laboured more than they all yet not I but the grace of God with me The Scripture calls us Workers in Gods Vineyard not Tools and Instruments Call the Labourers and give them their hire And again We shall all receive a reward according to our works Mark 16.20 They went forth and preached every where the Lord working with them 2 Cor. 6.1 We then as workers together with him beseech you that ye receive not the grace of God in vain But in vain they would receive it if they would not cooperate with it If St. Paul whom St. Chrysostome calls the best child of grace thought it no disparagement to the grace of God to say he was a worker together with God towards their Conversion how can it be a disparagement to the grace of God to say we together with God work out our own Salvation It were in vain to persuade us to do what God alone solely and wholly doth in us Now how many persuasions in Scripture do we meet withal To make you a new heart to put off the old man and to put on the new These plainly prove a liberty of Will and that we must work out our own Salvation or else safety it self will not save us How pathetically doth God wish the Conversion of sinners Jer. 13.27 O Jerusalem wilt thou not be made clean when shall it once be Oh that my people would have hearkned unto me for if Israel had walked in my ways c. Who reading such Texts can imagine that God did not expect mens co-operation or that the cause of their ruine was only because Grace was so slenderly offered by God that it proved ineffectual unto them when God says Jer. 51.9 We would have healed Babylon but she is not healed forsake her The judgment inflicted plainly shews God was not wanting to her but she was wanting to her self All Comminations and threatnings were in vain if the Will did not or could not cooperate with the grace of God How could men fall from grace if God leave us not to the mutability of the Will It would be in vain to exhort such to do their first works and threaten them if they did not if they were meerly passive in every act of saving grace nay certainly if God withdraw his grace it is meerly because we walk unworthy of it for to him that hath shall be given and he shall have more abundance but from him that hath not that is hath not well improved it shall be taken away even that which he hath Some men think they can never exalt the grace of God enough unless they debase the powers and light of Nature far more than Adam debased them by his Fall But the Law of Nature written in the heart is no less the Law of God than those Laws of God which are written in the Scripture else Murther and Adultery in the Heathen should not be sins for where there is no Law there is no Transgression Rom. 2.14 The Gentiles which have not the Law and do by nature the things contained in the Law shall judge the Circumcised which transgress the Law which place doth plainly shew unto us that the light of Nature is good as being the Candle of the Lord and that it is not wholly extinguished in us but only darkened by Adams Transgression I come now to answer those Arguments which are brought against this truth And first it is objected that Christ is said to fill all in all Ephes 1. ult My answer is These words are not to be so taken as if we were to do nothing at all towards our own Salvation for they are spoken figuratively where by a Synecdoche the chief part is put for the whole As suppose a man should say Towards a mans maintenance Money is all in all not but that Food and Rayment do maintain him more immediately but because these cannot usually be procured without Money that answering all things the saying is usual and none except against it Their second Argument is taken from verse 19. of that Chapter where the Apostle says We believe according to the working of his mighty power which he wrought in Christ when he raised him from the dead Whence they infer the grace of Faith is wrought by an infinite power in the heart but we can contribute nothing to an infinite power therefore nothing towards our own Faith My answer is St. Pauls Faith and so of the Primitive Christians was not wrought only by means as ours now adays is but also by Miracles The Apostles preached and the Lord confirmed the Word with signs following Mark 16.20 which signs and wonders when the people saw they believed according to the working of this mighty power But our Faith now is not so wrought but only by hearing without seeing such an Almighty power to confirm the Doctrine yet are we never the less blessed but rather the more Thomas because thou hast seen thou hast believed blessed are they which have not seen and yet have believed Thirdly it is objected If the Will of man have power to assent or not assent to grace offered man shall do more towards his own Conversion than God for the act is more perfect than a meer power to act I answer although in a Metaphysical sense the act is more perfect than a meer power to act as the end of a thing is preferred before the means tending to it yet in a Moral sense it is not always so neither doth man by accepting do more than God by offering his grace God gives us power to get Wealth say we get it are we more beholden now to our selves therefore than to God for our riches I trow not The case is the same in the point of grace when we have accepted of his goodness we ought to say Not unto us Lord not unto us but to thy name give the praise If a Benefactor give an indigent person a considerable sum of money and he accept it is he more beholden to himself for his acceptance than to the Donor for his kindness If so then their Argument is of force but not else Fourthly it is objected If the Will of man hath power to assent to grace offered and he do assent another hath the same grace offered and he doth not assent all the difference must needs come from mans Will and so he that believes and assents makes himself to differ from him that assents not contrary to that of the Apostle 1 Cor. 4.7 I confess this Argument hath stumbled many learned men as if the Apostle had spoken these words concerning the act of Conversion or of receiving sanctifying grace but it is spoken only concerning receiving Ministerial Offices in the Church See the first verse else Let a man so account of us as of the Ministers of Christ and Stewards of the Mysteries of God 〈◊〉 he taxes as St. Ambrose well observes the pride and arrogancy of some Teachers who did insinuate into the people that
this unmerciful opinion are such as these First that of St. Paul in the ninth Chapter to the Romans ver 11. For the Children being not yet born neither having done good or evil that the purpose of God according to Election might stand not of works but of him that calleth it was said unto her the elder shall serve the younger as it is written Jacob have I loved but Esau have J hated You see say they before Jacob or Esau had done good or evil one was loved and the other hated My answer is First these words are not spoken of Jacob or Esaus persons but by a figure the person of either is put to represent and shadow out the condition of their Posterities Secondly the Election there mentioned is meant chiefly concerning things Temporal not things Eternal That that saying The elder shall serve the younger was not meant of their persons but of their Posterities may appear from Gen. 25.23 Two Nations are in thy Womb and two manner of People shall be separated from thy bowels and the one People shall be stronger than the other and the elder shall serve the younger Esau in his own person never served Jacob nay Jacob called Esau his Lord and bowed seven times to the ground before him Gen. 33.3 and was glad by a Present to obtain his peace of him If Esau had done so to Jacob how would they have triumphed in their personal sense Secondly that the love and hatred was meant chiefly concerning things temporal see Mal. 1.2 3. from whence the words were taken Was not Esau Jacobs Brother saith the Lord Yet I loved Jacob and I hated Esau and laid his Mountains and his Heritage waste for the Dragons of the Wilderness So that you plainly see the Apostle means not personal Election to eternal life or hatred to eternal death but of choosing Jacobs Posterity to be a greater Nation than the Off-spring of Esau meerly for his good pleasure which no man can justly speak against for he may do what he pleases with his own good blessings If it be said the temporal blessings on Jacob's Posterity did shadow out spiritual 't is not denied but they might and certainly to be brought so nigh unto God as to be his peculiar People in Covenant was a spiritual blessing and if all that were in Covenant were elected the Argument were of force but seeing they are not all Israel which were of Israel it falls to the ground The truth is the words are here used by the Apostle by way of Allegory and all that he accommodates them to is to shew that God might justly cast off the Jews the People of the elder Covenant of Works and take in the Gentiles those minors and youngers into the Covenant of grace in their rooms as may appear from Rom. 9.30 What shall we say then to these things That the Ghntiles which followed not after righteousness have attained to righteousness even the righteousness which is of faith But Israel which followed after the Law of righteousness hath not attained unto the Law of rightehusness Wherefore Because they sought it not by faith but as it were by the Works of the Law And this he makes the conclusion and is the chief if not the only thing he doth infer from the whole Allegory And what he says to Moses is most equal I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy that is it belongs to me to appoint upon what terms I will shew mercy and justifie men whether by the Law of Faith or by Works For as he that builds an Hospital hath an equitable right to appoint the qualifications of the persons that shall partake in his gift whether poor Children or Widows Aged persons or the like so it belongs to God to appoint upon what terms he will justifie men whether by the Law of Works or by the Law of Faith and seeing neither Works nor Faith can deserve it at his hands Justification is not of him that willeth nor of him that runneth but of God that sheweth mercy God hath reason enough for all his doings but in distributing mercies which have no foundation in merit he need give no account or reason of it but his Will And so likewise for his judgments upon Pharaoh here used as a Type of the obstinate Jews although God had reason enough to raise him up I suppose out of the former Plague to reserve him for a more famous overthrow because the Hebrew hath it I have made thee stand The Septuagint hath it for this cause 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Thou hast been preserved till now The Chaldee Paraphrase and Junius so likewise explain it And although God had reason enough to find fault with him for hardening of his heart though now judicially hardened and he could not help it yet the Apostle waves these Reasons and says Nay but O man who art thou that repliest against God As if he had said it is intolerable presumption to quarrel at the ways of God as unequal when they clearly appear to be his You ought rather with reverence to presume there is wisdom and righteousness in them though you through ignorance cannot comprehend them For as his power in forming man ought not to be found fault withal and none ought to say Why hast thou made me thus So neither his Justice which is as infinite as his Power and renders to men only according to their Works A second Scripture is this Hath not the Potter power over the Clay of the same lump to make one vessel to honour another to dishonour Ver. 21. Whence they infer God is the Potter we the Clay the Elect are the Vessels of honour the Reprobates the Vessels of wrath and dishonour and if God make a Vessel of wrath shall the thing framed say to him that framed it Why hast thou made me thus To this I answer We are indeed in Gods Hands as the Clay in the hand of the Potter and when he framed man of the dust of the earth he might have made him the tail and not the head of the Creation he might have moulded us Dogs or Swine or loathsom Serpents and in that sense Vessels of dishonour but to make us Vessels of wrath and in that sense Vessels of dishonour so the good God could not make us no more than he can lie or be cruel or deny himself The nature of God cannot come so nigh the nature of the Devil as to be a Murtherer from the beginning There can be no Vessel of wrath without sin Ephes 5.6 For these things sake having fore-mentioned many sins he saith the wrath of God comes upon the Children of disobedience But we cannot be sinful as we come out of his hands and therefore cannot come out of his hands Vessels of wrath he like the good tree cannot bring forth corrupt fruit Jer. 2.21 God doth avouch he never made a degenerate Plant Yet I had planted thee a noble Vine wholly a right seed The
to love God and to give him thanks to hate God is so intrinsically evil that it is impossible but that it should be forbid If it were possible for this not to be forbid it were possible for this to be lawful for where there is no Law there is no Transgression but it is utterly impossible it should be lawful therefore it must be granted there is an evil in order of nature before the prohibition of it and so some things must needs be good in their own nature as bearing a resemblance of the Image and goodness of God before any external Law pass upon them These things premised my answer is Although the Will of God be a rule of justice to us yet it is not a rule of justice to himself but his justice is rather a rule of his Works and of his Will and he works all things according to the Counsel of his Will and that Counsel adviseth nothing rashly or unmercifully unreasonably or unjustly but according to the greatest Equity and Chancery in the world and therefore cannot without the greatest violence to Reason and Religion be thought to make irrespective Decrees to torture for ever the greatest part of mankind chiesly for the pleasure of his Will Again they say Omnipotent Power authorizes all actions Now if God will make Vessels of wrath what hath any one to do with it May he not do what he pleases with his own Creatures My answer is we must not magnifie Gods Power so much as to eclipse his goodness or his truth which doth assure us that he is loving unto every man and that he delights not in the death of any sinner These men make God a Tyrant rather than a King and attribute such Prerogatives to God as are broadly inconsistent with his nature Acts of Power are not good in themselves but as they are accompanied with Justice and Mercy otherwise they are bad and lay a mans honour in the dust we must not so magnifie one Attribute in God as to justle out all the rest The Lord proclaimes his name to Moses Exod. 34.6 after this manner The Lord the Lord God merciful and gracious long suffering and abundant in goodness and truth keeping mercy for thousands forgiving iniquity transgression and sin Now Gods name is every ways agreeing to his nature which is rather than his Creature should perish to forgive iniquity transgression and sin and not to decree everlasting fire to it without the intuition of sin Let us not therefore entertain any hard thoughts of Almighty God Rev. 20.12 13. when the earth and the Sea gave up their dead they were all judged according to what was found in the Books and those Books were written only according to their works Conscience is one of those Books which shall be opened at the last day and it will acquit God of all hard dealing towards men that perish When Moses prayed thus Exod. 32.32 Either forgive this People or blot we out of the Book which thou hast written The Lord said Whosoever sins against me him will I blot out of my book Where you see sin only blots out of Gods Book and not any Fatal Decree If it should happen to men according to their Lots to be under such or such a Decree and not according to their Works there would nothing be remaining for us to do but only patiently to obey Fate for if an irrespective Decree do shut up the most of men under Condemnation can any one of those men by all his industry alter his Destiny Surely no unless he were stronger than he that made that Decree To what purpose then were all his endeavours or to what purpose should we beat the air and persuade him to impossiblities Yes to good purpose say the Abettors of such a Decree because no particular man knows under which Decree he is I confess this answer is the best they have to give but it nothing enervates the Argument for it is not the knowing of a Decree or the being ignorant of a Decree makes any thing to the altering of a Decree for neither if I know it will it be repealed neither if I be ignorant of it will it cease to be accomplished Now then although no particular man knows under which Decree he is yet he must needs know he is under one of them if there be such Decrees and under which soever he be he is bound with an Adamantine Chain unto it and his end is fixt by reason of it as unalterably as the Laws of the Medes and Persians Who then believing this can believe that his fasting weeping or mourning renting heart or garment can avail any thing to the altering of that Decree under which it was his Lot to be born So that he that hath imbibed this Doctrine hath cut the Sinews of all industry if he acts consequentially to what he himself doth believe Nay but the means are ordained as well as the end may some say True they are so But to the far greatest part of men if their opinion were true God should command them to seek his face in vain for those means could never attain the end for which men should use them namely the Salvation of their souls For never any man from the foundation of the world under that Decreo was sav'd neither indeed can be though Moses and Samuel should pray for him or an Angel from heaven preach unto him he could not believe To what purpose now was the means ordained to these or the use of them Nay to what purpose should God wish the conversion of such sinners send his Embassadors to intreat and beseech them expostulate the case with them Why will ye die swear unto them As I live I had rather you should live if in the mean while he hath decreed their death before they did good or evil and in order to that Decree was resolved never to afford them power to perform any one act of saving grace Now whether there be insincerity in these Expressions or in their Opinions judg ye Nay let God be true and every man a liar Let us heartily believe that every mans destruction is wholly from himself and not from any fatal Decree of God Lastly it is objected the seventeenth Article of the Church of England says God hath decreed before the foundations of the world were laid by his Counsel secret to us to deliver from Curse and damnation those whom he hath chosen in Christ out of mankind From whence they thus argue Before the foundations of the world were laid no man could do good or evil but even then some were chosen and consequently some not therefore those that were not chosen were rejected before they had done good or evil To this I answer as some were chosen in Christ and consequently others not chosen before the foundations of the world were laid so known unto God were all things before the foundations of the world were laid He knew the first man would fall
they infer That as a dead man doth nothing to the raising of himself no more do we that are spiritually dead As God put forth an Almighty power at the Creation of the world so an irresistable power at our Conversion which is called the new Creation Now the truth is in the middle we need Gods grace as well to assist the Will in goodness as at first to excite to goodness and it is very reasonable to think that as the Devil is dayly and hourly suggesting evil motions to us so God or his good Angel is dayly and hourly inspiring and assisting us to what is good according to that of the Apostle Phil. 1.6 Being confident of this very thing that he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it that is will assist you to perform it unto the day of Jesus Christ So that it is plain against Pelagius that God doth not only assist to will but also to do what is good of his good pleasure Neither is it less plain against the other that grace is not so efficaciously inspired into the Soul that is not in the power of the Will to refuse it for this would quite destroy the nature of the Will for as he said well He that cannot chuse but chuse doth chuse because he cannot chuse which is a palpable and thick contradiction Secondly it appears from our Saviours words How oft would I and ye would not that grace is not so irresistibly put to the Will that it is not in the power of the Will to refuse it seeing he blames them for so often forsaking their own mercy So that they not only had a power to resist his grace but brought that power into act in judging themselves unworthy of everlasting life The truth I told you was in the middle way and it hath been the antient opinion of the Church of God for above a thousand years ago that the Will is not destroyed by grace but only repaired A dislocated joynt when it is well set again doth not lose the nature of a joynt but rather is restored to its former use and comliness so the grace of God healing the Will doth not take away the nature of the Will but only makes it able to obey Gods Will. So that when Grace cooperates with the Will man is left in the hand of his own Counsel to turn or not to turn to the Lord God sets life and death before him and bids him reach out his hand to whether he will This is apparent from Isa 5.4 What could have been done more to my Vineyard that I have not done in it wherefore when I looked that it should bring forth grapes brought it forth wild Grapes under the Parable of a Vineyard the whole House of Israel is shadowed out unto whom God was not wanting in the least measure of gracious dispensations to make them good yet they remained unreformed and were wanting to themselves I shall briefly shew you the meaning of those Scriptures which these men mistaking the one attributes too much the other too little to the Will in Conversion and so proceed Where it is said Now they have no cloak for their sin because Christ came and spake to them by coming and speaking is not only meant barely enlightning them but as appears by the Context he by Miracles so convinced them that resisting those Convictions our Saviour says They hated both him and his Father Joh. 15.24 And as for the other Text urged by Pelagius If ye were blind c. it doth not from thence follow that the Will enlightned needs no other assistance but only thus sins against knowledge are not so easily forgiven as sins of ignorance but deserve more stripes And as for those Texts which are urged on the other hand where it is said We are dead in trespasses and sins and Created in Christ Jesus unto good works c. These speeches are meerly Metaphorical and figurative which they so squeeze till they bring bloud and not milk out of the breasts of the Scripture They are Similitudes only and they would have them run on four feet as if all things that agree to a dead man did agree to a man in the state of nature whereas the one is capable of preventing grace the other is not the one may be raised by means the other can be raised only by miracles Neither sin nor grace take away the natural power of the Will but only thus it is Sin hurts and weakens it especially ill habits grace heals and strengthens it and brings it near to its primitive goodness An old heart and a new heart differ only as an Instrument in tune and the same Instrument out of tune there are the same strings still but not the same ordering of them So the same Understanding Will and Affections a man had before only now placed on God and delighting in goodness which before delighted in sin which they not minding make a man meerly as a Tool in the hand of a Workman or a Pen in the hand of a Writer meerly passive to any good action A man before any Grace be offered hath a Free Will to natural acts and a remote one to supernatural that is a power to embrace Grace and work in the strength of it in case it be offered The man which lay at the Pool of Bethesda had not lost his Limbs only the use of them When Christ strengthened those palsie members he arose took up his Bed and went unto his house Thus the weak Will is strengthened by the grace of Christ but being strengthened is able to do what is good God doth persuade the Will by extrinsical helps as well as intrinsical inspirations Those providential acts of Abigail meeting David or of Sauls sleeping in the Trench when David took away his Spear from his Bolster were of grace not only to David but also to Saul and turned his heart from pursuing David Efficacious Grace to use their own term is nothing but perswasion which doth not determine the Will but only is so congruously and seasonably put that it is not rejected of the Will Extraordinary gifts are wrought immediately by Gods holy Spirit without mans cooperation Sauls Prophesying was without his assent to it if every act of grace were thus given what difference would there be between his manner of giving ordinary and extraordinary gifts The Spirit of God is said to help our infirmities in our Prayers in stirring up ardency of devotion in us the original word for Help is a double compound and is Metaphorically put for it hath relation to one that helps to bear part of anothers burthen for him taking it off in part from his shoulders and putting it on his own or else helping him to lift it up Now he that is holpen in bearing or lifting a burthen doth something sure himself towards the bearing or lifting of it And so did St. Paul cooperate with the grace of God for he saith I
ransom for them But certainly he is able to save to the uttermost all that come to God by him For as by the offence of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation So by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men to justification of life If Christ did not redeem all it was either because he was not able or because he was not willing to do it If you say he was not able you blaspheme the power and vertue of his death for St. John tells us If any man sin we have an Advocate with the Father Jesus Christ the righteous and he is the Propitiation not only for ours but for the sins of the whole world If you say not willing you blaspheme his goodness who would have all men sav'd and is not willing that any should perish 2 Pet. 3.9 If any part of Mankind left unredeemed Christ must needs be willing that part of mankind should perish else he would have redeemed them without which he saw they must perish Nothing could hinder but his Will for he might have redeemed all at the same rate but he was not willing any should perish therefore it roundly follows he left none unredeemed When we urge those Scriptures which assert universal Redemption their answers are so weak that it would make a man pity the strength of a wrong byassed education that will not let them see that their answers are mere frivolous evasions When we urge that of the Apostle 2 Pet. 2.1 Some deny the Lord that bought them they answer he bought them for Slaves and not for Children Now I would fain know what slavish work Christ hath to do for his redeemed ones whose service is perfect freedom When we urge that place Heb. 2.9 That by the grace of God Christ should taste death for every man They answer Voluntate signi non beneplaciti that is he signifies so but he means not so If he means not so when he says so how shall we then know at any time by his words what he means When we urge God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son into the world that whosoever believes in him might not perish They answer by the world is meant only the Elect chosen out of the world That by the world in Scripture is often meant that Party of men in the world which is contrary to the Saints many places may be brought as the whole world stands in wickedness these are not of the world even as I am not of the world c. but that in this place God so loved the world by the world should be meant only the Elect I have not saith enough to believe and I am still to seek for that place of Scripture where the Holy Ghost by the world meaneth only the Elect. In a word what Scriptures soever we bring to prove that Christ paid a price for all mankind they reply to us that Christ paid a price for all sufficiently but not intentionally Now I appeal to the universal reason of all Mankind whether if Titius and Sempronius be in slavery he that paid nothing for Titius can be said to pay for him what was sufficient to bring him out of Captivity because he paid more for Sempronius ransom than would have bought it and which Sum if he had designed it so might have redeemed Titius also That such weak answers as they bring should satisfie any rational men must be imputed meerly to the strength of prejudice and prepossession If Christ died for all says St. Paul then were all dead 2 Cor. 5.14 By all say they were meant only all the Elect Then say I by vertue of the Antithesis only the Elect were dead but in Adam Elect and Reprobate are alike dead therefore the Apostles meaning cannot be that Christ died only for the Elect for all were dead both Elect and Non-elect and he died for all that were dead Christ in no wise took upon him the nature of Angels but the Seed of Abraham to shew that he came not to redeem the lost Angels but Mankind that was lost Now if any of Mankind were left out of this Redemption Christ should tender their Salvation no more than the Salvation of the Devil and his Angels but he doth not leave the most of men in as hopeless and helpless a condition as he left the Devil and his Angels whose nature he never took upon him It shall never be laid to the charge of a wicked Angel that he did not believe in Christ but it shall be laid to the charge of a wicked man that he did not believe in Christ which plainly shews he did more to redeem a wicked man than a wicked Angel It should not be a sin in a wicked man to refuse Christ as his Saviour if he be not his Saviour unless he thought him so to be and yet refused him but it must necessarily be always a sin to refuse Christ whether a wicked refuser of him think him a Saviour or no because in deed and truth he is the Redeemer of all mankind He came to seek and to save that which was lost but all mankind was lost therefore he came to seek and to save all Mankind Mar. 16.15 Christ bids his Disciples preach the Gospel to every Creature that is offer life and salvation to all in case Christ should offer it to all when he hath purchased it but for a few there would be matter of disparagement in it For what makes us despise Mountebanks as one says well but that they promise more than they are able to perform Therefore seeing he bids us preach the Gospel to every Creature the glad tidings of the Gospel belongs to every Creature and we are to exhort every man to believe in Christ and promise him life and salvation if he do which thing we could not truly do if he laid down his life but for a few and paid no ransom for the most of mankind This Doctrine of our Church that Christ redeemed all mankind hath no malignant influence in it at all which makes me admire why men are so bitter against it If it were not true yet methinks even for humanity sake we should wish it were true and not to be so narrow hearted as to desire salvation only for our selves That must needs be the best good which is most diffusive and wherein most may partake If Moses was so affectionate to the Souls of a provoking poople as to pray after this manner for them O Lord forgive their sin and if not blot me out of the book which thou hast written as if his own happiness could not please him unless it might be accompanied with the happiness of his people how can we chuse but be enlarged with love and gratitude unto God that he hath reconciled the world unto himself and how chearfully should we publish that glad tidings If St. Paul was so diffusive of his charity as to wish himself accursed from