righteousness of Christ that we are justified I cannot but think they are out likewise For if when Paul sayes we are not justified by works his meaning were not by our own works but by the obedience of Christ wrought for us then when James sayes we are justified by works his meaning must be by the works Christ did for us and he must not mean our own But this is absonant to any rational apprehension to construe St. James so Nor do I think such a meaning ever came into the heads of either of the Apostles Our Divines then should not say here of our works in general but as to the sense the Apostle speaks of them in general we are not justified them And what is that sense then in which he speak of works why he speaks of works in that sense most manifestly as the law require them that we may live in them Let a man then have the help of the spirit or be without it so long as he falls short of what the law requires at his hands be it never so little he cannot live by those works the curse is due to him for the least breach and that is contrary to justification There are some Divines of note therefore seeing no footing for this distinction have chose an other There are works of the Law say they and works of the Gospel When St. Paul sayes we are not justified by works he speaks expresly of works of the Law St. James is to be understood of the works of the Gospel This distinction may serve well provided it be cloathed with the sense of the Apostles When some have used these terms to signify no more but that we are not justifyed by Jewish observations but by the righteousness of the Gospel it falls too short in the first branch to do any thing But by the works of the law let them understand works which answer the law and that there are none justified by the works of the law because there is none perfectly fulfil it and they have hit the business For though Paul speaks not only of works by the law of innocency but directly and mostly of the works of the Jewish law which the Jews fancied ex sufficientia praestantialegis did as such procure pardon and life without looking to the merits of the Mediator for it and so erred yet the law of Moses consisting either in moral precepts that represented the law of Nature which no man can come up to and the most righteous of them did break or in the remedying commandements of sacrifices or attonements for sin whose virtue alone did lye in the blood of the Redeemer the ground and bottom of their errour which he confuteth does indeed lye herein that whatsoever it was they did or whatsoever they thought of it it did fall short of the law of works therefore did not justify them before God There are works then which if they be performed doe answer the law the law we are to mean ultimately as given to mankind in a Covenant by our creation and works which if performed do not answer the law but answer the Gospel If the distinction before-cited be received with this meaning it is true that Paul speaks of the works of the law and James of the works of the Gospel and that there is no man justified by the former because there is no man does or can perform them when we do perform the latter and are justified by them To give more light and weight to this There are works which if we be justified by them exclude grace and there are works which exclude not grace though we be justified by them The works of the law take them in this sense that answer the law if they be performed must make justification due so as it may be challenged according to the law the reward shall be of debt and there be no need of grace but justice in the case for he that doth them ought of right to live in them And these are the works undoubtedly that Paul disputes against while he proves justification to be of grace which is also agreeable to the end and scope the holy Ghost seems to have in it to wit he beating man down from all vain exaltation in himself and laying him at Gods feet for all he has Wherein it were not yet enough that what he hath is received seeing he would be even ready to boast of this that he hath received what others have not but that when he is enabled by God to perform that which he does even this which he hath received and is accepted is but such as God Almighty might choose whether he would accept it or not and if it were not for grace for all he hath done he could not yet be justified and saved On the contrary hand therefore the works of the Gospel that is the works which the Gospel requires of us as the condition of our justification and salvation such as faith repentance and new obedience when they are performed and answer the Gospel they do yet stand in need of grace because they do not answer the law and God might chuse whether he would accept them or no or make any promise to them When we repent it includes the acknowledgment of sin and when we believe it is a flying to Gods mercy for it and though we may walk sincerely before God we do not and cannot walk perfectly and he might condemn us is justice for the least failings and much more for our manifold transgressions If God then shews mercy and accepts of what we do it must be of his grace that he does it It is true that these works do justifie us but that is while we are judged at the bar of Gods grace or according to the new Covenant which is therefore called a Covenant of grace or the law of grace because that grace is no ways destroyed but confirmed by these works From whence it may appear that the two Apostles shall be so far from contradicting one another about this point as that what St. Paul contends for shall be made good by that which is said by St. James Paul sayes we are justified by grace and St. James proves it while he shews us that our works which are imperfect even such as Rahabs as well as Abrahams are accepted and rewarded as if they were perfect that is are imputed to us for righteousness which they could never be but for grace and that purchased through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus The third thing wherein St. Augustine mistakes is that which strewes the way to the Papists doctrine or justification by works and therefore it will be necessary before I come to it to advance here somthing out of this Father which offers us I think some light towards the fixing our own doctrine of justification by faith Per legem cognitio peccati per fidem impetratio gratiae contra peccatum per gratiam sanatio animi a vitio
5. Where he is proving that our conversion and so faith it self is from God To go on when the Apostle does oppose this faith and grace unto works he is put to it for when by grace he understands nothing but infused righteousness for the fulfilling the law how does that oppose works For the making his notion hold therefore by works in opposition to grace and faith he understands Opera sine adjutorio dono Dei works without the assistance and gift of God In short our justification is not of works which are done before we have grace but of works which proceed from it Israel non pervenit ad justitiam quare quia non ex fide sed tanquam ex operibus id est tanquam eam per semet ipsos operantes non in se credentes operari Deum Israel attained not to righteousness why because he sought it not of faith but as it were of works that is as working it out of themselves and not believing in God to work it in them Ib. c. 19. So De gra lib. arb c. 8. Quomodo non ex operibus ne fortè quis extollatur audi intellige non ex operibus dictum tanquam tuis ex te ipso tibi existentibus sed tanquam his in quibus te Deus finxit Ipsius enim figmentum sumus creati in Christo Jesu in operibus bonis How not of works that one may not boast hear and understand it is said not of works as thy own done by thee of thy self but of those as in which thou art created by God for we are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus unto good works Again Ignorantes Dei justitiam id est quae ex Deo est homini ut sit justus suam volentes constituere tanquam per eorum non adjutam divinitus arbitrium lex possit impleri Being ignorant of the righteousness of God that is which comes from God to man to make him righteous and being willing to establish their own that is as if by their own free-will without the divine help they were able to perform the law Contra duas Epistolas Pelagianorum l. 3 c. 1. In this doctrine of the Father there are three things wherein he is out The first is in his conception of grace When works and grace are opposed we are not to apprehend with him that grace is taken for any thing infused in the Soul which is inherent grace for works and grace in this sense have no opposition the one being the fruits of the other But by grace we must understand the grace of God without us the grace which is in God that is his favour or the condescention of God to us in this matter And thus is the opposition very plain That which is of debt is one thing and that which is of favour another Not of works that is not of debt or of what would make the reward to be due but of grace that is when it is not due but of favour The certain truth is this God Almighty gave to man a law according to his nature which he repeated to the Jews and if any man were able to keep this law according to the Covenant of Nature then should his justification be of right and due according to the law of his creation but the Apostle does most industriously prove that neither Jew nor Gentile was able to produce these works and consequently if there be any whether Jew or Gentile that are justified it must be by grace because it cannot be of right or what he may challenge by the law upon that account Grace then and mark it well is the accepting of any mans person or thing which is done when one may choose or when in justice one were not bound to do it Accordingly when God justifies us by grace it is his accepting of us as righteous or of what we doe for righteousness and rewarding it as such when according to his law it would not stand but he might condemn us for it Let any who have better words use them I regard only my sense And here may we have an answer to a question of great heat amongst our Divines The Gospel requires Faith Repentance and new Obedience and how then are we justified and saved by grace or how then is grace free when it is not vouchsafed but upon conditions This difficulty hath made some run into that extream that the Covenant of grace is without condition but I say readily the grace of God or of the Gospel is free in that he accepts of the sinners faith and repentance when he needs not or when according to the law he is not tyed to it unless mans obedience were perfect That which our Divines do offer usually is this It is free because it is not of merit mans belief and obedience cannot merit any thing at the hands of God and much less salvation as well from the disproportion of our performances or momentary sufferings to the eternal weight of glory with other the like reasons as that we do herein but our duty and he helps us also in the doing which are the cheif reasons that are urged This information does labour I think with some defect of light If man had performed the condition of the Covenant of works it might upon these reasons have been said that life and salvation had been still of grace and free as not merited while these considerations hinder merit whereas the Apostle industriously opposing the sinners being justified or saved freely by Gods grace to justification by works or the deeds of the law does account if man were justifyed by works it would be of debt Could a man I say have performed the condition of the Covenant of Nature the Apostle accounts still in his reckoning that then had the reward been of debt or merit and if a mans own Conscience could not accuse him of sin he had no need of grace but now sayes he seeing both Jew and Gentile fall short hereof and all are become guilty before God there is none is or can be justified but it must be gratis freely in opposition to that performance To lend more help against this difficulty we must distinguish of merit There is a debt or merit of commutative justice or of governing distributive justice It is impossible that any should engage the Almighty in a debt of the former sort Of the latter fort there is a debt or merit upon compact or upon strict retaliation It is true that there is nothing man does or could do in the state of innocency had he continued perfect can merit or could have merited any reward from God upon the score of a strict retaliation or returning good for good any more then upon commutative justice because there is nothing we can do to our Governour who is infinite to benefit or hurt him and so these reasons before named of our Divines and others may come in if they please Can a man
bee profitable to God sayes Eliphas to Job And who hath given to the Lord that he should receive of him sayes the Apostle But the case is not so under their favour with a debt or merit upon equal and upon terms unequal In a compact upon terms that are equal we are to know that the reward does become debt or may be said to be of merit notwithstanding by way of strict retaliation or upon an account of equal benefit the performance of the condition would require no such matter For instance if I agree to give a man half a crown for his dayes work I must pay it him as debt though the emolument to me by the work done is not worth it nay though if I had not agreed I should have thought much to give him half the money but in a compact upon terms unequal as if I promise a poor man a shilling for his leading my horse to the next stile though I am bound to give it to him when he has done so yet is the shilling an Almes or the reward of grace or favour for all that Now I account when God in the Covenant of Nature hath made eternal life to be due upon exact obedience it is a compact upon terms but equal he that doth them shall live in them So long as man was innocent God in justice could not punish him and so long as he continued but in the same state he was created he must be happy and eternally so which is the same thing with salvation only it could not be called by that name till man was first lost Neither may Gods giving him ability or his doing no more then his duty be any hindrance to him of meriting upon this compact any more then my letting the man I have hired to work with my shovel or mattock and his doing only what he was bid hinder him of his wages the reason is because the compact supposes that if he does but his duty with the strength that God has given or does give him he shall be justified and blessed If Adam then had or we could perform the condition of Nature which is to live perfectly without offending God at all the reward no doubt seeing the Apostle so accounts of it should be of merit or debt for that was a Covenant upon terms but equal it being meet that God should deal benignly with us as his Creatures while we carry our selves towards him as our Marker and that he should not deprive us of any benefit to which we were created before we forfeited it by our transgression But now when he gives us the reward which is eternal life through his Son upon an obedience which is imperfect that is by a new Covenant upon terms unequal he gives it freely seeing he gives it without performance of the condition at first required to obtain the same The sum of this is the rectoral justice of God is either under the strict law or under the law of grace When our Divines then say that our works do not merit they say true but they must be rightly understood when they give us those reasons for it at first named their reasons are good against all merit of commutative justice and of strict retaliation in distributive justice and against merit ex pacto under the strict law or upon terms that are equal but as to a merit of compact under the law of grace secundum regimen gratiae pate num they are not good When by some of these reasons therefore our works if they were perfect should not yet be meritorious which is a contradiction to the Apostle I must conclude that the reason why grace is said to be free by St Paul is not because our works do not merit upon their reasons or do not merit with a merit of strict retaliation or ex pacto upon terms that are equal which their reasons only exclude but because we do not come up to those those works which notwithstanding their reasons would merit if we did perform them that is because they come short of that condition which by Gods first compact according to nature should make the reward to be of debt and yet God accepts of them for Christs sake and rewards them no less then if they did That the grace of justification is purchased by Christ it is apparent in the words that are ordinarily joynd with it Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus But if the notion of free did lye in the conception our DivInes ordinarily frame then could it not be the fruit of Christs purchase for how can that which is purchased in their sense be free whereas it is this grace certainly is the main fruit of Christs redemption to wit that the new Covenant should be established so as the poor sinner whose Conscience does condemn him of the breach of that law which is written in his heart and according to which he should dye hath yet a refuge to Gods mercy which he is said I pray pardon me the repetition to bestow freely because man hath not the works which should make the reward due to him Lo then how the grace of God is said free indeed in the meaning of the Apostle Not upon the account I say that man cannot merit at Gods hand though it be true that our works do not merit as our Divines ordinarily only inform us seeing both that God can be made debtor ex pacto regimine gratiae paterno and Christ who became man did merit for us but upon the account here mentioned which is a most direct answer to the doubt proposed how the grace of God can be free which is not tendred and obtained but upon condition and I declare that Gods abatement of the terms and requiring a new condition is that which therefore makes it free seeing it is tendred and obtained without performance of the old As also that the new being unequal hinders not grace The second thing wherein St. Austin is out is in his interpretation of Works It is manifest that Paul speaks of words in such a sense as no man living can perform them and upon that account no man can be justified by them But if the interpretation of this Father and the Papists after him were true that by works we must understand works only that are done before a man is regenerate or before he hath the help of the spirit then may a man who is regenerate and hath its help perform the works that the Apostle speaks of and so be justified by them And then must his doctrine be false that comes to this universal conclusion Wherefore we conclude that by the works of the law shall no flesh living be justified in his sight for by the law is the knowledg of sin On the other side when some Protestants conceive that the Apostle speaks of our works in general and accounts that we are not justified by them because it is by the
unto life and a valid donation of it to the sinner The last is the ground of the former for man must be made just or God cannot reckon him so and acquit him in judgement The judgement of God is according to truth Now to this making a man just as there is this donation of God there must be mans receiving Christ is not ours though tendered or given until we receive him This receiving then which is our act that is faith it self God excites and make use of to this end He makes use of it I have accounted as his instrument of making Christ ours to this end he hath apppointed it for that he may accordingly reckon his righteousness to us unto the remission of sin and everlasting salvation Having told you this first I may make the bolder to tell you my more indifferent thoughts of farther years I do apprehend that the Apostles in their doctrine and the Primitive Christians had more simple and less intricate conceptions of things then we have and that their dispute then whether we are justifyed by faith or works in the most simple understanding of it contains no more than to shew us what is required of persons that they may be justified or what is that God hath made the condition on our parts of our justification St. Augustine I have said does teach us that faith does justifie us as the beginning and foundation unto grace and a good life and the Council of Trent with Bellarmine and the Papists after that Council stand upon this Faith justifies only as initium justificationis the beginning of justification But howsoever the Papists have made use of that Father the truth and light which he hath offered is not to be lost I do take this to be the most right and certain notion that faith does justify as initium and fundamentum I will not say justificationis seeing I understand not justification to be all one with sanctification as they do but as fundamentum conditionis The condition of our full final justification the Gospel offers is repentance and sincere obedience and faith is the initium and fundamentum of that condition Was not Abraham our Father justified by works when he had offered his Son Isaack sayes St. James The faith of Abraham or his believing God was the beginning and foundation of this excellent work the ready offering his Son which shewed his sincerity of life the condition of justification And the Scripture was fulfilled which faith Abraham believed God and it was imputed to him for righteousness Here believing offering Isaac are all one with S. James The Offering Isaack proceeded from believing as the initium and fundament ū of it and so believing as the initium of sincerity of life or sincere obedience does justifie Such a faith as produces good works which are sincere though imperfect or such good works as proceed from faith are but one and the same thing with the two Apostles and made by both the condition of our justification And here I should be willing to come off but the uniform judgement of the reformed Churches on the Article of Justification requires some regard There is therefore in the Schools a Quatenus specificative reduplicative I suppose when I have said that faith does justifie us as the foundation of the condition and so productive of the whole of it I have said well with S. Augustine as to the quatenus specificative and if I said nothing else it might be enough Nevertheless seeing it is but fit upon this account to speak yet a little more curiously I must needs say farther that I apprehend there is indeed something really in that which lyes in the concurring thoughts of our Divines that faith hath and must have a hand in our justification someway as no other of our works of acts have It is this I believe that God will pardon me if I repent and therefore I repent as my faith now makes me repent and perform the condition it justifies me as to a quatenus specificative but when I have repented and performed the condition the duties I have performed are imperfect and sinful and have need of mercy in point of law and it is my faith yet must go to God for his acceptance of them through Christ when I have done It is my faith let my say that must make up to me out of the mercy or grace of God for Christs sake what is wanting in that I have done to make it such as he may impute it to me for righteousness which else he could not And as faith procures me this or procures it thus we have the quatenus also reduplicative in the great question how faith justifies It is faith makes me perform the condition and then finds acceptance for it being done and as it does both it does specificative and reduplicative justifie the sinner By this it appears how faith hath an eye still to pardon according to the Protestant while it is opposed to works in the point of justification which is not only as respecting the pardon of all our sins upon the performing the condition but as respecting that pardon more especially which goes into the very accepting the condition performed for when there is imperfection still in our duty and yet he accepts it he must pardon also what he accepts And thus it is that the just man is said to live by faith in the most subtle conception The works which the just man does are his righteousness most certainly and that which justifies him but they are short and he could not live in them but that faith supplies as I speak out of Gods pardon and grace and consequently out of the Covenant for Christs sake what is wanting otherwise for acceptation unto life I do not say faith supplies this out of Christs merits as if his and our obedience were mingled to make up that one righteousness that justifies us but that it is our works which we perform our selves is the condition and through Christs merits both the imperfection is pardoned and they accepted according to covenant upon faith It is of faith sayes St. Paul that it might be of grace To be of works is to need to grace but to be of faith is to have such works as need to be pardoned even when they are accepted of God for Christs sake unto everlasting salvation When Augustine does tell us so often that faith justifies gratiam impetrando let us take grace in his and also in our acception and both together will compleat the notion Faith goes to God for his grace or help whereby we perform the condition and so justifies us Faith goes to God also for his grace or favour to pardon and accept what is done for Christs sake and so justifies us As it does impetrate grace or obtain his spirit for our duty and then impetrates grace or finds favour also for acceptance of it taken them both together and we understand fully
The righteousness of God and grace opposed to works is really nothing else but the meritorious righteousness of Christ procuring the pardoning Covenant of grace and our performing the condition that is the righteousness of the Covenant of grace accepted by God for Christs sake instead of the righteousness of the Covenant of works Only we are to know this righteousness may be understood either with respect to God as it is all one I say with his grace or with respect to Vs as it is all one with that upon which this grace is vouchsafed Charitas Dei dicta est diffundi in cordibus nostris non qua nos ipse diligit sed qua nos facit dilectores suos sicut justitia Dei qua justi ejus munere efficimur As it is called the love of God whereby we are made to love him so the righteousness of God whereby we are made righteous through his gift Aug. de spir lit c. 32. It is true that this righteousness is wrought in us by the spirit and flowes not from our selves it is true also that as we performe it by his aid it is our own work yet is not the one the reason why it is called the righteousness of God nor the other any hindrance why it should not be so called for the reason lyes altogether in the opposition of it meerly to that of works Let a man do all that he can whether by his own strength or by Gods aid he can never come up to the law of works or to a conformity to the terms of the Covnant of nature or law of Moses as it was a representation of that Covenant so that by the deeds thereof he cannot be justified and for as much as it pleased God therefore to vouchsafe us a new law the law of faith or grace or the new Covenant having lower terms that in the performance hereof or in a conformity only hereunto the man who is a sinner in respect of the law may be righteous and so God just in justifying him this grace and condescention of God being meerly from his own good will is called thus the righteousness which is of him in opposition to the other which is of nature and so were ours or mans righteousness properly if he could attain unto the same But when he cannot attain unto that which is so by nature whatsoever he attains if it be less must be a righteousness only through grace which notwithstanding our shortness God mercifully condescends to accept instead of that which is perfect through the merits of our Saviour and in regard of that acceptation N. B. it is called his or the righteousness which is of him of his own free tender and allowance when in regard of performance it is ours though we do it by his help Lo here the true key that opens the mind of the Apostle and consequently the door to that treasure which depends upon it That which is said I know by our Protestants most to the quick is this that pardon indeed is an act of meer grace but justification is an act of justice according to law and therefore must Christs is an act of justice according to law and therefore must Christs righteousness which alone does answer the law be brought in to justifie the believer But this is a mistake for if justification lyes not altogether in pardon Even as David describeth the blessedness of the man unto whom God imputeth righteousness without works saying blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven it is at least one part of it and the whole is expresly declared by the Apostle to be by grace being justified freely by his grace True indeed it is an act of righteousness even a judicial or forensical act that is according to law but what law not the law of works but according to the law of Faith It is an act I say of that righteousness of God and no other which the Apostle sets forth in opposition to the law and works and makes all one with his grace To reckon it then an act of justice according to the Law intending thereby the law of works is to correct the Apostle and to tell him we know better how we are justified by Christ then he It is the understanding of this righteousness whereof we are now speaking will set us all right It is Christs obedience and sufferings alone no doubt which could make any compensation to God for our sins that he might without diminuition to his honour as Law-giver or Governour recede from his first law but when Christ hath by his satisfaction procured this that God should now deal with us by a new law the remedying law or upon other terms the thing is manifest in itself that the righteousness then which is pleaded and accepted for this satisfaction sake of Christ must be this righteousness of the new law or the righteousness of faith and not of works which both denominates the performer righteous and God just in justifying him according to it For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth That is as I construe it Christ by his satisfaction hath procured that we should not be judged by the law of works and consequently that righteousness or justification be attained if we do but perform the terms of the Gospel To declare I say at this time his righteousness that he might be just and a justifyer of him that belives in Jesus Who is made unto us of God that is a phrase I take it signifying no more then through whom one way or other God would have us obtain all spiritual blessings wisdome righteousness sanctification and redemption After this there are no texts I count such as the last purposely mentioned which are pressed by our Divines for their service before that are able to carry such a burden He hath made him sin for us sin as the expiatory sacrifice under the law is called sin who knew no sin that we might be made the righteousness of God in him That is he who was the imaculate Lamb was made a sacrifice for our sins that we may become righteous with the righteousness of God which he accepts through him Christ as a Sacrifie redeems us from the law of sin and purchases for us a law of grace according to that law we have a righteousness which is accepted unto life through Christ I pray note it therefore it is not said that his righteousness might be made ours nor that we might be made his righteousness but that we might be made the righteousness of God And what is the righteousness of God I have shewen you just now and what in him likewise is declared here together with it in these few words Vt simus justitia Dei in ipso Haec est illa justitia Dei non qua ipse justus est sed qua nos ab eo facti That we should become the righteousness of God in him This is that righteousness
be justifyed Pauls own righteousness as a Jew or as a Pharisee I say is one thing and Pauls faith and obedience which is his righteousness as a Christian is another And this distinction our Saviour himself hath first offered Except your righteousness exceed the righteousness of the Scribes and Pharises The righteousness of works is twofold The righteousness of Mankind according to the Covenant of Nature and the righteousness of the Jewes while they reckoned to be justified by the external observation only of the rites of Moses The one of these exceeds the righteousness of faith and we are not justified by it because no man can attain to it the other falls short of the righteousness of faith or of a true Christian according to these words of our Lord and for that reason as for several others the establishment of it was dangerous to their Salvation A last text they have what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin condemned sin in the flesh that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us who walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit It is urged here by a Perfectist that if the Protestant doctrine were true it should be said that the righteousness of the law should be fulfilled in Christ and not in us But these words I apprehend may be a phrase of the Apostles as the words attaining unto righteousness otherwhere and so it will be all one as if he had said that we might be justified who walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit Nevertheless there is this here must be known and noted that when a Christian obeys God according to the Gospel that obedience of his proceeding from faith though imperfect is accepted of God instead of the laws perfect righteousness or stands him in the stead as if the whole law were fulfilled which is the ground of such expressions From whence in the way we may have light for the understanding the Apostle when he tells us the law is established by faith or uses the like words The law is established only by the fulfilling of it and faith as it works by love fulfils the law But how why in the sense N. B. as is now told you Faith produces obedience which is imperfect yet answering the terms of the gospel it is through that grace and condescention from God which Christ hath purchased for us in the work of our redemption imputed to us for righteouaness that is accepted and rewarded so as it is made to stand us in the same stead as the full performance of the law would have done which is to justifie us and bring us life eternal When God made man he gave him a law suitable to his Creation That law being founded in the image of God wherein he was created is most holy equal and unchangeable God as Rector must deal with the World according to this law so that man transgressing he is engaged to proceed against him by it unless there be some means found out that he may be no loser in his justice if he do not There is nothing can be offered to God but his justice and holiness must be losers if it be of consideration less valuable then that which the law it self required which is the obedience of all mankind or their everlasting suffering for its transgression No Man or Creature but Christ alone could offer any such satisfaction as this for us And this he offered in the obedience or righteousness of his whole life and death as the price sacrifice ransome propitiation for our sins which through the dignity of the Person that offered it being the Son of God as well as man was of value which is infinite That which exceeds a thing or is more in value then it cannot be the very thing it self which in value it exceeds The righteousness then of Christ is really imputed to man tendred in his behalf and made ours in regard of this effect or in the end to which it was intended I will say when it cannot be ours in it self to wit that God being satisfied or made no loser in his justice hereby does deal with us otherwise then by that law unto which at first we were created If he deals not with us then according to that it must be by some other which hereby also is purchased and that is according to his grace or righteousness revealed in the Gospel This grace or righteousness lyes in his acceptance of faith and repentance instead of perfect obedience for this righteousness sake of Christ thus imputed and no otherwise then thus When our Divines now say that there are no works of ours can stand before God in his district judgment that they should be causa propter quam the cause for which that is for the merit sake or worthiness whereof he should justifie any person they say well and there meaning is that our works coming not up to the original law God cannot for the performance of them absolve us as no sinners but yet seeing they are such as answer the terms of the Gospel he does for Christs sake or his merits sake both pardon their imperfection and impute them to us for righteousness in the accepting them to life or rewarding them with everlasting salvation In short Christs righteousness is imputed to us but not for righteousness It is for the righteousness sake but not formally though efficiently by the righteousness of another we are justified It is not Christ but our selves that perform the new Covenant and by the new Covenant is it or by grace that we are righteous in Gods sight It is not consequently Christs sufferings or obedience only but our faith obedience sincerity also that is rewarded with salvation yet is it not for the merit of this obedience of ours but for his merits or the merits of his righteousness Behold this is the critrical hindge upon which the whole controversie does turn We will stand for the imputation of Christs righteousness N. B. so far as ever we can with holding justification by the Covenant of grace but when some Protestants have stood for it so as renders our justification to be by the law or the Covenant of works and not by grace they have departed from the Apostle And thus the dispute in the upshot will I think end in this that Christs righteousness is the meritorious indeed the only meritorious or meritoriously procuring efficient but must not be made the formal cause of mans justification And yet do I see there is need still of some more words seeing here the heart of all lyes A righteousness we must have if we be justified and what is that righteousness There is a legal righteousness and Evangelical Christs righteousness our Divines account our Legal righteousness which must answer the law for us and our faith and repentance must be produced to answer the
of Arminius is good It is faith which is a mans own act that is imputed for righteousness therefore not the righteousness acts or obedience of another But when this acute Divine would introduce a notion hereupon that the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 credere therefore must justifie us and not works or not the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 operari it is both an ill and weak conceit which is neither of use nor value For as the Scripture speaks of faith being accounted for righteousness so does it tell us that Abrahams offering his Son and Phineas act were accounted to them for righteousness and that Rahabs hiding the Spies did justifie her That is it is faith as productive of works or works as produced by faith that receives the reward of perfect righteousness which is we are to remember also for Christs sake or through his merits not imputed to us as proprietors but prevailing with the Father for such terms for sinners as answers our redemption and grace of the Gospel I would fain know of any man who is most Orthodox in his complexion whether he does or is able to think that Enoch Noah Job who were before the law Samuel the Kings and Prophets who were under the law or any man or woman whatsoever before the coming of Christ did ever imagine that they were righteous and to be accepted with God for the obedience which the Messiah should perform in their behalf when he came into the world and that the believing this was an instrument of making it to be theirs and so to be imputed to them which it could not be else or whether they did not look on themselves to be righteous by doing righteously and to obtain Gods favour by their upright walking with him and no otherwise in the World They judged not their own righteousness the meritorious cause of pardon to answer the Curse of the Law of Innocency but they believed in Gods mercy and so repented obeyed and were saved through the Redeemer And Enoch walked with God and God took him Blessed is the man sayes David who walkes in his wayes and to whom he imputeth no sin In the acceptation then of a mans own upright walking and in the pardon of his sins did our justification and blessedness lye in Davids time and in the same no doubt does it lye still under the Gospel I would yet fain know whether any of the Disciples James John or Paul himself whether Clement Roman or Alexandrine Justin Martyr Cyprian Ambrose Augustine or any of the Fathers whether Councels or School-men whether John Hus or Wickliffe or any famous or holy Writer without resting on some bare incoherent scraps of sentences did ever understand or receive the full notion of faiths instrumentality and the imputation of a passive righteousness before Luther And if not whether it be possible it should be of any such moment as is made of it by most Protestants It was an Article indeed that raigned in Martins heart and I do therefore give it my obeysance but it is no Article I take it as the remission of sins is in the Creed of the Apostles If the righteousness of Christ be imputed to us as if it were ours in it self it must be the righteousness of his active or passive obedience or both If his active obedience be imputed to us then must we be lookt upon in him as such who have committed no sin nor omitted any duty and then what need will there be of Christs death how shall Christ dye for our sins if we be lookt on in Christ as having none at all If Christs passive obedience be imputed then must we be look't on as such who in Christ have suffered and satisfied the law and born the full curse of it and then how shall there be room for any pardon The man who payes his full debt by himself or surety can in no sense be forgiven by his Creditour Indeed the Argument of the Socinian from pardon against Christs satisfaction is not valid but it is good against the imputation of it to us as if we our selves had satisfied Christ may have wrought with the Father or made him that satisfaction as to procure new terms so that a man may be justifyed as a fulfiller of them and yet need pardon for non-performance of the old If Christs active and passive obedience both are imputed then must God be made to deal with man according to the Covenant of works in the business of his justification when nothing is more apparent in the Scripture than that by grace it is that a man is justified and by grace saved If nothing less then such a righteousness as does both answer and satisfie the law also and that fully will suffice for the sinners plea to free him from condemnation he is not judged by the law of grace but he is judged by the law of works out of question There were no need to bring this notion of Christs imputed righteousness into the Church but that our Protestants mistake themselves and forget that we are justified and saved by the Covenant of Grace and not by the law of Moses or Covenant of our Creation Christ came into the World to procure and tender a new law and in this regard is he said to be our Law-giver not that he hath given any other moral rules of life to us for we know his conmandement only is Love than what was contained in the Law before wherein some do but boldly impose upon themselves and others but that he hath given the same precepts with indulgence If God then shall not deal with man in his justification here and at judgment according to that indulgence or according to the law now in Christs hands that is according to the Covenant of Grace the main business of Christ coming and redemption were lost You shall hear a Protestant in his prayer appealing from the Tribunal of Gods justice to the throne of his grace and yet in his Sermon be telling the people that it is nothing else but the perfect obedience and satisfaction of Christ imputed to them that saves them which is to bring them back from the throne of his grace to the bar of his justice to be judged Such appeals have been received I suppose from the Fathers as very significant of truth and their meaning but not agreeable to this notion In the last place there is a righteousness revealed in the Gospel that God went by in his dealing with all the holy men and women who were before Christ and which he goes by in his dealing with us now and all the World whereby it is that we are justified in opposition to the righteousness of works the which together with the grace of the Gospel in the true sense and import thereof is kept out of the Protestant understanding by this notion of the rigid imputation of Christs righteouness in it self that being also but a late and forced notion and not tending to