according to which he himselfe works in loue or hatred not of that according to which he commands and appoints men to worke These men in truth confound all things setting mans will where Gods should stand God saith on whom I will they say on him that himselfe wils or seeketh as he ought c. The same Idol of mans wil they advance set up v. 16 where in stead of Gods shewing mercy they put mans beleeving mercy The Lord by willing and running v. 16 excludes whatsoever is of or in man and either within or without him and draws all to himselfe alone In the stead of God shewing mercy they put themselvs and their free will receiving mercy by God offered as the proper cause of difference between man and man The 17 vers For the Scripture saith unto Pharaoh c they handle very sleightly saying something such as it is about Gods hardening Pharoahs heart but not medling at all with the place according to the coherence which it hath with the words going before unto which yet the Holy Ghost strongly tyeth them in saying For the Scripture saith c. And herein they are in truth wise in their generation These words must needs answer to the latter part of the objection of unrighteousnesse with God in hating that is as they interpret it in rejecting such as seek righteousnesse by the works of the Law as did the fleshly Israelits But wherein I wonder did Pharaoh so How sought he justification by the works of the Law Who so professedly despised the God therof saying Who is the Lord that I should obey his voyce Did they see that this example of Pharaoh and their exposition of the place could not stand together and therfore chose to cut off the coherence so firmly tying the words together rather then to let fall their preconceived erroneous exposition Whatsoever they intend herein we know it is brought for an example of Gods absolute but righteous power of hardening rather then another whom he will and not whom he finds most deserving it for whom finds he not too much deserving it if he would deal in like manner with all as it is said whom that is which rather then other he will he hardneth v. 18. And let it be diligently minded that the Apostle here opposeth Gods shewing mercy to some and his hardening of others and not his shewing mercy to some and his condemning of others The adversaries by Gods shewing mercy would haue us understand his saving of such as beleev and repent And then on the contrary by Gods hardening should onely be meant his not shewing mercy to but punishing condemning such as doe not beleev nor repent But we know that the not hearing God voyce not beleeving and repenting follow upon hardnesse of heart Wherupon the Lord promiseth that in the day of his mercy and pittie he will take from his people their stony and hard hearts And so touching Pharaoh the Scriptures expresly shew that his hardnesse of heart was the cause of his unbeliefe and disobedience Whereupon I conclude evidently that the Apostle here speaks not of such a mercy onely as follows faith as the Adversaries would haue him but as goes before it also as he speaks of such a hardening as goâ—s before unbelief Note we here also that the Apostle in this place propounds Gods will as the cause of his dealing diversly with divers persons and not of his saving such as are to be saved after a divers manner from that which some namely the carnall Israelites imagined ADVERSARIES NOW to return to them They lay down a question thus What is the meaning of the hardening of Pharaoh And in their answer wholly passe by God as no doer in the businesse They make Pharaoh a doer in hardening his own heart which is true and Satan a doer in hardening Pharaohs heart and this is true also but God no doer but a sufferer only in giving him up that is as else where they expound it in leaving him to himselfe and to Satan to be hardened DEFENCE BVT first the Text imports a further thing in God whom it brings in thus speaking For this same purpose haue I raised thee up that I might shew my power in thee and that my name might be declared through all the earth Is Gods raysing up which is his hardening v. 8 nothing but his letting a man lie still and fall down lower then he was before Besides the end which was the glory of Gods power and name shews God to be a worker Every end must haue an efficient or working cause The glory of God was not the end of Satans work nor of Pharaohs work and therefore of Gods work in it Thirdly God hardened Pharaohs heart by sending Moses and Aaron unto him as by an occasion though not a cause as the Law is the occasion of sin and the Gospell the occasion of strife and variance Fourthly God deprived Pharaoh of the use of common sense and reason otherwise it could not haue been that after so many experiments by him taken of Gods powerfull hand against him and for the Israelits he should so furiously as he did haue followed them into the middest of the Sea Lastly besides and aboue all these God in whose hands the hearts of Kings are as the rivers of waters to turn them whether he will hardened Pharaohs heart by ordering his pride cruelty and contempt of God to this effect of obstinacy appearing in his most desperate course without which powerfull and unerring hand of God all the former notwithstanding it might haue come to passe that Pharaohs heart might haue been softned by the miracles and means used and so Gods word which before had foretold his hardening might not haue taken effect which is contrary to the truth and drift of the Apostle in this place God therefore was not onely a sufferer but a doer in the hardening of Pharaoh ADVERSARIES THeir next question is How consider you these words Who hath resisted his will v. 19. Vnto which they frame this untoward Answer viz. that those Iews seeking salvation by those works of the Law did not resist Gods will and so gaue him no cause to complain DEFENCE NOthing lesse as we haue shewed and shall further manifest by and by from the Apostles answer v. 20. The meaning is plain The words v. 19 Thou wilt then say unto me why doth he yet finde fault for who hath resisted his will are an objection against that which immediately went before whom he will he hardeneth Now against this it may colourably bee objected that if God hardens whom he will hee hath then no reason to complain of mens being hardened in disobedience for Who can resist his will if he will harden them A piece of an eie is sufficient to see the plainnesse of this exposition and coherence Their discourse then following that God would saue all and haue all repent amend and beleev
obtain it as exhortations and warnings are to perseverance Is it a good argument that the conduit may want water because a man skilfull in water-works layeth the conduit pipes with all diligence and Art between the Spring-head and the Conduit Or that the childe whom his father holding him fast by the hand in a slippery way and bidding him look that he fall not can fall out of his fathers hand Nay though left to himselfe he may yea cannot but fall yet considering his Fathers strength supposing him one that cannot fall himselfe wherof the childe is made partakers for his supportance he cannot fall Such a holding and helping hand of God are these exhortations made effectuall by his Spirit in the hearts of his children true beleevers Vnto whom as the Lord suith Seek yee my face so they answer Thy face Lord doe we seek The Lord saith in his word Take heed Stand fast Beware that ye fall not away and the like Vnto which their godly hearts answer Lord wee doe take heed doe beware c. For by these the servant of God is warned They are as seed sown in good ground which brings forth fruiâ— with patience to the harvest So as in truth the clean contrary doctrine to these mens collection is true that therfore the truely faithfull cannot fall away because they they I say being faithfull obedient and of honest hearts are by such exhortations and admonitions armed against such evill of apostacy To conclude this point The Lord Iesus giues his Apostles in charge to teach all Nations whatsoever he had commanded them adding thereunto the promise of his presence with them if they so did to the end of the world against whom also a Woe was denounced if they did not preach the same Gospell I would now know whether it could so come to passe that these Apostles should not and that willingly preach this Gospell and the truths thereof This to affirm were to blaspheme the holy Spirit of God by which they were immediately and infallibly guided in their Ministery Promises therfore and threatnings are not in vain for the provoking of men unto those duties which by reason of the Spirits powerfull work in them it is not possible but they should perform ADVERSARIES THE Scriptures brought by them for their Assertion follow The first is Hebr. 11. 15. whence they gather that as Esau lost his earthly inheritance to which hee had right so may the Saints loose their heavenly inheritance which they haue right to DEFENCE THE Apostle doth not so conclude but exhorts them onely to take head thereof and of that matter we spake even now at large Esau was a prophane person before he sold his birth-right and never other No doubt but a prophane person or hypocrite nourishing in himselfe the root of bitternes though living in the Church may loose whatsoever right he had and of such the Apostle here speaks If it be further objected that Esau had right indeed to the birth-right by them unskilfully called the inheritance I answer that he had never right to it spiritually nor in Gods appoyntment but onely in outward course and in regard of men and such a right to the heavenly inheritance may be and is by too many lost as the Apostle here insinuates Lastly who sees not the difference between the inward grace of faith and holines in the heart of a true beleever and the carnall right to that which is common to good and bad In Math. 5. 15. Christ sayth not as they accuse him that salt may loose his savour but if the salt loose his savour as he sayth If it be possible let this cup passe from me which yet all things considered could not be Of which form of speech we haue lately treated and shall more hereafter I suppose it was never seen that salt wanted saltnesse and if it doe how is it salt Besides Christ calles not his Apostles salt and light in regard of the grace of faith in their hearts but of their preaching the Gospell therewith to season and inlighten the world 2. Pet. 2. 20. they pervert as the former places making that absolute which is but conditionall and with an If. They say they which are washed may return with the sow to wallow in the myre and their latter end be worse then the beginning The Apostle sayth If after they be washed c. These forms of speech whether in scripture or other where If this then that do not necessarily prove that either this or that is so indeed but onely that if this be so then that also Both this and that in themselves may be impossible and yet the consequence good as if I should say at mid-night If it be day the Sun is rising or at mid-day If it be night the Sun is set so in the Scriptures Luk. 19. 40. 1. Cor. 15. 13 14. 15. 16. c. Gal. 1. 5. 10. and in infinite other places It is sufficient for the truth of a conditionall proposition that the latter part follow infallibly upon the former if it be but requires not that it should be These men and others herein labour of the same mistaking with the Disciples Ioh. 21. 22. 23. who upon Christs words to Peter touching Iohn If I will that he tarry till I come what is that to thee concluded that Iohn should not dye but should survive till the second comming of Christ which fancy also continued a long time in the mindes of many But the Evangelist in the same place teacheth them that will learn not to interprete conditionall speeches as absolute Iesus sayd not unto him he shall not dye but if I will that he tarry till I come or dye not If it be further replyed that the Apostle aimes at certaine particular persons which denyed the Lord that bought them whose pernicious wayes others followed unto whom it did happen according to the true proverb The dog is turned to his vomit again which same persons Iude also chargeth to haue turned the grace of God into wantonnesse I willingly grant the thing so to haue been but deny the conditionall form of speech to proue it absolutely And for the thing I answer that the Apostles there speak of mens being purged and washed and the like according to the outward profession onely which they formerly made and which the Church took knowledge of and not according to the inward truth of the heart which they knew not but God alone I add to put the matter wholly out of question that these Apostles thus speaking doe in the same places both gather themselves by the event and teach us that these persons of whom they speak were never truely and effectually sanctified but onely in their own and other mens opinion as where Peter v. 7. 8. 9. opposing righteous Lot to the wicked Sodomites addeth that as God delivered him so fo he knoweth that is can and will deliver the godly out of
A DEFENCE OF THE DOCTRINE PROPOVNDED BY THE SYNODE AT DORT AGAINST IOHN MVRTON AND HIS ASSOCIATES IN A Treatise intuled A Description what God c. WITH THE REFVTATION OF their Answer to a Writing touching BAPTISM By IOHN ROBINSON Printed in the year 1624. THE PREFACE THE record which the Apostle bare the Iews in his time such as either reade these mens writings or know their persons may bear them which is that they haue a zeal of God but not according to knowledg I add touching them nor in modesty neither Which if it held any place in their hearts as were meet would moderate and restrain both their causlesse presumption in themselvs and gracelesse licentiousnesse which they fear not to use both towards God and other men They would seem very zealous for the Scriptures purity and perfection vvarning all to take heed they presume not aboue what is written nor to add to or diminish from the perfect law of the Lord contained therin And yet they themselvs presume so frequently and notoriously in this their book to corrupt the very words of the Texts which they cite by adding to and taking away and altering for their advantage as I suppose the like hath not been seen before in any of any sect whatsoever and as if in truth they meant not to use a gift to interpret the holy Scriptures but a priviledg to correct them A taste of this they giue us in their very Epistle where answering an objection taken from the learning of the Synode at Dort by Es. 29. 14 Math. 11. 25. 26 they instead of wise and prudent which are Christs words put learned and that in small letters as part of the Text both wronging therin that lawfull and helpfull learning in others which themselvs want and corrupting the Lords words which they ought religiously to keep and obtruding another meaning then ever came into his mind which they doe usually in this Treatise by neglecting the main scope of the place cited and catching at a word or phrase in it which is the highest way that can be to all heresie And for men how uncharitable are they towards them in their persons judging them as perishing without remedie if they receiv not their new Gospell of Anabatistry and Free-will How injurious in relating their own mis-formed collections for their opinions And lastly how contemptuous of their gifts and graces how eminent soever As if the word of God came out from them or to them alone It is true we ought not to pin our faith on the sleevs of any nor to call any Master as Christ speaks and means but him alone and no lesse true that Christ hath given gifts to some men for the edifying of others and that we ought not to look on our things alone as if we alone had knowledg and conscience and zeal and soules to saue but every man also of the things of others though in some things differing from them as having these things as well as we and therwith considering that many eies see more then one and that specially having as so many spectacles the advantages of knowledge of Tongues and Arts with daily travail in the Scripture which in us are wanting And thus serving God in all modesty of minde and being sincere in the truth in loue we shall be much sitter both to help others and to be helped by them in the things agreeable thereunto A DEFENCE OF THE DOCTRINE PROPOVNDED BY THE SYNODE AT DORT CHAP. I. Of Predestination ADVERSARIES WEE hold that before the foundation of the world the most holy God predestinated to make the world and man c. DEFENCE NEither the Scriptures so speak neither is it sensibly said that God predestinated to make the world and man c. To predestinate is to predetermine or to destinate or ordain before hand a person or thing to its end God indeed purposed from eternity to make the world and man but destinated it and him considered as to be made to their ends Christ as God was preordained or predestinated before the foundation of the world and manifested in the last times for our redemption yet is he not of the number of persons or things made or created Again the glory of the grace of God shineing in mans salvation is a created thing and yet not predestinated of God nor preordained to any end being it selfe the utmost end of all things We see then something predestinated and yet not made and something again made and â—ot predestinated With like incongruity they adde that God predestinated to make man a reasonable soule to giue him a righteous Law and lastly to send his sonne to purchase the very wicked c. which last words haue neither truth in them in their meaning nor sense as they lay them down Secondly the Synode at Dort against which these Adversaries deal and all others speaking distinctly of things apply the decree of predestination to reasonable creatures and that Synode specially to men and the same considered as faln its Adam and thereby made guilty of eternall death referring the decree of creation and permission of the fall to a more general work of divine providence Their description of the elect and reprobate may be admitmitted in a good sense namely that the receiving of grace by some argues Gods eternall election of them as the effect doth the cause The not receiving of this grace by others to whom it is offered his eternall reprobation that is his not-electing but refusing or passing by of others as the consequent the antecedent Of which more hereafter In setting down the difference between them and us they insinuate as if we made God the Authour yea the principall Authour of all the evill of sin in the world But as the Synode disclaims that prophane errour so doth it justly complain of this ungodly slander which in these men ariseth from their want of skill to put difference between Gods working of the sinne as authour therof and his appointing and ordering both of sin and sinner to his own holy ends ADVERSARIES THe first particular against which they deal is our affirmation that God decreed the sinne of Adam and that of necessity to come to passe and consequently all other sinnes in their time taking upon them with all to manifest that herein wee not onely contradict the truth but our own affirmation elsewhere quoting for example Theses Genevenses pag. 26 where it is affirmed that Adam in innocency had free-will or power from the creation of God not to haue sinned which matter they also prosecute in many words with great disorder making the head of their discourse Predestination and the body sin DEFENCE AS the contradiction is not in our Assertions but in their misunderstanding So might I by good right forbeare to meddle about Adams sin in the case of predestination considering the determination of the Synode at Dort hereabout which I take upon
a necessity which takes away freedom and voluntarinesse from men but then they rather suffer then doe For example the striking or thrusting of a man with such violence as that he is compelled thereby to stagger or fall this necessity of compulsion depriues me of all freedom to this bodily motion so as I stagger or fall unwillingly but this comes from an externall principle or beginning working violently and from without me But this is nothing to that other necessity in regard of God causing and effecting the good in and by the creature according to its kinde and suffering and ordering the evill person and thing according to its kind with which mans freedom may well stand And first whatsoever God doth he doth it both most freely and most necessarily well So the elect Angels doe the will of God most voluntarily and yet most necessarily So did Christ as man the will of his Father so freely as none can doe any thing more and yet as necessarily as it was necessary for God not to sinne On the contrary the devils doe evill both most necessarily being by these mens own grant unchangeably evill and yet most willingly as carryed thereunto withall their power Christ saith it must needs be that offences come and the Apostle that there must be heresies in the Church If then freedom of will can stand with no manner of necessity the authours of these heresies and offences sinne not therin for all sinnes specially of this kinde are voluntary I add in the last place that the better any man or Angell is he doth good the more both necessarily and willingly and the worse any evill both waies Neither will it seem strange unto us that one and the same action comes under so divers considerations as in one regard to be voluntary contingent and casuall and in another necessary if we consider how divers agents concur and meet together in producing it No work of man is so mans alone as that God hath not some hand in it in sustaining and ordering the person and work yea in effecting that which is good in it as all that is which hath in it any created being or order What hinders then but that the same thing may in regard of man as the particular and immediate cause be voluntary and contingent and yet in regard of God the highest and generall cause necessary We daily see the truth of this in proportion amongst men the meeting of Ahab and Eliah was in respect of Ahab casuall but in respect of Eliah of destinate counsell These things thus cleered we will come to the exposition of the words of Ezechiel so oft and vehemently urged by these men and others which are that God takes not pleasure in the death of a sinner but that he turn from his way and liue I answer first that the Lord takes no delight in the death of a sinner that repents and turns from his wicked way but otherwise if the sinner repent not the Lord takes delight in his death not for the misery of the creature but for the glory of his justice shining therin Of such the Lord testifies that he wil laugh at their calamity mock when their fear cometh And considering that the death and destruction of the wicked is Gods own just and holy work for their sins who will deny that God delights in it Secondly for sinne who was ever so wicked as to imagine that God takes pleasure in it It pleaseth him for his holy ends to suffer sin and to order the creature sinning by his own freewill election of evil as hath been formerly proved Thirdly it must be noted that the Prophet speaks there of such sinners onely as to whom the word comes saying Turn yee turn yee from your evill waies for why will yee die ô house of Israel Whence we doe gather evidently these two particulars First that the Prophet doth not here speak of all men universally as they conceiu but onely of the house of Israel or of such as to whom he◠sends his Prophets to call them to repentance secondly that he speaks not of that decree of the Lord willing which is accompanied with the powerfull work of his grace by which hee will giue repentance to wicked men instructed in the truth by his servants but onely of that degree of his will which stands in commanding that which is good and in approving of it if it be performed And so we grant it to be the Lords pleasure and will that all repent to whom the Word is preached It is true which they add that Adam and others sinned against the will of God but not that any ever sinned against the secret will of God as they affirm The will of God is no law to man till it be revealed and where there is no law there is no transgression It is also truely sayd that the Iewes unwillingnesse to be gathered to Christ was against Gods and Christs will that is his commanding will for he would that is commanded and they would not but disobeyed but that it was against that decree of Gods willing which sets his almightie power awor◠that I deny For God could if thus he would haue giuen them repentance and drawn them to his son Whatsoever he thus wills he can do That which they add as an eye-salue to cure our blindnes namely that we haue nothing to do with Gods secret wil not revealed in his word is true in regard of our obedience to God expectation from him but not absolutely as they conceiue The particular events of things in the world though not so much as insinuated in the scriptures concern us when they come to passe so as we may and ought to say it was the will of God they should so be either his will to work them if good or to suffer and order them and their doers if evill ADVERSARIES NExt comes into consideration a speciall distinction of ours which is that God is the author of the action or fact but not of the sin of the fact or crime Over which they insult and in it over all learned men though they mention Calvin onely with high contempt and great triumph before the victory calling it a merely fabulous ridle and marvellous sophistication telling us that a spade is a spade c. but in truth shewing themselues sitter to medle with a spade and a mattock then with those high mysteries Let us see their reasons In the first whereof they make us say that God is the author of the very fact and deed of Adams sin yea of adultery theft murder c. DEFENCE WE deny their charge and answer by distinction that Adams taking and eating the forbidden fruit Davids adultery Ioahs murther and the like are to be considered two waies First naturally and as they are motions in nature performed by mans natural created faculties and powers of soul and body secondly morally as
he wanted And as the Apostle affirms of the Ephesians that they were elect of God in Christ before the foundation of the world in regard of the faith and holines appearing in them so might the Lord well say of this and other his like hypocrites and unsanctified ones that they are not of the number of the elect or chosen in Gods eternall decree so far as their present state manifests Neither is it the meaning of the Lord in those words simply to reprove him for not having on a wedding garment but for coming thither and not having it on Friend how comest thou hither not having on a wedding garment and so to warn others to make sure their election and not to content themselues with the shew of obedience without inward truth And taking the words thus they make for our and against their opinion Or take the words as meant of the actual execution of election and that in the largest sense so as in the same be cōprehended whatsoever God doth in time for the effectual procuring of a mans salvation as of the giving of Christ for him of the Gospell to him and by it faith and holinesse and the spirit of adoption and so glory in the end and we say all this he doth according to his eternall purpose of election effectuall onely in those who are made partakers of the inward calling and wedding garment thereby and not in all that are called outwardly For known unto the Lord are all his workes from the beginning of the world Whatsoever God doth in time that he purposed to do from eternitie as he doth it But take election as these men do in most places and which seems likewise to be their meaning upon best advise for that first work of mercie in God by which he actually and particularly as they speak chuseth persons to salvation they erre with great error in holding that this election is for the qualitie which God findes in persons and upon the condition of faith and repentance going before and that God onely chuseth and electeth where he finds faith and obedience to his son For first the Apostle teacheth Eph. 1. 4. that we are chosen in Christ to wit as the mediator and meanes of communicating all spirituall blessings with us before the foundation of the world was layd that we might be holy and unblameable in loue before him This is meant our adversaries granting it of the decree of election the meaning therefore must needs be that God hath from eternity decreed to elect or chuse us in time actually not because we should or would be holy as these men perversly imagine but that we might be holy As God from eternity purposed to chuse men so hee chuseth them actually in time But he purposed from eternity to chuse men that they might be holy and therfore actually in time chuseth them that they might be holy and unblameable before him and therfore not because they are holy or beleev and obey Gods actuall chusing therfore goes before our actuall faith holinesse repentance and obedience as the cause and follows them not as an effect as they mis-judge The same is confirmed from v. 5 where we are said to be predestinated to the adoption of children by Iesus Christ With which joyne that Rom. 8. 30 Whom he predestinated them also he called and whom he called them also he justified and whom he justified them also he glorified To be elected to wit in decree and to be predestinated in the good part as here are the same in substance onely we are said to be predestinated in respect of the supernaturall ends and means leading therunto unto which God in time bringeth us and to be elect or chosen in respect of others from whom God selecteth us Now if we be predestinated of Christ to the adoption of children then not because we are children or beleev which are the same Ioh. 1. 12. To this purpose it is that the Lord so oft by Moses beats upon this that he chose the Israelits to be his people out of his loue to them and loue and promise to their Fathers excluding all other motiues and placing the cause of his chusing them in himselfe alone and his loue and the stability of his purpose and promise Moses testifyeth that God chose them that they might be a holy and peculiar people unto the Lord But these men will make God begin at the other end and chuse men because they are an holy and peculiar people that is having faith and repentance going before Ioyn we with this that in the Psalm Blessed be the man whom thou chusest and causest to approach unto thee that he may dwell in thy courts we shal be satisfied with the goodnesse of thy house of thy holy Temple Faith then and holinesse are not the fore found conditions for which God chuseth a man but the actuall conferring and giving of them according to an eternall purpose is the very actuall chusing of him even that by which God severs elects selects and chuseth him out of the masse of the wicked Every mans common sense will teach this All are of themselues and by nature sinners and subject to wrath Now what is it for God actually to chuse some from the rest but to bestow that upon them actually and effectually by which they differ actually from the rest which is faith and repentance God doth not therfore as these adversaries imagine chuse upon condition of faith and repentance going before but doth by the very bestowing of these graces of faith and repentance which others want chuse elect select and sever actually from others the elected from eternity in his decree Lastly by the crosse doctrine of these men we should chuse God before God chuse us for by beleeving and obeying we chuse God to be our God and for this by their crooked rule God after chuseth us to be his people Thus proud flesh will needs be before hand with God But Christ our Lord leads us another way saying You haue not chosen me but I haue chosen you to wit first which he speaks not onely of their Apostolicall but of their Christian state also as the words following make it plain that whatsoever ye shall aske of the Father in my Name hee may giue it you Vnto the state of faith and obedience onely doth this promise appertain Their assertion thus disproved wee will come to their proofs which are partly impertinent and partly against themselues The first is The Lord chuseth to himselfe a righteous man The place which is Psal. 4. 3 they note not for what purpose they best know but all may know it is grosly perverted a◠not being meant of Davids election to salvation but to the Kingdom of Israel whose glory that way his adversaries would haue turned unto shame but all in vain v. 3. But consider we this choise in proportion to the other and see what followeth Gods
greatly by them mistaken excepted ADVERSARIES Adams posterity as they came to understanding had a law And again the law is given to a man when he comes to understanding and when his conscience gives him peace by keeping it and war for breaking it and not till then which qualities say they are not in babes for they discern not earthly things and how then should they discern heavenly c. seeing there must be a conscience unto which the Law is given which infants haue not DEFENCE THis errour in the latter part of their speech must the more carefully be observed and cleerly refuted by us because it is laid down as the ground of divers other errours and the same not small as will appear hereafter Neither needs there in truth more nor can there be any thing more cleere against them then that which themselvs bring from Rom. 2 their words are The law is written in the hearts of men in nature who haue a conscience to excuse them if they doe the things of the Law c. This form of speech used by the Apostle of the Law as written in mens hearts is borrowed from Gods writing the Law in tables of stone which had first and by creation been written in mens hearts out of which it was almost quite blotted by sin Now what is it for the Gentiles to haue had the Law written in their hearts in or by nature as the Apostle speaks This must needs be in nature created for in nature as corrupted there is no writing in but blotting out of the Law If by nature created then as infants haue this nature so haue they this naturall manuscript or writing of Gods hand This also the very word nature imports signifying that which is born with a man or with which hee is born comming of a word in Greek that signifies to beget or produce as parents doe children and each living creature its kind And seeing the Apostle here speaks of a Law by which men discern the differences between right and wrong good and evill honest and dishonest in morall and main matters whence and with what hand should all and every man and woman living in the world even there where is no Law otherwise written or preached haue this law and conscience thus written in their breasts saue by the finger of God in creation This knowledg and conscience being the remainders of that image of God in which all men in Adam were made By all which it appears evidently that infants bring into the world with them this law of nature and those foot-steps of Gods image in their reasonable soules who having in them the faculties of understanding and will cannot possible be devoyd of all law for the ordering of the same to whâ—ch â—aw they are necessarily either disposed or indisposâ—d 〈◊〉 it â—â—â—not be that the reasonable faculties of understanding and â—â—ll â—â— any of mankind should be voyd of all vertuous or vitious â—â—sposition and inclination at least to the things of the law of nature that is of God the effects whereof they shâ—w forth actually in their time And this truth themselues elsewhere confirm undenyably though they think it not where they say that Adams posterity originally for of that state they there speak haue weak natures by the which when the commandement comes they cannot obey This originall weakness then is a contrary disposition to the Law of God and to that which they were created else it could not hinder them from obeying God actually afterward at least internally and in their hearts Surely nothing but the Law of sin is contrary to the Law of God warring against it and against the law of the mind agreeing with it as the Apostle speaketh Neither follows it that Infants haue no Law because they haue not peace or warre of conscience in them nor can discern of earthly or heavenly things The shewing the workes of the Law and doing the things contained in the Law and so the having a conscience excusing or accusing for the contrary as the Apostle speaks are not simply requisite for the having of the Law nor for being conformable to it but for the actuall obedience therunto in particular actions Persons are in three respects conformable to the law of God first in habite and so a godly man is a godly man and conformable to Gods law when hee sleepeth secondly in disposition or inclination and so infants considered either in state of creation or regeneration are conformable thereunto thirdly in performance of particular acts of obedience by men of discretion for which the conscience excuseth and accuseth for the contrary As well may these men deny that infants are reasonable creatures as that they are lawlesse They can perform the works of neither but haue the faculties and dispositions of and to both which in time and in their effects they manifest ADVERSARIES IN the next places follows their promised proofs that Christ hath been and still is offered to all that haue sinned and that they haue put him away and that the fault is their own and condemnation from themselvs and Good freed from partiality DEFENCE BElike then if God shew that mercy to one in calling him to his grace in Christ which hee doth not to another it is partiality with them from which to free him they take this pains as if the Lord stood in need of their patronage wheras in truth they but forge lies for God as Iobs friends did and talk deceitfully for him Let us consider of their proofs admitting of such as haue in them either apparant truth or probability and reproving the rest as there is cause And first they erre in saying that the generation of Adam and Eve took notice of Christ as they took notice of their sin seeing the notice of sin specially of that which is more grosse is naturall and the effect of the law of nature written in all mens hearts whereas the notice of Christ is by supernaturall revelation The like vain presumption and apparant falsifying is in the words following that all the sonns of Noah could doe no lesse but take knowledg of Christ to convey it by tradition to all their generations If it be meant that indeed they did so How many 1000 thousands are there at this day which never so much as heard of Christ at least as God and man and Redeemer of mankind by his death For this their presumption of the ages before Christs coming in the flesh they bring not any shew of reason or testimony divine or human Onely they alledg the sacrifices of the Gentiles which say they they either had from their ancestors in their generations or as being moved by a troubled conscience which must be quieted by sacrifice And these sacrifices they tell us were remembrances of Christ and kinds of acknowledgings of him though in the end they account them no better then remembrances of a false Christ in stead of him As their opinion
hoping to come in time to some dore or window A second is that the terrours of conscience accusing them for sin should haue caused them to seek after God with earnestnesse for reconciliation And to this we assent also A third is that it is not Gods fault but their own that they are ignorant of the means of reconciliation and salvation And of this also we are perswaded as they so far as there is a fault But now what did those Heathens in this case They became vain in their thoughts and their foolish hearts were full of darkenesse so as they turned the glory of the incorruptible God to Idols satisfying themselvs in their own inventions And this also as consonant to the Scriptures we willingly admit of And what then God for this say they delivered them up to a reprobate minde that they never knew more for what should he that is not faithfull in a little be trusted with more Luk. 16. 10 and gaue them up to their own hearts lusts and so they became past feeling And to consent with them herein also the Scriptures leade us very directly But what now follows of all this for conclusion Namely that all Nations Citties houses c. that is every particular man and woman hath had the mercy of God in the offer of Christ affoarded them that all were bidden to the marriage Nay the plain contrary and that all were not bidden but that many in stead of this mercy to be bidden were in justice left to themselvs and given up to their own vain imaginations the Lord suffering all the Nations to walk in their own waies as the Apostle saith and refusing as themselvs confesse to trust them with much which had not been faithfull in a little so as they never knew more And whereas they cunningly shuffle in now and then that men might haue had Christ given unto them or offered them and that Christ might haue been manifested to every one if they had would how congruously to the Scriptures they speak therein we now dispute not is not onely besides the matter in controversie which is what was and is and not what might haue been done but to their own prejudice feeing that which onely might haue been is not specially that bar being put by mens own default which effectually hinders the being of it as in this case Having thus shewed that these men either fight busily with their own shadows in proving at large things never called into question by us or may easily haue their weapons turned upon themselvs in the main matter I will even now proceed after that I haue briefly observed some particular mistakings by them And first they both add to the Text and err in applying that which is written Rom. 11. 32. The Scripture is God hath concluded them all in unbeliefe that he might haue mercie upon all they add of their own every person whereas the Apostle neither speaks of every person but onely of the Gentiles indefinitely at one time and of the Iews at another which he there opposeth the one to the other neither speaks he of the offering of grace and mercy onely as they deem but of the actuall conferring of it upon all of whom there he speaks who beleeved and obtained mercy the other remaining in unbeleef And this both the drift and words of the place expresly manifest v. 30. 31. 32. Neither doth that other place alledged Tit. 2. 11 speak of all and every particular person but of persons of all sorts servants as well as masters or any others The Apostle v. 9 10 provokes beleeving servants to obedience to their masters rendâ—ing this reason of encouragement v. 11 for the grace of God which bringeth salvation unto all hath appeared as if he should say that even they though poor bond-slaves if they continued in faith and faithfull obedience should haue their part in the salvation of God as well as any others Secondly as I will not simply deny that God punished the Heathens other sins with the want of preaching Christ unto them so is it certain that greater sinners and deeplyer drowned both in idolatry and other lusts none in the world were then the Corinthians Athenians Ephesians and others to whom Christ was preached and faith thereby given to many unto salvation The Lord tels the Prophet that though the house of Israel to whom he was sent would not hear yet if he had sent him to the Heathens surely they would haue heard him So the Lord Iesus upbraids the cities of Chorah Bethsaida and Capernaum where he both preached and wrought most of his mighty works that they were deeper in the contempt of God and further from all disposition to use aright the means of salvation then the Heathenish Cities of Tyre and Sâ—don yea of Sodom it selfe unto whom yet he vouchsafed not the means of repentance and revelation of grace which he did to the former By which it doth appear that the Lord doth not observ the order prescribed unto him by these men for the dispensing of his favours this way in trusting them with most who are of their faithfull in a little that is wholly faithlesse indeed but as the wind blows where it lists so doth he by the sweet gusts of his Gospell and spirit according to the good pleasure of his own will and not according to the good pleasure of mens will in their use of naturall light and conscience dispense supernaturall grace both for means and efficacy Lastly as they here contradict their main ground of universall calling in supposing some Nation to haue no means of knowing Christ so I would learn of them how the Gentiles wholly voyd of faith could rightly examine all things touching the offence of God an accusing conscience and the satisfying of Gods justice as they would haue them or in so doing could promise to themselvs the revelation of Christ by one means or other as they liberally undertake for them They tell us He that seeks shall find Math. 7. But we answer them that Christ there speaks not of a seeking by blind and unbeleeving Gentiles but by his faithfull Disciples Now albeit the eternall and unchangeable election of God doe not manifest it selfe in time in the bare outward calling of the so elected common to many others with them but as the same hath joyned with it the effectuall work of true faith and repentance in the heart peculiar to them alone Yet seeing these adversaries labour upon presumption of an universall grace offered to all in the preaching of the Gospell to establish an uniuersall election of all that is in truth to overthrow all election I will here annex to the things formerly laid down two or three plain testimonies for thâ—â— further conviction The first â—s from the Psalm He shewed his word unto Iacob his statutes and his judgements unto Israel He hath not dealt so with any Nation and as for judgements they
threatning that if they continued not in the bounty of God they should be cut off ch 11. 21. I answer as before first that the threatning is conditionall as Gal 1. 8 If we c. Was it possible that Paul should preach any other Gospell Or were he an Angell from heaven or of God that should so doe I suppose no ch 4. 14. But an Angell from hell rather and of the divell The question is not whether if any should not abide in the bounty of God they were to be cut off or no But whether any with whom hee hath dealt so bounteously as indeed to justifie and sanctifie them haue not also a promise by his power to be kept in that his bounty by the means which he hath appointed Secondly Paul pronounceth those Romans justified not from the judgement of certainty but of charity Of whom as some were undoubtedly sincere whom God did by this and the like warnings preserv and keep in his grace so for the hypocrites mingled amongst them it was but that which we say if in their time they were broken off from that which formerly they seemed to others by their profession and it may be to themselvs also to haue had And indeed this very place if it be well minded ministers full answer to the most of their Arguments This warning though immediately given to the Romans concerns all Christians as well as them And being founded upon an example of the Lords dealing with the Iews must be expounded and applyed accordingly Who then were these exemplary Iews formerly cut off by the Lord from the oliue tree Were they such as had once truely beleeved but had after made defection I suppose not even in these mens judgment but such as occupying a place in the Church yet were in truth faithlesse hypocrites and as chaff in the Lords flore which the Son of man comming with his fan in his hand purged out And in these we may see what kind of branches they are which in time come actually and visibly to bee broken off from the Oliue The instances following of Elies house loosing the Priesthood Saul the Kingdom of Israel and the Israelites Canaan serv onely to fill up room That Priesthood Kingdom and Canaan were not the graces of faith and sanctification in the heart nor the losse of them sin but punishments onely Onely the last place Math. 18. 32 where debt forgiven is as they say recalled were something to the purpose if the drift of the parable were to shew that God indeed forgivs sins and after unforgives them which were lightnesse unbecomming any graue and honest man But the scope of the parable being no more then that we ought to forgiue such as offend us and that otherwise God will not forgiue us to draw more from it is to forget that it is a parable and to take the high way to to most grievous errour Besides there is in this parable no colour for falling away from grace and true godlinesse formerly had but onely even their exposition being admitted that a man may haue his sins pardoned who yet wants all brotherly loue and goodnesse which the Scriptures every where deny Math. 6. 14. 15 Mark 11. 24. 25 1 Ioh. 3. 14. 15 Rom. 8. 1 Ps. 32. 1. 2. Thirdly by these grounds no man can certainly know that his sins are indeed pardoned whilst he liues in the world because he may still fall away and so haue his pardon recalled though sealed up unto him by the very spirit of God it selfe And so all our faith must be but adventure whilst we liue in the world whether our sins past be in truth pardoned or no contrary to the Scriptures Lastly this impeacheth both the justice of God and his truth His justice in making him require double satisfaction for the same debt first of his Son even the price of his bloud and the same also by faith applyed to the person that hath sinned and beleeveth and after of the person himselfe Of his truth and that both of his word absolutely promising forgiuenesse of sins to him that beleeveth and also of his spirit by which he seals up the same unto their hearts Their second and third reason taken from the fall and sin of Adam and all mens falling and sinning in and by him are wholly besides the question which is onely of falling from the grace of God in Christ from election in him from the loue of God towards us when we were enemies from mercy which presupposeth sin and misery and is properly Evangelicall God gaue Adam his portion in grace by creation and left it in his own keeping which hee soon mispent but hath dealt more mercifully with us in making his Son our feofâ—er in trust that he as our head might keep and improue the grace of God belonging to us as is meet for us lest we having â—ll at once and that same left in our own hands should mispend all as Adam did To that which they alledge from Eph. 1. 4 compared with Rev. 2. 4. 5 I answer first that Paul stiles those Ephesians elect onely as he knew them so to be which was by outward appearance of holinesse Secondly that the leaving of their first loue was not a total falling from grace but onely a decaying of their former zeal Thirdly the threatning of the Candlesticks removing was to the truely called an effectuall means of drawing them to repentance When these men can make it appear that any one of the truely elect and sanctified Ephesians did wholly despise this and the like means of their bettering I will then grant their proof strong It may as well be concluded that therefore the fire goes out because it hath good and fresh fuell put unto it and is diligently blown For these exhortations and admonitions are as fuell and blowing to preserv from going out the spark and fire of grace in the hearts of beleevers That onely he that continues to the end and overcomes shall be saved and that the promise of acceptance and salvation by them miscalled the promise of election is no otherwise intended to us then upon our abiding in the faith and obedience of Christ. Wee beleev and confesse with them according to the Scriptures but withall are taught and beleev according to the same Scriptures that God keeps all his holy ones unto the end and giues them to overcome that he puts his fear in their heart that they shall not depart from him that the seed sown in good ground shall neither wither by persecution nor be choaked by cares of the world or deceitfulnesse of riches or otherwise but shall grow up to the harvest that the gates of hell shall not prevail against the Church or any one member thereof built upon the rock of Peters confession that God is faithfull who with the temptation will giue a way to escape for all his that they are kept by the power of
God through faith to salvation and that being born of God they doe not sin nor can to wit as the children of the devill doe because his seed remaineth in them Their objections following that by our doctrine men need not fear falling into condemnation though they fall into notorious sin nor repent having committed such sins are of no weight seeing God though he promise salvation to the truely called certainly yet he neither promiseth it neither are they to beleev it immediately but by means of fearing to sin and of repentance when sin is committed which hee also promiseth to work and put in their heart that they shall not depart from him The Lord promâ—sed by the Prophet Ieremy that after 70 years of the Iews captivity accomplished at Babylon he would visit them and cause them to return to Ierusalem And whereas it might be objected against the certainty of this promise and event What Shall they return though they repent not nor seek the Lord but remain rebellious as they haue been and their fore-fathers before them He answers that then they shall call upon God and pray unto him and seek unto him and he will hearken unto them be found of them and return their captivity He promiseth both the end and the means and hee that promiseth is faithfull in performing and providing for both temporall and eternall deliverance and the meanes thereof Their Argument taken from exhortations and admonitions in the Scriptures that we receiv not the grace of God in vain 2 Cor. 6. 1 and the like hath formerly been fully answered They are not in vain either in respect of elect or reprobate neither yet will we own their absurd answer here fathered upon us that the whole Scriptures are given to keep both elect and reprobate from falling into grosse sins yet that neither the elect can be damned by transgressing them nor the reprobate saved by observing them The Scriptures haue divers ends and amongst others are given to keep all not onely from grosse but from all sins Neither doe we affirm that the elect cannot be damned by transgressing them or that the reprobate cannot be saved by observing them as they like deceitfull proctors plead for us or rather for their own advantage But this we say that the elect and truely sanctified are so kept by the power of God in his feare that they never transgresse as the wicked do nor can because his seed remaineth in them that they continually renue their repentance particular for sins known into which through infirmity they fall and generall for sinns unknown as David did and that even by means of those exhortations and admonitions which God opens their hearts to attend unto and giues increase accordingly And the contrary the reprobates being left to themselvs of God haue by their own and satans malice their eyes so blinded and hearts hardened as though those means of exhortation come unto them they either understand them not or beleev them not or despise them but never observ or obey them aright Their curses of the doctrine in this point received in all Reformed Churches as Atheisticall and damnable and their blessing themselvs from it is here as every where the fruit of that wilde zeale wherewith their ignorant hearts are possessed Their answers follow to the Scriptures brought against them The first is Math. 24. 24. If it were possible they the false Teachers should deceiv the very elect Whence we conclude as they say that it is not possible the elect should perish And here first they shew who are the elect of God noting indeed the persons but perverting the order of grace If in saying as they doe that the elect of God are those that receiv and obey the truth of Christ and abide in him unto the death they meant that such as are chosen of God in his decree before the world and actually and effectually chosen and called in time by the Word and Spirit to beleev and obey did so abide to the death it were but the truth which the Scriptures teach and we professe But intending as they doe that men haue onely the promise of actuall and particular election till then but are not absolutely elected and that absolute election follows this abiding in Christ till death they are like the foolish builder which would lay the foundation upon the roofe of the house By their comment upon Christs words men should be in danger to be seduced by false Prophets when they haue abiden in Christ unto death for till then they will haue none elect and the elect are here said to be in danger to be seduced That which they gather from the manifold warnings in the Scriptures to the elect that none deceiv them c. is true namely that the elect may fall from their election or rather from the grace received if they take not heed But they should withall proue that God doth ever so far leav and forsake any truely justified and sanctified in Christ as that they take no heed at all as they ought It is certain that if the very elect Angels in heaven or Christ Iesus upon earth had taken no heed to Gods commandements they could not haue observed them That which is added that many fall away not by being deceived but willingly forsaking the truth and again that many fall away willingly not being deceived is neither pertinent seeing the place in question speaks onely of such as are deceived nor true seeing a man cannot will any evill but under a shew and appearance of good so presented to the will by a deceived and eâ—â—ing understanding And so the Scriptures every where ascribe all manner of defection from God and his holy commandements to errour either in the generall ground or particular case The next place is Ioh. 10. 27. 28 My sheep hear my voyce and they know me and follow me and I giue unto them eternall life and they shall never perish neither shall any take them out of mine hand My Father which hath given them me is greater then all and no man is able to pluck them out of my Fathers hand They here conceiv the purpose of Christ to be to confirm his sheep so long as they continue his sheep c. But herein they draw violently Christs purpose to their own For Christ as may be seen by comparing herewith v. 16. 26. 27 is to shew how it came to passe that some of his hearers beleeved and obeyed his voyce and some not Many of the Iews beleeved not because they were not his sheep some did being his sheep to wit by destination of God Christ saith not that they are not his sheep because they beleev not but that they beleev not because they are not his sheep that is not being of the elect of God they are left to their own impenitent and unbeleeving heart which they also willingly harden against Christs voyce Where v. 16 he saith Other
also the workers of iniquity not with a passion of the mind as hatred is in man but with a holy will to punish the violation of his righteous Law And though with a generall loue of the Creator to the creature he alwaies after a sort loue the persons of men as being his generation yet he loues as is meet the honour of his holinesse more then the happinesse of his creature having violated and prophaned it without repentance They further bewray their ignorance where they think to mend the matter in saying that God hates the persons as weapons and instruments of those wicked qualities Where hath God ever so spoken or any other man before them The godly qualities or graces of knowledge faith loue patience and the like are the spirituall armour and weapons of godly men the members also of men are called the weapons of righteousnesse or unrighteousnes for that with them they practise perform the works thereof But to say the persons are weapons and instruments of the qualities is to put the person in the hand of the weapon to be used by it wheras on the contrary all know that the weapon and instrument is in the hand of the person and to be used and exercised by him They here in desiring the Reader well to observ what they haue said as being a most blessed truth are loath that their nakednesse should not be seen in their spirituall drunkennesse ADVERSARIES NOW for the words of the Apostle to which they return after so long wandring their comment is They went out from us c. that is say they Those lying spirits those persons who had once the spirit of truth in them went out from the Apostles and other Saints And again those lying spirits and Antichrists in mens persons went out c. and were never of the truth the summe of all being that lying spirits and Antichrists in mens persons went out of the truth DEFENCE A Riddle better fitting H. N. then the professours of the truth in simplicity It behoues us therefore a little to insist upon the Text opening it according to the Apostles meaning and ours with him and first proving against them that by those that went out are not meant the lying spirits in the persons but the persons themselues And first these words They went out from us or better from out of us shew that those out-goers were formerly of them in a respect else how could they haue gone out from them But lying spirits were never of the Apostles and Saints but the persons sometimes were Secondly hee saith not as they corrupt the Text If they had been of the truth but of us nor they would hane continued with it but with us nor but they are not of it but they were not of us all carrying it to persons so and so qualified Thirdly Is it to be conceived that the Apostle would complain as heere he doth that lying spirits did not continue with the Churches Fourthly in saying They went out of us that it might be manifest that they were not all of us he shews that by their out-leaps something was manifested which was hid before But it was plain before to the Apostles and Saints that lying spirits were not of the truth He speaks therefore of the persons of hypocrites whom by this their professed defection God discovered Fithly in saying they were not all of us he insinuates that some of them were What some lying spirits of the Spirit of truth No but that not all the persons that formerly professed the truth with them were true members of Christs body which they were Lastly v. 20 He makes an opposition between them of whom hee writes and to whom But yee What yee spirits and so v. 28 little children that is little spirits All may see with what spirit these men are led He then speaks of the going out of persons not of spirits as they mean but being indeed Antichrists as v. 18 in regard of their spirits and doctrines for which they pretended the spirit of Christ. That which they add of the spirit of Hymeneus together with his person being in fellowship with Paul is like the rest By his Spirit it seems they mean his faith in saying faithfull Hymeneus was of the truth erroneous Hymeneus was never of it Hath the faith of a person fellowship with the Saints Or did Hymeneus his faith sometimes hold faith and a good conscience and after put them away Or are not these things plainly spoken of the person of men Paul speaking that of Hymeneus and others which hee knew in regard of outward appearance and not that which he knew not of the inward truth in the heart The meaning of Iohn is plain enough that these Antichrists went out of the Church not by making any seperation or schism from it as some thinke for they still continued in the outward fellowship preaching and prophesying and deceiving but in it by heresie and prophanenesse contrary to that outward profession of faith and holinesse which they had formerly made by which their defection they shewed that they were never truely regenerate and inwardly and indeed living members of the body but having been hypocrites at their best God so ordered that they should hereby discover themselvs For had they been indeed of the number of the faithfull they had so continued to the end Which truth this Apostle confirms further ch 3 very evidently saying whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin For his that is Gods seed remaineth in him and he cannot sin because he is born of God He doth not say as some would haue him he cannot sin or commit sin that is giue himselfe to sin as the wicked doe whilst the seed of God remains in him or whilst hee is born of God but for or because this seed of the new birth remaineth in him One observation I will here annex and so conclude this Head It cannot be saith Christ but offences will come And of all offences none is greater and which more wounds the tender heart of a weak Christian then when he sees such as by their former profession and appearances haue purchased to themselvs the opinion of piety and godlinesse to apostate and fall away from that their former profession either to grosse errour or prophanenesse This occasions him to suspect Satan by suggestions of unbelief furthering him herein that there is not in the course of Christianity that power of grace stablenesse and true comfort which it promiseth This stone of offence which Satans malice casts in the way Gods spirit removeth in providing that where there is in the Scriptures either mention or insinuation of mans falling away from the grace of God there is withall commonly an item given in the same place that such persons were never effectually sanctified but hypocrites at their best whatsoever they seemed either to others or to themselvs Thus where some at the first
in Adam haue sinned and by sin lost the Image of God in which they were made so as the Law is impossible unto them by reason of the flesh and so cannot possibly but sin by reason of the same flesh raigning in the unregenerate and dwelling in all which these light persons expresly confesse in the sequel of this book and that this so comes to passe by Gods holy decree and work of providence answerable not forceing evill upon any but ordering all persons in all actions as the supreme Governour of all and that the wicked being left of God some destitute of the outward means the Gospell all of them of the effectuall work of the Spirit from that weak flesh and naturall corruption daily increased in them sin both necessarily as unable to keep the Law and willingly as having in themselvs the beginning and cause thereof the blindnesse of their own minds and perversenesse of their will and affections and so are inexcuseable in Gods sight Here with the lowd boasts of their large and undenyable proofs they joyn sundry errours As first in making the good things of creation to come from Gods grace viz. for salvation of which our question is The good things of creation the Scriptures account our own and of our selvs ever opposing them to the good things of grace to salvation Secondly they err egregiously in saying that what Adam had in creation and lost by transgression for himself and his posterity that is restored through Christ to wit to all for so the question is By this all should be restored actually into Gods favour haue his image repaired in them and be wholly free from that weak flesh making the Law impossible unto them With like perversnesse doe they misapply to all Adams posterity without difference that which the Apostle speaks of himselfe and other godly Ministers and Christians onely Rom. 8. 3. 4 2 Cor. 3. 5 Phil. 4 13 as any that pleaseth to peruse the places may see Lastly they most absurdly affirm that the flesh through Christ is able to fulfill the Law wheras we fulfill the Law no further then as we kill crucifie and destroy the flesh and lusts thereof by the Spirit ADVERSARIES TO the question Whether a man can doe any thing in the work of his regeneration they answer after much froath of words that faith and repentance is regeneration and that it is most plain as what is not to their peircing eye that even in the work of regeneration man may submit to it or hinder it DEFENCE AN ignorant assertion shewing the ground of their errour in not putting difference between Gods work and mans They may as rightly say that the life and motion of the childe is its begetting To regenerate is nothing else but to beget anew Doth the child beget it selfe Or doth not the parent onely beget it So God begets by the Ministery of the Word and man is begotten by him according to that of the Apostle Every one that loveth him that begat loveth him also that is begotten of him So Iam. 1. 18. Of his own will begat he us by the word of truth By these mens doctrine we should beget our selvs of our own will Begetting in creatures is both in nature and time before the being of the begotten Men then before they be must beget themselvs by their saying And as God regenerates and not man so doth man being regenerated beleev and obey and not God Wheras if faith and obedience be regeneration then God beleevs and repents seeing God regenerates Besides as the outward means of regeneration may be and are by too many hindred from working and made unprofitable So where God pleaseth to add to the outward means and motives of the Gospell the inward work of the Spirit of which Spirit we are born or begot anew of the Spirit I say though by the Word by the same Spirit which he puts within them he takes away first what might hinder thier regeneration even their stony heart and giving them a heart of flesh a heart to know God and putting his fear in their hearts and by putting his Spirit in them causing them to walk in his statutes he thereby regenerates them or giues them faith and repentance which they must haue before they can beleev or repent as the childe must haue life before it can liue or doe acts of life and must be generated or begotten before it haue life or being Regeneration therefore goes before faith and repentance This Head they shut with answering three Scriptures The first Math. 22 but mistaken for Luk. 14. 23 which as it is frivolously objected if by any so is it easily answered The second is Ioh. 6. 44. No man can come to me except the Father draw him This is not meant say they of violent compulsion True nor yet onely as they would haue it of outward teaching by heavenly doctrine For thus the Father drew many that came not to Christ whereas hee speaks here of such a drawing as is peculiar to them that come to him who shall never hunger v. 35 and whom he will in no wise cast out v. 37. He speaks not therefore of the outward teaching onely but withall and principally of the inward teaching of the spirit as Esa. 54. 13 Ier. 31. 33. 34 1 Ioh. 2. 27. The most of them whom the Father drew by heavenly doctrine that is to whom Christ preached murmured at him v. 41 this hee reproues vers 43 vers 44 takes away the offence which might arise at the consideration of the small effect which his words had with many considering what he testified of himselfe v. 39. 40 shewing that such was mans perversenesse in spirituall things as that except God to the outward word adjoyned the inward work of the Spirit thereby drawing him his obstinacy could not nor would not be tamed nor he turned to God Lastly to Phil. 2. 13. It is God that works in you both the will and deed after much impertinent discourse and many errours mingled among they answer that God doth this in men by reasons and perswasions that they would chuse life and avoyd death And first they conclude without and against reason that if the regenerate haue power to resist they haue power not to resist which is as if a man should say if a fool can doe foolishly then he can doe wisely or the like Secondly it is a slander upon the Calvinists that they are divided in this point or that any of them affirms that the elect though unregenerate cannot resist good Whilst they are unregenerate they can doe nothing else but resist in spirituall things But God in time as he hath decreed by the spirit of regeneration overcomes their corruption and works in them not to resist but willingly to follow him that calleth them Thirdly I would know what they mean by these phrases of Gods sending his word and spirit to
work our regeneration and again of God by the power of his word and spirit shewing man the benefite of life c. If they consider the spirit onely as the Authour of the word speaking in the men of God why doe they not say the Spirit and the Word rather then as they do the Word and the Spirit Or how doth God send the spirit thus understood to work regeneration in men If they answer that God is ready to giue the spirit and so doth to them that will receiv it first to be ready to giue is not to giue or send secondly they should understand that to be willing to receiv spirituall things is a main fruit and effect of regeneration and therfore not a cause as they mistake For the will thus holily bent presupposeth the understanding divinely enlightned whose direction it follows and without which going before it is blind and brutish Neither can a man possibly will a thing but as he understands it to be good for him If the understanding be divinely inlightned and the will holily bent then the whole man is before regenerated that is begotten before of God by the spirit of regeneration In truth they but speak of Gods sending his Spirit to work in mans regeneration as Senacherib by Rabsakah spake of Gods sending him against Ierusalem He to cover the pride of violence and they to cover the pride of free-will in bending it selfe of itself to receiv grace offered To conclude this Head referring the Reader to the Arguments of conviction formerly laid down I onely add thus much that if God onely bend the will by perswasions of promises and threatnings and works not otherwise then by force of reasons and by using strong arguments and perswasions as they expresly affirm then that whose contrary both the Scriptures and experience confirms would ordinarily come to passe namely that the wise and prudent should haue heavenly things revealed unto them and discern them much more easily and effectually then babes and weak persons and so should be converted sooner then they specially sooner then harlots and light persons considering how much better they mind and understand arguments and reasons of all sorts then the other We therfore conclude with the Apostle that God works in us both the will and the deed not onely by his word working on us but by his Spirit working in us not onely by sending Paul to plant by propounding strong arguments of perswasion but also by giving the increase by the most effectuall work of his Spirit inlightning the eyes of the understanding to see the force of those arguments opening the heart to attend unto them and so writing them in the same heart and most inward parts as they cannot be blotted out CHAP. V. Of the Originall estate of Mankinde THE main question here to be discussed is whether all Infants sinned in Adam and so be guilty of death and condemnation naturally and without mercy in Christ or not This I will proue God willing against them answering and disproving what they bring to the contrary and that in their own order as followeth ADVERSARIES INfants had no life nor being as Adam had at that time when God gaue the Law to Adam and therfore no Law was given unto them and therfore sinned not nor were guilty of condemnation DEFENCE I Grant that infants had then no life and being as Adam had to wit actuall and distinct but affirm that they had both after a sort and as the branches in the root Odegos the guide of the blinde as Rom. 2. 19 affirms pag. 114 that mankind was in Adam in bodily substance they had therfore being in Adam after a sort namely so far as they were in him If they had being in Adam any way they had life also in him for nothing in Adam was dead but all living their being therefore so far as it was in him was a living being We reade Hebr. 7. 9 that Levi payed tithes to Melchisedeck in Abraham But how could this be might one say seeing Levi had then no life and being The Apostle answers that he was in the loyns of his father Abraham when Melchisedeck met him And reason teacheth that none can doe any act but he must first be nor doe it otherwise then as he is Levi therefore then had a kind of being and that living and reasonable also as he performed that act of paying tithes He in Abraham as a particular root Mankind in Adam as in a generall root 2 That Infants had a Law given them I thus proue First the word of God Gen. 2. 17. In the day that thou eatest of the tree of knowledge of good and evill thou shalt die the death shew that whom God threatneth with death to them he gaue the Law The punishment Gen. 3. 17. 18. 19 reacheth to all Adams posterity and so the threatning and by consequence the Law Secondly the Apostle teacheth Rom. 2. 15 that the Law is written in the hearts of the Gentiles according to which Law of nature written in their hearts though they had it not written in tables of stone as the Iews they shall be judged at the day of the Lord v. 15. 16. 17. These Gentiles cannot be imagined to haue this Law thus written any other way then as God in the beginning created Adam and all mankind in him after his Image in righteousnesse and holinesse in which respect also they are said to doe by nature the things contained in the Law having also a naturall conscience in them which without a Law were vain Vnder which generall Law binding the reasonable creature to faith and obedience in all things in disposition before use of discretion and in act afterwards the particular Law Gen. 2 is conteyned and to be referred unto it Thirdly if infants haue reasonable soules then haue they the faculties of understanding and will though not the actuall use of them as men haue This understanding cannot be conceived by any to be without all disposition and pronenesse either to the knowledg of God or to ignorance errour and doubting of him nor this will to bee without all disposition and inclination to will according to or against Gods will As the yong whelps and cubs of Lyons Beares and Foxes haue in their naturall and sensitiue faculties a pronenesse and inclination to raven and every beast pronenesse to the things of its kind after actually performed and practised by them so haue infants necessarily in their reasonable faculties a disposition one or other to understand and will things specially such as concern God by reason of the most naturall necessary and indossolible relation between the reasonable creature and the Creator and that specially in those most noble faculties The objection from Rom. 7. 1 hath in it no colour of truth for neither are there any such words that the Law is given especially onely which must be added to them that know it neither doth the Apostle there intend
not the justice of God infinite and so requiring infinite satisfaction To what reasonable creature soever the smallest punishment is due from God the greatest is due also in rigour of justice And so the curse as they grant extending to Adams generation by his sin eternall condemnation as the principall part of it extendeth unto them necessarily except mercy be shewed them Neither will it help our Adversaries that other creatures die also seeing their absolutely mortall condition limits their punishment to this present life But such is not the estate of infants but their immortall soules unto which their bodies at that day are to be reunited makes the whole capable of a more full declaration of Gods justice if he deale in severity therof without mercy as he may Besides the Apostle saith that death passed upon all for that all haue sinned viz. in that one man Adam Doth death come over bruit beasts because they haue sinned in Adam They are brutish that see not the difference which these men will not acknowledge It is said else-where that in Adam all die Doe beasts die in Adam as his posterity doth As all that are Christs are in Christ and made aliue by him so all Adams posterity were in him and die in him Which death also the Apostle makes no lesse then judgement to condemnation to wit if redemption be not obtained to which he opposeth justification and eternall life Ioyn herewith these mens confession that all mankind by Adams fall are made unable to keep Gods precepts when he giues them and so all fall under the wrath of God and are therfore said to be children of wrath Eph. 2. 3 and there is sufficient for their conviction as hath been shewed But I add that the Apostle means plainly a further matter and that all are born children of wrath for to be so by nature and to be born so are the same We are children of wrath by sin onely If therefore all be children of wrath by nature it is by the sin of nature which we call originall sin and not by actuall sin onely as they surmise Lastly I demand whether if Adam had not sinned hee should not haue transferred to his posterity the Image of God after which he was created and a pronenesse to keep it as notwithstanding sin he doth some feeble remainders thereof and therewith right to eternall life If yea why not then sin and the guilt thereof by proportion having sinned To Ezech. 18 I haue formerly answered He speaks of the sins of immediate parents not of the first sin of our first father which was naturall whereas the other but personall yea not onely other mens but his after sins also Secondly it is plain he speaks of such children as seeing all their fathers sins consider and doe not the like but doe that which is lawfull and right keeping and doing all Gods statutes To such God imputes no sin Their affirmation following is strange that Infants shall receiv no judgment because they haue done neither good nor evill according to which all judgment passeth By this they should neither be saved nor damned for what else is it to receiv judgment of salvation but to be saved and so for the contrarie They doe ignorantly exclude Infants from a state one or other for wanting that condition which is required of men of years onely They might as probably say that Infants shall be damned seeing Christ saith He that beleevs not shall bee damned or should not eat because it is said He that will not work shall not eat To the place Ps. 51. 5 Behold I was brought forth in iniquity and in sin did my mother conceiv me they answer not directly but by many Ifs ands chusing many uncertain vanities rather then one certain truth which is that David in this whole context confesseth his transgression and sin And as men ascend by the stream to the fountain so doth he in those words to the fountain of all evill As if he should haue said Lord I am not onely stayned with and guiltie of these particular evils but I am even wholly corrupt by nature from the very womb and haue brought a fountain of sin into the world with me from whence these particular mischiefs haue issued ADVERSARIES THeir Answers follow The first is that David confesseth that he is made as Ps. 103. 14 of weak flesh and unable to resist the Tempter being dust c. DEFENCE DOth mans being made of dust make him unable to resist the Tempter Then God making Adam of the dust made him unable to resist the Tempter also which both crosseth the truth and their own assertion The Prophet Psal. 103. 14 speaks of bodily weaknesse and frailtie onely which is nothing at all to the matter in hand and which if it had been greater in David would haue been more advantageable against that sin into which he fell Next for their advantage they corrupt the Text Rom. 8 in saying Christ came in sinfull flesh where the Text saith hee came in the similitude of sinfull flesh He came in nothing sinfull but all holy and pure from sin So doe they that 2 Cor. 5. 21 leaving out for us which shewes how Christ became sin for us that is as our Surety and lyable to the curse due to our sinns but not in sinfull flesh as they erroneously say Thirdly they absurdly affirm that the sin of his mother whether Hevah or that bare him is that sin or punishment layd upon her which he here confesseth in saying I was conceived in sin David confesseth a sin as evill wheras all punishments are Gods good work yea his own sin onely of which he desires forgiuenesse Neither doe the words here at all agree with those Gen. 3. 16 as they say The Reader that will may see them opened at large by Mr. Aâ—nsworth They add that it is frequent with the Holy Ghost to call punishments for sins by the name of sins But first not so frequent by a 1000 times as to call the transgression of the Law sinn secondly the phrase in sin is never taken but properly as to be in sin to liue in sin to continue in sin to die in sin and specially to be born in sin as Ioh. 9. 34 the Pharisees in so judging followed the errour of the Pythagorean Philosophers thirdly where Christ is sayd to bear our sins it is primarily in regard of the guilt as he was our Surety Of what sin of his mother was David guilty They unjustly accuse us as saying that David sinned in being born and conceived or that the very matter and substance wherof David was made was sin Vayn are they in imagining such vain things of us David was meerly a patient in being born and sinned not therin neither yet did his mother sin either in conceiving or bearing him though shee conceived and brought him forth in sin But he having sinned in Adam
Christ promiseth to be present alwaies even to the end If I should answer as I know not but I might lawfully that these words of Christ I am with you alway even unto the end of the world are to be expounded as those of the Apostle 1 Thess. 4. 15. 17 Wee which are aliue and remain unto the comming of the Lord and that the meaning of both is that all should so walk as if that day of the Lord were to come every day of their liues what would they reply But admit this be spoken mediately to the successours of the Apostles not in their power Apostolicall for that ceaseth with their office Apostolicall and their office with their persons neither is there left in the Church any authority or direction for the chusing of Apostles but in the performance of such ordinary works in lawfull order as the Apostles were to exercise themselvs in specially of teaching and baptizing there mentioned I thus proue that by those successors are not meant as they conceiv disciples but such as haue speciall commission and authority and so specially Pastors And first Christ here opposeth them to whom he speaks as the makers of Disciples as the words are to Disciples to be made by them Secondly if every disciple of Christ then why not women also which are disciples as well as men and wherof there are diverse to be found better gifted then any of this fellowship Neither can they object the Apostles prohibition of women 1 Cor. 11 1 Tim. 2 seeing they hold Baptism no Church action but personall onely and so administer it as privately as Midwines use to doe Thirdly if Pastors be most rightfully the Apostles successors in other works of their Apostolicall commission here given by name in administring the Lords Supper and over-seeing the flock and defending the same in the truth which they grant why not in teaching and baptizing also which alone are expressed Math. 28. ADVERSARIES BVT this they account a meer fiction seeing converting and baptizing is no part of the Pastors office which is to feed watch and oversee the flock of Christ and defend the same in the truth then which they deny further charge to be laid upon him by his office quoting for that purpose Act. 20. 28 Tit. 1. 9 proceeding also to challenge it as an imagination that he is to preach by vertue of his office yea adding that any disciple having ability is authorized yea commanded to preach convert and baptize as well and as much if not more then any Pastour To this height of usurpation are these Chorites come DEFENCE FIrst here as alwaies they alter the state of the question which between them and me is not whether onely Pastors but whether onely such as haue a speciall Church-calling may baptize Secondly it is true that Pastors in the right state of things are not to be set over heards of goats and swine but over flocks of sheep yet doth it not follow thereupon that Pastors in no sort convert For first there may be in the Church hypocrites undetected or after detection yet uncensured which they may by Gods blessing effectually convert Secondly the Pastor as Pastor of the flock and feeding it may convert a stranger comming in and why then not baptize him by their own ground The person so converted publiquely may and ought to be baptized publiquely and should not the Pastor doe it by whom also hee is converted rather then a private member Thirdly it is not all one though they confound them to convert to wit from being wicked to become godly and to make a disciple Children born in the Church may be made Disciples yet not so converted as it may be never having been such as of whom it could be said that they were wicked Fourthly it is their ignorance to make converting of men and the baptizing them actions of the same nature seeing onely men and women before converted and repenting are to be baptized Lastly in granting according to the Scriptures that the Pastor is by office to feed the flock they cannot deny but that hee is to baptize thereby seeing baptism is a part of that feeding properly serving to confirm the faith of beleevers in the washing away of their sinnes by the bloud of Christ Begetting is by the seed of the word the word of truth and so whatsoever means follow thereupon is but for feeding and nourishing the so begotten ADVERSARIES BVT that which followeth is admirable viz. that the Pastour is not required to preach nor doth perform it by vertue of his office when he doth it DEFENCE MAny men and these with the rest haue spoken many absurd things in religion but these in this exceed them all yea and themselves They from Act. 20 affirm that the Pastours are to feed the flock by their office And can the flock be fed as it ought without preaching and where the bread of life is not broken unto it They also graunt in the same place from Titus 1. 9. that he is to defend the flock in the truth against all gainsayers But why to defend the flock c. as their cunning and corrupt glosse is rather then as the words of the text are by sound doctrine both to exhort and convince the gainsaier Are exhortations and convictions by sound doctrine no preachings with these men yea are they not directly for the conversion of gainsayers And how then belongs it not to Pastours to whom these things belong to convert So where it is required that the Bishop to be called be apt to teach is he not by his office to doe that which is requisite in him for his enabling unto it I say for the enabling of him unto his office and not for the adorning of it onely as hospitality is which though he wholy want ability to perform yet that disables him not as the want of aptnes to teach doth Ioyn with these the Apostles exhortation that the Elders that rule well be had in double honour specially they that labour in the word and doctrine for the labourer is worthy of his reward and what can be clearer then that the Pastour is to preach by his office and that as being the speciall work for which his wages are due unto him Is not to labour in the word and doctrine here spoken of for him to preach and that as an Elder as the former rule as Elders Strange it is that a Pastour or Teacher by office should not teach and preach by office that is not exercise their office or ministery the Teacher in teaching and Exhorter or Pastour in exhortation And see we not here what new Patrons dumb ministers haue gotten of whom the old almost every where are ashamed If it be not required of the Pastour to preach by his office then though he never preach at all yet it cannot be said to Archippus fulfill thy ministery which thou hast received in the Lord. The Pastour