Ministerie of the word without usurping a stated superior Order of Governing as their special work let be immixing themselves by privilege in secular Courts and affaires 3. That they should be obeyed is this their power for discipline and Government set down in Scripture not also its rules limites Were the Apostles more then Ministers of Christ and Stewards of the Mysteries of God was not the sure word of Prophecie their great warrant When the Apostle Paul is about to set order in the Church of Coriath hear his Preface by ye followers of me even as I also am of Christ And as in the ordinance of the Lords Supper he only delivers what he had received of the Lord so even as to that smallest of matters the Length and Fashion of the hair doth he use any other Authority then what he seconds with rational persuasion How far was he then from that dominion over our Faith which you ascribe to the Church not only of appointing significant instructing Ceremonies but of abrogating things as expresly ordained in your opinion as the true Sacraments 4 You say That things should be done to Order Edification and Peace keep within these bounds and invert not this Method and we are agreed but if you subsist not in the regulation of the manner but wil impose New things which the Lord requireth not nay which he abhorreth even your own inventions framed to your own lusts and interests or produced by your delusions then make peace your Argument because ye will not allow it to such as in Conscience cannot conforme the Lord who hath founded Zion Reigns in it who hath builded his House rules over it will one day judge Thus you see how these your everlasting obligations do fully conclude all the truths that we assert Where you adde that the other Rules are now altered with the alterable state of things whereunto they were accommodate if you understand it soundly of these things only which are indeed ceased it is a very certain and allowable truth but you remember not that in the very Page preceeding you impute this alteration so groslyâ— to the bare Practice of the Catholick Church a very doubtfull terme and thereby not only unsetle Scripture foundations as to the Sacraments but endeavour to introduce such an arbitrary authority in the Church that in place of establishing true Christian Liberty which you seem here to assert it is evident that you go about plainly to set up an absolute Spiritual tyranny over the Church of God and so to load it with the Ceremonies and innovations a bondage more severe then the old dispensation from which we are liberate but blessed be our Lord Jesus Christ who hath delivered us not only from that old Law of Ordinances but hath made us free that we should be no more the Servants of Men nor liable to be judged in meat or drink or in respect of an holy Day or of the new Moon or of the Sabbath and having blotted out the hand writting of God's Ordinances that was against us hath put no new blank in Mens hands for their own devices and superstitions To conclude then in your own words these things are so rationall and also so clearly deduced from your own concessions that I see nothing either to be excepted against our Conformity to the Scripture pattern and the true Christian liberty both in opinion and practice which we maintain or to be alleaged for your pretended liberty consisting in a Licentious absurd imposing on such whom you acknowledge to be free But in order to this last point viz. your attempt to remove a Scripture rule easie in it self and imparting true Libertie to its observers and to set up an unwarrantable Yoke of Church Authority in its place I conceive it is that here you go about to represent your N. C. as a vain and clamorous boaster of the Crown Throne and Kingdome of our Lord on purpose to prejudicate against our just complaint of your invasion and Robbery but waving your Calumnious Methods I shal only endeavour to speak â—urth the words of truth and sobernesse I shall not here discourse of the Kingdom of Christ in all its parts whereunto we finde in Scripture both the outward Protection of the Church vengeance upon Adversaries and all judgement even the great and last ascrived but in order to our present purpose I affirme plainly that our Lord Jesus as the Redeemer is in a peculiar manner exalted to be Head and King in and over his Church by vertue of which Kingdome he sendeth forth and Authorizeth his Ministers hath defined their Order and Power determined Censures and given and declared Laws to be observed in his house and that in such a manner and in that perfection that in all things properly thereto relating he hath only left to the Officers by himself appointed a Ministerial power of administration so that there is neither place left nor power given to diminish from or adde to the Officers Laws Censures and Orders which he hath therein established that these things are so cannot be better cleared then by remitting you to our larger Catechisme where as you will finde satisfying Scripture proof for their confirmation so really I cannot but by the way recommend to you its more serious study for the curing of that loosenesse in Principles which almost in every thing you discover My part at present shall be to consider your strange discourse on this subject You say then Christ's throne Crown and Kingdom are inward and spirituall not of the World nor as the Kindoms of the World Sir though I acknowledge the Scripture phrase in this matter to be Metaphoricall Yet I wish you had better observed it and forborn the hard and unused expression of an Inward Crown But to the question Christs Kingdom is indeed in its power and effects the restriction a little above premised being remembred internall and Spirituall but doth it therefore follow that its administration is not externall and visible when the Lord declared all power to be given unto him and by vertue thereof sent forth his Apostles and Ministers and gathered Churches having peculiar Rulers Laws and Ordinances was not this both visible and audible Are not all the acts of Discipline and Government properly thereto referable of the same Nature Our Lords Kingdom is truely not of the World nor as the Kingdomes thereof is it therefore not in the World What doth this arguing conclude You proceed a great part of his Kingdom is the liberty whereto he hath called us and I grant that as liberty and deliverance from Sin and Satan are among its choise benefites and therefore the exultation of Zachariah his thanksgiving so our liberation from the yoke of Jewish Ceremonies and all such bondage is that which we readily acknowledge in opposition to youâ— unwarrantable exactions but what would you thence inferre because Christ hes liberate us from the former slavery and Pedagogie hath he
Innovations of Prelacie and the Perth Articles thereafter introduced were by this Oath condemned Notwithstanding that its obvious meaning doth abundantly import the same both in the particular abjuration of the Popes corrupt Doctrine anent the nature number and use of the holy Sacraments his unwarrantable dedication of Dayes and his worldly Monarchie and wicked Hierarchie and also in the generall detestation which it contains of all Rites and Traditions brought into the Kirk without or against the word of God And that the generality of the Godly in the Land did so understand it yet such was the tenderness then used that the practice was only at first agreed to be forborn and the determination of the Question for the gaining of the doubtfull and refractory referred to a lawfull Assembly Now if this Assembly in the light of the reasons already touched and others mentioned in their Act did clearly determine this matter and the Covenant was thereafter taken with an agreeable Declaration where can you fixe your challenge To alledge after an Oath is taken that to be thereby abjured which doth no where appear in it is certainly as false as the termes you use are scurrilous but to declare from undeniable grounds these things to be contained in a prior Oath which only the temptation and darknesse of an after-defection did make to be questioned is nothing els then a just vindication and application requisite to a faithfull pursuance and whereof the instance of Nehemiah his renewing Covenant with God with a more large declaration of the manner of the Sabbaths observance then is to be found in the Law is an undeniable warrant But reason failing your passion and big words must be made use of to supply that deâ—ect for you say what violence did we use to oblige all to bow on this Idole Church-men refusing were deposed yea both they and Lay-men also excommunicat 'T is answered A faithfull and zealous prosecution of the Lords Oath from the Conscience of his holy jealousie is only the just and laudable effect of his fear and no wayes to make it an Idol But seing you love such expressions to sweare and forsweare as your partie hath done without either constancie or repentance is certainly to make an Idol not of the Covenant only but of the Great God thereto invocked who infallibly will one day avenge it As for the Censures you speak of if the perfidie of that refusall with the other transgressions and delinquencies whereof the persons particularly censured were for the most part if not all notoriously known and found to be guilty be duely pondered they will rather be found to fall short of then exceed the proportions of righteousness And though I deny not but the heats prejudices and other temptations inevitable in such changes to humane infirmity may possibly have rendered the lot of some few and these very few recusants rather obstinate then malitious a little hard and apparently rigid yet this is most obvious that the late revolution hath so infinitly exceeded not only for iniquity but also in the measure of its oppressions all the excesses chargeable on former times that nothing less then an impudence sutable to the late perjury could prompt you or any of your partie to move such an objection but let us hear your conclusion What man of common sense can think this the Cause of God which had such monstruous errours in its first conception Sir though I think that in the matters of God you do appeal to an ill Judge yet I am so little diffident of the cause which I maintain that only wishing you to be more sparing in obtruding your own ridiculous delusions for monstruous errours I heartily referre our discourse to my greatest Opposite In the next place making a step of your N C. weak and groundless concession That there were faults in the imposing of the Covenant and taking it up at your own hand That the matters of the Covenant are in themselves indifferent you go on to argue that seing in these things a man is not his own Master but by the command of God obliged to obey the Magistrat in all things lawfull a tye before all Oaths as by no act of ours we can be bound to break the Command of God so no more can we oblige our selves to do any thing in prejudice of anothers right our Soveraign's Authority and therefore since the King and Parliament have by Law annulled the Covenant and required submission to Episcopacie our antecedent Oath a voluntary deed of our own can no longer â—ind us against the commands of the Powers which are the mediatâ— commands of God I have set down this argument of yours more fully to the effect you may perceive that if I have not so much of your common sense as to comprehend it as a clear demonstration yet it is not for want of a just and true apprehension but really from the greater evidence of the answeres subjoined and first I say your foundation fails the matters of the Covenant are not things indifferent but in themselves true righteous and holy importing such an antecedent obligation as in the occurrence of the preexistent circumstances did render the taking and requiring of that Oath an indispensable dutie And this when you think good to quarrell I am most ready to make out 2. Supposing with you that the matter of the Covenant is indifferent and that in such things the Magistrates power of commanding cannot by any Oath or deed of ours be prevented or prelimited yet Sir think you that your Omission must so farre charme us to oblivion as to make us forget that as King Charles the first did in plene Parliament An. 1641. under his hand-writing ratifie the Nationall Covenant with the explication and Bond thereto annexed and prior Acts made anent it with such solemnities and concurrent considerations as it is impossible to question it so his Son who now Reigns did in the year 1650. and 51. take and confirme both it and the Solemn League and Covenant with such Oaths Subscriptions as well private and unrequired as publick Declarations and Acts that greater grounds of assurance were never heard of amongst men if then this was the case of the obligation of these Covenants at his Majesties returne admitting all that you suppose dare you or any say that the King and Parliament had power either to resile or to loose others from the Bonds which they themselves had thus established If a Fathers silence and non-contradiction to a Daughters vowing and whose vowes he may disannull do make her vowes to stand so that he cannot thereafter make them void how can the express solemn and sworne confirmation of King and Parliament in favours of a Covenanting people with any colour of reason be thought to be either in it self ambulatory or toward others less effectual But 3 to undeceive you of the vain esteem you have for this argument the very grounds of it are manifestly fallacious For
Who would think that this were the accusation of Non-conformists who from the very beginning of Reformation have been continually vexed by your impositions and not rather conceive the objection to be made by them against your violent pressing of Crosse Surplice Service-book Book of Canons and other â—rash wherewith the Lords people have been uncessantly urged as the main yea only things of Religion But I cannot stand upon every one of your calumnies the Lord deliver you from this perverse spirit Only if by the driving objected you do understand our causing the people of the Land to stand stedfast and adhere to the Lords Covenant whereby they were formerly obliged it is already fully answered But that which you say is of greatest weight is that we are guilty of the waxing cold in Love to which our Saviour knits the abounding of Iniquity And this challenge you qualify by our judging you in Matters which are doubtful disputations spreading tattlesâ— of you as you call them carrying sowrly toward you and casting odious aspersions upon you as Apostates and the like with petulant railings and this you adde is a greater persecution then any little suffering of ours in the World Sir though I cannot sooth you as you do your felf by the mouth of your N. C. whose tongue you teach to speak lyes in your smooth words of deceit by telling you that too much of what you speak is true Yet I heartily wish there were more Charity on all sides but where you accuse us of waxing cold in Love and thence would inferre our accession to the present abounding iniquity I would first have you to read the text aright which runeth thus And because iniquity shall aboâ—nd the love of many shall wax cold which is a plain inversion of your causality 2. Admitting your ground to be good I seriously wish without vanity that the waxing cold in love both toward God and your Neighbour were not more your sin then ours then had we not been scorched into a blacknesse and consumed almost into ashes by these fiery trials kindled blown and kept into a flame by the Grandees of your way pourtrey them as you please whose heat speaks them to be set on fire against the Work People and Interests of God 3. To call the causes of our Differences matters which are doubtfull Disputations when both by Scripture Reason and Solemne Engagements and many sad experiences they are so fully determined is indeed to put false glosses upon things and to pretend to be a good Christian and to acclaime the charity and kindnesse of others in an avoued persistence in open Perjury Opposition to the Cause of God and persecution of his People is it not to wipe your mouth and say you have done no wickednesse But you say it is from the spirit of the Devil to fasten the brand of Apostasie upon the leaving of a partie and that to grow wiser is not to play the changling nor is a consciencious obedience to standing Laws time-serving Sir as I love neither to irritate nor prejudicate by hard words so I approve not either your or your N. C. tattles but if to leave God and not a Partie be Apostasie if to forsake the way and Truth of God be to play the changling and if to obey and conforme to mischief framed by a Law be time-serving I am sadly apprehensive that what you account to be but the Malice of the spirit of the Devil shall one day be found the Verdict of the Spirit of God Whether it be thus or not in our controverted differences let the things themselves and the issue of our discourse declare What you tell us of the primitive application of the word Apostasie is no restriction of its proper acceptation And for your other petty conceits in this place with your mock-complaint of the persecution of a just but disdained censure they are not of that moment to stop my procedour to that part of your conference which concerns Episcopacie This head you say falls asunder in two the one a general consideration of that Government the other supposing it were amisse how far it ought to be separated from And for the Government in place of all these weighty and unanswerable objections viz. the want of our Lords Warrant 2. Repugnancie to his and his Apostles Precepts and practice of restless labour simplicity equality humility and contempt of the world c. 3. Disconformity to the first and purer times of the Primitive Church 4. The pride avarice usurpation and cruelty to which it naturally tends and hath been depraved And lastly these evil and bitter fruits of profanity ignorance and superstition that it hath ever in its prevalencie produced which have been charged upon and made out against it by many of the Lords faithfull Witnesses you make your N. C. faintly and poorly to aledge I cannot think that Church-men should be called Lords and be great Persons that this is a desingenuous prevarication is obviously manifest Yet such is the weaknesse of your cause that the meanest argument you could put in your N. C. mouth is stronger then your answere wherein you tell us That this belongs not to the thing it self but is an addition of the Christian Magistrat But I must remember you first that Church-men and Ministers are not capable of every addition Civil offices and administrations are very lawfully bestowed by the Magistrat upon fit Recipients but as for Ministers they are not only an intolerable distraction many degrees above that charitable imployment which the Apostles could not bear but so inconsistent with the nature manner and end of their Ministrie that even our Lord while in this capacitie doth bruskly decline to be so much as an amicable trister And therefore to justify Bishops titles from this ground that they are extrinsick additions or from their civil place and voice in Parliament is no wayes concludent 2. Though this were not yet I am confident that who ever considers the received use and import of this title of Lord amongst us will find it an addition as full of fastuous vanity for Ministers as the title of Rabbi even admitting that its excess did lye another way therefore excepted against and prohibited by our Lord was unlawfull for the Apostles but 3. This title is not an addition flowing from the Christian Magistrat as you pretend but the very product of that pride and usurpation that at first exalted Prelacie which as as first it was assumed by the connivence of if not rather forced from the Civil Magistrat so now by the Bishops it is only derived from him in consequence of that Supremacie which both falsly against our Lord Jesus Christ and traiterously to the Pope in this respect their proper head they have for their own conveniencie transferred upon him But you add that we consider not that Sir and Lord Gentleman and Nobleman differ but in degree since therefore a Minister by Office â—hes the temporall â—onour of
will admit cannot but be received for a Directory both of words and things But you add That it was but a cheat to cozen the World who might have startled to have seen us without any rule for Worship in as much as our Leaders quickly wearied of it It is answered first So long as any Church doth own the revealed will and word of God for the rule of Worship none but such phantastick Formalists as you will prove startlers at this sure and acceptable simplicity 2. Whence you alledge our Ministers their wearying of the Directory as such except from the suggestion of your own malice I cannot conceive that our Leaders neither turned it nor astricted themselves to it as to an imposed Liturgie is very certain but that they did not at all regard it is a groundless calumnie In the next place you add that Hence it clearly followed that the Preaching was the great matter of the Worship but the constant acts wherein the Church should adore God were thought too homely How you will make out this connexion seing both the ground is false and the consequence doth not hold I recommend to your second thoughts though our Prayers and Psalms related to our Preaching yet it will not conclude that therefore the Preaching was the great matter of the Worship Your Service-book makes many both Prayers Gospells Epistles and Collects relative to certain festivall dayes is therefore the observation of these dayes the great point of Worship The great matter of Worship is the rendering of our acknowledgement unto God which if performed by prayer hearing of His word and praises and that in such a harmony as all the exercises may conspire and be mutually helpful is thereby greatly advanced and not in the least marred As for these Constant acts which you desiderat in our Service if thereby you mean your Constant Set-forms you are already answered but if only the dayly solemn performances of Prayer and Praise which in liew of the morning and evening Sacrifice ought as the stated and fixed recognizance of the great God be observed and kept up in every Christian Society when other things shall be restored I frankly promise you my assent In the last place you say It is the least evill of extemporarie Forms that a Minister is ready to pour out his Soul to God in such devotions as are then most in his own Spirit Which may possibly happen to be very unfit for Publick Worship Sir this is so groundless a fear and so plain a diffidence of the assistance and presence of the Lord that I shall not trouble you with any further answere then to add that as a thoughtfull serious Spirit is ever found to be most prepared for dutie and divine influences so all experiences do conclude that a Ministers particular exercises have been so farre from marring that on the contraire they have alwayes rendered his publick performances more spiritual and lively And thus at length your dull N. C. comes to see that you are for Set-forms and demanding your reason tels you that the Apostles used them not to which you answere that you cannot doubt but they used our Saviour's Prayer and really though I do as little doubt but they might have done it yet I think both you and I must acknowledge that we finde no vestige of their doing of it For as for your distinguishing betwixt Mathew's after this manner therefore pray ye and Luke's when ye pray say the pattern to be proposed in the first and the practice intended in the second seing the form is formally the same in both places and the patterm so proposed by Mathew that the practice might be its most exact imitation and the practice so enjoined by Luke that yet the latitude of a Pattern is not discharged your notion is but airie and of no moment But if it were needful to give you my thoughts in this matter I would say that considering 1. That this pattern was given to the Disciples in the infancie of their knowledge before the out-pouring of the Spirit as a short and easie rudiment 2. That thereafter the Spirit is promised and that in such an abundant measure as it should flow like rivers of living water 3. That our Lord in his last discourse commands them frequently to pray to and ask the Father in his Name and 4 that the Spirit being given de facto they were enriched unto all utterance and both in their own Prayers and in their Directions to others how to pray do constantly make mention of the name of Iesus these things I say considered I am verily in the opinion they did not precisely use either this form of Prayer or any other but leaving this digression and esteeming this Form to be the most excellent modell and the very Substance of all prayer and granting the Apostles might have used it yea supposing with you they did use it yet what makes all this for your imposing and enjoining of Forms the only point of our present difference But you go on and say the Iews at that time had a Liturgie and hours of Prayer which our Saviour never reproves ergo quid I have told you already that to inferre an approbation from our Lords tolerance for a time of either the whole or any of the parts of that service which he was in a short space to abolish totally is bad Logick 2. Admit this tolerance were an approbation how will you make it out that the Iews their Lyturgie was more then a Directorie and that they were thereby astricted to an imposed Set-form Specially seing we finde that where in their best times certain Forms of Prayer and Thanksgiving dictated by the Spirit are committed by David and other men of God to the Ministers for publick use yet the thing was both done and observed without the mention of any precise astriction or limitation In the next place you tell us that the Lords Prayer is word for word taken out of the Iewish Lyturgie and thence you think that exception against the English Service that some of its Prayers are out of the Roman Missal and not or Breviarie to be foolish and groundless But pray Sir why talk you so confidently of the Iewish Liturgie of these times for other posterior Liturgies availl not since to this day though much search hath been made and many forgeries have been obtruded no such thing could assuredly be found Next if such a thing sound and pure was in our Lord's dayes think you it was then no better Pattern nor the Roman Missal Ritual and Breviarie were in the very profoundest darkeness of that Superstition immediatly before the Reformation broke up and when the first glimmerings of that light managed as much by Police as Piety did translate from it the English Liturgie The disparity of these things is too palpable 3. Admitting the Iewish Liturgies used in the dayes of our Lord were yet truely extant it will not be sufficient for you to
God as the great Judge attempeâ—ing justice with mercie doth thereby accept of a Ransome and Surety offered and therefore absolve yea justify the Criminal and yet notwithstanding of the evident Scripture testimonies that shew the Lord our Righteousness to be in very deed this Ransome and Surety and faith only its instrumental application to join good works with it and state both as the condition of our Justification is not only reproved by the Papists their more consequent explication who because they admit of works in Justification do therefore hold it not to be a judicial act but rather a gracious work but by the common sense of all men in these similare instances from which the manner of explaining these things is borrowed If in our ordinarie Courts the Law being transgressed and the transgressor convicted the pronouncing of the doome of judgement and its execution were stopt by the interposition of a ransome and surety offered so fully satisfying and acceptable in the eyes of the judge that for his sake the poor Criminal were both pardoned and received to special favour would any rational man say that the person guilty were thus absolved and justifyed either for his act of laying claime to the price and pledge as a condition seing it is only the moral instrument whereby the true motive of the ransomers satisfaction is applyed or yet for the act it self together with the absolved person his consequent good behaviour which is the parallel of your interpretation which is yet more absurd And not rather affirme plainly that it is for the ransome and surety only that the man is acquit and accepted Certainly common ingenuity which must acknowledge all the defects of this similitude to be the manifest advantages of the point principally pressed will both cede to the conviction of its evidence aud transferre it plainly to the case in hand Having thus set down a Scriptural and easie account of this important truth which reflecting upon almost all Protestant Divines with whom in this we agree and wandering in your raveries after no better guid then Patrick the Pilgrim you say is by us handled with much niceness and subtilty for it s further clearing and the better discoverie of your vanity I shal now examine your discourse in its particulars and 1. you say Iustification and Condemnation are two opposite legal termes By legal I know you mean judicial and therefore in place of urging your mistake I seriously wish that the tenor of what ensues had been consistent to so true and solid a ground but you add That they relate to the judgement shall be given out at the last day a strange fetch to compasse a false designe I might remember you that the Scripture is express That being justifyed by faith we have peace with God through our Lord Iesus Christ and there is now therefore no condemnation to them which are in Christ Iesus who by their assured partaking of his grace and in consequence of their true faith in him and Justification therethrough walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit and that thence it is evident that as it is God that judgeth so it is by an act of his free grace in Jesus Christ antecedent to the last judgement that we are reconciled unto him and justified in his sight But your own words viz. For though we are said to be now justified as the unbeleeving are said to be condemned already this is only that we are now in the state of such as shall be solemnly justified or condemned do sufficiently reprove you because 1. It is certain that the unbelieving are not improperly and with respect only to that future judgement said to be condemned already but as by reason of sin judgement is already come upon all unto condemnation and he that beleeveth not the Son shall not see life is under the curse and the wrath of God abideth on him so it is manifest that now it is that they stand truely under the condemning power and sentence of Gods holy Law from which it is most unquestionable that condemnation doth directly proceed against all transgressours however in the forbearance of God they are not only for a time reprived but place left for a ransome 2. To be justified freely through grace doth plainly import the person justified to be antecedently under condemnation if by the offence judgement had not come upon all to condemnation there had been no need of the Righteousnes of Christ to the Iustification of life How then can the opposite instance of Condemnation be by your referred unto the last day Far less made an argument to deferre untill that judgement our Iustification which of necessity doth presuppose it Certainly you cannot but grant it to be most absurd to think that Believers shall in that day be first condemned and thereafter justified 3. When you say That it is in that day that men shall be solemnly justified or condemned you clearly resolve the matter viz. that as the solemnity of the judgement of that day shall be only declarative and finally executive so it evidently concludes that the judgement then to be pronounced was given and established of before Pray Sir do you think the Spirits of just men made perfect are not as yet justified But 4. you grant that we are now in the state of such as shall be solemnily justified or condemned which clearly shews your insinuation premised to be only a designe to obscure by words without knowledge in as much as the question remains the same anent this state and how we now attaine to it as anent the justification which you would deferre And 1. What is the state of Iustification Is it not that we who were under the Curse and aliens are accepted unto favour pardoned and brought near Wherein doth it then differ from actual Iustification 2. How is it that we attain to this state Sure not by works either alone or in conjunction with faith as we have heard from Scripture and shall be further evinced But if it be by faith alone as the instrument laying hold on the sole meritorious Righteousnes of Christ our difference is only verbal wherein you foolishly resile from Scripture phrase If you shall further add that by faith we do indeed attain to this state but only inchoatly or unfixedly and changeably then you evidently impinge both upon the perfection of Christs Righteousnes and the faire and certain grounds of the Saints their perseverance It followeth in your discourse Now at the great day we must give an account of our actions and we must be judged accordingly And I note in your ensuing words That since all must be condemned if God enter into judgement with them and that not only if he should charge us with our transgressions but even if he should only reckon with us upon our good works and for that imperfection and weakness wherewith as they are from us they are tainted doth not the certainty of this judgement
above all things plead the necessity and alone sufficiency of the Righteousness of Jesus Christ for our Justification But to restore your words to their own channell you say that since all must be condemned if God enter into judgement therefore God gave his Son unto the death for us that thereby we might obtain Salvation And though by this passage it be clearly enough imported that it is before God and by the sentence of his Law that all men stand condemned and that therefore he hath given his Son whose Death and Bloud is the Propitiation and in whom he is well pleased to be a ransome for liberation and acceptation to all that believe on him whereby Justification by faith in Jesus Christ without the deeds of the Law is in substance granted yet for ushering in your good works to share with faith in Justification by a strange connexion you subjoin And all judgement is committed by the Father to the Son and Iesus Christ hath proposed life through his death to as many as receive his Gospell and live according to it But I must take notice 1. That by laying down the commission of judgement given to the Son as a ground to his proposing of the Gospel offer you manifestly repugne to our Lords own words and testimony expressly distinguishing the character of his first coming which was in the form of a servant to minister not to be ministered unto and by performing the Fathers commandment to save the World and not to judge it from that of his second coming which shall be with power and great glory to the Salvation of all that look for him and to judge and to execute judgement upon all that are ungodly 2. By making our Lords commission to judge antecedent to his ministration of the Gospel you invert Truth and plain Scripture-evidence whereby it is clear that our Lord was first sent into the World to preach the Gospel and lay down his life for sinners that whosoever believeth on him should not perish but have everlasting life And then because of his compleat and perfect obedience is exalted to be the Head of all things unto the Church and hath Authority also to execute judgement committed to him because he is the Son of Man But. 3. By this your doctrine you in effect subvert the grace of the Gospel in as much as in the place of the Gospel-covenant offering pardon and peace to poor lost sinners through Christ Jesus and with and in him all grace and glory you introduce our Lord as having by his death indeed merited the privilege of a new offer of life unto sinners but making and renewing the same in no better termes then these of the Law-covenant for as the Law sayeth that the man that doth these things shall live by them so you tell us that the termes of the Gospel-tender are to receive the same and live according to it Now if the Law doth offer life to such as receive and live according to it and our Lords proposal stand in the like termes admit the proposers not to be the same yet the proposals are certainly coincident and therefore although the eternal transaction betwixt the Father and the Son may be of Grace yet it is undeniable that in your opinion the tenders of the Law and Gospel as to us-ward do rune in the same tenor and the condescendence of both prerequiring our works is equally to be reckoned of debt These being the consequences of that Gospel-method by you here contrived and its designe no less evident to make works with saith the condition and procuring cause of our Iustification at least in the sight of Christ as the Judge appointed I add 1. That your attributing of Iustification to Christ as judge ordained over all in the last judgement is contrary to the Scripture that telleth us that it is one God that justifieth it is Christ that died marke the distinction made and no doubt reason it self informing us that it is the Law and Law-giver and not the Judge which define dutie determine paines and condemne the transgressors poenae enim persecution non Iudicis voluntati mandatur sed legis authoritati reservatur It doth also confirm that it appertaines unto God only as the Law-giver to remit the punishment incurred and accept and justify sinners upon an aequipollent satisfaction 2. The Authority to execute judgement being given to our Lord as the Mediator and because he is the Son of Man in which respect he is not the principal Author and efficient but only the meritorious cause of our Iustification not the very act but only the solemn declaration thereof can be ascrived to him in this capacity unless you can conceive that our Lord is not only both the Ransome and the accepter thereof but that by becoming the Propitiation he also becometh the partie to be appeased which are palpably inconsistent 3. The plain Scripture-truth in this point is that our Lord having compleatly obeyed the will of God and being made perfect through suffering is therefore highly exalted above every name and hath all power and judgement committed to him whereby as he doth here in time enrich with all Grace guid support and preserve all that beleeve in him and also over-rule restrain and punish all his and their Adversaries so shal he in the last day appear first to receive and welcome all his redeemed ones formerly justified by his Righteousnesse and sanctified by his Grace unto his Fathers joy And then with them to judge the reprobate and take vengeance on all that know not God and obey not the Gospel by which it is evident that Justification proceeding from God for Christs sake and necessarily preceeding both our Sanctification here and Glorification in the last day cannot be referred unto that judgement which is only declarative and executive according to these words Come ye blessed of my Father nor explicate according to its scheme And therefore although our Lord do therein for our encouragement in well doing and the commendation of the riches of his bountie make mention of our good works and shall certainly in that day also crown his own free grace in us with a reward yet thence to inferre that our Justification before God and in order to his holy justice having for its alone cause the Righteousnes of Jesus Christ and imported in the compellation ye blessed of my Father is founded on our weak love and scant charity which even the Righteous in that day seeme ashamed to owne is both a groundless error and high presumption But I proceed to your next words viz. That Christ Iesus hath proposed life through his death to as many as receive his Gospel and live according to it That this is a manifest perversion of the free Grace of God whereby our Lord Jesus doth freely hold out himself unto us not only for to be our Righteousnesse for Justification but also our Sanctification through his Spirit unto the glory of God and therefore
That being made free from sin and become servants to God we have our fruit unto holiness and the end everlasting life Now then if there be a constraint in love and gratitude above the perswasion of fear and if the desire of reward be powerful above the apprehension of punishment these considerations are certainly cumulative and in our way above any thing that yours doth contain That I may therefore summe up this discourse anent the necessity of holiness Know that without holiness none shall see the Lord But hence it doth so ill follow that holiness by way of previous condition is to be joined unto our Faith in order to our Justification that on the contrary as God hath elected us in Christ Jesus to be holy so he also justifieth us through Faith in his Name not because we are but that in and by him we may be partakers of the glorious riches of his free grace in begun holiness here and consummat holinâ—ss in Glory hereafter and hereby is our obligation unto and study of holiness so far from being remitted that it is both promoved by the same standing fierie Law against all sin ungodliness and strengthened by that alsufficiency of grace which is in Christ Jesus for our compleating to whom through Faith we are united And lastly we are bound and encouraged unto it by all that is most binding in the Laws Authority and obliging in Divine bounty To all which this consideration may also be superadded that as the exercise of holiness remaineth with us still under the obligation of Divine precept and is certainly the end and effect of our acceptation in Gods sight so the same being the necessary consequence and inseparable effect of beleeving and thereby becoming its most assured test must upon this ground stirre up as effectually unto the truth and sincerity of Faith whence it flows and which doth again incite to the sincere closs and constant study of holiness by a reciprocal influence as your vain stating of it as a condition in our Justification doth but lamely perswade its persuite But I hasten to the last part of your discourse viz. That it is upon the necessity of holiness that we shall be solemnly judged justified and absolved at the last day I cannot now enlarge upon these mistakes that are again by you crouded into these few words it may here suffice that I tell you that it is without all doubt that on that day all men shall be solemnly judged according to the holy Law of God and therefore seing by the deeds of the Law there shal no flesh be justifyed in his sight The righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that beleeve without the mixture or conjunction of our imperfect righteousness in the often forementioned respect is only thereby the more recommended 2. Where you say that it is upon this so understood necessity of holiness or upon our holiness that we shall be in that day solemnly justifyed and absolved you erre and impinge most grosly contrary to Scripture-evidence the value of Christs Righteousnesse the holiness of Gods Justice and the glory of free Grace as I have already demonstrat I grant indeed that in that day when our Lord shal gather into one welcome and appear glorious in all Beleevers he will also confess them before his Father and the holy Angels commemorate their charity and good works and in the exceding riches of his bountie reckon his own grace in them unto the increase of their reward but thence to inferre that it is upon our holiness that we are justifyed and absolved in Gods sight is destitute of all truth and reason Nay the very figure of that judgement wherever represented in Scripture bearing only in order to Beleevers their solemne reception and welcome from our Lord and Saviour as such who are already in him blessed and justifyed and by him redeemed and sanctifyed doth most plainly and powerfully confute it And thus I hope I have evidently demonstrat not in the language of men or in Schoole termes which on purpose I have declined but in the express revelation of the Gospel that that Doctrine of yours which you make your N. C. only to taxe as singular in its phrase and you your self do the more commend as being closely Scriptuâ—al is in effect both vain and antiscriptural in matter as well as expression What you mean by preferring the stile of the Catholick Church to Modern and Scholastical expressions under which the Doctrine of all the Reformed Churches is unavoidably comprised let others judge but as for the abuses which you mention viz. the presumption of such who love to hear of Salvation by the Death of Christâ— provided they be bound to do nothing themselves that they may be saved seing there can be nothing more engaging and effectual unto holiness then that which in Scripture termes we do assert viz. That we are saved and called with an holy calling not according to our works or doings but according to his own purpose and grace given us in Christ Jesus the sin thereof remaineth with the Authors and pure and certain truth is neither thereby lessened nor ought to be stumbled at And therefore having fully redargued the falsehood of your Doctrine and the vanity of all your pretenses that I may once for all vindicat this most precious and important truth of Iustification by Faith only from all calumnie and warne all of that delusion which you would very unjustly make proper to our way I plainly and positively affirme that the study of holiness is a most necessary and indispensable dutie unto the justifyed Beleever 1. By the necessity of Divine precept at length above declared 2. By the necessity of loves constraint holiness being both amiable in it self and the high path way leading unto the seeing and enjoying of God who therein delights 3. By the force of fears perswasion in regard of Gods fatherly displeasure against all sin a motive most tenderly perswasive to all that are truely godly 4. By the obligation of gratitude which is indeed the cords of a man and cannot but powerfully engage the Beleever to the constant acknowledgement of God's free love and grace and to walk worthy of him who hath delivered us from death and called us with so heavenly a calling 5. For the manifestation to our selves of our faith and justifyed state to our own peace and comfort 6. For the adorning of the Gospel to the edification of others nay in a word if our felicity be in God if glory be our desire if free grace be the most powerfull attractive and sufficient help and if there be any dread and terror from Gods displeasure the study of holiness is by the united force of all these motives most strongly recommended and by the wonderful free love of God in our Justification through faith in Christ Jesus only yea infinitly intended In the next place your N. C. having acquit
â—hew the words and sentences of the Lord's Prayer to be therein disorderly found for so no doubt a good Christian prayer might almost be said to be taken out of the Alcoran but even for evincing that our Lord did respect them so much as Directories you must make out the whole context of his Prayer to be formally found therein But you add that Though the Aposâ—les and others immediatly inspired might pour out extemporarie Prayers it doth not follow that every one may use the same liberty Who would not pitie this folly If infallibilitie be required in our extemporarie methods wherefore not also in your Set-forms But seing the Apostles were only the better assisted and not singularly privileged to pray ex tempore by their extraordinary Gifts and if the same command of God and promise of the Spirits assistance are still with us for our warrant and encouragement to this dutie your argument here insinuate is emptie and inconcludent and in effect doth as much prove neither the Apostles their Preaching nor Praying to be at all by us imitable as the point you aime at Your next Argument for Set-forms you usher in by the instance of the Corinthians who in their Worship used Hymnes of their own composing as well as prayers and then you adde that you could never comprehend why we allow the Spirit to be restrained in Praising as to words and not in Praying Sir whether you preface the custome of the Corinthians for enforcing your imposed Forms or as the reason of your doubt anent the difference used by us in Praying and Praising doth not appear from your words However as it is evident that in that Church there was rather an exuberant liberty then any thing like to your stinting so our practice and theirs shal soon be reconciled but first let us take your N. C. Answere to your main scruple and he and I tell you that because the Psalmes and Scripture-songs are a collection of Praises dictated by the Spirit of God for Worship and have been so made use both by the Church of the Iews in the time of the old Testament and by the Christian Church in all Ages therefore they are used by us to the same end without either restraining the Spirit in the performance seing it is his own appointment or tying all our praises to these Forms seing God hath thereto only tyed our solemn praise by singing and otherwayes left and allows us a furder liberty To your N. C. part of this answere you reply that never were more absurdities crouded in less bounds And if I may also anticipat I am certain there were never more profane and ignorant fopperies stuffed into a return then in that which you here do make And first you say it is clear we may worship in the Spirit and yet be restrained as towords since we acknowledge that God hes done it in praising But waving that which I have already plainly and so often told you viz. that it is the imposing of men and not the free use-making of Set-forms that we condemne how absurd is it for you to alledge that a man worshipping in words prescribed by the Spirit is in so doing restrained in Spirit Could you not advert that the Spirits prescriving and mens are different and that he prescriveth to himself without any restraint 2. You say there are many Psalms prayers and why may they not be used for constant prayers as well as the other for constant praises Nay why for instance may we not use the 51 Psalme in plain words with a plain voice as prayer as well as in hobling rime with a Tuneâ— 'T is answered That I may first take out the waspish sting of your Mockerie is this the tender respect that you profess p. 70. to every thing that relateth to Gods service to call the Psalmes in meeter used both by you and us hobling rime or is your Poëtick vain so nicely delicate that you can endure no verses inferior to your loftie Pindarick Which yet if Criticks mistake not doth trote more rudely and lamely then our hobling meeter for my part I see not what answere can be given to these Questions save this that it seems both your tenderness and poesie are but false and forced But to the purpose 2. I answere that the Psalms-prayers and particularly the 51 Psalm may in plain words with a plain voice be used in Prayer as Prayer if so be the Spirit do so direct our utterance but if by constant prayers you mean that the Praying-psalms may as well be imposed and enjoined for prayer as the other for praise you want the warrant of the Word and Spirit of God who hath appointed the whole Psalms to instruct our praise but not to regulat our prayers and so you widely miss your marke But here you insinuat two difficulties 1. How we come to sing Psalms-prayers and this you afterward enlarge by demanding our warrant for using all David's Psalms since many of them relating to particulars of Davids life belong not to us Others of them are imprecatorie hardly to be sung and many things there are in the Psalmes which we understand not and lastly there were not above twentie of the Psalms used by the Jews in Worship To this it is answered that being commanded we sing Psalms-prayers not with direct thoughts suted to the strain of Prayer wherein they were first framed and said before they were appointed to be sung but with a reflexe acknowledgement of the goodness and mercy of God the hearer of Prayer who both turned the Authors mourning into a song of gladness and hath appointed it to be so used by us that we may be encouraged and praise him in the like hope if in almost all Psalms of Praise we finde the preceeding distress and afflictions with the prayers and groanings therein made first pathetically commemorat as the ground of the ensuing praise for the deliverance is it not easie to apprehend how that a small reflection might after the Lord's reliefe have made the reciting of a Psalm wholly of lamentation the most exulting expression of the delivereds joy and may commend it to us to the same purpose For my part when I read or hear the 88 Psalme beginning with crying and ending with darkeness and like Iob's imprecation upon the day of his birth having no light shining but a cloud dwelling upon it and yet finde it a song of the Sons of Korah directed to the chief Musician I cannot but acknowledge it for a Psalme of high praise unto God who turned such dolefull mourning to be the matter of rejoicing and thus if you will rightly consider that the Psalmes are ordained for the matter of praise whereof the manner consisting in reflexe acts directed by the Spirit unto such suteable meditations as may excite our joy in and praises unto God is most rationally and warrantably expressed by singing you may very quickly be satisfied that the Saints their complainings David's particular