A VINDICATION OF THE Faithful Rebuke TO A False Report AGAINST The RUDE CAVILS of The Pretended Defence Titus 1. 13 Rebuke them sharply that they may be sound in the Faith Tum si quis est qui Dictum in se inclementius Existimavit esse sie existimet Responsum non Dictum esse quia laesit priùs Terent. Eunuch Prolog 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Arist. Rhet. 3. LONDON Printed for Iohn Lawrence at the Angel in the Poultrey 1698. To the Author of the Defence to the Late Report SIR 'T IS somewhat a hard Case that having just cause to complain I must complain to your Self of your Self and make your own Conscience Chancellor in your Cause placing you upon the Bench who in Justice ought to stand and Plead at the Bar. But my Appeal will lie from your Self in the height and heat of Passion to your Self when the ferment is a little dasht with due Reflection From your Self as Laccar'd all over with the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to your Self when you shall think fit to reassume your innate Ingenuity of which benign Moments I can not wholly Dispair because you must needs have some good Nature yet to spare having spent so little of it in your Defence Now when I have done this I have nothing more to do but to repose my Self in the Comfort of my own Innocency committing the Concerns of that Truth which I espouse and vindicate to Him who has the greatest Interest in it § 1. And first I must seriously and sadly Complain that having given us Rep. p. 5. The Substance of the Gospel of Christ the Ground and Foundation of our Faith for which you received a faithful Rebuke that yet when you pretended a Defence of your Report you should not bestow one Word in Defence of your own Gospel Who will ever believe your Report in Matters of Fact when you believe not your own Gospel in Matters of Faith And I assure you Sir They who knew your excellent skill at Fencing and Defencing did expect you should have been the Defender of your own Faith and wondered you should no better fortifie your own Frontiers when you invaded anothers Territories But such was the Method of your Great Friend religiously pursued two Years ago 1. You cannot but remember that the Rebuke Charged you that out of the Substance of your Gospel you had quite expunged Regeneration Conversion Repentance Holiness Sanctification a new Heart new Obedience and good Works And would not the Gospel look Meagre Lean and Consumptive had our Lord Jesus Christ left them out of his Gospel as you have out of Yours And are these great Matters grown so inconsiderable with you now a Days that they must first be left out of your Religion and then left to shift for themselves as they can to sink or swim without your least Care to Defend them 2. It was charg'd upon that Scheme of yours that it gave great and just Cause of Suspicion to those who were of no Jealous Inclinations that you had utterly discarded Faith from any concern in the Iustification of a Sinner made it unnecessary to our Union with Christ that so we might have an Interest in his Righteousness and only gave it a place in our escaping Wrath to come and having Everlasting Life Whoever pretends to give us the Substance of the Gospel is obliged to give us all the Essentials that Constitute it and if you Cashier Faith from any Part or Lot in Justification which Christ and his Gospel make so necessary to it your Draught is defective in an Essential Part and then I may leave it you to Judge whether it can be any Religion at all I have ever thought this Point to contain the Venime and Poison of all Antinomianism That a Sinner may be justified without Faith in Jesus Christ for if this be so 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Tell us where we may safely fix How far we must go back for the precise Moment of Justification some send us as far as the Decree of Election Others are Content to bring it down as low as Christs making actual Satisfaction And some will abate us three Days and date it from Christs Resurrection and others will reduce it yet lower to the Minute of our Conception and Formation in the Womb but take the rise where and fix the Moment when you please if you conceive of Justification one Moment before our Union with Christ by Faith you may as well make it bear Date from any of the other Epocha's which the Teeming Imaginations of Antinomian Brains have invented I know not therefore how to believe you in what you say Defence p. 85. That the Reporter about seventeen Years ago wrote against Antinomianism For most certain it is that either the Reporter is not the same Man that wrote that Book or is not the same Man he was when he wrote the Book Either you was not the Author or you are Metamorphosed into a Reporter Heu quantum mutatus ab illo Hectore What a lamentable Commutation of Persons is here made from a Hyperaspistes of Truth into a Hector for the Antinomian Errors So easie is the Conversion of a Hector into a Ranter I will therefore charitably undeceive you and plainly Convince you that you was not whatever you Fancy no you was not the Author of that honest Book Display Epist. The first Work of a Minister of the Gospel is to Preach up Repentance towards God and then Faith in our Lord Iesus Christ Your Gospel Minister was then to Preach up Repentance but now he must Preach it down then he must Preach it first but now he must Preach it neither first nor last Then it was in the Ministers Commission now it s left out of the Gospel Again Every Elect Soul while under the Power of Unbelief and other Lusts is Unpardoned and in a State of Condemnation whence notwithstanding your Election if you would receive actual Pardon you must go to God through Christ for it Nay you must receive Christ in your Heart by Faith and that you may we must beseech you as in Christs stead that you come unto Christ but come unto Christ you cannot without Faith and Repentance Now Sir I appeal to your own Conscience do you can you believe that you wrote the Display when you read your own Report That you were the Author of these two inconsistent Pieces Is it possible you should know your own Face when you see it in such different Glasses I hope I may use your own Words and say O Blessed Change Repentance is necessary to Pardon Faith to Justification in the one but no News to be heard of either of them for those Ends in the other So that you fall under the Censure of Origen Ubi bene Nemo melius Ubi male Nemo pejus 3. You cannot but remember Sir That in your Substance of the Gospel you affirmed that it was our State and Condition by
Presbyterians Such a Cyphar would have given you a great Figure I have read that these two Letters S. L. which you have now stampt upon your Book were once Printed with a Red Hot Iron upon the Cheeks of a famous Patriot who was a Confessor and hugely Ambitious to be a Martyr for his Countrey His Enemies did Interpret S. L. to stand for slanderous Libel and one of the Wits of that Time would needs give us the Etymology of the Word Libel that is A lie with a â—ell hung about the Neck to Ring the scandalous Story up and down to his Friends in the Country and really it would as decently have set upon your Front as his Cheeks I wonder not at your Desultory Humour that Ebbs and Flows like the Euripus in frequent Vicissitudes and is constant in nothing but Inconstancy Sometime you are so smooth as if you would cut my Throat with a Feather And by and by so cruelly severe as if you would saw off my Head with an old rusty Hand-saw It is some Comfort to be rail'd at in handsome Language but it s the worst of Deaths to be Assassinated with dull insipid Reflections destitute of Wit and Truth So that when we can meet with nothing but ill chosen Words dark Phrase ill-turn'd Periods and the Language all over Leprous and Scabbed the best Defence I can Recommend to the Reader against your Defence is a good Pair of sharp-long-Nails Sir I have appealed to you but because I understand I must expect no Redress of Greivances I do hereby Appeal from you to the Impartial Reader At present I take my Leave of you and Rest as you see Your Servant c. A Vindication of the Faithful Rebuke from the Rude Cavils of the Pretended Defence of the late Report THE Author of the Defence has so strongly immur'd himself and intrench'd his Cause in Dung that we have more occasion for the Scavenger than the Schollar for the Shovel than the Pen to remove it § I. And the first Nuisance I must remove is an Invidious Misrepresentation of his Rebuker as if he charged the Congregational in the bulk without a Salvo to the Reputation of any one of them Def. p. 82. Now to give some colour to this Calumny he has recourse to his wonted Artifice a piece of pure impure Forgery from Reb. p. 56. The true Reason of their the Congregational Brethren severe Displeasure against the third Paper is that it has so clearly and fully born its Testimony against the Antinomians A single Observation will remove this Dirt that those Words the Congregational Brethren are his own Gloss no part of my Text His own Suppositious Antecedent obtruded upon my Relative and I would leave it to his Conscience to determine of the Honesty of this dealing had I not had too frequent experience of its partiality I have ever embraced the Orthodox and Godly of both Denominations with equal Affections nor could I ever yet see cause from their Principles or Practices to Abate those Affections Tho the same Notions in the hands and management of those of a due Temper are clear another thing when they 're got into the power of those of a fiery Spirit and bigotted Zeal But yet more particularly 1. I return this There needed no Exception where there was no general Impeachment nor was there occasion for a Salve where there was no Wound given to any but the Reporter and his few Antinomian Partizans 2. And yet whether it were from my own good Nature or a foresight of this Objection I had timously and sufficiently obviated this Cavil Rebuke pag. 23. It 's an unquestionable Truth that some of them had vented such strange Doctrines that it gave Umbrage to them the United Brethren that there might be found among them one or two or so that had dipt very deep in the Crispian Heterodoxies 3. Nor ought he to take himself to be of that Consideration and Bulk bulky enough tho he be as if the whole Body of the Congregational was stowed in his Prominent Belly For although his Discourse generally runs in the Style of We we yet 't is no other Language than what Emperors and Reporters Princes and Defences do use when yet they design no more than a single Person 4. He will hardly allow the same liberty to interpret his own words in his Preface where he scandalously exposes the Discourses from the Pulpit of late Years to have been Adjusted to move the Affections rather than to inform the Iudgment And yet this he has done without any salvo either to Presbyterian or Congregational Learned or Unlearned Ordained or Un-ordained Linnen-drapers Barbers or Taylors 5. I will add that I know many of the Congregational Brethren who are sound in the Faith holy in their Conversation eminently useful Ministers of Christ in the great Work of the Gospel and wholly remote from all Antinomian Tincture But he shall pardon me if I say that others have more grievously corrupted themselves their Doctrine their Hearers with these Speculations A brief Specimen whereof was given Reb. p. 25. A much larger by the Answer to the Report p. 22 23. and a much larger yet remains ready to be given in due time This filth it 's true affects not the Cause in the least but was thrown to cast an Odium upon the Person of the Rebuker which being removed the Reader may now breath in a freer and fresher Air I dismiss it therefore with this short Note That the Defence in this Paragraph has proved himself a Person hugely versed in the Oriental Tongues for the second Language spoken in Paradice by the grand Enemy of Mankind was the Lying and Slandering Tongue and the elegant Figure with which our Author has imbellisht his whole Discourse is Purus putus Satanismus § II. There is one gross Mistake more in the Defence p. 85. If it be proper to talk of one more when the whole is but one grand continued complicated Mistake when he would perswade us that the Reporter about seventeen Years ago wrote a Book against Antinomianism meaning no doubt that well meaning Piece The Glory of Free Grace display'd I will now once for all rectifie his Error and evince that the Display and the Report could not possibly be Indited from one Head nor conceived in one Heart nor written by one Hand and Pen. Display p. 30. assures us That God's punishing Sin is founded in and upon his Rectoral Iustice the Excellency of his Laws but the Report grounds it upon his Essential Iustice. Again Display p. 75. asserts That Faith and Union with Christ is in order of Nature antecedent to an actual Imputation of Christ's Righteousness and consequently before our Iustification in the sight of God But the Report tells us quite another Story for tho Believing is allowed some place in escaping Wrath to come and having Everlasting Life yet he assigns it no Service no Interest no Concern at all in the Iustification of
softly return this That of all Men living a Reporter has need of a good Memory but here his Memory or Conscience or both fail'd him For tho it be true I did say the Charge was Rude yet 't was this Reporter who added that it was ignorant and thus I must be accused by him of the Crime if it was a Crime of his own Expression and of this I have the Evidence of many Brethren whose Faithfulness in Witness-bearing is Incontestible and not to be mention'd in the same Day with his for the thing was not spoke in a corner and it was at that time when this Reporter frequented Little St. Hellens before he fell and left his first Station § 5. How I have Acquitted my self of the Charge of Antinomianism brought against me the Reader has heard whether there be any pretence for an Insinuation that the Reporter is a favourer of Dr. Crisp's Notions the Reader shall now judge The Difficulty of making a clear Judgment upon this Trimming Author's Opinion in this matter lies chiefly in this Whether we are to take our Measures of what he is from his visible Book or his invisible Heart What he is in his Heart and secret Inclinations falls not under our Cognizance what he appears to be in his legible and intelligible Writings comes under our Notice But still whether we are to proceed by the strict inflexible Rule of Judgment or Reason or whether we are to allow some Latitude in our Thoughts according to Charity may admit of a Debate And 1. my Charity inclines me to think him no Antinomian from what a Friend of his and mine assur'd me the other Day since I awarded my self the Pennance and my Pen the Punishment of these Lines Sir said he the Reporter is no more an Antinomian than your self It may be so reply'd I but for all that he may be Antinomian enough for he has endeavoured to prove me one But if he be none why does he write at this rate If he Preaches one thing and Prints another if he be one Man in the Pulpit and another from the Press if he writes one thing and means another how shall we possibly make a Judgment of his Faith 'T is not the sense of his Soul but the sense of his Book in which I am concern'd if these two be at odds they must either agree it or fight it out as well as they can Well! Well! reply'd our Common Friend I can assure you he 's no Antinomian in his Judgment tho he writes a little squinting that way to gratifie some great Friends that are strongly byassed that way Ay but said I this is to pluck the Thorn out of one Foot and thrust it into the other for now you allow him sound in his Head but then you render him rotten at Heart and thus while you clear his Orthodoxy you accuse him of Hypocrisie and what Account can you give of his halting and doubling thus in a matter of the greatest Importance But here our Discourse was interrupted 2. Therefore not daring to depend upon our Friends Opinion I sought Relief from the Defence it self hoping I might rely on his own Judgment of his own self and as I find I will nakedly Report to the Reader without taking his Office out of his Hands The Author of the Rebuke did think and now is confirm'd in his Thoughts that the United Brethren after they had given such incontestible Demonstrations of their soundness in the Faith against all Arminian and Socinian Errors might reasonably expect that those other Brethren should give some good account of their stedsastness in the Faith in opposition to the Antinomian Heterodoxies Nor did they want cogent Reasons for their Expectations that if they gave satisfaction upon slender and sleighty Surmises the others ought to give the like where the Proofs were Notorious and Flagrant Now the Defence could not but take some notice of this Passage and thinks it not amiss to shew what fell under Consideration when this Point was to be debated Now Reader mark well what he says 1. It was thought conducive says he p. 66. to the great end to avoid as much as possible a running into the Discussion and Determination of Differences of lesser moment and therefore to keep to those Matters which did more nearly concern the Essentials in Matters of Faith Now to set the Reader right herein he must Note 1. That tho the United Brethren valued Peace as high as any they know they might buy Gold too dear and therefore durst not purchase Peace with the loss of Truth The great end therefore which they had in their Eye and upon their Heart was that they might secure their Union upon good security that Antinomian Errors were not secretly lodged in the Hearts of some Brethren or if there harboured it might by a sound Test be discovered And therefore a Test was drawn up to obviate all possible Evasions See Rebuke P. 25. 2. Whereas this Defender tells us of Differences of a lesser moment This will bring our Author's Faith to the Ordeal and we shall now see what are the Differences of lesser moment in his Opinion and to speak plainly they were such Trifles as these Whether Faith be necessary to Iustification Repentance to pardon These were our Author's Punctilio's his Matters of lesser moment And thus we have gain'd this one Point That a Iustifying Faith and Repentance in order in Pardon are none of the Essentials of the Gospel of Christ as they were but Accidentals in the Gospel of the Reporter 3. To trim up this matter handsomly and find out a due Temper as the Phrase and Practice was in the Conventicle of Trent both Parties are deluded under a colour of pleasing both and thus things stand in the first Paper Altho Regeneration Repentance towards God and Faith in our Lord Iesus Christ and a holy Conversation are by God's express Word manifestly necessary to the Salvation of a Sinner c. These things then are necessary to Salvation but not so to Pardon Iustification Acceptance with God for in that respect they are Matters of lesser moment which must not be discussed much less determined but avoided as much as possible because that was conducive to their great ends Now I would modestly ask Whether the Ends of both these sorts of Brethren were the same For it 's most evident that the end of one was to conceal the end of the other to discover latent Antinomianism And secondly I would ask If the Care and Caution was so great not to come to a Discussion of these lesser Matters why was the Zeal so hot to come to a Determination of far more inconsiderable They could discuss and determine upon a Phrase Commutation of Persons between Christ and Sinners but could not or would not determine by any Means that Faith and Repentance were absolutely necessary to the Iustification of a Sinner 4. The Author would give us a Reason why they would not
into one Lump What a Monster will that Person seem made up of such Integrals and such a Person as Mr. Hobbs represents his Commonwealth to be an Aggregate of Copper-Farthings or Guinea's Of this Objection our Antagonist is so civil as to take no notice the wisest way in the World unless he could have given an Answer What does he then For a noise must be made Why he multiplies Quotation upon Quotation Author upon Author and such a Lumber of Modern Testimonies as if the Cause were to be press'd to Death with number not with weight but this was the Logick of Iob's Friends who proceeded eternally upon an Ignoratio Elenchi Job 6. 25. what doth your Arguing Reprove Thus all his Learned Divines are of this Faith That Christ dyed in our stead But that this Phrase Christ dyed in the Person of Sinners was necessary to the Explication or Confirmation of that Truth they prove not But let us hear him speak Defence p. 11. The Phrases of a change of Persons between Christ and us and of Christs taking on him the Person of Sinners and suffering in their Person room and stead are most apt to convey unto our Understanding the True the Orthodox the genuine Sense of those Texts Christ dyed for our Sins and for us This he asserts with great Bravery and Confidence enough I hope we may have leave to wedge in a few Words 1. As for one of these Phrases viz. That Christs suffering in the room and stead of Sinners is apt to convey to our Understanding the true and for ought I know the genuine Sense too of Christ's dying for us and for our Sins I agree with him perfectly because every Expression in the World is apt to convey its own self to a humane Understanding 2. And yet perhaps it had been more properly said that Christs dying for us and for our Sins is apt to convey to our Understanding this Truth that Christ dyed in our room and stead For when all is said that can be said 't is the Holy Scripture divinely inspired that must convey to our Understanding whatsoever we are to believe and build our Faith upon nor ought we from Terms of humane Contrivance to conceive of the Scriptures but by and from the Scriptures of Truth to judge of and to Measure those Terms and Phrases and from thence to form such other Terms as there is really need of and occasion for which must clearly and adequately express the Mind of God therein contained and from hence they receive all their Value and Authority 3 I must nevertheless enter my peremptory Dissent to what he says That those Phrases A Commutation of Persons between Christ and Sinners and Christ's suffering and dying in the Person of Sinners are most apt to convey to our Understanding the sense of those Scriptures Christ died for our Sins and for us And I advance these opposite Positions That these Phrases are not apt nor more apt nor most apt to convey to our Understanding the aforesaid Truths 1. They are not apt in themselves but inept and unproper to convey to our Understanding those Truths for that Christ dyed for us and for our sins conveys to our Understanding That there was a Change of Christ's Person for others but the phrase A Commutation of Persons between Christ and Sinners conveys to my Understanding this Falshood That there were two persons exchanged mutually each for the other They are inept and improper to convey to my Understanding the import of those Scripture Expressions because they are less known less understood than those Scriptures which they pretend to illustrate 2. Nor are they more but less apt to convey to our Understanding the sense of those Scripture Expressions Christ suffered for us for our Sins than the other Phrase so well known and approved Christ suffâ—red dyed in our room place and stead loco nostro vice nostra 3. Nor can they be most apt to do this Service because Scripture Expressions and Phrases are more apt much more apt for that end than they unless we should be so vain as to fancy that the Spirit of God was not able to chuse the most apt and proper Phrases to convey to our Understandings whatever it was his Will we should believe with our Hearts to Salvation At this rate the Apostle spoke and taught and argued 1 Cor. 2. 13. Which things we speak not in the Words which Man's Wisdom teacheth but which the Holy Ghost teacheth comparing things Spiritual with Spiritual Nor did St. Paul fear he should vent Pestilent Heresies so long as he kept close to the Words of the Canon dictated by the Holy Ghost But it seems these Persons whom our Author has Dubb'd to be the Godly Learned have a priviledge to render their Terms of Art more expressive more signisicant than the Canoniz'd Expressions of the Holy Ghost I must beg their pardon Men may deceive and be deceived What the Psalmist spoke in his haste the Apostle spoke in cool Blood that all Men are Lyars that is we can have no infallible certainâ—y no good security to rest our Faith upon them further than as they propose to our Belief what is conformable to the Word of God Sir I need not give my self or you any further trouble in this matter 'T is a Phrase and but a Phrase that all this pother is about and a Phrase none of the best that ever was invented and a Phrase that has been and may easily be interpreted to an evil sense and the World has been troubled about some fruitless barren Controversies about it and if any has occasion for it let 'em use it and for my self I will use my own liberty But yet Sir because I am no Hider but open-hearted I will therefore deal frankly with you and give you what satisfaction I am able in this phrase 1. I firmly believe that Christ took on him our Nature the Nature of Sinners but not their sinful Natures He was made like unto us in all things yet without sin Heb. 4. 15. I believe the Word was made Flesh and dwelt among us John 1. 14. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Eternal 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 condescended to dwell in the Humane Nature as in his Tabernacle That this Assumption of the Humane Nature into personal Union with himself was a Foundation laid in the Counsel between the Father and the Son for his suffering in his Holy and Sinless person for and in the stead of Man 2. I believe also that according to the Compact and Counsel that was between them both the Father and the Son Jesus Christ did take on him our sins that is he bore the punishment due to them and therefore in some sense bore the Guilt too as the R. R. B. B. of Norwich and Worcester have explained the Term from Isa. 53. 5. He bore our Sins and carried our Sorrows 3. I have read and probable 't was true There was once a Crew of lewd