Which two things are more different than any of his three kinds of Faith Noah was an Heir of Righteousness that is he inherited those advantages which come by Righteousness he had the peaceable fruits of Righteousness As a Son by being his Fathers Heir inherits the Purchases Possessions Honours of his Father Thus Noah by being an Heir of Righteousness enjoyed whatever Priviledges the Promise of God had entailed upon Righteousness Noah was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Heir of Righteousness where Righteousness is not Geâ—…itivus materiae but efficientis It denotes not that Righteousness was the thing he inherited but the true Reason why he inherited those blessings Righteousness answers not to the Possession but to the Ancestor not what but from what he inherited And this is clear from this one Consideration That Noah was righteous before God before that particular Revelation was made to him He was not made righteous because he believed that particular Revelation but God made him that particular Revelation because he was already righteoâ—… Gen. 6. 8 9. Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord Vers. 9. Noah was a just man and perfect in his Generations and Noah walked with God Vers. 13. God said unto Noah The end of all flesh is come before me Ver 14. Make thee an Ark of Gopher wood Ver. 17. And behold I even I do bring a Flood upon the Earth He proceeds to Abraham Who in obedience to the divine Revelation left his Country went into a strange Land offered his son Isaac which seem'd to thwart that former promise In Isaac shall thy Seed be called i. e. That from Isaac should proceed that numerous Off-spring which God had promised Abraham and yet he was so well assured of the power and faithfulness of God that whatever Impossibilities Humane Reason suggested he would neither disobey Gods Command nor distrust his Promise Now here would arise several Queries As 1. Whether then Abraham's Religion was of the right stamp seeing it would not approve it self to his Reason and Whether Abraham's Reason was not Carnal that suggested Impossibilities against God's Promise and Whether our Author had he been in Abraham's Circumstances ought not by his own Principles to have disobeyed and distrusted God both in his Precept and Promise because they did not approve themselves to his Reason 2. It might be enquired What inference he will make from hence and that he tells us is That the Faith whereby Abraham and all good men were justified before God was such a firm belief of the Being and Providence of God and all the particular Revelations God made to them as made them careful to please God in all things Now this is still the Question and is like so to continue for any assistance we are like to have from our Author's Arguments But 3. There is one thing that I shall particularly examine Whether that Promise Gen. 21. 12. In Isaac shall thy Seed be called be made good in that numerous Off-spring that issued from Isaac ' s loyns Now if any regard might be had to the Apostle he would soon decide the Controversie Rom. 9. 7 8. In Isaac shall thy Seed be called that is they which are the children of the Flesh are not the children of God but the children of the Promise are counted for the Seed See here now the vast difference in mens judgments In Isaac shall thy Seed be called id est says our Author from Isaac should proceed that numerous Off-spring No says the Apostle In Isaac shall thy Seed be blessed id est The children of the Flesh are not the children of God but the children of the Promise are counted for the Seed Again Rom. 4. 16. Therefore it the Promise is of Faith that it might be sure to all the seed not only to that which is of the Law but to that which is of the Faith of Abraham who is the Father of us all Gal. 3. 29. And if ye be Christs then are ye Abrahams Seed and Heirs according to the Promise 4. It were easie to evidence that what the Apostle speaks of Abraham's Faith in offering up his son related not to the Act of it whereby he was justified but to the Evidence of his Justification His third sort of Faith follows § 3. From hence says he we learn what Faith in Christ is which is now imputed to us for Justification From hence From whence If we never learn what faith in Christ is better than from the Faith of Abel Enoch Noah and Abraham which are the whole Heavens asunder each from other as he has ordered the matter we must be content to be ignorant of it till our lives end For who could learn the special Nature of one thing from another that differs from it in the kind But let us give him the hearing Our faith in Christ must signifie such a stedfast belief of all those Revelations which Christ hath made to the World as governs our lives and actions Why so To make our faith in Christ answer to the faith of Abraham and all good men in former Ages without which the Apostles Argument from Abraham ' s being justified by faith to our Iustification by faith is of no force There is a necessity then granted that our faith in Christ and Abraham's do answer one another lest the Apostle should be reproach'd with a Non-sequitur Now to perform this instead of making Abrahams to be a faith in Christ as it really is he debases faith in Christ as low as if not below the faith of Abraham He pretends to under-prop the Apostles Argument but really he undermines it and whilst he seems to provide an Expedient that his Reasonings may not be invalidated he renders them more than Nugatory For 1. How can faith in Christ answer to the faith of all those good men in former times Abel Enoch when their's was Faith without Revelations but faith in Christ is a Faith grounded upon Revelations The Motive of their Faith was Natural Demonstrations the Reason of ours is Revelation The Object of our Faith in his sense is Eternal Life but whether they had any such thing in their eye our Author will not grant for he that will not allow Abraham whose Faith was grounded upon Revelations to have had any spiritual Promises will less allow those poor good men the priviledg whose Faith was only built upon Natural Demonstrations 2. How can faith in Christ answer to the faith of Abraham He has laid it down as the bottom of this Discourse p. 252. that The different sorts of Faith result from the different Objects and Motives of it But Abraham's Faith had different Objects and Motives from ours as he tells us And therefore it 's of another nature sort and kind than ours for so he says expresly The Apostle takes notice of two kinds of Faith and faith in Christ makes a third Now will it not be hard for the Apostle to maintain his great Principle That Abraham is the
easily cured and at length easily discovered but then impossible to be removed according to the French Proverb Toutes les maladies termines en Ique font aux Medecins la Nique And therefore e re things are gone too far and we be given over by Aesculapius himself as those whom safety it self cannot save let us try if we may prevent a growing evil And 1 it stumbles some I perceive that he layes the Happiness of Mankind in the Knowledge and Love of God and then the Means to that End in making known himself and his will which looks as if the Means and the End were coincident and the knowledge of God were the way to know God 2 He supposes that God has by one Means or other made himself known by which Means if he understand no more than the lowest Agents and subordinate Instruments it will not doe his work and we can grant what will not serve his Cause but if he exclude the Son of God who is the Sovereign Revealer of the Fathers Counsels in all Ages that we shall not grant and that he cannot prove 3 We are more dissatisfied about this one point that he makes the Revelation of Gods Will a sufficient Means for Happiness to all Ages for though it were granted to have been so in the state of primitive Integrity yet it 's not so in those Ages when the whole world lay in wickedness The Spirit of God describes the state of Sin to be a state of Impotency Rom. 5. 6. When ye were yet without strength in due time Christ dyed for the ungodly There must goe something more then to make the Means sufficient to attain that End than a Naked discovery of what God would have Sinners doe even strength and ability to doe it for the Will of God was and is the same Doe this and live and if strength be not afforded to fulfill this Law exactly which none could ever yet find nor a Substitute allowed which some will not accept Man may and must perish as well with as without the discovery of Gods Will with this onely difference that he sees now his sin going before him unto Iudgement 4 It 's very vain to talk of Mans tampering about doeing the Will of God in Order to Eternal Life till some means be found out to take up the old Controversie and make a peace betwixt God and his Creature that they may treat upon other Terms We are sure Adam thought it so And the first in its kind may well be allow'd the just measure of all after Attempts who when he had sinn'd went and hid himself at once discovering both his Rational fear which was to stand before God and his foolish contrivance which was to hide himself from God in the Covert of the Trees under which nay under Rocks and Mountains it had been more comfortable for him ever to have shrowded his guilty Face had not God revealed the postliminary means of conversing with him 5 We think our Authors Reason is as lame as his Assertion viz. Because God is never wanting to his Creatures happiness To which I return 1. God will not have his Goodness impeached because he exerts it such a Way Method and Measure as seemed good to his own infinite wisdom and sovereign pleasure If any shall dare to charge God foolishly I doubt not he will acquit himself well enough but if he will plead his Prerogative he can demur to the Iurisdiction of the Court and refuse before the Barr of Imperious and sawcy Reason to give an Account of any of his matters Job 33. 13. But 2. God did create man upright at first and if he departs from the Law of his Creation I know not whether an Action will lye against his Goodness should he leave him to perish in his Apostacy A Father is not bound to set up his Son as oft as he will shut up shop and become Bankrupt 3. God was not wanting to the Happiness of his Creature when fallen but did provide a remedy for him and remembred him in his law in his lost Estate because his mercy endured for ever but then 't is upon another Account than this Assign'd by our Author for he supposes That Gods not being wanting to his own Glory and not being wanting to his Creatures happiness stand upon one and the same level in equal terms of Necessity but I suppose quite another thing God had not been wanting to his own Glory could have secur'd that well enough though Man had perished though he had never revealed a Mediator betwixt God and Man And that he has done it is to be ascribed to a Sovereign Act of Grace But I see what things are vereing to Deus non erit Deus nisi homini placuerit God shall not be God unless he approve himself to every Caprice of a Rational Divine who has two peculiar Priviledges and incommunicable Properties one that he may call whom he will Irrational and the other that he may canonize what he will for Reason 4. I 'le throw him in a little one Although he tells us God is not wanting to the happiness of his Creatures and therefore by one means or other he revealed himself to the World yet he also acquaints us p. 30. Long and sad experience proved all these wayes ineffectual And as good never a whit as never the near For all this was but rubbing a Brickbatt and putting a Blackmore into a Lather and so we are but just as we were for though he was not wanting to them yet it seems wisdom was wanting to Him whose Contrivances did not attain their Ends and thus our Author has spun a fair thred I 'le onely mind him of the Epigram Turpe est difficiles habere Nugas Et stultus labor est Ineptiarum Having discoursed these things in general it 's a fine sight to stand by whilest our Author is dividing the World into Provinces and its several Appartments And you shall hear him not â—…ispute but with the Cartesian Provincias dare Atomis or split a single Cummin-seed into four and twenty equal parts 1 For the state of Integrity How God was not wanting to his Creatures Happiness therein he informs you at large He left such visible Impresses of his own Wisdom and Power on the works of Nature and planted in the Mind of Man such a Natural Knowledge of himself that it was as easie to discover the first Author of all things as it 's now for a well disposed Eye to see the Sun when it shines and while Man preserved his Innocency God Himself did not disdeign to converse with him And so I hope Adam is well provided for Some may think that we are here less agreed and others that we are more of a Mind than indeed we really are I shall not take notice of that Phrase of conversing with God it looks as if it were neer a kin to and well nigh as bad as that of holding Communion with God which
Every particular Christian is a Member of Christ therefore Christ is primarily related to every particular Christian And thus the Conclusion will be as far to seek as ever Whether this Metaphor of a Head does primarily referre to the whole Body or particular Members But let us go on Christ is called a Husband says he but then the whole Church not every particular Christian is his Spouse as St. Paul tells the Church of Corinth 2 Cor. 11. 2. I have espoused you to one Husband that I may present you a chaste Virgin to Christ. To which renowned Argument I have many things to oppose 1. If the Church of Corinth was the Spouse of Christ then the Church of Ephesus that of Coloss that at Philippi and to be sure the Church of Rome will put in their claims with equal right to that Title and then what becomes of what he asserts p. 14â—… Christ is a great Enemy to Poligamy and has but one Spouse Is it not great pity a Conceit so ingenious should have its Neck broken at the first Encounter And 2. If Christ hath but one Spouse and yet every particular Church be his Spouse it s but crumbling the Metaphor into more minute particles and then he may be a Husband to every individual Believer 3. The Text proves not that Christ has but one Spouse but that the Church hath but one Husband I have espoused you to one Husband 4. Though the Metaphor may perhaps more fitly express Christs Relation to particular Churches than particular Believers yet this hinders not but that Christ may be primarily related to particular Believers For the Metaphor does not express the Order of Christs Relation but the Relation it self The word Church is onely a Term of Art which expresses the same Persons collectively who distributively taken are each immediately related to Christ. Again Christ says he is a Shepheard and the Christian Church is his Flock for the Relation between Shepheard and Sheep doth primarily concern the whole Flock This is but one Doctors opinion at most and will hardly mount it up to the Credit of Probability For 1. A Shepheard may be related to one single Sheep and that one is enough to keep alive and maintain the Relation one Sheep will denominate him a Shepheard though there must be more than one to constitute a Flock As there was a first Man related to God as a Creature to his Creator before there was A Church so there was a first Disciple a first Believer or Convert and that one under the Pastoral Charge and care of Christ the great Shepheard ipso facto as a sincere Convert and sound Believer and yet that Individual would not make a Society under Bishops or Pastors 2. A Flock is made up of many Sheep now that which constitutes is at least in order of Nature before the thing constituted The whole is made up of parts and I have been taught to presume that the parts are in order of Nature before the whole A Shepheard does not muster a company of howling Wolves and roaring Lyons and then by that Collection make them a Flock of Sheep but he gathers particular Sheep together unites them into one Fold and thereby they become a Flock The way of Christ is not to amass a Medley of debauched Varlets and Scoundrels and by making them a Church make them Christians but he seeks out for his own Service particular Christians and out of these Materials he forms his Church Again Christ says he is the Rock upon which his Church is built and the Christian Church is a Holy Temple Let him take it â—…or granted if it will do him any service but is this Rock this Foundation this Corner-stone related primarily to the Building or to the particular Stones The Apostle Peter who was a wise Master-builder in Church-work understood the Method much better 1 Pet. 2. 5. To whom coming as to a Living Stone ye also as lively Stones are built up a spiritual House Hence ordinary understandings would conclude that the building did not make the materials but the materials made the building the Spiritual House did not make the Lively Stones but the Lively Stones made the Spiritual House Such Language the Apostle durst use these lively Stones were first united to the living Corner-stone and the product of all was a beautifull Fabrick And thus was Solomon's Temple built the materials were exactly fitted and squared for their respective uses and places and there was nothing to doe but to joyn them together and out of those after seven years Labour there grew up a Holy Temple Had He built of Bricks the Edifice would never have converted them into hewen Stones and had he used onely Sycamores they had never been turned into Cedars by being Sleepers in the wall I must therefore abate him an Ace or two of his general Conclusion All these Metaphors in their first and most proper use referre to the whole Society of Christians In Isa. 9. 6. Christ is called the Everlasting Father which Metaphor if it be a Metaphor does primarily express the Relation of Christ to every adopted child and not the Relation of Christ to Children in gross and in the Lump A Father is as really so to one child as to Twenty he may be a Father to more but not more a Father It will sound harshly in the Ears of any that have not lost them under the Cataracts of Nilus to say That Father does not primarily describe the Relation of Philip v. g. to Alexander Iohn c. but to children in the first place and then at second hand and through a remove or two to Alexander and Iohn Thus is the Everlasting Father primarily related to every childe by virtue of his Adoption and Regeneration and secondarily to them all as brethren related to one another living under the same Discipline and Laws of the Family 2 He observes further to us for our Learning That the Union of particular Christians to Christ is by Means of their Union to the Christian Church Which he as Learnedly proves from 1 Cor. 12. 27. Ye are the Body of Christ and Members in Particular Where the strength of this Argument lies I confess I see not That the Church of Corinth was the Body of Christ That I plainly see That every particular Member of that Church was a Member of Christ I think I see that too But that it was therefore a Member of Christ because it was United to that Body of the Church of Corinth I own my Dulness that I cannot see And I have some scruples that makes me Halt and not so Nimbly go on both Feet into our Authors Opinion For 1. If particular Christians by being United to the Body become the Members of Christ then what Medium of Union have these particular Churches to Unite them to Christ We poor Folks of the Laity have an Expedient found out to Unite us to Christ namely by Uniting us to the Church under the
as Mediator between God and Man he must either give it to God or Man for as Mediator he stands onely between these two Parties How absurd it is that he should pay it to Man needs not many words to evince it remains therefore that he paid it to God himself But the Apostle Peter puts that out of dispute in the place under consideration For he tells us that we were Redeemed by the blood of Christ as of a Lamb without blemish and without spot whence it appears that Christ was the true Sacrifice chosen by God immaculate to be the real sin-offering and that he was Offered to God as the Lamb was 3. Sect. Our Author supposes that all that the Gentiles were Redeemed from was some gross sins he instances onely in Idolatry but we favourably allow him to include all Actual sins and yet he comes not up to the design of Christ in Redemption The vain Conversation received by tradition from their Fathers 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was that Corruption that they derived by propagation being by Nature the Children of wrath even as others Jews and Gentiles being all equally under the Curse and Condemnation of the Law 4. Sect. He supposes that we are Redeemed by the Preaching of the Gospel To which I Answer That we could never in any sense have been Redeemed by the power of the Gospel Preached if we had not first been Redeemed by the price of the Blood of Christ paid to God in a proper sense 5. Sect. He asserts that Deliverance by Preaching is called Redemption by Christs blood because we owe this unspeakable blessing to his Death But how do we owe the Preaching of the Gospel to the Death of Christ When our Author himself was in such a Huff not long ago with any that should own a Doctrine as Gospel that was not Preach'd by Christ in his Life He admired the Sermons of Christ beyond those of the Apostles and will not allow that his Disciples Believed his Death before he was Crucified and yet now we owe it all to his Death As if Moses had not sufficiently confirmed the Truth of his Mission and Doctrine by Miracles though he never dyed himself to confirm them And as if Christ had not done the same abundantly though he had never dyed Christ sent his Apostles to Preach the Gospel to the Iews and Preach'd it in his own Person before his Death and yet of those Jews it 's said Ye were Redeemed not with Corruptible things as Silver and Gold but with the precious Blood of Christ. But this our Author thinks he has proved from Eph. 2. 15 16 17. Having abolished in his Flesh by his Death the enmity even the Law of Commandments c. Came and Preached Peace to you which were afar off and to them which were nigh That which he would prove from hence is this That the Redemption of the Gentile World by the Death of Christ signifies no more than the Removing of the Ceremonial Law and reclaiming them from Idolatry and Prophaneness by Preaching the Gospel and then bringing them into one body or Church with the Jews To make the Text Serviceable to such a design it was necessary 1. That he should lustily bind over our weaker imagination to his own stronger fancy that by Flesh is meant the Death of Christ For my part I see no necessity that Flesh should signifie any more than his Assumption of our Nature In which Nature he has answered and fulfilled all the Types and Ceremonies of the Law though in divers ways and at divers times 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which we render to Abolish signifies not any formal positive Act whereby a Law is expresly repealed and disanulled but the rendring a thing useless of course when it 's end is attained Thus were all the Ceremonies of the Law rendred absolete and of none effect when Christ in the Course of his Ministry had answered their design and particularly Sacrifices became useless by the Death of Christ those Services which were Mercies and no curses in their day being swallowed up of that greater mercy of the Death of Christ. 3. He must suppose and that is indeed a reaching supposition that Christs Preaching Peace is the same thing formally with his procuring peace by his Death than which nothing can be imagined more precarious for he first procured Peace by his Blood and then Preached that Peace which he had procured to Men in his Person and by his Apostles and therefore though Christ Preach'd that peace to the Jews before he Suffered yet it was with reference to that peace he should procure by his Sufferings An eminent instance whereof we have in his Institution and first Celebration of his last Supper Mat. 26. 28. This is my blood of the New Testament which is shed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for the Remission of sins for though his blood was not yet shed Actually yet in Gods regard and the Faith of Believers it was considered as shed Antecedently to the Remission of sins for without shedding of blood there is no Remission Heb. 9. 22. And thus was the Blood of Christ considered as shed from the first establishing of the New Covenant Christ being called The Lamb slain from the Foundation of the World even that Lamb without spot and blemish by whose precious Blood Iews and Gentiles were Redeemed 4. He must suppose too that the enmity here mentioned is nothing but some bickering that had fallen out between Jew and Gentile about Ceremonies which the Gentiles that I can find were never very envious at and then when he has made all those suppositions and begged those Postulata's he will be ready for Demonstration A particular consideration of the Text will set that strait which he had made crooked And 1. The Apostle describes the state of the Gentiles by Nature to be most wretched and miserable ver 12. They were Aliens from the Common-wealth of Israel Strangers from the Covenants of promise without Christ having no hope without God in the World They that are without Christ are without God and they that are without a promise are without Christ and they that are without Covenant are without promise and they that are without all these must needs be without hope Their Case must needs be desperate that have â—…o Christ to bring them to God no promise to bring them to Christ and if they were Aliens from the Church where the means of Grace were to be had they must needs be without all these 2. The Apostle shews the true means whereby the Gentiles were brought nigh to God Ye who sometimes were afar off are made nigh by the blood of Christ It was Christs blood alone by which the great impassable gulph was filled up that was between God and his Creature by sin for Christ is our Peace 3. That the Gentiles might not Object that there were many Ceremonial Hedges and Fences that kept them off from enjoying the Priviledges of those who were
Infallible Spirit laid claim to an Eternal Reward therefore to that Reward they might justly lay claim Psal. 73. 24. Thou shalt guide me with thy Counsel here below in my Passage and Pilgrimage and afterwards when I have run my Race and finisht my Course receive me to Glory The Epilogue to the whole is this The Righteousness of Christ is our Righteousness when we speak of the Foundation of the Covenant by which we are accepted but if we speak of the Termes of the Covenant then we must have a Righteousness of our own The Righteousness of Christ will not serve the turn Christs Righteousness and our own are both necessary to Salvation The first as the Foundation of the Covenant the other as the Condition of it Two things are here asserted First that Christs Righteousness is the Foundation of the Covenant Secondly that our Righteousness is the Condition of the Covenant A brief Examination of which things shall ease the Reader of any further attendance upon these Discourses 1. The Righteousness of Christ is the Foundation of the Covenant of Grace Let us hear his Proofs not a word Peracta est haec Fabula Spectatores valete plaudite We have heard of Procuring Meriting Founding a Covenant but not a syllable of Evidence Methinks I see the Reader filled with shame and wonder wonder that he who could so pleasantly scoff at the Scripture Expressions of building upon Christ as on a Foundation p. 105. and so merrily inveigh against Dr. Owen for asserting Christ to be the only Foundation of our Communion with God should now so zealously talk for Christs being the Foundation of the Covenant and shame that after such expectations of Proof he should find himself bilk'd in the stock That the Reader may not wholly therefore lose his pains I shall entertain him with my own apprehensions in this matter The Covenant of Grace may be considered either in iâ—…'s Constitution or Execution The Constitution of the Covenant is Gods firm and unchangeable purpose of saving his Elect to the praise of his glorious Grace For the word Covenant which in the English Notion has seduced our Understandings in the Hebrew 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by which the Spirit of God expresses those things to us signifie a disposition appointment or ordering of Matters whether there be restipulation or no Thus the fixed purpose the determinate Counsel of God in Scripture is called a Covenant though the things about which that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Counsel of God is conversant be not capable of re-promising any thing and have onely an Obediental Capacity in them answering the absolute extraordinary Power of God Thus Ier. 33. 20. If you can break my Covenant of the day and my Covenant of the night that there should not be day and night in their Season ver 25. Thus saith the Lord If my Covenant be not with day and night and if I have not appointed the Ordinances of Heaven where Gods fixed Law concerning the Succession of Day and Night to the period of all time is called his Covenant and which is still more to our purpose by the stability of this grand Law of Nature he is pleased to instruct us in the fixedness of his better Covenant that of Grace ver 21. Then may also my Covenant be broken with David my Servant ver 26. Then will I cast away the Seed of Jacob and David my Servant This purpose of God this disposition of Grace is immutable Rom. 9. 11. That the purpose of God according to Election might stand The Execution of this fixed Constitution follows which is Gods wise and gracious managing of all things for the accomplishment of that glorious design which he had in the prospect of his Eternal Counsel which he steddily and regularly pursues through all the vicissitudes that his mutable Creature was obnoxious to whilst man stood God pursued his Counsel in giving him a Holy Law to guide him Seconded and back'd with promises and threatnings when Man with drew from God yet God could not deny himself but devolves this great Affair into the hand of a Mediator who with equal readiness and satisfaction in that Seed that should be given him as the purchase of his undertaking addresses himself to this glorious work of Recovering them back again to God and when the fulness of time was come took upon him our Nature partook of our Flesh and Blood because the Children whom God had committed to him were partakers of it This Redeeming Mediator undertakes with God as a Righteous Iudge that he may not lose the glory of any of his Attributes and unto God as a Father that he shall not lose any of the Children that he had given him and therefore he becomes a Priest a Sacrifice a price of Ransom a Curse to satisfie the Judge and his Law and a Prophet and King to recover us Actually in our state to God Thus is he the onely Foundation 1 Cor. 3. 12. The Foundation not of the Constitution but of the Execution of the Covenant 1. On Gods part whatever grace and mercy was in his eternal purpose that is given out to us by Jesus Christ The Promises are made by free-grace as their Reason but made good by Jesus Christ as the means of procuring the promised Mercy which had been forfeited for all the promises of God in him are yea and Amen 2 Cor. 1. 20. He accepts us in the beloved Eph. 1. 6. Forgives us through him ver 7. Iustifies us by Christ Rom. 3. 24. Sanctifies and saves us by Christ Tit. 3. 4 5 6. And 2. On our part through him we approach to God John 14. 6. Heb. 10. 19 20. By him we believe in God 1 Pet. 1. 21. He is our hope of Glory Col. 1. 27. He is the ground of our Faith the Foundation upon which our Souls are laid 1 Pet. 2. 5. To whom coming as to a living stone we also as lively stones are built up a Spiritual house Thus is he the Foundation of conveying all the blessings of the Covenant to us Eph. 1. God blesseth us with all Spiritual blessings in Christ but that Christ is the Foundation of the Covenant it self that I crave leave to deny and to render the Reasons of my denial 1. Sect. Christ cannot be the Foundation of the Covenant because Christ himself is promised in the Covenant as the great Comprehensive Blessing of the Covenant Isa. 49. 8 9. I will give thee for a Covenant that thou maist say to the Prisoners go forth to them that are in darkness shew your selves Whence it 's evident first that the free-love of the Father is the Reason of his giving his Son to be our Deliverer Secondly that Christ is the great undertaker to Execute that Counsel of God in our actual Deliverance Luke 1. 68. Blessed be the Lord God of Israel who hath Visited and Redeemed his People and hath raised up a Horn of
his Prophetical Office subtract offering himself a Sacrifice from his Sacerdotal Office and then Governing the Church raising the Dead and judging the World c. from his Regal Office and when you have done compute the clear Remainder and I suppose at the foot of the Account you will have three great Cyphers without one poor figure to give them the least significancy or value I know he will say He does but onely place them upon other Bottomes and so long as we find them what 's matter where they are found But then say I they will have but a praecarious station in any other place and he that removes them from their proper and true grounds can with a wet finger jostle them from that false Basis whereon out of meer good Nature he had for a season set them But to come closer home to our Author There are two small faults I charge this Discourse with Confusion and Falshood First Here 's a great deal of Confusion As your old dull Philosophers use to tell us that Cold did congregare Heterogenea Unite things that were of differing Names and Natures so has our Author glazed over his discourse with Ice which has so united things of various Natures that its hard to find sure footing in his Expressions Christ pardons sin upon one Account governs his Church and raises the Dead upon another The former he does by his Sacrifice the other by his almighty power And yet some of these things in one respect belong to one Office of Christ and some of them to another he purchases Grace as a Priest he dispenses and gives forth that Grace as a King he offers Sacrifice for sin as our High-priest yet he applyes the pardon of sin to us as a King But Secondly I find as much Falshood as Confusion in these Expressions and that 1. In denying that these are truely appropriated to Christs kingly Office For if Governing the Church raising the Dead Iudging the World do not speak a king never talk more of a Kingly Office in Christ but make that Metaphorical too as you make the rest and so the Tree is cut up by the roots 2. In that these are assigned only as the Reward of his Death and Suf ferings For we find Christ invested with an Authority to execute and actually executing these Powers before his Death saving in one or two particulars where the Nature of the Thing did exclude the perfect and compleat exercise of them at that time It may be worth the while to run over the particulars 1 For governing the Church he gave Laws to it set up new Institutions of Worship for it Baptism and the Lords Supper to continue to the end of the World sent out his Apostles to preach the Gospel and we have good and sufficient warrant for it under our Authors own hand just on the other side of the Leaf That his preaching the Gospel was the exercise of his Regal Power and Authority in publishing his Laws 2 For sending his Spirit that is in an extraordinary way pouring out the gifts of Miracles 't is true the full and abundant effusion of these Gifts was reserved for the day when the Son of Man should be glorified Yet it is clear beyond Contradiction that Christ had the Power and delegated the Power too before his death The Gift of speaking with Tongues there was no need of and Christ never used to bestow extraordinary Gifts without an extraordinary and pressing Reason The Apostles were sent to their own Countrey-men and could dispatch their Errand and deliver their Message in their Vernacular and Mother-tongue Math. 10. 5. Goe ye not into the way of the Gentiles and into any of the Cities of the Samaritans enter ye not but goe rather to the lost Sheep of the house of Israel But as to other miraculous Operations of the Holy Spirit he had Authority to make it over to others v. 8. Heal the sick cleanse the Lepers raise the Dead cast out Devils Nay the Seventy Disciples had an extraordinary power in their Commission as it appears Luke 10. 17. And the Seventy returned again with joy saying Even the Devils are subject to us through thy Name That is We produced thy warrant and authority and the very Devils could not resist it 3 As to forgiveness of sins there needs no other proof that Christ had the power than that he exercis'd it Matth. 9. 2. Son be of good cheer thy sins be forgiven thee I know there are some who will allow Christ a Power to forgive sins even here on Earth but then it 's such an odde kind of Forgiveness as never was heard of Volkel lib. 3. de verâ Relig. cap. 21. Non diffitemur quidem eum viz. Christum cùm in terris degerit divinissimâ potentiâ praeditum fuisse quam ipse peccatorum in terrâ condonandorum id est terrena ab hominibus supplicia propulsandi potestatem appellat We deny not that Christ even when he was upon Earth had a most divine power which he calls a Power to forgive sins that is to drive away from men temporal and bodily punishments A very liberal concession truly to cure a Fever or an Ague must be pardon of sin when these mens Necessities require it should be so 4 That Christ did dispense Grace and supernatural assistances at any time we are glad to hear owned and as sorry that they vanish again into smoke and nothing when our Author is out of the good Mood but let them signifie what he will for once he dispensed them before his death he conquered Errour and Ignorance destroy'd the Kingdom of darkness by the brightness of his Appearing erected a Throne in the Hearts and Consciences of men by the power and evidence of Truth And I suppose he will allow Christ to do no more now he is risen from the dead 5 That Christ raised the Dead needs no other Confirmation than to call over the Instances of Lazarus the Widows Son of Naim the daughter of Iairus but whether he did it with or without Authority I list not to dispute till I hear the Gentleman endeavour to disprove it 6 That he answer'd Prayers will need no proof I think it would puzzle the most froward Caviller to instance in one Case where-ever he denyed Mercy to any that with Faith or Importunity craved it for themselves or others 7 That the power to judge the World was committed to him we have his own words Ioh. 5. 27. The Father hath given him authority to execute judgement because he is the Son of Man And the ground of this Power entrusted with him is not assigned because he had merited it by his death and sufferings but because he was the Son of Man And though it be true that the General Judgement be yet to come yet Christ was furnisht with ample Power to execute it whenever it should come Say the same of his bestowing immortal Life on all his Disciples Now concerning all
findeth his own Brother Simon and saith unto him we have found the Messiah which is being Interpreted the Christ. A Person then there was who under the Title of Christ was alwayes laid before the Faith and Expectancies of the People of God And of so great Concernment was this Name that Peter joyns it with the Son of God Matth. 16. 15. Whom do ye say that I am Simon Peter answered in the Name of the rest Thou art Christ the Son of the Living God I shall not urge the Testimony of the Devils Luke 5. 41. Thou art Christ the Son of the Living God For he is a Lyar from the Beginning and would not have owned the Truth but to Disparage it by his Testimony yet it s somewhat sad there should be greater Heresies on Earth than in Hell Nor shall I insist upon that of the Souldiers who took it for granted that he was commonly Distinguisht by the Name Christ Mat. 16. 68. Prophesie unto us thou Christ who it is that smote thee But Christs own Testimony must pass Matth. 23. 8. 10. Be not ye called Rabbi for one is your Master even Christ and all ye are Brethren neither be ye called Master for one is your Master even Christ. A huge Bussle there has been about this place and our Authors Evidence had it been Subpoened in would have struck the Business dead One is your Master even an Office And now will you hear a Facetious and Merry Reason why He is alwayes called Iesus in the Gospels which contain the History of his Life and Death p. 8. Because forsooth all this time it was Disputed whether He were the Christ or not Great Disputes indeed the Devil has raised about the Lord Jesus some will dare to Dispute it whether He be very God or not others whether He be the Christ of God or not And not a few whether he offered himself a Propitiatory Sacrifice upon the Cross to an offended God for sin so that if Christ must never be owned till all Disputes be ended we must Prorogue his Naming till the coming of Elias The World was then as 't is now which would alwayes be Disputing things in themselves Indisputable Disputed then his Name was before his Resurrection and so has been ever since by Infidels and by those who Believed neither Disputed before nor after I have heard of a great Dispute of late amongst Persons of great Learning about the Reason of an Appearance in Philosophy when one of the Company wiser it seems than his Neighbours gravely Counselled them to Examine more Narrowly whether indeed the Thing were so in Fact or no before they did beat their Brains about giving a Reason why it should be so His Advice was hearkned to and upon severe Scrutiny they had been Arguing about a Non-entity Thus it had become our Authors Excellencie to have shewn that it is before he came to flie so high at the Why it is But it seems the Matter was not weighty whether he were the Christ or not it being determined by our Authors own Licenser that whatever is Disputable is inconsiderable Thirdly Christ signifies the Gospel and Religion of Christ As Moses signifies the Writings and Law of Moses and the Prophets the Writings of the Prophets Hold good Sir Create your self no further Trouble we will grant you more than you con Prove even as much as you Demand that we may purchase our Peace And that in Common Speech Christ may signifie his Laws by much stronger Reasons than Moses can signifie his Laws For Moses was but a Servant in His Masters House but Christ a Son in and over his own House Christ was the Law Maker Moses only an Instrument for their Promulgation and Execution But then it must be Remembred withal 1. That the Name Moses signifies Originally Properly and Primarily the Person of Moses the very Man Moses and only Obliquely Secondarily Figuratively or as your great Friend Vol. has it Analogico Figuratoque dicendi genere the Doctrine Writings Laws of Moses 2. That when we meet with a word that has a Proper and an Improper a First and a Second a Plain and a Tropical signification we always let that Proper Plain and Primary signification take the Wall and have the Upper hand of the Improper Tropical and Second-hand sence all ways provided that no Cogent Inexorable Reason taken from the Circumstances of the Place do Oblige to the Contrary 3. We must well understand what our Author Claims and what we Grant That it's usual nothing more usual in Common Speech than to call any Laws or Religion by the Name of the first Authors In Common Speech then this holds for if he will lay the Weight or Stress of any Disputable Point upon it that the word is so used in Scripture we must beg his Pardon and desire him to hold us Excused unless he can Prove it by Convincing Arguments and we lay down this Protestation before-hand that we shall not take High mounted Confidence nor Imperious Dictates nor Hungry jejune Glosses for Apodictick in the Case The rather because we are ascertained that the Name Christ does Properly Primarily Frequently nay Generally express a Person in Office and if our Author will needs have it signifie or Office or Church or Gospel or any Living thing else in all the Worldâ—… merely to evade the force of Truth or to hedge in any Whimsical Notions of his own he shall get his Ground by Inches and force his Way through the main Rocks for we shall part with nothing that we can Fairly and Honestly keep But we attend his Evidence Gal. 6. 15. In Christ Jesus neither Circumcision availeth any thing nor Uncircumcision but a new Creature That is in the Gospel and Religion of Christ nothing is of any Value to Recommend as to the favour of God but a new Nature a Holy and vertuous Life p. 9. To which Gloss I oppose two small Incoveniencies First The Uncertainty Secondly The Apparent falshood of it First If there were nothing else to Disparage it its Uncertainty is enough for its merely Precarious that Christ must signifie so here If any has the Confidence to deny it though never so faintly the Cause is utterly blown up our Negative upon him puts him to Eternal silence When our Author is hard beset at any time he has one Answer ready Cut and Dried which serves for every Text in the Scripture as pag. 261. It is a sufficient Answer to this to say they need not signifie so If that will suffice him which others must be glad to be sufficed with he 's Answer'd But why not the Common Gloss In the Account of Jesus Christ Circumcision nor Uncircumcision avail nothing but c. And the strongest Probabilities lie on this side First The foregoing words whereof this Verse is rendred as a Reason do unquestionably speak of a Person ver 14. The Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. And now comes in this Verse as a Reason or
and a new Spirit will I put within you and I will take away the stony heart out of your Flesh and give you an heart of Flesh and I will put my Spirit within you and cause you to walk in my Statutes and ye shall keep my judgments and do them where the order and method of God in this great work is laid down with such a convincing evidence that he must have no eyes or shut those he has who does not see it And 1. God promises that he will remove the great principle of resistance that which makes head and opposition to the Commands of God the stony hard inflexible-Heart 2 That he will bestow another a better a new heart a soft Spirit a heart of Flesh that may comply and close in with Gods Commands 3. That from this new heart all new obedience all service acceptable to God must proceed as from its spring or root I will put my Spirit into you and cause you to walk in my Statutes and ye shall keep my judgments 4. That all obedience inward and outward obedience keeping the Commandements of God with the heart and doing them in the practice of our lives yet all must proceed from this new heart this new Spirit which God promised to put within them But he comes to close Argument we are exhorted that the same mind be in us that was in Christ Phil. 2. 5. And to be his disciples is to learn of him who was meek and lowly in spirit Math. 11. 29. We question not that it s our duty to imitate Christ to copy out all his imitable excellencies and if he can prove that we can do this viz. imitate Christ in Acts of self denyal taking up the Crosse bearing reproach forgiving enemies without a better heart and Nature than we brought into the world with us he will then begin to speak to the purpose But says our Authour Christ transcribed his own nature into his Laws and therefore a sincere obedience to his Laws is a conformity to his Nature To which I answer 1. He that transcribed his Nature into his own Laws must yet transcribe it once more even into the heart of a son of Adam e're he can give to him that new Obedience which is acceptable to him It was not enough that God wrote his Lawes in Stone unless they be written upon the Tables of the heart with the finger of God 2. Obedience to the Laws of Christ does increase our conformity to the Nature of Christ but still there must be a renewed heart and Nature upon which all progressive conformity to Christ in obedience must proceed 3. Transcribing of Christs Nature into his Lawes is a Metaphorical expression which our Authour may explain how he pleases but I observe alwayes when he can cloath an Argument with Metaphors he is then secure yet still he presses upon us from Rom. 8. 9. If any man have not the Spirit of Christ he is none of his That is says he Unlesse he have the same Temper and disposition of mind that Christ had Now let the Reader look well about him and he shall see rare sights we do all remember that to be United to Christ or to be one of Christs signifie to be United to a particular Church And now we are told That by having the Spirit of Christ is meant being of the same temper and disposition and now from hence we have these consectaries 1. That if any man be not of the same Temper with Christ that is be not holy as he is holy he cannot be United to a particular Church And our Saviour has vouched for it John 3. 5. Except a man be regenerate and born again he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God We must be like minded with Christ and thereby become one of his and what is now become of the great Proposition that has filled so many pages That the only means of Uniting as to Christ is by our Union with a particular Church 2. He tells us that Union to Christ is described by having the Spirit and then having the Spirit is interpreted by being of the same Temper with Christ so now we have got another Doctrine That our Union to Christ consists in being of the same Temper and disposition with him But 3. We have here an excellent expedient to discharge the World both of the Person of Christ and of the Spirit too For as he can interpret Christs Person into Doctrine office Church Religion Bishops Baptism so he has interpreted the Spirit into Temper disposition and when an exigency calls for it he may explicate it by a strong wind or a vapour and then his work is done But 3. For the explicating of the new Nature he tells us there is a closer Union which results from this which consists in a mutual and reciprocal love which I am glad of amongst other Reasons for this that now it will be lawfull to Love Christ without persecution provided alwayes we do not over love him nor be passionately in love with him but yet there are a few inconveniences which attend this explication For 1. If we be United and closely United to Christ by Love then a Political Union is not the onely one betwixt Christ and Christians And 2. Then it seems for all the sorrow a Christian may be United to Christ without being United to a particular Church for we therefore love Christians because we love Christ and are taken with the imperfect holiness which is copied out into their Natures and lives because we are surprized first with a delightful admiration of Him who is the grand exemplar of all perfect Holinesse 1 John 5. 1. He that loveth him that begat loveth him also that is begotten of him 3. Why may not this Union with Christ signifie an Union with the Church as well as the other and then to love Christ signifies no more than to love his Church and so we are but where we were 4. It s very strange that our Love should result from our obedience and subjection whereas its hard to conceive how the soul should give subjection without Love and if it should give any a forced subjection without its principle of Love would find as cold a well-come in Christs heart as that cold heart it came from our Saviour had described obedience as the result of love John 14. 15. If ye Love me keep my Commandements No says our Authour keep my Commandements and then you will fall in Love with me but let him give light to his own Notions when we are transformed into the Image of Christ he loves Us as being like him and we love him too as partaking of his Nature He loves us as the price of his blood as his own workmanship created to good works and we love him as our Saviour and Redeemer now love is the great Cement of Union which unites interest and thereby does more firmly unite hearts It is not then quite so bad as was
the decking with Ornaments and aâ—…dorning with Iewels the representing true Believers accepted with God through a better Righteousness than their own 2. The Reader would admire to hear these glorious Gospel-Promises recorded in the Old-Testament thus interpreted to bare skin and bone But our Author confesses he swarms with prejudices against the Doctrine of Imputed Righteousness When Prejudice sits upon the Bench it 's like to go very ill with poor Truth that stands at the Bar. As a Bribed Fancy will admit the most feeble Appearances for plain Demonstrations of what it longs should be True so a mind fore-stalled with prejudice will despise the clearest evidence for what it desires to be false And we need no other instance of all this than our Author 's great Indisposition and Averseness to receive the present Truth And 1. I perceive he is very much stumbled at one thing That in all our Saâ—…iour's Sermons there 's no mention of his Imputed Righteousness Now because the same Charity that commands me not to lay a stumbling-block in the way of my Neighbour enjoyns me also to remoâ—…e it out of his way or however to help him over it the ensuing Considerations will afford him that Civility if he please to accept it 1. If our Saviour had mentioned the Imputation of his Righteousness a thousand times over he could easily have evaded it at his rate of answering for he might have said This is but to interpret Scripture by the sound of words or if that had been too frigid that it 's sufficient to say The words may possibly have another meaning though he could not tell what that should be or that by the Imputation of Christ's Righteousness no more is meant but the Accepting of our own Righteousness which Christ has commanded in the Gospel 2. It may be of good use to him to consider Whether Christ's Silence raised his prejudice against the Doctrine or his own prejudice against the Doctrine raised the conceit that Christ was silent in it Whether it was the want of an Object to be seen or the want of eyes to see the Object For most men are deaf when they have no mind to hear and blind when they have no will to see For 3. Christ in his Sermons has plainly revealed the case to be such between God and man that without a better Righteousness than their own they are all lost for ever Matth. 5. 19. He that breaks the least of these Commandments shall be called least in the Kingdom of Heaven that is shall never come there Now the universal Suffrage of all mens Consciences is That there is no man that lives and sins not and therefore Christ has determined upon him that he shall never enter into the Kingdom of Heaven I never yet heard that God has dispenced with one jot or tittle of the Moral Law but Do this and live is as strictly exacted as ever So that unless a Surety be admitted and the Righteousness of another owned the case of all the Sons of Adam is deplorable and desperate To deny then the Righteousness where in the believing sinner may stand before this Righteous and Holy God is to affirm the Eternal Damnation of all the World 4. Christ has plainly discovered to us such ends of his Death and Sufferings as evidently prove the impossibility of being justified by our own Righteousness Matth. 20. 28. He gave 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 his Life or Soul a Ransome a Redeâ—…ption-price for instead of many Which is no whit less than that of the Apostle 2 Cor. 5. 21. He was made sin for us who knew no sin that we might be made the Righteousness of God in him And the same with Isa. 53. 10. It pleased the Lord to bruise him when he shall make his Soul an Offering for sin c. Again Matth. 26. 28. This is the Blood of the New-Testament which is shed for the Remission of the sins of many Whence it 's plain that God in pardoning sin in justifying and accepting the sinner has such a respect to the Satisfaction of Christ in our stead as may properly be called the Imputation thereof to us 5. Though Christ mention not the Imputation of his Righteousness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 yet has he mentioned that Righteousness which it's certain from the Scriptures must be imputed to Believers or they can have none of that benefit by it which they are said to have Matth. 3. 15. Christ fulfilled all Righteousness and vers 17. In him or upon his account God is well pleased comes to delight in Believers whom he accepts in the Beloved Ephes. 1. 6. ' 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He hath graciously accepted us in his Beloved one Hence it is the Holy Ambition of all the Saints 2 Cor. 5. 9. to be accepted of him or in him ' 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That regard then which God has to the Obedience of Christ as the Reason for which he accounts a Believer righteous we judg may commodiously be called the Imputing of Christ's Righteousness to them without the Leave License or Faculty of our Author A second Prejudice that is deep-rooted in our Author's breast against this Doctrine is That Christ exacts from men a Righteousness of their own if they would find mercy with God A Righteousness of their own Ay but let them be sure they come honestly by it The Righteousness of Christ must be made ours or else we shall never find mercy with God We must also have another Righteousness of our own an Inherent Righteousness if ever we expect to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven and find mercy with God in his great Day But what is that Righteousness for which we are just and accepted with God But for the removing of this small prejudice may he please to consider 1. How easie it is to vapour and make a flourish with those Texts that require an Inherent Righteousness as a necessary Qualification for Eternal Salvation and yet how hard to produce one place that mentions our own Inherent Righteousness as that which answers God's holy Law makes Reconciliation with God and constistutes the sinner spotless and blameless before God the Holy Righteous Judg yet such a Righteousness we want and such a one we must have 2. Our own Righteousness is very pleasing and acceptable to God in Christ being the fruit of Faith and following after Iustification So says the Church of England Artic. 12. But says She Works done before the Grace of God and the Inspiration of the Spirit are not pleasing to God for as much as they spring not out of Faith in Christ Artic. 13. Which two Articles I shall leave to our Author to confute at his best leisure A third Block which I perceive lies in his way is That our Saviour should never once warn his Hearers to beware of trusting to their own Righteousness But 1. Christ preach'd to the Iews who had had warnings â—…now to beware
determined against him to whom therefore from his partial Judgment-Seat I shall appeal v. 5 6. For Moses describeth the Righteousness of the Law that the Man that doth these things shall live in them from whence I argue against our Author That Law whose Righteousness Moses describes the Apostle excludes from having any place in Justification but it is the Moral Law whose Righteousness Moses describes therefore it is the Moral Law which the Apostle excludes from having any place in Iustification The Major is evident from the Connexion of the Apostle's Words v. 3. They have not submitted themselves to the Righteousness of God v. 4. For Christ is the end of the Law for righteousness to every one that believeth for Moses describeth the Righteousness which is of the Law c. The Minor I prove thus That Law which saith He that doth these things shall live in them is that Law whose Righteousness Moses prescribeth but it is the Moral Law which saith He that doth these things shall live in them therefore it is the Moral Law whose Righteousness Moses describeth The Major is the Apostles own v. 5. the Minor I prove from Lev. 18. 5. You shall keep my Statutes and Iudgments which if a Man do he shall live in them v. 6. None of you shall approach to any that is near of kin to him 7. The nakedness of thy Father or of thy Mother thou shalt not uncover c. from whence I argue thus That Law which forbids incest is the Moral Law but that Law which saith He that doth these things shall live in them is the Law which forbids incest therefore that Law that saith He that doth these things shall live in them is the Moral Law Again I argue thus from Gal. 3. 10 11. That Law which hath the Curse annext to it for noncontinuance in all things commanded therein is the Law which the Apostle excludes from having any place in the Justification of a Sinner but it is the Moral Law which hath that Curse annext to it therefore it is the Moral Law which the Apostle excludes from having any place in the Justification of a Sinner The Major is evident from the place v. 10. As many as are of the Works of the Law are under the Curse for it is written Cursed is every one that continues not in all things which are written in the Book of the Law to do them v. 11. But that no man is justified by the Law in the sight of God is evident The Minor I prove from Deut. 27. 26. from whence the Apostle quotes it Cursed be he that continueth not in all the Words of this Law to do them That Law which forbids making Images which forbids setting light by Father or Mother which forbids removing Land-marks which forbids causing the Blind to go out of his way which forbids perverting of judgment incest sodomy is the Law which hath the Curse annext to it but it is the Moral Law which forbids all these things Therefore it is the Moral Law which hath this Curse annext to it I cannot foresee what our Author will return to all this but his old tawdry Answer That indeed the Apostle does exclude the Moral Law but that is only with respect to External Obedience without Internal Conformity But it 's evident that the Apostle excludes the Law it self and therefore it must be highly impertinent to enquire what Deeds of the Law are excluded when the Law it self is excluded But yet for his further satisfaction I shall bestow an Argument upon that also Those Acts of Obedience to which the Promise of Life in the Covenant of Works originally was most directly made are excluded from Iustification but to inward acts of Obedience the Promise of Life was most directly made and therefore inward acts of Obedience are excluded from Iustification The Apostle has secured the Major Rom. 10. 3 5 6. They have not submitted themselves to the Righteousness of God For Moses describeth the Righteousness of the Law that he that doth these things shall live in them The Minor is evident for God never made a Promise of Life to External Acts of Obedience without inward Conformity of Soul to them and of both to the Law of God Again Those Acts the want whereof mainly exposes the Sinner to the Curse are excluded from Justification but the want of Internal Acts of Obedience mainly exposes the Sinner to the Curse therefore internal Acts are excluded from Justification And the true Reason why these inward Acts are excluded from Justification is not because they are not well-pleasing to God but because the case is thus with impotent fallen men that he cannot reach the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the utmost tittle of what the Law requires theresore must fall under the severe doom annext to the violation of the Law in the least punctilio unless God had provided a better Righteousness than that of his own Obedience After all that has or may be said in the Case If any one will be so civil and ingenuous as out of his pure good-nature to yield our Author a few small inconsiderable things As 1. That there is a double Antithesis where there is but one And 2. That a man 's own Righteousness is another thing than the Righteousness of the Law 3. That the Righteousness which is by the Faith of Christ is distinct from the Righteousness of God 4. That by the Righteousness of the Law no more is intended than Ceremony and Hypocrisie 5. That a mans own Righteousness is so called not because it is his own but because he places his Righteousness in it and 6thly one poor sorry triffle more That all he asserts is meer Gospel grant him but this and he will prove all the rest with ease but though I would go a great way to save his longing yet this is so large a boon that it deserves mature advice and serious deliberation There are yet a few odd things in arrear some notice whereof I promised to take and seeing we are a little at leisure I shall do him justice And first let us consider what work he has made with that Text Rom. 8. 3 4. For what the Law could not do in that it was weak-through the Flesh God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful Flesh and for sin condemned sin in the Flesh that the Righteousness of the Law might be fulfilled in us who walk not after the Flesh but after the Spirit Now our Authors Paraphrase as well as we can scramble it together from broken fragments and odd shreds of his Discourse is thus much The Ceremonial Law being designed of God to work in the Iews inward holiness and purity of Mind which was represented by Circumcision Washings Purifications and Sacrifices it was found too weak to effect this design and therefore God sent Christ into the World to die as a Sacrifice for our Sins to confirm and seal the New-Covenant with his Blood
to work in us that Internal Holiness and Purity which is the Perfection and Accomplishment of the Figurative and Typical Righteousness of the Law which he gives us in other words p. 267. What the Law could not do i. e. govern our Minds and Passions this God effected by sending Christ into the World to publish the Gospel to us and to confirm all those great Promises and Threatnings contained in it with his own Blood This is indeed a parcel of excellent Divinity but that it 's wholly destitute of truth For 1. he supposes That that Law whose weakness the Apostle assigns as the Reason of Gods sending his Son was only the Ceremonial Law the Falshood whereof I shall demonstrate if that be not too great a word for any mans Mouth besides his own by and by 2. He insinuates that the whole of Christs being a Sacrifice for our Sins lay in confirming the New-Covenant the Falshood whereof the next Section will give us direct occasion to evince 3. He makes the whole business of the Ceremonial Law to represent inward purity and perhaps to effect it whereas though some of the Ceremonies did represent inward purity yet the main of their design was to lead to Jesus Christ and particularly Sacrifices which represented that Atonement and Reconciliation which Christ in due time should make with God on the behalf of Sinners Col. 2. 17. The Law had a shadow of good things to come but the Body is of Christ. 4. He scandalously charges it upon God that he appointed a means to an end which was found too weak to reach his End As if God must try conclusions and make experiments before he could be certain whether his design would take and his appointments reach their End 5. He renders Christ's Coming into the World unnecessary for what though the Ceremonial Law could not effect that inward Purity yet I hope God had means to effect it unless he will say all the World till Christ's Coming were whited-Walls and painted-Sepulchres For what was become of the Moral Law all this while had it no power to effect that End 6. He tells us p. 269. That the Reason why the Law of Moses was abrogated was because it could not make men good But then the Moral Law was either able to make men good or it was not If it was not why was not that abrogated also If it was able and had its effect then what need of Christ to come into the World to effect that which the Moral Law was able to effect without him But the true Reason why the Ceremonial Law is expired is because the Lord Jesus Christ has answered and fulfilled all that is represented When the Sun is risen the Shadows fly away there was no formal abrogation either made or necessary to be made it expired of course when Christ had made good what-ever the Ceremonies had exhibited to their Faith 7. He tells that Christ came to work in us that inward Purity represented by the Ceremonial Law but for all his good-morrows when he is throughly catechifed Christ's working is no more than those sufficient arguments and motives to excite their own wits whereby they might work it themselves and I cannot tell whether he will deny that the Jews had sufficient motives and arguments for that end under their Law 8. He contradicts himself which is no news for whereas he had said p. 265. That the Law was designed to work in them inward purity He says p. 269. That the Law nursed them up in a ritual and external Religion and taught them to serve God in the Letter by Circumcision and Sacrifices or an external Conformity to the Letter of the Law And then I hope God could not justly blame them much less damn them for being Hypocrites if they did as well as and no better than his own Law taught them Nay he adds That the Gospel of Christ alone teaches us to worship God with the Spirit and to offer a reasonable Sacrifice to him This is strange Doctrine but it 's less matter for that if it be but true But was not God always a Spirit and did he not always teach his People to worship him with their Spirits How osten does God complain that they drew nigh him with their Lips when their Hearts were far from him which he could not well do if he taught them no better It 's a Riddle to me that these Ceremonies should represent inward purity and yet not teach it when they had no way to teach that Purity but by representing it 'T is true the Gospel teaches us to worship God in the Spirit in opposition to Ceremonies but God always taught his People to worship him with their Spirits in opposition to Hypocrisie Psal. 51. 6. Thou desirest truth in the inward parts Did God institute a Law a Law so chargeable and burdensome and all to teach his People to worship like Parrots to mumble over their Mattens and like Puppets to make an outward noise without a rational Principle to guide it If they had no reasonable Service why were they reasonable Creatures But a little more reverence of the Divine Majesty would confute a great deal of such blasphemy Let us now seriously consider the Text and 1. It will be necessary to enquire what that Law is whose weakness the Apostle assigns as the reason of God's sending his own Son And for all the Authors presumptions I am well satisfied it was not the Ceremonial Law for what if the Ceremonial had proved weak what if it had been resolved into its first nothing the Moral stood still where it always did and what need of Christ's Coming into the World upon that account There was a time when the Ceremonial Law was not created and what if it had been again repealed and annihilated things had been but in statu quo But that the Law here mentioned is the Moral Law the Connexion of the Apostle's Words his Premises out of which he draws his Conclusion will abundantly manifest In Chap. 7. v. 7 He tells us he had not known sin except the Law had said Thou shalt not covet But sin taking occasion from that Law wrought in him all manner of Concupiscence v. 8. Nevertheless he clears the Law v. 12. The Commandment was holy and just and good had an intrinsick goodness righteousness in it and this he calls v. 25. The Law of God Now the Apostle having said v. 10. That this Commandment of the Moral Law which was unto life in God's Original Institution he found to be unto death Nevertheless Chap. 8. v. 1. he assures us That there is no Condemnation to them that are in Christ Iesus and he shews how Sinners are brought from under that Condemnation v. 3. What the Law could not do in that it was weak through the Flesh God sending his own Son c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That impossible thing of the Law where the Apostle adding the Article 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉
intimates that he spake of that Law whereof he had made mention before which was the Moral Law that Law which saith Thou shalt not covet that Law which is holy just good that Law which is eminently the Law of God and not that which carries the name of the Law of Moses 2 But what was that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the impossible thing of this Law There are many things that this Law cannot do It can lay a Command upon the Creature but it cannot give strength to obey the Command it can offer the Promises of Life to the obedient and shake the Threatning over the Conscience of the Rebellious but meeting with depraved Nature it cannot redintegrate lapsed Nature it can wound but it cannot heal it can condemn but it cannot absolve a Sinner But yet there seems to be some one thing which above all other impossibles is absolutely impossible for this Law to do for man and that is to justifie him before God For so he had said and proved Chap. 3. 20. By the Deeds of that Law shall no Flesh be justified in his Sight But 3. How comes the Law to be so weak for certainly it had once such a Power in its primitive appointment and was fitted to give life to the Obedient for we must not dare to think that the Wise God ever appointed a Law or the meanest thing in the World but it was fitted to reach all those Ends which in his Holy and Secret Counsel he designed it to How then comes this Law the Moral Law to be so weak If any of the Sons of Adam can produce an Obedience every way such as the Law demands it is able to give Life Eternal still The Apostle answers us It 's weak through the Flesh it was not made weak but became weak through our weakness The Law is as strong to reward still if we were but as strong to obey as ever But 4. How did Christ remedy and help us in this desperate Case for if we cannot live by the Law we must die by the Law The Apostle resolves us God sent his Son in the likeness of sinful Flesh and in the truth of humane Flesh and for sin condemned sin in the Flesh 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That is as an offering for Sin So near is the relation between the Sacrifice and the Sin that is laid upon it that they are called the same 2 Cor. 5. 21. Christ was made sin that is he was made an Offering for sin For so 't is exprest Isa. 53. 10. When thou shalt make his Soul an offering for sin The Greek therefore 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 does but imitate the Hebrew 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies both the Sin and the Sin-Offering thus then Christ supplyed the Laws weakness he who knew no sin was made sin and as he was made sin for us so are we made the Righteousness of God in him Christ could no otherwise be a Sinner but by imputation nor we otherwise Righteous than by the Imputation of his Righteousness As the Offenders guilt under the Law could not otherwise be laid upon the head of the Typical Sacrifice but by God's Imputing it so neither could our Sin otherwise lye upon the Head of Christ but by his own voluntary Susception and thereupon God's Righteous Imputation but these things we shall meet with professedly in the next Section There is a Metaphorical expression still behind which our Author cannot digest whereupon when he has thrown away a little and truly but a little wit he will ease us of the tediousness of this Discourse The expression which sticks so hard with him is that of the Apostle Ephes. 3. 8. The unsearchable Riches of Christ. Now though at another time I would try a fair fall with him whether this and many others which he thinks it enough for their reproach to call so be a Metaphorical Expression or no yet I have not leisure at present to attend that Service for my part I think that riches is more properly and literally predicated of that Grace that is treasured up in the Lord Jesus than of all that paltry trash which has got the vogue in the Dialect of deluded Worldlings but I am weary and shall therefore only make a defensive War of it What is then this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 this unsearchable Riches of Christ Why even here these Men cannot agree for some are zealous for it that what-ever is meant by unsearchable Riches yet by Christ is meant Christ himself others amongst whom our Author professes his Name by the unsearchable Riches of Christ understand the Gospel which St. Paul preached to the Gentiles And is it not a small thing that he should stand so stifly upon it for us to entreat 1. That the Glorious Person of Christ his Offices his Natures his Obedience his Life his Death with their proper Springs and Causes their special ends and designs might come in for a good share of the Gospel But 2. The Gospel preached is the opening of the Treasures of Wisdom Knowledg and Grace that are in Christ. Those Riches are or were unsearchable as they lay hid and deep in the Counsels and Purposes of the Father and the Son so far as they are revealed in the Gospel they are not unsearchable But what is meant by Riches why Riches says he signifie only an abundance This 't is to be wise above the common sort of ordinary Mortals most men I dare say have hitherto thought that Riches carry in their first Notion preciousness as well as plenty A handful of Gold is more truly Riches than a heap of Pebbles but then what are unsearchable Riches why they are so called because the Gospel is not a narrow and stinted thing is not confined to a particular nation as the Law was but is offered to all mankind c. I shall not cope with him in his Grammatical skill for therein he is unmatchable but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 has formerly signified that which cannot be traced that whereof we have no foot-steps and such are the Riches of Christ such the Counsels of God to reconcile the World to himself by his dear Son A Mystery whose knowledg depends upon Divine Revelation whereof we have not the least track in nature no more than of a Ship in the Sea an Eagle in the Air or a Serpent upon a Rock The Light of Nature is Dark the Tongue of the Creature Dumb the Book of the Creation a great Blank and he alone that was from eternity in the Bosom of the Father whose Name is Wonderful Counsellor was able to reveal and give us notice of them One small brush at Mr. Brookes will conclude this Section for 't is impossible for our Author to conclude without reviling and what evil has this good Man done Oh he has spoken a little too prodigally in commendation of Christ and it 's a standing rule that whoever will give our Saviour one good Word shall
to us in the true Covenant Ioh. 6. 37. All that the Father giveth me shall come to me and him that cometh to me I will in no-wise cast out Eph. 2. 8. By Grace ye are saved through Faith and that not of your selves it is the gift of God And lest it should be Answered that Faith is indeed God's gift as all other things are wherein the Common Providence of God concurs with Humane industry The Apostle as if aware of such a petty Answer has laid in a Reply ready ch 1. v. 19. That they who believe do so by the exceeding greatness of God's power even according to the working of his Mighty power which he wrought in Christ when he raised him from the dead Secondly we have a direct and express Promise too of that New-heart from which we give to God New-obedience nay of that New-obedience it self which proceeds from the New-heart or renewed Nature Ezek. 36. A new heart also will I give you and a new Spirit will I put within you and I will take away the heart of Stone out of your Flesh and will give you a heart of Flesh there 's the new Heart and v. 27. I will put my Spirit within you and cause you to walk in my Statutes and ye shall keep my Iudgments and do them there is new obedience thus also Heb. 8. 10. This is the Covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days saith the Lord I will put my Laws into their minds and write them in their hearts c. wherein it 's easy to observe 1. That this New-Covenant was founded upon God's free Grace v. 9. They continued not in my Covenant the old Covenant and I regarded them not saith the Lord They were a Covenant-breaking people deserved utter rejection yet God will make another a better a New-Covenant with them 2 That the promises of this Covenant were purely Spiritual writing his Laws in their minds and hearts 3. The parties Covenanting God and his Israel not all and every individual Son of Adam But 2. This Description gives us very little of the true Covenant of Grace here 's a Promise of Pardon and Life to them who believe and obey but perseverance in Faith and Obedience is left to the desultory and lubricous power of free-will whereas in the true Covenant of Grace there 's an undertaking that the Covenant shall be immutable both on God's part and the Believers Jer. 32. 38 40. They shall be my people and I will be their God and I will make an everlasting Covenant with them that I will not turn away from them to do them good but I will put my fear in their hearts that they shall not depart from me There are but two things that we can possibly Imagine should make the Covenant fall short of perpetuity either God's turning away from his people or which is only to be suspected their turning away from their God Against both of these God has made sufficient Provision 1. God has promised that he will not turn away from them to do them good 2. He has promised that they shall not depart from him and to fix and determine their backsliding Natures he has promised to put his fear into their hearts which is the great preservative against Apostacy § 2. As it describes not the whole of the Covenant so it describes not the Nature of a New-Covenant The Gospel-Covenant may be called a New Covenant either in opposition to the Old Covenant of Works or the old Administration of the Covenant of Grace Now 1. This Covenant which he has here described is no new Covenant in opposition to the Old-Covenant of works The Covenant which God made with Adam promised Life upon condition of Obedience Now the Commands which God gave to Adam were as easy as those which are now given to all Mankind and much easier too if we consider first That he had more natural strength to obey and keep them and as for supernatural strength our Author will allow us none unless by a desperate Catachresis we will call Moral Arguments so which to a Creature dead in trespasses and sins signify just nothing without special power from on high to render them efficacious which neither will be allowed us And Secondly we are told that Christ has added to the Moral Law which is to lay more Load on those who were before overcharged so that as he makes Covenants Adam's was much the better Covenant of the two But he has wisely shuffled in a Promise of the Pardon of Sin which may seem to give his Covenant a preheminence above that of Adam But that will not mend the matter both because it 's better to have no sin in our Natures than such a Remedy better to have no Wound than such a Plaister and also because the Promise of Pardon is suspended upon the condition of Faith and Obedience which without supernaturally real influx of immediate Divine Power reduces the promise to an impossibility of performance 2. This Covenant which he has here described is no New-Covenant in opposition to the old Administration of the Covenant of Grace There were the same promises then that we have now the same moral precepts to observe that we have now and though the word Gospel comes in for a blind yet the Apostle assures us Gal. 3. 8. That Abraham had the Gospel Preached to him § 3. Upon the matter it 's no Covenant of Grace at all For 1. A Promise of Pardon and Life upon Condition of Believing and Obeying is neither better nor worse than a threatning of Condemnation and Death to them who Believe not and Obey not It may with equal right be called a threatning of Death as a Promise of Life It 's no more a Covenant of Grace than a Covenant of Wrath and therefore 2. if it be lawful to consider Man as the Word of God describes him as dead in Sins and Trespasses as one that of himself cannot think a good thought that can do nothing at all without Christ It 's no Covenant at all to him under his present circumstances for what is the nice difference between a Promise of Life to him that obeys when it 's certain before-hand he cannot obey and no Promise at all 3. This Covenant which he calls New and well he may for it 's of his own making or however of his own new-vamping assigns the same conditions of Pardon and Eternal Life but the Scripture requires other qualifications for Eternal Life than for the Pardon of Sin A Believer may be justified without a sinless perfection but without such a sinless perfection none shall enter into Glory He may be actually justified that has not persevered in Holy Obedience to the Death but without such perseverance he can never be made partaker of Eternal Life 4. This Covenant of his is supposed to be made with all Mankind and yet all Mankind never heard of it Now is it not very
Truth for which end had there been nothing more in 't the Death of the Martyrs had clearly out-gone it But it 's high time to recollect our selves and return into the way again for those pittiful things which stand for proof that this was all the design of the Death of Christ call aloud for examination The Blood of Christ says he is called the Blood of Sprinkling which speaks better things than the Blood of Abel Heb. 12. 24. which is an allusion to Moses his Sprinkling the Blood of the Sacrifice whereby he confirmed the Covenant between God and the Children of Israel Heb. 9. 20 21. For when Moses had spoken every precept to the People according to the Law he took the Blood of Calves and Goats and sprinkled both the Book and all the People saying This is the Blood of the Testament which God hath ordained for you Thus the Blood of Christ is called the Blood of Sprinkling because by his Blood God did seal and confirm the Covenant of Grace as the sprinkling of Blood did confirm the Mosaical Covenant There are four things which I shall offer any one of which cleared up will shew the vanity of this Period § 1. The Blood of Christ is not called the Blood of Sprinkling which speaks better things than the Blood of Abel only in allusion to the Sprinkling of that Blood which confirmed the Mosaical Covenant There is a further a higher design in the Expression The Blood of Abel cried to God from the Earth for vengeance upon the Head of Cain and with the same importunity does the violation of every Law of God sollicite Divine Justice against the Transgressour and that with great justice For the same God who hath establisht his Holy Law in the Promise Do this and live hath bound and confirm'd it also with the threatning If thou sinnest thou shalt die Such dreadful things did the Blood of Abel shed in defiance of the Law speak to God But O what sweet how much better things does the Blood of Christ speak It speaks better things to the Justice of God than if the Sinner himself should suffer his utmost Indignation It speaks better things to the Law than if the Sinner had felt the weight of its severest Curse It speaks better things to the Conscience than if we had wrought out our inward Peace by our own Righteousness It satisfies God's Justice answers the Law and quiets the Conscience And in reference to this use of the Sprinkling of Blood viz. the Atoning and Reconciling of God is the Blood of Christ called the Blood of Sprinkling and to this the Apostle refers Heb. 11. 28. By Faith Moses kept the Passeover and the Sprinkling of Blood that he who destroyed the first-Born might not touch them The Apostle evidently points to Exod. 12. 14. The Blood shall be to you a token upon your Houses and when I see the Blood I will passe over you and the Plague shall not be upon you v. 21 22. Kill the Passeover and you shall take a Bunch of Hyssop and dip in the Blood and strike the Lintel and the two side-Posts and none of you shall go out of his House until the Morning Now here are several things observeable 1. That it was a respect to the Blood of the Paschal-Lamb duly used and applyed in consideration whereof God would not destroy them with the rest 2. That if they expected any benefit from that Blood they must abide under the shelter and protection of it 3. This Blood must be sprinkled upon the Lintel not upon the Threshold to mind them as the Jews observe that they ought not to trample it under their Feet And surely that Blood which turns away the deserved wrath of God from their head might claim more reverence than to be trampled under their feet 4. That this Blood thus sprinkled was considerable in God's eyes as it was the Blood of such a Lamb so chosen â—…t of the flock without any spot or blemish and so slain precisely according to God's appointment I just proportion the Lord Jesus Christ is called expresly our Passeover 1 Cor. 5. 7. Christ our Passeover is Sacrificed for you Now as the Blood of Christ has the same influence so it has the same plea It has the same Influence upon God it turns away his Anger he has a respect to the Blood of Jesus under this Blood do we take shelter and Sanctuary and therefore it pleads with us that we account it not a prophane and unholy thing for that will be interpreted a trampling under foot the Son of God himself Heb. 10. 29. which is to despise all the Grace and Mercy of God for what-ever Mercy we receive from God it is through the intervention of that Blood § 2. The whole concern of the Blood of Christ is 〈◊〉 exprest by the Blood of Sprinkling Sprinkling was one way and but one way of employing the Blood of the Sacrifices but it must be shed before it could be sprinkled and therefore sprinkled because it had been shed as a Sacrifice What-ever other use there was of the Blood of Sacrifices yet the efficacy of all was derived from this that that Blood had been once shed at the Altar Lev. 17. 11. It was Blood upon the Altar and that not merely as Blood but as it was the Life-Blood of the Sacrifice substituted in the room of the offender that made an Atonement for their Souls And this is evident in that the Blood of many of the Sacrifices for sin atoneing expiating Sacrifices were not sprinkled but only shed at the Altar What an unrighteous dealing is this then with the Blood of Christ to allot it no service but only the Confirmation of a Covenant because it 's called the Blood of sprinkling whereas the Blood of the Sacrifices of old as it was sprinkled did not express all the ends and uses of the Blood of Christ. § 3. That which comes home to our Author is this The whole design of the Blood of sprinkling 〈◊〉 not to confirm a Covenant As Blood was larger than sprinkling of Blood so sprinkling of Blood was larger than the confirming of a Covenant 1. The Blood of the Sacrifice was sometimes sprinkled 〈◊〉 turn away God's Anger thus in the Passeover and thus in that very place which our Author insists upon Heb. 9. 19. which the Apostle cites from Exod. 24. 5 6 7. where we read of a twofold Use of the Blood First one half of the Blood of the Burnt-Offering and the Peace-Offering which had been shed at the Altar Moses sprinkled upon the Altar Now all the use of Blood upon the Alâ—…r was Atonement Propitiation and Reconciliation of God Secondly With the other half of the Blood Moses consecrates and dedicates the People to the Lord to walk before him according to the Tenour of that Covenant whereas then he will argue that the Blood was sprinkled only to confirm a Covenant because one half of it was reserved for that
reputed the onely Children of God He removes that small Objection telling them Christ had already removed them in his Flesh in his Person he was the summe and substance of them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Having already in his Flesh or Person made void the Law of Ordinances and already dissolved that Partition Wall He that has Reconciled you to one God has also brought you into one Church which he repeats again ver 16. That he might Reconcile both unto God in one Body by the Cross having slain the Enemy thereby or in himself 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Here are first the Parties Reconciled Jews and Gentles Secondly to whom they are Reconciled to God Thirdly the Fruit of this Reconciliation to God They are brought into one Church amongst themselves Fourthly The Means whereby they are Reconciled to God that so they might be capable of being United into one Church and that is by the Cross of Christ or by himself on the Cross who bare our sins on the Tree 4. The Apostle shews the way and means of promulgating this Peace which he had made with God and that was by the publick Preaching of the Gospel ver 17. He Preached Peace he made Peace with God and then Preached it to the Gentile World He that had procured good will towards men Preaches Peace on Earth How little ground now had our Author to say That we are said to be Redeemed by the Preaching of the Gospel when the Preaching of the Gospel is nothing but a Declaration of that Redemption which Christ has made of Jew and Gentile with God and the way and Method to be partakers of the benefit of it And now to draw to a close of this Matter let us re-view our Authors Doctrine of Redemption The Redemption of Iew and Gentile he makes to differ as much as the Faith of Abraham and that of Christians 1. They differ in the matter of Redemption that which they were Redeemed from The Jews they were Redeemed from the Ceremonial Law the Gentiles they were Redemed from Idolatry and impure practises 2. They differ in the manner of procurement for the Jews Christ says he by his Death put an end to that Legal Dispensation and so their turn is served that little Redemption that they needed which is all our Author can afford them was Actually accomplisht by the Death of Christ which was a proper and immediate cause of their Redemption such a one as it was but then the Gentiles they were Redemed after another fashion by the Preaching of the Gospel whereby they were turned from Idolatry and impure practises And this shall be called Redemption because it were dangerous to ascribe it to the blood of Christ for an Obvious Reason that he knows of but because the Scripture says we are Redeemed by the Blood of Christ and gives that Blood a concernment therein therefore to stop the â—…uth of the Scripture it shall be said we owe the Preaching of the Gospel to the blood of Christ. 3. There is one thing more from whence our Author flatters himself with hopes of great success and that is by mis-representing the Analogy between the Iewish Sacrifices and the Sacrifices of Christ Two things he attempts 1. To shew what it is under the Law to which the Death of Christ his Ascention into Heaven and presenting his Blood to God does Answer 2. What it is under the Law to which his Intercession Answers Which project of our Authors has been contrived and managed with a great deal more subtilty by those who would storm or blush to see their Arguments thus miserably abased 1. To the former of these he expresses himself thus Now as the Death of Christ upon the Cross and his Ascention into Heaven and presenting his Blood to God in that most Holy place did answer to the first sprinkling of the Blood under the Law which confirmed the Mosaical Covenant as the Apostle Discourses in Heb. 9. c. In which few words he has heaped up more absurdities and follies than another must hope to bring into twice as many For 1. Here is a supposition of Christs presenting his Blood to God in Heaven distinct from his Intercession which when he shall offer to prove it may be time to consider it 2. He supposes that Christs Ascention into Heaven answered the first sprinkling of blood under the Law A most ridiculous supposition For what is there in sprinkling that answers to Ascention or bears the least Analogy to it Surely these Gentlemen that create such parallels and fancy such uncouth resemblances must have some mad design in their Heads which nothing will subserve but such forced allusions And I do not now wonder that he should so tediously rail at the use of Allusions in others for they will deserve the most of scorn that can be thrown upon them if they be all like his own 3. That the Death of Christ upon the Cross did Answer the sprinkling of Blood under the Law which confirmed the Covenant is very true but then 1. It must be remembred in what respect it confirmed the Covenant not meerly as a witnessing to the Truth of what he has preach'd but as Answering the demands and claims of the Governing Iustice of God as we have before shewed 2. It must be remembred also that it was not such a Covenant as he has imposed upon us but the true Covenant of Grace wherein God promises to give that which our Author will not own the New Heart New Spirit and New Obedience 3. That to confirm a Covenant was not all the design of it's sprinkling but diverting of the wrath of God procuring his favour c. So the Blood of Christ has greater ends than confirming of the Truth he taught viz. the appeasing Gods just displeasure procuring his Actual Love pacifying of the Conscience cleansing the Soul 4. He supposes also that the Apostle Discourses to this purpose Rom. 9. which is to make the Apostle accessory to his own groundless fopperies who is indeed perfectly innocent of these crimes For 1. The sprinkling of the blood which the Apostle mentions Heb. 9. 9. in that mentioned Exod. 24. 6. Now there was another sprinkling of blood Antecedent to that which we read of Exod. 12. to which the blood of Christ did Answer and to which the Apostle refers as is evident from Heb. 11. 28. Heb. 12. 24. 2. The sprinkling of Blood Heb. 9. 19. being the same with that Exod. 24. 6. shews evidently that as the whole concern of the blood sprinkled at that time was not confirming a Covenant but Atoning God So the whole concern of the blood of Christ is not taken up in confirming a Covenant much less such a thing as he will mis-call a Covenant but in Reconciling God to Man paying a price of Redemption to God c. 3. That the Apostle carries another Argument is evident For 1. The Typical Interest which those Sacrifices had in Redemption were accomplish'd before the
Matter of Justification before God and when it was attainable and it shall be once more the proper sence of being made righteous in Heaven where the spirits of just men are made perfectly perfect but to us in the way it 's not the proper sence of being made righteous but a Figurative sence as we may call an Aethiopian white because his teeth are so and it must be a stretching Synechdoche that will denominate a Christian Righteous by inherent Righteousness if he shall compare the Attainments of a Pilgrim with the perfect Law of God but the proper sence of being made righteous is that of the Apostle Rom. 5. 20. By the Obedience of one Man many shall be made righteous made so perfectly and compleatly by the Constitution of the Law of Righteousness and Faith for thus we are compleat in Christ Coloss. 2. 10. through whom we are presented to God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 unblameable and unreproveable in Gods sight so pure that there is not a spot or blemish to be found in a Believer in the sight of God himself which upon the Account of inherent Righteousness is impossible Inherent Righteousness is properly Righteousness for so much as there is of it but it is so imperfect that it will not denominate any man properly righteous in the sight of God 2 There is another thing which mightily discomposes this kind of Argumentation We may be said to be made righteous by the Righteousness of Christ in a proper sence Why so Oh! Because the Righteousness of Christ is one of those great Arguments of the Gospel that forms our Minds to the Love and practice of Holiness and so makes us inherently righteous Which is this The Righteousness of Christ and our Righteousness hang so loosely and contingently together that it seems very absurd to ascribe the Effect of the latter to the former If indeed the Righteousness of Christ did properly necessarily and infallibly produce an inherent Righteousness in us it were warrantable to say we were made righteous by it but when the Connexion is so accidental so uncertain that the Effect depends upon our own Free-will as in the New Theology it does we cannot properly be said to be made righteous in this sence by his Righteousness For when all these Arguments and Motives have done their best That which does the work is Free-will and Humane Endeavour and therefore properly are we said to be made Righteous by them 2. Sect. A Forensick sence which is this The Grace of the Gospel accepts and rewards that sincere and Evangelical Obedience which according to the Rigour and Severity of the Law could deserve no reward This Forensick is a hard word and if I might presume to soften it a little with Interpretation it should be thus A Forensick sence of Justification is a sence borrowed from Courts of Judicature where the Judge absolving or acquitting a Prisoner of those Crimes wherewith he stood charged does not doe it by making him innocent or honest by infusing into him the Habits of Vertue but onely declares That according to the Evidence he is found Innocent Righteous Just and therefore as the Law acquits him so the Judge as the Minister of the Law declares him to be acquitted Now the Question is Whether our Author has given us a true Forensick sence of Iustification or no His Sence is this The Grace of the Gospel accepts and rewards that sincere and Evangelical Obedience which according to the Severity and Rigour of the Law deserves no reward which seems to me so far from a Forensick sence that it 's the Forensick Non-sence of Justification for does a Judge pronounce and declare him righteous whom the Law says is unrighteous Can he justifie him whom the Law condemns The Judge sits not there as a good Natur'd Man with a Chancery of Charity in his own breast but as a Righteous Governour to render to every man according to his works weighed in the Ballance of that Law by which he is to judge And shall we dare to fancy that the Grace of the Gospel will pronounce that Man righteous reward that Man as righteous who is not righteous by the Law of God if that be the Law by which he must be Condemned or Acquitted I will grant that in a Criminal Cause which by the Law deserves Bodily Punishment if the Constitution of the Law will Allow it the Judge may lay the Punishment of the Guilty Person upon another who will freely undergoe it or that which is equivalent in the eye of the Law to it and acquit him that in the first Consideration of the Law was not innocent Let us apply it God is the righteous Iudge of all the World and by his Eternal Holy Law he will Judge the Sons of Men so true is God to his own Law that he will not acquit and justifie him whom the Law condemns nor Condemn him whom his Law Acquits nor is it possible he should To say the Sinner is righteous by the Verdict of his Law when by the Verdict of the Law he is not righteous is not consistent with the Veracity of that God who cannot lye But there is another Law the Law of Righteousnesse and Faith which Sovereign Grace has set up and this admits the satisfaction of Another admits a Sacrifice a Surety even Jesus Christ the righteous whom God hath set forth to be a Propitiation through Faith in his Blood to declare his Righteousness that he may be just and the Iustifier of him that believes in Iesus If now according to the Terms of this New Law of Grace the Righteousness and Sufferings of this Jesus may be accepted for the Delinquents then will there a genuine sence of a Forensick Iustification be found out Yet let us examine these things further 1 The Grace of the Gospel says he accepts and rewards that sincere Obedience Let it be supposed he means the Grace of God declared in the Gospel yet this is so far from being Grace that it is not good Moral Vertue Is that Grace or something that deserves Another Name to declare an Offender to be righteous when he is not so to pronounce he has kept the Law when he has broken it and yet thus must the Grace of the Gospel speak if it declares him righteous in a Forensick sence who is a Violator of the Law and yet has no Substitute to keep it for him Here is some Provision made for an Imaginary Grace to the destruction of real Iustice whereas in the true Covenant of Grace there is a blessed Accord of all Gods Attributes Mercy and Truth have met together Righteousness and Peace have kissed each other 2 If it be the Grace of God or the Gospel that accepts this sincere Obedience then how do we owe this to the Righteousness of Christ what Influence has that upon God to move him to accept and reward that sincere yet imperfect Obedience which his Law will not accept This is the thing
recommend his Glory and Perfections What Nature will teach us so great a Darling of hers the Privado to all her Mysteries cannot be Ignorant of but in my Judgment he fetches a huge Blow to do Nothing We believe God was perfectly happy from all Eternity in the Enjoyment of his own Self and Infinite Perfections and needed not have recommended his Glory to his Creatures he made not the World because he needed it but by our Authors good leave or without it supposing that God will recommend his Glory he must have something out of himself to which he may recommend it And on like Supposition that He will Manifest his pardoning Grace and Mercy there must be a fit Object capable of that Grace and Mercy unless our Author from his too much familiarity with Nature can tell us how God can Pardon one that is no sinner or forgive him that is not guilty Though every sinner be not an Object qualified to receive Mercy yet he must be a sinner upon whom pardoning Mercy is exercised though all Misery be not a fit Object of pity yet Pity supposes Misery some of Gods Attributes create their Objects as Omnipotency but others do suppose them as Sin pardoning Grace and so God may be said to need Sins and Misery to recommend some of his Perfections I am sure supposing sin and misery to exist God has recommended his Son to us in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us Rom. 5. 8. Of the same bran is that which follows God would not Truckle and Barter with the Devil and Sin for his Glory It 's like he would not but when the Devil and Sin had confederated against God I know not why God might not Over-reach them in their Designs and as he has made the wrath of Man so he might also the policy of Satan to serve and praise Him and thus he fixes a New end upon sin which the Devil never dreamt on or however did not design But I perceive our Author is wondrously pleased with the fine Notion of Trucking and Bartering and that we might not loose the beauty of it he warns us amongst the Errata I would there were no worse that for Truckle we read Truck Oh be sure Courteous Readers you do not mistake for there 's some weighty Controversie depends upon it which the Coffee-house and the Inch of Candle must determine But further Nature teaches him That God had much rather be Glorious in the Happiness and Perfection and Obedience of his Creatures than in their sin and misery Nature is an excellent School Mistress I see and this is one of her highest Mysteries that God delights in Obedience more than Sin But what now if Sin and Disobedience have got in for my part I question whether Nature will teach him that God had rather much rather or however how much rather he had be more Glorious in exacting one Attribute than another or whether God may not equally glorifie himself in the Execution of his just Displeasure against Sin obstinately pursued as in the glorifying the Penitent and Reformed sinner but this I know that the former has more deserved Eternal Punishment than the other can pretend to merit Eternal Life But perhaps he has Ballances that will turn with the Twentieth part of a Grain and in these he knows how to weigh which of Gods Attributes weigh heaviest And that he can do for he tells us That pardoning Mercy and vindictive Iustice are but secondary Attributes What warrant he has to marshal Gods Attributes in this order I dare not enquire which are first rate which second rate Attributes is a Nice enquiry but I expected a Dish of Coleworts before he had done for these have been served up to us in the Racovian Catechism Let these things be as they will I observe 1. That vindictive Justice and pardoning Mercy are both equally Gods Attributes 2. They are not the less Essential and primary Attributes because they were not Eternally exercised for then neither would Omnipotency be such God was Eternally Omnipotent though he Created not the World from Eternity and he was also Eternally a God of pardoning Mercy and a God of punitive Justice though to the Exerting the outward Acts proper to those Eternal excellencies there was required an Object capable of receiving them This Nature and Scripture teaches us and we are not much concern'd in our Authors Theologie but to close up all he gives us an Inference from his Doctrine and a Reason of that Inference His Doctrine was this Vindictive Iustice and Pardoning Mercy are not Primary but Secondary Attributes His Inference is this Therefore God cannot Primarily design the glorifying of them His Reason is this For that cannot be without Primarily designing the sin and misery of his Creatures That is God cannot Primarily design one thing except he Primarily designs another and so we shall have two Firsts without a Second This is very thin Stuff it shines through 2. The Reader has heard to his great Contentment how admirably he has acquitted himself in the Matter of sin if he can but play his part as well in the Matter of our Righteousness too he will deserve the Whetstone and that may save him the Labour of going to the Counter-door As it is with your Artificial Fencers that never knew further than the Discipline of the School they have all the Terms of Art know their Postures and with good Credit can play a Prize upon the Stage yet when these men come to Sharpe when the Point of a real Enemies Sword is ready prest at the heart it puts them often out of their forms their School-play and Systematical skill Thus possibly it may fare with our confident Bravo's who can talk very confidently of appearing before God in their own Duties and a Righteousness finely Composed out of those Materials yet possibly their Blood may freeze in their Veins and the Colour forsake their bold Cheeks when God shews himself in his glorious Majesty and they must be in a moment as they must be for ever None ever Ranted higher than Bellarmin nor Hector'd the World with Arguments against Imputed Righteousness yet when he saw Death was in good Earnest he was glad to Lower his Top-sail and cry out Precor ut inter sanctos suos non estimator meriti sed veniae largitor me admittat And in his very Ruff against that Doctrine retreated to his Tutissimum est liâ—… 5. de justificatione What Doctor Owen asserts herein is briefly thus much Com. pag. 113. All men are perswaded that God is a most Righteous God Hab. 1. 13. and therefore the Ungodly cannot stand in the Judgment Hence the enquiry of every one convinc't of Immortality and the Judgment to come is concerning the Righteousness to appear before this Righteous God The first thing that offers it self for Direction and Assistance is the Law which hath many fair Pleas to prevail with a Soul to close with it for a
Righteousness It was given out by God himself for that end it contains the whole Obedience that God requires of the Sons of Men It has the promise of Eternal Life annext to it Do this and Live But there are two things that discover the Vanity of seeking Righteousness in this Path 1. That they have already sinned and come short of the Glory of God Rom. 3. 23. So that though they should for the time to come fulfil the whole Law yet there is a Score upon them already they know not how to answer for 2. That if former Debts were blotted out yet they are no way able to fulfil the Law for the future many other Devices men have found out but in the Issue the matter comes to this They look upon themselves 1. As sinners obnoxious to the Law of God and the Curse thereof so that unless that be satisfied it 's in vain from thence to seek after an appearance before God 2. As Creatures made to a Super-natural end and therefore bound to answer the whole Mind and Will of God Now both these being beyond the Compass of their own endeavours it 's their wisdom to find out a Righteousness that may answer both these to the utmost now both these are to be had only in the Lord Christ who is our Righteousness Who 1. Expiates former Iniquities 2. Fulfils the whole Law by his active Obedience Rom. 5. 10. We are saved by his Life And now the Doctor has told you the short of his Story But our Author confutes him much shorter and without Cicumlocution replies This is a mighty comfortable Discovery how we may be Righteous without doing any thing that is good or Righteous I 'le warrant you a whole Cart-load of Books hath been Written of this Subject all which with Laconick Brevity our Author has blown away with one Puff And is not this a Compendious way of Dispatching Controversies out of the World It is a Truth that none is Righteous but he that doth righteousness and as great a Truth that None is righteous before God because he doth righteousness Without Holiness no man shall see God and without something more than his own holiness no man shall see God or it were better he had never seen him But more distinctly 1. It 's seasonable to enquire what is the Mind of the Church of England in this Matter and She speaks freely Art 11. We are accounted righteous before God only for the Merit of our Lord and Saviour Iesus Christ by Faith and not for our own Works Pray ask her then Whether we may be Righteous without doing any thing that is Righteous for which we are so accounted in the sight of God And whereas he says with a Scoff This is a mighty comfortable Doctrine The Church in that very Article determines in earnest Wherefore that we are justified by Faith only is a most whole some Doctrine and full of Comfort Either then that Article Confutes his Assertion or his Assertion confutes the Article Again Art 13. Works done before the Grace of Christ and the Inspiration of the Spirit are not pleasant to God for as much as they spring not of Faith in Christ. And for that they are not done as God hath Commanded them to be done no doubt but they have the Nature of sin Hence it were easie to argue against our Author Those works which are not pleasant to God which have the Nature of sin cannot justifie the doer of them But all works done before the Grace of Christ the Inspiration of his Spirit which spring not from Faith are such therefore they cannot justifie the doer of them before God Either then we must never be justified or else we must be justified without good Works as that for which we are justified at least though the Article would conclude something more It 's very uncomely to see ill taught Children to spit in their Mothers face and we account that an evil Bird that defiles its own Nest. 2 It will be no less seasonable to enquire into the mind of the Spirit also And the Apostle Paul seems to speak high Rom. 4. 5. To him that worketh not but believeth in him that justifieth the ungodly his faith is counted for righteousness And more modesty would become him than to quip the Apostle and tell him This is a comfortable discovery how a man may be righteous without doing any thing that is righteous Again In the business of Election the Apostle argues thus Rom. 11. 6. If it be by Grace then it is not of Works otherwise Grace is no more Grace but if it be of Works then it is no more Grace otherwise Work is no more Work 3. It 's seasonable to enquire whether our Author had not better have understood the Doctor better before he had undertaken to answer him For when he asserts that we are justified by Christ he excludes not the way and means that God hath appointed to make the righteousness of Christ to become ours He that saith we are justified by Christ doth not deny we are justified by Faith and therefore not without doing something that is good Nay he excludes not Inherent righteousness from the Soul nor Gospel obedience from the Life only he excludes them as too defective and imperfect to make us stand before God in the judgment And herein he seems a more dutiful Son of the Church of England than our Author let the 12th Art judge Albeit Works which are the fruits of Faith and follow after Iustification cannot put away our sins and endures the severity of Gods judgment yet are they pleasing and acceptable to God in Christ and do spring out necessarily of a true and lively faith insomuch that by them a lively faith may be as evidently known as a Tree discerned by the fruit Whence it is obvious That if our good Works which are the fruits of Faith which follow Iustification cannot endure the severity of Gods judgment What shall become of those that are only the fruits of Nature and go before Iustification Again If those Works which are pleasing and acceptable to God in Christ yet cannot endure the severity of Gods Iudgment Where then shall those appear that being done before Iustification have the Nature of sin and are not pleasant to God As the 13th Art determines To whomsoever then this is comfortable Doctrine I am sure it was once so to our Author who by Subscribing these very Doctrines got a Living of very comfortable Importance and might have had the Civility with them of Ephesus to have owned By this Craft we get our Living But if our Author like not the Doctors way let him prescribe his own only let him be sure it be a better and safer way That he will The Scripture tells us expresly he is righteous that doth righteousness and without Holiness no man shall see God that the only way to obtain the pardon of our sins is to repent of them and forsake