exemplar of noble Charity who laid down his life to expiate the crimes of his own and his Fathers Enemies 2. Of a congruity and complyance with the state and condition of Mankind both in respect of 1. Moral
2. Natural Evils First in respect of Moral Evils The degeneracy and fall of Mankind from God made them Slaves and Vassals to sin and Satan for the busie Tempter being not able to work upon them by external force and violence drew their wills into consent by craft and specious solicitations till at last he had so far enlarged his Kingdom as to bring the whole Race of Mankind under his Dominion Wherefore the Gospel being designed to free Men from that unnatural Bondage and to restore them to their true liberty it does in all points confront the ways and methods by which their Captivity was compassed and effected It had been a small matter by a high hand and by an Infinite Power at large to have destroyed the Devils Kingdom but herein appeared an excellent Wisdome so to lay the Ground and Foundation of this glorious purpose of the salvation of the World that the Politick Prince of Darkness might be taken in his own craftiness and lose this his Empire and Dominion by the same methods by which he at first obtained it The Woman being first in the Transgression and bringing sin and Death upon all her Off-spring that Divine Wisdome that draws light out of darkness and Order out of Confusion decreed that the seed of the Woman should break the Serpents head that is that Christ who is the Seed of the Woman 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by Nature and his Members who are so 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by spiritual engraftment into him should dispossess the Devil of that Power Soveraignty and Principality which he holds over the World by sin According to this early Declaration of Men's Recovery Jesus Christ the true Seed of the Woman comes into the World and by walking exactly contrary to his Enemy restores to the World what they lost by the first Adam And whereas the Devil managed his Kingdom of sin and Death with all imaginable Tyranny and Insultation over poor Mortals our Blessed Jesus was so far from requiring Humane Blood to be sacrificed to him that out of a deep sense of our Calamity he parted with his own Blood for the life of the World A more effectual and agreeable course could never have been taken than this that the Captain of our salvation should visibly appear and conquer the Kingdom and Powers of Darkness in that Nature which the first Adam ruin'd and destroyed Secondly in respect of Natural Evils Though it be no disgrace nor shame to be made a Man yet he that deeply reflects upon Humane life shall find it at the best very calamitous and standing in need of much Pity and Compassion We are born into the World helpless and weak and as if we did presage our own future miseries the first actions of our life are spent in crying and tears Our very Bodies are a sad load and burden upon our Spirits inclining them to many foolish lusts and passions subject to many Pains Diseases and Death insomuch that many good and holy Men have in passionate streins bewailed their stay and continuance here on Earth Woe is me that I sojourn in Meseck and have my habitation in the Tents of Kedar and O wretched man that I am who shall deliver me from this body of Death Now none can so affectionately pity nor so intimately resent the distress of another as he that hath smarted and suffered under the same calamity Therefore says the Apostle We have not an High-Priest that cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities by reason of the great distance disproportion and sublimity of his Nature but was in all points tempted like as we are yet without sin that is manifested and declared himself to be a true Man by being subject to all the harmless affections and infirmities of humane flesh and blood forasmuch therefore as he became our Brother by taking upon him the same Natural condition he must needs be throughly apprehensive and sensible of our state and so the more apt to sympathize with and commiserate poor Mortals and by that powerful soveraignty to which he is exalted act for us and send down relief from Heaven to us For though the Infinite Essence of God pervade the whole World and all the Creatures live within it and therefore must needs feel and know the inmost Energies Motions and stillest Actings of all Beings yet it affords not such a sensible comfort to Humane minds as to behold the Son of God taking upon him our Nature and by that Union and Proximity assuring us of his Tenderness and Compassion towards us For he took not on him the nature of Angels being unwilling to be so far removed from us but took on him the Seed of Abraham Wherefore in all things it behoved him to be made like unto his brethren that he might be a merciful and faithful High-Priest for in that he himself hath suffered being tempted he is able to succour them that are tempted 3. A third thing which demonstrates the excellency of Divine Wisdome in the dispensation of the Gospel consists in the fitness and sutableness of it to the end for which it was designed For things are so much the more excellent by how much the congruity and fitness is greater for the accomplishing their end and purpose Now the great intent and design of God in the Gospel being as I have said the everlasting blessedness of Humane Souls the more congruously and fitly disposed it shall be found to be for the obtaining this effect the greater is the glory of the Divine Wisdome interessing and concerning it self about it This aptness and sutableness is seen 1. In that the Gospel is furnished with all those Arguments that are requisite to approve it self worthy of Belief to all Rational Persons To this two things are necessary 1. The attestation of God himself 2. Rational evidence and conviction For whatever is attested of God and hath his Seal affixed to it is by the general consent of all Men to be looked upon and entertained as infallibly true Veracity being an Essential Attribute and Perfection of the Divine Nature St. Paul discoursing of the mystery of Godliness tells us that Christ and Christianity was justified by the spirit i. e. owned approved and recommended to the World by the spirit of God And this God's recommendation of our blessed Saviour to the World as a Person commissioned and invested with full Authority to declare his will unto Mankind was done at several Times and in divers manners 1. At the Baptism of our Saviour Mat. 3.16 17. when the Heavens were opened and the spirit of God descended upon him and a Voice from Heaven proclaiming him the beloved Son of God in whom he was well pleased And this manner of Divine Revelation by a Voice from Heaven as it was the most ancient so the most honourable way of God's communicating his will to Mankind Exod. 20.22 Ye have seen that I have talked with you from Heaven For what
and Wickedness are none of God's Creation but are Obliquities and Aberrations from those Rules and Laws he implanted in us and therefore as it is impossible the Soul should have any proper agreement with sin because 't is none of its Nature so she must needs on the other hand sensibly embrace and acquiesce in the Principles and Precepts of Holiness from that Vital Cognation they bear to her own Moral Being There is no capacious and generous Mind but will find it self wonderfully affected and inamour'd with the loveliness of Christianity there being nothing found but Principles of the highest worth and nobility and whatever else may speak true excellency and perfection The Gospel is nothing but God manifested in the Flesh an eternal Mind clothed with the condescensions of Humane Nature shewing us the Beauty and Pulchritude of that life from which we had so foully apostatiz'd and degenerated and confirming and re-establishing that Happy league which was once between our Souls and Righteousness By the tenor of which sacred Institute we are obliged to great measures and degrees of Holiness to Sobriety and Temperance Chastity and Purity to be strict observers of the Rules of Justice and Equity full of good nature and the desirable fruits of tenderness and compassion in a word we are injoyned no other things in Religion than what the best and bravest spirits the World ever knew have always accounted the flower and summity of Rational Natures And do not all considering Men find the greatest ease and satisfaction of Mind in the exercise of these things And whence comes this Heavenly calm and serenity of Soul but only from that gratefulness and symmetry that is between such things and our Intellectual Man so that the more earnestly we attend to them the more fully are we transformed into their lovely Image and likeness True Christianity is so far from debasing that on the contrary it infinitely exalts them by setting them at a true proportion to their proper Objects and raising them to such a state as all wise Men have ever acknowledged the highest Happiness and Perfection of the Soul of Man I have now shown the fitness and sutableness of the Gospel to the end for which it was designed in that it is furnished with all those Arguments of Credibility that may beget Assent in Rational Persons but its aptness and accomodateness to that great purpose of Men's salvation may further be demonstrated in that 2. Secondly It is so attemper'd to Humane Nature that Men shall certainly believe and yet no violence done to their Wills For Men being Moral Agents must be dealt withall according to their Natural Powers and Faculties and this makes the Method of saving Humane Souls by the Gospel to be indeed a Work of Wisdom and Counsel whereas if God should by his Omnipotency force them to a Belief and Obedience of it it would not have been so much an effect of Wisdome as of absolute and uncontrollable Power Now herein appears the Glory of Divine Wisdome in the choice of such means and ways as shall effectually bring to pass its end and purpose and yet no violence and force offered to that Nature in whose behalf it acts As therefore to assert that there is no necessity of the assistance of the grace and spirit of God in our progress in Virtue and Holiness but that Men may be good by the strength of the Powers of Nature is directly repugnant to the frame of Christianity delineated in the Holy Scriptures and the sense of the Universal Apostolick Church of Christ so to think that the Operation of God's Spirit upon the Hearts of Men is by an External Impetus and Force is no less precarious and absurd than the other is wicked and abominable I shall therefore wave the first of these as not being at all concerned with it but directly supposing the contrary and only discourse so far of the concourse and energy of the Spirit of God upon the minds will and affections of Men as is evidently declared in the Holy Scriptures And here I humbly conceive that the Sacred Writings do no where declare the concurrence or operation of the Spirit of God upon Men's Souls to be by an Omnipotent Power at large such as was shown in the Creation of the World or Resurrection of the Dead and which supposes us so altogether passive as not to be in the least measure capable of promoting or hindring our own good for this were to destroy that noble faculty of Humane Souls their Will and render all their Actions fatal and necessary Whereas the Christian Religion was intended to heal and cement to joyn and confirm the dislocated and disordered powers of our Souls not to take them away to perfect and compleat not to extirpate and eradicate their very Nature and Being No Man acknowledges the actions of Brutes or Engines or the results of our Animal and irrational powers capable of Moral Goodness because they act fatally and necessarily and such would the actions of Mankind be if they were produced by an irresistible Power A power and assistance then it is certain God has given us and that of his Holy Spirit under the Gospel but the manner of his Operation is not absolute and unconditionate but hypothetical like the great conciliating and formative Principle of God in Nature requiring certain terms and previous Dispositions and Qualifications without which it is as vain to hope for the compleat efformation of Christ within us as to expect the Rudiments of the Body of an Animal to be formed out of a piece of Brass or Marble For though we do not distrust the Power of God but believe he is able to raise himself up Children out of the very stones of the Fields and to change and alter the Natures of things as he pleases yet since we find him framing and guiding them not according to Will and Power alone but according to the Counsel of his Will we are likewise ascertain'd that in the conducting Humane Souls to Heaven God works sutably to their Natures and Capacities and in such an orderly Way and congruous Method as supposes the Presence of an Infinite Wisdome and Counsel in the Management of it And this not only appears from the consideration of the frame of Humane Nature which in its choicest part is wholly Intellectual and therefore not to be forced by an outward violence but moved and drawn as the Scriptures speak with bands of love and cords of a man that is by Rational means and perswasive Arguments whose force and strength must lye in their Congenerousness and sutableness with the Ancient Idea's and Inscriptions of Truth upon our Souls but is likewise manifest 1. From the resistibility of the Operations of the Spirit of God And for a demonstrative and convictive Evidence of this we need look no further than the preaching of the Son of God while he conversed with the World and dwelt amongst us who though he were
Light and Glory as shall cause them to shine as the Sun and Stars for evermore So that what the Poet fabulously speaks of the Apotheosis of Daphnis shall much more be verified in the Translation of every good Man into the Kingdome of Heaven Candidus insuetum miratur limen Olympi Sub pedibusque videt nubes sidera Daphnis Having thus far brought this Discourse towards an end and displayed the Goodness Wisdome and Power of God in the Gospel the great Instrument of the blessedness of Mankind it becomes our duty to receive it with the highest and most honourable thoughts and apprehensions not to let our Conceptions dwindle into something low and mean and unworthy of the Nature of God who hath so intimately concerned himself in it For whatever whether Opinion or Practice lessens that esteem and veneration Men ought to have of the Works of God is a high Affront and Injury and an Unworthy Derogation from the Perfections of the Divine Nature whereas nothing shallow trifling and contemptible can ever be a sutable Object of Divine Goodness Wisdome and Power much less can there be any thing such in the Evangelical Oeconomy which was designed for so great a Work and so Universal and general a Good as the Immortal Happiness of Humane Souls The very light of Reason it self teaches us that we ought to speak worthily of God and to have due and right Apprehensions of his Nature the Excellency of which though it were in a great measure stamped and ingraved upon the Minds of Men at their first Creation yet is more clearly and sensibly discovered under the Gospel than by any other Dispensation since the World began And as we are to take care that our thoughts and expressions be agreeabe and becoming so great a Mystery so are we concerned vigorously to prosecute that which is the Grand Intent scope and aim of the Gospel that is our progress and growth in Virtue and Holiness to perfect our Minds in true Goodness by a sincere Practice of all the indispensable Laws and Rules of Righteousness For however Men may please themselves in expounding Christianity in an Opinionative and Notional way in peculiar Phrases and Terms of Art as if Religion were a thing deduced and borrowed from the Schools yet certain it is that the true Life of God which our Holy Lord and Master Jesus Christ came to disseminate and propagate by the Gospel is not a bare sound of Words but an inward Principle of Life and Power elevating and raising the Souls of Men from all childish toyes and follies to a manly and generous Apprehension of Righteousness and Virtue advancing their Rational to a compleat and entire command and superiority over their sensual and Animal Powers and Faculties and begetting in them such a lively sense of whatever is absolutely good and holy as may at last reduce their thoughts words and actions into an entire conformity to the Divine Will And forasmuch as this Heavenly Life consists in the sincere Prosecution and Practice of Virtue and that Morality and Virtue are depressed beneath the concerns of Christianity by those who pretend a more free Exaltation of Grace as it will not be Impertinent to the present Discourse so I am sure 't is infinitely necessary for every Man to contribute his Pains in stopping and damming up that Flood of Wickedness and Immorality that has broken in upon the World by shewing the Indispensable Necessity of the Practice of Morality that true Religion and Virtue are at no such Mortal Jarrs but that whoever is false and Hypocritical to the sincere and Conscientious Practice of it though he flie to Heaven in his vain Dreams and Imaginations and talk of the Vision of God and an Immediate Communion and Converse with Him yet he has neither seen nor known Him and is so far from being a true Christian that he has very little of the Life of Christianity dwelling in him As I desire not therefore to charge any Man with the Evil Consequences of his Opinion but charitably suppose that he holds fast to the Foundation and whatever Tendency his Opinions may have in their Consecutions that yet in their Primary Intention he designs not the discountenancing of unfeigned Piety so neither would I nor can by any considering Person be upbraided with setting and exalting Works above the Grace of God as will appear when I have a little explicated and unfolded those Termes which have of late raised such hideous storms and Tragedies By Virtue therefore I mean that Power of the Soul which so rules and governs all the Animal motions and inclinations that she does every where and in every thing constantly and unmoveably follow that which is best As for the word Grace all the Notions of it in the Sacred Dialect as a Learned Critick observes spring from that Primary Notion of it for Charity or Liberality Wherefore the Participation of the Divine Nature being the highest Perfection and Accomplishment of the Soul of Man and the ultimate end of Christianity it self all those Acts which have a Natural Tendency to the furtherance and attainment of so high and glorious a purpose are stiled Virtues they being nothing but the Powerful Exertions of the Soul in the subjugation of its Corporeal Passions that it may with ease and constancy follow that which is simply Best and Graces because they are the free undeserved and Gratuitous Donations of him whose Almighty and Beneficent Spirit pervades the whole Order and Comprehension of Intellectual Agents refining and purifying the Minds and Spirits of the lapsed Creation and every where attempting the Replantation of that Beautiful Image Sin and Vice had obliterated and defaced Now for the Term Moral remaining to be explained I conceive it may signifie Whatever contains in it an Eternal Immutable and Indispensable Obligation By Eternal Immutable and Indispensable I exclude from it all Temporary Constitutions and Positive Sanctions though deriving their Authority from GOD Himself I add Obligation to difference Moral Truths from Speculative and Theoretical for there may be many Physical and Mathematical Notions which may properly be called Eternal and Immutable Verities which yet lay no necessary Obligation upon Us. That what is once moved will continue to move till something hinder it is alike an Eternal and Immutable Verity with this That every Man is to honour his Parents but the One layes a necessary Obligation upon the Soul whereas the other does not Wherefore though the subject of all Truths whatever and so of Moral Ones be the Perceptive and Intellectual Part of the Soul yet the sole and Adequate Object of Morality seems to be the Immutable Idea's and Reasons of Good and Evil. And so far forth as the Soul exercises it self in the Discrimination of Moral Entities it is called by the Name of Conscience So that the mistake seems to arise from hence that Men distribute Humane Actions in reference to Religion into Moral and Evangelical whereas Moral is
Life and Nature to a participation of it again And this he hath done by sending his own Son into the World to become an Expiatory Sacrifice for the sins of all Mankind For should God have cast Men off for ever and thrown them into Hell though he had still been Just and Righteous in his Actions and declared but a high dislike of that which his Essential Holiness could never patronize or countenance yet his Goodness and Love had not so conspicuously and gloriously appeared On the other hand should God have received the World into grace and favour forgiving their Iniquities without any previous satisfaction for sin though he might have done this without any breach of the Eternal Purity and Justice of his Nature yet he had not so sensibly affected the minds of Men with his just aversation of sin nor so effectually discovered to them his Anger and Displeasure against all evil and wickedness But now in the Death of Jesus Christ God has reconciled Goodness and Holiness Justice and Mercy punishing sin and yet saving the sinner Behold therefore and wonder at the Ineffable Goodness and Transcendent love of God! Could not Man redeem his Brother and give unto God a Ransome for him No surely for that Sacrifice that is presented and offered up to God must be without spot and blemish but when the Lord looked down from Heaven upon the Children of Men he beheld them all gone aside and become filthy so that there was not one that did good no not one But if this might not be yet could not God have declared his will to us by an Angel by a Voice from Heaven or by uniting himself to the Angelical Nature Certainly he might but none of these ways could have been with such endearing circumstances with such sensible Testimonies of dear Compassion and Benignity as enravish ingenuous Minds into sutable Returns and expressions of love Jesus Christ therefore the Delights of his Father the Brightness of his Glory and the express Image and character of his Person took flesh and dwelt among us He that was in the form of God clothed with all the Majesty and Glory of the supramundane life yet emptyed himself of all this unspeakable Felicity and took upon him the form of a Servant i. e. an Earthly or a body of flesh and blood in opposition to that state which he before called the form of God and being found in that servile scheme he humbled himself and became obedient unto Death even the Death of the Cross What higher expressions of love can Humane Understandings possibly conceive than these The endearing love of Friends could never give any greater evidence of it self than that they lay down their lives one for another but such was the transcendent love of Jesus that he dyed for Rebels for Apostates from that sacred life of God to which alone the Soveraign Command and Rule both of Heaven and Earth does of right belong Behold him a Man of sorrows exposed to the envy hatred and malice of the cruel and unbelieving Jews and yet so inwardly affected with tenderness and commiseration towards them that he omits nothing which a Heart enflamed with love and compassion could do to make them happy And though God in his Eternal Wisdome foresaw the accursed Disposition of the Jewish Nation who as they had been heretofore thirsty after the blood of the Prophets and righteous Men so now would never leave till they had satiated their Revenge in the Blood of his only begotten Son yet he delivers him up into their hands for so the Apostle speaks that they had taken and by wicked hands crucified and slain 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 him that was given out of the protecting hand and providence of God to the will of his Enemies A love which the Tongues of Men and Angels are never able sufficiently to express And as the Infinite love of God appears in this way of saving Men by Christ Jesus so his severity and hatred against sin is no less manifest and conspicuous for in that God spared not his own Son but delivered him up to Death it is a sufficient proof and Argument of his utter Detestation of all sin and evil No circumstance of his bitter Passion but speaks forth the heavy wrath and indignation of God against sin When he came into the Garden of Gethsemane where began the first Scene of his Tragical Passion the Scripture tells us that he was sore amazed and very heavy and this inward grief and ineffable trouble of his soul he expresses in that Passionate speech to his Disciples My Soul is exceeding sorrowful even unto Death not only extensively such as must last till Death it self do end it but likewise intensively so great as is usually at the very point of Death And whence arose this sorrow It was not out of any cowardly fear of pain and death for knowing all things that should come upon him yet with a firm constancy and sedate Resolution of mind he comes to his implacable Enemies at Jerusalem and when he was betrayed in the Garden he willingly offers himself into their hands I am he Though certain it is our Blessed Saviour bearing about him our Humane Nature was likewise subject to all the harmless Passions and affections of it and was so far from that Stoical stubbornness and insensibility that his Passive and tender Constitution filled him with grief and yielded to the fear of pain and Death Nor did his sorrow proceed from any displeasure of God against his Person for he being perfectly obedient and fully and exactly conformable to his Fathers will it could not be that he should groan under the anger and wrath of God Nor was it altogether Bodily pains that made him so but there was something extraordinary As 1. A withdrawing the sensibleness of Divine Assistance from him As the Sun at our Saviour's Crucifixion though not disjoyned from the World yet for a time deserted the World by withdrawing his light from it And although this withholding the sensibleness of the Divine Presence was done without any Aversation and dislike of the Person of our blessed Lord which not only before but at that very instant was tenderly beloved of God yet the Apprehension of it could not but make him bemoan his case in that sad exclamation My God my God why or how hast thou forsaken me 2. Because then all the Powers of Hell and darkness were let loose upon him The Prince of Darkness with his accursed Legions did then as we may reasonably suppose appear to him in the most affrighting and dreadful forms and by the Permission of Divine Providence exerted and tryed the utmost of their Insulting Rage in these their last and most furious Assaults the Conquest and Victory over whom being to be atchieved not by the Divine Power but by the Piety and Obedience of our Saviour he falls into an Agony and an Angel descends from
and may be consistent with the Nature of Rational Creatures and that it may appear there is nothing wanting on God's part to make them happy Wherefore those who deny to the greatest part of Mankind such a Participation of the assistance and grace of God as may place them under a capacity of obtaining Heaven seem to me to question the reality and sincerity of God's Design and Intention of saving all the World by Christ Jesus For if the purpose of God in sending Jesus Christ into the World was that he should tastâ— death for every man and that the World through him might be saved it was likewise undoubtedly a part of this purpose that they should all be qualified and impowered with such ability the faithful actuating of which should certainly attain that end for which it was designed And that God should intend the salvation of all Mankind and promulgate this his Intention and alarm the hopes and expectations of all the World and yet deny them that without which they cannot be saved is utterly irreconcileable with those apprehensions which we ought to have of the Divine Nature 2. That all Men might thereby be accountable to God No Man can be accountable for any more than he has received and if there were any number of Men to whom the Gospel were faithfully preached and the means of salvation made known and yet were always left destitute of a power and ability of believing and acting according to the prescriptions of it they would be so far from being left without excuse or having their mouths stopped that their Apology would be as reasonable as if God should expostulate with them for not creating the World or raising the Dead For if they never were so much as put â—nto a capacity of believing how can they be justly punished as Infidels But because the righteous Governor of Heaven and Earth cannot but do that which is just and equal and that all men to whom God has communicated the Gospel shall be accountable to him for it therefore we are assured that all of them at some time or other were endued with such a measure and degree of God's powerful assistance as should inable them to do what he required of them and so as he would accept of This is the condemnation says our Blessed Saviour Joh. 3.19 not that all the World was in a state of Darkness but that Light that is the Gospel is come amongst them and by It they are put into a capacity not only of discovering but of coming out of their sins and they loved darkness rather than light that is preferred the satisfaction of their own corrupt lusts before a sincere obedience to the will of God And methinks the Righteousness of God's Dispensation with Men in this kind is evidently prefigured in that Parable of the Vineyard Isai 5. which is alike applicable to the state of things under the Gospel as it was then to the Jewish Church the planting it in a fruitful soil the careful manuring and cultivation of it implying all necessary means for the increase and growth of Men in grace and vertue whereby might very well have been expected such Wine as might chear and exhilarate the heart of God and man but when after all this pains it brought forth nothing but wild Grapes then God determines upon the just destruction of it and for the Equity and Justice of this Procedure appeals to the Consciences of Men What could have been done more that I have not done But against this it is objected that if all Men under the Gospel are put into a capacity of salvation whence then comes the different entertainment of it and Why is it that all Men are not effectually convinced and wrought upon by it For the solution of this difficulty I shall return 1. That of Origen that to an effectual perswasion there is required not only that the Perswader offer such things as are apt to beget belief but likewise a sutable disposition and tractable frame in him that is to be perswaded So that the Reason why many Men do not entertain and believe the Gospel is not that the Gospel is unfurnished of perswasory Arguments or that God is wanting in any thing on his part but because they reject and refuse those things which do in others and might in them if it were not for their own obstinacy produce faith and belief As says the Father the most eloquent Orator that ever spake may perswade in vain where he meets with a stubborn and refractory disposition It is sufficient therefore that the Gospel suggests and offers 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 such rational Arguments and Motives as are proper to beget Belief in Moral Agents but the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 perswasibility or the Act of being perswaded is a work of Mens own For proof of which the Father cites these Scriptures Gal. 5.8 Perswasion cometh not of him that calleth you And Isai 1.19 20. If ye be willing and obedient ye shall eat the good of the Land but if ye refuse and rebel ye shall be devoured with the Sword Which account Origen seems to have taken out of Irenaeus Facere enim proprium est benignitatis Dei fieri autem proprium est hominis Naturae Si igitur tradideris ei quod est tuum id est fidem in eum subjectionem percipies ejus artem eris perfectum opus Dei. Si autem non credideris ei fugeris manus ejus erit causa imperfectionis in te qui non obedisti sed non in illo qui vocavit 2. The Assistance and aid of the grace and spirit of God under the Gospel is not by Omnipotency or Power at large but such a concurrence as leaves to Men the liberty of their own wills as is manifest from several places of the sacred Scriptures Joh. 5.40 Ye will not come unto me that ye may have life Though our blessed Saviour spake as never Man spake and wrought such Miracles as never Man did beyond which nothing can be offered to make the Gospel credible yet those contumacious Jews would not receive him And of the Pharisees and Lawyers it is said Luk. 7.30 That they rejected the counsel of God against themselves that is the merciful purpose or design of God towards them in making provision for their salvation as well as the rest of the Jews 3. It is necessary that some allowance be made for our infirmities For though a mighty Power engage it self on our behalf yet if God should be extreme to mark what is done amiss if he should take advantage of every frailty and miscarriage who then could be saved Hence it is that our merciful God considering our frame and remembring the imperfection of Humane Nature is willing to abate and strike off much of our account upon that stock and treats with us not according to the degrees of an Angel but the measures of a Man not after the highest rigor
but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 according to equity which is the truest and most perfect Justice For herein consists the excellency of the Gospel Covenant in that under it 1. God allows of our Repentance for past sins 2. Accepts of our sincerity for the time to come It was part of that Commission which Christ gave his Apostles before his Ascension into Heaven that they should Preach repentance and remission of sins in his Name among all Nations which they faithfully observed offering life and salvation to those that crucified the Son of God provided they would repent of this their heinous crime and become new Creatures Repent and be converted that your sins may be blotted out It is the great comfort the Christian Religion brings guilty sinners in that it assures them of the love of an offended God that their past sinful lives shall not ruine or exclude them from his favour but that now in this day of mercy and peace if they will return unto him by a speedy Repentance he will be merciful to their Unrighteousness and will remember their iniquities no more The Conscience of Mens own guilt makes them afraid and like Adam run from the Presence of God wherefore to prevent those misgiving thoughts of the Nature of God which Mens sinful hearts possessed them withall and for the future to take away all jealousies and suspicious fears out of their Minds God is pleased to publish a Declaration of Pardon and Indulgence to all Penitent Persons giving them all imaginable security of his Propensity and readiness to be reconciled and of his unfeigned desire and willingness to accept of their Persons upon their serious and hearty detestation of their former sins and evil courses And to the end that Men may be perfectly convinced that God is not inexorable and implacable and that he consults not his own Glory in any other way than that of the Creatures good and advantage he vouchsafes out of his undeserved favour and grace to accept of our Sincerity for the time to come the knowledge of which is therefore imparted unto Men by the Gospel to settle their Minds and quiet their Consciences which otherwise upon every failure in their Duty would perpetually torment them with the fear of God's everlasting Anger and Displeasure By sincerity I mean such a frame and constitution of spirit whereby our whole Souls are faithfully carried out in obedience to the will of God so far as it is made known to us These things I write unto you says the beloved Apostle that ye sin not that is It is the design of the Gospel perfectly to abolish all sin and therefore it requires Mens utmost caution and endeavour against it But because Men may fall into sin through the improvidence and short-sightedness of Humane Nature or through the sudden incursion of a Temptation and the Violence and importunity of it yet let them not cast away their confidence nor sink under their load and dye for if any man thus sin we have an Advocate with the Father a royal Agent at the right hand of God who makes intercession for us not as in the days of his flesh by offering up Prayers with strong crying and tears but by Virtue of that Power and Authority of ruling his Church according to his own Pleasure dispensing his favours and saving Men by the mercies and compassions of the Gospel which Prerogative he purchased and merited for himself by his bitter Death and Passion For God does not exact of us a perfect unsinning Obedience so as never to fail in our duty or offend in the least tittle or circumstance but he requires of us a perfection of sincerity the not giving way to any known sin or doing that upon deliberation which a Man's conscience tells him is a breach and violation of the Law of God though there be never so great Temptations to it This is that which the Scripture calls by the Names of the New Man and the New Creature when we love and serve God with our whole hearts and retain such a clear sense of the deformity of sin and the loveliness of Virtue as makes us studiously prosecute the one and detest and abhor the other And though this sincerity of heart may be accompanied with meekness and imperfection yet it is such as God has graciously promised to accept of and to wash away those lesser frailties and infirmities in the Blood of Christ This state of mind is an everlasting Fountain of Peace and Joy a spring of Eternal contentment and satisfaction It supports us in all dangers carries us undauntedly through all difficulties and fills our souls with an enravishing calmness and tranquillity It is certainly the best Companion and the surest Friend in all the World for when the Clouds gather and a storm arises and the face of things in this lower Region becomes troubled and confused yet our sincerity never leaves us but in the most formidable and dismal appearance of Nature puts on a chearful countenance and looks abroad and meets the greatest dangers with a high and generous resolution being confident of this that that everlasting goodness which folds the whole Creation in tender Arms will never disdain or cast away a sincere Person nor despise him who unfeignedly and bewailing his weakness prosecutes that which is simply and absolutely the best 2. A second thing wherein the Excellency of Divine Wisdome appears lyes in the manner of the manifestation of the Gospel to us God was manifest in the flesh says St. Paul that is the wonderfulness of the mystery of the Gospel consisted in this that God took upon him our flesh and blood God communicated his will to us by sending down his Son in the likeness of sinful flesh Rom. 8.3 that is in a body of flesh and blood I shall not here insist upon those 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 those various ways and divers manners by which God spake to the Fathers of old communicating his will to them sometimes by Dreams and Visions by a Voice from Heaven and the Apparitions of Angels but consider that way which God hath chosen of manifesting himself to the World in these last days by his Son which as it best sutes with the Evangelical Dispensation so it discovers to us that manifold wisdome the Apostle speaks of Eph. 3.10 a Wisdome that displays it self in several ways and manners and yet all tending to one great end and purpose namely the recovery of Men from sin to a state of Purity and Holiness For in this great design of instructing the World by the Incarnation of our blessed Saviour we discover the evident Traces and Footsteps 1. Of a condescending Wisdome accommodating things to our Apprehensions and Capacities The delivery of the Law on Mount Sinai was usher'd in with a terrible and amazing solemnity the Mountain quaking and vomiting out pitchy Clouds of smoke and globes of Flame a fiery Tempest or Whirlwind roaring with formidable peals and
though condemned as a Malefactor and that I was owned and approved of God in that he visibly took me up into Heaven Which plentiful effusion of the Holy Spirit in such a wonderful manner whenas he had been withdrawn from the Jews as to those extraordinary and Prophetical gifts for the space of four hundred years was a Testimony clear as the Sun that Jesus was the true Messias the beloved Son of GOD and therefore that they ought to have believed on Him 6. Lastly Christ was approved by the Spirit of Prophecy Their want of understanding and incredulity of the Prophetick Oracles was that for which our Saviour upbraided his two Disciples O Fools and slow of heart to believe all that the Prophets have spoken Whereby we are informed that the Prophets had long ago given not only a character and description of the Person but of the Doctrine Death Burial and Resurrection of the Messiah and these Prophecies being so directly applicable to Jesus and to none else it was an unquestionable proof that he was the true Messiah and that the World ought to believe on him This Argument St. Peter makes use of against the Jewes To him give all the Prophets witness q.d. If you believe not us the Apostles of Jesus yet believe your own Prophets who unanimously point out and refer to this Jesus whom we preach to you And thus St. Paul pleads for the Gospel Act. 26.22 that he taught no other things than those which the Prophets and Moses did say should come By all these several ways it is very apparent that God hath born witness to Christianity and approved and owned the Person and Doctrine of our Lord Jesus Christ which is the first thing required to the credibility of the Gospel namely the Attestation of God himself 2. The Second is Rational Evidence and Conviction The most Noble Faculties of the Soul of Man are the Understanding and the Will and that Religion bear a Rational Evidence and Conviction it must be fitted with Arguments that must convince the Understanding and perswade the Will to a due Reception and entertainment of it Now the proper Object of the Understanding is Truth from whence it follows that Christianity must be true that it may be believed For the Truth of Religion I shall refer to those Learned Authors who have purposely handled that Argument and brought as clear Evidence as the thing it self is capable of And he that cannot believe without a Mathematical certainty declares himself to be very absurd and disingenuous and may upon the same grounds as well expect the same Demonstrative Evidence for the affairs of Humane life or to prove the Truth of the Chronicles of the Kings of England or France that is he is so strangely unreasonable as to desire such proof as the nature of the things will not bear though in the mean time he have the highest evidence and most unquestionable assurance of the Truth of Religion that the thing it self is capable of that is a Moral certainty For the Mind of Man may be as indubitably assured of the Truth of a Moral Proposition as of a Mathematical or Physical one although there be not the same way of Probation in all As for Example This is a self-evident Truth in Morals and needs no other light but that of its own to gain Assent That in those things which we have not seen nor experienced our selves we ought to believe them that say they have seen and experienced provided they live up to their profession and are not moved to it by secular respect Which if it be not assented to we must be Scepticks even in ordinary affairs and transactions of Humane life we must not believe there is such a Place as Constantinople nor credit any thing but our own Eyes and Ears and say in a larger sense than ever the Psalmist did that all men are lyars See more of this in Bishop Wilkins Principles of Natural Religion Now for the Will that Religion may have a full and compleat entertainment in the Soul of Man there must be something likewise to work upon that Wherefore to make a thing eligible it must have the appearance of Good that is it must have a sutableness congruity and harmony with the Intellectual Nature of Man and a tendency to promote the perfection thereof And such is the Christian Religion in its whole Frame and Contexture For let us consider who it is that owns and has interessed himself as the Blessed Author of the Evangelical Oeconomy even the Eternal Logos and Wisdome of God that Almighty Mind which has closely contracted and deeply seal'd upon all Intellectual Agents that large and diffusive wisdome that is seen in all the Parts of Heaven and Earth And to think that Christianity should be in any of its Parts unreasonable is to imagine this to be the only Unreasonable thing that ever the Divine Wisdome was the Author of and this alone of all his numerous Off-spring to be unlike the Father The Gospel does in the most intimate manner derive it self from Christ the Eternal Son of God and is especially owned and superintended by him as being the repairing that work which he alone made and which he alone can rectifie and to imagine that an Infinite Reason should propound any thing to us that were unreasonable is as fond as to say that cold can flow from fire or darkness positively ray from the bosome of light Jesus Christ did not bring a Religion into the World to perplex our minds and dazle our understandings but for the real good and behoof of the lapsed Creation to form our minds according to his own Image and to regenerate our spirits into a living nature of Truth and Righteousness which Design were utterly lost if there were not in Christianity a perfect symphony congruity and agreeableness with our Intellectual Natures Besides let any Man but consider how the Will is allured and solicited to Action and he shall find that it is then the most vigorously tempted forth when something is propounded which has a Natural sutableness and harmony with those Constitutive Principles of which we are made but on the contrary it is naturally averse to and not at all concerned with that to which it hath no vital sympathy or concord Which is an evident sign that Christianity is not only agreeable to but perfective of our Rational Powers What can be more agreeable to the true Nature of Man than Righteousness What more sutable to his higher and Diviner Faculties than Truth and Goodness These beautiful and glorious Forms shone bright in our Souls before Vice and Sin had covered and overspread them and forced our Minds into a Preternatural state Now Christianity is design'd for the Recovery of Us to our Pristine Health and Rectitude and tends to the enlargement of our better Powers and the Recovery of them from that narrow and contracted state sin and evil had brought them to Vice