of what already they have receaved from him at his command He is a propitiation for the sins of the whole world Both these divine oracles and manifestations of Gods will law and Gospel were made knowne to Adam in Paradise the one typed out in the tree of the knowledg of good and evil fitly resembling the first created liberty and fredom of will man was left to the exercise of under the law the other by the tree of life placed in the midst of the Paradise of God lively figuring out the better fredom and lasting holines which the Son himself makes us partakers of in the Gospel as he is the end of the law to al that beleeve and can be perswaded to trust him as the Gospel requires In both these respects it is that John sayes I write no new Commandement to you but an old commandement which was from the beginning As it first came forth in law and Gospel before the fal it was the law written in Adams heart and the Gospel set before the eyes of his mind by the ministry of angels in lively types and figures This we are to understand by the law of nature by which all natural men shal be judged who never have atteined or lived under the hearing of the written law or word of God given afterwards in the holy Scriptures 2dly The self-same old commandement of God that is both law and Gospel came forth since the fall by divine inspiration in the bookes of the old and new Testament The law was under this dispensation engraven on tables of stone conteining the ten commandements The Gospel was represented in the ceremonial law of Moses ministry under the old Testament Then againe the law is written in the fleshly tables of Christs heart as he was born of a woman and made under the law and the Gospel was represented in the two Sacraments of baptism and the Lords supper instituted during the dayes of Christs flesh the witnesse whereof is left us upon record in the New Testament as that manifestation of Gods wil which the Son himself in and by his first appearance hath brought to light This we are to understand by the law of the Scriptures which are not of private interpretation nor a prophesy that is come to us by the will of man but that which holy men spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost for a sure ground of truth to be relied upon 3dly and lastly the same commandement or word of God which hath bin from the beginning is to come forth once more in and by the son's second and personal appearance in Spirit a fiery and living law call'd in Scripture the law of the Spirit of life that is in Christ Jesus which by faith is espied and seen as the Land of promise into which all true beleevers must enter and where they must inherit the immutability and eternal life promised a life from the dead which those that possesse whether in the glory of the first or second Resurrection though as yet but in the seed shal never die more The second death shal not have power over them but all tears shal be wiped away from their eyes and all cause of sorrow or fear This is the Son's Kingdom in Spirit which he receaves and enters upon by the appointement of the father He is pleased to begin it in weaknes and subject it a while to great sufferings but will shortly enter upon and continue the exercise of it in power during the space of a thousand years wherein he is to judg the world in righteousnes effectually causing his wil to be done on earth as it is in heaven The law under this dispensation is found as the tables of the Testimony laid up in the heavenly tabernacle of Christ the Son of Man a fiery law of indignation and vengeance in severity without mercy upon all wilful disobedient sinners The Gospel under this dispensation is as the throne or heaven itself together with the earth that is made Gods footstool or the natural man subjected and brought through faith to Gods foot in a way exclusive to al boasting This is the new heavens and new earth of which the new Jerusalem consists that comes downe from God written in and upon the heart of Christs manhood glorified and made immutably holy shining forth as the living Image of God in a twofold forme to wit in the form of a servant not only made a Son which is the first but exalted to a name above every name and anointed with the oyle of gladnes above his fellows that 's the second Thus Christ is the WORD as is above sayd that is commanded to a thousand generations He that was he that is and he that is to come the Almighty He was both law and Gospel in the day or under the dispensation of the law of nature is the same in the day and under the dispensation of the law of the Scriptures and is to come and wil shew himself to be the same also in the day and under the proper and immediate dispensation of the law of the Spirit of life that is in him This is the spiritual day of the Lord the thousand years Jubilee and Sabbath This third dispensation hastens apace draw's very neer and the faithfull and upright in heart beleeve expect and wait for the comming of the Lord therein both as an Eliah in and by his messengers and Servants elect angels and beleeving men that shal restore all things root up every thing that offends by a swift execution of vengeance on evil doers in the morning of this day and after that in his owne person wherein the man Christ by whom God hath ordeined to judg the world in righteousnes wil shew himself as the great King and bridegroom that hath the bride whose mariage he wil gloriously solemnize on earth in order to cary her up with him into heaven upon the expiration of his thousand years reigne and the Resigning up of his Kingdom into the hands of this father that God may be all in all That the matter of Gods command and mans duty is the same as wel under the law as under the Gospel and in them both under all the three dispensations before mentioned is sufficiently cleered and demonstrated nor is the difference lesse perspicuous wherein each of them vary one from another 1. The law of nature writes the matter of the law and duty commanded upon the nature and in the very heart of man teaching and instructing him also in the nature of the Gospel the new nature by the ministry of angels in most apt significant types and figures suited to his natural understanding 2dly The law of the Scripture first writes the law in tables of stone and teaches the Gospel by the types conteined in the ceremonial law or a sort of ordinances that are worldly rudiments being but the shadow of the good things to come whereof the body is Christ Afterwards therefore Christ coming
had its use and service in subordination and as a Schoolmaster pointing to him that was to follow the seed that was to come It was as the baptism of repentance preached by John which in respect of transgressions was to cleanse and prepare the way of the Lord in the hearts of the Sons of men dead by nature in trespasses and sins The Lord that afterward was to be revealed through faith would have their soules purged and kept as wel fenced as might be in the mean time against all impurity of evill doing by this law of written words which was also a witnes afterwards of Christs birth death and resurrection This is a second law that after the fall was given to man as a light or lamp to his feet and lanthorn to his paths a light but under a cover and in a dark place sealed and bound up as amongst Christs owne disciples who are taught and learned in the wisdom that is from above Otherwise as it may be used receaving a sense and meaning from the wisdom of the earthly and sensual man or from the subtil skill of the Serpent it does become the fortresse and strong hold of sin a ministry of the letter and of death a most dark and uncertain guide to any that pretend and profess them selvs to be the followers of it and of the commands in it For the vision of all is unto them as of a book or letter that is sealed which when delivered to one that is learned after the manner of men and not illuminated with the Spirit of TRUTH saying read this I pray thee he sayes or at least should say I cannot for it is sealed and I need one to open it And when it is delivered to him that is not learned in any kind he answers if he deale ingennously I am not learned I have not that skill which is required for the reading of it nor can I se any more into the true meaning of it them one that cannot read at all or tell how to spell words and put letters together The voice and sound of this law is not of that extent as the first which is published by the tongue and speech of angels and other peeces of the creation but is more peculiar to one sort of men who formerly were they of the seed of Abraham according to the flesh unto whom God more especially committed these his oracles expecting answerable fruit from all those that having sinned under this law were reserved by God to be judged and at last to stand or fall by it The rest of mankind amongst the gentiles that lived without this law were not to be judged by it but by their owne law the law of nature unto which they are perpetually still obliged This generation of the fleshly seed of Abraham is neither literally nor figuratively as yet passed away For there are too many that since the light of the Gospel hath sinned forth upon them doe yet desire to be under the law preferring their station and lot in the earthly Jerusalem Mount Sinai that is stil in bondage with her children and choose so to remaine rather then to ascend into the Jerusalem that is above and is free These are the branches Spoken of Rom. 11. taken out from among the Gentiles upon the rejection of Abrahams natural seed who contrary to nature are graffed into the good olive tree surrogated and taken by God as a nation or people to himself in stead of the other in the same relation under the same Covenant and law being made to partake of the root and fatnes of the same olive tree These are notwithstanding all their priviledges in this estate to take heed of boasting or taking up their rest under the dominion and in the inward principles of that law which excludes not boasting If they doe they are fairly warned that their standing and aboad in and with the root is not so sure nor their righteous principles and operations in conformiry to the law so fixed but that they may fall and be rejected as their predecessours the Iews were before them to wit all such of them whose standing was but by that Covenant and not by the law of faith for want whereof God complains against them Heb. 3. as children of his wrath and provocation a perverse crooked and froward generation that alwayes erre in their hearts and have not known his wayes At last they come to nothing never enter into Gods rest though they thinke themselves and in some sort are a nation that works righteousnes in strict observance of the letter of all Gods Ordinances and commands This is the same law that was by God written in the heart of Adam at the creation being renewed and published after the fall first by the ministry of angels in the hand of a Mediatour on Mount Sinai which word spoken by angels remained stedfast in its revenging property against all that contemned and disobeyed it Hence is it said in another place the law works wrath and is sure in inflicting the penalties and curse threatned It was committed to writing by Moses the Prophets Evangelists and Apostles Even in the Gospel the law is fulfilled and made honorable By the doctrine of it man is taught what he ought to doe and what not to doe He is bound up to perfect and exact obedience to it and by reward and punishment is either encouraged to obedience or restrained from disobedience being left to his owne dispose and choise as to any thing of prevailing influence which this law dispenses Yet is there that in the doctrin of it which sends all under it to Christ as the only way and means of their salvation shewing who this Christ is and that they must beleeve in him or perish in their sins and that by beleeving in him they may attein the remission of their sins and life eternal This distinct knowledg of Christ the Redemer Adam had not nor properly could have before the fall Neverthelesse by the things rhat were made and from the voices and significations of Gods mind ministred by the tongue of Angels which Adam in Paradise was capable of hearing and vnderstanding and out of the book of the creature more especially the tree of life he was and might have bin more then he was instructed in the maine point as to who and what Christ was and how the comming to him and feeding upon him was the only way and means to make man immutable in righteousnes by obtaining an inseperable union with the cheif good without ever falling into sin yea as the only sure means to have prevented the fall In the third and last place there is the law of the Spirit of life which is in Christ Jesus the immediate writing and engraving of Gods owne mind true in it self and true in the receaver of it the heart of Jesus the Son of man the living tables upon which the living WORD by way of self-impression and personal union does
the lawyer and answer him according to his owne heart and principles What is written in the law sayes he how readest thou The lawyer replies Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart with all they soule with all thy strength and with all thy mind and thy neighbour as thy self This Christ agrees to be the sum of the things conteined in the commandements of God which man is to doe and in the doing and obeying whereof as he ought and God requires will make him heir and sure of eternall life Therefore all that Christ adds is Thou hast answered right this do and thou shalt live But although these few words contein mans whole duty to God and to his neighbour yet as by the following verses does appeare in the parable of the wayfairing man that fell amongst theeves there is more in it then at first we are aware of to perform this duty to God and to our neighbour rightly and after such manner as is acceptable to God For so do to it requires faith that faith which works by love or which makes us new creatures giving us the sight of that man in the person of the Mediatour that hath seen God by whose testimony we also are taught to so him and know that he is and what he is even the rewarder of all those with eternall life who diligently seek him No man knows who the Son is but the Father nor who the Father is but the Son and he to whom the son will reveale him He that beleeveth on the Son of God hath this witnes in himself by the sons comming into his heart and bringing this knowledg along with him giving us to know him that is true and that we are in him that is true even in him that is the true God and eternall life By such knowledg are we preserved from idols and setting up some other thing in our hearts for the true God or from ignorantly bestowing our worship love and service upon him He that beleevs not God hath made him a liar because he beleeves not the Record which God gives of his Son when it is plainly represented and set before his eyes in such legible characters that he is able to understand and perceave the Record even that God hath given unto us eternall life and that this life is in his Son and is to be had only in the gift of the Son made to us in a most intimate and inseperable union which he that hath hath life he that hath it not hath not life Whatsoever comes short of this let it make never so faire a shew for the present it wil be sure to end in death Hence is it that without faith it is impossible to please God because otherwise we cannot know him as we ought with such certainty as not to mistake him for some other thing or some other thing for him And so also will it be with us as to our neibour or brother we shall take him to be our neibour and brother that is not he and he that is not we shall account to be him For not knowing the very Image and first patern set up in Christ our elder brother and the lowly meek spirit in him which with God is of great price how can we know the children and many brethren that are to be conformed to him therein Unlesse we know and love him that begets how can we know and love them that are begotten of him For both he that sanctifies and they that are sanctified are all of one for which cause he is not ashamed to call them brethren those who if we be are love unto we thereby know that we are passed from death to life And if we love not but hate them sitting and speaking against these our brethren slandering our owne Mothers Sons we are in Gods account no better then Cain wicked munderers whatever righteous works we are conversant in according to the letter of the law Be we as zealous and forward as we will in offering our sacrifices and bringing our gifts before the altar till we be first reconciled to our brother we are directed to leave our gift before the altar as better not to offer it at all with a heart which is without that love by which faith works In this sence are we to understand 1 Cor. 13.1 2 3. If we have al other gifts and good things from God that are possible to be had and not this love with them we are nothing we are but as sounding brasse and tinckling cymballs The saying therefore of Christ do this and thou shalt live according to his owne reading and understanding of the law is do this at present by the light thou art under but give not off be not satisfied til thou come to do it by faith as a new creature with the knowledge and love which faith teaches and workes and thou art a true heir of eternall life and shalt most certainly enter into it and possesse it for ever Leave thy sacrifice and thy guift before the altar in humility and brokenes of Spirit and in lowlines of heart rather then take upon thee to offer it untill thou have the Son given to thee and art regenerated For it is better for thee that thou shouldst not vow then that thou shouldst vow and not pay Keep thy foot therefore when thou goest into the house of God or doest enter upon the performance of his worship and Service in thy natural mutable frame of Spirit and be more ready to heare then to give the sacrifice of fools for they consider not that they do evill even in their very prayers and duties of divine worship By faith it is that the right and stedfast Spirit is formed the whole and entire heart which God requires We may then take notice that there is a twofold reading preaching hearing receaving and obeying of the Word of God and doctrine of his law the one after a lesse the other after a more excellent way the one proportiond to the sight hearing and heart of the natural and earthly man in his mutable state properly called the law the other proportioned to the sight hearing and heart of the heavenly and spiritual man properly called the Gospel How readest thou says Christ to the learned lawyer when he would point out the law in the former sence and as to the latter himself is the reader preacher and worker of it as he is the Son himself and word of faith which through our being in him in whose manhood it is as in our mouth and in our heart is made bread to us and not only possible but most desireable and prevailingly attractive unto us to do and fulfil after him In this sence it is that Christ is the end of the law to all that beleeve and the law in its first kind of teaching or reading is the Schoolmaster or teacher that sends us to Christ and is appointed to keep us under its rule and discipline
in the flesh abolishes and abrogates that dispensation of the mosaical ministry and in stead thereof makes the heart and conscience of man in himself and followers the fleshly tables whereon the law is written by the Spirit of the living God Hereby a conformity of holy flesh is wrought in man like unto the flesh of Christ through the hearing of the word This is the washing of our body or natural man with the pure water of the living WORD and Spirit of Christ through the ministry of the outward preaching thereof to the purging and clensing us from all filthines of flesh And this is obteined through the vertue and price of Christs blood together with the atonement and remission of sins past Under this dispensation it is that by the doctrin of the cross signified in the Sacraments of baptism and the Lords Supper and thereby lively represented to the eyes of the very natural man he is taught the Gospel a second time under the Scripture dispensation of law and Gospel Neverthelesse this teaching yet is short of the glory of God to be revealed in and by Christs personal appearance in Spirit which as it is the 3. Third and last dispensation of law and Gospel so does it differ in excellency and glory very much from the other two For it is the fruit of the vine which Christ reservs to drink with his owne brethren and faithful Servants in the Kingdom of his father or which his father hath given unto him that those that have continued with the Son in his temptations and followed him fully in the regeneration may eat and drink at his table in this his Kingdom and sit on thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel or the natural and fleshly holy seed jew or gentile who at that day shal be found to be but in their mutable state of righteousnes and life This is the best wine far exceeding any before receaved in types figures and Sacraments being that which Christ keeps till the last as that fruit of himself the heavenly and true vine which will refresh the heart of God and of man or of the divine and heavenly man as wel as of the earthly and natural man brought forth in the exercise of an immutable righteousnes and made after the power of an endlesse life The former of these is to sit at Christs right hand the latter at his left in this his Kingdom and glory unto which both of them are fitted and prepared by the father through the lively conformity they are taken into and made to beare with Christ in his death and resurrection So much be spoken in way of resolution to the first general query of the 4 above propounded to insist on in this Treatise to wit concerning the subject matter of the law or command of God delivered to man by the divine WORD and oracles of God under the threefold dispensation thereof together with the difference of these dispensations under the law of nature Scripture Spirit The time of the latter branch of the 2d dispensation beginning with John the Baptists and Christs owne personal ministry in the flesh is now far spent and the yet more glorious day of Christs 2d appearance and dispensation in Spirit is at hand The second General query to be insisted on is concerning the mutable state man was created in at first and remains in even after the fall out of which he is again capable to be changed and either restored and regenerated by the knowledg of Christ in the Gospel or else cast down for ever into eternal perdition The WORD that hath bin the old Commandement from the beginning that it may evidently appear to all understandings to be the word of Truth doth branch itself forth as hath bin declared into two Testimonies or witnesses which are both of them the law of Gods mouth The one conteins in it the doctrine of the law of works the rule of mans first communion with God in the first Covenant the other the doctrin of the law and righteousnes of faith the rule of that 2d communion which God thinkes fit to take man into in the spirit of his Son which can never be lost as the first may but endures to everlasting life Now two Testimonies according to the law are sufficient for the discovery and confirmation of all truth Answerable hereunto does he that is Truth itself shine and give forth the light of his glory whose two Testimonies may either be joyned in consortship harmony and subserviency with and to one another in the ministry and dispensing of them and so become a law of life to all that heare and obey them that new song mention'd Rev. 14.3 sung before the throne called chap. 15.3 the song of Moses and of the lamb sung together in perfect harmony and agremēt which no man can learne but the 144000 Virgins that follow the Lamb whithersoever he goeth being redeemed from among men as the first fruits to God and to the Lamb. But now these two laws or Testimonies of works and of faith as they may be taught and dispensed in difference disagreement inconsistency and opposition one unto the other may become a ministry of death either by setting up and exalting the letter above and against the spirit or disjoyning the spirit from the letter as that which may be without it and needs no consortship with it This is the work of the false deceitful Spirit the father of lies and is not of the Truth Now these being the Testimonies which from the beginning are commanded by God to be heard and obeyed no sooner was man created in Gods image and endued with an immortal intellectual rational and sensual soule made a free agent but God set them before him as a meet and capable subject to be made wise and happy in the practice of them The work of the one of them was immediatly written in his heart by the finger of God at his creation and the word of the other of them as soon as he was put into Paradise was sounding every wherein his eares and was exposed to the sight of his mind in the visible types and signes of the Sabbath the institution of marriage the tree of life and by the ministry of the holy angels Two things are recorded by Moses concerning the first make and constitution of being given unto man by God at his creation The first we find Gen. 1.26 27. where the counsel is taken by the blessed Trinity his creatours within themselvs saying Let us make man in our image after our likenes and let him have dominion over the visible creation and be fruitfull multiply and replenish the earth ruling over every living thing that moveth upon the earth So God created man in his owne image in the image of God created he him male and female created he them God is in his being the highest reason and the operation or work of his mind is discovered and made knowne by the word of his
power and office by the sight givē to them of his star a star that made him known to thē and went before them to conduct them to a sight of him in his owne person which is al that this sort of messengers or preachers of Christ can do Thus the book of the creatures by Gods special Ordination and institution in the way of types ād figures through the ministry of angels does teach and preach the righteousnes of God which is in Christ in order to lead us to the personal sight of him that we may in the end hear himself speak After this manner the righteousnes of God in Christ is and may be manifested without the law or written word Secondly In the same Psalm he mentions another sort of preaching and teaching of the knowledg of Christ and that is out of his law the law of his written word the ministry whereof is for the converting of mens Soules and it is a sure Testimony that makes wise the simple more to be desired then gold yea then much fine gold sweeter also then hony and the hony-comb The righteous statutes and judgments of God signified in his written word reioyce the heart and are true and righteous altogether His commandement is pure enlightning the eyes Concerning the law or command of God thus manifested Christ sayes search the Scripturs whose true office is not only to revive and instruct you in that law that was written in your hearts at the creation and lost by the fal but to send you to me also that by obteyning a personal sight of me in spirit you might be farther instructed in the knowledge of me But ye wil not come unto me that ye may have life Thirdly and lastly Ps 8 2 David shews that there is another sort of preachers that God sends as labourers into his harvest saying out of the mouths of babes and sucklings hast thou founded or ordeined strength because of thine enemies and that thou mightest stil the enemy and the avenger These babes and sucklings Christ himself interprets and expounds to us Luke 10.21 first of those his sent ones seventy in number which he immediatly authorized and qualified by commission from himself sending them two by two before his face as his harbingers and forerunners into every city and place whither he himself would come Secondly he expounds it of those babes and children of the fathers begetting to whom he reveals those things which he had hid from the wise and prudent One of these babes Peter is acknowledged by Christ to be Mat. 16.17 when he called him the rock Christ hereupon owned him as one of the blessed seed who had that sight and knowledg of Christ in spirit given to him which none but the father could reveale Flesh and blood could neither give nor receave it For such knowledg of Christ requires a spiritual eyesight and discerning peculiar to these children and babes of the fathers owne begetting the plantation of his owne right hand of whom Christ sayes Mat. 13.16 17. Blessed are your eyes for they see and your ears for they hear Verily I say unto you many prophets and righteous men have desired to se those things which ye see and have not seen them and to hear those things which ye hear and have not heard them For all things are delivered to me of my father and no man knoweth the son but the father neither knoweth any man the father save the son and he to whomsoever the son wil reveal him This sight of the Father and Son in their mutual relations to and fruitions of each other gained by the personal sight of Christ in spirit is mentiond by Paul 1 Cor. 9.1 when he says Am not I an Apostle have not I seen Christ or am not I one of those that by the sight of Christ in spirit and the revelation of the Son in me have receaved grace and Apostleship to the obedience of faith among al nations for his name These are the pure in heart and poor in spirit that are taught after this most excellent manner to se God and have the knowledg of Jesus Christ in order thereby to be made ministers and witnesses as wel of the things at first seē by them as of those also wherein afterwards Christ yet reserus himself farther and more fully to appear unto them These speak the things which they know testify that which they have seē whether their witnesse be receaved or no having themselv first heard the record that God gives of his Son and set to their seal that God is trues This is the threefold cord the lines whereof are streched out over al the world and to the ends of the earth by the quickning power of the living WORD He rideth upon the heaven of heavens of old Loe he sends out his voice in each and in al these his dispensations and that a mighty voice sharper then any two-edged sword peircing even to the dividing asunder of soule and spirit and of the joynts and marrow a discoverer of the thoughts and intents of the heart Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in his sight All things are naked and open to the eyes of this our great saviour and redeemer And as he speaks immediatly by himself by the voice of his owne mouth so does he also send out his voice by his hosts or armies of angels those ministers of his which doe his pleasure and signify his commands to others which they receave as always attending and hearkning to the voice of his word The word therefore as at first it is given in a fore-running and preparatory dispensation to the Sons appearance in his owne person is called Heb. 2.2 the word spoken by angels the command whereof is so stedfast that every transgression and disobedience thereof receaves a just recompence of reward By the Rule and autority of the holy and elect angels exercis'd according to his word and law was God the Mediatour Pleased to put and keep in subjection the whole first creation even man also who in his first and mutable state is the cheif and highest member thereof next under the angels themselvs By means of this angelical ministry and Rule under Christ or in the hand of the Mediatour the righteousnes of God wrought out in the person of the redeemer is made manifest without the law to the gentiles that are without law that is the knowledg of the Scriptures or written word as also by the law to the jews that are in and under the teaching of Gods written oracles and do or may there find the witness and manifestation thereof In and by these it doth appear that Jesus Christ died for our sins and is risen again for our justification By jews in this case we are not only to understand the seed of Abraham according to the flesh but those also among the gentiles who are planted into the same good olive tree Christ on the same tearms of mutability as they