that it 's as possible for the Black-Moore to wash himself white which is the Embleme of Labour in Vain or the Leopard to rub out his Dapples as for such a one so enslaved to doe good And if difficulty onely be designed in the Comparison there 's great danger of seduction to have the Case of habituated sinners thus described 3 Our Author is much mistaken to say That the Apostle speaks of the Case of the Heathens The place is Eph. 2. 1. And you hath he quickened who were Dead in Trespasses and Sins c. And these things are exceeding clear 1. That to be dead in Trespasses and Sins let it signifie what it will is a Condition common to Iew and Gentile v. 3. Amongst whom also we all had our Conversation in times past in the lusts of the flesh fulfilling the desires of the Mind and of the Flesh and were by Nature the Children of wrath even as others v. 5. When we were dead in sins 2. That the same Power and Grace was required to Quickening of the one as the other v. 4. God who is rich in Mercy for his great Love wherewith he loved us quickned us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 4 It 's very ridiculous to express some strength by None As if you should say A dead man will hardly walk above five miles a day and then he must rest himself too at every miles end It 's true a Natural Death does not deny a Resurrection by Divine Power nor a Moral Death exclude the efficacious Power of him that raised up Iesus from the dead yet both exclude all Ability in the subject or we must despair of ever understanding one Syllable of Scripture to the Worlds end 2. There is Another Doctrine he will examine by this Rule viz. the Manner of Gods Working in Regeneration Concerning which the Apostle Eph. 2. 10. when he had before shewed all to be dead in Trespasses and Sins thus expresses himself For we are his workmanship created in Christ Iesus unto good works and 2 Cor. 5. 17. He that is in Christ is a New Creature Wherein the Apostle does instruct us in three very material points 1. Here is the Product of Gods Grace A real Effect 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Something brought forth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a New Creature a New Creation Another a better though a lesser World 2. The End of this Work or Product of Gods powerfull Grace 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it was to good works which God ordained they should walk in The End of the New Heart New Creature and New Nature is New Obedience 3. The Manner of Gods producing this work 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ye were Created to that End so that as God at the first by his Creating Power exerted brought forth the Creature and gave it power to bring forth fruit after its Kind So in this New Creation there is something that Answers both the created Effect the Creating Power and the End of this Creation This would have done pretty well had it not chimed too near the words and therefore our Author shall expound it himself and then if ever he will be in the good Humour This were true says he if our being created to good works did signifie the Manner and Method of our Conversion and not the Nature of the New Creature But what if it signifies both Here 's a Workmanship and here 's the Manner of working We are his Workmanship created The work called a New Creature shews the Thing and its being said to be done by Creation shews the Manner All the Apostles Metaphor will else be very lame The Manner of Gods producing the Old Creation expressed but Nothing to answer it in the New Creation and yet this was the Main of his design v. 5. Even when we were dead in sins and trespasses he hath quickened us v. 8. By Grace ye are saved not of your selves it 's the Gift of God But let us hear his Paraphrase That as in the first Creation we were created after the Image of God so we are renewed after his Image in the second which is therefore expressely called Renewing and Renovation An excellent Similitude just as God wrought All in the first Creation so for all the world he does Nothing in the second That is in plain Terms The New Creation is no Creation and the Apostle could not more unluckily have express'd the Doctrine of our own Ability to good Works than by saying we were created by God in Christ Iesus to the Performance of them To conclude That the Image of God restored should answer the Image in which God created Man at first I can be content onely to fill up the Pà rallel What is that act of God in the New which answers to Gods creating Act in the first Creation And that the New Creation should be called a Renovation I can very well digest but then we must take in Gods Renewing Power as well as the Renewed Effect but that this is called so expressely in other places I do not very well approve nor will our Author when he thinks better upon 't for that will discredit the whole Paraphrase because it chimes too harmoniously to the sound of words Hitherto we have heard a very learned Declamation against interpreting Scripture by the sound of words and now we shall have another Oration against Metaphors Similitudes Allegories Types Figures and all this under the same Head If they say Christ is our Righteousness our Wisdom c. then they interpret all by the sound of words and if they say the Pearl the Manna the Rock c. signified Christ which seems to be very remote from yet that is interpreting Scripture by the sound of words also so that we are in a Fork Snick or Snee and both wayes equally undone Mr. Watson thinks that The Pearl in the Parable Math. 13. 46. may be accommodated to Christ for as the Pearl is there said to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so Christ is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1 Pet. 2. 7. That he was praefigured by the Manna upon the onely Credit of Christs own Interpretation Joh. 6. 48. I am the Bread of Life your Fathers did eat Manna in the Wilderness and are dead This is the bread that cometh down from Heaven that a man may eat thereof and not dye That the Rock also did typifie Christ from the Apostles warrant 1 Cor. 10. 3. They drank of the Rock that followed them and that Rock was Christ That Christ was also Resembled by the Brazen Serpent upon Christs own Authority Ioh. 3. 14 15. As Moses lifted up the Serpent in the Wilderness even so must the Son of Man be lifted up and that Christ is compared to a Vine Joh. 15. 1. I am the True Vine He proves also or thinks he proves That Christ has very lovely and excellent Titles given him in the Scriptures He is the Desire of all Nations Hag. 2. 7. The Prince of Peace Isa. 9.
and a new Spirit will I put within you and I will take away the stony heart out of your Flesh and give you an heart of Flesh and I will put my Spirit within you and cause you to walk in my Statutes and ye shall keep my judgments and do them where the order and method of God in this great work is laid down with such a convincing evidence that he must have no eyes or shut those he has who does not see it And 1. God promises that he will remove the great principle of resistance that which makes head and opposition to the Commands of God the stony hard inflexible-Heart 2 That he will bestow another a better a new heart a soft Spirit a heart of Flesh that may comply and close in with Gods Commands 3. That from this new heart all new obedience all service acceptable to God must proceed as from its spring or root I will put my Spirit into you and cause you to walk in my Statutes and ye shall keep my judgments 4. That all obedience inward and outward obedience keeping the Commandements of God with the heart and doing them in the practice of our lives yet all must proceed from this new heart this new Spirit which God promised to put within them But he comes to close Argument we are exhorted that the same mind be in us that was in Christ Phil. 2. 5. And to be his disciples is to learn of him who was meek and lowly in spirit Math. 11. 29. We question not that it s our duty to imitate Christ to copy out all his imitable excellencies and if he can prove that we can do this viz. imitate Christ in Acts of self denyal taking up the Crosse bearing reproach forgiving enemies without a better heart and Nature than we brought into the world with us he will then begin to speak to the purpose But says our Authour Christ transcribed his own nature into his Laws and therefore a sincere obedience to his Laws is a conformity to his Nature To which I answer 1. He that transcribed his Nature into his own Laws must yet transcribe it once more even into the heart of a son of Adam e're he can give to him that new Obedience which is acceptable to him It was not enough that God wrote his Lawes in Stone unless they be written upon the Tables of the heart with the finger of God 2. Obedience to the Laws of Christ does increase our conformity to the Nature of Christ but still there must be a renewed heart and Nature upon which all progressive conformity to Christ in obedience must proceed 3. Transcribing of Christs Nature into his Lawes is a Metaphorical expression which our Authour may explain how he pleases but I observe alwayes when he can cloath an Argument with Metaphors he is then secure yet still he presses upon us from Rom. 8. 9. If any man have not the Spirit of Christ he is none of his That is says he Unlesse he have the same Temper and disposition of mind that Christ had Now let the Reader look well about him and he shall see rare sights we do all remember that to be United to Christ or to be one of Christs signifie to be United to a particular Church And now we are told That by having the Spirit of Christ is meant being of the same temper and disposition and now from hence we have these consectaries 1. That if any man be not of the same Temper with Christ that is be not holy as he is holy he cannot be United to a particular Church And our Saviour has vouched for it John 3. 5. Except a man be regenerate and born again he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God We must be like minded with Christ and thereby become one of his and what is now become of the great Proposition that has filled so many pages That the only means of Uniting as to Christ is by our Union with a particular Church 2. He tells us that Union to Christ is described by having the Spirit and then having the Spirit is interpreted by being of the same Temper with Christ so now we have got another Doctrine That our Union to Christ consists in being of the same Temper and disposition with him But 3. We have here an excellent expedient to discharge the World both of the Person of Christ and of the Spirit too For as he can interpret Christs Person into Doctrine office Church Religion Bishops Baptism so he has interpreted the Spirit into Temper disposition and when an exigency calls for it he may explicate it by a strong wind or a vapour and then his work is done But 3. For the explicating of the new Nature he tells us there is a closer Union which results from this which consists in a mutual and reciprocal love which I am glad of amongst other Reasons for this that now it will be lawfull to Love Christ without persecution provided alwayes we do not over love him nor be passionately in love with him but yet there are a few inconveniences which attend this explication For 1. If we be United and closely United to Christ by Love then a Political Union is not the onely one betwixt Christ and Christians And 2. Then it seems for all the sorrow a Christian may be United to Christ without being United to a particular Church for we therefore love Christians because we love Christ and are taken with the imperfect holiness which is copied out into their Natures and lives because we are surprized first with a delightful admiration of Him who is the grand exemplar of all perfect Holinesse 1 John 5. 1. He that loveth him that begat loveth him also that is begotten of him 3. Why may not this Union with Christ signifie an Union with the Church as well as the other and then to love Christ signifies no more than to love his Church and so we are but where we were 4. It s very strange that our Love should result from our obedience and subjection whereas its hard to conceive how the soul should give subjection without Love and if it should give any a forced subjection without its principle of Love would find as cold a well-come in Christs heart as that cold heart it came from our Saviour had described obedience as the result of love John 14. 15. If ye Love me keep my Commandements No says our Authour keep my Commandements and then you will fall in Love with me but let him give light to his own Notions when we are transformed into the Image of Christ he loves Us as being like him and we love him too as partaking of his Nature He loves us as the price of his blood as his own workmanship created to good works and we love him as our Saviour and Redeemer now love is the great Cement of Union which unites interest and thereby does more firmly unite hearts It is not then quite so bad as was
pretended to Love the Lord Jesus Christ provided we have but our Authours license to love him but now the Question will be this whether our Union to Christ consists in a mutual and reciprocal love And if our Authour had been judge a little while since he would have resolved it in the Negative That our Union to Christ consists in our Union to a particular Church and that it is a political union such a one as is between Prince and Subject and consists in a belief of his revelations obedience to his Laws and subjection to his Authority I shall only note a few things and dismisse it 1. That there is a love of Benevolence and good Will a designing purposing love in Christ towards us before we bear his Image and Superscription this love he bears towards those that are unlike him Rom. 5 8. God Commendeth his love to us that when we were yet sinners Christ dyed for us verse 10. When we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son 2. There must of necessity be the intervention of an Union a likenesse a Conformity of Natures before there can be supposed a love of mutual complacency and reciprocal delight in each other for this love this delight must have something to work upon As there must be a Conjugal Relation before the Husband can take delight in his Wife as his Wife and the Wife in her Husband as her Husband 3. That this love of good will in Christ is the Original Reason of our transformation into the Image of Christ whereby we become meet objects for that other love of Complacency 4. It s true that we love him as partaking of his Nature but then it s also as true that those Acts of love to and delight in Christ proceed from that New Nature which we derive from him 5. The Love wherewith Christ Loves us as the price of his blood is a differing love from that wherewith he loves us as his workmanship created in Christ Jesus to good works 6. I rejoyce however that we are owned to be Christs workmanship Created to good works which it were not so we had more reason to love our selves to admire and deifie our own natural Abilities which effected that glorious workmanship And I see of late our Authour takes to the Church Catechism which had he attended to in time had saved him half the Labour of his Book My good Child know that thou art not able to do these things of thy self to love God to believe in him to fear him with all thy heart with all thy mind withal thy strength to worship him to give him thankes to put thy whole Trust in him c. nor to walk in the Commandements of God and serve him without his special Grace which thou must learn at all times to call for by diligent prayer 7. The more we exercise our selves in the Love of Christ the more like him we grow and the stronger bonds are layd upon our Souls to maintain the Union inviolable but still there must precede an Union which is the true Foundation of the Exercise of this Love of Delight and mutual Complacency Ay but says he Love is the great Cement of Union which unites Interests and thereby more firmly unites hearts Let him call it the Cement or the Soder or the Glew it 's all one to me I conceive that Interest is the Cement of Love and not Love the Cement of Interest Men love because it 's their Interest so to doe but whether that Love that flutters up and down the world a thing so unstable and desultory that we cannot tell where to have it be a fit Pattern for the heigths and lengths and depths and breadth of the Love of Christ ora just Measure of it I very much question Many things we meet with that are full of delight but one may take a Surfeit of Sweet-meats and therefore I shall onely trouble the Reader with his Concluding Argument taken from the Sacraments Which are says he the Instruments and Symbols of our Union with Christ. And if by Christ he understands the Church it 's not worth the while to make a Controversie on 't we will grant That Union with the Church consists in Union with it and the surest Means to be United to the Church is to be United to it and this way seldom fails But if he had a mind to conclude something else he had done like a Neighbour to have informed us for I must needs confess I am in the dark But yet we shall not lose all our labour For these Sacraments represent both our external and real Union with him And it 's worth all our pains and patience to hear one of his Lectures upon this Subject First for our External Union Baptism is a publick Profession of the Christian Religion that we believe the Gospel own his Authority and submit to his Government Secondly These Sacraments signifie our Reall Union to Christ Thus Baptism signifies our Profession of becoming New men our profession of Conformity to Christ in his Death and Resurrection Now look how much Conformity to Christs Death and Resurrection is better than owning his Authority and submitting to his Government just so much is our Real Union better than our external which if one so exactly versed in the essential differences of things as our Author had not told us other wise ordinary Capacities had judged to be both one That little advantage there is the External Union carries it For as to our External Union Baptism he tells us is a Profession of it but as to our Real Union Baptism onely signifies a profession of it and then it will be somewhat better to make a Profession of submission to Christs Government than to make a signification of a Profession of Conformity to his Death I shall therefore rather acquiesce in the Judgement of the Catechism about the Signification of Baptism than in our Authors which makes this Question What is the inward and spiritual Grace Ans. A death unto sin and a New Birth unto Righteousness for being by Nature born in sin and the children of wrath we are hereby made the children of Grace 4 His last and most famous Observation is That Fellowship and Communion with God signifies what he calls a Political Union And would we knew what that was why it is this To be in fellowship with God and Christ signifies to be of that Society which puts us into a peculiar Relation to God that God is our Father and we his Children that Christ is our Head and Husband and Lord and Master and we his Disciples and followers his Spouse and Body It 's below the generosity of the Eagle to catch Flies an Employment more suitable to the impertinent humour of Domitian and therefore it may be expected that our Author should scorn to play so mean a Game as to impose upon our weakness with the Ambiguity of a poor word To be in Fellowship
gives subjection to all inferiour officers in all things wherein they act by his Commission for he may passe for a very tolerable good Subject who does all things that are commanded him so in this case no man can be said to Obey Christ who denies subjection to the Pastors of the Church who act according to their instructions from the supreme Lord of the Church nor any be said to resist Christs authority though they refuse complyance in those things to the Officers of the Church wherein they act besides their Commission But let us a while wholly set aside the consideration of the lawfulness or unlawfullness of these new conditions of Communion yet still me thinks there 's a great deal of disingenuity in the Pastors of a Church to make new Terms of Communion with them for if it be so necessary as is pretended to our Union with Christ that we be United to the Church and then again so necessary to our Salvation to be United to Christ and then further so necessary to our Union with the Church to submit to those conditions that the Pastors shall appoint every new condition is a Bar to and a Clog upon our Salvation We must come up to the condition e're we can be United to the Church and we must be United to the Church e're we can be United to Christ and we must be United to Christ e're we can be saved That condition therefore how small soever it be in it self how indifferent soever in its own Nature is thereby made necessary to Salvation because indispensably required to that which is so Now I will not clamour and make a noise at this as an evil thing but yet methinks it does not look as if it had over much good Nature in 't for a Church to deal thus with the people The Church received a Religion from Christ at first that had no incumbrance upon it and that the Church should leave it deeplyer engaged than she found it I think is not very handsome if the Church found the door wide open why does shee set it on half-charrs when she could march in with a full body why should others be forced to crowd in and wedge themselves through a narrow wicket sidelings why should the Pastors bind heavy burdens on others fhoulders when Christ laid none upon theirs or why should they raise the Markets so high in the latter age when they had it so cheap in the primitive times It was a good plain saying of King Iames to the pragmatical Spalatensis when he would be new modelling affairs at Winsor Extraneus es Relinque res sicut eas invenisti Come Reader there 's no false Latine in 't had former Ages heard and taken the advice we could have been content with the Primitive light though we had wanted sumptuous Candlesticks the power of Religion had made amends for its plainnesse and golden Officers recompensed woodden chalices Thus far at our Authors invitation we have step't out of the way and are now ready to return with him into it The next thing considerable wherein he ingages is a description of the New nature whereof the Holy Ghost makes frequent mention as that from which all new Obedience must proceed This New Nature says he the Scripture represents under several Notions 1. By the subjection of our minds and Spirits to Christ. 2. By a participation of the same Nature which is the necessary effect of the subjection of our minds to him If a man would study to be cross all his days and resolve to trade in no figure but Hysteron Proteron he might hardly hope to equalize our Author in this discourse For 1. What subjection of mind and Spirit can be given to Christ without a new Nature from whence that Act of subjection should proceed the most inward Acts of Obedience are yet but Acts the most spiritual and refined workings of the soul are still but works and have alwayes for their root and principal a good and an honest a new and a renewed heart and Nature Thus we see 't is in Nature there must be a principle of motion before there can be natural motion all the rest is violent and against the hair And this order our Saviour has described in the most plain and familiar way to gratifie our understandings that they could desire Math. 12. 33. Either make the tree good and the fruit good or the evil and the fruit evil and Math. 7. 17. 18. Do men gather Grapes of thornes or Figs of Thistles Even so every good Tree bringeth forth good Fruit and a corrupt Tree brings forth evil fruit But our Authour has found out a way called Transmutation of species to make a Thorn become a Vine and to Transubstantiate a Thistle into a Figtree I know the Reader has a grudging of the old curiosity to see the experiment The operation therefore is this teach a Thistle to produce Figs for one seven years and you shall see it become as very a Fig-tree as any is in the world thus let the natural and unregenerate man perform multiplyed Acts of the best obedience he can and without any efficacious working of the Holy Ghost he shal acquire a new heart which I shall believe at the same time when I see a thousand Cyphers give themselves the significancy of one figure Our Blessed Saviour has long ago determined this to our hand John 3. 6. That which is born of the flesh is flesh Let the Egyptian Pollinctors practise upon it let them sweeten perfume and season it with the spicery of India and all the balm of Gilead it will be but flesh still all its operations carnal 2. It will be of good use in this matter to enquire wherein lay the Image of God in Adam what relation it had to his obedience and thence perhaps we may get some light what order the Image of God in us observes That it mainly consists in righteousness and true holinesse no man can doubt that reads the Apostles description Eph. 4. 24. but now it is evident that Adam did not procure this Image of God by repeated Acts of obedience it was not the result of many particular duties it was no acquired habit but it was concreated with him as a condition due and meet for a Creature made to such sublime and glorious ends as the enjoyment of his God and from this Nature this Image of God proceeded all that Obedience which he payed all that which God required and accepted And if this be so it 's evident that all who are renewed who are born again who are Created unto good works go through the same method So the Apostle Col. 3. 10. And have put on the new man which is renewed in knowledge after the Image of him that Created him The order of Gods working is conformable to his promise we may be sure he will do both what and how he has promised Ezek. 36. 26. A new heart also will I give you
his Mediation or to Trust in his Blood but you must â—…o Nomine doe it in Contradiction to the Terms of the Covenant sealed therewith or which is all one it 's impossible but that things subordinate should be opposite The blood of Christ and the Covenant of Christ are perfectly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Person of the Mediator and his Mediatory work cannot be conceived but they involve the thoughts in a thousand Contradictions Positio unius est Remotio Alterius Nay soft sayes he I onely mean in case they understand any more by these things than expecting to be saved according to the Terms of the Gospel-Covenant I do not think they doe And as our Author gave his word for those that are suspected to make Christs Person useless if my word would go as far as his I would readily engage it for them who are suspected to make his Laws useless And so once again all is Husht and still and the fearfull skirmish that was towards is at present stinted Pulveris exigui jactû Let me therefore in the Close give our Author one wholsome Caution That he would not be too rash and peremptory in drawing or wracking Conclusions from other mens Expressions Some will think he has mistaken in his own and may with more ease in others Principles and the Conclusions from thence A Ladder of Deductions and Inferences forty Rounds long is not easily master'd A Sorites or Climax may quickly impose upon us we are never sooner cheated than in a Chain of many links the smallest interruption may secrâ—…tly and insensibly discompose the whole series and concatenation of Dependencies wherein we fancy an infallible Connexion I would not anticipate 〈◊〉 Hericano ill weather comes unsent for and is alwayes too soon and unwelcome when it comes the latest let us therefore keep our selves well whilest we are well Thus smoothly we conclude and say Here ends your Worships Chapter for the Day CHAP. III. Section 1. Of the Knowledge of Christ. THis Section allures the Eye of the Reader with the specious Frontispiece of the knowledge of Christ but proves a mere MockBeggar-Hall and Fools Expectation like a Fair Porch to no House or a great Mountain without a Mouse just like the Guilded Titles of Apothecaries Boxes which pretend to Lodge the rich Drugs of Pontus and both the Indies but are Inhabited often by the Poysonous Spider and Hung with Cobweb-Tapistry Spun out of her own Bowels and Woven with her curious Fingers Or like those gawdy Signs which Encounter us upon the Road whose promising Motto first Invites the Traveller with Hopes of Horse-meat and Mans-meat and then Baffles his hopes with Entertainment that would sterve a Dog To see our Author heaving for a far-fetcht Blow you would verily think he Design'd to Knock the Business stone-dead for ever whilst he does but Imitate the Black-smith that would needs Use the great Sledge Hammer to Kill a Flie on his Childs Fore-head and very Discreetly dasht out the poor Infants Brains Leave we him therefore to the Satisfaction of his own private Thoughts a while and let ours give the Readers Patience a small Exercise The Happiness of Man consists in the Knowing and Enjoying the True God blessed for ever and therefore He who is never wanting to his own Glory nor to His Creatures Happiness in such ways as best Comply with His own Unsearchable Wisdom first Created Man and then gave him an Understanding to Know a Heart to Love and Enjoy His Creator Admirably proportioning his Faculties to his Employment and as he made it his Work and Wages to Love and Serve he furnisht him with a Soul qualifi'd to Love and Serve his God But when Man had sinned and thereby lost his Fitness for that blessed Service it pleas'd God to enter into a New and better Covenant with him Establisht upon that Promise Gen. 3. 15. The Seed of the Woman shall bruise the Serpents Head God would not suffer Satan to rejoyce too much in his success and glory in his greater hopes that he should sweep the World before him and draw the rational Creation into the same Ruine into which he found himself Irrecoverably Plunged The Father had Divided to the Redeemer a Portion with the Great and Promised He should Divide the Spoyl with the strong and Wrest out of his hands that Advantage he had gotten over Man by sin and the Curse inseparably annext to it In the Faith of this Promise had guilty Man encouragement to Return to God and not sinck down in black Despaire to which the Reflexions he must needs make upon that Cursed state he had so cheaply brought himself into could not but Expose him And though the Generality of the Sons of Men through their own sinful Negâ—…ect Lost the Faith of that first and precious Promise yet the Gracious God took Effectual Care that his Service and Worship should be carried down in a chosen Seed and holy Line from our first Parents by righteous Abel heavenly Enoch upright Noah and others to believing Abraham to whom he was Graciously pleas'd to vouchsafe a more Distinct and Explicit Revelation of the Promised Seed And whereas before all Families of the Earth might equally pretend to the hopes of it Now God Clears and Secures it to his Faith that in his Seed by the Line of Isaac should all the Nations of the Earth be Blessed In pursuance of this Promise and the glorious Design managed thereupon he Renews in a more Solemn Ample and full Manner the Covenant of Grace with him the Epitome and Abstract whereof was this Gen. 17. 7. I will be thy God And for the greater Security adds Circumcision a Seal of the Righteousness of Faith Rom. 4. 11. As the Family of Abraham was branched out into two so we observe how the vigilant Eye of Providence Traces that Line by which He had fore-appointed to Conveigh so Rich a Mercy as a Redeemer down to the following Generations And accordingly he Hedges it about with special Care Waters it with extraordinary Blessings Impales it from the Common and Wild of the World by distinguishing Ordinances that it might get a fixed Root in the Earth Hence was Ishmael waved and Isaac taken into special Protection Esau excluded and Jacob comes under the peculiar Cognizance of God just as the Stream and Current of the Promise found its proper Channel and the other Old ones grew either Shallow and Inconsiderable or quite Dried up For the better Securing and more prosperous Managing this great Project God was also pleased to cast the Posterity of Iacob into a visible Church-frame and Political Model appointing to them a Ceremonial Law as an Appendice to the former and the Iudicial Law as an Appendice to the latter Table of the Moral Law accommodating so the whole that all might lead to Him who was indeed the whole life and Soul of that Administration An High-priest and other inferiour ones he also instituted with great variety of