many But I know nothing can be said against it but by denying the Antecedent viz. That Faith as it Accepteth Christ for Lord and King doth Justifie But that I have proved before If it be one Faith and have the Object entirely propounded as one and be one entire principall part of the Covenants Condition then sure it cannot be divided in the work of Justifying This may be easily apprehended if men will but understand these three things 1. That Faith is no Physicall or naturall proper Receiving of Christ at all But meerly a morall Receiving though performed by a Physicall Act of Accepting For thy Will doth not naturally touch and take in the person of Christ That is an impossible thing whatsoever the Transubstantiation men may say Though the Essence of the Godhead is every where 2. That this accepting which is a Morall Receiving doth not nor possibly can make Christ ours immediately and properly as it is a Receiving But mediately and improperly onely The formall cause of our interest being Gods Donation by the Gospell Covenant 3. That this Covenant maketh a whole entire Faith its Condition A Receiving of whole Christ with the whole soul It is as Amesius Actio totius hominis And if the Covenant doe make Christ as King the object of that Faith which is its Condition as well as Christ as a Deliverer or Priest Then may it be as fit a Medium for our Justification as the other That Obedience is as neere a fruit of Faith as Affiance is evident if you take it for the Obedience of the Soul in Acts that are no more remote from the heart then Affiance is And so is the Obedience of our Actions externall in its formall respect as Obedience though not in its materiall because the imperate Acts are not all so neer the fountain as the Elicite I take it here for granted that Dr Downames arguments in the place fore-cited have proved Affiance to be but a fruit of the principall justifying Act of Faith THESIS LXXIII FRom what hath been said it appeareth in what sence Faith only justifieth and in what sence Works also justifie viz. 1. Faith only justifieth as it implieth and includeth all other parts of the condition of the new Covenant and is so put in opposition to the Works of the Law or the personall Righteousnes of the old Covenant 2. Faith only justifieth as the great principall master duty of the Gospell or chief part of its Condition to which all the rest are some way reducible 3. Faith onely doth not justifie in opposition to the Works of the Gospell but those Works do also justifie as the secondary less principall parts of the condition of the Covenant THESIS LXXIV SO that they both justifie in the same kinde of causality viz. as Causa sine quibus non or mediums and improper Causes or as Dr Twisse Causae dispositivae but with this difference Faith as the principal part Obedience as the less principall The like may be said of Love which at least is a secondary part of the Condition and of others in the same station EXPLICATION I Know this is the doctrine that will have the loudest out-cries raised against it and will-make some cry out Heresie Popery Socinianism and what not For my own part the Searcher of hearts knoweth that not singularity affectation of novelty nor any good will to Popery provoketh me to entertain it But that I have earnestly sought the Lords direction upon my knees before I durst adventure on it And that I resisted the light of this Conclusion as long as I was able But a man cannot force his own understanding if the evidence of truth force it not though he may force his pen or tongue to silence or dissembling That which I shall do further is to give you some proofs of what I say and to answer some Objections Though if the foregoing grounds do stand there needs no more proof of these assertions 1. If Faith justifie as it is the fulfilling of the Condition of the new Covenant and Obedience be also part of that Condition then obedience must justifie in the same way as Faith But both parts of the Antecedent are before proved The other proofs follow in the ensuing Positions and their Explications and Confirmations THESIS LXXV THe plain expressions of Saint James should ternifie us from an interpretation contradictory to the Text and except apparent violence be used with his Chap. 2. 21. 24 25 c. it cannot be doubted but that a man is justified by Works and not by Faith only THESIS LXXVI NEither is there the least appearance of a contradiction betwixt this and Paul's doctrine Rom. 3. 28. If men did not through prejudice negligence or wilfulness overlook this That in that and all other the like places the Apostle doth professedly exclude the Works of the Law only from Iustification but never at all the Works of the Gospell as they are the Condition of the new Covenant EXPLICATION IN opening this I shall thus proceed 1. I will shew the clearness of that in Iames for the point in question 2. That Paul is to be understood in the sence expressed 3. How this differeth from the Papists Exposition of these places and from their doctrine of Justification by Works 4. And how from the Socinian doctrine 1. The ordinary Expositions of St. Iames are these two 1. That he speaks of Justification before men and not before God 2. That he speaks of Works as justifying our Faith and not as justifying our persons or as Mr. Pembles phrase is the Apostle when he saith Works justifie must be undestood by a Metonimy that a working Faith justifieth That the former Exposition is falfe may appeare thus 1. The worlds Justification freeth us but from the Worlds Accusation to which it is opposed And therefore it is but either a Justifying from the Accusation of humane Lawes Or else a particular Justification of us in respect of some particular facts or else an usurped Judgement and Justification For they are not constituted our Judges by God And therefore we may say with Paul It is a small thing with me to be judged of you or of mans Iudgement And so a small thing to be Justified by men from the Accusations of the Law of God But the Justification in Iames is of greater moment as appeares in the Text. For 1. It is such as salvation dependeth on vers 14. 2. It is such as followeth onely a living Faith but the world may as well Justifie us when we have no Faith at all I therefore affirme 1. The World is no lawfull Judge of our Righteousness before God or in reference to the Law of God 2. Neither are they competent or capable Judges They cannot possibly passe any certaine true sentence of our Righteousness or unrighteousnesse 3. If they could yet Works are no certain medium or evidence whereby the world can know us to be Righteous For there is no outward work
c. are implyed in the Covenant expressed as the necessary for future therefore if there be no conjugall actions affections or fidelity follow the Covenant is not performed nor shall the woman enjoy the benefits expected It is so here especially seeing Christ may dis-estate the violaters of his Covenant at pleasure This sheweth us how to answer the Objections of some 1. Say they Abrahams Faith was perfect long before Answ. Not as it is a fulfilling of the Covenants Condition which also requireth its acting by Obedience 2. Abraham say they was justified long before Isaac was offered therefore that could be but a manifesting of it Answ. Justification is a continued Act. God is still justifying and the Gospell still justifying Abrahams Justification was not ended before 3. Mr Pemble thinks that as a man cannot be said to live by Reason though he may be said to live by a reasonable soul and as a plant liveth not per augmentationem si per animam auctricem So we may be said to be justified by a working Faith but not by Works I Answ. Both Speeches are proper And his simile doth not square or suit with the Case in hand For Justifying is an extrinsecall consequent or product of Faith and no proper effect at all Much lesse an effect flowing from its own formall essence as the life of a man doth from a Reasonable soul and the life of a Plant from a Vegetative I hope it may be said properly enough that a Servant doth his work and pleaseth his Master by Reason as well as by a reasonable soul And a Plant doth please the Gardiner by augmentation as well as per animam austricem So that a man pleaseth God and is Justified by sincere Obedience as well as by a working Faith 3. How this differeth from the Papists Doctrine I need not tell any Scholar who hath read their writings 1. They take Justifying for Sanctifying so do not I. 2. They quite overthrow and deny the most reall difference betwixt the Old Covenant and the New and make them in a manner all one But I build this Exposition and Doctrine chiefly upon the clear differencing and opening of the Covenants 3. When they say We are Justified by VVorks of the Gospell they mean only that we are sanctified by Works that follow Faith and are bestowed by Grace they meriting our inherent justice at Gods hands In a word there is scarce any one Doctrins wherein even their most learned Schoolmen are more sottishly ignorant then in this of Justification so that when you have read them with profit and delight on some other subjects when they come to this you would pitty them and admire their ignorance They take our Works to be part of our Legall Righteousness I take them not to be the smallest portion of it But onely a part of our Evangelicall Righteousness or of the Condition upon which Christs Righteousness shall be ours 5. But what difference is there betwixt it and the Socinian Doctrin of Justification Answ. In some mens mouths Socinianisme is but a word of reproach or a stone to throw at the head of any man that saith not as they Mr. Wotton is a Socinian and Mr. Bradshaw and Mr. Gataker and Mr. Goodwin and why not Piscator Pareus c. if some zealous Divines know what Socinianisme is But I had rather study what is Scripture-truth then what is Socinianisme I do not think that Faustus was so Infaustus as to hold nothing true That which he held according to Scripture is not Socinianisme For my part I have read little of their writings but that little gave me enough and made me cast them away with abhorrence In a word The Socinians acknowledge not that Christ had satisfied the Law for us and consequently is none of our Legall Righteousness but onely hath set us a copy to write after and is become our pattern and that we are Justified by following him as a Captain and guide to heaven And so all our proper Righteousness is in this obedience Most accursed Doctrine So farre am I from this that I say The Righteousness which we must plead against the Lawes accusations is not one grain of it in our Faith of Works but all out of us in Christs satisfaction Onely our Faith Repentance and sincere Obedience are the Conditions upon which we must partake of the former And yet such Conditions as Christ worketh in us freely by his Spirit 6. Lastly let us see whether St. Paul or any other Scripture do contract this And for my part I know not one word in the Bible that hath any strong appearance of Contradiction to it The usuall places quoted are these Rom. 3. 28. 4. 2. 3. 14. 15. 16. Gal. 2. 16. 3. 21. 22. Ephes. 2. 89. Phil. 3. 8. 9. In all which and all other the like places you shall easily perceive 1. That the Apostles dispute is upon the question What is the Righteousness which we must plead against the Accusation of the Law or by which we are justified as the proper Righteousness of that Law And this he well concludeth is neither Works nor Faith But the Righteousnesse which is by Faith that is Christs Righteousnesse But now St. Iames his question is What is the Condition of our Justification by this Righteousness of Christ Whether Faith onely or Works also 2. Paul doth either in expresse words or in the sence and scope of his speech exclude onely the works of the Law that is the fulfilling of the Conditions of the Law our selves But never the fulfilling of the Gospell-Conditions that we may have part in Christ. Indeed if a man should obey the Commands of the Gospell with a Legall intent that it might be a Righteousnesse conform to the Law of Works this Obedience is not Evangelicall but Legall obedience For the form giveth the name 3 Paul doth by the word Faith especially direct your thoughts to Christ beleeved in For to be justified by Christ and to be justified by receiving Christ is with him all one 4. And when he doth mention Faith as the Condition he alwayes implyeth obedience to Christ. Therefore Beleeving and obeying the Gospell are put for the two Summaries of the whole Conditions The next will clear this THESIS LXXVII THat we are justified by sincere obedience to Christ as the secondary part of the Condition of our Iustification is evident also from these following Scriptures Mat. 12. 37. Mar. 11. 25. 26. Luk. 6. 37. Mat. 6. 12. 14. 15. 1 Joh. 1. 9. Act. 8. 22. Act. 3. 19. 22. 16. 1 Pet. 4. 18. Rom. 6. 16. 1 Pet. 1. 2. 22. THESIS LXXVIII OVr full Iustification and our everlasting Salvation have the same Conditions on our part But sincere Obedtence is without all doubt a Condition of our Salvation therefore also of our Iustification EXPLICATION THe Antecedent is manifest in that Scripture maketh Faith a Condition of both Iustification and Salvation and so it doth
168. that while wee are busie in examining our forefathers inventions and posterity imployed in trying our examinations neither we nor they have much time to adde any thing for the increase of Learned Knowledge Whence you may guesse at one cause why many Sciences for some thousands of yeares have kept one pitch and not growne above that dwarfish stature that they had in their infant invention and also what the reason is that many that read most prove not the deepest Schollers for no greater impediment to exact Learning then to make use of other mens understandings and neglect our owne I speak not this as if I had overcome these impediments any more then others but because I have perhaps more beene hindred by them and so take my selfe bound to warne thee of the pit that I have falne in And with all to let thee know that if godly men themselves while they lye in these snares shall oppose any truth in this Tract it is no wonder but a thing to be expected To give thee the History of the conception and nativity of these Aphorismes the reason why I trouble the world with more Bookes which I blame in others understand that this is but an Appendix to another Treatise going to the Presse on a more excellent Subject Also that having occasion therein to touch upon Matth. 25. 35. I was desired to explaine in what sence it is that Christ giveth the reason of his sentence in judgement from mens works In answer hereto and to cleare some other incident doubts of the like nature I wrote these Positions or Aphorismes which when some had got they complained of obscure brevity and desired some fuller explication which when I had done that which before was but two or three leaves annexed as an Appendix to the fore-mentioned Treatise did swell to this bignesse that I was faine to let it goe alone Could I have got Copies enow for my owne friends whom I am bound to instruct other men had not beene like to have been troubled with it If thou please thou mayest let it passe without thine observation If otherwise it is so small that it will take up but little of thy time to read it nor adde much to the common burden Some few passages here are which I am not so cleare and confident in my selfe As the nature of the Death threatned in the first Covenant The necessity of the punctuall performance or execution of all threatnings The interest of Christs Active Obedience to those Laws which did binde men in innocency in the work of satisfaction as conjoyned with his Passive Obedience to make up the same price But as these are but few so I am not utterly at a losse concerning them but seeme to discerne a strong probability of what I have written therein For you my Friends whom Christ hath committed to my Teaching and Oversight as to an unworthy Vsher under him in his Schoole and Steward in his House and of his Mysteries I publish this for your sakes and use 1. Because I have still thought that points controverted are better written than preached and read than heard especially where the greatest part of the Auditory is uncapable of understanding them 2. Yet is this Doctrine of so great concernment and so neer the Foundation that of all the controversies agitated in the Church there 's few that doe better deserve your study and few that I am so loath you should be ignorant of It is my exceeding joy that God hath kept you in his distracted age from doting about questions that engender strife and hath given you to cleave to the most fundamentall undoubted and practicall Truths and to spend your time in practice and peace and promoting the salvation of the ignorant about you when others are taken up in censuring their brethren renting the Church opposing the truth or wrangling about lesser things which are quite above their understandings Hold on this way and if you have not in it more Communion with Christ more growth in Grace and on your Death-beds a more comfortable review of your lives and at last a better reckoning made thereof then the other then say I have deceived you Yet as I would have you neglect no truth so especially what time â—ou can spare for controversie let it chiefely be spent upon these that are so weighty Be ashamed that men shâ—uld heare you disputing about Circumstantiâ—lls of Discipline Baptisme Supper c. before you know how to bee justified before GOD or understand the Doctrine of the Covenants Redemption Faith Obedience c 3. The Bookes that are written of justification are many and some great which I knew you had not time to read and if you did perhaps would lose much of your labour as I have done Therefore I desired to set the most necessary part before you in a narrower compasse I never intended the full handling of the Doctrine of justification these Apherismes being but for the Answering of a particular Question Especially what is in Master Bradshaw I omit because I expect that you will read and study him the Book being so small and of such singular worth containing as much as the greatest Volumes In some places I have omitted the proofe of my Assertions partly because they seemed plaine or to be the evident consectaries of former Positions partly for brevâ—ty and partly because it is for your use to whom I am yet at hand to cleare what you doubt of and who I hope doe understand that to take upon trust from your Teachers what you cannot yet reach to see in its owne evidence is lesse absurd and more necessary than many doe imagine Moreover knowing that I must shortly put off this Tabernacle and be taken from you I thought good to use this endeavour that you may bee able after my departure to have these things in your understandings and remembrance 2 Pet. 1. 14. 15. And while I am in this flesh I shall not cease to admonish you and pray on your behalfe that you may beware lest yee also being led away with the errour of the wicked fall from your owne stedfastnesse but may grow in Grace and in the Knowledge of our LORD and SAVIOVR JESUS CHRIST Nor shall I desire any greater Honour or Advancement on this Earth than with Abilitie Sinceritie and Successe to be A Servant of Christ in the work of your Salvation RI. BAXTER Kederminster Novemb. 17. 1648. APHORISMES OF JUSTIFICATION With their Explication Annexed Wherein also is opened the Nature of the Covenants Satisfaction Righteousnesse Faith Works c. THESIS I. GOd hath first a Will of purpose whereby he determineth of Events what shall be and what shall not be de facto Secondly And a Legislative or Preceptive Will for the government of the Rationall Creature whereby he determineth what shall be and what shall not be de jure or in point of duty and in order thereto concludeth of Rewards and Punishments EXPLICATION THis
is very small The chief difference lyeth in this That the Terminus a quo of Remission is the obligation to punishment but the Terminus of Iustification or the evil that it formally and directly doth free us from is the Laws Accusation and Condemnation Now though the difference between these two be very narrow and rather respective then reall yet a plain difference there is For though it be one and the same Commination of the Law by which men are both obliged to punishment accused as guilty and condemned for that guilt yet these are not all one though it is also true that they all stand or fall together That pardon is most properly the removing of the Obligation and that Iustification is the removing of Accusation and Condemnation in the Law will be evident to those that have read what Divines have written at large concerning the signification of the words especially such that have skill in Law which is a great advantage in this doctrine of Iustification Therefore as Mr. Wotten and Mr. Goodwin do a little mistake in making pardon of sin to be the formall cause of Iustification though they are far neerer the mark then their opposers So Mr. Bradshaw doth a little too much straiten the form of it making it to lye only in Apology or Plea It consisteth in both the Acts 1. Apology in oppositioÌ„ to AccusatioÌ„ thus Christ our Advocate doth principally justifie us 2. In Sentence virtuall or actuall so it is opposed both to Accusation and Condemnation so Christ the Mediator as Iudge and the Father as one with him and as the supream Iudge doth justifie But this latter is the chief Act. The rest of the Definition is sufficiently opened under the foregoing Definition of Pardon and will be more after THESIS XXXIX IVstification in Sentence of Iudgement is a gracious Act of God by Christ according to the Gospel by Sentence at his publique Bar acquitting the sinner from the Accusation and Condemnation of the Law pleaded against him by Satan upon the consideration of the Satisfaction made by Christ accepted by the sinner and pleaded for him EXPLICATION THere is also a two-fold Pardon as well as a two-fold Iustification One in Law the other in Sentence of Iudgement So. Acts 3. 19. Repent that your sins may be blotted out when the time of refreshing comes c. But pardon of sin is usually mentioned in respect to this life present as being bestowed here because a man may more fitly be said to be fully quit from the Obligation of the punishment commonly called the guilt in this life then from the Accusation of that guilt which will be managed against him by Satan hereafter or from the Condemnation which he must then most especially be delivered from The difference betwixt this Iustification and the former may easily be discerned by the Definition without any further Explication THESIS XL. WHen Scripture speaketh of Iustification by Faith it is to be understood primarily and directly of Iustification in Law title and at the bar of Gods publique Iudgment and but secondarily and consequentially of Iustification at the bar of Gods secret judgment or at the bar of Conscience or of the World EXPLICATION 1. THat Justification by Faith is in foro-Dei and not in foro conscientiae primarily see Dr. Downam's Appendix to Covenant of Grace against Mr Pemble Conscience is but an inferiour petty improper Judge The work must be transacted chiefly at a higher Tribunall View all the Scriptures that mention Justification by Faith and you shall finde by the Text and Context that they relate to the bar of God but not one directly to the bar of Conscience It is one thing to be justified and another thing to have it manifested to our Consciences that we are so 2. That it is not directly at the bar of the World all will acknowledge 3. That it is not directly at the bar of Gods secret Judgment in his own brest may appear thus 1. That is not a bar at which God dealeth with sinners for Justification or Condemnation in any known or visible way No Scripture intimateth it 2. We could not then judge of our Justification 3. They are immanent Acts but Justification is a transient Act Therefore Dr Downame in the place before mentioned hath proved against Mr Pemble that Justification is not from Eternity And as I judge by his following Tract of Justification Mr Pemble himself came afterwards to a sounder Judgment in the nature of Justification 4. God dealeth with man in an open way of Law and upon Covenant terms and so will try him at a publique Judgment according to the Tenor of his Covenants There secrets of his brest are too high for us By the word will he judge us That must justifie or condemn us Therefore when you hear talk of the Bar of God you must not understand it of the immanent Acts of Gods Knewledg or Will but of his Bar of publique Judgment and in the sence of the Word Some think that Justification by Faith is properly and directly none of all these yet but that it is a publique Act of God in heaven before his Angels I think this opinion better then any of the three former which would have it at the Bar of Gods secret Judgment or of Conscience or of the World and I know no very ill consequence that followeth it But that God doth condemn or justifie at any such Bar. I find no Scripture fully to satisfie or perswade me Those places Rom. 2. 13. Heb. 9. 24. Luke 12 8 9. 15. 10. which are alledged to that purpose seem not to conclude any â—â—ch thing as that to be the Bar where Faith doth most properly justifie Yet I acknowledge that in a more remote sence we may be said to be justified by Faith at all the four other Bars viz. Gods Immanent Judgment and before the Angels and before Conscience and the World For God and Angels do judge according to Truth and take those to be just who are so in Law and in deed and so do our Consciences and Men when they judge rightly and when they do not we cannot well be said to be justified at their Bar. Therefore I think they mistake who would have Works rather then Faith to justifie us at the Bar of the World as I shall shew afterward when I come to open the conditions of Justification THESIS XLI THat saying of our Divines That Iustification is perfected at first and admits of no degrees must be understood thus That each of those Acts which we call Iustification are in their own kind perfect at once and that our Righteousness is perfect and admits not of degrees But yet as the former Acts called Iustification do not fully and in all respects procure our freedom so they may be said to be imperfect and but degrees toward our full and perfect Iustification at the last Iudgment THESIS XLII THere are many such steps toward our finall and
or melancholly maketh you not know your own minde or else you do but dissemble in pretending trouble and sad complaints If you be indeed unwilling I have no comfort for you till you are willing but must turn to perswasions to make you willing I should answer The Condition of the Covenant is not the Perfection but the sincerity of Faith or Consent which way goes the prevailing bent or choyce of your will If Christ were before you would you accept him or reject him If you would heartily accept him for your only Lord and Saviour I dare say you are a true Beleever Thus you see the comfortable use of right understanding what justifying faith is and the great danger and inconvenience that followeth the common mistakes in this point THESIS LXX FAith in the largest sence as it comprehendeth all the Condition of the new Covenant may be thus defined It is when a sinner by the Word and Spirit of Christ being throughly convinced of the Righteousness of the Law the truth of its threatening the evill of his own sin and the greatness of his misery hereupon and with all of the Nature and Offices Sufficiency and Excellency of Iesus Christ the Satisfaction he hath made his willingness to save and his free offer to all that will accept him for their Lord and Saviour doth hereupon believe the truth of this Gospell and accept of Christ as his only Lord and Saviour to bring them to God their chiefest good and to present them pardoned and just before him and to bestow upon them a more glorious inheritance and do accordingly rest on him as their Saviour and sincerely though imperfectly obey him as their Lord forgiving others loving his people bearing what sufferings are imposed diligently using his means and Ordinances and confessing and bewailing their sins against him and praying for pardon and all this sincerely and to the end EXPLICATION THis is the Condition of the new Covevenant at large That all this is sometime called Faith as taking its name from the primary principall vitall part is plain hence 1. In that Faith is oft called the Obeying of the Gospell but the Gospell commandeth all this Rom. 10. 16. 1 Pet. 1. 22. 4. 17. 2 Thes. 1. 8. Gal. 3. 1. 5 7. Heb. 5. 9. 2. The fulfilling of the Conditions of the new Covenant is oft called by the name of Faith so opposed to the fulfilling the Conditions of the old Covenant called works But these forementioned are parts of the Condition of the new Covenant and therefore implyed or included in Faith Gal. 3. 12 23 25. Not that Faith is properly taken for its fruits or confounded with them but as I told you before it is named in the stead of the whole Condition all the rest being implyed as reducible to it in some of the respects mentioned under the 62 Position It may be here demanded 1. Why I do make affiance or recombency an immediate product of Faith when it is commonly taken to be the very justifying Act I answer 1. I have proved already that Consent or acceptance is the principall Act and Affiance doth necessarily follow that 2. For the most of my Reasons that Affiance is a following Act and not the principall they are the same with those of Dr Downame against Mr Pemble and in his Treatise of Justification whither therefore I refer you for Satisfaction 2. Quest. Why do I make sincerity and perseverance to be so near kin to Faith as to be in some sence the same and not rather distinct Graces Answ. It is apparent that they are not reall distinct things but the Modi of Faith 1. Sincerity is the verity of it which is convertible with its Being as it is Metaphysicall Verity and with its Vertuous or Gracious Being as it is Morall or Theologicall Sincerity 2. Perseverance or duration of a Being is nothing really distinct from the Being it self Suarez thinks not so much as a Modus THESIS LXXI 1 THe sincere Performance of the summary great Command of the Law To have the Lord only for our God and so to love obey believe and trust him above all is still naturally implyed in the Conditions of the Gospell as of absolute indispensible necessity 2 and in order of nature and of excellency before Faith it self 3 But it is not commanded in the sence and upon the terms as under the first Covenant EXPLICATION 1 THis Command need not be expressed in the Gospell Conditions it is so naturally necessary implied in all As the ultimate End need not be expressed in directions precepts so as â—he meanes because it is still supposed consultatio est tantum de mediis 2 Love to God and taking him for our God and chiefe Good is both in excellency and order of nature before Faith in Christ the Mediator 1. Because the End is thus before the meanes in excellency and intention But God is the ultimate End and Christ as Mediator is but the meanes Ioh. 14. 6. Christ is the way by which men must come to the Father 2. The Son as God-man or Mediator is lesse then the Father and therefore the duties that respect him as their Object must needs be the lesse excellent duties Ioh 14. 13. The glory of the Son is but a means for the glory of the Father Ioh. 14. 28. My Father is greater then I therefore the Love of the Father is greater then the Love to the Son c. So also in point of necessity it hath the naturall precedency as the End hath before the means for the denying of the End doth immediately cashiere and evacuate all means as such He that maketh not God his chief Good can never desire or Accept of Christ as the way and meanes to recover that chief Good The Apostle therefore knew more reason then meerely for its perpetuity why the chiefest Grace is Love 1. Cor. 13. 13. Though yet the work of Justification is laid chiefely upon faith 3 That this Love of God is not commanded in the sence and on the termes as under the Law is evident For 1. The old Covenant would have condemned us for the very imperfection of the due degree of Love But the Gospell accepteth of Sincerity which lyeth in loving God above all or as the chiefe Good 2. The old Covenant would have destroyed us for one omission of a due Act of Love But the Covenant of Grace accepteth of it if a man that never knew God all his life time doe come in at last Yet the sincere performance of it is as necessary now as then THESIS LXXII AS the accepting of Christ for Lord which is the hearts subjection is as Essentiall a part of Iustifying Faith as the Accepting of him for our Saviour So consequently sincere obedience which is the effect of the former hath as much to doe in justifying us before God as Affiance which is the fruit of the later EXPLICATION I Know this will hardly down with
which an Hypocrite may not perform and inward works they cannot discern nor yet the principles from which nor the ends to which our works proceed and are intended There is as much need of a divine heart-searching knowledge to discern the sincerity of Works as of Faith it self So that if it be not certain that the Text speaks of Justification before God I scarce know what to be certain of Once more 1. Was Abraham justified before men for a secret Action 2. Or for such a◠Action as the killing of his onely Son would have been 3. Was not he the justifier here who was the imputer of Righteousness But God was the imputer of Righteousness vers 23. therefore God was the Justifier So I leave that interpretation to sleep 2. That it is the Person and not his Faith onely which is here said to be justified by Works is as plain in the Text almost as can be spoken vers 21. Abraham not his faith is said to be justified by works Vers. 24. By Works a man is justified If by a man were meant a mans Faith then it would run thus sencelessely By Works a mans Faith is justified and not by Faith onely so Vers 25 3. For Mr. Pembles interpretation That by Works is meant a Working Faith I Answer I dare not teach the holy Ghost to speak nor force the Scripture nor raise an exposition so far from the plain importance of the words without apparent necessity But here is not the least necessitie There being not the least inconvenience that I Know of in affirming Justification by Works in the fore-explained sence Men seldom are bold with Scripture in forcing it But they are first bold with Conscience inforcing it If it were but some one Phrase dissonant from the ordinary language of Scripture I should not doubt but it must be reduced to the rest But when it is the very scope of a Chapter in plain and frequent expressions no whit dissonant from any other Scripture I think he that may so wrest it as to make it unsay what it saith may as well make him a Creed of his own let the Scripture say what it will to the contrary what is this but with the Papist to make the Scripture a Nose of wax If Saint Iames speak it so oft over and over that Justification is by works and not by Faith onely I will see more cause before I deny it or say he meanes a Working Faith If he so understand a Working Faith as that it justifieth principally as Faith and lesse principally as working then I should not differ from him only I should think the Scripture Phrase is more fafe and more propert But he understandeth it according to that common assertion and exposition that Fides solum justificat non autem fides sola Faith alone justifieth but not that faith which is alone The question therefore is Whether Works do concur with Faith as part of the Condition in the very businesse of Justifying or whether they are onely Concomitants to that Faith which effecteth the business without their assistance The ground of the mistake lyeth here They first ascribe to much to Faith and then because that nimium which they give to Faith is not found agreeable to Works therefore they conclude that we are not justified by works at all They think that Faith is an Instrumentall efficient cause of Justification which that properly it is not I have proved before when if they understood that it justifieth but as a Causa sine quanon or condition they would easily yeeld that Works do so too I will not say therefore that Works do effectually produce our Justification For faith doth not so Nor that they justifie as equall parts of the condition For faith is the principall But that they justifie as the secondary lesse-principall part of the Condition not onely proving our Faith to be sound but themselves being in the Obligation as well as Faith and justifying in the same kind of causality or procurement as Faith though not in equality with it I prove thus 1. When it is said that we are Iustified by Works the word By implyeth more then an Idle concomitancy If they only stood by while Faith doth all it could not be said that we are Justified by Works 2. When the Apostle saith By Works and not By Faith onely he plainly makes them concomitant in procurement or in that kind of causality which they have Especially seeing he saith not as he is commonly interpreted not By Faith which is alone but not by Faith only 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 3. Therefore he saith that Faith is dead being alone Because it is dead as to the use and purpose of Justifying for in it self it hath a life according to its quality still This appears from his comparison in the former verse 16. that this is the death he speaks of And so Works make Faith alive as to the attainment of its end of Justification 4. The Analysis which Piscator and Pemble give contradicteth not this Assertion If in stead of a Working Faith they will but keep the Apostles own words I shall agree to most of their Analysis Though conclusious drawn from the Analysis are often weak it is so easie for every man to feign an Analysis suited to his ends onely the explication of the 22. vers they seem to fail in For when the Apostle saith that Faith did 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 work in and with his works it cleary aimeth at such a working in and with as maketh them conjunct in the work of Justifying And when he saith that Faith was made perfect with Works it is not as they and others interpret only a manifesting to be perfect But as the habit is perfected in its Acts because they are the end to which it tendeth And as Marriage is perfected per congressum procreationem or any Covenant when its conditions are performed Faith alone is not the entire perfect Condition of the New Covenant but Faith with Repentance and sincere Obedience is A condemned Gally-slave being Redeemed is to have his deliverance upon condition that he take his Redeemer for his Master This doth so directly imply that he must obey him that his conditions are not perfectly fulfilled except he do obey him as his Master And so taking him for his Redeemer and Master and obeying him as his Master do in the same kind procure his continued freedom Indeed his meer promise and consent doth procure his first deliverance but not the continuance of it So I acknowledg that the very first point of Justification is by Faith alone without either the concomitancy or co-operation of Works for they cannot be performed in an instant But the continuance and accomplishment of Justification is not without the joynt procurement of obedience As a woman is made a mans wife and instated in all that he hath upon meer acceptance consent and contracts because conjugall actions affection the forsaking of others
Obedience also as is before explained Therefore we are justified that we may be saved It would be as derogatory to Christs Righteousness if we be saved by works as if we be justified by them Neither is there any way to the former but by the latter That which a man is justified by he is saved by Though Glorification be an adding of a greater happinesse then we lost so justification is not enough thereto Yet on our part they have the same Conditions Yet here I say still Our full Iustification because as I have shewed our first possession of it is upon our meer Faith or Contract with Christ. But I think our Glorification will be acknowledged to have the same Conditions with our finall Iustification at the barre of Christ. And why not to our entire continued justification on earth You may Object Perseverance is a condition of our Glorification but not of our Iustification here I Answer 1. Perseverance is nothing but the same Conditions persevering 2. As the sincerity of Faith is requisite to our first possession of justification so the perseverance of Faith is the Condition of persevering Iustification See Hebr. 3. 14. 2. That Obedience is a Condition of our Salvation is undoubted Hebr. 5. 6. Christ is the Author of eternall Salvation to all them that obey him so fully Rom. 2. 7. 8. 9. 10. Revel 22. 14. Blessed are they that do his commandements that they may have Right to the tree of Life and may enter by the Gates into the City And hath that no hand in their Iustification which giveth them right to the tree of Life Iam. 1. 22. 23. 24. 25. Mat. 5. from the 1. to the 13. especially the 19. 20. Mat. 7. 13. 21. 23. 24. with the multitude the like Besides all those under Posit 22. which prove a personall Righteousness so called from the conformity to the Gospell See Rom. 8. 4. 13. THESIS LXXIX THis Doctrine is no whit derogatory to Christ and his Righteousnesse For he that ascribeth to Faith or Obedience no part of that work which belongeth to Christs satisfactory Righteousnesse doth not derogate in that from that Righteousnesse But he that maketh Faith and Obedience to Christ to be only the fulfilling of the Conditions of the New Covenant and so to be oneâ—y Conditions of justification by him doth give them no part of the work of his Righteousnesse Seeing he came not to fulfill the Gospell but the Law EXPLICATION I Have proved this before Posit 20. I shall here onely Answer some objections Object 1. Christ was baptized because he must fulfill all Righteousness But that was no part of the Legall Righteousness Answ. The Priests were to be washed when they entred upon their office There were many Ceremonious washings then in force Either Christs Baptisme was Legall or else by fulfilling Righteousnesse must needs be meant The fulfilling all the works of his own office whereof one was the instituting of Church Ordinances and he thought meet to institute this by Example as well as Doctrine He that will affirm that Christ hath fulfilled Evangelicall Righteousnesse for us as well as Legall shall overthrow the office of Christ and the nature of Christianity Object 2. Mr. Bradshaw and most others say That he received the Sacrament of his Supper Ans. Wholly without book I beleeve not that ever he did it for the Scripture no where speaks it And many absurd consequences would hardly be avoided All the probability for it is in those words I will drink no more of the fruit of c. Answ. 1. That may be a Reason why he would not drink now and doth not necessarily imply that he did 2. But clearly Luke who speaketh distinctly of the two Cups which the other do not doth apply and subjoyn these words to the first Cup which was before the Sacramentall 2. If it were granted that Christ did receive the Sacrament yet he never did as an obedientiall Act to his own Gospell precepts Did he obey a Law not yet made or his own Law and so obey himself Much lesse did he perform it as a part of the New Covenant Condition on our part But as a Law-giver and not an Obeyer thereof It was a Law-making Action if any such had been Object If sincere obedience be a part of the Condition then what perplexities will it cast us into to finde out when our obedience is sincere Answ. 1. This difficulty ariseth also if we make it but the Condition of our Salvation yet few but Antinomians will deny that 2. Why is it not as hard to discern the sincerity of faith as of Obedience 3. Obedience is then sincere when Christ is cordially taken for our onely Lord and when his Word is our Law and the main desire and endeavor is to please him and though through prevavalency of the flesh we slip into sin yet the prevailing part of our will is against it and we would not change our Lord for all the world Mr. Saltmarsh thinketh that because we have so much sin with our Obedience all Beleevers have cause to suspect it and so cannot conclude Justification from it As if sincerity might not stand with infirmity Or could not be discerned where there is any remaining imperfection Might not Paul conclude of the sincerity of his Willingness to obey Christ because he did the evill which he would not And might he not conclude his Justification from that Willingness to obey Read Ball of the Covenant chap. 11. THESIS LXXX TO conclude It is most clear in the Scripture and beyond all dispute that our Actuall most proper compleat Iustification at the great Iudgement will be according to our Works and to what we have done in flesh whether Good or Evill which can be no otherwise then as it was the Condition of that Iustification And so Christ at that great Assize will not give his bare Will of Purpose as the Reason of his proceedings but as he governed by a Law so he will judg by a Law and will then give the Reason of his Publique Sentence from mens keeping or breaking the Conditions of his Covenant that so the mouths of all may be stopped and the equity of his Iudgment may be manifest to all and that he may there shew forth his hatred to the sins and not onely to the persons of the Condemned and his Love to the Obedience and not onely to the persons of the Iustified EXPLICATION HEre I have these things to prove 1. That the Justifying Sentence shall pass according to Works as well as Faith 2. That the Reason is because they are parts of the Condition For the first see Mat. 25. 21 23. Well done good and faithfull servant Thou hast been faithfull over a few things I will make thee ruler over many things Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord. And most plain is that from the mouth of the Judg himself describing the order of the process at that day Mat. 25. 34 35. Come ye
Blessed inherit the Kingdom c. For I was hungry c. So 1 Pet. 1. 17. Who without respect of persons judgeth according to every mans work So 2 Cor. 5. 10. We must all appear before the Iudgment seat of Christ that every one may receive the things done in his body according to that he hath done whether good or bad So Rev. 20. 12. 13. They were judged every man according to his Works Heb. 13. 17. Phil. 4. 17. Mat. 12. 36. c. But this is evident already 2. As it is beyond doubt that Christ will then justifie men according to their Works So that this is not onely to discover the sincerity of their Faith is as evident but that it is also as they are parts of that Evangelicall Righteousness which is the Condition of their Justification 1. The very phrases of the Text import as much Mat. 25. 21 23. Well done good faithfull servant c. Mat. 25. 34 35. For I was hungry c. And in the rest According to their Works Can any more be said of Faith then that we are justified or judged to Life both for it and according to it 2. If Works be not then considered as part of the Condition how then 1. Not as the Righteousness which the Law requireth For so shall no man living be justified in the sight of God Rom. 3. 20. Psa. 143. 2. 2. Not as a meer sign whereby God doth discern mens faith For he seeth it immediately and needeth no sign 3. Not as a meer sign to satisfie the justified person himself For 1. There is no such intimation in the Text. 2. Then it should be no further usefull then men remain doubtfull of their sincerity 3. The godly then know the sincerity of their Faith 4. Neither is the business of that Day to satisfie the doubting about the sincerity of their Faith by Arguments drawn from their former works But to judg and justifie them and so put them out of doubt by the Sentence and by their Glory 4. But the common opinion is That it is to satisfie the condemned World of the sincerity of the Faith of the godly But this cannot stand with the Truth For 1. It is clearly expressed a ground or reason of the Sentence 2. And to the Consolation Justification of the justified and not to the satisfaction or conviction of others onely or chiefly 3. The poor world will have somewhat else to take up their thoughts as the Text sheweth to wit the excusing of the sin for which they are condemned themselves Mat 25. 44 4. It seemeth that Christ doth in the Text call them Righteous in reference to this personall Evangelicall Righteousness mentioned in their Justifying Sentence vers 46. The Righteous into life Eternall 5. If Gods Justice engage him not to forget their work and labour of Love Heb. 6. 10 11 12. If the dead in Christ are blessed because their Works follow them Rev. 14. 13. If in every Nation he that feareth God and worketh Righteousnes be Accepted of him Act. 10. 35. If men shall reap the fruit of well-doing in due time Gal. 6. 7 8 9. If Ministers save themselves in taking heed to themselves and to doctrine 1 Tim. 4. 16. If he that doth Righteousness is righteous 1 Ioh. 3. 7. If whatsoever good thing any man doth the same he shall receive of the Lord Ephes. 6. 8. If hearing and doing be building on a Rock Mat. 7. 24. If the doers of Gods Will be the mothers sisters and brothers of Christ Mat. 12. 50 c. Then the mention of these works at judgment is more then to signifie their sincerity to the condemned world 6. If Christ mentioned these works to convince the world 1. Either it must be his own Testimony of these works that they are sincere evidences of a sincere Faith 2. Or else by the discovery which the works doe make themselves But 1. Christ may testifie of their faith immediately as well 2. Works are no certain signes of Faith to any stander-by who knoweth not whether Works themselves are sincere or not See more under the 76. Position If any say that it is to silence the Accusacion of Satan that these works are mentioned at judgement The same Answer will serve as to the last Besides Scripture giveth us no intimation of any such accusation but onely the managing the Laws Accusation But if he should Accuse us falsely of Hypocrisie as he did Iob It must be onely Gods heart-searthing knowledg of our sincerity that can cleare us Yet do I not deny in all this but that Works are effects of Faith and to the person himself who knoweth their sincerity they may be some Argument of the sincerity of Faith and God will vindicate his peoples Righteousness before all and be admired in them But his Justification primarily respecteth the Law and his own Justice and the Righteousness and Salvation of the Justified and but remotely the beholders Let me conclude with two or three cautionary Quaeries concerning the inconvenience of the contrary doctrine 1 Qu. Doth it not needlesly constrain men to wrest most plain and frequent expressions of Scripture 2 Qu. Doth it not uphold that dangerous pillar of the Antinomian Doctrine that we must not work or perform our duties for Life and Salvation but only from Life and Salvation That we must not make the attaining of Justification or Salvation an end of our Endeavours but obey in thankfulness only because we are saved and justified A doctrine which I have elsewhere confuted and if it were reduced to practise by all that hold it as I hope it is not would undoubtedly damn them For he that seeks not and that striveth not to enter shall never enter Now if good Works or sincere Obedience to Christ our Lord be no part of the Condition of our full Justification and Salvation Who will use them to that end For how it can procure Justification as a means and not by way of Condition I cannot conceive 3 Qu. Whether this doctrine doth not tend to drive Obedience out of the world For if men do once beleeve that it is not so much as a part of the Condition of their Justification will it not much tend to relax their diligence I know meer love and thankfulness should be enough And so it will when all our ends are attained in our Ultimate End then we shall act for these ends no more we shall have nothing to do but to love and joy and praise and be thankfull but that it is not yet Sure as God hath given us the affections of Fear and Desire and Hope and so Care so he would have us use them for the attainment of our great Ends. Therefore he that taketh down but one of all our Motives to Obedience he helps to destroy Obedience it self seeing we have need of every Motive that God hath left us 4 Qu. Doth it not much confirm the world in their soul-cozening Faith
in this Life 2. And Iustification in sentence of the Iudge which is at the last Iudgement 24. Betwixt justifying us against a true Accusation as of breaking the Law Thus Christ justifieth us and here it is that we must plead his Safaction 2. And justifying us against a false Accusation as of not performing the Conditions of the Gospell Here we must plead not guilty and not plead the Satisfaction of Christ. 25. Betwixt the Accusation of the Law from Christ doth justifie believers 2. And the Accusation of the Gospell or new Covenant for not per forming its Conditions at all from which no man can be justified and for which there is no sacrifice 26. Betwixt those Acts which recover us to the state of Relation which we fell from that is Pardon Reconciliation and Iustification 2. And those which advance us to a far higher state that is Adoption and Vnion with Christ. 27. Betwixt our first Possession of Iustification which is upon our contract with Christ or meer Faith 2. And the Confirmation Continuation and Accomplishment of it whose Condition is also sincere Obedience and Perseverance 28. Betwixt the great summary duty of the Gospell to which the rest are reducible which is Faith 2. And the Condition fully expressed in all its parts where of Faith is the Epitome 29. Betwixt the word Faith as it is taken Physically and for some one single Act 2. And as it is taken Morally Politically and Theologically here for the receiving of Christ with the whole soul. 30. Betwixt the accepting of Christ as a Saviour only which is no true Faith nor can justifie 2. And Accepting him for Lord also which is true Iustifying Faith 31. Betwixt the foresaid Receiving of Christ himself in his offices which is the Act that Iustifieth 2. And Receiving his Promises and Benefits a consequent of the former Or betwixt accepting him for Iustification 2. And beleeving that we are justified 32. Betwixt the Metaphysicall Truth of our Faith 2. And the Morall Truth 33. Betwixt the Nature of the Act of Faith which justifieth or its Aptitude for its office which is its receiving Christ 2. And the proper formall Reason of its Iustifying power which is because it is the Condition upon which God will give us Christs Righteousness 34. Betwixt Works of the Law which is perfect Obedience 2. And Works of the Gospell Covenant which is Faith and sincere Obedience to Christ that bought us 35. Betwixt Works of the Gospell used as Works of the Gospell i.e. in subordination to Christ as Conditions of our full Iustification and Salvation by him 2. And Works commanded in the Gospell used a-Works of the Law or to legall ends viz. to make up in whole or in part our proper legall Righteousness and so in opposition to Christs Righteousness or in co-ordination with it In the first sence they are necessary to Salvation In the second Damnable 36. Betwixt receiving Christ and loving him as Redeemer which is the Condition it self 2. And taking the Lord for our God and chief Good and loving him accordingly Which is still implyed in the Covenant as its End and Perfection And so as more excellent then the proper Conditions of the Covenant Glory to God in the highest and on Earth Peace Good-will towards men Luk. 2. 14. Postscript WHereas there is in this Book an intimation of something which I have written of Vniversall Redemption Understand that I am writing indeed a few pages on that subject onely by way of Explication as an Essay for the Reconciling of the great differences in the Church thereabouts But being hindered by continuall sickness and also observing how many lately are set a work on the same subject as Whitfield Stalham Howe Owen and some men of note that I hear are now upon it I shall a while forbear to see if something may come forth which may make my endeavour in this kinde useless and save me the labour Which if it come not to pass you shall shortly have it if God will enable me Farewell AN APPENDIX to the fore-going TREATISE BEING An Answer to the Objections of a Friend concerning some Points therein contained And at his own Desire annexed for the sake of others that may have the same thoughts Zanchius in Philip. 3. 13. What can be more pernicious to a Student yea to a Teacher then to think that he knoweth all things and no knowledge can be wanting in him For being once puft up vvith this false opinion he vvill profit no more The same is much truer in Christian Religion and in the Knovvledge of Christ. Rom. 3. 25. Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through Faith in his blood for Remission of sins that are past through the forbearance of God READER THe disorder of the Interrogations and Objections which extorted from me this whole Tractate by pieces one after another hath caused me an unfeigned lover of method to give thee such a disorderly immethodicall Miscellany Also the quality of these Objections hath occasioned me to answer many things triviall whilest I know more difficult and weighty points are overlooked these things need no excuse but this information That I was to follow and not to lead and that I write only for those who know less than my self if thou know more thank God and joyn with me for the instruction of the ignorant whose information reformation and salvation and thereby Gods glory is the top of my ambition R. B. AN ANSWER to some Objections and Questions OF One that perused this small TRACTATE before it went to the Press The sum of the Objections is as followeth 1. IT seemeth strange to me that you make the death which the first Covenant did threaten to be only in the everlasting suffering of soul seperated from the body and that the body should de turned to earth and suffer no more but the pains of death and consequently not whole man but only part of him should de damned 2. Though you seem to take in the Active Righteousness of Christ with the Passive into the work of Justification yet it is on such grounds as that you do in the main agree with them who are for the Passive Righteousness alone against the stream of Orthodox Divines 3. I pray you clear to me a little more fully in what sence you mean that no sin but finall unbelief is a breach or violation of the new Covenant and how you can make it good that temporary unbelief and gross sin is no violation of it seeing We Covenant against these 4. Whether it will not follow from this doctrine of yours that the new covenant is never violated by any for the regenerate do never finally and totally renounce Christ and so they violate it not the unregenerate were never truly in covenant and therefore cannot be said to violate the Covenant which they never made 5. How you will make it appear that the new Covenant is not made with Christ only 6.
participation of that and whereby we must escape the condemnation of the Gospell which is Faith as I have opened before 5. If the Apostle should meane otherwise it were as much against your Doctrine as mine For is not Faith a work or act of ours But you will say That though Faith which is a work do justifie yet not as a work but as an instrument I answer 1. To be an actuall apprehension of Christ which you call its instrumentality is to bee a work Therefore if it justifie as it is such an apprehension it justifieth as a work 2. So also say I that subjection and obedience justifie 1. Not as works simply considered 2. Nor as legall works 3. Nor as meritorious works 4. Nor as Good works which God is pleased with 5. But as the conditions to which the free Law-giver hath promised justification and life Nay your Doctrine ascribeth farre more of the work to man then mine for you make justification an effect of your own Faith and your Faith the instrumentall cause of it and so make your selfe your owne justifier And you say your Faith justifieth as it apprehendeth Christ which is the most intrinsecall essentiall consideration of Faith and so Faith hath much of the honour But while I affirm that it justifieth onely as a condition which is an extrinsecall consideration and aliene from its essence or nature I give the glory to him that freely giveth me life and that made so sweet a condition to his Covenant and that enableth me to performe the said condition And thus I have according to my measure of understanding answered your Objections as fully as necessitated brevity would permit And for that question which you propounded about Relaxation Abrogation c. of the Law which you confesse you doe not well understand I refer you to Vossius Defens Grotii de Satisf cap. 27. where among other things hee telleth you that Apud Romanos seu ferenda esset Lex populus rogabatur an ferrivellet seu tollendae rogabatur an tolli eam placeret Hinc rogari lex dicebatur quae ferrebatur ut dicit Vlp. Tit. 1. Regal Eâdemque de causâ abrogari dicebatur cum antiquaretur c. And then he explaineth all those phrases to you out of Vlpian Lex rogatur id est fertur vel abrogatur idest prior lex tollitur vel Derogatur id est pars primae tollitur aut subrogatur id est adjicitur aliquid primae legi aut Obrogatur id est mutatur aliquid ex primâlege And so concludeth that the first Law was not abrogated but relaxed dispensed with and obrogate How farre it was executed I have shewed you in the Treatise But the last task you set me is of all the rest most ungratefull endlesse and in my judgement unnecessary viz. To answer what other men have written against some doctrines which I have here asserted 1. It is a work ungratefull to search into other mens weaknesse and mistakes to handle the truth in a way of contention or to speak in way of derogation of the labours of the learned and godly 2. And should I fall upon a confutation of every man that hath written contrary to any thing in my Book the task would be endlesse and I might stuffe a great deale of paper with words against words and perhaps adde little matter to what is already written which is a work unfit me for to undertake who have so much better work to doe and am like to have so short a time to doe it in 3. And it seemes to me a needlesse task partly because from the cleering and confirmation of the positive truth you may be enabled to answer opposers your selfe 2. The Authors which you mention doe so easily and effectually assault the doctrines mentioned that I should think no judicious man can thereby be staggered But at your request I will briefly consider them particularly The Authors which you refer me to are two D. Maccovius and Mr. Owen The points which they contradict are three 1. That our legall Righteousnesse which we have in Christ consisteth not formally in obedience to the Precept of the first Covenant but onely in satisfaction for our Disobedience This Maccovius opposeth in Colleg. Theol. par 1 Disp. 10. par 4. Disp. 9. 2. That Christ payed not the same debt which was in the first obligation but the value and so the Law was not properly and fully executed but relaxed This you say Mr. Owen confuteth in Grotius in his late Treatise of Vniversall Redemption lib. 3 cap. 7. p. 140. 3. That no man is actually and absolutely justified no not so much as in point of Right either from eternity or upon the meere payment of the bebt by Christ till themselves doe beleeve This you say is confuted by both of them Maccov par 3. Disp. 16. par 1. Disp. 17. Et owen ubi supra If mens names did not more take with you then their Arguments you might have spared me this labour But briefly to the first of these I answer 1. Most passages in Maccovius doe affirm but that Christ obeyed for us as well as suffered for us and who denyeth that 2. Of those passages which yet goe further there is few of them that say any more then this that Christs active Righteousnesse did merit for us that life and glory which is given by the New Covenant more then we lost by breaking the Old But this is nothing to our Question which is onely about justification For I have cleared to you before that Justification is properly and strictly taken one of those acts whereby we are recovered from the condemnation of the Law and set in statu quo prius and not one of those acts which give us that additionall glory which is Adoption Union Glorification 3. Those few Arguments which yet doe drive higher then this are so fully answered already by Mr. Gataker against Lucius Gomarrus c. and Mr. Goodwin notwithstanding Mr. Roboroughs Answer and divers others that I am resolved not to lose so much time and labour as to doe that which is better done already then can be expected from me 4. Onely one argument more then usuall I finde in part 1 Disput. 10. And which I confesse deserveth a speciall consideration And that is this If Christ onely suffered for us then the righteousnesse of Adam had hee continued in innocency would have been more excellent then the righteousnesse of Christ For the law requireth obedience principally and suffering but per accidens But the consequence is false because else Christ hath not set us in as good a state as we fell from To this I answer 1. This righteousnesse may be termed excellent in severall respects 1 In reference to its Rule 2. Or in reference to its Ends. The 1. denominateth it Good in it self The second denominateth it good to us Now the Rules to measure it by are two 1. The neerest inferiour Rule which is the
place Hab. 2. 4. Sop. 649. in the true Gain God doth as it were keep a double Court one of justice the other of Mercy In the Court of justice he gives judgment by the Law accuseth every man that continueth not in all things c. In this Court nothing can stand but the Passion and Righteousnesse of Christ and for the best works that we can doe we may not look for any acceptation or reward but use the plea of David Enter not into iudgement with thy servant O Lord for no flesh shall be justified in thy sight Now in the Court of Grace and Mercy God hath to deall with his own children that stand before him justified and reconciled by Christ and the obedience of such he accepteth in this Court and mercifully regardeth though imperfect for christ Perkins Vol. 1. pag. 124. On the Creed Christ as he is set forth in Word and Sacraments is the object of Faith Faith apprehendeth whole Christ. pag. 125. First it apprehendeth the very body and blood of Christ and then in the second place the vertue and benefits Whereas some are of an opinion that faith is an affiance or confidence that seemes to be otherwise for it is a fruit of Faith That Faith is so large as to contain very many acts see Zanchy on Eph. 1. in loco communi de fide That Word and Sacraments are the instruments of Justification on Gods part Zanchy affirmes on Ephes. 1. loco communi de justificatione That the form of Righteousnesse is conformity to the Law he teacheth on Phil. 1. 11. That there is a necessity of a two-fold Righteousnesse one imputed the other inherent Zanchy ibid freq Dr. Willet on Rom. 2. contr 3. 7. Good workes are required as a condition in those which are to be saved not as a meritorious cause of their salvation The meaning of this sentence the doors of the law shall be justified is the same God will approve justifie reward them that do the works of the Law whether Jew or Gentile Yet it followeth not that a man is therefore justified by the works of the Law But God approveth and rewardeth the workers not the hearers and professours So here the Apostle treateth not of the cause of justification which is faith without the works of the law But of the difference between such as shall be justified and such as are not Faïus They onely which have a lively Faith which worketh and keepeth the Law in part and supplyeth the rest which is wanting in themselves by the perfect obedience of Christ they shall be justified not those which onely professe the Law and keep it not The Apostle then here sheweth who shall be justified not for what By these words it is evident that Dr. Willet and Faius acknowledge sincere obedience to be a condition of justification or of those that shall be justified though not a cause as they say I think mistakingly Faith is Dr. Davenant Animadversions on Gods love to mankind p. 385. 386. The Doctrine of Predestination permitteth no man to perswade himself that his salvation is certain before he finde that he is truly converted truly faithfull truly sanctified Because you will perhaps hear Mr. Owen before Grotius see Mr. Ball on Covenant p 290. There is a two-fold payment of debt one of the thing altogether the same which was in the Obligation and this ipso facto freeth from punishment whether it be paid by the debtor himself or by his surety Another of a thing not altogether the same which is in the Obligation so that some act of the Creditor or Governour must come unto it which is called remission in which case deliverance doth not follow ipso facto upon the satisfaction and of this kind is the satisfaction of Christ. Thus this great learned holy Divine as almost England ever bred doth go on even in Grotius his own words translated betwixt whom had he been living and Mr. Owen would have been but impar congressus Ball on Covenant p. 240. As these false Teachers 2 Pet. 2. 1. were called into the Covenant accepted the condition beleeved in Christ for a time rejoyced in him and brought forth some fruit so we confesse they were bought by the blood of Christ because all these were fruits of Christs Death whereof they were made partakers As in the Parable Mat. 18. 25. the Lord is said to remit to his servant a 1000 talents when he desired him viz. Inchoately or upon condition which was not confirmed because he did not forgive his fellow-servant So the false Prophets are bought by the bloud of Christ in a sort as they beleeved in Christ. We read of Apostates who had bin enlightned c. Heb. 6. 5 6 7. and did revolt from the Faith To these men their sins were remitted in a sort in this world and in a sort they were bought with the blood of Christ but inchoately onely and as they tasted the word of life Had they eaten the word of life had they soundly and truly beleeved in Christ they had received perfect and consummate remission of sins both in this world and in the world to come they had been perfectly redeemed and reconciled to God But because they did not eat but tasted onely they received not perfect Remission they were not perfectly redeemed Idem pag. 225. There is this mutuall respect betwixt the promise and stipulation that the promise is as an argument which God useth that he might obtain of man what he requireth and the performance of the thing required is a condition without which man cannot obtain the promise of God Idem pag. 43. Of this Covenant be two parts 1. a Promise 2. a stipulation The Promise is that God will pardon the sinnes of them that repent unfeignedly and beleeve in his mercy 2. The Stipulation is that they beleeve in him that justifieth the ungodly and walk before him in all well-pleasing See him also delivering the most of Amiraldus doctrine p. 244 245. Molinaeus de elect ex fide p. 316. We know remission is not obtained before Prayers for it But I say that it was decreed before Prayers and that it is sought by Prayers although it be decreed Scarpius symphonia p. 93. The substance of the Covenant lyeth in the promise of grace made in Christ and the Restipulation of Faith and Gratitude Paraeus in Genes 17. p. 1130. The substance of the Covenant lyeth in the promise of free Reconciliation Righteousness and life eternall by and for Christ freely to be given and in the restipulation of our Morall Obedience and Gratitude Bullinger Decad. 1. Serm. 6. pag. 44. We say Faith justifieth for it self not as it is a quality in our minde or our own work but as Faith is a gift of Gods grace having the promise of Righteousnesse and life c. Therefore Faith justifieth for Christ and from the grace and Covenant of God Mr. Ant. Burgesse of Iustif. Lect. 14. p. 117. Scripture maketh no pardon of sin to be but where the subject hath such qualifications as this of forgiving others It is not indeed put as a cause or merit but yet it is as a qualification of the subject therefore our Saviour repeateth Except ye forgive others c. So Act. 10. 43. Rom. 3. 15. So 1 Ioh. 1. 9. If we confesse c. By these and the like Scriptures it is plain That remission of sinne is given us only in the use of these Graces Mr. Burges of Iustif. Lect. 18. pag. 148 149. Prop. 2. Although the Scripture attributes pardon of sin to many qualifications in a man yet repentance is the most expresse and proper duty If we speak of the expresse formall qualification it is repentance of our sins c. Prop. 3. None may beleeve or conclude that their sins are pardoned before they have repented Mat. 3. 2. Luk 13. 3. Prop. 4. There is a necessity of repentance if we would have pardon both by necessity of Precept and of means The Spirit of God worketh this in a man to qualify him for this pardon pag. 150. You see then that Faith is not the only condition of remission and consequently nor of justification Not as an appeal to men but to fill up the vacant pages and satisfy you who charge me with singularity have I added these promiscuous Testimonies supposing you can apply them to their intended uses FINIS
in execution of any part of the curse of the Law 3. Whether the sufferings of Beleevers are from the curse of the Law or only afflictions of Love the curse being taken off by Christ 4. Whether it be not a wrong to the Redeemer that the people whom he hath ransomed are not immediately delivered 5. Whether it be any wrong to the redeemed themselves 6. How long will it be till all the curse be taken off the Beleevers and Redemption have attained its full effect To the first Question I answer In this case the undertaking of satisfaction had the same immediate effect upon Adam as the satisfaction it self upon us or for us To determine what these are were an excellent work it being one of the greatest and noblest questions in our controverted Divinity What are the immediate effects of Christs Death He that can rightly answer this is a Divine indeed and by the help of this may expedite most other controversies about Redemption and Justification In a word The effects of Redemption undertaken could not be upon a subject not yet existent and so no subject though it might be for them None but Adam and Eve were then existent Yet as soon as we do exist we receive benefit from it The suspending of the rigorous execution of the sentence of the Law is the most observable immediate effect of Christs death which suspension is some kinde of deliverance from it Of the other effects elsewhere To the second Question The Elect before conversion do stand in the same relation to the Law and Curse as other men though they be differenced in Gods Decree Eph. 2. 3â—â—2 To the third Question I confess we have here a knotty Question The common judgment is That Christ hath taken away the whole curse though not the suffering by bearing it himself and now they are only afflictions of Love and not Punishments I do not contradict this doctrine through affectation of singularity the Lord knoweth but through constraint of Judgement And that upon these grounds following 1. It is undenyable that Christs taking the curse upon himself did not wholly prevent the execution upon the offendor in Gen. 3. 7 8 10 15 16 17 18 19. 2. It is evident from the event seeing we feel part of the curse fulfilled on us We eat in labour and sweat the earth doth bring forth thorns and bryars women bring forth their children in sorrow our native pravity is the curse upon our souls we are sick and weary and full of fears and sorrows and shame and at last we dye and turn to dust 3. The Scripture tells us plainly that we all dye in Adam even that death from which we must at the Resurrection be raised by Christ 1 Cor. 15. 21 22. And that death is the wages of sin Rom. 6. 23. And that the sickness and weakness and death of the godly is caused by their sins 1 Cor. 11. 30 31. And if so then doubtless they are in execution of the threatening of the Law though not in full rigor 4. It is manifest that our sufferings are in their own nature evils to us and the sanctifying of them to us taketh not away their natural evil but only produceth by it as by an occasion a greater good Doubtless so far as it is the effect of sin it is evil and the effect also of the law 5. They are ascribed to Gods anger as the moderating of them is ascribed to his love Psal. 30. 5. and a thousand places more 6. They are called punishments in Scripture and therefore we may call them so Lev. 26. 41 43. Lam 3. 39. 4. 6 22. Ezra 9. 13. Hosea 4. 9. 12. 2. Lev. 26. 18 24. 7. The very nature of affliction is to be a loving punishment a natural evil sanctified and so to be mixt of evil and good as it proceedeth from mixt causes Therefore to say that Christ hath taken away the curse and evil but not the suffering is a contradiction because so far as it is a suffering it is to us evil and the execution of the curse What reason can be given why God should not do us all that good without our sufferings which now he doth by them if there were not sin and wrath and Law in them Sure he could better us by easier means 8. All those Scriptures and Reasons that are brought so the contrary do prove no more but this That our afflictions are not the rigorous execution of the threatning of the Law that they are not wholly or chiefly in wrath but as the common Love of God to the wicked is mixt with hatred in their sufferings and the hatred prevaileth above the love so the sufferings of the godly proceed from a mixture of love and anger and so have in them a mixture of good and evil but the Love overcoming the Anger therefore the good is greater then the evil and so death hath lost its sting 1 Cor. 15. 55 56. There is no unpardoned sin in it which shall procure further judgment and so no hatred though there be anger 9. The Scripture saith plainly That death is one of the enemies that is not yet overcome but shall be last conquered 1 Cor. 15. 26 and of our corruption the case is plain 10. The whole stream of Scripture maketh Christ to have now the sole disposing of us and our sufferings to have prevented the full execution of the curse and to manage that which lyeth on us for our advantage and good but no where doth it affirm that he suddenly delivereth us To the fourth Question It can be no wrong to Christ that we are not perfectly freed from all the curse and evil as soon as he had satisfied 1. Because it was not the Couenant betwixt him and the Father 2. It is not his own will volenti non fit injuria 3. It is his own doing now to keep us under it till he see the fittest time to release us 4. Our sufferings are his means and advantages to bring us to his Will Mankind having forfeited his life is cast into prison till the time of full execution Christ steppeth in and buyeth the prisoners with a full purpose that none of them yet shall scape but those that take him for their Lord. To this purpose he must treat with them to know whether they will be his subjects and yield themselves to him and his terms Is it not then a likelier way to procure their consent to treat with them in prison then to let them out and then treat and to leave some of the curse upon them to force them to yield that they may know what they must expect else when the whole shall be executed To the fift Question It is no wrong to the sinner to be thus dealt with 1. Because he is but in the misery which he brought upon himself 2. No man can lay claim to the Satisfaction and Redemption upon the meer payment till they have a word of
Satisfaction is imputed to us instead of the value of a perfect Obedience of our own performing and the value of our Faith is not so imputed But because there must be some personall performance of homage therefore the personall performance of Faith shall be imputed to us for a sufficient personall payment as if we had paid the full rent because Christ whom we believe in hath paid it he will take this for satisfactory homage so it is in point of personall performance and not of value that Faith is imputed THESIS XXIV THis personall Gospell Righteousness is in its kind a perfect Righteousness and so far we may admit the doctrine of personall Perfection EXPLICATION OUr Righteousness may be considered either in regard of the matter and the acts denominated righteous or else in respect of the form which gives them that denomination Also our Faculties and Actions are considerable either in regard of their Being or of their Quality 1. The perfection of the Being of our Faculties or Acts is nothing to our present purpose as falling under a physicall consideration only 2. In regard of their Quality they may be called perfect or imperfect in severall sences 1 As Perfection is taken for the transcendentall perfection of Being so they are perfect 2. And as it is taken for the compleat number of all parts it is perfect 3. But as it is taken for that which is perfect Efficienter or Participaliter that is for a work that is finished for the Author so our holiness is still imperfect here 4. And as it is taken for accidentall perction so called in Metaphysicks when it wants nothing which beyond the Essence is also requisite to the integrity ornament and well being of it so our holiness is here imperfect 5. As perfection is taken pro sanitate for soundness so our holiness is imperfect 6. And as it is taken pro maturitate for ripeness so it is imperfect 7. In respect of the admixture of contrary qualities our holiness is imperfect 8. But whether all this imperfection be privative and sinfull or meerly negative and only our misery whether it be a privation physicall or morall is a question that will be cleared when I come to shew the extent of the Commands or Rule But not any of these kinds of perfection is that which I mean in the Position Holiness is a quality may be intended and remitted in creased decreased but it is the relative consideration of these qualities of our faculties and acts as they are compared with the Rule of the new Covenant so it is not the perfection of our holiness that we enquire after but of our righteousness which righteousness is not a quality as holiness is but the modification of our acts as to the Rule which is not varyed secundum majus minus See Schibl Metaph. li. 2 c. 9. Tit. 7. Art 2. Therefore our Divines usually say That our Justification is perfect though our Sanctification be not and then I am sure our Righteousness must be perfect A two-fold perfection is here implyed 1. A Metaphysical Perfection of Being 2. A Perfection of Sufficiency in order to its end 1. The being of our Righteousness formally consisting in our relative conformity to the rule either it must be perfect or not at all He that is not perfectly innocent in the very point that he is accused is not innocent truly but guilty Sincerity is usually said to be our Gospel-Perfection not as it is accepted in stead of perfection but as it is truly so for sincere Faith is our conformity to the Rule of Perfection viz. the new Covenant as it is a Covenant yet as it is sincere Faith it is only materially our Righteousness and Perfection but formally as it is relatively our conformity to the said Rule 2. Our Righteousness is perfect as in its Being so also in order to its end The end is to be the condition of our Justification c. This end it shall perfectly attain The Tenor of the new Covenant is not Believe in the highest degree and you shall be justified But believe sincerely and you shall be justified so that our Righteousness 1. formally considered in relation to the condition of the new Covenant is perfect or none 2. But considered materially as it is holiness either in reference to the degree it should attain or the degree which it shall attain or in reference to the excellent object which it is excercised about or in reference to the old Covenant or the directive and in some sence the preceptive part of the new Covenant in all these respects it is imperfect I speak not all this while of that perfection in Christs Satisfaction which is also our perfect Righteousness because few will question the perfection of that THESIS XXV YEt is it an improper speech of some Divines That Christ first justifieth our persons and then our duties and actions And except by justifying they mean his esteeming them to be a fulfilling of the Gospell Conditions and so unjust it is unsound and dangerous as well as improper EXPLICATION 1. IT is improper in the best sence 1. Because it is contrary to the Scripture use of the word Iustifying which is the acquitting of us from the charge of breaking the Law and not from the charge of violating the new Covenant 2 It is against the nature of the thing seeing Justification as you shall see anon implyeth Accusation but the esteeming of a righteous action to be as it is doth not imply any accusation 3. This speech joyning Justification of Persons and Actions together doth seem to intimate the same kinde of justification of both and so doth tend to seduce the hearers to a dangerous error 2. For if it be understood in the worst sence it will overthrow the Righteousness of Christ imputed and the whole scope of the Gospell and will set up the doctrine of Justification by Works For if God do justifie our Works from any legall Accusation as he doth our persons then it will follow That our Works are just and consequently we are to be justified by them There is no room for scripture-Scripture-justification where our own Works are not first acknowledged unjustifiable because there is no place for Satisfaction and Justification thereby from another where we plead the Justification of our own Works in respect of the same Law Justification of Works is a sufficient ground for Iustification by Works seeing the justness of his dispositions and actions is the ground of denominating the person just and that according to the primary and most proper kinde of Righteousness as is expressed in the distinction of it pag. 98 99. THESIS XXVI 1 NEither can our performance of the conditions of the Gospel in the most proper and strict sence be said to merit the reward seeing there is nothing in the value of it or any benefit that God receiveth by it which may so entitle it meritorious neither is there any
unbelief and not receiving Christ all one Ioh. 1. 11. and beleeving and receiving Christ all one Ioh. 1. 12. So it proclaims this as the great work of the Gospell to Take Eat Drink c. 2. The Gospell is the offer of Christ and his benefits to them that first accept himself Therefore Faith must be the accepting of the thing offered Both these are plain in Rev. 22. 17. Whosoever will let him take of the water of life freely There is the free offer upon condition of coming and taking or accepting 3. The will is the commanding faculty of the soul therefore its act is the principall act and that is accepting 4. Christ is presented to us in the Gospell as a Suitor beseeching us by his Spirit and Embassadors and wooing us to himself and the enjoying of him which this driveth at is called our Marriage to him and we his Spouse and he our Husband Now you know that which tyeth the knot of Marriage is Acceptance or Consent 5. Yea the very nature of a Covenant requireth this Consent maketh it a compleat Covenant Therefore I said before pag. 219. That Acceptance Consent Heart-Covenanting and Self-resigning are the proper essentiall Acts of this Faith For all these are the Wills acts to this their object which are of flat necessity to the very tying of the Covenant or Marriage knot Rom. 10. 10. With the heart man beleeveth unto Righteousnesse And here let me minde you of one usefull observation more The Covenanting on our part is a principall part of the Conditions of the Covenant Though this may seem strange that a Covenanting and performing Conditions should be all most all one But that is the free nature of the Grace of the Covenant As if you marry a poor woman that hath nothing you will give her your self and all you have meerly upon Condition that she will Consent to have you And that Consent is all the Condition on her part for obtaining present possession I say Acceptance Consent Covenanting Self-resigning which are in a manner all one thing But because the end of the marriage is the faithfull performance of Marriage duties though meer Consent were the onely Condition of the first possession and the continuance of her Consent is the chief Condition of continuing her possession yet the performance of those Marriage duties and not going into others is part of the Condition also of that continuance So it is in the present case of Justification 5. Let me here also tell you that I take love to Christ as our Saviour and Lord to be essentiall to this Acceptance and so some degree of Love to be part of Justifying Faith and not properly a fruit of it as it is commonly taken My reasons are 1. The Wills serious apprehension of a thing Good which we call at earnest Willing it and Accepting it is in my judgement the same thing as Love in an other name Love is nothing but such an earnest Willing choosing and Accepting it as it is Good It is generally acknowledged that the Affections are but the Motions or Acts of the Will And if Love be an Act of the same Will and have the same Object with Consent Election Acceptance c. Why should it not then be the same Act Onely Acceptance considereth its Object as offered Election considereth it as propounded with some other competitor Consent considereth it as we are perswaded and invited to it But all these are extrinsecall considerations They all consider their Object as Good and so doth Love You may object 1. Then Desire and Hope may be essentiall to Faith I Answ. That Love which they imply in them is but Desire and Hope as such do properly consider their object as absent which this Justifiing Faith doth not 2. Object Scripture oft distinguisheth Faith and Love Answ. 1. Sometime Faith is taken for Historicall faith or Faith of Miracles and then it may be distinguised 2. Sometime true Faith is taken in the strictest sence and sometime larglier as I shall shew anon 3. But especially so do I distinguish of Love as it is considered by it self and as it is an essentiall part of this Acceptance Love respecteth its Object meerly as Good in it self and to the Lover But Consent and Acceptance have severall other respects as is expressed And yet there may be Love in all such Acceptance though not properly Acceptance in all Love Object 3. Then Love Justifieth as well as Faith I Answ. When it is thus considered in Faiths Acceptance it is not called by the name of Love but loseth its name as a lesser River that falleth into a greater therefore it is not said that Love Justifieth but Faith that worketh even in its essentiall work of Accepting by Love Object But Love is the greater Grace and shall out-live Faith and Faith should rather then be swallowed up in Love Answ. Love considering its object onely as Good shall continue for ever because the Goodness of its object shall so continue But Acceptance Consent c. have other additionall considerations in their Objects which will vanish But which is the chiefest Grace in it self is not the question but which is the chiefest in the present work Now seeing Consent Acceptance c. are the chief as to Justification that Love which is essentially in them may well lose its name here seeing in the businesse of Justifying it is considered but as an essentiall part of the main duty My next-Reason is because Christ doth propound it in the Gospel as of the same necessity with the same promises annexed to it Io. 16. 27. For the Father himself loveth you because ye have loved me and beleeved c. Joh. 14. 21. He that loveth me shall be loved of my Father and I will love him and shew my self to him Jam. 1. 12. 2. 5. The Crown and Kingdom is prepared for them that love him 1 Cor. 16. 22. If any man love not the Lord Iesus Christ let him be Anathema Maranatha Ephes. 6. 24. In a word Faith is a comprehensive duty containing divers Acts whereof this seemeth to me to be part Neither can I yet conceive how there can be a cordiall Acceptance of Christ as our only Saviour and Love not to be an essentiall part of that Acceptance but if a finer wit can apprehend the difference better yet as I said Faith being considered here in Morall and Politick respects and not in its strict naturall quiddity may essentially be an Affectionate Acceptance for all that If any think fitter to make a wider difference between the nature of Faith and Love to Christ I will not contend for the matter is not great that both are necessary to Justification is doubtless and that they are concurrent in apprehending Châ—â—â— And that Love is a part of the Condition of the Covenant is also undoubted and therefore will have some hand in the business of Justification as I shall further clear 6. I put in the word
Sure that Faith which is by many thought to justifie is it that our people do all most easily embrace that is the receiving of Christ for their Saviour and expecting Pardon and Salvation by him but not withall receiving him for their Lord and King nor delivering up themselves to be ruled by him I meet not with one but is resolved in such a Faith till it be overthrown by teaching them better They would all trust Christ for the saving of their souls and that without dissembling for ought any man can discern Are all these men justified You will say They do it not sincerely Ans. There is evident a sincerity opposite to dissimulation But a Morall or Theologicall sincerity there is not Why is that but because they take but half of Christ. Let any Minister but try his ungodly people whether they will not all be perswaded very easily to beleeve that Christ will pardon them and save them and to expect Justification from him alone But whether it be not the hardest thing in the world to perswade them really to take him for their Lord and his Word for their Law and to endeavour faithfull obedience accordingly Surely the easiness of the former and the difficulty of the latter seemeth to tell us that it is a spirituall excellent necessary part of justifying Faith to accept unfeignedly of Christ for our Governour and that part which the world among us will most hardly yeeld to and therefore hath more need to be preached then the other Though some think that nothing is preaching Christ but preaching him as a pardoning justifying Saviour Indeed among the Turks or Indians that entertain not the Gospell it is as necessary to preach his pardoning Office yea and the verity of his Natures and Commission therefore the Apostles when they preached to Jews or Pagans did first chiefly teach them the Person and Offices of Christ the great benefits which they might receive by him but when they preach as Iames to Professors of the Christian Faith they chiefly urge them to strive to enter to fight that they may conquer so to run that they may obtain to lay violent hands upon the Kingdom and take it by force and to be unwearied in laborious obedience to Christ their Lord to be stedfast unmoveable always abounding in the Work of the Lord forasmuch as they know their labour is not in vain in the Lord. 5. Lastly Is not this excluding of sincere Obedience from Justification the great stumbling block of Papists that which hath had a great hand in turning many learned men from the Protestant Religion to Popery When they see the language of Scripture in the forecited places so plain to the contrary When Illyricus Gallus Amsdorfius c. shall account it a heresie in George major to say That good Works are necessary to Salvation And when if Melchior Adamus say true eo dementiae impietatis ventum erat ut non dubitarent quidam haec axiomata propugnare Bona opera non sunt necessaria ad salutem Bona opera officiunt saluti Nova obedientia non est necessaria When even Melancthons credit is blasted for being too great a friend to good Works though he ascribe not to them the least part of the Work or Office of Christ And when to this day many Antinomian Teachers who are magnified as the only Preachers of Free Grace do assert proclaim That there is no more required to the perfect irrevocable justification of the vilest Murderer or Whoremaster but to beleeve that he is justified or to be perswaded that God loveth him And when such a Book as that stiled the Marrow of Moderne Divinity have so many applauding Epistles of such Divines when the Doctrine of it is That we must not Act for justification or salvation but onely in thankfulness for it contrary to the main drift of the Scripture which so presseth men to pray for pardon to pardon others that they may receive pardon themselves and to strive to enter run that they may obtain doe Christ Commandements that they may have right to the Tree of life enter in by the gate into the City Revel 22. 14. Doe these men thinke that we are perfectly justified and saved already before the absolving sentence at the great Tribunall or the possession of the Kingdome for which we wait in Hope Indeed when we have that perfect salvation we shall not need to seek it or labour to attain it but must everlastingly be thankfull to him that hath purchased it and to him that hath bestowed it But in the mean time he that seeketh not shall not find he that runs not shall not obtain No nor all that seek and run neither Luk. 13. 24. Luk. 12. 31. 2 Tim. 2. 5. This Doctrine was one that helped to turn off Grotius to Cassandrian Popery See Grotii votum Pag. 21. 22. 23. 115. And was offensive to Melancthon Bucer other Moderate Divines of our own And all ariseth hence That men understand not the difference betwixt Christs part of the work which he performeth himself that which he requireth and enableth us to perform nor know they that true justifying Faith doth at once receive Christ both as Lord and Saviour and that sincere Obedience to Christ is part of the Condition of the New Covenant Works or a purpose to walke with God saith Mr. Ball on the Covenant pag. 73. doe justifie as the Passive qualification of the subject capable of Justification See Calvin on Luke 1. 6. The common assertion then That good Works do follow Iustification but not go before it must be thus understood or it is false viz. Actuall obedience goeth not before the first moment of Justification But yet it is as true 1. That the taking of Christ for our Lord and so delivering up our selves to his Government which is the subjection of the heart resolution for further obedience indeed an essentiall part of Faith doth in order of nature goe before our first justification 2. That Actuall Obedience as part of the Condition doth in order of Nature goe before our Justification as continued and confirmed For though our Marriage contract with Christ doe give us the first possession yet it is the Marriage faithfulness and duties which must continue that possession 3. That perseverance in faithfull obedience doth both in nature time go before our full compleat and finall Justification and that as part of the Condition of obtaining it If we walk in the light as he is in the light we have fellow ship one with another and the blood of Iesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin 1 Joh. 1. 7. So Isai. 1. 16. 17. 18. 19. Wash you make you clean put away the evill of your doings cease to do evill learne to doe well c. Come now c. though your sins be as scarlet they shall be as white as snow and though they be red like crimson
they shall be like wooll So Ezek. 33. 14. 15 16. 18. 21. 22. Neither let any object that this is the Law of works For certainly that hath no promises of forgivenesse And though the discoveries of the way of Justification be delivered in the old Testament in a more dark and Legall language then in the New yet not in termes contradictory to the truth in the New Testament Thus you may see in what sence it is that Christ will judge men according to their Works will say Come ye blessed of my Father inherit the kingdome c. For I was hungry ye fed me c. Well done good faithfull Servant thou hast been faithfull in few things I will make thee Ruler over many things Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord Matth. 25. For being made perfect he became the Author of Eternall salvation to all them that obey him Hebr. 5. 9. Of whom it shall be said when they are glorified with him These are they that come out of great tribulation and have washed their robes in the blood of the Lambe and made them white Therefore are they before the throne of God and serve him day and night in his temple and he that siâ—teth on the throne shall dwell among them Revel 7. 14. 15. To whom be Glory for ever Amen REader because an exact Index would contain a great part of the Book I shall omit it and instead of it I here lay thee down some of the chief Distinctions upon which this Discourse dependeth desiring thee to understand them and keep them in memory You must distinguish 1. BEtwixt Gods Decretive or Purposing Will And his Legislative or Preceptive Will The 1. is his Determining of Events The 2. of Duty and Reward 2. Betwixt 1. the Covenant or Law of Works which saith Obey perfectly and Live or sin and Dye 2. And the Covenant or Law of Grace which saith Beleeve and be saved c. 3. Betwixt the two parts of each Covenant viz. 1. The Primary discovering the duty in Precepts and prohibiting the Sin 2. The secondary discovering the Rewards and Penalties in Promises and Threatnings 4. Betwixt a two-fold Righteousness of one and the same Covenant 1. Of perfect Obedience or performance of the Condition 2. Of suffering or satisfaction for disobedience or non-performance which maketh the Law to have nothing against us though we disobeyed See Pemble of Iustification pag. 2. Our Legall Righteousness is of this last sort not of the first Both these sorts of Righteousnesse are not possible to be found in any one person except Christ who had the former Righteousness as his own incommunicable to us in that form The second he had for us as he was by imputation a sinner And so we have it in or by him Mark this 5. Betwixt two kinds of Righteousness suitable to the two Covenants and their Conditions 1. Legall Righteousness which is our Conformity or satisfaction to the Law 2. And Evangelicall Righteousness which is our Conformity to the new Covenant Note that 1. Every Christian must have both these 2. That our Legall righteousness is onely that of Satisfaction but our Evangelicall is only that of obedience or performance of the Condition 3. That our Legall Righteousnesse is all without us in Christ the other in our selves 6. Betwixt Evangelicall Righteousness improll perly so called viz. because the Gospell doth reveain and offer it This is our Legall righteousness o Christ. 2. And Evangelicall righteousness prnt perly so called viz. Because the new Covenar is the Rule to which it is conformed This is ou performance of the new Covenants Conditions 7. Betwixt the Life or Reward in the first Covenant viz. Adams paradise happiness 2. And the Life of the second Covenant which is Eternall glory in heaven 8. Betwixt the death or curse of the old Covenant which is opposite to its reward This onely was laid on Christ and is due to Infants by nature 2. And the death of the second Covenant opposite to its life called the second death and far sorer punishment This finall unbeleevers suffer 9. Betwixt sins against the first Covenant For these Christ died 2. And sins against the second Covenant For these he dyed not 10. Betwixt sinning against Christ and the Gospell as the object of our sin only So Christ died for them 2. And sinning against the new Covenant as such or as a threatning Law So Christ dyed not for them 11. Betwixt delaying to perform the conditions of the new Covenant This is not threatned with death 2. And finall non-performance This is proper violation of the Covenant and a sin that leaveth no hope of recovery 12. Betwixt paying the proper debt of obedience as Christ did himself or of suffering as the damned do 2. And satisfying for non-payment as Christ did for us 13 Betwixt repealing the Law or Covenant which is not done 2. And relaxing it or dispensing with it which is done 14. Betwixt relaxation or dispensation in the proper subject and circumstances of the Penalty This is done in removing it from us to Christ. 2. And dispencing with the Penalty it self This is not done for Christ did bear it 15. Betwixt the change of the Law 2. And of the sinners relation to the Law 16. Betwixt the Lawes forbidding and condemning the sin so it doth still 2. And its condemning the sinner So it doth not to the justified because Christ hath born the curse 17. Betwixt the Precepts as abstracted from the Covenant termes which really they are not at all 2. And as belonging to the severall Covenants 18. Betwixt perfection of Holinesse which is a quality This is not in this life 2. And Perfection of Righteousness which is a Relation This is perfect or none at all 19. Betwixt recalling the Fact or the evil of the Fact or its desert of punishment These are never done nor are possible 2. And removing the duenesse of punishment from the Offendor This is done 20. Betwixt Pardon and Iustification Condiditionall which is an immediate effect of Christs Death and Resurrection or rather of the making of the new Covenant 2. And Pardon Iustification Absolute when we have performed all the Conditions 21. Betwixt Conditionall Pardon and Iustification which is only Potentiall Such is that which immediately followeth the enacting of the new Covenant to men before Faith or before they have sinned 2. And Conditionall Iustification which is actual of which the person hath true possession such is our Iustification after Faith till the last Iudgement which is ours actually but yet upon condition of perseverance in Faith and sincere Obedience 22. Betwixt Pardon and Iustification as they are Immanent Acts in God improperly and without Scripture called Pardon or Iustification 2. And Pardon and Iustification as they are Transient Acts performed by the Gospell-Promise as Gods Instrument This is the true Scripture Iustification 23. Betwixt Iustification in Title and Sence of Law which is
How make you Faith and Repentance to be â—â—â—ditions of the Covenant on our part seeing the bestowing of them is part of the condition on Gods part Can they be our conditions and Gods too 7. Seeing God hath promised us these which you call conditions is not the Covenant therefore rather absolute and more properly a promise 8. In making a generall Covenant to all you bring wicked men under promise whereas all the promises are Yea and Amen in Christ and so belong only to those in Christ I find no promise in Scripture made to a wicked man 9. May you not else as well give the seals to wicked men as the Covenant Except you will evade as Mr Blake and say the Sacrament seals but conditionally and then let all come that will 10. How can you make it appear that Do this and live is not the proper voyce of the Covenant of Works Or that according to the new Covenant we must act for life and not only from life or that a man may make his attaining of life the end of his work and not rather obey only out of thankfulness and love 11. Why do you single out the book called The marrow of modern Divinity to oppose in this point 12. Seeing you make faith and covenanting with Christ to be the same thing do you not make him to be no reall Christian that never so covenanted and consequently him to be no visible Christian who never professed such a Covenant and so you bring in a greater necessity of publique covenanting then those who are for Church-making Covenants 13. Do you not go against the stream af all Divines in denying the proper act of Faith as it justifieth to be either Recumbency Affiance Perswasion or Assurance but placing it in Consent or Acceptance 14. Do you not go against the stream of all Divines in making the Acceptance of Christ for Lord to be as properly a justifying act as the accepting him for Saviour and all that you may lay a ground work for Justification by Gospell obedience or Works so do you also in making the Acceptance of Christs Person and Offices to be the justifying act and not the receiving of his Righteousness and of pardon 16. How can you reconcile your Justification by Works with that of Rom. 3. 24 4. 4 5 6 11. I desire some satisfaction in that which Maccovius and Mr owen oppose in the places which I mentioned THE ANSWER TO the first Objection about the death threatened in the first Covenant I answer 1. I told you I was not peremptory in my opinion but inclined to it for want of a better 2. I told you that the Objections seem more strong which are against all the rest and therefore I was constrained to make choice of this to avoid greater absurdities then that which you object For 1. If you say that Adam should have gone quick to Hell you contradict many Scriptures which make our temporall death to be the wages of sin 2. If you say that He should have dyed and rose again to torment 1. What Scripture saith so 2. When should He have risen 3. You contradict many Scriptures which make Christ the Mediator the only procurer of the Resurrection 3. If you say He should have lived in perpetuall misery on earth then you dash on the same Rock with the first opinion 4. If you say He should have dyed only a temporall death and his soul be annihilated then 1. you make Christ to have redeemed us only from the grave and not from hell contrary to 1 Thes. 1. 10. Who hath delivered us from the wrath to come 2. You make not hell but only temporall death to be due too or deserved by the sins of believers seeing the Gospell only according to this opinion should threaten eternall death and not the Law but the Gospell threateneth it to none but unbelievers You might easily have spared me this labour and gathered all this Answer from the place in the book where I handled it but because other Readers may need as many words as you I grudg not my pains TO your second Objection about Christs active and passive Righteousness You should have overthrown my grounds and not only urge my going against the stream of Divines As I take it for no honour to be the first inventing a new opinion in Religion so neither to be the last in embracing the truth I never thought that my faith must follow the major vote I value Divines also by weight and not by number perhaps I may think that one Pareus Piscator Scultetus Alstedius Capellus Gataker or Bradshaw is of more authority then many Writers and Readers View their Writings and answer their Arguments and then judg TO your third about the violation of the Covenant I shall willingly clear my meaning to you as well as I can though I thought what is said had cleared it The 34 Aphorism which is it you object against doth thus far explain it 1. That I speak of Gods Covenant of Grace only or his new Law containing the terms on which men live or dye 2. That by Violation I mean the breaking or non-performance of its conditions or such a violation as bringeth the offendor under the threatning of it and so maketh the penalty of that Covenant breaking due to him 3. I there tell you that the new Covenant may be neglected long and sinned against objectively and Christs Commands may be broken when yet the Covenant is not so violated The Tenor of the Covenant me-think should put you quite out of doubt of all this which is He that believeth shall be saved and he that believeth not shall be damned The unbelief and rebellion against Christ which the godly were guilty of before believing is a neglect or refusall of the Covenant and I acknowledg that all that while they were in a damnable state that is in a state wherein they should have been damned if they had so dyed for then their unbelief had been finall But your doubt may be whether they did not deserve damnation while they were in their unbelief for resisting Grace I answer you as before 1. I look upon no punishment as deserved in sensu forensi in the sense of the Law but what is threatened by that Law Now you may easily resolve the Question your self Whether the new Covenant do threaten damnation to that their unbelief If they believe not at all before death it pronounceth them condemned otherwise not 2. Yet might they in this following sense be said to deserve the great condemnation before they obeyed the Gospell viz. as their unbelief is that sin for which the Gospell condemneth men wanting nothing but the circumstance of finality or continuance to have made them the proper subjects of the curse and it was no thanks to them that it proved not finall for God did make them no promise of one hour of time and patience and therefore it was meerly his mercy in not cutting
I find him speaking my own thoughts in my own words and begun to think when I read him that men would think I borrowed all from Dr. Preston Read him in his Treatise of Faith pag. 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 89 97. Also Of Effectull Faith pag. 40 41. 87 And Treatise of Faith pag. 14 15 16 20 21. 56 57 58. 7. But especially the chief point that I stand upon am like to be opposed most in he handleth so fully and asserteth so frequently as if it were the choicest notion which he desired to divulge viz. That justifying faith as such is a taking of Christ for Lord as well as for Saviour Of so many places I will transcribe two or three And first his definition of the active part of faith is the very same with mine Of Faith pag. 44. It is to Believe not onely that Christ is offered to us but also to take and receive him as a Lord and Saviour that is both to be saved by him and to obey him Mark it saith he I put them together to take him as a Lord and Saviour for you shall finde that in the ordinary phrase of Scripture they are put together Jesus Christ our Lord and Saviour therefore we must take heed of disjoyning those that God hath joyned together We must take Christ as well for a Lord as a Saviour let a man do this and he may be assured that his faith is a justifying faith therefore mark it diligently if a man will take Christ for a Saviour onely that will not serve the turn Christ giveth not himself to any upon that condition only to save him but we must take him as a Lord too to be subject to him and obey him and to square our actions according to his will c. pag. 45. So of Effectuall Faith pag. 92. Now faith is nothing but this We come and tell you that Christ is offered if you will be content to let all these things go and to turn your hearts to him then the whole bent of a mans mind is turned the contrary way and set upon Christ this is such Faith indeed c. Now iâ— we were not mistaken in it there would be no question of this We think that faith is nothing but a perswasion that our sins are forgiven a perswasion that the promises are true and the Scripture true a perswasion that Christ died for my sins And thence it is that men are apt to be deceived in it If they took Faith as it is in its self a Marriage of our selves to Christ with all our heart and affections when he hath given himself to us as in Marriage and we are given to him in doing this we should never be deceived So in his Treatise of the New Covenant pag. 458. you must know that the Covenant is then dissolved when that is dissolved that did make the Covenant Lock what it is that puts a man into the Covenant of Grace at the first when that is taken away then the Covenant is disannulled between God and us but till then the Covenant remaines sure Now what is it that makes the Covenant Mark it This is that which makes the Covenant when Jesus Christ offereth himself to us and makes known his consent c. when we again come and take him and give our consent to make him our Lord and we subject our selves to him to be his when we say to the promised seed He shall be my God and my Governour and I will be among his people and be subject to him I say when the heart gives a full consent to this c. now the Covenant and contract is made between them Now as long as this union continues between Christ and us the Covenant is not disannulled So that in a word the Covenant is never nullified till thou hast chosen to thy self another husband till thou hast taken to thy self another Lord c. pag. 459. So that here you see 8ly that every infirmity breaks not the Covenant See also Treatise of Love pag. 147. 9 That there is a Gospel curse following the breach of the Gospel Law and that it is unrepealable and more terrible then that of the Law pag. 19 20. 10 What near conjunction love hath with Faith in justifying See Treatise of Effectuall Faith 41 42. 11 That the promise and offer of Christ is generall see Treatise of Faith pag. 9 10. I will transcribe but one more Treatise of the New Covenant pag. 317 318. You must know there is a two-fold Covenant one of works another of grace c The Covenant of grace runs in these termes Thou shalt believe thou shalt take my Sonne for thy Lord and thy Saviour and thou shalt likewise receive the gift of Righteousnesse which was was wrought by him for an absolution for thy sinnes for a reconciliation with me and thereupon thou shalt grow up in love obedience towards me Then I will be thy God and thou shalt be my people This is the Covenant of grace c. In this you see also 12ly That love and sincere obedience are parts of the condition of the New Coveuant Thus you see I am not in these 12. points singular and in more could I also prove his context though in some things I confesse he differeth as in making Faith an instrument in our justification pag. 54. Of Faith But as I take that to be a small difference so it is apparent by the forecited places that he took Faith to justifie as the condition of the Covenant and so the difference is but verball yet speaking in the common phrase put him upon that absurdity pag. 56. Treatise of Faith viz. to say That reconciling and justifying are acts of Faith If he had said but that they are effects of Faith it had been more then in proper strict sence taken can be proved To the fifteenth Objections TO your fifteenth Objection I answer 1. The Apostle in those places dealeth with the Jews who trusted to works without and against Christ This is nothing against them that set not up works in opposition nor coordination but onely in subordination to Christ. 2. If I affirmed that works are the least part of that Righteousnesse which the Law requireth and which must be so pleaded to our justification then I should offend against the freenesse of grace But when I affirme that all our legall Righteousnesse is onely in Christ then doe I not make the reward to be of debt or lesse free 3. The Apostle in the same verse Rom. 4. 5. saith that his Faith is counted for Righteousnesse and I have proved before that subjection is a part of Faith 4. The Apostle plainly speaketh of that Righteousnesse whereby we are formally righteous and which we must plead that we may be justified from the accusation of the Law and this is neither in Faith nor works but in Christ But he nowhere speaketh against that which is only the condition of our