the New Covenant has already been shewn An explicit belief of these is absolutely required of all those to whom the Gospel of Jesus Christ is preached and Salvation through his Name proposed The other parts of Divine Revelation are Objects of Faith and are so to be received They are Truths whereof none that is once known to be such may or ought to be disbelieved For to acknowledge any Proposition to be of Divine Revelation and Authority and yet to deny or disbelieve it is to offend against this Fundamental Article and Ground of Faith that God is true But yet a great many of the Truths revealed in the Gospel every one does and must confess a man may be ignorant of nay disbelieve without danger to his Salvation As is evident in those who allowing the Authority differ in the Interpretation and meaning o several Texts of Scripture not thought Fundamental In all which 't is plain the contending Parties on one side or tother are ignorant of nay disbelieve the Truths delivered in Holy Writ unless Contrarieties and Contradictions can be contained in the same words and Divine Revelation can mean contrary to it self Though all divine Revelation requires the obedience of Faith yet every truth of inspired Scriptures is not one of those that by the Law of Faith is required to be explicitly believed to Justification What those are we have seen by what our Saviour and his Apostles proposed to and required in those whom they Converted to the Faith Those are fundamentals which 't is not enough not to disbelieve Every one is required actually to assent to them But any other Proposition contained in the Scripture which God has not thus made a necessary part of the Law of Faith without an actual assent to which he will not allow any one to be a Believer a Man may be ignorant of without hazarding his Salvation by a defect in his Faith He believes all that God has made necessary for him to believe and assent to And as for the rest of Divine Truths there is nothing more required of him but that he receive all the parts of Divine Revelation with a docility and disposition prepared to imbrace and assent to all Truths coming from God And submit his mind to whatsoever shall appear to him to bear that Character Where he upon fair endeavours understands it not How can he avoid being ignorant And where he cannot put several Texts and make them consist together What Remedy He must either interpret one by the other or suspend his Opinion He that thinks that more is or can be required of poor frail Man in matters of Faith will do well to consider what absurdities he will run into God out of the infiniteness of his Mercy has dealt with Man as a compassionate and tender Father He gave him Reason and with it a Law That could not be otherwise than what Reason should dictate Unless we should think that a reasonable Creature should have an unreasonable Law But considering the frailty of Man apt to run into corruption and misery he promised a Deliverer whom in his good time he sent And then declared to all Mankind that whoever would believe him to be the Saviour promised and take him now raised from the dead and constituted the Lord and Judge of all Men to be their King and Ruler should be saved This is a plain intelligible Proposition And And the all-merciful God seems herein to have consulted the poor of this World and the bulk of Mankind These are Articles that the labouring and illiterate Man may comprehend This is a Religion suited to vulgar Capacities And the state of Mankind in this World destined to labour and travel The Writers and Wranglers in Religion fill it with niceties and dress it up with notions which they make necessary and fundamental parts of it As if there were no way into the Church but through the Academy or Lyceum The bulk of Mankind have not leisure for Learning and Logick and superfine distinctions of the Schools Where the hand is used to the Plough and the Spade the head is seldom elevated to sublime Notions or exercised in mysterious reasonings 'T is well if Men of that rank to say nothing of the other Sex can comprehend plain propositions and a short reasoning about things familiar to their Minds and nearly allied to their daily experience Go beyond this and you amaze the greatest part of Mankind And may as well talk Arabick to a poor day Labourer as the Notions and Language that the Books and Disputes of Religion are filled with and as soon you will be understood The Dissenting Congregations are supposed by their Teachers to be more accurately instructed in matters of Faith and better to understand the Christian Religion than the vulgar Conformists who are charged with great ignorance How truly I will not here determine But I ask them to tell me seriously whether half their People have leisure to study Nay Whether one in ten of those who come to their Meetings in the Country if they had time to study them do or can understand the Controversies at this time so warmly managed amongst them about Justification the subject of this present Treatise I have talked with some of their Teachers who confess themselves not to understand the difference in debate between them And yet the points they stand on are reckoned of so great weight so material so fundamental in Religion that they divide Communion and separate upon them Had God intended that none but the Learned Scribe the disputer or wise of this World should be Christians or be Saved thus Religion should have been prepared for them filled with speculations and niceties obscure terms and abstract notions But Men of that expectation Men furnished with such acquisitions the Apostle tells us I Cor. I. are rather shut out from the simplicity of the Gospel to make way for those poor ignorant illiterate Who heard and believed promises of a Deliverer and believed Jesus to be him Who could conceive a Man dead and made alive again and believe that he should at the end of the World come again and pass Sentence on all Men according to their deeds That the poor had the Gospel Preached to them Christ makes a mark as well as business of his Mission Mat. XI 5. And if the poor had the Gospel Preached to them it was without doubt such a Gospel as the poor could understand plain and intelligible And so it was as we have seen in the Preachings of Christ and his Apostles FINIS Printed for A. J. Churchil in Pater-Noster-Row A View of Universal History from the Creation to 1695. Wherein the most Remarkable Persons and Things in the known Kingdoms and Countries of the World are set down in several Columns by way of Synchronism according to their proper Centuries and Years In 16 Copper Plates By F. Talents A. M. A compleat Journal of both Houses of Parliament throughout the whole Reign of Q. Elizabeth By Sir Symonds Dewes Knight Fol. Notitia Monastica Or A History of all the Religious Houses in England and Wales c. 8vo By Tho. Tanner The Resurrection of the same Body asserted from the Tradition of the Heathens the Ancient Jews and the Primitive Church With an Answer to the Objections brought against it By Humph. Hody D. D. Octavo Bishop Wilkins of Prayer and Preaching enlarged by the Bp. of Norwich and Dr. Williams Octavo The Gentleman's Religion with Grounds and Reasons of it 20. By a Private Gentleman Dr. Patrick's New Version of all the Psalms of David 120. To be sung in Churches Gen. III. 17-19
directed the Lawyer who asked Luke X. 25. What he should do to inherit eternal life Do this i. e. what is required by the Law and thou shalt live On the other side it seems the unalterable purpose of the Divine Justice that no unrighteous Person no one that is guilty of any breach of the Law should be in Paradise But that the wages of sin shold be to every man as it was to Adam an Exclusion of him out of that Happy state of Immortality and bring Death upon him And this is so conformable to the Eternal and established Law of Right and Wrong that it is spoke of too as if it could not be otherwise St. Iames says Chap. I. 15. Sin when it is finished bringeth forth death as it were by a Natural and necessary production Sin entred into the World and death by sin says St. Paul Rom. V. 12. VI. 23. The wages of sin is Death Death is the Purchase of any of every sin Gal. III. 10. Cursed is every one who continueth not in all things which are written in the Book of the Law to do them And of this St. Iames gives a Reason Chap. II. 10 11. Whosoever shall keep the whole Law and yet offend in one point he is guilty of all For he that said Do not commit Adultery said also do not Kill i. e. He that offends in any one Point sins against the Authority which established the Law Here then we have the standing and fixed measures of Life and Death Immortality and Bliss belong to the Righteous Those who have lived in an exact Conformity to the Law of God are out of the reach of Death But an Exclusion from Paradise and loss of Immortality is the Portion of Sinners of all those who have any way broke that Law and failed of a Compleat Obedience to it by the guilt of any one Transgression And thus Mankind by the Law are put upon the issues of Life or Death As they are Righteous or Vnrighteous Iust or Vnjust i. e. Exact Performers or Transgressors of the Law But yet all having sinned Rom. III. 23. and come short of the glory God i. e. the Kingdom of God in Heaven which is often called his Glory both Iews and Gentiles v. 22. So that by the deeds of the Law no one could be justified v. 20. it follows that no one could then have Eternal Life and Bliss Perhaps it will be demanded Why did God give so hard a Law to Mankind that to the Apostles time no one of Adam's Issue had kept it As appears by Rom. III. and Gal. III. 21 22. Answ. It was such a Law as the Purity of God's Nature required and must be the Law of such a Creature as Man unless God would have made him a Rational Creature and not required him to have lived by the Law of Reason but would have countenanced in him Irregularity and Disobedience to that Light which he had and that Rule which was suitable to his Nature Which would have been to have authorized Disorder Confusion and Wickedness in his Creatures For that this Law was the Law of Reason or as it is called of Nature we shall see by and by And if Rational Creatures will not live up to the Rule of their Reason who shall excuse them If you will admit them to forsake Reason in one point why not in another Where will you stop To disobey God in any part of his Commands and 't is he that Commands what Reason does is direct Rebellion which if dispensed with in any Point Government and Order are at an end And there can be no bounds set to the Lawless Exorbitancy of unconfined men The Law therefore was as St. Paul tells us Rom. VII 12 holy just and good and such as it ought and could not otherwise be This then being the case that whoever is guilty of any sin should certainly die and cease to be the benefit of Life restored by Christ at the Resurrection would have been no great Advantage for as much as here again Death must have seized upon all mankind because all had sinned For the Wages of Sin is every where Death as well after as before the Resurrection if God had not found out a way to Justifie some i. e. so many as obeyed another Law which God gave which in the New Testament is called the Law of Faith Rom. III. 27. and is opposed to the Law of Works And therefore the Punishment of those who would not follow him was to lose their Souls i. e. their Lives Mark VIII 35-38 as is plain considering the occasion it was spoke on The better to understand the Law of Faith it will be convenient in the first place to consider the Law of Works The Law of Works then in short is that Law which requires perfect Obedience without any remission or abatement So that by that Law a man cannot be Just or justified without an exact performance of every tittle Such a perfect Obedience in the New Testament is termed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which we translate Righteousness The Language of this Law is Do this and live Transgress and die Lev. XVIII 5. Ye shall keep my statutes and my judgments which if a man do he shall live in them Ezek. XX. 11. I gave them my statutes and shewed them my judgments which if a man do he shall even live in them Moses says St. Paul Rom. X. 5. describeth the righteousness which is of the Law that the man which doth those things shall live in them Gal. III. 12. The Law is not of Faith but that man that doth them shall live in them On the other side Transgress and die no dispensation no atonement V. 10. Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them Where this Law of Works was to be found the New Testament tells us viz. in the Law delivered by Moses Iohn I. 17. The Law was given by Moses but Faith and Truth came by Iesus Christ. Cap. VII 19. Did not Moses give you the Law says our Saviour and yet none of you keep the Law And this is the Law which he speaks of where he asks the Lawyer Luke X. 26. What is written in the Law how readest thou v. 28. This do and thou shalt live This is that which St. Paul so often stiles the Law without any other distinction Rom. II. 13. Not the hearers of the Law are just before God but the doers of the Law are justified 'T is needless to quote any more places his Epistles are all full of it especially this to the Romans But the Law given by Moses being not given to all Mankind How are all men sinners since without a Law there is no Transgression To this the Apostle v. 14. Answers For when the Gentiles which have not the Law do i. e. find it reasonable to do by nature the things contained in the Law these having not the
words v. 47. 54. Verily verily I say unto you he that believeth on me hath everlasting life and I will raise him up at the last day The sum of all which Discourse is that he was the Messiah sent from God And that those who believed him to be so should be raised from the Dead at the last day to Eternal Life These who he spoke to were of those who the day before would by force have made him King And therefore 't is no wonder he should speak to them of himself and his Kingdom and Subjects in obscure and Mystical terms and such as should offend those who looked for nothing but the Grandeur of a Temporal Kingdom in this World and the Protection and Prosperity they had promised themselves under it The hopes of such a Kingdom now that they had found a man that did Miracles and therefore concluded to be the Deliverer they expected had the day before almost drawn them into an open Insurrection and involved our Saviour in it This he thought fit to put a stop to they still following him 't is like with the same design And therefore though he here speaks to them of his Kingdom it was in a way that so plainly bauk'd their Expectation and shock'd them that when they found themselves disappointed of those vain hopes and that he talked of their eating his Flesh and drinking his Blood that they might have Life the Jews said v. 52. How can this man give us his flesh to eat And many even of his Disciples said It was an hard saying who can bear it And so were scandalized in him and forsook him v. 60. 66. But what the true meaning of this Discourse of our Saviour was the Confession of St. Peter who understood it better and answered for the rest of the Apostles shews When Jesus asked him v. 67. Will ye also go away Then Simon Peter answered him Lord to whom shall we go Thou hast the words of eternal life i. e. Thou teachest us the way to attain Eternal Life And accordingly We believe and are sure that thou art the Messiah the Son of the living God This was the eating his Flesh and drinking his Blood whereby those who did so had Eternal Life Sometime after this he enquires of his Disciples Mark VIII 27. Who the People took him for They telling him for Iohn the Baptist or one of the old Prophets risen from the Dead He asked what they themselves thought And here again Peter answers in these words Mark VIII 29. Thou art the Messiah Luke IX 20. The Messiah of God And Mat. XVI 16. Thou art the Messiah the Son of the living God Which Expressions we may hence gather amount to the same thing Whereupon our Saviour tells Peter Mat. XVI 17 18. That this was such a truth As flesh and blood could not reveal to him but only his Father who was in Haven And that this was the Foundation on which he was to build his Church By all the parts of which passage it is more than probable that he had never yet told his Apostles in direct words that he was the Messiah but that they had gathered it from his Life and Miracles For which we may imagine to our selves this probable Reason Because that if he had familiarly and in direct terms talked to his Apostles in private that he was the Messiah the Prince of whose Kingdom he preached so much in publick every where Iudas whom he knew false and treacherous would have been readily made use of to testifie against him in a matter that would have been really Criminal to the Roman Governour This perhaps may help to clear to us that seemingly abrupt reply of our Saviour to his Apostles Iohn VI. 70. when they confessed him to be the Messiah I will for the better explaining of it set down the passage at large Peter having said We believe and are sure that thou art the Messiah the Son of the living God Iesus answered them Have not I chosen you twelve and one of you is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This is a reply seeming at first sight nothing to the purpose when yet it is sure all our Saviour's Discourses were wise and pertinent It seems therefore to me to carry this sense to be understood afterwards by the eleven as that of destroying the Temple and raising it again in three days was when they should reflect on it after his being betray'd by Iudas You have confessed and believe the truth concerning me I am the Messiah your King But do not wonder at it that I have never openly declared it to you For amongst you twelve whom I have chosen to be with me there is one who is an Informer or false Accuser for so the Greek word signifies and may possibly here be so translated rather than Devil who if I had owned my self in plain words to have been the Messiah the King of Israel would have betrayed me and informed against me That he was yet cautious of owning himself to his Apostles positively to be the Messiah appears farther from the manner wherein he tells Peter v. 18. that he will build his Church upon that Confession of his that he was the Messiah I say unto thee Thou art Cephas or a Rock and upon this Rock I will build my Church and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it Words too doubtful to be laid hold on against him as a Testimony that he professed himself to be the Messiah Especially if we joyn with them the following words v. 19. And I will give thee the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven And what thou shalt bind on Earth shall be bound in Heaven and what thou shalt loose on Earth shall be loosed in Heaven Which being said Personally to Peter render the foregoing words of our Saviour wherein he declares the Fundamental Article of his Church to be the believing him to be the Messiah the more obscure and doubtful and less liable to be made use of against him But yet such as might afterwards be understood And for the same reason he yet here again forbids the Apostles to say that he was the Messiah v. 20. From this time say the Evangelists Jesus began to shew to his Disciples i. e. his Apostles who are often called Disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the Elders Chief Priests and Scribes and be killed and be raised again the third day These though all marks of the Messiah yet how little understood by the Apostles or suited to their expectation of the Messiah appears from Peter's rebuking him for it in the following words Mat. XVI 22. Peter had twice before owned him to be the Messiah and yet he cannot here bear that he should Suffer and be put to Death and be raised again Whereby we may perceive how little yet Jesus had explained to the Apostles what Personally concerned himself They had been a good while witnesses of his Life and Miracles
large here by St. Luke it is plain that the Answer of our Saviour set down by St. Matthew Chap. XXVI 64. in these words Thou hast said And by St. Mark Chap. XIV 62. in these I am Is an Answer only to this Question Art thou then the Son of God And not to that other Art thou the Messiah Which preceded and he had answered to before Though Matthew and Mark contracting the story set them down together as if making but one Question omitting all the intervening Discourse Whereas 't is plain out of St. Luke that they were two distinct Questions to which Iesus gave two distinct Answers In the first whereof he according to his usual Caution declined saying in plain express words that he was the Messiah though in the latter he owned himself to be the Son of God Which though they being Iews understood to signifie the Messiah Yet he knew could be no Legal or Weighty Accusation against him before a Heathen and so it proved For upon his answering to their Question Art thou then the Son of God Ye say that I am They cry out Luke XXII 71. What need we any further witnesses For we our selves have heard out of his own mouth And so thinking they had enough against him they hurry him away to Pilate Pilate asking them Iohn XVIII 29-32 What Accusation bring you against this man They answered and said if he were not a Malefactor we would not have delivered him up unto thee Then said Pilate unto them Take ye him and Iudge him according to your Law But this would not serve their turn who aimed at his Life and would be satisfied with nothing else The Iews therefore said unto him It is not lawful for us to put any man to death And this was also That the saying of Iesus might be fulfilled which he spake signifying what Death he should dye Pursuing therefore their Design of making him appear to Pontius Pilate guilty of Treason against Caesar Luke XXIII 2. They began to accuse him saying We found this Fellow perverting the Nation and forbidding to give Tribute to Caesar saying that he himself is the Messiah the King All which were Inferences of theirs from his saying he was the Son of God Which Pontius Pilate finding for 't is consonant that he examined them to the precise words he had said their Accusation had no weight with him However the Name of King being suggested against Jesus he thought himself concerned to search it to the bottom Iohn XVIII 33-37 Then Pilate entred again into the Iudgment-Hall and called Iesus and said unto him Art thou the King of the Iews Iesus answered him Sayest thou this of thy self or did others tell it thee of me Pilate answered am I a Iew Thine own Nation and the Chief Priest have delivered thee unto me What hast thou done Iesus answered My Kingdom is not of this World If my Kingdom were of this World then would my servants fight that I should not be delivered to the Iews But my Kingdom is not from hence Pilate therefore said unto him Art thou a King then Iesus answered Thou sayest that I am a King For this end was I born and for this cause came I into the World that I should bear witness to the Truth Every one that is of the Truth heareth my voice In this Dialogue between our Saviour and Pilate we may Observe 1. That being asked whether he were the King of the Iews He answers so that though he deny it not yet he avoided giving the least Umbrage that he had any Design upon the Government For though he allows himself to be a King yet to obviate any suspicion he tells Pilate His Kingdom is not of this World And evidences it by this that if he had pretended to any Title to that Country his followers which were not a few and were forward enough to believe him their King would have fought for him if he had had a mind to set himself up by force or his Kingdom were so to be erected But my Kingdom says he is not from hence Is not of this fashion or of this place 2. Pilate being by his words and circumstances satisfied that he laid no Claim to his Province or meant any Disturbance of the Government was yet a little surprized to hear a Man in that poor Garb without Retinue or so much as a Servant or a Friend own himself to be a King And therefore asks him with some kind of wonder Art thou a King then 3. That our Saviour declares that his great business into the World was to testifie and make good this great Truth that he was a King i. e. in other words that he was the Messiah 4. That whoever were followers of Truth and got into the way of Truth and Happiness received this Doctrine concerning him viz. That he was the Messiah their King Pilate being thus satisfied that he neither meant nor could there arise any harm from his pretence whatever it was to be a King Tells the Jews v. 38. I find no fault in this man But the Jews were the more fierce Luke XXIII 5. saying He stirreth up the people to Sedition by his Preaching through all Jewry beginning from Galilee to this place And then Pilate learning that he was of Galilee Herod's Jurisdiction sent him to Herod to whom also the Chief Priest and Scribes v. 10. vehemently accused him Herod finding all their Accusations either false or frivolous thought our Saviour a bare Object of Contempt And so turning him only into Ridicule sent him back to Pilate Who calling unto him the Chief Priests and the Rulers and the People v. 14. Said unto them Ye have brought this man unto me as one that perverteth the People And behold I having examined him before you have found no fault in this man touching these things whereof ye accuse him No nor yet Herod for I sent you to him And so nothing worthy of Death is done by him And therefore he would have released him For he knew the Chief Priests had delivered him through envy Mark XV. 10. And when they demanded Barrabbas to be released but as for Jesus cryed Crucifie him Luke XXIII 22. Pilate said unto them the third time Why What evil hath he done I have found no cause of death in him I will therefore chastise him and let him go We may observe in all this whole Prosecution of the Jews that they would fain have got it out of Iesus's own mouth in express words that he was the Messiah Which not being able to do with all their Art and Endeavour All the rest that they could alledge against him not amounting to a Proof before Pilate that he claimed to be King of the Jews or that he had caused or done any thing towards a Mutiny or Insurrection among the People for upon these two as we see their whole Charge turned Pilate again and again pronounced him innocent For so he did a fourth and a fifth
Brethren ye have done it unto me Then shall he say unto them on the left hand Depart from me ye Cursed into everlasting Fire prepared for the Devil and his Angels For I was an hungred and ye gave me no meat I was thirsty and ye gave me no drink I was a stranger and ye took me not in Naked and ye cloathed me not Sick and in prison and ye visited me not In so much that ye did it not to one of these ye did it not to me And these shall go into Everlasting Punishment But the Righteous into Life Eternal These I think are all the places where our Saviour mentions the last Judgment or describes his way of Proceeding in that Great Day Wherein as we have observed it is remarkable that every where the Sentence follows doing or not doing without any mention of believing or not believing Not that any to whom the Gospel hath been Preached shall be Saved without believing Iesus to be the Messiah For all being Sinners and Transgressors of the Law and so unjust are all liable to Condemnation unless they believe and so through Grace are justified by God for this Faith which shall be accounted to them for Righteousness But the rest wanting this Cover this allowance for their Transgressions must answer for all their Actions And being found Transgressors of the Law shall by the Letter and Sanction of that Law be Condemned for not having paid a full Obedience to that Law And not for want of Faith That is not the Guilt on which the Punishment is laid though it be the want of Faith which lays open their Guilt uncovered And exposes them to the Sentence of the Law against all that are Unrighteous The common Objection here is If all Sinners shall be Condemned but such as have a gracious allowance made them And so are justified by God for believing Iesus to be the Messiah and so taking him for their King whom they are resolved to obey to the utmost of their Power What shall become of all Mankind who lived before our Saviour's time Who never heard of his Name And consequently could not believe in him To this the Answer is so obvious and natural that one would wonder how any reasonable Man should think it worth the urging No body was or can be required to believe what was never proposed to him to believe Before the Fulness of time which God from the Council of his own Wisdom had appointed to send his Son in He had at several times and in rent Manners promised to the People of Israel an extraordinary Person to come Who raised from amongst themselves should be their Ruler and Deliverer The time And other Circumstances of his Birth Life and Person he had in sundry Prophesies so particularly described and so plainly foretold that He was well known and expected by the Jews under the Name of the Messiah or Anointed given him in some of these Prophesies All then that was required before his appearing in the World was to believe what God had revealed And to rely with a full assurance on God for the performance of his Promise And to believe that in due time he would send them the Messiah this anointed King this promised Saviour and Deliverer according to his Word This Faith in the promises of God This relying and acquiescing in his Word and Faithfulness The Almighty takes well at our hands as a great mark of homage paid by us poor frail Creatures to his Goodness and Truth as well as to his Power and Wisdom And accepts it as an acknowledgment of his peculiar Providence and Benignity to us And therefore our Saviour tells us Iohn XII 44. He that believes on me believes not on me But on him that sent me The works of Nature shew his Wisdom and Power But 't is his peculiar Care of Mankind most eminently discovered in his Promises to them that shews his Bounty and Goodness And consequently engages their Hearts in Love and Affection to him This oblation of an Heart fixed with dependance and affection on him is the most acceptable Tribute we can pay him the foundation of true Devotion and Life of all Religion What a value he puts on this depending on his Word and resting satisfied in his Promises We have an Example in Abraham whose Faith Was counted to him for Righteousness As we have before remarked out of Rom. IV. And his relying firmly on the Promise of God without any doubt of its performance gave him the Name of the Father of the Faithful And gained him so much favour with the Almighty that he was called the Friend of God The Highest and most Glorious Title can be bestowed on a Creature The thing promised was no more but a Son by his Wife Sarah and a numerous Posterity by him which should possess the Land of Canaan These were but Temporal Blessings And except the Birth of a Son very remote Such as he should never live to see nor in his own Person have the benefit of But because he questioned not the Performance of it But rested fully satisfied in the Goodness Truth and Faithfulness of God who had promised it was counted to him for Righteousness Let us see how St. Paul expresses it Rom. IV. 18-22 Who against hope believed in hope that he might become the Father of many Nations According to that which was spoken so shall thy Seed be And being not weak in his Faith he considered not his own Body now dead when he was above an hundred years old Neither yet the deadness of Sarah 's Womb. He staggered not at the Promise of God through unbelief but was strong in Faith giving Glory to God And being fully perswaded that what he had promised he was able to perform And THEREFORE it was imputed to him for Righteousness St. Paul having here Emphatically described the strength and firmness of Abraham's Faith informs us That he thereby gave glory to God And therefore it was accounted to him for Righteousness This is the way that God deals with poor frail Mortals He is graciously pleased to take it well of them And give it the place of Righteousness and a kind of merit in his sight If they believe his Promises and have a steadfast relying on his veracity and goodness St. Paul Heb. XI 6. tells us Without Faith it is impossible to please God But at the same time tells us what Faith that is For says he He that cometh to God must believe that he is And that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him He must be perswaded of God's Mercy and good Will to those who seek to obey him And rest assured of his rewarding those who rely on him for whatever either by the light of Nature or particular Promises he has revealed to them of his tender Mercies and taught them to expect from his Bounty This description of Faith that we might not mistake what he means by that Faith without which we
Nature Whose Perfection lay in virtue And if the Priest at any time talked of the Ghosts below and a Life after this it was only to keep Men to their Superstitious and Idolatrous Rites Whereby the use of this Doctrine was lost to the credulous Multitude And its belief to the quicker sighted who suspected it presently of Priest-craft Before our Saviour's time the Doctrine of a future State though it were not wholly hid yet it was not clearly known in the World 'T was an imperfect view of Reason Or perhaps the decay'd remains of an ancient Tradition which rather seemed to float on Mens Phansies than sink deep into their Hearts It was something they knew not what between being and not being Something in Man they imagined might scape the Grave But a a perfect compleat Life of an Eternal duration after this was what entred little into their thoughts and less into their perswasions And they were so far from being clear herein that we see no Nation of the World publickly professed it and built upon it No Religion taught it And 't was no where made an Article of Faith and Principle of Religion till Jesus Christ came Of whom it is truly said that he at his appearing brought light and immortality to light And that not only in the clear Revelation of it And in instances shewn of Men raised from the Dead But he has given us an unquestionable assurance and pledge of it in his own Resurrection and Ascention into Heaven How hath this one truth changed the Nature of things in the World And given the advantage to Piety over all that could tempt or deter Men from it The Philosophers indeed shewed the beauty of Virtue They set her off so as drew Mens Eyes and approbation to her But leaving her unendowed very few were willing to espouse her The generality could not refuse her their esteem and commendation But still turned their Backs on her and forsook her as a match not for their turn But now there being put into the Scales on her side An exceeding and immortal weight of Glory Interest is come about to her And Virtue now is visibly the most enriching purchase and by much the best bergain That she is the perfection and excellency of our Nature That she is her self a Reward and will recommend our Names to future Ages is not all that can now be said for her 'T is not strange that the learned Heathens satisfied not many with such airy commendations It has another relish and efficacy to perswade Men that if they live well here they shall be happy hereafter Open their Eyes upon the endless unspeakable joys of another Life And their Hearts will find something solid and powerful to move them The view of Heaven and Hell will cast a slight upon the short pleasures and pains of this present state and give attractions and encouragements to Virtue which reason and interest and the Care of our selves cannot but allow and prefer Upon this foundation and upon this only Morality stands firm and may defy all competition This makes it more than a name A substantial Good worth all our aims and endeavours And thus the Gospel of Jesus Christ has delivered it to us 5. To these I must add one advantage more we have by Jesus Christ and that is the promise of assistance If we do what we can he will give us his Spirit to help us to do what and how we should 'T will be idle for us who know not how our own Spirits move and act us to ask in what manner the Spirit of God shall work upon us The Wisdom that accompanies that Spirit knows better than we how we are made and how to work upon us If a wise Man knows how to prevail on his Child to bring him to what he desires Can we suspect that the Spirit and Wisdom of God should fail in it though we perceive or comprehend not the ways of his Operation Christ has promised it who is faithful and just And we cannot doubt of the Performance 'T is not requisite on this occasion for the inhancing of this benefit to enlarge on the frailty of our Minds and weakness of our Constitutions How liable to mistakes how apt to go astray and how easily to be turned out of the paths of Virtue If any one needs go beyond himself and the testimony of his own Conscience in this point If he feels not his own errors and passions always tempting and often prevailing against the strict Rules of his Duty He need but look abroad into any Age of the World to be convinced To a Man under the difficulties of his Nature beset with Temptations and hedged in with prevailing Custom 't is no small encouragement to set himself seriously on the courses of Virtue and practise of true Religion That he is from a sure hand and an almighty arm promised assistance to support and carry him through There remains yet something to be said to those who will be ready to Object If the belief of Jesus of Nazareth to be the Messiah together with those concomitant Articles of his Resurrection Rule and coming again to Judge the World be all the Faith required as necessary to Justification to what purpose were the Epistles written I say if the belief of those many Doctrines contained in them be not also necessary to Salvation And if what is there delivered a Christian may believe or disbelieve and yet nevertheless be a Member of Christ's Church and one of the Faithful To this I Answer That the Epistles were written upon several occasions And he that will read them as he ought must observe what 't is in them is principally aimed at find what is the Argument in hand and how managed if he will understand them right and profit by them The observing of this will best help us to the true meaning and mind of the Writer For that is the Truth which is to be received and believed And not scattered Sentences in Scripture-Language accommodated to our Notions and Prejudices We must look into the drift of the Discourse observe the coherence and connexion of the Parts and see how it is consistent with it self and other parts of Scripture if we will conceive it right We must not cull out as best suits our System here and there a Period or a Verse as if they were all distinct and independent Aphorisms and make these the Fundamental Articles of the Christian Faith and necessary to Salvation unless God has made them so There be many Truths in the Bible which a good Christian may be wholly ignorant of and so not believe which perhaps some lay great stress on and call Fundamental Articles because they are the distinguishing Points of their Communion The Epistles most of them carry on a Thread of Argument which in the stile they are writ cannot every where be observed without great Attention And to consider the Texts as they stand and bear a part
in that is to view them in their due light and the way to get the true sense of them They were writ to those who were in the Faith and true Christians already And so could not be designed to teach them the Fundamental Articles and Points necessary to Salvation The Epistle to the Romans was writ to all that were at Rome beloved of God called to be Saints whose Faith was spoken of through the World Chap. 1. 7 8. To whom St. Paul's first Epistle to the Corinthians was he shews Chap I. 2. 4. c. Vnto the Church of God which is at Corinth to them that are sanctified in Christ Iesus called to be Saints with all them that in every place call upon the Name of Iesus Christ our Lord both theirs and ours I thank my God always on your behalf for the grace of God which is given you by Iesus Christ That in every thing ye are enriched by him in all utterance and in all knowledge Even as the Testimony of Christ was confirmed in you So that ye come behind in no gift waiting for the coming of the Lord Iesus Christ. And so likewise the second was To the Church of God at Corinth with all the Saints in Achaia Chap. I. 1. His next is to the Churches of Galatia That to the Ephesians was To the Saints that were at Ephesus and to the faithful in Christ Iesus So likewise To the Saints and faithful Brethren in Christ at Colosse who had Faith in Christ Iesus and love to the Saints To the Church of the Thessalonians To Timothy his Son in the Faith To Titus his own Son after the common Faith To Philemon his dearly beloved and fellow-labourer And the Author to the Hebrews calls those he writes to Holy Brethren partakers of the Heavenly Calling Chap. III. 1. From whence it is evident that all those whom St. Paul writ to were Brethren Saints Faithful in the Church and so Christians already And therefore wanted not the Fundamental Articles of the Christian Religion without a belief of which they could not be saved Nor can it be supposed that the sending of such Fundamentals was the reason of the Apostle's Writing to any of them To such also St. Peter writes as is plain from the first Chapter of each of his Epistles Nor is it hard to observe the like in St. Iames and St. Iohn's Epistles And St. Iude directs his thus To them that are sanctified by God the Father and preserved in Iesus Christ and called The Epistles therefore being all written to those who were already Believers and Christians the occasion and end of writing them could not be to Instruct them in that which was necessary to make them Christians This 't is plain they knew and believed already or else they could not have been Christians and Believers And they were writ upon Particular Occasions and without those Occasions had not been writ and so cannot be thought necessary to Salvation Though they resolving doubts and reforming mistakes are of great Advantage to our Knowledge and Practice I do not deny but the great Doctrines of the Christian Faith are dropt here and there and scattered up and down in most of them But 't is not in the Epistles we are to learn what are the Fundamental Articles of Faith where they are promiscuously and without distinction mixed with other Truths in Discourses that were though for Edification indeed yet only occasional We shall find and discern those great and necessary Points best in the Preaching of our Saviour and the Aples to those who were yet strangers and ignorant of the Faith to bring them in and convert them to it And what that was we have seen already out of the History of the Evangelists and the Acts where they are plainly laid down so that no body can mistake them The Epistles to particular Churches besides the main Argument of each of them which was some present Concernment of that particular Church to which they severally were address'd do in many places explan the Fundamentals of the Christian Religion and that wisely by proper Accommodations to the Apprehensions of those they were writ to the better to make them imbibe the Christian Doctrine and the more easily to comprehend the Method Reasons and Grounds of the great work of Salvation Thus we see in the Epistle to the Romans Adoption a Custom well known amongst those of Rome is much made use of to explain to them the Grace and Favour of God in giving them Eternal Life to help them to conceive how they became the Children of God and to assure them of a share in the Kingdom of Heaven as Heirs to an Inheritance Whereas the setting out and confirming the Christian Faith to the Hebrews in the Epistle to them is by Allusions and Arguments from the Ceremonies Sacrifices and Oeconomy of the Jews and Reference to the Records of the Old Testament And as for the General Epistles they we may see regard the state and exigencies and some peculiarities of those times These Holy Writers inspired from above writ nothing but Truth and in most places very weighty Truths to us now for the expounding clearing and confirming of the Christian Doctrine and establishing those in it who had embraced it But yet every Sentence of theirs must not be taken up and looked on as a Fundamental Article necessary to Salvation without an explicit belief whereof no body could be a Member of Christ's Church here nor be admitted into his Eternal Kingdom hereafter If all or most of the Truths declared in the Epistles were to be received and believed as Fundamental Articles what then became of those Christians who were fallen asleep as St. Paul witnesses in his First to the Corinthians many were before these things in the Epistles were revealed to them Most of the Epistles not being written till above Twenty Years after our Saviour's Ascension and some after Thirty But farther therefore to those who will be ready to say May those Truths delivered in the Epistles which are not contained in the Preaching of our Saviour and his Apostles and are therefore by this Account not necessary to Salvation be believed or disbelieved without any danger May a Christian safely question or doubt of them To this I Answer That the Law of Faith being a Covenant of Free Grace God alone can appoint what shall be necessarily believed by every one whom he will Justifie What is the Faith which he will accept and account for Righteousness depends wholly on his good Pleasure For 't is of Grace and not of Right that this Faith is accepted And therefore he alone can set the Measures of it And what he has so appointed and declared is alone necessary No body can add to these Fundamental Articles of Faith nor make any other necessary but what God himself hath made and declared to be so And what these are which God requires of those who will enter into and receive the Benefits of