works and in opposition to works That this is Pauls doctrine and Pauls justifying Faith I suppose hath beene enough evinced before and shall God assisting bee more fully eleared in its due place when I come to examine the reasons which Mr. Baxter bringeth to proove his doctrine not to bee opposite to Pauls but the same with it Therefore in calling this Faith a soule couzening Faith hee proclaimes Paul yea Christ himselfe which revealed to Paul his Gospel a cheater and couzener learning this calumniation from that Jewish and Pharisaicall generation from which he hath derived his Doctrine Joh. 7. 12. But the testimony of the Holy Ghost runnes contrary to Mr. Baxters pronouncing them that joyne Works with Faith as necessary concâ—uses with it to Justification to bee the couzeners troublers and subverters of mens soules Col. 2. 4. Gal. 5. 12. Act. 15. 1. 24. But to vindicate the Doctrine of the Protestant Churches and therein also the doctrine of the Gospel both being one and one 〈◊〉 from having any thing in it that may give footing to this 〈◊〉 that we teach a soule-couzening Faith and to manifest that Mr. Baxter doth knowingly asperse the Doctrine of Faith and them that held it with this slander I shall collect into a few heads the doctrine which our Churches teach yea which Mr. Baxter knoweth they teach as to this Question First then they affirme That God hath layd up in one Christ alone all supplies for poore sinners to relieve them against all their spiritual wants of which supplies these 2 are principal ones righteousnesse to justification and the Spirit to Sanctification The one delivereth from guilt and condemnation the other from the domination of sin and impotency to acceptable obedience The former stateth the sinner Rectum in Curia righteous before God again having his sin pardoned and no more imputed the latter spirituallizeth quickneth and new formeth him again to the will and image of God in holinesse and righteousnesse 2 That whosoever receiveth one receiveth both these supplies from Christ none puts him on to justification but puts him on to sanctification also and so becomes a new creature as well in reality as in relation becomes inherently as well as imputatively righteous by him 3 That it is one and the same Faith which is instrumentall both to justification and sanctification though not by one and the same but by severall and different Acts. As my hand even the same hand is instrumentall both to feed and cloth me though not by the same but by different Acts. It is the will of my benefactor to hold my selfe to Mr. Baxters simily having ransommed me from Turkish thraldome and appointed me to honourable service in his house to leave open to me both his wardrop and his store house or promptuary of provisions with a command that I should pertake freely and richly of both that by the one I might be fitly habited and adorned by the other nourished and strengthened for honorable service to be done to him In both these my hand is instrumentall to serve and furnish me yet by severall Acts. It neither fetcheth meat from his wardrop nor clothing from his Pantry and Cellar but by several Acts from both and either what in both and either is laid up for me yet so as all is my Lords goods and by my pertaking thereof I am put into a capacity of dooing him faithfull and acceptable service I need not make the application every one can do it for himselfe The eternall King having layd downe the life of his owne son for the ransom of my soule hath opened to me all his treasuries in one the same Christ the treasury of his blood merits to purge me from the guilt of sin and obligation to judgement and vengeance so that having put on Christ crucified my Law is done my sin forgiven my nakednesse and filthinesse covered and I stand in Christ as perfectly righteous as if I had never offended the treasury of his spirit and spirituall gifts sufficient to turn my water into wine to renew my hart and to sannctifie me throughout that henceforth I shall hate sinn no lesse than hell and delight in the Law of God after the inner man taking no lesse pleasure in the holinesse than in the happinesse which are by Christ The eternall Father offers both together and neither without the other And the same spirit which drawes to one drawes to both The same Faith which apprehends one apprehends both is not a justifying except it be also a sanctifying Faith Yet by severall Acts and from severall treasuries in the same Christ the same Faith fetcheth justification from his satisfaction and new inherent righteousnesse from the spirit of sanctification 4 That as justification ought and doth declare it selfe to the person justified by its proper and immediate fruits peace of conscience joy in the Holy Ghost prizing Christ above all things soul contentation in him living and dwelling upon him selling all to enjoy him alone to righteousnesse and salvation counting all things dung and losse in comparison of him emptying our selves more and more of our owne righteousnesse of our owne-selfe confidence that hee may be made out all at Gods Tribunall repairing no more to Abanaâ— Pharfar no nor to Jordan it selfe but to the one fountaine of Christs blood there to Wash dayly and be cleane neither in this mountain nor yet at Hierusalem but in Christ alone to worship that we may be accepted So also sanctification doth and ought to shew it selfe to us and others by its fruits to our selves by the seeds and habits of love righteousnesse holinesse c. affecting the heart within To others by the fruits and workes of the spirit manifested in the practise without viz. all the Acts of love mercy goodnesse sanctity piety charity equity patience meeknesse c. as also in subduing the flesh by the spirit mortifying every evill affection fighting against every sinn that we may shew our selves a peculiar people of the Lord zealous of every good worke 5 That justification and sanctification by Faith in Christ do evidence either the other He that can finde himselfe truely justified may know himselfe to be no lesse truly sanctified by Christ because he that is in union with Christ so as to be pertaker of his justifying and saving righteousnesse by being so joyned to Christ is become one spirit with him saith the Apostle The spirit of sanctification discendeth and giveth influence from the head to the whole body and every member thereof So on the other side he that by being one spirit is sanctified by the same spirit of Christ may by this evidence know himselfe that Christ by the same spirit is made righteousnesse to him and is in the same relation to God with Christ being justified adopted c. a son and heir with him to all the inheritance Sanctification I say truly understood is such an evidence for none are sanctified but the justified and
praises of the man yet this act of his meriteth it not no not from Mr. B. For as far as he transcribes him p. 182. Mr. Ball no further foâ—lowes Grotius then to Gods relaxing of the Law to take satisfaction from Christ in our steed But if he had also asserted that after satisfaction actually taken they which in Christ have satisfied are yet all their life-time under the Curse of the Law to bear it in their own persons would Mr. B. have hidden it Yet this is the thing in question between Mr. B. and the Protestants whether after the giving and receiving of satisfaction for our breaches of the Law the Curs of the Law be either nulled or els onely in part relaxed as to our bearing it Yea if he â—e as Mâ— B. stiles him then have we the testimony of so great learned and holy a Divine as almost England ever bred against Mr. B. himself not being able to deny any one almost that England ever bred which hath written more directly and contrarily to Mr. B. then this man in his Tractate of Faith about Justification If elswhere he contradicts himself I shall oppose Ball against Ball yea Ball in afflictions when he lived by Faith and had nothing else but Christ apprehended by Faith to support his troubled soul to Ball nâ—w raised to a prosperous state in the world and whâ— seeing the Court infected with Popery Socinianism and Arminianism and no other bridge to prefermâ—nt so effectuall as some shew of bending at least to these wayes might possibly as far as Conscience would permit him make use of the language there held most authentick I say of the language for I cannot condemn his doctrine alledged in his three following Testimonies it taken in a good sense But his ambiguities of words seem to speak him out to have had a levell to somewhat els besides the supporting of the truth and yet his Conscience seems to hold him bound from saying any thing manifestly against the truth Mr. B. may possibly tickle himself with his words but his matter duly pondered gives him a sting sufficient to perswade him to forbear laughter Let the unbiassed judicious Reader add consideration to his reading and then judge The rest of the testimonies which he hath here cited and quoted I let passe as altogether besides the questions which Mr. B. hath set in agitation between himself and all the Protestant-Churches And thus at length have his Arguments been examined which he brings to confirm his Justification by works He hath many things tending to the confirmation of some other Paradoxes scattered in his Aphorisms beginning at p. 123. of his Appendix and ending at p. 164. but because those things are handled by way of disputation against others and Mr. B. as a challenger doth call out there by name Mr. Owen and Maccovius to a Duell with himself each after other exposing them to the world as base and silly Animals in what they have said except they come forth into open field to make it good It shall be both impertinent and uncivil in me to meddle in a business to which others and the same far more worthy and able are called as to their peculiar task I should not be excused by any herein from being one that loveth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be busie in another mans office specially seeing I know not what these challenged have done or are doing in the defence of themselves and the doctrine which they have asserted Were it that their reputation alone and not a truth of Christ which they had undertaken to defend were here clouded by Mr. B. I should think it no fault in them to pass it by in contemptuous silence but seeing Mr. B. endeavours upon their ruines to erect his mounts against the City of the living God to destroy it or at least spoyle it of its principall immunities denying the full justification of the Lords redeemed ones in this world holding them under the curs and wrath of God both in their life and death I perceive not how they can be silent without betraying the truth of God which they once undertook to defend Since this was written I understand Mr. Owen hath fully vindicated himself and learnedly defended all that Mr. B. had laid on his score Thus far to his Arguments that he hath brought to prove Justification by works I find no more nor in these have I hidden any thing but set them forth in their fullest strength CHAP. XV. Mr. Baxters Plea to prove his Doctrine free from Popery examined and refuted I Come now to the most accurate finest and chiefest part of Mr. Brs. Art his Alcumistry by which hee turneth the basest metals into gold darkness into light death into life deformity into beauty and hell into heaven it self All this he with strong endeavours labours to accomplish while with strong confidence hee goes about to vindicate his doctrine from all error all infection of Popery Socinianism Pharisaism and to render it the same with the doctrine of Paul and of Christ guiltless of all derogation to the praise of Gods grace Christs merits or the Saints comfort Yea to set it forth in such a splendor that although hee hath hitherto described such a grace of God as by his donation was no more appropriated and peculiarized to Peter then to Judas to the cursed in hell than to the Saints in heaven and such a Christ as reigneth Tyrant-like in the Kingdom of grace chaining up his own all his own subjects and friends under the curse of the Law to bear the horrors and torments of it in soul and body all their life yea after death as long as the world shall continue though he hath taken away from the Saints after their self-denyall repentance building themselves by their most holy Faith upon Christ the Rock after their renovation and sanctification by the Spirit all hope and possibility of attaining any assurance of Gods unchangeable love to them or of their sinns irrevocably pardoned or of their perseverance in the state of Grace or of their indefeazable right to glory or of their exemption from the curse and wrath of God while they live or of the rest and freedom of their souls after death either from the flames of Hell or of Purgatory as long as the world standeth After hee hath taught that no man shall have any part in Christ and his benefits which procureth it not by his own righteousness his own perfect righteousness in suo genere yea by the merits of his righteousness After that he hath proclaimed that his Gospel brings no better tidings of joy than these Yet at length hee comes to varnish over such a Grace such a Christ such a Gospel such a state of believers who are all of his own faigning with such paints and fine colours as by them to enamour all men to embrace these as the only true and appetible Grace Christ Gospel and state of beleevers That this Doctrine
other sin but final unbelief and rebellion But this finall unbelief and finall rebellion hath its belly so full of other small sins threatned in the womb of their Mother Rebellion as ever a man found of the berries in the belly of a breeding Lobster And in his Appendix pag. 23. he makes finall unbelief the genus to which he attributes but three species of which the first viz. Ordinary finall unbelief is not to bee considered as species specialissima but subalterna which being looked upon as a genus hath so many species or as a species hath so many individuals under it according to Mr. Baxters doctrine as the best Arithmetician in the world saving himselfe will not dare to yeeld up upon his casting the true summe of them to satisfie Mr. Baxters censure therein as it will appear when Mr. Baxter comes to unlace and rip abroad his Justifying Faith in its largest sense Thes 70. To these I might adde many more quaintisies of the same nature breathing out themselves from the veins of this his dispute But all the rest as those already mentioned are but tarrying irons to take up the time of men that are Malè feriati rather love to play with the buttons then to close with the body and drink in the spirit of true Christianity And what other end can Mr. Baxter have in these his chippings and mincings but to shew the delicacy of his wit Whom hath he in the substance of what he speaketh his adversary We grant and teach with him 1. That there is no sin prohibited by the Gospel or New Covenant which is not a sin against the Law and Old Covenant also 2. That finall unbelief and rebellion are sins if not unpardonable as if they exceeded the bounds of Gods grace and Christs merits to pardon them yet which have no futurition of pardon shall never be pardoned in this life or in that which is to come For so hath the Lord declared his purpose in reference to these sins 3. That both the Law and the Gospel concurre in damning such persons the Law as a Covenant of Workes properly for their refusall to submit even till death it self to the will and authority of God requiring Faith in Christ for their redemption from vengeance The Gospel improperly by withholding its shelter from the Laws sentence against them because they would never be perswaded to come under the shelter of it yea more in strengthning the hand of the Law to give them the sorer punishment for the contempt of Gods grace as well as of his Authority and Justice And thus not onely the mountains of their sinnes against the Law but also Christ the Rock shall fall upon them to their greater shivering for that they dared to dash themselves against him and would not be induced to be built against all the stroakes of vengeance upon him This is the summe of all that which Mr. Baxter here in substance saies To what purpose then are his elaborate distinctions of the differing respects and aspects senses and non-senses in which Christ hath either satisfied or not satisfied for mans sins unlesse it be Balaam-like to lay a stumbling block in the way of the simpler people of Gods Israel to occasion their fall to puzzle their judgements and consciences and to make the way of grace which is in it self as discovered by the Lord Christ easie and plaine to be unto them by his evill working therein intricate perplexed and full of snares To all sober men it sufficeth to know 1. That there is no one of their sins in whatsoever consideration it be taken but hath death and hell in the tayl of it 2. That there cannot be any other way of exemption from the death hel which every such sin of theirs meriteth by any other meanes but by the redemption which is by and in the Lord Jesus 3. That the blood of Christ hath in it a perfect efficacy to cleanse from all sin whatsoever no one excepted if it be applyed to cleanse Not the very sin against the Holy Ghost which it hath not power totally to purge out from the conscience if it were truly applyed But therefore is that sin never pardoned and purged from the soul because the Spirit of God never doth nor will apply the blood of Christ to the soul that is guilty of it nor generates Faith in such a soul to run unto and wash in the Fountain of Christs blood that it may be clean Let there be any one sin named of all the sins whereof our corrupt nature is pregnant that is so much a sin against the Gospel but that the purging or not purging away of it the absolving of the conscience from it or retaining of it upon the conscience doth not wholly depend upon the application or not application of the blood of Christ to the soul and I shall acknowledge that I have seen but the Letter and was never yet acquainted with the Spirit and drift of the Scriptures Or suppose we should take a delight to contend about that which is a meer lana caprina whether it be hair or wooll that grows upon the Goats shoulders how feeble might we manifest the reasons to be which Mr. Baxter beingeth to prove that the sins against the New Covenant are not satisfied for by the sacrifice of Christs death As 1. When the Apostle affirmeth Christ to have suffered death for the redemption of the transgressions under the first Testament Heb. 9. 15. Doth it follow thence that he hath not redeemed from the transgressions against the New Covenant also If I say that Christ forgave to Peter or Paul or Mary Magdalen all their sins committed before conversion do I thereby as much as imply that he retains still and revengeth upon them all the sinnes they committed after they were converted Or should one of Mr. Baxters acquaintance say that whatsoever Mr. Baxter preached and wrote untill four or five years since was good and Orthodox doth it follow that all that he hath since preached and written is heretical and erroneous Nay the purpose of the Apostle here is to convince the Hebrews that sought in part for righteousnesse by the Law or Old Testament that it could not make its observers perfect For Christ dyed to redeem the transgressions of them that were under the first Covenant which he needed not to have done if all the Sacrifices under the Law could have purged them And thus the Morall Law is not here at all opposed to the Gospel that the Gospel or New Covenant doe purge the sinnes onely that were committed under and against the Morall Law because all the righteousnesse of the Morall Law could not purge them but the sacrifice of Christ the Mediator of the New Covenant is here opposed to the Leviticall sacrifices under the Legall Covenant What these could not the sacrifice of Christ hath expiated 2. Where he tels us that Christ could not satisfie for sinnes committed against the New Covenant
by the father of it with the name of justifying faith This definition he giveth Thes 70. pa. 279. I put this in the third place not because Mr. Baxter doth so for he hath many things between the former and this but because of its cognation if not identity with the former No doubt he saw the former argument more to shame then help his cause therefore in likelihood he brings it here again in another mode and forme if so paradventure it may relieve him Thus then runs his definition B. Faith in the largâ—st sense as it comprehendeth all the condition of the new Covenant may be thus defined It is when a sinner by the word and spirit of Christ being throughly convinced of the righteousnesse of the Law the truth of its threatning the evill of his own sin and the greatnesse of his misery hereupon and withall of the nature and offices sufficiency and excellency of Jesus Christ the satisfaction he hath made his willingnesse to save and his free offer to all that will accept him for their Lord and Saviour doth hereupon beleeve the truth of his Gospell and accept of Christ as his onely Lord and Saviour to bring them to God their chief good and to present them pardoned and just before him and to bestow upon them a more glorious inheritance and doe accordingly rest on him as their Saviour and sincerely though imperfectly obey him as their Lord forgiving others loving his people bearing what sufferings are imposed diligently using his means and ordinances and confessing and bewailing their sins against him and praying for pardon and all this sincerely and to the end Sponte Cretizantem quis neget esse Cretem Never more dubiousnesse in the most dubious Oracles of Apollo Delphicus then in this definition if indeed it be a definition because Mr. Baxter so calleth it He so speaks all that by all he might astonish some and deceive others yet if he be questioned his words bind him to nothing but that he may goe off and on at his pleasure The subtilissimus Doctor could not more warily have provided himself with evasions so sure that if all the world together should indeavour it none can catch him 1 If we demand of him whether he speak of faith quae Justificat qua Justificat which Justifyeth and as it Justifyeth he leaves us here at a losse and will noâ— tell us 2 In saying Faith as it comprehendeth all the condition c. and by all the condition understanding all the duties which the Law requireth if he be demaunded whether there be a faith which comprehendeth all these or if so whether as parts of it self or things reducible to it or if the latter why are all these or how more comprehended in faith then faith and all other of the rest in his sensu composito comprehended in any one of the rest or if in the former sense whether it be a faith of Gods making or of Mr. Baxters making made in the defining and defined in the making To no one of these our doubts that he leaves upon us by his ambiguity of speaking hath he one word to resolve us so that where to finde an answer to him he leaves us uncertain 3 If we should aske him where he saith in the beginning of of the definition It is when a sinner c. whether he means that the quando is the genus of faith or whether it be a regular definition of an act or habit to posit when it is and not what it is and if so why doth he not define it by a certain rather then by an indefinite time by Anno Mundi or Anno Domini or Imperii or Regni c. that from the Chronicle we may seek and finde it Or if by his quando we can find out the time how shall we find and know the thing Be it that we can hit the time when all that followeth is done and so upon Mr. Baxters authority conclude that then faith is yet do we not remain so uncertain as at first what it is that we may make use of it to justification he speaks nothing to certifie us that from what he saith we might take the occasion to consent with him or dissent from him 4 If we would know from him of all those things at whose being positure and acting he tels us faith is whether they include faith constitutively or else but declaratively whether faith consists of these as the whole of its parts or the genus of its species or the compound of its simples or else whether all these do but declare and evidence the truth of faith in a man If declaratively alone how then do those things which only declare faith any more then declare and evidence Justification by faith and how then holds his conclusion hence that we are justifyed before God by these because so justifyed by faith Or if constitutively as many severall parts and ingredients they make up as it were the body of faith how then doth the holy Ghost oppose faith and works even to the excluding either of other about the point of justifying as in other Scriptures so in that before mentioned Text Eph. 2. 8 9 10. Is there a conflict of flesh and spirit Jacob and Esau Christ and Eaxter in one and the same body and bowels of faith either to destroy the other as to Justification or if faith be made up of works and the holy Ghost doth so frequently in Scripture reject yea accurse works from the justification of the new Covenant how is not faith it self which is nothing else but a body and bundle of works accursed from justification also In none of these ambiguities that he hath left in his Thesis doth he speak one word to saâ—isfie us Lastly where he saith that faith is when all these duties are done sincerely to the end if we demand him whether he mean thaâ— when there is an end of doing them or of the man that doth them that then faith hath its being and not till then and so all other duties act in justifying while we live and faith after all when we are dead or whether he means that as long as these duties are done faith is but when they arâ— not done or when they cease to act faith is not but loseth its being Fuit Ilium ingens gloria Teuerorum I had once a faith and a ravishing joy in beleeving either while I was under sufferings for Christs sake but now my sufferings are ended and I am no more persecuted my faith is expired or while I waited on all the ordinances of Christ but now my sick bed or prison or banishment intercepts me from many of Christs ordinances My faith is lost which of these wayes or in what third sense he will be understood let him that can conjecture but in respect of any thing that we have under his hand in the Thesis he is yet free to choose his meaning so that in all that he
the Author wisheth all Grace and perfections in the LORD JESUS Madam IT abides I know in fresh remembrance with you by whom and with what transcendent praises both of the Worke its Author the Aphorisms in this ensuing Tractate examined were commended to your perusall to be an Enchiridion or Manual still in your hand or rather a Pectorall and Antidote next your heart to defend it against errors and inward Anguish But so abundantly hath God enriched you with the knowledg of and zeale for that pretious Mistery of Christ that you quickly saw the Misterie of iniquity that lurked in it therefore cast it aside as unprofitable yea noxious Yet afterward finding some of the Ministers with whom you had acquaintance deceived by it you intreated me to take it and give you my judgment of the worke and my exceptions against some Mistakes in it And as the deceit was â—urther propagated so you urged me to increase my exceptions and now at length that which was not purposed at first is come forth to publique view an Answer to Mr. Brs Aphorisms Alas that wee are brought forth in such an Age wherein the defence of Christs cause is left to fools and carkasses of men the Learned and potent declinâ—ng the service that in the midst of our Civill or rather uncivil broyls one against another there should be found such as fall foule with the Grace of God and Merits of Christ also that to preach the Gospel of Christ purely after the example and precepts of Paul and Luther should render a man in the opinion of so many an Heretick but to follow Arminius and Bellarmine gets applause that we are forced to see men violent and using force to subvert not to enter into the Kingdom of Christ If this â—reatise shall by the assistance of Gods mercy be in any degree helpfull to cure this Malady they that finde or see the benefit are bound to praise God for you that by you as a speciall instrument instigating it came to see the Light Whatsoever weakness there is in it will redound to the shame of the Author not at all reflect upon you whose desire it was could you have attained it to have had the best Patron employed in the defence of the best Cause I expect that Mr. Br. will come forth and that speedily with a vehement Reply But whatsoever he saith I shall follow the precept of the Apostle Tit. 3. 10 11. He hath had a first and two hundred of Admonitions as they report which come from him which he laies as heaps of sand not answering any of them how should I follow the Apostles precept in not rejecting in having any thing more to do with him The present Worke had no other relation to him but as to the undeceiving of the simple which had received infection from him But if my beloved and Reverend Brother in the work of the Lord which commended to you Mr. Brs Aphorisms and hath made it long his work to propagate it through many Counties yea undertaken in the Western Counties to be the defâ—nder of all that Mr. Br hath written in that Book the performance whereof is by many Ministers there expected will take it up as his task to Apologize for him and affirm the Apology as in his name so to be his owne I shall in despight of all infirmities of mind and body so long as breath lasteth by Gods assistance Anti-apologize for Christ and that not in such an expression of words as I have used to M. Br whom I look upon as an Impostor but in such a spirit of meekness and Reverence as is meet to be used towards so pious and learned a Divine who cannot dares not against the light of his conscience hold any Truth of God in unrighteousness The Lord give unto you to keep your station firm in the Light and heat of the Sun of Righteousness that the splendor thereof may more and more shine into your understanding and the heat thereof more inflame your affections to the pure Gospel of Christ that you may be able to comprehend with all Saints what is the breadth and length and depth and height And to know the love of Christ which surpasseth all knowledg and be filled with all the fulness of God This is the request of From my Lodging Decemb. 24. 1653. MADAM Your humble servant and daily Remembrancer at the throne of Grace J C THE PREFACE TO THE READER Courteous Reader IF thou knowest me as well as I know my selfe thou wilt also wonder as much as my self to see me appeare in Print specially in so Momentous a Cause and that against so formidable an Antagonist But the ground of our wondering may somewhat differ That which affects thee may be that a man of so despicable parts should dare to brandish a weapon though the Lords against so great incomparable a Champion as flesh and blood accounts him But the thing which affects me is that the Heroick Worthies of our Land hide their heads and Come not forth to helpe the Lord against the mighty Jud. 5. 23 but leave the defence of Christs cause to contemptible and unqualified persons for such a performance In excuse of my selfe against the imputation of rashnesse and presumption I can say Mr. Baxters Aphorisms had been extant full three yeares before I put pen to paper to except against him A strong expectation still possessed me of seeing something come forth against him from an abler hand When my expectation failed and I found his Tractate of all other that have come forth these many yeares most perillous and pernicious as destroying the very foundation of a Christians hope and comfort at length I thought it fit to do my endeavour for the undeceiving of some private Friends either taken or in danger to be taken in his snares not ceasing still to expect the publication of some work by others openly to vindicate the grace of God from his injurious warring against it At length having finished what I thought fit to be communicated privately to some friends and not with-holding the view thereof from any that craved it I suffered it to sleep many moneths in hope still to see a more learned answer to his worke What should I do more May not I justly say with David when all the armed Worthies of Israel either fled or at least shunned the encounter was there not a cause to stand forth for lack of better weapons with a sling and a smooth stone trusting in the name of the God of Israel whose grace this man had defied When the wise and prudent the high Priests Scribes and Pharisees oppugned the grace of God in giving Christ to be the justifier of Publicans Harlots and Sinners the spirit of Christ enlarged the hearts of the illiterate and vulgar to sing their Hosannahs and out of the mouths of babes and sucklings ordained praise to himselfe Nay if these should hold their peace the very stones should cry out
in name but as void of the truth and power of Christianity as are the very Pagans that never heard of Christ I come now to speak of the fatall if I may so term it and almost totall ruine of the Church and Gospel Towards the end of that which is called the Primitive Church and of them which are dignified with the name of the ancient Fathers of the Church As the Saracens invaded the Eastern Churches so a most stupendous and barbarous people not onely unchristian but also inhumane the Goths and Vandals made incursions upon these Western Churches with one swelling tide carrying all at once before them and made impression into Italy it self and seizing on Rome made it their imperiall City and reigning over or at least molesting all those nations which in this western part of the world were then termed Christians made it their work for more then a hundred years not only to raze out the very being of christianity from the earth but also all polite learning filling all things and places with their barbarism which also in length of time they accomplished almost to the utmost Now when at length by the valour of Carolus Magnus they were discomfited and wholly driven out of these christian Lands after their subversion there sprung out of the Barbarism which they left behind them a Barabarian sect of Divines more pernicious to Religion then the Goths Vandals had been In a general term they are usually called Schoolmen or School-Doctors These like the Babel-builders erected upon other foundations and of other materials a Babel-Church with such barbarous slime in stead of cement and morter as was never before used since the first building of the old Babel who exauctorating Christ and his Gospel from having any soveraignty in matters of Religion and permitting them but now and then to peep for their advantage canoniz'd Aristotle the most subtle but untill then the least regarded of all the sects of Heathen Philosophers to be their ipse dixit chose Peter Lombards sentences to be their Text themselves to be the Commentators The matter of their Commentary a Miscellane partly of the excrements of their own brains partly of moralities legalities formalities and partly of superstitions idolatries and heresies borrowed some from the Jewes some from the Heathen and the rest from Hell it self The Language in which all is set forth no Language but being cought out in syllabical barbarous and bombastical sounds of their own coining would better fit the bellowing of a beast than the utterance of men or if the utterance of men more beseeming Conjurers and Charmers than Divines The God whom they serve and sacrifice unto in all is not Christ but Antichrist whose commands and decrees assoon as they have received they must and will with all their Hyperborean conjurations of ghastly words defininitions argumentations and a cell or hell full of distinctions maintain them to be from heaven though they smell of nothing but hell it self Nimble work-men leaving a glory upon their disputes when they meet with sublunary matter with a subject not above the comprehension of natural reason but such whereof all men have an idea or image within their Synterisis or natural conscience but when they meet with Gospel-doctrine that makes men wise to salvation blinder than Balaam that saw less than his Asse which hee rode upon These have erected and held up many hundred years a religion which can save none but damneth all that cleave strictly to it and they have this peculiar vertue that they have still waxed wors and wors the second generation more impure than the first and the third than the second and so lineally every generation almost until now save that in these last times they have attained so much of the subtlety falshood and impiety of Satan that there is scarce a possibility of receiving a further addition If then any man will read how far the humane Learning of which I am speaking may be helpful to propagate maintain the truth of the Gospel let him but look back to the fruit of these sophistical Doctors Labours these many hundred years last past and by that which hee seeth he shal be able to answer himself viz. that it hath been and is powerful to deface and subvert utterly the whole truth and salvation of the Gospel in relation to their Disciples that rest upon their Learning and Precepts for look what of Religion worship and ordinances there is in the Popish Church the praise of it redounds to philosophy and sophistry the main instruments of laying its ground-work and the sole instruments unless ye will annex to it the fire and fagot and tyrannical inquisition for the maintenance thereof Having seen how great a corruption and how long a desolation of the truth of Religion there hath been while Sophistry was made its perfidious Advocate We are now in the next place to consider how the same truth of Christian Religion thrived when delivered out of the captivity of and communion with this secular Learning After the long holding of the purity of the Gospel in unrighteousnes by these Theologasters it pleased God to raise up to himself for the reformation of his Church men of his own choise and gifted with a measure of the Spirit answering so great a work to which they were deputed as Luther Zuinglius and many other learned and godly men some their contemporaries some their followers These restored the Scriptures to light again which had been many hundred years buried in darknes and preached again the true and clear Gospel which had been long also clouded with mens inventions traditions and superstitions What success this their Ministry had cannot be unknown to them that know any thing of the history of those times Disciples came in by thousands and ten thousands unto Christ being totally revolted from Antichrist Whole Kingdoms Nations Dukedoms that ere while worshipped the Beast now fell flat at the feet of Christ to submit to his Scepter And this not as constrained by the command of their Magistrates or Laws but even while Magistrates and Laws slept yea when Magistrates and Laws persecuted with Fire and Sword all that went this way even then the Kingdom of heaven suffered violence and the violent tooke it by force i. e. by an unresistible conviction of the word and wonderful operation of this Spirit upon their souls they were carryed out in contempt of all dangers and persecutions to receive the Lord Jesus Christ purely revealed in his righteousnes beawty and salvation to them So that in few years maugre all the malice of the Pope Emperour Kings Princes World and Hell Christ might be even seen reigning in the midst of his Enemies and whole Lands at least great multitudes of many Lands which were darknes became light in the Lord even so farr as we see the Protestant Religion at this day propagated If it be demanded here how it came to pass that the word and truth of
before and in those thousands of years oft held out afresh and renewed but in opposition to the Covenant of Grace as it is now held forth in a new form and administration under the Gospel So that the two Covenants there mentioned are termed Old and New not for their differing in substance but for their different wayes of administration The Church of Israel then and the Churches of Christ now are and were under the same Covenant of Grace in substance but the Church then under a legall and the Church now under an Evangelicall and spirituall administration thereof That was the old this the new administration and in respect hereof the same Covenant then and now are termed the Old and New Covenant This is evident from the Text It shall come to passe saith the Lord that in those dayes I will make a New Covenant with them not such as I made with their Fathers when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Aegypt which my Covenant they brake though I were an Husband to them saith the Lord. But this is the Covenant that I will make with them in those dayes I will put my Lawes in their minds c. And I will be their God c. And they shall not teach every man his neighbour c. For I will be mercifull to their unrighteousnes and their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more Here Mr. B. must 1 Grant that the Old Covenant in this place mentioned was the Covenant of the Law given in the Wildernes For this is expresly affirmed where it is said to be made with their Fathers when the Lord took them by the hand to bring them out of the Land of Aegypt And 2 Notwithstanding Israel being under the Covenant they were not either wholly under a Covenant of works or besides the Covenant of Grace For the Apostle maketh these two phrases to be Aliens from the Common-wealth of Israel and Strangers from the Covenant of Promise to sound one and the same thing Ephes 2. 12. and telleth us that the Law which was 430 years after could not null the Covenant that was confirmed before of God in Christ so as to make the Promise of no effect but that after the addition of this Legall Covenant that Gospel Covenant made with Abraham and them iâ— him of blessednes by Christ the seed of Abraham stood firm unto them still Gal. 3. 17. This also will doubtles be granted 3 That therefore the Gospel Covenant in this Scripture promised is called a New Covenant not in opposition to that made with Abraham for that is the same with this here promised onely that was confirmed of God in Christ to come this in Christ already come and yet in opposition to that legall administration of it and additory Covenant of the Law 430 years after annexed 4 That this additionall Covenant was that Pedagogy of the Law under which the Apostle affirmeth the Jewes though Lords of all to be kept untill the coming of Christ in the third and fourth chapters to the Galathians And it consisted partly of Ceremoniall Lawes and typicall Ordinances pointing to Christ that was to come and obscurely teaching Christ and Faith in him partly of the Morall Commandments the observation whereof was injoined as a condition of attaining that blessednes before promised to Abraham in Christ yet so as this condition If ye will obey was still in the hand of a Mediator satisfying for disobedience because no perfect obedience could be fulfilled This Pedagogy or leading of the Jewish Church by the hand while it was a child in the knowledg of the mystery of salvation by Christ was needfull it could not well be without the typicall Ordinances which by Lectures read upon them by their teachers might discover and seal up much of Christ to them Neither could it well be without the promises and threats of the Law while yet the Grace of the Lord Christ was veiled to them that in the light joy and brightnes thereof they could not as the Saints now run the race of Gods Commandments of pure love without some mixture of servile fear 5 It will hence then follow that the New Covenant here promised is termed a new Covenant because exempted from that additament of the Law 1 From the Ceremoniall Law which in its revealing of Christ veiled him and let out but a dark shadow of him and the grace that is by him so that there was need of a large exposition upon every figure Circumcision Passeover Sacrifices c. Brother to teach Brother and one Neighbour another what these things meant and yet at last both teachers and learners remained exceeding dark in the mystery of Christ But it is otherwise with us under the Gospel The shaddowes are vanished and we have the very body which is Christ Col. 2. 17. Our eyes have seen we have heard with our ears and our hands have handled the bread of life 1 Joh 1. 1. All is made out to us cleerly by the Doctrine and Spirit of Christ The Law by which the Prophet speaking in the tone of the Iewes and in a phrase which under that administration they best knew understandeth the Gospel and Law of the Spirit of life is written in our hearts revealed and sealed up to our Consciences We need not say Who shall ascend up to Heaven or who shall discend to the deep c. But the word is nigh thee even in thy mouth and in thy heart this is the word of Faith which we preach Rom. 10. 6-8 So that there is not so much need of brothers teaching brother c. because all is held forth not in the shadow but in the clear light 2 From the conditions of the morall Law yea from all conditions which made that former administration of the Covenant terrible because conditions could not be performed The New Covenant saith the Holy Ghost shall be absolute not such as was made with their Fathers that might be broken but free and absolute all begun and ended by the meer grace of God I will teach c. I will be their God and they shall be my people I will be mercifull to their unrighteousnes and their sins and iniquity will I remember no more I am not so happy as to express my self in few words nor so either reckles or evilly subtle as under a pretence of brevity to leave things in ambiguity for self-ends This I conceive to be the meaning of this text and in these five Positions I have sub calculo melioris judicij expressed what yet I conceive to be the truth about the Covenant of Grace 1 between God and Christ 2 between Christ and man To this last thing handled that the Covenant of Grace in its present administration is free and not conditionall otherwise then I have before granted the Apostle giveth purposely his suffrage affirming the Covenant made to Abraham is that which now stands in force that the Law
signifie But that he means to extoll them he doth enough plainly give us to understand When he saith that the purchase did not Onely serve to advance the value and efficacy of that grain of pepper his meaning must be at least that Christ dyed and by his death hath purchased to the pepper-corn of mans righteousness a value and efficacy in part though not Onely to Justifie us so that our righteousness must go Cheek by Cheek with the righteousness of Christ to Justification Now as if Usury as it Consisteth in taking increase be unlawfull a penny of a hundred pounds taken by way of increase is no less in substance Usury and unlawfull than the taking of Tenn pounds of the hundred so if the adding of our righteousness to the righteousness of Christ for our justification be an unlawfull exalting of our own and depressing of Christs righteousness then to bring our own righteousness with the righteousness of Christ in the least part to justifie is as truly an unlawfull depression of Christs righteousness and advancing of our own as if we brought it in the highest degree wholly and alone to justifie us and so by his account Christ dyed to make man though not the Onely yet in part a saviour of himself And herein to follow his doctrine is the ready way to be a self-destroyer Christ is become of none effect to you whosoever of you are justified by the Law ye are faln from grace said the Apostle to a people that did extoll but in part and not Onely their own righteousness to justification Though it be not Onely poyson which a man eateth yet it there be poyson in it it brings death after iâ— If we magnifie one grain of our own pepper to that height that we make it a part of that righteousness by which to stand at Gods tribunall this one grain will sink us down to hell so hot a poyson is Mr. Brs pepper-corn I shall joyn that which followes in the similitude viz. Bax. But thus A personall Rent must be payd for the testification of his homage He was never Redeemed to be Independent and his own Landlord and Master The olde Rent he cannot pay his new Landlords clemency is such that he hath resolved this grain shall serve the turn With that which is homogeneous to it in the application Bax. Two things are considerable in this debt of righteousness The value and the personall performance or interest The value of Christs satisfaction is imputed to us in stead of the value of a perfect Obedience of our own performing and the volue of our Faith is not so imputed But because there must be some personall performance of homage therefore the personall performance of Faith shall be imputed to us for a sufficient personall payment as if we had payd the full Rent because Christ whom we beleeve in hath payd it and he will take this for satisfactory homage so it is in point of personall performance and not of value that faith is imputed It is not denyed but a personall testification of homage is required We were not Redeemed to be independent or our own Landlords and Masters to serve our selves and walk after our own thoughts No Ye are not your own for ye are bought with a price saith the Apostle Therefore glorifie God in your body and in your Spirit which are Gods 1 Cor. 6. 20. And again He hath given himself for us that he might redeem us from all iniquity and purifie to himself a peculiar people zealous of good works We must live and dye to him that dyed for us in testification of our homage But the thing in question is not whether this homage is to be done but whether when it is performed it be a Cause or an effect of our redemption and justification Whether we are to perform all duty that we may be redeemed and justified or because we are redeemed and justified Whether the relation of the persons go before the relative duties or the relative duties before the relation of the persons Reason tells us that filiall obedience doth alway presuppose the relation of a Son and where there is no Childe there can be expected no Childlike obedience First free and then free service And to this tenor runs the vote and voyce of the Gospel We are delivered out of the hands of our enemies that we may serve him without fear in holines and righteousness before him all the dayes of our life Luk. 1. 74 75. Not that we shall be delivered out of c. because we have so served him all the dayes of our life That we are married to Christ that we should bring forth fruit unto God Rom. 7. 4. Not that we are married to Christ because we have brought forth fruit unto God That he dyed for all that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves but unto him that dyed for them 2 Cor. 5. 15. Not that we must live to Christ that we may live by Christ and obtein life by his death If any man be in Christ he is a new creature 2 Cor. 5. 17. Not that he must be a new creature to the end that he may be in Christ Mr. Br shakes the whole frame of the Gospel into a topsie-turnie and might as rationally make our glorification the Condition of our sanctification as sanctification the Condition of our Justification and Adoption As for the distinction which he puts in the application between the value and the performance of Faith i. e. in his sense of sanctification making the value of Christs satisfaction to be imputed in stead of the value of a perfect obedience and the personall performance of Faith to be imputed onely in stead of the personall performance of the Law and so our inchoat sanctification for that he means by the performing of faith is imputed to us in place of performing all perfect righteousness unto justification some pretty witty men may be taken with it as a pretty witty fancy But whosoever Loveth the Lord Jesus up to a due jealousie for his honour Cannot but have his heart full of trembling to see the sacred word and mysteries of Christ to be made the play-game of an audacious and frothy wit and eluded yea vilified and enervate with such absurd and windy distinctions that have no footing in the word of God Himself using this distinction with a purpose not to teach but to Cheat the simple For pag. 141. he doth in express words affirm the worthines or value which he doth here ascribe to Christs satisfaction to lye in our performance or works Either he must be destitute of all natural and moral operations of Conscience or an Anti-Hannibal that hath sworn unreconcileable warrs not for God against Rome but for Rome against Christ that in so holy a busines can so frequently and fearlesly act the wanton I shall conclude therefore in the words which Mr. Pemble hath against the brethren of Mr. Br in this point
of rich glasses set in artificiall order and able to dazle the eye of the beholder what pity is it that any one of them should meet with a knock and be broken and so the beautifull order in which they were placed be on a suddain marred yet if such a thing should fall out it were no great wonder Pretinesse and strength are rarely twins and we speak of prety things but rarely long in the present tense before their perishing by weaknesse forceth us to take up another tone and to tell that there was such a delicate toy but if we seek it the place thereof is not to be found It is possible such a stroke may befall the image that Mr. Baxter hath here set up in imitation of that of Nebuchadnezzar Dan. 2. 31 32 33 c. it hath clay in the feet cannot goe without halting if it meet with a stone to crush its toes it may possibly fall all to shivers Himself seems to doubt of it therefore prepares himself to defend it as seeing it cannot defend him or it self So saith he in the Explication B. Here it will be expected that I answer to these Questions 1. Why I call the Gospell the Instrumentall cause 2. Why I call Christs satisfaction the Meritorious cause and the Causa sine qua non 3. Why I make not Christs righteousnesse the Materiall cause 4. Why I make not the imputation of it the formall cause 5. Why I make not faith the Instrumentall cause 6. Why I make it only the Causa sine qua non To these Quaeries it will be expected saith he that he answer But what if other besides these exceptions be made though it be in his power to deny his answer yet it is not in his choice or authority to restrain any from excepting 1 Perhaps some may except why he in asserting God to be the principall efficient cause of Justification lets it passe so nakedly without an adjection of any of his attributes so leaving it doubtfull whether it be the grace or the justice the love or the hatred the mercy or the wrath of God that is the efficient of Justification We may easily answer our selves as to this question It is not Gods but Mr. Baxters justification whereof the causes are here assigned such as the Scriptures are unacquainted with a justification of his own devising defining and distinguishing himself and none before himself that I know was in every point acquainted with it No marvell then if he speak differingly in setting forth the causes of his from our Divines in laying down the causes of Gods justification And indeed it is a difficult question to determine whether his justification if it were at all granted to be of God might challenge more properly the love or the hatred the grace or the justice of God for its womb It being a justification that leaves all men under the curse under the wrath of God both in life and in death untill the very day of Judgment as we have found him disputing most profoundly in and under his 9. Thesis A justification that gives only a titular title without actuall and absolute possession of any greatest or least benefit to the justifyed which according to Mr. Baxter is the same thing as if we should say to the unjustifyed A justification more unpossible to be apprehended and held then was the first justification by works that was held forth upon possible tearms exacting from a living man only continuance in the works of life this upon unpossible as respecting our present state of infirmity offering to a dead soul righteousnesse and life upon condition the dead soul will quicken and arise from the dead to fetch it thence whither if it come it must still abide empty as it came untill the day of Judgment and then Mr. Baxter will come again to tell us more of his minde whether it be at all attainable I do not at all injury the man in saying he offers justification to a dead soul c. upon condition the soul will quicken it self For let there be found but one clause in his whole book that implyeth a concurrence and effusion of grace from God more to the quickning and justifying of Peter and Paul then of Cain and Judas of the damned then of the saved Or what doth he lesse that brings in works to justification then destroy grace to set up justification after the order and rule of strict justice Or when Mr. Baxter is so exact in enumerating the Procatarcticall or outwardly moving causes to what purpose doth he jumpe over the Proegumene or inward moving cause viz. the grace love and mercy which is within God himself but to imprison it in darknesse and eclipse its glory that mans righteousnesse might have the praise which pertains to God alone 2 It may be also questioned why amongst all the causes of justification here assigned there is no mention made of union and communion with Christ when as our Divines following the rule of the Word makes our union with him the very chief cause and ground of our being justifyed or declared to be justifyed according to the Gospell justification 1 Joh. 5 12. Phil. 3. 9. 1 Cor. 5. 19. and a multitude of other Scriptures which they alleadge and if there were the least need I might here quote a score What else but an evill eye maligning the praise of God and of his Christ suppresseth in silence and suffers not to appear in the chain of the causes of justification this link of union with Christ Is it not that he will make our faith and works yet out of Christ the cause of our union with Christ and not this the ground of the other 3 To come to those questions which Mr. Baxter answereth because he conceives it will be expected 1. About the instrumentall cause we question not what he goes about to answer why he cals the promise or grant of the new Covenant or the Gospell the instrumentall cause of justification actively considered but 1. Why he makes it the only instrumental cause of justification howsoever considered For this grant and promise doth by it self no more justifie the beleevers then the infidels the justifyed then the unjustifyed Doth not God also make the spirit his instrument of justifying by declaring and unfolding the doctrine of the Gospell and evidencing and witnessing to the soul remission and justification together with the love and grace of God from which this justification floweth Why doth he stifle the working of the Spirit from having to do in this great work except either with the Sadduces he denies the being or with the Socinians the divinity and divine operation of the Spirit or else to leave open a door to let in justification by the flesh not by the Spirit by the strength of mans free will without the preventing helps of the Spirit of grace Or as justification is taken passively for our being justifyed in our selves why is not faith put as an
instrumentall cause also But this Mr. Baxter will answer anon and I shall wait on him to hear how satisfactory his answer is 2. Whether in his answer to the Question as he puts it when he makes a mans lease or deed of gift and a Kings pardon to have their force from the hand and seal annexed to it is it not much more implyed that the grant of the Gospell without hand and seal put to it is not a sufficient instrument to the justifying of any man For the grant of the Gospell is made to the world indefinitely but when faith as the impression of Gods hand upon the soul and the Spirit witnessing and sealing to the conscience thou art the person to whom the justification generally proposed in the Gospell doth particularly belong and so are applyed by God as true accessary evidences to the grant of the Gospell to terminate justification upon the soul of man can Mr. Baxter deny these being acts of God distinct from the word of promise to be instrumentall to justification as properly and fully as the said promise and grant 3. To his Procatarctick causes which in the Thesis he giveth viz. so far as God may be said to be moved by any thing out of himself speaking after the manner of men saith he I aske 1 Whether God may be moved in his will by any thing out of himself If so whether then something out of God do not give magis minus increase and diminution to God For every change of Gods will is a change of God himself and what shall it avail any to be justifyed by a mutable God that to day will justifie to morrow unjustifie againe being apt to take impression of change from things without him yea if a God mutable then in truth no God but one of the Pagans Idols or Puppets Or how little doth his additionall cause help him to speake after the manner of mâ—n he ought not to speak a lie for God to please men much lesse to lie against God to fashion himself to the manners of men foolish or wicked men If he say God cannot be moved by any thing out of himself how can he excuse himself from being a slanderer of the most high God by devising and asserting here 4. causes out of God moving him to justifie us having before wilfully suppressed in darknesse the riches of Gods grace within himself alsufficient without any auxiliary strength from the creature to move him How preposterous is he herein to the order of nature making the fruit to bear the tree and not the tree the fruit What lesse doth he in making Christs satisfaction and intercession the sinners supplication and desire of supply and the opportunity or advantage for the glorifying of his justice and mercie the causes of Gods will and gracious willings when contrariwise Gods gracious will is the cause of all these 2 Whether he jears at the invaluable means of our salvation or else that he thinks himself matching cocks for the game that he counterpoiseth the highest perfections of Christs mediatorship with mans vanity how unsufferable is it to see him putting into the one scale a precious pearl into the other a peppercorn or cherry stone To match Christs intercession with the sinners supplication To make the feeblenesse of man a collaterall and concause in the same order and degree of efficacy to justification with the vertue of Christ glorifyed It is to be acknowledged that the nothingnesse of the one is of as full validity as the omnipotency if I may so terme it of the other to beget new love new purposes new acts in Gods will This is that which God himself cannot do not because it is a work above his power but beneath his nature and perfection to work or to be capable of the working of any new impressions or changes in his will Neverthelesse this excuseth not Mr. Baxters vilifying of Christ in mating his intercession with the sinners supplication as if the former were a star of the same magnitude with the latter like that profane fellow that twisted together Religion and Cheese 3 Not to trifle away time upon every trifling word of Mr. Baxter I demand of him why seeing in the Explication pa. 215. he acknowledgeth that Procatarcticall or outwardly impulsive causes have properly no place with God he doth yet in his Thesis here fetch about again his four impulsive causes to marke them with severall names in their foreheads in Aristotles print is it not a testimony under his own hand that he will rather play and dance about God as if he were a meer may-pole then lose the ostentation of one least peece of his wit and art 4 Though I mean not to contend about the meritorious causality of Christs satisfaction because in this he hath as well many orthodox writers as Papists speaking in the same tone with him neverthelesse I should deny his assertion unlesse he he will grant me these 4. or 5. suppositions 1. That so far as justification is an act eternall and immamanent in God Christs satisfaction is not the meritorious cause of it 2. If in some other respect it be the meritorious cause that God doth therein merit from himself For the satisfaction made to him is of his own proper money himselfe paid the price in delivering his Sonne for our sinnes the body which Christ offered for us was given him by the Father to offer in our behalf 3. That this merit must in no wise hinder but that the entire benefit of justification must come to us freely without money and without price 4. That it is but unproperly termed merit even then when it respecteth the discharge which God giveth into a mans conscience it being so called metaphorically as our state in sin is considered as a state of debt which when Christ our surety hath paid for us he hath so far merited only as the payment of our debt may be said to deserve that we should receive a full acquittance from the debt In which Mr. Baxter goeth yet further that it was so paid that the Creditour might have chosen to accept it for satisfaction much more to have given us a full acquittance and discharge So that in relation to him and his principles it is lesse properly merit then to another 5. That Christs satisfaction is more properly to be called Gods foundation of this our new relation of justifyed persons upon which he hath inabled himself to justifie us in mercie without any seeming diminution of his justice and truth These things granted me I dismisse Mr. Baxter with his meriâ—orlous cause 5 When he cals Christs intercâ—ssion and the sinners supplication the morall perswading cause c. I demand whether there were such a totall deficiency or so great a scarcity of morall reason in God that it needed a begetting or quickning by perswasions from without him or whether he were so flinty aâ— that without strong perswasive reasons he could not be induced
Wherefore puts he the soul for the man but to cheat in stead of informing his reader If any say faith is the instrument of the soul he speaks by a Synecdoche putting the part the chief essentiall part of man for the whole man after the common use of the Scriptures and why may not the severall faculties of the soul be as well mans instruments as the severall members of the body It is not unproper to call the eye the instrument by which man seeth or his ear the instrument of hearing or the the tongue of speaking or the hand of working c. and why should it be then unproper to call the faculties of the soul the instruments of man to act those offices by each faculty to which each faculty is appropriated Or when faith is infused into the soul doth it disinstrument the faculties thereof that they become no more instrumentall to man in their places Nay it makes them instrumentall to work henceforth upon spirituall as before upon naturall and morall objects And this also answereth his second reason why the habit of faith cannot fitly be called our instrument because saith he the holinesse of the faculties is not their instrument I grant it but this is not the question That which he was to disprove is that faith makes not the faculties of the soul into which it is infused instrumentall to the applying of Christ to justification The Compasse is the Mariners instrument by which to steer his ship yet would it be nothing instrumentall to this purpose were it not touched with the Loadstone that points it to the North-pole so are the will and understanding instrumentall to the receiving of Christ and justification in and by him not by any innate power in themselves but as they are touched and pointed directly by faith to the bloud of Christ for justification as to the doctrine of Christ for illumination and to the Spirit of Christ for sanctification And for this cause we call not so much the faculty of the soul the instrument as faith because faith makes it instrumentall to justification The power and disposition which it hath to this act being not naturall from it self but supernaturall from faith infused into it and working on it In stead of answering in order to every particle of what he addeth it shall suffice to discover his Sophistry by which he seeketh to elude a sacred truth of the Gospell in all that he saith upon this Argument and this will be enough in answer to all that he saith yea manifest him unworthy of an answer As before he first maketh all the instrumentality or causality whether proper or improper of faith to consist in the act of faith or faith actuated as if the Chirurgeons instruments were not his instruments while they lie by him but then only while he actually useth them in the severall offices to which they are appointed and faith were no longer an instrument if an instrument of justification then while it is actually receiving Christ and so the same man should be justifyed and unjustifyed oft in the same day in the same hour being no longer justifyed then while faith is in the act of applying Christ And 2. In contracting the whole man yea Christian into a soul as if we did make such a faculty of the soul the souls and not the mans instrument to receive Christ which himself knoweth to be the meaning of no one of them against whom he fighteth but a slanderous and subtle trick of his own devising to make their doctrine seem absurd in an alien sense which in their own sense he can in no wise confute So 3. Here he further sophisticateth and perverteth their doctrine in contracting the whole man not only into a soul which he had done before but into some one or two faculties of the soul into which faith is infused and inherent as in its subject as if they taught that faith is the instrument of a faculty and not mans instrument The holinesse of the faculties is not their i. e. the faculties instrument saith he but themselves rectifyed The absurdities therefore which he infers as consequents of such an assertion are the consequents of his slander not of their doctrine None ever taught faith to be the instrument of a faculty or instrumentall to justifie a facultie but mans instrument and nstrumentall to justifie man 4. In supposing it as a thing granted that faith in the soul or faculties of the soul is nothing but the holinesse of such faculties or their being rectifyed and not a being distinct so distinct as may be called their instrument a doctrine well agreeing with his principles who makes sanctification the condition of justification and no further attributes any thing to faith but as it is a part of our sanctification Pag. 195. n. 5 6. and thorowout this whole Treatise but altogether denied by the Protestant Churches which ascribe not to faith any instrrumentality to justification as it is a part of our holinesse and rectitude but as by a supernaturall virtue which it infuseth into the soul to carry it out to Christ to God in Christ for remission and reconciliation Otherwise godlinesse hope love meeknesse and all other the fruits of the Spirit should justifie us equally with faith because the holinesse and rectitude of the soul consisteth no lesse in these then in faith And this is the thing in question if we grant it all is granted which the worst of Jesuites seeks or Mr. Baxter in this whole book contends for so that to make the whole thing in question a known and granted conclusion from which he will prove a particle in question is too grosse and un Baxterlike a Sophism he is wont to spin finer webs what make such course threads in his fingers And why saith he Not so distinct is faith a being distinct from the faculty in which it is Even this that it is a being distinct from the essence of man speaks it capable of an instrumentality to mans justification especially God having appointed and fitted it to that end much more of being an instrument in generall for mans use which is all that Mr. Baxter should have denyed when he denies it to be the faculties instrument 5. In reiterating the soul for the whole man and annexing captious words to it Who ever called habits or dispositions the souls instruments Thus he playes the Sophister to make the instrumentality of faith ridiculous as if we affirmed it instrumentall to justification quatenus as it is and only in this respect because it is a habit or disposition of the soul when contrariwise we ascribe this power and office to it as it is a virtue or gift of grace endewed with this property from the author of it to cleave to Christ and draw forth the soul with it to Christ for justification as hath been before expressed and in this office it hath no other habit power or disposition of the soul naturall or infused
9. 15. So that it is not of him that willeth or of him that runneth but of God that sheweth mercy verse 16. Many other Arguments have our Divines against the Papists about this question which I intreat the Reader to fetch from them for his fuller satisfaction Now let us see what Mr. Baxter brings to prove that obedience and good workes are the condition of our salvation Yet by the way let us note that the Argument it selfe which here Bell. de ju 〈…〉 4. 〈◊〉 he seeks to confirme is the Papists and great is Belarmines striving to maintaine it as his great prop of justification and salvation by works Si promissio vitae aeternae est conditionata faith he ut C 〈…〉 probavimus certè necessarium est implere conditionem si quis salvus fieri velit â—â—e if the promise of eternall life be conditionall 〈◊〉 I have proved in the first Chapter certainly he must nec 〈…〉 fill the condition that willâ—eâ— saved This Condition of which hee speakes is the same with Mr. Baxters viz. the Condition of works Neither shall it be impertinent heer to take into consideration some rules of our Divines for the right understanding of the minde of the holy Ghost in promising eternall life unto persons of such and such qualifications or that perform such and such duties before wee descend to examine the particular promises and testimonies which Mr. Br. alleadgeth These are principally such as follow 1. That they belong so farre as to bee effectuallized to none else but such as are vitally within the covenant of Grace under the protection of the bloud of the Lamb in spirituall union with Christ Jesus the mediator of the new Covenant according to that of the Apostle All the promises of God in him are yea and in him Amen never effectuallized to them that are not in him 2 Co. 1. 20. To Abraham and his seed were the promises made he saith not his seeds as of many but of one and to thy seed which was Christ viz. in him alone and to them alone to be confirmed which are in Christ Gal 3. 16. Therfore the blessedness which Matthew in sound of words seems to hold forth more generally Ma. 5 3. c. Luke as the Expositor of him or rather of the mind of Christ in those promises contracts to the right objects or persons to whom they were to bee made good thus Jesus lifted his eyes upon his disciples and said Blessed be YEE poor for yours is the Kingdome of God Blessed are YEE that hunger YEE that weep c. implying that the blessedness was to come upon them not by the vertue of these Acts and qualifications mentioned but upon this ground alone that they were his Disciples by him Gospellized and received into Covenant this is that which Augustine so much presseth in such promises to looke to the Root which is Christ and that the reward is not from their works because they are holy but because they are holy or Saints which wrought them and that they are thence saints from whence righteous not from the works but from the Faith of the workers 2. That in such promises the qualifications or works of the persons to whom they are directed are mentioned not as the ground or foundation of the blessednesse promised but to shew the method and order which God observes in bringing them to the possession therof Because he is holy pure spirituall therfore he powrs into them his purifying sanctifying and adopting spirit to conform them to his own will and nature before hee brings them into the full and reall fruition of himself So hee promiseth all the heaven of felicities to the meek the righteous the saints to them that love him that fear him that obey him not therby insinuating that hee found them but that he hath made or will make them such as many as he will crown at last with glory Heerin the power of that father of Spirits excelleth and exceedeth the power of the fathers of our bodies He new creates their hearts new forms their wills puts into them a new spirit therby making them as Peter saith partakers of the Divine Nature and to enjoy the kingdome of God within them heer before they be translated to it above 3. Nevertheless the foundation of all these promises is not such acts and qualifications in us but the relation of sons in which wee stand before God Such God beheld us in Christ before wee were born such hee hath made us that truly beleeve by the grace of the new Covenant having begotten us to himself of incorruptible seed 1. Pet. 1. 23. we are born of God and have received the spirit of adoption by which we cry Abba Father So that our salvation dependeth not upon the vertues and good works which are mentioned in the promises but upon this our relation of sons if sons then heirs c. Ro. 8. 15. as a speciall friend of Mr. Br. who walks by the same rule and the same spirit with him hath acknowledged heerin consenting with our Divines and stoutly maintayning their Assertion at least because it seemed to give some fulture to his cause And I suppose Mr. Br. will not heer leave him whom in all the rest he followeth 4. Yet what the Lord giveth to and hath prepared of endlesse glory for his children as his children he doth oft-times hold forth and promise to them as a reward of such gifts of grace in them and of works which they have done or sufferings that they have undergone for his sake Not but that it was provided for them and promised to them before all such works and sufferings as they were children but for some other honourable ends which I shall in part mention having first instanced some promises of this kind Before the birth of Isaac long had the Lord of free grace promised to Abraham all blessedness corporall and spirituall present and future that his seed should be as the dust of the earth as the stars of heaven numberless that he should bee blessed and in him all nations of the earth be blessed that the land of Canaan the type and the eternall land of Promise the Antitype should be his and his seeds for ever Ge. 12 2. 3. and 13. 15. 16. and 15. 1-6 and 17. 1-8 Yet afterward cha 22. when Abraham had shewed that notable fruit of his faith fear and love to God in offering his son Isaac in obedience to Gods command God called from heaven to him by an Angel and sayd By my self have I sworn because thou hast done this thing and hast not with held thy son thy only son That in blessing I will blesse thee and in multiplying I will multiply thy seed as the stars in heaven and as the sand c. and in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed because thou hast obeyed my voice Ge. 22. 15-18 We see heer that promised as a reward of this act of
be brought to leave the way that nature hath taught to find and enter into this way which the Father revealeth What then say yee is the broad way and wide gate by which men seek to enter into life I answer M. Brs. way the way of our own righteousness and strict carriage It is broad and wide because all learn it from nature corrupted which telâ—s us it was the way if we had kept it but cannot tell us that it is now blocked up to sinners so that many so many as seek for life by their own righteousness and works doe by this supposed way of life passe to destruction Not but that the way of vice is a broad way also buâ— our Saviouâ— speaks not heer of it but of the broad way by which men seek life but find destruction To this effect is that of our Saviour â—he Publicans and harlots enter into the kingdome of heaven before the strict living Pharisees Ma 21. 31 By what way did these vitious livers enter but by Christ into the Kingdom else if strictness of life had been the way to it the Pharisees had entred before them This is the interpretation of this Gospel text after the tenour of the Gospel and so Mr. Br. suo se jugulavit gladio hath brought a sword to cut the throat of his own cause B. Ma. 7. 21. Not every one that faith Lord Lord shall enter c. but he that doth the will of my Father c. This is the will and work of the Fathers willing and commanding as to life that we beleeve on him whâ—m he hath sent Jo. 6. 29. B. Ma 7. 22. 23. Many shall say in that day Lord we have prophesiâ—d c. to whom it shall be answered I know you not depart from me ye workers of iniquities Hypocrites that come with their mouths full of Works and merits to plead for Heaven shall all be shaken off and the ground of their exclusion is this I know you not ye were not built upon mee had no union with mee no setled dwelling and recumbency upon me therfore he shakes off both them and their works as workers and works of iniquity B. Ro. 8. 4. That the righteousnes of the Law might bee fulfilled in us which walk not after the flesh but after the spirit The righteousness of the Law is perfect And they walk not after the flesh but after the spirit which as the same Apostle saith worship God in the spirit and rejoice in Christ Jesus and have no confidence in the flesh i. e. as in the following verses he expoundeth in legall priviledges or works of their own Righteousnes Phi. 3. 3. In these the righteousnes of the Law is fulfilled They have a perfect righteousnes even Christ made Righteousnes to them which the Law weak through the flesh could not produce in them B. Ro. 8. 13. If yee live after the flesh yee shall die but if yee through the spirit do mortifie the deeds of the body yee shall live Who they are chiefly that in reference to life and death doe live after the flesh and after the spirit the same Apostle teacheth not only in the forequoted Text Phi. 3. 3. but also Gal. 3 3. Are yee so foolish having begun in the spirit are ye now made perfect by the flesh In which words I challenge Mr. Baxter yea the whole pâ—ck of Jesuits if they dare to deny that by beginning in the spirit the Apostle means their trusting wholly on Christ for justification and salvation and by being made perfect by the flesh their seeking to perfect it by works viz Circumcision and with it the morall duties which the Law commandeth If in this place â—e will take the flesh and spirit in a larger sense yet compare we this 13 with the 1. vers of the Chapter and it will appear heer is nothing for his turn Ver. 1. he saith There is no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus But who are they Such as walk not after the flesh but after the spirit Let now Mr. Baxter put what sense he will upon flesh and spirit in the 13. verse it must bear the same sense as in the 1. verse And then if any demand why they that live after the flesh must die the answer is in readiness Because they are not in Christ Iesus or why they that mortifie c by the spirit shall live Every one can answer because they are in Christ Iesus So that in these there is no condemnation to the other nothing but condemnation Because he that hath the son hath life he that hath not the son hath not life 1 Jo. 5. 2. Heer according to promise I annex what I left unanswered cap. 16. of the third bunch of Scriptures quoted by Mr. Baxter p 236. referring them to this place to be examined as speaking more soundingly to glorification than to iustification by works I shall begin as I there left at B. pa. 236. lin 21. Mat. 10. 37. Hee that loveth Father or Mother more then me is unworthy of mee so of Sonne or Daughter When he meaneth the same with Bellarmine as he hath enough manifested under his 26. Thesis let him speak out the same with Bellarmine viz. That none shall receive salvation by Christ but those that by works merit it and make themselves worthy of it Let him so express himselfe and hee shall not want an expresse answer At present while he will lurk in the dark we will leave him in the dark B. Lu. 13. 24. hath been before examined Phi. 2. 12. Work out your salvation with fear and trembling Whether we look to that which precedes or that which followeth this Text we shall find its testimony to be to Mr. Baxters cause what a Colledge Brush alias called a hatchet to a Freshmans Gown cutting it in peeces because it will not be cleansed If to that which goeth before we are bidden v. 5-11 to follow the example of Christ as far as he was in a capacity to give him selfe a patterne to us in this kind in selfe deniall who being in the form of God and equall with God took to himselfe the forme of a servant made himselfe of no reputation abased himselfe to the death to the Cross to the Curs and so became exalted on high above all names c. So must wee deny and abase our selves in our relation as Christ did himselfe in his lay all the false glitter and glory of our works and righteousness in the dust as he did his true glory watching with a holy feare and trembling over our backsliding heart that is apt assoon as any shew of righteousness and goodness appears in our selves and works to depart from Christ and to rest in it as our sanctuary in this case is it that the Apostle requires this continuall working and heaving out selfe from our selves that Christ may be our All. And that with much fear and trembling watchfulness over our deceitfull hearts that are
dead from further labouring and moving to this end For what righteousness what works can bee sufficient to such an atchievement So obedience to the Faith is nipt in the very budde where there is a sense and conviction of a mans naughtiness and nothingness 3. By taking off the spirits of a Christians love joy and alacrity in beleeving and serving when a humble and selfe-denying soul is once choaked with Mr. Baxters Doctrine that all the benefit which he hath or can have by Christ is to be only a probationer for justification and life even to his dying day that till then hee is but conditionally pardoned and conditionally adopted that Gods love to him may be anon turned into hatred his sinnes againe imputed and himselfe hurried into hell That his safety still depends upon his own works righteousnes no peny no Pater noster that the grace of God is let to farme for fine and rent no one promise of the word in all this his Booke being alledged by Mr. Baxter which I can remember of any support which the beleever shall receive from God in the state of Grace but all Selfe doe and selfe have This Doctrine eyther benummeth and freezeth up all a poore Christians love and delight in serving God emasculating his spirits to obedience or reduceth him under a yoke of bondage making him to worke possibly but in feare not of love as under the rod or rather in the fire fearing death and hell all his life time And whether this bee saving in Mr. Baxters accompt obedience or disobedience let them that are spirituall judge 4. By turning the very obedience of his Disciples into disobedience and rebellion The best works done to be justified by them and for them are the greatest abhomination in Gods accompt his Grace and Salvation are either denied or refused when wee bring works to appropriate it to us Rom. 4. 4 5. what is righteousnesse in its matter is sin in its end Therefore shall wee finde still that whosoever are admitted to those that seek to ingratiate themselvs by their good works though done in Christs name are hurled off from Christ I am not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance I know you not depart from mee yee workers of iniquity More joy for one sinner that repenteth than for ninety nine just persons that need no repentance For a more full and satisfactory answer to the Argument contained in this Quere I leave the Reader to the perusing of the Protestant Divines that have written upon this Subject and abundantly refuted this calumny of the Papists what I have here said is rather an addition to them then a full answer to the Quere which I leave to be fetcht from them What he speakes in the Amplification of this Quere needeth no large examination First he grants That love and thankfulness should be enough to hold us to obedience and duty and will bee so when all our ends are attained in our ultimate end then wee shall act for these ends no more c. How untowardly doth this passage and and another passage of the former Quere hang together what he pronounceth here that love and thankfulnesse should be enough to hold us to duty without doing for justification and salvation and that which here should be and hereafter shall be our perfection the same he affirmes there if practiced will undoubtedly damne the Practicer So according to Mr. Baxter if a Christian endeavour sincerely to do what he should and to come as neere in this life as it is possible to the perfection which he shall enjoy in the future hee shall undoubtedly bee damned for it Who then goes about to drive obedience out of the world he or they whom he opposeth What use is to be made of the affections of feare desire hope and care to the attainment of our great ends hath been enough discussed in the examination of the former Quere and would be a meere Tautology here to do it againe Let it be proved once that God hath left Justification by workes to be a motive to obedience it shall be granted to bee a help to the destroying of Obedience to take downe this one Motive But if contrariwise Justification of sinners by Works and Morall Obedience bee erected not by God but by the Devill Mr. Baxters neither Sophistry nor Oratory shall induce us to leane upon the Devils crutch both to the forfeiting of our Justification and turning our Obedience into sin CHAP. XII Whether the doctrine of justification by Faith without workes be a soul-cozening doctrine or harden the people in a soul-cozening Faith what the doctrine of Faith which the Protestant Churches holde is and how farr from deserving this Calumny with something about the facility or difficulty to perswade the multitude to such a Faith HIs fourth Quere by which as by another Argument he goeth about to make odious and to destroy justification by Faith without works runs thus B. pag. 326. Doth it not much confirme the world in their soul cozening Faith surely that Faith which is by many thought to justifie is it that our people doe all most easily embrace that is the receiving of Christ for their Saviour and expecting pardon and salvation by him but not withall receiving him for their Lord and King nor delivering up themselves to be ruled by him I meet not with one but is resolved in such a Faith till it be overthrowne by teaching them better They would all trust Christ for the saving of their soules and that without dissembling for ought any man can discerne Are all these men justified c. A Chip of the same blocke with the former in the use of it Mr. Baxter as he hath learned of them from whom he hath received it levels against the very heart of Christ and his Gospell Had hee said with Iames that to say we have Faith and not to have workes is to cozen our souls I should have said with him But in that he speaketh not of a soul-cozening profession of Faith but layeth so horrid an imputation upon Faith it selfe this gives us cause to examine what Faith he meaneth that we may be able to discern whether that Faith or else Mr. Baxter by defaming it goe about to cozen our souls and so embrace the true friend and reject the Cheater This cozening Faith according to Mr. Baxter must needs bee that which squareth not in its nature and manner of justification with the justifying Faith viz. that Gospell Faith which neither as a deed and worke as a worke of Morall duty and worke of our owne righteousnesse of our perfect and meritorious righteousnesse doth begin and but begin to inright us to Christ and justification by him leaving to eyther vertues and works to perfect it but as an instrument ordeyned and given us of God by which we receive Christ alone offering up himselfe a sacrifice for us to bee cur whole righteousness to justification and that without
all the justified by Faith are sanctified if it be sanctification indeede it may be made an evidence of justification 6 Yet neither all seeming peace and quietnesse of conscience or joy in expectation of salvation or hope that is made the ground of this joy and such other like seeming effects of Justification are alway sure evidences to a man that he is justified because not alway fruits or parts of sanctification they may proceed from another and baser principle viz. from the deceitfulnesse of their heart or self-love and self-advancing or from the spirit of slumber upon the conscience or from ignorance of Gods way and method of bringing many Children to glory Nor are all seeming holiness honesty meeknesse temperance patience and other like vertues either in their habite as they really affect the heart or in their act as they are with an ardent zeale for God brought forth into practice sure evidences of sanctification by Christ because these also may proceed from other and baser principles and not from the Spirit of Christ as from the abiding prints of the Law of Nature written in the heart or from the power and suggestions of a convinced and awaked conscience or from strong impressions made into the soule by a morall and vertuous education or other like sub-celestiall and unspirituall principles So that our certaine and known union to Christ and our justification and sanctification sensibly thence flowing may be properly and unfailingly made our sound evidence of the spirituall life and acceptablenesse of our vertues and works But these in themselves in no wise certaine evidences and demonstrations to us of our justification and sanctification by Christ Sanctification is one thing and a zealous endeavour to be in all things conformed to the will of God is or may be another The former is only from the Spirit of Christ and wrought only in them which are in Christ The later may proceed from morall principles and is incident even to them also that are aliens from Christ 7 Neverthelesse even these vertues and good works do so farr evidence that from the Negation of these a man is certainely denyed to be in Christ or to be justified or sanctified by the faith of Christ I mean that whosoever can allow himself in the habituall practice of any known sin or rejection of any known duty that man may know himself and be known of others to be an Alien from Christ Because whosoever is in Christ is a new Creature all things are become new not only in respect of his relation but of his manners and conversation also and in whomsoever the Spirit of Sanctification dwelleth it dwels in a state of reign not of bondage Withall these vertues and good works when they are found to flow from our union to Christ and the love of God shed abroad in our hearts through Christ and upon examination a man can truly say that he hath ceased to hew from any other Qâ—arrie or to dip from any other Fountain than from Christ that from his Spirit alone hee daily sucketh life as the branch from the root to bring forth fruit and from the sacrifice of Christs death a sweet odour to make himself and his fruit acceptable then they serve as good seconds to prove to his soul that he is justified and sanctified But so that his being in Christ must first prove his fruit to be good before his fruit can have any power to evidence him to be in Christ and the evidence of both his justification and sanctification consisteth not so much in the qualifications which he hath attained or works which he doth and hath done as in his continuall waiting upon Chrih from him alone to receive what hee ought to be and to do in all wel-pleasing before God and the love of God in Christ enabling to obedience 8 That although Sanctification and the fruits thereof do each in its own degree as aforesaid more or lesse evidence our Justification yet have they no concausality with Faith to the producing of it All that are in Christ are Saints in Christ yet their sanctity goes not before their being in Christ but is an immediate fruit thereof The forgiveness of sin and Adoption doth in order go before their doing of acceptable service to God and unacceptable service cannot justifie 9 The grace of God which bringeth salvation and justification teacheth men to deny ungodlinesse c. and to live soberly c. Cals upon all to stretch forth their Faith to apprehend to themselves in Christ both the imputed and the inherent righteousness so far is it from breathing a soul-cozening or a soul-corrupting faith Therefore is the justifying Faith called by the Holy Ghost a most holy Faith Jude 20. A soule purifying Faith Act. 15. 9. A sanctifying Faith Act. 26. 18. Implying its efficacy as well to sanctifie as to justifie and that there is no true sanctification but that which is instrumentally obtained or at least received by Faith Lastly that one chief end of our Justification is that we bring forth acceptable fruit to God here inchoate hereafter in perfect obedience to God and conformity with him And the Justifier doth and will attain his end in justifying therefore brings none to glory but such as have all vertues and good works at least in their root and seed while they are here and if after their effectuall calling they live to have time and opportunity do not unfeigâ—edly endeavour universally to declare the same in their practice So that to dream of any glorified man in heaven that was not actually a Saint upon earth is a dream from hell not from heaven All these things might have been largely proved both from the Scriptures and our Protestant Writers but that I esteem them all to be so known to be the consenting asserteons of all our Churches and by them so fully confirmed by the word that I should but abuse time to take it up in particularizing what is in this Case so generally written and read I have been the more large in expressing the doctrine of the Protestant Churches upon this Argument to wipe off the stain which Mr. Br. hath learned of the Papists to lay upon it in this and the former quere which are wholly framed to beguile the weaker sort having nothing in them to stagger the Judicious And now I leave it both to the strong and weak to judge whether the Accuser of the Brethren himself can possibly expresse more impudence and falshood in slandering the Churches of Christ than this man hath done or if he had not bound himself to speak after the Jesuits and Monks whatsoever they traducingly say whether there be any colour of reason for him to have layd upon us these two accusations To hold my self to that which I am now examining what is there in this Faith and Doctrine thereof which I have described deserving to be called a soul-cozening Faith And when he addeth That Faith which is by many
to be received both as a justifier and sanctifier declareth him to have descended from heaven both to justifie the ungodly and to sanctifie the justified That he is made unto us of God not onely Righteousness but Sanctification also To justifie us by an imputed and sanctifie us by an inherent righteousness The one by the effusion of his bloud the other by the infusion of his Spirit That his office is not onely to satisfie justice for us that we may live but also to new principle and create us that we may live to God Not onely to redeem us from all iniquity but withall to purifie us into a peculiar people zealous of good works In whom both these works are not in good measure neither of them is in any measure effectually accomplished That sanctification is the purchase of Christs bloud but the immediate effect of his Spirit merited by his death but Conferred and Communicated by his life as all power both in heaven and in earth is given into his hand and as he is ascended on high to give gifts to men That both imputed and inherent righteousnes as termined and actually existent in and upon man proceed from his union unto Christ That Sanctification is as great and glorious a work as Justification and our real as our relative holiness and righteousness Neither could it be discerned so cleerly how we were quickened in Law raised from the dead who were dead in sinns and trespasses and so passed from death to life from Condemnation to salvation by the forgiveness of sinn were we not also quickened raised up from under the death and bondage of sinn no more to serve sinn but as alive from the dead had our fruit and living motions to practicall holines and righteousness That as well our sanctification as our Justification is in Christ and both from him derivable to us by Faith in him That Faith is qualified by God to apprehend Christ both to purifie us by his bloud and to sanctifie us by his Spirit and so becomes instrumentall both to Justification and sanctification yet by a twofold Act as the Condemned Traytor extends one and the same hand to receive from his gracious Prince a pardon of his Treason and a Commission to be his vice-gerent in some Noble and magnificent office therein to serve his Prince promote the welfare of his Countrey and make his own name and person famous and pretious in the eyes of all men among whom his present vertuous behaviour and Noble atchievements may wipe off and bring to oblivion the stain of his former delinquency That one and the same a chief end of our Justification by Christ is our sanctification the fruits thereof here inchoat and increasing hereafter Consummate and perfected Therefore are we delivered out of the hands of our enemies that we may serve him without Fear in holiness and righteousness Luk. 1. 74 75. Therefore are we dead to and delivered from the Law by the body of Christ that we should be married to another even to him that is raised from the dead that we might bring forth fruit to God and serve not in the oldness of the letter but in the Newness of the Spirit Rom. 7. 4 6. Christ hath made us Kings and Priests or a Royall Priesthood unto God to offer up living sacrifices acceptable to God through him 1 Pet. 2. 5 9. Rev. 1. 6. To our instalment therein are pre-required the sanctification of Consecration and the sanctification of habitual righteousness and holiness infused into us and set in actual operation in us The former of these is done chiefly by the sacrificed bloud of Christ sprinkled upon the Conscience and the sacred vestiments of his Righteousness put on by Faith as was typified primarily of Christ the High Priest and secondarily of the Priesthood of Saints under the kingdome of Christ by the Consecration of Aaron and his sonns with the bloud of the Altar sprinkled on them and the putting on of holy vestiments upon them their own being Cast off Lev. 8. The latter Chiefly by the Spirit of Christ in livening enabling and acting them to the work and worship for which they are Consecrated and I know not but this may be also figured in the ordination of the Priests under the Law by the Anoynting oyl in the same Chapter mentioned and used That differs but little from Justification as termined to this its end This differs not at all from sanctification when it is taken in the sense wherein the scriptures often and our Divines still use it when they distinguish between Justification and sanctification viz. in its active sense the inspiration of the habits of holiness and righteousness in its passive sense the same habits inspired into the soul Whosoever wanteth either of these prerequisits to this sacred office we grant him to be but a titular Priest a Mock-Saint For without Consecration to offer as a Priest speaks him an usurper And to profess Priest and not to offer speaks him a rebell and revolter We own no sanctification by the Spirit of Christ which hath not Justification by his bloud in order going before it nor any Justification or forgiveness by the death of Christ which hath not sanctification by his Spirit in order of nature following it Thus we do not as the Papists and Mr. Br. learning from the Papists object calumniously exclude works from the life of a Christian but assert them to be necessary to a Christian life so necessary that without them whosoever is Capable of working is no Christian Though we exclude them from Justification yet we include them in sanctification their habits as parts in the whole their acts or themselves acted as fruits thereof Nay we do not deny in a good sense some kind of Causality which they have to sanctifie that is to the increase of sanctification To him that hath it shall be given and he shall have more abundantly Well done good and faithfull servant thou hast been faithfull in a little I will make thee Ruler over much c. saith our Saviour Ask and ye shall have seek and ye shall finde knock and it shall be opened to you The ground or earth which drinketh in the Rain which cometh oft upon it and bringeth forth herbs or fruit c. is neer to a blessing But that which bringeth forth bryars and thorns is rejected and neer to cursing c. Heb. 6. 7 8. with many other the like Testimonies of Scripture which it would be superfluous here to recite How then do we in the least measure blunt the edge of mens affections to good works by teaching that they do not justifie when we affirm them necessary to sanctification If Mr. Br. should affirm that Bread and Wine and other Creatures appropriated to mans nutriment are not ordeined of God to Clothe him or that his garments are not ordeined of God to Feed him doth he therein minister to me just Cause to exclaym against him that
he fights against natural reason perswading men never more to eat because their meat is not appointed to Clothe them or to walk naked because he saith their garments are not usefull to nourish them No more Cause hath Mr. Br. or the Papists to accuse us that we banish good works from the life of a Christian by teaching that they are not usefull or appropriated to justifie but to sanctifie very usefull in all the particulars before-mentioned How unacquainted with the frame of a Christian spirit are these objectors Either they do not experimentally know or else do stifle within themselves this knowledge that a Christ-enjoying and Gospellized soul gaspeth no less for deliverance from the bondage than from the Condemnation of sinn delights so much in performing duty to Christ as in receiving pardon from him groanes so pathetically under the body as ever he did under the guilt of sinn Cryeth with equall vehemency of affâ—ctionâ— for holiness unto God as for happiness with him for Conformity to him in righteousness as in glory makes no other use of his redemption than to run at liberty the race of obedience set before him embraceth and delighteth in sanctifying as well as in saving grace in the infusion as in the imputation of righteousness labours to dispense all for the Lord and his service whatsoever he hath received from the Lord and his free grace Therefore whatsoever the Lord powrs upon him to sanctification is received with so great joy in the Holy Ghost as that which is communicated to him to justification and he labours to be and express himself wholly Christs as well as to obtein Christ wholly his As for Mr. Brs meerly Morall Men that will receive Christ neither to Justification nor to sanctification but upon their own terms purchasing him by Fine and rent that the glory might be partly theirs and not wholly Christs It is enough that Mr. Br. hardens and subverts them in this their Moral madness wholly contradictive to the spirituallness and wisdome of the Gospel We shall not be insnared by all the nicities of his Arts and Chimicall extracts of the spirits of his spoyling Philosophy to involve our selves with him in the guilt of poysoning so many souls and turning their best righteousness and devotion into sinn by encouraging them to appropriate the same to such an end as is destructive to the glory of Gods grace and contrary to the minde and rule of the Gospel We have one Master which is Christ his dictates expressed by him and his Apostles in the plainness and foolishness of their preaching are so sacred and authoritative with us that neither the most labyrinthical mazes of sophistry shall unwinde us nor the extravagancies of the most luxuriating witts nor the most Curious plausibilities of humane reason shall by Gods Grace unreason us so from our selves as to undisciple us from him Yea though we could not in some things give a satisfactory answer to the sophisticated reasonings of these disputers against Christ and his Gospel yet should we fit down as fools with Christ and his Apostles adoring the manifold wisdome of God revealed in a mystery rather than be wise with these men to the world knowing that the foolishness of God is wiser and the weakness of God is stronger than men And we seek wisdome and happiness from the mines of Christs Gospel not from the dry quarrie of mans literature and inventions 2 Though we reject it as an arrogant and presumptuous doctrine which Mr. Br. in Common with the Papists teacheth That we are justified and saved by our good qualifications and works for our works for the merit and worthinesse of our good works yet we teach and believe that they are in respect of all that have age ability and time to perform them necessary Consequents of our Justification and Antecedents of our glorification Let a man pretend what he will of Faith in Christ yet if by Faith hee do not cleave firmly to him to derive from him power to mortifie every sinn to perform all duty if he can allow within himselfe any known evill or continue in the neglect of any known duty without striving to get the victory in the strength of Christs Spirit over every such infirmity wee take such a man so farr from Christ as Christ is from Belial A branch in Christ not bearing fruit which is appointed to be cut off and cast into the fire because he was never in Christ otherwise but by a formall profession never had vitall union to him or communion with him by the ligatures of Faith and the Spirit For sanctification is an individual companion of Justification And the office of Christ is to be the Author of both to all that believe Otherwise the work of his Mediator-ship should not be compleated in either one of these and so he should not be our Christ if a halfe Christ only to us And Sanctification is still begun and carried on towards perfection also where there is time and meanes in the kingdom of Grace before its perfecting and swallowing up into glory in the Kingdom of glory No righteousness and holiness of man is begun in the next life But there shall be the consummation in power of that which here was begun in truth though it laboured of and languished with much infirmity 3 Wee are guiltless of those Crimes wherewith Mr. Br. endeavours to defame us and our Doctrine For 1. Neither doe wee teach or think as M. Br. suggesteth that nothing is preaching Christ but preaching him as a pardoning justifying Saviour Aph. pa. 328. Indeed we preach Justification to consist if not only yet chiefly in the pardon of sinn through the mediation of Christs death That this benefit of Christ is perfected by the satisfaction which he hath made to Gods justice in suffering for us and appropriated to us by faith alone But wee deny this to be all the Gospel-grace exhibited to us by Christ and in and through him We hold him forth as the Light of the world also having all the treasures of wisedom and knowledg hid in him Joh. 8. 12. Col. 2. 3. from whom are all the irradiations and Revelations of all the mysteries of Grace effectuall to life and holiness Mat. 13. 11. 1 Cor. 2. 10. And to the word and spirit of Christ we send all men for illumination And the Life of the world not only to restore them to life in law by Justification but as the Lord and principle of Life to beget in us an inherent life active and moving to all obedience Therefore we endeavour to send all to Christ for life even for this life because the whole judgment and dispensation thereof is committed to him and he is our all to sanctification also Joh. 5. 21 22 25 26. Col. 3. 11. We indeed except against that Doctrine as more Legal than Evangelical that roars thunders Condemnation against poor Exiles in a dry wilderness where is no water fainting and even dead with