THE Righteousness of God Revealed in the GOSPEL OR An IMPARTIAL ENQUIRY into the Genuine Doctrine of St. PAVL In the Great but much Controverted ARTICLE of JUSTIFICATION By Mr. JOHN HUMFREY Of making Books there is no End and much Study is a Weariness to the Flesh Let us hear the Conclusion of the Matter Fear God and keep his Commandments for this is the whole of Man Ec. 12.13 14. LONDON Printed for T. Parkhurst at the Bible and Three Crowns in Cheapside 1697. TO THE READER HAVING seriously read this Treatise concerning the Justification of a Sinner I sound so clear and distinct an Account given of it that as it gave me no small Satisfaction so I could not but think it worthy to be perused by others For though the Learned Author departs in some things from the common Opinion yet he doth it so modestly that candid Persons though contrary minded will not blame him for it And his Reasons are such that it is possible they may be convinced by them and perswaded to embrace his Explication of this weighty Doctrine However his Drift and Intention is so evidently Holy viz. to prevent Mens falling into the most dangerous Errors that he may hope for their Pardon who think him not to be altogether in the Right himself For as to the main Business no Man more strenuously asserts the Doctrine of our Church of Justification by Faith only accorto the Explication which is made of it in our Homilies in the Second Part of the Sermon of Salvation in these Words This Saying That we be justified by Faith only freely and without Works is spoken for to take away clearly all Merit of our Works as being unable to deserve our Justification at God's Hands And thereby most plainly to express the Weakness of Man and the Goodness of God the great Infirmity of our selves and the Might and Power of God the Imperfectness of our own Works and the most abundant Grace of our Saviour Christ and therefore wholy to ascribe the Merit and deserving of our Justification unto Christ only and his most pretious Blood-shedding But although this Doctrine be never so true as it there follows that we be justified freely without all Merit of our own Good Works as St. Paul doth express it and freely by this lively and perfect Faith in Christ only as the ancient Authors use to speak it yet this true Doctrine must be also truly understood and most plainly declared lest carnal Men should take unjustly occasion thereby to live carnally after the appetite and will of the World the Flesh and the Devil Now this being the very Scope of this Author to declare the right Vnderstanding of this Doctrine so plainly that no Man may thereby take any Occasion of Carnal Liberty he hopes his Endeavour will be acceptable to all those that love the Lord Jesus in Sincerity Amen Nov. 24. 1696. SY ELIENS Worcester Apr. 7. 1697. SIR THE Papers you were pleased to send me I have carefully perused and I am not without Hopes that through the Blessing of God they may allay those unreasonable Heats which have made so great a Noise about the Point of Justification and yet we are told that they all agree in the Doctrine of Christ's Satisfaction and the Covenant of Grace as founded upon it But we find by too common Experience that it is possible for Men upon their own Mistakes to grow as warm in this Matter as if they were disputing with the Jews as St. Paul did in his Epistle to the Romans But if such Persons would lay aside Prejudices and Impartially consider the State of the Case at that Time they would far better understand this Controversy and not think so hardly of their Brethren For nothing can be plainer to me than that St. Paul opposes that which he calls The Righteousness of God by Faith Rom. 1.17.3.21.10.3 to their own Righteousness which was by the Law And which made the Reward not of Grace but of Debt And Faith is taken by him as a Term opposite to the Law and importing the Grace of the Gospel Therefore it is of Faith that it might be of Grace Phil. 3.5 So that Justification by Faith is in other Words being justified by the Grace of the Gospel Rom. 3.27 28.4.15 manifested by the Doctrine of Christ and procured by his Sufferings which are granted both by them and us to be the only meritorious Cause of our Justification The remaining Dispute then can only be concerning those Terms on which we may be made Partakers of this Grace of the Gospel which is communicated to Mankind as the Effect of Christ's Satisfaction Which is very different from that which St. Paul managed against all such as set up their own Works whether according to the Law of Nature or of Moses against the Gospel of Christ and thought there was no necessity of any such Propitiation by Christ as St. Paul asserted in order to the Remission of Sins and the Favour of God For the Jews believed that the Righteousness of the Law as it was performed by them was sufficient in order to their Acceptance with God and that there was such a Proportion between their Works and the Favour of God as made it a Debt of Justice Which Opinion remains among them to this Day as appears by this Saying of Manasseh Ben-Israel Hinc meritis Gratiam Dei acquiri non est Dubitandam By which it seems that the Jews have not alter'd their Opinions since the Apostles Days but all that understand Christianity aright do agree that there is no other meritorious Cause of our Acceptance with God but the Propitiation which Christ hath made Colos 1.14 In whom we have Redemption through his Blood even the Forgiveness of Sins Titus 3.5 6. And not by Works of Righteousness which we have done but according to his Mercy he saved us that being justified by his Grace we should be made Heirs according to the Hope of Eternal Life But here comes the material Question to be resolved How we come to receive the Benefits of Christs Sufferings To answer this Distinctly we must consider them Two Ways 1. As they respect Mankind or those in General for whom Christ died 2. As they belong to Particular Persons The former are those Benefits which result from God's Acceptance of Christ's Sacrifice on behalf of Mankind which the Apostle calls God's being in Christ 2 〈◊〉 5.19 reconciling the World to himself not imputing their Trespasses unto them If this be meant of actual Pardon then all the Sins of the World are not imputed upon Christ's Death without any Act on their Parts and so the Ministry of Reconciliation would be to no purpose which the Apostle immediately adds was committed to them To what End if the Sins of the World were already forgiven But the Apostle saith v. 20. That it was to perswade Men to be reconciled to God i. e. to believe and repent and
of Life by his Law of Grace or the Gospel and is our Formal Righteousness according to that Law being made so by that Act of Imputation which may be attributed to God or his Law when he imputes it to us for Righteousness as I have had it already By the Evangelical Law this is our Righteousness we are made righteous that is not guilty of the Non-performance of the Condition according to Mr. Baxter To this purpose aforesaid I will note that when in that remarkable Text Rom. 3.30 Predestination Calling Justification and Glorification are linked without mentioning Sanctification we must suppose that intended either in Calling or Justification and I have always received it under Calling that is Effectual Calling or Conversion Now a Man is converted and he believes and repents but this being no Righteousness according to the Law there comes after Calling Justification and it is that makes this imperfect Believing Repenting New Obedience to become our Righteousness by Imputation God's imputing it to us for Righteousness making it by that Act Et Juris Judicis to serve us in the room of such a Righteousness as is perfect rewarding it for Christ's sake as he would the other The having Faith Repentance New Obedience is one thing the having it accepted for Righteousness is another The one is Regeneration or Sanctification the other Justification and without the one there cannot be the other Fides inquiunt justitia nostra formalis esse non potest Concedo upon his Opinion he must say so not I tho' in the Popish Sence I say Concedo too At potest à Deo justitiae loco haberi ut preater ipsam nihil amplius à nobis flagitet ad justitiam consequendum says Mr. Wotton As for this Righteousness of God now in his imputing to the Believer his Faith or the Performance of the Evangelick Condition for Righteousness we must not conceive as Dr. Owen objects that here is an Imputation only of that which is ours so that accounting it an imperfect Righteousness God cannot deal with us but only according to an imperfect one When he does certainly deal with us according to a perfect one and we understand so by this Imputation Dr. Owen who never gave the Matter its due Consideration not perhaps Mr. Baxter neither Philosophizes thus There is an Imputation to us of a thing that is Ours and that is judging it Ours and dealing with us accordingly Or of a thing which is not Ours and that is by a Donation of it on some just Ground and dealing with us according to it made Ours Of this he makes the Application that our Righteousness cannot but Christ's must be that which is imputed to our Justification But I will Philosophize otherwise and so may any that * When ever we read of Imputing or Accounting to a Man a thing that is good it is an Act of Grace and Law-acceptilation and signifies something which is not Truman's Endeavour p. 222. please As there is therefore an imputing to a Person that which is His or that which is not His So is there an imputing also to a Person that which is partly His and partly not His but that which in the Effect may become His too by the Imputation Such is the Case here but never sunk in the Doctor 's Mind There are two things in the matter I have said before from Luther Our Faith and God's Imputation Our Faith or the Evangelick Condition performed which is Ours and God's Imputation which brings with it in the Effect I say that which was not Ours that is the Satisfaction and Merits of Christ his Satisfaction for Pardoning the Failings and his Merit for accepting that which is done though imperfect to the accounting us righteous and dealing with us no otherwise than if we were perfect A Man that has not a legal sinless Perfection for that is meant by the Ungodly Rom. 4.5 his Faith is accounted for Righteousness that is his Faith shall avail him as much to all intents and stand him in as much stead as a perfect sinless Righteousness would do says Sir Charles Wolesley in his Book of Evangelical Justification This is most certain that there is no Grace vouchsafed to a Sinner from God in order to Life but upon the Account of Christ's Satisfaction and Merit against the Socinian When this exceeding Grace and Favour therefore that an imperfect Righteousness is accepted in the room of a perfect one as is intended in this express Scripture that says Our Faith is imputed for Righteousness the Satisfaction and Merits of Christ must be supposed as its Foundation And consequently they are imputed to our Faith for its Acceptation as we say they are imputed to us for Ours That Christ's Righteousness is imputed to us we assume without Scripture but this is express that Righteousness is imputed and that our Faith is imputed for Righteousness and it will be strange if any shall question an Imputation of Christ's Merit to our Duty when it is accepted and accepted only through him Our Dissenting Brethren in their Printed Agreement Dec. 1692. have these Words God looking on the Good Works of Believers in his Son is pleased to accept and reward that which is sincere though accompanied with many Weaknesses and Imperfections I quote these Words not as rare but as the common Judgment to shew that an Imputation of Christ's Merit to our Duty is undeniable Here are the Believers Works and that is our imperfect inchoate Obedience and this accepted and it is accepted in Christ that must be through his Satisfaction and Merit and is rewarded too upon his Account What is there more in the accepting our Persons in Justification Our maimed Righteousness is accepted to Salvation as if it were perfect says one Dr. Owen cites for that it should be so Christ hath merited by his most perfect Righteousness When this unnamed Author says As if it were perfect he accounts it it is not so Legally or In se but Evangelically or quoad Effectum that is it stands us in the stead of a perfect one through the Merits of Christ And unto this saying of his whosoever he be does that Elder in the Revelations well accord who tells St. John that the Robes of the Saints which are their inherent Grace their Good Works or Holy Life are made white that is rewardable with Glory by their washing them in the Blood of the Lamb. We are accepted in the Beloved that is in Christ We are accepted in Christ no otherwise than our Duty is accepted that is as the Meritorious Cause of that Acceptance The Satisfaction and Merit of Christ is that upon the Account whereof God does justifie us But if Christ's Righteousness it self be imputed to us it is not Meritoriè upon the Account thereof but Formaliter that we are justified by it Before I yet quite leave Mr. Wotton there are two Texts most commonly urged by those that define Justification only by Remission
this Comfort here tho' none else in the World for this alone is worth a World that we may must ought to trust lean cast our selves upon the Satisfaction and Merit of Christ for pardoning all our Failings and accepting our poor Mite and if the Soul remains in doubt it must quiet itself upon him If with the Pharisee I justifie myself God may condemn me If I condemn myself with the Publican he may acquit me And what must I do in this Case Behold O Lord I am at thy Bar and I commit my Cause unto my Judge Thy Bar is a Bar or Throne of Grace I cast myself on thy Grace And the Lord send me a good Deliverance at the Great Day As for Actual Pardon and Life that follows Justification the Merit is to be attributed to that which procured Justification on that Condition There is nothing of Merit but Christ's throughout It is Christ's Satisfaction runs through all I must still say as the Meritorious Cause when Performance of the Condition becomes thereby the Formal Cause of our Justification I know how hardly this is like to be received by many when Dr. Owen will allow nothing of any Personal Righteousness or any Works Legal or Evangelical but excludes them all from our Justification supposing that if it be of Works any way it is not of Grace at all when it is therefore of Faith or upon the Evangelick Condition that it may be of Grace Dr. Owen is a Person whose Name I honour for his Worth Learning Comprehensive Parts and one in whom was more of a Gentleman as to his Deportment than in any Divine I knew ever among us Yet is he more Authorative sometimes in his Book than he needs which being liable to hurt the humbly Inquisitive I will speak the more positively in this matter that the Doctor is out as I believe and never came to the plain true knowledge of what Paul means by the Works he opposes to Faith in this Point of Justification Which Works are such as would justifie a Man in the Apostles Account if he had them but that no Man is justified by Works because he has them not This I am past doubt is Paul's meaning and in this particular the Learned and Honoured Sir Charles Wolesley before quoted is rather to be attended A Man says Sir Charles that has not a Legal Sinless Perfection is that Paul means by the Ungodly Rom. 4.5 In my first Papers I wrote I had this Sence of the place and I have it before and in my Pacification I say the like of that Text * For solving this Matter Austin and from him the Schools distinguish of Opera Naturae and Opera Gratiae We are not saved by Works or according to Works done in our own Strength but by Works done by Grace But is this the Apostle's meaning No I have shewn in my Book of Just that One Thing of Three wherein Austin was out and hath misled the Schools is this Notion of Grace By Grace he understands still this inherent Grace or Operation of God's Spirit in us when Paul understands it of that without his Favour or Condescension to us Not of Works but of Grace is all one as not of Desert but of Favour only Grace is Mercy without or contrary to Merit Now when the Papist receives the Solution mentioned the Protestants generally will have all Works tho of the Regenerate to be but Rags and Christ's Righteousness alone to save us But they are both out for Paul's meaning it plainer than they think Not by Works of Righteousness we have done The Righteousness which the Jew hath done is living according to the Law of Moses The Righteousness which the Gentile hath done is his living according to the Law of Nature There is neither one or the other that fulfil that Righteousness which answers God's Law so as it should be able to save him and therefore it is of Grace or Mercy that Any are saved Pacif. p. 29. Not by the Works of Righteousness we have done but according to his Mercy he saved us Which Words have put so many to the inventing Distinctions when the right understanding is to make none the meaning being only Not by the Works of Righteousness we have done because we have not done them and it must be of Mercy therefore and in another way we are saved or not at all See the Quotation above The Works then I have said there and here and must still say which Paul means are such as would justifie us such as would make the Reward of Debt if we had them that is perfect Works Such says the Judicious Le Blanc as the Law requires to Justification And as for that the Doctor hath in answer to this that it is a wild Imagination that the perfect Works of the Law will not justifie us but imperfect Works which answer not the Law will do so it does confirm what I judge of the Doctor 's Conceptions that certainly he never understood the Apostle as to this Matter who I say excludes not Works of the Law from Justification as if they would not justifie us if we had them but because none have them to be justified by them It is therefore the Righteousness of God the Righteousness of the Evangelick Condition that he in his Mercy through Christ's Merits hath instituted in the room of Works to justifie the Christian And as for the Doctor 's quoting Socinus saying this to prejudice the Reader against it I must needs say I like this excellent Doctor 's Judgment the meaner and seeing I took the Notion from Scripture and am sure I am no Socinian myself Socinus was a Man of Reason and it is to be lik'd the better for that It is a thing whether so proposed or not more worth the Thoughts of a serious Man how the Doctrine of Justification as formerly it hath been taught and is maintained by the Doctor can be made to lodge with the Doctrine of Sanctification or Regeneration in the same Scripture or be preached together in the same Gospel The Papists are so careful to have these agree that they make them one The Protestants are so careful to keep them asunder that they will not have any Works of ours not Faith itself as a Work or the Fruits of it Repentance and a Good Life to be brought into our Justification least by going to establish our own Righteousness we submit not to the Righteousness of God and perish Let the Works be wrought in us says the Doctor Of Just p. 524. if they be also wrought by us I fear their Introduction into our Justification doth include beasting This he adds is a dangerous Point even like to make us lose all the Benefit we might otherwise expect by the Grace of God I cannot but remember since I was young holy Mr. Shepherd's Book The Sincere Convert and do reflect sometimes on that Terror the Reading that and the like Books hath wrought in
in God's sight whatsoever they were in their own but that all have sinned and need that Messias they expected to make Reconciliation for their Sins that our Lord Jesus Christ being that true Messias by his Death answering their Legal Sacrifices hath born the Curse of the Law and so redeemed us from it That God's undeserved Goodness here in accepting of Sinners through this meritorious Sacrifice of his to Pardon and Life upon Condition which he gives the Grace also to perform presupposed and by me acknowledg'd it is another Righteousness and not that of the Jews Not that Paul calls his own as a Jew or not a Righteousness of Works Perfect Works but a Righteousness of Faith which makes the Reward only of Grace Of Faith that it may be of Grace a Righteousness of Faith but a true Faith working by Love which is an Internal Righteousness though imperfect and not as the External Works of the Jews was is that Righteousness of God in opposition to the Terms of the Law whereby we are justified and saved The Apostle I observe in one place speaking of Faith calls it the Obedience of Faith the same Word if you compare that Text Rom. 11.30 31. with the Margin signifying both to Believe and Obey And the People believed God and his Servant Moses I will conclude hereupon that Christ's Redemption in the immediate fruit thereof which is the Grant of a General Pardon through his Satisfaction to all the World on Condition being laid as a foundation To be justified by Faith is to be justified by performing that Condition To be justified by Faith Believe me at parting is in St. Paul's Mind to be justified by the Obedience of Faith in opposition to the task of the Law that is in St. Paul's Mind I say opposing the Jew by embracing the Christian Religion and living according to it Reader In p. 14. l. 34. correct the Word its and make it it with a Full Point after Other Errataes you may find at the end of the Book or mend your self OF THE Righteousness of GOD In the Matter of JUSTIFICATION The First PART BEcause upon the right Understanding of what the Apostle means by the Righteousness of God without the Law revealed now in the Gospel which indeed is dark and hardly understood I think by Papist or Protestant in their Disputes and much less by our Brethren in their present Differences does depend the Elucidation of the Great Article of Justification whereof I wrote some Sheets formerly called The Middle Way and more lately six Sheets called Pacification I have thought good yet to write a few more upon some further increase of my own Knowledge about this Subject And under this Title I beseech God for his Light and Truth and for Integrity of Heart and Pardon of my Weakness and Failings for my self and for the removal of Prejudice from and the establishing the Judgment of others who shall read what is written The Search after Truth is indeed hard Work it is digging in a Mine It was so to me in writing on this Point at first and it is still What I dig up is but rude it is the Ore as it comes naturally and that is best to edifie those that would improve it I am one whose Genius is averse from any Notion imposed and receives none without distrust that does not arise first out of my own Mind or that I see something new to cultivate it I do not only bear with others but do like them often better that they differ from me because I know I differ from the most Where the Mine though is Gold as the Scripture is there is no Dust of it but must be saved The least Dust of Gold is Gold and if any other who hath better Words and Parts will be at the pains to sift and order what I have digged I doubt not but they may make Gold of that which I have brought to be but the Dust of Gold When a Book is so Methodized as it does exhaust its Subject there is no coming after it But when there is only some Ore turn'd up something of Notion for others to refine a riper Wit will be encouraged to an Endeavour of bringing that Something to more perfection It is so with my Middle-Way Books I am content to be but the Digger I expect some others should be the Refiners of what I have digged The Trent Doctrine which is the perfect papists I must confess is lead them bâ— St. Austine They say Justification is the making a Man just Ex impio Christianum by Infusion of Grace inherent or Charity Being justified freely by his Grace Augustine being immersed in his Dispute with Pelagius could think of Grace in no Sence but this and by Freely Gratis justified he understood only that Works preparatory did not merit this infusion which the Trent-Doctors also say after him The Efficient Cause quae efficit is the Spirit the Instrumental Cause qua efficitur Baptism the Meritorious Cause propter quam Christ's Death the Formal Cause per quam of Justification is this Grace infused Gratia Habitualis Habitual Righteousness making the Man before ungodly now righteous in God's sight This habitual Righteousness then being infused by Baptism they say does abolish Sin so that there remains in the Baptized after the Opus Operatum nothing that is Peccatum but Fomes Peccati only and upon that Account is perfect so by the Law justifies and the Works proceeding from it meritorious of Salvation This is their Opinion and they fall foul on us for holding Justification by Pardon only or by Christ without inherent Grace as if Good Works were laid aside by us altogether Our Protestants therefore renouncing this Charge do grant an habitual Righteousness or Grace infused as necessary in the justified Person but deny this Righteousness to be that which justifies him they deny Justification to be Regeneration and distinguish these as two things It is not this inherent Righteousness say they that can be opposed between the Wrath of God and our Conscience of Sin to be the Cause Propter quam we are not condemned No there is a Righteousness they add without us that is the Righteousness of Christ performed for us and by our Faith made ours that we rely upon to do this for us Our inherent Grace is inchoate imperfect and cannot standing in Judgment before God This being now partly well on both sides there is a Middle Way appears which we must take between them It is true against the Papists that there is no such Righteousness inherent though infused by the Holy Spirit as does abolish Sin and make us so just that we can oppose it to Gods Wrath so as to render him appeased with the Sinner or that the Conscience can rest on it as that Proper quod he is forgiven or saved It is true likewise against the common Protestant that there is not any Righteousness without us that can be made ours so as we
as the full Tale be brought in or no Righteousness of Christ imputed no Merits of Christ otherwise to be applied Whereas if the End of Christ's doing and suffering what he did in our behalf was that what we do our selves by his Spirits preventing and assisting Grace shall be imputed to us for Righteousness which is the very Truth seeing the Scripture says it that it is our Faith to wit a sound Faith working by Love is and shall be so imputed that is our Faith Repentance New Obedience is accepted in regard to the Reward instead of that Righteousness the Law required to our Justification then we see what Line we have given us for the actuating our Faith and reliance on God's Grace Goodness Mercy and Christ's Merits for Pardoning our Failings as I am saying and taking what is done in such good part as to reward it with Life seeing it is for Christ's sake altogether for his Merits sake only not for its value that it finds acceptation which is the greatest Encouragement to our Endeavours and consequently to a Holy Life that can be in the World I will add that God our Judge who is gracious and wise does consider the diverse Natures Tempers Natural Infirmities Temptations of Men and Women and hath his Grains of Allowance for all according to these Circumstances so as that shall be accepted for the Condition performed in one that falls exceeding short of what is done by another Alas there are such diverse Sizes of God's Children so vast a disproportion I mean as to the Degrees of their Grace that one would hardly think them the Children of the same Father What a Difference is there between a Seth and a Sampson Rahab and Elizabeth Who would think that one Heaven should hold them both He knoweth our Frame and remembreth we are but Dust Upon which Account we read so often of his Compassions toward the Weak and Fainting which gives us this Ground for our trust in him to bear with our Frailty in mollifying to some the Condition Not but all must be Sincere but that this Sincerity is of diverse Degrees in the Sence I speak in regard to God's Acceptance and Grace which hath no Bounds to be set by any And now if any pious Brother shall go to take away this Doctrine from us and the Fruit of it I will wish him to take heed to his own and consider whither it leads If Christ hath died for the Sinner so that God looks on the Sinner to have satisfied the Law in Christ then should he preach this Gospel He should declare to all and every of his Hearers that God is in Christ reconciled to him and that he is to believe it's Christ hath died for Sinners thou art a Sinner All are Sinners Christ hath died for all and thou art to believe thy Sins forgiven Thou art not to believe only that there is Forgiveness of Sins and Everlasting Life but that these Articles through Christ are thy Possession Who loved Me and gave himself for Me. In Christ's Obedience and Sâ—fferings thou hast obeyed the Law and satisfied the Penalty and therefore art justified and in a State of Salvation As for Good Works they are indeed to be done out of Gratitude afterward God commands them and they please him and they do good to Men and therefore thou must do them but nothing is to be done for thy self but believe only in order to thy Justification and Salvation Let a Man but believe once in good earnest that it is so he cannot choose but love God and Jesus Christ and that Love will constrain him to Obedience If you hold the Doctrine of Election he must not stick at that but he must believe also he is Elect and indeed that none but the Elect can believe that is thus believe Or that there can be this Fiducia specialis misericordiae in none ever but the Elect only and therefore is it called The Faith of God's Elect. And what says any of my sober Brethren to this Doctrine Can he find in his Heart to preach it when Christ when John when Peter Acts 2.38 when they began to preach did preach Repent for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand I confess that Luther as I apprehend did at first preach at this rate which was the way to fetch in so many by the Shoals as he did from Popery when the World was groaning under the Burden of their Priests Impositions their Penances Satisfactions Fastings Scourgings praying to Saints worshipping Images Pilgrimages Indulgences besides the Vows of Chastity Poverty and Monastical Obedience as to the more Religious whereby they were made to believe they merited Salvation for themselves and others It was glad Tydings now and a welcome Gospel to the World at this time to tell them that it is Faith alone in opposition to these Works that justifies and saves Men. Nevertheless when that excellent Man saw the Effect of his own Doctrine that such as he had turned from Popery began to run as fast to Antinomianism and Libertinism he saw occasion to change his Preaching to press the Law and Repentance as much as others Nor was the Doctrine of Preparatory Works Man's lying at the Pool Refused but Sated and Approved by his Followers A Convinced Sinner is the only Subjectum capax Justificationis even with Dr. Owen Of Just p. 133. The Second PART I Know that several of our chiefest Divines have been so far from imbibing the Sence of this Righteousness which is my Theme The Righteousness of God revealed in the Gospel that their Doctrine in opposition to the Papists is extream in the thwarting without being truly aware of it When those Prudential Catholicks who understand that Qualitas Gratiae infusa non Natura sua sed ex Dei acceptatione ordinatione habet ut Hominem Deo gratum reddat are to be heard rather than them Nay the deep and acute Mr. Baxter so far as I remember any thing he has never came to lay this Righteousness of God enough to his Thoughts when nothing almost else escapes him as it appears by his frequent approbation or mention of the Learned Sober Logically Judicious Mr. Anthony Wotton and sometimes Mr. Hotchkis his Follower I will examine therefore a little into Mr. Wotton's Opinion Justification by him is thus defined It is Reconciliationis pars qua Deus in Christum credentibus fidem reputans ad justitiam omnia illis peccata condonat Reconciliation is God's Return into Grace and Favour with Sinners as he says whom Sin had made his Enemies through Satisfaction given him by Christ God is said to be angry with Sin and Sinners and upon Christ's Satisfaction and their Repentance to be appeased or reconciled Not that Man's Repentance or Christ's Satisfaction works any change in God but Ex Connotatione Objecti God is denominated Man's Repentance changes himself and Christ's Satisfaction makes a change in the Order of Things but God is unchangeable while yet the
Scripture speaks Lingua Filiorum hominum as the Jews say Or as the Schools Secundum nostrum concipiendi modum in many Matters incomprehensible To leave Mr. Wotton's Genus Definitionis therefore to himself without farther concern he hath defined Justification by Remission of Sin in opposition to those that define it by the Imputation of Christ's Righteousness and he hath elaborately proved this to be the Sence of the Church of England and Calvin's with many others I do now agree with Mr. Wotton herein in excluding the Imputation of Christ's Righteousness in his Sence intended that is as our Formal Righteousness out of the Definition because there is no such thing as the Imputation thereof In se tho' the Merit of it be imputed to Believers as to the Effects But I do not agree with him in making Remission of Sin to be that he wont let the other be the Form or Formal Reason of our Justification Because I hold with Mr. Bradshaw our Actual Pardon to be the Effect or Benefit of it The Righteousness of God which is not yet throughly understood by Protestant or Papist and I have made the Subject of this Dissertation is indeed that Formal Righteousness we are seeking and I do not think that any Man in his first natural reading Paul's Epistle to the Romans who brought not his Understanding from without to the place did ever apprehend by that Righteousness of God now Revealed when Remission of Sin was a thing never Hid that Pardon only is to be understood I will advise every Judicious Man therefore when any material Point is concerned in a Text to ponder it in the Original several times 'till he come to some Resolution about it in his own Mind because when he hath sucked in the Sence of another his own Judgment is worth nothing Mr. Wotton hath said enough to turn a Man to his Opinion he is so rational a Man but having been myself otherwise inclined as to the Sence of this Righteousness and finding the Scripture calling no Man righteous but upon the Account of doing righteously I cannot comply with Mr. Wotton in his Notion nor with the contrary in such as the hitherto prevailing Dr. Owen in theirs The Ministry of the Gospel is called the Ministration of Righteousness upon the Account of this Righteousness as also the Ministration of the Spirit in regard of the Grace the Spirit brings to perform it which Austine I remember in his Book De Spiritu Littera hath told us It can by no means be called the Ministration Thereof in regard to Remission of Sins There are many the like Arguments I think I could find out against Mr. Wotton's Opinion but that my Discourse is rather to be Demonstrative than Elenctical and therefore I must not omit that place in Daniel where it is prophesied that Christ shall bring in Righteousness that is a Righteousness procured by his Death and Merits and called an Everlasting Righteousness being that by which they that ever were are or shall be so are justified and saved and it is said brought in and at such a time when the Messiah shall be slain as it is said Now Manifested or Revealed by the Gospel which is I said but now the Ministration of it To which purpose it is to be understood and observed farther that Righteousness as well as Reconciliation and the making an End of Sins is one End of our Redemption which I have explained more * That the End of Christ's coming in the World of our Redemption and the Covenant of Grace was that we should be holy and righteous is said ordinarily by Divines according to the Scriptures but the right and plain Understanding or Reason of what they say is not said by them He hath chosen us in Christ that we should be Holy He hath redeemed us from Iniquity that we should be a peculiar People We are his Workmanship created unto Good Works in or through Christ Jesus Well! when God made Man at first and gave him a Law was it not that he should live holy And when Righteousness then was the End of his Creation and the Law thereof how is this said to be the End of his Redemption I answer therefore Righteousness or Holiness as they are one we must know does lie in a Conformity to the Law which God gives us There is nothing less than this the full Performance of a Law given that is Righteousness Upon this Account as soon as Man once fell and broke the Law of his Creation it is impossible he should be righteous any more unless there were a New Law brought in in the Performance whereof he might attain to that again which he had lost Now to this End was it that Christ came and died This was the very main Business I count of his Redemption as to free us from Condemnation by the Old so even the procuring this New Law or another Law with lower Terms which some Men performing they do thereby become righteous and so have Righteousness according to that Law imputed to them for Remission and Life Eternal Here you see what that Righteousness indeed is which Christ is said to bring in and in what Sence he hath brought it in or how such Texts as these before does attribute our Holiness to him It is called an Everlasting Righteousness as the Gospel is called the Everlasting Gospel because it is the Righteousness in opposition to that of the Law or of Works that all Men from the Beginning of the World to the End of it do obtain Everlasting Salvation Mid. Way of Justif p. 43. other-where Daniel 9.24 Titus 2.14 Well! you will say then if the Imputation of Christ's Righteousness be not the Form of our Justification nor Remission of Sins when some Protestants say the one and some the other and some both what then is the Form of it I answer Mr. Wotton hath told us truly in the rest of his Words It is God's imputing to a Man his Faith for Righteousness This is Scripture express and the Righteousness of God I am treating of is otherwhere called the Righteousness of God by Faith and the Righteousness of Faith for that is express Scripture also Justification supposes a Man just Justificationis formam justitia constare certum est God cannot account a Man righteous without a Righteousness The Papists therefore are hot here with Calvin that will have a Man be justified only by Remission of Sins without an inherent Righteousness and the Protestants as hot with the Papists that will have any inherent Grace or Righteousness of ours to be such as answers the Law that it should justifie us for by Righteousness both understand a Conformity to the Law of Works Both therefore are out There is no such inherent Grace as answers the Law nor any Grace from without either Remission of Sins or Christ's Righteousness imputed that is or can be our Formal Righteousness but it is Faith which is Grace and