it which is not to be seen by climbing up into heaven to search into Gods secrets but by finding in themselves faith and sanctification they say and those too such as are so and so qualified as may evidence them to be fruits of election and so men must have the effects before and without their proper cause which is love discovered to men Tit. 3.4 5 6. they must have all these Repentance Faith Love to God and men Justification Sanctification yea and perhaps too eternal Glory before they shall see any solid ground or motive to repent believe in him serve and love him or that Christ hath done any thing for them by vertue of which he can justifie and sanctifie them and bring them to glory with him And so they are not lead to deny ungodliness and worldly lusts and to live soberly righteously and godlily by Gods grace appearing in the Gospel to them but deny ungodliness and live godlily or rather pretend and seem to do so that so grace might appear to them and that they might see the gospel declaration to belong to them The Gospel doctrine is to them but like the law that is a doctrine that consists of duties commanded with promises and threatnings annexed without Gospel motives of Gods love propounded the viewing of which things the Spirit of Love breaths in to lead and to produce the things required and so their endeavours after those works and duties are looked upon as the fruits of grace and goodness yea as the arguments of their Election past and future happiness when they may be as far from both as the Pharisee that denied Gods free Grace to Publicans and sinners and yet judged himself a partaker of Gods Grace by his works of righteousness magnifying grace against free will and thanking God as giving such grace in those things which were but the products of his will neglecting and abiding ignorant of that grace in Christ which would have truly corrected both his Judgment and will such the effect of this limiting restraining doctrine as theirs also was Men are led hereby to bottom the Gospel it self with all arguments of love and goodness therein leading to faith and repentance upon their faith and repentance which they pretend they may have before they know whether they have any solid ground for them or no as if they could winde in themselves into the perception of Gods love by their frames and endeavors and not first be wrought up to them by the love and goodness of God perceived by them and as if men should look to themselves and their endeavors as the glass through which they shall see Gods love as for them and not rather upon God and Christ as declared in the Gospel to love them as the glass in which they may see their obligation to God in Christ and be moved to and strengthened in their seeking after him hoping in him In that their way thou mayst see that God commands thee to repent or change thy minde to Judg him good and to love him and that he threatens thee if thou dost not and promises great things to thee if thou dost but whether thou beest one of them that he intends any good in his promises to or that art in a possibility of attaining them or only hast them propounded to thy hearing without good will towards thee but that thou mightest thereby have the greater destruction that by it thou knowest not for it presents no act of love from him that according to it thou canst say respects thee or takes thee in as the object of it only do all those things first repent believe love serve him and then it shall be true for thee to believe that he hath good will to thee a most preposterous way that doth to men as Pharaoh to the Israelites takes away their straw and bids them get it themselves and yet exacts their number of brick takes away that declaration of Gods love and good will to men that should properly move them to repent believe c. and sets men upon seeking arguments and demonstrations of these to themselves and yet not fail to perform those duties required of them A doctrine it is that presents less love to this or that man then the Law it self did whereas the Apostle magnifies the true Gospel as more excellent and more un vailed for it set some certain demonstrations of Gods goodness to the Israelites before them as his bringing them out of Egypt chusing them in their Fathers to be a peculiar people to him and many typical sacrifices representing Christs death for them upon which they were commanded to love and serve him but for ought this tells thee thou wert hated by him from all eternity yea this suggests to thee that all he doth to thee may be but to bring thee to misery Nay I might safely say Gods dealings with the Gentiles represented more goodness as to their particulars without suggestions of eternal hatred of them then this kind of Gospell-preaching ascertains any one man of as yet unregenerate as truly goodness and out of good will to him in particular And O how injurious is that doctrine to men that withholds the most absolute perfect motive to their duties and way to meet with consolation Whence it comes to pass that first many are led by it into presumption to lean upon themselves and their own works as evidences of that distinguishing love of God that makes them sure of salvation as the Pharisee Luke 18.9 10. and so of their being pure and righteous when as yet they have never believed and through faith received that love of God into their hearts thats preached in the Gospel to wash and purify them yea to bring them out of themselves into Christ that they might be reckoned after him conformed to him to salvation These are of those that justifie themselves and labour to establish a righteousness of their own and are ignorant of and fight against the righteousness of God despising others and hindring them of that Gospel of grace that should be opened to them stumbling as much that the Death of Jesus Christ should be preached to all to ungodly and sinners not so qualified as they as ever did the presumptuous proud Pharisees that Christ should eat and drink with Publicans and sinners and that his Apostles should preach the Gospel to the uncircumcised Gentiles 2. Others again are held in bondage all their dayes and are ever ready to fall into desperation while not having the Love of God and his goodness and grace propounded to them as for them that should beget faith hope fruitfulness c. or being hindered from believing it as so propounded by occasion of this limiting doctrine and yet being pressed on to believe repent be humble and broken that so they may know that God hath good will to them and hath given his Son for them they labor and strive and finde nothing which they can attain to
had it but that they were all after converted and saved that he proves not Many of them were that he proves but not all He cannot prove one Ruler of them converted He brings Acts 6.7 to prove it but that sayes but the Priests not the chief or high Priests much less Rulers and yet much less that those Priests were of the number of his Crucifiers Priests and Rulers in the Scriptures are spoken of as distinct parties Luke 23.13 and 24.20 Besides were any of the Priests Rulers It s probable they were then called the chief Priests but it s not said many or any of them believed However this yet concludes that Christ there interceded for men in and of the world ut supra But he hath besides all these Objections a pretty conceit not worth the answering such a one as we might as well put upon the 17. of John viz. of praying as a private man not as Mediator and so we might say he prayed there as a private man for his friends not as the Saviour of the world for he supposes That Christ as a private man might intercede for things that were never granted but not as Mediator as if as a private man subject to the Law he would act contrary to his Acts of Mediation take in whom that rejected and that in an act of Mediation too For its evident there he put himself between God and the people for forgiveness Was it ever before heard that acts of Mediation were excluded the Office of Mediatorship and looked upon in a Mediator as no acts of his Office Or can it be supposed that Christ in any thing he though but as subject to the Law requested of God was not heard of him Did ever a righteous man guided by the Spirit ask according to the will of God and he denied him and did Christ ask otherwise there Or was he denied what was so asked by him I might use his own words Apage has nugas He goes on to the instance of John 17.21 23. In which he saies nothing but what we have spoken to before except this That a conviction of men that Christ is not what they formerly thought him and so that his people are a people in whom God is and whom God loves is not for any good of the world Which is a very false saying For it s to the end that they might submit to him and love his that they might chuse the right way that they might see their light and glorifie God And is that no good to have the right way evidenced and put into their reach and to have means of glorifying of God afforded to them Yea Suppose none but the compelled chuse aright upon this discovery which yet cannot be proved shall we say it was not for the others good because they abuse it to their harm Shall Gods goodness and Christs love be blasphemed or despised and vilified because men abuse it Is not this it the Apostle faults Rom. 2.4 5. Despisest thou the riches of Gods goodness forbearance and long-suffering not knowing that his goodness leads thee to repentance because men are not led by it but sin against it hardening their hearts and treasuring up wrath against the day of wrath shall we despise it too and make a tush of it and say it was not afforded for any good to them Is it not a good to lead men to Repentance O let not those that undertake to call men to Repentance so lightly speak of nay speak so evilly of that they should commend to them as if themselves too and their calling them were not for their good speaking the very language of ungracious hearts that say if God would have given me grace I would have done better when they willingly despised and smothered that which God gave them Might not the Israelites by this be justified in their saying that God did little or nothing for them nay he brought them out to destroy them because that did actually befall them for their refusing to follow him The Lord set it home to mens consideration that they believe not Satan nor nurse up in their hearts slighty esteems of that goodness that heeded by them would do infinite great good to them Whereas the Answerer also alledged Matth. 5.15 16. and Joh. 1.9 as I conceive onely to prove that Christ would have his people useful to the world for convincement intimated in this expression Ye are the salt of the earth and for drawing in convinced men intimated in that experssion Ye are the light of the world agreable to the end of Christs prayer for his called ones in Joh. 17.21 23. and to shew that he doth so intercede and put in for others then Believers that he doth in some measure inlighten every man c. Mr. Owen not perceiving his drift in the former proof speaks impertinently about it and on the latter blusters a little too high and too causlesly asking in what measure how far into what degree by whom and by what means c as if he would be angry with the expression of Scripture for that he inlightneth every man that comes into the world is the Scripture saying a more certain and full expression then that which he suborns in the room of it viz. He inlightneth every man that is inlightned which gives an uncertain sound and may signifie All or Some or almost None only T. Moore put in the words in some sort to signifie that all are not in the same measure inlightned by him nor in the same manner which the Scripture also fully proveth Psal 147.19 20. Now to ask a man in what measure degree c is to put a man to search into the secrets of God and of every mans heart to see how far the word insinuates it self into men I mean Christ the word who was in the world and it knew him not and came to his own even before his being made flesh actually and they received him not What understanding of God with motions to seek him in by his works and oracles this word or divine light gave or gives to every man who can disclose but he whose all seeing eye knows all things and he will discover that it beamed in so much light by one means or other as that all men when they come to be judged by him shall be left without excuse and they that have submitted to him shall glorifie his goodness toward them in the day of the Lord Jesus The sum of what the Answerer further said to the fore-propounded Objection amounts to this That as Priest he offered up himself to death and through death as a sacrifice to God in which he respected diverse things had several nearer ends subordinate to the ultimate Heb 9.9 26. Joh. 1.29 1 Joh 2.2 Heb. 9.14 15. Matt. â—6 2â— the glory of God as he did it to ransom men faln into Death from the power of that sentence upon them and to be the propitiation that
give to this or that muchless to all he dyed for effectually to believe in him and to be saved not a word to that purpose So that that piece of doctrine viz. That for whom Christ dyed them he procured faith for is none of those Scripture-truths that will scatter the supposed clouds and mists Nor yet follows it that the whole impetration of Redemption is made unprofitable For 1. God hath ingaged himself so to glorifie his Son that some shall be brought in though he no were say All he dyed for nor that I know of any particular persons so as that this or that individuall must or else he should be unjust 2. He shall have much glory from his good bounteous and merciful dispensations to men through the Death of Christ that yet he compels not to believe on Christ Matt. 22.2 3 4 5. with Rom. 11.36 yea in the just and righteous condemnation of those that sin'd against that mercy and refused to submit to him For that condition upon which he supposes we will say Christ is to bestow salvation viz. so they do not refuse or resist the means of grace It s a mistake we know no such imposition put upon him for men may receive the means and yet rebel against the grace it self that comes in them have a form and deny the power of godliness and for that perish Though that all Pagans and infidels are left destitute of all means leading them to seek after God or that any that have no outward means from Christ nor ever resist Gods workings in them shall be condemned as Mr. Owen would perswade us I leave for him to prove Christ says to the Jews that if he had not come and spoken to them they had not had sin and for ought I know If Christ neither come in Word Joh. 15.22 nor in any spiritual way as he preached to the old world by his Spirit if any such he can finde they may not have sin charged on them to condemnation and destruction Yet if Mr. Owen can shew me otherwise I will believe it For making Christ but a half Mediator its frivolous yet we shall speak to it lib. 3. c. 3. where it occurs again That Christ did not dye for any on condition of their believing I believe nor that he dyed only for the Elect of God that they should believe nor finde I any Scripture calling any man while yet in and of the world an Elect person He dyed for All that being Lord of them and presenting his light to them according to the good pleasure of the Father whosoever believes might not perish but have eternal life And here ends this Second Book and my Answers to it The Third Book His third Book contains Arguments grounded for the most part upon his former premises against the universality of the Death of Christ we shall Favente Deo orderly view them CHAP. I. An answer to his two first Arguments contained in his first Chapter of this Book The first Chapter contains two Arguments Argu. 1 As FRom the nature of the Covenant of Grace established ratified and confirmed in and by the Death of Christ His Argument runs thus The effects of the death of Christ cannot be extended beyond the compass of the new Covenant or Christ died only for those that are within the New Covenant But this Covenant was not made universally with all but particularly onely with some Therefore those alone were intended in the benefits of the death of Christ A very vitious Argument whereof the Conclusion contains a quartus terminus for in stead of any effects the tearm propounded in the Major He says the benefits therein as is clear by what follows in him comprehending the choice benefits of the death of Christ applied The Major also is ambiguous and uncertain For either it is universal as No effect of the death of Christ c. or else particular as Some do not c. If the latter its impertinent and concludes not against the death of Christ for All but onely its having some effects in All which is besides the thing in question if the former as I suppose he intends it then I deny it I deny I say that Christ died for none or that none have any effect of his death extended to them but onely such as with whom the New Testament is made He brings no other proof for it which he perhaps therefore lisped in because he saw himself weak in the proof of it but onely from that title given to his blood that it s called The blood of the New Testament So that his Argument to prove that runs thus It s called the blood of the New Testament Therefore shed onely for them that are heirs of the New Testament Which is like this The Spirit is called the Spirit of Comfort and the Comforter Therefore whoever it works upon it comforts them and so when it convinces the world of sin it s their comforter too and when it kindles the fire of Tophet Isai 30.33 it comforts them that are tormented with it A wilde Argument and yet such is his The truth is As its an office of the Spirit to comfort and he is a Comforter to all that obey him so is it an office of the blood of Christ or rather one end of its shedding to ratifie the new Covenant which it also doth to all that believe in it But as that is not all the work or business of the Spirit to comfort so neither was that all the work or end of the blood of Christ to establish the new Covenant but first of all to ransom from the death that was passed upon men and then to confirm a Covenant to the house of Israel and Judah This blood where ever it s tendered the Covenant is tendred with it Hear and your souls shall live and I will make an everlasting Covenant with you the sure mercies of David and he that obeys this is entred into Covenant by it but not All for whom it was shed are in Covenant by its shedding no more then all for whom the water of Purification was made were therefore purified because it was made for them and called the water of Purification Numb 19 9.20 Mr. Owen also mistakes the parties with whom the Covenant is made For he understands them to be a certain number of persons yet lying in the world and that its one clause of the Covenant to give them faith or make them to believe whereas indeed especially as pertaining to the Gentiles the proper object with whom the Covenant is made is the called of God believers in Christ Jesus into those mens hearts God will put his fear not to bring them to him but to keep them from departing from him which argues their being brought to him before these shall have the Law written in their hearts an allusion to the old Testament written in Tables of Stone not before they were brought out of Egypt but after they
justification by a lesser revelation of God then Paul had Josh 2.10 11 12. with Heb. 11.31 and so Cornelius before Peters coming to him believed in a lower act by less light then Peter brought to him and the Ninivites by far lesser then the Jews rebelled against now that power accompanies these mediums too in their lesser or greater dispensations is evident in that the Spirit is said to have preached to striven with men even those that yet obeyed it not Gen. 6 3. 1 Pet. 3 19. the hand of the Lord was stretched out with his reproofs and councels Prov 1.24 and in the effects it produceth as that they attain to some knowledg of God convincements illuminations c. against which they often willfully rebel and close their eyes and I say further that God doth in many by these means effect faith and bring them actually to believe and I conceive many more might have faith did they not wilfully turn away from God for I conceive a fore going act propounded or injoyned to men you may call it a condition if you please upon which they might be brought to believe Whereas Mr. Owen askes what that is I answer it is to listen to the voice of God not hardning the heart So Isa 55.3 hearken diligently and your souls shall live by diligent attendance to the voice of God the soul is quickned up to a life of faith and hope in God so Isa 49.1 Listen O Isles unto me and hearken ye people from far and in Psal 95. To day if ye will hear his voice harden not your hearts Lift not up your reasons and understandings against the authority of God be swift to hear hear him out and make not haste to speak and cavil against him As also to minde those demonstrations of his Divine Power and Goodness that he affords not winking with the eye and wilfully turning from the light when he makes it appear or from the means of light which beheld would give us to see what he holds forth to us according to that Call Hear ye deaf and look ye blinde that ye may see Isai 42.18 So Behold my servant whom I have chosen ver 1. And look to me and be ye saved Isai 45.22 And consider the works of God Job 37.14 That that is to be known of God is in them manifested c. Rom. 1.19.20 But then Is not this same hearing and listening believing I answer No It s but a mean to it We are to attend that we may believe by this hearing Faith and the spirit of it are given unto us But it will be objected Its obeying and obeying is believing So M. Owen But there is a fallacy in that for neither is every Act of hearing obeying nor every Act of obeying the believing spoken of As obeying in some acts follows believing so in some it may be but a tendency to the meeting with that which will cause us to believe so believingly to obey Take this Simile Two men are at controversie suppose a Master and a Servant the Master would have him do such things as the servant doth not nor will The Master begins to expostulate with him and to shew him reasons for his demands the servant hears what he says this is not yet an act of obedience to his Master for perhaps he may yet prove refractory and more obstinate then before and perhaps in hearing he may be perswaded and become obedient to him being convinced and changed in minde by what he hears till which change his act of hearing will not denominate him obedient or pass for an act of obedience Mr. Owen saith If we can propound a condition for Faith that is not Faith he will hear it And yet I suppose he will not think his hearing us propound it an act of obedience to us at all But then he says This is procured by by Christ or not In the sense before explained we grant it procured otherwise not and that to the power of exercising it is absolute but as to the act of exercising of it its voluntary and to the most uncompelled or unnecessitated Many have absolute power and ability given them of hearing and seeing the hints of Light and Truth that come from God that yet have it in their choise whether they will act so or so and therefore are faulted for not acting as they might for not chusing the fear of the Lord Prov. 1.29.30 For shutting their eyes against his Light and stopping their ears Matth. 13.15 Acts 28.27 And yet the cause of Faith is not resolved into our selves but into him that gives the power to hear and that speaks such words when we do listen as overcomes our reason and our hearts Our faith is justly still ascribed to him For if he spake not we could not hear yea if he gave us not power to hear yea if when we hear he spake not suitable words and exercised not power with his words we should not yet believe in him So that Inference is as absurd as these That because the blind man went and washed in the Pool of Siloam Therefore he was the cause of his own healing or Not Christ so much as he and The ten Lepers were the cause of their own cleansing because they went on their own legs to shew themselves to the Priests at his Commandment VVe avoid also all his following Consequences If by procuring Faith he means his meriting and obliging God to cause all to believe in him for whom He died For denying that it follows not either 1. That Faith is an act of our own wills and so our own as not to be wrought by Grace and that its wholly sited in our own power to perform that spiritual act No such thing follows upon that Proposition denied 1. That Faith is an act of the VVill no man can deny for in it the Will closes with an Object propounded as good to be relied on but that it s not wrought by Grace is clearly false from what is said above It s our act to hear and yet not that without the VVord of God buts t is Gods Act even the act of his Grace to perswade us by what he speaks to lean upon him and believe in him Besides 2. God might freely work it in some without being obliged to it by the Death of Christ the same love that led him to give Christ may sin being removed and the enmity being slain by Christ work as much as it pleases without being obliged and tied to work it Besides 3. Christ might oblige him to work it in some and yet not in all He died for So that every way this is inconsequent And we neither 1. Contradict any Scripture Nor 2. Speak contrary to the nature of the new Covenant of Grace which indeed is sealed by Christs Death to believers but says not that Christs Death obliged God to make this and that man much less all he died for to believe Nor is it 3. Destructive
All and dispenses of his goodness to All quite contrary to the Demerit of All in that sin And further he hath done for All so sufficiently in his Death that He is a meet object for All to believe on and hope in and especially where the Gospel-proclamation comes its great unrighteousness and iniquity in men not to depend on him live to and serve him even as great or greater then it was for the Israelites brought wonderously out of Egypt not to believe Gods word for bringing them to Canaan He hath done so much for All and every man that he is worthy they should look up to him and able in so doing to save them without renewing his sufferings or making a new bargain about them for them His inferences from that first premise I shall view also they are 1. That he conceives Infer 1. That the Assertors of Vniversall Redemption do much undervalue the infinite value and worth of the Death of Christ which I deny and challenge him to make it good against us which he assays By telling us that we Affirm that a door of grace was opened by it for sinners but deny that any were effectually carryed in at the door by it Which 1. Is a false imposition for we affirm that the sight and discovery of this hath such vertue in it that it effectually pulls in many at the door reconciles washes begets to hope c. Yea this is the proper or ordinary way of Gods bringing in men effectually to glorify his Son in these his sufferings and sacrifice to them 2. Suppose we should say he obliged not God by his Death to bring in any at All yet it will not thence follow that we extenuate the value and worth of the sacrifice of Christ If Mr. Owens principle be true it salves that for he says It s being a price for this or that man sure then by consequence too for this or that thing ariseth not from its inward worth but is meerly externall to that arising solely from the Intention of the offerer and accepter that is from the mutual part or Covenant agreed upon between them Therefore if it was not agreed upon by Christ and God that God should bring in this or that man or any at all to believe in him it would be no diminishing the vertue of it that being not hereby to be measured No should we say any of or All those things that he imputeth to the Arminians viz. That God might if he would and upon what condition he would save those for whom Christ dyed and Christ procured not a right of salvation for any so that God might have dealt with man according to a legall condition again or that all and every man might have been damned and yet the Death of Christ have had its full effect c. That Christ purchased no more for any then that they might go to hell with yet supposing that such had been the Covenant between God and Christ as doubtless they do suppose so that so express themselves by Mr. Owens own principle before laid down we should be acquitted of dishonoring or undervaluing the Death of Christ therein that not being the Measure of its worth what he purchased by it but what the dignity of his person and greatness of his sufferings The things purchased being only according to the agreement between God and Christ not the sufficiency of his Death to have purchased by it Such expressions may not rightly declare the agreement between God and Christ about the end of his sufferings but no way deny the inward worth of them by his principles from which this is wondrously inconsequently inferred 2. His second is Infer 2. That the innate vertue and sufficiency it hath is a foundation to the generall preaching of the Gospel to All Nations and of the right that it hath to be preached to every creature because the way to salvation it declares is wide enough for all to walke in How that should be a foundation for that I see not more then the paying for ten prisoners in a thousand ten times as much to ransome them as might have sufficed to have ransomed them all but yet excluding in the bargain All but ten is a good foundation to go tell all those thousand that there is very good news for them All ther 's as much paid for ten of them as would have ransomed them All ten times over but 990. of them were excluded the bargain yet good ground to bid every one of them look for freedom by it Sure it s not the wideness of the way that is ground enough to tell All that there is good news for them but the liberty that they may have to walk in it The Truth is that Doctrine not only makes the Gospel needless to be preached to All but needless also to be preached at All seeing none for whom Christ dyed can possibly miss of life by their doctrine All their sins past present and to come being satisfied for and of due to be discharged should they hear nothing at all But he infers further 3. That Infer 3. That inward sufficiency in it self made insufficient to the most by that exclusive intention is a good ground to call all men every where to Repent and to believe I wonder what ground that can be for that Sure as much as the telling a thousand prisoners That one had paid as much for the ransome of ten of them as would have sufficed for the ransoming ten times so many as they all are is a good ground to call upon them All to have good thoughts of him that gave the ransome for them some to be sorry for their faults against him and to be broken at the hearsay of his love to them and expect every one of them to be set at liberty by vertue of that Ransome I pray what greater ground should a thousand men have All to look for deliverance because of the payment of so much for so few more then if they should hear that he had paid only so much as would suffice to ransome them few How can we exhort All to admire and be affected with Gods love to them mourn for their follies against such a lover of them love him for his love and hope that he by vertue of Christs Death will fully save them if we cannot say by the word of God which is only meet to beget divine faith that Christ hath dyed for half nay for any of them for such may be the case for ought any of them know of their whole Congregation Is our humane conjectures and peradventures that such and such a one may be of that Number ground enough to bid men affect and love and hope in God as one that hath loved them Or do we speak of Faith and Repentance neither springing from Love believed nor accompanied with love to God in our hearts Sure such Faith and Repentance are not those the Scriptures call for
in him and cast themselves upon God for further saving So the Apostles were led Rom. 5.10 and not from believing on him to argue that Christ died for them So that this notwithstanding that Mr. Owen hath said I yet stand to my former Argument and shall not need to put it into the following frame in his Book into which he puts it By this that is already said Concl. 1. his following Conclusions appear clearly to be some of them untrue some impertinent viz. 1. That all called by the Word in what state or condition soever they continue are not bound to believe that Christ died for them by name but such as are so and so qualified Answ To which I oppose and have shewed That All called by the Word in that state in which they are when called and as it s required of them to believe the Gospel and to believe in Christ for salvation are therein also necessarily required to believe that God appointed Christ to be a Mediator for them and that he hath died for them and so is a fit medium for them to come unto God and to believe in him by 2. That the Precept of believing with fiduciary confidence that Christ dyed for him Concl. 2. is not proposed nor is not obligatory to all that is called nor the not performance of it any otherwise a sin but as it is in the root and habit of unbelief and not turning unto God for mercy To that I answer Answ That the Precept of believing with fiduciary confidence is proposed to all that are called by the word according to the Gospel yea this M.O. granted before inasmuch as it is justifying Faith and so its obligatory to them all And to that end as it thereto necessarily conduceth to believe that Christ dyed for them the not believing which is a giving God the lye it being contained in the record given of his Son which contrary to his fift and sixt Conclusions is too that there is one Mediator between God and men who gave himself a ransom for all men and not onely that he that hath him hath life but also first that God hath given us eternall life and that life is in his Son See that expresly affirmed to be part of the Record of God which the unbeliever makes God a lyer in not believing 1 Joh. 5.10 11 12. And whether Mr. Owen hath dealt faithfully or fraudulently with the Word of God in leaving out the first part of that Record as once before he left out God hath given us eternal life running into that fault which more groundlesly he called the trick of the old Serpent in T. M. and put the name of an Impostor upon him for I leave it to the Reader to judge As for his 3. That no Reprobate for whom Christ died not Concl. 3 shall be condemned for not believing that Christ died for him It shall be granted him when he hath proved what he here begs viz. That there is any such Reprobate for whom as faln in Adam Christ never died His 4. That the command of believing in Christ given to All Concl. 4 is not in that particular obligatory unto any but upon the fulfilling the condition thereto required is sufficiently spoken to It with all conditions or necessary conducements thereto are required of all those to whom the Word is preached Amongst which necessaries the believing Christs Death to be for them we have shewed to be one Therefore I shall say no more here to it but view what he says to a second Argument viz. That Doctrine that fils the mind of men with fears and scruples whether they ought to believe or no Argu. 2 when God cals them to it cannot be agreeable to the Gospell But such is the Doctrine of the Particularity of Redemption c. To which he tels us 1. That doubts and scruples may either rise from a doctrine it self in its own nature giving cause thereto to those who perform their duty rightly or from corruption and unbelief setting up it self against the truth of Christ I answer It 's corruption and unbelief setting up it self against the truth of Christ in the Gospell that makes men hold forth the Particularity of Christs Death as being undergone only for the Elect and the Doctrine it self gives occasions and causes of scruple to men in this that men seeing their sinfulness and looking upon God but according to what this doctrine presents of him to them they are wholly uncertain whether the Mediator was sent for them or not and so whether God be an object of faith fit for them 2. He tels us that obiection supposeth That a man is bound to believe that Jesus Christ dyed by the appointment of God for him in particular before he believe in Christ Jesus and that men that are of that perswasion of the restraint of the Death of Christ to the Elect may scruple whether they ought to believe or not which he says is to involve our selves into a plain contradiction for according to Scripture for a man to be perswaded that Christ dyed for him in particular is the highest improvement of faith including a sense of the spirituall love of God shed abroad into our hearts the top of the Apostles consolation Rom. 8.34 and the bottome of his joyfull assurance Gal. 2.20 so that we require that a man do believe before he do believe and suppose that he cannot believe and shall exceedingly fear whether he ought to do so except he believe before he believe To this I answer That for a man to be perswaded that Christ dyed for him is no where made the highest improvement of faith but only that faith by the belief of this hath been improved and so may be to highest pitches the soul that perceives see and mindes the love of God therethrough commended so as to be drawn to God thereby abiding therein may grow up to great assurance therein and find matter of exceeding great nourishment unto eternall life But it follows not that because from that believers have sprung up to such assurance of eternall life as in the greatest tryals and temptations to trust in him for it and make their boast of God which is the highest improvement of faith That the bare believing that Christ dyed for them is the faith of full assurance Some of the Israelites from beholding the great power and goodness of God to them in delivering them out of Egypt and bringing them over the red Sea c. were led to follow God with a full heart and to be silled with a full perswasion that they should be brought into Canaan and possess it but it followed not thence that the belief or knowledge that God so delivered them was the faith of full assurance of entering into Canaan by all that knew that they were thence delivered So Paul was lead with confidence to trust in God for future deliverance by this that he had delivered him and yet it s
be one of them for ought I know 4.5 The promise of life upon believing and the assured salvation of all believers without exception These two are of the same nature with the former only the soul hath this to except It s not every believer for many fall away in time of temptation having no root in them as my faith cannot have if I know not that Christ dyed for me and so grow not upon Gods love therein evidenced to me The soul cannot so believe as to love God and so but with a dead faith unless it believe his love first It may see all its endeavors to believe and to rest on God to be but fleshly strivings out of self principles and at the best it argues Gods love but from its own believing which it may justly question the heart being deceitfull and he a fool that trusts for it for evidencing his condition This is but a promise and an assurance of thriving to all that eat duely of a meat which it knows not whether it may or can duely eat or not for to eat the flesh and drink the blood of Christ and so to believe on them is when the soul beholding the love of God and Christ in his Death and sacrifice commended to it doth gather boldness and incouragement to love and cast it self upon God and so grows up into the full assurance of peculiar love to him even to eternall life without the knowledge of love to the soul first it can but at highest come to this It may be I am one that God loves and perhaps not well I will leave thinking about it and tyring my self with thoughts if I can and let it alone I must submit when all is done to be disposed to Heaven or Hell by him which indeed is a condition most sit and needfull for the Gospell to be preached to but is far from faith in God which works by Love and is justifying These things The call to believe the command threatning promise c. are good evidences that the ransome is given and accepted for All and there is good provision in Christ for them God never using to call men to any ordinance that he appointed not for them and coming with this they may incourage thee to believe on and love him that gave his Son for thee to believe on And this implyed by them is that declaration that good tidings to sinners that indeed draws them into believe through the spirits working in them or else if they turn their backs upon it renders them throughly guilty when they shall say in their hearts O what did God for me and what cause had I to believe and to have stayed upon him but I refused it As the Israelites in Egypt were indeed sinners for not believing when God had done so much for them to ingage them to it His conclusion then under this head is false viz. That those are enough to remove all doubts and fears much less which I would rather urge against it are they sufficient to incourage and imbolden the heart and frame it to believe but more especially is that false that follows in him viz. That those are All that the Scripture holds out to that purpose It holds out others as we have noted from Acts 3.26 13 37. 1 Tim. 2.4 5 6. but of this he can take no notice they are nothing for his purpose I could give him back here some of his own expressions as that in pag. 283. That if pride and error had not taken too much possession of mens minds they could not so far deny what they reade in plain texts of Scripture as if they had never seen them to maintain their corrupt and false opinions But he answers further 4. That that perswasion which asserts the certainty of the Death of Christ to All believers and 2. That affirms the command of God and call of Christ to be infallibly declarative of that duty which is required of the person commanded and called which if it be performed will be assuredly acceptable to God 3. That holds out purchased free grace to all distressed burthened consciences whatsoever and 4. Discovers a fountain of blood alsufficient to purge all the sin of every man in the World that will use the appointed means for coming unto it that doctrine cannot possibly be the canse of any doubt or scruple in the hearts of convinced burthened sinners whether they ought to believe or no. I answer that this is in a manner the same with the former and there answered I will adde this touching the second particular that its ambiguous whether by the person called he mean by man in the preaching of the Gospell or by God effectually for many are of that mind that God cals not nor holds forth Gospell to all that the Ministers declare it to but only to the Elect if he be of that mind too it s not so undoubtedly true to the hearer as he would make it that God requires what the Minister doth because they may be divided the command and call may be intended only to some that the hearer knows not whether he be one of or not though the Preacher out of ignorance direct it to all and this may beget much doubting in the hearer whether its Gods voice to or him no. Again he supposeth more in this Doctrine he pleads for in two last particulars then is in it as that it holds forth purchased free grace to all distressed burthened consciences there are many among the Heathen have their consciences accusing them yea sometimes like furies burthening them there are many that profess Christ conscious of heinous sins and are ready to despaire and make away themselves for them there are many burthened that they can no more walk up to the righteousness and labor to stablish righteousness to themselves and cannot be setled Will Master Owen say that their doctrine holds forth purchased free grace to all these that I deny for it says he purchased free grace only for the Elect and that all such are Elected I suppose he will be put to it to prove seeing many such go on in their sins notwithstanding their burthens and many seek to put them off and sometimes do stifle them by worldly imployments and vanities and many actually despair and make away themselves If he say he means not such the matter is where it was the distressed conscience may yet doubt and is apt so to do whether it may not be one of those in the issue As for that in the fourth that there is an alsufficiency in the blood of Christ for all that will use the appointed means c. I will not stand to tell him though I might that his speech here is like one of them that in us he uses to tax with-holding Free-will which seeing he declaims against I hope he will be so charitable as to allow us the like liberty of speaking without fastening upon us that Odium But I say
which is the thing the Apostle brings it to prove but that he hated either of them from Eternity and before they had done either good or evil or that he so hated the greater part of mankinde that God loved only his elect and chosen that he is only their Saviour that Christ died only for them and gave himself a ransom only for his sheep and Church and did not die for the greatest part of men nor hath any fitness or sufficiency as a mediator for them to save them that God did make the greatest part of men with intention to destroy them and never bare any good will to them that they perish for ever for the sin of Adam and that their condemnation is aggravated by their after sins for their neglecting that that was never for them and for not repenting and believing on him though there was neither object meet for them to believe on nor any power vouchsafed to them from God by which in attending to God in the meanes propounded they might have been brought to repent and believe that all that Christ died for shall be saved eternally and none of them shall perish these and the like positions maintained by them we finde no Scripture asserting and so have no divine ground of believing but to maintain them they rely on their reasons adding to and detracting from the Scripture-expressions as they please yea plainly contradicting them making particular affirmative propositions in Scripture equipollent to universal affirmatives as We or the Church are sanctified by his Death ergo All that he died for and particular Affirmatives to be repugnant and contradictory to universal Affirmatives as He gave himself for us ergo Not for all gave his life as a shepherd for his sheep ergo he gave not himself a ransome for all men and many such inept and unscholarlike inferences their wisdomes make to maintain and strengthen their devised Assertions drawing conclusions by them openly contradictory to the Scripture-expressions as ergo He died not for all and every one God would not that all men should be saved c. I would Master Owen and the rest of his minde would be content that God should be true and reason be judged absurd and vain where it opposes him that he may have but that glory of his mercy goodness truth and Justice that he in the Scriptures asserts to himself we should willingly hold us to that bargain with them But alas how injurious they are to the truth of God too and how unbelieving of and contradictory to the Scriptures thou mayst see by this litle tast here given and more fully I hope by the treatise itself here presented to thee as an answer to him but yet I have not set before thee all the good and usefulness of the truth here defended nor all the evil of theirs opposed For 3. This truth is profitable too for men both in respect of themselves and others in both which regards too their counter-positions are injurious First In respect of mens selves to whom its propounded who are to believe and receive it its profitable for them to hear and receive it because it presents to them an object for their faith a motive to repent believe serve and love God and matter of comfort to them that lye in sadness and distress for want of seeing ground to hope in him for this presents God as loving and gracious to them and what can be a greater motive to a man to listen to God then that his Doctrine comes in love and good will and brings good to him or what so powerful as love to break a man off from evils against him a loving carriage in David toward Saul melts him into tears and brings him from seeking to harm him to confess his evil and give good language to him how much more shall the love of God preached to men and believed by them work upon them Rom. 2.4 5. Psal 36.7 8. or else they shall be left the more excuseless and God shall be the more glorified in their destruction It is not commands to repent but love and goodness in him that is offended that indeed leads and brings in the heart to true repentance So what will so effectually draw a soul to trust in God as when it hears and believes the goodness of God Mansheart is so conscious of its own evil that neither commands or promises especially being so uncertain whether they appertain to us or no will draw us in to betrust our selves with God 1 John 4.19 except we perceive some real Testimonies of his love first towards us And what so strong a cord to love and service of him as to see his love preventing us Love seen and believed in him Tit. 3.4 5. begets love and service in us to him We love him because he loved us first Such our contrariety to God in our selves and such our apprehensions of his contrariety to us that till our hearts be purged from both by the demonstrations of his love and goodness we will not love and serve him not serve him in love without which our service is not acceptable and delightful to him so that from this love of God preached and believed springs true obedience and the hearty keeping of Gods Comandmments Yea herein it is that men see their sins most exactly odious and are abased in the sight of them True the Law saies what is good and evil righteous and sinful but the Gospel shews most lively the hainousness of that sin while it presents it not otherwise to be expiated then by the bloud of Gods own Son and shews otherway no remission yea this love and goodness at once both humbles for sin against God and leads to hope in and expect good from God yea and while it speaks not of an absolute certainty of life and happiness for all for whom Christ died but these things to be certainly obtained in submission to him believing on him and yielding up to his Spirit it leads the soul to serve the Lord with an holy fear and to rejoyce in him with trembling through which holy fear the heart is preserved from departing from him So that this doctrine from the very word and Oracle of God discovers to thee or any man while yet not sinning that great sin to death an object meet to look upon and admire God meet to be turned to sought after hoped in and served yea is a motive to and a ground foundation and spring of true comfort and godliness of all which the contrary position deprives a man No man by that beeing able as from the word of God to see good and right ground of loving hoping in and serving God till he see that he do love hope in and serve him there being nothing that bears witness of God to any particular soul in their doctrine that he loves and hath good will towards it untill it see the discriminating and distinguishing electing love of God towards
foreknowledge and owning to be made like his Son whom in order of nature he had fore-ordained as their pattern to dye rise and be glorified in all which he ordained his foreknown ones even them that believe in him should be conformed to him and unto which he called them and in that conformity in sufferings justifies and maintains them and as he hath done so yet he doth bring them to glory with him Yea in his calling men we deny not his liberty of pulling in more powerfully preserving from general Apostacies actuall chusing and ordaining in his Son glorified to their hearts whom he pleases and as he pleases but that either any company of men as in themselves as of the world uncaled are ever called or signified by the word Elect much lese that any were chosen to be the object of Christs death and the others left out Election being ever coupled with or respecting mens calling to Christ and right to his priviledges not Christs dying I can no where finde in Scripture Besides that which is more secret and mysterious in his decree or dealings we neither confound with what he hath done in the death of Christ for us and declares in the Gospel to us as the object of our faith or motive to believe and that in which he so calls puls in and saveth according to his good pleasure Nor dare we make them to run cross to the Scriptures that more plainly declare his good will and love to men acknowledging rather our want of capacity to comprehend those more abstruse things then daring to call in question the extent of the truth of his other expressions that are more fitted to our understanding and speak to the more intelligible principles of Christian Religion Nor finde we warrant for making our narrow conceptions of those more abstruse things of God which are ever delivered in Scripture without any opposition to or limitation of the things we treat of to be the measure of and to give limits to them they that so do both contradicting the Scripture expressions in the things we speak to and swarving also from them and their method in propounding and speaking of those things of Election and Reprobation by which they measure them 2. For the Heathens that have not had the Gospel opened to them they put us needlesly upon that to stumble men about the truth of our doctrine for we could content our selves with the Scripture expressions of all and every one and the whole world unlimitedly without running into any nice speculations but when men propound that to us I know not upon what ground we should say Christ died not for them except the Scripture did in some place exclude them from being of that all for which he dyed if any man can finde an exception as to them I shall listen to it but for my part I have not yet met with it And to make exceptions without warrant in the word of God about the matters of the Gospels doctrine I judg very dangerous I know there are many cavils of reason which have some specious colour for it but they all amount to no more then those admirations of its ignorance and enmity in other cases 2 Cor. 10.4 How can this thing be they are but high imaginations and thoughts exalting themselves against obedience to the faith of Jesus Math. 16.24 which are to be captivated to faith not faith to them Reason being a part of that self of ours which he that will be Christs Disciple must deny in what it would stop us from receiving the doctrines he propounds to us So that this is but a trick of Satan to stir up men to cast such stumbling considerations in their own and others way that they might not believe and have the benefit of the truth declared to them to whom its best to say Get thee behinde me Satan to leave disputing and inquiring into things more secret and say either produce me some Scripture that saith he dyed not for them or else be silent It s good in such cases to take what Christ said to Peter curiously inquisitive after John for a satisfactory answer How God deals with them further then the Scripture says what is that to thee they shall be found excuseless when Christ shall Judg them and therefore follow thou Christ in the receit of his word and let not any seeming absurdities to thy reason prevaile to impede thee And so we might say to Mr. Owens Cui bono quaeso about them that perish what good doth the death of Christ to them which reasonings are but of the spawn of the Serpents wisdom pretending to teach our reason the knowledg of good and evil from the beginning Such a question might have been as well made by many Israelites in the wilderness might not reason thus have led them to argue either God absolutely willed to possess us all of Canaan or only some few of us if the first how come so many of us to perish short of it if the latter then I pray Cui bono to what end or what good was in the deliverance of the rest from Egypt seeing they had as good have dyed there as have been consumed in the Wilderness Nay if our corrupt and blinde reason shall be umpire then what Satan and unbelief suggests is righter then what God himself saith for did not the Israelites perish in the Wilderness many of them as their reason and unbelief suggested and did they attain to Canaan though that was the promise set before them but as we said before Let God be true and every man in his best wisdom but a blinde fool and liar We durst not believe our carnal reasonings against Gods word nor exclude inlarge or limit his word by our own hearts dictates but as we see God in other places instruct us to it Not but that we can give reasonable answers to their reasons against Christs dying for the Heathen they being all faln in Adam and the sentence being executable upon them and all men in him in the day that he sinned so that what life and mercies of life with goodness leading to seek after God and to repent they do injoy may well and necessarily be conceived to spring from Christs interposing himself as mediator and ransome But yet if any can shew that Christ died but for all in these latter times or that the Gospel is preached to and shew it by Scripture proofs we will be willing so to interpret those general expressions till when we cannot admit of that interpretation O Object but we must not believe Scriptures as they lye in their litteral expressions for that is dangerous and will introduce transubstantiation and to believe Christ to be a door a vine c. there are in the Scriptures many figurative expressions To which I answer Answ that this is another stumbling block cast in our way much what like to what the Papists used to object against the Scriptures
were Baptized into Moses in the Cloud and in the Sea and were come to Mount Sinai The Apostle alluding to that tells the believing Hebrews partakers of the heavenly Call Heb. 3.1 that they were not come to Mount Sinai to have a Law of works and death put upon them but to Mount Sion * Whence the Law of Grace goeth forth Isai 2.3 to hear him that speaks from heaven and so intimately to have the Law writ in their hearts Heb. 12.18 22 24 25. in which they came also to the blood of sprinkling He doth not say they were come to Mount Sion while they were yet uncalled but in obeying the Call they came thither to meet with and receive the new Covenant opposed to the Covenant made with their Fathers at Mount Sinai That that confirms me in this belief is this that it is by faith that we are made of one body with the Israel of God and are no where called the seed of Promise or Israel of God till brought to Christ but then we are all one with the believing Jews Jews in the inner man the Circumcision the seed of Abraham and heirs according to Promise Gal. 3.26 29. Now the Covenant spoken of is made with the house of Israel and Judah If Mr. Owen think men to be faederates in that Covenant before faith let him shew me that any unbelieving Gentiles or uncalled are called by the name of Israel and Judah Besides That the promises of God are made with Christ Gal. 3.16 and are in him yea and Amen 2 Cor. 1.20 But if any yet out of Christ should be faederates while out of him then they should have a larger object then Christ and a larger performance then in Christ Jesus But I say this ex abundanti to the Minor it being sufficient to the overthrow of the Argument that the Major is proofless Whereas Mr. Owen makes the difference between the Old and New Testament to be That this Covenants the giving of Faith and that not I deny it and say The difference between them is in this That was carnal weak and afforded not such operation of Spirit This spiritual powerful and full of life writing Gods teachings in the heart whereas that writ them but without in Books or Tables of Stones That propounded Precepts and Promises but gave not the performance This in Teaching conforms the heart to Gods VVill and gives in the injoyment and accomplishment of the promises whence as the Apostle saith The righteousness of the Law is fulfilled in us that walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit Rom. 8.4 That this Covenant is propounded conditionally too to those that are not yet believers we have shewed before in Isai 55.3 So that no man short of believing can say as Mr. Owens Objection supposeth The Lord hath promised To write his Law in our hearts but if we listen to Christ he will write them in our hearts but to the believer in Christ to him that is Christs the Covenant is free he being the proper heir of it as is before shewed He repeates his Argument again in the winding up of the Argument That the blood of Jesus Christ was the blood of the Covenant and his Oblation was intended onely for procuring the things intended and promised thereby and therefore it cannot have respect to All c. That it procured the good things contained in the Covenant or rather that he ingages the performance of them to the called for I think the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sponsor hath rather that signification then of a procurer we grant and to that the Quotation of Heb. 7.22 is pertinent but his inference from thence is yet unproved as we have shewed And so we have seen the fallacy and weakness of this Argument 2. His second Argument is thus That if the Lord intended Argu. 2 that he should and so Christ by his death did procure pardon of sin and reconciliation with God for all and every one to be actually injoyed upon condition that they do believe then ought this good will and intention of God with this purchase in their behalf by Jesus Christ be made known to them by the Word that they might believe for faith comes by hearing c. otherwise men may be saved without faith in and the knowledg of Christ or else the purchase is plainly in vain but all men have not those things declared to them in and by the Word c. To this Argument many things may be answered Answ As 1. That it concludes not against the Assertion that he undertook to oppose in lib. 1. cap. 1. pag. 4. viz. That Christ gave himself a ransom for all and every one But against his intention of purchasing pardon and reconciliation for All to be injoyed upon condition of believing which is a fallacy that we call Ignoratio elenchi 2. Again The Antecedent of the Major contains and crowds together divers questions which is another fallacy in arguing As with this Of Christs dying for All it jumbles Gods intention of his procuring Reconciliation and Pardon and the intention of bestowing it and upon what condition Now these are three distinct questions viz. First Whether Christ died for All The thing he set himself to oppose Secondly Whether in dying for them he procured Reconciliation and forgiveness for all And Thirdly Whether he procured it for All with intention that they all should injoy it upon condition of believing The first of these I absolutely affirm and Mr. Owen denies The second I thus affirm That for the offence of Adam and the condemnation that came upon All therefore he hath procured justification or pardon for All so as that God dealeth with All after another manner then according to its Merit and the Obligation to Death that came thereby And for their other sins there is with him a treasury of Forgiveness and Redemption full and free for All. So as that in answer to the third All may have forgiveness of all their sins and Reconciliation upon believing in him and it was his intention that whosoever of All yea were it All believe in him should have forgiveness of sins and be reconciled to God by him Whence it s propounded to men in general upon that condition in the Gospel But yet neither is that condition upon which God propounds it to be confounded as Mr. Owen here doth with the act of purchasing it and Gods intention therein nor may we binde up God to that condition in his dispensing it nor his intention of forgiving and saving men in his giving Christ to dye for them as if because All or Any may have it according to the Gospel-tender upon believing therefore he intended that none should have it that have not that believing condition For I dare not say That God intended not that any Infant dying in its Cradle or deaf man that never heard any word at all should have forgiveness or salvation by vertue of Christs purchase
should not serve sin But quorsum haec how doth this prove that all that Christ dyed for are and shall be sanctified by his blood Why he tels us That the fifth verse says That a participation in the death of Christ shall be accompanyed with a conformity to him in his Resurrection But what mean you Sir by a participation in it an having part in it or being a part of the object of it If so which word in ver 5. says so That says He that 's planted into the likeness of it not he that Christ died for Surely if Mr. Owen had dealt fairly he should have kept the same tearms in both branches of his Assertion as the Apostle doth thus Conformity to Christ in his death shall be followed with a conformity to him in his Resurrection Sure if planting into the likeness of him signify conformity to him in the latter branch as it doth it signifies so in the former too it being the very same maner of expression But Mr. Owen hath a little too much art of making quidlibet de quolibet But what follows The words of the later verse yield a reason of the former Assertion Because our old man is crucified with him that the body of sin might be destroyed c. What gathers he from that why this That our sinful corruption and depravation of Nature are by his Death and crucifying meritoriously slain and disabled from such a rule and dominion over us as that we should be servants to them But suppose this was the Apostles sense That Christ merited that such as are planted into the likeness of his Death by Baptism or conformed to him in his Death should have their sins subdued in them will it therefore follow That he says all that he died for shall be so conformed to him or shall have their sins subdued in them Let Reason judg of that Consequence But which word in the Text signifies a Meritorius slaying I suppose he means the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If so I deny it That signifies there a real crucifying in us according to that in Gal 5.24 They that are Christs have crucified the flesh c. That is have nailed it upon the Cross that is the Grace and Spirit of God which is cross to it and lusts against it they have given it up to be mortified by the Spirit that so the body of Sin might be destroyed It is not destroyed yet nor doth the Apostle say so as well he might if he had spoken of a meritorious slaying for what concerns the matter of Merit that is already accomplished though the thing merited be not But when was this crucifying I answer when the soul was brought to give up it self to Christ and not before Rom. 6.4 5. when it was Baptized into his Death not in the outward onely but chiefly in the inward spiritual Baptism 1 Pet. 3.21 and so begun to be planted into the likeness of it But perhaps he will say The word is Crucified with Christ and therefore must be referred to what was done in his crucifying I answer no It signifies but a companionship in being crucified as he was or after his similitude not a thing done when he was crucified as Col. 2.12 we are said to be buried with him but when was that He says not in his being buried but in Baptism which is a thing not inwardly accomplished no nor begun before believing And so You that were dead in sins and trespasses hath he quickned with him the quickning men up to hope in God and bringing them from their dead condition in which before believing they lay without hope is said to be with Christ Yea when we suffer for Christ and dye for his Name we are said to suffer and dye with him 2 Tim. 2.11 12. Rom. 8.17 which are not to be referred to the time of his suffering and dying as if we then suffered and died meritoriously with him So that first express saying is pressed too injuriously to speak for Mr. Owen besides its proper intention Again He brings 2 Cor. 1.20 All the Promises of God are in Christ Yea and in him Amen Which says nothing that God hath promised that All that Christ died for should be sanctified and cleansed from all their sins but that in him all the promises are surely to be met with The Covenant we have spoken to before That 's made or rather promised to be made with the House of Israel and the House of Judah of which houshold men are not accounted till brought to Christ to believe as is plain Ephe. 2.12 17 18 19. After Christ hath preached peace to us and given us access to the Father then we are of the houshold of God and fellow Citizens with the Saints The promise of circumcising the heart which he mentions as most famous in the New Covenant follows after obeying the voice of God in listning to his Son Deut. 30.1 2 3 4 5 6. so the Apostle intimates 2 Cor. 3.16 When the heart turns to the Lord the vail shall be taken away which I conceive answers to Circumcising the heart As impertinent to his purpose is that in Heb. 9.23 of purging the heavenly things except he prove that All that Christ died for are heavenly men even before believing and before their calling to God with a heavenly call And that in Col. 1.14 of the believer brought to Christ receiving and having the Redemption in him with which agrees the 1 Cor. 1.30 which says not all that he died for are made wise redeemed righteous c. by him but they that are in him by faith as see Rom. 16 7. have him in the vertue of his blood and by his Spirit for wisdom righteousness sanctification and redemption As impertinent is his allegation of Heb. 2.14 To destroy him that had the power of death that is the devil that he might free those that by reason of death or through the fear of death rather were all their life time subject to bondage No more is his Probandum proved by that then that all that Christ spake to are saved can be proved by that in Joh. 5.34 These things speak I to you you that had neither heard the voice of God nor seen his face And who will not come unto me that ye might have life ver 38.40 that ye might be saved Or from this That he brought us into Egypt that he might bring us into Canaan that all that came out of the one entred into the other Nor is there any more consequence from the other places mentioned in Ephes 5.25 26. and Tit. 2.14 He gave himself for his Church that he might sanctifie it provided in his death for the perfecting those that should believe in him Ergo All he died for shall be sanctified and saved So that the contrary to his Conclusion is true that he hath in no one place proved what was by him undertaken But to take off this that we say Many
by him but who they are that attain the end propounded to them viz. He that believeth on his Name he shall be saved He will do his Office to all that come to him for it according to Gods appointment But he that believeth not he that when Christ speaks to them that they might be saved as in Joh. 5.34 turn a deaf ear to his words Heb. 2 3. and 12.25 harden their hearts neglect so great salvation and refuses him that speaks for heaven he is now judged Now in the day of the Gospel However God might wink at mens ignorances in former times yet Now God will not bear it that men should despise him that speaks to them more fully for their good His Son preaching salvation to them but judges him The word judges him and the Spirit condems him and makes this word of salvation a Savour of death unto death to him because he hath not believed on the Name of the onely begotten Son because he did not trust to him for healing when the Gospel declared such readiness and ability in him to heal them Which why or how it should be if Christ was not sent for them and was neither sufficient nor willing to save them as was said Chap. â— I cannot discern So thâ—â— this Argument serves not his purpose 3. The third is That it s not unusual to call Gods chosen people the World This I deny and he indeavors to prove from John 4.42 The Saviour of the world Which saith Mr. Owen he onely is of them that are saved a Saviour of men not saved is strange But how that may be true we have hinted in the former Argument Besides According to 1 Tim. 4.10 Is this so strange to denominate a person by his Authority and Office rather then from his actings onely in that Authority May not a man be called Lord chief Justice of all England though he do not execute Justice to all persons in England or cannot so do by reason that many decline his Justice-executing So may not a man be called and indeed be a Physition for a whole Town by the appointment of Authority though many in it refuse to take Physick of him when they are sick And is not many a man constituted Minister of and preacher to all such a Congregation when yet perhaps half of them despise his Ministery and refuse to hear him Shall not he be called the Minister of that Parish wholly because many refuse to have his Ministry acted towards them So Christ is the Saviour of the World both in that 1. He is He in and through whom God is the Saviour of All men God not saving any man in any sense immediately but his Son doing all from him Joh. 5.22 And 2. In regard that he is set up and held forth in the Gospel as filled and furnished for saving All or any man upon looking to him and all commanded to look to him to be saved by him And in the same sense He is said to give life to the World both in that it s through his Mediation that the World hath a being under goodness and patience contrary to the desert of their sin which had God dealt with man according to the demerit of Adams sin and the strict sense of his own VVord pronounced upon him none in the world had had but if they had not been all forthwith cut off in Adam their beings would have been as far from Gods goodness and mercy as the being of the Devils which is not worthy the name of life nor is so called in any Scripture as mans is And this is as I conceive that life out of which he prayes that his malicious enemies might be blotted for in the book of the righteous which is of eternal life they are not written Psa 96.28 for which life He gave his Flesh to bear that sentence that otherways in the day in which Adam sinned should have faln upon him and the whole world in him As he is called the Light that inlightneth every man that comes into the world meaning it of lower hints of light then what the believer peculiarly receives from him So that his other Quotations of John 6.33.51 are as meerly beg'd as any other and as little pertinent they being thus to be interpreted As also that he gives exposes and holds forth lise in the Gospel to the world as in ver 32. The Father is said to have given him to them and yet the world neither receives him nor the life tendered and freely given in and by him Joh 1.10 11. and 5.4 and 6.36 But he tells us that Christ in John 10.27 28. Says He gives life to his sheep onely which is neither right nor pertinent for he neither puts in the word onely nor speaks of the life of the world but of eternal life Which if we take given for a free holding forth to men Compare Mark 15.23 with Luke 23.36 so as that they may have it for nothing if they will accept of it as the word given is many times used As where it s said the Jews gave Christ Vinegar to drink and he refused it and they gave him gall c. then he gives it to the world even to others then do accept and receive it as is said above to Joh 6.33 But if we take give for such an imparting it as is accompanied with receiving it so neither we nor Joh. 6.33 says that he gives eternal life to the world much less as it is in Joh. 10.27 28. he gives it them and they shall never perish Could he but have shewed us one word to that purpose that the world shall never perish it had been to purpose For Rom. 4.13 and 11 12 15. we have answered them before in the precedent Chapter The falling of the Jews is called the Riches and Reconciling of the world as the decay of Trade in another Country and diverting it hither may be said to be the inriching of this Kingdom In which the word Kingdom may truly fignifie the whole body of the people though many through idleness and riotousness in it may deprive themselves of that inriching which it brought them or gave them fair advantages of Besides the world the Nations in general not the Elect in them onely were reconciled or taken into savor as to the Gospel-preaching to them and opening of the Kingdom for them which before they had no such liberty to but were looked upon as unclean in respect of having the Kingdoms outward Ordinances and Priviledges allowed them but now were cleansed by God and accounted clean as to them and that also was their riches though not the riches of the glory of the Saints they indeed have yet further riches even Christ in them the hope of glory which many of the world reconciled as to the former of which the Apostle evidently there speaks the Jews being cast off from that and not from inward Union with God which they had not
old distinction which the Gospel came to take away Again How usuall was it with Christ speaking to believing disciples of the Jews onely to oppose them to the world and by the world to mean unbelieving Jews also as in Joh. 15.19 and 7.7 and 17.14 So Paul to the Gentiles as to the Corinths 1 Cor. 11.30 opposes the world to believers of the Gentiles and by the world means all final unbelievers Jew and Gentile Nay if this had any force then in 1 Joh. 5.19 he should strengthen the Jew in their obstanacy which he says they had against the Churches of the Gentiles for there he opposes himself and those he wrote to to the whole world besides in like manner as here We know that we are of God and the whole world lies in wickedness Now if he writ as a Jew reckoning with the Jews and set himself with them in opposition to All other believers in the world then he says there That he and the believing Jews were of God but all the Churches of the Gentiles lay in the wicked one And who would not abominate such an Exposition Nay Mr. Owen should do well to finde any one place in all the Scripture where the word world specially spoken of with distinction from believers or any sort or Nation fignifies another sort or kinde of believers So that that 's vain too His last is His mentioning and given cautions of Deceivers Seducers Antichrists c. As if any man that mindes the Scriptures could be ignorant that these kinde of people did pester also the Gentile Churches as the Galathians Corinthians Churches of Asia c. And that the Apostle Paul was as circumspect of the Gentile Churches and as careful to preserve them from these Seducers as possibly could be and so that John living after the rest of the Apostles needed as much to war and watch over them as an other Churches Nay he that shall equally weigh things will say there was more need for them then others because they receiving the Gospel from the Jews the Deceivers of the Jews had more influence upon them then upon their own Churches for they were apt to question Pauls Doctrine upon this ground that others of the Jews that pretended Authority from the Apostles taught otherwise Besides that the great stumble of the false Apostles was in the Gentile Churches that they wanted Circumcision which the Jewish Churches wanted not to say nothing that we finde them troubling the Gentiles often but never that they troubled with such Doctrines the Jewish Churches Acts 15.3 4 5.23 24. So that I shall need to say no more to that first Consideration having undermined it and made it unable to afford that patronage to his Gloss that he puts upon it 2. For the scope and aim of the Apostle It is saith he to give consolation to believers against their sins and failings If any man sin we have an advocate c. But herein also he comes short For though 1. I grant that he writ to comfort believers all or any believers and not believing Jews onely and that that was his main aim yet it was not all for 2. He affords them also a Direction in case of other men to improve their interest in their Advocate by Prayers Intercessions c. for them according to Pauls direction to Timothy 1 Tim. 2.1 c. Thence it s to be noted That he says not If any of you sin but indefinitely If any sin But suppose he aim onely at the comfort of believers what then He adds Then he can speak of none but them onely and that the extending it to All can possibly make nothing to the end proposed namely the Consolation of believers But sure he is out here For the consideration that Christ renders God propitious to strangers such his power and prevalency with him is an argument much conducing to perswade them that he will render him much more propitious to his children that are wounded for their follies and fly to him And I conceive the Apostle may be understood so to speak in Rom. 8.32 He that spared not his own Son but gave him up for us All That is for us All men one and other how shall he not with him having given him to us also as Beza notes on the place give Vs that is his chosen ones All things He that doth good to good and bad to them that are unkinde and ill-requiting will not he do good to us that love him and are born of him Surely if this afford no comfort I know not what will Nay I see nothing in the Text aggravate the consolation more then this It s like that in Matth. 6.26 28. He feeds the Fowls of the Air and clothes the Lillies how much more you his children So here Christ is free for All to come to God by how much more you that have believed and are his peculiarly He procures that gratiousness and kindness or mercy be extended to the whole world how much more to you his choice Inheritance That 's the very voice of unbelief that counts this light Manna and retorts the Argument as Mr. Owen doth They perish most of them through unbelief so may I too So might the Disciples have retorted Ah Lord but many of the fowls of heaven are taken and kill'd and perish for want of food and so may we do too The Argument is strengthned from that If God care for Birds made to be taken and killed and for Lillies that fade and are cast into the Oven much more for you that are his children ordained to an eternal inheritance So If the world many of whom yet perish finde Christ ready to do them good till they have made themselves void of all excuse and hardned their hearts against him much more will he be ready to accept us and pass by our offences who believe on him Yea if their perishing is for their unbelief and they might be brought into special favor did they believe what cause have we to believe on him and not let go our belief And yet in this the Apostle doth no more throw the consolation of believers to Dogs then Christ did throw the consolation of his Disciples to the fowls or then James doth the believers consolation to Dogs in James 1.5 Nor is Christs dying for men the childrens proper portion that 's yet to prove but the Kingdom and Priviledges of Christ in the injoyment of God which we do not throw to any Dogs which yet men are not accounted as meerly natural but as Rebels against the grace of God proud scorners Prov. 9.8 except it be by some conceited Jew◠like spirits that count themselves the onely Elect and Priviledged people and all others as refuse and reprobate beside themselves and men of their opinion c. 3. For the words Propitiation and the whole world 1. The word Propitiation in the Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 coming of that Verb the Publican uses 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉
I finde no other price mentioned in the New Testament but the blood of Christ either as shed or as also testified if Mr. Owen doth let him shew it for us to devise prices is to add of our own heads to the Scriptures Now if Christ be the price it s not material whether we say that the Lord that bought them be God or Christ the act of buying or purchasing being attributed to both Acts 20.28 1 Cor. 6.20 Rev. 5.9 Christ buys men unto God and God buys men by Christ God gave Christ as a price to purchase men and Christ gave himself for and gives himself to men And there are these two things in this buying or price by which people are bought 1. Christ given by God and Himself to the Death for men that they might be preserved and delivered and from the destruction due to them in Adam 2. Christ given of God and by Himself to them in point of tender and free offer as in Joh. 6.32 and at least good things given unto them by and through him And as I understand none are said in Scripture to be bought or redeemed from their vain conversations or unto God from men till this price made known to them buy them off from their love to those other things and ingage them for God to be his Thence men reason inconsequently from those Scriptures which say By the blood of Christ men out of all Nations Peoples or Families are bought or redeemed to God As that in Rev. 5.9 and 14.4 and 1 Pet. 1.18 19. which speak of the efficacy of his blood declared and believed ingaging their hearts and spirits to and for God as Hosea bought him a wife by a price given her Hos 3.2 to deny the extent of Christs given himself a ransom and dying for men These two things then I understand in this place of Peter 1. That God had given Christ to the death and he gave himself a ransom for these false Teachers amongst all the rest of men and thereby they with all other were delivered from perishing in that sentence of death which should in Adam have else destroyed them and had with others their liberty to the Church and Kingdom of Christ 2. That God in the Gospel presenting this his love unto them and this his Son that dyed for them or the Son presenting himself so and so as the onely Lord and Saviour able and ready to save them with promises of salvation upon their submission to him bought them or disingaged their hearts from their former idols worships vain and evil ways called ver 20. the pollutions of the world and had ingaged and purchased their affections to his Gospel People Salvation and Glory set before them and so to the service of him and they now after all this denying him as the Israelites after their bodily redemption did Deut. 32.6 They brought upon themselves swift destruction If Mr. Owen would fasten any other sense upon this place he must shew us that any people are said to be bought or redeemed from their vain conversations as these were ver 20. for such are the pollutions of the world by any other price then the bloud of Jesus 1 Pet. 1.18 or 2. That some are bought with that for whom it was never shed That God glorifies it to and purchases those by it for whom it hath done nothing nor shall do any thing for we have proved and do believe him to have dyed for All. If he perform either of those two things we shall listen further to his exposition Whereas he sayes The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 answers to the Hebrew word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he deals not ingeniously with his Reader For the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in all those places he brings for proof of it viz. Deut. 7.8 15.15 and Jer. 15.21 and in all other places generally so far as I find yet is in the Greek translated by the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and not by the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and so those places of 1 Pet. 1.18 and Luke 1.78 may better be applyed to that observation that Mr. Owen thence makes then this The Hebrew word that Answers to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He objects further the Apostles not mentioning the Word Price Isa 55.1 But that 's frivilous for if we speak of buying things especially of Gods buying a price is necessarily intimated as the correlate to buying though we may buy the grace of God without price yet he buyes not us at that rate we are well paid for what ever God hath of us Whereas he would have this buying to be onely a deliverance by Gods goodnesse from the defilements of the world a seperation of them from them by the knowledge of the truth Besides that that note is grounded on his former mistake that the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 answers to the Hebrew 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to deliver I would faine have him shew me that God extends any reall goodnesse to men without Christs buying them from their obligation to the misery contracted to them by Adam or else that rather confirmes that Christ dyed for them and the knowledge of him as so dying for them and able and ready thereby to save them bought them yea what else is it to know him Lord and Saviour How Lord but by dying for them especially how else a Saviour Againe did God give them any thing in that truth made known to them worthy their forsaking the world for him had they any share right interest in that truth namely in the knowledge of the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ was there any good for them to get there for to be sure the worlds good they were not like to get by that knowledge in those dayes If yes then whence proceeded that if he never dyed for them if it declared no salvation as attainable by them would men leave all and expose themselves to persecutions for meer uncertainties when they could not be told that Christ had done any thing for them or God by Christ or that Christ was a Mediator for them to attaine to happinesse by If they had no right to the truth nor that had any thing of goodnesse in it for them what had they to doe with that truth that so little concerned them If he say it had matter of advantage in it for them for ought they knew they might think it had though it had not Then I answer they had made but a blind bargain and they knew not the Lord and Saviour Christ Jesus It was rather a mistake about him that gave them that escape from the worlds pollutions then any knowledge of him had they known him rightly they should have known that they had no such reason to let all go for him that had excluded them his mediation and could not save them not having dyed for them And then having made some tryall and
their souls in particular whereby they become weary heavy laden and burdened 4. A serious full recumbency and resting the soul upon Christ in the promise of the Gospel as an Alsufficient Saviour able to deliver and save to the utmost them that come to God by him Ready able and willing through the preciousness of his blood and sufficiency of his ransom to save every soul that shall freely give up themselves to him for that end amongst whom he is resolved to be one Now says he in doing all this there is none called on by the Gospel once to inquire after the purpose and intention of God concerning the particular object of the death of Christ every one being fully assured that his Death shall be profitable to them that believe in him and obey him but after all this and not before it lies upon a believer to assure his soul of the good will and eternal love of God to him to send his Son to dye for him in particular I might here return him his own words with admiration Oh what a preposterous course is this and how differing from the right way of the Gospel 1. I would know what is that Gospel that men in the first place are to believe to be true Is it onely that Jesus Christ is the power and wisdom of God to salvation and the connexion of faith and salvation That we have shewed before to be untrue The Word of God it self tells us that the Gospel used to tell men of Christs being sent of God to turn them in particular from their sins and to lay down that as the ground of Repentance and believing on him 1 Tim. 2 4.6 And the Apostlesays expresly that that wâs the Testimony or Gospel that God ordained and sent him to preach ver 7. Acts 3.26 And that God would have all to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth for there is one God and one Mediator between God and man the Man Christ Jesus who gave himself a ransom for All and can a man believe that to be true and not believe that he gave himself a ranson for him Is he no body So that what he says in this first step overthrows him But 2. See the preposterousness of these men that that the Apostle writ about the High-Priesthood of Christ to the believers as peculiarly useful for them to lead them up to perfection in their faith and confidence viz. That Christ hath the office of an unchangeable Priesthood is able to save to the utmost all that come to God by him because he ever liveth to make intercession for them that is here produced as the ground to draw in unbelievers though the intercession there mentioned is not affirmed there for any as while yet unbelievers and on the other hand that which the Apostle tells us was the Testimony whereof God had made him a Minister an Apostle to preach to the Gentiles that were ignorant of God as that before repeated that is not to be preached as true for any ones particular and as so to be believed by him till they are made believers Who would think that wise men should go so preposterous a way but that its the judgement of God for their leaning to their own wisdom and no more then is fore-prophesied that God will destroy the wisdom of the wise c. 3. He impertinently mixes the object of faith with the operations of that object attended to and believed as conviction by the Spirit of their need of a Redeemer and recumbency in him with the truths of God that lead to that convincement and reliance on him The Argument is about the object of faith needful to be believed by all that hear the Gospel that they may believe to justification And he tells us of an order in the operations of God upon mens spirits before they believe as they should do And yet he minds not that the convincement of the great sin of unbelief is not kindly effected till men see they have ground of believing and yet believe not till when the heart rather thinks it is sin and presumption to believe But when it sees that Christ hath done so much for it then it must needs be convinced that it sins greatly in not betrusting it self wholly to him 4. He confounds the object of faith about the Mediation of Christ and the object of his Death with the secret Purpose and Counsel of God about our particular right to and injoyment of eternal salvation 5. He talks of rolling the soul upon Christ in a Promise whenas he cannot prove that any can have him in a Promise to be rolled on further then he is supposed first to have dyed for him the Promises being sealed in his blood and the way of closing with them is believing in his blood which how should men do whâ—le its wholly doubtful to them whether they have any thing to do with his blood or nor Indeed 6. He supposes that a soul is brought to believe in God and to trust in his mercie through Christ before it know of any love in God toward it whereas he uses to draw with the cords of love and testimonies of his goodness It s goodness seen in him leads us to repentance It s not only a letting sinners see a need of a Saviour that there is one able to save them that go to God by him that will suffice to draw in a man that yet cannot see him as a way for him to go to God by as he is not for any otherwise then he hath died for them Heb. 10.19 20. to rowl himself upon God for salvation Never yet could any sinner that indeed was convinced to be so and to be under wrath and that saw Gods Justice and Anger against him hope in and expect help from God by Christ not being first perswaded that Christ had done so much for him that he might have salvation through him Many men may delude themselves and take their own self-actings for acts of Grace as the Pharisee did Luke 18.10 11. and from their endeavors and self reformations seem to commit themselves to God and conclude themselves to be believers that yet never knew what it is rightly to believe The true Gospel-believers believe through Grace 2 Cor. 6.1 as they Acts 18.27 That is by the grace and goodwill of God declared to them in the Gospel The grace of God appearing to them teaches them to live godlily and saves them from their former disobedient condition Tit. 2.11 12. and 3.4 5. They do no per 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Pharisee argue Gods grace towards them by their frames towards him that God loved them first because they as they conceive love him but on the contrary they therefore love him because he first loved them and sent his Son for them Believing Gods Testimony of what Christ hath done for them they are helped through the power of God to believe
not ever true that he that believes that God delivered him from one danger is confident he will from another much less That that belief in all that so believe yea or in any is the confidence that he will deliver from another 2. Whereas he askes if it include not a sense of the spirituall love of Christ I answer That where the Death and Resurrection of Christ are opened to the heart by the Holy Ghost there the love of God is shed abroad into the heart also but not wherever this proposition is believed viz. Christ dyed for me many a man believes that and yet seeth not into the glory of it nor the depth of goodness held forth in it and so hath not the love of God therethrough shed into his heart yet the minding God in this is the way to meet with the holy Ghosts displaying that love Many Israelites believed that God brought them out of Egypt 2 Pet. 1.9 that had not such a view of his power and love therein or at least like them that forget that they were purged from their old sins forgat what they had seen as to be lead to confidence in God for the future by it 3. Whereas he says By this a man must believe before he believe What strange thing is that with reference to diverse acts of believing did not he himself say that we must have a faith of reliance and recumbence in Christ and before that too believe many truths of the Gospell before we can believe that Christ dyed for us so that there is believing before believing and believing before believing again and yet he counts that absurd in us when we say only we must believe the word of God to be true before we can by it be led to believe in God we must believe Gods goodwill to us-ward and a medium provided for us by whom to go to God before we can be perswaded to go to him by faith whom otherwise we look upon as angry and dreadfull ready to consume us We cannot put our confidence in his blood and there through rise up to assurance of eternall life except we first be perswaded that he shed his blood for us So long as we doubt whether he be a Mediator for us or no and whether he hath given himself to ransome us from death we shall doubt whether God will accept us or no or whether he hare us from eternity or not and whether we have any thing to do to take incouragement from the blood of Christ to approach him because we know not we have any right unto it Nor can Master Owen nor all the world beside to help him make it appear to be otherwise but that the soul will question whether it may expect salvation from God or betrust it self with God so long as it knows not but he hates it and Christ hath never done any thing with him for it 3. He denies That a perswasion that it was Gods will that Christ should dy for him in particular neither is nor can be necessary that a sinner be drawn to believe because other grounds will do it without The consequence of this is that many things were spoken unnecessarily by the Apostles Act. 3.26 as when Peter says Christ was sent to turn every one of them from their iniquities And Paul that the grace of God reconciling the world 2 Cor. 5.19 20. 6.1 was to them Corinthians to perswade them to be reconciled That he preached to the Corinths in the first place that Christ dyed for our sins 1 Cor. 15.2 3. And so all those generall phrases that include mens particulars But let us see what other grounds he gives viz. That it is the duty of sinners as such to believe Math. 11.28 Isa 55.1 To believe in what in the blood of Christ as Rom. 3.25 Then it supposes it shed for them all and so it s a truth according to the Gospell-declaration but denying the extent of his Death how can he make it out that sinners as such * A quatenus ad omne valet consequentia which reaches to All sinners ought to believe in Christ What have sinners if not Elect to do with Christ besides he had said before they must be sinners so and so convinced and qualified before they are to be called upon to believe in Christ And I fear he will upon second thoughts say that those Scriptures hold forth that sinners not as such but as so qualified with thirsting after Christ and being weary c. are there required to believe but many a soul is hereby put upon doubting whether it be Elected or so convinced and thirsty c. as is required and so whether God be not an enemy to it from eternity and so whether it hath cause of trusting in him 2. The command of God John 3.23 That shews it to be its duty if it could be proved to extend to it for that says That we believe in his name and a soul may more justly doubt whether that We reach to it seeing they that deny the extent of Christs Death and teach it to doubt of it use such applicatives as We to oppose an Universality and to signify but the Elect and Church c. This therefore yet leaves the soul to doubt whether it may hope in him for salvation especially being told that these things God sends to men indefinitely that the Elect onely might be brought to him he hath no goodwill to any other and that its Elect it knows not commands to believe while men are taught to doubt whether the object to be believed in as such pertains to them can give no more security from doubting then the building with one hand and pulling down with another secures the building from falling 3. The threats against unbelief That indeed doth as much as the threat for not keeping the Law fils the soul with terror on every side while it hears that God commands more to believe then have cause so to do and threatens them for not believing and yet gives them nothing to induce them to it no evidence of his goodwill to them to draw them to believe this may fill them with hard thoughts of God representing him to them like one that bids another eat or else he will kill him but yet gives him no meat to feed on no evidence of his goodness that may induce him to hope and trust in him 4. The alsufficiency of the blood of Christ to save all believers This may make the soul say O how happy are they that do believe and that have his blood to drink for its able to save them but as for me I know not whether it belong to me or not or whether one drop of it was shed for me and so how I can lean upon it I hear it s not sufficient to save any that it was not shed for not for want of inward worth in it but because it s not for them and I may