If you consent not to this you then must maintain that this Covenant excludeth not Infidels from salvation the term only being not implyed in the promise of pardon to Believers But if you grant all this as sure you will then it is most evident that Believing is taken in the same sense in the promise and in the threatning For no man breathing can tell me either how a Promise to one kind of faith can imply a threatning against the want of another kind or act of faith or else what that other faith must be that is so implyed if not the same And if it be the same faith that is implyed which is a most evident truth then it will follow that if I prove the Threatned unbelief to be a Rejecting of Christ as King the faith then that is made the condition of the promise must be the accepting of him as King as well as Priest But I have proved that not believing in Christ as King is part of the unbelief that is specially threatned werth condemnation therefore believing in him as King is part of that faith which hath the promise or is the Condition of Justification But saith Mr. Blake I further answer Rejecting Christ as King is a sin against the moral Law which damns Yet somewhat more then subjection to the Moral Law is required than a sinner may be saved Repl. For my part I know no Law but moral Law It s a strange Law that is not Moral as it is a strange Animal that is not quid Physicum But yet I partly understand what some others mean by the phrase Moral Law but what you mean I cannot tell for all your two volumns And it s to small purpose to dispute upon terms whose sense we be not agreed in nor do not understand one another in And you must better agree with yourselves before you agree with me I cannot reconcile these speeches Mr. Blake of the Covenant pag. 111. I know no other Rule but the old Rule the Rule of the Moral Law that is with me a Rule a perfect Rule and the only Rule Mr. Blake here pag. 563. Yet somewhat more then subjection to the Moral Law is required that a sinner may be saved I am confident you will allow me to think you mean somewhat more ex parte nostri and not only ex parte Christi And can that somewhat more be required without any Rule requiring it And yet I find you sometimes seeming offended with me for telling you I understand you not But I further answer you The rejecting of Christ as King is no further a sin against the Moral Law then the accepting him as King is a duty of the Moral Law Will you not believe this without a Dispute when you are told by Paul that where there is no Law there is no transgression and elsewhere that sin is a transgression of the Law And need not stand to prove that the same Law which is the Rule prescribing duty is the Rule discovering sin even that sin which is the Privation of that duty I desire no Readers that will not receive these things without any more arguing Mr. Blake adds Vnbelief if we speak properly doth not at all condemn further then as it is a breath of a Moral Commandment The privation of which you speak only holds the sentence of the Law in force and power against us which me thinks should be yeur judgement as well as mine seeing you are wont to compare the new Law as you call it to an act of oblivion And an act of oblivion saves many but condemns none Repl. It is in more then one thing I perceive that we differ But this is a truth that you must not so easily take out of our hands Though having had occasion to speak largely of it elsewhere I shall say but little now First Again I know no Commandment that is not moral But if you mean by Moral the Commandment either meerly as delivered by Moses or as written in Nature I am not of your mind nor ever shall be To be void of the belief of these Articles of the faith that this Jesus is the Christ that he was actually conceived by the Holy Ghost born of the Virgin Mary suffered under Pontius Pilate was crucified dead and buried Rose again the third day ascended into Heaven sitteth in our nature at the right hand of God gave the Holy Ghost to his Apostles to confirm the Doctrine of the Gospel with many more doth condemn further then as it is a breach either of the Mosaical or Natural Law yea in some respects as it is no breach of those Laws And yet the same sin materially may be a breach of several Laws and condemned by several Secondly you very much mistake my judgement here if you think it the same with yours Nor will the mention of an act of oblivion justifie your mistake I suppose an Act of oblivion may possibly have a Penalty anexed as that all that stand our and accept not of this pardon by such a year or day shall be remediless and lyable to a greater Penalty And I think if no Penalty be named there is one implyed For my part I am satisfied that the Remedying Law or the Law of Grace hath its special Threatning when I so often read it He that believeth shall be saved and he that believeth not shall be damned and unless ye believe that I am he ye shall die in your sins And I take it to differ from the Threatning of the law of works thus First In the matter of the condition which is not sin in general any sin but a special sin viz. the final rejecting the Remedy that is Refusing to turn to God by faith in Christ Secondly In the Penalty First The Gospel Penalty is Non-liberation from the curse of the Law Not to be forgiven or saved This had been but a Negation and not Penal if there had been no Christ and Gospel But it is a privation and penal now because by a special sin we forfeit our hopes and possibilities Secondly As to the degree I find it will be a far sorer punishment Heb. 10.29 The Law of greatest Grace doth threaten the greatest punishment Thirdly And doubtless in Hell Conscience will have a special kind of Accusations and self-tormentings in reflecting on the refusals of the remedy and treading under foot the blood of the new Covenant which is a punishment that was never threatned by the Covenant of works Fourthly And there will be a Privation of a greater Glory then ever was promised under the Law of works Fifthly As also of a special sort of eternal felicity consisting in loving the Redeemer and singing the song of the Lamb and being his members c. Thirdly And as there are these five differences in the Penalty besides that of the Condition of it so is there a considerable modal difference in the consummation it self viz. that of the Law of works was
do use it as a means then what means is it Is Prayer any cause of Pardon say so and you say more then we that you condemn and fall under all those censures that per fas aut nefas are cast upon us If it be no cause of pardon Is it a condition sine qua non as to that manner of pardoning that your prayer doth intend If you say yea you consequentially recant your disputation or Lecture and turn into the tents of the Opinionists But if it be no condition of pardon then tell us what means it is if you can If you say it is a duty I answer Duty and Means are commonly distinguished and so is necessitas praecepti medii Duty as such is no means to an end but the bare result of a command Though all Duty that God commandeth is also some means yet that is not qua Duty And so far as that Duty is a means it is either a Cause near or remote or a Condition either of the obtainment of the benefit simply or of the more certain or speedy or easie attainment of it or of obtaining some inferiour good that conduceth to the main So that still it is a Cause or a Condition if a means If you say It is an Antecedent I say qua tale that is no means but if a Necessary antecedent that which is the reason of its necessity may make it a means If you go to Physical prerequisites as you talkt of a mans shoulders bearing the head that he may see c. you go extra oleas It s a moral means that we treat of and I think you will not affirm Prayer to be a means of physical necessity to pardon If it were it must be a Physical cause near or remote or a Dispositio materiae of natural necessity c. If you say that prayer for pardon is dispositio subjecti I answer that 's it that we Opinionists do affirm But it is a dispositio moralis and necessary ut medium ad finem and that necessity must be constituted by the Promiser or Donor and that can be only by his modus promissionis which makes it in some measure or other a condition of the thing promised So that there is no lower moral medium then a meer condition sune qua non that my understanding can hitherto find out or apprehend Treat ibid. Paul Judgeth them dung and dross in reference to Justification yea all things c. Answ 1. But what are those All things 2. And what Reference to Justification is it If All things simply in all relation to Justification then he must judge the Gospel dung and dross as to the Instrumental collation of Justification and the Sacraments dung and dross as to the sealing of it and the Ministry dung and dross as to the preaching and offering it and beseeching men to be reconciled to God and Faith to be dung and dross as to the receiving of it as well as Repentance and Faith to be dung and dross as conditions of it or Prayer Obedience as conditions of continuing it 2. It s evident in the text that Pauls speaks of All things that stand in opposition to Christ and that stand in competition with him as such and not of any thing that stands in a necessary subordination to him as such 3. He expresly addeth in the text for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord this therefore is none of the all things that are dung for the All things are opposed to this And it containeth that faith which is works with the Opponents for this is more then a recumbency on Christ as Priest It is the Knowledge of him as Lord also I am confident I shall never learn to expound Paul thus I esteem All things even the knowledge of Christ Jesus as Lord and Prophet as dung for the Knowledge of him as Priest Also Paul here excepteth his suffering the loss of that All. I am confident that the All that Paul suffered the loss of comprehended not his Self-denyal Repentance Prayer Charity Hope c. 4. It is not only in reference to Justification that Paul despiseth All things but it is to the winning of Christ who doubtless is the Principle of Sanctification as well as Justification and to be found in him which containeth the sum of his felicity If a man should be such a self-contradicter as to set Repentance or Faith in Christ or Prayer in his Name or Hope in him c. against winning Christ and against being found in him or against the knowledge of him let that man so far esteem his faith hope prayer c. as dung If you should say I account all things dung for the winning of God himself as my felicity Would you have me interpret you thus I account the love of God dung and prayer to him and studious obeying him and the word that revealeth him c. even as they stand subordinate to him This same Paul rejoyced in the testimony of his conscience that in simplicity and godly sincerity he had had his conversation among them and he beat or subdued his body and brought it into subjection lest he should be Reprobated after he was justified and he prayed for pardon of sin and tells Timothy In doing this thou shalt save thy self c. therefore these things thus used were none of the All things that he opposed to the knowledge of Christ as dung Treat pag. 234 235. Others would avoid this Objection by saying that Gospel graces which are the Conditions of the Covenant are reducible to the Law and so Christ in satisfying the Law doth remove the imperfections cleaving to them And they judge it absurb to say that Christ hath satisfied for the sins of the second Covenant or breaches which is said to be only final unbelief Answ As this is brought in by head and shoulders so is it recited lamely without the necessary distinctions and explications adjoyned yea without part of the Sentence it self and therefore unfaithfully Treat But this answer may be called Legion for many errours and coctradictions are in it 1. How can justifying faith qua talis in the act of Justifying and Repentance be reducible duties to the Law taken strictly Indeed as it was in a large sense discovered to the Jews being the Covenant of Grace as I have elsewhere proved Vindic. Legis so it required Justifying Faith and Repentance But take it in the sense as the Abettor of this opinion must do justifying faith and repentance must be called the works of the Law Answ It s easilier called Legion then faithfully reported or solidly confuted 1. Let the Reader observe how much I incurr'd the displeasure of Mr. Blake for denying the Moral Law to be the sufficient or sole Rule of all duty and how much he hath said against me therein and then judge how hard a task it is to please all men when these two neighbours and friends do publikely thus draw
Instrument 4. And Repentance under the notion of a preparative or condition 5. But if you mean only that he excludes the co-operation or efficiency of works I yield as before 6. Paul expresly excludes only the works of the Law that is such as are considered in opposition to Christ or co-ordination as required by the Law of Works and not such as Christ himself enjoyneth in subordination to himself so they keep that place of subordination 7. Pauls Question is What is the Righteousness which must denominate a sinner just at the Bar of the Law And this he saith is no Works under any notion no not Faith but only Christs Righteousness and so faith must be taken relatively for certainly it is Christ and not Faith that is that Righteousness Is not this all that our Divines say or require and so say I over and over But Paul doth not resolve there what is the Condition on which Christ makes over this Righteousness of his so directly but collaterally 8. Or if you say he do yet if Paul speak of our first possession of Justification I say it is without not only the operation but the presence of works which is more then you say 9. Or whether he speak of begun or continued Justification I say we are justified without works in Pauls sense yea that they are not so much as a condition of the continuance of Justification For works in Pauls sense relate to the reward as of debt and not of Grace As a man that works to yearn wages as Paul plainly saith Rom. 4.4 To him that worketh the Reward is not of Grace but of Debt These works I disclaim as sinfull in their ends But obeying the Gospel or being willing that Christ who hath redeemed us should rule over us and running that we obtain and fighting the good fight of faith and suffering with Christ that we may be glorified with him and improving our Talent and enduring to the end and so doing good works and laying up a good foundation against the time to come I think Paul excludes not any of these from being bare conditions or causae sine quibus non of our Justification at Judgement or the continuance of it here Abrahams faith excluded works in Pauls sense as before but not works in this sense or in James his sense When you say my sense for reconciling Paul and James cannot be admitted 1. I would you had told me what way to do it better and answered what I have said in that 2. Your reason appears to me of no seeming force For first you say the one saith a Justification by faith without works you make Faith as well as works c. Answer 1. Paul saith not barely without works but without the works of the Law And I have shewed you what he means by works Rom. 4.4 2. I say no more then James that a man is justified by works and not by faith only I believe both these Scriptures are true and need no reconciling as having no contradiction in the terms And yet I speak not so broad usually as James doth Where you say that the Orthodox do sweetly reconcile them I know not who you mean by the Orthodox For I doubt not but you know the variety of interpretations to reconcile them Piscator and Pemble have one Interpretation and way of Reconciliation Calvin Paraeus and most Divines another Camero confuteth the best esteemed and hath another Brochmond with most of the Lutherans have another Jac. Laurentius Althemor and many more tell us of divers which of these you mean by the Orthodox I know not But if you exclude all those from the Orthodox that say as I say in this you will exclude as Learned Divines and well reputed of as most Europe hath bred viz. excellent Conrad Bergius Ludov. Crecius Johan Crocius Johan Bergius c. Who though they all dispute for Justification by faith without works understanding it of the first Justification for most Divines have taken Justification to be rigidly simul semel till Dr. Downam evinced that it is a continued Act yet they both take works for meriting works that respect the reward as of Debt and they say that otherwise Obedience is a Condition or cause as they make it of continuing or not losing Justification once attained And is not that to say as much as I And many more I can name you that say as much And you approve of Mr. Bals book which saith that works or a purpose to walk with God do justifie as a passive qualification of the Subject capable of Justification You add that we may dispute c. but you know not how a godly man at his death can look on his Graces as Conditions of the Covenant fulfilled by him c. Which speech seems strange to me I confess if I be so I am ungodly For I have been as oft and as long in the expectation of death as most men and still am and yet I am so far from being afraid of this that I should live and dye in horror and desperation if I could not look upon the conditions of the Covenant of Grace fulfilled by my self through goes workings If by our Graces you mean Habits I think it more improper to call them the fulfilling the conditions of the Covenant For what you say of the Papists you know how fundamentally almost they differ from me in this confounding the Covenants Righteousness c. If it were not to one that knows it better then my self I would shew wherein For your question How come the imperfections in our conditions to be pardoned You know I have fully answered it both in the Aphorisms and Appendix And I would rather you had given me one discovery of the insufficiency of that answer then asked the Question again Briefly thus Guilt is an obligation to punishment as it is here to be understood Pardon is a freeing from that Obligation or Guilt and Punishment All Punishment is due by some Law According to the Law or Covenant of Works the imperfection of our Faith Love Obedience c. deserve punishment and Christ hath satisfied that Law and procured forgiveness of these imperfections and so acquit us from Guilt and punishment The new Law or Covenant of Grace doth not threaten death to any but final Unbelievers and so not to the imperfection of our Faith Love Obedience where they are sincere And where the Law threatneth not Punishment there is no obligation to Punishment or Guilt on the party from that Law and so no work for Pardon Imperfect believers perform the conditions of the new Covenant truly and it condemneth none for imperfection of degree where there is sincerity No man is ever pardoned whom the new Law condemneth that is final Unbelievers or Rejecters of Christ So that Christ removeth or forgiveth that obligation to punishment which by the Law of Works doth fall on us for our imperfections And for the Law of Grace where it obligeth not
not every man that is saved so fulfill the conditions of the new Covenant and so is Evangelically righteous The condition is not Believe and obey perfectly but sincerely Quest 13. If there be no such thing as a personal Righteousness necessary to salvation besides imputed Righteousness 1. What is the meaning of all those Scriptures cited Thes 22. that say there is 2. And of our Divines that say there is inherent Righteousness And 3. What real difference between the godly and the wicked the saved and damned Quest 14. Have you found out any lower place for Love and Obedience then to be bare conditions if you acknowledge them any way conducible to final Justification or Salvation If you have what place is it and how called and why hath it not been discovered unto the world To say they are qualifications of the Subject is too general and comprizeth qualifications of different Natures and it shews not how they are conducible to the said ends and why a man may not be saved without qualifications as well as with them if God have not made them so much as conditions Quest 15. Seeing I ascribe not to Evangelical Obedience the least part of Christs Office or Honor nor make it any jot of our legal Righteousness where then lies the error or danger of my Doctrine Quest 16. Do not those men that affirm we have an inherent Righteousness which is so pronounced properly by the Law of works accuse the Law of God for blessing and cursing the the same man and action And how can that Law pronounce a man or his action righteous which curseth him and condemneth him to Hell for that same Action It makes me amazed to think what should be the reason that Divines contest so much that it is the Law of Works that pronounceth them inherently righteous which they know condemns them rather then the Law of Grace or new Covenant which they know absolveth them that sincerely perform it When all Divines acknowledge an inherent Righteousness and that the Law of Works is fulfilled by none and that it pronnunceth none righteous but the fulfillers and when the condition of the new Covenant must be performed by all that will be saved and when the Holy Ghost saith that it was by faith and so pronounced and measured by the Law of faith that Abel the second Righteous man in the world offered the excellent Sacrifice and by it obtained witness that he was righteous God testifying of his gift c. Heb. 11.4 Quest 17. Do not those Divines that will affirm that our inherent Righteousness is so called from its imperfect conformity to the Law of works and that it is the Law that pronounceth them righteous lay a clear ground for Justification by works in the worst sense for if the Law pronounce their works and them properly righteous then it justifieth them and then what need have they at least so far of Christ or Pardon yea and what Law shall condemn them if the Law of Works justifie them At least do they not compound their Righteousness as to the law of Works partly of Christs satisfaction and partly of their own Works Quest 18. Whether you should not blame Dr. Preston Mr. Norton Mr. Culverwel Mr. Throgmorton c. for laying by the good sound definition of Faith as you call it as well as me And is it not great partiality to let the same pass as currant from them which from me must be condemned And why would you agree to such a corrupt definition being one of the Assembly when theirs in the lesser Catechism and indeed both is in sence the very same with mine And why may not I be judged Orthodox in that point when I heartily subscribe to the National Assemblies Definition viz. that Faith is a saving Grace whereby we receive and rest on Christ alone for Salvation as he is offered to us in the Gospel Qu. 19. Do I say any more then the Assembly saith in the preceding Question What doth God require of us that we may escape his wrath and curse due to us for sin Answ God requireth of us to escape the said wrath and curse c. Faith in Jesus Christ repentance unto life with the diligent use of all the outward means whereby Christ communicateth to us the benefits of Redemption And is not Justification one benefit And is not final Justification a freeing us from that Curse Quest 20. Which call you the good sound definition of Faith When our famous Reformers placed it in Assurance Camero and others in perswasion such as is in the understanding others in Assent as Dr. Downam c. Others in a Belief of Gods special Love and that sin is pardoned Others in Affiance or Recumbency Others in divers of these Some as Mr. Ball calling it a fiducial Assent Others an obediential Affiancce Did not each of these forsake that which by the former was accounted the good sound Definition And why may not I with Dr. Preston Mr. Wallis c. say it is an Acceptance or consent joyned with Assent or with the Assembly and the rest say it is a receiving which is the same in a more Metaphorical term Quest 21. If you judge as Melanchton John Crocius Davenant Amesius c. that Faith is in both faculties how can you then over-leap the Elicite Acts of the will which have respect to means Eligere consentive uti Quest 22. If the formal reason of justifying faith lie in a Belief or Perswasion that Christ will pardon and save us or in an Affiance or resting on him or Trusting to him only for Salvation or in an Acceptance of him as a Saviour meerly to justifie and save from Hell Why then are not almost all among us justified and saved when I scarce meet with one of an hundred that is not unfeignedly willing that Christ should pardon and justifie and save them and do verily trust that Christ will do it and the freer it is the better they like it If they may whore and drink and be covetous and let alone all the practise of Godliness and yet be saved they will consent If it be said that they rest not on Christ for Justification sincerely I Ans. They do it really and unfeignedly and not dissemblingly which as we may know in all probability by others so we may know it certainly by our own hearts while unregenerate So that it is not the natural but the moral Truth that is wanting And what is that And wherein is the Essential formal difference between a wicked mans resting on Christ for Justification and a true Believers To say it is seen in the Fruits is not to shew the Essential difference Quest 23. If resting on Christ for Justification be the only condition of final Justification What is the reason that Perkins Bolton Hooker Preston Taylor Elton Whately and all the godly Divines also yet living do spend most of their labour to bring men to obey Christ as their Lord
and not the hundreth line or word to press them to Trust that he will pardon and save them All the powerfull Perachers that ever I heard however they dispute yet when they are preaching to the generality of people they zealously cry down laziness lukewarmness negligence unholyness prophaness c. As that which would be the liklyest cause of the damnation of the people But if only the foresaid saith be the condition and all other Graces or Duties be but meer signal effects of this and signal qualifications of the subject and not so much a conditions what need all this Were it not then better to perswade all people even when they are whoring or drunk to trust on Christ to pardon and justifie them And then when they have the tree and cause the fruits and signal effects will follow Quest 24. Yea Why do the best Divines preach so much against Presumption And what is Presumption if it be not this very faith which Divines call justifying viz. the Trusting to Christ for Pardon and Salvation only without taking him for their King and Prophet If it be said that this last must be present though not justifie How can the bare presence of an idle Accident so make or marr the efficacy of the cause Quest 25. If to be unwilling that Christ should raign over us be part of the directly condemning sin Luke 19.27 why is not the willingness he should raign part of saving justifying faith Quest 26. Seeing resting in Christ is no Physical apprehension of him who is bodily in Heaven nor of his Righteousness which is not a being capable of such an apprehension How can that Resting justifie more then any other Act but only as it is the condition to which the Promise is made Resting on a friend for a Benefit makes it not yours but his gift does that As Perkins cited by me To believe the Kingdom of France shall be mine makes it not mine But to believe Christ and the Kingdom of Heaven c. vid. loc where he saith as much as I vol. 1. p. 662. If God had not said He that believeth shall be justified and saved would Believing have done it And if he had said He that repenteth or loveth or calleth on the name of the Lord shall be justified or saved would not these have done it if so then doth not faith justifie directly as the condition of the Gift Promise or new Covenant And its apprehension is but its aptitude to be set apart for this Office And if it justifie as a condition of the Promise must not others do it so far as they are parts of the Condition Sir If you should deny me the favour I hope for in resolving these doubts yet let me hear whether I may expect it or not And in the interim I shall search in jealousie and pray for direction But till your Arguments shall change my judgement I remain confident that I can maintain most of the Antinomian Dotages against any man that denyeth the principles of my Book and that which is accounted novelty in it is but a more explicate distinct necessary delivery of common Truths Yours RICHARD BAXTER April 5 1650 Sir I Am sorry that you are not in capacity for the motion I profered I thought discourse would not so much infeeble you especially when it would have been in so loving a way And I judged it the more seasable because I had been informed of a late solemn conference you had about Paedobaptism which could not but much spend you I shall press no more for it although this very letter doth abundantly confirm me that letters are but a loss of time for one word might have prevented many large digressions Is not that endeavour of yours in your seventh question to prove out of my book that Repentance is a necessary condition or qualification in the Subject to be pardoned c. a meer impertinency You earnestly desire satisfaction of your conscience therefore I cannot think you do wilfully mistake For is that the state of the question with us Is it not this whether the Gospel Righteousness be made ours otherwise then by believing You say by believing and Obedience I say only believing I say faith is only the condition justifying or instrument receiving you make a justifying Repentance a justifying Patience you make other acts of grace justifying as well so that whereas heretofore we only had justifying faith now there are as many other qualities and all justifying as there are Graces So that I do firmly hold and it needs a recantation that repentance and other exercises of Grace are antecedent qualifications and are media ordinata in the use whereof only pardon can be had But what is this to you Who expresly maintain the righteousness of the Covenant of Grace to be made ours upon our godly working as well as believing If therefore you had spent your self to shew that faith had no peculiar Instrumentality in our Justification but what other Graces have then you had hit the mark What is more obvious then that there are many conditions in justificato which are not in actu justificationis The fastening of the head to the body is a necessary condition in homine vidente but it is not in actu videntis You grant indeed some precedency to faith but you make Faith and Works aequè though not aequaliter the conditions of Justification I should say much more to the state of the question but I forbear In other things you seem to come off and though I do not say you recede from your Assertions yet you much mollifie them that I need not therein contend with you But here is the stick Let it be demonstrated that whereas the Scripture in the current of it attributes Justification to believing only as through faith and by Faith and through faith in his blood that you can as truly say it s received by love and it s through love of his blood shed for our sakes c. This is a little of that much which might be said to the state of the question This I judge new Doctrine justifying Repentance justifying Charity And in my Letter I laid down an Argument Rom. 4. Concerning Abrahams Justification the Pattern of all others To this you reckon up many Answers but I see not the Argument shaken by it First you say you exclude a co-operation effective but why do we strive about words You do not exclude works justifying as well as faith let the expressions be what they will Whereas Paul saith he would be found having the Righteousness which is by faith you will add and which is by love by zeal 2. You desire it to be proved that Paul excludes all works under any notion I think it s very easily done First because of the immediate opposition between Faith and Works now you will contradict Pauls Argument and give a tertium works that are of Grace But the Apostles opposition is so immediate here and
in other places between faith and any thing of ours that he admits of no medium 2. He instances in Abrahams works and excludes them now were Abrahams works works done by the meer strength of the Law Did not Abrahams Obedience and other works flow from Grace Were Abrahams works in opposition to Christ Yet even these are excluded 3. He excludes all works under any notion by the opposition justifying covering all is wholly attributed unto God 4. The Assertion is universal The Apostle saith without works in general ver 6. And he works not ver 5. Lastly By the testimony he brings from the Psalmist that blessedness is where sin is not imputed whrere it is forgiven These reasons do evidence that he excludes works under all notions in the act of Justification though not from the person justified 3. You say how then saith James true But I ask if there be justifying works how saith Paul true But again James saith true for this faith which in respect of its act ad intra doth only justifie yet it works ad extra The old Assertion is fides quae viva not quo viva You speak of a seeming Antilogie among the orthodox in this reconciliation but though all go not eadem semiâ—â yet they do eadem viâ against works under any notion whatsoever in the act of Justification 4. You argue that faith as an Instrument is excluded Thus Bellarmine also apprehendere est opus therefore faith is excluded But non sequitur Faith is passive in its Instrumentality and although to believe be a Grammatical action its verbum activum yet its physicâ—n or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 passive A man by believing doth not operari but recipere As videre audire are Grammatical actions but Physical or natural passions now you cannot say thus of the exercises of other Graces this is the seeming strength of your Exceptions For Repentance is not excluded as qualifying but as recipient which is a fifth Exception As for your discourse whether Paul disputes what is our Righteousness or upon what terms it is made over to us it doth not much matter for indeed Paul speaks to both those only inclusively or collaterally as you say but that which he chiefly intends is to shew in what manner we are justified whether by believing or working and these he makes two immediate opposites not granting any tertium You speak of Faith taken relatively for Christs Righteousness but how can you find out such a figure for faith in your sence unless you will acknowledge Love or Obedience relatively for Christs Righteousness Indeed those that hold Faiâ—h instrumentally receiving the whole righteousness of Christ and no other Grace they often speak of faith taken relatively but so cannot you who hold that not only seeing this brazen Serpent but any other actions of sence will as well heal the wounded Christian You say you acknowledge the Assemblies definition of resting or receiving you cannot take in that sence as they declare it as the Scripture words which are Metaphorical do imply for its the resting of a burdened soul upon Christ only for Righseousness and by this Christs Righteousness is made over to us and it s a receiving of Christ as the hand embraceth any Object now you make the Righteousness of Christ made over to us in any other exercise of Grace as well as this So that although you would willingly seem not to recede from others yet you plainly do and although you think your Assertions are but more distinct explications yet they are indeed destructive Assertions to what our Divines do deliver neither may you while you intend to dispute exactly build upon some homiletical or popular expression in any mans book You reply to a second part in my Letter whether a godly man dying may be affected according to your position and thereupon you instance in Hezekiah Paul and that no man can dye with comfort without the evidence of these works But is this the state of the question with us Do you think that I deny a godly life to be a comfortable testimony and a necessary qualification of a man for pardon You cannot think that you speak to the point in this But here is the question Can a godly man dying think the Righteousness of Christ is made his by working or believing Is it repent and Christs Righteousness is by this made yours and rest in Christ Certainly the dying Christian is in agonies directed to this resting on Christ to the eying of this brazen Serpent not to be found in any thing but the Righteousness by faith It s an act of Dependance not of Obedience that interests us in Christs Righteousness It s that puts on the robes of Christ that our nakedness may not appear And that is very harsh still which you express to expect the Righteousness of the Covenant of Grace upon the conditions fulfilled by your se lf through Gods workings I am unwilling to parallel this with some passages that might be quoted out of unsound Authors but that I am confident howsoever your Pen-writes you have a tutissimum est to rest only upon Christs Righteousness and that by bare resting and beleiving you look for a Righteousness As Philosophers say we see or hear intus recipiendo not extra mittendo otherwise Bellarmine argues consonantly enough that Love would justifie as well as faith but we say that Faith doth pati Love doth agere Not but that faith is an active grace only in this act it is meer recipient Sir I have not time nor paper to answer those many questions the most of which I conceive impertinent to this business and your Explication of your self how imperfections in our Graces are done away and yet the conditions of righteousness is to me 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but I cannot go any further What I have written with much love and respect to you I should account it a great mercy to be instrumental to bring you to the right way again If there be so much Joy for reducing a wandring sheep be not offended if I say there will be much more for an erring shepheard though I hope at last your error may prove in words rather then in sence with heartly brotherly love I have written this and so let it be received from your fellow-labourer who honours Gods gifts in you and is also sensible of his own infirmities and proneness to err Dear Sir IF you doubt of the truth of my bodily infirmity it is because you neither know my body nor mind The dispute at Bewdley as it was almost at home so I had the choice of the time and such strength vouchsafed from God which I cannot again expect much less promise my self I told you I have some lucida intervalla perhaps a few hours in a moneth but if upon such uncertainty I should draw you to a journey and then ten to one fail you I should be injurious But seeing you so far and freely condiscend
that bona opera sequuntur justificatum non praecedunt justificandum in regard of our first justification I dare not say they are Antecedents or media ordinata Where you add what is that to you that make the righteousness of the Covenant of grace to be made ours upon our godly working c. I answer 1. I have shewed it is as much as I say if not more upon intending but a condition or medium ordinatum 2. I never said what you say I maintain in phrase or sense if the word made intend either efficiency or any causality or the first possession of Righteousness 3. You much use the harsh phrase of working as here Godly working as mine which I doubt whether ever I uttered or used And the term works I little use but in the explication of James For I told you that I disclaim works in Pauls sense Rom. 4.4 which make the reward not of grace but of debt You add If therefore you had spent your self to shew that faith hath no peculiar instrumentality in our justification but what other graces have then you had hit the mark Answ I confess Sir you now come to the point in difference But do you not hereby confess that I give no more to works then you but only less to faith Why then do you still harp upon the word works as if I did give more to them the task you now set me is to prove that faith doth no more and not that works do so much That faith is not an instrument and not that love or obedience are conditions And to this I answer you 1. I have in my book said somewhat to prove faith no instrument of justifying and you said nothing against it Why then should I aim at this mark 2. I think I have proved there that faith justifieth primarily and properly as the condition of the Covenant and but remotely as A receiving justification this which you call the instrumentality being but the very formal nature of the act and so the quasi materia or its aptitude to the office of Justifying And because I build much on this supposition I put it in the Queries which you judge impertinent 3. Yet if you will understand the word instrument laxely I have not any where denyed faith to have such an instrumentality that is receiving or apprehensiveness above other graces Only I deny and most confidently deny that that is the formal proper or neerest cause of faith's justifying But the formal reason is because God hath made it the condition of the Covenant promising justification to such receiving which else would have no more justified then any other act And therefore so far as others are made conditions and the promise to us on them they must needs have some such use as well as faith And that they are conditions you confess as much as I. 4. But what if I be mistaken in this point what is the danger If faith should deserve the name of an instrument when I think it is but a condition 1. Is it any danger to give less to faith then others while I give no less to Christ For if you should think I gave less to Christ then others I should provoke you again and again to shew wherein 2. I deny nothing that Scripture saith It saith not that faith is an instrument perhaps you will tell me Veronius argues thus But I mean it is neither in the letter nor plain sense and then I care not who speaks it if true 3. You make man an efficient cause of justifying himself For the instrument is an efficient cause And what if I dare not give so much to man is there any danger in it or should I be spoke against for the Doctrine of obedience as if I gave more to man then you when I give so much less 4. Those that dissent from me do make the very natural act of faith which is most essential to it and inseparable from it as it from it self viz. Its apprehension of Christs Righteousness to be the proper primary reason of its justifying What if I dare not do so but give that glory to God and not to the nature of our own act and say that Fides quae recipit Justificat sed non qua recipit primarily but as it is the condition which the free justifier hath conferred this honour upon is there any danger in this and will there be joy in heaven for reducing a man from such an opinion You say What more obvious then that there are many conditions in justificato which are not in actu justificationis The fastning the head to the body c. Answ 1. You said before that they are Antecedents Media ordinata and then they are sure conditions in justificando as well as in justificato 2. Your mention of the condition in homine vidente is besides our business and is only of a natural condition or qualification in genere naturae When we are speaking only of an active condition in genere moris The former is improperly the later properly called a condition 3. If this be your meaning I confess there are many natural or passive qualifications necessary which are no active or proper moral conditions in a Law-sense But this is nothing to the matter 4. The phrases of Conditions in justificato in actu justificationis are ambiguous and in the Moral sense improper Our question is whether they are conditions ad justificationem recipiendam Which yet in regard of time are in actu justificationis but not conditiones vel qualificationes ipsius actus And if you did not think that repentance is a condition ad justificationem recipiendam and so in actu justificationis how can you say it is medium ordinatum A medium as such essentially hath some tendency or conducibleness to its end 5. As obvious therefore as you think this is it is past the reach of my dull apprehension to conceive of your conditions in a judiciary sense which are in justificato for the obtaining of justification and not be both ad actum in actu justificationis for I suppose you are more accurate and serious then by the word condition to mean modum vel affectionem entis Metaphysicam vel subjecti alicujus adjunctum vel qualificationem in sense Physico when we are speaking only of conditions in sensu forensi And there are many thousand honest Christians as dull as I and therefore I do not think it can be any weighty point of faith which must be supported by such subtilties which are past our reach though obvious to yours God useth not to hang mens salvation on such School distinctions which few men can understand 6. And every such Tyro in Philosophy as I cannot reach your Phylosophical subtilty neither to understand that the fastning of the head to the body is not conditio in actu videntis though it be nothing to our purpose Indeed we may think it of more remote use
then some other and but propter aliud quasi conditio conditionis and if you say so of Repentance c. we should not disagree You say In other things I come off and so mollifie my assertions that you need not contend Answ 1. I would you had told me wherein I so come off For I know not of a word If you mean in that I now say obedience is no condition of our first attaining justification but only of the continuance of it c. I said the same over and over in my book and lest it should be over-lookt I put it in the Index of distinctions If you mean not this I know not what you mean 2. But if explication of my self will so mollifie and prevent contending I shall be glad to explain my self yet further Yea and heartily to recant where I see my error For that which you desire I demonstrate that its By love and Through love c. I have answered before by distinguishing of the sense of By and Through and in my sense I have brought you forty plain Texts in my book for proof of it which shew it is no new Doctrine To your argument from Rom. 4. Where you say that Abrahams justification is the pattern of all others I conceive that an uncouth speech strange to Scripture for phrase and proper sense though in a large sense tolerable and true Certain I am that Paul brings Abrahams example to prove that we are justified by faith without the works of the Law but as certain that our faith must differ from Abrahams even in the essentials of it We must believe that this Jesus is he or we shall dye in our sins which Abraham was not required to believe Our faith is an explicite Assent and Consent to the Mediators Offices viz. that he be our Lord and Saviour and a Covenanting with him and giving up our selves to him accordingly But whether Abrahams and all recited in Heb. 11. were such is questionable Too much looking on Abraham as a pattern seems to be it that occasioned Grotius to give that wretched definition of faith Annot. in loc that it is but a high estimation of Gods power and wisdom and faithfulness in keeping his promises c. yet I know he came short also of describing that faith which he lookt on as the pattern My first answer was that I exclude also any effective co-operation to which you say Why do we strive about words c. I see that mens conceivings are so various that there is no hopes that we should be in all things of one mind Because I was loth to strive about words therefore I distinguished between causality and conditionality knowing that the word By was ambiguous when we are said to be justified By faith c. now you take this distinguishing to be striving about words to avoid which you would bring we back to the ambiguous term again Whereas I cannot but be most confident that as guile is most in Generals so there would be nothing else between us but striving about words if we dispute on an unexplained term and without distinction Do you indeed think that to be an efficient cause of our justification and to be a bare condition is all one or do you think the difference to be of no moment You say I do not exclude works justifying as well as faith let the expressions be what they will Answ 1. You should have said Let the sense or way of justifying be what it will for sure the difference between an efficient cause and a condition is more then in the expression or else I have been long mistaken 2. I do not exclude God justifying Christ justifying the Word justifying c. and yet to distinguish between the way that these justifie in and the way in which faith justifies I take to be no striving about words but of as high concernment as my salvation is worth 3. Either you mislike my phrase or my sense if the phrase then you mislike the word of God which saith a man is justified by works and not by faith only If the sense then you should not fall upon the phrase and then to distinguish and explain is not to strive about words 4. If I do bring faith and obedience neerer in justification then others it is not by giving more to works then others but by giving less to faith And if in that I err you should have fallen on that and shewed it and not speak still as if I gave more to works then you I am sure I give less to man and therefore no less than you to Christ I perceive not the least disadvantage herein that I lye open to but only the odium of the phrase of justification by works with men that are carried by prejudice and custome 5. I will not quarrel about such a word but I like not your phrase of Faith justifying and works justifying for it is fitter to introduce the conceit of an efficiency in them then to say We are justified by faith and by works which are only the Scripture phrase and signifie but a conditionality To that you say out of Phil. 3.9 I believe Paul doth most appositely oppose the righteousness which is by faith to that which is by the Law But then 1. He means not By faith as an instrument of justification 2. Nor by faith which is but a meer affiance on Christ for justification or only as such 3. Nor doth he exclude Knowledge Repentance Obedience c. 4. But to say that righteousness or justification is by love or by obedience c. Without adding any more is not a convenient speech as it is to say that righteousness is by faith 1. Because the speech seems to be of the first receiving of righteousness wherein obedience or works have no hand 2. Because faith having most clear direct relation to Christ doth most plainly point out our righteousness to be in him 3. Because faith as it is taken in the Gospel is a most comprehensive grace containing many acts and implying or including many others which relate to Christ as the object also Even obedience to Christ is implyed as a necessary subsequent part of the condition seeing faith is an accepting of Christ as Lord and King and Head and Husband as well as a justifier 5. Yet Scripture saith as well as I that Christ shall justifie us By his knowledge and we shall be justified by our words and by works and me thinks it should be no sin to speak the words of God except it be shewed that I misunderstand them It is not so fit a phrase to say that a poor ignoble woman was made rich and honorable by her Love or Obedience or Marriage faithfulness and conjugal actions as to say it was by marriage with such a Noble man or consent to take him to be her husband For the marriage consent and Covenant doth imply conjugal affection action and faithfulness Yet are these last
reign is part of that faith which justifies Even willingness of his Reign as well as to be pardoned justified and saved from Hell by him or else few among us would perish For I never met with the man that was unwilling of these 3. And then it will easily appear Whether your Doctrine or mine be the more safe 1. Yours hath the many inconveniences already mentioned It maketh man his own justifier or the causa proxima of his own Justification and by his own Act to help God to justifie us for so all instruments do help the principal cause And yet by a self-contradiction it maketh faith to be of no Moral worth and so no vertue or grace Yea I think it layeth the blame of mans infidelity on God Many such wayes it seemeth to wrong the Father and the Mediator 2. And it seemeth also to wrong mens souls in point of safety both by drawing them so to wrong God and also by laying grounds to encourage them in presumption For when they are taught that the receiving of Christs righteousness or of Christ for justification or the confident expectation of pardon or resting on Christ for it or a particular perswasion of it c. Is justifying faith and when they find these in themselves as undoubtedly they may will this much or else they cannot presume Is it not easie then to think they are safe when they are not As I said I never yet met with the man that was not willing to be Justified and saved from Hell by Christ and I dare say Really willing and but with few that did not expect it from Christ and trust him for it Now to place Justifying faith only in that which is so common and to tell the men that yet they believe not truly when they have all that is made essential to faith as Justifying is strange For knowing that the godly themselves have fowly sinned and that no man can perish that hath Justifying faith how can they choose but presume when they find that which is called Justifying faith undoubtedly in themselves And to tell them it is not sincere or true because they receive not Christ also as King and Prophet and yet that such receiving is no part of justifying faith This is to tell them that the truth of their faith lyeth without it self a strange Truth in a signal concomitant and who will doubt of his faith for want of a concomitant sign when he certainly feeleth the thing it self Will not such think they may sin salva fide When as if they were rightly taught that justifying saving faith as such is the receiving of Christ for Saviour and Lord and so a giving up themselves both to be saved and guided by him then they would find that faith in Christ and sincere obedience to Christ have a little neerer relation and then a man might say to such a presumer as I remember Tertullian excellently doth De poenitent Operum pag. mihi 119. Caeterum non leviter in Domixum peccat qui quum amulo ejus Diabolo poenitentiâ renunciasset hoc nomine illum Domino subjecisset rursus â—undem regressusuo erigit exultatione ejus seipsum facit ut denuo malus recuperata praeda sua adversus Dominâ—m gaudeat Nonne quod dicere quoque periculosum est sed ad adificationem proferendum est dâ—abolum Domino praeponit Comparationem enim videtur egisse qui utrumque cognoverit judicato pronunciasse â—um meliorem cujus se rursus esse maluerit c. Sed aiunt quidam satis Deum habere si corde animo suspiciatur licet actu minus fiat itaque se salvo metu Fide peccare Hoc est salva castitate Matrimonia violare salva pietate parenti venenum temperare sic ergo ipsi salva venia in Gehennans detrudentur dum salvo metu peccant Again your Doctrine seemeth to me to overthrow the comfort of Believers exceedingly For how can they have any comfort that know not whether they are justified and shall be saved and how can they know that who know not whether they have faith and how can they know that when they know not what justifying saith is and how can they know what it is when it is by Divines involved in such a cloud and maze of difficulties some placing it in this act and some in that and some in a Passive instrumentality which few understand If any man in the world do For the Habit of faith that cannot be felt or known of it self immediately but by its acts for so it is concluded of all Habits Suarez Metap T. 2. disp 44 § 1. pag 332. and instead of the act we are now set to enquire after the passion and so in the work of examination the business is to enquire how and when we did passively receive righteousness or justification or Christ for these which let him answer for himself that can for I cannot But now on the other side what inconvenience is there in the Doctrine of faith and justification as I deliver it As it is plain and certain saying no more then is generally granted so I think it is safe Do I ascribe any of Christs honour in the work to man No man yet hath dared to charge me with that to my knowledge and no considerate man I believe will do it I conclude that neither faith nor works is the least part of our legal righteousness or of that righteousness which we must plead against the accuser for our justification which is commonly called by Divines the matter of our justification The Law which we have broken cannot be satisfied nor God for the breach of it in the least measure by our faith or obedience nor do they concur as the least degree of that satisfaction But we must turn the Law over wholly to our Surety Only whereas he hath made a new Law or Covenant containing the conditions on our part of the said justification and salvation I say these conditions must needs be performed and that by our selves and who dare deny this and I say that the performance of these conditions is our Evangelical righteousness in reference to that Covenant as Christs satisfaction is our legal Righteousness in reference to that first Covenant or as perfect obedience would have been our legal righteousness if we had so obeyed And for them that speak of inherent Righteousness in any other sense viz. as it is an imperfect conformity to the Law of works rather then as a true conformity to the Law or Covenant of grace I renounce their Doctrine both as contradictory to it self and to the truth and as that which would make the same Law to curse and bless the same man and which would set up the desperate Doctrine of Justification by the works of the Law For if men are righteous in reference to that Law then they may be so far justified by it Nor do I ascribe to works any part of the office or
14.9 And therefore when we are freely pardoned bought from hell it is equal that Christ should rule us who bought us and that his Covenant hang till the continuance of our Legal title to pardon justification and glory and so the full possession of them upon this perseverance in sincere loving grateful subjection to him that bought us and by him to the Father And thus Sir I have digressed and used many words on this which to you I think needless not only because I perceive that you acknowledge the conditionality of obedience in some sense but tell me not in what sense but lest you should not discern my sense who desire to speak as plain as I can that you may truly see wherein we differ And that I also may see it when you have as clearly opened your meaning of your term Qualifications And for your Question Whether a godly man can think the Righteousness of Christ made his by working or only believing I answer causally and efficiently by neither I think though you think otherwise I dare not so advance faith and so advance man I remember good old learned solid Gatakers words to Saltmarsh pag. 53 It is your self rather then any of us that trip at this stone when you would have faith so much pressed in the Doctrine of salvation in regard of the gloriousness and eminency of the grace it self which to assert is not sound sic in Animadv in Lucium part 1. § 9. v. 7. The righteousness of Christ is made ours by Gods free gift but faith and true subjection are conditions of our participation and what interest each hath in the conditionality and on what grounds I have shewed I fear you give too much to faith and man You ask Is it repent and Christs righteousness by this is made yours Answer It is oftimes Repent and be forgiven and repent and be baptized and repent and believe and be forgiven but not efficiently by repenting nor believing but on condition of both though in ordaining them conditions God might intend one but as preparative or subservient to the other and not one equal terms or to equal use immediately And when you say that the dying Christian is directed to the Resting on Christ and eâ—ing the brazen Serpent not to be found in any thing but a righteousness by faith I never durst entertain any doubt of this it is no question between us only in what sense it is called a Righteousness by faith I have shewed even in opposition to Works in Pauls sense which make the reward to be of debt and not of Grace Rom. 4.4 where you say It is an Act Dependance not of Obedience that interests us in Christs Righteousness I answer It is no one Act but many It is an act of Assent first and thence the whole hath the name of faith it being so hard a thing to believe supernatural things as it would have been to us to believe Christ to have been God when we had seen him in the shape of man had we lived in those times when the Doctrine of faith came not with those advantages as now it doth And then it is an act of willing consenting electing affecting which three are but a velle Respectivum and so in the act all one in this in order of nature goes before any act which you can in any reasonable propriety call Dependance and I doubt not are far more essential to justifying faith yet I am heartily willing to take your acts of dependance for those also are more then one in the next place But it confoundeth and abuseth us and the Church in this controversie that many learned Divines will needs shun the strict Philosophical names of the several Acts of the soul and overlook also the natural order of the souls motions and they will use and stil use the Metaphorical expressions as apprehension improper dependance relying resting recombency adherence embracing with more the like I know Scripture useth some of these but then it is not in strict disputing as Joh. Crocius tels Bellarm. We may use apprehend figuratively because Scripture saith apprehendite disciplinans and lay hold on eternal life But this would quickly end disputation or else make it endless Yet in the places cited who knows not the same word hath different senses in the former being used for to accept and stoop to in the later for an earnest pressing on and endeavouring after as a runner to catch the prize And they will be loth to say these are all and each of them the justifying acts And where you add that it s not an act of obedience I answer 1. I would you had first answered the many Scriptures to the contrary produced in my Aphor. 2. It s true of the first interest in Christ further then faith is called obedience but not of the further continued and consummate interest 3. Doth not Christ say Take my yoak learn of me to be meek and lowly that they may have ease and rest Ease and Rest From what Why from what they came burdened with and that was sure guile and curse and what ever is opposed to pardon and justification Mat. 11. And Blessed are they that do his commandments that they may have right to the tree of life and may enter in c. Rev. 21.14 And he is the Author of eternal salvation to all them that obey him Heb. 5.9 And Mat. 25. is who'ly and convincingly against you And so is the second Psalm wholly which makes subjection to Christ as King the great part of the Gospel condition Kiss the son conteineth more then Recombency in my judgement and yet no more then that true faith which is the condition of justification But no word in your paper brings me to such a stand as your next where you say And that is very harsh still which you express to expect the Righteousness of the Covenant of Grace upon the conditions fulfilled by your self through Gods workings Answ Truly it is quite beyond my shallow capacity to reach what you here mean to be so harsh what should I imagine That there are conditions upon which the Tenor of the Gospel gives Christ Righteousness you acknowldge And that he that performeth them not the Gospel giveth him none of it I know you confess these And that we must needs perform them our selves through Gods workings i. e. both enablement and excitation and co-operation I know you doubt of none of these for you have wrote against the Antinomians and Mr. Gataker hath evinced the sottish ignorance or impudency of Saltmarsh in denying Faith Repentance and Obedience to be the conditions on which performed by us we must enjoy the things promised Pardon c. or else not Yea in this paper you yield to this conditionality What then is the matter Is it harsh when yet you never once shew the fault of the Speech It must be either the falshood or the unfitness but you have yet accused it of
will not be effectual to our Justification without Faith and repentance But perhaps this Writer means only to shew his offence against my naming Christs righteousness legal If that be so 1. I have given in my reasons because there can be no better reason of a name then from the form and the form of Christs righteousness being relative even a conformity to the Law of works and to the peculiar Covenant of redemption I thought did sufficiently warrant this name 2. The rather when I find not only that he is said to fulfill the Law and all righteousness and be made a curse for us but also to be righteous with that righteousness which is denyed of us which can be none but a legal or prolegal righteousness 3. But yet if the name Legal be all I could easily have given this Brother leave to differ from me about a name without contention and methinks he might have done the like by me Mr. W. Object But what if works and faith were both of them applyed to procure our Justification Answ This Objection yet further shews that the Author understands me not if it be me as I have reason to judge that he writeth against for he supposeth that its works that I call a legal Righteousness when I still tell him it is Christs satisfaction and fulfilling the Law of which our faith or works are no part but a subordinate particular Evangelical Righteousness Mr. W. 5. If both these kinds of Righteousness were absolutely necessary then where one of them is wanting in a person there can be no Justification of that person But Ergo. For where was any Legal Righteousness of the good thief on the Cross condemned for legal unrighteousness Answ I deny your minor The converted thief had a legal righteousness hanging on the next Cross to him even Christ that then was made a curse for him and was obedient to the death of the Cross I begin to be a weary in writing so much only to tell men that you understand me not Mr. W. 6. If legal Righteousness be thus necessarily to be joined with our Evangelical Righteousness to Justification then there must be two formal causes of Justification Answ I deny your consequence If the formal cause consist in remission and imputation as you say then Christs meritorious righteousness is none of the Form but the Matter And if besides that Matter a subservient particular righteousness of faith be necessary as the condition of our Title to Christ this makes not two forms of this Justification 2. And yet I grant you that it infers a subservient Justification that hath another form when you are made a Believer or justified against the false charge of being no Believer or penitent this is not remission of sin but another form and thing Mr. W. 7. That which maketh void Christs death cannot be absolutely necessary to Justification But legal righteousness makes void his Death Gal. 2.21 Answ It s a sad case that we must be charged with making void Christs Death for saying that he is legally Righteous by satisfying and fulfilling the Law and that this is all the legal righteousness that we have I am bold therefore to deny the Minor yea and to reverse it on you and tell you that he that denyeth Christs legal Righteousness denyeth both his death and obedience The Text Gal. 2.21 speaks not of the Law as fulfilled by Christ but by us Righteousness comes not by our keeping the Law but it came by Christs keeping it yet so that the Gospel only giveth us that righteousness of his Mr. W. 8. That which concurs with another efficient must have both an aptitude and Confluence to produce the effect but the Law and consequently Legal righteousness hath no aptitude to give life Gal. 3.2 Answ This is Disputing enough to make one tremble and loath Disputing Is there no aptitude in Christs legal Righteousness to give us life The Law doth not give us righteousness but it denominateth Christ righteous for fulfilling it and the Law-giver for satisfying and to that it had a sufficient aptitude The Text Gal. 3.2 saith truly that the Law giveth not life but first it speaks of the Law as obeyed by us and not by Christ that fulfilled it Secondly And indeed its speaks of Moses Law and not directly of that made with Adam Thirdly And it denies not that Christ fulfilling it may give us life though the Law it self give us none so that all this is besides the business Mr. W. 9. That Doctrine which doth most exalt the Grace of God ought to be admitted before that which doth least exalt it But the Doctrine of Justification by Faith alone as our Gospel-righteousness doth most exalt his Grace and the other less Ergo. Answ Still misunderstanding Doth the Doctrine of faith alone without Christ advance Grace That 's no faith You do not think so that which denyeth Christ or faith denyeth Grace Mr. W. 10. That opinion which considereth a person under a two-fold Covenant at the same time ought not to be admitted But to require both Legal and Evangelical Righteousness is to consider him under the Covenant of works and Grace I conclude therefore that two sorts of righteousness are not necessarily required to our Justification Answ How far we are or are not under the Covenant of works I will not here trouble you by digressing in this rambling Dispute to enquire But to your Minor I say this opinion considereth man only under the curse of the Law till Christ take it off him by being made a curse for us and making over the fruit of his merits and suffering to us Mr. W. 2. As for the Subjects of these kinds of Righteousness I thus declare 1. That Jesus Christ and he alone who was truly endued with Legal righteousness who as he was made under the Law so he did not destroy but fulfill it and if he had not been the subject of Legal righteousness in himself he could not have been the Author of Evangelical Righteousness to us Answ Here after all these Arguments I have all that granted me that I contend for supposing the Imputation or Donation of Christs Righteousness to us whether in se or in â—ffectis I now dispute not You have here his full confession that Christ had a legal Righteousness Let him but grant the imputation of this and then it s ours And then I have granted him that it may be also called Evangelical in another respect Mr. W. pag. 166. I think it to be no incongruity in speech or Paradox in Divinity to say that Christs Legal righteousness is our Evangelical righteousness 1 Cor. 1.30 2 Cor. 5.21 Jer. 23.8 Answ Sure we shall agree anon for all the ten Arguments Here 's all granted but the name as to us Many and many a time I have said that Christs Righteousness made ours is Legal in respect to the Law that it was a conformity to and which it answereth for us but
also of the objec as an offered good besides the understandings Assent to the Truth of the word which offereth it The former is by the Apostle oft distinguished from Love and is said to work by Love as the lively acts of the understanding produce answerable motions in the will But the later is that faith which justifieth to wit The Receiving of an offered Christ And this comprizeth both the Act of the Understanding and Will as almost all Protestant Divines affirm But both these acts together are called Faith from the former which is most strictly so called because the great difficulty then lay in Believing the Truth of the Gospel and would do still if it were not for the advantages of Credit Education Custom c. therefore the whole work is thence denominated though yet the compleating of the work be in the Will and the Understandings Act but preparatory thereto 2. You must also distinguish between Love to Christ the Mediator and the Grace of Charity in general as it is extended al so to God as Creator to Saints to all men c. And between that first act of Love which is in our first receiving of Christ and the love which we afterwards exercise on him and so I answer you 1. That as the Apostle distinguisheth between Faith Hope and Love So do I. 2. Faith taken strictly for assent to Divine Testimony produceth love in every one of the forementioned senses of the word Love 3. Justifying faith comprizing the wills acceptance produceth both the grace of Charity as it is exercised on other objects and also the following acts of it towards Christ the Mediator And so I acknowledge that Faith worketh by Love and that Love is not faith But yet whether Love be not in some sense essential to justifying faith if you speak only of Love to Christ and that not as a distinct grace but as it is comprized in our Acceptance of him at first I shall leave to your consideration when you have first resolved these things 1. Whether justifying faith be not an act of the Will as well as the Understanding Few but Papists deny it and not all of them 2. Whether Christ himself be not the object of it Few Protestants will deny it 3. Whether Good be not the object of the Will and so Christ be not willed as Good None doubts of it 4. Whether this willing be not the same as Loving as love is found in the rational appetite Sure Aquinas saith so no man that I know contradicting it 5. Whether you can call Affiance or any other act of the will justifying faith excluding this willing or not principally including it For 1. This is the Wills first act towards it object and will you say that Love goes before justifying faith and so before Justification and such a Love as is distinct from justifying faith as being no part of it How then is Love the fruit of faith and as Divines say a consequent of Justification Yet it is beyond all doubt that this Velle or Love to Christ goes before Affiance on him or any other act of the Will vide Aquin. 1.2 Q. 23. a. 33. Et. 1. Q. 20. a. 1 Et Tolet de anima l. 3. cap. 9. Q. â—7 28 Et Ames contra Gravinchou pag. 16. 2. And can it be imagined that preceding assent and subsequent Affiance in Christ should be conditions of our Justification and yet the Velle Christum oblatum that Willing which we call Consent Election or Acceptance which goeth between assent and Affiance should be excluded as no part of this condition 3. Especially considering that Affiance contains divers acts whereof one is of the Irascible of the sensitive and so is but an imperate act of the Will and less noble then that elicite Act which I plead for as well as Posterior to it and if Aquin. be not out in his Philosophy when he so oft saith that fiducia is spes roborata then our Divines make Hope to justifie Yet for all this I have not espoused this saying that Love to Christ is Essential to justifying faith nor will contend with any man that thinks it unmeet if we agree in the things of moment I hate to quarrel about words Nor do I think it a meet phrase to say we are justified by Love though in the sense before mentioned I think it true because it is but a part or affection as it were of that reception by which we are justified and stands not in so full a relation to the object received And yet if I had said none of all this I see not that I need any more then to deny your consequence as being wholly ungrounded For it followeth not that if it be an essential part that therefore it must have the Denomination of the whole yea though the whole be said to work by that part The Brain and Heart are essential parts of the Body and yet not to be called the Body and it is more proper to say that the body works by the Brain or Heart or that the vegetative soul doth work by the natural heat and Spirits then to say the Body worketh by the Body or the vegetative soul by it self I will explain all together in my usual Similitude which is Dr. Prestons or rather Pauls A condemned Beggar is offered a Pardon and also to be made a Queen if she will but take the Prince for her Husband Now here put your Questions 1. Is Love any part of the Condition of her Pardon and Dignity Answer Yes An essential part for Consent is of the Essence of it and Love is essential to true consent to receive any offered good Not love as it is a Passion but as it is an act of the rational Appetite which is but Velle And Eligere Consentire Acceptare are nothing else but a respective Willing 2. But it is not Love as a Vertue in general or as exercised on any other object which is this essential part of the Condition but only love to him whom she marrieth And so her first love is necessary to her Pardon and Dignity as begun and her continued love and marriage-faithfulness is necessary to them as they are to be continued supposing the Prince to know the heart as Christ doth Qu. 2. Is it then a meet phrase to say that she is pardoned and dignified by loving such a Prince Answ It hath some Truth in it but it is not a fit speech but rather that it is by marrying him because Love is but a part or as it were an Affection of that Marriage Covenant or consent which indeed doth dignifie her Love may be without marriage but not Marriage cordially without Love So in our present case justifying faith is the very Marriage Consent or Covenant with Christ It is therfore fitter to say we are justified by it then by love because the former expresseth the full condition the latter not Qu. 3. If love be an essential part of the
cause as they think some other Act is Paul doth not exclude that which he makes necessary Argument 5. That which makes not the Reward to be of Debt and not of Grace is none of the works that Paul sets faith against But other acts of faith in Christ do not make the reward to be of Debt and not of Grace any more then the one act which you will choose E. g. Believing in Christ as King and Teacher any more then believing in him as a Ransom therefore they are not the works that Pauls sets faith against The Major is proved from the Description of the excluded works Rom. 4.4 The Minor is evident Argument 6. All acts of Faith in Christ as our Justifier are such as are opposed to works by Paul and are none of the works which faith is opposed to But they are more then one or two that are Acts of faith in Christ as Justifier Ergo. The Major I think will be granted the Minor is plain For 1. Christ justifieth us meritoriously as a Sacrifice 2. And as Obeying and fulfilling the Law 3. As the complement of his satisfaction and the entrance upon his following execution his Resurrection justifieth us 4. As the Heavenly Priest at Gods right hand he justifieth us by his Intercession 5 As King and Head he justifieth us by his Covenant or Law of Grace 6. As King and Judge he justifieth us by sentence 7. As Prophet he teacheth us the Doctrine of Justification and how to attain to Justification by sentence So that at least none of these are the excluded works Argum. 7. If the whole Essence of Christian faith be opposed to works and so be none of the opposed works in the matter of Salvation then it s so also in the matter of Justification But the Antecedent is true therefore so is the Consequent The Minor is confessed by my Opponents The consequence of the Major I prove 1. Because Salvation is as free as Justification and no more of works which Paul excludeth 2. Salvation comprehendeth Justification and Glorification hath the same conditions as final Justification at Judgement it being part of Justification to adjudge that Glory 3. The express Scripture excludes works as much from Salvation as from Justification Eph. 2.8 9. For by Grace ye are saved through faith and that not of your selves it is the gift of God not of works lest any man should boast Tit. 3.5 6 7. Not by works of Righteousness which we have done but according to his Mercy he saved us by the washing of Regeneration and the renewing of the Holy Ghost which he shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Saviour that being justified by his Grace we should be made Heirs according to the hope of eternal Life Many such places are obvious to any diligent Reader For the Minor also read 1 Cor. 15.1 2 3 4 5 6 c. Argum. 8. If no man can name any one Act of faith that is opposed to all the rest as works or opposed to works when the rest are not then no such thing it to be asserted But no man can name the Act that is thus opposed alone to works 1. It is not yet done that I know of We cannot get them to tell us what Act it is 2. And if they do others will make as good a claim to the Prerogative Argum. 9. They that oppose us and affirm the Question do feign God to have a strange partiality to one Act of faith above all the rest without any reason or aptitude in that act to be so exalted But this is not to be feigned and proved it cannot be that God should annex our Justification to the Belief in Christ as a sacrifice only and to oppose this to belief in him as Rising Interceding Teaching Promising or Judging is a fiction contrary to Scripture Examine any Text you please and see whether it will run well with such an Exposition Rom. 4.4 5. Now to him that worketh i. e. Believeth in Christ as Teacher Judge Intercessor is the reward not reckoned of Grace but of Debt But to him that worketh not that is believeth not on Christ as King and Teacher c. but Believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly an act of his Kingly office c. Doth this run well I will not trouble you with so unsavoury a Paraphrase upon the like Scriptures you may try at pleasure on Rom. 3. 4. and Gal. 3. Eph. 2. Phil. 3. or any such Text. Argument 10. If the Doctrine of the Opponents holding the Affirmative were true then no man can tell whether he be a condemned Legalist or not yea more if it be not faith in Christ as such containing the whole Essence by which we are justified as opposed to works or which is none of the excluded works then no man can tell but he is a condemned Legalist But the Consequent is false therefore so is the Antecedent The Reason of the Consequence is because no man is able to tell you which is the sole justifying Act or which are the only acts if it be not faith Essentially that is it for among all the acts before mentioned if a man mistake and think one other E. g. faith in Christs Resurrection in Christ as King Judge Teacher c. is it by which he must be justified then he falls upon Justification by Works and so falls short of Grace for if it be of Works then it is no more of Grace else Works were no Works And so no man can tell but he destroyeth Grace and expecteth Justification by works much less can weak Christians tell I never yet saw or heard from any Divine a just Nomination with proof of the one Justifying act or a just Enumeration of the many acts if all must not be taken in that are Essential Some say Affiance is the only act but as that 's confuted by the most that take in Assent also so there are many and many acts of Affiance in Christ that are necessary and they should tell us which of these it is Object And do you think that we can any better tell when we have all that are Essential Or doth every weak Christian believe all the twenty Articles that you mentioned at first Answ 1. We can better know what is Revealed then what 's unrevealed The Scripture tells us what faith in Christ is but not what one or two acts do Justifie excluding all other as Works Divines have often defined Faith but I know not that any hath defined any such one act as thus exalted above the rest of the Essence of Faith If we covld not tell what is essential to Faith we could not tell what faith is 2. The twenty Objects of Assent before mentioned are not all Articles or material Objects the second is the formal Object And of the rest unless the Fifth Believing that Christ was conceived by the Holy Ghost and born of a Virgin may be excepted which I dare not affirm
believing the record that God hath given of his Son and that record is not only concerning Justification or the merit of it So 2. Thes 2.12 That all they might be damned who believed not the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness So 2 Thess 1.8 9 10. That obey not the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ is the description of the Vnbelievers opposed to them that believe ver 10. So Jo. 8.24 If ye believe not that I am he ye shall die in your sins which as to the act and effect is contrary to justifying faith And that I am he is not only that I am the Ransome but also that I am the Messiah and Redeemer So John 16.8 9. He willl reprove the world of sin not only in general that they are sinners but of this sin in specie because they believed not in me Many texts may be cited where justifying faith and condemning unbelief are described from acts of the understanding though the will be implyed as believing or not believing that Christ is the son of God c. which cannot possibly be restrained to his Ransom and Merit alone The Consequence cannot be denyed if it be but understood that this unbelief doth thus specially condemn not in general as sin or by the meer greatness of it but as the privation of that faith by which only men are justified For Privatives shew what the Positives are And if this unbelief did condemn only as a sin in general then all sin would condemn as it doth but that is false And if it condemned only as a great sin then first every sin as great would condemn as it doth and secondly it would be Derogatory to the preciousness and power of the Remedy which is sufficient against the greatest sins as great It remains therefore that as it is not for the special worth of faith above all other Graces that God assigned it to be the condition of Justification so it is not for a special greatness in the sin of unbelief that it is the specially condemning sin but as it is the Privation of that faith which because of its peculiar aptitude to that Office is made of such necessity to our Justification But saith Mr Blake This is like the old Argument Evil works merit condemnation therefore good works merit salvation An ill meaning damns our good meaning therefore saves Repl. First A palpable mistake Meriting and saving by merit are effects or efficiencies so plainly separable from the things themselves that the invalidity of the Consequence easily appears But in good sadness did you believe when you wrote this that he that argueth from the description or nature of a privation to the description or nature of the thing of which it is the Privation or that argueth from the Law of opposites and contradictions doth argue like him that argues from the moral separable efficiency or effect of the one to the like efficiency or effect of the other Secondly But understand me to argue from the effect it self if you please so it be as affixed by the unchangeable Law or Covenant of God I doubt not but the Argument will hold good As under the Law of works it was a good argument to say Not-perfect-obeying is the condemning evil therefore perfect-obeying is the justifying condition So is it a good argument under the Covenant of Grace to say Not-believing in Christ as King Priest and Prophet is the specially-condemning unbelief therefore believing in Christ as King Priest Prophet is the faith by which we are justified The main force of the reason lyeth here because else the Covenant were equivocating and not Intelligible if when it saith He that believeth shall be saved and he that believeth not shall be damned it did speak of one kind or act of faith in one Proposition and of another in the other If when it is said He that believeth shall be justified from all things c. and he that believeth not shall be condemned if you believe you shall not come into condemnation but if you believe not you are condemned and the wrath of God abideth on you He that believeth shall be forgiven and he that believeth not shall not be forgiven I say if the Affirmative and Negative Propositions the Promise and the Threatning do not here speak of the same believing but divers then there is no hope that we should understand them and the language would necessitate us to err Now the Papists Argument ab effectis hath no such bottom Bad works damn therefore good works save For the Covenant is not He that doth good works shall be saved and he that doth bad works shall be condemned But he that obeyeth perfectly shall be justified and he that doth not shall be condemned Or if they argue from the threatning of the Gospel against bad works to the merit of good quoad modum procurandi it will not hold viz. that Evil works procure damnation by way of merit therefore good works procure salvation by way of merit For there is not eadem ratio and so no ground for the Consequence Nor did I argue ad modum procurandi Rejecting Christ as King doth condemn by way of merit therefore accepting him as King doth save by way of merit This was none of my arguing But this Rejecting or not believing in Christ as King is part of that Vnbelief which is by the Law of Grace threatned with condemnation therefore accepting or believing in Christ as King is part of that faith which hath the Promise of Justification And so if a Papist should argue not ad modum procurandi but ad naturam actus effecti I would justifie his Argument Raigning sin Rebellion or the absence of Evangelical good works is Threatned by the Gospel with condemnation at Judgement therefore good works have the Promise of salvation or justification at Judgement And that I may and must thus understand the Condemning Threatning and the Justifying promise to speak of one and the same faith I am assured by this because it is usual with God in scripture to imply the one in the other As in the Law of works with perfect maâ— the promise was not exprest but implyed in the Threatning In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt die So in the Gospel the Threatning is oft implyed in the promise He that believeth shall not perish When the Lord saith The soul that sinneth shall die It implyeth that the soul that sinneth not shall not die And though we cannot say the like of the prohibition of Eating the forbidden fruit that is because the same Law did on the same terms prohibite all other sin as well as it And in the day that thou sinnest thou shalt die doth imply if thou sin not thou shalt not die So he that believeth shall be saved doth imply he that believeth not shall be condemned And so If thou believe thou shalt be justified implyeth If thou believe not thou shalt not be justified
act it self and therefore it is not faith as faith that is as it is an apprehension of Christ or recumbency on him that Justifyeth nor yet as an Instrument thus acting The nature of the act is but its aptitude to its office or justifying Interest and not the formal cause of it Proposition 6. No work or act of man is any true proper cause of his justification as Justification is commonly taken in the Gospel neither Principal or Instrumental The highest Interest that they can have is but to be a condition of our Justification and so a Dispositio moralis which therefore some call cansa dispositiva and some causa sine qua non and it s indeed but a Nominall cause and truly no cause at all Proposition 7. Whatsoever works do stand in opposition to Christ or disjunct from him yea or that stand not in a due subordination to him are so far from Justifying even as conditions that they are sins which do deserve condemnation Proposition 8. Works as taken for the Imperate Acts of Obedience external distinct from the first Radical Graces are not so much as conditions of our Justification as begun or our being put into a Justified state Proposition 9. Repentance from dead works denying our our selves renouncing our own Righteousness c. much less external Obedience are not the receptive condition of our Justification as faith is that is Their nature is not to be an actual Acceptance of Christ that is they are not faith and therefore are not designed on that account to be the Condition of our Justification Proposition 10. God doth not justifie us by Imputing our own faith to us in stead of perfect Obedience to the Law as if it were sufficient or esteemed by him sufficient to supply its place For it is Christs Righteousness that in point of value and merit doth supply its place nor doth any work of ours justifie us by satisfying for our sins for that 's the work of Christ the Mediator Our faith and love and obedience which are for the receiving and improving of him and his Righteousness and so stand in full subordination to him are not to be made co-partners of his office or honor Affirm Proposition first We are justified by the merits of a perfect sinless Obedience of Christ together with his sufferings which he performed both to the Law of nature the Law of Moses and the Law which was proper to himself as Mediator as the subject obliged Proposition 2. There is somewhat in the nature of faith it self in specie which makes it fit to be elected and appointed by God to be the great summary Condition of the Gospel that it be Receptive an Acceptance of Christ is the nature of the thing but that it be a condition of our Justification is from the will and constitution of the Donor and Justifier Proposition 3. There is also somewhat in the nature of Repentance self-denyal renouncing all other Saviours and our own righteousness desiring Christ loving Christ intending God and Glory as our end procured by Christ confessing sin c. which make them apt to be Dispositive Conditions and so to be comprized or implyed in faith the summary Receptive condition as its necessary attendants at least Proposition 4. Accordingly God hath joyned these together in his Promise and constitution making faith the summary and receptive Condition and making the said acts of Repentance self-denyal renouncing our own righteousness disclaiming in heart Justification by the works of the Law and the renouncing of all other Saviours also the desiring and loving of Christ offered and the willing of God as our God and the renouncing of all other Gods and so of the world flesh and devil at least in the resolution of the heart I say making these the dispositive Conditions which are ever implyed when faith only is expressed some of them as subservient to faith and perhaps some of them as real parts of faith it self Of which more anon Proposition 5. The Gospel promiseth Justification to all that will Believe or are Believers To be a Believer and to be a Disciple of Christ in Scripture sense is all one and so is it to be a Disciple and to be a Christian therefore the sense of the promise is that we shall be justified if we become true Christians or Disciples of Christ and therefore justifying faith comprehendeth all that is essential to our Discipleâ—ship or Christianity as its constitutive causes Proposition 6. It is not therefore any one single Act of faith alone by which we are justified but it is many Physical acts conjunctly which constitute that faith which the Gospel makes the condition of Life Those therefore that call any one Act or two by the name of justifying faith and all the rest by the name of works and say that it is only the act of recumbency on Christ as Priest or on Christ as dying for us or only the act of apprehending or accepting his imputed Righteousness by which we are justified and that our Assent or Acceptance of him as our Teacher and Lord our desire of him our love to him our renouncing other Saviours and our own Righteousness c. are the works which Paul doth exclude from our Justification and that it is Jewish to expect to be justified by these though but as Conditions of Justification these persons do mistake Paul and pervert the Doctrine of Faith and Justification and their Doctrine tendeth to corrupt the very nature of Christianity it self Though yet I doubt not but any of these acts conceited meritorious or otherwise as before explained in the Negative if men can believe contradictories may be the matter of such works as Paul excludeth And so may that one act also which they appropriate the name of justifying faith to Proposition 7. Sincere obedience to God in Christ is a condition of our continuance in a state of Justification or of our not losing it And our perseverance therein is a condition of our appearing in that state before the Lord at our departure hence Proposition 8. Our Faith Love and Works of Love or sincere Obedience are conditions of our sentential Justification by Christ at the particular and general Judgement which is the great Justification And so as they will prove our Interest in Christ our Righteousness so will they materially themselves justifie us against the particular false Accusation of being finally impenitent Unbelievers not Loving not obeying sincerely For to deny a false accusation is sufficient to our Justification Proposition 9. As Glorification and Deliverance from Hell is by some called Executive pardon or Justification so the foresaid acts are conditions of that execution which are conditions of Justification by the sentence of the Judge Proposition 10. As to a real inherent Justice or Justification in this life we have it in part in our Sanctification and Obedience and in the life to come we shall have it in perfection So much for the
28.13 Act. 3.19 with many more The Consequence is plain in that Pardon is by very many made the whole of our Justification and by others confessed a chief part and by all it s confessed to be made ours on the same terms as is Justification it self My fourth Proof is from those texts which make these kind of Acts to have the place of a condition in order to salvation if they are conditions of salvation then are they no less then conditions of our final Justification But the Antecedent is ordinarily acknowledged by the Opponents and it s proved 1 Tim. 4.8 Heb. 5.9 1 Tim. 6.18 19. Luk. 11.28 and 13.24 1 Cor. 9.24 25 26 27. Rev. 22.14 John 12.26 Rom. 8.13 Mat. 5.20 Mat. 19.29 Mat. 6.1 2 4 6. and 5.12 46. and 10.41 42. 2 Thess 1.5 6. Col. 3.23 24. Heb. 6.10 2. Tim. 4.7 8. Gal. 6.4 5 6 7 8 9 10. 2. Cor. 9.6 9. John 5.22 27 28 29 c. The Consequence is proved good first In that final Justification and Glorification have the same conditions as is plain both in many Scriptures mentioned and in the nature of the thing for that Justification is the adjudging us to that Glory and therefore so far as any thing is the cause or condition of the Glory it self it must be the reason of the sentence which adjudgeth it to us Secondly And salvation is as free as Justification and no more deserved by man and therefore the Apostle equally excludeth works from both Eph. 2.5 8 9. By Grace ye are saved through faith and that not of your selves it is the gift of God not of worke lest any man should boast so Tit. 3.5 6 7. more fully Now if Salvation by grace through faith without works exclude not sincere obedience from being a Condition of Salvation then Justification by grace through faith without works doth not in Scripture sence exclude sincere obedience from being the condition of our final Justification nor Repentance from being the condition of our justification as begun for there is eadem ratio and the Text makes the one as free without works as the other But the Antecedent is plain in the Scriptures Ergo c. My fifth Proof is from those texts that in terms seem to assign a causality to such obediential acts which can be interpreted of no less then a conditionality such are Luke 19.17 Mat. 25.31 23 34 35 40 46. Gen. 22.16 17 18. 2 Chron. 34.26 27. Psalm 91.9 14. Mark 7.29 1 John 3.22 23. John 16.27 Rev. 3.10 and 3.4 and 7.14 15. c. And though some of these texts speak not of Divine acceptance to life yet first some do secondly and the rest speak of no mercy but what is as freely given as Justification A mans own works are excluded other Means and parts of salvation as well as that I run over these briefly and generally both because I expect that the bare texts without my Comments should work upon the Considerate and because I have been so much upon it formerly in other writings as Confess § 3. p. â—6 cap. 3. cap 5. § 2. pag. 117 118. alibi passim as that I apprehend in this work more tediousness than necessity But the chief thing that I further here intend is to answer some Objections that by a Reverend Brother in his second part of his Treatise of Justification are brought against me But before I come to his Arguments its necessary that I a little animadvert on his Description of Justification that we may first agree upon the sense of our terms or at least know how to understand one another Treat Of Justification p. 126. Justification is a gratious and just Act of God whereby through Christ our Mediator and Surety a sinner but repenting and believing is pronounced just and hereby put into a state of Reconciliation and favour with God to the praise of Gods glorious attributes and to the Believers eternal salvation I shall not examine this Description by accurate Logical Rules c. Answ First Doubtless an accurate rather then popular definition would as soon be expected from you as from most and here as anywhere in a Treatise purposely on the Subject Secondly Pronunciation doth not go before Constitution not put us into a state of Reconciliation and favour but find us in it you say your self pag. 120. To justifie is to constitute and to declare or pronounce righteous And in your first Treatise of Justification pag. 7. Indeed the Apostle Rom. 5. saith many are made righteous by the second Adam which if not meant of inherent holiness doth imply that the righteousness we have by Christ is not meerly declarative but also constitutive and indeed one is in order before the other for a man must be righteous before he can be pronounced or declared so to be Treat p. The Application of Justification is attributed to the Holy Ghost Answ I know not of any such except first where Justification is taken for Sanctification Secondly or as the Holy Ghost is made the Author of the Promise though I doubt not but he is the Author of faith also Treat 16. The Socinians say Christ justifieth only Instrumentally not principally even so faith is said to save but this cannot be because Christ is God as well at Man and therefore cannot be instrumental but principal Answ As they err on one hand that say Christ justifieth only Instrumentally which flows from their blasphemous denyall of his God-head so it s an error on the other hand to say that Christ cannot be Instrumental but principal I prove the contrary first If Christ may be an Officer appointed by the Father to the Redemption and ruling of mankind then may he be an Instrument But c. Ergo c. Secondly If Christ may be a means he may be an Instrument but he may be a means for he is called by himself the way to the Father and a way is a means Thirdly He is called the Fathers servant therefore he may be an Instrument Fourthly He is said to come to do his Fathers will therefore he is his Instrument Fifthly All Power is said to be given him even the Power of judging John 5.22 and Matthew 28.18 19. therefore he is the Fathers Instrument in judging And your reason is invalid viz. because Christ is God for he is Man as well as God and so may be Instrumental Treat p. 129 130. It sounds as intolerable Doctrine in my ears that Christ our Mediator did only expiate by his death sins against the Law and Covenant of works but that those that are against the Covenant of Grace c. Answ A sin is against the Law of Grace or Gospel first because it is against some object revealed in the Gospel which the sin is against as Christ Thus sin was expiated by Christ 2ly As it is against a Precept of the Gospel and thus it is expiated by Christ 3ly As it is a breach of a mans own Promise or
they shall do better without him and a third party that seem to be friends tell them though you do take him for your Physitian yet must you work your self to health and take those other medicines as well as his if you will be cured But the Physitian saith its only your trusting in me that can cure you Now here we are at a loss in the interpreting of his conditions Some say that they must be cured barely by believing or trusting in him and not by taking his person in the full relation of a Physitian or at least not by taking his medicine which they abhor nor by exercising or sweating upon it or observing the dyet and directions which he giveth them But I rather interpret him thus in requiring you to take him for your Physitian it is implyed that you must take his medicines how bitter soever and that you must order your selves according to his directions and must not take cold nor eat or drink that which he forbiddeth you for though it be only his precious medicine that can cure you yet if you will take those things that are destructive to you it may hinder the working of it and an ill dyet or disordered life may kill you The working therefore that he excluded was not this implyed observance of his directions but your own Receipts and Labourings as above-said 3. I further answer to your observation that the same Scripture that saith We are justified by faith doth also say that Except ye Repent ye shall all perish Luke 13.3 5. And Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Iesus Christ for the Remission of sins Acts 2.38 and mentioneth the Baptism of Repentance for the Remission of sin and joyneth the preaching of Repentance and Remssion Luke 24.47 Repent and be Converted that your sins may be blotted out c. Luke 6.37 Forgive and it shall be forgiven you Jam. 5.15 The prayer of faith shall save the sick and if he have committed sins they shall be forgiven him Mat. 6.14 15. If you forgive men their trespasses your heavenly Father will forgive you but if you forgive not c. Mark 11.11 25. Forgive that your Father may forgive you 1 Iohn 1.9 If we confess our sins he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins c. Isa 55.6 7 c. And he that saith We are Justified by faith saith also that by works a man is justified and not by faith only and that by our words we shall be justified 4. Lastly to your argument from the peculiar attributions to faith I say that we do accordingly give it its prerogative as far as those attributions do direct us and would do more if it were not for fear of contradicting the Scripture Treat pag. 224. From these expressions it is that our Orthodox Divines say that faith justifieth as it is an Instrument laying hold on Christ c. ad pag. 226. Answ Though I could willingly dispatch with one man at once yet because it is the matter more then the person that must be considered I must crave your Patience as to the Answering of this Paragraph till I come to the Dispute about faiths Instrumentality to which it doth belong that so I may not trouble the present Dispute by the Interposition of another Treat pag 226 The third Argument is If in the continuance and progress of our Justification we are justified after the same manner we were at first then it s not by faith and works but by faith only as distinct to works Rom. 1.17 Galat. 3.11 Answ 1. I grant the whole understanding faith and works as Paul doth but not as you do 2. By the same manner either you mean the same specifically as specified from the Covenant and Object as distinct from Jewish Righteousness or from all false waies or all Mercenary meritorious works so intended or any manner that is not subordinate to Christ and implyed in Believing And thus your Antecedent is true and your Consequence in your sense of faith and works is false Or else you mean the same manner in opposition to any additional act implyed in our first believing as its necessary Consequent And thus your Minor or Antecedent is false If you will not believe me believe your self who as flatly spake the contrary Doctrine as ever I did being not as it seems in every Lecture of the same thoughts pag. 118. you write it for observation in a different Character thus For though holy works do not justifie yet by them a man is continued in a state of Justification so that did not the Covenant of grace interpose gross and wicked waies would out off our Justification and put us in a state of Condemnation But because you may avoid your own authority at pleasure many waies I shall give you a better authority that cannot be avoided 1. In our first Justification we were not justified by our words but in our last Justification at Judgement we shall Mat. 12.36 37. therefore they so far differ in the manner 2. In our first Justification we were not justified by our works but afterwards we are in some sense or else James spoke not by the Spirit of God Jam. 2.24 The Major is plain in that the works of Abraham Rahab and such like that Iames speaks of were not existent at their first Justification 3. In our first Justification we are not Judged and so Justified according to our works But in the last we are therefore they differ in the manner 4. In our first Justification we are not justified by the mouth of the Iudge in presence passing a final irreversible sentence on us but in the last we are therefore they differ in the manner 5. Our first pardon is not given us on condition of our first forgiving others but the continuance is Matth. 18.35 6.14 15. 6. Our first pardon is not given us if we confess our sins For we may be pardoned without that but the renewed or continued pardon is if we be called to it 1 John 1.9 7. Reconciliation and final Justification is given to us in title If we continue in the faith grounded and settled and be not moved away from the hope of the Gospel c. Col. 1.23 8. In our first Believing we take Christ in the Relation of a Saviour and Teacher and Lord to save us from all sin and to lead us to glory This therefore importeth that we accordingly submit unto him in those his Relations as a necessary means to the obtaining of the benefits of the Relations Our first faith is our Contract with Christ or Acceptance of him as our Saviour And all contracts of such nature do impose a necessity of performing what we consent to and promise in order to the benefits To take Christ for my Saviour is to take him to save me viz. from the power and guilt of sin therefore if I will not be saved by him when I have done but had rather keep my
sincere Repentance and sincere Obedience and this is the same in all Secondly But the matter of both these viz. the sins repented of and the duties of Obedience may differ in many particulars in several persons One may not have the same sins to Repent of as another and one may have some particular duties more then another though in the main all have the same sin and duty But this difference is no absurdity nor strange thing When Christ mentioneth the final Justification of some Mat. 25. and gives the reason from their works for I was hungry and ye fed me c. I read of none that took it for an absurdity because First The poor Secondly Infants Thirdly Those that dye before they have opportunity do no such works Treat pag. 231. The seventh Argument This Assertion according to the sense of the late Writers that are otherwise Orthodox for I mean not the Socinians will bring in a Justification two waies or make a twofold Justification whereof one will be needless For they grant an Imputation of Christs Righteousness in respect of the Law he fulfilled that and satisfied Gods Justice that the Law cannot accuse us And besides this they make an Evangelical personal Righteousness by our own Evangelical works Now certainly this later is wholly superfluous for if Christs Righteousness be abundantly able to satisfie for all that righteousness which the Law requireth of us what is the matter that it removeth not all our Evangelical failings and supply that righteousness also surely this is to make the stars shine when the Sun is in its full lustre Thus it may be observed while men for some seeming difficulty avoid the good known way of truth they do commonly bring in Assertions of far more difficulty to be received In this case it s far more easie to maintain one single Righteousness viz. the Obedience of our Lord Christ then to make two c. Answ First This twofold Righteousness is so far from being needless that all shall perish in everlasting torment that have not both I doubt not but you have both your self and therefore do but argue with all this confidence against that which you must be saved by and which you carry within you As if you should argue that both a heart and a brain are needless and therefore certainly you have but one But the best is concluding you have but one doth not really prove that you have but one for if it did it would prove you had neither and then you were but a dead man in one case and a lost man in the other First Did ever any man deny the necessity of inherent Righteousness that was called a Protestant Object But that 's nothing to its necessity to Justification Answ First it s the very being of it that you plead against as needless if your words are intelligible 2ly It s as gross a contradiction to talk of a Righteousness that makes not righteous or will not justifie in tantum according to its proportion as to talk of whitness that makes not white or Paternity that makes not a father or any form that doth not inform or is a form and is not a form Secondly If there be two distinct Laws or Covenants then there is a necessity of two dstinct Righteousnesses to our Justification But the Antecedent is certain I suppose it will be granted that Christs righteousness is necessary to answer the Law of works And I shall further prove that a personal righteousness given from Christ is necessary to fulfill the condition of the new Covenant or Law of Grace believe and be saved c. Thirdly Christ did not himself fulfill the condition of the Gospel for any man nor satisfie for his final non-performance therefore he that will be saved must perform it himself or perish That Christ performed it not in person is past doubt It was not consistent with his state and perfection to repent of sin who had none to repent of to return from sin to God who never fell from him to beleve in Christ Jesus that is to accept himself as an offered Saviour and to take himself as a Saviour to himself that is as one that redeemed himself from sin to deny his own righteousness to confess his sin to pray for pardon of it c. Do you seriously believe that Christ hath done this for any man For my part I do not believe it Secondly That he that hath not satisfied for any mans final predominant Infidelity and Impenitency I know you will grant because you will deny that he dyed for any sin of that person or at least your party will deny it Thirdly All that shall be saved do actually perform these conditions themselves I know you will confess it that none adult but the Penitent Believers Holy shall be saved This sort of Righteousness therefore is of necessity Fourthly The Benefits of Christ obedience and death are made over to men by a conditional Promise Deed of gift or act of oblivion Therefore the condition of that Grant or Act must be found before any man can be justified by the righteousness of Christ It is none of yours till you repent and believe therefore you must have the personal Righteousness of faith and repentance in subordination to the imputed righteousness that it may be yours And will you again conclude that Certainly this later is wholly superfluous Hath not God said He that believeth shall be saved and he that believeth not shall be damned And Repent and be converted that your sins may be blotted out c. Is it not necessary that these be done then both as duty commanded and as a condition or some means of the end propounded and promised And is this wholly superfluous In Judgement if you be accused to have been finally impenitent or an Infidel will you not plead your personal faith and repentance to justifie you against that accusation or shall any be saved that saith I did not repent or believe but Christ did for me If it be said that Christs satisfaction is sufficient but what 's that to thee that performedst not the conditions of his Covenant and therefore hast no part in it Will you not produce your faith and repentance for your Justification against this charge and so to prove your Interest in Christ Nay is it like to be the great business of that day to enquire whether Christ have done his part or no or yet to enquire whether the world were sinners or rather to judge them according to the terms of grace which were revealed to them and to try whether they have part in Christ or not and to that end whether they believed repented loved him in his members improved his Talents of Grace or not Or can any thing but the want of this personal righteousness then hazard a mans soul But you ask If Christs righteousness be able to satisfie what is the matter that it removeth not all our Evangelical failings c. Answ
Either you ask this question as of a penitent Believer or the finally impenitent Vnbeliever If of the former I say First All his sins Christs righteousness pardoneth and covereth and consequently all the failings in Gospel duties Secondly But his predominant final Impenitency and Infidelity Christ pardoneth not because he is not guilty of it he hath none such to pardon but hath the personal righteousness of a performer of the conditions of the Gospel And for the finally impenitent Infidels the answer is because they rejected that Righteousness which was able to satisfie and would not return to God by him and so not performing the condition of pardon have neither the pardon of that sin nor of any other which were conditionally pardoned to them If this Doctrine be the avoiding the good known way there is a good known way besides that which is revealed in the Gospel And if this be so hard a point for you to receive I bless God it is not so to me And if it be far more easie to maintain one single righteousness viz. imputed only it will not prove so safe as easie If one righteousness may serve may not Pilate and Simon Magus be justified if no man be put to prove his part in it and if he be how shall he prove it but by his performance of the conditions of the Gift Treat pag. 232. Argu. 8. That cannot be a condition of Justification which it self needeth Justification But good works being imperfect and having much dross cleaving need a Justification to take that guilt away Answ First Again hearken all you that have so long denyed the Covenant to have any conditions at all Here is an Argument to maintain your cause for it makes as much against faith as any other acts which they call works for faith is imperfect also and needs Justification a pardon I suppose you mean I had rather talk of pardoning my sins then justifying them or any imperfections what ever Secondly But indeed it s too gross a shift to help your cause The Major is false and hath nothing to tempt a man to believe it that I can see Faith and Repentance are considerable First As sincere Secondly As imperfect They are not the conditions of pardon as imperfect but as sincere God doth not say I will pardon you if you will not perfectly believe but If you will believe Imperfection is sin and God makes not sin a condition of pardon and life I am not able to conceive what it was that in your mind could seem a sufficiennt reason for this Proposition that nothing can be a condition that needs a pardon It s true that in the same respect as it needs a pardon that is as it is a sin it can be no condition But faith as faith Repentance as Repentance is no sin Treat ibid. It s true Justification is properly of persons and of actions indirectly and obliquely Answ The clean contrary is true as of Justification in general and as among men ordinarily The action is first accusasable or justifiable and so the person as the cause of that Action But in our Justification by Christs satisfaction our Actions are not justifiable at all save only that we have performed the condition of the Gift that makes his righteousness ours Treat pag. 233. This question therefore is again and again to be propounded If good works be the condition of our Justification how comes the guilt in them that deserveth condemnation to be done away Is there a further condition required to this condition and so another to that with a processus in infinitum Answ Once may serve turn for any thing regardable that I can perceive in it But if so again and again you shall be answered The Gospel giveth Christ and life upon the same condition to all This condition is first a duty and then a condition As a duty we perform it imperfectly and so sinfully for the perfection of it is a duty but the perfection is not the condition but the sincerity Sincere Repentance and faith is the condition of the pardon of all our sins therefore of their own Imperfections which are sins Will you ask now If faith be imperfect how comes the guilt of that Imperfection to be pardoned is it by a further condition and so in infinitum No it is on tht same condition sincere repentance and faith are the conditions of a pardon for their own Imperfections Is there any difficulty in this or is there any doubt of it Why may not faith be a condition as well as an Instrument of receiving the pardon of its own Imperfection I hope still you perceive that you put these questions to others as well as me and argue against the common Judgement of Protestants who make that which is imperfect to be the condition of pardon Repent and be baptized saith Peter for the remission of sin Of what sin is any excepted to the Penitent Believer certainly no It is of all sins And is not the imperfection of faith and repentance a sin The same we say of sincere obedience as to the continuance of our Justification or the not losing it and as to our final Justification If we sincerely obey God will adjudge us to salvation and so justifie us by his final sentence through the blood of Christ from all the imperfections of that obedience what need therefore of running any further towards an infinitum Treat ibid. The Popish party and the Castellians are so far convinced of this that therefore they say our good works are perfect And Castellio makes that prayer for pardon not to belong to all the godly Answ It seems they are partly Quakers But they are unhappy souls if such an Argument could drive them to such an abominable opinion And yet if this that you affirm be the cause that Papists have taken up the doctrine of perfection I have more hopes of their recovery then I had before nay because they are some of them men of ordinary capacities I take it as if it were done already For the Remedy is most obvious Understand Papists that it is Faith and Repentance and Obedience to Christ in Truth and not in Perfection that is the Condition of your final Justification at Judgement and you need not plead for perfection any more But I hardly believe you that this is the cause of their error in this point And you may see that if Protestants had no more Wit then Papists they must all be driven by the violence of your Argument to hold that Faith and Repentance are perfect And seeing you tell us of Castellio's absurdity I would intreat you to tell us why it is that you pray for pardon your selves either you take Prayer to be Means to obtain pardon or you do not If not then 1. Pardon is none of your end in praying for pardon 2. And then if once it be taken for no means men cannot be blamed if they use it but accordingly But if you
if God wil shew me so much Mercy as to enable this restless uncessantly-pained Sceleton to such a work I shall be bold to send you word and claim the favour you offer In the mean time it is my duty to let you know I have received your Letter and to return your hearty thanks for it though it be not that which I hoped for and shall now cease to expect I am convinced now as well as you that Letters are but a loss of time but your Arguments or direct answers to my Questions would have been for my advantage a precious improvement of it but seeing I may not be so happy I must rest content It still seemeth to my weak understanding to be no impertinency to prove that your self affirm Repentance Confession Turning Forgiveing others c to be more then signs i. e. to be conditions to qualifie the Subject to obtain forgiveness and to tell you that I say no more and to tell you still that you give more to faith and so to man then I but I give no more to works for ought I descern then you I am sure then our ordinary Divines do And if I do mistake herein you have little reason to suspect me of willfulness though of weakness as much as you please As for the state of the Question between us which you speak of I am a stranger to it and know not what you mean I never came to the stating of a Question with you nor did you state any to me in your letters but mentioned your vehement dissent from several passages in my book and therefore I had reason to think that you fell upon the Questions as there they were stated so that it is intime medullitùs pertinent to my question which is impertinent to yours You say the question is Whether the Gospel righteousness be made ours otherwise then by believing and tell me that I say by believing and obedience when I never stated such a question nor ever gave such an answer I suppose by Gospel Righteousness you mean Christs Righteousness given to Believers Now I have affirmed that those only shall have part in Christs satisfaction and so in him be legally righteous who do believe and obey the Gospel and so are in themselves Evangelically righteous But your phrase made ours doth intimate that our first possession of Christs Righteousness should be upon Obedience as well as Faith which I never affirmed But Christs Righteousness is continued ours on condition of obeying him though not made ours so and we shall be justified at Judgement also on that condition As it is not marriage duty but Contract which is the condition of a womans first Interest in her Husband and his riches but marriage duty and the performance of that Covenant is the condition of her Interest as continued And indeed it is much of my care in that Book to shun and avoid that question which you say is stated between us for I knew how much ambiguity is in the Word By which I was loth to play with I know we are justified By God the Father By Christs satisfaction By Christs absolution By the Gospel Covenant or Promise By the Sacraments By Faith By Works for I will never be ashamed to speak the words of the Holy Ghost By our words for so saith Christ Therefore if you will needs maintain in general that Christs Righteousness is made ours no otherwise then by beleiving nor otherwise continued ours you see how much you must exclude But to remove such Ambiguity I distinguish between justifying By as an efficient instrumental Cause and By as by a condition and I still affirm that Works or Obedience do never justifie as any cause much less such a cause but that by them as by a condition appointed by the free Lawgiver and Justifier we are finally justified And truly Sir it is past my reach at present to understand what you say less in this then I except you differ only about the word By and not the sence and think that it is improper to say that Pardon or Justification is By that which is but a condition You seem here to drive all at this and yet me thinks you should not 1. Because you affirm your self that conditions have a moral efficiency and then it seems when you say Repentance Confession c. are conditions you mean they are morally efficient which is a giving more to works then ever I did 2. Because you know it is the phrase of Christ and his Spirit that we are justified By our words and works and it is safe speaking in Scripture phrase 3. Because you say after that my Assertions are destructive of what Divines deliver but the word By if we are agreed in the sence cannot be destructive and except the phrase only By c. be the difference where is it When you say Repentance c. are conditions and I say they are no more and I have nothing from you of any disagreement about the sence of the word condition Lest you should doubt of my meaning in that I understand it as in our usual speech it is taken and as Lawyers and Divines generally do viz. Est Lex addita negotio quae donec praestetur eventum suspendit Vel est modus vel causa quae suspendit id quod agitur quoad ex post facto confirmetur ut Cujacius And whereas Conditions are usually distinguisht into potestativas causales mixtas seu communes I mean conditiones potestativas Where you add that you say only faith is the condition justifying c. but I make a justifying Repentance c. And whereas heretofore we had only justifying faith now c. I answer 1. If by justifying Repentance c. you mean that which is as you say Faith is an instrument or efficient Cause I never dreamed of any such If as a Condition you confess it your self 2. If you speak against the sence we are agreed in that for ought I know If against the phrase then justifying Faith or Repentance is no Scripture phrase but to be justified By faith and By works and By words are all Scripture phrases You say you firmly hold that Repentance and other Exercises of Grace are antecedent qualifications and media ordinat◠in the use whereof only Pardon can be had but what is this to me c. I answer 1. Add conditions as you do in your Book and you say as much as I. 2. If by the other exercises of Grace you mean the particulars in your book enumerated or the like and if by Pardon you mean even the first pardon as the word Only shews you do then you go quite beyond me and give far more to those exercises of grace then I dare do For I say that Christ and all his imputed Righteousness is made ours and we pardoned and justified at first without any works or obedience more then bare faith and what is precedent in its place or concomitant and
as flat conditions of her continuing her enjoyments as the marriage Covenant was of first obtaining them To my second Answer you shew that Paul excludes works under any notion 1. From his opposition between faith and works where you say I contradict Paul and give a tertium To which I answer to distinguish of Pauls terms and explain his meaning in his own words is not to give a tertium or contradict but this is all that I do I distinguish of the word Works sometime it is taken more largely for Acts or Actions and so James takes it sometimes more strictly for only such Actions as a Labourer performeth for his Wages or which make the Reward to be not of Grace but of debt So Paul tells you that he understandeth or useth the term Rom. 4.4 usually therefore calling them Works of the Law Now he that excludes Works only under this notion doth not therefore exclude them under every notion Where you add that Pauls opposition is between Faith and any thing of ours I answer 1. Is not Faith ours as much Love c 2. Are not Knowledge Words Works ours by all which God saith we are justified 3. There is no such Scripture where Paul makes any such opposition but only he renounceth his own Righteousness which is of the Law Phil. 3.8 9. and any thing of our own that may be called Works in the stricter sence Your second is because Paul excludes Abrahams works c. Answer 1. You make my tertium to be works that are of Grace and here again works that flow from Grace and say Abrahams were not by meer strength of the Law But these are no words of mine nor is it candid to feign them to be mine but that I impute it to your haste I believe you remembred so well the words of Andradius Bellarmine and other Papists that they dropped from your pen in haste in stead of mine nor is my sence any whit like theirs for I speak not of the efficient cause of works Nature or Grace nor the meer command requiring them when I speak of Law and Gospel but the full entire Covenant or Law consisting of all its parts and so making our Acts the conditions of the Punishment or Reward as I have opened over and over in my Book 2. You ask Were Abrahams works in opposition to that c Answer 1. Paul excludes also works in co-ordination with Christ and so do I. 2. Yea and works supposed to be subordinate to Christ which are not capable of a real subordination 3. but not such as are truly subordinate from being such conditions as is before said 4. You seem to me to mistake Paul much as if he took it for granted that Abraham had such works which Paul disputeth against but could not be justified by them Whereas I doubt not to say that Paul contrarily supposeth that Abraham had no such Works which make the reward to be of Debt and not of Grace and therefore could not be justified by them Your third Argument is because imputing covering all is wholly attributed to God Answer I doubt not but that God is the only Principal efficient Cause and his Promise or Covenant the Instrumental therefore I cannot think as others that man is the efficient Instrumental by believing or that Faith is such But what Is all therefore attributed to God Even the performance of the Conditions on mans part Or are there no such conditions which man must perform himself or perish God only covereth sin imputeth Righteousness c. but to none who have not performed the Conditions Is Believing attributed to God or is it an act of man Or is it excluded When will you prove the Consequence of this Argument Your fifth Argument is because the Assertion is universal without works in general Answer 1. Doth not the Apostle contradict you by expounding himself in the very next verse before those you cite Rom. 4.4 That by works he means not simply good Actions as James doth but such as make the reward to be of debt and not of Grace Indeed such works are universally excluded 2. Therefore he excludes the very presence of works and saith to him that worketh not c. ver 5. But the presence of good actions you say is not excluded Your last Argument seems to me the same with the fourth and it forceth me to admire that you should think the consequence good Blessedness is when sin is forgiven therefore no work or good act performed by man is the condition of forgiveness either as begun or continued or consummate If this be not your consequence you say nothing against me if it be I assure you it is not in my Power to believe it nor to discern the least shaddow of probability of truth in it nor to free it from the charge of being the grossest Antinomianism si pace tui ità dicam And here I must needs tell you also my utter disability to reconcile you with your self for you before say they are media ordinata and here you say They are excluded under any notion As if to be a medium were no notion or the medium did nothing in or to the very justifying of the person To my next Answer If works be excluded under any notion then James his words cannot be true that we are justified by works You reply If there be justifying works how saith Paul true I answer This is a most evident Petitio principii It is undeniable that James includeth works under some notion and that Paul excludeth them under some other notion now therefore I might well ask How saith James true else Because my supposition cannot be denyed But you suppose that Paul excludeth works under any notion which is the very Question and is denyed When you ask how saith Paul true Paul saith true because he speaks of works strictly taken as is by himself explained James could not say true if works under every notion as you say be excluded Next you come to reconcile them by expounding James where you say Faith which in respect of its Act ad intra only justifies yet it works ad extra fides quae viva non qua viva I answer What 's this to the Question The Question is not whether Faith work Nor whether Faith justifie Nor what Faith justifieth But in what sence James saith we are justified by works and not by Faith only You answer by a direct contradiction to James if I can reach the sence of your Answer saying It is by Faith only and that not as it liveth c. So dare not I directly say it is not by works when God saith it is but think I am bound to distinguish and shew in what sence works justifie and in what not and not to say flatly against God that we are not justified by works under any notion but only by the Faith which worketh A denyal of Gods Assertions is an ill expounding of them To what you say of the
honour of faith Though that were not so dangerous as to derogate from Christ For I acknowledge faith the only condition of our first Remission and justification and the principal part of the condition of our justification as continued and consummate And if faith be an instrumental cause I do not give that honor from it to works for they are not so Nay I boldly again aver that I give no more to obedience to Christ then Divines ordinarily do that is to be the secondary part of the condition of continued and consummate justification Only I give not so much as others to faith because I dare not ascribe so much to man And yet men make such a noise with the terrible name of Justification by works the Lords own phrase as if I gave more then themselves to man when I give so much less And thus Sir I have according to your advice spent my self as you speak in aiming at that mark which you were pleased to set me And now I shall proceed to the rest of your exceptions My next answer to you was that If works under every notion are excluded as you say they are then repentance is excluded under the notion of a condition or preparative But repentance under that notion is not excluded Therefore not works under every notion To this you reply that Repentance is not excluded as qualifying but as recipient which what is it but a plain yielding my Minor and so the cause For this is as much as I say If repentance be a work or act of ours and not excluded under the notion of a qualification or as you elsewhere yield a Medium ordinatum and a condition then works are not under every notion excluded And that repentance is not recipient how easily do I yeild to you But do you indeed think that when Paul excludeth the works of the Law that he excludeth them only as Recipient and not as qualifying If so as this answer seems to import seeing you will not have me here distinguish between works of Law and of Gospel or New Covenant then you give abundance more to works of the Law then I do or dare For I aver that Paul excludeth them even as qualifications yea and the very presence of them and that the Jews never dreamt of their works being Recipient To my next you say Whether Paul dispute what is our righteousness or upon what terms it is made ours it doth not much matter But I think it of very great moment they being Questions so very much different both in their sense and importance And whereas you think Paul speaks chiefly of the manner I think he speaks of both but primarily of the quasi materia and of the manner or means thereto but secondarily in reference to that So that I think the chief Question which Paul doth debate was Whether we are Justified by our own works or merits or by Anothers viz. the satisfaction of a surety which yet because it is no way made ours but by believing therefore he so puts the Question whether by works of the Law or by faith and so that he makes them two immediate opposites not granting any tertium I easily yield But of that before To the next you say that I cannot find such a figure for faith Relatively in my sense Answ And I conceive that faith in my sense may be taken Relatively full as well as in yours Doubtless acceptance of an offered Redeemer and all his benefits doth relate as properly to what is accepted viz. by the assent of the understanding initially and by the election and consent of the will consummately as a Physical Passive reception or instrumentality can do And also as it is a condition I make little doubt but it relateth to the thing given on that condition and that the very name of a condition is relative So that in my sense faith relateth to Christ two ways Whereof the former is but its very nature and so its aptitude to its office The later is that proper respect in which it immediately or directly justifieth Yet do I not mean as you seem to do as I gather by your phrase of putting Love and Obedience for Christs Righteousness For I conceive it may be put relatively and yet not strictly loco correlati for the thing related to when I say my hands or teeth feed me I do not put them instead of my Meat and yet I use the words relatively meaning my Meat principally and my teeth secondarily Neither do I mean that it relateth to Christs righteousness only or principally but first to himself And I doubt not but Love to Christ and Obedience to him as Redeemer do relate to him but not so fully clearly and directly express him as related to as Faith Faith being also so comprehensive a grace as to include some others It is a true saying that a poor woman that is marryrd to a Prince is made honourable by love and continued so by duty to her husband But it is more obscure and improper then to say she is made honourable by Marriage or taking such a man to her husband which includes love and implyeth duty and faithfulness as necessarily subsequent I conceive with Judicious Doctor Preston that faith is truly and properly such a consent contract or marriage with Christ Next to your similitude you say that I hold that not only seeing this brazen Serpent but any other Actions of sense will as well heal the wounded Christian To which I answer Similitudes run not on all four Thus far I believe that this holds 1. Christ was lift up on the Cross as the brazen Serpent was lift up 2. He was lift up for a cure to sin-stung souls as the brazen Serpent for the stung bodies 3. That as every one that looked on the Serpent was cured an easie condition so every one that believeth Christ to be the appointed Redeemer and heartily Accepteth him on the terms he is offered and so trusteth in him shall not perish but have everlasting life 4. That as the cure of their bodies came not from any natural reason drawn from the eye or from any natural excellency or efficacy of seeing above hearing or feeling but meerly from the free will and pleasure of God who ordained that looking should be the condition of their cure So all those Acts usually comprized or implyed in the word believing which justifie do it not from any natural excellency efficacy or instrumentality but meerly from the good pleasure of the Law-giver And therefore the natural Receptivity of Faith that is its very formal essence must not be given as the proper direct cause of its Justifying But that is its conditionality from the free appointment of God But on the other side 1. It was only one Act of one sense which was the condition of their cure but you will not say I believe that it is only one act of one faculty which justifieth however I will not 2. It
12 though it do not properly cleanse the hands yet it plucks off the Gloves and makes them bare for washing and Godly sorrow with its seven Daughters 2 Cor. 7.11 are clensing things Dr. Stoughton Righteous mans plea for Happ Serm. 6. pag. 32. Faith comprehends not only the Act of the Vnderstanding but the Act of the Will too so as the Will doth embrace and adhere and cleave to those Truths which the understanding conceives and not only embracing meerly by Assent to the Truth of it but by closing with the Good of it What is that but loving tasting and relishing it As faith in Christ is not only the Assenting of a mans mind that Christ is the Saviour but a resultancy of the Will on Christ as a Saviour embracing of him and loving esteeming and honouring him as a Saviour The Scripture comprehends both these together and there is a rule for it which the Rabbins give for the opening of the Scripture viz. Verba sensus etiam denotant affectus as Jo. 17.3 This is eternal life to know thee c. It is not bare Knowledge the Scripture means but Knowledge joined with affections You see Dr. Stoughton took Love to be full as near Kin to Faith as I do Many the like and more full in him I pass I cited in my Append. Alstedius Junius Paraeus Scharpius Aretius Ball c. making Faith Obedience Gratitude Conditions of the new Covenant who saith not the same If all these be homiletical and popular I much mistake them which yet I cite not as if no words might be found in any of these Authors that seem to speak otherwise but to shew that I am not wholly singular Though if I were I cannot help it when I will On the next Q. Whether a dying man may look on his Faith and Obedience Duty as the condition of the N. Cov. by him performed You would perswade me that I cannot think that I speak to the point in this but you are mistaken in me for I can mistake more then that comes to and indeed I yet think I spoke as directly to the question in your terms laid down as was possible for I changed not one of your terms but mentioned the Affirmative as your self expressed it If you did mean otherwise then you spoke I knew not that nor can yet any better understand you Only I can feel that all the difference between you and me must be decided by distinguishing of Conditions but you never yet go about it so as I can understand you You here ask me Whether I think you deny a godly life to be a comfortable Testimony or necessary qualification of a man for pardon Answer 1. But the Question is not of the significancy or Testimony nor yet of all kind of qualification that is an ambiguous term and was not in the Question but of the conditionality 2. You yield to the term Condition your self elsewhere and therefore need not shun it 3. Qualifications and Conditions are either physical and remote of which I raise no question so the Essence of the soul is a condition and so hearing the Gospel is a natural Condition of him that will understand it and understanding is a natural Qualification of him that will believe it For ignoti nulla fides But it is another sort of conditions you know that we are in speech of which I have defined and Mr. Gataker before cited viz. Moral legal conditions so called in sensu forensi vel legali when the Law of Christ hangs our actual Justification and salvation on the doing or not doing such a thing Yet do I very much distinguish between the Nature and Uses of the several Graces or Duties contained in the conditions for though they are all conditions yet they were not all for the same reason or to the same use ordained to be conditions but repentance in one sence as preparatory to faith and Faith 1. Because it honoureth Christ and debaseth our selves 2. Because it being in the full an Acceptation of the thing offered is the most convenient means to make us Possessors without any contempt of the Gift with other reasons that might be found So I might assign the reasons as they appear to us why God hath assigned Love to Christ and sincere Obedience and forgiving others their several parts and places in this conditionality but I have done it in my Aphorisms but then all these are drawn from the distinct nature and use of these duties Essentially in themselves considered which is but their Aptitude for the place or conditionality which they are appointed to and would of themselves have done nothing without such appointment So that it is one question to ask Why doth Faith or Works of Obedience to Christ Justifie To which I answer Because it was the pleasure of God to make them the conditions of the Covenant and not because of their own nature directly and it s another Question Why did God choose Faith to the Precedency in this work To which I answer 1. Properly there is no cause of Gods actions without himself 2. But speaking of him after the manner of men as we must do it is because Faith is fitter then any other Grace for this Honor and Office as being both a high honouring of God by believing him that 's as for Assent and in its own Essential nature a hearty thankfull Acceptance of his Son both to be our Lord which is both for the Honor of God and our own good and our Saviour to deliver and glorifie us and so is the most rational way that man can imagine to make us partakers of the procured happiness without either our own danger if a heavier condition had been laid upon us or the dishonour of the Mediator either by diminishing the estimation of the favour if we had done any more to the procuring it our selves or by contempt of the Gift if we had not been required and conditioned with so much as thankfully and lovingly to accept it And then if the Question be Why God hath assigned sincere Obedience and Perseverance therein to that place of secondary Conditionality for the continuance and consummation of Justification and for the attaining of salvation I answer Not because they have any such Receptive nature as faith but because Faith being an Acceptance of Christ as Lord also and delivering and resigning up the soul to him accordingly in Covenant this Duty is therefore necessarily implyed as the thing promised by us in that Covenant and so in some sence greater then the covenanting it self or the end of it and Christ never intended to turn man out of his service and discharge him from Obedience but to lay on him an easier and lighter yoak and burden to learn of him c. and therefore well may he make this the condition of their finding Ease and Rest to their souls Mat. 11.28 29. For for this end he dyed that he might be Lord Rom.
reason but in the same sence there must be a frequent Justifying For as our Divines well conclude that sin cannot be pardoned before it be committed for then there should be pardon without Guilt for no man is Guilty of sin to come formally so is it as necessary to conclude that no man is justified from sin before it be committed that is from that which is not and so is not sin For then Justification should go before and without Legal Accusation and Condemnation For the Law accuseth and condemneth no man for a sin which is not committed and so is no sin It is said Acts 13. â—9 that by Christ we are Justified from all things from which we could not be justified by the Law of Moses Where as I desire you to observe that phrase of being Justified by the â—aw to shew it is an Act of the Law though sin maketh transgressors uncapable so you see it is a Scripture phrase to say we are Justified from sin And then either there must be some kind of particular Justification from particular sins after faith of the nature of our renewed particular Pardon or else what will become of us for them For sure if the Law be so far in force against the actions of Believers as to make and conclude them Guilty and Obliged to Punishment as much as in it lyeth and so to need a frequent pardon for pardon is a discharge from Guilt which is an Obligation to punishment then it must needs be in force to Judge them worthy condemnation and so to Accuse and as much as in it lyes to condemn them and so they must need also a particular Justification But then according to my Judgement 1. There is a sure Ground said of both in the Gospel or new Law or Covenant 2. And the said New Law doth perform it by the same Power by which it did universally justifie and pardon them at the first There needeth no addition to the Law The change is in them And the Law is said Moraliter agerâ— quod antea non actum erat because of their new Capacity necessity and Relation As if your Fathers Testament do give you a thousand pound at his Death and twenty shillings a week as long as you live after and so much at your marriage c. here this Testament giveth you these new sums after the first without any change in it and yet by new moral Act for it was not a proper gift till the Term expressed or the condition performed and if that term had never come nor the condition been performed you had never had right to it so I concieve Gods Gospel Grant or Testament doth renew both our Remission and particular Justification If Satan say This man both deserved death by sining since he Believed as David must we not be justified from that Accusation And here let me ask you one Question which I forgot before about the first Point Seeing you think truly that Pardon is iterated as oft as we sin by what Transient Act of God is this done Doth God every moment at a Court of Angels Declare each sinner in the world remitted of his particular sin for every moment we commit them If you once-see a necessity of judging the New Covenant or Promise Gods Pardoning Instrument I doubt not but you will soon acknowledge as much about Justification And sure a Legal or written Instrument is so proper for this work that we use to call it A Pardon which a Prince writes for the acquitting of an offendor Besides the Gospel daily justifieth by continuing our Justification as your Lease still giveth you Title to your Land Mat. 12.37 is of more then the continuance of Justification even of Justification at Judgement THe next Point you come to about the Nature and Object of Faith you are larger upon through a mistake of my words and meaning I know not therefore how to Answer your Arguments till I have first told you my sence and better stated the Question Indeed that in pag. 11. of Rest I apprehended my self so obvious to misconstruction that I have corrected it in the second Edition which is now printed Yet 1. I spoke not of faith as Justifying but as the condition of Salvation which contains more then that which is the condition of our first justification 2. I neuer termed those Gospel-Precepts which are not in some way proper to the Gospel And for the next words That subjection to Christ is an Essential part of faith I confess I do not only take it for a certain Truth but also of so great moment that I am glad you have bent your strength against it and thereby occasioned me to search more throughly But then if you think as you seem to do that by Subjection I mean Actual Obedience you quite mistake me for I have fully opened my mind to you about this in my Aphoris that speak only of the subjection of the Heart and not of the Actual Obedience which is the practise of it I speak but of the Acceptation of Christ for our Lord or the Consent thereto and so giving up our selves to be his Disciples Servants or Subjects This I maintain to be an Essential part of justifying Faith in the strict and proper sense of that word It s true that de jure Christ is King of Unbelievers and so of them that acknowledge him not to be their King But in order of nature the acknowledging of his Dominion and consent thereto and so receiving him to be our King doth go before our obeying him as our King As a woman in marriage-Covenant taketh her Husband as one whom she must obey add be faithfull to But that taking or consenting goes before the said Obedience as every Covenant before the performance of it Yea though the same act should be both an acknowledgement of and consent to the Authority and also an obeying of it yet it is Quatenus a consent and acceptance of that Authority and not as it is an obeying of it that I speak of it when I ascribe Justification to it as faith in the common sense is certainly an act of Obedience to God and yet Divines say it justifie not as it is Obedience but as an Instrument So that by Heart-subjection to Christ I mean that act by which we give up our selves to Christ as his Subjects to be ruled by him and by which we take him for our Soveraign on his Redemption-title But when I judge the word Faith to be taken yet in a larger sense comprehending obedience I never said or thought that so it is the condition of our first Justification nor will I contend with any that thinks the word is never taken so largely it being to me a matter of smal moment Now to your Objections 1. YOU say Faith worketh by Love c. Answ 1. Faith is sometime taken strictly for a Belief of Gods word or an Assent to its Truth 2. Sometime more largely for the wills embracing
Marriage-consent then may we not as well say Marriage causeth Marriage as to say Marriage causeth Love Answer No. For 1. That Love which it causeth is the following acts of Love 2. And the name of Love is most usually given only to the Passion which is in the sensitive but not usually to the meer Velle the elicite act of the rational appetite I have been the more prolix on this because it serves also for answer to other of your Objections especially the third 2. You object Gospel-Precepts are many if not all the same with the moral Law if justified then by obedience to them are we not justified by the works of the Law c. Answer 1. James yields the whole 2. If you speak of our Justification at first by which of guilty and lyable to condemnation we become recti in curia or are acquit I then yield all that you seek here viz. that we are not justified by works 3. This objection is grounded on your formentioned mistake of my meaning as if I thought that justifying faith contained essentially such obedience or works 4. We are not justified by works of the Law if you mean the Law of works or by any works which make the reward to be not of Grace but of Debt which are the works that Paul speaks of 5. That which you call the moral Law viz. the bare Precepts of the Decalogue taken Division without the sanction viz the Promise or the Commination is not the Law but one part of the Law and the other part viz. the sanction adjoined if diversified makes it two distinct Laws though the Duty commanded be the same The Law that commandeth Socrates to drink Cicutam is not the same with that which should command a sick man to drink some for a cure 6. That our Justification is continued on condition of our sincere obedience added to our faith I maintain with James 7. Will you answer your own objection and you tell me what to answer Faith is a duty of the moral Law if we are justified by faith then we are justified by a work of the Law I know you will not evade as those that say Faith is not a work but a Passion nor as those that say we are justified by it not as a work but as an Instrument for I have heard you disclaim that If you say it is not as a work but as a condition by the free Law-giver appointed to this end then you say as I do both of faith and secondarily of works For what Divine denyeth works to be a condition of Salvation or of the final Justification or of our present Justification as continued vel nor amittendi Justificationem jam recaptam as Conr. Bergius saith I know but one other evasion left in the world which I once thought none would have adventured on but lately an acute Disputant with me maintains that faith is not conditio moralis vel ex voluntate constituentis but Conditio physica vel ex natura rei But I think I shall easily and quickly disprove this opinion Rababs and Abrahams works were works of the New Law of Grace and not of the old Law of works In a word As there is a two fold Law so there is a two fold Accusation and Justification when we are accused as breakers of the Law of works that is as sinners in common sort and so as lyable to the penalty thereof then we plead only Christs satisfaction as our Righteousnes and no work of our own But when we are Accused of final non-performance of the conditions of the New Law that is of being Rejectors of Christ the Mediator we are justified by producing our faith and sincere obedience to him The former Paul speaks of and James of the latter You may see Divines of great Name saying as I in this as Mead Deodate on James the 2. but most fully Placaus in Thes Salmuriens Thes de Justific c. To your third Objection That Faith Repentance Hope and Love as before explained are distinguished I easily yield you But where you say Faith and Love have different Objects therefore one is no essential part of the other I answer That faith in Christ and Love to the Saints which your Texts mention have different Objects I soon confess But faith in Christ as it is the first Act of the Will and love to Christ have one and the same Object beyond all doubt Your fourth I wholly yield if you speak of faith strictly or as it Justifieth and not in a large improper sence Your fifth is grounded on the forementioned mistake of my meaning And there needs no further answer but only to tell you that though sincere obedience to all Christs Lawes be a part of the condition of our Justification as continued and consummate at Judgement yet it follows not that every particular duty must be done no more then that Adam must obey every particular Law before he were actually just It is sufficient that there be no other defect in our Obedience but what may stand with sincerity The same Precept may command or make Duty to one and not to another and so be no Precept as to him A man that lives but an hour after his conversion is bound sincerely to obey Christ according to his Law but he is not bound to build Churches nor to do the work of twenty years Christ may be received as King and is in the same moment in which he is received as Justifier and in that reception we covenant to obey him and take him for our Lord to the death but not to obey him on earth when we are dead for we are then freed from these Lawes and come under the Lawes of the Glorified To your sixth I answer The Texts alledged have no shew of contradicting the Point you oppos se One saith we are justified by his Blood But doth it thence follow therefore not by Believing in him or receiving him as King are we made partakers of it His Blood is the Purchasing cause but we enquire after the condition on our part The other Text saith through faith in his Blood But 1. it saith not only in his Blood 2. And his blood is the Ground of his Dominion as well as of his Justifying us for by his blood he bought all into his own hands For to this end he Died Rose and Revived that he might be Lord of Dead and Living Rom. 14.9 It may be therefore through faith in his Blood as the chief part of the satisfaction and yet necessarily also through faith in himself or the Reception of himself as the Christ 3. Yet doth the Apostle most conveniently say through faith in his blood rather then through faith in his Dominion or Government because when he speaks of Faith he speaks Relatively not as some understand it by Faith meaning Christ but using the name of that Act which fitliest and fulliest relates to its Object and so intending the Object more
neither a continued Act nor renewed or repeated neither Faith nor Repentance afterwards performed are any conditions of our Justification in this Life This may seem a heavy charge but it is a plain Truth For that Justification which we receive upon our first believing hath only that first Act of faith for its condition or as others speak its Instrumental cause We are not justified to day by that act of Faith which we shall perform to Morrow or a Twelvemonth hence so that according to your opinion and all that go that way it is only one the first Act of Faith which justifies and all the following Acts through our whole life do no more to our Justification then the works of the Law do I would many other Divines that go your way for it is common as to the dispatching of Justification by one Act would think of this foul absurdity You may add this also to what is said before against your opinion herein Where then is the Old Doctrine of the just living by faith as to Justification I may bear with these men or at least need not wonder for not admitting Obedience or other Graces to be conditions of Justification as continued when they will not admit faith it self Who speaks more against faith they or I When I admit as necessary that first act and maintain the necessity of repeated acts to our continued Justification and they exclude all save one Instantaneous act 2. And what reason can any man give why Repentance should be admitted as a condition of our first Justification and yet be no condition of the continuance of it or what proof is there from Scripture for this I shall prove that the continuance of our Justification hath more to its condition then the beginning though learned men I know gain-say it but surely less it cannot have 4. But why do you say only of Repentance that it is the condition of Remision and of forgiving others that it is the condition of entring into life Have you not Christs express words that forgiving others is a condition of our Remission if ye forgive men their trespasses your heavenly Father will forgive you but if you forgive not men c. Nay is not Reformation and Obedience ordinarily made a condition of forgiveness I refer you to the Texts cited in my Aphorisms Wash you make you clean put away the evil of your doings c. then if your sins be as crimson c. He that confesseth and forsaketh his sin shall have mercy And I would have it considered if Remission and Justification be either the same or so neer as all Divines make them whether it be possible that forgiving others and Reformat on or new Obedience should be a condition of the continuance or renewal of a pardoning Act and not of Justification Doubtless the general Justification must be continued as well as the general pardon and a particular Justification I think after particular sins is needfull as well as particular pardon or if the name should be thought improper the thing cannot be denyed Judicious Ball saith as much as I yet men were not so angry with him Treat of Covenant pag. 20.21 A disposition to good works is necessary to Justification being the qualification of an active lively faith Good works of all sorts are necessary to our continuance in the state of Justification and so to our final Absolution if God give opportunity but they are not the cause of but only a precedent qualification or condition to final forgiveness and Eternal bliss And pag. 21. This walking in the light as he is in the light is that qualification whereby we become immediatly capable of Christs Righteousness or actual participants of his propitiation which is the sole immediate cause of our Justification taken for Remission of sins or actual approbation with God And pag. 73. Works then or a purpose to walk with God justifie as the passive qualification of the subject capable of Justification or as the qualification of that faith which justifieth So he 5. How will you ever prove that our Entering into Life and our continued remission or Justification have not the same conditions that those Graces are excluded from one which belong to the other Indeed the men that are for Faiths Instrumentality say somewhat to it but what you can say I know not And for them if they could prove Faith Instrumental in justifying co nomine because it receives Christ by whom we are justified they would also prove it the Instrument of Glorifying because it Receives Christ by and for whom we are saved and Glorified And so if the Instrumentality of Faith must exclude obedience from justifying us it must also exclude it from Glorifying us And I marvel that they are so loose and easie in admitting obedience into the work of saving and yet not of continuing or consummating Justification when the Apostle saith By Grace ye are saved by Faith and so excludes obedience from Salvation in the general as much as he any where doth from Justification in particular 6. But lastly I take what you grant me in this Section and profess that I think in effect you grant me the main of the cause that I stand upon For as you grant 1. That faith is not the whole condition of the Covenant 2. That Repentance also is the condition of Remission which is near the same with Justification 3. That obedience is the condition of Glorification which hath the same conditions with final and continued Justification 4. So you seem to yield all this as to our full justification at Judgement For you purposely limit the conditionality of meer faith to our Justification in this Life But if you yield all that I desire as you do if I understand you as to the last justification at Judgement then we are not much differing in this business For I take as Mr. Burges doth Lect. of Justification 29 our compleatest and most perfect Justification to be that at Judgement Yea and that it is so eminent and considerable here that I think all other Justification is so called chiefly as referring to that And me thinks above all men you should say so too who make Justification to lie only in sententiâ— judicis and not in sententia Legis And so all that go your way as many that I meet with do If then we are justified at Gods great Tribunal at Judgement by obedience as the secondary part of the condition of the Covenant which you seem to yield 1. We are agreed in the main 2. I cannot yet believe that our Justification at that Bar hath one condition and our Justification in Law or in this Life as continued another He that dyeth justified was so justified in the hour of dying on the same conditions as he must be at Judgement For 1. There are no conditions to be performed after death 2. Sententia Legis sententia judicis do justifie on the same terms Add to all
take it for an Immanent Act. Your self who take it for a transient act but once performed do yet judge I doubt not that our Justified estate which is the effect of it is permanent and the relations of Reconciled Pardoned Adopted are continued Also you and they I hope will confess that Justification passive is continued on the condition of continued faith Now I would know how you will avoid Tompsons Doctrine of Intercision upon every notable defect of a Christians faith when unbelief gives him a foyl which is too common as you answer so will I. If you say his faith is not overcome habitually when unbelief is prevalent in the present Act I will say so of his obedience 2. You know most Divines say as much as I that obedience is a condition of the continuance of Justification only they say that faith only is the Instrument of Justifying and how will they answer you 3. You know that all say that obedience is a condition of Salvation and so of our present Title to Salvation Now how will they avoid Tompsons Doctrine of Intercision of that Title to Salvation upon the committing of such sins 4. It is not perfect obedience which I say is the condition but sincere And by sincere I mean so much as may express that we unfeignedly take Christ still for our Lord and Saviour And so it is not every sin that I say will forfeit or interrupt our Justification and cause it to discontinue that is lose our Title or change our Relation in Law no nor every gross sin but only that sin which is inconsistent with the continued Accepting Christ for our Soveraign that sin which breaks the main Covenant of which see Dr. Preston at large as Adultery or Desertion doth in marriage A denying God to be our God or Christ to be our Christ by our works while we confess him in word An actual explicite or implicite Renunciation of Christ and taking the flesh for our master and the pleasing of it for our happiness or as the Mahometans following a false Christ Now I hope that no justified person doth ever commit this sin much less any elect and justified man of whom Tompson speaks You may see through his ninth chap. part 2 that Tompson erred through misunderstanding wherein the sincerity of Faith as justifying doth consist I wish many more do not so He thought that Justification did follow every act of undissembled Faith but only rooted Faith would certainly persevere and therefore the unrooted Though true Believers might lose their Justification if they were Reprobates Prascits as he calls them or have it interrupted if they were elect But if he had known what I have asserted in the aforesaid cap. 11. part 3. of Rest Edit 2. that the very sincerity of faith as justifying lyeth not in the natural being of the act meerly but the prevalent Degree and moral specification then he would have known that his unrooted ones were never justified therefore never lost it And if in asserting justification by the only act of Faith he had not over-looked the use of the habit he had not spoke so much of Intercision of Justification through interruption of the acts where the Habits remain Of this I must further explain my self where it is more seasonable His Objections pag. 21. cap. 5. part 1. I have answered in the place before cited Yet even Tompson denyeth that ever sins once pardoned do return or Justificationem à peccatis sâ—mel remissis amitti pag. 11 part 1 cap. 2 sed â—arsonam quae aliquando justa fuit posse contrabere aliquando actu contraâ—ere per nova peccata novum reatum ire Divinae mortis aeternae So that it is not the loss of the first justification that he asserteth I conclude then that as you and others answer Tompson just so will I if you do it well for it concerneth my cause no more then yours or other mens But Sir you have drawn me so neer the difficulty which perplexeth me that I will now open it to you How to avoid the Intercision of justification is a question that hath long troubled me not on any of these terms proper to my own judgement but how on your Grounds or any Orthodox Divines it will be avoided I would know 1. whether we are Guilty not only facti sed poenae of every sin we commit or of such sins as Davids before Repentance if not guilty then what need of Pardon of daily praying Forgive us our Debts or of a Christ to procure our Pardon If we are Guilty how can that consist with a justified state Reatus est obligatio ad Pernam The least sin unpardoned makes obnoxious to condemnation and Hell He that is obnoxious to them is not at present justified Here I am much puzled and in the dark In my Aphor. I have slightly touched it but so as doth not quietare intellectum I deny the Intercision of universal Justification Yet I dare not say but that a Believers sins may be unpardoned till he Repent Believe and seek pardon And I dare not think that Christ teacheth us to pray only for pardon in soro conscientiae or only of the temporal punishment nor only for continuance of what we had before But how to make personal universal uninterrupted Justification consist with the Guilt of one sin or with one sin unpardoned here is the knot Our British Divines in Dort synod Act. de Persever Thes 5. pag. 266. say that Believers by such sins Reatum mortis incurrunt Prideaux Lect. 6. de persev pag. 80. saith they do reatum damnabilem contrahere sic ut saltem demeritorie licet non effectivè Jus ad regnum caelorum penitus amittant This distinction doth no good for we pray not Forgive us our trespasses i. e. that they may not deserve Death Mr. Burges of Justif Lect. 27. pag. 242. thinks They have an actual Guilt obliging them to eternal wrath not absolutely but conditionally till they take the means appointed of God for their pardon for God doth not will to them salvation while they abide in that state Mr. Reynolds Life of Christ pag. 404.442 443 496. saith that they certainly incur Gods displeasure and create a merit of Death and deserve Damnation but de facto bring it not Now all this openeth not mine understanding to see How a man is Reus mortis and yet perfectly justified and so non-condemnandus etiam in sententia Legis at the same moment of time And were it a thing that should be futurum which we may suppose that he should dye in that state whether he should be justified at Judgement and so be saved or not Sir though â— resuse not to accept your further Animadversions on the former Points yet being indeed satisfied pretty well in them I chiefly intreat that you would communicate to me your thoughts of this one Point as soon as you can if you have any clear way to untye the knot and if
joyned with Assent as Heat in the Sun with Light though they are not the same But then the second sort of Affiance followeth Assent and hath another act of the Will interceding which is Consent or acceptance of the Benefit offered which also is closely conjunct with the first act of the Will And then followeth last of all affiance in Christ for the performance of the undertaken acts And these latter are also many particular Physical acts as the objects in specie specialissima are many And yet all these make but one object in a moral sense and so but one act and are done in a few moments of time of which after Would it not be too tedious I should stay to cite several Texts to prove that never a one of all these acts is excluded as works by Paul But of divers of them it s before proved from Rom. 3. and 4. and of more in Heb. 11. and in Gal. 3.1 6 7 8 9 13 14 15 16 18 20 21 22. There are at least these Objects of Justifying faith expressed 1. Christs Person 2. that he was seed promised 3. That he was crucified 4. That this was for our sins 5. That he was made a curse for us in this his death 6. That hereby he Redeemed us from the curse 7. That he is the Mediator 8. God as the Party with whom he is Mediator 9. God as Believed in his Promise 10. God as Justifier 11. The Gospel preached and he Promise made 12. Blessedness by Christ 13. The confirmed Covenant 14. The Inheritance 15. Righteousness 16. Adoption 17. That Belief is the means and believers the subjects of these benefits All these objects of Faith you will find in the Text. Argument 2. Ex natura rei If other acts of faith in Christ are no more works then that one whatsoever it be which you will say Paul opposeth to works then Paul doth not call them works or number them with works But the Antecedent is true therefore so is the Consequent Doubtless the Scripture calls them as they are and therefore if they are not works it calls them not works And for the Antecedent 1. If by works you mean the Keeping of the first Covenant by sinless obedience so neither the one or the other are works 2. If you mean the keeping of Moses Law so neither of them are works 3. If you mean the performance of an act of obedience to any Precept of God so the several acts are works but justifie not as acts of obedience to the command that 's but their matter but as the condition of the Promise 4. If you mean that they are Acts of the soul of man so every act of Faith is a work though it justifie not as such so that here is no difference to be found E. g. If you make the Believing in Christ as Dying though you take in both assent and affiance to be the only Justifying act what reason can you give why our Believing in Christ incarnate in Christ obeying the Law in Christ rising again and Glorified and Interceding in Christ actually now giving out the pardon of sin and Adoption c. should be called works any more then our Believing in Christ as crucified No reason at all nor any Scripture can be brought for it Yea what reason have you that our Believing in Christ as the Physitian of our souls to cure us of our sins and cleanse our hearts and sanctifie our Natures and in Christ as the Teacher and Guide of our souls to life eternal should be called works any more then the other Or that believing in Christs blood for everlasting Life and happiness should be any more called works then believing in his blood for Justification Yea that Believing in him as the King and Head and Captain of his Church to subdue their enemies and by his Government conduct them to perseverance and to Glory should any more be called works then believing on him as crucified in order to forgiveness Argument 3. All acts Essential to faith in Christ as Christ are opposed to works by Paul in the point of Justification and are not the works opposed to Faith But many acts are essential to faith in Christ as Christ therefore they are many acts that are opposed to works and no one of those acts is the works excluded The Major is proved thus If faith in Christ as such be it that Paul opposeth to works then every essential part of it is by Paul opposed to works for it is not faith in Christ if it want any essential part But the Antecedent is true Ergo. The Minor I have proved in the first Disputation Though sometime it is said to be by faith in his blood that we have remission of sin and sometime that we are justified if we believe in him that raised Christ from the dead c. Yet most frequently it is said to be by faith in Christ by believing in the Lord Jesus receiving Christ Jesus the Lord c. Belive in the Lord Jesus and thou shalt be saved was the Gospel preached to the Jaylor Acts 16. But this is sufficiently proved already That many acts are essential to faith in Christ as such is also proved and particularly that believing in him as our Teacher Lord and as Rising Interceding and Justifying by sentence and Gift as well as believing in him as dying for our Justification As Christ is not Christ as to his Office and work without these Essentials so faith is not the Christian faith without these acts But here observe that though I say these acts of faith are not the works which Paul excludeth I speak of them as they are and not as they are misunderstood For if any man should imagine that Believing in Christ is a Legal Meritorious work and that can justifie him of or for it self I will not deny but he may so make another thing of faith and so bring it among excluded works if it be possible for him to believe contradictories But then this is as true of one act of Faith as another If a man imagine that it s thus Meritorious to Believe in Christ as purchasing him Justification it is as much the excluded works as to think it Meritorious to Believe in him as our Teacher or King and Judge that will lead us to final Absolution and actually justifie us by his Sentence at that Judgement Argument 4. Those acts of Faith that are necessary to Justification are none of the works that Paul excludeth from Justification unless changed by misunderstanding as aforesaid But other acts of faith as well as one are necessary to Justification Ergo. The Minor which only is worthy the labour of a proof 1. is proved before and in the first Disputation 2. And it is confessed by my Opponents that say Faith in Christ as Teacher King c. is the fides quae Justificat and the condition of Justification as Repentance also is though it be not the Instrumental