conversion bespeaks an extraordinary change and a mighty influence of the Spirit of God upon him though they told him that if he believed on the Lord Jesus Christ he should be saved and his house yet by their proceeding with him they plainly shew that their meaning was not that he should be saved by his Faith without Baptism For the event was that he and his houshold were immediately baptized upon their profession of this belief v. 33 Acts XVIII 8 Acts XIX 2 3 4 5 6. I mention not the Baptism of Crispus the Ruler of the Synagogue and the other Corinthians that believed and were baptized with him nor even of those Believers at Ephesus who notwithstanding their having already received the Baptism of St. John the Baptist notwithstanding their belief in Christ upon the same Baptists Preaching notwithstanding they heard St. Paul himself Preach and therefore must in all likelihood have felt that Grace which followed his Preaching in Persons qualified to receive it yet remained still uncapable of receiving our Saviours Spirit till they had first received his Baptism By all which instances it appears that how great soever the Grace of God was which then accompanied the Word Preached yet even then it was not thought so great as to supersede I do not say the Vse but even the Necessity of Sacraments So far it is from being reasonable to expect it should do so now when all confess it is not distributed in so plenteous a measure § XXI BUT though this be abundantly sufficient for my present design that this Grace is not so great as to encourage them to think themselves in a safe condition whilest they have it though they want the Sacraments and want them through their own faults I mean when they are unwilling to purchase them by unsinful condescensions Yet because this is the great support of many in our Age even who pretend to live Religiously and I do not doubt do really mean so too that satisfie their Consciences with frequenting Sermons and the ordinary Prayers which accompany them whilest in the mean time they notoriously neglect the Sacraments even where they may have them on neither sinful nor so much as grievous terms nay not on such which themselves think either sinful or grievous and because this is a Popular mistake which certainly hinders many Conscientious Persons from discerning that danger in a state of Schism which they would certainly have discerned and resented otherwise and because it must needs give greater satisfaction to Prudent Enquirers to believe that this Grace is not so great as to excuse from Sacraments when they shall understand Positively how great it is it will not be amiss on this occasion to invite our Brethren to some closer thoughts concerning this matter than possibly they may yet have enterteined Let me therefore desire them to consider further § XXII 6. Whether all the Grace which is supposed to accompany the Word Preached be any more than what is necessary to dispose the Auditors to receive and believe the Truth of the Doctrines Preached to them Or whether there be any the least ground to believe that they shall there receive that assistance which is necessary to help them to practise what they have thus received and believed That thus much Grace is necessary for atteining the end of Preaching will not be doubted of by those who believe the Church's Definitions against the Pelagians concerning the necessity of Divine Grace to make us willing as well as able Voss. Hist. Pelag. Nay even Julian himself went so far as to grant at least Gods illumination And this is indeed an eternal immutable reason why the Grace of God should accompany his Ordinance of Preaching concerning as well our present Ages as those of the Apostles For if this be the Case that we can neither apprehend the reasonableness of what is preached to us without the Divine Illumination extinguishing our carnal Prejudices and quickening and Spiritualizing our faculties nor be willing to perform Conditions till the Divine Grace has has made us unwilling it will thence plainly follow that some Divine Grace must be granted us Antecedently to the performance of Conditions namely all that Grace which is requisite to make the Conditions performable by us that is all that which is requisite to make us willing and able to perform them And because the Preaching of the Word is the first address made to us in Gods name and so the first ordinary step to our conversion therefore here it is very suitable to suppose us rather Passive than Active And therefore if God be supposed indeed to be in earnest with us in his invitations here proposed it will be absolutely necessary that he perform those beginnings for us without which he knows it impossible that we should perform the rest But when he has thus put it in our power to receive conviction by the Word Preached to us this Word will direct us whence we are to expect our further supplies and it will then be in our Power to go thither for them And when it is thus in our power to receive those Assistances which he communicates to us in the use of the Sacraments it will then be most agreeable to his design in instituting those Sacraments as ordinary Means of conveying those Assistances that he should oblige us to the use of them by refusing to grant them otherwise For all the Ordinances being instituted by the same Power it is for the reputation of the wise contrivance of them that no one Ordinance should supersede the use of the other and that as every Ordinance has its distinct benefit so there should be that obligation to keep up the respect due to an Ordinance of Divine Institution that none should be encouraged to hope for the benefit but in the use of the Ordinance And indeed the only way to keep up a constant dependance on an Ordinance is to confine to it the benefit to be expected by it and therefore it is not agreeable with the Rules of the Divine Government to institute two Ordinary Means of obteining the same benefit so that it might be in the power of good Persons to live in a perpetual neglect of one of them and it might be in the choice of every particular Person to choose whether of them he would be pleased to neglect § XXIII NOR is this less agreeable with the Politicks of the Divine Government than it is with the ordinary methods of the Divine Goodness in other Cases Though he be very Liberal yet he is not Prodigal Though he distribute favours proportionable to the necessities of all yet he contrives no more Ordinary ways for obteining them than what may make them possible to the generality Many particular Individuals do want the necessary supports of his Ordinary Providence when they want the Ordinary Means of obteining them But much more he observes this Method of proceeding when the benefits are very excellent
and quickened in the Spirit that is did not die as to his Divinity for so 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies to save alive as well as to make alive Which exactly agrees with what we have elsewhere observed that the Spirit is it self called Christ. And what can be more agreeable to the design of these places where this sin is mentioned by our Saviour than this all things being considered As in the places now produced the flesh and Spirit are joyned together and opposed so in these places the Son of man and the Holy Ghost are the same way opposed Not that I think that our Blessed Saviour took his own Divinity for granted in dealing with the Jews or that he proceeded on the supposition of his being anointed with the Spirit and with the fulness of it any otherwise than as it was capable of appearing to them that he was so the same way as the Holy Ghost appeared to them in the Wilderness as an assistant of Moses that is by as stupendous Miracles as had ever been performed by Moses himself § IX AND so the Argument would hold exactly that as on account of the Miracles performed by Moses their obstinate refusal of conviction by those Miracles was not taken only for a contempt of Moses who was a frail man like themselves as Moses himself had often told them Who are we that ye murmur against us Your murmuring is not against us but against God Exod. xvi 7 And if the Lord make a new thing c. then shall ye know that these men have offended not us but the Lord and was accordingly resented by God himself Numb xvi 30 and punished as a contempt of his Holy Spirit by whom those Miracles had been performed so our Saviour giving the same evidence of his Mission as Moses had done they had reason to expect that God would also resent the contempt of those Miracles not as an affront offered only to the Son of man as he seemed to them but as an affront to the Holy Ghost by whose power alone his Miracles were performable as well as those of Moses And as it was not every lighter affront to the Holy Ghost himself that had been thus punished in the Israelites in the Wilderness with an irrevocable sentence but a high degree of provocation of him so our Saviour had particular reason to warn them to beware of that high degree For what could be a greater provocation to the Holy Spirit than to call him an evil one Yet this was the thing the Jews were likely to be guilty of in ascribing the Miracles themselves that were performed by our Saviour to Belzebub the Prince of the Devils if they still persisted in it after our Saviour had warned them that the Holy Ghost would resent such injuries as offered to himself And therefore though their affronts against our Saviour as the Son of Man had been no more severely punishable than those against Moses had been considering only his Person as a Man though an excellent and good one which had never brought those capital Punishments upon their Fore-fathers in the Wilderness as Moses himself had often warned them who suffered under them yet their hard Speeches against the Holy Ghost for that is the meaning of blaspheming him might expect not only a capital Punishment in this World like that of their Fore-fathers in the Wilderness but also in the World to come which was a thing they had not formerly been so generally acquainted with but was a Revelation reserved for the coming of the Messias who was the Prince of the World to come and proper to the times of the Gospel as the Author to the Hebrews tells them So that if the Gospel which he preached to them should prove true as the Miracles he did in confirmation of it proved it true they must expect to suffer for sins committed against this Dispensation not only in this but in the other World because these sufferings in the other World were a principal Discovery of the Gospel § X AND indeed this threatning of our Saviour was punctually executed on them who persisted in their obstinacy notwithstanding his warning by a Punishment not only in the other World but even in this every way as remarkable as that was of the destruction of their Fore-fathers in the Wilderness that is in the destruction of their Temple and City and soon after in the dispersion and exile of their whole Nation from that beloved Canaan which their Fore-fathers in the Wilderness thought themselves so unhappy for because they did not live to see and enjoy it And if it were necessary to make a Notion of a Punishment in the other World which might also be National as their Punishment in this World now mentioned was and as that was also of that generation of their Fore-fathers which perished in the Wilderness I should take it to be the depriving them of the Priviledges they had formerly enjoyed on account of Gods Covenant with them that they should be no more Gods People that they should have no more interest in the Promises of God and that special Providence of his which on that account had been formerly so watchful over them that they should lose their interest in the true Messiah which was the principal Promise without which the performance of all other Promises as they expected them had been little significant to them These were Punishments of the other World as it was expected by them under the Messias And these things they afterwards suffered for this very fault of resisting and blaspheming those mighty influences of the Spirit whereby the Gospel was recommended to them by the Apostles as they now did on the same way of recommendation of it used by our Lord himself This I take for a clear and easie and intelligible account of what the Evangelists tell us concerning this whole matter § XI NOW by this it appears that this sin against the Holy Ghost is a resisting the Gospel Dispensation for which the Holy Ghost is pleased so eminently to concern himself For this is that which has peculiar to it self the concerns of the other World of which the Messias was expected to be the Prince And accordingly resisting this Dispensation is elsewhere usually characterized as a resisting of the Holy Ghost So in the Case of Ananius and Sapphira who had consecrated a Possession to the service of the Church Act. v 3.9 but kept back part of it St. Peter charges them with lying to the Holy Ghost and agreeing to tempt the Spirit of the Lord. Act. vii 51 So St. Stephen Ye stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears ye do always resist the Holy Ghost as your Fore-fathers did so do you How their Fore-fathers had resisted the Holy Ghost he had before shewn in the whole Chapter exactly agreeably with the account I have given of it concerning their frequent Lapses in the Wilderness and elsewhere notwithstanding the many Miracles
God had been pleased to do for their conviction And their present resisting the Holy Ghost at that time is plainly their perverse behaviour against St. Stephens Preaching Act. vi 8 notwithstanding that also had been confirmed to them by many signs and great Miracles Heb. x. 29 So falling away from the Church Assemblies is in the Author to the Hebrews a doing despite to the Spirit of Grace So St. Paul tells the Thessalonians that he that despised the injunctions of the Apostles of which he had been speaking despised not men 1 Thes. iv 8 but God who had also given them his holy Spirit Therefore he intreats the Ephesians that they would not grieve the holy Spirit by which they had been sealed to the day of Redemption Eph. iv 30. And as this Office of performing Miracles is still ascribed to the Holy Ghost so our Saviour in regard of the Miracles performed by him Act. x. 38 is said to have been anointed with the Holy Ghost and with power which enabled him to heal all those who were under the power of the Devil And so all those who are said to have preached the Gospel with that power with which we see it was preached in the History of the Acts are still described as Persons full of the Holy Ghost Therefore we find so often mention of the demonstration of the Spirit 1 Cor. ii 4 and of the Testimony of the Spirit given to the Gospel which plainly infer that whoever resists the Gospel so demonstrated and testified must necessarily reflect on the wisdom and veracity of the Spirit himself And that these things are so frequently mentioned on all occasions seems plainly to have been with design to give men warning of the greatness and dangerousness of the sin they were likely to prove guilty of in resisting the evidence of the Gospel which was the same that our Saviour had in warning the Jews of it in the Gospels This may suffice to shew in general that a resisting of the Gospel Dispensation is a resisting of the Spirit and that particularly on this first account as it is a resisting of the Miracles done by the Spirit in confirmation of the Gospel § XII A second resisting of the Spirit with which the Jews are also expresly charged was their resisting and murdering the Prophets and particularly with reference to the Gospel in murdering of their Saviour himself This St. Stephen charges on them immediately after the words now mentioned as instances how they had resisted the Holy Ghost and how they still continued to resist him Act. vii 52 Which of the Prophets says he have not your Fathers persecuted and they slew them who foretold of the coming of the Just one of whom you have now been the betrayers and murderers The persecuting therefore and killing of the Prophets was that resisting of the Holy Ghost who had spoken by those Prophets of which their Fathers had been guilty and their own murdering the Just one himself who was also a Prophet Luk. xxiv 19 2 Chro. xxxvi 15 16 17 c. Jorem xxv 4 5 6 7 8 9 c. mighty in word and deed was the instance of their doing like their Fore fathers And this is often taken notice of in the Old Testament as a reason of Gods dealing so severely with their Fore-fathers and of his giving them up at last to those Judgments by which he intended to punish their undutiful behaviour And our Saviour himself takes notice of it as the particular reason why Jerusalem should be destroyed because she had killed the Prophets and stoned them that had been sent to her Matt. xxiii 37 Ver. 34. And among the Prophets he reckons those whom he designed himself to send to them So also in the Parable of the King who let out his Vineyard to the unfaithful Husbandmen he first mentions the several sending of the Servants Matt. xxi 41 Mark xii 9 Luk. xx 16 but when he tells of their murdering the Son there he concludes as the utmost tryal of his Prince's patience and makes him immediately resolve cruelly to destroy those wicked men And this seems also to have been the gradation which was observed by the Author to the Hebrews Heb. i. 1 that whereas God had spoken to their Fore-fathers in sundry times and in divers manners by the Prophets he had now in those last days spoken to them by his Son which they were therefore to look on as the last tryal and which if they neglected they could expect no relief by any other Dispensation nor delay of the threatned vengeance this being the highest degree of provocation This seems exactly to agree with the whole reasoning of that Epistle And it very well agrees with the Notion of the unpardonableness of the sin I am speaking of § XIII BESIDES it is very considerable to this purpose that this sin against the Holy Ghost as he is the Spirit of Prophesie is peculiarly threatned in that Law which is understood to promise a Succession of Prophets For so the words run A A Prophet will I raise unto them out of the midst of their Brethren Deut. xviii 18 19. like unto thee and I will put my words into his mouth that he may speak whatsoever I shall command him And it shall come to pass that whoever shall not hearken unto my words which be shall speak in my name I will require it of him Maimonid Fundam Leg. Cap. ix §. 4. The Punishment here threatned the Jews themselves understand to be a capital one which is as far from any relief or hopes of pardon as any expression used concerning the Punishment of this sin against the Holy Ghost implies that to be But this place will appear yet more apposite to our purpose when it is considered that however a Succession of Prophets may be secondarily implyed yet the words express but one and that one Prophet is as expressly applied in the New Testament Act. iii. 22.vii.37 Abarbin de Pen. Excis to our Saviour And what is here said to be God's requiring it at their hands is there called a destroying out of their People which as it rather implies the Punishment of Excision as they call it which was rather to be expected from God himself than to be inflicted by the Civil Magistrate and as it thereby resembles the Shammatha the turning them over to God's own Judgment at his coming which as I have said was inflicted on desperate Offenders and as it is like the expression of the XII Tables Tull. de Legib. which for the most piacular Offences allotted no other Punishment but this Si secus farit Deus ipse vindex esto so it exactly agrees with the account which the New Testament gives of the Punishment of those who should prove refractory to the Gospel 1 Thes. i. 8 9 ii.8 that they are reserved to that flaming fire in which Christ was to be expected to
far I should be from excusing any hard thoughts concerning a Multitude But if the knowledg of their danger be the most likely means to secure them from it if more of them will come to understand their danger when they are warned of it by others than would if they were left to the ingenuity and sagacity of their own reflections It must be then the greatest cruelty to conceal our apprehensions of their danger as it would be in the other case to reveal them And the greater the multitude is of them that are indangered the more pitiable is their case and the more obliging a tender compassionate truly Christian Spirit to endeavour all he can for their relief How can such a one who has learned the true value of Souls from what his Lord has done and suffered to save them endure to see his Lords designs so frustrated and such numbers of Souls fall short of those favours which were designed for them by what he had done and suffered for their Salvation Could the danger of his Fathers Life extort words from the dumb Son of Croesus And can any Lover of the Father of Spirits keep silence when thousands of those Spirits are in danger of perishing for want of seasonable information To think that there are such multitudes of those who unfeignedly believe the truth of the Christian Religion who yet are destitute of the ordinary means of Salvation required by that Religion to think how many more are like to be engaged on the same dangerous courses in all those future generations wherein these SCHISMS may last if they be not timely obviated to think how many of these poor Souls neither think of any danger in the state of SCHISM nor are sensible of the true stating of those disputes which might in all likelihood convince them how nearly they are concerned in that danger who if they were but rightly informed and made sensible of their danger would in all likelihood receive conviction and escape the danger at least would be more inquisitive if they knew their present course to be indeed so dangerous if they should prove mistaken To think I say on these things seriously must sure raise the zeal of him who has any zeal of God in him or any bowels of compassion for Souls that is indeed who has any thing of the Spirit of Christianity So that hitherto the multitude of them who are concerned ought rather to be an inducement than a dissuasive to a compassionate soul to let them see their danger § XII BUT if another use be made of this consideration of the multitude of those who are concerned in the consequences of this discourse for a charge against our modesty for dissenting from so great a multitude in thinking their condition so dangerous when they think it so secure in pretending to any thing new that such a multitude have not discovered before us though I know how little such an Objection becomes the Person of those who are most of all concerned to make it who make no scruple to practise and avow this liberty of dissenting from greater multitudes than themselves yet many other considerations may be pleaded for our defence even in this particular also First the multitude though they may seem many when we confine our thoughts to the narrow extents of our own Dominions yet are really inconsiderable in comparison of the whole Church I do not say only of former Ages but even of this also wherein we live And what immodesty can it be to dissent from a multitude when we have so much greater a multitude to confront against them Next this multitude it self are so disunited among themselves as that no particular party will make a multitude in comparison of the whole And if they be united in this conclusion that their condition is not dangerous it is not from any common principles but purely from common interest that they are so united It is plain that the different parties do state the question of SCHISM and their own defence from the charge of it very differently and are obliged to do so by the different interests of their causes So that no one set of Principles can pretend even to the patronage of a multitude And sure a Vnion in Negative conclusions without any Vnion in Principles to prove those conclusions a Vnion not of unprejudiced Judgment but plainly suspicious of common interest a Vnion of innovaters against the concurrent sense and Principles too of all Antiquity cannot have any thing very venerable in it for the recommendation of its Authority though a higher deference were due to Authority than can be allowed by the common Principles of the Reformation § XIII AS for the multitude of those whose Authority is really considerable in this case I mean that of Catholick Antiquity I hope hereafter to make it appear in my Second Part that I have said nothing as to my general charge but upon their common Suffrages and Principles too And why should we presume a multitude of innovaters better acquainted with the principles and practices of the Apostles than they who had so much better advantages of knowing them by living so much nearer to their times I do not prejudg against their actual knowing some things better than the ancients But if there can be no general presumption in favour of them but the enquiry in what particulars they do so be resolved into particular information that is enough to overthrow their Authority as a presumption against us in point of modesty which is all for which I am concerned at present Besides that this acknowledgment that Persons of less advantages for finding the truth in general and therefore of less Authority may yet be so happy as to light upon better information in some particulars is that which might be a very satisfactory plea and by them against whom we plead it undeniable for our dissent from them in these particulars though we had been more destitute otherwise of Authority for our dissent than indeed were are And to know when the case may prove so that Persons more unlikely may discover some particular truths which have escaped the observation of others who were otherwise much more able to have made the discovery a better rule can hardly be given in general than that this may be then expected when either some false Principle was taken up unwarily at first by them who though they were themselves as subject to humane frailties as others yet by their being the first had the Authority with their Successors as to recommend them as Principles to posterity so that all their future enquiries were only into their consequences not into the truth of such Principles themselves or when some other means of information were made use of which either were not known or not made use of by those more able Persons Thus it is very justly pleadable against the Romanists that whilest they made unwritten traditions of equal Authority with the written word of
A further presumption for proving the same thing § XIII p. 156. CHAP. VIII 3. The participation in these external Solemnities with any legal validity is only to be had in the external Communion of the visible Church § I. The Church as taken for the body of the Elect uncapable of being communicated with externally § II III. That all things here contrived are exactly fitted for a visible Church and no other § IV V. p. 163. CHAP. IX 2. That in reference to the duty of particular Persons the visible Church wherein they may expect to find these ordinary means is the Episcopal in opposition to all other Societies not Episcopally governed and particularly that Episcopal Communion under whose Jurisdiction the Persons are supposed to live § I. 1. The Episcopal Communion in opposition to all other Societies not Episcopally governed is that visible Church to whose external Communion these ordinary means of grace are confined This proved by several degrees § II. 1. The ordinary means of grace are now confined to the Sacraments Two things premised The former § III IV. The later § V. The thing to be proved § VI. Proved two ways 1. Exclusively of other means of gaining that Grace which is necessary to Salvation besides the Sacrament § VII VIII 1. Of the Word Preached Some things premised § IX X XI XII 1. Much of the Grace conveyed by the Word Preached in the Primitive times was undoubtedly proper to those times and not fit to be expected now § XIII XIV XV. 2. There were reasons proper to those times why such Grace might be expected then which will not hold now for the conviction of the Persons who then received the Spirit § XVI 3. There were also other proper reasons necessary for the conviction of those with whom they had to deal § XVII 4. That Grace which might otherwise have been expected in attending on the Word Preached is yet not so probably to be expected in the Preaching of Persons unauthorized especially if they Preach in opposition to those who are Legally invested with Spiritual Authority § XVIII XIX 5. It is yet further doubtful whether the Grace which which may now be ordinarily expected at any Preaching whatsoever be so great as to be able to supply the want of Sacraments at least so great as to secure the Salvation of those who enjoy this Ordinance whilest they want the Sacraments § XX XXI 6. It is also very doubtful whether all the Grace which is supposed to accompany the Word Preached be any more than what is necessary to dispose the Auditors to receive and believe the truth of the Doctrines Preached to them or whether there be any the least ground to believe that they shall there receive that further Assistance which is necessary to help them to practise what they have thus received and believed § XXII XXIII XXIV 7. This first Grace of persuasion if we suppose it alone to accompany the Word Preached will fully answer the design of the Word Preached § XXV 8. The Grace here received seems to be only some actual influences of the Spirit which wicked men may receive whilest they continue so and which therefore cannot alone be thought sufficient for Salvation not the Person of the Divine Spirit himself § XXVI p. 166. CHAP. X. The exclusive Part proved 2. as to Prayer That neither this alone nor the Grace which may be expected in the use of it are sufficient for Salvation without the Sacraments The Objection proposed § I II. The Answer 1. That no Prayers can expect acceptance with God but such as suppose the use of the ordinary means and consequently of the Sacraments if they should prove such § III. 2. No Prayers can expect acceptance which are offered by a sinner continuing in the state of sin even at the same time when he offers them § IV. 3. It is more to be considered what is the ordinary means appointed by God than what is ordinarily observed by the best and wisest men § V. 4. It is no way safe for us to venture on our own Judgments concerning the design of God in instituting the Sacraments to neglect them This proved by several degreâ—â— It is hard to know the true design of the Sacraments § VI. They are not sure that raising Devotion by the sensible representations was the principal design of these Sacraments § VII They cannot assure themselves that this use of the sensible representations was the only or the principal end of the Sacraments § VIII Though they were sure of these things yet they have no reason whereby to be assured that God will be pleased with their taking upon them to judg of his designs and by that means allowing themselves the liberty of paying their obedience at their own discretion § IX 5. Another design of the Sacraments has been proved the confederating Subjects into a Body Politick and the obliging Subjects in it to a dependence on their Governours It is no way convenient that any should be excused from these establishments upon pretences to perfection They who were really perfect would not make this use of such pretences for their own sake § X. They would not do it for the sake of the publick § XI XII XIII They would not do it on account of the Divine actual establishment and the Divine assistances conveyed by the Sacraments which are necessary for perfection of the Person § XIV And of his Prayer § XV. 6. The Scripture no where allows such a degree of Perfection atteinable in this life as can in reason excuse from the reason of the Obligation to Ecclesiastical Assemblies All Members of the Church need the gifts of each other § XVI They need particularly those gifts which belong to Government § XVII All the other Members need the Head which cannot be understood of Christ but of Persons eminently gifted § XVIII This Head not a Head of Dignity only but also of influence and Authority § XIX Though they needed not the gifts of others yet they are obliged to joyn themselves in Ecclesiastical Societies in regard of the good they may do to others They are obliged to this as Platonists and as Christians § XX. p. 191. CHAP. XI 7. The Scripture gives us no encouragement to believe that any Prayers shall be heard which are made out of the Communion of the Church or even in the behalf of those that are so excepting those which are made for their Conversion This proved from St. John who was the only Apostle who lived to see the case of separation § I. St. Joh. xvii 9 § II. Where by being given to Christ is meant a being given by external Profession § III. By the World all they are meant who were out of the visible Society of the Professors of the Christian Doctrine § IV V. They are said to be in the World purely for this reason because they did not keep to the Society of the Church § VI. The same thing proved from 1
which the Spirit gave him by miracles § IX How our Saviours threatning was fulfilled § X. The sin against the Holy Ghost a resisting of the Gospel-Dispensation § XI 2. Murdering of the Prophets a sin against the Holy Ghost as he is particularly a Spirit of Prophesie § XII This particularly applied to our Saviour and the state of the Gospel § XIII 3. Resisting the influences of the Holy Ghost in us Applied to the Jews § XIV to the Christians § XV. According to the Hellenistical Philosophy § XVI XVII XVIII 4. Resisting the Government of the Church which was then ordered by the Spirit § XIX Separation from the Canonical Assemblies of the Church a sin against the Holy Ghost § XX. Concerning the punishment of this sin against the Holy Ghost and the way of arguing used by the Writers of the New-Testament from Old-Testament precedents § XXI XXII p. 294. CHAP. XV. 2. Directly That Salvation is not ordinarily to be expected without Sacraments § I. This proved 1. concerning Baptism 1. By those Texts which imply the dependence of our Salvation on Baptism 1. Such as speak of the Graces of Baptism § II. 1. The Spirit of God is said to be given in Baptism and so given as that he who is not baptized cannot be supposed to have it § III. The Spirit it self is absolutely necessary to Salvation as to his actual influences § IV. as to his constant presence as a living and abiding Principle § V. That the Spirit is first given in Baptism This proved from our new Birth 's being ascribed to our Baptism § VI. It is safe to argue from Metaphorical expressions in a matter of this nature St. Joh. iii. 5 considered § VII Water to be understood in this place Literally § VIII These words might relate to our Saviours Baptism § IX The Objection concerning the supposed parallel place of baptizing with the Holy Ghost and with fire § X. The fire here spoken of a material fire and contradistinct to the Holy Ghost § XI Our Saviours baptizing with the Holy Ghost and with fire as well applicable to our Saviours ordinary baptism as to that of the Apostles at Pentecost § XII The true reason why this descent of the Holy Ghost in Pentecost is called a Baptism was because it was a consummation of their former Baptism by Water § XIII The reason why this part of their Baptism was deferred so long § XIV Other instances wherein the Holy Ghost was given distinctly from the Baptism by Water § XV XVI XVII Our Saviour alluded herein to the Jewish Notions concerning Baptismal Regeneration § XVIII What the Rabbinical Notions are § XIX How agreeable to the Doctrine of the New-Testament § XX. The Notions of the Hellenistical Jews and of the Philosophers § XXI XXII XXIII How imitated by our Saviour § XXIV An Objection § XXV Answered § XXVI XXVII 2. Grace of Baptism forgiveness of sins § XXVIII XXIX XXX That unbaptized Persons cannot be supposed to have received the benefits of the washing of the blood of Christ or of the Mystical Baptism proved from two things 1. That all who would be Christians are obliged to receive even the Baptism by Water § XXXI 2. That every one who comes to Baptism is supposed to continue till then under the guilt of his sins § XXXII XXXIII XXXIV XXXV 2. The same dependence of Salvation on Baptism proved from those Texts which speak of the Priviledges of Baptism § XXXVI The same thing proved 2. from those Texts which expresly ascribe our Salvation to our Baptism § XXXVII A sum of the Argument from 1 Pet. iii. 21 § XXXVIII from other Texts § XXXIX The Application § XL. p. 321. CHAP. XVI Things to be premised § I. 1. That this dependence on the Episcopal Communion for a valid Baptism will alone suffice so far for my purpose as to discourage the perpetuating any opposite Communion § II III IV. Inference 1. That if this were granted even the absteining of pious Persons from the lawful Communion would be very rare § V. Inf. 2. That even those few pious Persons who after all diligence used to inform themselves and all lawful condescensions could not submit to the terms of the lawful Communion would yet never perpetuate so much as their Non-Communion § VI VII 2. Premisal That it cannot be expected that this Sacrament of the Lords Supper should be as necessary as that of Baptism § VIII The necessity of the Lords Supper to Salvation proved from the Mystical style by which this whole matter is expressed in the Scripture And that by these degrees 1. The Life of particular Members of the Mystical Body of Christ is in the Scripture supposed to depend on a constant repetition of vital influences from the common vital Principle as the Life of particular Members in the Natural Body does § X. 2. The Scripture also supposes the Life of particular Members to depend as much on their conjunction with the whole Mystical Body in order to their receiving these repeated influences as the Life of particular Members in the natural Body depends on their conjunction with the whole natural Body § X. 3. The Church with which it was supposed so necessary for particular Members to be united in order to their participation of this Spiritual Life is plainly supposed to be the Church in this World and that visible Society of them which joyned in the same publick exercises of Religion in that Age when these things were written § XI XII 4. The Reasons used by the Sacred Writers for this purpose are such as concern the Church as a Church and so as suitable to the later Ages of the Church as those earlier ones wherein they were used first § XIII 5. In order to this Mystical Union with the Church it is absolutely necessary as far as an ordinary means can be so that we partake of the Lords Supper This proved from 1 Cor. x. 17 § XIV The same thing proved from the true design of the Eucharist rightly explained This done by these degrees 1. The design of our Saviour seems to have been the Mystical 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so much spoken of in the Philosophy then received as the peculiar Office of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 2. In this Union the reason of our being in Christ is his being in us 3. Two things according to the Scripture to be distinguished in Christ his Flesh and Spirit and in both regards we are concerned that he be united to us § XV. 4. There are very material reasons why our Saviour should require this bodily Union in contradistinction to the Spiritual viz. the benefits which our Bodies in contradistinction to our Spirits may receive by it 1. That by this Corporal Union with Christ we may be made sensible of the interest he has in our Bodies and of our Obligation to serve him with our Bodies and to abstein from those sins which are seated in the Body The great necessity
III BUT however it is certain that no Man can be assured of anothers Election And seeing the Persons themselves are thus incapable of being distinguished from others Seeing at least there are no visible distinctives of any Society of them how is it possible to maintein any visible Communion with them by visible Solemnities The Elect may indeed be capable of mainteining a Communion with God because they know him and are known by him without any visible Societies but for want of these necessary conditions of Communication they can never constitute any Society nor maintein any Communication with each other And therefore if this be the Church to which our dissenting Brethren would pay the respect due to the Church all our Sacraments must be perfectly insignificant which seem plainly designed not only nor principally to maintein a visible Communication with God but with each other § IV SEEING therefore that this Legal validity depends on the due administration of these External Solemnities by which they may be believed Obligatory of God by the same Rules of Legal Equity whereby they would be Obligatory of Men And seeing that this is the only way among Men to infer an Obligation on Persons not immediately appearing in their own Persons as God does not in Covenanting with Vs that it may appear that the Persons acting in their behalf be indeed impowered by them to act in their Names and to pass such Acts into Legal Forms by solemn sealing them this must also be conceived requisite to Gods Obligation as it may be valid in Law and as it may be capable of appearing to Vs And therefore his Covenant is Transacted with Vs by Ministers dealing with us immediately and who must make out their Authority to Act and Administer the Seals in his Name the same way as Legal Procurators do by their Deputation from them who were Originally concerned § V NOW all the things on which this Tryal depends are visible the Covenant it self the Seals the Ministers their Call by Authorized Persons and therefore are uncapable of being Transacted any where but in a visible Church and an External Communion And it is further Observable that this way of proceeding will resolve the ultimate Tryal of the validity of these Solemnities into the Authority of the Persons administring them which will more directly prove that the visible Church here supposed must also be a Body Politick And this may suffice at present for proof of this second thing necessary for the Justification of this Proposition That the Ordinary Means of Salvation are confined to the External Communion of the visible Church CHAP. IX That the Grace to be expected in hearing the Word Preached is not sufficient for Salvation without the Sacraments THE CONTENTS 11. That in reference to the Duty of particular Persons the visible Church wherein they may expect to find these Ordinary Means is the Episcopal in opposition to all other Societies not Episcopally governed and particularly that Episcopal Communion under whose Jurisdiction the Persons are supposed to live § I. 1. The Episcopal Communion in opposition to all other Societies not Episcopally governed is that visible Church to whose External Communion these Ordinary Means of Grace are confined This proved by several degrees § II. 1. The Ordinary Means of Grace are now confined to the Sacraments Two things premised The former § III.IV. The later § V. The thing to be proved § VI. Proved two ways 1. Exclusively of other Means of gaining that Grace which is necessary to Salvation besides the Sacrament § VII VIII 1. Of the Word Preached Some things Premised § IX X.XI.XII 1. Much of the Grace conveyed by the Word Preached in the Primitive times was undoubtedly proper to those times and not fit to be expected now § XIII XIV.XV 2. There were reasons proper to those times why such Grace might be expected then which will not hold now for the conviction of the Persons who then received the Spirit § XVI 3. There were also other proper Reasons necessary for the conviction of those with whom they had to deal § XVII 4. That Grace which might otherwise have been expected in attending on the Word Preached is yet not so probably to be expected in the Preaching of Persons Vnauthorized especially if they Preach in opposition to them who are Legally invested with Spiritual Authority § XVIII XIX 5. It is yet farther doubtful whether the Grace which may now be Ordinarily expected at any Preaching whatsoever be so great as to be able to supply the want of the Sacraments at least so great as to secure the Salvation of those who enjoy this Ordinance whilest they want the Sacraments § XX. XXI 6. It is also very doubtful whether all the Grace which is supposed to accompany the Word Preached be any more than what is necessary to dispose the Auditors to receive and believe the Truth of the Doctrines Preached to them Or whether there be any the least ground to believe that they shall there receive that further Assistance which is necessary to help them to Practice what they have thus received and believed § XXII XXIII.XXIV 7. This first Grace of Perswasion if we suppose it alone to accompany the Word Preached will fully answer the design of the Word Preached § XXV 8. The Grace here received seems to be only some actual Influences of the Spirit which wicked men may receive whilest they continue so and which therefore cannot alone be thought sufficient for Salvation not the Person of the Divine Spirit himself § XXVI § I I PROCEED therefore to the second Particular requisite for bringing this Proposition home to my present design viz. That in reference to the Duty of particular Persons that visible Church wherein they may expect to find these Ordinary Means is the Episcopal in opposition to all other Societies not Episcopally governed and particularly that Episcopal Communion under whose Jurisdiction the Persons are supposed to live This will also consist of 2. Parts fit to be considered distinctly 1. That the Episcopal Communion in opposition to all other Societies not Episcopally governed is that visible Church to whose External Communion thâ—se Ordinary Means of Grace are confined And 2. That in respect to particular Persons that Episcopal Communion under which the Persons live is that particular Episcopal Communion to which these Ordinary Means of Salvation are confined in the Case of these particular Persons § II 1. THEN The Episcopal Communion in opposition to all other Societies not Episcopally governed is that visible Church to whose External Communion these Ordinary Means of Grace are confined This I shall endeavour to prove by these degrees 1. That the Ordinary Means of Grace are now confined to the Sacraments 2. That the validity of these Sacraments depend upon the Authority of the Persons by whom they are administred 3. That no other Ministers have this lawful Authority but only they of the Episcopal Communion § III 1. The Ordinary Means of Grace
either already was our interest or at least has been made so by his Institution of it and yet for some more momentous reason than the bare exercise of our Obedience But it is certain many more are influenced by the Spirit than they who are possessed by him Caiaphas (a) St. John XI 51 was influenced by the Spirit So was Balaam (b) Numb xxii xxiii 2 S. Pet. II. 15 16. and so were all they who are said to have resisted (c) Acts VII 51 or grieved (d) Eph. IV. 30 him Our Calvinistical Brethren themselves distinguish between common and special Grace and to keep to the now-mentioned Notion of the Spirits making Prophets the Jews do also distinguish between a Prophetick instinct and the Spirit of Prophecy These first Impulses of the Spirit are so far from making Men good as that indeed there is no Man so wicked but has them at some time or other and it is an aggravation of his wickedness by how many more he has resisted of them They are but dispositions and inclinations to good courses but do not turn to good will and good resolutions till they be consented to And no man is to be reputed either good or bad without some kind of consent And yet even when they are consented to they make a man only willing but for ability to perform what he is then willing to perform they leave him in a need of further Assistances At least they do not suppose the constant abiding of the same Spirit as a constant certain Principle from whom they may still expect the like influences Which consideration alone is sufficient to shew how little confidence is to be reposed in them without the Sacraments Now that these influences which thus accompany the Word Preached are of this kind may appear hence that wicked Men are as apt to feel them as others in the hearing of zealous Preachers and may at the same time strive against them to stifle and suppress them and this with too fatal a success But they who have the Spirit as an inhabiting enlivening Principle must whilest they have it so be predominantly influenced by it This must at least be granted by our Calvinistical Brethren who think no proper Grace resistible or amissible whereas we daily see many who have been affected with zealous Sermons to fall totally and finally too as far as we can judg of them And it is clear in the Cases of Herod hearing (e) S. Mark VI. 20 St. John Baptist gladly of Felix hearing St. Paul and (f) Acts XXIV 25 trembling upon it and of all those who received the Word with (g) S. Mark IV. 16 17. gladness yet fell away in the time of tribulation This I take at least for an Argument ad homines I have intimated others which I my self think more solid but I shall not now repeat them CHAP. X. The Grace which may be obtained by Prayer is not sufficient for Salvation without the Sacraments THE CONTENTS § I The Exclusive Part proved 2. as to Prayer That neither this alone nor the Grace which may be expected in the use of it are sufficient for Salvation without the Sacraments The Objection proposed § I.II. The Answer 1. That no Prayers can expect acceptance with God but such as suppose the use of Ordinary Means and consequently of the Sacraments if they should prove such § III. 2. No Prayers can expect acceptance which are offered by a Sinner continuing in the state of Sin even at the same time when he offers them § IV. 3. It is more to be considered what is the Ordinary Means appointed by God than what is Ordinarily observed by the best-meaning and wisest Men. § V. 4. It is no way safe for us to venture on our own Judgments concerning the design of God in instituting the Sacraments to neglect them This proved by several degrees It is hard to know the true design of the Sacraments § VI. They are not sure that raising Devotion by the sensible Representations was the principal design of these Sacraments § VII They cannot assure themselves that this use of the sensible Representations was either the Only or the Principal End of the Sacraments § VIII Though they were sure of these things yet they have no reason whereby to be assured that God will be pleased with their taking upon them to judg of his designs and by that Means allowing themselves the liberty of paying their Obedience at their own Discretion § IX 5. Another design of the Sacraments has been proved the confederating Subjects into a Body Politick and the obliging Subjects in it to a dependence on their Governours It is no way convenient that any should be excused from these Establishments upon pretences to Perfection They who were really Perfect would not make this use of such Pretences for their own sake § X. They would not do it for the sake of the Publick § XI XII.XIII They would not do it on account of the Divine actual Establishment and the Divine assistances conveyed by the Sacraments which are necessary for Perfection of the Person § XIV and of his Prayer § XV. 6. The Scripture no where allows of such a Degree of Perfection atteinable in this Life as can in reason excuse from the reason of the Obligation to Ecclesiastical Assemblies All Members of the Church need the Gifts of each other § XVI They need particularly those Gifts which belong to Government § XVII All the other Members need the Head which cannot be understood of Christ but of Persons eminently Gifted § XVIII This Head not a Head of Dignity only but also of Influence and Authority § XIX Though they needed not the Gifts of others yet they are obliged to join themselves in Ecclesiastical Societies in regard of the good they may do to others They are obliged to this as Platonists and as Christians § XX. THE Second Expedient which many are too apt to trust even to the neglect of the Sacraments is Prayer And the reason which makes them inclinable to this excessive confidence in this seems to be that as it is the Ordinary remedy to which Men betake themselves when they find themselves destitute of other supports so withal the Benefits to be expected by it are not confined to any one certain kind But as it is the design of Prayer to make God our Friend so when he is made so and that his good will is gained all things then seem fit to be expected from him which are within his power which is unlimited And if this be so that all things may be expected by Prayer and that Prayer is the Ordinary Means of obteining them it must then indeed follow that there can be no obligation in interest to use any other Means And if the Spiritual things of Religion be so Spiritually transacted in the Soul of Man as this kind of Persons seem apt to conceive as to depend on no externals but that rightly
readiness of inventing those expressions or a volubility of the Tongue in pronouncing them if it were only a heat of fancy or a warmth of temper or a natural Enthusiasm peculiar to some tempers if it were any of these things which are usually mistaken for it by our dissenting Brethren I should then indeed not wonder that a perfect Prayer should be separable from the Sacraments because I know such a Prayer as this is separable from a good Life it self But if perfect Prayer be wholly transacted in the Soul of him that prayes if it be a real and hearty sense of his want of the things he prayes for and a sincere desire of them and an intire Resignation unto the Divine Will in things wherein he desires the Divine conduct if it be to think seriously as he speaks and to be affected as he thinks if it be Prayer (a) Eph. VI. 18 and supplication in the Spirit which helps (b) Rom. VIII 26 their infirmities and intercedes with sighs and groans unutterable then it will be as impossible to suppose such a Prayer separable from the Sacraments as it is to suppose it separable from that Grace which according to our Principles is confined to the Sacraments Such a Prayer as this must necessarily suppose a good Man and he who is perfect in it must be perfect in goodness too For this must suppose good inclinations as well as good Actions and therefore must suppose extraordinary degrees of Grace and a fixed inhabitation of the Spirit as an abiding and enlivening Principle which if they be not separable from the Sacraments this kind of Prayer will also be inseparable from them At least these other Popular Principles of Prayer are so like in their signs as to us to the Spirit it self that it will be at least extremely hard if at all possible to distinguish them And therefore it will be a much surer way of arguing to prove a Prayer imperfect if it proceed not from the Spirit than any other Argument can be to prove it perfect distinct from the Spirit And we have just reason to suspect that he wants the Spirit who has neglected the ordinary means of coming by it what preternatural transports soever he may feel otherwise As therefore none can rationally presume that his Prayer is perfect unless he can be rationally assured that he has these Assistances of the Spirit which are requisite to make it so so none can rationally presume that he has these Assistances but by his frequenting the Sacraments themselves wherein according to these Principles these Assistances are only to be expected By which way of proceeding a perfect Prayer must suppose the use of the Sacraments so far it will prove from being an Argument to excuse any from them Nor are these Assistances necessary only to make a Prayer perfect but also to continue it so and the Sacraments as necessary to continue these Assistances to a Prayer that is already perfect as at first to give them whilest it was imperfect Which will oblige all even whilest their Prayer is already perfect to continue the use of the Sacraments if they would continue that Perfection as well as suppose that they must have made use of them at first before they could attein to that Perfection § XVI BUT it is further considerable 6. That the Scripture no where allows such a degree of Perfection attainable in this Life as can in reason excuse I do not only say from the obligation to enter into Ecclesiastical Assemblies but also from the reason of that obligation One great reason which may oblige any one in interest to enter into a Society and consequently to submit to such conditions without which he cannot expect Admission from them who are supposed alone to have the power of admitting him is the advantage he may receive from other Members of the Society who are endued with gifts which he cannot pretend to and which yet he finds very necessary for himself This is the most likely account why a perfect Person should not need these Assemblies because such a dependence on others gifts must necessarily suppose the Person so depending imperfect at least in those gifts for which he depends on others But whether this notion of Perfection may deserve the name of Perfection properly or not it may at least deserve it comparatively in regard of others inferior to it And it is plain that the Perfection spoken of in Scripture is such as is only gradual and still capable of further improvement and that the highest degree of if attainable in this Life does not make any so perfect as not to need the gifts of others This is the Apostles express Doctrine even where he speaks of the gifts of the Spirit That (a) 1 Cor. xii 11 he distributes his gifts to every one as it pleases him That he gives (b) Rom. xii 3 6. a certain measure of this miraculous Faith to every one which I take to be the true meaning of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 mentioned afterwards That (c) 1 Cor. vii 7 every one has his own gift from God one after this manner and another after that That to every one of us is given Grace but (d) Eph. iv 7 according to the measure of the gift of Christ. And accordingly the fulness which is that which answers these terms of measure and proportion is still ascribed either to Christ (e) S. Jâ—hn I. 14 16. Col. I. 19 II. 9 himself or the (f) Col. I. 23 Church never to any particular Member And the very design of the Spirit in distributing his Graces so very differently is described to be that he might by this means oblige them to a mutual dependence That as in the natural Body the several Members have different employments and it is by this peculiarity of employments that the Unity of the whole Body is maintained he has taken the same course to oblige them to the same mutual dependence in the Body Mystical Here also the several Members have not the same (g) Rom. xii 4 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is the Apostles word Here also the whole (h) 1 Cor. xii 14 20 Body is not one Member but many and the Apostle takes it to be as destructive (i) v. 19 to the Body Mystical as it would be to the Body Natural if it were otherwise And that he means by the difference of Members not a difference of Individuals only but a difference of Office which makes them all necessary to each other he plainly shews by his continuation of the same Allegory That as in the natural Body (k) v. 17 the Eye needs the Ear to hear by and the Nose to smell by as well as both those Organs need the Eye to see by so it is also in the Body Mystical That as (l) v. 21 22 23. the Eye cannot say to the Hand I have no need of you nor again the Head to
of being proved In which way of proceeding it is plain that it is supposed that Communion with Christ could not be maintained without Communion with his visible Church and in after Ages without a Communion with that Church which could derive a visible Succession from that which originally was so I say this is supposed Antecedently to the proof that the Seducers were disunited from Christ both because it was from hence proved that their Doctrines were destructive to the true Christ because the Church said they were so and because their Communion is proved not to have been with the true Christ because it was not with his Church But of this I may have more occasion to discourse more largely hereafter I only observe at present that they are not therefore said to have been disunited from Christ because they did in express terms disown him which is the principal thing which is urged to shew how different their case was from the present case of our Brethren § XXX But 3. Whatever the occasion was yet the Argumnets used by those Primitive Writers to convince those Seducers of the dangerousness of their condition do certainly come home to our Brethrens Case My meaning is they do not only prove that the Seducers could have no Communion with Christ because they did either expressly or interpretatiuely deny him but also because they had no visible Communion with the visible Church So I have already shewn that it was a visible Association which St. John meant b 1 Joh. i. 3 when he exhorted them to whom he wrote to communicate with his own Party because he and his communicated with the Father and the Son It seems then there was no communicating with Christ however Orthodox a Profession they made of him without a continuance in the Orthodox Communion So the Author to the Hebrews c Heb. x. 25 26. does not make the denying of Christ to be the true Messias to be the willful sin of which he there speaks so dreadfully but the forsaking of the publick Assemblies And the whole reasoning of St. Paul in comparing the Mystical Body of Christ with the natural Body does plainly suppose that although all Grace be derived from Christ the Mystical Head to the several Members of his Mystical Body as in the natural Body all the vital influences are derived from the Head to the several Members respectively yet there is withall the same mutual necessity of the Members to each other for receiving these influences from the Mystical Head as there is in the Natural Body for receiving influences from the Natural Head And therefore it is impossible in the Natural Body that any particular Member should receive influences from the Head if separated from its Fellow-Members by which those influences are to be propagated to it so it will also be as impossible by the same Analogy of reasoning for any Member of the Mystical Body of Christ to receive vital influences from Christ the Mystical Head of that Body if separated from its Fellow-Members of the same Mystical Body And it is observable from the Offices and Gifts there mentioned that it must be an external Organical Body that is there spoken of in which only it is that those Offices and Gifts were capable of being exercised And from the reasoning they must not only be the Gifts but the Graces of the Spirit which are most properly to be considered as vital influences that are thus derived And then Persons divided from the Church must necessarily be in the state of Death as St. John supposes them as necessary as it is in the Body natural that that Member should be dead which receives no vital influences from the Head But these are also things which I may have occasion to discourse more largely in my second Part and therefore say no more concerning them at present CHAP. XII The very Case of abstaining from the Ordinances on pretence to Perfection seems to have been taken up and condemned in the time of the Apostles THE CONTENTS 8. This very pretence of abstaining from the external Ordidinances under the pretence of Perfection seems to have been taken up even in those Primitive Ages Euseb. Dem. Eu. L.iii. c. 4. The Philosophical Notions of those Ages concerning the worship of the supreme Deity § I. How this Hypothesis was received first into the Elective Philosophy thence taken up by the Hellenistical Jews and from them derived to the first Converts to Christianity § II. The several reasonings of the Primitive Christians that might make them in interest favourable to this Hypothesis § III. Particularly their pretending to a Mystical Priesthood might make them less solicitous for their dependence on the literal external Priesthood § IV. Instances of several like mistakes of those times in reasoning from Mystical Titles § V. How the Genius of this Philosophy has inclined men to this way of reasoning where-ever it has prevailed even among our modern Enthusiasts § VI. Inference 1. That what the Apostles did resolve in this particular they did resolve with a particular design upon our Adversaries Case § VII That the Prudential establishments of the Apostles are sufficiently secure § VIII Inf. 2. Hence may appear the insecurity of this way of arguing in general from Mystical Titles to the neglect of external Observances § IX.X. Inf. 3. It plainly appears to have been against the design of the Legislator in the very Case of the Jews from whom the Christians borrowed it § XI Inf. 4. That the whole contrivance of things by the Apostles plainly supposes that they also did not allow of this Plea for excusing any from the Publick Ordinances § XII Inf. 5. The Philosophers themselves never intended this Plea for their exemption from the Mysteries and external Rites of Initiation then used to which the Sacraments are answerable among Christians § XIII XIV Inf. 6. The great design of this way of arguing was to exclude themselves from paying any external worship to the Supreme Being and so destructive to the very foundation of the Christian Religion § XV. And this very rationally on the Hypothesis then received § XVI But the reason of this Argument does not hold against those Exteriors which are observed by the Christian Institution § XVII It is very probable that our Adversaries Case is particularly spoken to in Heb. x. 22 23. § XVIII § I TO proceed therefore with my present design it is further observable 8. That this very pretence of abstaining from the external Ordinances under the pretence of Perfection seems to have been taken up even in those Primitive Ages Those Philosophers who excused their neglect of all exterior worship of the Supreme Being by pretending that the only proper and acceptable worship of him was that of a a Vid. Testimonia Porphyr Apollonii Tyanei Theophrasti apud Eus. Pr. Eu. L.iv. c. 12 13 14 15 19 c. Porph. ipsum L.11 Abstinent Hierocl in Aur. Carm. Cyr. in Julia. L.1 pure
Law from their great complaints in time of exile and their hard opinion of the state of excommunicated Persons and from that general Popular Notion then prevailing among them whereby they ascribed more to the punctual observance of these external Sanctifications than to real Holiness it self Phil. iii. 6.9 These things were accounted the very Righteousness of the Law and these were the vulgar measures of Popular Holiness But though this be abundantly sufficient to shew that this use of this Priviledg cannot be justified in the Mystical Israel on account of their being Israel which was never challenged by the carnal Israel themselves nor ever intended for them yet to give all possible satisfaction in this Case it is further observable § XII 4. That the whole contrivance of things by the Apostles plainly supposes that they also did not allow of this plea for excusing any from the publick Ordinances They plainly suppose that the most perfect as well as others stood in need of Church-Society They plainly formed the Church into a Body Politick and obliged all the most perfect as well as others to observe their respective Duties which was not done by the Philosophers who maintained our Adversaries Notions They plainly confine the Graces of God to the Sacraments that so no Persons might on any pretence of Perfection think they did not need the Sacraments unless they were withall so perfect as not to need the Graces also conferred in the Sacraments They make the influences of the Spirit derived from Christ the Head to particular Members by the mediation of other Members the same way as the vital influences are derived in the Body Natural They confine his influences to his Body and make the Sacraments to be the only ordinary means of joyning or continuing a Member in that Body They make the casting-out of the Churches Communion the same thing as a delivering over unto Satan 1 Cor. v. 5 1 Tim. i. 20 Vid. cap. xi §. 4 5 6. and describe the condition of such Persons as very sad that they are in the World in Darkness nay in a state of Death it self These are all of them other contrivances of things than they would ever have settled if they had allowed any Plea of Perfection whatsoever as sufficient to excuse the pretender to it from the External Communion of the visible Church § XIII And further 5. It is very considerable in this whole matter that even those Philosophers themselves who allowed this Notion of Perfection as sufficient to excuse Persons who were indued with it from the Sacrifices and some of those grosser ways of Worship of their Deities which were more suitable to popular capacities who thought a wise man might Sacrifice as acceptably with a little meal as others with a Hecatomb nay that his Prayers might be more acceptable than the Sacrifices of others yet never thought of extending it to the Mysteries and forms of initiation into the more familiar acquaintance with their Deities These they were so far from thinking meanly of as that indeed they were the most perfect sort of Persons for whom they thought them most proper Especially the greater Mysteries or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 were purposely so contrived that meaner spirited Persons might never have the courage to undertake them Therefore the Aegyptian initiations were so extremely severe that they thought to have terrified Pythagoras himself from his curiosity to be acquainted with them and Appion Joseph cont Appion Nonn 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Nazianz. the Jews great Adversary died of his Circumcision which was only one of them Therefore the preparatory tryals of Mithras were so many and so rigorous that very many perished under them To this end were their frightful shapes their shewing their Images only with Torches not by day-light their tedious and solemn preparations only to advance the horrour of the Spectacle Therefore they were first expiated by all the Purgations proper in the respective Cases that so they might approach the Idol it self with the most exquisite Purity Thence the Proclamation before the Orphaicks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to warn all impure Persons to beware how they ventured to approach them And therefore they are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and are said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and they are principally recommended by the Pythagoreans for the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which they make the highest pitch of Philosophy and oppose to the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Purgation of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which they conceived proper for Beginners § XIV And to these the Primitive Christians thought the Lords supper answerable and accordingly spoke of it in all that sacred style which the Philosophers had used concerning these greater Mysteries as may be seen punctually observed among very many others by the Pseudo-Areopagite And yet even the lesser Purgative Mysteries were not so neglected as that any Person how perfect soever durst presume immediately to venture on the greater without these preliminary expiations No Moral Purity whatsoever was thought so great as to make these ritual Purgatious needless to him who was desirous to initiate himself in any of their particular Religions The most Perfect Persons among them and they who were thought to approach nearest to the Purity of the gods themselves nay who were often themselves called gods in such a sense as the name required when it was communicated to inferiour Beings As they often thought it necessary to initiate themselves so when they were admitted they were not admitted on other terms than the Ordinary Lustrations Such were the a Hercules in the Eleusin Scholiast Aristoph in Plut. Schol. in Homer Il. Theta in Tzetzes Lycophr Alex. Argonauts in the Samothraclan Apollon Rhod. Argon Castor and Pollux Plutarch Thes. Heroes the b Demetrius Policrates Plutarch Demetr Adrian Spartian Antoninus Capitolin Emperours and the c Pythagoras Jamblich de vita Pyth. Ch. 16. Philosophers Of all which sorts there are several instances of Persons who were initiated and initiated in the common way but I believe no one Precedent can be given of any who were thought too Perfect either to need the initiation it self or any one external Rite with which it was ordinarily performed At least they were so extremely few as that no modest man can in initiation of such Precedents find in his heart to reckon himself in the number No wise man who throughly considers and understands his own interest can venture the loss he may suffer if he should neglect them on confidence of a thing wherein he may so easily prove mistaken Which will again assert the necessity of Baptism which in the Christian Institution was answerable to these lesser Mysteries But I shall not now enlarge further to shew that their Sacraments were rather thought to hold proportion to the Heathen Mysteries than their Sacrifices because I may possibly take an occasion to insist more largely on it on another occasion
However at present this Observation may suffice to shew that even pursuant to these Philosophical Notions themselves and the influence they might have had on the minds of the Primitive Christians no Perfection can be pleaded such as may excuse from the use of the Sacraments § XV And further 6. It has also appeared that the great design of pleading this Spiritual way of worship of the supreme Being to the neglect of external Ritual-Observances was indeed to excuse themselves from paying him any external worship at all And indeed seems very rational on that Hypothesis which was then commonly received concerning the natural Philosophical reason of the worship of their ordinary Daemons Vid. Oracula aliaque Plutarchi Porphyrii Testimonia apud Euseb. L.5 Praep. Eu. c. 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17. For they conceived that the Daemons commonly worshipped were not purely Spiritual but at least cloathed with vehicles more or less gross according to the several degrees of their respective excellencies And hence they inferred that the Daemons themselves were sensibly delighted and nourished either with the Souls or nidor of the Sacrifices offered to them And that this was the true reason why the different Daemons were pleased with different sorts of Sacrifices and different sorts of Trees in their Groves and peculiar places and ceremonies of worship that their vehicles were of as great diversity of complexions as mens Bodies are and therefore inclined them to as great a diversity of desires because that the same thing which was grateful to the vehicle of one Daemon would either not affect the vehicle of another or would prove ungrateful to it And as they thought these vehicles to be material so they thought them subject to the same influences to which the matters were subject whereof they consisted And accordingly as all matter was supposed to be under the dominion of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so they conceived these vehicles to be also and that they were by this means subject to the fatal influences of the Stars and even to the influences of Sublunary Bodies also as herbs and stones and the steams of Animals that were offered in Sacrifice to them This seems to have been the true Philosophical reason of all the Judicial Astrology and Magick which were then in so good esteem with the Persons I am speaking of § XVI Now on these Principles it is very true that no Bodily worship is suitable to the nature of the supreme Being that is there is no Bodily Being that is capable of affecting a Nature so perfectly abstract from matter as God's is with any sensible pleasure or advantage In this regard himself expressly disowns such a way of Worship and that even in such a time when he was otherwise pleased to accept of bloody Sacrifices Thinkest thou that I will eat Bulls flesh and drink the blood of Goats Psal. i. 13 And in that regard he immediately requires a more Spiritual kind of Worship For so it follows Offer unto God thanksgiving Ver. 14. and pay thy vows unto the most Highest But as this whole design of excusing themselves from the publick solemn Worship of the supreme Deity was a thing directly contrary to the fundamental Principles of the Christian Religion nay indeed it seems to be the principal design of this Religion to restore the publick solemn Worship of the chief God which had before been taken from him and given only to inferiour Daemons and this seems to have been the principal Dispute between the Christians and the Philosophers so our Adversaries will have reason when they reflect on the great unlawfulness of the design to distrust the Principles by which they defended it And therefore when they shall perceive that the tendency of this way of arguing from the Spiritual Nature of that Worship which must be suitable to the supreme Being to the neglect of the external Observances of his solemn Worship in publick Assemblies aims at the overthrow of the fundamental Principles of the whole Christian Religion and was designed so by them who first made use of it They cannot chuse but have a great unkindness for this way of arguing if they have any kindness for the Christian Religion which is so plainly undermined by it And that this account of their design and Principles is true I might refer to Porphyries account of Sacrifices De Abstinent ab esu Animal which he gives in the name of the Pythagoreans whose cause he principally undertakes to defend but which withall seems generally to have been received into the elective Philosophy which then prevailed § XVII But besides the reason of this Argument will by no means hold in those exteriors which are observed by the Christian Institution The Sacraments are not pretended to have any natural influence on God but only to be means of conveying his Graces to us And how can it be against the Nature or decorum of a Spirit in dealing with Beings which are not Spiritual to use means suitable to the capacities of those Beings with whom he deals If we conceive any commerce at all between Spiritual and Corporal Beings this is certainly the most likely way we can think of how such a commerce should be maintained Corporeal Beings are not able to converse by means wholly Spiritual and therefore it is absolutely necessary that if God would be pleased to have any dealings with them he should maintain them by Corporeal significations This moral use of the Sacraments as Solemnities of transacting the New Covenant does rather derogate from the Perfection of God not from that Perfection which a Corporeal Being is capable as it is Corporeal If further in the Symbols of the Heathen Mysteries there might have been fancied something that in its own Nature might influence the vehicle of the Soul and more easily dispose it for receiving Spiritual influences which dispositions such Souls as are already perfect might not be supposed to need if this is not the Case in our Christian Mysteries The Symbols here used are such as are familiar among us and therefore if they had any such natural virtue must exert it as well out of the Sacraments as in them So that all their influence must be wholly ascribed to the Divine appointment And why then should any Soul which is not so perfect but that it needs the Divine Assistance be yet thought so perfect as not to need those means which he has been pleased to appoint for the conveyance of those Assistances § XVIII And indeed I know not whether the Author to the Hebrews did not allude to some such fancy of some who mysticised Baptism possibly to the disparagement of the Literal Baptism For having exhorted those to whom he wrote to draw nigh to Christ with a true heart in full assurance of faith having their hearts sprinkled from an evil Conscience Heb. x. 22 as if he had been afraid that they should understand him of this Mystical Baptism
them for the shame is to be referred to the kind of suffering by the Cross with which it is also frequently joyned on other a Heb. xii ◠occasions rather than to the shame of their disowning him nay this very 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is elsewhere ascribed to the Cross was no more than he had deserved This was indeed as the same Author elsewhere expresses it b Heb. x. 29 a trampling under feet the Son of God that is indeed a shewing the greatest possible contempt of him which is elsewhere c Psal. xci 13 Isa. xiv 19.xxviii.3 Matt. vii 6.v.13 Rev. xi 2 importance of that Phrase a counting the Blood of the Covenant by which they bad been sanctified an unholy thing that is indeed so far from being fit to expiate the sins of others as the Blood of the Covenant ought to do as that it needed expiation it self as it must needs have done if it had been shed for Crimes of his own that had justly deserved it a doing despite to the Spirit of Grace that is of the Gospel which they had received d Gal. iii. 2 not by the works of the Law but by the Obedience of Faith accounting that it self an evil and deceiving Spirit as they must needs have accounted it if it had been given them by the means of a Deceiver § XIII THESE are aggravations I confess unapplicable to our Brethrens Case Their departure from the Church does not imply their taking Christ himself for a Deceiver but their thinking them deceived from whom they depart in pretending to a Succession from him And therefore as far as this special aggravation of the crime is a particular reason of the severity of the Punishment so far I shall ingeniously confess that I think our dissenting Brethren unconcerned in it But then withall it will be fit to be considered that this disparity of their Case can only be as to the intention of the Persons not as to the nature of the Thing They who in those times and circumstances deserted the School of Christ to go over to his professed Adversaries must have been more sensible of this consequence of their doing so because the party to which they went did in terms profess to believe our Lord an Impostor which was the Principle from which all these dreadful consequences followed And their knowing this must needs have been an extreme aggravation of their Crime But as to the nature of the thing the Case is the same now as then Whosoever deserts Christ's School must necessarily imply that he is not such as he pretended to be that is not so Authorized from God as himself pretended for if they thought him so they could never pretend any reason why they should desert him And then all the other consequences follow out of Course For whoever pretends an Authority from God when he has it not must be supposed so wicked for doing so as that there is no other crime chargeable on him by his greatest Adversaries but it may then prove likely for him to have been guilty of it So that in this regard the Cases of our present Adversaries and those of the Apostles times would be like that of two Persons assisting a Rebel who should pretend a Commission from his Prince but falsely The one of them I suppose knows the falshood of his pretence the other does not but thinks that whilest he serves him he serves his Prince Both of them are alike guilty of the same Crime and both are as real Enemies to the Royal Authority and may do as much real mischief in prosecuting the Rebellion Only the Crime is not alike imputable to him who knows what he does to be Rebellion as to him who mistakes it for Loyalty So if they be as really Enemies to Christ whom our Adversaries mistake for his Friends as they were in the Apostles times who did not so much as pretend to be his Friends if they really disown the Chair of Christ in disowning his Regular Successors in that Chair though they pretend only to disown the Men who are at present possessed of the Chair the Crime of deserting this Chair now will prove as grievous as it was in the Apostles days though it be not now so imputable to the Persons guilty of it as it was then when they had better information However it will highly concern our Brethren by no means to neglect the real guilt whatever they may think of the imputation if for no other reason yet for this that the neglect will certainly aggravate the imputation Besides that the imputation it self may prove really greater than they are aware of § XIV THIS therefore being the guilt here spoken of let us now consider the Punishment of it from whence it will both appear how great the guilty is and how liable our Adversaries are to the Punishment suitably to their proportion of the guilt And this is rather implyed here than exprest when it is said to be so great as to need a Renovation For it is hereby intimated that all they enjoyed before is so totally lost by this fall as that nothing remained of it and if they would recover any of the advantages of the former state they must recover them by a new admission into that state and an admission so intirely new as if they never had been of it so little benefit they could expect from their former Admission even in order to the making their second Admission more easie and compendious Now this Renovation it self does also refer to Baptism So Baptism it self is expressly called the laver of Regeneration and of the renewing of the Holy Ghost Tit. iii. 5 by which we are also said to be saved The same word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is used in both places From these things therefore it follows that the Holy Spirit of our Master which is his internal Teacher which must open the understanding of his Disciples and make them capable of understanding his sublimer Doctrines his Acroamaticks which according to the methods of Teaching in those times were only intrusted with those of their Scholars whom they found to be of extraordinary capacities which method was also punctually observed by our Master himself I say it follows that this Spirit by which the Scripture usually signifies all the good things of the Gospel is so intirely lost by this lapse of theirs from their Baptismal State as that it is not recoverable but by a new admission into Christ's School again such a one as that was whereby they at first became his Scholars Which would be so far from fitting them for the Mysteries of Christianity for which it is the great design of this Author to perswade them to fit themselves in this whole Chapter that they might be the better capable of apprehending the mystical discourse concernig Melchizedec which occasioned this whole digression and which he immediately resumes in the following Chapter as that it would only be a
Persons for whose conviction they were designed so the Authority of the sacred Writers themselves who used them are sufficient to assure us that the applications are really true and solid And this will assure us of the Truth of all those things which are necessary for the Parity of the Case for on this depends the application of this kind of Argument that the consequent of the Old Testament Instance may then be expected when that instance is a Precedent that is when the Case to be ruled by it is exactly like it And therefore 1. This must plainly suppose that the sin against which the Apostle writes is exactly of the same nature and the same degree of Guilt with those produced by them from the Old Testament And therefore the sin of Apostates from the Christian Religion must in this regard be supposed as criminal as that of the Angels and the old World and the Sodomites and the Israelites in the Wilderness so that if one be against the Holy Ghost the other must be so too And therefore the same proofs which prove the Old Testament-sins to have been against the Holy Ghost must prove the New Testament-sins too have been so too and on the contrary whatever proves the New Testament-sins to have been against the Holy Ghost must also prove that the Old Testament-sins were so also so that on this supposal each of them will afford the other a mutual confirmation And 2. As the sins are supposed equally grievous so the Punishments must be supposed too For indeed the very design of this Argument in the New Testament is from the equal Guilt of the sins to infer an equal grievousness of the Punishments to be inflicted for those sins And therefore the Punishment to be feared by Apostates from the Gospel-Dispensation must in this way of reasoning be supposed to be as grievous as any of the instances now mentioned And they are certainly of the highest kind And 3. I can hardly think but that what the Apostles on occasion of their mentioning the Old Testament-instances are pleased peculiarly to remark that they meant to note as an instance wherein they thought them Parallel And therefore in Esau's Case it being peculiarly noted that he found no place for Repentance though he sought it carefully and with tears Heb. xii 17 I suppose the Author meant that they who should desert the Christian Religion as he did our Worldly considerations should expect to find the same difficulty of being admitted even upon Repentance as he did And 4. That this Mystical way of Arguing requires something suitable in the other World to what the Old Testament sinners suffered in this which will beget a further dreadful aggravation of their Case who sin against the Gospel-Dispensation if the Punishment of these must be as grievous in the other World proportionably as the Punishment of those was in this that is if it must be in the most afflictive part and degree of Hell it self And 5. That what is spoken primarily of Nations and publick Bodies are yet not confined to them but applicable also to particular Persons For indeed the Apostles design in these Discourses is levelled also against particular Persons Heb. xii 15 16 17 iii.12 Now for the National sentence concerning the whole generation which was to perish in the Wilderness except Caleb and Joshua it was punctually executed though several of the Persons might probably have repented And God having sworn their destruction it is not probable that the sentence had been reversible as to particular Persons even upon their Repentance Moses and Aaron themselves found it not so though no doubt they were sorry for the sins which excluded them from the promised Land And the sin of the Jews against the Holy Ghost of which our Saviour speaks as it was punished in this World and in the other in the sense already explained so there are no hopes that those Punishments should ever be reversed though they should repent That is there are no hopes that upon their Repentance either their Nation or their Religion as appropriated to their Nation should ever be restored to them But if they be saved it must be by their coming over to Christianity And if the Case of Persons now lapsing from the Communion of the Church be only such a one as may shorten their Personal day of Grace if this sin more than any other tend to the shortening of it if when it is at last finished Gods Decre concerning it be as irrevocable as it was in these National Punishments if it may provoke him now again to swear as he did then that they shall never enter into his rest as the Author to the Hebrews plainly supposes it may these are Considerations sufficiently disheartning any from depending on any hopes of a recovery And this sin of separating at least of setting up opposite Societies being a sin of so very heinous a nature and so very hardly remissible none of the sins they supposed they should be guilty of by continuing in the Communion of the Church or at least by not dividing from it can be comparable to it And therefore by the forementioned Rule of Prudence it will be much safer for them to avoid this than any other sin they can suspect by continuing in the Canonical Communion CHAP. XV. Salvation is not ordinarily to be expected without Baptism THE CONTENTS 2. Directly That Salvation is not ordinarily to be expected without Sacraments § I. This proved 1. Concerning Baptism 1. By those Texts which imply the dependence of our Salvation on Baptism 1. Such as speak of the Graces of Baptism § II. 1. The Spirit of God is said to be given in Baptism and so given at that he who is not Baptized cannot be supposed to have it § III. The Spirit it self is absolutely necessary to Salvation as to his actual influences § IV. As to his constant presence as a living and abiding Principle § V. That the Spirit is first given in Baptism This proved from our new Birth 's being ascribed to our Baptism § VI. It is safe to argue from Metaphorical Expressions in a matter of this Nature St. Joh. 3.5 considered § VII Water to be understood in this place Literally § VIII These words might relate to our Saviour's Baptism § IX The Objection concerning the supposed parallel place of Baptizing with the Holy Ghost and with Fire § X. The Fire here spoken of a material fire and contradistinct to the Holy Ghost § XI Our Saviour's baptizing with the Holy Ghost and with Fire as well applicable to our Saviour's ordinary Baptism as to that of the Apostles at Pentecost § XII The true reason why this descent of the Holy Ghost in Pentecost is called a Baptism was because it was a consummation of their former Baptism by Water § XIII The reason why this part of their Baptism was deferred so long § XIV Other instances wherein the Holy Ghost was given distinctly from
the Baptism by Water § XV XVI XVII Our Saviour alluded herein to the Jewish Notions concerning Baptismal Regeneration § XVIII What the Rabbinical Notions are § XIX How agreeable to the Doctrine of the New Testament § XX. The Notions of the Hellenistical Jews and of the Philosophers § XXI XXII XXIII How imitated by our Saviour § XXIV An Objection § XXV Answered § XXVI XXVII 2. Grace of Baptism Forgiveness of sins § XXVIII XXIX XXX That unbaptized Persons cannot be supposed to have received the benefits of the washing of the blood of Christ or of the Mystical Baptism proved from two things 1. That all who would be Christians are obliged to receive the Baptism by Water § XXXI 2. That every one who comes to Baptism is supposed to continue till then under the guilt of his sins § XXXII XXXIII XXXIV XXXV 2. The same dependance of Salvation on Baptism proved from those Texts which speak of the Priviledges of Baptism § XXXVI The same thing proved 2. From those Texts which expresly ascribe our Salvation to our Baptism § XXXVII A sum of the Argument from 1 Pet. iii. 21 § XXXVIII From other Texts § XXXIX The Application § XL. § I I Have hitherto proved Exclusively that the Grace conferred in the Sacraments is not to be had otherwise than by the Sacraments particularly not by those two Popular Means by which Ordinary Persons think to obtain it that is not by Preaching of the Word and Prayer I now proceed 2. To prove directly that the Grace conferred in the Sacraments is such as does suppose the Persons to whom it is not givâ—â— in an Vnsalvable Condition Which will prove that the Grace here given is really necessary to Salvation Both which put together will fully amount to the thing which I design to prove under this Head That Salvation is not ordinarily to be expected without an external participation of the Sacraments § II THIS I shall endeavour to prove distinctly concerning both the Sacraments 1. Concerning Baptism and 2. Concerning the Lords Supper 1. Concerning Baptism And this two ways 1. By those Texts which imply the dependence of our Salvation on our Baptism and 2. By those which expresly ascribe Salvation to it The former I shall again consider in two regards in regard of the Graces and in regard of the Priviledges of Baptism He that wants either of these cannot be supposed to be in a salvable Condition 1. Not he who wants the Graces Those are two the Spirit of God and Forgiveness of sins And without either of these the Gospel assures no man of Salvation § III 1. Then the Spirit of God is said to be given in Baptism and so given as that he who is not Baptised cannot be supposed to have it Tit. iii. 5 This appears in that Baptism is called the laver of Regeneration and of the renewing of the Holy Ghost that our Saviour himself tells Nicodemus Joh. iii. 5 That except a man be born of Water and the Spirit he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God that it is made the Property of our Saviours Baptism that whereas St. John baptized with Water only Matt. iii. 11 Mark i. 8 Luk. iii. 16 Joh. i. 33 Act. 1 5.xi.16 Act. ii 38 and then much more reason we have to believe that that was the only effect of the Pharisees Baptism our Saviour was also to baptize with the Holy Ghost and with fire And therefore St. Peter exhorts his Auditors to Repent but not only so but also to be baptized for the Remission of sins that they might receive the Holy Ghost And when St. Paul would give the Holy Ghost to them Act. xix 5 6. who had before been baptized with St. John's Baptism he does it by first baptizing them in the name of Jesus and then it follows that when he had laid his hands on them the Holy Ghost came upon them And that appeared by this sensible sign which then usually accompanied it that they spake with tongues and prophesied § IV NOW that the Spirit is absolutely necessary to Salvation I suppose our Adversaries themselves will not think it necessary that I bestow much time in proving without this that Grace cannot be had which is absolutely necessary both to prevent sin and perform any thing which may be acceptable to God for our Salvation Without this they cannot make those Prayers which may be grateful to him The supplication of the Spirit the Praying in the Holy Ghost is that alone which can hope for success It is he who helps our infirmities For Jude 20. as the Apostle tells us We know not what to pray for as we ought Rom. viii 26 27. but it is the Spirit who intercedes for us with groanes which cannot be uttered And he who searches the hearts knows the mind of the Spirit who intercedes with God for the Saints And he who has not the Spirit of Christ is none of his and every one has the Spirit who is not a Roprobate whence it plainly follows that whoever wants it is a Reprobate at least so long as he wants it But thus much I suppose our dissenting Brethren themselves will not deny § V I add therefore further that not only these actual influences of the Spirit which are common to wicked men as well as good are necessary to Salvation but also his constant presence in us as a living and abiding Principle This alone is that presence of the Spirit which can only sanctifie us Neither Nebuchadnezzar nor Pharaoh nor Caiaphas were the holier for the good motions they received but rather the unholier for having resisted them Nay these actual motions are communicable to Heathens themselves who are not capable of so much as a Federal Holiness Heb. xii 14 And yet without Holiness no man shall see the Lord. This only is that presence of the Spirit which makes Christ himself present in us as I have elsewhere shewn and they who have not Christ formed and born in them cannot be said to be in Christ and consequently can have no Legal Actual Title to all that Christ has done and suffered for them This is only that presence of the Spirit which communicates to us the influences of the Divine Life that is to the Mystical Body of Christ as the Animal and vital influences are to the Natural Body to derive all those influences from the Head which are necessary for enlivening the particular Members And therefore they who have not the Spirit in this sence cannot have the Son of God who is our Life cannot partake of any vital influences from him And they who do not are certainly in a state of Spiritual Death This also I suppose our Brethren will not deny when they are thus warned of it and shall impartially consider it If therefore this presence of the Spirit be first given in Baptism so that they who have it not given them here must be supposed not to have it at
Persons as these should signifie a falshood so disparaging the means by which they had been expiated if there had been any such And either of these sufficiently serves my purpose either that there are no other means of applying this washing of the blood of Christ or of this Mystical Baptism of the Soul antecedently to the Baptism by Water or that at least there are no means whereby Persons concerned may be so well assured of this application as they can by Water-baptism This later if granted will make the Sacrament even the external Symbol of it as necessary to them as I am concerned it should be So much for the Graces of Baptism § XXXVI BUT besides these the priviledges of Baptism are also such as must needs suppose the Person who wants them in an unsalvable Condition Gal. iii. 27 As many as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ. Where we plainly see that Baptism is the means of putting on Christ and of being in him Which is very different from the Notions commonly received among our Non-conforming Brethren vid. 1 Cor. vi 3 And by the expression of being baptized into Christ it seems plainly to be implyed that by Baptism we come to belong to Christ as they who were baptized into Moses were by being so made Disciples of Moses 1 Cor. x. 2 and got an interest in the Polity established by him So also by one Spirit we are all baptized into one Body 1 Cor. xii 13 It is the Body of Christ he had been discoursing of And here he tells us that it is by partaking in one Spirit that we come to be reputed one body as we count all those members to belong to one natural body which all communicate in the same vital influences and that it is by that Spirit which we receive in our Baptism that we come to communicate in one Spirit For as I said before this Mystical Baptism being only called Baptism in a secondary regard as it has relation to the Baptism of Water no other reception of the Spirit can be so properly called a Baptism as this which accompanies the Baptism of Water The same Spirit when it is signified in relation to another way of receiving it is spoken of in the same Allegory to which it alludes As we are said to drink of it when it is spoken of as received in the Lords Supper where we drink the Element by which it is communicated to us as it follows immediately in the same verse So we are said to be buried and raised Rom. vi 4 Col. ii 12 and quickened with him in Baptism according to the nature of Mysteries which are supposed really to confer those Spiritual benefits which are signified by them And therefore as we do here signifie the Death and Resurrection of Christ so we are by this way of arguing made partakers also of the merits of his Death and Resurrection And if these be priviledges of Baptism I believe our dissenting Brethren themselves will not doubt but they are absolutely necessary to Salvation and that they who want them must also want necessaries for Salvation For they will not pretend that they who are not in Christ who have not put him on who are not of his Body nor partake of the influences of his Spirit who have not the merit of his Death and Resurrection are in a secure or comfortable condition And yet this is supposed to be the condition of unbaptized Persons when they are supposed to be first changed into a contrary condition by their Baptism Even this external Right which this external participation of the Water if it were not a means of conveying the blessings signified by it as certainly it is if the Sacrament be compleat according to the design of a Sacrament yet it is at least a means without which we cannot be so well assured of our Right § XXXVII TO these other Topicks may be also added those other passages of Scripture wherein our Salvation it self is expresly ascribed to our Baptism So St. Peter The like figure whereunto Baptism also now saveth us 1 Pet. iii. 21 not the putting off the filth of the flesh but the examination of a good conscience as to God by the Resurrection of Jesus Christ. So I think the Text may be translated more agreeably to the sence of the Original than as we have it in our common Translation By the examination of a good Conscience I only mean the solemn stipulation of Baptism Which as other stipulations also were in those times was transacted by way of Question and Answer and the great efficacy of Baptism was conceived to depend on the sincerity of the Answer made to the Ministers Interrogatories that is in their meaning heartily as they pretended Cyrill Hieros Catech. Now the comparison between Noah's being saved by the Ark and our being saved by Baptism seems to consist in this that as they who were in the Ark escaped out of the water by which all the rest perished who were not in it that Notion will very well agree to the words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the like Phrase of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is used in St. Paul 1 Cor. iii. 15 so in Baptism when we rise out of the Water we escape out of that Mystical destruction which we suppose to have befallen the Enemies of our Salvation when we descended under it And this Salvation of Baptism is very properly ascribed to the Resurrection of Jesus Christ. For as our going under the Water represents the Death and Burial of Christ and does not only represent it but apply it to us as if it were our own and as if we made one Person with him and by applying it to us produces in us a like Mystical Death to the Worldly Life as in this Mystical way of arguing from Archetypal to Ectypal Beings so frequently used in the Scripture in allusion to the Platonick Notions then received among the Hellenists the Archetypes are supposed to be not only like Copies in imitation whereof the resemblances in the Ectypa were made but as Seals to produce their own similitudes as Seals do by application to the wax in regard whereof we are said in Baptism to be dead with Christ and to be buried with him and to be planted with him Rom. vi 4 5. to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the likeness of his Death So I say by the same way of arguing our rising out of the water represents the Resurrection of Christ and does not only represent but apply the merits and efficacy of his Resurrection to us so that it must produce in us a like signature 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is the Platonical term first of a Mystical Resurrection from sin and a worldly Life and then of our corporal Resurrection from the grave And this consequence holds so firmly that if Christ himself be risen it is absolutely necessary that they rise also to whom
of Governours as well as Governed which were all qualified for their offices by Gifts of the Spirit a 1 Cor. xii 28 29. Eph. iv 11 Apostles Evangelists Prophets Pastors and Teachers which were all only useful for the Church in this World and only for their benefit as united in Assemblies these Gifts being generally of that nature as that others were more concerned in them than they who had them Their Gifts were also of the same kind and many of them more principally designed for the edification of Believers than the conviction of Infidels Such were the gifts of b 1 Cor. xiii 2.xiv.2 knowing Mysteries Interpretation c 1 Cor. xii 10.xiv.26 of Tongues of d 1 Cor. xi 4 5 xiii.9.xiv.1 3 4 5.22 24 31 39. Rom. xii 6 1 Thes. v. 20 Prophesying and e 1 Cor. xiv 14 15. Praying especially of that office of the Eucharist f 1 Cor. xiv 16 where the Idiot had his set part assigned him and was to answer Amen These were the very employments of the Synaxes in that Age. And therefore certainly the Church thus united by such Gifts and Offices of the Spirit must needs have been that Body of them which joyned in the celebration of their publick Assemblies and considered under that very Notion as they were united in those Assemblies for which alone these Gifts and Offices were useful And plainly the Apostles design being as I have elsewhere observed in all these Discourses to prevent the falling away of the Persons to whom he writes either to Judaism or Gentilism or any of the Heresies which then began to appear there could be nothing more apposite to this purpose than to perswade them to keep to this external Body as united by the celebration of the same publick Assemblies whereby they were visibly and notoriously distinguished from those erroneous Societies and nothing more disagreeable than our Adversaries Notion of a multitude not a body of Elect not distinguishable from others by such notorious Characters as might be prudently useful by way of Argument § XII BESIDES the similitude of a Vine used by our Saviour was the same which had been used concerning the carnal Israel in the Old Testament Psal. lxxx 8 14 15. Isa. v. 1 7 xxvii.2 Jer. ii 21 Ezek. xix 10 Hos. x. 1 and therefore very fitly applyed to the Spiritual and Mystical Israel in the New according to that way of arguing which is so universally observed by the sacred Writers of the New Testament And then considering that the Christians made the Spiritual Israel a Society in the same sence wherein the carnal Israel had been so before nay allowed of something suitable to those very means by which they were confederated into a Society Instead of Circumcision they continued not only the Mystical Circumcision of the heart but Baptism which had been a means taken up by the Jews before the Preaching of the Christian Religion and which they thought more countenanced by the Prophets who had foretold the state of Christianity than Circumcision it self was and withal thought it more agreeable to the more Spiritual nature of the Christian Religion in comparison of the Jewish And so for Sacrifices though they rejected the bloody ones which they also thought discountenanced by those same Prophesies which had predicted the state of Mystical Judaism yet they allowed a Mystical Melchisedechian Sacrifice not only of the Morals of Religion but also under those very Elements and Symbols which they supposed predicted and Typified in those fame Writers who had spoken so disparagingly of the bloody Sacrifices Yet still these means of confederation though they were indeed more agreeable to the nature of a Spiritual Religion than those among the Jews were still external and therefore as proper for confederating an external Society as those were in the room of which they succeeded § XIII AND 4. It is further observable that though the immediate design of the Sacred Writers seems to have been to secure the Persons to whom they wrote in the external Communion of the Church in that Age wherein they wrote yet the reasons used by them for this purpose are such as concern the Church as a Church and so as suitable to the later Ages of the Church as those earlier ones wherein they were first used Indeed if the Argument used to prove their obligation to continue in the external Communion of the Church had been this that they could not otherwise partake of the miraculous 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and manifestations of the Spirit than as those Gifts and manifestations were proper to that Age so the Argument would lose its force in succeeding Ages which could not pretend to those Gifts and manifestations But when I consider that those Gifts and manifestations in that Age did generally accompany the Graces of the Spirit and that therefore it is no good Argument to conclude that the Spirit was only given for extraordinary purposes because he was pleased to manifest himself by Gifts and Appearances that were indeed extraordinary when I consider that it is the Spirit as a Principle of Spiritual Life of which they are supposed to be deprived by falling away from that external Communion nay as a Principle of Spiritual Life to themselves when I consider that the Church being called Christ they are supposed to lose their interest in Christ and all his saving Graces by separating from the Communion of the Church to lose their interest in his Redemption to lose their interest in him by losing his Spirit which whosoever has not is none of his when I consider that by falling away from their Baptismal Obligations they are supposed to have forfeited all the advantages of their Baptism their illumination their tasting of the heavenly gift their participation of the Holy Ghost their tasting of the good Word of God and of the Powers of the World to come and so to have forfeited them as to need Renovation as intire as if they never had enjoyed them nay to have forfeited their whole interest in the New Covenant which sure respects the Graces of the Spirit more principally than his Gifts I say when I consider these things I cannot but think that the Graces here spoken of on these occasions are as well the Graces properly so called as the Gifts of the Spirit those of them which are to be ordinarily expected in all Ages as those which were proper to that those of them which are absolutely necessary for Salvation as well as those which were only more convenient for the more advantagious procurement of Salvation And sure we have reason to expect as that these ordinary necessary Graces of the Spirit should be continued to these later Ages wherein they are still as necessary as they were at first so that they should be continued in the same means of conveyance by which they were communicated at first And we have the rather reason to expect that they should be continued by the
same means of conveyance because if they be continued at all especially if they be continued by way of a Covenant which may afford such a right as may be Legally challenged it must be continued by virtue of those same Provisions which were then made there being no others pretended since nor indeed to be ever expected for the future And therefore if in those times these Graces of the Spirit could not have been expected out of the external Communion of the Church it must follow by the same proportion of reasoning that they are not to be expected now nor for ever § XIV 5. THEREFORE in order to this Mystical participation of this Grace which is not otherwise to be expected than by these Mystical means by which God himself has designed its conveyance it is absolutely necessary as far as an ordinary means can be so that we partake of the Lord's Supper This plainly appears from the Principles now mentioned 1 Cor. x. 17 For we being many are one Bread and one Body For we are all partakers of one Bread Where it is plain 1. From the coherence that the Bread here spoken of is no other than that which we receive in the Lords Supper 2. That the reason why we are said to partake of one Bread is because it is said to be broken before we receive it so that all are supposed to communicate of the same loaf 3. That by our communicating in this one Bread which must therefore be broken before we can communicate in it we are in a Mystical sence said to be one Bread as I have observed that Mysteries especially those of Divine appointment do not only signifie but also cause the things signified by them And 4. That because this â—read is also called the Body of Christ therefore our partaking of this one Bread 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is the word properly used concerning it when it is spoken of as meat is our 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 our Communion or rather Communication in this Body And 5. That it hence follows by the same Rule of Mystical reasoning that we are said to be one Body because we do communicate in one Body as we were said to be one Bread by our partaking of one Bread This plainly shews that all the advantage which we are to expect from Christ by being Members of his Mystical Political Body the Church is to be derived from our communicating in the Lords Supper because it is by this Communion that we become Members of this Mystical Political Body But it further appears from the reasoning of the Apostle in this place how it is that we are hereby made one Body which will very much conduce to the clearing of the Argument deduced from it and for shewing the necessity of our becoming Members of this Body 6. Therefore it is also further clear that the one Body of which we are made Members by communicating in this one Bread is no other than Christs Body This appears from the words immediately preceding 1 Cor. x. 16 The Bread which we break is it not the Communion of the Body of Christ and besides from the reasoning as I have now explained it For the reason why we come to be made one Body by our partaking of one Bread being plainly the words of Institution in which Christ has called that Bread of which we partake his Body it plainly appears that the Body of which we partake by this Bread is no other than his Body and that his Personal Natural one This plainly appears because the Body of which he speaks when he calls the Eucharistical Bread his Body is plainly that which he says was broken for us according to St. Paul in this Epistle and which was given for us according to St. Luke 1 Cor. xi 24 Luk. xxii 19 But this cannot be understood of the Mystical but only of his Personal Body The consequence whereof will be that the whole Church becomes one Body Mystical of Christ by this participation of his Personal and Natural Body in the Lords Supper § XV AND because the right understanding of this will be of use not only for my present purpose but for preventing many popular misunderstandings in this matter particularly that of Transubstantiation and because the things I have to say on this Subject are such as at least I have not seen observed by others I hope it may prove not an altogether ungrateful divertisement to the Reader to endeavour an explication of this Mysterious contrivance which yet I intend to dispatch with as much brevity as the Argument will permit 1. Therefore the great design of Christ plainly appears to have been that Mystical 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so much spoken of in the Mystical Philosophy of that Age and spoken of as the peculiar office of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This St. Paul himself speaks of elsewhere that he came to make all one Eph. ii 14 15 16. And our Saviour makes this the great design of his Prayer for his Disciples That they all may be one as thou Joh. xvii 21 See Ver. 11 22 23. Joh. xi 52 Father art in me and I in thee that they also may be one in us that the World may believe that thou hast sent me So St. John expresses the end of our Saviours death to have been that he might gather together in ONE the Children of God which were scattered 2. This Vnion is expressed according to the way usual in the Scriptures to express the whole by an enumeration of particulars by his being in us and our being in him and indeed by this later only as a consequence of the former so that the very reason why we are said to be in him is because he is first supposed to be in us And the true reason of this consequence seems to be that cautious way then taken up of speaking concerning God that they would not allow him to be in any thing for fear of the confinement which weak imaginations might fancy from such a way of speaking To correct this error of the imagination they invented contradictory ways of speaking concerning him Porphyr Sent. 40. ex sententiâ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They made him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and yet 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 · Everyâ—where in regard of the dependence of things on him and yet no where in regard of confinement Of which kind this way of speaking also is that he is in us in regard of his influence on us and we in him in regard of the independence of his influences and the immensity of his presence 3. Therefore the Scripture speaking of Christ does distinguish him under two considerations as to his flesh wherein he suffered and as to his Spirit by which he was raised and glorified Luk. xxiv 26 Phil. ii 8 9. And it is observable that the raising and glorifying of Christ in the Spirit are grounded on his first having suffered in the flesh Accordingly our