If one side promise his part is not a Covenant except both do So that that transaction between God and the people at Sinai was properly a Covenant Exod. 19. 3 4 5 6 7 8. though God had not yet told the People what Laws he would require Obedience to in particular for Moses come's with a message to the people from God and tells them that if they will obey his Voice and keep his Covenant i. e. his Law they should be a peculiar Treasure unto him and a Kingdom of Priests that is He would be their God to bless them if they would be his people to obey him This was Gods Promise in this Covenant the people give this answer unanimously We consent we will obey God in all his Commands be they what they will though they were not told yet what his Commands should be But this though a Covenant was but in order to the great Solemnization of this Covenant which was Exod. 24. 3 4 5 6 7 8. Where having given the Moral-Law the Ten Commandments and some Judicial and Ceremonial Laws Moses comes down from God and relates them to the people And the people answered All that the Lord hath spoken We will do meaning all that he hath or shall speak for the addition of new commands did not make so many New-covenants Well Now God hath promised on his part to be their God if they will obey his Law Moses writeth these Laws that are rehearsed in the 20 21 22 23 chapters and consecrateth some young men to offer Sacrifice for Aaron and his Sons were not separated till the year after He made the people confirm their Covenant by Sacrifices as we do by Sacraments He read the Book of the Covenant that is the Book comprehending the Laws fore-mentioned and he sprinkles the Blood of the Sacrifices on the people and saith Behold the Blood of the Covenant which God hath made with you concerning all these Words that is all these Commands Thus the word is used most properly of such a Transaction God hath engaged himself to bless them if they would serve him and they have engaged themselves to serve him Sometimes the word Covenant is used for the Promise of one of the Parties only as Gods conditional Promises that if we will in sincerity Love Serve and Obey him he will be our God to bless us This is not a Covenant in the strictest sense but a conditional Promise yet is so called frequently in Scripture because it is Gods part of the Covenant yea all God's part of the Covenant of Grace and all that he Seals or Promises and when we do in sincerity promise our part these together make it actually a Covenant He engaged actually to bless us and we to serve him Yea if we promise only hypocritically yet we are engaged so as we are guilty of Covenant-breaking though God is not engaged by his conditional Promise we not being real in performing the condition So our promising engaging to obey may be called our Covenant because it is our part of the Covenant and all required of us is so to engage and be real in it But most frequently in Scripture the Laws of God the Precepts themselves are called the Covenant being the Laws that God hath made Promises to the obedience of and that the people by their engagement are bound to observe Deut. 4. 13. Sometimes the word is used in other senses as for an absolute Promise as that of destroying the World no more with a Flood but these significations before named are all that I shall have occasion to make use of Now to make it appear that the Promises and Precepts of the Covenant made in Mount Sinai and the Land of Moab were the same Consider This Book of Deuteronomium signifying the second Law is so called as all agree because it contains a repetition of the Laws formerly promulgated almost all of them were made at Mount Sinai above thirty nine years before this Deuteronomium this Repetition of the Law was Spoken or Written The occasion of which Repetition of the Law which may well be called the Prophet Moses's Fare-wel Sermon was as follows That actual Covenanting that was made at Mount Sinai or Horeb was in the first year yea within two months after they came out of Aegypt Exod. 19. 1. And all the people that were Twenty years old at their numbering which was in the second year after their coming out of Egypt are now dead for their murmuring except Caleb and Joshuah and Moses and so there was great need to cause this new Generation of people to enter actually into Covenant to keep Gods Laws which Joshuah caused them to do again after at less than half that distance of time The appointed time of the end of the forty years drew near for the peoples entering the good Land and Moses must not bring them thither nor enter himself Now Moses well knowing all these things and that his departure was at hand for he died within a Month after his beginning this Repetition of the Law to the people for he began it the first day of the Eleventh Month in the Fortieth year and died in the end of that Month for the people mourned for him Thirty dayes viz. the whole Month after Deut. 1. 3. and Chap. 34. 8. compared I say Moses foreknowing this and earnestly desiring to tye the people that he was about to leave fast to God and his Laws he begins in the hearing of the people in the Land of Moab a Month before he died Deut. 1. 3. 5. to take an effectual course to inform them in the knowledg of God's Laws and to engage them to Obedience by reciting and Summing up the Transactions of God towards them in the Wilderness and all the Laws Moral Judicial and Ceremonial yet leaving out for the most part those Judicial and Ceremonial commands that concerned the Priests Office or were not of ordinary Practice and adds some commands especially concerning things to be done by them when they come into the Promised Land And affectionately exhorts them to obey these commands with all their Heart and Soul ever and anon intermixing discourses of the Blessings would come on them by their obedience and Miseries by disobedience This is the Sum of his Discourse to this Chap. 29. He that shall think that all the Promises and Threats in this Book hitherto do only mundum sonare are only Temporal sure a vail is upon his Eyes and Heart in reading the Old Testament And then in this Chap. 29. Having thus far prepared them to do what they do knowingly and affectionately He engages them in a Covenant even with an Oath which was more than was done in Sinai to keep all these Laws He begins his Prologue to this actual Engagement as at Sinai with these words You have seen v. 2. v. 9. keep therefore the words of this Covenant that is the commands that I have repeated unto you that you may prosper in
Scripture is profitable for Doctrine for instruction in Righteousness That the man of God i. e. a Minister may be perfect throughly instructed to every good work this is spoken of the Old Testament-Scripture Christ and his Apostles do Interpret the Life promised to the Obedient in the Law as reaching to Future life Lev. 18. 5. The man that doth these Commands shall live in them Ezek. 20. 11. I gave them my Statutes which if a man do he shall live in them Gal. 3. 12. The Apostle cites these words and by Life takes it as a thing granted that they meant Eternal life Also Rom. 7. 10. The Commandment that was unto life Mat. 19. 16 17. The young man asks What shall I do to inherit Eternal life Christ answers If thou wilt enter into life keep the Commandments Which shew that Life and Eternal life signifie the same Psal 16. ult Thou wilt shew me the way of life in thy presence is fulness of joy and at thy right hand are pleasures for evermore Life here also signifies the Future life There are frequent Promises That if they will keep his Commandments He will be their God The Apostle cites Lev. 26. Where it is said If you will walk in my Statutes and keep my Judgments and do them then I will be your God and you shall be my people Ver. 3. 12. Which was Gods part of the Covenant his Engagement made to the people at Mount Sinai as appears Ver. 46. Now the Apostle having cited this Promise amongst others 2 Cor. 6. 16. adds Having these Promises let us cleanse our selves c. Which shews That he understood these words of Gods being one's God to extend to Future happiness So Mat. 22. 31 32 33. Have you not read concerning the Resurrection of the Dead I am the God of Abraham and Isaac Now God is not the God of the Dead but of the Living So Mark 12. 26. By the words translated Resurrection of the dead in Mat. and Rising in Mark seems to be meant Immediately and Primarily only †See Doctor Hammonds Annotation Mat. 22. 31. well cleaâ—ing this subsisting and being in a Future-state after death And this was that which the Sadduces denied as well as other things consequential thereto and of less concernment to support this Opinion And this was a most wicked Tenent subverting virtually all Religion which cannot be said of an Opinion only denying the Resurrection of the Body provided a man did but hold a Future-state of being or subsistence of the Soul in happiness or misery according to a mans works in this life But such an erronious Opinion might possibly be held for any thing I can see to the contrary in those more dark times consistent with this foundation of true Religion that God is a Rewarder in a Future life of Obedience in this and Punisher of Disobedience And further I do not think that the Resurrection of the Body was so clearly delivered in the Old Testament as that one believing all the Books of it to be Divine might not yet hold it a disputable Point considering the difficulties that Oppugne it and the obscurity of the Scriptures affirming it Though none of competent understanding believing the New Testament can now doubt of it Now our Saviour's Argument drawn from these words I am the God of Abraham and of Isaac c. since this was spoken to Moses and therefore after Abraham and Isaac were dead is cogent to prove against the main foundational wicked Opinion of the Sadduces viz. That Abraham and Isaac were then in being and also in Being in happiness for had they been utterly extinct or in beeing but in no estate of happiness He could not have said I am the God but only at the most I was the God of Abraham He is not so much as the Sustainer as the God in such a low-sense of the dead viz. of men totally extinct but of the living viz. of men in actual being And He cannot be called the God which implies some wonderful great and infinite favour of men being indeed and subsisting after their death but being in misery and dead in the sense wherein the Law threatned Future death But only can be called a God to such men departed as are in being and also are in great happiness and so are alive in the sense the Law promised Future life Also Saint John Rev. 22. 3 4 7. citeth that very Scripture fore-mentioned viz. Lev. 26. 11 12. Where God promises from Mount Sinai that if they would obey his Voice he would be their God It appears He refers to this very Scripture by the foregoing words in both places of setting his Tabernacle amongst them And he interpreteth the meaning of those words of God's being one's God by expressions denoting Life-to-come happiness As wiping away all tears And death being no more ver 7. He that overcometh shall inherit all things and I will be his God And also the Author to the Hebrews Chap. 11. 14 15 16. explain's this phrase of God being one 's God All these dyed in the Faith not having received the Promises but having seen them afar off were perswaded of them and declared plainly by confessing themselves Pilgrims and Strangers that they sought a Country and that not meerly Canaan an earthly Country but a Heavenly Wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God For he hath prepared for them a City meaning Heaven of which Canaan and Jerusalem were but Types Implying that if that phrase of being their God had meant no more than giving them temporal good things in Canaan it would have been a shamefully too high a word for so low a thing and that giving only such low things as temporal Mercies are would have been unworthy of that Appellation of God being their God So that God might have been ashamed of using so Emphatical a Speech in such a low signification But he is therefore not ashamed of so high a profession of Friendship as those words import since He builded for them a City not made with hands Eternal in the Heavens These following are the only colourable replys made by some or that can be made here that I can call to mind First It would be to no purpose to reply The Old Testament had no Promises or Threats of Life-to-come happiness or misery but it typified Promises and Threats of Life-to-come happiness or misery For first I suppose I have sufficiently proved it had Life-to-come Promises and Threats Secondly In the sense wherein it did typifie such Life-to-come good or evil things it had no Life-to-come Promises or Threats else it would typifie Promises of such Fâ—ture-good things in promising those Future-good things which would be ridiculous to affirm Thirdly In the sense wherein it did typifie Life-to-come things it was neither the strict Law of Works requiring perfect obedience under the penalty of Future misery and promising Future happiness thereon Nor the Law of Grace or the Gospel promising
belong to this visible World but saith not a tittle concerning a Future life It excites us not to Piety with any promises of this sort but requires that we do its commands not adding any such promise to excite us Only saying Thou shalt live here a prosperous and fortunate life as appears Lev. 18. 5. but that place Gal. 3. 21. is most clear If there had been a Law which could have given life verily Righteousness should have been by that Law The Law is said to give or do what it promises The sense thereof is If the * Here He lays the fault on the Law and denies it virtually to be the fault of the Man unsaying what he had said before Law had had promises of life viz. Eternal then men could have attained by the Law true and perfect Righteousness or true and perfect Justification that is Justification conjoyned with Eternal life But the matter was far otherwise the Law contains only promises belonging to this Life Being no better supplied with proofs than with these out of the Apostle Paul he brings some out of the Author to the Hebrews and might have brought many more and clearer to shew that Author means by the Law the Law of Sacrifices which Sacrifices did only expiate Temporal guilt as real propitiatory Sacrifices and not at all guilt as to Eternal punishment but only Typified that which did Pag. 215. Quest Is there no promise of Eternal life extant in the Old Testament Answ Either you mean by the Old Testament the Covenant made in Mount Sinai or all things contained in Moses the Hagiography and the Prophets If taken in the latter sense it may perhaps be granted there are some not obscure hints of a Future life though not a clear and express Promise of Eternal life But these hints such as they were were only Praeludiums and Anticipations of Gospel-Grace They did not belong to the Law For the Law as it is considered by the Apostle in his Disputations with the Jews doth properly denote the Covenant made in Mount Sinai Gal. 4. 24. And that had earthly Promises and earthly only It is true indeed that those earthly Promises added to the Law of Works were signs of those good things which did follow the Law of the Spirit and those were comprehended in them in the intention of God himself It is also true that there are extant some general Promises or Promises made in general terms in the Law it self in which it is manifest that Eternal life not only might be but was contained in Gods Intention As I will be thy God and I will Bless you For who doubts but in these Promises thus generally pronounced there might be contained every sort of good things yea those which come only after Death For God to be willing to be one's God what is it else then God to be willing to embrace a man with Divine good Will Now Divine good Will or Benignity worthy of God What is it else than the highest Benignity and than which there can be no greater or further And therefore with a Benignity most long in duration that is Eternal most powerful in Operation and therefore freeing from Death and Destruction For it is manifest by the Interpretation of Christ himself and his Apostles that Life-eternal in the Intention of God was comprehended in these words see Mat. 22. 31 32. Heb. 11. 16. 2 Cor. 6. 16 17 18. compared with Chap. 7. 1. Rev. 21. 3. 7. But these things do not suffice that we may say that Life-eternal was promised in the Mosaic-Covenant For Promises annexed to a Covenant ought to be clear and express and such as may be understood by either Party but it was almost impossible that any one should understand these Typical and general Promises without some adventitious Interpretation Again this Eternallife shadowed with Types and comprehended in these general Promises was not given to the external Righteousness required in the Letter of the Law but to that spiritual Purity and Piety of which this other External was only a shadow For even as Eternal good things lay covered under the bark of Temporal good things so also the Bodily-Religion prescribed in the Law was a Shadow and Type of Spiritual-Righteousness to be revealed more clearly in the Gospel In a word the Law considered Carnally and according to the Letter neither required Spiritual-Righteousness nor promised Eternal-life but being considered Spiritually was the very Gospel it self neither doth the Apostle move any controversie about here it being so taken Pa. 232. He again largely tells us what Law it was that the Apostle only meant when he exclude's the Law and Works of the Law from Justification where denying the Spirit to be given by that Law he thus speaketh If by the Law you understand the Covenant made in Mount Sinai and given to the Israelites Moses being the Mediator which I have even now said is the most proper and genuine Acceptation and Notion of it in Paul's Epistles it is manifest it contained no Promise of the Holy Spirit But in other Books of the Old Testament yea and in the writings of Moses though not in the Mosaic-Covenant it self we may find a Promise cleer enough of giving the Grace of the Holy Spirit to the Israelites as that Deut. 30. 6. The Lord thy God shall circumcise thy heart and the heart of thy Seed to love the Lord thy God with all thy heart c. Now this cannot be done as all that differ from Pelagius confess without a great force of the Holy Ghost But this did belong to the Gospel-Righteousness which first Moses himself and after other Prophets did shew to lie under the Bark of the external Rites and Ceremonies for the Righteousness of Faith which is manifested in the Gospel was in times past testified by the Law and the Prophets as the Apostle expresly affirms Rom. 3. 21. Yea I will shew you further that this was part of the New Testament promulgated by Moses For that the Covenant made with the Jews Deut. 29. and 30. in which these words are found was plainly distinct from the Covenant made in Mount Sinai and also doth contain a Renewing of the Covenant made with Abraham that is of the Gospel-covenant then more obscurely Revealed may be Demonstrated by many Arguments First It is expresly said Deut. 29. 1. that the words which there * It is not said the words which follow I rather think that the Expression these are the words of the covenant meaning the laws or Precepts of the Covenant hath reference to the Laws before recited in this Book of Deuteronomy rather than to the words following in this Chapter And that this Verse if a right division had been made should rather have ended the former Chapter than have begun this follow were words of the Covenant which the Lord commanded Moses to make with the Children of Israrael in the Land of Moab besides the Covenant which he made with
Pâ—scaâ—or interpreting the words beside the Covenant thus Praeter actionem illam qua foedus fuit pactum which can mean nothing but the peoples Engagement which actual promise of the people the Lord commanded Moses to make with the children of Israel that is which the Lord commanded Moses to cause the children of Israel to make for so this phrase and word is expresly used Josh 24. 25. Joshuah made a Covenant with the people that day that is caused the people to promise obedience to the Lords Commands that day The like sense the word hath so far as concerns the Covenanting of the people 2 Kings 11. 17. in the Land of Moab beside the Covenant that is beside their actual promising which Moses made with them that is caused them to make at Horeb or Sinai But suppose this Verse should have reference only to the following Verses in this Chapter and the following his meaning can only be These are the words whereby he engaged the people in a Covenant distinct from the words whereby Moses engaged them in a Covenant to the Lord formerly We find Joshuah a little before his death again engaging the people in a Covenant to obey Gods Commandments and useth Words and Exhortations different from these in this Chapter in engaging them Suppose we had read such words as these viz. These are the words of the Covenant which Joshuah made with the people besides the Covenant which Moses made with them at Mount Sinai and in the Land of Moab This might import that it was a distinct Engaging of the people from the other two but not that it was another Covenant of God having other Promises and Commands and Threats We find the people in Nehemiah's time Nehem. 10. 29. entering into a Covenant But it was into the Mount Sinai-Covenant It was to walk in God's Law which was given by Moses and we may see there it was also to observe Ceremonial and Judicial commands It seems they had not observed this New-covenant of this Authors in these two Chapters of Deuteronomy Object But may not this whole Book of Deuteronomy being spoken in the Land of Moab comprehend a new Gospel-Covenant distinct from the Old at Sinai and so that be serviceable to reconcile those passages of the Apostle Paul in dispute the Author's way Answ No For the Apostle Paul cites Gal. 3. two Passages out of this Book for words of the Law And again There are by far more Promises and Threatnings in this Book expressed in a Carnal Temporal and Terrence stile than in all the Law of Moses beside in Exodus Leviti Numb I am sensible this Ignis fatuus hath led me out of my designed way for I designed here only to bring in those Passages together without any reflection upon them where the Author tells us what he supposes the Apostle Paul means by the Law which he disputes against Justification by and by the Works of even a Law that either hath or at least in the sense the Apostle opposeth Justification by it hath neither Spiritual-promises nor Threatnings nor Precepts There is only one place more and that is pag. 122 123. where he explains the Apostle's meaning by the Law but because I have been long in Reciting these and that wâ—ll methodically be brought in in another place I shall bring it in there and so shall return now to the place where I left off viz. At the end of pag. 102. and shall begin at the top of pag. 103. where he tells us The Apostle useth two Arguments against Justification by Works which two Arguments this Author only prosecutes and so largely that the Setting down and Proving and Explaining these takes up almost two third parts of his whole Book Take his own words Pag 103. The Arguments whereby Paul opposes the Law may be divided into two sorts one into those which belong to the whole Mosaic-Covenant the other into those Arguments which chiefly respect the Ceremonial Law This latter sort of Arguments which chiefly respect the Ceremonial-Law he leaves till near the end of his Book and then spends but few Lines about them as not being as he saith controverted by Christians The Arguments of this first sort whereby the Apostle fights are especially two and those are taken from a double defect of the Mosaic-Covenant viz. From the want both of pardoning Grace and of helping Grace The first Argument of the Apostle respecting the Mosaic-Covenant is drawn from the defect of Pardoning-grace or Remission of sins which that Covenant wanted Where the Apostle shews the Universal guilt as well of the Jews as of the Gentiles and that all are guilty of those sins that there is no true and perfect Remission to be hoped for by this Law It is clear that this is the scope of Paul in the third Chapter of the Epistle to the Romans For there after a long Catalogue of sins charged both on the Jews and Gentiles by the Law v. 10. c. At length ver 20. he inferrs this conclusion Wherefore by the works of the Law shall no flesh be justified in his sight viz. in the sight of God And also the things which the Apostle disputes in the 3d. Chap. of Gal. are to be referred the same way where he proves also by this Reason That all who are under the Law are under a Curse because it is written Cursed is every one that shall not continue in all things written in the Law to do them v. 10. But here I am sensible that upon the very Threshold I am cast upon a great difficulty For it may be doubted here whether this Argumentation of the Apostle doth not lean upon this Foundation that he determines The Mosaic-Law as it was given to the Jews was a Law requiring Obedience wholly perfect and so impossible to be performed and also whether the Apostle conclude that upon this account all men are sinners by this Law and by and for their sins guilty of eternal Death and Malediction and so that no man can be Justified by this Law Thus indeed the most think affirming that the Law of Moses did oblige if not absolutely yet †Conditionally is no good word here For though we may properly say Men shall perish for their sins conditionally except they repent for this is no more than to say the Law that threatens death absolutely shall be executed except they repent yet we must not say that the Law threatens death conditionally except they repent but we must hold it threatens death absolutely repent or repent not and that the Gospel is a distinct Law a Remedying-Law For if God threatned death by the Law only conditionally except they perform the Gospel-condition it would follow that no man is pardoned that performs the Gospel condition it would also quite destroy Christs Satisfaction Though I know many mean well that use such speeches and however far better than the Author that denies any such Law-threat either absolute or conditional conditionally
Pardon as to Conscience and Future happiness upon repentance and sincere Obedience but the Jewish political Law And it is a palpable mistake though common to say otherwise Secondly The Reply That God intended Life and Death eternal by the words used in the promises and threats but the people could not so understand them though they used their utmost integrity and diligence Is already confuted For then they would have been excusable and it would not have been said they have Moses and the Prophets let them hear them c. And I have made it apparent the people did so understand them Thirdly It is irrational to reply as some We grant the ancient Jews did believe God would give Eternal life to the obedient but God never promised it to them Thus Socinus For first Then they were to blame to believe it if God never made any Notification of his Will that it should be so It was then an Irrational foolish act for them when tortured not to accept deliverance that they might obtain a better Resurrection Heb. 11. 35. Secondly We read they believed and embraced the Promises of Future-life happiness So that they had such Promises Heb. 11. and there was no more in their Faith than in the Divine promise no more in their Subjective than in their Objective faith than in the Revelation Thirdly This is to affirm that if they did well in thus believing That they gave God what was none of his own gave to God what they had no power or ability from him to do in believing what God never said and hoping for what God had never promised This would be To Supererogate in Faith and Hope if it was but well done of them But to avoid such Supererogation we must say that such doing would not have been acceptable to God but a foolish sinful irrational act As it would be in a man now to believe and hope that if he serve God here he shall have a fair House built in the Moon to dwell in for ever when God hath made no Revelation or Promise of any such thing Fourthly The most rational and probable reply possible of them that deny Life-to-come Promises in the Old Testament-Writings would be this though apparently false and I know not of any that use it That the Jews before Christ had such Promises of Future-life happiness and so were obliged to Piety but they were revealed only by the light of Nature and Providence and not in the Scriptures And that the Jews erred in looking for Eternal life from the Scriptures For the Old Testament Scriptures were only written for the Common-wealth Temporal-Law and to typifie Soul and Conscience-concernments but did not so far intermedle with Conscience-concernments as to threaten Future misery to any sin or to promise Eternal or Future happiness on any Terms whatsoever But 1. I have proved they had such Promises in the Scriptures 2. They had need of their Reason and Faculties and of the Light and Law of Nature and of all helps they had to understand these things in their Scripture as we have also yet to understand the Writings both of the Old and New Testament 3 I do hold and could prove it apparently from the Scripture That there were and are some discoveries by the Light of Nature and Works of Providence not only of the strict Original-law making Future misery due to every sin and Future happiness to perfect Obedience But also of the Gospel or Law of Grace viz. that God was placable and that there was place for Repentance and that God would receive sinners to Future favour and happiness by pardoning their sins upon Repentance and sincere Obedience It is apparent The Heathens did ordinarily maintain this and without doubt it was not their Errour And this they might gather from their beholding the present goodness of God to them notwithstanding their incorrigibleness in great sins in giving them Rain and fruitful Seasons and filling their Hearts with Food and Gladness Yea they had so much Light as to make them Inexcusable and Condemnable in not Repenting which could not be if there was no Notification of his Will to receive them to Future-life favour upon Repentance but rather as some hold were bound to believe that there was no forgiveness with him no Future reward or happiness Notified by such goodness of God in his Providence to men that were sinners and did need Repentance Though I think the Scripture offers us ground to believe That this way of Revelation enough for their Condemnation did not yet through their own wickedness effectually prevail to turn any man throughly from sin to God or to cause such Repentance to Life as in its own Nature it dictated any man I mean that had no more or further Revelation from God Now if they had such Discoveries these are as properly Promises of a Future-life and threatnings of Future-death as those written Fourthly It is apparent that there was more cleer and convincing Discoveries of Future-life happiness to the Obedient and miseries to the Disobedient in the Old Testament-Scriptures than in the Law of Nature and Book of Providence The Law was given that the Offence might abound and doth not only discover Duties and Sins known by the light of Nature more cleerly but the great danger of sin and happiness that comes by obedience more convincingly yea this discovers the Future-life happiness so much the more cleerly that the Discoveries made to the Heathen of this was no discovery comparatively which is implied at least in those words Aliens from the Covenants of Promise without hope And those words they have Moses and the Prophets c. teach us that there they were taught Future misery due to sinners and Future happiness to the Obedient as convincingly as if one rose from the dead to tell them of them The Apostle Paul also speaketh of the written Law and therefore of the Old Testament-Law as the norma judicii as the rule of the Future judgment to them that lived under it Rom. 2. 12. As many as have sinned without Law meaning written Law shall perish without Law And as many as have sinned in the Law shall be judged by the Law viz. at the Future judgment as appears by the following words Judged that is Justified or Condemned at the last day by the Law which could not be if the Law promised no Future-life or threatned no Future-death Also by the Law he means the Law of Moses as appears by the following words ver 17. Thou art called a Jew and restest in the Law and by the words until the Law And until Moses being used as equivalent terms by this Apostle Rom. 5. 13 14. compared Fifthly It would be in vain for any to reply here as the Author of the Book called Friendly Debate doth who having said Part 1. pag. 26. That the difference between the two Covenants is this That the old Covenant made with the Jews had Temporal promises But the Gospel Eternal
And one in Answer to this Book replying that this is contrary to the seventh Article of the Church of England which saith They are not to be heard who say the Fathers looked for no more than Transitory promises Meaning things Promised In his Appendix to the third Part pag. 150. He rejoyns I never thought that the Fathers looked for no more than Transitory promises but that it was not by virtue of the Covenant made with Moses that they looked for more I did and do affirm A great many of the Worthies mentioned Heb. 11. lived before the Law was given and the rest that followed them built their Expectation on the same ground they did Which also seems to be Doctor Hammond's opinion viz. That there were Promises of Future-life made to the more Ancient Patriarchs but none in the Mosaic-Dispensation For First Almost all the Arguments I have used do convincingly prove this That the Law of Moses to the Jews promised Future-life as well as threatned Future-death Now whether this Author holds the Law of Moses threatned Future-life-death to any sin or not I know not but think I have proved both sufficiently Also the Threats of Moses Law are expressed in as temporal a stile as the Promises so it would be irrational to affirm it threatned Future-death but promised not Future-life Secondly The promises made to Abraham were made in as temporal a stile as those in the Mosaic-Law if not in a far more temporal Thirdly If it shall be urged for I know the misunderstanding of such passages occasions this mistake that those Promises made to Abraham Isaac and Jacob are Interpreted in the New Testament as apparently reaching to a Future-life I answer So are the Promises of the Law of Moses made with the Jews Rom. 7. 10. Chap. 10. 5 6 7 2 Cor. 6. 16. Gal. 3. 10 11 12. And also the Threats Fourthly It seems apparent to me that that Dispensation of the Law from Mount Sinai and the Land of Moab was a clearer Dispensation of Threatnings of Future-death to the Disobedient and Promises of Future Soul-life to the Obedient than that to Abraham Sixthly You cannot with any colour reply It is true there are Promises of Future-life and Threatnings of Future-death as this Author somewhere grants but virtually and often unsays it again in Moses writings but not in the Law of Moses for these Promises and Threats were Gospel in Moses writings For First I have spoken against this Opinion enough already Secondly Some you see deny any such Promises in the Jewish Law And some any such Promises or Threats in the Scriptures of the Old Testament Thirdly If this was true it would follow That Christ never satisfied for any more than a temporal Curse of the Law For I have shewed the obsurdity of saying that he satisfied for the Curse of the Gospel in Moses writings threatned Fourthly The Apostle speaks of the Law in a sense distinct from the Gospel in Moses writings wherein it had Spiritual commands and that to Life meaning Eternal-life and also Future life Threats saying Christ hath born the Curse of the Law for us So Rom. 3. 20. By the deeds of the Law shall no flesh be justified in his sight For by the Law is the knowledg of sin So that I may conclude from what hath been here said that the utmost that can be said in derogating from the Law is First That the Law of Moses as it was the Common-wealth Law had no Eternal Promises or Threats or Spiritual Commands And in this sense are many Scriptures produced by this Author to be understood Secondly That the Law of Moses and the Old Testament-Law dispensation taken in the Important sense as refering to Conscience and Soul-salvation or damnation both in the sense wherein it was the Original-law of Works And also in the sense wherein it was the Gospel or a Law of Grace and Pardon hath no such cleer and distinct Promises of Eternal-life and threatnings of Eternal-death as are in the New Testament-Scriptures And in this comparative sense may some places of Scripture speaking in extenuation of the Law-promises be understood as being no Spiritual promises or Promises of Heaven comparatively to these in the New Testament And multitudes of Instances may be brought of Scriptures denying possitively and yet to be understood only comparatively As for Instance That place 2 Tim. 1. 10. where we read that Christ hath brought Life and Immortality to light through this clearer Dispensation of the Gospel must be understood comparatively as this Author grants though he destroys his whole Argumentation by granting it And may possibly be understood only of bringing them to light among the Gentiles who are said to be without hope being aliens from the Covenants of Promise For he saith in the verse following He was made a Teacher of the Gentiles viz. in these things Now though the light of Nature and Providence taught them Future-life happiness to the Obedient and Future misery and death to the Disobebient yet they taught these things so obscurely and faintly That they living wickedly and contrarily to the Light they had and so making it their interest to wish there was no Future-life might with ease stiffle and bafle such natural Sentiments so far as to hope there was no such Future state or however to make it a disputable Point as it was amongst them I mean more easily than the Jews that had the Law given in a dreadful manner testifying these things and credibly and convincingly brought down to them by Irrefragable testimony and more easily by far than men now But it is probable also this Scripture is to be understood comparatively to the Jewish dispensation of the Law and Gospel by Moses and the Prophets And indeed though it is so apparent that the Jews were taught a Future-life of Retribution by the Scripture of the Old Testament else those Scriptures could not have taught the Foundation of Religion and they did so understand the Scriptures That it is a wonder so many Learned men should incline to any Notions contrary yet the evidence they had of these things was very obscure to what this open-fac'd Dispensation of the Gospel affords and especially as to the exact manner of the great Judgment by Christ Jesus Acts 17. 31. And of Bodys being raised and made glorious like Christ's Body c. And also without doubt the best of them had very little particular hope and assurance ordinarily comparatively to this cleer Gospel-dispensation That they themselves in particular should enjoy the Future blessed state For they that knew but little of Christs satisfaction as comparatively to us they did which being now with open face known answereth such perplexing difficulties as they were ordinarily perplexed with and made subject to Bondage through fear of death could not ordinarily but be much perplexed thinking though it is apparent by the Testimony of God himself he will pardon sinners yet every truly Pious person might be ready