things of the spirit of God for they are foolishness unto him neither can he know them because they are spiritually discerned No Sir it is the peculiar work of the Spirit to regenerate and convert Lydia's heart was opened Acts 16. Mat. 13.3 Rom. 1.16 before she so diligently attended to Pauls words The word of God that brought forth fruit did not make the ground good but it was so before by the special working of that Spirit The word which is the power of God to salvation doth not make believers but God first makes them so by sanctifying of their natures and giving them to believe Phil. 1.29 The word of God in Regeneration hath no greater force or power then the word of the Prophets and Apostles had in raising of the dead which had no other operation then to be tanquam signum as a sign of the thing done or as a moral instrument for there is no lesser power requirable in the recovery of a poor soul from a spiritual death to a spiritual life then there is from a natural death to a natural life And therefore as it is Gods peculiar to raise from death to life natural so it is his alone prerogative to raise from a spiritual death to a spiritual life The dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God and they that hear shall live Ioh. 5.25 Yea the same power is exerted in the work of Regeneration or the new creation as was at first in the work of the old creation 1 Cor. 4.6 no less then an hand of omnipotency in them both and therefore not communicable to any creature From all of which I shall hence infer that if it be Gods peculiar work to regenerate and not the word in the hearing of it and that Regeneration is principally necessary to give us ingress into heaven Joh. 3.3 Mat. 5.8 God may then as well regenerate infants by his secret power unsearchable to us though they neither hear nor understand as he doth those that are of riper years by so weak an instrument as the word and Gospel is which hath no such inherent power in and of it self Secondly this your assertion labours of another sickness viz. a false supposition that nothing but actual sins expose men to the danger of being cast into the lake of fire whereas the truth is That original sin or that hereditary pravity we brought with us into the world deriving it from our parents Psal 51.5 who conceived us in sin hath so much of filthiness and uncleanness in it that God may justly cast a new-born infant into the lake of fire for it unless it be washed clean by the blood of Jesus who is the alone way the truth the life Joh. 14.6 and through whose alone merits we have an access into the Holy of Holies into which place are admitted onely these whose names are written in the Lambs book of life Rev. 21.27 Luke 10.20 Rev. 20.15 whose names are written in heaven registred there in the eternal immutable decree of Gods election unto life all the rest whose names are not there recorded infants as well as others are cast into the lake of fire which is the second death But enough of this at present I shall be sure to meet you again more about this when you lay out your strength against original sinne Another thing which you give out in the nature of a reason why infants cannot be damned is viz. for that their not having of faith will never be charged upon them as sin Sir suppose I grant so much and so likewise what you produce out of Rom. 4.15 as a confirmation or rather as a reason of your reason for where no law is there is no transgression both may be very true as set disjunctively but as you have woven them both into one sentence they may not be true nor applicable to your purpose for herein you vary your terms that which you write takes notice of sin the text speaks of transgression wherein I conceive sin and transgression are not terms convertible for though every transgression of the law be a sin yet every sin is not a transgression of the law as in the case now before us for original sin though it be a sin properly and really yet it is not a transgression of the law as personally acted in and by the infants but as imputatively and as a defect of original righteousness So what you further say by way of illustration that there can be no law to infants as such and sin is not imputed where there is no law I grant you as to infants now in existence which law might require the exerting or putting out of any act or duty which their minority is uncapable to receive or to perform But I must withall tell you that as Adam as a publick person as a root and stock received Grace righteousness and holiness for him and his even for those in his loins so he received a law to him and his even the Covenant of works do this and live which law was incumbent not onely on Adam himself but likewise on all those that were in his loins So that infants now are born under a law and their want of original righteousness and that for the defect thereof their being conceived and born in sin and uncleanness shall be a deserving cause of their just condemnation What you bring forth in evidence to what you here aim at viz. Rom. 5.13 sin is not imputed where there is no law is so far from answering your desire that it cuts the throat of your assertion For the clearing whereof its expedient to search into the mind of the Spirit by the scope of the place The Apostle in this Chapter is prosecuting that grand point of Justification by faith in Christ and ver 11. laies down this that we have received attonement by him whence he makes this corollary ver 12. that as by the first Adam sin and death entred into the world so by Iesus Christ righteousness and life are restored to us But ver 13. he meets with an objection that sin is not imputed where there is no law where he argues after this manner If all have sinned in the loins of Adam then those likewise have sinned who lived before the law was given by Moses but before the law was given there could be no sin because where there is no law there is no transgression as Chap. 4.15 and therefore all have not sinned in Adam Now here the Apostle denies the assumption or minor proposition affirming the contrary that sin was before the law given by Moses constantly affirming that howsoever it was not imputed i. e. reckoned or accounted or reputed to be sin yet indeed and in truth sin was then in the world and this being of sin in the world before the law ver 14. he proves by the effect viz. death was then in the world and that all had sinned because that
by a comparison of our righteousness and life received by Jesus Christ with sin and death contracted from Adam that as by the disobedience of Adam we were made sinners viz. sinners by imputation his sin being laid upon our account as much as if we our selves had eaten of the forbidden fruit So by the obedience of Christ we are made righteous i. e. righteous by imputation God being so pleased to accept of Christ his righteousness as though we in our own persons had fulfilled all righteousness either in doing or in suffering See for further satisfaction 1. Cor. 1.30 and 15.22 and 2 Cor. 5.15 The second thing considerable in original sin is a privation of the Image of God the glory of God or original righteousness of this see Rom. 3.23 Eccles 7.29 Ephes 4.24 which uprightness had been hereditary had man kept his first station but he failing in the breach of the holy law of God he lost that righteousness both to himself and all his posterity So that there unavoidably succeeding a defect of conformity to the law of God which sinless nature did enjoy necessarily must it draw with it the sin of that nature which it voluntarily had contracted viz. Original unrighteousness Whence I reason thus Every transgression of the law of God takes along with it the true and proper name and nature of sin and to have eternal death as the reward thereof 1 Ioh. 3.4 Rom. 3.23 But every defect of conformity with the law of God is such a transgression Therefore c. The Minor is proved from those places 1 Cor. 2.14 and 2 Cor. 3.5 Rom. 3.10 and Rom. 7.18 cum multis aliis The third thing considerable is a proneness aptitude and bentness to sin not by imputation but by inclination As the young Lion and the young Serpent have not the bloudy and stinging nature of the old Lion and the old Serpent by imputation but by natural and intrinsecal inherencie so it is with men from the womb they are sinners from the birth bringing into the world a body of sin and death Whence I argue thus Every evill concupiscence or proneness in man to sin or rebellion to the law of God or enmity to God carries with it the name and nature of sin But original sin Synecdochically taken for the habit of original unrighteousness is that evil Concupiscence or proneness to sin c. Therefore For the Major I presume none dare question it and for the Minor that is confirmed abundantly and that in a special manner in the greatest part of Rom. 7. where the nature of original sin is most lively represented and the Apostle not onely for himself but for all others bemoanes their sad estate in respect of the natural inherency of that depravation of our nature And whereas you Sir were pleased to supply me with places to prove what I intended as to original sin I must tell you it was not for want of stock that I had then in store but onely because I would not then in so short an epitome be tedious and troublesome to such dissatisfied persons for whose alone satisfaction I composed that breviary but never intending it should have been exposed to publick view it was onely your pleasure to bring it into the sun light naked and bare as it was And therefore that you may see that the subject is not any wayes lame or defective for want of sufficient authority to support it take these texts of Scripture ex abundanti for the confirmation of it Gen. 6.5 and 8.21 Iob 14.5 Psal 57.7 Isa 64.10 Ier. 17.9 Matth. 15.12 Ioh. 3.6 Rom. 5.12 c. and 6.16 c. and 8.6 7. c. Eph. 2.3 and 4.22 Col. 3.9 11. Tit. 3.3 Heb. 12.1 Iam. 1.14 15 c. For what you conclude this paragraph with that if sinners should repent confess and forsake their sins they should find mercy And if the elect should continue in sin and not repent c. they should be equally lyable to the decree of Reprobation I say Sir though to affirm this doth utterly interfere with your first position where you affirm that the elect cannot become reprobates neither can reprobates become elect And yet there is some truth in it according to the Gospel manner of expressions but this hath been fully spoken to already Your next encounter is to answer a place by me quoted where you write thus But yet lest it should be thought that there is some weight in that Scripture which he quoteth out of Ephes 2.1 2 3. Children of wrath even as others to prove that reprobation to the second death is for that sin in Adam or that infants dying in infancy should be cast into the lake of fire for the same I doubt not but by the help of my God I shall make it appear that there is no such thing in it for first consider that these words in ver 1. you hath he quickened who were dead in trespasses and sins cannot relate to their being in the corrupt mass or lump of Adams transgression for that is but one being in the singular number but that which is there spoken of is in the plural number or more than one to wit trespases and sins Secondly it doth appear that it doth not relate to that sin they had as they were new born infants because it relateth to their conversation or course of life as they had a being in this world ver 2.3 wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world amongst whom we all had our conversation in times past c. By which it doth appear that he doth not speak to the Ephesians of what they were as they first came into the world as Infants for they could not upon that account be said to walk according to the course of this world neither can new born Infants as such be said to have their conversation in times past in the lust of the flesh of the mind and therefore they were not children of wrath upon that account but the Apostle there speaketh of that course of life or conversation in which they lived in time past as they were grown persons in the lusts of the flesh and the mind fulfilling the desires thereof and being by nature the children of wrath even as others Answ What man are you so confident of this first fruits of your brain as to think that you have answered all things of weight in what I have formerly written to your positions Truly Sir if I have any judgement at all there is not one parcel of all that I have delivered that you have given the least colour of satisfaction to But let us examine the reasons you give in why those words were the children of wrath even as others cannot prove reprobation to the second death or expose infants to a desert of the lake of fire Your first reason is because those words ver 1. you hath he quickned who were dead in trespasses and sins cannot
relate to their being in the corrupt lump for that is but one in the singular number but that spoken of here is in the plural more than one viz. trespasses and sins A good Critick I assure you but to this I answer First that though the Scripture when it speaks of original sin may speak of it in the singular number yet oftentimes it is described by words of the plural number So Psal 51.5 the original carries it Behold I was shapen in iniquities and in sins did my mother conceive me and Joh. 9.34 thou wast altogether born in sins and Col. 2.13 you being dead in your sins And so here Secondly you must know that every particular person is the subject of that sin and in every member and part of that particular person is that sin inherent there is an infective that hath spread over both body and soul and even all the faculties of them both having contracted that defilement by an hereditary propagation and why may not the Holy Ghost for the exaggerating of the greatness of our natural corruption make use of words in the plural number in setting forth of this sin as usually it doth without the censure of a Thomas Tazwel Thirdly I do willingly acknowledge that ver 1. Actual sins committed by men when full grown are here spoken of and meant but not exclusively to original sin that is understood as well as actual and both of these will necessarily require a word of the plural number Actual sins as the streams running in all their veins and their whole conversation in the time of their pilgrimage here but original sin as the fomes and fountain whence those actuall sins had their first conception birth and nursery being deep rooted and fast rivited in the head and heart Fourthly you might easily perceive what I chiefly insisted on in the quoting of that Scripture having set it down in words at length and not in figures by nature children of wrath So that this your first reason will stand you in little stead as to acquit you from this third absurdity Neither will your second perform any greater exploits than his fellow that went before him for where you beat the ayr with your walking and conversation ver 2 3. I must tell you I insist not on it neither am I such an innocent as to make that applicable to infants No Sir it is the close of the 3. ver which I mainly intend and which the Holy Ghost applies singly to the hereditary and original depravation of our sinful nature lineally descending from our primogenitor Adam Gen. 5.3 who howsoever he was created in the image of God yet he begat children in his own likeness after his own image i. e. deprived of the image of God and sinful like himself and by nature children of wrath To which words you would fain say somewhat and so you do but to little purpose and that which you do say is this But now the question is how they were by nature children of wrath say some because nature led them to the doing of these things and to the living in such a filthy conversation But I have better thoughts of nature and yet I desire to think no better of it than the Scripture speaketh of it and my judgement of it is this that nature is so far from leading men into sin that the teaching of it are against sins which I prove by these reasons being grounded upon Scripture Answ Here Sir you propose a question and make your own skul the anvil whereon to forge and fashion an answer which I utterly disclaim as none of ours because of its shortness and insufficiency And whereas you say you have better thoughts of Nature Sir you need not tell me so I know you have seeing by you and those of your party the bond-woman is advanced equal to the free-woman the servant set up in honour to the disgrace and contumely of the mistress Nature I mean being placed by you in the chair of state instead of Grace Joh. 7.51 But doth our law judge any man before it hear him and know what he doth I will therefore bring your reasons to the touchstone whereby you endeavour to confirm this assertion viz. that nature is so far from leading men into sin that the teachings of it are against sin and your first reason is this Because the Gentiles do by nature the things contained in the law of God Rom. 2.14 Answ But I hope you will then limit this law of God to the law of the second table and therein likewise to the external acts of civil righteousness and that not as acted from any internal principle of a desire of glorifying of God therein and then what is all this doing worth Besides I believe you have not the front to affirme that the Gentiles did by nature worship one God in Trinity and Trinity in Unity or that they did abstain from falling down before or worshipping the creature more then the Creator Rom. 1.25 or that they observed a seventh day Sabbath Nature I am sure never directed them to such principles Search all the records of the chiefest of the heathens even those that have aspired to the highest pitch of all humane and natural knowledge yet in those their loftiest speculations concerning the nature of divine things they were miserably blind Aristotle a man of the deepest reach that Antiquity ever bred among so many books that he wrote and are in part yet extant hath not left us any one discourse by which it might appear that he bestowed any paines in searching after the knowledge of God except here and there in some poor pitiful disputes and if it may be said thus of the most eminent of the heathens what then may be concluded of the whole croud and rout of them but as what the Apostle ver 12. having a consideration of them as in their pure naturals before their conversion by the Gospel that they were at that time without Christ Eph. 2.12 being aliens from the Common-wealth of Israel and strangers from the covenant of promise having no hope and without God in the world that they sate in darkness and in the shadow of death Mat. 4.15 and indeed how could it be otherwise Acts 14.16 Ps 147.19.20 when God favoured them not nor had any purpose to bestow grace upon them for in times past he suffered all the Gentiles to walk in their own waies the word and ordinances of his worship they had not for he sheweth his word unto Iacob his statutes and his judgements unto Israel he hath not dealt so with every nation Ro. 10.14 neither have they known his judgements A preacher they have not and how should they believe in him of whom they have not heard 1 Cor. 2. and how shall they hear without a preacher Natural ability to know the mystery of the kingdome of God Mat. 13.11 they have not for the natural man
untill the harvest Mat. 13.29 30. Answ Ans Truly Sir you have made a fair progress and are honourably preferred from being a common Trooper in the Kings party thus to become a Candidate to the Council of State yea not only to know their actings by the effects but to be made acquainted with their reasons of so doing the very mysterieâ— of State For here you determine of their resolves in not punishing which you phrasifie persecuting in matters of Religion and next you affix their reasons thereof Their resolves as you tacitely imply are not to interpose in matters of religion by way of punishment But Sir you are too precipitate in your conjectures or conclusions and this is grounded on a false Hypothesis namely that indulgence of Toleration Wherein if it might be lawfull for me to cast in my mite and make a gloss on such Edicts I should rather say that it is 1. Either that those that are approved may be known Or Act. 16.3 2. To bear with the infirmity of the weak as Paul caused Timothy to be circumcised and not to support the refractory Or 3. For the avoiding of offence as the Apostles in the Council at Hierusalem inhibited Act. 15.23 1 Cor. 6.12 strangled meats and bloud for though all things may be lawful yet all things are not expedient Or Mat. 19.8 4. For the hardness of peoples hearts as Moses permitted a bill of divorce Or as our Statute Law tolerated usury not approving of the fact but dispensing with the punishment but ab initio non-fuit sic rather I say should I make these favourable conclusions then hence to infer Toleration of Religion is indulged to some Therefore the Magistrate may not punish offenders in the case of Religion And the more easily am I enclined to be of this judgment because of these convincing Arguments 1. From the express law of God concerning blasphemers Num. 24.14 Num. 14.14 Deut. 13 5. v. 11.17 Deut. 18.20 1 King 15.12 2 King 11.16 and confirmed by a rule for the punishment of Apostates and inticers to Apostacy Deut. 13.5 6. the reasons whereof are given v. 11 17. Concerning false Prophets Deut. 18.20 2. From the examples of Kings and Prophets in the old Testament Asa took away the Sodomits 1 King 15.12 Jehojada Athalia 2 King 23.5 Elijah the Prophets of Baal 1 Kings 18.40 3. From the examples of the Apostles in the new Testament who inflicted punishment on severall persons both for life and limb Acts 5.5 Act. 13.11 Acts 5.5 At the word of Peter Ananias and Saphira were stricken dead Acts 13.11 Elymas the Sorcerer was smitten with blindness at the word of Paul which more remarkable acts of justice though they were done by speciall instinct being allien from their calling to inflict corporall punishment yet then how much more sutable were it for a Christian Magistrate to put in practice that authority God hath committed into his hands Neither doth it any whit elude the strength of this Argument to object that the Apostles used the Word and not the Sword Because it is thus far satisfactory that they inflicted corporall punishment on refractory transgressors 4. From the Office of the Magistrate qui custos est utriusque tabulae the safeguarder of both the Tables Rom. 13. yet in distinction from the Church Ministers and therefore Rom. 13. he is said to be ordained of God for their good not only corporall but spiritual and hence it is that he ought to vindicate the injuries done by those that profanely hinder the spiritual good and thereby disturbe the peace and unity of the Church of God 5. Thefts Murders Adulteries and other like crimes are daily rewarded with poenall and Capitall punishments and therefore much more ought Blasphemies Apostacies Perjuries c. be punished with some such like condign punishment and the rather for that the one are committed immediatly against the good of our neighbour only but the other immediately against the honour and glory of God by the one a loss is contracted to our bodies or fortunes but by the other a danger to our souls 6. From the very light and dictates of nature The Gentile Governors interessed themselves in matters of Religion and would never suffer their Gods to be blasphemed Exod. 8.26 Ex. 8.29 Shall we sacrifice the aâ—â—omination of the Aegyptians and will they not stone us Socrates was put to death for blaspheming the multiplicity of their gods yea the records of our own Scripture testifie so much Ezra 7.26 7. Yea the contrary hereof is obvious to every discerning eye by the late procedure of the highly honourable Court of Parliament against that grave Impostor and Blasphemer your brother Naylor wherein notwithstanding all your interests and overbold confidence you are forced to sit besides the Cushion 8. At least I would have said that there were some intrinsecall mysteries of State involved in that Edict of Toleration which it is not fit for you and me to pry into and adventure to give a reason thereof And thus having left your concealed assertion bleeding I proceed to your reasons which are as barren and empty of truth and honesty as they are full fraught with malice and ignorance The first tends to this purpose That the grave Senators of this Nation in whom resided the Legislative power did heretofore beat down truth instead of heresie being instigated thereunto by our fathers the Bishops which crime being espied by those now in authority they have therefore given a Toleration for any Religion Answ Well and wisely said In answer to which let me premise this protestation from the sincerity of my heart that notwithstanding my plain dealing with you in this business of the Contest yet I bear not the least grudge to your person but should be glad upon any just occasion offered do you the best office of love that lies within my compass But yet for all this I cannot without abundance of indignation see such a shrub such a worm such a nothing as you are to rake up the dead ashes of those honourable Patriots and venerable Prelates of this then flourishing Nation and so to bespatter them with your rancorous calumnies What man were our Nobility and Magistracy so besotted that they should be brought into a fooles paradise by the delusions of others Did they only see with the Bishops eyes and were they not quicksighted enough of themselves to discern between good and evill light and darkness truth and heresie Fie man fie I am ashamed of your insolence this sure is no better than Crimen laesae majestatis And for the Prelats who by a simple sarcasm you call your Fathers the Bishops cannot you see and read as in a lively character more piety zeal and sincerity in the words and works and lives of those reverend pillars of the Church than to say that they were acted by a spirit of delusion What think you of Cranmer Ridley Latimer Hooper Farrar c.