Who shall lay any thing to the charge of Gods elect it is God that justifieth who is he that condemneth it is Christ that hath dyed yea rather that is risen again who sitteth at the right hand of God and maketh intercession for us Having laid down these two positions as truths undeniable that Christ hath effectually satisfied and as a perfect Mediator sits at the right hand of God making intercession for believers And that God thereupon justifieth them He now boldly challengeth earth and hell who shall charge them who shall condemn them Yea his interrogations bear the force of strong negations as if he had said None can effectually charge much less condemn them yea none dares to attempt it no not one not sin nor Satan the Lords Enemies much less the Law which is just and conformed to the will of God Collect we together now but some short notions of these Scriptures what the Holy Ghost concludeth in them and by them that believers are not under the Law that it is an apostacy from Christ from grace to put themselves in the least part under the Law as a Covenant of works that they are dead to the Law that the Law is dead to them that they are delivered from the Law are no more under it were servants to it but are now free from it there is no Law against them that it is done away from having any domination over them that they are departed from the Lawes terrours and come to the Gospels celestial previledges are not under the Covenant of Works but under the Covenant of Grace have the originall of their present condition not from Sinai but from the supernall Hierusalem are sons not of the bond-woman but of the free that there is none that can condemn them none that can justly say any thing to their charge Let any man now that beleiveth there is a Holy Ghost and that the Holy Ghost speaketh in the Scriptures judge whether iâ— be possible for the wisedom of the Holy Ghost himself which is infinite to give his testimony more fully cleerly or plainly to this assertion that believers are not under the cursing power of the Law or under the Law as a Covenant of works whether this truth hath not from these testimonies of Scripture a sufficient fortification raised about it against all Jesuits and Devils Yet Mr. Baxter with horn and hoof tooth and nail assaults it partly by secret minings and partly by open batteries to subvert it I shall hold out his slights in his owne words B. Thes 11. Not that Christ doth absolutely null or repeal the old Covenant hereby viz. by constituting a New Covenant Thes 10. But he superaddeth this as the onely possible way of life The former still continueth to command prohibite promise and threaten so that the sins even of the Justified are still breaches of that Law and are threatened and cursed thereby This is his first plea his dispute in generall against the before proved Assertion The Aphorism consisteth of meer obscurities ambiguities equivocations and mentall reservations in words and phrases wherein the Aphorist hides himself that he may smite and not be smitten speaking in words of a double and doubtfull sense that he may beguile the unwary in the sense wherein he would be understood that he may deceive and yet in case that by them which are wise and wary he be called ad partes to answer for his fallacious subtlety he might fly for shelter to the other sense that he might not appear to be a deceiver And first the word nulling yea the phrase absolutely nulling is ambiguous equivocall and fallacious A thing a law a covenant may be said to be nulled i. e. made void or none either as to its essence and being or as to its power and operation yea to be absolutely nulled in some operations though absolutely in force in other Null as to such ends or persons though in its perfect validity to other But when Mr. Baxter saith absolutely null he would be taken in another sense then he dares to avouch in the sense that the words do most litterally and gramatically import viz. the whole and absolute nulling of it not onely to some but to all operations ends and persons yea not onely to its operation but to its being also For so much that distinguishing word absolutely insinuateth viz. in contra-distinction to secundum quid that it is nulled not as to this or that purpose in this or another respect but absolutely simply wholly from having any more operation or being And this equivocation of his serves him to three ends 1 To leave a secret accusation and odium among the people upon the Orthodox Divines against whom his dispute bendeth that they deny both the power and being of the Law of God and hold that it is become useless and abrogated so that the people of God must be no more acquainted with it And this is a tacit slander for who among them ever taught such things 2 To lay open to himself a wide field for a luxuriating and extravagant disputation to affirm or deny confirm or confute any thing about the present state of the Law knowing that what is incompetent to what he asserteth in one sense will be enough competent in another and he doubts not while he is thus circling and roving some pur-blind ones will be taken in his snare if none els yet at least such as are made to be taken 2 Pet. 2. 12. 3 That if his words come to a strict examination how little of simplicity and truth how much of doublenes and falshood is couched in them he may not want a place of retreat his meaning forsooth was but so and so and there is a fault in them that mistake him 2 The same might I say of the word repeal which he useth But because he repeats it again in the Explication of this Aphorism affirming that there are godly and learned men that hold the repealing of the first Covenant c. I shall there speak what els might be here not unfitly spoken 3 No less ambiguous is it what he will have us to understand by the Old Covenant which he affirms not to be nulled but to have the New Covenant super-added to it at least to what sense thereof he will stand Whether he meaneth 1 The Law of nature not sounded in the ear but written in the heart of man at his Creation Doe and live Sin and dye Or 2 That Covenant expressed in the word about a positive Command of not eating of the Tree of knowledge of good and evill Eat and dye and consequently Abstein and live Or 3 The Covenant of the Law written in stones upon Mount Sinai If the first Mr. Baxter himself sometimes declares his doubting whether there were such a Law with a clear impression of its penalty ever created and imprinted in mans soul And there are not wanting some among the most profound and Classicall Divines which hold that
have done their Law their iniquities past present and to come are blotted out their peace made and they reconciled to God This is observably set forth in Aaron and the other High Priests his successors as they were Types of Christ Aaron the High Priest must bear the Names of the Children of Israel engraven upon 2 precious stones on the two shoulders of his Ephod before the Lord for a memoriall Exod. 28. 10 12. yea he must bear their names in the breast-plate of judgment upon his Heart when he goeth in unto the Holy place viz. with the blood of the sacrifice for the expiating of siâ—s for a memoriall before God continually What memoriall that they were the men for whom the sacrifice was offered and that their sins were purged thereby that God should therefore have them in remembrance to preserve them from the Curse and judgment of the Law for so it followeth And Aaron shall bear the judgment of the Children of Israel upon his heart continually ver 29 30. These things were but figuratively done in Aaron but really and fully accomplished in Christ his Antitype who being constituted our High Priest and having received Command from the Father not onely what but for whom to offer even for Israel i. e. the elect of God which for a great part were not yet in being hâ—th by his own blood entred into the Holy place with their names engraven upon his heart having purchased for them an everlasting Redemption Not into the Holy place made with hands but into Heaven there to appear for them by way of Mediation and Intercession Heb. 9. 12 24. Rom. 8. 34. Wherefore also God hath given him not onely an acquittance for them from all their sins Heb. 10. 17. but hath also given and delivered up them into his hands as hath been before proved and Mr. B himself confesseth yet not as he insinuateth to plague and Curse them and hold them during life under the intolerable bondage of the Law but to deale with them in a gentle dispensation according to the tenor of the Covenant of Grace in tender mercy to draw them unto and keep them in the Faith without all Apostacy to the end All which he performeth to all his elect as is evident from most of those Scriptures which were brought for the confirmation of the former point and elswhere Gods giving them to Christ and into his dispensation being their perfect translâ—tion from the Covenant of the Law into the Covenant of Grace And this was done before their beleeving All that the Father giveth me shall come to me first they are given and then they shall come Be not afraid but speak and hold not thy peace for I have much people in this City said the Lord Jesus to Paul of the Corinthians yet Heathen Acts 18. 9 10. They were his people before therefore must they be gathered to him by Faith I have other sheep which are not of this fold them also I must bring and they shall hear my voyce c. Jo 10. 16. he means the Gentiles that were infidels yet nevertheless his sheep that must afterward hear his voice because they were his sheep how were these termed Christs people Christs sheep while yet in Paganism idolatry and unbeleef but because they were his redeemed and justified ones Ye beleeve not because ye are not of my sheep Jo 10. 26. What is that but because they were not of the number of them for whose sins he had effectually satisfied Gods justice 3 Justification and Remission of sins may be considered also as it is brought into their own apprehension and Conscience that were justified by Christ and in Christ before And in this sense it is oftenest taken in Scriptures yea alway when we are said to be justified by Faith This is done when Christ by the manifestation and ministry of the Gospel maketh known in all ages to them for whose sins he hath satisfied the Mystery of Grace by him and frameth their hearts with all gladnes by Faith to embrace him and it thorow him unto Justification Then are they justified in themselves and remission of sins sealed up by the spirit to their own Consciences and so have the Kingdom of God within them consisting of Peace Righteousnes and Joy in the Holy Ghost Before this Christ had life for them now they are said to have it themselves Jo 20. 31. 1 Jo 5. 12. Untill now was their winter season so that all their life was in Christ as the Vine or Root now is their spring so that the life sheweth it self in them as the branches blossoming with peace and joy unto all obedience Before life was purchased and seizure thereof taken for them by Christ Now they are passed from death to life 1 Jo 3. 14. i. e. are put into the actuall possession of it Before though they were Lords of all as the Apostle in a case little different from this speaketh Gal. 4. 1 2. yet differed nothing from Servants being in their own apprehension under the threats and condemnation of the Law and so still in slavish fears and terrors But now they see their freedom and take possession of it with boldness to cry Abba Father and to enter into the Holiest by the blood of Jesus and through the veil of his flesh with full assurance of hope c. Hebrewes 10. 19 20. These things so premissed we shall the better see whether the Scriptures which Mr. Baxter here produceth do by their own force or else by his mis-interpretation of them seem to prove that the Elect while unbeleevers are under the Law as a Covenant of works First that of Joh. 3. 18. is a threat of the Gospel Covenant against the Contemners of it and of Christ the preacher thereof and not of the Law Covenant And it is brandished against reprobats and not against elect unbeleevers Christ had now preached his Gospel a while in Galilee the elect beleeved and of them saith Christ they are not condemned The reprobates would not beleeve of them he saith they are condemned already and the reason is rendred not because they have broken the morall Law but because they have not beleeved in the Name of the onely begotten Son of God This is the condemnation that Christ the light is come into the world and men preferred their own darknes before him c. The same also is the meaning of the 36 ver which he citeth Neither of these pointing in their threat to the elect but the reprobates among unbeleevers Neither threatening for Contumacy against the Law but the Gospel Therefore nothing here proveth the elect before they beleeve to be under the Law as a Covenant of works Again those Scriptures which he saith bid us to beleeve for the remission of sinnes Act. 2. 38 c. do only prove that faith in Christ doth justifie the elect in the third consideration of Justification or remission of sinns before mentioned viz. as it evidenceth and brings
head-peece whosoever thinks the contrary For it were a mad contradictive proposition to say whosoever doth or shall beleeve shall be justified in himselfe before he had a self or being But this is no nearer to the matter in question than the North is to the South pole As for that barr of God in heaven that hee concludes with where his Angelical and Seraphical Doctors that better know the way thence than thither saw at their last coming thence God fitting and transacting these things before his Angels we are bidden to wait untill he shall have the leisure after he hath spoken once more with Lucians Icaro-Menippus and enquired of him the certainty thereof and then we shall hear the dream interpreted This is the summe of his noble dispute against justification as an act immanent in God from Eternity And now I appeal to the reader comparing together his bigg and swelling promises with his curt and insubstantial performance after his challenge of all the Antinomians his promise to shew that there is no such thing his charging the doctrine with the scandalous terms of errour and pillar of Antinomianism his undertaking to prove it such upon due examination to judge Quid tanto dignum tulit hic Promissor hiatu CHAP. XXII Arg. VVhat the reall Antinomians have been and are and that Master Baxter casteth this reproachfull name upon all the Churches of Christ charging the innocent with the fault whereof himself is guilty THE second thing which I promised to take into examination in his explication of this Thesis is his vellication of the Antinomians which here and elsewhere throughout this Book he defieth with unquenchable hatred charging and discharging so hotly against them as ever Iupiter did against the Giants that made a battery against the Heavens And what are they that Goliah like he should come harnessed from the head to the foot brandishing his weavers beam against them he tells us They are Ignorant animals pa. 169. Fitter to learn the grounds of Religion in a Catechism than to manage those disputes wherewith they trouble the world pa. 115. If so who can abstain from laughter to see so great a Nimrod as Mr. Baxter hunting with no lesse weapon then Hercules his Club a nest of wrens to death and with the great Monarch of the World Domitian to set himself in battel array against the gnats and flies that dared to peep into his chamber But his aim is to shew his Craft more than his power as I before in part have manifested in the preface to this examination and there promised more fully afterward to evidence The performance whereof I have reserved for this place That we may the better discern Master Baxters either singlenesse or doublenesse in this Case it shall be somewhat expedient to enquire after first the originall secondly the growth of the Antinomians properly so taken and denominated in the severall reformed Churches untill our late divisions within this land have made such a medly and confusion of all or at least many errors together that we know not punctually what error is predominant in most of the willfully erroneous that having seene them both in their birth and their full height also wee may compare Master Baxters Antinomians with the Antinomians indeed and so judge how far he goes about to confute the innocent and how far to defame and deceive the innocent The first rise of them was in Germany Anno. Dom. 1538. as Sleidan in the 12 Book of his Commentaries tells us Their principall ringleader was Ioannes Islebius Agricola I have not met with any of their Books neither know I whether there be any of them extant from which we may certainly gather their opinions Wee are forced therefore to take them at the second hand from the foresaid Author who in the forequoted place thus speaks of them Hoc Anno secta prodijt eoruÌ„ qui dicuntur Antinomi Hi poenitentiam ex Decalogo non esse docendam dicunt illos impugnant qui docent non esse praedicandum Evangelium nisi primum quassatis animis at que fractis per pradicationem legis Ipsi verò statuunt quaecunque tandem sit hominis vita quamtumvis impura justificari tamen eum si modò promissionibus Evangelij credat i. e. This year sprung forth the sect of them which are called Antinomians Their Tenents he reduceth to three generall heads telling us that first They say that Repentance is not to be taught out of the Decalogue 2 They impugn them that teach the Gospell ought not to be preached to men untill their hearts be first shaken and broken by the preaching of the Law 3 They assert that whatsoever the life of a man be and how impure soever yet is he justified if he onely beleeveth the promises of the Gospel He addeth further that Luther wrote against this Islebius who thereupon submitted and in a sort recanted and so it seemes the Sect ceased and their assertions for a while slept Such were they at their first rise In these after times they discovered themselves in more plain terms than Sleidan here discovered them About twenty years since I had acquaintance and upon that acquaintance much reasoning and many disputes with some of them in Summer set shire who much honoured and professed themselves to have received their light from that Master Wâ—otton whom Master Baxter doth seem much to applaud in some parts of this Treatise Their opinions that partly were and partly weretaken by the most tâ— be points of Antinomianism were these as in discourse with them I found them to maintain 1. That the Law is totally abrogated now under the Gospel and that not onely as a Covenant of Works but also from being any more the rule of righteousnesse That wee have but one Master Christ that since his coming into the world he is our Teacher sent from heaven the Prophet raised up like to Moses that we should hear him alone That since the time he began to speak Moses hath been silent and we are bound now to attend to the voice of God as in these latter times he speaketh to us by his Son only 2. That the whole Old Testament is as it were uncanonized though it were the Word of God the Rule and Canon of Faith and practice to them that lived under it yet to us that are under the Gospel it remains not in its former power Because the Last Will and Testament onely stands in force and when a latter Testament is made the former is thereby to all uses and purposes made voyd We may read the Old Testament as other Apocryphal and Ecclesiasticall Writings but must no more subject our judgements or consciences to it then to these For Moses and the Prophets prophecied onely untill John the Baptist were in force untill he began to preach the Gospel and ever since the Kingdom of heaven hath suffered violence the doctrine of the Gospel hath succeeded in its place 3. That we
have no Sabbath under the Gospel but all holyness in dayes and difference between dayes and dayes is taken away so that to sanctifie any one day to the Lord above another is meer Wil-worship and Superstition Upon this ground they actually made use of shooting bowling and other lawful recreations upon the Lords day pronouncing it to be a use of the Liberty which Christ had purchased for them 4. They disrelished altogether that phrase of Justification by Faith as attributing somewhat to man and would that all should rather say that we are Justified by Grace or by Christ or by being found in Christ or by our union unto Christ that the praise of our Justification might be reserved whole and entire to the Grace of God in Christ alone 5. That we are justified by the Passive not the Active obedience of Christ 6. That God seeth no sinne in the justified he knows indeed when they sinne and that they have sinned but the doth not see it because themselves and it are covered under the righteousnes and cross of Christ so that the Father doth not will not see it As if the eternal God had any other eyes besides the eyes of his knowledge to see or that Gods seeing and his knowing were at least disparats and not the same thing 7. That God punisheth not sinne in his people for he seeth not sin in his people and what he seeth not that he cannot punish He hath punished it upon Christ therefore are they free from punishment 8. That whatsoever is not in precise words forbidden in the New Testament that is lawfull for a Christian to doe how strictly soever it be prohibited in the Law and Old Testament So that I have taken notice that when in disputes such and such things have been denyed to be expresly forbidden in the New Testament and that they could not finde any clear testimonies of the New Testament literally forbidding them though before they made it a case of conscience to abstain yet thenceforth notwithstanding all that is said in the Old Testament against it they have taken full liberty to commit it These things were formerly as farre as I have taken notice either all or the chief things branded with the name of Antinomianism And they that held them were called by the most Antinomists or Antinomians because either in all or most of these assertions they either did or seemed to oppose and set themselves against the Law or Old Testament In these last seven or eight years indeed wherein all the Ghosts of all the Hereticks of former Ages have been let loose from hell in full swarms to infest this Nation more then ever the Locusts did the Land of Egypt and men in wantonizing against Christ and his Truth have thought it too little to be Satans budget-bearers in some except they had their packs filled with all varieties of his hell-bred errors so that the Legion of Devils now might be found sometimes in one man which heretofore was distributed into a legion of men By means whereof many Heresies moulded together have gone under one denomination partly through ignorance and partly out of malice both all the dreames of mad Eâ—thusiâ—sts and blasphemies against the Word sometimes and sometimes the very sacred truths of the Gospel of Christ have been exposed to the hatred of the multitude under the title of Antinomianism Men ful of all subtiltie and mischief thus painting Christ in the midst of many Devils that he might be taken for one of them and the truth of his Gospel bee abandoned under the name of Heresie But as to the forementioned tenents in former times charged with Antinomianism I shall say something First those three mentioned by Sleidan as he expresseth them it is very ambiguous whether they were truths or errors Because the words by which he describes them are ambiguous and may be taken either in a good or evill sense 1. That they taught that Repentance is not to be taught out of the Decalogue It is doubtfull what his meaning is 1. Whether they denyed it to be taught simply or secundum quid either that it ought not to be thence taught at all or not to be taught thence as ordained and effectual to justification and salvation 2. It is doubtfull also what hee meanes by the Decalogue whether he means the Ten Commandements considered strictly in their own words as meer Law for so I see not how repentance can be taught properly out of the Decalogue because it commandeth perfect obedience that there may be no need of repentance or as the Doctrine of the said Decalogue is amplified and expounded in other Scriptures where we shall find indeed Repentance required in case of transgression with a promise of temporall deliverances and blessings annexed and so the teaching of Repentance out of the Law be here opposed to the teaching of it out of the Gospel and consequentially the Legall be here opposed to the Evangelical Repentance 3. Or whether his meaning be that they would not have repentance at all taught because they took it to be a meerly Legall not an Evangelical duty therefore pertaining to the administration of the Law not of the Gospel I conceive the Historian being a man singular for his moderation in all that he writes though he speaks of their opinion in the easiest words he may yet meanes that they held it in the worst sense And such have been the Antinomians in these latter times otherwise in a good sense that his words will bear this first tenet deserves not the name of Antinomianism or error To the second if his meaning be that they impugned those that preached the Law to shake the hearts of men into self-denial and to break down the proud confidence of safety and righteousnesse in themselves thereby to make way for the doctrine of Christ into them There is something indeed worthy of blame layd to their charge But if we take his words strictly as they lye viz. that they opposed them which teach that the Gospel is not to be preached untill the Law hath so convinced and shaken the conscience c. I professe my self to be an Antinomian also if this be Antinomianism For what warrant hath any Minister so to teach The commission which we receive from Christ is to preach the Gospel to every creature in all the world Mar. 16. 15. without any restriction whether they be shaken or unshaken And if we continue Law-shakers still among some people untill wee see them thereby shaken into a Palsie of selfe-despairing I know no ground we have to promise to our selves a time of preaching Gospel so long as we live And what answer can be given in such a case to Christ for following our own carnall wisdome and not his commission Neither was it one of Luthers praises pace tanti viri dixerim from the experience of Gods working upon himself which was first the laying of him prostrate by the Law under great horrors and
Covenant and that pretious Gospell promise He that beleeveth in the Son shall not come into condemnation but is passed from death to life so I affirm faith to be both Gods and Mans instrument Gods effective and mans receptive instrument in relation to justification as shall be beneath more fully explained First it is Gods instrument This justification is but Gods pronouncing and declaring a man to his own conscience to be just and discharged from sin and condemnation through Christ so that he perceives and apprehends himself absolved and doth acquiesce in this absolution One chief instrument by which God doth thus justifie or declare and manifest man to himself just and pardoned is faith This is Gods instrument in the same sense in which Mr. Baxter maketh the promise and grant of the new Covenant to be Gods instrument and that more fully as I in part shewed before For that grant doth but declare a possibility to a man as it is considered by it self to be justifyed promising forgivenesse and life to all that shall beleeve By this act alone no singular person is actually justifyed But now this grant premised when God is pleased to infuse faith into the soul of any singular person by it as by his instrument he declareth that person to himself just and acquitted from condemnation so that he can thenceforth plead out his own justification God hath pronounced them all just and pardoned which beleeve in his Son I so beleeve therefore I am pronounced and declared of God just and pardoned So this faith is the instrument of God for so Lawyers term Deeds and Grants in writing instruments yea instruments of him that makes the Deed or Grant And the promise of the new Covenant or the new Testament is called novum Instrumentum as it is his evidence written not without the man as that Gospell grant but by the finger of Gods Spirit in the hearts of the Elect so that they may read this instrument of Gods writing within their hearts evidencing and manifesting to themselves their justification from God And this is one principall instrument and evidence of God promised under the new Covenant Jer. 31. 31-35 recited as now fulfilled by the Apostle Heb. 8. 8-12 10. 16 17. I will write my Lawes in their hearts c. what Law but the rule doctrine and evidence of life and salvaâ—ion But what benefit by having it written within them more then if it were in writing without them Yes this They shall not need externall teaching to know the Lord for they shall all know me from the least to the greatest What knowledg of God was this whereupon they should not need teachers They shall know him to be their God their Justifyer their Saviour for so much intimate the next words For I will forgive their iniquities and remember their sins no more This was one chief part of the Law or will of God written in their hearts justification or everlasting remission of sins This they should not need to be taught from without the instrument of writing or evidence thereof should be within their own hearts apparent not to others but their own reading And what more principall evidence or instrument of writing within our hearts thus to assure us then our faith engraven by Gods own hand in us I appeal to Mr. Baxter himself whether I wrest this Scripture from its proper sense or if any shall except against me I doubt not but I shall make it good to be the minde of the holy Ghost which I have here given To the same purpose is it that Faith is called the Evidence of things not seen Heb. 11. 1. Whose evidence Gods evidence given us by which he declareth to us and manifesteth to our consciences the invisible things of our justification and salvation and when given then our evidence also by which we not only apprehend but also plead against all the accusations of the Law yea of sin and Satan our actuall justification And that it is called the witnesse of God in us or within us because God by this witnesse as his instrument declares and evidenceth us to our own consciences justifyed 1 Joh. 5. 10. Secondly It is mans instrument by which he applyeth to himself and without which he cannot applie to himself this justification and remission of the new Covenant to know and be sensible of it that he may rest and rejoyce in it being justifyed in himself i. e. in his own knowledge and conscience God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself not imputing to them their trespasses 2 Cor. 5. 19. Reconciliation and Justification as hath been shâ—wed are one and the same thing That we may receive it therefore from him in Christ he gives us as many as are his Elect this living faith as an instrument by which he may apply it and bring it home into our bosomes Therefore is the operation of the soul by faith set forth in the Scripture by a comparison of a mans working by the severall members of the body as by his instruments Calling Faith sometimes the eâ—e of man by which he looketh to Christ crucifyed as the Israelites to the brazen Serpent thence to obtain cure to the wounded and poysoned soul Joh. 3. 14 15. Sometimes the fooâ— of the soul by which it runs and comes to Christ for life and justification Joh. 5. 40. Sometimes the hand of the soul by which it apprehendeth Christ and the justification that is in and by him To as many as received him to them he gave power to become the sons of God even to as many as beleeve in his Name Joh. 1. 12. Sometimes the mouth of the soul by which it eateth and drinketh in Christ with the life that is in him both to justifie and sanctifie He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my bloud hath eternall life Joh. 6. 54. If ye have tasted that the Lord is gracious 1 Pet. 2. 3. Sometimes the armes of the soul by which it embraceth and holdeth in possession Christ with his life and righteousnesse He that hath the Son hath life he that hath not the Sâ—n hath not life 1 Joh. 5. 12. What doth all this imply lesse then that faith is instrumentall to our justification Yea given to us to be the sole instrument on our part by which to apply to our selves the justification offered by God in Christ Or what else is meant by the generall voice of the Gospell pronouncing us to be justifyed by faith but by faith Gods instrument and evidence to declare and manifest it to our souls and our instrument to apprehend and hold it fast and firm to our selves It remaineth now to examin Mr. Baxters reasons by which he assayeth to prove that it is neither mans nor Gods instrument First that it is not mans instrument he thus argueth B. Not mans instrument for he is not the principall efficient he doth not justifie himself Both this and all that which followeth in this his dispute
all the justified by Faith are sanctified if it be sanctification indeede it may be made an evidence of justification 6 Yet neither all seeming peace and quietnesse of conscience or joy in expectation of salvation or hope that is made the ground of this joy and such other like seeming effects of Justification are alway sure evidences to a man that he is justified because not alway fruits or parts of sanctification they may proceed from another and baser principle viz. from the deceitfulnesse of their heart or self-love and self-advancing or from the spirit of slumber upon the conscience or from ignorance of Gods way and method of bringing many Children to glory Nor are all seeming holiness honesty meeknesse temperance patience and other like vertues either in their habite as they really affect the heart or in their act as they are with an ardent zeale for God brought forth into practice sure evidences of sanctification by Christ because these also may proceed from other and baser principles and not from the Spirit of Christ as from the abiding prints of the Law of Nature written in the heart or from the power and suggestions of a convinced and awaked conscience or from strong impressions made into the soule by a morall and vertuous education or other like sub-celestiall and unspirituall principles So that our certaine and known union to Christ and our justification and sanctification sensibly thence flowing may be properly and unfailingly made our sound evidence of the spirituall life and acceptablenesse of our vertues and works But these in themselves in no wise certaine evidences and demonstrations to us of our justification and sanctification by Christ Sanctification is one thing and a zealous endeavour to be in all things conformed to the will of God is or may be another The former is only from the Spirit of Christ and wrought only in them which are in Christ The later may proceed from morall principles and is incident even to them also that are aliens from Christ 7 Neverthelesse even these vertues and good works do so farr evidence that from the Negation of these a man is certainely denyed to be in Christ or to be justified or sanctified by the faith of Christ I mean that whosoever can allow himself in the habituall practice of any known sin or rejection of any known duty that man may know himself and be known of others to be an Alien from Christ Because whosoever is in Christ is a new Creature all things are become new not only in respect of his relation but of his manners and conversation also and in whomsoever the Spirit of Sanctification dwelleth it dwels in a state of reign not of bondage Withall these vertues and good works when they are found to flow from our union to Christ and the love of God shed abroad in our hearts through Christ and upon examination a man can truly say that he hath ceased to hew from any other Qâ—arrie or to dip from any other Fountain than from Christ that from his Spirit alone hee daily sucketh life as the branch from the root to bring forth fruit and from the sacrifice of Christs death a sweet odour to make himself and his fruit acceptable then they serve as good seconds to prove to his soul that he is justified and sanctified But so that his being in Christ must first prove his fruit to be good before his fruit can have any power to evidence him to be in Christ and the evidence of both his justification and sanctification consisteth not so much in the qualifications which he hath attained or works which he doth and hath done as in his continuall waiting upon Chrih from him alone to receive what hee ought to be and to do in all wel-pleasing before God and the love of God in Christ enabling to obedience 8 That although Sanctification and the fruits thereof do each in its own degree as aforesaid more or lesse evidence our Justification yet have they no concausality with Faith to the producing of it All that are in Christ are Saints in Christ yet their sanctity goes not before their being in Christ but is an immediate fruit thereof The forgiveness of sin and Adoption doth in order go before their doing of acceptable service to God and unacceptable service cannot justifie 9 The grace of God which bringeth salvation and justification teacheth men to deny ungodlinesse c. and to live soberly c. Cals upon all to stretch forth their Faith to apprehend to themselves in Christ both the imputed and the inherent righteousness so far is it from breathing a soul-cozening or a soul-corrupting faith Therefore is the justifying Faith called by the Holy Ghost a most holy Faith Jude 20. A soule purifying Faith Act. 15. 9. A sanctifying Faith Act. 26. 18. Implying its efficacy as well to sanctifie as to justifie and that there is no true sanctification but that which is instrumentally obtained or at least received by Faith Lastly that one chief end of our Justification is that we bring forth acceptable fruit to God here inchoate hereafter in perfect obedience to God and conformity with him And the Justifier doth and will attain his end in justifying therefore brings none to glory but such as have all vertues and good works at least in their root and seed while they are here and if after their effectuall calling they live to have time and opportunity do not unfeigâ—edly endeavour universally to declare the same in their practice So that to dream of any glorified man in heaven that was not actually a Saint upon earth is a dream from hell not from heaven All these things might have been largely proved both from the Scriptures and our Protestant Writers but that I esteem them all to be so known to be the consenting asserteons of all our Churches and by them so fully confirmed by the word that I should but abuse time to take it up in particularizing what is in this Case so generally written and read I have been the more large in expressing the doctrine of the Protestant Churches upon this Argument to wipe off the stain which Mr. Br. hath learned of the Papists to lay upon it in this and the former quere which are wholly framed to beguile the weaker sort having nothing in them to stagger the Judicious And now I leave it both to the strong and weak to judge whether the Accuser of the Brethren himself can possibly expresse more impudence and falshood in slandering the Churches of Christ than this man hath done or if he had not bound himself to speak after the Jesuits and Monks whatsoever they traducingly say whether there be any colour of reason for him to have layd upon us these two accusations To hold my self to that which I am now examining what is there in this Faith and Doctrine thereof which I have described deserving to be called a soul-cozening Faith And when he addeth That Faith which is by many
of his labors that he had beleeved nothing nor witnessed or taught any thing save what is written in the law of Moses and the Prophets Acts 24. 14. 26. 22. That whatsoever Churches he had planted were built by him upon the foundations of the Apostles and Prophets Jesus Christ himselfe being the chiefe corner-stone Eph. 2. 20. Nothing here of Aristotle and Plato but of the Prophets and Apostles i. e. the Doctrine which Christ had revealed to them and by them laid to support the Churches in the Faith of Christ That he had utterly exploded all humane wisdom Arts and inventions as incompetent with the Gospel of Christ That whether he laid in the hearts of men the principles and beginnings of Christ having to deale with such as were but yet in converting or else but babes in Christ he totally abstained from the words of mans wisdome from intermingling any of the artificiall disputes of the Philosophers that their faith might not stand in the wisdome of men but in the power of God or whether he treated with them that were perfect i. e. grown to a high stature in the knowledg and faith of Christ even when he spake wisedom delivered doctrines of the greatest depth and misteriousness to them yet was it not the wisedome of this world i. e. neither was the matter thereof the doctrine of the profound Philosophers and Disputers that were held the Princes of the world for wisdome but the mysterie of Christ Neither for the confirmation thereof did he use the words which mans wisedom teacheth i. e. that way of philosophicall and dialectical disputation whereof the Philosophers give their precepts but in the words which the holy Ghost teacheth c. 1 Cor. 2. 1. 13. Now if neither Christ nor his truly inspired Ministers ever used or would use this kind of learning in Gospel-matters the conclusion will necessarily follow that it was never of Gods ordination For Christ was faithfull in his house the Church Heb. 3. 2 6. and finished the worke which his Father had given him to do Joh. 17. 4. And the like may be truly affirmed and confirmed of the faithfulnesse of all those truly inspired Ministers of Christ according to their measure that with Paul they were stewards of God and studied so earnestly to be found faithfull that they knew nothing by themselves to accuse themselves of falshood or neglect 1 Cor. 4. 1 2. 4. That they kept back Act. 20. 20. 26 27. nothing which was profitable to the people but declared to them the whole Counsell of God therefore were pure from the blood of all men so that it must follow that either the use of the aforesaid humane learning in Gospel-matters is no ordinance of God and at the best unprofitable or else that Christ and his Apostles not using it yea rejecting the use of it were not faithfull But all will deny the latter therefore must grant the former A second Reason to prove it not to be an ordinance of God c. I may draw from the slighting abasing and invective terms which the Holy Ghost in Scripture useth against it The wisedom of the Holy Ghost doth in no wise slight any ordinance of God qualified and blessed by him to Gospel-ends But the use of those humane pieces of learning whereof I am speaking is much slighted and abaâ—ed by the H G as impotent and unusefull to Gospel-work and ends Ergo c. That the H G doth thus slight it in Scripture to omit what the Lord Christ speaks against the traditionary learning of the Jewish Rabbies Mat. 15. 1. 9. 23. 13 c. 11. 25 26. Joh. 9. 29-41 I shall mention only how contemptuously the H G by the Apostles pointing directly to this Gentilizing learning speaks of it They became vain in their imaginations saith he and their Rom. 1. 21-23 foolish heart was darkened Professing themselves wise they became fools and changed the glory of God into a corruptible image c. What more to the abasing of their learning he calls it at the best the very froth of light fancies and imaginations the darknesse of foolish hearts a profession of such wisedom as made them grosse fools that as it acted about religion and the way to happinesse it made both it and them a very abhomination to the Lord. Again The preaching of the Crosse is to them that perish foolishnesse As it is written I will destroy the wisedom of the wise bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent Where is the wise where is the Scribe where is the disputer of this world hath not God made foolish the wisedom of this world For after that in the wisedom of God the world by wisedom knew not God it pleased God by the foolishnesse of preaching to save them that believe c. 1 Cor. 1. 18-21 c. How differing is the spirit of our Sophisters from the Spirit which wrought in the Apostle He pronounceth this Sophisticall learning to be so far from being a furtherance to the only true which is the Gospel-way of salvation as that it is an enemie to it rejects it as foolishnesse 2. Them that follow it as their rule and authority what to believe and do that they may be saved to be in a perishing condition in the ready way to damnation They that perish account the simplicity of the Gospel without the fulture or rather tainture of their Arts foolishnesse 3. He affirms God to be an enemy to it to detest any patronage from it to his mysterious Doctrine of the Gospel He hath left it upon record to curb wanton wits that he will destroy the wisedome c. 4. That according to his threat he hath executed and will still fulfill therefore challengeth the Sophisters to give answer from their own experience at last whether God hath not doth not alway so curse this wisedom of theirs that it turns to ruine and foolishnesse Where is the Scribe where the Disputer c. Hath not God c. 5. That it is a knowledg by which men know not God which while they pursue they lose utterly the saving knowledg of God 6. That in contempt of this secular learning God will by the simplicity and foolishnesse of Gospel-preaching save them that believe leaving the Disputers to reason themselves into Hell It pleased God c. Unto this I shal add but two Testimonies more the one when the Apostle hath to do with a company of Christians dwelling among the Philosophers in great jealousie fear of them he cryes out Beware ye be not spoiled with Philosophy Col 2. 7. vain decit He speaks of no possibility of any good that there should accrew unto them by the help of Philosophy but of great danger to be spoyled and corrupted by it and when is there such hazard of being corrupted by it he answers when men intermingle this learning which is but of humane invention and tradition after the Rudiments of the world
Scripture may be judge and that they will put by no one Text to that end produced till they can give some other commodious and not forced interpretation We gladly accept this rule of dispute and pronounce all other rules in Questions of this kinde to be irregular Yet have we somewhat to say to the proposer of it 1 Why hath he in the former part of this Tractate so much wandered from the rule of Scripture as insufficient or improper to try his opinions and make use in stead of it of so much exotick learning the Jesuits sophistry and Socinus his right reason as if the Scripture were not but these were to be attended on as proper Judges in such matters 2 When all the Scriptures which he here bringeth to prove a cooperation of workes with faith to justification scarce any one of them excepted as I undertake if he call me to it to shew have been alleaged by the Monkes and Jesuits against us and been answered over and over a hundred times by our Divines why doth he here urge them as Scriptures of his own collection and require an interpretation to be given to them that might manifest they hold not forth Justification by works how doth he abase the Ministers his readers for whose seducing he hath compiled this Book by imprinting within himselfe a supposition that their Libraries consist only of Aristotle and Schibler and that they are as ignorant of the controversie between the Papists and us as they were born Else if he supposed they had read such controversies he would not have called for an interpretation of these Scriptures as now first alleaged by himselfe Simplicity in handling the truths of Christ is necessary to declare the heart upright If Mr. Baxter had possessed such a jewell within his bosome he would have exploded all tricks of subtlety and craft with an Anathema Maranatha and told us plainly these Scriptures have been urged by the Papists for their justification by works that the Protestants have said somewhat to elude the force of such Scriptures by forced interpretations of them but against every interpretation of every such Scripture he thus and thus excepteth and desireth these exceptions of his to be answered else he cannot be convinced but that works cooperate with faith to Justification But in the midst of a room that is hung with a thousand candles and torches to cry out O that some one would give me one spark of light in this dark dungeon this is no lesse then to pronounce all save himself within the room blind that in the midst of light they see nothing Or otherwise to pronounce all these lights darknesse in comparison of his more shining light Let not Mr. Baxter so contemn all the Anti-papisticall worthies as smoaking snuffs in comparison of his beames nor think all his yoak-fellowes in the Ministry at the present to be such glow-wormes and slimy sots that being thus spitted with his base esteem of them they should be insensible of it and goe away rejoycing as sprinkled with his holy water 3 Why doth he only quote Scriptures and bring for himself and against us only Arithmeticall figures and ciphers without the words of those Scriptures and telling us how they make for him against us would he have us to understand that he means to argue from them no otherwise then the Priests and Jesuites have done before him we might then answer all in a word by sending him to those pretious servants of Christ who have answered the Argumentations of these Priests and Jesuites from these Scriptures Or is it to straighten us with a doubtfulnesse what to answer because we know not how he will argue from these Scriptures and to reserve to himself an advantage to except against all our answers that we have not spoken to the purpose he meant not so but thus and thus to have argued from these Testimonies What better answer to such a roving disputer then to leave him roving untill he will cease from circling and fall upon some point wherein he will declare himself that he would be answered This I should do had it been my only purpose to have answered Mr. Baxter but because my aime was and is least to grapple with him from whom I expect nothing better but many things worse after all wiser mens endeavours then mine and could shew reason for it but chiefly to preserve the single hearted Christians free from his infection I shall not wholly passe by without examination these Scriptures that none by the misunderstanding of Scriptures may be carryed into Anti-scripturall errors 4 But how seasonable is the Caution that he gives us to take heed of giving any uncommodious or forced interpretation to those Scriptures which the Papists and after them the Socinians have urged for their justification by workes As if all our Divines and Martyrs for Christ in these last 200. years have abused the Seriptures with false interpretations and so have been Apostates from Christ in departing from Rome and that the Jesuits and Socinians have been the only sincere interpreters of Scriptures when contrariwise all that have but looked over the pale into their writings find nothing so sacred no Scripture so plain which they do not violate and distort with their Sophisticall cavillations That Hell it self hath in no age vomited out any brood of hereticks that can parallell these in audacious abuse and violation of Scriptures yet while Mr. Baxter fights with their Arguments and maintains their assertions he cals upon us Take heed abuse not Scriptures 5 Why doth he not produce first seeing he professeth himself a Protestant and Anti-papist those manifold and cleer Scriptures which all the Protestant Churches alleage for stablishing of justification by faith alone and the expelling of works from having any part with faith in this work and answer their Arguments drawn from such Scriptures before he brings in the Scriptures which the Jesuits have muâ—â—ered up against their assertion At least why doth he not declare as well what the Protestants have to say for themselves as what the Papists have to say against them that both sides may be heard But to make a roar on the one side and to exhibit the other party as mute as fishes having nothing to say or reason to give for their own Religion nor to gainsay the adversaries in opposing it is this fair and Christian dealing Thus to stifle our cause or rather the cause of Christ in darkenesse and to imprison the light by which we have walked from the time of Luther untill this day what doth it argue in him lesse then what Christ tels us He that doeth evill hateth the light neither cometh to the light lest his deeds which are evill should be reproved Joh. 3. 20. These things thus premised let us come now to the Scripture making it the Judge and touchstone in this Controversie But so as that it shall be requisite for me to supply what Mr. Baxter hath left untouched
slaves future service is not a condition but a consequent of his present redemption But let us see now whether Mr. Baxter with this paint of that which he cals right Reason do fight against God or Man doth resist the placits of men or else the holy Ghost himself He required before that all might be tryed by Scriptures Let us now bring his doctrine to the touch-stone I shall not repeat all or any of the Scriptures before alleadged or that might be further alleadged against him One arrow out of that holy quiver one Scripture out of the whole body of Gospell doctrine shall suffice to smite to the heart to death it self all that he goeth about here with fine flourishes of wit to establish Eph. 2. 8 9 10. thus speaks the holy Ghost By grace are ye saved through faith and that not of your selves it is the gift of God Not of works lest any man should boast For ye are Gods workmanship created in Christ Jesus to good works which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them That the word Saved is an equipollent here with Justifyed if there should be any that will deny yet Mr. Baxter will and must affirme unlesse he will beat in pieces one of the chief pillars of the fabrick erected in this book and overthrow what he hath built In this truth he must joyn with us though in other he estrange himself from us The same Act of God being called justifying as it dischargeth us from the state of our misery as considered to be a state of sin and saving as it delivereth us from it under the consideration of it as a state of condemnation and vengeance Mr. Baxter will grant cannot but grant this And then there will naturally drop from this Scrtpture these following positions 1 That the justification or salvation of the Covenant of grace is by faith 2 That it is not of works but by faith in opposition to works 3 That the very works which flow from our union to Christ and to which we are new created in Christ Jesus even those which Mr. Baxter calleth the righteousnesse of the Gospell are excluded from bearing any part with faith in our justification 4 That the not justification by works doth in no wise hinder the beleevers performing of them for they are created in Christ Jesus their hearts are new wrought by the Spirit to a holy delight in them 5 That God hath not ordained them to justifie but for the new created and justifyed in Christ to walk in them 6 That to teach otherwise of works the very works of Sanctification is to depresse Gods grace and to extoll mans boasting and vain-glory 7 Even these gospell works and righteousnesse are excluded from having any part in justifying not only as collaterals with the satisfaction of Christ but also as collaterals with faith i. e. from bearing a part either in causality or conditionality with faith to justifie I challenge Mr. Baxter and all his Legall and Anti-evangelicall disciples here to deny any one of these positions to spring naturally from this Text. And if the the holy Ghost here speak all this then by it all that Mr. Baxter speaketh throughout this whole Tractate for justification by works is by the breath of Gods mouth blown to the curse as in many things I shall by Gods help shew afterward At the present what he speaketh of works comprehended in faith to justification is here shaken off as a Sophisticall phantasticall Antiscripturall dream the holy Ghost here by the positing of faith in expresse words rejecting works Gospell works all that Mr. Baxter makes a part with faith in that which he cals Evangelicall righteousnesse from all and any copartnership with faith in saving or justifying so excludes all as that he denyeth that justification by grace can any more stand if the best Gospell works of the best Saints are put in any cooperation with faith in the promoting of it All the rest that he hath in the explication pa. 240. and thence to pa. 243. is wholly besides the question which is not whether works and duties be reducible to faith or in what respect every particular qualification and duty standeth to it But whether reduced or not reduced it doth by Gods appointment help with saith to justify us before God This we have found to be an usuall feat of Mr. Baxter where his assertions are confident and peremptory but his proofs of them light and shadie to devise in such case some witty passage wherewith to divert the considerations of his reader from the shame and nakednesse of his foregoing Arguments And this most probably was his drift and craft here having given us but words in stead of Arguments to prove that works are comprehended and implied in faith in all such Scriptures as attribute justification to faith only that the emptinesse and nothingnesse of his argumentation to make this good may not appear to the reader he tols him a way to attend to a subtle and plausible dispute of the relation that every good endowment and work hath particularly to faith In which discourse of his we will not examine how many things are true and how many false for if they were all true they are nothing to the thing in question viz. whether in the severall relations that Mr. Baxter makes them to stand to faith or in any other they help with faith to justification and that so as that when all these with faith cojustifie we may be yet said to be justifyed by faith alone When he hath spoken all by meer affirming without confirming he thus indeed at last concludeth pa. 243. B. So then when you invite a man to your house it is not necessary to bid him come in at the door or bring his head or arms or legs or cloaths with him though these are necessary because all these are necessarily implyed Even so when we are said to be justifyed by faith only or when it is promised that he which beleeveth shall be saved all these forementioned duties are implyed and included How ecliptick is falshood but sincerity open and full No man invites another to his house but to some end either to taste of some dainties or hear some good tidings or see some excellent work or for some other end He should have named the end and we would grant him all thus that as much as the door head legs armes clothes of the invited do partake with the mouth in the act of tasting or with the eye in seeing or the ear in hearing so much when we are invited to Christ do other duties and workes partake with faith in receiving him to justification A third argument if indeed it be not one and the same in substance and differ only in words from the former he draweth from a wide wilde vast confused and incircumscriptive definition of faith begotten of his own brain and now first as an overgrown monster born into the world and baptized