A RE-ASSERTION OF GRACE OR VINDICIAE EVANGELII A Vindication of the Gospell-truths from the unjust censure and undue aspersions of Antinomians In a modest Reply to Mr. Anth Burgesses Vindiciae Legis Mr. Rutherfords Triall and Tryumph of Faith from which also Mr. Geerie and M. Bedford may receive a satisfactory answer By ROBERT TOVVNE AMBR Quia Conscientiae suae luce clarescunt alienis rumoribus sordidentur JOHN 16.2 They will put you out of their Synagogues yea the time cometh that whosoever killeth you will thinke that he doth God service JOHN 4.4 Ye are of God little children and have overcome them because greater is he that is in you than he that is in the world LONDON Printed for the Author and are to be sold at the Angell in Cornhill 1654. The PREFACE THe written Papers of this Booke originally under the Authors owne hand did accidentally fall under my view by meanes of a faithfull friend and brother who first gave me intelligence that there was such a work in hand but not as yet perfected afterward obtaining a sight of it in its primary engrossings he borrowed the same for a time in which he might peruse and reade them over and so in the interim before they were returned to the owner they came to me the which when I had considered I found therein a composure of very excellent matter the Doctrine of the Law of God truly published in its lightening lustre and native purity drawne forth from under the vailing glosses with which it lay covered the meere Inventions of Sathan transformed into an Angell of light and restored to its former integritie and proper use Psal 12. as Silver tryed in a furnace of earth purified seaven times So that Sinah's Thunderclapps or the bolts of Horeb doe here appeare Shot out the cloudes and Pharisaicall expositions darkening the counsell of God by words without knowledge being dissolved and broken thorow Job 38. And moreover that the fainting sinner might not utterly be excluded I found comprized therein the bringing to light of life and immortality through the Gospell the opening of the kingdome of heaven the doores being largely expanded in Christs owne way 2 Tim. 1. and method of preaching which reason and the seede of the Serpent sowen therein the enemie to the simple truth of God hath endeavoured by all subtile workings and secret insinuations either wholly to shut or else to open and but to the halfe by the key of such qualifications that there is no possibility for any heart sensibly discovered by the doore so opened to enter in Onely the hypocrite who lives in a fooles paradise fraighted with a vaine imagination of his owne conditionall goodnesse doth conceitedly seeme to himselfe to enter into the kingdome of heaven Josh 6. by that way which Sathan hath prepared and cast up but the issues thereof are the issues of death leading to Jericho the accursed City so that this he shall have in the end He shall lye down in sorrow Isa 50. John 9. and because he thinks that he seeth therefore his sin remaineth For the end cannot be enjoyed but only in God own way appointed by himselfe which way thou shalt finde most clearely held out John 14. and convincingly proved in these ensuing treatises to be Christ himself by whom the believing heart hath accesse to God and comes with boldnesse to the throne of grace no man comming to the Father but by him John 10. And also that he is the doore ready to entertaine and receive into peaceable habitations and sure dwellings all such as are wounded with the invenomed arrowes of their hidden abhominations and stand trembling under the hand of God fearefull of his fiery wrath and justly deserved indignation which none may abide nor otherwise can avoid John 3. And that he is the truth of the brazen Serpent which is lifted up upon the pole in the wildernesse not for the whole but for the mortally wounded to look unto And the water of life to coole and refresh the withered heart Psal 23. parched with the heat of sin at the which as still waters the weake sheepe may drinke which otherwise were not able to stand in or withstand the boysterous streames and hold its footing in the clashing waves so that out of his belly flows the Rivers of Living Water John 10. And the good Shepheard who fully manageth that relation for the good of his tender ones he feeds his Flock Isa 40. like a Shepheard he gathers the Lambes with his arme John 15. and carries them in his Bosome and gently leads those that are with young The Vine in which the Branches live and in whom his people enjoy their life by faith Gal. 2. being dead in themselves through the Law John 1. Colos 1. Isaiah 6.1 Rev. 1. Eph. 5. Eph. 1. Acts 15. Rom. 8. so that what they have or enjoy doth proceed and issue from that Root so full of moysture of which fulnesse they receive and grace for grace They live but it is in him who is their life They are righteous and that compleatly but it s through his Robes They are cleansed and washed but it is by his Bloud They are accepted but it is in the Beloved They are adopted but it is in the first begotten among many Brethren Their Hearts are purified but it is by the faith of the Son of God They are free from Condemnation but it is because they are in Christ Jesus for to such there is no condemnation Nay reckon up all their participations and we shall finde that they are in and proceed from him who is the head Coloss 1. that in all things he might have the preheminence So that What have they but they have received it And a believing man may say most truely In Christ I have and am all things but out of him I am meerly nothing nay less than nothing and vanity And why should this Doctrine be so impugned but that the strong man armed and keeping his house will not be quiet for feare he should be dispossessed but by all means possible both as Fox and Lyon bestirres himself that he may keep and retain his ancient hold when as it ought rather to be highly extolled and magnified in Heart Press and Pulpit Mic. 4. seeing it lifts up and establisheth the mountaine of the house of the Lord in the top of the mountaines and exalts it above the hills and doth but fulfill that saying of Isaiah where the Prophet speakes in the person of God himselfe Isa 52. Behold my Servant meaning Christ shall deale prudently he shall be exalted extolled and shall be very high though many should be astonished at him because his visage not appearing comely to the eye of fl sh and blood was so marred more than any man and his forme more than the Sons of men But what God in Himselfe or his Word hath most highly exalted that Sathan alwayes an enemy to the truth of God and the seed of the
by him then you canonize him for Orthodox M. B. But they never used such expressions in the Antinomian sense as if hereby we were made not only perfectly righteous but also holy and without sin Answ When the Authors have the same expressions and use the same words yet if you may be the Glossary your sinister mind can make their sense to vary and differ 2. They who say we are persectly righteous do affirme us to be holy also and without sin in the same sense and manner but not inherently for if the law require holiness and righteousness how can we be justified in Christ from what the Law hath against us and yet not be as well holy as righteous in him and so without sin what can be spoken by the Spirit of God more plainly then this Christ hath loved us and washed us from our sins in his blood Rev. 15. See also Col. 1.22 And read Luther on Psal 130. vers 3. who there saith They that put not their trust herein alone that by the death of Christ their sins are taken away and Gods eyes closed that he cannot see their sins must needs perish for this onely do the Scriptures set forth that our life resteth wholly and alonely in the remission of sins and in that the Lord will not see our sins but in mercy cover them c. In the reading of which words the said Author of the Honey-comb was much convinced and sore terrified and troubled as he confessed But your carnal reason can put a lower and strange sense upon all such places and so present them in your own shape that nothing may offend any beyond a carnal sense no truth can be admitted what God speaketh plainly will be received no further then wit conceiveth and letteth us see how it may be true and then we will say we belive it but that is not to give credit unto God in what in his word he propoundeth but to assent unto reason as it comprehendeth LECT XV. Exod. 20.1 And God spake c. M. B. HAppily the Law will be more extolled in its digninity then ever by those opinions which would overthrow it Answ It is impossible for any to extoll the Law above the dignity due and proper to it but what you attempt for that purpose doth neither gaine glory to the Law nor commendation to your self 2. You tell us of opinions overthrowing it yet can let your reader see none more subverting and injurious then your own Indeed you bear the world in hand that the adversaries which you have made or feigned to your self do speak against the use of the Law and preaching of it cry down the Law utterly abolish it c. all which with more such-like interwoven stuff is fasly suggested by you to render them erroneous and odious but you can make no such things appear M. B. page 139. For we may either take the word Law for the whole dispensation of the commandments moral judicial and ceremonial or else more strictly for that part we call the moral law yet with the preface and promises added to it And in both these respects the law was given as a covenant of grace which is to be proved in due time or else most strictly for that which is meer mandative and preceptive without any promise at all Answ It is granted the word Law is capable of the two former significations but that in both those respects it was given as a covenant of grace especially in the later more strict sense for the moral law Is a new-coyned and bold assertion lately come out of the mint having as yet no image or superscription upon it save onely ipse dixit to make it currant If your spirits be grown so wanton and confident by reason of some supposed parts or abilities more eminent in your self that you will not keep tract of the Orthodox but slight and reject all humane authority as falling too short of that height you aime at in your aspiring thoughts yet reason requireth it of you to shew your reader some clear text of Scripture upon which you ground your distinction and positions If the moral law strictly and properly so called was given as a covenant of grace Why is it called a law of works requiring mans righteousness And then Paul argued nothing solidly when he said If it be of works it is no more of grace and if of grace it is no more of works else grace is no more grace To admit the one is to exclude and deny the other so inconsistent they be in this point Rom. 11.6 But you take time to prove it and you have your asking and we wait your leisure In the interim you present us with as uncouth and unwarrantable an assertion viz. that the word Law is taken for that which is meer mandative without any promise at all c. It will prove as difficult as bold an enterprize to undertake the proof and defence of this The Scriptures define the law in these words Do and live and so implyeth the contrary viz. He that doth not shall dye so that the mandative is not without the promise nor threatning When Paul saith They that are of the works of the law are cursed Gal. 3.10 doth he not argue convincingly that the works of the law which we do in obedience to its command cannot be secured and set free from the curse And that the law is ever invested with divine authority to promise and threaten to curse and bless to kill and give life I should be afraid so to limit the Lords Soveraignty and to devest him of so much power in his just and holy law as to make him some petite and under-ruler or commander allowing him in his law onely a jurisdiction to make and impose a law without a full and due reigning power having no more light to clear it then as yet you hold forth unto us And now with this wittily-devised key you can pick out and give us the right sense of all those assertions which the learned have concerning the difference between the Law and the Gospel and putting your sense into their words can make them speak as you please But though you can shew us no text to ascertaine the verity of any thing yet you give us a reason as weak and unsound as is your affirmation viz. M. B. For if you take as for the most part they do all the precepts and threatnings scattered up and down in the Scripture to be properly the law and then all the gracious promises where-ever they are to be the Gospel then it is no marvel if the law have many hard expressions cast upon it Answ This reason seemeth to occasion your forged distinction And 1. You would father this upon the learned but tell us of no Author book nor testimony It would have been to your credit and the justification of your weak and questioned cause to have produced one sentence or sillable sounding that way 2.
preach it at Rome also If the Law would have served and Paul had known also this your liberty and chose to use either law or Gospel he needed not to shun nor shrinke in the preaching of it for every mans heart is principled to approve and receive that doctrine having the seeds and effect of the law naturally in his bosome but the Gospel is supernatural and the soul is indisposed to receive it of it self yea and strongly by assed and inclined against that way of peace and life revealed by it for it maketh void rejecteth and casteth downe all the excellencies of man his free-will strength righteousness wisdome goodness as being vanity folly weakness sin and vile with God so to prepare and make way in the soul to bring in and commend Gods grace to be all-sufficient and that Christ alone may be exalted and rejoyced in Hence the mystery of the Gospel was to the Gentiles foolishness and to the Iew a stumbling-block 1 Cor. 1.23 Also it is more then evident that this word of the Gospel was the instrument of converting all those Churches to whom Paul writ as his Epistles do testifie as besides these mentioned places to the Romans Corinthians and Ephesians you may also see in Gal. 1.6.8.9 Col. 1.5 Phil. 1.5 who were called into the fellowship of the Gospel But what need the lighting of a Candle at noon-day unless it be still dark Saturday with us The second remarkable place is 1 Pet. 1.23 25. Being born again not of corruptible seed but incorruptible by the word of God which liveth and abideth for ever and vers 25. he expounds himself saying And this is the word which by the Gospel is preached unto you If need were a cloud of expositors might be here produced to evince and confirm it that this instrumental word of regeneration is not the Law but the Gospel It is true some tell us of a twofold regeneration or rather a twofold sense of the word by the one the soul cometh to a second new being and by the other it hath the image of God reinstamped on it And of a regeneration of Faith and another of holiness of nature and life but I would trouble none with these distinctions yet this I add that Melancthon upon Iohn observeth that Christ calleth our justification regeneration and indeed it is a new creation and the putting of the soul into a new and happy condition for thereby it hath reconciliation and peace with God Rom. 5. 2. And there is a twofold healing 1. Of our spiritual estates and thus we are said to be healed by the stripes of Christ Isa 53.5 who is the repairer of this breach and as for that wound of conscience in that day when sin doth bite and sting and the law accuse and terrifie none other plaister can cure it but the blood of Christ who by his eternal spirit offered himself to purge and purifie the conscience Heb. 9.14 and this is done by the application of faith for health or salvation is onely in Christ and in nothing else you can name And as Moses lifted up the Serpent so must the Son of man be lifted up that whosoever believeth in him might not perish but have everlasting life John 3.14 15. 2. There is an inchoate and partial healing of our natures hearts and lives which is effected by the Spirit of Christ renewing and changing all and every member of his mystical body whereof he is the head but as the Moral Law is not the instrument to reveal and hold forth Christ crucified so Faith by which the soul comes to be sensibly healed and having communion with Christ to receive vertue from him this Faith is onely instrumentally by the Gospel which is preached to all for the obedience of Faith Rom. 16.25 26. And if our inheritance come by the law in part or in whole then Faith is made void and the promise made of no effect Rom. 4.14 3. And lastly Conversion may be taken 1. for the change of the condition as when who was in bondage is enlarged set free delivered out of the hands of his enemies and of far off is made near as Iohn 8.36 Ephes 2.13 Col. 1.21 or 2. for the turning of the heart to God Act. 26.18 To turn them from Satan to God If thou wilt return return unto me 3. For the change and alteration in the soul when God sanctifieth a man throughout c. 4. A man may change his religion as did the Jewish-Proselytes and his outward way and manner of life being refined and reformed according to the letter of the law as the Pharisee Luke 18. Now to apply all Hence I infer and say that it is never read in the Scripture that the soul was made spiritually free and estated in grace and favour by the preaching of the Moral Law but the office of it is to arrest convince shut up the soul under sin the curse and condemnation Gal. 3.22 the law and the Gospel are the two keys that Christ gave that by the one sinners might be shut and bound and by the other set free and brought forth Mat. 18.18 2. Neither did the Law instrumentally convert and turn the heart to God for Christ is the way to the Father his blood and cross slayeth the enmity that is between divine justice and the sinner and removeth all lets whatever did hinder or separate and so openeth a free way for access Heb. 10.19 20. and his righteousness is the melius terminus bond or mean of union between God and the soul bringing them into a sure and everlasting covenant of peace he is first King of righteousness and after that King of Salem that is of peace Heb. 7.2 Now Christ his death and resurrection with the fruits and benefits thereof are the subject and peculiar treasures of the Gospel whereof Paul was made a Minister that he might preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ Eph. 3.7 9. further God cannot be com'd unto known nor enjoyed nisi in Christo suo but in Christ And he gaineth and draweth the soul with cords of love he appears gratious and merciful to poor sinners beaten downe humbled and brought to deaths door in the conscience of sin else the soul being afraid of him would with Adam flee away and hide it self from him hence passim men are exhorted to turne to the Lord because he is gratious and merciful Joel 2.13 Psal 86.5 Hos 6.12 We are to hold forth God in Christ reconciling the world unto himself and not imputing their sins unto them and as Ambassadours for Christ we pray men in Christs stead to be reconciled unto to God 2 Cor. 5.18 20. Now this cannot be by the ministery of the Law by which cometh the knowledge of sin for it worketh wrath Rom. 4.15 threatneth with the curse and death Gal. 3.10 And thus the Law doth by the will and appointment of God to force man out of himself to destroy all self-confidence
to life but by death And when a man hath seen and felt nothing but sin and death in himself the law cannot tell him nor let him know of a righteousness and life ordained for him in another out of himself and therefore here it ceaseth to help He that expecteth conversion by the Law may as well seek light in darkness life in death conversion where confusion terrour and desperation is Who can credit your bare word in this that the law which is found both by Scripture and experience to be the word that revealeth and worketh wrath and death should yet be the ministry also of conversion to the soul I cannot do it M. B. Onely two things must be premised Answ Nay not onely two but a third also viz. that what you say is infallibly true without exception your new divinity must pass for current M. B. First that the law could never work to regeneration were it not for the Gospels promise Answ You mean not that the Gospel-promise should be any ingredient to the ministry of the law and so by the vertue and efficacy of this as some special pearl used amongst other things in themselves of little or no force this cure or work should be effected but you say that vertue should go forth equally and indifferently by law or Gospel and this because God hath promised to give a new heart through Christ as the Medium by and in whom he creates and changes it anew for so you would contradict your self but thus you intend that Gods promise to give this heart is grounded on Christ as the reason of making it but the performance may be by the law But is it your part to make this to appear for truth By regeneration we are become children to God but if this be by the law then are we but like Ishmael children of the bond-woman Well your words want weight and credit too I wonder you should think such private fancies would ever be received having no warrant but your pen. What have you no Text nor Author to produce not one sentence or word from either for confirmation M. B. So that while a Minister preaching of any commandment doth thereby mold and new frame the heart Answ You want a probatum est for it M. B. All this cometh by Christ who therefore dyed and ascended into heaven c. Answ Every word of God is pure add thou not to his word lest he prove thee and thou be found a lyer Prov. 30.5 6. Where is it said that Christ dyed and ascended to give such power and vertue unto the law M. B. So that there never was in the Church meer pure Law nor meer pure Gospel Answ It is a heavy accusation and charge never what not in the Prophets Apostles nor yet Christs time but alway a Miscellaneous or mixt doctrine this seemeth too bold and rash If you shuffle all together it was not alway so the promise in Paradise That the seed of the woman shall bruise the head of the Serpent and that to Abraham Gen. 12. That in Christ all the families of the earth shall be blessed was surely pure Gospel without any Law M. B. But they have been subservient to each other in the great work of conversion Answ Subserviency was alway granted and taught but that may be without mixture Christ or the Gospel and the Law cannot be and dwell together and as the dead fly marreth the Ointment in the box so the least thing of the law mingled with the Gospel corrupteth it and wholly destroyeth it saith Luther they are so repugnant and opposite you know the nature and operations of contraries and the doctrine of grace and of works are contrary Rom. 11. If of grace it is no more of works You say you approve of Luther Qui scit inter legem Evang discernere c. sciat se esse theologum but you will not meddle with that now Answ No nor no time else it is needless if they were alway intermingled how can they be otherwise now and if either severally or both joyntly may effect true conversion what need we make a difference or why it is of so great consequence to give an exact difference between them I understand not But in the closure you seem as if you would have eat your own words saying God may make the opening of the moral law instrumentally to concur thereunto you are providing hereby some moor rome aforehand for fear of that strait your former assertion brought you into M. B. The second thing which I premise is this That howsoever the law preached may be blest to conversion yet the matter of it cannot be blest to Justification Adoption or consolation Answ More strange still what conversion is it which is not included in Justification by it the soul is re-united and reconciled to God Totus processus a peccate c. The learned have taught and told us that the whole passage and way from sin wrath and death unto righteousness favour and life is by mean of free justification What is blest to justifie is blest to convert us to God but the Gospel and not the Law you grant is blest to Justification Adoption Consolation When Paul did beseech the Corinthians to be reconciled to God 2 Cor. 5.19 20 or to receive the Atonement was not that to turn to God no God had the heart to eschew evil and do good is not to turne unto God My son give me thy heart and then let thy eyes observe my wayes Christ is the way to God Again is it possible to partake of Adoption whereby we become children by one doctrine and to receive the qualification or divine image or likeness reinstambed on us by another doctrine 3. Is not our Reconciliation or coversion the ground of our hope and consolation The promise of the Gospel giveth no ground of hope or consolation to the unconverted 1 Pet. 1.3 We are begotten again to a lively hope Who can have hope in God or consolation from him but he that is regenerated or converted or is there any ground or reason of either but onely in this that we are called and converted to the faith of the Gospel Blessed be God who hath given us everlasting consolation and good hope through grace 2 Thes 2.16 You put in after Not in any thing he doth as if you made no difference between conversion and mans doing or work which is gross And yet elsewhere you erect much hope and consolation of future good and glory upon mans doing and duty which here you deny see pag. 40. where you say there is a promise made to our works c. M. B. Therefore let us not confound Law and Gospel nor yet make them so contrary in their natures and effects that where one is the other cannot be An. If this your doctrine doth not confound them while you say they were never pure nor distinct in the Church and not telling what is Law
distinguished as Mark 1.15 Repent and believe the Gospel 2. I do not make repentance and to mortifie sin all one as I there speak of repentance 3. Neither say I that to repent and to mortifie sinne is by faith to flye to grace embrace Christ c. The Law is against you as a false witness in all these And you cannot but perceive that I speak of that legal repentance and mortification which you with others so much stand for as requisite before faith Which is when a man is so laid open to himself so effectually convinced and wrought upon by the Law that he seeth acknowledgeth and renounceth all things in him and done by him as sinne and abomination before the Lord whatever esteem he hath had of them formerly or whatever shew they may make Yea and as sinne the sting of death appears and reviveth in all which is the very mortification the wounding and killing of the soul Rom. 7.10 so all these seeming excellencies and good things become mortified within him and his heart that lived and rejoyced in them now dyeth unto them finding nothing but vanity sin and death in all things out of Christ Thus he repenteth and changeth his mind with shame and sorrow that ever he so exalted and established his own righteousness of works as did Paul and those zealous Jews being converted to the faith And because we are necessitated to carry this body of death to the grave and therefore sin and death will ever and unavoidably be in us and all our works and we can by faith in Christ alone finde true righteousness life peace confidence joy and salvation hence Christ is our onely treasure who hath our hearts delight and all else are renounced and accounted as dung and dross Phil. 3.9 You neither may nor can rightly understand my words as spoken of that Evangelical repentance or mortifying of sin in life and conversation by the Spirit of which we read Rom. 8.13 Colos 3.5 Also you know that both in the Scriptures and Authors repentance is somtimes taken largely as comprehending faith also with the effects and fruits of it and so it is divided into mortification and vivification But fince all fulness is in Christ who is made unto us wisdom righteousness sanctification and redemption that all our rejoycing should be in him he that liveth by faith in him is the onely mortified man Psal 73.25 Whom have I in heaven but thee and there is none upon earth desired besides him Mr. Rutherf pag. 273. There be two things in the Law 1. The authority and power to command 2. To punish pag. 275. It s most false that Mr. T. saith To justifie and condemn are as proper and essential to the Law as to command 3. It s false that we are freed from active obedience to the moral Law because Christ came under the active obedience for law requires obedience out of love Reply These two authorities of the Law are repeated and inculcated by you and Mr. Burg. usque ad nanseam Dictator-like you still say It 's false it 's most false c. but where is there any truth or weight in what you say against me I can contemn your vain and reproachfull words and do account your self-coined distinctions as windy without warrant and weight You have a satisfactory answer in my former Reply I may challenge you to produce one syllable for a Law commanding without its condemning power Remember Matth. 5.17 18. 2. That the Law requires obedience out of love its true but we worke from self-love and for self-ends viz. that we may live thereby and not dye The first Adam by his obedience might have preserved himself in that life and state of holiness and happiness he had by creation but now in Christ our life and and felicity is attained and kept by faith we believe that we may live And we love and obey freely for no such ends as not standing and falling by our obedience or disobedience moral Also if our love be changed from legal into evangelical void of selfness Yet that altereth not the cords of the law nor the chaines we were in but Christ hath happily freed us from them The change is in the true Christian and in his estate but you can shew no change in the Law Neither do we destroy the Law as you slander us again but do establish it by faith Rom. 3.31 Where I see that Paul preached the same way that we do in that he was so put to clear and vindicate his Ministery as you do us This also will serve for that exception in pag. 275. where you set the same Coleworts before your Reader It is your constant doctrine that works have reward here and eternall life hereafter and that they be conditions and the way to life and glory how this will consist with faith and Christ let all judge Mr. Rutherf pag. 332. Town in Assertion pag. 56 58. A believer is as well saved already as justified by Christ and in him Divines say Our life and salvation is inchoate but they speak of life as it is in us subjectâ—è Quantum ad nos spectat or in respect of our sense and apprehension here in grace our faith knowledge sanctification is imperfect but in regard of imputation and douation our righteousness is perfect and he that believeth hath life not he shall have it or hath it in hope onely Answ If we have glory really actually perfectly but want it onely in sense we have the resurrection from the dead also actually we want nothing of the reality of heavrn but sense but we are not yet before the throne Therefore holy walking can be no way nor condition nor means of salvation c. therefore no wonder they reject all sanctification as not necessary and teach men to loose the reynes to all fleshly walking Reply Justification puts the soul into a present state of salvation The Scriptures are plain He hath saved us 2 Tim. 1.9 Tit. 3.5 Eph. 2.8 and These things have I written unto you that believe c. that ye may know that ye have eternal life 1 Joh. 5.13 This is the record that God hath given to us eternal life and this life is in his Son ver 11. and Ephes 2.5 God hath quickned us together with Christ and hath raised us up together and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus I muse you stumble in so clear light Hence saith Musculus Before God we are all that which he willed and also hath caused us to be Christ is not alone in his eyes but we also are conjoyned to him The Assertion doth present you with testimonyes sufficient you believe so farre as you see and feel If you deny our perfection in Christ our head In whom we are compleat Col. 2.10 deny also our union with him that we have received him have him are now the Sons of God 1 Joh. 3.2 Yea then deny that God hath given us as yet
Christ and life in and with him but all is still kept in suspence and reserved till future So where the Spirit of truth saith God hath given unto us Christ and eternal life in him your Ghost saith nay but he will his promise is de futuro give us them upon condition of our good works and by them as a way we must come to Christ and salvation God hath conveyed and given nothing by promise There is no Christ nor life in reality and substance communicated by the word and Sacrament these are empty shels The just liveth by faith what feedeth he on to nourish and encrease life what on the Wind well you teach that we must live in hope to have all in the end upon condition of our obedience and service And for this reason you call upon men to work and please God But the truth saith Christ hath received all for us and we enjoy all in him You say that because we hold works are no conditions of salvation therefore we loose mens reines to carnal walking It s a Popish cavil or slander And argueth a spirit in the Author too servile and mercenary which will do no good but for lucre and to gain by it and such a spirit must needs accompany your doctrine Mr. Rutherf pag. 463. Mr. T. saith In sanctification as well as in justification we are meer patients and can do nothing at all and pag. 464. The blessedness of man is onely passive not active in his holy walking Reply As this is objected in your other book so you have your answer to it But my words are in Assert pag. 68. What can you do to the sanctifying or changing of your self more then in your justification It s Gods act to sanctifie throughout you cannot make one hair white or black Who would think that Mr. Rutherf would quarrel with this You alter my words to make them capable of your gloss and sense But all men may see that I speak of the act of sanctification and not of the expression and fruits of it If you can sanctifie your self in whole or part glory in your freewil and power but that is the greatest arrogancy of Antichrist saith one So I leave you with your absurdity unto the worlds censure you shew neither text or reason against me 2. And that blessedness is passive not active in holy walking you must grant or when you say any thing against it deserving or requiring it you may then expect your answer Blessedness in holy walking is declarative shewing how God hath renewed and enlarged the heart but that phrase is yours not mine Mr. Rutherf Town the Antinomian said Pag. 501. David confessed his sins not according to truth and the confession of faith but from want and weakness of faith c. Reply My words are David prayed that his sins might be pardoned which you grant were pardoned Now then did he thus pray according to truth and the confession of faith or from want or weakness of faith and of the effectual apprehension of forgiveness Is not Mr. Rutherford now the Antinomian who against Law so palpably mistakes his Adversary There is great difference between confessing of sinne and praying for pardon If God my own conscience men yea Satan require that I confess my self a sinner I shall readily do it for this is to justifie God in his Law saying There is none righteous c. And this may well stand with my faith and effectual apprehension of pardon for I confess what I am in my self I believe what I am in Christ through that grace that justifieth the ungodly Thus while your mistakes onely make me erroneous whom otherwise you find not so who is now the Antinomian Is not the Author of the errour so all will returne to your own discredit and disadvantage And what a gross slander is that which followeth viz. Town and all Antinomians teach that it is unbeliefe a worke of the flesh of old Adam c. that justified persons confess or feel sin sorrow or complain of the body of sin as Paul Rom. 7 This is as if the continual dwelling of sinne in us did not trouble us or could not consist with faith in justification by Christ or that now the spiritual estate of the soul being clear and safe made up in Christ sin in no other regard were sorrow or trouble to us But you cannot in this neither make good your charge You care little how falsly you accuse us so that you make your Bill foul and black enough to make us still more odious and vile M. Rutherf pag. 505. M. T. contendeth for a compleat perfection not onely of persons justified but also of performances so that saith he pag. 75. I believe there is no sin malediction or death in the Church of God he will have a perfection not of parts but also of degrees this he proves from Luthers words perverted Reply What perfection I contend for you must yeeld me or else with your heart you believe not that there is a holy Church which is indeed as Luther saith nothing else but I believe that there is no sin no malediction no death in the Church of God but this is in Christ not in our selves by justification not by inherent sanctification for this is imperfect You say I pervert Luther take his words again So mightily saith he worketh faith that he that believeth that Christ hath taken away sin from him he like Christ is void of sin Again Christ will have us to believe that like as in his own person there is now no sin nor death even so there is none in ours there is no defect in the thing it self but in our incredulity Let us see what construction or sense you can make of these words But you pervert my words or meaning as if I meant it that sin dwelleth not still in us a fiction But Luther addeth as you read in the Assertion That to reason its a hard matter to believe these inestimable good things and unspeakable riches Moreover Satan with his fiery darts and his Ministers with their wicked and false doctrine go about to wrest it from us and utterly to deface this doctrine and specially for this Article we sustaine the cruel hatred and persecution of Satan and the world for Satan feeleth the power and fruit of this Article Consider what you Read M. Rutherf pag. 510. When D. Tailer objects as a limb of their fleshly divinity No action of a believer after justification is sin M. T. Answers Nothing but of the way no action is sin the disorder or ataxie of the action is sin But D. T. meaneth that there is no disorder in the action of a justified man by their way c. can this be any but the divinity of the flesh Reply If the Dr. say it you will swear it But my answer is direct to his words yet sith you now help me to know his meaning I say there is disorder in
in Christ when God did lay on him the iniquities of all the Elect and in raising him from death did acquit and justifie both him and all them in and through him of and from all those sins for ever and ever since doth behold and accept them in that perfection and clear estate wherein Christ was raised And Master Pemble had that discretion and charity that by distinguishing between justification in foro Coeli and in foro Conscientiae he did admit of Polanus in the former acception Now when sins were so transacted and Christ rose again wholly discharged of them for our justification Rom. 4.25 how could any of good works be then present or existent Mr. B. He Doctor Crisp concluded that therefore though a man rebel actually from time to time and do practise this rebellion yet the hatefulness thereof is laid upon Christ Is not this such a doctrine that must needs please an ungodly man Answ The Doctor speaketh of the Elect who before calling to the faith of Christ did not cease to practise rebellion and saith that God satisfied his justice even for those wickednesses he is in committing at that time in which Christ did suffer And this will be the only refuge plea and staffe of support and comfort when that soul is in trouble and distress which is the very end he propounded to himself in these so free and absolute expressions of the grace of God as neither you nor any other laying aside all prejudice can otherwise conceive for these be his words pag. 141. I say all the weight and all the burthen and all the 〈◊〉 sin it self is long agone laid upon Christ and that laying it upon him is a full discharge and a general release and acquittance to thee that there is not any one sin now to be charged upon thee Behold the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world Ioh. 1.29 The laying of thy iniquities upon Christ is an absolute and full discharge to thee that there neither is nor can be any iniquity that for the present or for hereafter can be laid to thy charge If the Lord give to any to believe this truth that it is his iniquity the Lord hath laid on Christ Est scopus hujus gravissimae consolationis munire pertene factos qui agnoscant immunditiam imbecillitatem suam ut certo statuant se Deo placere propter Christum c. God himself cannot charge any one sin upon that person pag. 137. You may remember your own rule that all things are to be taken in the Authors sence and as he intendeth it and that of Hilary Ex causis dicendi dictorum intelligentiae sumatur And so it is true that this doctrine must be pleasant and most acceptable to an ungodly heart which travelleth and is weary under the sence and burthen of his sins Comfort ye the hearts of my people c. Isai 40.1 M. B. 3. In denying of gaining any thing by them even any peace of heart or losing it by them Now this goeth contrary to Scripture Ans While you believe that you are justified and accepted in Christ you can want no peace of heart Christ is our Righteousness and our peace Ephes 2.14 Heb. 7.2 If you cease to believe so and fall from faith to purisie Conscience by works you gain nothing but by catching at the shadow lose all true and effectual consolation But you say it is contrary to Scripture and when you shew your Scripture look for a more full and satisfying answer M. B. Thus Doctor Crisp pag. 139. The business we are to do is this that though there be sins committed yet there is no peace broken Answ I finde no such words in that page but I credit you so far that those are his words you tell us of error but show none The peace saith the Doctor is not broken to wit between God and the believer because the breach of peace is satisfied in Christ What more Orthodox or plain He is our Peace-maker If any Conscience lose her peace and be troubled it is because he believeth not and giveth way to sence and the Law but then receive abide in and enjoy Christ as he ought In your Answer you bring in nothing directly against him only you pretend a confutation You bid us especially consider Heb. 12. two last verses Our God is a consuming fire Answ This helps you not because God is so terrible out of Christ in the Law revealing wrath therefore receiving a Kingdome that cannot be removed let us have grace whereby we way serve God acceptably c. Here is an Argument to perswade the wavering Jews to close with God in the Covenant of free-grace in Christ Jesus otherwise his presence and dealing would prove most terrible and not that men should serve God themselves and by that means to make placable and loving and so to avoid the danger which is to deny and overthrow faith in the reconciliation by Christ and the whole grace of the Gospel You infer If the Scripture threaten thus to men living in sin if they do not they may finde comfort Answ 1. You should have said To men that abide in the unbelief of the Gospel dallying with it or not having that grace unto which the Apostle there exhorteth which in effect is this that all those are so threatened who believe not Christ to be the Messiah and the Mediator who hath made and brought in a full and everlasting Atonement whereupon followeth the serving of God acceptably c. The despising or neglecting of this grace doth most displease God and is the main condemnation under the Gospel Ioh. 3.19 And so long as the heart doubteth whether God be pacified and become propitious in Christ it can never please God Heb. 11.6 For no prayer nor worship with this unbelief or doubting in the inward parts can be heard and accepted How can they call upon him in whom they have not believed Rom. 10.14 2. You say If they sin not they may finde comfort Answ In what or Displicet Deo â—ubitatio quaâ—â—e neque coli â—eque in vocari â—cum dubitatione pâ—â—est where 's he that sinneth not and can say my heart is clean So all our comfort lyeth in our discharge by Christ Blessed is the man whose iniquities are forgiven Psal 32.1 M. B. Secondly Our holy duties they have a promise of pardon and eternal life though not because of their worth yet to their presence and therefore may the godly rejoyce when they finde them Answ This is strange teaching among Protestants It is an Assertion gross enough to have fallen from the pen of a Jesuite who now deny any dignity in good works as well as you deserving eternal life only eo vi promissionis by vertue of Gods promise made to good works they expect it I will not write all my thoughts while I consider how such doctrine is countenanced and commended by the President and Fellows of
last day Come ye blessed of my Father receive the Kingdome prepared for you from the foundation of the world For I was hungry and ye gave me meat c. Matth. 25.34 35. but the promise of inheriting is to them in that they were elected to it from eternity and prepared for it by the righteousness of faith were found in Christ and heirs annexed with him and these works in ministering to the necessities of the Saints did flow from their hearts and fervent love unto Christ and declare the truth of their faith and of their Adoption and Election It is for the weak and simple sort that I have been thus large M. B. When we deal with adversaries especially Papists in disputation then we ought to speak exactly Answ You now deal with a friend however you slander and account of us but with whomever you deal or in what case soever you nor I cannot be too exact and careful in our words and expressions nor may we use more liberty at one time then other Yet it is true learned men are found in their disputes more distinct and clear for as the Fan cleanseth the barn-floor so opposition inforceth them unto it and so I think you clearer in these controversal Lectures then ordinary but if we be not distinct clear and soâ—iâ— in every Sermon that so our hearers may be rightly instructed throughly established and well able to answer the objections of the tempter and of his own thoughts which are not so easily satisfied as an adversary of flesh and blood without us a little failing herein may occasion much danger in the time of inward dispute and conflict of conscience One thought of the necessity of a work or of the presence of any thing but Christ may prove the sinking and the casting away of the soule for ever Let me add two more considerations and I have done First That many who have not the true faith and be not of the slock of Christ yet may and do flourish in good works are full of pity and compassion honest and sober in life true and just in their dealings careful in performing duties and zealous in their religious way now if you teach thus as you do in this book 1. That good works are necessary to salvation in regard of their presence 2. Good works are the way to heaven and salvation 3. Our holy duties have a promise of pardon and eternal life 4. There is some kinde of Analogical relation between good works and heaven comparatively with evil works 5. Our goodness is a motive moving God to favor and bless us as a King is moved to prefer one that daily saluteth him 6. To every good action thou doest there is a promise of eternal life 7. Good works be conditions without which a man cannot be saved 8. They are necessary by way of comfort to our selves and the like Will not such Doctrine hearten and encourage them in their way make them bless and speak peace falsly unto themselves and conclude that their case and estate is safe and good to say nothing of a hundred more fearful consequences and dangerous effects of it And Secondly consider how this kinde of teaching doth sute and agree well with the principles of nature and answereth the dictates and requirings of every natural conscience therefore ponder that of Luther Omnibus propria est qui salutis nâ—go io kumanam raâ—ione in consilium adhibent It is saith he the property of all those who consult with reason in the matter of salvation to be offended at the doctrine of the mercy and grace of God for although God himself did preach this doctrine concerning the free promise of his mercy unto our first Parents in Paradise and in ages after did illustrate and confirm it c. yet this cleaveth and sticketh firmly within us that we confess God indeed to be merciful yet reason thus judgeth that they alone do obtain mercy who give themselvs to righteousness or in whom something may be found worthy of some kinde of respect Humana sapiâ—ntia ossâ—nditur eo si gratâ—ae predicatione c. more then is in others and afterward The wisedom of man saith he is offended as if by the preaching of grace the justice of God is abolished and that they were affraid least carnal security and sinful licentiousness would be bred among men So ignorant are we by nature of the true nature and efficacy of the doctrine of heavenly grace and salvation M. B. Good works are necessary upon these grounds 1 They are the fruit end of Christs death Tit. 2.14 Tthere are two things in our sins 1. the guilt and that Christ doth redeem us from 2. the filth and that he doth purifie us from Answ It is the filthiness and loathsomness of sin that maketh us odious and guilty if God abhor us it is because of the vile and evil nature of sin which Christs blood doth cleanse and purifie us from that so a way may be made in divine justice for our reconciliation and acceptance Guilt is an effect of justice in the Law not holding the sinner innocent but binding it over to the curse and death till it be purged and washed Rev. 1.5 He hath loved us and washed us from our sins in his blood M. B. 2. There is some kinde of analogical relation between them and heaven comparatively with evil works so in those places where it is said If we confess our sins he is faithful and also just to forgive us our iniquities 1 Ioh. 1. So 2 Tim. 4.8 A crown of righteousness which the righteous Judge c. Answ You tell of an ordinability of works and say that evil works cannot be ordained to eternal life but good may a very dark expression who ever read of ordination of works to heaven or hell but of the worker and secondly there can be no ordinability in good works nor by them to life unless you can make it to appear that God hath any respect unto them either in ordaining or accepting us unto eternal life but in this case good works and grace are made directly opposite and contrary one to the other If by grace c. not by works Rom. 11.6 the soul is become ordinable by free grace but not disposed by works 2. In your first Scripture 1 Ioh. 1.9 There is mention made of no work but only of confession of sin And is that such a good work Judas confessed that he had sinned If there be any ordinability in it it is not because of any goodness in the act of confession simply but because God hath purposed and promised in that way or after that order to dispence and give his pardon and so this place maketh directly against you for it is by the knowledg and confession of sin and not by any good thing the soule findeth or acknowledgeth in it self that its ordinability is effected And whereas you observe that God is not only faithful but
are resolved to venture against the pikes of old tryed and pure truth innocency and a good conscience Well henceforth be better advised like one bemisted you have mistaken your way misrepresented your adversaries and run your credit cause and conscience into a great hazard and you may expect worse in all these without wise and timely retreat The counsel is good if it can be seasonably taken and it cometh from a friend and well-wisher M. B. page 63. This law of nature can never be abrogated And herein we may demand of the Antinomian Whether the law of nature do binde a believer or no whether he be bound to obey the dictates of his natural conscience Answ If a man were not first bound he could not be said properly to be loosed or set free It is granted yet with much limitation and in some things only that every one is bound to obey the dictates of his natural conscience and it is as true to be granted by you also that in case he hearken not at some times or in some things or in case of defect and failing or imperfection this natural law will give out sentence of condemnation for the same as Rom. 2.15 from which it is the peculiar and continual office of faith to set free and secure the conscience So that you do very improperly demand whether the law of nature do binde a believer quatenus so whereas a man believeth that he may be set at liberty in Christ In whom he in his spiritual estate towards God in the things of his peace and life is free as Christ is free with whom by a true and real union he is become one spirit 1 Cor. 6.17 And so is passed from judgement of condemnation and from death to life Fidei nil proponi debet praeter meramgratiam aâ—que haec est ejus objectum Calv. John 5.24 And here faith doth not stand bound to give ear to the voice of either implanted or moral law for the procuring or preservation of peace and comfort but turning from both and not regarding them doth direct and confine ear eye the thoughts and meditations of the soul to that alone simple object Christ and to what he speaketh in the word of grace and salvation whose blood sprinkled and shed for remission of sins cryeth for better things then the blood of Abel This is the proper office obedience and exercise of faith So in God will I praise his word Psal 56. here will I settle my thoughts and fortifie them against the dictates and accusations of a natural conscience sense of sin reason law Satan or whatever assaileth If faith give not an acquiescence and rest to the foul in that free and full atonement by Christ and the goodness and favour of God in him it is in danger to be lost for ever And as you have given me this fair occasion so for the more simple and weak Christians sake who is little versed herein and principled otherwise let me further add That although nature do acknowledge a God and that he is to be worshipped and served Nil magis adversatur fidei quam lex ratio Luth. yet this opinion which is also seconded and much strengthened by the moral law is not without danger and is repugnant to the doctrine and knowledge of faith for nothing is more cross to faith then the law and natural reason the maine battel and dispute in a believer is between the dictates of his natural conscience confirmed by the moral law and the principles of his faith and as the law of faith doth enter and prevaile so it captivateth razeth and expelleth the natural and legal knowledge and thoughts of God and imprinteth a divers from them only suiting to the Gospel or covenant of Grace for now since the death of the Testator the covenant is so ratified and confirmed with God that he remembereth the sins of his people no more but abides fully In illa gratuita reconciliatione per obsignationem spiritus acquiescit It a gloria datur Deo non considerat fides quicquâ—d in nobis vel aliis creaturis ei adversari videatur Olev and for ever pleased with them in his Son and through faith herein the conscience also is made to yeeld to it to receive and imbrace it and so is led and brought into this confidence of the quietness and peace of God towards us and hereby effecteth our assured rest in God reconciled for ever which is the true Christian Sabbath Thus every high thing exalting it self against the knowledge of God according to the Gospel is to be cast down and every thought to be brought into captivity to the obedience of Christ 2 Cor. 10.4 5. And by this is glory given unto God while one thing is felt or suggested within and another is believed Let this be well marked of great and continual use in every Christian that the law implanted by nature is ever contradicting and reclaiming against the testimony of God in the word of his grace whence ariseth the difficulty and impossibility of believing save by the power and operation of God Col. 2.12 therefore in the weighty things of faith to hearken to the natural conscience or moral law will quite overthrow whole Christianity and turn aside the soul to destruction The seeds of morality and remanents of the covenant of works may be found in nature but there is no sparke nor intimation of any pure Gospel In innocency Adam was not principled to finde and receive his righteousness peace and life in another out of himself M. B. Think not that because he Christ dyed to free you from the curse of the law that therefore you are freed from the obedience Answ And do not you think nor teach that Christ came to take away the curse and condemning power from the law contrary to his own express words Mat. 5.17 18. where he saith that every jot of the Law is imperishable and in his opening and applying it afterwards he doth as command so reprove threaten and condemne 2. You will not deny but what Christ hath performed for me as my surety that I am so freed from that it may not be required of me to that end as before 3. Christ doth free us that we by his Spirit may serve freely and cheerfully and without all fear in holiness and righteousness before God all the dayes of our life Luk. 1.76 Therefore are we taken into a New covenant that giveth power and fitness so to serve wherein he promiseth the law in our hearts to put his Spirit into us to give a new heart and a new way c. which the covenant of works could not do Jer. 31. Ezek. 36.27 c. M. B. Vse of instruction against the Antinomians who must needs overthrow the directive and obligative force of the law of nature as well as of Moses Ans This is but the old slander the same false charge so often repeated It is by this
evident enough that those things whereof we are accused are not so we overthrow no force at all in your sense thus we have it in confesso that you do deny the condeming power the stones then that you cast may fall upon your own head M. B. 2. Some Swenckfeildians held that a man was never truely mortified till he had put out all sense of conscience for sin Answ Let the understanding reader judge whether this your doctrine of taking away the damnatory power of the law doth not directly tend to that end and can produce no other effect or fruits but senselesseness and wretched security for if I apprehend no danger in the law it revealing no wrath nor threatning nor condemning nor terrifying I can then rest quiet and secure under the law and in sin and so never seek nor desire to come and dwell under the protection of Christ in his Gospel LECT VII VIII IN these two Lectures I finde many things not currant with me and more which are dubious and questionable but as he medleth not with his Antinomian so I willingly let all pass as having no minde to raise or occasion new disputes the Church being too much disquieted already LECT IX Rom. 2.14 For the Gentiles do by nature c. M. B. Sect. 1. ANtinomians seem to deny all the preparatory works upon the heart of man Answ Can there be a heart desiring Christ and willing to receive him for righteousness reconcilation and life and yet be no preparatory work these a man with but half an eye may see and read in Doctor Crisp against whom this exception is made And what other preparation is needful or you do 〈◊〉 may be known hereafter M. B. Holding that Christ immediâ—â—◠〈…〉 himself to grâ—ss sinners abiding 〈…〉 Answ Your terms are ambiguous by that word immediately may be thought as if your adversary denyed all use of means as an Euthusiast or else that Christ communicateth himself before the sinner can or do prepare to meet him or receive him according to that of the prophet I am found of them that ask not after me Isa 65.1 as he called Matthew sitting at the receit of custome Mat. 9.9 and Peter Andrew James and John Mat. 4.18 21. And so he prevented Paul Act. 9.4 5. for will ever the stray sheep seek first to the sheperd or is it not the shepherds office to seek the scattered and lost Luk. 19.10 you are no patron of free-will why then do you wrangle in a matter so clear After that I was turned I repented Jer. 31.19 2. You say to gross sinners Do you make a difference before Christ and Faith come Paul saith There is no difference between the profane Gentile and legal Jew Rom. 3.9 the Jew is in no wise better then the other although the blinde Pharisee thought and judged otherwise Luk. 18.11 or is not Christ as free for one sinner as another for a gross and great offender an idolater a Necromancer as Manasses a blasphemer and persecuter as Paul for Publicans and harlors as for a refined and reformed legalist Alas Sir what then shall become of all gross sinners if Christ may not communicate himself unto them you would have them amended first that may like you but it pleaseth not Christ who is most glorified in the chief of sinners like that skilful physician whose art and faithfulness doth best appear in the healing and recovery of a patient desperately sick But by what power or means shall a gross sinner reforme and amend before Christ come to him who said truly Without me yo can do nothing you seem by this book to be just of the elder brothers that is the Pharisees minde Luk. 15.12 who was offended and murmured because the loose and sinful prodigal was so freely received and kindly welcomed and entertained What your fears or other reasons may be Eph. 1.6 I cannot well tell but Christ took more pleasure in conversing with gross sinners the mercy and grace of God is become most free and rich to the praise of the glory of it when such are freely justified and received into favor and never did nor shall any love so much and be so serviceable and full of expressions of love as such unto whom most are forgiven Luk. 7.47 3. But you add abiding so 1. Answ What after Christ hath communicated himself Impossible 2. You know your adversary can intend no such thing nor hath any such words but his expressions are otherwise as appeareth in his book to any reader 3. And if you mean abiding so till Christ come to him I say then you must work some strange cure on such an one in making him a Proselyte but I forbear M. B. And though they hold us passive at the first receiving of Christ which all Orthodox do yet they express it in an unsound sense comparing God unto a physician that doth violently open a sicke mans throat and poure down his physick whether he will or no. Answ 1. If you think that a man must or may prepare himself you are not so Orthodox as to hold us passive at the first receiving of Christ 2. You stumble at the similitude used but have not other approved Divines compared Gods dealing with man at first to a riders rough handling of a wilde colt who is forced to cast him ere he can shooe him and by a strong hand and sharpe usage to subdue break and tame him Neither of these do imply any more then is warranted Jer. 31.18 and other places Are you of opinion that God in the conversion of a sinner doth nothing against the will of man look then on Manasses Paul Adigondo peccatum in conscientiam the Jailor was there not violence done whilst God useth afflictions without and the terrors of the law within driving sin into the conscience and so compelleth the man to come in Luk. 14.23 no bitter potion or aloes is so unpleasant and loathsome unto the body as the due working of the law is ingrateful to the conscience besides the patient knowing that his physick is given not to kill but of purpose and with a minde to prevent death and to cure the diseased body will more willingly receive and digest what is so untoothsome but the soul when the law revealeth sin and wrath and the spirit of bondage beginneth to work knoweth nothing of Gods purpose herein unless it be that his minde is to destroy and therefore it doth struggle and refist as much as in it lyeth It may be truly said in a good sense that God who worketh the Will and the Deed Phil. 2.12 doth save a man against his will for man of himself is both unwilling to suffer and abide the work of God in him and upon him and also to have salvation in Gods way therefore said Christ You will not come unto me that ye may have life Joh. 5.40 and none will come unless the Father draw him Joh. 6.44 And how often would
stand with a covenant of grace your own words imply that it is not then a covenant of grace as you formerly asserted M. B. page 155. How necessary it is to have this law promulged if it were possible as terribly in our congregations as it was on mount Sinai this would make the very Antinomians finde the power of the law and to be afraid to reject it Answ 1. If it were so necessary that the outward promulgation or preaching of the law should be so terrible as your wisdom requireth surely God would have it so for he hath power to do it but the special power and terror is inward and spiritual God by his convincing spirit making the heart shake and tremble in the conscience of sin and a cursed perishing condition of this terrour and consternation your Antinomian may scon have much experience as you yea more for he findeth death in that ministration by the reviving of sin Rom. 7.9 10. and therefore is dead to it as Gal. 2.19 but you say life cometh by the law and so live by doing and working an assured argument that you were never truely slain by the law 2. Would you now have the law become so terrible in your congregations why then did you reprove them that made it like a horrid Gorgon c. you mean surely this terrour only for the Antinomians not for others you thunder against your adversaries but deal gently with friends Also you dash sin out of countenance which is well but do not throw down mans righteousness but establish it rather A little after you say The Antinomian counteth sin nothing because of justification But in what sense doth he so vilifie it I dare affirme that none hateth sin more is so weary of it complaineth so of its remaining and dwelling in the flesh and the sorrow it sometime breeds him c. And yet if he make light of it how can he prize justification from it he that accounteth nothing of sin cannot rightly esteem of a Saviour to save from it therefore contrarily our counting all things loss and dung even our best works legal zeal reformation and worship because mingled and defiled with the leprosie of sin for the excellent knowledge sake of Christ Jesus our desire ever to be found in him not having our own righteousness to know nothing but Christ crucified c. do argue sin to be our greatest and most fearful evil to our apprehensions but it is not so with you and your disciples who seldome or never preach or desire to hear of a Saviour of free justification and do so wrangle with the doctrine of grace and faith And lastly it is confessed that by faith in the blood of Jesus and the grace of justification raigning in the conscience sin Satan and hell be conquered defied and triumphed over Who can lay any thing to their charge Thanks be to God through our Lord Jesus Christ c. he that envyeth this in others is to be pitied because of his poor condition What account do you make of a debt you know is discharged It troubleth you little in reference to danger by suite or law Lastly That phrase of Gods not seeing sin in a believer is still an eye-sore to you and many other And to add this to the former It argueth that you make nothing of sin For 1. If you hated it you would seek to get your soul cleansed from it 2. If you loved God you would not come and appear in his sight untill you were washed from it seeing it is unto him so hateful and abominable that he cannot endure the sight of it and therefore calleth upon his people to wash and make them clean and then to come Or yet 3. If you feared God and stood in true aw of him knowing how terrible he and his presence is where he seeth and marketh iniquity for who may abide it Psal 130.3 or who then can stand you durst not abide in his fight without that faith and assurance that the blood of his Son Jesus hath washed and cleansed you from all your sinnes If as that Martyr said the vaile were taken off Moses face such a glory and dreadful Majesty would break forth as would confound your spirits and be intolerable your sins being set in the light of his countenance then you would not deal with God without faith in the blood of Christ Extrae Christum horrendum est imo de Deo cogitare Calv. nor durst entertaine a thought of him out of Christ in whom iniquity is done away never to be remembred any more Then you cry out Oh blessed man whose iniquities are for given and whose sin is covered and so use your own words say all that ever you preached or writ against this is false you knew not what you said Thus a day of temptation and trouble may come in which you all who have disparaged and despised this may be brought to acknowledge and embrace it as an useful and most acceptable truth of God full of soul-consolation which in your wretched security is now loathed and rejected the law is so mitigated and modified in your opinion and Ministery that Sinai is your Sion you are not afraid to stand there LECT XVII Exod. 20.1 And God spake c. M. B. THe Antinomian pleads for the universal abrogation of the law Answ He is an Antinomian that doth so but you cannot finde the adversaries you deal with guilty of such a crime yet you are no fit advocate to patronize or defend the law for it is abrogated by your self if that be true as it is most certaine that lex non damnans non est lex a law without power to condemn is no law for the law you would establish hath no condemning power as you say therefore the law is by you abrogated How fully satisfactory is Luther to any reasonable man Non quod lex pereat imo manet vivit regnat in impiis sed pius est legi mortuus sicut peccato diabolo Inferno mortuus est quae tamen manent mundus ac impii ea habebunt Ideo cum Sophistae intelligunt legem abrogari tu intellige paulum quemlibet Christianum universae legi abrogari mori tamen legem manere Sophisters do understand and take the law to be abrogated but the truth is the Christian is abrogated and dead to it and yet the law remaineth entire Henceforth correct your self and cease to slander or mistake your poor brethren and without cause so to embitter your words with gall and servour of spirit and the Lord forgive you What further is spoken in this Sermon against the Antinomians is either chargeable upon Islebius or some other not known to me or 2. Is grounded upon a meer mistake of our tenets or is answered elsewhere so that to avoide prolixity I meddle with no more LECT XVIII Mat. 5.21 22. Yee have heard that it was said by them of old time Thou shalt
is that the Hebrew word doth signifie largely any doctrine and so may comprehend the whole word of God Answ You say that others as well as they Antinomian take the law so largely so that you see your Adversarie is not single in his opinion as you are who can produce no Author but onely say It seemeth good to expound that phrase in such a manner And otherwise it seemeth it would cross your designe else I see nor you do shew no reason But Luther and some others upon that place Psal 19.7 do take the law for the moral law but I dare say you will not stand to their exposition of it Luther saith This is no absolute commendation of the law but it is to be understood legem talem factans esse per fidem non talia facit lex The law worketh not these it self but they are effected by the influence of the Sun of righteousness inwardly quickning reviving and comforting the soul through the faith of the Gospel The law giveth nor hath no such heat or vertue of it self but produceth contrary effects It may indeed saith he convert the eye mouth hand ears omnes vires sed magis avertit cor odio paenarum indignatione prohibitae concupiscentiae sed cor non est rectum spiritus non est fidelis In brief his judgement is that after the soul is justified and converted by the Gospel then it loveth the law which it hated before and now it doeth not avert or as being afraid she from God in his law but with confidence and delight draweth nigh unto him and observeth the things of the law because the Spirit of Christ in the Gospel maketh them sweeter to the soul then all the riches and pleasures of this life Thus it s the doctrine of reconciliation by Christ believed on that marvelously altereth the Christians heart causing it to convert and turn to God as being thereby able to abide his sight and presence and to love his saw Et Amans legem non potest eam satis landare adeo placet quae prius adeo displicuit You say nothing that hath any strength in it against the truth held out and maintained by us And by this you may see whence it was that David so commended the law strictly taken because his heart was so altered by the faith of the operation of God It is remarkable saith Luther that the way to love and keep the law is to believe and receive the Gospel from this belief issueth love and all true obedience and it is not bred and effected by the law commanding and requiring it By faith we establish the law Rom. 3. ult M. B. That opinion which would make Christ not take an instrumental way for conversion of men in his first Sermon wherein he was very large that must not be asserted but to hold that the preaching of the law is not a Medium to conversion must needs be to say Christ did not take the nearest way c. Answ You answer your self page 169. where your words are That our Saviours intent was only to explicate the law better then did the Scribes and Pharisees that so they might be sensible of sin and discover themselves to be fouler and more abominable then ever they judged themselves unto which let me add And that by requiring and so letting the hearers see a necessity of a more absolute righteousness then was held forth even in the doctrine of the Scribes and Pharisees he might so destroy all confidence in their own works prevent the establishing of mans righteousness and prepare and dispose them to hearken after his righteousness for he is the end of the law for righteousness to al that believe Rom. 10.4 And by this it may appear that he used the law preparatorily to justification and conversion as you in part are forced to grant it to be the opinion and doctrine of all Orthodox Divines and yet it is thwarted by you who love to have a way by your self M. B. If the law of God have that objectively in it that may work exceedingly upon the heart when set home by Gods Spirit then it may be used instrumentally as well as the Gospel but it hath c. Answ Here is nothing but the vain reason of man If God be otherwise pleased what is it how glorious fit and worthy soever it may seem for this in our eyes The Sun in the firmament is a glorious object to look upon when we have eyes but God useth it not therefore to give and restore the use of sight to those that be blind the seeing man findeth variety of delightful objects to look at among the creatures but they finde him not eyes therefore M.B. 5. If the law of God may be blessed after a man is converted to the increase of his grace and holiness why not then to the first beginning of it That it is for the increase of of Godliness appeareth by experience Answ Every Christians experience teacheth him that the more he inwardly seeth and feeleth that divine love that pardoneth reconcileth and preserveth the soul in that everlasting covenant of sure mercies and peace the more it loveth againe and in love hateth evil escheweth it doth good is every way cheerfully obedient I love the Lord saith David because he heard me when I called upon him in the time of trouble and delivered my soul from death my eyes from tears and my feet from falling What bred and caused love and gained the heart to God at the first that same is of continual force still to enlive and enlarge the affections towards him But because sins are forgiven it is said she loved much Luke 7. and if this Candle be put under a bushel if this Sun the light of Gods countenance do not shine forth upon the Solissequium the soul of a believer it will be dark dull and indisposed to whatever good you can propound to it therefore is it requisite that faith be nourished and ever operative and lively in apprehending and feeding upon that exceeding kindness of God in Christ that so it may be more quick and free in all holy expressions Faith works by love if faith dye or wax cold by which the soul liveth the law can but little work upon or affect the heart Besides as the Christians beginning so his building up and increasing is in another way and by other means then are meerly legal he lives and grows in the Vine Christ and thereby fructifieth M. B. It is hard to think that a Minister having opened any moral duty of the law may not pray to God to cloath that word with power to change the heart of the hearers Answ Why should man thinke it hard or be offended at any thing where he findeth it Gods will that it be so and no otherwise 2. If God reveal not his minde and willingness to put forth any renewing power in the law how can you then pray in faith to be
yet the man is but one and his state but one not two and put the Law with its terrour and compelling power to the flesh what availeth this Can this draw the flesh to the waies of piety as your words are you imagine either that the flesh being and remaining flesh can move in the waies of piety or that the terrour of the Law can change the corrupt heart but can clear or justifie neither It is simple and free believing that leadeth and carrieth the soul into the right way and all the forcing and terrifying of the Law can provoke onely unto an externall and hypocriticall obedience such as is in the Children of the Bondwoman If the spirit in the godly be not alway so willing the Law cannot give aide and quickening to it but rather dampeth and deadeth the spirit of faith and love and doth vivifie the corruption in nature for so saith Paul when the Commandment came sin revived and I died Rom. 7.9 and againe the strength of sin is the Law 1 Cor. 15.56 It 's onely faith in the Gospel of Christ that exciteth to all goodness cheerfully and joyfully so Heb. 11. Noah Abraham Moses are said to do all by faith Sine qua multa faciendo nihil facimus impleudo Legem non implemus What caused life at first must preserve and quicken it being dead or dull 5. And your fifth Assertion is false for the Law doth as is said and proved increase sin even in the faithfull this being the bitter effect of it through the vitiousness of our nature Rom. 7.5 The motions of sin which were by the Law do work in our members to bring forth fruit to death and all along the chapter Paul saith It wrought no otherwise in him in his regenerate estate but that all the power to resist weaken and overcome sin and the flesh was from Christ the head and his spirit Therefore thankes be to God through our Lord Jesus Christ This take notice of that if infidelity be accidentally nourished and faith hindered and opposed by the Law as is most true then sin cannot decrease but doth increase by it Besides is not flesh and corruption in the regenerate of the same kinde with that in the unregenerate If the Law then be the occasion of the reviving of sin in the one why not in the other the nature of the flesh nor the operative vertue of the Law is not altered by grace though they both be overmastered and subdued In the sixth you slander your Antinomian again for disparaging the Law in that it was written in stones What good can it do say you Answ It doth good many waies else God would not have writ it there but that cannot make man good God therefore hath promised to write his Law in the Tables of the heart by his spirit whereby the Gospel also is made effectuall as he pleaseth but this inward writing of the Law is a promise and branch of the new Covenant Jer. 31.33 Mr. B. But the Law continueth to them as a rule which may appear first from the different phrases used concerning the ceremonial law nowhere applied to the moral as which Chemuitius doth reckon up 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. which are not used of the Morall but when he speaketh of it he saith We are dead unto it We are redeemed from the curse of it which Phrases do imply the change to be wade in us and not in the Law Answ Your supposition is still false for we hold no abrogation mitigation or mutation in the Law as is already cleared 2. This maketh wholly for us for if there be no change in the Law then it continueth in all other offices and regards as well as to be a rule and so hath power to promise and to condemn also Hunc suo jugulo gladio 3. You reason nihil ad Rhombum viz. If the Antinomian could bring such places that would prove it were as unlawfull to love the Lord because the morall Law commands it as we could prove it unlawfull to circumcise c. Answ The rule of comparison requireth that it should be unlawfull to circumcise because the ceremoniall Law commands it And if that Law were of force still and not repealed it were as lawfull to circumcise so that the unlawfulness to do it is not from the nature of the thing but in that the ceremoniall requiring circumcision is abrogated but so is not the moral for then to love were not required But though the morall Law command love yet your heart wanting it it giveth it no power to do it Thus you have gained here nothing to your purpose but lost both labour and credit Mr. B. 2. From the sanctification and holiness that it requireth of the believer which is nothing but conformity to the Law Answ Though the Law require yet it proveth not it to be a rule regulating disposing and framing the soul to holiness for the Law doth not sanctifie but Christ is of God made to be sanctification whereby cometh true conformity to the Law The Law requireth to be just but doth not justifie so it willeth us to be Saints but sanctifieth not There is a mutuall relation between Christ and faith as a quality or vertue faith purifieth not but as it fetcheth and deriveth vertue from Christ Purity is not in us naturally the Law requiring it doth convince us both of the want of it and of the necessity to have it but it supplieth us not with it for then Christ need not be our root of holiness nor we by faith to have it from him but driveth us to Christ in whom all fulness dwelleth You have your Answer to the rest of the Section in what precedeth Mr. B. 3. In that Disobedience to it is still a sin to a believer Answ As Disobedience is a sin against the Law so it is condemned by the Law as was Davids adultery Peters deniall c. else what need they of faith to be justified from them so still by this the Law hath power to condemn as well as to rule As for the evasion you mention I know it not you have not as yet brought us into any such strait or danger as that we need seek evasion The residue of this Lecture maketh nothing for your purpose nor at all against us LECT XXIII Rom. 3.31 Do we then make void the Law yea we establish it HEre you do not invalidate the Authors assertion nor Arguments If the Law and Prophets lasted but till John And as John was greater then any before him so the least in the kingdom of Heaven is greater then he You will then find it hard to put John either under the old or new Testament or to evince your Adversary Inter Legem Evangelium interpositus fuit Johannes qui medium obtinuit munus utrique affine Calv. It 's true the Law or Moses and the Prophets write of Christ and agreed in that and did not onely typifie him
take away sin ours now is That he is come and hath done it he loved us and hath washed us from our sins Rev. 15. they had the promise of this but we the performance This might content an indifferent mind The Sun of righteousness was not risen in their dayes Mal. 4.2 I hear of another of better abilities and helps who is much ingaged in this controversie and hath promised to vindicate both the Hony Comb and D. Crisp I shall not prevent him What D. Crisp asserteth is solid and clear neither do you bring any thing of any great force to overthrow it I perceive his Scriptures and reasons to prove them two distinct Covenants carry such light and weight in them that you have little mind to meddle with them And to the judicious yourdealing her is neither satisfactory nor son You tell of a heap of fulshoods and much errour in few lines but make not one truely to appear Also you cannot justifie your charge afterward for he saith not that all the legall sacrifices were onely for sinnes of meere ignorance but alledging that place Numb 15.28 and ver 20. The soul that sinneth presumptuously shall dye Here saith the Doctor is a sacrifice for sins of ignorance but that soul that sinneth presumptuously shall dye no sacrifice for that The Scripture is plain and will bear him out in all that he inferreth from it See your many errours and mistakes in this 1. He saith Here Numb 15.28 is a sacrifice for sins of ignorance and so there is but your charge is that he saith All legall Sacrifices were for sins of meer ignorance 2. That they were onely for those sins 3. You put in the word meer which he useth not Is this candid or as a Minister let me aske Was there not divers sinnes for which no sacrifices could be admitted and againe was not pardon of sin sued out upon those sacrifices that God required If you grant those two as the evidence of truth in them will prevail and inforce so farre then I see no cause herein to except against the Doctor Mr. B. Obj. Christ the true satifice was represented in every sacrifice and all the vertue and benefit to come from Christs blood and then could not that take away all sin as well as some Answ It 's true Christ was represented and sufficient vertue from his blood to take away that sin the party then was guilty of and was troubled with but the blood of Christ was not held out in every particular sacrifice to expiate all sins present past and to come as in the time of the Gospel Even as the brazen serpent was erected to cure as they were wounded and in the sense of their fear and smart made use of it therefore you are too rash in saying Unless the Antinomian Author were a Socinian he can never expedite himself Mr. B. In the new Testament is there not the sin against the Holy Ghost for which no pardon is promised Answ What is this against the Doctor or to the point in hand The Doctor speaketh of the sins of the Elect of God for who else receive forgiveness and of the manner of Gods dispensing pardon to them how differing it was from this under the Gospel but the sin against the holy Ghost is unpardonable and therefore the Elect are kept from falling into it Moreover as I conceive The differences which the Doctor insisteth on are to be understood in regard of the application of the sacrifice and blood of Christ and that not onely on mans part through faith but on Gods part also in his Ordinances and manner of administration The Apostle in the Epistle to the Hebrews brings all or the main and most differences between the Churches state before and after Christs death unto the condition of the conscience which could not be peaceable comfortable and joyfull under the old Testament because there was still on Gods part new remembrance of sin and so also sacrifices appointed to be offered upon the commission of fresh and new sinnes And God did not appear unto them neither could they in conscience so receive and apprehend him as actually satisfied and reconciled till after their sacrifices but now Christ by one sacrifice and offering of himself hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified so there is no remembrance of sin for God hath said that in his Son he is well pleased and that for ever So that the opposition is not onely as you say between Christ and those legall sacrifices being considered and used without him or without faith in his blood for so they were effectuall to take away no sin at all whenas yet it is said in many places of the Epistle to the Hebrews that they did though not to the perfecting of the conscience in that there was a remembrance of sin again but it is evident to be between the estate of the Church in the dayes of Moses and now after Christs resurrection which is the time of reformation Christ by his eternal spirit having offered himself without spot to God by his blood to purge the conscience from dead works to serve the living God And hereby all may see how insolid impertinent and vain all your reply is First The blood of Christ in the vertue and efficacy of it did extend and reach unto those times also and did cleanse from all sin but God did so carry it that he was pleased to reveal and apply this his grace unto them as they needed All pardons by Christ were purchased which they had but these unsearchable riches of forgiveness peace favour adoption and inheritance were manifested and dispensed by some and some as Fathers do things of worth by small pittances at once unto their Children Secondly It 's true in this is no difference between the faithfull Jews then and Christians now that all the good God did to either was onely for his own names sake and no good in them and so are prevented by him in being made his people freely and of free grace Yet while God did govern his Church under the Law most of his favours and good thing he after they became his did tender dispense and communicate upon antecedent conditions So that although they were Children and free yet their state and manner of education was servile And in the way of their obedience therefore they received their peace the conscience whereof gave them boldness towards God And yet if God veiled his Paternity graciousness and favour as somtimes Parents do not shew the like pleasant countenance to their Children when they have not carried themselves dutifully It will not follow then that God ceaseth to love them but is wise in the opportune manifestation of his love Thus it is a perpetuall truth indeed That Christs sacrifice was as efficacious to those before his death as those after viz. to procure and purchase all things necessary to salvation but these treasures being in the Fathers keeping he did dispose and
grant you repentance Amen Mr. Rutherf pag. 575. There is a twofold keeping in of sinners one meerly legal they care not for Mr. T. Gaole Reply The law is not my Gaole but Gods and both they and you may be made to minde it more then either yet doth you speak too contemptibly Mr. Rutherf Mr. T. will have the believer so free so perfect as the law needs not to teach nor direct him in one stop he doth all without a keeper by the free compulsion of a Spirit separated from Scriptures which is right down A believer is neither under law nor Gospel but a Spirit separated from both guides him Reply When I say the Spirit of the Lord is his keeper do I teach then he hath no keeper 2. He receiveth the Spirit that leads him by the Gospel how false then is your charge who speak or dream of a spirit separated from Gospel and not I. And yet the Spirit breatheth and bloweth in the heart and the voice or sound of it is there heard when there is no sillable of outward Law or Gospel but you have sufficient answer before As for your instances of Joseph and David I ask of you whether it was the Spirit within that kept them from offending or the law T. pag. 5 6. I muse you omit to shew what it is to be under Grace Mr. Rutherf Dr. Taylor did not omit to shew what it is if you did not omit to read his words he is clear to any Reply Before you complained you could not see what was plain before you but now you can see what is not extant this is the fruit of partiality Mr. Rutherf But let your exposition stand you are not under the law as teaching directing regulating believers in the way of righteousness but the Gospel giveth power to subdue sin without any teaching or regulating power of the law But what is the power of subduing sin to the Antinomians not sanctification but justification that is a power to believe that Christ hath obeyed law for me we are obliged to no personal sanctification c. then to be inherently holy is unlawful to Antinomians Reply The exposition is not mine verbatim yet even in your owne expression the light of truth is so clear and convincing on our part that you turn your back on it as afraid to meddle And being disposed to take occasion to wrangle you demand what it is to subdue sin whereas it is set before you even the weakening of the power of sin within us that it domineer not over us Indeed the Prophet Micah 7.19 useth the phrase of subduing by justification and that is a true subduing it in the conscience that it there raign not to death condemnation And yet by your confession this must precede and is the proper cause of subduing it in conversation and then that will necessarily follow issuing out of this faith So that in fine this is but a Papistical cavil That to teach justification is the overthrow of holiness and good works Lastly whereas you tell of obliging to sanctification I answer we are to believe that God will sanctifie us and that throughout and put his Spirit into us to lead us in his wayes and so in that faith desiring and hungering after it to seek to him as a sick man longing for health unto his Physitian and to wait in the use of his ordinances that he may so perform The new Covenant properly requireth nothing of man but God knowing his spiritual poverty and utter disability calleth upon him to seek to him who worketh both the will and the deed of his owne pleasure Open thy mouth and I will fill it Psal 81. Your slanderous conclusion is both against the rule of Gods law and of all humane arts But such extravagancy becometh or still pleaseth Mr. Rutherford T. Assert pag. 6. I deny not the law to be an eternal and inviolable rule of righteousness yet the Grace of the Gospel doth truly and effectually conform us unto it Mr. Rutherf pag. 578. I ask to whom the law is a rule if to Believers then they must be under it 2. That rule the grace conformeth unto we must be under 3. An inviolable rule of justice cannot be violated without sin Then the Believer cannot violate the law and murder but they must sin and violate the rule c. Reply It s true the law is an inviolable rule but not to him as a Believer or in the things of his Faith but here he departs from it for he doth not the Law to be saved but believeth after the rule of the Gospel 2. If you consider him morally I see not but he may be conformed to the rule of the law and yet not under it but under grace and the rule of the spirit which conformeth him 3. In this your moral or civil conception of him you take him quite out of Christs kingdom where grace reigneth And now grant he doth murder and sin It is death and condemnation by the same rule and law so that he must be totally removed out of the limits of the law before he can be freed and secured from either sin or death You leave faith and fall from grace in all your arguments And they are as forcible to maintain the condemning power of the law to believers as the regulating for where the law regulates it may condemn and so it doth the best Saint here if you bring him and his life under it T. Assert pag. 7. Through faith is bred assured confidence lively hope c. M. Rutherf pag. 579. This is a close perverting of the word of truth the Antinomians faith may here be smelt then whoever once wavereth or doubteth are yet under the law of works A doctrine of despair to broken reeds who cry I believe help my unbelief Reply I must commend to you Jam. 1.6 7. But observe good Reader what is here excepted against viz. Through Faith in Christ is bred assured confidence lively hope pure love towards God invocation of his name without wavering fear or doubting not questioning his good will audience acceptance which would never be effected by all the zeal and conscience towards God according to the law of works And now judge impartially what truth can be current with Mr. Rutherf I aske 1. can assured confidence lively hope c. come or be effected any way else then by faith in Christ If there want light at Noon-day Read Heb. 3.9 where your Bible-Note saith That he calleth that excellent effect of faith whereby we cry Abba Father confidence and to confidence he joyneth hope which is termed a lively hope that God begets unto 1 Pet. 1.3 see also Heb. 10.22 23. Rom. 15.13 and 10.14 How shall they call on him on whom they have not believed But it is like this moveth M. Rutherf that it is said that these cannot be attained by all the zeal according to the law of works yet Paul clears it Eph. 2.18 That