Works he hath whereof to glory but not before God as if it were any thing whereof he could glory in himself for all Glorying and Boasting is excluded but Abraham's glorying is in God who freely justified him and he rejoiced from that Act of Faith concerning his Son evidencing the Soundness of the saving Faith and the Manifestation of his Justification thereby both to himself and other Men whereby he glorieth before Men and not before God And whereas it is said That Faith worketh by Love it cannot be understood that Acts of Love are Acts of Faith for they are Graces essentially distinct but that Faith is Man's Part of the Covenant whereby Love is given upon God's Part nor doth it follow that because Faith is perfected by Love therefore its Essence is not distinct from Love Man is perfected by Love yet it is no part of his Being That Historical Faith believing the Truth of the Gospel is specifically different from saving Faith and yet it is said That whosoever believeth Christ is come in the Flesh is born of God for no Man can call Jesus Lord but by the Spirit of God which imports no more than a Sign of saving Faith at that time when there was so general an Opposition against Christ when no Man did avow or own Christ hypocritically 7. The Church of Rome hath more exceeded in bringing Works as Man's Part of the Covenant of Grace than any other Society of Christians for they have made Works the whole and only Part of Man in the Covenant of Grace and have given no Preheminence to Faith but to Charity or Love consequently enough to that Principle As it is said of the three eminent Christian Vertues that of these the greatest is Charity so that if Faith did save as a good Work Love would much more save They acknowledg no Justification distinct from Sanctification they do not require good Works as the Condition of Salvation but as the meritorious Cause of Salvation that God in Justice could not deny Celestial Glory to those that live holily and which is yet more extravagant Supererrogation is the common Opinion publickly preached in that Church and when the Council of Trent was call'd on purpose to amend Errors in Doctrine and Manners that had crept into that Church not one Word in any of their Canons disapproving Works of Supererrogation and the Treasure thereof out of which the Pope by Assignment of the superfluous Merits of the Saints may supply the Merits of others and bring them to Heaven either immediately upon Death or shortning their purging by the purgatorial Fire as soon as he thinks fit and yet they dispute vehemently against the Imputation of the Holiness of Christ. They do acknowledg that Christ's Sufferings have satisfied the Justice of God that without encroaching thereupon he may give Pardon of Sin and they do not ascribe the Pardon of Sin to the Merit of their Holiness but only to the Expiation by Christ's Sufferings and inconsistently enough they require purging by the purgatorial Fire which cannot be thought Correction to amend them and therefore could only be to cleanse and expiate in which they derogate even from the Sufferings of Christ. But to give them the most benign Interpretation they think the Forgiveness of Sin could not exalt Men to heavenly Blessedness but that as in the Covenant of Works every one behoved to merit that Exaltation by their Works which could not be after the Fall because of Original Sin whereby the eating of forbidden Fruit did condemn all Mankind descending from Adam by Ordinary Generation until Christ's Suffering had satisfied that Debt and even the actual Transgressions of those in the Covenant of Grace yet tho Men be still sinful their Sins being pardoned as satisfied by Christ's Sufferings Mens good Works lose not their Effect to merit Heaven as well as Adam's which is the only Difference they make between the Covenant of Grace and the Covenant of Works Nothing can be more contrary to the Covenant of Grace and to the Way of Salvation inculcated in the Gospel wherein 1. All Glorying or Boasting of the Creature attributing any Part of its Salvation to it self is excluded Where is boasting then It is excluded by what Law of Works Nay but by the Law of Faith Therefore we conclude saith the Apostle That a Man is justified by Faith without the Deeds of the Law But God who is rich in Mercy for his great Love wherewith he loved us even when we were dead in Sin hath quickned us together with Christ where it is twice repeated by Grace you are saved through Faith not of Works lest any Man should boast Yea Boasting is so far excluded that Man cannot boast of Faith as it is his Part of the Covenant of Grace for it is said By Grace you are saved through Faith and that not of your selves it is the Gift of God What could be more said to exclude Works from Man's Part of the Covenant of Grace not only that there cannot be an equivalent Cause deserving Glory but not so much as the Terms upon which Glory was to be freely given For it is expressy said that we are God's Workmanship created in Christ to good Works which God hath before ordained or prepared that we should walk in them and God hath not predestinated Men to Salvation for their Works foreseen or performed For whom he did foresee them he did predestinate to be conformed to the Image of his Son which Image is Holiness which is not the Cause but the End and Effect of Predestination Good Works indeed are Via Regni but not Gausa Regnandi and they are the Evidences of true and saving Faith to be diligently followed not only by reason of the indispensible Law and Duty anterior in order to any Covenant but as the Means to evidence true Grace and give solid Peace and therefore it is said Strait is the Gate and narrow is the Way that leadeth unto Life and that the Kingdom of God is taken by Violence and the Violent enter it by Force which doth import no more than the Way to the Kingdom And where it is said Blessed are they that do his Commandments that they may have Right to the Tree of Life it doth not import Right by Merit the Word being 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so that Works can no more properly be called Right than the Evidence of Lands or Inheritance are called the Rights thereof as sighifying the same and therefore the explicatory Words are subjoined and may enter in through the Gates to the City All others but the Romanists that bring in Works to the Covenant of Grace bring them in as the Conditions of it but not as a deserving meritorious Cause much less as a superfluous supererrogatory Merit seeing Christ hath declared so clearly that the first and great Command of God is Thau shait love the Lord thy God with all thy Heart with all thy Soul and with all thy Mind
to which Luke adds witth all thy Strength Can any Creature do more than this Command doth require which doth not import that all are obliged to the same measure but according to their several Capacities For to whom much is given of them much is required 3. Nothing can be more apposite to take off that Pretence that Remission of Sins is not attributed to Works but only the Exaltation of Man from an Animal Life such as Adam had in his Innocence to an Angelical Life in Heaven than where it is said Even when we were dead in Sin hath he quickened us in Christ and hath raised us up together and made us sit together in Heavenly Places with Christ Jesus What a pitiful Pretence is it that by the Works of the Law are only meant the Mosaical Law including Institutions and Ceremonies when Faith is said to justify without the Works of the Law and thereafter Works are excluded without mention of any particular Law all Negatives and Exclusives are Universal It is also a groundless Pretence to bring in Works to the Covenant of Grace to make Men more diligent in Holiness seeing it is the Evidence of true Faith ever joined with it in Existence tho not in Concurrence as the Terms of the Covenant on Man's part for the habitual Grace of Holiness is God's part given in Regeneration which even Infants must have I do not think it a convincing Reason against Merit as it is against Supererrogation or Super-Merit that no Creature can merit except it did that which it was not obliged to do seeing all Creatures are indispensably obliged to love God with all their Strength and so to do all that is acceptable in his Sight For then God should only have Punitive Justice and not Premiative Justice by proportionable Rewards which yet certainly is as congruous to the Divine Perfections as the other To him that hath shall it be given Well done thou good and faithful Servant thou hast been faithful in a few things I will make thee Ruler over many things There are indeed two kinds of Rewards and there is but one word commonly used to signify both The one is a Reward proportioned to deserving of which it is said To him that worketh the Reward is not reckoned of Grace but of Debt Whence it is clear that there is one Reward of Debt and another of Grace which is more properly to be called a Prize or a Gratification I doubt not that the Exaltation of Adam if he had persisted in Integrity from an Animal to an Angelical Life and the Confirmation of him and his Posterity against the hazard of falling was a Prize far above the Proportion of his Merit and so a Reward not of Debt but of Grace for it was annexed to Perseverance in his Innocence not to any high degree of his Attainments and was lost by losing his Innocence not by coming short of such a degree of Holiness How impudently insolent is it then for any sinful Mortal to claim Celestial Glory and to be out of hazard of Misery by their own Merit which were the ground of the most excessive boasting for then they might say that God had given them nothing that he could have withholden These are all the ways I know that Men pretend to ascribe any part of Salvation to their own good Works or Holiness whereof the last is the worst and it is a wonder that such a Multitude of People after so great Discoveries of its Falshood should not be asham'd to own and urge it Many of them at their Death durst not adventure on that ground but betook themselves to the Merits of Christ alone even their greatest Champion Bellarmine to whose Merits more is ascribed in the Support of that Church than to the greatest Merits of the most mortified Monks but they are necessitated to own it because their Church hath defined it as an Article of Faith so that without Shipwrack of Infallibility which is the Ground and Pillar of their Church they cannot part from it There are other Mistakes and Errors about the Terms of the Covenant of Grace and the way of Man's Salvation even of those that admit nothing of their Works but who ascribe all to Faith and acknowledg that Faith is not by the Power of Human Nature but that it is the supernatural Gift of God Those of the Augustan Confession and the Arminians hold that Christ hath purchased to all Mankind a Renovation of Nature concreated with their Souls whereby it becomes in their Power to repent believe and be holy or not as they please and choose And that these Graces are not given to every Individual at the time of their Conversion but that their Election is by God's Fore-knowledg that they will make use of that Power aright which God hath given them and will repent believe and be holy at their Death tho during their Life they may oftentimes fall from all these Graces yet God who foresaw these would not fall away finally did elect them to Glory In this they think they do not boast because this Power was the Gift of God but given to all alike which therefore they call universal Grace thereby they think they fall neither in with Pelagians who attribute these Powers to Human Nature nor with Papists that attribute their Salvation to their own good Works Yet these Opinions are abundantly inconsistent with Revelation of the way of God's dealing with Man and even with Reason They are very clearly inconsistent with the Wisdom of God who doth nothing in vain Were it not in vain to give Grace to the greatest part of Mankind whom God knew would never make use of it or at least would not continue in it but finally fall from him Is it not evidently more consonant to the Wisdom of God to give Grace only to the Elect at the time of Conversion Could it be consistent with the Wisdom of God that he should reconcile with and accept into Favour those whom he knew would apostatize and desert him I know nothing they can pretend to extricate the Wisdom of God in such a course but that it could not consist with God's Justice to require of Creatures that which were impossible for them to perform much less to condemn them to eternal Punishment for that which was impossible and therefore both the Wisdom and Goodness of God required that even the Damned should be inexcusable and so all Mankind behoved to be put in a Capacity of Salvation if not by the natural Powers of Man in Creation at least by superadded Powers after the Fall But there is no necessity to infer that kind of universal Grace to render all Mankind capable of Salvation and to make the Damned inexcusable It is sufficient and consonant to the Word of God that Christ's Merits should be in Value sufficient to purge away the Sins of the whole World and that Grace should be effectual to all of them who when it was offered
without a meritorious Cause deserving Damnation it doth no way follow that he doth save and glorify the Elect upon foresight of a meritorious Cause in them God's Independence cannot exclude the consideration of the Object of his Decree as it must be considered in his Decree He cannot decree to give Mercy but to a Creature that is in some measure miserable He cannot decree to relieve a Creature unless he consider it as distress'd He hath clearly declared and consequently decreed that he would never pardon the Sin against the Holy Ghost Therefore he behoved to foresee who would commit that Sin for he doth nothing in vain and would never decree any thing relating to a Case that were never to exist he could not decree to elect any Creature but upon Foresight and Consideration that he was to create that Creature and that he was never to suffer it to have Hatred and Despight against him In that Golden Chain Whom he did foreknow them he did predestinate to be conform to the Image of his Son and whom he did predestinate them he also called and whom he called them he also justified and whom he justified them he also glorified The first Link is Foreknowledg of the Object to be predestinated which with congruity to the Divine Natural Perfections were predestinable prior in order of Nature to Predestination Yet in none of these is the Independence of God incroached on Could a miserable or distressed Creature be so impudent as to pretend that its Misery or Distress were the cause of God's Mercy or Relief but only the Object or Occasion thereof the true Cause being God's Mercy and Goodness and so God's Decree to inflict eternal Punishment upon his rational Creature that he foresaw would hate him or be obstinate in Sin is his own Justice and Purity 2dly It is said In God we live we move and have our being And therefore all the Motions of our Minds and Bodies must be his Motions acted by him which Inference is no better than this in him we have our Being therefore our Being is his Being but the true meaning is cleared by those Things which are frequently said of Christ That they are in him and yet are the Creatures importing no more but that they are by Virtue and Power derived from Christ and so we move in God that is by Virtue and Power derived from him 3dly It is objected That if in the worst of Actions God were not Actor he could not be the first and universal Cause but thence it will not follow that the first and universal Cause must still be the immediate and total Cause which is necessary to an universal Predetermination 4thly The main Reason against universal Predetermination is to vindicate the Purity of God which it doth not for whosoever permitteth Evil that he could hinder is accessary thereto and guilty thereof And so God judgeth his Creatures which will not conclude against God because Creatures are not only subject to the moral and unchangeable Laws of God but to his positive Laws neither are Creatures universally obliged to hinder all evil Acts that they were able to hinder For God having set up Civil Authority thereby obligeth Subjects to suffer the Legal Executions thereof though unjust albeit they have sufficient Strength to hinder the same This Reason hath been the chief Inducement of the Error of those who to maintain the Purity of God incroach upon his Power and Wisdom holding that the Will of a free Creature is essentially undeterminable by any other than by it self and therefore God can do no more but perswade and bring Motives into the Mind and so is blameless having done all he could do to hinder Sin For certainly God could have been so powerful a Perswader as to make Prophets and Preachers go to all Nations which he hath not done and this Ground encroacheth on God's Omnipotence that he cannot effectually over-rule his Free Creatures and encroacheth on his Wisdom who having no need of any Creature created such which he could not govern but behoved only to supplicate and perswade The 5th Reason assign'd for universal Predetermination is brought from the accurate arguing of that Case by the Apostle Paul in the 9th of the Romans where it is said of Esau and Jacob That the Children being not yet born neither having done any good or evil that the Purpose or Decree of God according to Election might stand not of Works but of him that calleth Jacob have I loved but Esau have I hated Against which he brings this Objection Is there Vnrighteousness with God To which he answers with a strong Denial God forbid For be saith to Moses I will have Mercy on whom I will have Mercy And thence concludeth That it is not of him that runneth or of him that willeth but of God that sheweth Mercy Whence he doth conclude Therefore hath he Mercy on whom he will have Mercy and whom he will he hardeneth Against which Conclusion he brings a new Objection thus Thou wilt say then unto me Why doth he yet find fault For who hath resisted his Will To which he answereth thus Nay but O Man Who art thou that replies against God Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it Why hast thou made me thus Hath not the Potter Power over the Clay of the same Lump to make one Vessel unto Honour and another unto Dishonour Thence the Authors of universal Predetermination or Excitation of God to the worst Acts think they have unanswerable Grounds to infer That God is not only the Permitter but the Actor of Hardening as well as of Mercy Yea that he hath no more Consideration of what the Creatures were to act in Reprobation and Damnation than in Election and Glorification but that of the same Lump or Mass of Mankind he doth as indifferently make the Vessels of Dishonour that is the Reprobate as the Vessels of Honour that is the Elect. But the Context sufficiently cleareth the Mistakes of these Inferences for it inferreth nothing as to Reprobation that the Children being not yet born had done nothing of Good or Evil the Inference is only that Election might not be of foreseen Works But where it is said that God loved Jacob and hated Esau tho they had yet done nothing it doth not infer That as there is no foreseen Merit or cause of Love of the Elect fo that God hates the Damned without a meritorious Cause deserving his Hatred there is no Consequence from the Freedom of God's Election and Love which are Acts of Bounty to infer the Freedom of his Hatred and Reprobation which are Acts of Justice for Bounty and Mercy are absolutely free but so is not Justice But the main Mistake is that the Vessels of Dishonour are supposed to be the Reprobate and the Vessels of Honour the Elect As if God as indifferently reprobates and elects as the Potter doth of the same Lump make one Vessel to Honour and another to Dishonour
as in the other It is not said whosoever sheds Man's Blood by that Man or his Relation his Blood shall be shed for he that 's killed or disabled cannot shed his Blood who did it nor ought he to be Judg or Avenger of it where another can be had which is the Prerogative of God alone Men may defend themselves against Injury which is not by Distributive or Judicial Justice but by the Obligation they owe to God to preserve these Lives whereof he alone is Master but they may not avenge themselves without a Judg knowing the Evidence of the Fact tho he be not a Civil Judg having an Authoritative Superiority Kings and States ought not to be both Judges and Parties where others can be had but before they enter in War they ought to demand Satisfaction and give sufficient Evidence of the Fact and not decline Arbitriment where an indifferent Judg can be found nor do they judg their own Cause against their Subjects but by Judges tho constituted by themselves yet sworn to do Justice between them and their Subjects without respect of Parties not only in their Civil Rights but in Crimes and Injuries against themselves It is by this kind of Justice that Princes and States interpose between their Neighbours entering in War where no Arbitration hath preceded and they cannot justly concur with the injured without a preceding Judgment for it would choak Humanity to think that they might kill Men by implicit Faith or Report much less by Kindness or Contract By this Justice Men are not only obliged to act as Judges but as Witnesses by giving their own Testimonies or any Evidence they have or can cause any in their Power to give Avenge not your selves is not with a Restriction to private Persons Vengeance is God's and can only be done by himself or by his Warrant I know the Perverseness and even Inadvertance of Men make them run upon their Adversary to give themselves that great but inhuman Pleasure of Revenge not so much delighting in Justice as in the Misery of the Injurer yet the Mighty God hath not only said but sworn That he delights not in the Death of a Sinner When I consider these Branches of Justice as they are in God I perceive great Difference in them as they are in Men who by Attributive Justice may take nothing from any Man that is his own except in the way of Punishment for a just Cause but as to God all Mens Goods Honour Freedom and even their Lives are but precarious during God's Pleasure and as the Peculia of Children or Servants and therefore it is no Injustice in God to take them away or to transfer the Right of them to any other The Israulites not restoring those things that they had borrowed from the Egyptians at their Departure was no Stealth or Injury because they did it by God's Warrant It is more questionable whether it was congruous to God to have taken away the Life of his innocent Rational Creatures by Annihilation or by Death wherein I do incline to the Negative For I see not how it can consist with the Happiness of any Creature if it have not Certainty of its blessed State But I think also that the assurance of the Continuance thereof is not from God's Justice but from his Bounty especially from his Faithfulness There is nothing revealed of any Promise made to the Angels and yet there is no doubt of their full assurance not to be annihilated and it is hard to conceive how their Life can be otherwise taken away nor do I know whether there was such a Promise made to Man in Innocency for tho Death was threatened upon his Disobedience the assurance of the perpetuity of Life did not thence necessarily follow But innocent Angels and Men had sufficient ground to have full Trust in God that if they offended him not he would never destroy them tho not from his Promise for that had been by his Justice but I am far clearer that God's Justice could not permit that he should torment his innocent Creatures or make them miserable I know some think that by his Soveraignty he might torment his innocent Rational Creatures as having more Power over them than the Potter over his Clay to make Vessels of Honour or Dishonour of them but I have cleared my Mind as to that Point that by the Vessels of Honour or Dishonour are not meant the happy and miserable but his free giving of Grace by which they become honourable or his permitting them to harden their Hearts by which they become dishonourable for that is said in Answer to an Objection Why doth God find fault with Men that their Hearts are hardened for who hath resisted his Will Finding of fault cannot relate to innocent Misery I know some are puzzled to extricate themselves as to God's Command to Abraham to sacrifice his Son Isaac I see no Difficulty in the Case as to God's Justice for tho Isaac had been sacrificed God could have restored him to Life and so fulfilled his Promise That in Isaac all Nations should be blessed I conceive the Difficulty lies as to God's Unchangeableness who hath never changed any Law of Nature that he wrote in Man's Heart but Abraham's killing and sacrificing his own Son without a deserving Crime is inconsistent with the Law of Man's Nature But there was no certain ground for Abraham to conclude that his Son would be sacrificed but only that God did prove his Obedience who by an implicit Faith which is only due to God was obliged to proceed till he was stopped tho he could not know how that Act could consist with the Law of Nature yet he might still hope for a Reprieve even when he lifted the Knife to give the fatal Blow as the Event shewed and I take this to be the best Instance of God's voluntas signi where there is not voluntas beneplaciti for here there was a presumed Will or rather a Presumption of the Will of God from his Command but it admitted a contrary Probation the Voice from Heaven having warranted him to hold his Hand This is also a clear Evidence that God does not always will to operate what he does command for his Will can never want its Effect tho oft his Command doth the Intent whereof is to oblige the Creature and shew it its Duty I know some think they cannot enough exalt God's Soveraignty if they admit any thing right but by his Will but they should remember that he is so Soveraign as he is also Just Bountiful and Faithful They do too much detract from the Loveliness of God that plead for him as Courtiers for their Masters who love not to hear or give another Cause of their Commands but Such is our Pleasure God's Promises do certainly infer his Attributive Justice to perform and yet what he performs may well be accounted a free Gift because before his Promise he was not only free but indifferent but
Infancy Can it be thought that Man by his Merit could deserve Celestial Glory and Confirmation freeing him from the hazard of falling in Sin or losing that blessed State by Mortality or Annihilation and yet there is no ground to doubt that as the Angels were confirmed after their Trial so would Men have been which with the Immortality God had promised he lost and became mortal and miserable by eating the forbidden Fruit. Whence there is enough to satisfy the Consciences of Men of God's Dispensation in suffering Adam to fall whereby neither he nor any of his Posterity could ever by themselves recover that blessed Estate which he had lost to himself and them by his Fall albeit they could not conceive how God could eternally torment all his Posterity for his Sin tho they had none of their own But blessed be God that Christ was separate from Sin unto the end and became the second Adam expiating Sin and procuring for the Elect that Blessedness which through Adam's Fall they had lost How unreasonable then and odious must the Meritmongers of Rome be who not only hold that sinful Men acquire Heaven by their Merits but that they have so great store of Works of Supererrogation to which they were forced to flee when the horrid Grossness of the Pope's setting to Sale Indulgences for Money through most of the Dominions of his Obedience had awakened a great part of the World to see that it was impossible he could be Christ's Vicar on Earth but rather the Antichrist There was no Evasion with any pretence but that there was a Treasure of the Supererrogatory Merits of the Saints whereof the Pope was the sole Dispenser and yet tho that Treasure was not pretended to be infinite and inexhaustable the Popes neither knew what was the measure of it nor how much was exhausted and how much remained or if any thing at all for there was no Record kept of what Indulgences were given out or how much they needed that got them nor could there be seeing the Indulgences were not given by the Popes immediately and upon trial but were gifted and farmed to his Emissaries who were the vilest of Men who rendered that Religion absolutely ridiculous I pity the deceived Multitude of that Synagogue but I abhor their chief Leaders and without the breach of Charity I think I may safely say that many of them must be convinced of gross Errors in that Church but cannot acknowledg them because of the Canons already made unless therewith they quit Infallibilty which is the Pillar and Ground of their Faith God's Punitive Justice has not escaped dangerous Errors not only from those who make all God's Laws to be only obliging by his Will so that he may not only dispense with them without any Punishment but may abrogate them of which I have cleared my self before in meditating upon his Holiness but from those that think his Justice requires no exact Proportion between the Crime and the Punishment but that it is meerly Arbitrary that God might have accepted the Sacrifice of a Lamb for the greatest Sin or the Penance that Men inflict upon themselves and that the Mosaical Sacrifices did expiate Sin of themselves not as Types of the only one satisfying Sacrifice of Christ. I am convinced that the very Nature of the Justice of God imports an exact Proportion of Rewards and Punishments to the Objects of them and that therein God's Justice differs from the Justice of Man who neither can know the exact Proportion nor can adjust a Punishment to expiate any Sin Mens Justice in Punishments are not to satisfy Justice or to expiate Crimes past but to prevent and suppress them for time to come and therefore they become unjust and cruel by applying Arbitrary Punishments more than are needful to suppress the Crimes but God perfectly knows the just Proportion of Rewards and Punishments and he hath not that Indifferency in applying them as he hath in his Acts of Bounty Sin is so opposite and so odious to God that his Aversion to it is infinite and therefore it cannot be expiated but by a Punishment infinite in Value and therefore in the Damned Punishment is only eternal because in no Time the finite Natures of Creatures can bear an infinite Punishment The Sins of the Elect are expiated by the Sufferings of Christ which were short in Time but infinite in Value because of the Dignity of the Person that suffered yet God having denounced the Wages of Sin to be Death both by the Separation of the Soul and Body and by the Separation of both from the Joy arising from God's Countenance Justice required that the Mediator should suffer both tho but for a short time in his Agony in the Garden and on the Cross when innocent Nature made him cry out in the one that if it were possible that Cup might be removed yet with voluntary Submission and in the other when he said My God! My God! why hast thou forsaken me They must be strangely deluded that attribute that Cry to the Pains or Sense of Death for therein he should have been exceeded by innumerable Martyrs none of which cried that they were forsaken of God and many have triumphed over their Tormentors and have sung in the midst of the Flames I think they are both bold and ignorant who presume to assert that any Suffering of Christ without Death had been sufficient to expiate the Sins of the Elect None but God can know the just Punishment of Sin Common Reason may assure that God would not afflict his innocent Son in vain but Revelation putteth it beyond doubt by the Apostle's arguing against the Possibility of Salvation by Works of the Law saying If Righteousness come by the Law then Christ is dead in vain It is necessarily understood as in all such Arguments but that is impossible that Christ should have died in vain nor would it conclude if by dying in vain were understood dying to no purpose For tho it had been indifferent to God to have brought Salvation by the Law or by the Death of Christ yet neither of the ways had been in vain that is to no purpose which soever of the two God had chosen But then it would not have concluded that Righteousness could not have come by the Law therefore in vain must be understood as ordinarily it is that which is needless or unnecessary and then the Argument is clear and convincing thus If Righteousness had been by the Law then Christ's dying had been needless because the Law alone could have brought Righteousness but it is impossible that Christ should have died when there was no necessity for it therefore the Law nor no other way could do it There is another dangerous Mistake about God's Punitive Justice as if the Consideration of his Punishment were to compense the Displeasure he had from Sin by his Pleasure in the suffering of his Creature as Men commonly do but the true Consideration is
was lost and seeing the Preference of the Benefit by the second Adam is expressed in the Parallel if that Exaltation had been wholly new it would not have been omitted The Parallel also imports that the Promise of Immortality was not only to Adam but to his Posterity It could not consist with the Wisdom and Goodness of God that the first Covenant should have been impracticable and therefore it must have been a part of God's Promise that if Adam continued faithful for such time as God had appointed for his Trial that God would confirm him by more powerful and efficacious Grace as it is commonly believed that he hath confirmed the Elect Angels that they should never fall but be happy I see not how it could be called an happy State that were still under the fear of being lost There is no ground to think that by the first Covenant Adam's Posterity should have been in a better Condition than himself but that they also should have had a time of Trial as he had and such as should persevere should also be confirmed yet there was necessity that they should be endued with more Strength from the Womb thereby to be put in equal Capacity to stand as he was For seeing Adam was created in the Ripeness of Disscretion and in the clear Knowledg of God and yet so soon fell upon so small Temptation it had been impossible for any of his Posterity being to be born Infants without any Principle vigent in them but the Pleasure of Sense till they attained to Discretion and by long Exercise of these sensible Pleasures strong habitual Pleasures supervening that any one of them could have persevered unless God had promised that if Adam had stood out his Trial he would have given farther Perfection to his Posterity This first Covenant between God and Adam is commonly called the Covenant of Works to distinguish it from the Covenant of Grace and therefore there behoved to be something in it of Merit And that God's part of that Covenant was not only of Grace or free Favour but partly by Premiative Justice and Debt in Remuneration of the Holiness of the Creature as the Apostle saith To him that worketh the Reward is not reckoned of Grace but of Debt Yet it cannot be thence inferred that the Reward promised by God to Adam in his Perseverance was wholly and only a Reward of Debt by Justice but that it might be partly a Reward of Debt and partly a Reward of Grace freely given and not deserved Those who arrogate Salvation by the Merit of their Works fortify themselves in their Error by holding that Salvation by the Covenant of Works would have been wholly by Merit and therefore Christ having expiated the Sins of the Elect their good Works must merit Heaven which is clearly confuted seeing God's Dispensations are by Covenant importing Ingagements which did not arise from the Creatures Interest by Creation but only by God's Promise which was free by the Freedom of Indiffrency I am fully perswaded that a great part of God's Promises in the Govenant of Works was by his free Favour and could not have been claimed by Adam or his Posterity as due in Justice to their Perseverance For there was an exceeding great difference between the Value of Adam's part and God's part of that Covenant Adam's part was only Obedience to God There is nothing mentioned in Scripture or consequent from the Nature of that Covenant that God's Promises were for Adam's improving and increasing those Moral perfections God had given him by his Creation but on the contrary that which is expresly mentioned is only forbearance to eat of the forbidden Fruit which could not be the only Obedience but likewise the Obedience to all the Moral Law written in his Heart and also to the positive Law of Marriage instituted in Innocency yet Innocence in all was Man's part and Improvement tho it was no Work of Supererrogation even in him because he was obliged to love God with all his Might yet it did deserve and merit by God's Remunerative Justice but it cannot be pretended that it was a proportionable Remuneration to Adam's Innocency that he should not only become Immortal and be exalted to Celestial and Eternal Glory and that he should be confirmed and made free of the hazard of falling but that also all his Posterity should have additional Perfections created with their Souls enabling them against the Prepossessions of Youth to remain innocent and all as a just Proportion by Premiative Justice no certainly The Nature of a Covenant which is a mutual Contract implieth mutual Prestations to be performed by the Parties Contracters as the mutual Causes and Conditions of each to other and that the ingaging to these Performances be voluntary even tho the Matter engaged were necessary and have an anterior Obligation distinct from that Obligation which ariseth by the Contract For as it is well said by Lawyers the same thing may be due by several Obligations and may be exacted by any of them but the Property of a thing cannot be by more Rights for none can acquire that which is already his own Therefore before the Covenant of Works the Man was obliged to a full Observance of God's Commands without any Engagement of his own because God who gave him his Being might justly qualify his own Gift at his Pleasure so he had given Man his Being by Creation with sufficient Intimation of his Pleasure and Command by the Laws written in his Heart none of which did oblige him to enter into a Covenant with his Creator nor did God command him so to do but offered it to his free Choice inducing him thereto by the great Benefits he offered him by it which he had not Right to nor any ground of Confidence of it but through that Covenant The Covenant of Works had no Sanction by a Penalty added to it For the Dissolution of it upon Man's Failure in his part arose from the Nature of all Contracts whereby it the one Party fail the other may either urge Performance or declare himself free After Adam's Fall Performance became impossible and he was not punishable by that Covenant but by the antecedent Divine Law neither could Man's Consent or Engagement to be liable to the Punishment of Death have any Effect because his Life is not in his own Power Therefore he was only punishable by the antecedent Law of God which was before any Covenant and remained the same during the Covenant and after the Breach of it The Pain of Death expressed for eating the forbidden Fruit was no part of the Covenant and it doth appear to have been anterior to the Covenant intimated to Man immediately after his Creation before Eve was created otherwise Adam might have eaten of that Fruit which doubtless was most pleasant before the Prohibition but Eve's Creation is related after that Prohibition and there is no ground to doubt but the Covenant was made both with Adam and
Eve Death was the due Punishment of the Breach of that Prohibition tho it had not been expressed for the Obedience of a Rational Creature to the Creator is indispensible not only by the Immutability of the Divine Decree not to dispense but simply by the nature of the Thing It could not consist with God's infinite Love to himself to make a Rational Creature that owed him no Obedience and if he could renounce Obedience in one thing he might in all But tho the Prohibition had been after the Covenant yet it was no part of it nor did God by it restrain his own Freedom to command what he pleased for which he had given an Ability to perform For it was a chief Law written in Man's Heart to obey all God's Commands The Institution of Marriage was also before the Fall and even before the Covenant of Works and the Breach of it or any of God's Moral Laws would have annull'd that Covenant God did both in Wisdom and Goodness express the Sanction of Death to the eating of that Fruit as that which Man might be most readily deceived in the Matter being in it self indifferent and of small moment abstract from the Command and therefore the Devil tempted to break it rather than any other God made the Covenant of Works with Adam and when Adam had broke that Covenant and made it ineffectual God did publish to him the new Covenant of Grace There is but little of either expresly related by Moses yet doubless both were largely revealed and made known to Adam and now when the Canon of Scripture is full the Analogy of Faith may thence sufficiently be collected both as to the Tenor of the Covenant of Works and of the Covenant of Grace It were a vast Task to gather in order all that might be deduced from Scripture concerning these Covenants But that which I find necessary for my Satisfaction and for clearing to me the beautiful Representation of the Divine Decrees and Dispensations towards Mankind by Grace and Glory to the Elect and just Judgment against the malicious and obstinately wicked I will digest my Thoughts of both these Covenants between God and Adam that the Parallel may the more clearly appear by expressing the Terms of both in the Form of a free Offer made by God and accepted by Adam for himself and all his in the way Covenants used to be entred in as if God had said to the Protoplasts I have made you after my own Image Innocent and Holy and have endued you with Understanding whereby you can judg and reason and have written my Laws in your Hearts in the Principles of Knowledg to which you cannot but give assent and the Knowledg of necessary Consequences which you may thence certainly deduce I have also endued you with Capacities of Pleasure and Grief whereby upon the Preception of these Objects which may most concern your Well-being Pleasure or Grief will result and from Pleasure Appetite and from Grief Aversion and have made the purest and powerfulest Joy to arise from the Perception of my glorious Perfections and next from these things which conduce to the Well-being of your Kind and then the Pleasure that is peculiar to every one All which are good when kept within their Limits and in due Order I have given you that capacity of Freedom that you need not be under the Power of the Pleasure or Grief arising from perception of any Creature but that you may avoid or abate them by the Application of other Objects to your Senses or Mind by the Pleasure or Grief thence resulting especially by perceiving and considering my own Perfections whereby you may govern your selves and your Choices Appetites or Aversions as may be allowed and accepted by me and as may conduce for my Glory shewing my Divine Perfections in creating preserving and ruling such Creatures whereby as I have been the first Author so indispensibly I must be the last End of your Being to which you must subordinate and direct all your considerate Actions even the desire and endeavour of your own Happiness that thereby you may be in the fuller capacity to please and glorify me wherein if you transgress you must be punished by perpetual Exclusion from my Favour which neither you nor any Creature can ever be able to expiate and restore you my Aversion from Sin being infinite as my self If you improve the Capacities I have given you I will also reward you with greater Perfections as you shall deserve Your Obedience and Devotion to me must not be in trivial things but in such things as require Attention and Diligence yet such as by these shall still be in your Power while you remain innocent By careful Inspection of your own Minds you may find my Laws written therein most of them are evident to you without reasoning and I have endued you with this Principle to know all things that are congruous to and becoming my glorious Nature and yours as you bear my Image and as is congruous to and becoming that part of your Nature peculiar to your selves I am now pleased to enter with you into a Covenant by your willing Engagement in the Terms that I offer you wherein your part is no more than persevering in your Innocence during that time of Trial which I appoint you to which you are obliged by your natural Duty to which I propose the Accession of your voluntary Engagement and my part shall be to put you thenceforth out of hazard ever to offend or to lose that Happiness that I give you and to put all your Posterity in the like Condition that now you are in that each of them that shall continue innocent during his Trial shall be likewise confirmed and because they are to be born Infants carried only by sensible Pleasures before Discretion which will become habitual and strong and much more ready to exceed than you who were created in ripeness of Judgment I will enable them to be in like Capacity to stand as you are and I will exalt you and them from an animal Life on Earth to an Angelical Life in Heaven so that you shall be Immortal without any Separation of your Souls and Bodies I will put you in no Necessity to fall by my Decree or any Circumstances in which you shall be placed I will now add nothing to your Obedience by the Laws of your Nature but the For bearance to eat of the Fruit of one Tree in the midst of the Paradise that it may be an Evidence of your Obedience for my Command alone in a Thing in it self indifferent wherein you must take heed that you yield not to the Pleasure which will arise from that Fruit. Are you now content to enter into this Covenant for your selves and your Posterity wherein if you fail on your Part you lose all the Benefit of it To which Adam and Eve with Joy Acclamation and Blessing did engage and assent and God exhorted them to take good
the Person injured and if there be any thing of Reparation due by the Wrong it may be lawfully prosecuted but the Aversion and Resentment arising from the Injury is that which Men are required to forgive and obliterate There was indeed a Debt of that holy Action that by Sin was transgressed but every Debt is not a Debt of Payment for Payment imports the delivery of some Fungible as Money or Grain but other Debts consist not in Payment but in Prestation or performance of some Deed as the doing any Work putting one in Possession giving Honour or Obedience And so Creatures Obligements to God are not Debts of Payment but of Prestation or Performance much less can the Guiltiness of Sin import a Debt of Payment but it doth not even import a Debt of Performance A Criminal is not obliged to offer himself to the Justice of the Magistrate who therein is the Minister of God no not to confess his Crime when accused by another unless it can be otherwise proved Nor doth the Judg punishing take Payment but useth his Authority in the way of Vindication as an Act of Punitive Justice done by him on the Criminal and not done to him by the Criminal Prestation of Facts being omitted especially to God can never be repayed that which is past cannot be recalled nor is it compensable by any Liquid Payment but only the Damage done by it and if there be no other Damage the Grief arising by the Injury may be compensed with Joy arising from the Application of some of the Injurer's Goods to the Injured and oftentimes Men count it a Satisfaction by taking Pleasure in the suffering of the Injurer but that is it which Men are required to forgive How can it then be imagined that God requireth Payment for the failure in Duty by the Committer of Sin He is not capable of Grief or Damage and he hath not only said but sworn that he taketh no Pleasure in the Torment of his Creature As I live saith the Lord I delight not in the Death of a Sinner If Sin inferred a Debt of Payment it might be forgiven without any Satisfaction for scarce is any Creditor obliged to exact the Debt due to him but he may freely forbear it or forgive it And therefore if Sin did properly infer a Debt God might forgive it without Satisfaction therefore God punisheth not Sin as a Creditor exacting his Debt but as he is the King Ruler and Judg of the World he vindicates the Injury against his Law and manifests his infinite Aversion and Abhorrence of Sin not his Delight in the Misery of his Creature 3. I consider the part of the Son in the Decree and Dispensation of the Covenant of Grace not as a making Payment for the Debt of Sinners but a submitting to these Sufferings which do as much manifest God's Abhorrence of Sin and Delight in his indispensable Law as if the whole Race of Mankind had been eternally in Hell and thereby he made way to God's Mercy to fallen Man so far as it was congruous to the Divine Perfections If Christ's Satisfaction had been the Payment of the Sinner's Debt the Forgiveness of Sin would not be by free Grace A Cautioner or any interposed Person paying a Debt the Creditor cannot be said to give a free Discharge to the principal Debtor for he has gotten all he could demand Law doth not suffer a Creditor to refuse Payment from any that shall please to interpose which therefore would be far from exalting the free Goodness of God in pardoning Sin as the Scripture sets it forth beside that all interposed Persons acquire Right to the Debt and have Recourse against the principal Debtor for whom they pay But Scripture makes no mention of Sinners becoming Debtors to Christ for Punishment If Sin had been undertaken by and transferred on Christ the Sinner being so liberated how could the Sinner beg Pardon of the Sin that was already payed Thence some have imagined that it was a fault to mourn for Sin and that so they were no way under the Law but under Grace And those who are a little more modest say that they do not observe the Law as a Debt by Justice but as a free Gratification mistaking grosly that place that the Regenerate are not under the Law but under Grace that is that the Law is no more the Counterpart of the Covenant between God and them as it was in the Covenant of Works but is still a Law obliging them to Performance without Abrogation Derogation Indulgence or Pardon of Sin before it were committed anterior in its Obligation to any Covenant of and with Man The reason of the severe Punishment of Sin is commonly given because it is committed against the infinite Majesty of God to which I think it may be well added that as the Aversion of God from Sin and as his Purity is infinite so his Justice requires an infinite Punishment which because a Creature cannot bear in a finite Duration it becomes an infinite Punishment Thence also it is evident that Christ's Satisfaction could not be infinite in Weight for Weight can no more be infinite than Bulk but it becomes infinite in Value by the Dignity of the Person that suffered it 4. All that deserve the Name of Christians do agree that God's Justice could not be satisfied nor Sin expiated without the suffering of Christ of infinite Value but they do exceedingly disagree in the Terms of the Covenant betwixt the Father and the Son and betwixt God and Man All do agree that in every Covenant there must be mutual Prestations by either Party but the Question is what these Prestations were in the Terms of the Covenant of Grace what is God's part and what is Man's part in it There be many Errors not only perillous but pernicious especially when they are wilfully maintained That Infallibility the Church of Rome pretends makes all her Errors to become wilful and sinful if once they have been owned in that way they count infallible All others may and oftentimes do retract their Mistakes It were highly uncharitable to imagine that any of these had wilfully or willingly taken up an Error in this matter which is the greatest Interest of Men but at first they behoved to be mistaken I do therefore think it worth my utmost Endeavour for my own clearing to consider how they have fallen into these Mistakes and by what way they might come cut of them 1. The Pelagians held That the natural Powers God had given Men by Creation were sufficient for Regeneration and that which seems to have led them into that Error was that it could not consist with the Goodness and even with the Justice of God to damn Men for that which was never in their Power to avoid Seeing nothing can be a Crime but what is voluntary and where the Will might have actually chosen or followed the contrary and so at least it was in their natural Power to
Apostles but to others Was either Reason or Will made use of in the producing of these or was it a brute Way unbeseeming God Are not the Principles of reasoning inbred in Nature and freely given of God Is therefore Man's reasoning a brute Way Nothing can be more express against this Opinion than that of Ezekiel A new Heart also will I give you and a new Spirit will I put within you and I will take away the stony Heart out of your Flesh and give you a Heart of Flesh and I will put my Spirit within you and cause you to walk in my Statutes and you shall keep my Judgments and do them 3. There is a great Inclination in Man to put Works upon Man's Part of the Covenant of Grace and that as deserving by Justice the Performance of God's Part. The Semi-Pelagians after the Pelagians were baffled and exploded that they durst no more profess the Powers of Nature to be sufficient for Salvation said there behoved to be supernatural Grace given of God at Conversion yet there were preparatory Works such as the Sense of Sin and of its deserving the Spirit of Bondage the use of Ordinances which they thought deserved Grace which God in Justice could not but give these were also exploded and were called Semi-Pelagians All the Apostle Paul's Arguments against Righteousness by the Law strike as fully against these as against any Merits or Works on Man's Part in the Covenant of Grace and he is accurately positive That by Faith only we are sav'd without any thing on our part in which we might glory or attribute our Salvation to our selves in whole or in part 4. There is of late an Opinion vented in England that tho the Covenant of Works is now become impossible which required perfect Obedience yet God in his Goodness hath entered into the new Covenant or Covenant of Grace in which Man's Part is not a legal and full Obedience but through Christ's Mediation he hath accepted an Evangelical Obedience being a sincere Endeavour to fulfil all God's Commandments and a Course of Life without continuing in any kind of known Sin Their main Ground is that it cannot be thought that God entering with Men in the Covenant of Grace would not have Men as a Part of their Engagement to resolve and promise to have respect to all God's Commandments and to endeavour so far as humane Frailty could allow to fulfil them all if it were not so that Holiness were Man's Part of the Covenant we behoved to take the Antinomian's Interpretation that we were no more under the Law but under Grace that the Law had no more Obligation on Believers therefore the new Obedience must be Man's Part. This Opinion hath been held by some Pious and otherwise Orthodox Divines and therefore it ought rather to be cleared as a Mistake than prosecuted as a stated Profession It must therefore be adverted that God's Moral Law is indispensable and behoved to be binding tho there had never been a Covenant as hath been shown before God's Dispensation might have been without taking Man's Consent by way of Covenant but by the Law written in his Heart obliging him to Obedience under the just and proportioned Punishment of eternal exclusion from God's Favour the breach or loss of no Covenant could take away that it became indeed Man's Part of the Covenant of Works but that Covenant is broken yet the Obligation of the Law which was anterior to that Covenant stands In theCovenaut of Works there was partly Merit partly Favour but the Covenant of Grace excludes all Merit and Man's Part is by Faith only so that Faith is not considered in its moral Goodness for in that Consideration Love is a far more excellent and disinterested Vertue than Faith but Holiness is on God's Part of the Covenant of Grace as in the former Conception is expressed he infuses the Habits of all the Christian Vertues in Conversion Man's Engagement to endeavour to keep God's Law were of no Import unless he did keep it and so God's Part should not be at the time of Conversion but at the time of Death after the Course of Man's Life did appear The Scripture makes no mention or moment of Man's Resolution which is as the early Cloud or Morning Dew which quickly passeth away Neither would the Terms of the Covenant of Grace be equal to all the Endeavour of some would go much further than the Endeavour of others 5. Some Divines in England have made Man's Part of the Covenant to be Faith as it is a good Work because it is said Abraham believed in God and it was imputed to him for Righteousness That is it was held sufficient as if all Righteousness had been performed But this had been still a Covenant of Works accepting one Work in place of entire Obedience but Abraham's believing in that Place was not the Act of Faith as it is Man's Part of the Covenant for it relates to a former Place of Scriptnre as the Scripture saith Abraham believed which was concerning his Son Isaac who was promised to him in his Old Age and therefore he staggered not at the Promise of God through Unbelief which was a particular Act of Belief of that Promise and was properly an Act of Holiness and was so imputed or reputed as an Act of Righteousness but the Act of Faith in which Abraham entered in the Covenant of Grace was believing in God through the Messiah to be justified sanctified and glorified 6. Some Reformed Divines in France and England bring good Works on Man's Part of the Covenant of Grace as perfecting and compleating Faith for only a lively Faith working by Love is saving for there is a Faith that worketh not by Love The Devils believe and tremble and Faith without Works is dead Abraham was justified by Works when he offered Isaac Seest thou how Faith wrought with his Works And Abraham believed and it was imputed to him for Righteousness by Works a Man is justified and not by Faith only Yet Paul's reasoning is much more full and accurate discussing the Point of Justification by Faith only without the Works of the Law which could not consist if James spoke of Faith as Justifying whereas James takes off an Error of those that thought they might be saved by believing the Gospel without Holiness which he redargues as a wrong Consequence from Paul and shews that not to be true Faith but such a Faith as the Devils have which cannot be that Act of Faith whereby Man entereth in the Covenant of Grace which is not believing the Truth of the Gospel but relying on God for Salvation through Christ according to the Gospel and on the contrary Abraham's Faith is brought in as true Faith which yet was not the justifying Act nor is the Justification there meant the Justification in Conversion which maketh a Man just but that which manifests his Justification to himself and other Men For Paul saith If Abraham were justified by
know that God can make them willing in the Day of his Power Conversion and Regeneration when accurately considered are distinct for Conversion is wrought by that Inclination given of God to accept the Offer of Grace for thereby the Soul is no more addicted to Sin but Regeneration is the Infusion of the Habits of Grace the Pardon of Sin Justification or holding of the Believer as Just and thereby reconciling with him and adopting him as a Son which are God's Part of the Covenant of Grace and are always done together and the future Blessings of the Covenant for increasing Grace giving Perseverance exciting Repentance and renewing Pardon Direction Protection and Glory are not Parts but Effects of the Covenant of Grace proceeding from God's Bounty and Faithfulness and from his Engagement in the Covenant of Grace to give these things which Promise is a Part of the New Covenant There is a great deal of Debate and Noise between divers Churches and those of the same Church in what Justification doth consist And it is clear from comparing Paul and James that there is a Justification before Men and a Justification before God The former is but the Manifestation of Justification the latter is the being of it and this only is in God's Part of the Covenant of Grace so that the Question is in what Justification before God consists Some make it anterior to the Covenant of Grace with the Believer and so no Part of it but rather of that Covenant between the Persons of the Trinity accounting the Elect as just Persons Others hold Justification never to be till all Sin be purged and so not before Death Neither of these do agree with the golden Chain of Salvation the Order of which is not without great Moment wherein Foreknowledg is first Predestination second Vocation third Justification fourth and Glorification last So that Justification is after Vocation and before Glorification and so it is one of the two Links in Time Foreknowledg and Predestination being before Time and Glorification being after every particular Believer's Time when they are entred into Eternity Yet even those who hold Justification to be in Time and a Part of the Covenant of Grace differ in their Conceptions of the Nature of it Some hold it to differ nothing from the Forgiveness of Sin to which I cannot agree for then there behoved to be an Act of Justification whenever there is forgiveness of Sin which is often to be repeated and is a chief Article in the Lord's Prayer which bearing Give us this Day our daily Bread and forgive us our Sins must at least import a Prayer for these every Day By entring into the Covenant of Grace future Sins are not forgiven before they be committed which would be an Indulgence to Sin The Church of Rome maketh Justification to be nothing else but Sanctification which doth not consist with that golden Chain where Sanctification is put as the End or Effect of Predestination For whom he foreknew them he did predestinate to be conform to the Image of his Son That Conformity is Sanctity or Holiness not only in conformity to the Holiness of God which would not reach many Duties of Man's Holiness but conformity to his Son God-Man which comprehends them all Others make Justification a judicial Act whether before Time after Time or in Time supposing God to charge a Man as a Criminal with the Guilt of his Sin and that Christ for the Sinner or he for himself pleaded Christ's Satisfaction and thereupon God doth absolve But I conceive there is no such pleading by Man at the Entrance of the Covenant of Grace tho virtually that Absolution be implied but only his assenting to be converted and to be made holy and happy Therefore I conceive Justification to be God's holding and reputing the Believer to be as if he were intirely Just notwithstanding the Remainders of Sin seeing he is become an Adversary to Sin and so may say with Paul Not I but Sin that dwelleth in me In which Sense only it can be said That God seeth no Iniquity in Jacob nor Sin in Israel and that he that is born of God cannot Sin Seeing the indelible Habits of Grace do ever continue in him which is called the Seed of God Tho forgiveness of Sins past at Regeneration purge him and make him innocent yet thereby alone he cannot be accounted Just because the sinful Inclinations remain yet may he be reputed as Just seeing it is expresly said Happy is the Man to whom the Lord imputeth not Iniquity and whose Sin is covered It is an ordinary Expression that the Righteousness of Christ is imputed to Believers and that their Justification consisteth in that Imputation because Christ is said to be our Righteousness which is not a proper or accurate Expression but improper and metonymick whereby the Cause is put for the Effect as Christ is also our Wisdom and our Peace because he is the Cause of both And likewise Faith is said to be imputed for Righteousness which gave the Rise to that Error that Faith as a good Work is accepted in place of intire Righteousness and of all the good Works required for the fulfilling the Law Whereas the Apostle in the Fourth of the Romans saith Abraham believed and it was counted to him for Righteousness and Faith is counted for Righteousness to him that believeth on him that justifieth the Ungodly but is not imputed to him as Righteousness for the Original Word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 now 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifieth not to impute but to reckon account esteem or repute And therefore Christ's Righteousness can no more properly be imputed as our Righteousness than his Wisdom or his Peace can be our Wisdom or Peace of which he is the Cause not the Effect for if his fulfilling of the Law were our fulfilling of it we needed not also fulfil the same and the Antinomians would have too much to say that Believers are not obliged to fulfil the Law which Christ fulfilled in their Place and that all their good Works are only free Gratifications Christ's Rightousness is no otherwise imputed to Believers than as a necessary Accomplishment of the second Adam coming in the Place of the first Adam who if he had continued Righteous would have made effectual the Covenant of Works which was lost by his Failure The fifth Point proposed will now easily be cleared That the saving Act of Faith is not ordained to be Man's part of the Covenant of Grace upon Consideration of its own Worth and Value but as it relateth to and relieth on the Mercy and Faithfulness of God and the Merits and Satisfaction of Christ. It useth to be called the Eye of Faith looking to these the Hand of Faith laying hold upon them or the Instrument of the Soul whereby it obtains Salvation There are sharp Disputes under which of these Considerations it justifies but I like it much better to be conceived only as the
if they continued sinless during the time of their Trial But tho innocent Adam was capable of Merit by improving the Holiness God gave him yet so great a Reward as God promised him upon his Persistance was not a Reward of meer Debt but of Grace so that only the Covenant of Grace is of meer Grace without any thing of Merit in the Elect. Therefore as Faith in the Covenant of Grace is only the Manner freely chosen of God so Persistance in Obedience was the Manner freely chosen of God in the Covenant of Works So then the clearest way of taking up the Covenant of Grace is that Christ by his Humiliation and Suffering did so fully vindicate the Purity of God and his Justice that thereupon God might have forgiven the Sins of the whole World and of every individual Man and he did exclude none from Mercy but malicious and obstinate Sinners that rejected the Motions of Conversion and the Offers of Grace but did even include some of these and that he advanced the Elect to Celestial Glory upon Christ's entire fulfilling of his Law being also as the Manner freely chosen for the Covenant of Grace as Adam's Performance was for the Covenant of Works and so not only Christ's Passive Obedience is imputed to Believers but his Active Obedience as the Terms of the Covenant and so the exceeding superabundant Grace of the Goodness of God is manifested not only in accepting the Expiation of Sin by a Mediator but in giving to the Elect Glory freely as a Reward by Grace and not of Debt whereby the Difficulties on both Hands in the forementioned Controversy do evanish If Christ's Sufferings had been properly a Payment of the Debt of Sin it could have had no effect in relation to the Reprobate nor could they have been restored to a possibility of Salvation nor could God complain of the Hardness of their Hearts For if Christ had suffered as to pay the Debt of Sin he could not have paid the Debt of those that were to perish or else God had exacted that Debt of them which Christ had paid nor should Christ have suffered more than what were sufficient to pay the Debt of the Elect only whereas all agree that his Sufferings were sufficient for the Sins of the whole World but being conceived as the Vindication of God's Aversion from Sin he not only saved the Elect but stopt the Mouths of the Reprobate and Damned and made them inexcusable so that their own Conscience will condemn them and be their perpetual Tormentor that they have thrown themselves into Hell when they might have escaped if it had not been their own deserving fault This way doth far more illustrate to my Soul the infinitely amiable Representation of God both in his Grace and his Justice than any other way that I can apprehend in which I am exceedingly confirmed by that excellent Parallel of the first and second Adam held so clearly forth to the Romans by the blessed Apostle of the Gentiles saying Death reigned from Adam to Moses even in them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's Transgression who is the Figure or Type of him that was to come that is of Christ. Where the similitude of Adam's Transgression distinguishing it from others is that by it the whole Benefit of the Covenant was lost not only to himself but to all his Posterity For if through the Offence of one Man many be dead much more the Grace of God and the Gift by Grace which is by one Man Jesus Christ bath abounded unto many If then Adam was a Type of Christ certainly it was not in that he sinned and lost his Posterity but in this that as if he had continued obedient to God he had brought himself and his Posterity to Glory and as his bringing them to Glory were not by Merit but by fulfilling the Terms of the Covenant of Works so Christ's bringing the Elect to Glory is by fulfilling the whole Will of God as his part of the Terms of the Covenant of Grace The same Apostle to the Corintbians makes the Type and Parallel yet more clear For since by Man came Death by Man came also the Resurrection of the dead And so it is written the first Man Adam was made a living Soul the last Man Adam was made a quickning Spirit But seeing the second Adam not only performed the Terms of Salvation by Obedience but hath expiated Sin by his Suffering therefore it is said For this cause he is the Mediator of the New Testament that by the means of Death for the Redemption of the Transgressions that were under the first Covenant they which are called might receive the Promise of Eternal Inheritance Here the Transgressions that were under the first Covenant must be meant of the accumulated Sins in the Fall which were redeemed repaired and restored by Christ the second Adam's fulfilling all Righteousness and purging the Sins of the Elect. And again it is said Not as the Offence so also is the free Gift Not as it was by one that sinned so was the Gift for the Judgment was by one to Condemnation but the free Gift is of many Offences to Justification where the Gift to Adam is said to be to Condemnation not by the Intent but by the Event through his failing whereas the second Adam could not fail in performing his Undertaking By this Explication of the Covenant of Grace I find my Mind cleared and eased of these perplexing Difficulties about God's Decrees and Dispensations in the Salvation and Reprobation of his Rational Creatures and about the Terms and Tenor both of the Covenant of Works and of the Covenant of Grace The most learned and most accurate in all Churches and all Ways have been perplexed in thinking how God would decree to reject damn and eternally torment a great part of his Rational Creatures for that which was never in their Power to perform much more without any cause on the Creatures part but only by his meer Soveraignty or that they were never in a possibility to have escaped eternal Misery Or that Christ the second Adam had not so far exceeded the first Adam that as the first Adam might have preserved all his Posterity in a Capacity to be saved if he had not fallen so the second Adam should not at least have put all Manking in a Capacity to be saved and escape eternal Misery by the Covenant of Grace And yet on the other hand the Scripture is so plain and positive that it is not in Man's Power to believe by a saving Faith to be holy or how it could consist with the Veracity and Sincerity of God to exhort and expostulate with Men to repent believe and be holy tho it were neither in the Power of the Elect or Reprobate to perform the same Whereupon some found no Outgate but by recurring to that Freedom that once was in Adam and that a Creditor might press his Debitor to pay his Debt