of everlasting glory through Faith § 7. This Repentance is the same thing with Conversion and as I said before Faith it self includeth Repentance in its Essence as denominated from the terminus a quo it being a Turning from Unbelief to God by believing in him as God and to Christ by believing in him as our Saviour and to the Holy Ghost by believing in him as the Agent and Witness of Christ and our Sanctifier § 8. Particular Repentance is our turning with Sorrow from a particular Sin to our contrary obedience to God § 9. Without that universal Repentance or Conversion which turneth the Mind Will and Life to God from created Vanity and this World no Man can be saved because he continueth an Idolater and Rebel and doth not indeed take God for his God nor Christ for his Saviour nor the Holy Spirit for his Sanctifier but is an ungodly Man and a Forsaker of God and his own Felicity § 10. Repentance as towards God is sometime distinguished from Faith in Christ And then Repentance is our turning to God as God by Faith Trust Love and Obedience resigning our selves to him as our Owner subjecting our selves to him as our Ruler and loving him as our Benefactor and chiefly as the Infinite Good in himself our ultimate objective End And this is the greater Duty respecting God as our End even the same with Love to God for the procuring of which Christ came into the World and Faith is given us And then Faith in Christ is the mediate grace and duty by which we are brought to this Repentance § 11. Not that any man can truly take Christ for his Saviour before he taketh God for his God for the Love and Intention of the End is before our Choice and Use of the Means But Christ being our Teacher first bringeth us to assent to the Truth of God's Perfections and Relations to us and then to the Truth of his own Gospel and by this Assent bringeth us first to a common and then to a special Consent at once that God be our God and Christ our Saviour but so that we desire God as our End and Christ as Mediator as the Means § 12. Universal Repentance or Conversion doth virtually contain all particular future Repentance but not actually Therefore where this is that Soul may be saved without actual Repentance for some particular sins or sorts of sin As e. g. if we are ignorant that such or such a thing is sin for want of necessary Instruction or if in a crowd of business some sinful Thought Passion or Word pass unobserved or if we do our faithful endeavour to find out a sin and cannot remember it as who can remember at Conversion one of many that he has committed in Unregeneracy and after many are forgotten And every Man dieth in some sin which he hath no time here to repent of viz. in some sinful imperfection of all grace and duty and omission of due degrees of Love and other Acts For all which virtual repentance will be accepted § 13. But great and heinous sins must needs have actual repentance because it will not consist with the Truth of Holiness to be so indifferent or easâ—e towards them as not to observe them and remember them And if they be known and remembred they will be repented of when the Soul hath opportunity to consider what it hath done For habitual repentance is necessary to Salvation and Habits will act when they are not extraordinarily hindred having notable Objects and Opportunity § 14. Yet some sins that are great materially in their nature may be lessened much to some persons by unavoidable ignorance and so may not have an actual repentance As e. g. in times of War to kill men in a wrong Cause is one of the greatest â—ins in the World and yet when by the darkness of State-cases the Question who is in the right is so difficult that very few can decide it and after their utmost search each Party thinks that God bindeth them to fight for their King or Country such persons cannot have a particular repentance while they are not able to see that they were deceived § 15. It is therefore a Case of exceeding difficulty what sins may stand with Iustification not particularly repented of and what not or as some speak which are mortal and which venial sins or sins of Infirmity § 16. But he that hath a care of his Salvation must hate all sin in the general as sin and keep up his watch and be willing to know all the worst in himself and diligently use the means to know it and resolve to forsake it to his power when he knoweth it that so he may not be wilfully impenitent And he that will sin as far as he thinks will stand with grace either hath no true grace or shall not know that he hath it § 17. The time of repentance or mercy may be said in two Sences to be past 1. When a man shall not be accepted and pardoned though he should repent And so the Day of grace is never past in this Life and the Damned do not truly repent in our present Sence so that for a penitent person to fear that the Day of grace is past or his Repentance too late if true is to contradict the Scope of the Gospel which giveth pardon to every one that truly repenteth 2. When a man that before had some motions and helps to repent and obstinately resisted them shall be given up to his Obstinacy and never have such motions more Thus the Day of grace may be past with many And such persons turn from God to Wickedness and are hardened in the love of sin and usually blinded to defend it and hate a holy Life But those that do repent or fain would repent or yet feel God moving them to repent have no cause to think that God hath thus forsaken them For it is only obstinate and continued forsaking God that is the sign of one forsaken by him § 18. And this also is no proof to us that such a Person is finally forsaken For many that have rejected grace many years are afterward converted by that grace So that all that we can say is That such as God hath forsaken do continue to the end to reject his Mercy and prefer their Lusts but that he will so continue to the end no man himself can tell before the end § 19. About the unpardonable sin there are two Coâ—â—oversies 1. What it is 2. Whether it be absâ—â—â—â—ely unpardonable That final impenitency is unpardonable is undoubted But the sin in question is called The Blasphemy against the Holy Ghost of which having written a special Tractate I now only say That it is the Sin of such as believing not Christ to be the Son of God but a Deceiver and yet being convinced of his and his Disciples Miracles do in their judgments think and blasphemously say and maintain that they were done by
capable of performing at that time though viciously indisposed it being only natural disability and not moral vicious unwillingness that hindereth Obligation But though not to do all that we can be peccare yet it is not to sin unto Death or Damnation if he perform so much as is made by Christ the Condition of life In short 1. Before mans sin he was under the proper Law and Covenant of Innocency which made perfect personal Innocency the Condition of life 2. Immediately after sinning before the Promise man was not under any Promise of life on condition of Innocency nor yet under the Command of being innocent nor of seeking and hoping for life on that Condition For upon the Impossibility these ceased without a Repeal cessante capacitate subditi But man was then under no Covenant or premiant Law But under 1. The Command of perfect Obedience for the future 2. The Obligation to Punishment not peremptory but due for every sin unless it should be pardoned on due satisfaction These two Obligations man was under between the Fall and the Promise 3. But next sinful condemned man with his said Obligation was delivered into the hands of the Redeemer who now continueth the said Law of lapsed Nature making perfect Obedience de futuro due or Death for sin in primo instanti but adding the Remedying Law of Grace giving Christ Pardon and Life to penitent Believers § 36. The Question What Punishment is due to Venial sin must be resolved from the sence of the Law that obligeth us And the Question is not what Punishment would have been due to the smallest sin if the Covenant of Innocency had continued but what is due to it by the Law of Redeemed Nature and of Grace which is in force § 37. There is a three-fold Dueness or Desert here considerable without distinguishing of which many such Questions cannot be answered 1. A Dueness of natural Congruity without any Remedy which the Law gave or took notice of So Death was due for every sin by the Law of Innocency as I think 2. A Dueness of natural Congruity with an affixed Remedy which hindereth the guilt from being compleat and fixed And such is the Dueness of punishment to the least real sin by the Law of Redeemed Nature to which the Law of Grace is annexed giving a Conditional Pardon to all the World for the Merits of the Redeemer As if God said Thy sin in strict Iustice is worthy of death but I will forgive thee if thou repent and believe in Christ. Here is so much Dueness as needeth pardon but it is virtually conditionally pardoned as soon as committed and so it is not a plenary Obligation to punishment 3. A Remediless Dueness or Guilt by natural Congruity and peremptory determination of the Law-giver And such was the Guilt of temporal death for sin against the Law of Innocency at least the eating of the forbidden Fruit for so far it is not forgiven and the Guilt of perpetual misery to impenitent Unbelievers and ungodly Ones that so die § 38. By this it appeareth that sins of meer Infirmity consistent with sincere Faith Repentance and Holiness in the second sence deserve punishment not all alike but according to the degree of the Offence But not in the first sence or the last § 39. Accordingly a great Question must be determined Whether the sins of the Faithful deserve any more than a temporal Chastisement And whether they may pray for pardon of perpetual punishment or need any such pardon Ans. The sins of the Godly deserve everlasting punishment in the second Sence or Degree of Desert or Dueness which is so far as to need a Saviour and Pardon and so as they must pray for and receive that pardon But not in the first or third Sence § 40. It is the Law of Christ or of Grace which is norma officit judicii and by which we must be judged at the last day § 41. It is of great importance in the Controversies of Justification to know whether or how far we shall be judged by the Law of Innocency or whether only by the Law of Grace He that is judged by the Law of Innocency must be justified by personal perfect perpetual Obedience not by anothers or be condemned But he that is judged by the Law of Grace must be justified by Christ's Merits and Sacrifice or Righteousness as purchasing his Grant of a Pardon and life or Right to Impunity and Glory given by the Covenant of Grace conditionally with his own performance of that Condition CHAP. XIII Of the Universality and Sufficiency of Grace § 1. IT was not only the Nature of the Elect but of all Mankind that Christ assumed in his Incarnation § 2. It was not to Adam only as the Father of the Elect but as the common Father of Mankind lapsed that God made the Promise or conditional Law or Covenant of Grace Gen. 3. 15. And so renewed it with Noah § 3. It was not the sin of the Elect only but of all Mankind that were the occasion of Christ's sufferings called by some An assumed meritorious Cause because by his consent they were loco Causae meritoriae § 4. It is not to the Elect only but for all the World as to the Tenor of it that Christ hath purchased and given a conditional Pardon of sin and a conditional Donation of Life eternal in the Covenant of Grace both of the first and second Edition That is the conditional Grant is Universal Whoever believeth shall be saved Though the Promulgation of it may have many stops § 5. It is not to the Elect only but to All that Christ hath commanded his Ministers to proclaim this Law or Covenant and offer the Benefits and require their Consent as far as the said Ministers are able § 6. It is not only to the Elect but to all Mankind that many Mercies procured by pardoning and reconciling Grace are actually given which were forfeited or not due by reason of sin against the Law of Innocency § 7. These Mercies given to all Mankind after sin and contrary to desert are not given by Gods Mercy alone without respect to the Blood and Merits of Christ But his Blood and Merits are the Cause of them as truly as of the greater Mercies of the Elect. And they that say That God doth give all these Mercies without a Saviour's Merits as the Cause prepare the way for Infidels to inferr That then he might have done so by the Mercies of the Elect. § 8. All these actual Mercies given to mankind contrary to Merit are a degree of Promulgation of the Law of Grace telling all the World That God doth not now rule and judge them meerly by the Law of Innocency but upon Terms of Mercy as is aforesaid § 9. Hereby it is signified to all the World that God is as he proclaimed his Name to Moses Exod. 34. 5 6 7. The Lord the Lord God merciful and gracious long-suffering and
above all Vinc. le Blank yea and of moderate Papists Espencaeus Ferus Gerson Cassander and especially Erasmus And how harsh to the Lovers of Love and Peace are such Writings as spit Fire and Brimstone Reproach and bitter Censures against those that be not just of their Opinions it puts the wisest Divines hard to it how far they may pronounce Damnation on all those Heathens that live in Sincerity though not in Perfection according to that measure of the notification of God's Will which they are under that come to God in the belief that God is and that He is the Rewarder of them that diligently seek him and that in every Nation they that fear God and work Righteousness and are no worse than such Righteous men as Abraham thought even wicked Sodom had had fifty of are accepted of him And shall Christians damn curse and kill all that understand not a thousand Controversies which perhaps the destroyers as little understand and that know not an hundred things to be indifferent or lawful which the destroyers do but say are such § 7. It hath oft grieved me to read in Dr. Heylin's Life of Archbishop Laud how great a hand the Controversies then called Arminian or of the Five Articles had in the Divisions of the Church of England between those that he maketh Archbishop Abbot in England and Archbishop Usher in Ireland to Head on one part and the few that at first and many after that followed Archbishop Laud in England and Archbishop Bramhall in Ireland on the other part And to find what a stress the many Parliaments that feared Popery did lay on the thing that they called Arminianism And being carried down by the stream of many good mens Opinions and Fears I was my self some years confident that Arminianism was a character of an Enemy to the Soundness and Safety of the Church But when I had set my self throughly and impartially to study it I found that which so amazed me that I durst scarce believe what I could not deny even that from the beginning of the Quarrel between Augustine and Pelugius all the Voluminous Contentions of the Thomists or Dominicans and the Iesuites and Franciscans and between the Lutherans and Zuinglians herein and the Synodists and Arminians have been mostly about either unsearchable things which neither side understood or about ambiguous words which one Party taketh in one sence and the other in another or about the meer methodizing and ordering of the notions which both sides are agreed in and that indeed the most reach not the very point of the difficulty and controversie but talk before they understand as their Leaders have taught them And that when the matter is distinctly opened it is found that multitudes that write rail and plot against one another are really of one Opinion De rebus and did not know it And that the few remaining Controversies that are real and not only verbal are but of such small or dubious things as should break no Love nor Communion among Christians but all should with forbearance love each other in that liberty of judging which they cannot remedy The man that could cure all mens Errours and his own and will not is much to blame And he that would but cannot is little better if he will kill all that he cannot cure and no doubt hath greater than any of theirs uncured in himself And what Do I in all this take part with Ignorance Error Heresie or any Sin No! he that can cure it let him But is he a fit person to cure it that hath the Errours of Ungodliness Malice Lying and Bloodthirstiness in himself Or will killing men cure them The Charity of these men saith Burn hang or kill them leâ—t they infect others Ergo say others Kill these that far so because their Errours are the most pernicious lest they infect others with the Asps and Dragons killing Poyson Nature teacheth Man to hate and kill Wolves Kites Adders and all that live on the Blood of harmless Creatures and to protect Sheep Doves and such other Creatures as cannot protect themselves My nature grudgeth to live on the Flesh of these harmless Creatures though God hath given them to us but I little pity a Toad a Snake a Spider or a devouring Fox But regnante Diaâ—olo where the Devil ruleth he will have his Butchers and Shambles and as Brutes are killed for Men honest men shall be killed by these as for God And because God himself will not allow the murder of the Innocent and Just and Pious it is but calling them Rogues and Knaves and as Christ an Enemy to Caesar and as to Paul A Ring-leader of a Sect and Mover of Sedition among the People real crimes where there is real Guilt and then they may say of them and do to them what they will and by cheating History represent Saints as Villains to ignorant Posterity But O blessed be the final Just deciding Judge who is as at the door The Leech's Religion that cannot live without Blood is against the reliques of Humanity in Mankind so much that even they that for worldly interests comply with it do secretly suspect it to be indeed Diabolism § 8. But Satan told Christ that the Kingdoms of the World and the glory of them is delivered to him and their Power is his Gift which he giveth to whomsoever he will and that shall be to those that obey and worship him Luk. 4. 5 6. Though he be a Lyer too much of this is proved by the effects And doubtless where he reigns his work doth denote his Power and Government that is 1. Blind Ignorance Error Lying and Deceit 2. Malignant Hatred of good things and persons 3. Bloodthirsty and destructive wolvish ways And when he transformeth himself into an Angel of Light and his Ministers as into Ministers of Righteousness all this is done most successfully as for God and as by pretended Commission from Christ to kill the most conscionable and faithful Christians as odious Villains and that as for the Church and Christ and for Unity Order and Holy ends yea to kill them in meer Charity though they love not such charity to themselves Such is the Cainites and Cannibal Religion that will dye if it be not fed with Blood And yet is so impatient of its own name and to hear the recital of its own Exercise which hath maintained it a thousand years that it is a mortal crime to tell men that they do that which they openly do glory in Wonderful that it should be a necessary Virtue to do it and a capital Crime to say they do it To know what such do goeth for worse than doing it Inscius Acteon c. § 9. The effects of these Controversies have been and still are so dismal among Papists and Protestants that sure no man should be angry with a Reconciler that is not in love with Hatred and Destruction I confess they are very learned men of the Church
must speak improperly of God or not at all You say that It shall be is a Futurity Ans. What 's that A shall be is a Futurity and a futurity is a shall be Ergo a shall be and a futurity is a being Would I knew what But to hope for that from you is too great Presumption You add A futurity a nothing and to decree nothing is not to decree Ans. Say you so I am glad you say no worse Then if those be in the right as most that think Sin is nothing no more than Death or Darkness you will grant that God decreed it not And if I prove that Futurity ex parte rei is nothing you will grant that it needeth no Decree as such But seeing you are so much on my side I crave your help to confute those that otherwise you defend who make innumerable Nothings the Objects of God's Decrees But yet I would not follow you too far Not to give Grace to an Infidel is nothing Not to give the Gospel not to end the World till the time not to take away Grace Gospel Life c. You say here in your general that none of these can be decreed But then prepare an Answer to your Friends that will take this ill of you I have fully opened my sence of it elsewhere You say Abstract futurity from the Decree and it will be nothing Ans. If you abstract not Futurity as a real Entity from the Decree you will abuse God by presumptuous false Conceits But if you abstract the word shall be from the humane Conceptus of it it will not differ from a Conceptus de praesente And though I more reverence you I may say of some other Objecters that quibble with arbitrary notions that if you except Fatuity and Futility from what they say for the entity of Futurity it is all nothing You add That if in time only the thing actually exist by virtue of the Decree the Decree is something in time but eternally it was nothing That is God's will to effect any thing is nothing till it do effect it Yes 't is God's Will so to do and is that nothing It is nothing but God's essential will denominated from the res efficienda but that is not nothing if God be nothing there is Nothing There is nothing indeed but God from Eternity If you think otherwise tell us what it is Aureolus indeed pleadeth That Actus Dei creantis is neither Creator nor Creatura but quid medium but few second him and many confute him It seems you think of Futurity as our Epicureans and our new Infidels do of matter That it is an eternal effect of God as an eternal Cause I will give you many thanks if you will peruse and answer Raymundus Lullius's Arguments against tâ—â— Eternity of any Creature where he argueth That whatsoever hath the perfection of Eternity must needs have other suitable Perfections and so be God Is Futurity a more excellent Being thaâ— Spirit Matter and Motion to be capable of this Divine Attribute I pray what is the Verity that you say resulteth eternally Can you forgive me for not loving Confusion Is it 1. The veritâ— rei futurae 2. Or the veritas conceptus Divini de rerum futuritione 3. Or the Verity of a Proposition Are these all one with you The first being a Metaphysical Verity is Affectio entis aâ— unum and bonum are And quod non est non est unum verum aut bonum 2. As to the third is it a divine Proposition or a humane If a divine prove that God had either concept as vel prolatas eternal Propositions if he had and you prove it I never denied the truth of such propositions If humane when there was no man there was no humane propositions All that you can say is but what I oft said That God's Volitions were a ground that would have made such propositions These things will be certainly true if there had been any such eternal propositions And as to the second it is not denied as before explained God's Will and Knowledge were certain but they were but himself who gave no Being to eternal Futurition out of himself You ask How are the Promises being Propositions true signs of the Divine Will where there are none Ans. How is the World and signa naturalia the signs of God's Will and how are Writings and Voices signs of it if there be no World Writings oâ— Voices in God God willeth that which is not 〈…〉 himself eternally God willeth Creatures and God willeth Propositions And these are the â—roducts of his Veracity when he sendeth them â—y Revelation and true because they come from â—im When his Will is to give the world an 〈…〉 carnate Saviour may not the promise of this â—ruly signifie his will though he have no Proposition in his mind but only a will to give him â—nd an intuitive Knowledge But I say again â—f you can prove that God thinketh reasoneth â—r talketh eternally and knoweth by terminos simâ—lices Propositions and Syllogisms I will easily confess that all these are true and yet not grant that ex parte rei Futurition or Non-futurition Possibility or Impossibility are any Beings Ad 8. You meet with a distinction of Futurity as nothing and a Proposition de futuro as something with an how so It signifieth only futurity and that is just nothing Ans. You should pardon a man in my condition if he be â—oth to write new Books to answer all Objecters that know not that a Proposition de nihilo is something If Atheists say There is no God They shall know that they say something If I say that there are no other true Gods I say something They that say Datur vacuum say something You say But was it not true before what is your it The Proposition was not true before it was a Proposition Concepta vel prolatâ— Futurity had not the Metaphysical or Physical verity of an Entity for it was nothing The res futura had no such truth for it was not res dum futura tantum What mean you then by it I say still if you can prove that there was an Eternal Proposition de future in God it was true and was God's Essence which is nothing to our question You add Not true before nor knowable as true Ans. You seem by thiâ— to intimate that God cannot know what will be by his production without making Mental or Oral Propositions and knowing them to be true Must God's Prescience be deplorate if he know not by your Meâ—ns and Measures You may neâ—â— say It must be by Sense Fantasie and Species as our Souls work in these muddy Brains God s Knowledge receiveth not a constitutive Object from without as ours doth It first concurreth with his Will and Power in making all things what they are All flowing from it and it receiving from none And in sâ—cundo instanti it discerneth all things to be what they are And wheâ—
Miracles Therefore a Servant of Christ may most comfortably suffer Martyrdome for his testimony to the Deity Christianity the Life-to-come or Charity and Justice against Malice and Persecution and Cruelty which even a Miracle would not justifie more than for a disputable Opinion § 20. It 's a great Question How a true Prophet might be known antecedently before his Prophecy was fulfilled And it 's of great moment to consider the difference between a Legislative Prophet and a meer particular Message Moses and CHRIST the Legislators confirmed their Laws and Word by multitudes of uncontrouled Miracles For Life and Death lay upon mens Obedience or Disobedience to them And if a Prophet did reprove any Sin against that Law the Miracles that confirmed the Law did justifie them But if it were but a Prophecy about some other temporal Event as Ieremy's of the Captivity it needed no Miracle for it was but a temporal Suffering that followed the not believing them The Law of God which should here be handled I shall speak of afterward CHAP. VIII Of God's causing or not causing Sin § 1. HOw certainly the Doctrine of the necessity of immediate efficient physical predetermining Premotion doth make God the principal Cause of all Sin I have so oft shewed and so fully proved that I shall here be very short upon that Subject § 2. To say that God is the principal determining Cause of every sinful act with all its Objects and Circumstances called the materiale peccati and also the Cause of the Law that forbiddeth it and the Person that committeth it is to make him the chief Cause of Sin as far as it is capable of a Cause even of the formal Cause § 3. To say That such a Cause is the Cause only of the Act but not of the Obliquity is absurd because the obliquity is a Relation necessarily resulting from the Law and Act with all its modes and circumstances And the obliquity can have no other Cause § 4. To say That God willeth and loveth and causeth Sin not as Sin but for good ends and uses is to say no more for God than may be said for wicked men if not for Devils save only that God's Ends are better than theirs § 5. To say That God willeth not Sin but the Existence and Futurity of Sin is but as aforesaid to say that He wills not Sin as Sin or sub ratione â—ali but that it exist for better ends or else it is a contradiction For to will or cause Sin is nothing else but to will and cause the existence of Sin § 6. They that say That God willeth the Existence of Sin as it is summe conducibile to the Glory of his Justice and Mercy yea and that per se and not only per accidens do wrong the Glory of God's Holiness and Wisdom A Physician can love his own skill and compassion and the honour that cometh to him by curing a Disease without loving or willing the Disease it self but only supposing it as an Evil which he can turn to Good § 7. They that say That God is the Cause indeed of our Sin but is no Sinner himself because he is under no Law say nothing in the latter but what all grant and nothing in the former but what God's Church doth commonly abhorr excepting some few singular presumers § 8. They that hold That God doth by immediate physical efficient predetermining Premotion principally and unresistibly cause every sinful act with all its modes and circumstances do certainly deny all certainty of Faith and so subvert all Christianity For the formal Object of all Divine Faith is God's Veracity that God cannot lye if God could lye our Belief could have no certainty Now God speaketh to us but by inspired men and not by an essential voice of his own And if God cause as aforesaid all the Lyes that ever were spoken by Men or Devils in the World then no man can be sure that he doth not so by Prophets and Apostles or that ever they say true And God's Veracity then is gone § 9. They that think â—o evade this Evidence by the difference of Predetermination and Inspiration and say God inspireth no Lyes though he predetermine all by physical Premotion do labour in vain For 1. No man can ever prove that any Inspiration doth interest God more in the Act or Lye than physical Predetermination doth For how can God be more the Author of any Act than by effectual premoving the Creature to act it and that by immediate physical Predetermination What doth Inspiration do but so move the Mind Will and Tongue of a Prophet No man can name more that Man is capable of 2. But if there were a difference we are not capable of understanding that difference so well as to prove that God can cause all the Lyes in the World by predetermining Premotion and yet can cause none by Inspiration shall none believe him that know not this difference 3. And were it intelligible it would be only to inspired men themselves So that I am past doubt that we must part with all Certainty of Christianity and of all Divine Belief if we receive this Doctrine of Predetermination because the objectum formals fidei is then gone § 10. They that say that if we make not God the Predeterminer to every act in specie morali and in every comparative respect and mode we shall make Man a God by making him a Causa prima do thereby as much conclude God to be the first and principal predetermining efficient Cause of every wicked Habit as of Malignity or Hatred of God c. because a Habit hath as much Entity as an Act Therefore if it deifie Man to make him the first Cause e. g. of a Lye or Murder in specie then so it will do to make him the first Cause of the Habit. § 11. If it be as impossible for Man to do any thing but what he doth or not to do all that he doth without God's foresaid predetermining Premotion as it is to be Gods or to overcome God or make a World then if Men are counted Sinners and condemned it is for not doing such impossibilities for not doing what God alone can do or for not overcoming Almighty premoving Power § 12. â—t cannot rationally be expected that they that believe that God is the chief Cause and Willer of all Sin should think it very bad or themselves bad for it or that when God hath unresistibly made all men to sin he yet hateth it and sent his Son into the World to testifie his Hatred by dying for it and that he is serious in all that he saith against it in his word nor that such men should hate it and rather die than sin § 13. Therefore as the Church of God hath ever abhorred to make God the Cause of Sin and kept up the sence of the Evil of Sin for our hatred of it and departing from it and our Humiliation as a
necessary part of our Religion so must we resolutely do still or else we shall be worse than the Light of Nature teacheth Heathens themselves to be § 14. God hath many waies to cause the Effects of Sin without causing the Sin it self as by impediments to other waies by altering Recipients Objects Concauses and many others which I have elsewhere enumerated He can will and procure that Christ shall die by the sinful malice and action of the Iews without willing or causing their malice will or action as bad As he can procure a man to be in the way where a Murderer cometh with a disposition to murder and can direct the Bullet c. § 15. When one and the same word doth signifie both the Sin and the Effect of the Sin it occasioneth the error of men that cannot distinguish And so if the Scripture should say That God is the Cause of it they think it includeth the Sin with the Effect So Murder signifieth both the will and action of the Murderer and the death of the man murdered as the effect Absolom's Constuprations signifieth both his sinful will and action and the effect of both The revolt of the Israelites from Ieroboam the giving up of Kingdoms to the Beast and many such-like in Scripture are ascribed to God as the Cause not as the words signifie the sinful will and action of the Malefactor but only the produced effect of both saving when God's permission only is understood § 16. They that deride it as absurd that God should decree will and cause the Effect and not the Wills forbidden Act are too bold with God in measuring his Counsels and Actions by the rule of their vain Imaginations Yet many give us instead of Scripture and Reason but such a confident derision and say How absurd is it to say that God willed decreed and caused that Christ should be murdered and yet willed decreed or caused not that any should murder him That God should will and cause David's Concubines to be defiled and not will or cause that Absolom should defile them That He should will and cause the Kingdom to be rent from Rehoboam and yet not cause any one to will or do it c. But is all false that is not agreeable to their imagination Or is this a convincing way of reasoning It is not from imperfection but perfection that God doth not will or cause mens Sin But it is from his perfection that he causeth the effect as being the Lord and Ruler of the World Sin is not a capable Object of God's Volition or an effect which he can cause But the effect is God cannot love or cause Iudaâ—'s will or act in specie of betraying Christ nor the Iews will or act in murdering him But God can will and cause that Christ shall be betrayed and killed by such individual persons as he foreknew were by their wickedness disposed thereunto § 17. All good men have so deep a hatred of Sin and zeal for God's Holiness and confess that Sin is of the Devil and it is his special character to be the Author of it that when zeal against an Adversary in Disputation can yet make many put that character on God yea as the prime Efficient which is more than a Tempter and this as a part of the Honour of his Providence and think they serve God and his Truth by bitter reviling the contrary-minded it is a dreadful instance how far Faction and Contentious Zeal may carry men And yet when we see how carefully many avoid Sin when they have thus honoured it as God's work it is a notable instance how far good men may err in notions and yet practically hold the contrary truth and what great notional Errors must be pardoned to each other as they are pardoned of God § 18. God punisheth Sin with Sin without causing that Sin at all that is 1. He justly demeth his Grace to the rejecters of it and their Sin is the consequent of that Privation as a drunken man's wandering is to ones denying to lead him 2. God maketh it a punishment when man hath first made it a Sin q. d. If thou wilt commit such a Sin it shall have this penal nature and effect As if in the Law of Nature God decreed that excess of Drink or Meat should breed Sickness that taking a sweet Poison should torment you that Venery should bring the Pox that Prodigality shall impoverish men c. Here Man first maketh it a Sin and then God maketh it a Punishment And Sin it self being the deformity and misery of the Soul hath two relations at once in time the first in order of Nature is the sinfulness caused by Man and the second the penal relation caused by God whose Act indeed was antecedent in his Law of Nature making Nature such that it should so suffer if it will so do and yet the Effect is consequent to mans Act. CHAP. IX Of Natural Power and Free-will § 1. THE Glory of God on his Works is their expression of his Perfections by the Impression of them which he hath made And He hath communicated Being and Substantiality as the substratum and therein the Virtues of Vital Power Wisdom and Goodness or Love and these are his Image upon Man § 2. The more Power therefore a Creature hath the more he glorifieth the Power of God And the most powerful Creatures as the Sun do more shew forth his greatness than the most impotant Therefore to deny or extenuate any Power given of God is to dishonour him in his works So absurd is it to think that the Power ascribed to Man is dishonourable to God as if you took from the Workman all the Praise that you give to his Works § 3. All Man's Power is passive from GOD and superiour Causes but it is naturally active as to things inferiour and in it self § 4. God endued man at first with a threefold Power 1. Natural 2. Moral 3. Political which is a Ruling Power over Inferiours § 5. Man's Power was partly essential or inseparable and partly accidental or separable 1. To have the three Powers or Faculties of Vital Activity Intellection and Will is essential and Man cannot be a Man without them But to have these in promptitude and strength is but as health or strength to the Body a separable thing 2. To have some moral Power to know and desire and practise some moral Good it seemeth is inseparable from Man in via for all men naturally have some notitiae communes and differencing sense of moral Good and Evil Else men should be as bad as Devils But to be truly Holy was separable as Health and so was lost 3. To have some superiority over Brutes and Parents over their Children it seems is inseparable or is not separated for it continueth in Nature But the true Majesty of this superiority was lost by Sin § 6. No Creature hath any Power but what is totally derived from God and
dependent on him and still upheld by him and used under him § 7. Though some would have more Power ascribed to Nature and others appropriate more to Grace yet in this it is no Controversie How much is to be ascribed to God For both Nature and Grace and the Powers of both are totally from God But all the question is Which way God giveth it to man § 8. In general we should be most cautious 1. That we disparage not any Power or Endowment which is God's own Work whether natural or gracious 2. That we give not too much to any Work that is proper to Man § 9. Natural Power of Vital Action Intellection and Volition is supposed by God as Lawgiver in his Subjects that is that we are Men. § 10. Every act of Knowledge Faith Repentance Love and Obedience is done by our natural Powers or Faculties and none without them § 11. The word Moral Power signifieth 1. Sometimes a Power to moral actions and so natural Power in Man is also moral in some degree 2. Sometimes a Holy Disposition especially in the Will to such holy moral actions which is the Rectitude of our natural Powers or the Health of them in a saving degree or sort and is the Gift of Grace since Sin departed 3. Most frequently I use the words for such a degree of God's helping or healing Influx or Grace as is short of a Habit for promptitude and facility but yet puts the soul in such a disposition by which Man can do the Act and it may come to pass without more Grace whether it do or not which the Dominicans call Sufficient Grace and I rather call Necessary Grace 4. Sometimes it is meant as causa moralis for that which is Power Reputatively § 12. Power hath several degrees some can act easily yea is hardly restrained some can act with difficulty yet constantly some difficultly and very rarely some can act but the Impediments are so great and its weakness such as that it never will do what it can And these we call a moral Impotency as being reputative impotency in these three last degrees § 13. Sin hath debilituted Man's very natural Vivacity and Activity to things spiritual and also darkened and undisposed his Understanding to them but especially disâ—ffected him and perverted his will with an indisposition averseness and enmity to God And none of these are cured but by the Grace of Christ quickening or strengthening and awakening illuminating and converting the Soul Of which more after in due place § 14. Adam had Power to have stood when he fell God took no power from him nor let out such a Temptation as he could not resist But Sin entered at his Will and corrupted it before he lost his Power § 15. There is therefore in 〈…〉 such a thing as a true Power to do more good and less evil than we do § 16. And there was such a Power in Adam's Will by which he could have willed what he did not â—ill and by which he could have rejected the Temptation And this without any other Grace than that which he then had and used not § 17. Otherwise all the sin of Adam and the World would be resolved into the necessitating Will and Work of God and so all Faith would be subverted § 18. Therefore Man's Will was such a Faculty as could be a causa prima of the moral modification or specification of its own Acts Not a causa prima simpliciter but thus secundum quid For else God must be the causa prima of Sin which is the ill modification of that Act. § 19. I know that to Nature the Reasonings of our late Infidels to prove That every Act of the Will is as truly necessitated as the motions of a Clock do seem plansible and hard â—o answer because it seemeth strange that in any mode of Action Man should be a first Cause of it and that a Creatures Act should have no superiour Cause in any mode But on the other side the Evidence is cogent 1. That God is able to make a self-determining Power that can thus do For it is no contradiction 2. That it is congruous that below the happy Race of confirmed Spirits there should be a Race of such undetermined free Agents left much to their own self-determining Power 3. And Experience perswadeth us de facto that so it is 4. And they that deny it must unavoidably make God the prime Cause of all Sin in a higher degree than it is or can be ascribed to Satan And is all this with the rejection of Christianity more eligible than the Concession that God can and doth make a Creature with such self-determining Free-will as can as a first Cause of its modified act sin without God's Predetermination And by his help could forbear Sin when he doth not The Contest is Whether GOD or Man shall be counted the causa prima of Sin we say Man is the first Cause and GOD is none at all Some say God must be the causa prima of all that can have a Cause in it and rather than deny him the Honour which is given to Satan they will deny Christianity and deny him to be holy and to be GOD. § 20. GOD made this natural Free-will that Man might be a governable Creature fit to be morally ruled by Laws and rational Motives and as part of God's Image on Man CHAP. X. Of Original Sin § 1. BY one man Sin entred into the World and Death by Sin and so Death passed upon all in that all have sinned § 2. We were not in Adam distinct Persons really for our Persons then existed not and therefore did not inexist § 3. God doth not repute us to have been what we were not for he judgeth truly and is not mistaken Therefore he judged not Peter and Iohn to have been those Persons in Adam then nor Adam's person the same with theirs § 4. Therefore we were not then when he sinned persons guilty in Adam for Non existentis non sunt accidentia § 5. We were Seminally or Virtually in Adam when he sinned Which is but that he had that Virtus generativa from which we naturally sprang in time But to be Virtually in him is Not to be personally in him but Potentially it being as to Existence terminus diminuens § 6. As soon as we were Persons we were Persons derived by Generation from Adam Therefore with our Persons we derived Guilt and Pravity For he could beget no better than himself § 7. When Adam sinned his whole Person was guilty and no part innocent Therefore his very Semen prolificum had its part in the guilt according to its Capacity And though it was not a guilty Person it was a part of a guilty Person and a part that was the Semen personae so that when that Semen became a pâ—rson Cain it became a guilty person the guilt following the subject according to its Capacity And so downward by Propagation
use and by one he merited this and by the other that when though each part of his Condition or Duty had its proper reason yet it was only the entire performance that was the Condition of the Benefits and so of our Iustification and Salvation § 17. But I say before his Exaltation because the Benefits being of several sorts some of them were given upon Christ's merit presently and some upon Man's believing and some not till long after by application But to all these what Christ did only as under the Law of Mediation was properly his merit by which they were procured But his undertaking what he after did in gathering his Church and interceding and ruling may be numbered with the parts of his foresaid merit and still as a Creature he is under his Creator's Law even the Law of perfect uniting Love and so doth eminently merit § 18. It was neither the Covenant nor Will of the Father and Son that we should either have full possession deliverance or right thereto immediately upon Christ's Merit and Sacrifice as we should if we had done all by him as our Person But that we and all things being delivered to Christ's Power and Will he should convey the Benefits of his Death and Merits upon terms and in an Order suitable to the interest of his Wisdom Love Mercy and Justice even by a Law of Grace and a Ministry and Means adapted to the end and in the time and degrees which his Wisdom should make choice of Which accordingly is done This Covenant which giveth Right and Reward to Christ is not it that giveth any Right or Reward to us SECT III. Of the Law or Covenant of Grace in the first Edition § 1. AS God delivered the Law of Innocency partly by natural and real and partly by supernatural and verbal significations of his will so hath he done the Law of Grace which is the signification of his Will concerning Pardon and Life granted to guilty Sinners and the terms thereof § 2. The Promise Gen. 3. 15. The seed of the Woman shall break the Serpents head c. was a Breviate of the supernatural signification but it is not unlikely that God did more fully acquaint them with his Law of Grace and Redemption than those words alone could make us understand Because we find in their sacrificing some such intimation and in other signs § 3. God's actual Continuance of forfeited Life Liberty Health and other comforts and his actual Collation of many great Mercies by the course of Nature to such as by Sin have deserved present Damnation is a degree of signification of his pardoning will and mercy by these natural signs which they were not before sin and forfeiture § 4. Man being after guilt of death thus reprieved and enriched with manifold Mercies and his life and faculties continued with many instructing providential helps and means the very Law of Nature now obligeth him to love and thankfulness to God that sheweth him so great kindness § 5. And the same Law of Nature obligeth him to take that God still for a God of Love and Mercy and to believe that what Mercy he hath already shewed the World and us is on terms which he knoweth to be very well consistent with his Holiness Truth and Justice And it obligeth us therefore to seek to him for Mercy and to use all possible means for further hope and pardon and recovery and not to sit down in despair § 6. The common sence of all Mankind from Adam to this day acquainteth us by that experience That these Hopes and Duties are found in the Law of lapsed Nature For all the World that never heard the Gospel do yet take God to be a merciful forgiving God and take themselves to be under some duty for the obtaining of further mercy recovery and felicity § 7. Though want of the sense of Sin and its desert and Man's misery may be thought by some to be the only cause of this and so that it is but sinful presumption and no part of Nature's obligation yet this upon trial will prove false Though what they alledge be one part of the Cause For 1. These men do acknowledge themselves Sinners and to deserve punishment from God 2. They find some misery and fear more 3. It is not presumption to judge God to be merciful when they and all the World do find him so 4. It is not presumption to judge that he can and will pardon Sin when full Experience assureth us that he hath already pardoned much To remit the Sin is as we now speak of it to remit the deserved punishment And He that giveth Man forfeited life health time and all the abundant Mercies which the World is full of doth thereby so far actually forgive Sin Saith Christ Whether is it easier to say thy sins be forgiven thee or to say arise take up thy Bed and walk that is Executively to forgive them which is the full forgiveness by taking away the punishment 5. It is no presumption to believe such Duty to be incumbent on us as the remaining Law of Nature doth oblige us to 6. Nor yet to take God's own Encouragements to seek our own recovery and felicity § 8. The Light and Law of lapsed Nature doth convince men of the duty of repenting and returning to God and oblige them to it So that as Perfect Obedience was the duty of entire Nature so Repentance is the duty of laepsed Nature And I think few will say that all men are not hereby obliged to repent and that in hope of mercy § 9. Hence it is that it is found among the Communes notitiae and all the World as well as Christians acknowledge it and plead for it § 10. They that by God's Patience and Mercy are invited to Repentance which is a return from sin to God and are by Nature obliged to it ought to believe that it is not made their Duty in vain nor shall they lose by it if they perform it for that were to accuse God of making Mans Duty in vain or to his loss which is not to be suspected § 11. Therefore they are bound not to despair of Paâ—don and Salvation for an obligation to use means as tending to recovery is inconsistent with an obligation to despair Therefore hope of Mercy and use of some means Mankind is obliged to by the Law of lapsed Nature § 12. This is not the obligation of the Law or Covenant of Innocency for that Law bound us only as Innocent to keep our Innocency and perfectly therein obey But it giveth no pardon nor appointeth Man any Duty in order to pardon and recovery Whatever doth this is a Law of Grace § 13. The sum of that Duty which the Law of Nature now obligeth Man to is To consider of all the Mercies which God vouchsafeth Sinners and thankfully to improve them to repent of sin and turn to this God who sheweth himself a merciful â—aeâ—doniâ—g God To resign
abundant in goodness and truth keeping mercy for thousands forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin and that will by no means clear the guilty by false judging and that the World have no cause to despair of forgiveness as if they were under the remediless or unremedied Sentence of Damnation § 10. There are no People on Earth that are not obliged to the use of some means appointed them to be used for their full Pardon and Salvation else Despair would be their Duty and they should not be judged Sinners for neglecting any such means And were they not bound to do any thing for their own Salvation their Sin and Misery that neglect so to do would be far less than it is § 11. Therefore all People have some such Means that have a tendency to Recovery and Salvation afforded them by God § 12. They that say That all the Mercies of the Non-elect are no Mercies because through mens Sin they end in their Misery do perversely extenuate Gods Mercies and Man's Sin and teach Sinners falsely to plead in Judgment That they never abused or sinned against Mercy which God and their own Consciences will easily confute § 13. In the Controversie Whether Christ died for the Elect only or for all Mankind it seemeth to me that we little differ about the matter but only strive about ambiguous Words even about one Syllable for If to die for signifie for their sins under the reason of a Cause of Christ's Death so as Paraeus doth we must all grant that Christ died for all 2. If for signifie eorum loco in their stead so the Phrase hath yet great Ambiguity and will require a great deal of distinguishing for its due Explication The various kinds and degrees of Benefits to which the Intention is limitted do leave the word liable to various Sences Christ died so far in the stead of all Mankind as to suffer Death by his voluntary sponsion as a punishment deserved to themselves by sin to free them all from it on condition of their suitable acceptance of his Grace But if by for be meant in the civil person of all men as representing them the Word is still among Lawyers and all Writers ambiguous In a large sence he may be said to persenate or represent another who doth it but secundum quid and not simpliciter in parte aliqua vel in tantum ad hoc and not in omni vel ad omne And if any will so far stretch the Phrase and because Christ suffered in the common Nature of man will say that he suffered in every man's Person or because he had a special purpose of saving his Elect will thence say He died in the person of Peter Iohn and every elect Sinner I will not strive against mens Phrases if they will explain them soundly But in strict Sence as Representing a man or doing it in his Person signifieth that Christ so died and merited in several mens Persons as that the Law or Lawgiver doth take it to have been in sensu civili their own suffering and doing and meriting or to all intents purposes and uses all one to them as if they had so died and merited themselves thus Christ neither died nor obeyed for any man as shall be hereafter proved But if by for is meant for mens benefit or good so it is yet ambiguous and liable to a threefold sence viz. 1. Intentionally 2. Aptitudinally 3. Eventually for their good And 1. Intentionally the Controversie either speaketh of Christ's Divine Nature and Will or of the Humane Concerning the former the Question is the same with that about Election or Gods Decrees which is before spoken to viz. How far God decreed good to all men by Christ's Death As to Christ's Humane Nature and Will it will prove but an arrogant unprofitable Question Whether Christ as Man knâ—w the Names of every individual person in the World or of every one of the Elect and had a distinct Intent to save every one of those by Name that are saved It 's better let such Questions alone 2. And Aptitudinally there is no question but there is that in Christ's Sufferings and Obedience Sacrifice and Merit which is in its moral Nature adapted to the Good and Salvation of all and hath that sufficiency thereto which would accomplish it if it were duly accepted and improved 3. And as to the Event we are agreed viz. That some and not all are saved by Christ's Death and Merits but that all have great Mercies which are the fruits of these though many wilfully turn them to their Sin and Misery § 14. By all this it appeareth that it is a most unfavoury thing for men called Divines to dispute hotly That Christ did or did not die and merit for all and bitterly revile their Adversaries in the Controversie without ever explaining that one ambiguous syllable FOR or telling men what they mean And when it is well explained we scarce know how to differ § 15. For few will deny but that Christ suffered not immediately because Man sinned as if Suffering were due to him meerly because we sinned but because he undertook so to do and was obliged so to do by the Law of Mediation But remotely he suffered not only because the Elect had sinned but because all Mankind had sinned That is The Conditional Pardon and Mercies given to all Mankind are such as Christ's Sacrifice and Merits must be congruously the Causes of as well as the actual Pardon of Believers § 16. But if the stress of the Controversie be laid on Christ's personating or representing this man or that by that time this humane invented ambiguous unscriptural Phrase is explained either we shall be â—ound to be all of a mind or else some will run into an intolerable errour about Christ's dying and meriting in our civil person and our dying and meriting by his natural person or else they will dispute themselves into a Wood of Uncertainties and be lost about the sence of a word that cannot be sufficiently explained § 17. And they that will lay the stress of the Controversie on the Aptitude or the Event must be men of some singular Conceits and not of the common judgment of the Reformed Churches the Lutherans the Iesuites or the Dominicans if they will disagree for here we are commonly agreed § 18. But as far as I can discern most Contenders lay the Controversie upon the point of Divine Intention Purpose or Decree viz. Whether Christ as God did purpose to justifie and save all men by his death or else Whether he purposed to do good to all men by his death Which Purpose is nothing but God's eternal Will or Decree And why then do they make two Controversies of Election and Redemption when they mean the same in both And here methinks there cannot easily be a difference For in a few plain words whatever good Christ giveth to any that he from Eternity decreed to give them But we are agreed
that he giveth not Salvation to all men and yet that he doth give many and great Mercies to all men and especially that he hath given to the World and not only to the Elect an express conditional Pardon of Sin and conditional Iustification Reconciliation Adoption and Right to Glory And sober Divines had rather say that this universal conditional Deed of Gift is the effect of Christ's Sacrifice and Sufferings than that God giveth it to one part of Men for Christ's death and to the other part not for his death but as without it And we are agreed that Christ doth give to some such special Grace as shall and doth infallibly prevail with them to repent and believe and also actual Pardon Justification Adoption and Salvation § 19. Therefore in this sence Christ died for all but not for all alike or equally that is He intended good to all but not an equal good with an equal intention Whatever Christ giveth men in time as the fruit of his death that he decreed from Eternity to give them And whatever he never giveth them he never decreed to give them What he giveth them absolutely he decreed to give them absolutely And what he giveth them but conditionally he decreed to give them but conditionally Therefore being agreed of the fact and event we must be agreed of the Intention or Decree and what needs there more And by this time you may answer their Objection that say Why not a common and conditional Election as well as a common and conditional Redemption Ans. Neither of them are conditional as to the Act of God and Christ There is no act of ours the Condition of God's decreeing ex parte Dei but only of the thing decreed nor of Christ's Death or Intent but only of the benefit That a conditional Act of Grace or Deed of Gift of Christ and Life to all Mankind in common in the tenor of it should be made was both decreed by God and purchased by Christ. But 1. This is not the whole of God's Decree or Christ's Purchase and Intent 2. And this is not to be called Election as it signifieth a choosing of some from among the rest Common Redemption and the Decree of Common Grace both antecede that which is properly called Election in order of Nature in esse objectivo that is God decreeth to give Faith and Salvation effectively to some of them that had common Grace § 20. The old Solution which Schoolmen and Protestants have acquiesced in is That Christ died for All as to the sufficiency of his death but not as to the efficiency of their salvation Which is true but must be thus explained Christ's Death and Obedience were not only sufficient but effectual as to their first effects that is They effected that which is commonly called Satisfaction and Merit and hence and from the Covenant of God they were also effectual to procure the Covenant of Grace as of universal tenor and therein a free pardon of Sin and gift of Right to life-eternal to all on condition of due acceptance This conditional Gift of Christ and Life is effected And this efficacy of the antecedent Mercies must either be called part of the sufficiency of Redemption as to the consequent Mercies viz. Actual Pardon and Salvation or else an efficiency beyond the sufficiency antecedent to the said special efficiency That Christ's Death hath effectually procured the Act of Oblivion or conditional Gift of Life to all Mankind but it doth not effect the actual salvation of all To the universal Grace it is both sufficient and efficient but to the special Grace and actual Salvation it is sufficient to All as after shall be opened but not efficient which is by the Refuser's fault and forfeiture § 21. When we say that either Christ's Death or Grace is sufficient to more than it effecteth the meaning is that it hath all things on its part which is absolutely necessary to the effect but that somewhat else is supposed necessary to it which is wanting § 22. As there is a common Grace actually extended to Mankind that is common Mercies contrary to their merit so there is such a thing as sufficient Grace in su◠genere which is not effectual So that though it be disputable in what cases this is found and what not yet that there is such a thing is past dispute § 23. By sufficient Grace here I mean such without which Man's Will cannot and with which it can perform the commanded Act toward which it is moved when yet it doth not perform it and this without any other degree of help than that which procureth not the act So that it is not all that is useful to the effect nor all that is necessary to easie or prompt performance or to the infallible ascertaining of the act nor to the melius esse only that we speak of but so much as is necessary ad esse and efficient of the true posse When you can properly say that a Man can do this you say that he hath all that is of necessity to the doing of it § 24. Iansenius himself is so far from denying this Grace called Sufficient that he asserteth that by this improved by free-will without such special Grace as of it self giveth the Act as well as the Power the good Angels stood when the bad ones fell and Adam stood till the time of his Fall And so that such a thing there hath been § 25. And seeing God is still the same and man's will the same in its natural faculties and God seemeth to us to delight in Constancy it is very improbably imagined that God did for so short a time Rule Angels and Men by such a Grace as he would never after make use of in the World and that Man's free-will did for so short a time do its Duty by that Sufficient Grace and never after do any one act by the like Grace in any one to the World's end § 26. It 's true that such Grace will not serve our turn to do that now in our lapsed state which Adam could have done in Innocency no nor will all our effectual Grace yet reach it that is to have continued sinless But it is incredible that no common Grace of God now is as sufficient to the performance of the least good act which is good but secundum quid as Adam's was to the fulfilling of all God's Law and that the best unregenerate man is not able to do any better than he doth or forbear some Evil that he doth as well as Adam to have forborn all § 27. At least to the Regenerate such a Grace must be acknowledged For though of the rest Iansenius will say They do no good because they love not God and goodness and on the like reasons others will say That the Regenerate do no good because all hath sinful mixture or imperfection yet he will not say so of the godly And must we believe that no godly
these are the World in the worst sence 3. Consenting Subjects under the Common Law of Grace who yet were not Iews nor are not in the Covenant of Peculiarity And such are in a state of Salvation though not in the Church of the peculiar as the Subjects of Melchizedeck Sem c. and so are both in the Church and in the World in several sences § 37. Having delivered that in this great Question which seemeth to me agreeable to God's Word I advise those that use to assault such things with reproach which they find reproached by their Party to remember that God is Love and Christ is the Saviour of the World and the Pharisaical Appropriators of Mercy and Salvation do seldom know what spirit they are of CHAP. XVII Of the Necessity of Holiness and of Moral Uirtue § 1. HOLINESS is our Dedication Separation or Devotedness to God and alienation from all that stands in competition or contrariety to God § 2. It is our Separation to God as the Creator of our Nature and our Redeemer and the Author of Grace and our Felicity and the Cause of Glory As the first Efficient supreme Dirigent and ultimately final Cause § 3. It is our separation to God as our Owner by Resignation as our Ruler by Obedience and as our Benefactor and ultimate End by Thankfulness and Love in the acknowledgment of his infinite power wisdom and goodness as essential to himself and related to his works § 4. Holiness is our dispositive actual and relative separation to God 1. When our Souls are habitually inclined to God and to his Will 2. When we actually give up our selves to God and to his will by Consent first and Obedience and Love after 3. It signifieth the relation of the Person as thus habitually and actually separated A holy Priesthood 1 Pet. 2. 5 9 11. § 5. Holiness is the Habit and Act of all the three Faculties of the rational Soul viz. 1. Of the vitael Active Power by Quickening and Strength 2. Of the Intellect by Illumination 3. Of the Will by Conversion Love or Complacency § 6. The Soul as sensitive and the body it self are said to be sanctified so far as they are dispositively and actually subject and subservient to a holy Soul in Holiness and related accordingly as separate to God § 7. Our Holiness is no alienation from the Creature as a Creature in its due place and subordination to the Creator but contrarily containeth our Honour of and Love to all God's Creatures for his sake and impress and a devoting of all that is ours to his use But it containeth a renunciation of that which is against his Honour and Government and Love as such § 8. As God communicateth Holiness really and relatively to Man so holy persons communicate such Holiness to Creatures below them as consisteth in the use and relation of things separated to God by a due separation of them by their dedication and holy use and that in various degrees § 9. True Holiness is the Health the Rectitude the Honesty the Justice of man's Soul and therefore necessary as his Duty by God's Law even of Nature and to his Happiness both in the very nature of the thing and by the determination of God's Law It is a contradiction to be happy and unholy Rev. 20. 6. § 10. Holiness is the end or perfection of our Nature and God's chief Interest in man and is begun by Grace and perfected in Glory § 11. The Fear of God and his Iudgments and a Care of our own Souls and a Sorrow for Sin and a desire of Happiness may be not only Preparatives but lower parts of Holiness but the true formal specifying nature of it consisteth in a love of God's infinite goodness and a Will addicted to obey his Will or a Pleasedness in pleasing Him This is Holiness § 12. Because a man is denominated according to the predominant bent of his Will or Soul he is not to be called Holy who hath some slight inclination to please God and more to please his own carnal Appetite and Will or greater love to the Creature than to God § 13. Christ himself came into the World to recover sinful Man by Holiness to God and disdained not to be a means of Man's Sanctification and to make this the notable operation of his Holy Spirit on us § 14. Whatsoever Law Men are under before Christ or since Jew or Gentile Works or Grace no man can be saved and happy without Holiness that is unless they be devoted in Obedience and Love to GOD and Goodness § 15. No man can be damned that is holy while such nor can God hate and make miserable those that truly love him and his governing Will. § 16. Yet a person that is holy may deserve Damnation by deserving to be denied that help of the Holy Spirit by which his Holiness must be continued And as to be saved is to be perfectly sanctified so to deserve Hell is to deserve to be forsaken to the â—oâ—al loss of Holiness And so though it be hard for us to know whether Adam's first loss of Innocency was a total loss of Holiness yet if it were not it was a forfeiture of divine help and so a mediate loss of it And so a man that loveth God sincerely may by great Sin deserve to be deprived of the Spirit and therefore we must pray for the pardon of such desert for the sake of Christ though we cannot be damned or miserable while holy § 17. Obj. But how doth God love a holy Soul if he forsake him and with-hold his Spirit And if he be not loved of God he is miserable If he be loved he will not be forsaken Ans. Answer this your self as to the Case of the Angels and Adam God loved them and yet not so as to secure them from the loss of Grace But he so far loved them efficiently as to give them that grace by which they could persevere but not that by which they necessarily should persevere and he loved them complacentially according to the goodness which was in them and yet they lost it § 18. Obj. That is because they were left to their Free will and had but sufficient Grace and not efficacious determining Grace But it is now otherwise with all true Believers Ans. True Believers have not determining efficacious Grace to prevent all sin nor all such sin as Noah Lot David Peter did commit And that sin deserveth an answerable desertion of God it being a deserting him first so far And though God pardon it yet the desert is presupposed to the pardon for it is desert of punishment that is pardoned § 19. Quest. If a man were holy that is an obedient Lover of God and Goodness without Faith in Christ would that save him Answ. 1. The Covenants of Grace requireth various degrees of Faith according to its several editions and promulgations It is not the same degree of
agreed what will be the event that I think the Controverfie not worth the handling but made among other snares of Satan to trouble the Church and draw us to vain Janglings about words that edifie not from the Simplicity that is in Christ. § 14. Q. VII Whethâ—r there be a state of Confirmation here Ans. 1. Undoubtedly there are some Christians that are strong rooted settled established and some that are weak and like Children toss'd up and down Rom. 4. 20. 15. 1. Heb. 5. 12 14. 1 Ioh. 2. 14. 1 Cor. 16. 13. Eph. 6. 10. 2 Tim. 2. 1. 1 Cor. 15. 58. 1 Pet. 5. 9. Col. 2. 5. Eph. 3. 16 17. Col. 2. 7. There is a need of strengthening Grace 1 Pet. 5. 10. Luk. 22. 32. Rev. 3. 2. Act. 9. 22. Col. 1. 11. 2 Tim. 4. 17. Psal. 138. 3. Phil. 4. 13. § 15. 2. It is agreeable to Scripture Reason and Experience to judge that strengthened Christians stand faster than the weak and that it is in it self more unlikely that they should be seduced and forsake Christ. § 16. Seeing it is so doubtful whether any that are sincere fall away we have great reason to think that it will hardlier be proved of the Confirmed I know that Strength hath several degrees and it 's hard to determine just what this Confirmation is but I am perswaded that abundance of confirmed Christians there are who have taken hold of Christ by Faith and Love and have clear light and great experience and so much Grace as that from that Confirmation it may be inferred that they never fall away and perish and consequently that Certainty of Salvation and not only of present Justification is attainable in this Life And some of the Papists themselves are of this mind though others of them say That even a state of Confirmation may be lost § 17. Q. VIII Whether Perseverance depend on meer Election Ans. It was Augustine's Judgment and his Followers That Election is the ascertaining Cause of Perseverance giving the special Grace of Perseverance but what that Grace was besides Divine Volition and Preservation whether any special confirming degree or kind it is not easie to gather out of him And I think it past doubt That God doth elect some to Perseverance and all persevere whom he so electeth and because he electeth them and no other But whether many also are truly sanctified and justified that are not elect and so do not persevere as Austin held I said before I do not know § 18. Q. IX Are all or most Christians certain that they shall persevere Ans. No For 1. most Christians in the World hold that Perseverance is uncertain to the godly and how can they be certain of it to themselves 2. Most that hold otherwise hold it but as uncertain and are not themselves certain that it is true though they call it certain I am uncertain And I find not by other signs that the most have more knowledge than my self And he that is not certain of the Premises is not by them certain of the Conclusion 3. Most Christians are uncertain that they are sincere and justified And such cannot be certain to persevere in that which they are not certain that they have § 19. Q. X. Certainty of their present state of Iustification is not fit for those that sin as much and are as bad as ever will stand with sincerity till they repent Therefore certainty of Perseverance must needs be unfit for them And therefore God never giveth it to such § 20. Q. XI Certainty of Grace Iustification and Perseverance and Salvation is a most excellent desirable thing above all the Treasures of the World and to be earnestly sought by all and tendeth not of it self to carnal security but to fill the Soul with holy Love and Thankfulness and Joy and make our Lives likest to Heaven on Earth O blessed are they that do attain it And woe to them that dispraise it and perswade men to causeless doubting It is the height of our attainment here in it self and the improvement and maketh us live a Heavenly Life and long to be with Christ But we cannot therefore say that those have it that have it not But all should promote and seek it § 21. Q. XII They that are certain that all true Believers persevere have one great help towards their own Consolation But if they be uncertain that they themselves are true Believers this will not comfort them As they that are perswaded only that all Confirmed Christians persevere must know that they are confirmed before this can give them the comfort of Assurance § 22. But I have elsewhere fully proved 1. That most Christians have not the comfort of their own certain Perseverance for want of the Certainty of their Sincerity if not of the Doctrine it self 2. And that thousands and millions of Christians live and die in Peace and Comfort that have not a proper Certainty of Salvation 3. Much more may such live in Joy that are sure of their present state of Grace though not of their Perseverance § 23. For Experience telleth us that though most of the Christian World are against the Doctrine of Certain Perseverance of all true Believers yet many of them live and die in Comfort § 24. And Church-History and the Ancients Writings tell us That though for many hundred years the Christian Doctors commonly held That some lose true justifying Faith and perish yeâ— multitudes lived and died in Joy and went with boldness through the flaâ—es § 25. And we see in all things that men are affected according to what is predominant and he that hath far more Hope than fear and doubting will have more joy than sorrow though he be not certain but some doubting do remain § 26. It is certain in it self that God's Promises in the Gospel are all true But every one that truly believeth it is not properly certain of it past all doubt And he that hath the least doubt of the truth of the Gospel must needs doubt as much of that Salvation which is expected on the Gospel-Promise And yet such Believers may have Peace and Joy according to the measure of their Faith and Hope § 27. We see among men no Wife is certain one day or night that her Husband will not forsake or murder her no Child is certain that his Father will not kill him nor any one of his dearest Friend And yet we can have Love Peace and Comfort in our Relations without such certainty For it 's melancholy folly to live in fears of things utterly unlikely and to cast away the Comforts of great probability § 28. Yea no godly man is certain that he shall not fall into such hainous Sin as Noah Lot David Peter did or that he shall not kill his dearest Friend or himself And yet when a man is conscious that his Nature his Reason his Experience and his Resolution do all make him hate such a wicked act and that there
is no probable cause to move him to it and when we know God is ready with his Grace to help us how few lose the Comfort of their Lives by fear of such improbable things Certainty therefore is very desirable but a hope of great probability may give us joyful thankful Hearts or else few Christians would have such § 29. And the Doctrine of Perseverance hath its difficulties too as to mens comfort For he that holdeth That no man falleth from a state of Grace and seeth many that to all possible humane judgment were once excellent persons fall quite away can himself have no assurance that he is so much as justified at the present unless he be sure that he is better than the best of all those persons ever were which doubt the other side are not cast upon § 30. Q. XIII Whether the Doctrine of Apostacy infer any mutability in God Ans. No there 's no shew of it unless you hold that his absolutely Elect fall away It was no change in God when he gave us grace and justified us and it would be no more if he cease than it was to begin It was no change in God when I was born and it will be no more when I die The Change is only in Man and his receptive Disposition Even the Law of the Land without any Diversity or Change doth virtually condemn a thousand Malefactors and justifie the Just and will cease to justifie them and begin to condemn them if they cease to be just and begin to be Offenders The Changes that God himself maketh in all the World are made without any Change in him Therefore what man doth or undoth cannot change him § 31. Q. XIV Why did God ledve this Case so dark Ans. It is not fit for us to call for any reason of his doing but what he hath given us But while he hath made it sure to us that he will cause all his Elect to persevere and will deny his Grace to none that faithfully seek it and will save all that do not wilfully and finally reject it and giveth us no cause to distrust his Mercy his holy Ends are by this attained in his Peoples Uprightness and Peace And he seemeth by leaving the rest so obscure to tell us that it is not a matter of so great use to us as some imagine and that it is not a point fit for to be the measure of our Communion or Peace § 32. XV. What was the judgment of the ancient Churches of this Point Ans. Vossius in his Pelagian History hath truly told you and copiously proved it in the main Before Augustine's time it was taken commonly as granted That men might fall away from a state of Grace and that many did but the Case was not curiously discussed But some thought that confirmed Christians never fell But upon Pelagius his Disputes Augustine defending the honour of Grace laid all upon Election and maintained That though the Non-elect did fall away from the Love of God and Justification and a state in which they had been saved had they died yet none of the Elect did fall so as to perish but that the preservation of Grace in perseverance was the fruit of Election Thus Prosper and Fulgentius after him and some Passages in him and Macarius and some others intimate that they thought there was a confirmed degree of Grace which was never lost but they all took it for granted that some fell from a state of Iustification and perished And I remember not oâ—â— Writer that I have read and noted to be of the contrary mind for a thousand years after the writing of the Scriptures nor any mention of any Christian that was so unless Hierome be to be believed of Ievinian who saith that he held That the godly could not sin which Report is much to be suspected on many accounts § 33. What Use is to be made of this I leave to others but it beseemeth no good Man to deprave or deny the Truth of such History And some great Divines are to be blamed for reproaching Vossius for a true Historical Report when they neither can confute him nor attempt it Two or three Sentences out of Austin are cited by some but meerly mistaken as if they spake that of all the Justified which he speaketh only of the Elect. § 34. Q. XVI By all that is said it is past denial that Certainty of perseverance should be most earnestly sought and that state of Confirmation which is likest to obtain it but that few have it eâ—en of the truly godly and that it is not the common ground of Christians Peace and Comfort but Hopes upon great Probability do sustain the most and that the difficulty of the point is such as that it should in all Churches be left free and neither side made necessary to our Christian Love Peace Conâ—ord Communion or Ministery CHAP. XXVII Of Repentance late Repentance the time of Grace and of the unpardonable Sin § 1. REpentance as a Pain and involuntary is part of the Punishment of sin by the Law of Works but Repentance as a returning to God and a recovery of the Soul is a Grace and Duty proper to the Subjects of the Redeemer under the Law of Grace § 2. Yea it is a great and excellent part of the Law of Grace to give Repentance unto life and to admit of Repentance after sin which the Law of Innocency did not admit of § 3. Therefore Iohn and Christ himself did preach the Gospel or Law of Grace when they preached Repentance which was a great part even of Christ's own preaching § 4. Therefore the Antinomian Libertines know not what they talk of when they call it Legal Preaching and set Repentance as in opposition to Faith as if Faith were all that the Gospel did command or Repentance did not belong to Faith § 5. Yet it must be confessed that of late times many have laid more upon the sorrowing weeping and fearing part of Repentance than was meet and said too little of the turning of the Soul from worldly and fleshly sinful Pleasures to the delightful Love and Praises of God and willing Obedience and Conformity to his Will which is the principal part of true Repentance And I think God permitted the Antinomians to rise up and cry up Free-Grace and call the Ministers Legallists to rebuke our Error in this point and to call us to preach up his Grace more plentifully and to consider better that Gospel-obedience doth chiefly consist in Thankfulness Love and Ioy and in the words of Praise and Works of Love I am sure this use we should make of their Abuses § 6. Repentance is either general or particular General or Universal Repentance is a turning of the Understanding Will and Practice with repenting Sorrow from the inordinate Estimation Love and seeking of temporal Things for the Pleasure and Prosperity of the Flesh or sensual powers to God his Will and Service and the Hopes
the power of the Devil to deceive men These men rejecting the last convincing means of Faith are left by themselves remediless § 20. But 2. the Papists and many Ancients say That by not forgiven is meant only very hardly and rarely but most Protestants expound the words absolutely as they run which the Reader will think most probable I leave to his consideration § 21. Some think that the Novatians denied all pardon to such as committed any great sin after Baptism but Albâ—spinaeus Petavius and others have truly proved that it was not so but only that they denied Power in the Church to pardon such Backsliders which yet no doubt was their Error seeing as God on his part pardoneth men as oft as they truly repent so the Church must pardon as far as belongs to them such as seem truly to repent But frequent gross sinning doth so much disprove mens verbal repenting that such mens credit being forfeit their words are not to be taken till they amend their lives THE END Vid. Vit. Georg. Anhalt Buchaltrin in Mâ—lc Adam Such a noise do the Histories of Church-Faction make about Nestorians Eurychians Monothelites c. that will not permit â—s to pass by these points ☞ These five preceding Chapters were on Emergent Occasions written about Twenty years after the rest of the â—ook save one Chapter Chap. 5 Pardon the disorder of not handling the Law before Sin It is for young Readers sake who would have all God's Laws opened together â—â— give Light to each other Of the divers sorts of Freedom of Will and the fuller opening them see my Methodus Theologiae and Cath. Theol. Dr. Twisse frequently well openeth this * Of this I have published a Disputation which proveth it Mr. W. Fenner put his Opinion for the Traduction of Souls into his Catechismes But the Publisher left that out And where 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is taken for a Testament the Parts and Acts are the same with the Relation of it to the Death of the Testator who as his last Will giveth such gifts on such Terms And Christ did put his Commands unto his Testament John 14 15 16. * John 12. 32. John 7. 39. 6. 60 61 62 63 54. Joh. 5. 22 23 24 25. Joh. 10. 2 3 4 7 8 11 14 15 16. 2. 16 c. Heb. 13. 20. Joh. 6. 33 34 35 48 51 53 63. 8. 12 13. 10. 10. 11. 25. 14. 6 7. 20. 31. Rom. 5. 17 18 19 20. 8. 1 2 3. Col. 3. 3 4. 2 Tim. 1. 1. Tit. 1. 2. 2 Pet. 1. 3. Joh. 12. 25. 17. 2 3. Tit. 3. 5 7. 1 Joh. 1. 2. 2. 25. 5. 11 12 13 20. 1 Tim. 1. 16. Joh. 4. 14. Gal. 6. 8. †Mat. 28. 19. Joh. 17. 1 2 3. Rom. 14. 9 10. Eph. 1. 20 23. Phil. 2. 7 9. Joh. 5. 22. Col. 1. Joh. 3. 16 38. Mat. 28. 20. Eph. 4. 7 8 c. Rom. 8. 9. 2 Tim. 1. 7. Rom. 8. 1 â—o 28 34. Heb. 7. 25. Rom. 8. 30 35. John 3. 18 19. Matth. 28. 20. Heb. 10. 29 2. 3. Acts 15. 10. Gal. 5. 1. Rom. 7. 8. 3 4. Gal. 3. 4. 5. Heb. 7. 10. Rom. 3. 4. 5. Mat. 5. John 17. 2. 13. 3. Matt. 28. 19. Rom. 14. 9. John 5. 22. Eph. 1. 23. * Though this be said before a new Case here causeth me to repeat it Of Sufficient grace See of this my Discourse of Saving Faith * Some say that God's meer will causeth man's act as willing it without any other Influx or Impress on Man's Will save our Act it self effected But though it be only God's essential will which is the first Cause yet the thing received by us from God seemeth to be a certain Impress Impulse or vis or Disposition to act in order of Nature before the act it self which Impress sometime is made uneffectual by a prevalent Indisposition or Resistance of the Will * Though before I shewed that this seemed not necessary to all acts of Man will not overthrow Durand Exod. 34. 5 6 7. Heb. 11. 6. Act. 13. 48. Mark 16. 16. Joh. 3. 36. Joh. 14. 6. Ro. 10. 10. c. Mat. 11. 27. Luk. 10. 22. Mat. 16. 17. Rom. 1. 16 17. 1 Cor. 2. 10 c. 2 Cor. 4. 3. Rom. 8. 1 9 13. Luk. 19. 10. Luke 24. Zech. 14. 20 21. 2 Tim. 1. 9. Heb. 3. 1. 1 Pet. 1. 15 16. 2. 5 9. 2 Pet. 3. 11. Exod. 19. 6. Deut. 7. 6. 26. 19. 28. 9. Isa. 62. 12. Rom. 11. 16. 1 Thes. 5. 23. Eph. 1. 18 19. Act. 26. 18. 1 Cor. 3. 17. 7. 14 34. Luk. 14 26 27 31 33. Heb. 12. 14. Col. 1. 22. Eph. 1. 4. 5. 27. 1 Peâ— 1. 16. Eph. 5. 27. 4. 16 c. * Col. 1. 10. 1 Thess. 2. 4. 1 Iohn 3. 22. Heb. 13. 21. Col. 3. 20. Heb. 11. 5. †Luk. 1. 75. Eph. 4. 24. 1 Thess. 4. 7. Heb. 12. 10. Rom. 8. 1 9. Phil. 4. 8. 2 Pet. 1. 3 5. Pro. 12. 4. 31. 31. 29. See the full proof in my two Disput. of Original Sin ☜ In two Treatises for Infants Church-membership and in my Review of Infant-Baptism ☜ Gen. 6. 9. Hos. 14. 9. Heb. 10. 38. 12. 23. Luke 1. 17. 2. 25. 14. 14. 15. 7 Matth. 10. 41. 2 Pet. 2. 8. 1 Tim. 1. 9. Rom. 5. 7. Mat. 13 17. 1 Jo. 3. 7. 1 Pet. 3. 12. 4. 18. Heb. 11. 4. Mat. 13. 43. 25. 37. 46. Rom. 10. 6 10. 8. 4. 10. 6. 13 16 19 20. 5. 17 21. Rom. 2. 26. Act. 10. 35. Luk. 1. 75. Mat. 5. 6 20. * Against Dr. Tully's Accusations * Dr. Kendal Act. 12. 21. Of this more before How far Infants Grace is loseable ☜ See Mr. Hales of the sin against the H. Ghost and Paraphrase on Matth. 12. lately published