be justifyed Pauls own righteousness as a Jew or as a Pharisee I say is one thing and Pauls faith and obedience which is his righteousness as a Christian is another And this distinction our Saviour himself hath first offered Except your righteousness exceed the righteousness of the Scribes and Pharises The righteousness of works is twofold The righteousness of Mankind according to the Covenant of Nature and the righteousness of the Jewes while they reckoned to be justified by the external observation only of the rites of Moses The one of these exceeds the righteousness of faith and we are not justified by it because no man can attain to it the other falls short of the righteousness of faith or of a true Christian according to these words of our Lord and for that reason as for several others the establishment of it was dangerous to their Salvation A last text they have what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin condemned sin in the flesh that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us who walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit It is urged here by a Perfectist that if the Protestant doctrine were true it should be said that the righteousness of the law should be fulfilled in Christ and not in us But these words I apprehend may be a phrase of the Apostles as the words attaining unto righteousness otherwhere and so it will be all one as if he had said that we might be justified who walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit Nevertheless there is this here must be known and noted that when a Christian obeys God according to the Gospel that obedience of his proceeding from faith though imperfect is accepted of God instead of the laws perfect righteousness or stands him in the stead as if the whole law were fulfilled which is the ground of such expressions From whence in the way we may have light for the understanding the Apostle when he tells us the law is established by faith or uses the like words The law is established only by the fulfilling of it and faith as it works by love fulfils the law But how why in the sense N. B. as is now told you Faith produces obedience which is imperfect yet answering the terms of the gospel it is through that grace and condescention from God which Christ hath purchased for us in the work of our redemption imputed to us for righteouaness that is accepted and rewarded so as it is made to stand us in the same stead as the full performance of the law would have done which is to justifie us and bring us life eternal When God made man he gave him a law suitable to his Creation That law being founded in the image of God wherein he was created is most holy equal and unchangeable God as Rector must deal with the World according to this law so that man transgressing he is engaged to proceed against him by it unless there be some means found out that he may be no loser in his justice if he do not There is nothing can be offered to God but his justice and holiness must be losers if it be of consideration less valuable then that which the law it self required which is the obedience of all mankind or their everlasting suffering for its transgression No Man or Creature but Christ alone could offer any such satisfaction as this for us And this he offered in the obedience or righteousness of his whole life and death as the price sacrifice ransome propitiation for our sins which through the dignity of the Person that offered it being the Son of God as well as man was of value which is infinite That which exceeds a thing or is more in value then it cannot be the very thing it self which in value it exceeds The righteousness then of Christ is really imputed to man tendred in his behalf and made ours in regard of this effect or in the end to which it was intended I will say when it cannot be ours in it self to wit that God being satisfied or made no loser in his justice hereby does deal with us otherwise then by that law unto which at first we were created If he deals not with us then according to that it must be by some other which hereby also is purchased and that is according to his grace or righteousness revealed in the Gospel This grace or righteousness lyes in his acceptance of faith and repentance instead of perfect obedience for this righteousness sake of Christ thus imputed and no otherwise then thus When our Divines now say that there are no works of ours can stand before God in his district judgment that they should be causa propter quam the cause for which that is for the merit sake or worthiness whereof he should justifie any person they say well and there meaning is that our works coming not up to the original law God cannot for the performance of them absolve us as no sinners but yet seeing they are such as answer the terms of the Gospel he does for Christs sake or his merits sake both pardon their imperfection and impute them to us for righteousness in the accepting them to life or rewarding them with everlasting salvation In short Christs righteousness is imputed to us but not for righteousness It is for the righteousness sake but not formally though efficiently by the righteousness of another we are justified It is not Christ but our selves that perform the new Covenant and by the new Covenant is it or by grace that we are righteous in Gods sight It is not consequently Christs sufferings or obedience only but our faith obedience sincerity also that is rewarded with salvation yet is it not for the merit of this obedience of ours but for his merits or the merits of his righteousness Behold this is the critrical hindge upon which the whole controversie does turn We will stand for the imputation of Christs righteousness N. B. so far as ever we can with holding justification by the Covenant of grace but when some Protestants have stood for it so as renders our justification to be by the law or the Covenant of works and not by grace they have departed from the Apostle And thus the dispute in the upshot will I think end in this that Christs righteousness is the meritorious indeed the only meritorious or meritoriously procuring efficient but must not be made the formal cause of mans justification And yet do I see there is need still of some more words seeing here the heart of all lyes A righteousness we must have if we be justified and what is that righteousness There is a legal righteousness and Evangelical Christs righteousness our Divines account our Legal righteousness which must answer the law for us and our faith and repentance must be produced to answer the
THE Middle-Way In One Paper of JUSTIFICATION With indifferency between PROTESTANT PAPIST By. J. H. Doing nothing by Partiality LONDON Printed for T. Parkhurst at the Three Bibles in Cheap-side 1672. Of Justification IT is a trouble to to me often in reading Polemical Divinity to see how men that walk in a vain shew to others and disquiet themselves in vain are governed by Prejudice and Party it is a hard thing many times and a man must be very witty and strain himself to pick a fault in his Adversary for matter of contention when a little pains only to understand him and the least candour or but a bare equality in the interpretation would bring him whether he would or no almost to reconciliation The truth is the Papists do abuse the Protestants and the Protestants abuse the Papists and that is the summe of most of our great Controversies I judge the like between Arminian and Calvinists and other Contenders If Luther hath said it or Calvin hath said it it must be Heretical and if the Council of Trent have delivered it or Bellarmine said so it must be dangerous it savours of the Harlot it is the abominable doctrine of the Church of Rome Amongst the many contests between this Church and us there are few which are carryed on with that affection and concernment as the dispute of Justification St. Paul was the first that engaged upon this point and not without some warmth against those that opposed him S. James is the next that hath spoken of this Subject The Primitive Church and the Fathers after them have accorded pretty well with both but the School-men as I take it by pressing some passages of the Fathers over-closely having obscured the grace of the Gospel our Protestant Churches have risen up as it were under the standard of St. Paul that is under his words and the Roman Church under the words of St. James and come out into a set Battel which serving only to raise up dust darkness and doubt among the most it is a conference I count between the Leaders I mean a plain understanding or adjustment only of the one united certain sense of both Apostles inspired by the same holy Spirit that will that must and does give light to the intelligent and impartial to uncloud the errors on each side and end the quarrel The word justify is from the word just and one may be said to be made or rendred just by infusion or by plea. Our Protestant Divines do all teach us that the word is a forensical term and is to be understood in opposition to condemnation for which they have good Scripture the Papists doe tell us that to justify a sinner is to make him righteous and understand by it in effect the same thing with sanctification St. Augustine it must be acknowledged hath lead them this way Gratificavit nos in dilecto gratificavit a gratia sicut justificavit a justitia De bono perseverantiae c. 6. Christus justificat impium faciendo ex impio Christianum Christ does justify the ungodly by making him of one that is wicked a holy man or a Christian Contra litteras Petiliani l. 3. c. 45. There is his book De spiritu littera where he hath the same up and from whence a man may pick out his judgment on this point rather then any where lese that I know I did expect to find more De fide operibus but I perceive it does mainly respect another matter we may see also his Book De libero arbitrio gratia The judgment then of this Father which leads the Schools in their disputes about these matters as to the main comes to this That God of his own goodness only or free will to wit according to Election does vouchsafe the holy Spirit to some Persons who does infuse his grace in their hearts which grace is that which disposes them to all righteousness and is the same according to him otherwhere with Charity which fulfils the law and so justifies us And in this sense does he tell us that Bona opera sequuntur justificatum non praecedunt justificandum that is Good works do follow the Person justified and do not go before justification The meaning whereof with him is that we must first have this grace infused which habitually enclines to our whole duty both unto God and to our Neighbour that is the making the ungodly a just man before he can do any thing that is good Pelagius doctrine was that grace is given according to our merits but St. Augustines doctrine is that grace is first given and good works follow When the Apostle then does tell us that we are justified by grace this Father I say understands by it this infused grace that is an habit of righteousness infused into the heart for fulfilling the law of God and so justifies Lex data est ut quaereretur gratia gratia data est ut lex impleretur The law is given that grace may be sought and grace is given that the law may be fulfilled De spir lit c. 19. In correspondence to this when the Apostle sayes we are justified by faith he tells us that it is by its impetration of this grace Impetrat orando he has it in another place Faith carries us to God when we cannot fulfill his commandements our selves and by the infusion of this habit he enables us to do it and thereby are we justified in his Opinion Quod operam lex minando imperat hoc fidei lex credendo impetrat Lege operum dicit Deus fac quod jubeo lege fidei dicitur Deo da quod jubes That which the law of works requires by threats the law of faith obtains by believing In the law of works God saies doe what I command in the law of faith we say to God give what thou commandest Ib. c. 12. Opus quod qui fecerit vivet in eo non fit nisi justificato justificatio autem ex fide impetratur The works which he that does shall live in them are not done but by the justified and justification is impetrated by faith c. 19. Lex non evacuatur sed statuitur per fidem quia fides impetrat gratiam qua lex impleatur The law is not made void but established by faith because faith fetches from God his grace whereby the law is fulfilled c. 30. Now when he accounts that this grace which makes us just or this infused grace is obtained by faith it is plain that he must account that good works do follow it Upon which there is a dfficulty might be proposed to this Father the spirit infuses this grace does faith then prhcede the spirit that infuses it or not If it doe then must our faith be of our selves when our good works are of his gift And this indeed was his judgment while he wrote this book though after he recalled it in others See particularly De gra lib. arb c.
bee profitable to God sayes Eliphas to Job And who hath given to the Lord that he should receive of him sayes the Apostle But the case is not so under their favour with a debt or merit upon equal and upon terms unequal In a compact upon terms that are equal we are to know that the reward does become debt or may be said to be of merit notwithstanding by way of strict retaliation or upon an account of equal benefit the performance of the condition would require no such matter For instance if I agree to give a man half a crown for his dayes work I must pay it him as debt though the emolument to me by the work done is not worth it nay though if I had not agreed I should have thought much to give him half the money but in a compact upon terms unequal as if I promise a poor man a shilling for his leading my horse to the next stile though I am bound to give it to him when he has done so yet is the shilling an Almes or the reward of grace or favour for all that Now I account when God in the Covenant of Nature hath made eternal life to be due upon exact obedience it is a compact upon terms but equal he that doth them shall live in them So long as man was innocent God in justice could not punish him and so long as he continued but in the same state he was created he must be happy and eternally so which is the same thing with salvation only it could not be called by that name till man was first lost Neither may Gods giving him ability or his doing no more then his duty be any hindrance to him of meriting upon this compact any more then my letting the man I have hired to work with my shovel or mattock and his doing only what he was bid hinder him of his wages the reason is because the compact supposes that if he does but his duty with the strength that God has given or does give him he shall be justified and blessed If Adam then had or we could perform the condition of Nature which is to live perfectly without offending God at all the reward no doubt seeing the Apostle so accounts of it should be of merit or debt for that was a Covenant upon terms but equal it being meet that God should deal benignly with us as his Creatures while we carry our selves towards him as our Marker and that he should not deprive us of any benefit to which we were created before we forfeited it by our transgression But now when he gives us the reward which is eternal life through his Son upon an obedience which is imperfect that is by a new Covenant upon terms unequal he gives it freely seeing he gives it without performance of the condition at first required to obtain the same The sum of this is the rectoral justice of God is either under the strict law or under the law of grace When our Divines then say that our works do not merit they say true but they must be rightly understood when they give us those reasons for it at first named their reasons are good against all merit of commutative justice and of strict retaliation in distributive justice and against merit ex pacto under the strict law or upon terms that are equal but as to a merit of compact under the law of grace secundum regimen gratiae pate num they are not good When by some of these reasons therefore our works if they were perfect should not yet be meritorious which is a contradiction to the Apostle I must conclude that the reason why grace is said to be free by St Paul is not because our works do not merit upon their reasons or do not merit with a merit of strict retaliation or ex pacto upon terms that are equal which their reasons only exclude but because we do not come up to those those works which notwithstanding their reasons would merit if we did perform them that is because they come short of that condition which by Gods first compact according to nature should make the reward to be of debt and yet God accepts of them for Christs sake and rewards them no less then if they did That the grace of justification is purchased by Christ it is apparent in the words that are ordinarily joynd with it Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus But if the notion of free did lye in the conception our DivInes ordinarily frame then could it not be the fruit of Christs purchase for how can that which is purchased in their sense be free whereas it is this grace certainly is the main fruit of Christs redemption to wit that the new Covenant should be established so as the poor sinner whose Conscience does condemn him of the breach of that law which is written in his heart and according to which he should dye hath yet a refuge to Gods mercy which he is said I pray pardon me the repetition to bestow freely because man hath not the works which should make the reward due to him Lo then how the grace of God is said free indeed in the meaning of the Apostle Not upon the account I say that man cannot merit at Gods hand though it be true that our works do not merit as our Divines ordinarily only inform us seeing both that God can be made debtor ex pacto regimine gratiae paterno and Christ who became man did merit for us but upon the account here mentioned which is a most direct answer to the doubt proposed how the grace of God can be free which is not tendred and obtained but upon condition and I declare that Gods abatement of the terms and requiring a new condition is that which therefore makes it free seeing it is tendred and obtained without performance of the old As also that the new being unequal hinders not grace The second thing wherein St. Austin is out is in his interpretation of Works It is manifest that Paul speaks of words in such a sense as no man living can perform them and upon that account no man can be justified by them But if the interpretation of this Father and the Papists after him were true that by works we must understand works only that are done before a man is regenerate or before he hath the help of the spirit then may a man who is regenerate and hath its help perform the works that the Apostle speaks of and so be justified by them And then must his doctrine be false that comes to this universal conclusion Wherefore we conclude that by the works of the law shall no flesh living be justified in his sight for by the law is the knowledg of sin On the other side when some Protestants conceive that the Apostle speaks of our works in general and accounts that we are not justified by them because it is by the
righteousness of Christ that we are justified I cannot but think they are out likewise For if when Paul sayes we are not justified by works his meaning were not by our own works but by the obedience of Christ wrought for us then when James sayes we are justified by works his meaning must be by the works Christ did for us and he must not mean our own But this is absonant to any rational apprehension to construe St. James so Nor do I think such a meaning ever came into the heads of either of the Apostles Our Divines then should not say here of our works in general but as to the sense the Apostle speaks of them in general we are not justified them And what is that sense then in which he speak of works why he speaks of works in that sense most manifestly as the law require them that we may live in them Let a man then have the help of the spirit or be without it so long as he falls short of what the law requires at his hands be it never so little he cannot live by those works the curse is due to him for the least breach and that is contrary to justification There are some Divines of note therefore seeing no footing for this distinction have chose an other There are works of the Law say they and works of the Gospel When St. Paul sayes we are not justified by works he speaks expresly of works of the Law St. James is to be understood of the works of the Gospel This distinction may serve well provided it be cloathed with the sense of the Apostles When some have used these terms to signify no more but that we are not justifyed by Jewish observations but by the righteousness of the Gospel it falls too short in the first branch to do any thing But by the works of the law let them understand works which answer the law and that there are none justified by the works of the law because there is none perfectly fulfil it and they have hit the business For though Paul speaks not only of works by the law of innocency but directly and mostly of the works of the Jewish law which the Jews fancied ex sufficientia praestantialegis did as such procure pardon and life without looking to the merits of the Mediator for it and so erred yet the law of Moses consisting either in moral precepts that represented the law of Nature which no man can come up to and the most righteous of them did break or in the remedying commandements of sacrifices or attonements for sin whose virtue alone did lye in the blood of the Redeemer the ground and bottom of their errour which he confuteth does indeed lye herein that whatsoever it was they did or whatsoever they thought of it it did fall short of the law of works therefore did not justify them before God There are works then which if they be performed doe answer the law the law we are to mean ultimately as given to mankind in a Covenant by our creation and works which if performed do not answer the law but answer the Gospel If the distinction before-cited be received with this meaning it is true that Paul speaks of the works of the law and James of the works of the Gospel and that there is no man justified by the former because there is no man does or can perform them when we do perform the latter and are justified by them To give more light and weight to this There are works which if we be justified by them exclude grace and there are works which exclude not grace though we be justified by them The works of the law take them in this sense that answer the law if they be performed must make justification due so as it may be challenged according to the law the reward shall be of debt and there be no need of grace but justice in the case for he that doth them ought of right to live in them And these are the works undoubtedly that Paul disputes against while he proves justification to be of grace which is also agreeable to the end and scope the holy Ghost seems to have in it to wit he beating man down from all vain exaltation in himself and laying him at Gods feet for all he has Wherein it were not yet enough that what he hath is received seeing he would be even ready to boast of this that he hath received what others have not but that when he is enabled by God to perform that which he does even this which he hath received and is accepted is but such as God Almighty might choose whether he would accept it or not and if it were not for grace for all he hath done he could not yet be justified and saved On the contrary hand therefore the works of the Gospel that is the works which the Gospel requires of us as the condition of our justification and salvation such as faith repentance and new obedience when they are performed and answer the Gospel they do yet stand in need of grace because they do not answer the law and God might chuse whether he would accept them or no or make any promise to them When we repent it includes the acknowledgment of sin and when we believe it is a flying to Gods mercy for it and though we may walk sincerely before God we do not and cannot walk perfectly and he might condemn us is justice for the least failings and much more for our manifold transgressions If God then shews mercy and accepts of what we do it must be of his grace that he does it It is true that these works do justifie us but that is while we are judged at the bar of Gods grace or according to the new Covenant which is therefore called a Covenant of grace or the law of grace because that grace is no ways destroyed but confirmed by these works From whence it may appear that the two Apostles shall be so far from contradicting one another about this point as that what St. Paul contends for shall be made good by that which is said by St. James Paul sayes we are justified by grace and St. James proves it while he shews us that our works which are imperfect even such as Rahabs as well as Abrahams are accepted and rewarded as if they were perfect that is are imputed to us for righteousness which they could never be but for grace and that purchased through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus The third thing wherein St. Augustine mistakes is that which strewes the way to the Papists doctrine or justification by works and therefore it will be necessary before I come to it to advance here somthing out of this Father which offers us I think some light towards the fixing our own doctrine of justification by faith Per legem cognitio peccati per fidem impetratio gratiae contra peccatum per gratiam sanatio animi a vitio