Answ Here you wrong your adversary he speaks of a power and you of an act The Law may actually condemn where and when it cannot actually justifie as it condemneth every transgressor but can justifie onely the innocent and yet the power for to do both is equally in it as a Law Why do you not answer the ensuing Question viz. Can you put your Conscience under the Mandatory power and yet keep it from under the damnatory The Law bids you love your neighbour though your enemy and presuppose you are obedient thereunto yet do you do it so perfectly that the Law hath no power to reprove and condemn you in that particular If the Law condemn you not away with humiliation Confession Repentance Justification and all living by Faith in Christ For now you can so walk according to the rule of the Law that it cannot subject you to the curse and death you are not reproved and judged in your self for any thing your peace and safety is by your just life the Law being curbed and restrained or rather exauthorized or dis-invested of all power to condemn and your life and comfort is not by your Faith in the Son of God who loved you and gave himself for you as Gal. 2.21 There is no condemnation unto you not because you are in Christ as Rom. 8.1 but the reason is in that the Law though a rule yet wanteth power to reign to death We often meet with this groundless and false assertion and now see what is the chief stone that you stumble at Let this now suffice M. B. The same Author again pag. 5. He dare not trust a believer to walk without his keeper c. they are onely kept within compass by the Law but are no keepers of it Answ The word they relates not to believers if you look the place as here you do intimate You onely repeat what we write but confute nothing M. B. The same Author at another time calls it a slander to say they deny the Law who can reconcile such contradictions Answ I see no contradiction nor shew of any you might tell your Reader wherein it lyeth for all are not so quick-sighted as your self But is not this a contradiction in you who say that we grant the Law to be a rule and that a believer is a free keeper of it and yet that we hold and teach the abolition of it Here the task to reconcile is now yours Also that we deny the Law abideth still a slander for which the Law is against you See the the ninth Commandment The Lord layeth it not unto your charge M. B. p. 52. The second interpretation is of the damnatory and cursing power of the Law the Law is not made to a believer so as he should abide under the cursing and condemning power of it Answ You might remember that right now you said The Law a believer is under hath no power to condemn and curse what need he or how can he then be freed from the cursing power See your own instance If the fire had no power to burn what need was there that God should hinder the act You would saign such a fire as is without all power to burn and tell us of such a Law as wanteth power to condemn who will now fear either or rather who can credit such vain words Your sword cuts the throat of the owner for from the removal or restraint of the act or operation the Argument doth not hold for the removal of the thing or the power to condemn but rather on the contrary it strongly and necessarily inferreth and concludeth that there is such a condemning power in the Law in that it is restrained and hindered from the actual doing of it But secondly here is no such miracle wrought upon the Law as was there upon the fire which kept it from burning the three worthies Dan. 3.23 25. though more abundant mercy be shewed for Christ was made under the Law to redeem us from under it Gal. 4.4 Not to take the curse from the Law but to redeem us In what sense and to what end Christ was under as our surety in the same sense are we freed but he was under both the rule and raign of it Yet it will not follow that believers are in no state of subjection and obedience or being enlarged and set at liberty do not run the way of Gods Commandments For they do it though by another efficient from a new principle and for a different end then that of the Law Do and live They are under Christ and moved and led by his Spirit who is the head and husband of his Church But of this more afterwards M. B. Consider some parallel places of Scripture Gal. 5.23 speaking of the fruits of the Spirit Against such there is no Law the Law was not made to these to condemn them Answ And if you refer it to the fruits of the Spirit the Spirit produceth his fruits of himself and of his own accord no outward Law commanding and directing M. B. And if because the godly have an ingenuous free Spirit to do what is good he need not the Law directing or regulating it would follow as well he need not the whole Scripture Answ You would still bear men in hand that we are against the use of the Law which yet we do stand for if lawfully used as your Text requireth and that in all the Authority and Offices of it and this we can and are ready to make good upon occasion yet since this is so often inculcated by you I wish you would give satisfaction in these few things First If the Spirit make the will and affections free to what is good doth it alter and enlighten the understanding also to know what is truth and good and effectually encline move guide and lead aright without the direction and regulating of the Law doth the Spirit which is light and giveth all light and directive power to the Law need the Law in his work 2. You are to prove and cleer better then yet you have done that the Law is instrumental to the Spirit in the works and ways of sanctification 3. Where do you finde that the moral Law doth give help or power unto any jubet non juvat 4. Whereas you say we are flesh and not all spirit c. It may be replyed that by Scripture and all experience sin the wickedness of our nature is rather irritated and strengthened by the Law then weakned and mortified It is such a desperate disease that it makes head more strongly against any legal plaister and application Rom. 7.5 c. M. B. You say it will follow as well that he needed not the Gospel to call upon him to believe Answ Your reason is much unlike for first the Doctrine of the Gospel is not onely the object of Faith but the outward instrument and ordinary means the Spirit useth both to implant faith and to increase it to
from it 2. As for your instance in the Magistrate I answer If the Magistrate have no power to punish he is no compleat Magistrate See Rom. 13.4 He is a minister of God a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doth evil this is one maine part of his effice and as effential to it as it is to countenance and defend the innocent and good Also 1 Pet. 2.14 Governours be sent of purpose for the punishment of evil doers and for the praise of them that do well 2. Your other instance of confirmed Angels is as ineffectual They were under a law say you Answer Well it is true and those that fell are condemned by that law they were under And now suppose any of them that do stand should yet sin as did the other would they not fall into the same condemnation It may be disputable yet it is currant with most that the Elect Angels are confirmed by Christ now I would learn Whether the benefit they have by Christ is in that the condemning power is taken from the Law they live under so that though they fall it cannot hurt them or is it in that they are upheld and established in their integrity that they cannot fall as did the evil angels and yet the condemnation remaineth in the law still Who then do now need most rectifying I fear you wittingly do oppose the truth And your manner of replying doth confirme this my opinion If what is said be true and evident let it leave you satisfied and not go on against the clear light M. B. Every believer though justified by Christ is under the moral Law of Moses as also the Law of Nature Answ You are too bold and peremptory in your assertion For 1. If believers be under those laws then he is under their curse Sâ— judice nemo noâ—â—ns absolâ—itur Ascendet quisque mentis suâ—e â—â—â—bunale c. for both of them do curse and condemne all that any way disobey them but every one under them do many wayes disobey them Where is there any one if any stirring be in him but he may observe within his own thoughts and feel a sentence given out against him daily for one thing or other that he is found to be guilty of But is it not written that Christ was made under the law to redeem us from under it Gal. 4.4 again Rom. 6.14 you are not under the law but under grace whether now shall we believe Paul thus saying by the infallible Spirit of God or shall we credit you speaking contrary of your own head by a private spirit 2. You say though justified by Christ Now I here would aske whether by justification his condition or estate be not changed he was under the Law before and is he so still what availeth then his justification or where is his liberty wherewith Christ hath made him free Rom. 5.1 Being justified by faith we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ by whom also we have access unto this grace wherein we stand This grace of justification is like the City of Resuge for the peace and safety of the soul unto which it betaketh it self by faith that so it may finde rest and security by escaping the coademnation and danger of the Law when it is pursued by sin and the tempter Heb. 6.18 so that a Christian by his faith seeketh to be delivered from the law in the purest obedience and best works whereof the conscience cannot be secure nor dare not rest vae etiam laudabili vitae si remota sit misericordia Indeed faith worketh also by love in another sphere and consideration and here in love he is under the law serving his neighbour in the freedome and willingness of his minde Gal. 5.13 according to that exhortation Eph. 5.2 Walk in love as Christ hath loved us and given himself for us c. but this appertaineth onely to our conversation and the things of this life and is so perfect in none but that law he serveth under will finde matter and cause of condemnation so that still the soul elevated and kept above in saith by which it liveth Gal. 2.20 would be found in Christ having his righteousness which is perfect and everlasting and not having its own righteousness which is of the law Phil. 3.9 If there be no curse nor danger in the works of our own righteousness or of the law it having lost its condemning power as you affirme why should Paul be afraid to be found there But in temptation and the time of inward conflict the truth benefit and necessity of this will better appear and so be discerned and readily received and without temptation Christianus nullus est It seemeth your spirits live and abide under the law as under a quiet and peaceable government without sense or fear of condemnation and without inward molestation or chock of conscience in that you tell us of being under both the natural and moral law and yet free from condemnation of either And you would patronize D.T. Regula vitae and yet dare not nor cannot do planè plenè I finde you in doctrine agreeing with Doctor Laud who in a Sermon on Ashwednesday before the King his text being Jer. 6.16 said that the old pathes wherein we might rest were the Creed the Lords Prayer and the ten Commandments and added that the law was like unto a serpent at the hedge bottome which had lost its sting I believed him not though you do And so he told the King and the rest what a pestilential sect the Antinomians were and thus he did labour as you do to make the world believe that there are some abolishers of the law that these against whom you write and all others who go in the same way are such and so not to be tolerated in the kingdome And about the same time D. Gifford after many invectives against that sect and sort for it is spoken against everywhere Act. 28.22 in the closure he gave this wise admonition to his hearers viz. To repent to believe and to do as they should do and so he would warrant them to be saved Here was repentance faith and inchoate obedience as in your friend D. Tailer but in which will you place salvation In all you and these your complices do say and teach and then in none at all doth the truth of God say for If ye be circumcised Christ profiteth nothing Gal. 5.2 You cannot but see as D. Tailor in that his book so others of great note amongst you to preach and print many erroneous things and why do you not blaze or reprove those their assertions as being far more palpable and of more dangerous consequences then is the worst or weakest expression you can finde in your Antinomian authors Is it out of a pure zeal for God I doubt it or you come forth thus Goliah-like to shew your valour and to defie the family of faith And so to gratifie others you
You may seem to disparage the learned too much as if confining or ascribing all the promises to the Gospel or accounting them to be Gospel they should deny any promise to appertaine to the law Whereas I think you cannot alleadge one learned Author who doth not grant the law to have its promises also yea and to make this difference also between legal and Evangelical promises that the Evangelical are free and absolute the legal conditional Promiss alia conditionales aliae gratuita yet never read I of any hard or undue expressions cast upon the law as you insinuate If the curse be not sometime expressely set down yet it is implicite and necessarily included wher-ever the law is mentioned taking it for law moral but you reserve this to a future time and so it is referred M. B. pa. 141. In the moral law is required justifying faith and repentance c. the second commandment requireth the particular worship of God insomuch that all the ceremonial law yea our Sacraments are commanded in the second commandment Answ 1. You may as well say also that the judicial law is included in the first commandment and the second table and so jumble and confound all in one law which in their delivery nature use and end are so distinct 2. Justifying faith is so called only from the object of it unto which it hath respect Non aliunde nos salutem quam ex evangelio consequi quoniam non alibi suam nobis justitiam Deus patefacil quae sola nos ab interitu leberat Calv. but this object is not propounded in the moral law for the soul to have respect unto therefore it is an error to teach that justifying faith properly so called is required in the moral law and a confounding of law and Gospel The righteousness of God is the object of justifying faith therefore it is called the righteousness of faith also Rom. 10.6 and that in opposition to the righteousness of the law v. 5. and it is only revealed in the Gospel whence Paul inferreth it to be the power of God to salvation Rom. 1.16 17. and the Gospel is preached for the obedience of this faith Rom. 1.5 that is to call and bring men unto this justifying faith but if the law do it it is not the proper office and end of the Gospel 3. What requireth repentance must necessarily propound a promise of pardon and acceptance unto the penitent but the moral law knoweth nor offereth no such mercy to any sinner 4. God cannot be rightly worshipped nor known but in Christ the Mediator by whom alone we have access with boldness and confidence Deus nisi in Christo suo coli nec cognosci Eph. 3.12 but the law teacheth not Christ 5. And if our Sacraments be commanded in the second commandment then they were commanded the Jews for whatever the law requireth it is of them that live under it as did the Jews Rom. 3.19 but I hope our Sacraments were not commanded them to use yea and we by that are to be circumcised who now have the second comman dment 2. If all the ceremonial law be commanded there then the ceremonial doth not differ in nature and kind from the moral but as a part from the whole Where is the specifical dissirence then so that you have vainly distinguished the law into moral ceremonial and judicial many other arguments might be used to let you see your great mistake but I forbear in a case so clear M. B. The moral law hath more particulars then can be in the law of nature hence the Apostle saith he had not known lust to be sin had not the law said so c. Ans As the moral law is not so comprehensive as to containe justifying faith and repentance so neither do you evince it to be more extensive or large then the law of nature having more particulars then be in that these be your private crotchets How will it stand with the justice of God to require more then was given to our nature at first And the invalidity of your reason is evident for though the Apostle had not known lust by it yet you know that much of that law lyeth dead and obscure in us there be many seeds and remanents of it which to us be imperceivable till the Ministery of the moral law do fetch those sparks from under the ashes revive and bring them to light And lust lurketh in our corrupt nature as fire is in the slint not known nor taken notice of till the law as the steel beat it out and cause it to sparkle abroad but it followeth not that the moral law containeth more because it revealeth more 2. You take the natural law as it is obliterated and imperfect in our corrupt nature and the moral law in its perfection an unequal comparison 3. The sin of lust was there before the law came now if there were not a law of nature or in nature against which it was how came it to be sin by what law had it a being for the knowledge of it you say was only by the moral law As you pass along you are ever and anon like a rash and passionate Schoolmaster lashing your adversaries without cause accusing them as guilty of crying down the law preaching against it reviling it c. and the like aspersions you cast upon them which argue and bewray too much gall and distemper in you but such passages I pass over being minded not to reply to every extravagant expression but only to give satisfaction in what is material LECT XVI Exod. 20.1 And God spake c. LAstly observe in general that God did not give them his law till he had humbled them Answ The principal end of giving the law is that by it as an instrument God may humble us beating down that pride and presumption in our spirits conceiting and boasting of what we neither have nor are M. B. p. 151. To signifie that the law could not be a way of justification Ans And yet you said but lately that the law requireth justifying faith to what end is it if it show no way to justification nor cannot justifie as you say afterward or how can it then be a covenant of grace M. B. God doth use the law as he doth his whole word to beget and increase the life of grace in us and in this effect of the law to increase life David doth often commend it Ans 1. There be two principal and essential parts of the Covenant of Grace 1. To hold out the way of justification peace and life 2. To promise and give the Spirit of regeneration and renovation So Jer. 31.33 34. and Ezek. 36.25 26. And the law doth neither of these therefore it is no covenant of grace 2. There is nothing more against Scripture and the maine current of all true divinity then to teach that the life of grace is begot by the law Here are two great
it M. B. A third and last instance out of Scripture in answering of which all is answered from Gal. 3.2 Received ye the Spirit by the works of the Law or by the hearing of Faith that of the Gospel or doctrine of Faith In the opening of this Text we must take heed of three errors Answ A Caveat against all error is necessary but it is well that you accuse your Antinomian of none of those three And it had been wisdom in you to have taken heed of affectation of singularity for in rejecting all other of the Orthodox you substitute a most doubtful opinion of your owne as may appear by and by M. B. First I may demand whether any under the old Testament were made partakers of Gods Spirit or no. If they were how came they by it there can be no other way found but that God did give his Spirit in all those publick Ordinances unto the believing Israelites so that although they did in some measure obey the Law yet they did it not by the power of the Law but by the power of Grace Answ You might beware of co-incidency with the first error you named of having Faith before the Spirit for ever we come not to Faith by our reason and will yet you grant a giving of the Spirit to believers as if they first believed then received the Spirit but the gifts and operations of the Spirit are divers It s by the Spirit that the soul cometh to union with Christ and after the woman touched the hem of his garment she received a healing vertue but let this pass 2. By your next expression you might seem to be an Antinomian for They obeyed the Law say you but not by the power of the Law but by the power of Grace what difference now but I like not to force the joyning of hands where the parties hearts be not first linked yet the Reader may take it as if you contradicted your self for why are your words so exclusive but if it be not by the power of the Law originally as by the first and principal efficient yet you mean still it is a subordinate and secondary cause or mean of conveyance Egregie sane M.B. Again in the next place which hath alwayes much prevailed with me did not the people of God receive the grace offered in the Sacraments in the Circumcision Paschal Lamb They were partakers of Christ as well as we and yet the Apostle doth as much exclude Circumcision and these Jewish Ordinances from grace as any thing else wherefore that there may be no contradiction in Scripture some other way is to be thought upon about the exposition of these words Answ When a man willingly of himself is going down a steep place every thing will further him If you had not first conceived this silly and weak opinion of your self out of a humour of contradiction and desire to be accounted the vindicator of the Law you needed not to be so puzled and put to such shifts nor to seek out such sandy grounds and tottering Pillars to support what you see cannot be upholden I may so far credit you that this hath prevailed with you as you tell us but I cannot think it alway did so for you have not alway thought of this nor alway been of this private opinion that the Law is the doctrine of regeneration 2. Grant that this prevailed to keep and continue you in that minde yet would I learn if I might be so bold what brought you into it at first sure it came by some immediate inspiration for I see neither clear Scripture nor Author for it 3. As it hath so prevailed with you so I am sensible of no force at all in it whether to incline or carry the judgement unto it at first or to keep the minde the same still Consider better of it It is granted the people of God did receive the grace offered in their Sacraments c. and were partakers of Christ as well that is as truly and as really as we now what is this to your purpose I ingenuously profess I see not wherein it maketh one jot for you or to confirm your tenet what would you infer hence you say the Apostle did as much exclude these ordinances from grace as any things else and as well as much as the Law that must be your meaning Answ Your self have seemed still to exclude the Law from Grace and to make a direct opposition between them 2. As for Circumcision and these Ordinances being in their prime institution types yea signes exhibitive of Christ and if not essential parts yet appendances of their Covenant of Grace which cannot be said of the Law it being a doctrine of another nature and use therefore neither the Apostles nor Prophets in that case and sense did exclude them from Grace but onely as the hypocrites Ceremonia Legis in sua natura consideralae non autem quatenus suo tempore Sacramenta erant gratiae Pisc Gal. 3. and unbelievers did use them as resting in the things done or using them being antiquated and our of date or joyning them with Christ and Faith as necessary observances to salvation c. Now as this assertion will be too bold as unjustifiable That the Apostle doth as much exclude the Jewish Sacraments in their prime pure and right use from Grace as he doth the Law so that Argument is too childish viz. If the believing Jewes were partakers of Christ and did receive grace by these Ordinances so did they receive grace by the Moral Law also If you look again there is neither contradiction in Scripture nor occasion given to seek out such an uncouth and unwarrantable exposition of the words M. B. Some there are that understand by the Spirit c. Answ Here you first present your Reader with Beza's interpretation but that is misliked as not to your purpose Again say you thus it may be explained As by faith is meant the doctrine of faith so by the works of the Law is to be understood the doctrine of the works of the law thus far I approve which the false Apostles taught viz. That Chrict was not enough to justification unless the works of the law were put in as a cause also Answ If you look into Act. 15. and compare vers 1. and 5. it seemeth that they taught Christ for justification for it is said vers 5. they believed and what should they believe in Christ for but for righteousness and yet they required Circumcision and the keeping of the Law of Moses as necessary to salvation vers 1 5. when we are justified we must work to get heaven So many now hold and teach that good works and observing of the Law are not needfull to justification but they are to salvation of which sort you will prove one if I mistake not Contrary to Act. 15.10.11 Now why tempt ye God to lay a yoak on the Disciples necks c. that is as though he
could not save by faith and salvation now not to be sought by grace onely in Jesus Christ saith the Margent But we believe through the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ to be saved even as they Fathers do Learned Zanchy stateth the question between Paul and the false teachers to be An praeter Christum c. whether besides Christ good works also be necessary to salvation Mr. B. And if this should be the sense of the Text then it was clear that the Galatians were not made partakers of Gods spirit by the corrupt doctrine that was taught them of late by their Seducers but before while they did receive the pure doctrine of Christ and therefore it was their folly having begun in the spirit to end in the flesh this may be a probable interpretation Answ Yet these exceptions may be against the latter part 1. The question made by the Apostle is divisive whether they received the Spirit by the doctrine of faith or by the other for by one they must needs have it And not whether they received the spirit by both doctrines conjoyned and confounded so that you mistake the form of the question 2. They begun in the spirit while they abode in the doctrine of Christ for righteousness and salvation onely and their folly in ending in the flesh was in that besides the righteousness of faith they would have also works of the law for salvation for this is to end in the flesh that is in themselves having begun in Christ by the spirit or as saith Piscator this is called an ending in the flesh because it is a way both heavy and impossible Mr. B. That which I shall stand upon is this The Jews and false Apostles when they went furthest joyned Christ and the observance of the moral Law equally together for justification and salvation whereas the Law separated from Christ did nothing but curse and condemn not being able to help the soul at all Answ It is as probable if not more as I said that they held Christ sufficient to justifie but not to save without works 2. They joyned Christ and the Law for justification and salvation say you And you joyn them for sanctification and salvation so no such great difference 3. If the Law separated from Christ did nothing but accuse and condemn then it seemeth if it be joyned with Christ it will acquit and justifie or you think it hath left that power to condemn being joyned to Christ Came Christ to take that power from the Law or to mitigate and meeken it by uniting it to himself or to redeem his elect from under the Law to live and abide where no Law is to accuse Rom. 8. Who can lay any thing to their charge Is not Christ also our sanctification and redemption as well as our justification without the Law 1 Cor. 1.30 This doctrine is of God saith Paul there but yours is but of man Also you disclaim that the Law of it self is able to stirre up the least Godly affection in us but Christ and Law together can and not Christ without it If the soul be married to Chist her husband he cannot make her to bring forth fruits to God but Moses the former dead husband must be raised up again and so the beleiver hath two husbands to make him fruitfull and both at one time a thing utterly against the Law and the Ordinance of Mariage civill or spirituall for as in the civill two are thereby become one flesh so they that are joyned to Christ are one spirit 1 Cor. 6.17 Mr. B. More places of Scripture are brought against this but they will come in more fitly under the notion of the Law as a Covenant Answ It 's true there are many more pag. 165. of the Assert unto which as many might be added but you have enough of these the rest you reserve to a more fit occasion And I had thought to have enlarged this point but that it is lost labour and I may ill spare any Mr. B. Thus therefore I shall conclude this point acknowledging that many learned and orthodox men speak otherwise and that there is a difficulty in clearing every particular about this question but as yet that which I have delivered carrieth the more probability with me Answ I thank you for your ingenuous and free acknowledgement I am not alone in this my opinion as yet I think you are in yours for any thing I mean that can be read in the Orthodox for otherwise the whole Colledge would not have given you such hearty thanks and your book so superlative commendation if they inclined not your way 2. Whereas you find difficulty that is because you have taken the staffe by the wrong and worst end contending against the clear truth I will not say against the light and checks of conscience But the more difficult the more fit for one of your quality and parts to encounter with that so your victory might happily have been more glorious Yet you have brought it no further even in your own thoughts but to be questio probabilis and you found it in as perfect condition and state when you entred upon it nay I say more I never read that it was controverted by any Protestant till now but your words imply that you may be of another mind to morrow The Lord instruct and establish us Mr. B. And I will give one Text more which I have not yet mentioned that is Act. 7.38 where the moral Law is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the lively cracles that is not verba vitae but verba viva vivificantia so 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is as much as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 giving life not that we could have life by vertue of obedience to them but when we by grace are inabled to obey them God of his mercy bestoweth eternal life Answ Before you were onely defensive sheilding your self as busily as you could against those Scriptures that fought against you but now you are disposed to give your adversary one stroke and yet the arm or weapon rather will not serve to fasten one blow either to hurt or fright this is but a childish skirmish or flourish It is granted the moral Law may be called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 lively oracles or words and so it is in its own nature yea and in the Ministry of it life is propounded as Deut. 30.19 I have set before you life and death and Levit. 18.5 Ye shall keep my statutes and my judgements which if a man keep he shall live in them but this life it promiseth to give is upon such tearms and impossible conditions that as yet none was quickned by it but contrarily it brought death upon all by reason of that poysonfull enmity and maliciousness of our common nature whereupon Paul is bold and peremptory to affirm that all that are of the works of the Law are cursed Gal. 3. this inbred enmity is discovered but not cured by
your self or your ipse dixit must suffice you said so much indeed pag. 139. but proved not one syllable there nor here Much more might be added to discover the vanity and errour of your opinions and exceptions against us but this shall be all at this present Mr. B. Those that say the Law is abolished as it is foedus but not as it is regula say true The Law may be considered as it is a Covenant or as it is an absolute Rule requiring conformity unto it Now it may be granted that the Law is abolished in the former notion though not in the later Answ Those that say the Law as it is foedus is also regula and where it doth regulate there it is foedus a Covenant and that the Law is neither abolished as foedus nor regula say most truly and properly according to the Scripture If you look upon the Law and consider it as God propounded it you never find an absolute rule where it is not a Covenant we want your scriptum est Though God deal with his people in a Covenant of meer mercy it followeth not that his justice in his Law is abrogated or any whit diminished beside Christ having once answered and fully satisfied that hath also made a clear way for this manner of Gods dealing but this is onely the object of the faith of the Elect. 2. You are ready to grant what liketh you to any one save the truth to the favourers of it In your last page Law was not abrogated at all in any good sense say you but now it may truely be granted thus you play fast and loose as you please In whom now is inconstancy You promise to shew but take time for it and till then we will wait that the Law given by Moses was a Covenant of Grace If you understand it of the Morall Law it will be denied therefore look well what you affirm Mr. B. Whosoever expecteth life and justification by the Law he sets up the Covenant of works again nor is it any advantage to say These works are the works of grace and wrought by the spirit Answ 1. By the Law you must needs understand the Law of nature or as it was given to Adam for your opinion is that the Law given by Moses was a Covenant of grace by which then till it was antiquated it seemeth the Church might expect life and justification so that when God said by Moses Whosoever doth these things shall live in them herein they were to seek righteousness and life and not by faith I know not how you can evade but leave it to your second thoughts 2. You set up the Covenant of works again when you teach that salvation is due to good works by vertue of Gods promise though not of merit this doth none other but set up mans righteousness and the Law as foedus yet in words you would seem sometime to deny it And remember also your own words viz. It is no advantage to these works or works of grace for still it is by doing 3. And by this now we may learn what you mean when you say the Law instrumentally regenerateth and converteth for it did so in Davids time and in the old Testament that Law by your opinion was not the Law of works but the Covenant of grace But seeing you say withall that that Covenant of grace is now abrogated then it is not now to be used to quicken and convert It was of use and force in Davids time but not now say you therefore the Argument is inconsequent Or may we take you thus Christ hath obtained that the Law given to Adam may be instrumentall for the Spirit but how is it then that you bring no other Scripture but Psal 19. and 119. which you grant to be meant of the Law comprehensively that is as here for the Covenant of grace you see this will not prove the Law of works to be a converting word Thus you are found further from the truth and at great variance with your self here is much need of reconciling and salving Mr. B. The Law is a rule to walk by though not a Covenant be justified by Answ The just both liveth and walketh by faith 2 Cor. 5.7 then not by the Law 2. If the Law by Moses be a Covenant of grace then it was to be justified by If you object you mean the Law largely taken for the whole dispensation of Commandments Morall Judiciall and Ceremoniall I reply you cannot make all these of one nature so not all to make a Covenant of grace 2. To say the denomination is given to the better part I answer as no text warranteth this so the natures of the Laws is not thereby changed If you say of the whole heap in the floore It s as Corn that maketh nor proveth not chaffe to be Wheat Also so the judiciall which was for the government of the Jewish Commonwealth is as much the Covenant of grace as the Morall Law But this is to decline the question and to confound what you should keep distinct Mr. B. The Antinomian distinction of the Law abolished as a Law but still abiding in respect of the matter is a contradiction The Law saith the Antinomian in the matter of it was not denied to be a rule according to which a believer walketh and liveth Answ You much wrong your Adversary and more endanger your self if there be any evill in a false accusation as the ninth command for he saith not the Law is abolished as a Law but that it is inviolable and for ever Neither can nor yet would any man so conclude from his words but you his words are as you say The Law in the matter of it is not denied c. but what ground is here to inferre an abolition And where he saith A believer walketh according to the rule of the Law yet it is not by vertue from the Law regulating him but from another power within renewing and disposing the heart thereunto He is like the honest Traveller who keepeth the high way freely of his own accord and taketh pleasure in so doing And yet the work here is so imperfect and he cometh so far short of what is in that Law that he findeth and acknowledgeth a power therein threatning and condemning for it so that his free justification by grace is his continuall Rocke and refuge and his faith therein the sole preserver of his peace and safety But by your doctrine there should be no more need of justification Christ or faith after conversion for the Law hath onely a Mandative power say you but none to condemn or curse I muse that your own experience doth not convince you of your errour Thus we reach and say The Law or more properly and plainly that there may be no evasion God in his Law obligeth and bindeth unto that rule of perfect righteousness and also to the curse inevitably for every failing and disobedience You tell of a
their actions else perfection should be in us and no need of justification if we sin not What gaine you by this you say by justification there is no removal of sin but of the guilt or obligation to eternal wrath c. But the Scripture speaketh not of guilt nor obligation to punishment but of sin and the debt it self whereof we being discharged the obligation to the curse ceaseth upon that yet we may be discharged in our accounts with God of sin and it be still dwelling in us and we confess it too Now what flashly divinity is this nay is not your doctrine truely fleshly for it is self-liking and from a carnal principle That our good works are conditions of life and salvation And that Christ saveth from eternal wrath but we must suffer temporary punishment here we may sin and the law not curse us c. hence is your doctrine so currant and acceptable to all carnal mindes M. Rutherf pag. 572. Towne by the word Law Rom. 6. I understand saith he Moral law with all its Authority Answ If we be freed from all authority of the law then hath the sixth command no authority from God to teach that murder is a sin that Idolatry is agaainst the second commandment Reply By like consequence it may be said If there be no curse nor condemnation in the law we live under as you teach us then the sixth Commandment cannot curse or condemn for murder c. Your Argument holdeth not what the law saith it is to them that are under it The law may have power though you in a true sense be not under it So the Law teacheth what sin is and what curse is annext to sin though you agree with the prophane and secure in heart who in their imaginations deceitfully separate sin and the curse as they would sin without peril M. Rutherf Then the Believer when he lyes whores c. is not obliged to know and see from the light of the law that these be sins Reply In like manner by your doctrine he is to see no condemnation nor danger by the Law for these sins but may live and continue secretly in sinning for the Law to him hath no condemning power deliver your self and acquit me M. Rutherf Mark saith T. Three grounds of mistake 1. That justification and sanctification are separable 2. To ease men by faith of the yoke of the law is to suffer them to run after the course of the world 3. That all strict conformity to the law is right sanctification Answ 1. Not any of these is owned by Protestant Divines they are all in Mr. T. forged calumnies Reply I hate forging and wish you used it no more then I you finde not me charging Protestant Divines with these but whether Mr. Burgess with the President and fellows of Sion Colledge who unanimously justifie and commend to the whole Kingdome his Sermons and Doctrine and Dr. Taylor whom your self so much defend be Protestant Divines I leave that to your thoughts For 1. Mr. Burgess saith expresly That the Law is used as an effectual instrument of Sanctification Regeneration and Conversion And D. Taylor saith If a man be freed from the Law he may whore steal c. as if there were no power in the word of Grace and spirit to renew guide and keep us in the good wayes of God And to the third I say If hundreds teach not so then I am mistaken Who is now the forger of Calumnies whether they owne them or no. I avow them as I say Yet you say we never make the Law the efficient instrument of sanctification and you know it is otherwise They for whom you so plead and against whom for that cause we except have taught and published as I say Mr. Rutherf I cannot see that sanctification is any thing by Antinomian Doctrine but meer justification Reply You want eye-salve or will not see how often may you read them distinguished in the Assertion Mr. Rutherf Mr. T. passes by all guidance of the Saints by Commandment of Law or Gospel and tells us of a leading by a free Spirit onely So that by the Antinomian doctrine we are no more under the Gospel as a directing and Commanding rule then under law What hindereth then but Antinomian justification bids live as we list 2. A dead letter forbids no sin commands no duty but the Gospel without the Spirit is a dead letter as well as Law Reply 1. Is Mr. Rutherf guilty of denying all truths he never mentioneth but 2. The Assertion telleth you of a sanctifying vertue and power of the Spirit by the Gospel to subdue sin change the heart and freely dispose it to walk according to the rule of the Law this you read And under this dominion and guidance of this Evangelical spirit of Christ are all the Sons of God Rom. 8.18 What an indirect and undue inference then do you make saying We teach men to live as they lift First there is a change in their list and will from what they were The Spirit lusteth against the flesh Gal. 5. And 2. I tell you If this Spirit have not soveraignty over you and power to renew and guide you you will neither follow the rule of Law nor Gospel The unction leadeth into all truth You call the Gospel a dead Letter It s no Scripture-phrase which saith it s the ministration of the spirit 2 Cor. 3.8 yet it makes not against me at all Mr. Rutherf If by conformity to the law in the letter Mr. T. means external obedience without faith in Christ He knows Protestant Divines acknowledge no sound sanctification but that which is the natural issue and fruit of justification and flows from faith And such strict conformity to the law we hold to be true sanctification though all enemies to holy walking cry out against it such as are all mockers of all religion the Prelatical and Antinomian party who mock strait walking Reply Bona verba quaeso But 1. I know Protestant Divines hold sanctification to issue out of justifying faith and you cannot but know many who deny it and that some will have sanctification to be coetaneous unto yea to precede justification 2. If it be the issue and fruit of faith by which the heart believeth first to justification and salvation how is it that you teach strict conformity to be a necessary condition mean or way of salvation which by faith is attained in order before holy walking He that believeth is saved Abraham did believe and work both but he did onely by faith come to blessedness and so all his children Gal. 3.9 2. You are ill-transported when in your distemper you conjoyn us with the Prelatical party though I doubt not but amongst them were divers as sound for doctrine and life as in your party and make us both mockers and enemies to holy walking Sir doth the Law now regulate you when you are so far from charity and truth The Lord forgive and
to affirm and maintain it and with a smal touch he there passeth it over And here he saith The Law it self converts not No more doth the Gospel it self as he often saith without the spirit This is as if with Mr. Burgess he meanes that either Law of Gospel is the Spirits instrument for conversion and that we may preach either for that end Mr. Rutherford is unwilling to speak out Loquere ut videam 3. If the Spirit by the Gospel conform us to the rule of the Law It s then true that the Law is a passive rule but not active as actuating to effectuate this thus you grant what I asserted and oppose without cause But at last you tell us the Apostle never speaks of our freedom from the Law as it doth regulate direct and lead us Reply Now this overthroweth what you said even now viz. That the Spirit by the Gospel doth direct and lead us in the way of the Law for then the Law doth not actively lead us Mr. T. pag. 9. What freeth a believer from the curse but because he is a new Creature Mr. Rutherf That new creation is sanctification 2 Cor. 5.17 not justification If any be in Christ that is if he be justified he is a new creature that is sanctified or else by the Antinomian gloss the meaning must be If a man be justified in Christ he is justified in Christ Paul speaks not so non-sense Reply This new creature is the man changed in himself and his state Sanctification is not a new creation but a new qualifying of a man It begets him not nor recreates him not to God nor yet delivereth him from under the curse makes him not the child of God restoreth him not into favour nor doth make him Heir Co-heir with Christ c. See your errour 2. To be justified and to be in Christ is not all one as your gloss is they differ as the cause and the effect or as the antecedent and consequent To be in Christ imports union which is before justification Or it is insition that work of the Father Joh. 15.1 that being ingrafted into him he may partake of his righteousness and holiness both imputatively and inherently if I may use the Aristotelian word More sound or probable is their judgement who teach that regeneration includeth both justification and sanctification Mr. Rutherf How shall it follow that Christ hath loosed us from all debt of active obedience because he hath loosed us from a necessity of perfect active obedience but the Law is spiritualized and lustred with the Gospel Law and free-grace and drawn down to a Covenant of free-grace requires not nor exacts upon perfect obedience under pain of losing salvation It requires obedience as the poor man is able to give it by the grace of God that the man may enter in the possession of eternal life Reply I Reply You can shew no text nor reason why Christ looseth not from imperfect as well as perfect obedience and that from active as well as passive Nay if from prefect much more may we argue from imperfect 2. If our state and case be well considered we are spiritually so poor that we are as unable to pay pence as pounds It is all one to a dead man whether life be tendered unto him upon condition of moving his least finger or the removing of a great Mountain and this is our case Again you can produce no Law 1 That requires not perfect obedience 2 That calls not for obedience as a proper condition of life Do and live 3 That threatens not death upon the least failing in any Iota But you let all see your new divinity 1 I must obey but not perfectly 2 The Law is spiritualized c. drawn down to a Covenant of free-grace 3 No more is required of the poor man then he can give c. Vltra posse viri non vult Deus ulla requirt Thus grace is abrogated promise made void and faith is of no effect Mr. Rutherf Paul sheweth what Law we are freed from of sinne and death and saith Christ died for this end Rom. 8 4. That the righteousness of the Law might be fulfilled in us Whence I argue Those that ought to fulfill the righteousness of the Law by walking after the Spirit and mortifying the deeds of the flesh are not freed from the Law as a rule of righteousness Reply The strength of sinne is the Law 1 Cor. 15.56 2 Christ dyed that the righteousness of the Law might be fulfilled in us imputatively or grant inherently yet if this be the end and fruit of Christs death as you say then the Law is no active cause of it but the power of Christs death effecteth it And though this righteousness be for matter one with the Law yet still the Law is but a rule passively according to which the believer is conformed and regulated it not actively regulating Also active walking in the Law is but the expression and effect of sanctification and not properly sanctification it self Adam made holy lived accordingly from that inward form his holy life made him not holy Neither is our holy life to procure or preserve peace favour life as the Law propoundeth requireth it for these consist in faith alone which findeth and enjoyeth Christ to be such a true fulness and All-sufficiency to the soul that self by him and with him is satisfied and so needs no ends of its own in working and obeying Joh. 6.35 He that cometh to me shall never hunger and he that believeth on me shall never thirst Mr. Rutherf We are freed from the Law being once justified so the Antinomians whatever we do is not against a Law or rule the law gives a dispensation to do those things being justified which the unjustified cannot do but in doing it they sinne because the unjustified are under the law as a rule of justice which we are not under We have an Antidated dispensation to sinne Reply You straine your wit if not conscience to make quidlibet ex quolibet But I say Take justification in the full latitude and extent of it or consider a Christian still as justified and so he is freed from under the Law but if you speak of or consider him in his active righteousness of works so as you bring him under the Law so he sinneth yea and is judged and condemned by the Law and you must raise him and bring him up to his justified state ere he can be free and secure from the curse Justification extends to all sins at all times throughout the whole life But it s false that I give an Antidated dipensation that is your indirect inference If you put the believer under the Law as he sinneth like the unjustified so the Law threatneth and curseth both equally Though you tell us unwarrantably of your bare word that the Law hath power to rule where it hath no power to condemn then we may live securely in sin or the works
is not because the Law hath lost its power to accuse and condema as you would bear us in hand but because he is not under the Law but under Grace Rom. 6.14 Gal. 4.4 Christ hath satisfied for him taking all his sins guilt and curse unto and upon himself and God hath justified and set him free so he liveth in peace and at rest by Faith in Christ who loved him and gave himself to redeem him Also the grace and benefit of his Justification doth in some sort redound upon the actions of a Believer For was it not by his Faith that Abels sacrifice pleased God Heb. 11.4 There is no such purity perfection or dignity in the best thing you can do which of it self simply considered can procure or finde acceptance with God The Scripture and all Orthodox Divinity do hold forth Christ only as the ground and reason of all acceptation of man his works and ways 1 Pet. 2.5 Ye are an holy Priesthood to offer up spiritual sacrifice acceptable to God by Jesus Christ You say Dr Crisp is wide and see not your self out of the way of Truth and Charity A man under grace is no more under the Law he is dead to the Law that he may live to God Gal. 2.19 M. B. 6 Caution Law is not to be decryed because we have no power to keep the Law Ans Who cryeth down or speaketh against the Law You cannot shew or name any And who are so much against the Law as your selves who are become vain and needless Advocates for it The blinde Pharisees pretended most zeal for God and his Law who were yet in the state of enmity and by reason of their inward malice and envy against Christ opposition and hatred of the truth of his Doctrine false accusations and seeking to entangle and bring him into danger they lived in the continual breach of the Law Well it is too evident that you with thousand others of your Fraternity cease not to quarrel with except against and to condemn us for Antinomians and yet no demonstrative proof is extant of any such Error or guilt It is easie to lay on load of accusation upon Innocency it self hence such aspersions and indignities cast upon David Paul and that immaculate Lamb Christ himself if the corrupt heart within give way and be bent thereunto How weak is thy heart seeing thou hast done all these things Ezek. 16. The weakest and worst sort have been the most zealous and confident accusers We know say the Jews that this man Christ is a sinner Joh. 9.24 yet they knew no such thing by him What accusation saith Pilate bring you against this man They answered If he were not a Malefactor we would not have delivered him unto thee Ioh. 18.29.30 If so many of that Religion say it it is unquestionably true though there be no reality nor jot of verity in the accusation yet know it that it is an Antinomian part to slander and miscal and to make no crime to appear Thus may the greatest delinquency and guilt of Antinomianism be layd at yours and your fellows doors There is one that accuseth you even Moses in whom you trust Joh. 5.45 M. B. Ibid. It is an expression that an Antinomian * Dr. Crisp useth The Law saith he speaketh to thee if troubled for sin Do this and live Now this is as if a Judg should bid a Malefactor If thou wilt not be hanged take all England and carry it upón your shoulders into the West Indies What comfort were this Now doth not the Gospel when it bids a man believe speak as impossible a thing to a mans power Answ Doth the Doctor in this saying decry the Law Your own words and judgment too do import the like impossibility What a sinister minde is this But all if voyd of prejudice and partiality may clearly see by this his expression that Doctor Crisps main desire design and scope was to instruct erect and comfort a poor distressed and troubled Soul and that therefore he so applyed and ministred Gospel-Cordials Observe the ground and reason of his words if thou be troubled for sin and then you have no cause so to reprove and censure him as you do 2. His counsel and direction differ much from theirs of your way who in such a case bid the dejected man to desire promise and endeavor his utmost to do and walk according to the Law and so put him in hope of mercy in that as it is taught the Law is mitigated Evangelized God accepteth the will for the deed c. The Doctor wisely telleth him of the impossibility of making his peace that way knowing also how apt every one is to take that course that so he may utterly despair of himself self-doings and active righteousness and more readily hearken to the voyce and tydings of the Gospel only And 3. though to believe be as impossible to mans natural power yet it followeth not but that he is rightly put upon the believing the Gospel as Paul did bid the Jaylor Act. 16. to believe in the Lord Jesus that he might be saved The believing way is the only way of life peace and Salvation and the Gospel is to be preached for the obedience of Faith Rom. 1.5 You seek a knot in a rush M. B. 7 Caution I much wonder at one speaking thus The Law doth not only deprive us of comfort but it will let no body else speak a word of comfort because it is a rigid keeper and he consirmeth it by that place Gal. 3.23 But how short this is appeareth 1. Because what the Apostle calleth the Law here he called the Scripture in general before 2. He speaks it generally of all under that form of Moses his Regiment so that the fathers should have no comfort by that means Answ Your Margin might have directed us to the Author or Book if not to the page and place where that had been candid for the circumstances there would have given much light Many sentences of your own if singled separated from what precedeth would speak strangely and make a harsh sound I think that the expression which occasioneth so much admiration in you is either D Crisps or some other reputed Antinomians and his words are Allegorical Though Pauls friends had free access and might minister unto him Acts 24.23 yet many a Martyr in Queen Maries time had not that favor So the Law being a spiritual Jaylor to the Conscience suffereth none in a Legal way to comfort it no work no duty performance or reformation nor man nor Angel The Law came by Moses but Grace Pardon Peace Favor Life Consolation by Jesus Christ 2. That place Gal. 3.23 doth sufficiently confirm it and hath been used for that purpose by such Divines as you have no exception against 3. Your Reasons are invalid For first That Scripture in general is the Law or nothing in the Scripture but the Law which concludeth all under sin Verse 22.
Secondly Grant that it is meant of all even the fathers also under that regiment according to the History and it is true that they had no comfort that way but by that hope to be brought in afterward Heb. 7.19 Therefore the phrase is They waited for the Consolation Luk. 2.25 and looked for Redemption Verse 38. Yet besides that there is a mystical and spiritual meaning of that place as is granted by most and therefore it was alledged M. B. 1 Use of Instruction Law is good if used lawfully c. Answ And is this a lawful use of it to nick-name and miscal your Brother slander falsly accuseth him saying He is against the Law destroyeth it maketh it contrary Christ and his Gospel c. Look on your inward disposition frame of spirit and such outward expressions as these wherewith you have so presented mens eyes and ears by Pulpit and Press in this crystal glass and shame may cover your face and you be brought to such silence that you dare never open your mouth in this way LECTURE II. 1 Tim. 1.8 9. Knowing the Law is good c. Mr. B. In his first way of abusing the Law He preacheth the Law unprofitably not only that darkeneth it with obscure questions but that doth not teach Christ by it and I see not but that Ministers may be bumbled that they have pressed religious duties but not so as to set up Christ and hereby people have been content with Duties and Sacraments though no Christ in them Ans 1. I dare appeal to any of your constant Hearers or to the diligent Reader of this your Book whether any though you pretend the contrary did more darken the Law with obscure questions and vain-jangling about it 2. You are singular that will have a Minister teach Christ by the Law We may all come to your School to learn this new way I muse what a Christ the Law setteth forth it is most like you mean the setting up of Christ by pressing religious duties as your own and next expression is which is a most strange yea and impossible way to any that knoweth or ever received Christ truly 3. I would take you in the best sence if I could yet make any good and sound sence of your words Have you perceived indeed any such failing in Ministers that they may be humbled for pressing dutyes so as they have not set up Christ Your Charge is heavy on whomever it lighteth but you are so wise as to beware of putting your hand into that Hornet's nest for fear they flie not also about your ears save your skin and meddle not too much with that Noli me tangere If I preach Circumcision why do I yet suffer persecution then is the offence of the Crosse ceased Gal. 5.11 But you would have religious duties pressed so as a Christ may be in them what and not a Christ without them a naked Christ But Christ invested and clothed with works as Mr. Fox his complaint was to Queen Elizabeth yea first a Christ and then duties Let the poor sinful miserable and lost soul first be united and married to him in whom dwelleth the fulness of the Godhead and in whom she is then compleat wanting nothing Col. 2.9 10. then tell of duties The true Christ wil be all or none he will be alone without the joyning or mixture of duty as Christ hath satisfied the Father so that in him he is well pleased so are we to preach him and the unsearchable treasures in him that he alone may satisfie the Conscience give true rest to the soul be the way to favor peace and life and be the reason and ground of all respect and acceptance thus a dejected and distressed soul may know and receive him aright and finde sure and everlasting consolation and then may your duties and performances have their due place ends and praise with no danger But if you can make all your duties of pure and meer Christ you are a strange Alchymist this is such Chymical Divinity that I cannot skill of nor well understand Lastly You say people have been contented with Duties and Sacraments though no Christ in them still laying the blame of this upon the Ministers What I except against here is that your words import the people should have Christ in duties as he is in Sacraments which is dangerous or at least doubtful in the meaning As duties do differ much from Sacraments duties being our work what is wrought in and by the Sacraments is properly Gods Act so Christ is so present in the Sacraments that there he is represented and exhibited which I hope you will not affirm of your duties You have many such dark and difficult phrases which the simple by mistaking may be mislead Mr. B. 5. When they do oppose it to Christ c. and to compound Christ and the Law together is to make opposition there can no more be two Suns in the Firmament then two things to justifie there the reconciliation of the Law and Christ cannot be in matter of justification by way of mixture Answ As the Iews error was to oppose the Law to Christ in justification so it is your Error to oppose them in sanctification which you contend to be by the Law Christ of God is made unto us as Righteousness so Sanctification 1 Cor. 1.30 2. If their composition of Christ and Law was opposition can your compounding of them be any other yea you include Christ in the Law which they never did 3. As two things cannot justifie so Christ and Law both cannot sanctifie therefore the reconciliation of Christ and the Law cannot be neither in matter of Sanctification by way of mixture M. B. In 8 way thus And certainly for this twofold end I may think God suffers this Antinomian Error to grow 1. That Ministers may humble themselves that they have not set forth Christ and grace in all the glory of it How much more may we say that in many Sermons in many mans Ministry the drift and end of all his preaching is not that Christ may be advanced Answ The Error is yours who call light darkness We belong to Christs Barn-sloore Aliquis suit usus in illo your loose tongue is not the Fan to seperate nor can all this boisterous winde blow us away The Doctrine is of God you had need take heed how you fight against it he hath planted it and will defend and water it therefore it shall take root flourish and prosper what you imagine or practise against it is a vaine thing Psal 2.12 There is an Election of Grace who shall receive it though others be blinded and hardened and for their sakes God will have it preached and dispread maugre all malice and spite of man And therefore Ministers may be humbled that they have so much doted upon the Law of works that Christ and the riches of his grace hath been like the chief Corner-stone despised by the builders It seemeth
Ministery and how Jerusalem the valley of vision zealous in a religious way yet did not know the things of her peace Luk. 19.41 but erred in her heart not knowing God way of peace and life Psal 95.3 In what a dangerous and deep temptation many a poor distressed soul lyeth plunged sore for want of this doctrine and consolation of free-grace 4. And that the relieving enlarging and saving of such a soul is much to be preferred before conversation of life And 5. Lastly As Luther saith That there is no danger in preaching faith free-grace without works for good works will follow where that is truely received but in preaching works and the Law so as it may be done and obeyed is much danger lest free-grace be obscured destroyed unknown men rest in the way of the Law and the gate of eternal life never be opened c. If I say you had considered these and the like you would never have condemned the innocent There be also divers things exceptable in your supposed disputable questions and some that reflect on your self as being inconsistent with what you hold at other times and confirming what you oppose but we may not dwell on what is Cursory Mr. B. pag. 31. Let us see what prejudicial inferences they gather from this doctrine of justification denying them good works to be a way to heaven Thus Doctor Crisp in page 6 c. Answ Methinks that expression of the Doctor is so clear and fully satisfactory that you should not quarrel with it and to me your language is so confused that I cannot skill of it but do fear it will lead the Reader out of the right way Let Christ be the way and good works our imployment or business in the way as he saith and then I see no error nor danger If you do truly good works you do them in Christ abiding in him Ioh. 15.4 in whom you are alive and walk continually by faith doth the soul go out of Christ or leave him when or while it worketh As ye have received Christ Jesus so walk in him Colos 2.6 Now the soul cannot walk in Christ nor have union with him save by faith the believer also walketh in the way of the Law of works but this is his way on earth amongst men and Christ is his way to God and heaven Let me add Christ is set forth so to be our way that he is our salvation also so that in him the soul is at her journies end and need not work to go further for attaining life as if it were a far off and good works were a way to carry and bring us unto it Eternal life is in the Sonne He that hath the Sonne hath eternal life also Joh. 3.36 1 Joh. 5.11 12. Also the words of Bernard are Viaregni not ad regnum of which difference see more in the Assertion of Grace M. B. Thus Matth. 7.17 Strait is the way that leadeth to life What is this way but the work of grace and godliness Answ I might here put you in minde of a threefold work of grace as you will have it First Angusta est via oportet te fieri tenuem si vis per eam venire Caeterum qui operibus onerati sunt sicut cōnchylibus onustos videmus Jacobi peregrinos ii non toterant penetrare Si veneris cum magnis saceis operum plenis depenere oportebit c. Ger. which God hath wrought in and by Christ for man 2. That which he worketh in man 3. And that which man worketh by vertue of his grace Now I need not ask you which of these you mean for it 's seen by your words you take to the third and last which as I conceive cannot be the meaning of the place and I could give reasons for it But I incline to Musculus with others which Authors I have been forced to part with who expound it so That the Doctrine of Christ and faith is the straight way which few indeed do finde and the broad way is false Doctrine and error of all sorts which leaveth the simplicity that is in Christ 2 Cor. 13.3 There is a broad way common to the religious Iews Papists and deceived Protestants which leadeth to destruction As for the way of downright wickedness all know that is the way to hell And as many in a blinde zeal are carried to damnation as by prophaness and actual outward sinning And this is a strong inducement to me thus to understand it as that to believe is the straightest way of all others and fewest finde and walk in that way with an upright foot so because Christ is there speaking of Teachers and their Doctrine and not of mans life and manners so that it is doctrine he meaneth to be the straight way for it is doctrine true or false that guideth and carrieth the soul one way or other to heaven or hell and that is either the righteousness of faith or the righteousness of works He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved he that believeth not shall be damned and no good work can help to save him Mr. B. 2. Denying the presence of them good works in the person justified for thus saith the Author expresly speaking of that of Paul therefore we conclude that a man is justified without the works of the Law Here saith he the Apostle doth not only exclude works from having any power operative to concur in the laying iniquities upon Christ but excludes all manner of works man can do to be present and existent in persons when God doth justifie them And he instanceth of a general pardon for thieves Now one man may take the pardon as well as another Answ Your charge is heavie but I finde no evidence or proof What doth he deny the presence of good works in the person justified or after his justification did he not grant and say that they are our business and imployment in the way your words may be taken as if he denyed that ever a justified person should do good works Bona opera non precedunt justificandum c. Solis ortum sequitur aeris calafactio Melancth Cum peccata remitti constet etiamsi adhuc plena sit natura peccatis Melancth Deus nos in ca persectione in qua Christus resurrexit imactur If with Austine he hold good works do not go before a man to be justified I hope it is no error The air becometh warm not before but after the rising of the Sun Perhaps your meaning would be while justification is in fieri in doing not in facto after it is done yet your words are otherwise And this is to you so dangerous that to your charity it is inexcusable yet your great reading might tell you of divers Orthodox who speak and write as much and the Scripture will warant the same when you come professedly to handle the point hereafter Besides you cannot but know that the Doctor speaks of the sinners justification
upon false grounds 1. That a man cannot distinguish himself from hypocrites 2. That there can be no assurance but upon a full and compleat work of godliness Answ 1. No A man cannot distinguist himself certainly without faith's evidence how would you have discovered Paul having a zealous respect to all Gods Commandments 2. No one nor all your works can bring assurance sufficient I dare say that soul which seeketh establishment and to overcome doubting that way is far from it in the secret bottom of it Imperfections in all whereunto the conscience is privie will more weaken then confirm Semper operum respect nest trepidandi materia M. B. 4. All those Arguments will hold as strongly against faith for are there not many believers for a season or may not a man then know assoon the nature of his heart as the truth of his faith Answ 1. Though true faith fail never yet that is not simply from the nature of faith for there is no gift of grace but of it self it is perishable Constancy and immutability natural be only proper to God therefore Christ prayed that Peters faith might not fail 2. Faith doth not ascertain in that it indureth but in that by it the soul hath an effectual entrance into that grace wherein it standeth irremoveably Rom. 5.2 3. There is not that light of evidence in sincerity which is in faith Heb. 11.1 faith giveth light to those things which otherwise cannot lightly be discerned M. B. Now let us consider their grounds for this strange assertion Answ I cannot say what assertion you mean but it is not much material M. B. Because Rom. 4. It is said God justifieth the ungodly Now this hath a twofold Answer 1. That which our Divines do commonly give that those works are not to be understood in sensu composito c. therefore they compare these passages with those of making the blinde to see c. not that they did see while they were blinde but those who were blinde do now see and this is true and good Answ If you grant that a man is as meerly ungodly till he be justified as a man is blinde till his eyes be opened with those divines the Doctor and you might agree but this answer likes you not though you say it is good and true so well as another viz. Mr. B. 2. But I shall secondly answer it c. Vngodly there is meant of such who are so in their nature considered having not an absolute righteousness yet at the same time believers even as Abraham was So then the subject of justification is a sinner yet a believer Now it is impossible that a man should be a believer and his heart not purified Act 15. Answ So that in few and plain words your opinion is as we see by this and other passages where you call Abraham the ungodly man That a man must be a believer have his heart purified by faith be qualified as Abraham was at least then when it was said his faith was imputed for righteousness before he can be capable of justification here is poor and cold comfort to a distressed conscience who feels himself nothing but a meer compound of sin and misery Do you put men to believe and to know they believe and to be sure faith hath purified the heart but you mean not faith neither but the Law and sanctified them before they come to God who justifieth the ungodly A profound Rabbi O strange Divinity much good do it you You fear infection and so get as far from Doctor Crisp and from Paul's Doctrine as may be yet truth is with you Your Comes individuus to part at and you is impossible You might have named some of those learned men for I know them not But to deal punctually 1. You know that Doctor Crisp speaks of justification as it is Gods only free act absolving and discharging all the Elect of all their sins at once even then when he laid them on Christ Now as God said to Job Where wast thou when I cast the mountains so where was this Faith purity of heart and sanctification then this is no evasion you know but by this all you have said is annihilated he makes faith not to be necessary to justification but the evidence of it in due time for the relieving staying and comforting of the conscience troubled and affected by sin and the Law 2. To draw nearer to you who have thus set your self at this great distance that your longest weapon cannot teach your Adversary to harm him I will grant you that the Scripture setteth forth God as a justifier of them that are of the faith of Jesus Rom. 3.26 but let me then aske whether it be his faith or Gods act in justifying that doth alter him and his condition Israel looked upon the Brazen Serpent but the blessing of health came from God which did effect the cure 2. You say faith purified the heart Act. 15. what before justification or after Calvin and Luther understand that purifying to be by justification Luthers words are Totus purus es ratione hospitis tui because of Christ received by faith the heart becometh pure And when you tell us Abraham is that ungodly man if you mean he was ungodly when he was justified there is no difference But if you consider him otherwise he was then a worker and so the text is fully against you To him that worketh not c. But when Paul saith He believed in God who justifieth the ungodly it is a description of the object of faith or of God on whom faith believeth even that God whose nature property office and promise is to justifie an ungodly man and not a declaration how the subject or man is to be qualified So that the true God of the Gospell findeth men ungodly when he justifieth them but leaveth them not so Or if you will understand the place of Abraham yet there is no circumstance requiring it how ever he was so qualified by faith his heart purified he reported and found to have exellent things in him at that time when it was said his faith was imputed for righeousness Gen. 15.5 yet God in whom he believed is said to justifie them that are without such qualifications even the ungodly M. B. Another place they much stand upon is Rom. 5. Christ died for us while we were enemies while we were sinners But why then do they say that if a man be as great an enemy as enmity it self can make him if he be willing to take Christ c. be shall be pardoned which we say is a Contradiction for how can an enemy with Christ close with Christ So that would seem more then in some places they seem to allowe Answ You doe not surely deny the truth of that Scripture but argue the inconsistency of it with that assertion viz. That such great enemies and sinners closing with Christ can be pardoned this is a Contradiction say you I
mistakes First concerning the nature of the life of grace which is not in works nor the expressions of inherent holiness or sanctification for to move and walk in the law of works or of our own active righteousness is a legal life but that is the life of grace which reviveth quickeneth and comforteth the mortified Vita anima est sentire gratiam Dei mors animae est sentire iram Dei Scult dejected and distressed conscience which lay in extreme wo and in the shadow of death being apprehensive of the sentence of condemnation passed upon him by the law and the spirit of bondage If you know not yet what this life is and wherein it consists ask the condemned prisoner whose life is gone by the law and he will say his pardon would be his life which must come from the meer grace and mercy of his Prince Your great reading may tell you that when divinity was more pure and distinct then it is now repentance was said to have two parts Justificat vitae hoc est unde nascitur vita Pisc 1. Mortification 2. Vivisication and the object of both these is the man who is spiritually slain by the law as Rom. 7. and again quickened through the faith of the operation of God and so made partaker of the first resurrection Revel 20.6 hence it s said Col. 2.13 You hath he quickened together with him forgiving you all your trespasses and the efficient or worker of both these is God who killeth and maketh alive and man is the patient the soul receiving the pardon of sins hath entrance into the presence and favour also of God and in his favour is life and his loving kindness is better then life In his presence is fulness of joy saith the Psalmist Hence we read that justification is to life Rom. 5.18 and Christ is the bread of life whoever eateth of him shall live for ever John 6. and whosoever heareth his voice shall live John 5.25 Thus life cometh by believing but law is not of faith Gal. 3.21 If there had been a law that giveth life surely righteousness which is our justification should have been by the law Gal. 3.21 for righteousness and life come both one way but you confess our righteousness cometh not in that way of the law and so I hope hereafter you will say life cometh another way Here let me commend a sentence or two unto your self and the rest of the brethren yet for your sakes I will not English them Vos falsa imaginatione decipitis miseros homines quasi ex lege vivere debent eóque praetextu in lege ipsos detinetis Evangelio interea facitis invidiam quasi in nihilum justitiam redigat quam ex lege habemus atqui lex ipsa est quae nos sibi mori cogit Rom. 7. pulchre describit Paulus neminem legi vivere nisi cui lex est mortua hoc est otiosa fine effectu nam fimul atque lex in nobis vivere caepit jem nobis infligere lethale vulnus quo perimus c. ergò qui legi vivunt nunquam senserunt vigoram legis ac ne gustarunt quidam quid lex sibi vellet Calv. Paulus est hic haereticus omnium hareticissimus estque haereses ejus inandita quia dicit mortuum legi vivere Dēo Pseudo-apostoli docebant nisi vixens legi mortuus es deo hoc est nisi vixeris secundum legem coram deo es mortuus Panlus plane contrarium dicit Nisi fueris mortuus legi non poteris vivere Deo c. hanc doctrinam ratio sapientia humana non capit ideo perpetuò contrarium dicit scilicet si vis vivere deo oportet te legem servare c. Est que hoc principium una maxima omnium Theologorum vivens secundum legem vivit Deo Luth. Est omnino impossibile aliquem simul legi Deo vivere nunc cessante lege peccato morte adsit justitia Christi salus vita aterna Quicquid est in me gratiae justitiae vitae pacis ac salutis id omne est Christi haecn ipse mihi donat aboles legem damnat peccatum mortem mortificat ut ego vivam habeam in ipso aeternam pacem justitiam consolationem vitam Sed Christum intueor amplector qui crucifixus a me apprehensus mihi dat vitam sic viverit in me Christus Corn. He that hath any Christian experience knoweth that when the soul lyeth in death and darkness the apprehension and presence of Christ who is received and cometh into the heart by faith is the onely true light life peace and consolation of it What that law is David so commended to get life by is to be known hereafter together with your second mistake here viz. that the law is the instrument to beget life and to sanctifie for it is too irksome and vain a thing to speak to these every time you east them in our way M. B. p. 153. This is remarakble that though the former tables were broken yet now God enters into a covenant of grace with them as appeareth by proclaiming him self long-suffering gracious but yet God causeth the commandments to he written again for them implying that these may very well stand with the covenant of grace which opposeth the Antinomian Answ God entred into a covenant of grace with them not now but long before see Gen. 17.4 7. As for me behold my covenant is with thee and thou shalt be a father of many nations vers 7. And I will establish my covenant between me and thee and thy seed after thee for an everlasting covenant to be a God unto thee and to thy seed after thee 2. Though God in great wisdom gave the ten commandments to Abrahams posterity for special ends and purposes as now also it is continued in the Church yet it is not joyned to the covenant of grace as if it should perfect or alter it or adde any thing to it It being intire of it self and distinct from the law their natures offices ends and effects so much differing one from the other Read Gal. 3.15 16 17. A place full of light and satisfaction Brethren I speak after the manner of men though it be but a mans covenant yet if it be confirmed no man disannulleth or addeth thereto vers 16. Now to Abraham and his seed were the promises made c. vers 17. And this I say that the covenant that was confirmed before of God in Christ the law which was four hundred and thirty yeers after cannot disannul that it should make the promise of none effect And note by the way 1. How the covenant or Testament 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and promise are both one with the Apostle which you stumbled at elswhere 2. That there is not one word of truth in what you say to oppose your adversary but the text is directly against your self 3. Where you say the law may
faith to the everlasting Kingdom You thus swerve from the truth and the old and good way LECT XXII ROM 3.31 Do we then make void the Law Here you tell us It is hard to set up Christ and grace and not thereby to be thought to destroy the Law But it is easie with who was never suspected 2. You say Your Antinomians still are mistaken in this point and plunged into a dangerous errour You should make your words good and discover the errour if not help them out we expect this from you 3. But now like blind Sampson unto whose fact you allude you have raised a doctrine which will lead you to lay your hands on the chiefe pillars of the Antinomian edifice Mr. B. The question then at this time to be discussed is whether the Law be abrogated or no by Christ to the believers under the Gospel Answ Who would question it for Christ came not to destroy the Law but taught that every Apex or lota of it is imperishable Matth. 5.17 18. Indeed your doctrine is the Law is deprived of all power to justifie accuse or accurse but who can receive it If these be no tittle or part of the Lawd understand nothing And yet you tell us often of promises of great rewards for your legall obedience and good works cherefore there is a power to justifie command and bless established by you or else which I rather think your tenets be inconsistent and mutually overthrow each other Mr. B. If we would speak exactly and properly we cannot say in any good sense that the Morall Law is abrogated at all Answ If you would keep there denying according to the truth of the Scripture any mitigation at all either totall or partiall we might soon agree shake hands and lay down our weapons Mr. B. We may say it is mitigated Answ It is then because your Tongues are your own or that you will speak before God say so and so without your Warrant Such teaching of mitigating and Evangelizing the Law of Gods accepting the will for deed c. hath occasioned such dangerous confusion of Law and Gospel these sad controverfies in the Church much instabilitie and many mistakes in the peoples minds c. Mr. B. But you must still distinguish when we speak of the Law some parts of it from the whole Some parts of it may be abolished and yet not the whole nature of it for there are in the Law these parts 1. Commands 2. Promises of life to him that doth them 3. The threatnings of eternal death to him that faileth Now the Morall Law although it be abrogated in respect of the two later to a believer yet in respect of the former it doth still abide yea and will continue in Heaven it self as we have already proved that one part of the Law may abide when the other doth not Answ Like Foundation like Building This makes all your opposition dispute and discourse so weak and soon annihilated in that your ground is so faulty and failing 1. Why are you so inconsiderate thus to distinguish where God doth not and so audacious as to mutilate his good Law which he delivered and would have still to be preserved entire and perfect 2. All this tendeth to nothing but to make the Kingdom and way of the Law so easie and tolerable that the soul may here find a requiem where to settle her abode and never enjoy nor come to Christ and dwell under his shadow and Kingdom where Grace through his righteousness reigneth to eternall life Rom. 5.21 3. What is the reason your discourse is so loose and improper did you not even now tell us that to speak properly and exactly we cannot say in any good sense the Morall Law is abrogated and have you so soon forgotten what you said or are you regardless of any good sense or propriety of words You make three parts I would know what parts they may be called Homogeneal all of them truely law as a drop of the Ocean is as verily water as the whole Sea or Heterogeneal as Timber and Stones be parts of a House but not of the same kinde and nature in themselves and the Soul and Body be two essential parts constituting the man yet the one as flesh the other as spirit and not of one of these alone but the compositum of both is the man So here I demand when you tell us we must distinguish some parts of the Law from the whole Whether these parts be essentiall and requisite to the making or constituting of the whole Law If these three be all parts then to take away two will mutilate if not destroy the whole Law the whole consisting but of three cannot be entire and perfect having lost two And the rather I ask this because pag. 139. you say but prove not for it is not your manner your Disciples and so all other must be jurati in verba Magistri that the Law most strictly taken is meer Mandative without any promises at all Now if the meer Mandative be a Law why do you call the other two there excluded as not needfull parts of it and not rather with Dr. Tailer appendices to it 4. To distinguish between part and part may be granted and usefull but as to distinguish between soul and body between Christ and his Church or between the signe and grace in the Sacrament but to separate and sunder one part from the the other you know here its intoleable and destructive and you so distinguish that you plainly separate and cut off two parts from the third as abolished And yet the whole nature of the Law remaineth if we can believe you not abrogated to the believer you have often put your Adversarie to reconcile his tenets when there was no such cause as you see here is to agree yours The Law in regard of the threats and promises say you is abrogated a very bold assertion which never can be made good When you promise eternall life unto every good work a believer doth as pag. 40. is it not a legall and conditionall promise so as no good work no eternall life and how then can you here say that the promises of the Law be abrogated to a believer And when a believer with Noah David Lot c. doth fall into open and scandalous offences do you not threaten and terrifie him that he may be moved and stirred up if he be secure to seek for healing by faith in the blood of Christ And doth not this also convincingly argue that the reproofs and threats of the Law are of force and not abrogated Lastly if the preceptive part continue in Heaven you cannot say that justice there shall be without power for the two other also what though it doth not actually condemn any Is God without power to make another World because he maketh it not And whereas you say That you have already proved two parts to be abrogated and one still abiding you either forget
not unto themselves but unto us they did Minister the things that are now reported unto you 1 Pet. 1.12 Mr. B. There are two notorious falshoods 1. That God indeed saw sin in believers in the old Testament but not in these of the new Answ To see sin is as an Act of Gods justice in the legall Ministration under which they were in the old Testament but now as is cleared we are not under that Ministration as sometime you yeeld so that it may follow that God might see sin in those and not in these You conceive and think of God without reference to his word and would have sin the object of his eternall and incomprehensible sight in a carnall sense and imagination Can you believe that God remembreth the sinnes of his people no more as his Covenant is Heb. 8.12 And why not then be perswaded of this Mr. B. Was not that place God seeth not iniquity in Jacob spoken of the Church in the old Testament and besides If the Godly were in Christ then doth it necessarily follow by his principles That God must see no sin in them Answ The Authour took that place as I remember to be a Prophesie of a future state 2. Though they were in Christ yet not being adulti but in their time of minority under that legall government God might see and impute sin temporally unto them so there appeareth no absurdity or contradiction but that you love to have your own words Mr. B. The second difference he maketh is that God seeing did therefore punish and afflict for it but he doth not so now So Moses was stricken with death c. Now who seeth not how weak and absurd these Arguments are for doth not the Apostle 1 Cor. 11. speaking of those under the new Testament say That some were sick some did sleep were not Ananias and Sapphira struck dead immediately Answ Your words indeed are that his Arguments are weak and absurd but you make no such thing to appear As for that of 1 Cor. 11. his Answer to it still may suffice for you shew not any invalidity of it nor regard his distinctions there given Besides It will not be granted that those Corinthians nor yet Ananias and Sapphira were believers And so your reason falleth short of the point in question Mr. B. The Arguments of the Antinomians for the greater part do not onely overthrow the use of it to believers but to unbelievers also Answ Their Arguments if rightly conceived of and used do not overthrow the use of the Law to either but then you must keep it within its own proper limits and use it lawfully I grant if you understand those words The Law is a Schoolmaster to Christ historically onely for some make a mysticall and spirituall sence of them also then the meaning is that the same believing Jew who before was under the Law yet since Christ is freed from that servitude and so his state is changed that Pedagogy is no longer yea and believer or unbeliever in the daies of the Gospel we are not to meddle with that administration by Moses but onely to give care to the Gospel which is preached to all for the obedience of faith Rom. 1.2 5. but then it will necessarily follow that he that believeth is actually freed from the yoke of the Law if from the whole occonomy then from every part And he liveth by his faith onely under meer free grace Rom. 6.14 Mr. B. We will grant that to a believer the Law is as it were abrogated in these particulars 1. In respect of justification 2. Condemnation 3. Rigid obedience 4. It s no terrour nor are the godly slavishly compelled to obey 5. It doth not work nor increase sin as in the wicked 6. It is abrogated in many accessaries and circumstances Answ You say you had rather use the word Mitigation then Abrogation as being proper c. And I mislike both as they are used in reference to the Law for both Scripture and experience shew that neither word is incident nor can possibly befall the Law of God for it is inviolable If the Fire burn you not not Sea drown you it s not because they have lost that naturall power to do it but in that you happily are kept out of either such as abide under the Law find no true abrogation or mitigation And if the Law justifie not it 's not because the power of it to do it is lost or lessened for then it could not promise life to the observers saying Do. and live but in that it doth not justifie and give life actually to any that weakness is not in the Law but in man through the flesh Rom. 8.3 for the Law neither can nor ever yet had power to justifie a sinner nor one that failed the least in the observance of it And the like may be said in respect of condemnation The Law curseth and threatneth upon Sinai but cometh not on Mount Sion In Christ we are freed from the Law and so from its Condemnation so the change is in the state of a Christian but no alteration in the Law at all Your own expression cleareth it While the Law by reason of sinne doth pursue me I runne to Christ for refuge and seek to be found in him this I implyeth that the Law hath not lost any of its threatning or cursing power and that my security is not that the Law wanteth power to condemn but that I am in Christ and under his protection Phil. 3.9 As for your third respect of mitigating the rigid obedience as you call it yet I see you are forced to yeeld what D. Tailer and others did not that it cannot be maintained If we fail in the least tittle we are presently gone by the Law And as Christ hath not obtained at Gods hand that the Law should not oblige and tye us to a perfect obedience so you might as truly say he hath not procured that the Law should not justifie us being sinners for this it could not do before But I am glad to have such words from you that all our obedience is accepted not because of any mitigation in Gods justice or for dignity in the duty but onely in and through Christ 1 Pet. 2.5 the best piece of Divinity I find in your Book but then there is no mitigation of rigid obedience in the Law To the fourth To speak properly the Law is therefore no terrour because a believer is not under it for it is a terrour to all that be under it the Christian being under grace is free from terrour And if he be sometime or something afraid that is not because there is not fulness of security in his condition but through the imperfection of faith as children we fear where and when we have no true cause neither doth it argue any less terrour in the Law And you have some strange add unsound expressions in this Section for grant a regenerate and ungenerate part
yet the man is but one and his state but one not two and put the Law with its terrour and compelling power to the flesh what availeth this Can this draw the flesh to the waies of piety as your words are you imagine either that the flesh being and remaining flesh can move in the waies of piety or that the terrour of the Law can change the corrupt heart but can clear or justifie neither It is simple and free believing that leadeth and carrieth the soul into the right way and all the forcing and terrifying of the Law can provoke onely unto an externall and hypocriticall obedience such as is in the Children of the Bondwoman If the spirit in the godly be not alway so willing the Law cannot give aide and quickening to it but rather dampeth and deadeth the spirit of faith and love and doth vivifie the corruption in nature for so saith Paul when the Commandment came sin revived and I died Rom. 7.9 and againe the strength of sin is the Law 1 Cor. 15.56 It 's onely faith in the Gospel of Christ that exciteth to all goodness cheerfully and joyfully so Heb. 11. Noah Abraham Moses are said to do all by faith Sine qua multa faciendo nihil facimus impleudo Legem non implemus What caused life at first must preserve and quicken it being dead or dull 5. And your fifth Assertion is false for the Law doth as is said and proved increase sin even in the faithfull this being the bitter effect of it through the vitiousness of our nature Rom. 7.5 The motions of sin which were by the Law do work in our members to bring forth fruit to death and all along the chapter Paul saith It wrought no otherwise in him in his regenerate estate but that all the power to resist weaken and overcome sin and the flesh was from Christ the head and his spirit Therefore thankes be to God through our Lord Jesus Christ This take notice of that if infidelity be accidentally nourished and faith hindered and opposed by the Law as is most true then sin cannot decrease but doth increase by it Besides is not flesh and corruption in the regenerate of the same kinde with that in the unregenerate If the Law then be the occasion of the reviving of sin in the one why not in the other the nature of the flesh nor the operative vertue of the Law is not altered by grace though they both be overmastered and subdued In the sixth you slander your Antinomian again for disparaging the Law in that it was written in stones What good can it do say you Answ It doth good many waies else God would not have writ it there but that cannot make man good God therefore hath promised to write his Law in the Tables of the heart by his spirit whereby the Gospel also is made effectuall as he pleaseth but this inward writing of the Law is a promise and branch of the new Covenant Jer. 31.33 Mr. B. But the Law continueth to them as a rule which may appear first from the different phrases used concerning the ceremonial law nowhere applied to the moral as which Chemuitius doth reckon up 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. which are not used of the Morall but when he speaketh of it he saith We are dead unto it We are redeemed from the curse of it which Phrases do imply the change to be wade in us and not in the Law Answ Your supposition is still false for we hold no abrogation mitigation or mutation in the Law as is already cleared 2. This maketh wholly for us for if there be no change in the Law then it continueth in all other offices and regards as well as to be a rule and so hath power to promise and to condemn also Hunc suo jugulo gladio 3. You reason nihil ad Rhombum viz. If the Antinomian could bring such places that would prove it were as unlawfull to love the Lord because the morall Law commands it as we could prove it unlawfull to circumcise c. Answ The rule of comparison requireth that it should be unlawfull to circumcise because the ceremoniall Law commands it And if that Law were of force still and not repealed it were as lawfull to circumcise so that the unlawfulness to do it is not from the nature of the thing but in that the ceremoniall requiring circumcision is abrogated but so is not the moral for then to love were not required But though the morall Law command love yet your heart wanting it it giveth it no power to do it Thus you have gained here nothing to your purpose but lost both labour and credit Mr. B. 2. From the sanctification and holiness that it requireth of the believer which is nothing but conformity to the Law Answ Though the Law require yet it proveth not it to be a rule regulating disposing and framing the soul to holiness for the Law doth not sanctifie but Christ is of God made to be sanctification whereby cometh true conformity to the Law The Law requireth to be just but doth not justifie so it willeth us to be Saints but sanctifieth not There is a mutuall relation between Christ and faith as a quality or vertue faith purifieth not but as it fetcheth and deriveth vertue from Christ Purity is not in us naturally the Law requiring it doth convince us both of the want of it and of the necessity to have it but it supplieth us not with it for then Christ need not be our root of holiness nor we by faith to have it from him but driveth us to Christ in whom all fulness dwelleth You have your Answer to the rest of the Section in what precedeth Mr. B. 3. In that Disobedience to it is still a sin to a believer Answ As Disobedience is a sin against the Law so it is condemned by the Law as was Davids adultery Peters deniall c. else what need they of faith to be justified from them so still by this the Law hath power to condemn as well as to rule As for the evasion you mention I know it not you have not as yet brought us into any such strait or danger as that we need seek evasion The residue of this Lecture maketh nothing for your purpose nor at all against us LECT XXIII Rom. 3.31 Do we then make void the Law yea we establish it HEre you do not invalidate the Authors assertion nor Arguments If the Law and Prophets lasted but till John And as John was greater then any before him so the least in the kingdom of Heaven is greater then he You will then find it hard to put John either under the old or new Testament or to evince your Adversary Inter Legem Evangelium interpositus fuit Johannes qui medium obtinuit munus utrique affine Calv. It 's true the Law or Moses and the Prophets write of Christ and agreed in that and did not onely typifie him
in the ceremonies then used as you imply Mr. B. In what sense the Apostle argueth against the Law Answ Truly he argueth not against it in any true sense at all but for it to give and maintain all its rights Mr. B. The proper state of the question in those daies appeareth Act. 15. where you have a relation made of some believing Jews of the sect of the Pharisees who pressed the necessity of circumcision c. Answ See Act. 15.5 There arose up certain of the Sect of the Pharisees which believed saying That it was needfull to circumcise them and to command them to keep the Law of Moses Note that expression which believed So that the question was then Whether that circumcision and the keeping of the Law were needfull to be conjoyned with the faith of Christ in the point of salvation and ver 11. makes it more plain We believe through the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ to be saved even as did they also I confess your first words might import as much but you are not constant but shrinke much from this And tell us what opinion the Jews were generally of who thought that the observation of the morall Law without Christ was enough for their peace and comfort In your prosecution of it you sejoyne what in the proposition was rightly conjoyned Those Jews who thought as you say That the external performing of the ceremonies and a life outwardly conformable to the morall Law would secure them they did oppose Christ and perfecute his Gospel as 1 Thes 2.14 15. But the other mentioned Act. 15. did receive and preach the Gospel though not according to the simplicity that is in Christ 2 Cor. 11.3 but added and mingled other things to that of faith and so overthrew the whole Gospel and salvation also Hence it was the Apostle peremptorily said that If they were circumcised Christ profited them nothing implying that they would have Christ and circumcision too Your words are That the Apostle speaketh seemingly derogatorily to the Law because they took it without Christ But he indeed derogated not from it but acknowledged it to be good if used lawfully but they did otherwise not in taking it without Christ as you affirm but in conjoyning it with him as if he alone were not sufficient to salvation as well as to righteousness without the works of the Law Take you heed of this way and kinde of teaching Mr. B. Now where the Law seemeth to be abrogated it is taken either 1 Synecdochically put for that part which actually condemneth as Gal. 5. Against such is no Law for he speaketh as if there were nothing in the Law but condemnation Whereas we may say the Law is by way of direction and prescription for a thing as well as against it by accusation Answ If it be said the Law of our Land hath nothing against you or to accuse you of in point of homicide Is this any seeming abolition of the Law while your innocency is cleared and justified the Law suffereth no diminution by it how tryfling and childish is this your discourse 2. If the Law be for a thing in direction and against it by accusation then by Pauls doctrine still it hath lost nothing of its power Thus the constant mistake is not ours but yours who most abolish the Law indeed Mr. B. First He is without the Law that is without the understanding of it thus the Gentiles Secondly Without the sense and experience of the terrifying power of it as Paul Rom. 7. Now the godly though they be denied to be under the Law yet are not said to be without it Answ It is true the faithfull have both understanding and experience of the Law but now faith Luther It is their cheif point of wisdom to be ignorant of the Law Is not this a Paradox or Parable You say Paul Rom. 4.14 cannot mean the Law of Moses for that was long after a poor reason Doth he not in Gal. 3. deny the blessing and inheritance of Abraham to be by the Law but by promise and yet ver 11. he saith The Law was 430 yeers after When the blessing was promised to come in that way to Abraham there was no question but now since the circumcision and the Law were after added to the promise and have been of so long continuance is that question thereby occasioned In the fifth Interpretation of what it is to be under the Law your words are nothing against us but rather confirme that exposition of Rom. 6.14 which is in the Assertion of grace against D. T. But observe withall how here you oppose Law and grace in sanctifying and healing which formerly you so much contradicted You say The Law is never so much alive as in the godly who most obey it But I say It is the spirit of Christ that quickeneth them by the Gospel to love and obey the Law and their obedience floweth from this life of faith as an expression of it He that liveth by faith as Gal. 2.19 20. keepeth the Law joyfully and freely LECT XXIIII Deut. 4.13 And he declared to you his Covenant c. Mr. B. I Have already handled the Law as a rule and now come to consider it as a Covenant that so the whole Law may be fully understood Answ Your undertaken be great and your promises sat and fair but never knew I worse success nor less performance I muse that these points so weighty and so much controverted should be so sleightly handled and your Affirmative part so weakly confirmed by a man of your learning Suppose all be clear and unquestionable to your self which I cannot believe now yet others need more light then as yet you hold forth And your Adversaries see nothing to convince and satisfie them You tell us He that is so blinde that he cannot see by the light of one Sun would not see any more if there were a thousand Suns Alas do you think that he that readeth then shall find these your elaborate and judicious Lectures so clear and beyond exception that he is like unto him that hath the nooneday to walke in and is strangely blinded if any thing be rejected as erronious or questioned as obscure To give you my ingratefull opinion I neither see light of one Sun nor yet of one beam of it I fear you are too self-conceited and self-confident I say no more but Aliorum esto judicium We are now being made publique to be censured by others Now you come to consider the Law as a Covenant c. Answ Then it is not simply a rule but it may be you will help this somwhat by telling us of a more large acception of the Law yet that is not to speak precisely to the point in controversie also though your considerations be divers yet the Law is constantly the same Your doctrine that the Law was delivered in Mount Sinai in a Covenant-way or it was a Covenant God made with his people I list not
taken somtime largely and somtime strictly Answ By what is said It is apparent that repentance may be taken as it is often for the whole turning to God because after the soul apprehending its danger and seeing no hope of safety any way else yet hearing what is reported of Gods Grace in Christ to poor wretched and lost sinners It is moved drawn perswaded through the hand and mean of Faith taking hold hereon to repent and cry unto God for mercy and pardon so that sorrow and tears arising from the sight of his forlorn condition is but the pining away in their iniquities doth hasten death and to tend utter despair 2. Your second position as it may be construed shall pass now somwhat being before to like effect and the subserviency of the Law as preparatory being now granted by you 3. Your third conceit is ambiguously and confusedly set down but enough hath been said about it viz. That neither repentance nor the Faith of the Elect can be said to be wrought by the Law As for that legall Faith you mention it may be in a Reprobate and of it self it is the mother and breeder of despair If you or others will have a legal repentance meaning thereby that conviction fear or trouble wrought by the Law when it reviveth sin or at most such as is ascribed to Judas from whom by inward force and violence was squeezed out that confession I have sinned c. by a heavy hand upon his conscience as to clear the innocency of Christ so partly may be in hope by that venting to find some ease and mitigation of anguish within which yet is not that in question I shall not much contend about words so we accord in the thing but then you are to know this is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Also besides that Faith or perswasion of mercy in God according to his promise there is also another speciall Faith after the soul is come in to God which is an effectuall that the parties sins are done away God reconciled and he accepted and so this being the end of his coming his desire is satisfied and now followeth as it is called another Repentance upon this for now the love of God entreth and is shed out into the soul by the Holy Ghost which doth marvellously refresh and stablish the heart and renew and inflame it with love reciprocal unto God who hath appeared in such mercy and kindness and thus is the soul in love gained and given up to be the Lords and to serve him in holiness and righteousness without fear all the days of his life thus Luke 7. she loved much in affection and expression who had received forgiveness of many sins and this renovation and change of mind doth farre exceed your legall reformation which you so much press and stand for Mr. B. 4. Vnbeliefe is a sin against the Law as well as against the Gospel The Gospel declareth the object of justifying Faith but law condemns for not believing in him c. Answ I question whether the Law condemn for positive infidelity or for not believing in Christ Under favour I am of that mind that the Law onely condemneth for the not believing or obeying of those things which the Law propoundeth Now the Law propounds not Christ to be believed on besides your doctrine is that Christ is to be propounded to none but the broken in spirit the penitent and I know not how otherwise qualified And I see not then but the Law should condemne for not being broken and penitent first and for not believing after I confess the same God requireth Faith to whatsoever he shall speak by Law or Gospel but by the Law I can be bound onely to believe those things the Law declareth unto me Legall doctrine requireth a Legall but not an Evangelicall Faith Whatever the Law saith it saith it to them that are under the Law But you present us with much strange divinity so this is most uncouth to me and untrue That the Law should be enlightned by the Gospel and so fasten a new Command upon us how differeth this opinion from that of theirs who say Christ added to the Law which you say yet is infected with Socinian poyson page 243. LECT XXVIII Rom. 10.4 Christ is the end of the Law c. Mr. B. TAke notice of a foul errour of an Antinomian who denying assurance and comfort by signes of grace laboureth to prove that an unregenerate man may have universal obedience and sincere obedience bringing in this instance of the Jews Rom. 10.3 Your answer is that the Jews zeal was not Hypocriticall because they did not go against conscience but it was not sincere in that it was not a true gracious zeal Answ The Authour you mean would have you leave the streames and those waters which are questionable and impure and to seek to the first rise and Spring-head where the water floweth out freely purely and in an undoubted truth What foul errour is this if prejudice be not 2. He speaketh of Legall obedience such as was this their zeal in seeking to establish their own righteousness and you tell of sincerity taken for the truth of grace whereby the soul is freely subjected to the Gospel and submitteth to the righteousness thereof for so I would fain understand you which is passive and not active thus farre then you are wide Mr. B. pag. 257. I shall explain that place 2 Cor. 3.7 because it may be wrested by the Antinomian as if the law were to be abrogated Answ I wish the Scriptures were not more perverted by your self you pretending to fear others are too confident in your self you may see if ye will the men you fear are better establishers of the Law then who opposeth them How is it that still you so mistake both them and your self 2. You give an undue exposition but explain not but rather do involve the place in greater obscurity for say you Mr. B. The intent of the Apostle is to shew the excellency of the Ministery of the Gospel above that of the Law and that in three respects 1. In regard one is the Ministery of death and condemnation the other of life and righteousness therefore one called Letter the other Spirit which you must understand warily taking the Law nakedly without the Spirit of God and the Gospel with the Spirit for as Beza observeth Gospel without Gods Spirit is also the Ministration of death c. and what good is wrought by the Law it cometh from the Spirit of Christ 2. In regard of continuance The Ministery of Moses understanding it of the Jewish pedagogy was to be abolished not the Morall part which still obligeth Christians but Gospel abideth for ever 3. In regard of glory God caused some material glory to shine upon Moses c. but what cometh by the Gospel is spiritual Answ Both Beza Piscator and Augustin Collatioâ—st cb ipsa substantia
Ministerii sumpla and the express words in the text do make it more then manifest that the Apostles comparison is taken from the very substance of Moses Ministery to wit the Morall Law and not that part onely which is Ceremoniall as you would have it for verse 7. it is called that Ministery that is written and engraven in stones Whence it is easie to gather that Paul speaketh not of the Ceremoniall Impressum insculptum ex hoc locoisacile colligitur Paulum non agere de Ceremoniis sed de ipse Decalego B. but Morall part for it was the Decalogue that was so written and delivered in Tables of Stone 2 Your words imply that there is no difference in truth and strict sence between Law and Gospel so that the Spirit be taken with them both which directly contradicteth the Apostle who calleth one the Ministery of death and condemnation and the other of life and righteousness for the Spirit working by the Law doth kill and condemn and therefore is also called a Spirit of boudage Rom. 8.15 but the Spirit by the Gospel quickneth and giveth life being a Spirit of Adoption and liberty The Spirit is one and the same but the Ministrations be different and so are the effects produced by either You say the difference is because Christ the Author of the Gospel is the fountain of Life But is not Christ the Author of the Law also He is called the law-giver And though Christ be the Author of Life yet you cannot shew wheâ—e the Law is called the Ministery of Life as if Christ did use it to convey and give Life Also to say that the Spirit quickeneth by the Law is to enforce a sense flatly against the Apostle Moreover your expressions do make the place more obscure dark in telling us that the Gospel also without Gods Spirit is the Ministration of death because it is as impossible to believe as to obey the Law Whereas Paul therefore calleth the Gospel the Ministration of righteousness and life in that the Spirit thereby begetteth faith in the hearts of the Elect whereby they come to righteousness and life So Piscator The Law then having the Spirit working by it killeth as we see in Paul Rom. 7. But the Gospel maketh alive justifying all the Elect of God 2. You fail much in your second respect also for 1. as is proved and cleared that the opposition is chiefly between the Morall Law and the Gospel 2 However in a proper and true sense the Law is done away in the kingdom of Christ yet where infidelity is the Law remaineth but where the word of righteousness and life is there can the Ministery of sin and death have no place even no more then the darkness of midnight hath at noon-day but spirituall things are spiritually discerned 3. Paul intends that glory to be of the Law whereas you interpret it to be that accidentall glory which did shine upon Moses A word of these things shall suffice LECT XXIX Matth. 5.17 Whosoever shall break one of these least c. SEe and consider the words of the Prophet Psal 7.14 15 16. This Lecture above all yet sheweth much gall to be in your ink Now your task is neer an end The residue is but to make a grave or ditch for your Antinomian and to describe and delineate the man that all mistake being prevented he may forthwith be sentenced and sent to his appointed place but stay Where or who is he You are in a golden dream Mr. B. When there shall be a reformation and truth break forth c. then those corrupt Teachers who would poyson men should be discovered and be of least that is of no account Answ Seeing this will be when the truth breaketh forth Now Lord send forth thy light and thy truth that all false teachers and doctrines of lies and vanities may be put to shame and confusion And if your dream be true look to your self You fear not perhaps presuming upon your own supposed innocency externall sanctity the present state of our times the reputation you are in the authority and multitude of your combined fraternity c. as being now set upon a mountaine that will never be moved But the Church the Truth and quarrell is Gods He is strong that is Judge to put down the mighty from their seats to scatter the imaginations of the proud and to returne all the intended evill upon the head of the authors and devisers In him the fatherless find mercy he preserveth the simple and meek that trust in him Read Isa 66.5 Hear the word of the Lord ye that tremble at his word Your Brethren that have cast you out for my Names sake said Let the Lord be glorified but he shall appear to your joy and they shall be ashamed and Joh. 16.2.3 Some look for no better from your hands if left unto your will and have already sound the like dealing for the Scripture must be verified Mr. B. They overthrow the law when they hold such principles that will necessarily by way of consequence inferre the abrogation of the Law And thus though some Antinomians do expresly and boldly assert the abolishing of it at least to believers Yet others c. disclaiming it held such assertions as necessarily inferre the abrogation of it Answ You cannot prove and make it appear that any do assert the abolishing of it so it may be taken for a slander and false accusation 2. In way of correction as having overshot your self and would eat some of your Words You say At least to believers Now first What need believers a Law so farre as believers they live by Faith and walke by Faith yea and warre by Faith 2. The Law affordeth nothing to nourish or supply any defect in the Christians Faith 3. Yet you nor none can directly and duely inferre hence that they do abrogate the Law so much now to vindicate them But to returne your words upon your self I think that you do hold such principles that necessarily by way of consequence at least do abrogate the Law yea and make void repentance in great part after Faith is come and bring in carnal security and a false peace into the soul for one principle of yours is That direction and obligation to obedience be the sole essential constitutes of the law So that that which condemneth justifies promiseth and threatneth is not properly the Law but it hath been not onely asserted but proved already that these are as assential to a Law as the former Again What will you call that which doth condemn and promise favour and peace to the good if it be not Law I am sure it is no Gospel have you a third name for it 2. Whence have these power to condemn c. if no Law be in them The Scripture faith The Law doth curse reveal wrath c. I argue thus Whosoever denieth the Law a power to condemn and justifie he destroyeth the Law But Mr. Burg.
denieth this to the Law Therefore Mr. B. destroyeth and abrogateth the Law and so is the true Antinomian and least in the kingdom of God This is so plain that I leave it to your consideration with what hath been said formerly In the next place you say The Law hath power over a believer to direct command and oblige to duty but not to condemn Now I reply Suppose a believer hath no will nor disposition to obey in some things or at somtimes hath the Law no further power to threaten and condemn then the Law will soon become an Aesops block vilified and brought into contempt Also grant a believer having the spirit is freely disposed and willing to obey yet his obedience will be but partial and defective and if then the Law have no power to accuse and threaten in that way of new obedience he may trust henceforth in his own works have his peace in that way of duty and not by his Faith in Christ and thus grow self-consident and secure but Paul who consented to the Law delighted in it c. yet in that he attained not to that perfect righteousness of it cryed out Oh wretched man that I am Rom 7.24 And if the curse be now gone to a believer from the Law what further use or need hath he of his justification and of the preserving and maintaining his continual peace onely thereby Lastly Confession of sin self-humiliation self-judging and condemning the accounting of our own righteousness as dung the fear of it and the constant desire to be still found in Christ not having our own righteousness c. these will have no more place in us What need Noah to keep in the Ark if there be no drowning waters without what need Christ a refuge or protection where no power of the Law is to pursue nor no danger to be feared These and many such like be the consequences and fruit of your doctrine or assertions And note that either to curse c. is not so much as an Iota or tittle of the Law a hard thing to affirm much more to prove or you offer too much violence to the good and inviolable law of God in daring to part and seperate these from the Law every whit of it being imperishable and incur that danger your self as Mal. 5.17 18. Yet you have such an evil eye and spite against us that you say pag. 269. Mr. B. The Antinomians do more fall against this text then any who teach the disobligation not onely of the least Command but of the whole Law Answ The contrary is apparently true let the judicious Christian Reader looking through all our discourse hitherto judge how untrue and unreasonable your charge is The law bindeth continually to duty and to the curse for the least failing And faith uncessantly acquitteth and looseth setteth free the soul like those two keys which Christ left to his Church to continue with it untill the end In the law I am bound in faith set free M. B. It argueth impudency of those who would make Luther on their side because of his 6. disputations against the Antinomians Answ But if his disputations be against the Antinomians then they may be against your self and in no wise against us we establish and maintain the law in the utmost extension 2. You shew nothing asserted by any you quarrel withall which in effect may not be found in Luther so that he is for them 3. Yet it is not his opinion but the truth we contend for And whos 's those scattered Propositions were that you have so collected I know not but with a good construction divers of them may be received and justified And are held affirmatively by such as are not suspected guilty of Antinomianisme You spare not still to take and scrape together what you can to make us odious that we may be utterly cashiered saying Luther calleth those Hostes legis organa Satanae quid furores Antinomorum their doctrine is more to be taken heed of then Papists And also present the world afresh with those unfavoury and false records of D.T. M.B. which two have writ more then you lift to defend Psal 52.2 or they could justifie yet you love to have a hand in their sin and had rather side with them whose Tenents are so erroneous and unsound then give a favourable construction to one more Orthodox then your self But I see great mercy from the Lord shining through this thick and dark cloud of your malice You are witnesses to your selves saith Christ That ye are the children of them who killed the Prophets Fill ye up then the measure of your Fathers Mat. 23.31 33. M. B. In their Books every Error is more warily dressed then in secret Answ And still no Error can come to light 2. The Proverb is true You muse as you use I think your ordinary or Pulpit-divinity is more grosse or not so pure as we finde you here and yet upon you review this may be reproveable If your you can see in secret you may judge what is done in secret as God doth else De secret is now judicat Ecelesia M. B. It cannot be denied but in some parts of their books be some good passages as in a wood full of brambles be some violets and primroses Answ What wise man so clear sighted as your self would not gather the fragrant and useful flowers and forbear rather wholly to meddle with the bushes then so to trouble pricke and endanger himself as you have here done M. B. The Author of the Assert of grace disclaims the opinion against the law yet there affirmes such principles from whence this conclusion will necessarily follow Answ It is but your conceit of such a conclusion to make it indeed you must be forced to add of your owne unto the premises but proceed to justifie your Accusation M. B. For first he makes no real difference either in Scripture or use of words between the law reigning and ruling so that if the Law rule a man it ruleth over him now then they deny the law to reign over a believer therefore they must needs hold it cannot be a rule Answ If your Adversary say there is no real difference between reigning and ruling It is your part who oppose him to make the difference appear by Scripture or some way else but this you do in no place so often as you repeat it which maketh me thinke verily you cannot And you are not of that credit with me that your bare word can carry it Yet since you thus slightly pass over that which you make the main ground of your oppsition and this failing all you say falleth to nothing I yet shall add a little to occasion and provoke more diligence and better inquisition hereafter 1. I argue thus To grant or leave unto God onely a power to rule in his law and to deny him the reigning power is to make God in his law like an inferiour Magistrate who
curse and condemn yet it hath power to rule command and direct 4. The Law with the preface and promise added to it was given as a Covenant of Grace 5. The Law is taken most strictly for that is meer mandatory without any promise at all 6. God doth use his Law as he doth his whole word to beget and to increase the life of Grace 7. While a Minister is preaching any commandment he doth thereby mould and new-frame the heart 8. I suppose that Christ hath obtained of God by his death that such efficacy and vertue should go forth in the Ministery that whether it be Law or Gospel the souls of men may be healed and converted thereupon 9. I cannot yeild to that that the Law worketh only preparatorily 10. There was never in the Church of God meer pure Law or meer pure Gospel 11. Onely two things go to the essence of a Law 1. Direction 2. Obligation 12. In the Moral Law is required justifying Faith Repentance and our Sacraments be commanded in the second Commandment 13. The Moral Law containeth more then the Law of Nature 14. Good works are necessary to Salvation in regard of the presence of them 15. Our holy duties have a promise of pardon and eternal life not because of their worth but yet of their presence 16. To every godly action thou dost there is a promise of eternal life 17. Goods works be conditions without which a man cannot be saved 18. Good works are in their owne nature a defence against sin and corruption 19. Our good works be a motive moving God as a King that preferreth one that saluteth him 20. The State of reparation cannot be absolutely said to be better then that in innocency 21. We are not by Christ more righteous then Adam was or imputed righteousness though infinite in Christ is only imputed to us for that we lost and ought to have and we need no more 22. The Gospel makes known Christ and then the Law thus as it were illightned by the Gospel doth fasten a command upon us to believe in Christ Mr. Rutherf 23. Gods decree of grace in the execution of it may be broken in a linke by some great sin but Christ cannot but soder the chain and raise the fallen sinner 24. The Law hath power to convert by the Spirit 25. Sinners remaining in that damnable state are not to believe but as thus qualified that is humbled wearied self-condemned onely 26. Yet though thou were upon the borders of hell the Gospel excepts thee not from the duty of believing and coming to Christ They that sin against the holy Ghost are condemned for unbelief 27. Saving humiliation is conjoyned with Christ Dr. Tayeler A man may get from under his dangerous state by the attaining and exercise of three saving Graces Faith Repentance and inchoate obedience Repentance wipes off old scores repealeth all the actions of the Law getteth all sins cast into the bottom of the Sea Inchoate obedience hath promise of acceptance and is accounted as full and compleat obedience to the Law The way to escape the yoke and coaction of the Law is to become a cheerful and free observer of it That these are not of the substance of the Law but circumstances appendce and consequences viz. 1. That the Law yoaketh every man to a personal performance of it 2. To exact personal and perfect obedience upon pain of eternal death 3. To urge and force it self upon the conscience with fear and terror 4. That no life or salvation must be expected by the Law but by keeping it wholly and exactly 5. That the Law arraignes and condemnes the sinner and is the Ministery of death Without the law no man can know what God is nor his worship nor how to perform duties Good works be conditions of blessedness Mr. Bedford Christ hath freed us provided that men by faith lay hold on Christ keep close to him and walk according to those rules of holiness that he hath prescribed for in so doing we obtain what the Law promised life and salvation Believers are not under that condition of full and perfect obedience but under a condition of sincerity of obedience The Law as circumstantial viz. as it is a covenant of life and death is abolishod Mr. Bl. in serm Christ came to save none but holy ones Setting up of Familiy-duties like the sprinkling of the blood of the Paschal lamb will keep out the destroying Angel Mr. All. sem As Christ was glorified because he first glorified his Father so we must first glorifie God by our obedience and serve him if we will be saved There is a general equity that if God save any he save them that serve him To be glorified of God is to be received into communion have acceptance peace of conscience joy in the holy Ghost Adoption and the inheritance these we shall have by honouring and serving of God here so that by honouring God we do good to our selves Mr. No. The law is the word of Grace that bringeth salvation Grace cometh by the Law as well as by Gospel And so expounded those Texts Tit. 2.11 2 Cor. 6.1 Act 20.32 Mr. H. God made man for happiness and the Law must be his rule and guide unto it The Covenant of Grace is not absolute and free but upon condition of our good works or works are considerations or Causa sine qua non as when a great treasure is promised for going a hundred miles The Covenant of works requireth perfect obedience and the condition of the covenant of Grace is at least a purpose and endeavour to keep the Commandments The Lord give us a good understanding in all things and make us rightly to discern between things that differ To God belongeth glory for ever Amen FINIS Monomachia OR A Single REPLY To Mr. RUTHERFORD'S Book CALLED Christ's dying and drawing of Sinners Vindicating and clearing onely such Positions and Passages in The Assertion of Grace as are palpably mistaken and perverted and so mis-called ANTINOMIAN Wherein also it appeareth that the Adversaries dealing is neither just nor candid By Robert Towne Luke 6.22 23. Blessed are ye when men hate you and when they separate you and revile you and cast out your name as evil for the Son of man's sake Rejoyce ye in that day c. for after this manner their fathers did to the Prophets Joh. 9 39. And Jesus said For judgement I am come into this world that they which see not might see and they which see might be made blinde James 3.14 15. If ye have bitter envying and strife in your hearts glory not and lye not against the Truth This wisdom descendeth not from above c. Qui aliorum verba calumniantur illi arte alium fingunt ac formant sermonem quà m ab co quem calumniantur est dictus Moll Jac. 3.14 Aemulationem dixit amaram quia non regnat nisi dum veneno malignitatis infecti sunt ut omnia in amarulentiam
distinguished as Mark 1.15 Repent and believe the Gospel 2. I do not make repentance and to mortifie sin all one as I there speak of repentance 3. Neither say I that to repent and to mortifie sinne is by faith to flye to grace embrace Christ c. The Law is against you as a false witness in all these And you cannot but perceive that I speak of that legal repentance and mortification which you with others so much stand for as requisite before faith Which is when a man is so laid open to himself so effectually convinced and wrought upon by the Law that he seeth acknowledgeth and renounceth all things in him and done by him as sinne and abomination before the Lord whatever esteem he hath had of them formerly or whatever shew they may make Yea and as sinne the sting of death appears and reviveth in all which is the very mortification the wounding and killing of the soul Rom. 7.10 so all these seeming excellencies and good things become mortified within him and his heart that lived and rejoyced in them now dyeth unto them finding nothing but vanity sin and death in all things out of Christ Thus he repenteth and changeth his mind with shame and sorrow that ever he so exalted and established his own righteousness of works as did Paul and those zealous Jews being converted to the faith And because we are necessitated to carry this body of death to the grave and therefore sin and death will ever and unavoidably be in us and all our works and we can by faith in Christ alone finde true righteousness life peace confidence joy and salvation hence Christ is our onely treasure who hath our hearts delight and all else are renounced and accounted as dung and dross Phil. 3.9 You neither may nor can rightly understand my words as spoken of that Evangelical repentance or mortifying of sin in life and conversation by the Spirit of which we read Rom. 8.13 Colos 3.5 Also you know that both in the Scriptures and Authors repentance is somtimes taken largely as comprehending faith also with the effects and fruits of it and so it is divided into mortification and vivification But fince all fulness is in Christ who is made unto us wisdom righteousness sanctification and redemption that all our rejoycing should be in him he that liveth by faith in him is the onely mortified man Psal 73.25 Whom have I in heaven but thee and there is none upon earth desired besides him Mr. Rutherf pag. 273. There be two things in the Law 1. The authority and power to command 2. To punish pag. 275. It s most false that Mr. T. saith To justifie and condemn are as proper and essential to the Law as to command 3. It s false that we are freed from active obedience to the moral Law because Christ came under the active obedience for law requires obedience out of love Reply These two authorities of the Law are repeated and inculcated by you and Mr. Burg. usque ad nanseam Dictator-like you still say It 's false it 's most false c. but where is there any truth or weight in what you say against me I can contemn your vain and reproachfull words and do account your self-coined distinctions as windy without warrant and weight You have a satisfactory answer in my former Reply I may challenge you to produce one syllable for a Law commanding without its condemning power Remember Matth. 5.17 18. 2. That the Law requires obedience out of love its true but we worke from self-love and for self-ends viz. that we may live thereby and not dye The first Adam by his obedience might have preserved himself in that life and state of holiness and happiness he had by creation but now in Christ our life and and felicity is attained and kept by faith we believe that we may live And we love and obey freely for no such ends as not standing and falling by our obedience or disobedience moral Also if our love be changed from legal into evangelical void of selfness Yet that altereth not the cords of the law nor the chaines we were in but Christ hath happily freed us from them The change is in the true Christian and in his estate but you can shew no change in the Law Neither do we destroy the Law as you slander us again but do establish it by faith Rom. 3.31 Where I see that Paul preached the same way that we do in that he was so put to clear and vindicate his Ministery as you do us This also will serve for that exception in pag. 275. where you set the same Coleworts before your Reader It is your constant doctrine that works have reward here and eternall life hereafter and that they be conditions and the way to life and glory how this will consist with faith and Christ let all judge Mr. Rutherf pag. 332. Town in Assertion pag. 56 58. A believer is as well saved already as justified by Christ and in him Divines say Our life and salvation is inchoate but they speak of life as it is in us subjectâ—è Quantum ad nos spectat or in respect of our sense and apprehension here in grace our faith knowledge sanctification is imperfect but in regard of imputation and douation our righteousness is perfect and he that believeth hath life not he shall have it or hath it in hope onely Answ If we have glory really actually perfectly but want it onely in sense we have the resurrection from the dead also actually we want nothing of the reality of heavrn but sense but we are not yet before the throne Therefore holy walking can be no way nor condition nor means of salvation c. therefore no wonder they reject all sanctification as not necessary and teach men to loose the reynes to all fleshly walking Reply Justification puts the soul into a present state of salvation The Scriptures are plain He hath saved us 2 Tim. 1.9 Tit. 3.5 Eph. 2.8 and These things have I written unto you that believe c. that ye may know that ye have eternal life 1 Joh. 5.13 This is the record that God hath given to us eternal life and this life is in his Son ver 11. and Ephes 2.5 God hath quickned us together with Christ and hath raised us up together and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus I muse you stumble in so clear light Hence saith Musculus Before God we are all that which he willed and also hath caused us to be Christ is not alone in his eyes but we also are conjoyned to him The Assertion doth present you with testimonyes sufficient you believe so farre as you see and feel If you deny our perfection in Christ our head In whom we are compleat Col. 2.10 deny also our union with him that we have received him have him are now the Sons of God 1 Joh. 3.2 Yea then deny that God hath given us as yet
Christ and life in and with him but all is still kept in suspence and reserved till future So where the Spirit of truth saith God hath given unto us Christ and eternal life in him your Ghost saith nay but he will his promise is de futuro give us them upon condition of our good works and by them as a way we must come to Christ and salvation God hath conveyed and given nothing by promise There is no Christ nor life in reality and substance communicated by the word and Sacrament these are empty shels The just liveth by faith what feedeth he on to nourish and encrease life what on the Wind well you teach that we must live in hope to have all in the end upon condition of our obedience and service And for this reason you call upon men to work and please God But the truth saith Christ hath received all for us and we enjoy all in him You say that because we hold works are no conditions of salvation therefore we loose mens reines to carnal walking It s a Popish cavil or slander And argueth a spirit in the Author too servile and mercenary which will do no good but for lucre and to gain by it and such a spirit must needs accompany your doctrine Mr. Rutherf pag. 463. Mr. T. saith In sanctification as well as in justification we are meer patients and can do nothing at all and pag. 464. The blessedness of man is onely passive not active in his holy walking Reply As this is objected in your other book so you have your answer to it But my words are in Assert pag. 68. What can you do to the sanctifying or changing of your self more then in your justification It s Gods act to sanctifie throughout you cannot make one hair white or black Who would think that Mr. Rutherf would quarrel with this You alter my words to make them capable of your gloss and sense But all men may see that I speak of the act of sanctification and not of the expression and fruits of it If you can sanctifie your self in whole or part glory in your freewil and power but that is the greatest arrogancy of Antichrist saith one So I leave you with your absurdity unto the worlds censure you shew neither text or reason against me 2. And that blessedness is passive not active in holy walking you must grant or when you say any thing against it deserving or requiring it you may then expect your answer Blessedness in holy walking is declarative shewing how God hath renewed and enlarged the heart but that phrase is yours not mine Mr. Rutherf Town the Antinomian said Pag. 501. David confessed his sins not according to truth and the confession of faith but from want and weakness of faith c. Reply My words are David prayed that his sins might be pardoned which you grant were pardoned Now then did he thus pray according to truth and the confession of faith or from want or weakness of faith and of the effectual apprehension of forgiveness Is not Mr. Rutherford now the Antinomian who against Law so palpably mistakes his Adversary There is great difference between confessing of sinne and praying for pardon If God my own conscience men yea Satan require that I confess my self a sinner I shall readily do it for this is to justifie God in his Law saying There is none righteous c. And this may well stand with my faith and effectual apprehension of pardon for I confess what I am in my self I believe what I am in Christ through that grace that justifieth the ungodly Thus while your mistakes onely make me erroneous whom otherwise you find not so who is now the Antinomian Is not the Author of the errour so all will returne to your own discredit and disadvantage And what a gross slander is that which followeth viz. Town and all Antinomians teach that it is unbeliefe a worke of the flesh of old Adam c. that justified persons confess or feel sin sorrow or complain of the body of sin as Paul Rom. 7 This is as if the continual dwelling of sinne in us did not trouble us or could not consist with faith in justification by Christ or that now the spiritual estate of the soul being clear and safe made up in Christ sin in no other regard were sorrow or trouble to us But you cannot in this neither make good your charge You care little how falsly you accuse us so that you make your Bill foul and black enough to make us still more odious and vile M. Rutherf pag. 505. M. T. contendeth for a compleat perfection not onely of persons justified but also of performances so that saith he pag. 75. I believe there is no sin malediction or death in the Church of God he will have a perfection not of parts but also of degrees this he proves from Luthers words perverted Reply What perfection I contend for you must yeeld me or else with your heart you believe not that there is a holy Church which is indeed as Luther saith nothing else but I believe that there is no sin no malediction no death in the Church of God but this is in Christ not in our selves by justification not by inherent sanctification for this is imperfect You say I pervert Luther take his words again So mightily saith he worketh faith that he that believeth that Christ hath taken away sin from him he like Christ is void of sin Again Christ will have us to believe that like as in his own person there is now no sin nor death even so there is none in ours there is no defect in the thing it self but in our incredulity Let us see what construction or sense you can make of these words But you pervert my words or meaning as if I meant it that sin dwelleth not still in us a fiction But Luther addeth as you read in the Assertion That to reason its a hard matter to believe these inestimable good things and unspeakable riches Moreover Satan with his fiery darts and his Ministers with their wicked and false doctrine go about to wrest it from us and utterly to deface this doctrine and specially for this Article we sustaine the cruel hatred and persecution of Satan and the world for Satan feeleth the power and fruit of this Article Consider what you Read M. Rutherf pag. 510. When D. Tailer objects as a limb of their fleshly divinity No action of a believer after justification is sin M. T. Answers Nothing but of the way no action is sin the disorder or ataxie of the action is sin But D. T. meaneth that there is no disorder in the action of a justified man by their way c. can this be any but the divinity of the flesh Reply If the Dr. say it you will swear it But my answer is direct to his words yet sith you now help me to know his meaning I say there is disorder in
A RE-ASSERTION OF GRACE OR VINDICIAE EVANGELII A Vindication of the Gospell-truths from the unjust censure and undue aspersions of Antinomians In a modest Reply to Mr. Anth Burgesses Vindiciae Legis Mr. Rutherfords Triall and Tryumph of Faith from which also Mr. Geerie and M. Bedford may receive a satisfactory answer By ROBERT TOVVNE AMBR Quia Conscientiae suae luce clarescunt alienis rumoribus sordidentur JOHN 16.2 They will put you out of their Synagogues yea the time cometh that whosoever killeth you will thinke that he doth God service JOHN 4.4 Ye are of God little children and have overcome them because greater is he that is in you than he that is in the world LONDON Printed for the Author and are to be sold at the Angell in Cornhill 1654. The PREFACE THe written Papers of this Booke originally under the Authors owne hand did accidentally fall under my view by meanes of a faithfull friend and brother who first gave me intelligence that there was such a work in hand but not as yet perfected afterward obtaining a sight of it in its primary engrossings he borrowed the same for a time in which he might peruse and reade them over and so in the interim before they were returned to the owner they came to me the which when I had considered I found therein a composure of very excellent matter the Doctrine of the Law of God truly published in its lightening lustre and native purity drawne forth from under the vailing glosses with which it lay covered the meere Inventions of Sathan transformed into an Angell of light and restored to its former integritie and proper use Psal 12. as Silver tryed in a furnace of earth purified seaven times So that Sinah's Thunderclapps or the bolts of Horeb doe here appeare Shot out the cloudes and Pharisaicall expositions darkening the counsell of God by words without knowledge being dissolved and broken thorow Job 38. And moreover that the fainting sinner might not utterly be excluded I found comprized therein the bringing to light of life and immortality through the Gospell the opening of the kingdome of heaven the doores being largely expanded in Christs owne way 2 Tim. 1. and method of preaching which reason and the seede of the Serpent sowen therein the enemie to the simple truth of God hath endeavoured by all subtile workings and secret insinuations either wholly to shut or else to open and but to the halfe by the key of such qualifications that there is no possibility for any heart sensibly discovered by the doore so opened to enter in Onely the hypocrite who lives in a fooles paradise fraighted with a vaine imagination of his owne conditionall goodnesse doth conceitedly seeme to himselfe to enter into the kingdome of heaven Josh 6. by that way which Sathan hath prepared and cast up but the issues thereof are the issues of death leading to Jericho the accursed City so that this he shall have in the end He shall lye down in sorrow Isa 50. John 9. and because he thinks that he seeth therefore his sin remaineth For the end cannot be enjoyed but only in God own way appointed by himselfe which way thou shalt finde most clearely held out John 14. and convincingly proved in these ensuing treatises to be Christ himself by whom the believing heart hath accesse to God and comes with boldnesse to the throne of grace no man comming to the Father but by him John 10. And also that he is the doore ready to entertaine and receive into peaceable habitations and sure dwellings all such as are wounded with the invenomed arrowes of their hidden abhominations and stand trembling under the hand of God fearefull of his fiery wrath and justly deserved indignation which none may abide nor otherwise can avoid John 3. And that he is the truth of the brazen Serpent which is lifted up upon the pole in the wildernesse not for the whole but for the mortally wounded to look unto And the water of life to coole and refresh the withered heart Psal 23. parched with the heat of sin at the which as still waters the weake sheepe may drinke which otherwise were not able to stand in or withstand the boysterous streames and hold its footing in the clashing waves so that out of his belly flows the Rivers of Living Water John 10. And the good Shepheard who fully manageth that relation for the good of his tender ones he feeds his Flock Isa 40. like a Shepheard he gathers the Lambes with his arme John 15. and carries them in his Bosome and gently leads those that are with young The Vine in which the Branches live and in whom his people enjoy their life by faith Gal. 2. being dead in themselves through the Law John 1. Colos 1. Isaiah 6.1 Rev. 1. Eph. 5. Eph. 1. Acts 15. Rom. 8. so that what they have or enjoy doth proceed and issue from that Root so full of moysture of which fulnesse they receive and grace for grace They live but it is in him who is their life They are righteous and that compleatly but it s through his Robes They are cleansed and washed but it is by his Bloud They are accepted but it is in the Beloved They are adopted but it is in the first begotten among many Brethren Their Hearts are purified but it is by the faith of the Son of God They are free from Condemnation but it is because they are in Christ Jesus for to such there is no condemnation Nay reckon up all their participations and we shall finde that they are in and proceed from him who is the head Coloss 1. that in all things he might have the preheminence So that What have they but they have received it And a believing man may say most truely In Christ I have and am all things but out of him I am meerly nothing nay less than nothing and vanity And why should this Doctrine be so impugned but that the strong man armed and keeping his house will not be quiet for feare he should be dispossessed but by all means possible both as Fox and Lyon bestirres himself that he may keep and retain his ancient hold when as it ought rather to be highly extolled and magnified in Heart Press and Pulpit Mic. 4. seeing it lifts up and establisheth the mountaine of the house of the Lord in the top of the mountaines and exalts it above the hills and doth but fulfill that saying of Isaiah where the Prophet speakes in the person of God himselfe Isa 52. Behold my Servant meaning Christ shall deale prudently he shall be exalted extolled and shall be very high though many should be astonished at him because his visage not appearing comely to the eye of fl sh and blood was so marred more than any man and his forme more than the Sons of men But what God in Himselfe or his Word hath most highly exalted that Sathan alwayes an enemy to the truth of God and the seed of the
stay out my Quarter yet I did and then a Writ was procured from the Colonels to apprehend and imprison me My offer was To let me have justice and I would justifie what I taught and held and let them see their errours an easie thing to do but they refused Then I went to London with intention to Petition the Parliament but friends who had better intelligence and experience disswaded and deterred me So finding little hope of relief I returned and removed my family into Yorkshire so giving place to their fiery zeal Gentle Reader I have presumed on thy patience in setting down these passages by which it is clear that they seek themselves and not Christ and his Truth and chuse rather to use Club-law as did Cain the false Prophets Pharisees and Hypocrites in all times of persecution to extinguish or suppress the light of heaven then that it should discover their nakedness and shame If thou ask Why are they bent and enraged more against you Antinomians then any other Sect Answ They can tell thee great things and would have thee believe we are unworthy to live in any Commonwealth But the truth is and many of them cannot be ignorant of it we teach onely what is Orthodox and the old-received truths of God And do desire no more favour then what Justice can deny to none viz. leave to speak for our selves before we be condemned Onely they see the inconsistencie of divers of our Tenets with theirs and Dagon or the Ark must fall And how questionable and unjustifiable their assertions are to any indifferent capacity viewing and considering them in the true light and therefore would put out our Candie It would make a Christian face to blush or his heart rather to bleed to hear what stuff they can put off and vent in their Sermons I resorted to their Exercises divers yeers yet never heard one doctrine of Free-grace of Christ Faith or Justification Legal Reformation is taken for Regeneration and Evangelical Sanctification I have spoken with old and zealous prosessors who knew not what it was to be justified by faith except this was the meaning of it That God would accept of them for their good works and duties If any one which yet Nature is principled for be framed and brought somwhat into a Legal way to performances he is judged a true Convert and may set up his rest If they do well they tell you they can believe sufficiently upon their kinde of works they build their faith The Law is not preached as the ministry of death to cast down and to kill that Christ may be the life and spiritual resurrection but the life that most speak of is to live and walk in the Law yet Paul saith I by the Law am dead to the Law that I may live to God Gal. 2.19 I am resolved of this that if people had experience of a sensible death working in them by the Law and that nothing but the curse and wrath could be had in their works and ways and had felt as sensibly a reviving and quickning in the faith and apprehension of Christ there would be little ground of difference remaining but till that be or at least that the Law be preached for death and not for life and peace as too many do how can the controversie be ended But flesh and blood may object What good success can I promise to this my enterprise I go against the full tyde and violent current of humane policie and learning of such a religious multitude all being combined and conspiring against me Are not my adversaries in number infinite rarely qualified admired for sanctity and zeal backed and invested with worldly Authority countenanced by the times and the sole-esteemed pillars of the Church What am I how dare I oppose them Who is my Patron My answer is 1. I do not come forth in mine own name or strength nor measure my self with them for then hope of prevailing is gone But when God is set against them and his invincible Verity so opposed by them how vain and light then are all these powers and excellencies 2. I have been carried against the stream almost these twenty yeers yet they could not prevail by reason of the Lords strength and presence 3. However the voyage fall out I have not much left to lose onely my outward liberty in part and a few days it may be of my natural life can be in jeopardy And hath the sacred Truth of God and the desired good of his Church been so prevalent that for their sakes I have sustained such loss suffered so many things already and shall I now shrink or be unwilling to sacrifice the loan of what is remaining The Lord leave me not to that temptation 4. In all their opposition I see nothing to convince but am rather thereby confirmed They would see a mote in Dr. Crisp's eye but will not see a beam in their own If to my self I were guilty of any their unworthy imputations or of doing or yet offering a hundredth part of that wrong I received from them or if my conscience did not witness with me that I had sought to give unto them all possible satisfaction more then was desired or would be accepted of then I should not have that inward peace and contentment which now I enjoy And 5. lastly why should I desire a Patron and so become injurious to any in engaging them or rendering them to be suspected I know the Truth is able to protect it self and the servant of it and further then I am found in the way of Verity I seek no shelter The Name of the Lord is a strong tower the righteous runneth into it and is safe Prov. 18.10 Thou Lord hast seen it for thou beholdest mischief and spite to requite it with thy hand The poor committeth himself unto thee thou art the helper of the fatherless Psal 10.14 R. Towne Vindiciae Evangelii OR The Vindication of the Gospel from the unjust Censure and all Aspertions of A 〈◊〉 ntinomy Or A Reply to Mr ANTH BURGESSE'S Vindiciae Legis c. SIR YOur other Advantages are many but God and his Truth are with us therefore we may be confident in our just Cause and Quarrel and the Victory is certainly ours Your whole Colledg and Assembly approve of and commend your Book that is I confess cause of sadness and grief to my spirits but not one jot of terror Truth is of more weight and authority with me then the Consent and Judgment of all the Learning and Principalities in the world and as Luther writ to K. H. 8. I prefer one Paul before a thousand Thom. Scotus c. You anticipate our expectation of your future Reply in your Preface to the Reader I hope you will not for I perceive by this that the light of Truth hath almost overcome you a little more glory of it may happily both convince and convert also But your Ground or Reason of not Replying
So in the Closure of your said Preface is a too over-weening conceit and high esteem of this your elaborate and profound Treatise which is become as a Sun newly risen in our Church the which if it let us not see what is Truth what is Error a thousand Suns cannot It had been well if you had brought one of the least beams of the true Sun In Iob we read of one who darkned knowledg and I am sure the true Sun of Righteousness doth not shine forth to the world any more clearly by these Lectures To say no more I could reduce all your Exceptions and the Points in controversie to a few Heads which I find dispread and infinitely repeated but then perhaps you would think your self somewhat wronged or else the Reader would not be so fully satisfied Therefore as you do so I am enforced to set before him the same dish of sodden Colworts usque ad nauseam and yet leasure will not serve it would prove also too tedious to speak to all your Book My intent then is only to examine what you writ against your special eye-sore the Antinomian how candidly you deal with him and how solidly you confute his Positions or Tenets LECTURE I. Mr. B. Text 1 Tim. 1.8 9. Knowing the Law is good if a man use it lawfully Answer In Page 3 and 4. you say the Law is good in three several Respects in the prosecution of all which I could except against divers things but that I shall have often occasion and a more proper place to speak them all afterwards Mr. B. pag. 4. It the Law is good in respect of the Sanction of it for it 's accompanied with Promises c. and therefore the Law doth include Christ secondarily and occasionally though not primarily Ans I stand musing at this your Novel-assertion That the Moral Law for of this you will have us to understand you not of the Ceremonal doth include Christ whereas the Apostle saith Rom. 3.21 That the righteousness of Faith is revealed without the Law And Gal. 3.11 The Law is not of Faith Now if the Doctrine of Christian Righteousness and Faith be not contained in the Law I see not how Christ should be there included And yet you presently add It 's true the righteousness of the Law and that of the Gospel differ toto coelo We must place one in suprema parte coeli and the other in ima parte terrae as Luther Now I thus argue 1. Christ and his Righteousness are inseparable If Christs Righteousness which is the only Righteousness of the Gospel be as far above and out of the bounds of the Law as the highest part of Heaven is distant from the lowest part of the Earth then it is impossible that Christ should any way be included in the Law Or 2. You will make the Law more capacious and of far larger extent then is the righteousness of it so that the righteousness of the Law must be kept below but the Law it self filleth Heaven and Earth or is above as well as below even where Christ is This is your New Divinity a late Upstart It is strange to see what shifts you are often put unto and how to strain your wits if not conscience also for as you want no good-will to maintain and uphold the tot ring Ministry and Doctrine of your Party so perceiving Dr. Taylor and others in a way scarce justifiable and to use Arguments and distinctions not solid and ineffectual to convince the Adversary or to confirm your Opinions you are thus resolved to go in an unbeaten and new-found path in hope to effect your desire But to proceed And know also that your said Author Dr. Luther saith That Christ is no more in the Law nor yet the Christian then Christ is now in the grave or Peter in the Prison Again saith he A believer is out of the limits of the Law in another Kingdom c. How far your secondarily and occasionally shall be made to extend or how you will expound them I know not you promise more hereafter that is a supersede as now M. B. It 's the hardest task in Divinity to give them Law and Gospel their bounds Ans Yet you have undertaken that task and presume to have done it magnis excidis ausis M. B. It 's true if we take Law and Gospel in this strict difference as some Divines do that all the Precepts where-ever they are must be under the Law and all the Promises be reduced to the Gospel whether in the Old or new Testament in which sence Divines then say Lex jubat Gratia juvat and Lex imperat fides impetrat then the Law can have no Sanction by the Promise But where can this be shewed in Scripture Ans What struggling is here to evade Your reading exceeds mine I remember none who so reduced and marshalled Precepts and Promises If I credit you in this it is not material I am sure that all Orthodox Divines I read Promiss aliae conditionales viz. logales Evangel gratuitae Mela. and the Scripture do witness That there be legal Promises which be conditional As He that doth these things shall live in them Gal. 3.12 And to them who by patient continuance in well doing seek for glory and honor and immortality is promised eternal life Rom. 2.7 And that the Gospel-Promises are absolute and free being onely founded in Christ in whom they have their sanction and establishment 2 Cor. 1.20 All the Promises of God in him are Yea and in him Amen unto the glory of God by us Secondly August Luther Calvin Zanchy Melancthon with others in whom we read those expressions and the like viz. That what is only propounded and commanded in the Law is obtained wrought and established by the grace and faith of the Gospel according to that in Rom. 3.31 We through faith establish the Law These Authors I say do yet make a clear difference between Evangelical and legal Promises and therefore cannot be understood in this your sence But lastly If the Spirit do convert quicken and give power by the Precepts and in and by commanding God do convey his grace of Regeneration which is your Opinion then this question is to no purpose Whether all the Promises be reduced to the Gospel or not Neither can it be truly affirmed then That the Law is established by the grace and faith of the Gospel which yet is both according to the verity of Scripture and the Testimonies of all Authors as is already shewed Now let the Reader judg or your self whether the Law can have Sanction by promise or no. M. B. I wonder much at an Antinomian Author saying It cannot be a Law unless it also be a cursing Law Assert of Gr. p. 31. For besides that the same Author doth acknowledg the Moral Law to be a Rule to a Believer and regula hath vim praecepti as well as doctrinae Ans The Author you mention doth
grant the Law to be a perpetual and inviolable Rule of Righteousness but that it is a Rule to a Believer quatenus talis he will not grant 2. It is true it hath vim praecepti as well as doctrinae and so it hath vim damnandi a power to curse as he there affirmeth and you neither have nor can refute M. B. What will he say to the Law given to Adam who yet was righteous and innocent and therefore could not be cursing or condemning of him Ans You mean not that the Law had no power to curse and condemn because Adam was innocent for you grant it had that potentially though not actually If then it did not actually curse it was not because the Law wanted that power but in that state of innocency there was no place nor reason actually to curse Henceforth wonder not at the Author for saying the Law hath power to curse which is denyed by Dr Taylor and your self but wonder at your own oversight who while you would oppose and confute your Adversary do grant and affirm all he requireth And yet in your Lect. 6. you deny this power to curse to be any essential part of the Law When Adam had sinned whether did the Law actually condemn or no If yes I demand then whether it were by that authority and power it had before or some new and further power was given it upon the fall Did not the Law say to him yet in innocency What day thou eatest of that tree thou shalt dye Gen. 2. How was it that it threatened death and forbad the eating under such a fearful penalty if it had yet no power to execute and inflict the same You must now yield and cease or fight on with your own shadow M. B. In respect of the Vse of the Law to Believers It hath this Vse 1. To excite and quicken them against all sin and corruption c. because none of the godly are perfectly righteous and there is none but may complain of his dull love and his faint delight in holy things therefore the Law of God by commanding doth quicken him c. Have not Believers Crookedness Hypocrisie Luke-warmness Ans The love of God in Christ revealed and shed abroad in the heart doth quicken but the simple Command of the Moral Law can never effect what you say He that loveth the Lord hateth sin but we love the Lord not by reason of the Law requiring it but because he hath loved us first 1 Ioh. 4.19 and that we be born of God and know God in his Son It 's strange Divinity that the flesh and wickedness of our nature should be cured or weakened by the Law It may discover the malady or disease but not remedy it Put the Law to the old man it will revive and quicken it indeed but not to goodness if we may believe either Scripture or our own experience The strength of sin is the Law 1 Cor. 15.56 And Rom. 7.9 When the Commandment came sin revived and I dyed Such is the poysonful enmity in us by the first Adam that it maketh head against the plaister of the Law being applyed unto it The old man or flesh is enmity to God and all goodness Rom. 8.7 and the more it is stirred and quickened by the Law the more it is enraged But contrarily the Head of the Body that is the Church is Christ from whom it hath nourishment ministred and so increaseth with the encrease of God and by this means the body of sin is weakened and abolished Colos 2.19 Our Sanctification is not begun nor perfected by legal precepts and pressings but by our true and effectual union with Christ Ioh. 15.4 As the branch cannot bear fruit of it self except it abide in the Vine no more can ye except ye abide in me Verse 5. He that abideth in me and I in him the same bringeth forth much fruit for without me ye can do nothing M. B. In the third Use of the Law pag. 9. How absurd then are they that say the preaching of the Law is to make men trust in themselves and to adhere to their own righteousness Ans It may be truly said that too many so preach the Law that they establish mans righteousness for this is in the mouth of divers The Minister saith Do well and have well and we are taught That the way to come to glory in Heaven is to glorifie God on Earth by good works Christ saveth none but holy ones c. If the Law were used to discover sin not to cover it to weaken and destroy not to strengthen and build up to binde and cast out not to loose release and admit if the Vail were taken off Moses face and the glory of God in his fiery and terrible Law did break forth so that all found it to be a Ministration of death and condemnation this would be a mean to kill and overthrow all self-confidence and boasting But who doth make that use of it Not one of twenty and your self cannot receive the Law and digest it under such a terrifying and damning notion M. B. pag. 11. The Antinomian before he speaks any thing against or about the Law must shew in what sence the Apostle useth it Ans Your Antinomian is as good a friend to the Law as your self neither do you nor yet can you make it appear that he speaks one word against the Law You are too bold in saying that the Apostle argueth against the Law in any sence but if you so charge him your Conscience may give way to slander us M. B. 5 Caution pag. 13. To distinguish between a Believer and his personal acts Believers sins are condemned they are guilty of Gods wrath though not their persons Ans This your nice and groundless distinction was Dr Taylors shift as it is yours You might have seen the vanity of it in the Assertion of Grace or at least have considered how to satisfie the Objections against it before you present the world with it afresh 1. The Scripture maketh the guilt and curse to redound upon the person as Gal. 3.10 Cursed is every man that continueth not in all things which are written in the Book of the Law to do them 2. In your dayly repentance or confession you make in your prayers do you not judg and condemn your self for your sins whereof Conscience doth accuse you What a strange expression is it that sins are guilty of Gods wrath 3. If no guilt redound upon the person there is no more need of Christs blood to cleanse acquit and justifie and to be a continual propitiation for sin The Promise is vain and Faith of no effect unless you will say that you believe dayly to secure not your person but your sins from wrath 4. And the true reason why the sin guilt and curse redound upon any person is because he is put and placed under the Law which revealeth wrath and why all is kept off the Believer it
Sion-Colledge But this I am bold to say that this is not that Law or Doctrine which came first out of Gods Sion Isa 2. If you teach thus then no man can dare to beleive or receive remission of sins through Christs blood till he be sure he finde first the presence of good works and when will that be that a man can finde good works before he believe or what are the good works he must so necessarily finde and unto which the pardon is promised you might have done wisely and it had been a special work of charity to have given instance in some and then to have shewed both how those good works may be done in the state of unbelief and also how they may be certainly known to be good before faith O poor sinful and trembling soul into what an inextricable labyrinth will this bring thee and when thou shalt be deeply plunged into temptation how to prevent thy fearful desperation by this doctrine is utterly impossible 2. By this you will make people look more to good works then to Christ present and formed in the heart the only hope of glory Col. 1.27 And he that hath Christ hath life and he that hath not the Son hath not life whatever works he may pretend to have 1 Joh. 5.12 3. Yea a legal Ministery exhorting to duties performances and conformity to the Law of works will be held sufficient and men need not be bid to examine themselves whether they be in the faith and Christ dwell in them or no 2 Cor. 13.5 but whether they have store of good works and so they may be sure of pardon and salvation But Sir If you will have your Doctrine to have a free passage why do you not prove clear and confirm it your word will not bear and warrant a Tenet of this weighty importance and consequence Where finde you God speaking to the work or not rather to the worker and if the promise be made also to him of pardon or life it is for his faith or rather for Christs sake in whom all the promises are yea and Amon unto the glory of God 2 Cor. 1.20 Gal. 3.16 On that ever such a Doctrine should see the Sun be heard out of any our Pulpits and be suffered to pass the Press and with such applause to be published That good works must necessarily be present when we be justified and God should so respect and love them that he promiseth pardon and eternal life to them or to their presence you mean sure to the man for their presence sake for if they be so good and holy Etiam bona opera egent remissione they need no pardon or if they were not first pardoned by what art become they good If you say yet you will have Christ present too he need but stand as a cypher the promise is not to his presence but to the presence of holy duties Mr. B. Lastly Their ground is still upon that false bottom because our sins are laid upon Christ Answ You need wish to have your words well taken if you dare not build upon it as an infallible verity that your sins are laid on Christ yet others dare and the bottom is firm even a sure Rock when you have done all You add May they not be laid upon us in other respects to heal us and to know how bitter a thing it is to sin against God Answ 1. If the laying of sin on us will heal us what did make us sick or sore the wound is by sin 2. Then our health is not by laying them on Christ and discharging of us or by faith in him by the means of whose stripes we are healed Isa 53.5 2. That phrase of Gods laying of sin upon the justified in any respect is no Scripture-phrase but it is full of danger and most agreeable to the principles of reason a natural conscience and the Law 3. How bitter sin is may best be seen when we see and consider it upon Christ who under the heavy weight of it sweating water and blood cryed so out My God my God why hast thou forsaken me I grant the afflicted conscience knoweth some little of it and if ever God lay sin upon you and let you not see it laid on Christ for your full and final discharge it will then be intolerable Mr. B. 4. In denying them to be signes or testimonies of grace or Christ dwelling in us And here one would wonder to see how laborious an Author is to prove that no inherent grace can be signs c. Answ 1. They can be made no further evidences then it is evident and plain that they arise from true faith and then I must first know that I have faith and be assured I am justified else all such signs will leave me uncertain and may prove to be counterfeits For as this Argument holdeth not Here is light therefore the Sun is up for all light is not from the Sun the Moon and the Candle have proper lights also so all that we call graces and holy duties come not from faith nor are not only found to be in him who is in a justified estate and therefore cannot convincingly argue such an estate VVhat can you instance in being materially good that was not in Paul while he was a Pharisee who was blameless as touching the Law I fear me that it contenteth us that we know teach and profess a Christ crucified and come not to finde Christ truly formed and dwelling in the heart whose presence is the only light peace consolation and rest to the Soul and that is the reason of our eying and requiring of works and graces for testimonies and assurances of a good estate M. B. In answering the Author We may shew briefly how many weak props this discourse leaneth upon 1. In confounding the instrumental evidencing with the efficient Not holy works say they but the Spirit How he doth oppose subordinates Answ The Spirit and works are not subordinate for as is shewed works may be where the Spirit of adoption and faith is not 2. Neither can they be subordinate except the Spirit do infallibly reveal and confirm a good estate by them which you cannot make good Again you say Every man is in darkness and like Hagar seeth not a fountain till his eyes be opened Answ That is true but where do you read that our duties or works do open the eyes and clear this unto us The opening of the eyes is a good work indeed but it is Gods work and not ours Eph. 1.17 M. B. We say that a Christian in time of darkness and temptation is not to go by signs c. Answ And out of darkness and temptation what need is there to put them to that use will you light a candle at noon-day when there is light enough 2. when there is no temptation occasioning the questioning of faith or the estate what need is there to prove either M. B. 3. His arguments go
Christ a distressed and pursued soul may be safe and in peace but nowhere else M. B. Now these speak of Christs death as an universal meritorious cause without any application of Christs death unto this or that soul Therefore you must still carry this along with you that to that grand mercy of justification somthing is requisite as the efficient viz. the grace of God something meritorious viz. Christs sufferings something instrumental viz. faith and one is as necessary as the other Answ The full bent and chief drift of the Doctors ministery is the application of Christ and the benefits of his death unto the soul who so see any thing cannot but so judge I marvel then at this your so palpable accusation 2. Dr. Crisp speaketh of justification as it is Gods alone gracious act in Christ discharging and acquitting all the Elect in him at the time of his passion and resurrection fully and for ever This was done in fore caeli or as others coram judicio Dei As for the instrumentals whether the word to reveal and publish it or faith to apprehend and rest on it they were neither necessary to that Act of God but onely afterward to give evidence and assurance to the several consciences of all those Elect of what was done for them freely by God in Christ upon the cross For there God was in Christ reconciling them to himself 2 Cor. 5.18 M. B. I will but mention one place more Psal 68.18 Thou hast received gifts even for the rebellious also c. adding Is not all this strange Though the Author press sanctification never much in other places yet certainly such principles as these over grow it Answ 1. Why is it that you think this strange viz. That the loathsomness and hatefulness of this rebellion is transacted from the person upon the back of Christ he beareth the sin as well as the shame c. So that God acquitted his Elect and satiffied his justice in Christ their Sure y and by this means it cometh to pass that God can dwell withthose persons Is this any more then what Paul saith in short and plain words viz. Christ was made sin for us who knew no sin that we might be made the righteousness of God in him 2 Cor. 5.21 and Ephes 2.14 Christ by his Crosse hath slain enmity and made peace Is not Christ the Communis terminus the bond and mean of union and atonement with God by his only sacrifice while we were sinners enemies in our selves we were reconciled in Christ Rom. 5.10 The ground and reason of your opposing is in that you are of opinion that God commeth unto us by or with or because of some inherent graces or qualifications in us which be as a Load-stone to draw and unite his affection and that Christ is but the meritorious cause of this a Papistical conceit God is in Christ and where Christ is there is God present I am in the Father and the Father in me Ioh. 14.10 he that hath the Son hath the Father also and he that hath not the Son hath not the Father He that receiveth me receiveth him that sent me Ioh. 13.20 God then loveth uniteth himself and cometh to the soule only in and through Christ In whom he makes us accepted Eph. 1.6 and that only of his grace If the presence of good works you so contend for in justification were granted you yet God hath no respect to them but beholdeth us as sinful wretches plunged into all confusion and being moved to pity us he considereth our persons and receiveth us alone in our Lord Jesus Christ yea he only beholdeth as our selves so all our good works in that perfection of his Son else they could not be accepted nor liked saith Mr. Calvin And these are the only true and most powerful and operative principles of all right sanctification though your legally-forced sanctity or reformation may grow and arise out of another natural principle and dead root Lastly as for that conversion and change of the most rebellious by the Ministery it is the product or effect of this doctrine I muse that a man of your parts and Religion should so stumble in so clear a light LECTURE IIII. 1 Tim. 1.8 9. Knowing the Law is good if a man use it lawfully M. B. Having confuted some dangerous inferences that the Antinomian makes from that precious Doctrine of justification Answ Egregiam vero laudem spolia ampla refers tu Review now your elaborate work and you will not finde one syllable of real confutation you may learn palmodiam canere I only intend to defend and vindicate the assertions and cause of your later Antinomians as you are pleased to call them as for Islebius Agricola he is none of my acquaintance I never read him If you wrong him God is his Judg and avenger yea and this also I would have the Reader know thāt I am minded to pass by whatever I shall henceforth meet withall whether positive or controversal if it do not directly touch or reflect upon his three named Antinomians lest all the rest in this book be taken for orthodox or I be accounted an approver of it for many things in it besides are to me unsavoury and unsound M. B. sect 2. They tell us not only of a righteousness or justification by imputation but also Saintship and holiness by this obedience of Christ And hence it is that God seeth no sin in believers Answ If they tell you of such perfection that God seeth no sin they withal in the same place tell you if you had the same ears to hear it that this justification or Saintship is by imputation and not by inherent sanctification If Christ be held forth unto you by God himself as one that hath washed you and cleansed you from all sin and withal it be given you so to apprehend and receive it what think you now of your self and condition while you abide in this light In the Creed you say I believe a holy Church yet the Church it self is no exterior or visible thing that the world can discern though the persons be visible and her holiness is invisible onely faith which is of things not seen Heb. 11.11 can behold this purity of the Church not in the Law nor any work or inherent thing but as she is washed and made clean in the blood and righteousness of her Redeemer The Church is all fair saith August for her filthiness is taken away by Christ and he hath made her fair Look upon the Christians life and there thou maist finde many things that thou blamest If he look within himself the work of renovation there wrought it is also imperfect and not pure but as he is beheld in Christ who hath sanctified him he is altogether pure and holy but faith only seeth this Mark but this one saying of Calvin To the intent that God may no more be an enemy and take part against us who are
regenerate to Faith Rom. 10. and to confirm and build up in that way which you nor any can truly affirm of the Law Now this your Rock is passed by without danger M. B. The Swinckfeildeans upon like ground deny the whole Scripture to be needful to a man that hath the Spirit and that which the Antinomian doth limit to the Law that it is a killing letter they apply to the whole Scripture and I cannot see how they can escape this Argument Answ I see with a little help the light may so shine forth that there is hope you will prove ours however we are not here non-plussed See the errour of the Swinckfeild and your own weakness first if we were perfectly holy and happy as in Heaven and Glory we should not need the Scripture no more then the Angels do 2 But we are so onely imperfectly and inchoatly so that the Scriptures are still requisite and needful that we may increase with the increasings of God Ephes 4.12 for the perfecting of the Saints Till we come to the unity of the Faith unto a perfect man unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ 3 Again your friend the Antinomian doth not call the Law a killing letter as it is without the Spirit but as it is that instrument or the ministration the Spirit useth to kill and condemn as touching Conscience 2 Cor. 3.9 I was alive without the Law once but when the Commandment came sin revived and I died Rom. 7.9 But this may serve now viz. The Law can but direct in the things of the Law where you can finde no Christian estate nature name way life faith nor hope of his Calling nor to speak properly any thing of Christianity How now shall your Law direct in these things M. B. The Law must needs have a directive regulating and informing power over a godly man as will appear by these two Reasons First we cannot discern the true worship of God from superstition and idolatry but by the first and second Commandment Answ Here is a large field Inopem copia facit this requireth a full Treatise it self as for the explicating it in such manner as may satisfie mens minds being concerning this full of darkness and doubts so for the general necessity of some cleer and special light to be held forth for the informing and directing aright a world of people going far wide through want of this true knowledge In brief thus for the present First God was not onely a God unto his people but had made known also himself unto them before the solemn giving of the Law and he gave not the Law that by the observation and works of it he might be their God and they his people nor yet that thereby they might know and conceive of him in their hearts according to that Law of works And therefore is it observable that he beginneth with these words Hear O Israel I am thy God c. Now as he became their God onely by Christ the promised seed in the face of whom the knowledge of his glory is manifested 2 Cor. 4.6 so his redeemed and peculiar were onely to take notice of him as God in Christ reconciling them to himself blessing all in the alone Messiah giving out all peace life through him and vouchsafing all favour and respect onely in reference unto him To this dispensation manner and kinde of revealing himself to mankinde according to that first promise Dem nisi in Christo suo coli aut cognosci nolit Calv. Gen. 3.15 The seed of the woman shall bruise the serpents head and in him shall all the Nations be blessed are all to attend for God will not be known nor worshipped out of his Christ Now mans heart naturally is a shop of idolatry infinite are the forms conceptions and images which we frame and have of God within us And as our inward Notions are under which God cometh to our understanding so we think of him worship him seek to please him and lay a foundation for expecting and receiving some good from him And what inscription the Athenians had on their Altar Act. 17.23 the same may be found on a world of our devotions all being to an unknown God For as Christ said to the woman of Samaria Serviunt Deo qui tantum opinionabiliter non natura est deus for the most part we worship we know not what Joh. 4. for he is onely a God in our opinion and conceit and not in truth and his own nature who accepteth respecteth loveth or blesseth any for any work worth or goodness of theirs but the true reason and ground of all favour is Christ Eph. 1.6 Nam verus naturalis Deus sic loquitur Nulla religio sapientia justiâ—ia c. nisi illa unica qua pater glorificatur per filium c. Thus he that in his thoughts falleth from that true knowledge of Christ and that in him he is well pleased with him pacified towards him receiveth loveth him without and before any actual holiness and work or performance of his he necessarily falleth forthwith into Idolatry because he cannot now but imagine such a God and frame him in his own minde which is nowhere to be found A God out of Christ without a Mediatour not satisfied reconciled at peace with us propitious to us Omnis lomo qui relabitus a cognitione Christi necessario ruit in Idololatriam c. c. but requiring and respecting some duty or holiness in us to move him to grant us access audience and all blessings needful an absolute God clothed with glorious attributes terrible to sinners and not justifying the ungodly through Faith in Christ nor loving us when we were enemies and so by his own hand and work reconciling us to himself without any of ours Rom. 4.5 Rom. 5.8 9. such a God do many set up in their hearts and they frame their devotions works and ways suitable with this their image seeking in their own righteousness and holiness to draw nigh and that some goodness or qualification of theirs should commend and ingratiate them unto him A Fryers Coul a Monks hood holy order pilgrimages a strict and Religious life must speak for one sort Alii â—eâ—unant orant c. his se deum placere putant student quaerut Luth. others Fast Pray Vow Reform c. thinking studying seeking by those to pacifie God and procure his favour Now as we may plainly see that the Preface of the Decologue relateth to the Covenant of Grace of Promise of peace and life in the Messiah in which God did commend and make known himself what a God he would be unto them in what way he would deal with them and give them all their peace so God to keep this light in them to suppress or prevent all Idolatry or spiritual and false conceivings and imaginations of him contrary to that his promise whereunto mans nature is
exceedingly prone therefore saith I am thy God as I have made my self formerly known unto thee and thou shalt have no other as not worship stocks and stones so not form and conceive otherwise of me in thy heart and minde And verily as the heavenly light of this true knowledge of God which did appear in the word and work of atonement by Jesus Christ began to be eclipsed and darkened in the Church so idolatry and superstition crept in and prevailed till at last it became palpably gross by Images Pictures using of Saints for Advocates and the like And the bright and glorious arising and shining forth of the Sun of Righteousness who hath health under his wings Mal. 4.4 will prove the alone effectual means to disperse dispel demolish and abolish all that trash and superstitions vanities and to instruct and guide mens souls aright into the knowledge of the true God M. B. The practical use is to pray and labour for such a free and heavenly heart that the Law of God may not be a terrour to you Answ You have taken a course for that aforehand for how can the Law be a terrour while you teach that it cannot curse nor condemn but thus a mans heart may flatter him with a false peace in the way of legal conformity having not attained to the righteousness of Faith or of Christ Again that Spirit which maketh the heart so free and heavenly that the precepts of the Law are sweetness and delight cometh not by the Ministery of the Law but of the Gospel this is not the Spirit of bondage to fear but of Adoption Grace and love Therefore let us pray and labour that the Gospell may have a free passage and be glorified LECT VI. Rom. 2.14 15. For when the Gentiles which knew not the Law c. M. B. Pa. 58. OBservation There is law of nature writen in mens hearts How can the Antinomian think that the moral law in respect of the mandatory power of it ceaseth Ans Your Antinomian thinketh as you also know that the moral law is perpetual and inviolable in respect of the mandatory and damnatory power also within its own territories and dominion there is nothing taken from it thus you mistake him forget your self and abuse your reader and hearers M. B. Page 59. This is good to take notice of against a fundamental error of the Antinomians about the Law in general for they conceive it impossible but that the damning act of the Law must be where the commanding act of a Law is Answ If this errour be fundamental I muse you bring no stronger Artillery to batter and quite raze it 2. Your adversary speaketh of the power and you dispute of the Act there may be power where it is not alway acting 3. I say still The law hath power from the Author of it indifferently to command and to condemne If the Law of our Land should never condemne or punish actually for murder because no man-slayer is to be found yet it hath power to do it nvertheless when occasion shall serve M. B. There are only two things go to the essence of a law c. 1. Direction 2. Obligation Answ These are but your words without warrant or weight which can never carry it your part is to refell the contrary 2. If there be such a law which can onely direct and oblige to it the Apostles Argument may seem to be invalid Gal. 3.10 saying They that are of the works of the Law are cursed c. for a man may be of the works of the Law as it is of power to oblige to direct and oblige only say you and yet be exempt and free from the curse I much marvel that you or any can suppose a law obliging to it for obedience and yet not obliging or binding to answer for disobedience Whatever the Law saith it saith to them that are under the law that every mouth may be stopped and all the world become guilty before God Rom. 3.19 Herein say you lyeth the essence of sin that it breaketh the Law which supposeth the obligatory force of it Answ Sin is a swerving from the rule of direction 1 John 3.4 But can there be sin and not guilt or can you suppose a man to be formally a sinner and yet out of condemnation by the law by preventing that consequence as you call it Lastly a man is properly odious and hateful to God in that he is a sinner and not as he is guilty and subject to the curse which be the effects of justice occasioned only by sin M. B. God by reason of the dominion he had over man might have commanded obedience and yet never a promise of eternal life Answ To what purpose do you here tell us what God might have done where the question is of what God hath done what a law he hath made and put man under which as it commandeth obedience so it condemneth disobedience Rom. 2.8 9. Who God will render unto every one according to his deeds to them who by patient continuance in well-doing seek for glory and honor and immortality eternal life But to them who are contentious and do not obey the truth but obey unrighteousness indignation and wrath Is not here the express and full minde of God in his law and will you curtaile or conceal any part of it Besides how can it stand with divine justice to constitute a Law without power to punish transgressors when he giveth his law in charge he saith That he setteth before them life and death blessing and cursing Deut. 30.19 You may long tell any sober understanding man that he may safely put his hand into the fire it cannot burn him for there may be a fire without power to burn before you can perswade him unto it And yet God hath sufficient power to do this also M. B. As for the other consequent act of the law to curse and punish that is but an accidental act and not necessary to a law for it cometh in upon supposition of a transgression and therefore as we may say of a Magistrate He was a just and compleat Magistrate for his time though he put forth no punitive justice if there be no malefactors offending so is it about a law Answ The Apostle in Gal. 3.19 doth strongly and convincingly conclude against you viz. that the moral law came in with power not only to direct but to reveal wrath curse and condemne for saith he It was added because of transgression that is to accuse and convince of it and to condemne for it that so it might be subservient to the promise in preparing the heart for Christ the blessed Seed This is plaine to be Gods intent in giving and bringing in his law at the first by Moses except you can since then let us see how it is altered or where and when the law was onely given to direct and oblige the other authority and power being denied it or rather taken away
are resolved to venture against the pikes of old tryed and pure truth innocency and a good conscience Well henceforth be better advised like one bemisted you have mistaken your way misrepresented your adversaries and run your credit cause and conscience into a great hazard and you may expect worse in all these without wise and timely retreat The counsel is good if it can be seasonably taken and it cometh from a friend and well-wisher M. B. page 63. This law of nature can never be abrogated And herein we may demand of the Antinomian Whether the law of nature do binde a believer or no whether he be bound to obey the dictates of his natural conscience Answ If a man were not first bound he could not be said properly to be loosed or set free It is granted yet with much limitation and in some things only that every one is bound to obey the dictates of his natural conscience and it is as true to be granted by you also that in case he hearken not at some times or in some things or in case of defect and failing or imperfection this natural law will give out sentence of condemnation for the same as Rom. 2.15 from which it is the peculiar and continual office of faith to set free and secure the conscience So that you do very improperly demand whether the law of nature do binde a believer quatenus so whereas a man believeth that he may be set at liberty in Christ In whom he in his spiritual estate towards God in the things of his peace and life is free as Christ is free with whom by a true and real union he is become one spirit 1 Cor. 6.17 And so is passed from judgement of condemnation and from death to life Fidei nil proponi debet praeter meramgratiam aâ—que haec est ejus objectum Calv. John 5.24 And here faith doth not stand bound to give ear to the voice of either implanted or moral law for the procuring or preservation of peace and comfort but turning from both and not regarding them doth direct and confine ear eye the thoughts and meditations of the soul to that alone simple object Christ and to what he speaketh in the word of grace and salvation whose blood sprinkled and shed for remission of sins cryeth for better things then the blood of Abel This is the proper office obedience and exercise of faith So in God will I praise his word Psal 56. here will I settle my thoughts and fortifie them against the dictates and accusations of a natural conscience sense of sin reason law Satan or whatever assaileth If faith give not an acquiescence and rest to the foul in that free and full atonement by Christ and the goodness and favour of God in him it is in danger to be lost for ever And as you have given me this fair occasion so for the more simple and weak Christians sake who is little versed herein and principled otherwise let me further add That although nature do acknowledge a God and that he is to be worshipped and served Nil magis adversatur fidei quam lex ratio Luth. yet this opinion which is also seconded and much strengthened by the moral law is not without danger and is repugnant to the doctrine and knowledge of faith for nothing is more cross to faith then the law and natural reason the maine battel and dispute in a believer is between the dictates of his natural conscience confirmed by the moral law and the principles of his faith and as the law of faith doth enter and prevaile so it captivateth razeth and expelleth the natural and legal knowledge and thoughts of God and imprinteth a divers from them only suiting to the Gospel or covenant of Grace for now since the death of the Testator the covenant is so ratified and confirmed with God that he remembereth the sins of his people no more but abides fully In illa gratuita reconciliatione per obsignationem spiritus acquiescit It a gloria datur Deo non considerat fides quicquâ—d in nobis vel aliis creaturis ei adversari videatur Olev and for ever pleased with them in his Son and through faith herein the conscience also is made to yeeld to it to receive and imbrace it and so is led and brought into this confidence of the quietness and peace of God towards us and hereby effecteth our assured rest in God reconciled for ever which is the true Christian Sabbath Thus every high thing exalting it self against the knowledge of God according to the Gospel is to be cast down and every thought to be brought into captivity to the obedience of Christ 2 Cor. 10.4 5. And by this is glory given unto God while one thing is felt or suggested within and another is believed Let this be well marked of great and continual use in every Christian that the law implanted by nature is ever contradicting and reclaiming against the testimony of God in the word of his grace whence ariseth the difficulty and impossibility of believing save by the power and operation of God Col. 2.12 therefore in the weighty things of faith to hearken to the natural conscience or moral law will quite overthrow whole Christianity and turn aside the soul to destruction The seeds of morality and remanents of the covenant of works may be found in nature but there is no sparke nor intimation of any pure Gospel In innocency Adam was not principled to finde and receive his righteousness peace and life in another out of himself M. B. Think not that because he Christ dyed to free you from the curse of the law that therefore you are freed from the obedience Answ And do not you think nor teach that Christ came to take away the curse and condemning power from the law contrary to his own express words Mat. 5.17 18. where he saith that every jot of the Law is imperishable and in his opening and applying it afterwards he doth as command so reprove threaten and condemne 2. You will not deny but what Christ hath performed for me as my surety that I am so freed from that it may not be required of me to that end as before 3. Christ doth free us that we by his Spirit may serve freely and cheerfully and without all fear in holiness and righteousness before God all the dayes of our life Luk. 1.76 Therefore are we taken into a New covenant that giveth power and fitness so to serve wherein he promiseth the law in our hearts to put his Spirit into us to give a new heart and a new way c. which the covenant of works could not do Jer. 31. Ezek. 36.27 c. M. B. Vse of instruction against the Antinomians who must needs overthrow the directive and obligative force of the law of nature as well as of Moses Ans This is but the old slander the same false charge so often repeated It is by this
by him then you canonize him for Orthodox M. B. But they never used such expressions in the Antinomian sense as if hereby we were made not only perfectly righteous but also holy and without sin Answ When the Authors have the same expressions and use the same words yet if you may be the Glossary your sinister mind can make their sense to vary and differ 2. They who say we are persectly righteous do affirme us to be holy also and without sin in the same sense and manner but not inherently for if the law require holiness and righteousness how can we be justified in Christ from what the Law hath against us and yet not be as well holy as righteous in him and so without sin what can be spoken by the Spirit of God more plainly then this Christ hath loved us and washed us from our sins in his blood Rev. 15. See also Col. 1.22 And read Luther on Psal 130. vers 3. who there saith They that put not their trust herein alone that by the death of Christ their sins are taken away and Gods eyes closed that he cannot see their sins must needs perish for this onely do the Scriptures set forth that our life resteth wholly and alonely in the remission of sins and in that the Lord will not see our sins but in mercy cover them c. In the reading of which words the said Author of the Honey-comb was much convinced and sore terrified and troubled as he confessed But your carnal reason can put a lower and strange sense upon all such places and so present them in your own shape that nothing may offend any beyond a carnal sense no truth can be admitted what God speaketh plainly will be received no further then wit conceiveth and letteth us see how it may be true and then we will say we belive it but that is not to give credit unto God in what in his word he propoundeth but to assent unto reason as it comprehendeth LECT XV. Exod. 20.1 And God spake c. M. B. HAppily the Law will be more extolled in its digninity then ever by those opinions which would overthrow it Answ It is impossible for any to extoll the Law above the dignity due and proper to it but what you attempt for that purpose doth neither gaine glory to the Law nor commendation to your self 2. You tell us of opinions overthrowing it yet can let your reader see none more subverting and injurious then your own Indeed you bear the world in hand that the adversaries which you have made or feigned to your self do speak against the use of the Law and preaching of it cry down the Law utterly abolish it c. all which with more such-like interwoven stuff is fasly suggested by you to render them erroneous and odious but you can make no such things appear M. B. page 139. For we may either take the word Law for the whole dispensation of the commandments moral judicial and ceremonial or else more strictly for that part we call the moral law yet with the preface and promises added to it And in both these respects the law was given as a covenant of grace which is to be proved in due time or else most strictly for that which is meer mandative and preceptive without any promise at all Answ It is granted the word Law is capable of the two former significations but that in both those respects it was given as a covenant of grace especially in the later more strict sense for the moral law Is a new-coyned and bold assertion lately come out of the mint having as yet no image or superscription upon it save onely ipse dixit to make it currant If your spirits be grown so wanton and confident by reason of some supposed parts or abilities more eminent in your self that you will not keep tract of the Orthodox but slight and reject all humane authority as falling too short of that height you aime at in your aspiring thoughts yet reason requireth it of you to shew your reader some clear text of Scripture upon which you ground your distinction and positions If the moral law strictly and properly so called was given as a covenant of grace Why is it called a law of works requiring mans righteousness And then Paul argued nothing solidly when he said If it be of works it is no more of grace and if of grace it is no more of works else grace is no more grace To admit the one is to exclude and deny the other so inconsistent they be in this point Rom. 11.6 But you take time to prove it and you have your asking and we wait your leisure In the interim you present us with as uncouth and unwarrantable an assertion viz. that the word Law is taken for that which is meer mandative without any promise at all c. It will prove as difficult as bold an enterprize to undertake the proof and defence of this The Scriptures define the law in these words Do and live and so implyeth the contrary viz. He that doth not shall dye so that the mandative is not without the promise nor threatning When Paul saith They that are of the works of the law are cursed Gal. 3.10 doth he not argue convincingly that the works of the law which we do in obedience to its command cannot be secured and set free from the curse And that the law is ever invested with divine authority to promise and threaten to curse and bless to kill and give life I should be afraid so to limit the Lords Soveraignty and to devest him of so much power in his just and holy law as to make him some petite and under-ruler or commander allowing him in his law onely a jurisdiction to make and impose a law without a full and due reigning power having no more light to clear it then as yet you hold forth unto us And now with this wittily-devised key you can pick out and give us the right sense of all those assertions which the learned have concerning the difference between the Law and the Gospel and putting your sense into their words can make them speak as you please But though you can shew us no text to ascertaine the verity of any thing yet you give us a reason as weak and unsound as is your affirmation viz. M. B. For if you take as for the most part they do all the precepts and threatnings scattered up and down in the Scripture to be properly the law and then all the gracious promises where-ever they are to be the Gospel then it is no marvel if the law have many hard expressions cast upon it Answ This reason seemeth to occasion your forged distinction And 1. You would father this upon the learned but tell us of no Author book nor testimony It would have been to your credit and the justification of your weak and questioned cause to have produced one sentence or sillable sounding that way 2.
not kill and Whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the judgement But I say unto you That whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shalt be in danger of the judgement and whosoever shall say to his brother Racha shall be in danger of the counsel but whosoever shall say Thou fool shall be in danger of hell-fire I Wonder at an Antinomian who is so apt to oppose the doing of things in love M. B. p. 173. and doing them by the law together for doth not the law command every duty to be in love Answ Did not Christ taxe and reprove the Pharisees for their alms prayers sacrifices c. which were things commanded in the law because they wanted pureness of love and did them in hypocrisie for praise and self-ends 2. It is the chief point of wisdom in the teacher to discover want of truth of affection and love to things done according to the outward precept of the law 3. Whoso doth a thing simply being moved thereunto by the authority of the law doth it not in love 4. Though the law require love in every duty yet it both findes us in enmity and yet it cannot breed nor work love in the heart though it be often pressed to be done where no such affection is found nor once spoken of thus most are suffered to bless themselves in that kinde of doing M. B. Yea we are to love God by the law because he hath given Christ for us for the law commandeth to love God for whatever benefit he bestoweth upon us Answ If God command love by the law because he hath given Christ then you must presuppose that Christ was given before promise to give him in future it had been more probable for the promise of the Messiah was before the giving of the Law 2. But neither you nor I if we understand what love in truth is can love God because the law requireth it though that be a reason alledged and used for it for it is his love shed abroad into the heart that causeth love in us We love him because he loved us first Natural enmity whatever we profess otherwise cannot be destroyed and abolished but by faith which purifieth the heart and worketh by love M. B. God doth work grace in us by this the law as well as by the Gospel God doth use the law instrumentally for to quicken up grace and increase it in us as Psal 1 19. sheweth Answ Paul rendereth that as the onely reason why righteousness cannot come by the law because it cannot vivifie quicken or give life Gal. 3.21 the quickening spirit is not adjoyned to it The proper office and end of the law is to convince us of sin and death that we may seek righteousness and life in Christ by faith the branch liveth and groweth in the vine and so fructifieth John 15. But this controversie you do professedly and with all your forces of Scripture and Arguments enter upon and largely handle in your 20 Lecture therefore let us pass on unto it for the whole 19 nothing concerneth us LECT XX. Mat. 5.21 22. Ye have heard it hath been said by them of old c. THE Antinomian doth directly derogate from the profitable effect and benefit of the law M. B. Pa. 187. Answ Your accusation and charge will prove too directly peremptory bold and unjust he that acknowledgeth all the effects and benefits of the Law that the Orthodox or God himself in his word do mention cannot derogate any jot from it M.B. This therefore is the assertion which an Antinomian Author maintaineth viz. that the law is not an instrument of true sanctification and that the promise of the Gospel is the seed or doctrine of the new birth and it may not be denied but that many speeches might fall from some men which might seem to comply with that opinion Answ Here is strange insolency and loftiness of spirit All mens eyes must be put out but yours or theirs who see as you see you pretend learning and reading but how is the judgement of the learned slighted and contemned by you you stand up as a zealous advocate pleading for the Law but what illegality and injustice is this with what scorn and lordliness do you insult over your Adversary and would bear and beat down him the truth and his innocency under the foot of pride and disdain Your single opinion must be preferred before all and received by all in your conceit it carrieth in it the light of the Sun here is the Popes spirit all erre but he all is Gospel that comes from him his word is a law onely his Chair is wanting But what mean the Presisident and Fellows of Sion-Colledge to do in the end who so approve and applaud this man and his Book Intend they hereby to bring in and establish a piece of new and strange divinity and to reject and overthrow what is old and true 1. It may not be denyed say you Answ But if it might then perhaps it would be denyed but there is that convincing power in the light of simple truth that will force even the most impudent somewhat to yeeld 2. Yet see what mincing he useth and how loth he is to grant the whole truth and that the world should know that his Adversary hath any of the learned Orthodox truly and really for him or that he himself opposeth any in this but a vilified and despised Antinomian Many speeches might fall saith he from some men as if they were half a sleep or not so considerate as he is when they let such speeches fall or at least intended no such thing or not in our sense as he often saith for it is in him to put what sense or gloss he pleaseth upon their words that so they may not be for us whenas the same truth yea totidem ipsissimis verbis is asserted by both 3. From some men And are they not men of least worth and account too in the Church I dare say you do think no better of them for it They are but some then perhaps you mean few and yet I think you can hardly name one learned and sound Author from whose pen the same assertion hath not fallen 4. Might seem to comply with that opinion Multa videntur quae non sunt What do they seemingly accord with us but in truth and reality are all for you or as you will have them who have learned to make quidlibet ex quolibet yet why do you not produce one for you because you scarce can do it Reader If thou hast the Assertion of grace and wouldst turn to page 166. and 170. thou maist find there Augustine Luther Calvin Bullinger Cornerus Perkins Cudworth Brentius Piscator Fox Tindal and Rollock unto which it is easie to add as many more Orthodox all punctual and full to the point affirming what I say and their words are direct full and exclusive denying this power and work to the
law wherefore I am not the first deviser or broacher thereof nor alone in this opinion as walking in an unbeaten path But unto me it is most strange that M. B. should be so self-confident and bold of spirit as to presume to carry it with violence against all others Let me commend unto thee the words of Perkins because he is worthily approved of and best known unto the simple sort upon Gal. 3.2 Here saith he we see the difference between the Law and the Gospel the law doth not minister the Spirit unto us for it onely sheweth our disease and giveth us no remedy the Gospel ministereth the Spirit And upon Gal. 2.19 Evangelical sorrow is sorrow for sin because it is sin this indeed is the grace of God but it is not wrought by the law but by the preaching of mercy and reconciliation c. the Law then being the cause of no good thing in us And Cudworth on Gal. 6.2 in the last difference between Law and Gospel hath these words The law is no instrumental cause of faith repentance or any saving grace Is this now but seemingly to comply with our opinion when they say the law is no instrumental cause of faith repentance nor of any saving grace nor yet of any good thing in us and still these Authors were no Antinomians but we must be so because our Adversaries like those of Stephen Act. 7. do rule and will have it so I tremble to consider the woful consequences if the Ecclesiastical power should be once in their hands but I trust God will not suffer the wise and honourable Parliament so to intrust them But let us listen what his conceit is M. B. I shall now labour to maintain the positive part that the law preached may be blessed by God instrumentally to work the conversion of men An. The question is not of Gods power whether he may or can do it but whether he hath done it let it appear in all the New Testament that any one was converted but by the Gospel Nay Paul and Priests with others who had been zealous in the way of the law were then onely converted when they received the Gospel and become obedient to the faith Act. 6.7 or did God ever reveal it that his will is to convert by the law God can or may make heavy mountains to ascend as high as the Sun and there abide and the waters in the Sea to burn like straw or other combustible matter but he never did so as yet If you shew it to be his will we shall question it no further M. B. And it is necessary to make this good Answ Because you have undertaken it and are resolved to oppose the apparent and generally received truth to be contrary to all the Orthodox to gratifie Sion Colledge to get a name to your self of being a knowing man seeing more then all other learned Divines or at least to maintain your owne credit now it is necessary for you M. B. For were the contrary true it would be a Ministers duty in great part to lay aside the preaching of the Moral Law as not instrumental and subservient to that maine end of the ministry which is the conversion of souls Answ If I take your words in their true sense they argue 1. I am sorry to speak it that M. B. knoweth not what conversion of the soul is but this may be tryed by and by 2. That he intendeth when he preacheth to convert people by the Law and looketh that the Spirit should make it effectual for that purpose and however he putteth in or subservient to that main end yet he meaneth not onely preparatorily for that he saith he cannot yeeld unto which yet is the clear judgement and constant and sound doctrine of all true Divines but he will be singular But see his ground and how sandie uncertain and weak it is to lay and erect an edifice of so great consequence upon it M. B. I suppose that Jesus Christ hath obtained of God by his death that such efficacy and vertue should go forth in the Ministery that whether it be by Law or Gospel he preacheth the souls of men may be healed and converted thereupon Answ And must your meer supposition satisfie us in a controversie so newly needlesly and yet dangerously started up to the great offence and disturbance of the Church of this nature and high concernment you may suppose Christ hath redeemed all men and Devils A Papist supposeth that Christ by his death hath obtained that his Alms-deeds Penance and good works should have a meritorious vertue and efficacy in them for pardon and salvation and upon that deceitful foundation or supposition the silly deluded wretch buildeth and hazardeth his everlasting salvation Oh that any should be so simple and unwise to content himself with an I supposed it is so 2. You say whether it be by law or Gospel so as if God and Christ are indifferent and it is left to mans choice to use either as he liketh for conversion that is more liberty then is allowed you 3. That the souls may be healed and converted The right order is first to be converted then healed Mat. 13.15 But let this pass yet it is requisite that we agree about the terms for some doubts or differences may arise from the ambiguity of the words yet not as if I would yeeld that regeneration conversion or healing of which I see you make no difference in whatever Scripture-acceptation are wrought instrumentally by the law but to help the weak reader and to clear the truth every way And first Regeneration is the begetting again of the soul to God which God doth freely of his owne accord by the word of truth Jam. 1.18 but because this will not be current that this is meant of the Gospel onely as is objected and as is to be discussed more fully in the next Lecture in that the law is also called the word of truth Let me therefore add two pregnant Texts to put this out of all doubt that it is to be understood of the Gospel exclusively The first is Eph. 1.13 In whom you also after you heard the word of truth the Gospel of your salvation by which Paul telleth how the Ephesians came to their faith and hope in Christ namely by the preaching of the Gospel So saith Calvin He adorneth the Gospel with two Epithets in that he calls it the word of truth and in that it is the instrument of salvation which two adjuncts saith he are diligently to be observed And the Gospel is not onely a certain truth which cannot deceive for so is the Law but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he calls the word of truth as if properly no truth were without it and the vertue and efficacy of it is such that it bringeth salvation unto us as it is also Rom. 1.16 The Gospel is the power of God to salvation c. and therefore Paul was not ashamed nor afraid to
preach it at Rome also If the Law would have served and Paul had known also this your liberty and chose to use either law or Gospel he needed not to shun nor shrinke in the preaching of it for every mans heart is principled to approve and receive that doctrine having the seeds and effect of the law naturally in his bosome but the Gospel is supernatural and the soul is indisposed to receive it of it self yea and strongly by assed and inclined against that way of peace and life revealed by it for it maketh void rejecteth and casteth downe all the excellencies of man his free-will strength righteousness wisdome goodness as being vanity folly weakness sin and vile with God so to prepare and make way in the soul to bring in and commend Gods grace to be all-sufficient and that Christ alone may be exalted and rejoyced in Hence the mystery of the Gospel was to the Gentiles foolishness and to the Iew a stumbling-block 1 Cor. 1.23 Also it is more then evident that this word of the Gospel was the instrument of converting all those Churches to whom Paul writ as his Epistles do testifie as besides these mentioned places to the Romans Corinthians and Ephesians you may also see in Gal. 1.6.8.9 Col. 1.5 Phil. 1.5 who were called into the fellowship of the Gospel But what need the lighting of a Candle at noon-day unless it be still dark Saturday with us The second remarkable place is 1 Pet. 1.23 25. Being born again not of corruptible seed but incorruptible by the word of God which liveth and abideth for ever and vers 25. he expounds himself saying And this is the word which by the Gospel is preached unto you If need were a cloud of expositors might be here produced to evince and confirm it that this instrumental word of regeneration is not the Law but the Gospel It is true some tell us of a twofold regeneration or rather a twofold sense of the word by the one the soul cometh to a second new being and by the other it hath the image of God reinstamped on it And of a regeneration of Faith and another of holiness of nature and life but I would trouble none with these distinctions yet this I add that Melancthon upon Iohn observeth that Christ calleth our justification regeneration and indeed it is a new creation and the putting of the soul into a new and happy condition for thereby it hath reconciliation and peace with God Rom. 5. 2. And there is a twofold healing 1. Of our spiritual estates and thus we are said to be healed by the stripes of Christ Isa 53.5 who is the repairer of this breach and as for that wound of conscience in that day when sin doth bite and sting and the law accuse and terrifie none other plaister can cure it but the blood of Christ who by his eternal spirit offered himself to purge and purifie the conscience Heb. 9.14 and this is done by the application of faith for health or salvation is onely in Christ and in nothing else you can name And as Moses lifted up the Serpent so must the Son of man be lifted up that whosoever believeth in him might not perish but have everlasting life John 3.14 15. 2. There is an inchoate and partial healing of our natures hearts and lives which is effected by the Spirit of Christ renewing and changing all and every member of his mystical body whereof he is the head but as the Moral Law is not the instrument to reveal and hold forth Christ crucified so Faith by which the soul comes to be sensibly healed and having communion with Christ to receive vertue from him this Faith is onely instrumentally by the Gospel which is preached to all for the obedience of Faith Rom. 16.25 26. And if our inheritance come by the law in part or in whole then Faith is made void and the promise made of no effect Rom. 4.14 3. And lastly Conversion may be taken 1. for the change of the condition as when who was in bondage is enlarged set free delivered out of the hands of his enemies and of far off is made near as Iohn 8.36 Ephes 2.13 Col. 1.21 or 2. for the turning of the heart to God Act. 26.18 To turn them from Satan to God If thou wilt return return unto me 3. For the change and alteration in the soul when God sanctifieth a man throughout c. 4. A man may change his religion as did the Jewish-Proselytes and his outward way and manner of life being refined and reformed according to the letter of the law as the Pharisee Luke 18. Now to apply all Hence I infer and say that it is never read in the Scripture that the soul was made spiritually free and estated in grace and favour by the preaching of the Moral Law but the office of it is to arrest convince shut up the soul under sin the curse and condemnation Gal. 3.22 the law and the Gospel are the two keys that Christ gave that by the one sinners might be shut and bound and by the other set free and brought forth Mat. 18.18 2. Neither did the Law instrumentally convert and turn the heart to God for Christ is the way to the Father his blood and cross slayeth the enmity that is between divine justice and the sinner and removeth all lets whatever did hinder or separate and so openeth a free way for access Heb. 10.19 20. and his righteousness is the melius terminus bond or mean of union between God and the soul bringing them into a sure and everlasting covenant of peace he is first King of righteousness and after that King of Salem that is of peace Heb. 7.2 Now Christ his death and resurrection with the fruits and benefits thereof are the subject and peculiar treasures of the Gospel whereof Paul was made a Minister that he might preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ Eph. 3.7 9. further God cannot be com'd unto known nor enjoyed nisi in Christo suo but in Christ And he gaineth and draweth the soul with cords of love he appears gratious and merciful to poor sinners beaten downe humbled and brought to deaths door in the conscience of sin else the soul being afraid of him would with Adam flee away and hide it self from him hence passim men are exhorted to turne to the Lord because he is gratious and merciful Joel 2.13 Psal 86.5 Hos 6.12 We are to hold forth God in Christ reconciling the world unto himself and not imputing their sins unto them and as Ambassadours for Christ we pray men in Christs stead to be reconciled unto to God 2 Cor. 5.18 20. Now this cannot be by the ministery of the Law by which cometh the knowledge of sin for it worketh wrath Rom. 4.15 threatneth with the curse and death Gal. 3.10 And thus the Law doth by the will and appointment of God to force man out of himself to destroy all self-confidence
and trust in any goodness of his owne and to make him to seek out and to hearken after Christ the true and onely right door set open in the Gospel that by him the soul may have entrance being found in him not having its owne righteousness which is of the Law but that which is through faith in Christ The righteousness which is of God by faith Phil. 3.9 It is a vain and a strange conceit that the soul should convert to God by the preaching of the Law sith it can onely turne and come unto him by faith which nothing doth so much cross and hinder as the Law and it putteth the soul upon a contrary way 3. But if by conversion you mean as happily you do the change of the disposition and frame of the soul It is as certain also and clear that God doth not this by the law but by Gospel thus Act. 15.9 God purifieth the heart by faith and Acts 26.18 they sanctified by faith This is the special commendation that Paul giveth of the Gospel that therein we all with open face behold the glory of the Lord as in a glass and are changed into the same image from glory to glory even by the Spirit of the Lord. Againe can mans nature be changed till he be united and ingrafted into Christ the true vine and doth not vertue come by that insition or union And was it ever taught or read that the law should be that ministery by which this is wrought If the law do not set this object Christ before the soul nor is no mean to bring and joyn it to him how can it be an instrument to give and communicate the Spirit of Christ Indeed a legal spirit or power it hath which hath been effectual to work a great deal of reformation and legal strictness having a specious and deceitful shew and lustre as we see in the Pharisees who therefore were admired in their age O Sir if you would set before your own and the eyes of your people duely and daily that exceeding kindness of God and sweetness of his so surpassing love in Christ in so infinite expressions of it and seek to affect both your own and their hearts with it you would finde what an incredible force and vertue is in it far beyond any power in a legal Ministery to melt gaine and leaven the soul transforming it into its own nature and image which is love and mercy and so disposing you to do all things of the law freely and willingly which are but the offices and duties of love And the law was given not to beget this love but that by requiring it of us either love or enmity as it is in us might be bewrayed and made manifest In a word no sounder further nor better conversion can be wrought by the law then was in Paul before he received the Faith who in that his zeal of God was a blood-sucker and butcher of Christians Christs silly and harmless sheep for he was inwardly in the gall of bitterness c. and so are too many this day as we see finde and feel who might be metamorphozed by the Gospel and of wolves become lambs like Priest like People according to their pasture they feed in viz. as the nature of the doctrine is they receive so they are where much law is there hardness of heart cruelty self-love c. but want of meekness humbleness and mercy And it will ever be true that a legal zeal is persecuting 4. If lastly you hold this last sort of conversion to be by the law viz. to make a loose and profane man strict and religious in his course of life which is properly no souls conversion for both he may be in statu quo prius no changling in his state and his nature was principled for this way this may be granted you but alas who seeth not that this is hypocritical feigned unsound Luther saith The law can but make hypocrites if there be no further work but what is by it This I ingenuously profess what ever you may think of it that my desire is not to know or think of God out of Christ but to confine all the powers and workings of my soul unto that so pleasant and amiable object God reconciled in his Son And so to set him before me gracious propitious loving c. in all the events occurences and conditions of this life And this is the true and onely office and exercise of faith And thus I deal with God even as he also dealeth with me according to Luthers expression without the Law in his Covenant of meer grace the more I can do so the greater confidence I have towards him the better every thing he doeth pleaseth me the more welcome is the Cross and the more apt and able I am to bear and digest it the more is my heart and affections lively and sweetly stirred up and enlarged to love God and to delight my self in him by this mean the soul is made merry and kept joyful in the Lord and like an Instrument in good tune it is ready for use upon any occasion And the inward appearing and manifestation of God unto the soul in love and tender mercy doth melt it and effectually change and overcome the enmity and maliciousness of my naughty heart and nature And this light I endeavour to hold out to all and to walk in this way of loving kindness long-suffering and compassion towards every one in doctrine and life holding it the wisest most direct effectual and Gospel-like course and way thus to overcome the frowardness and evil that is in man with lenity and goodness even as God in this way prevented and overcame me The more I can look into that gentleness aimableness and those fatherly affections in God through Christ Jesus towards me and that secreet bosome of divine love is so laid open the more are all fears banished discontentments swallowed up and I am heartned to go on chearfully in a Christian course as best becometh that holy and heavenly calling And the more abundantly Gods thoughts of peace are discovered unto me the more peace and rest I thereby finde bred and preserved in my thoughts You may account it a licentious doctrine or otherwise asperse it with indignities because you have little skill of it and may bridle your self and disciples by another mean and kinde of woful doctrine but when you have done I wish you might feel how your owne pulses do beat But I proceed You deny the Law to work onely preparatorily in conversion And I thinke he never had experience of convesion that is of your mind you would make men believe you sit downe with a legal reformation as is the case of too many instead of a Gospels-conversion or that the law had never as yet its due and perfect work upon you for then you would sing another song When the commandment came sin revived and I dyed Rom. 7. Did ever any come
is that the Hebrew word doth signifie largely any doctrine and so may comprehend the whole word of God Answ You say that others as well as they Antinomian take the law so largely so that you see your Adversarie is not single in his opinion as you are who can produce no Author but onely say It seemeth good to expound that phrase in such a manner And otherwise it seemeth it would cross your designe else I see nor you do shew no reason But Luther and some others upon that place Psal 19.7 do take the law for the moral law but I dare say you will not stand to their exposition of it Luther saith This is no absolute commendation of the law but it is to be understood legem talem factans esse per fidem non talia facit lex The law worketh not these it self but they are effected by the influence of the Sun of righteousness inwardly quickning reviving and comforting the soul through the faith of the Gospel The law giveth nor hath no such heat or vertue of it self but produceth contrary effects It may indeed saith he convert the eye mouth hand ears omnes vires sed magis avertit cor odio paenarum indignatione prohibitae concupiscentiae sed cor non est rectum spiritus non est fidelis In brief his judgement is that after the soul is justified and converted by the Gospel then it loveth the law which it hated before and now it doeth not avert or as being afraid she from God in his law but with confidence and delight draweth nigh unto him and observeth the things of the law because the Spirit of Christ in the Gospel maketh them sweeter to the soul then all the riches and pleasures of this life Thus it s the doctrine of reconciliation by Christ believed on that marvelously altereth the Christians heart causing it to convert and turn to God as being thereby able to abide his sight and presence and to love his saw Et Amans legem non potest eam satis landare adeo placet quae prius adeo displicuit You say nothing that hath any strength in it against the truth held out and maintained by us And by this you may see whence it was that David so commended the law strictly taken because his heart was so altered by the faith of the operation of God It is remarkable saith Luther that the way to love and keep the law is to believe and receive the Gospel from this belief issueth love and all true obedience and it is not bred and effected by the law commanding and requiring it By faith we establish the law Rom. 3. ult M. B. That opinion which would make Christ not take an instrumental way for conversion of men in his first Sermon wherein he was very large that must not be asserted but to hold that the preaching of the law is not a Medium to conversion must needs be to say Christ did not take the nearest way c. Answ You answer your self page 169. where your words are That our Saviours intent was only to explicate the law better then did the Scribes and Pharisees that so they might be sensible of sin and discover themselves to be fouler and more abominable then ever they judged themselves unto which let me add And that by requiring and so letting the hearers see a necessity of a more absolute righteousness then was held forth even in the doctrine of the Scribes and Pharisees he might so destroy all confidence in their own works prevent the establishing of mans righteousness and prepare and dispose them to hearken after his righteousness for he is the end of the law for righteousness to al that believe Rom. 10.4 And by this it may appear that he used the law preparatorily to justification and conversion as you in part are forced to grant it to be the opinion and doctrine of all Orthodox Divines and yet it is thwarted by you who love to have a way by your self M. B. If the law of God have that objectively in it that may work exceedingly upon the heart when set home by Gods Spirit then it may be used instrumentally as well as the Gospel but it hath c. Answ Here is nothing but the vain reason of man If God be otherwise pleased what is it how glorious fit and worthy soever it may seem for this in our eyes The Sun in the firmament is a glorious object to look upon when we have eyes but God useth it not therefore to give and restore the use of sight to those that be blind the seeing man findeth variety of delightful objects to look at among the creatures but they finde him not eyes therefore M.B. 5. If the law of God may be blessed after a man is converted to the increase of his grace and holiness why not then to the first beginning of it That it is for the increase of of Godliness appeareth by experience Answ Every Christians experience teacheth him that the more he inwardly seeth and feeleth that divine love that pardoneth reconcileth and preserveth the soul in that everlasting covenant of sure mercies and peace the more it loveth againe and in love hateth evil escheweth it doth good is every way cheerfully obedient I love the Lord saith David because he heard me when I called upon him in the time of trouble and delivered my soul from death my eyes from tears and my feet from falling What bred and caused love and gained the heart to God at the first that same is of continual force still to enlive and enlarge the affections towards him But because sins are forgiven it is said she loved much Luke 7. and if this Candle be put under a bushel if this Sun the light of Gods countenance do not shine forth upon the Solissequium the soul of a believer it will be dark dull and indisposed to whatever good you can propound to it therefore is it requisite that faith be nourished and ever operative and lively in apprehending and feeding upon that exceeding kindness of God in Christ that so it may be more quick and free in all holy expressions Faith works by love if faith dye or wax cold by which the soul liveth the law can but little work upon or affect the heart Besides as the Christians beginning so his building up and increasing is in another way and by other means then are meerly legal he lives and grows in the Vine Christ and thereby fructifieth M. B. It is hard to think that a Minister having opened any moral duty of the law may not pray to God to cloath that word with power to change the heart of the hearers Answ Why should man thinke it hard or be offended at any thing where he findeth it Gods will that it be so and no otherwise 2. If God reveal not his minde and willingness to put forth any renewing power in the law how can you then pray in faith to be
heard 3. True prayer is for the fulfilling of his promise in his own way and not in ours M. B. If the Ceremonial Law the Sacraments and Sacrifices were blessed by Gods Spirit while they were commanded to be used for the strengthening and increase of grace notwithstanding the deadly nature of them now then the Moral may be blessed c. seeing it stands still in force Answ While those ordinances were in use they were effectual to increase faith and so to quicken confirm and cheer the heart against inward temptations from sin Satan the fear of death of judgement c. for they were instituted for that purpose and fitted also in that they held forth and shadowed Christ Crucified the body and substance life and thing signified If you can prove that the moral law was either ordained or so fitted for that end you say something else water is not so weak as is this Argument M. B. Let the use of them be c. Answ The Lord let you see your error and failing and give you a right use of what is said Indeed the law is holy yet it is manifest that maketh neither heart nor life full of holiness though you abound in legal performances M.B. What is regeneration but the working of the moral law in the heart that is the Image of God Answ Regeneration giveth a new being birth and estate as well as a new Image It maketh us both Sons and also like our heavenly Father but the law is the instrument for neither but the word of truth which is the Gospel of salvation Jam. 1.18 as is cleared before You seem to have a zeal but not according to knowledge and so would lead and hasten on your hearers in a wrong way LECT XXI Rom. 3.31 Do we then make void the Law c. M. B. Let us consider a great mistake of the Antinomian Author in the Assertion pag. 171. where he makes the very ground why they are charged with Antinomianisme to be because they do not hold the law to be used by God instrumentally for the conversion of men certainly this is a great mistake for there are many learned men who hold the work of the law to be no more but preparatory Answ Sir It is no mistake at all for both Dr. Tailor and many others upon that ground have so concluded and condemned us And if your words will sufficiently satisfie the world that this our Opinion and Tenet is so Orthodox and free from Antinomianism as you are enforced to do lest otherwise you should unavoidably as you see and say bring many yea all the learned into the same condemnation with us except your self who yet in so doing might put your owne neck into the coller I doubt not then but the truth will also clear and free us in all other out assertions And so in despight of all ill-will our innocency which hath so unjustly suffered and been so unworthily aspersed a long time by you and others will at last come to light and we shall mirabile dictu stand recti in curia Plead thou our cause O God of our righteousness M. B. Yet for all that they do peremptorily maintaine the use and obligation of the law in respect of believers therefore they are not in that respect condemned for that error Answ Surely if I understand any thing neither they nor yet your self will be so peremptory as to maintain the use and obligation of it to believers quatenus tales To faith or in the state or things of faith there is no obligation nor use of the law If the law be useful to the working Abraham as Luthers phrase and distinction is yet here they all and you also must do so at the last unanimously confess that the law hath power actually to condemn him in all his works and wayes so that by his faith he ever retireth in spirit and returneth to Christ his righteousness that so he may enjoy and preserve his peace freedom life and comfort your best performances need remission of sins much more you for these your Lectures Again if the learned be not condemned for this errour in this respect yet you account it an errour in them and cannot prove it so or else how is it so intolerable in us are you become partial and inequal judges M. B. The question is not whether by the power of the law we come to obey the law but whether Grace may not use the precepts or law preached for the inflaming of our affections so in love with the things commanded that we are thereby made more holy And thus I interpret those Authors that deny the law to be instrumental to holiness that is not animated by Gods Spirit or separated from it An. Now you should address your self to encounter and you begin to shrink in diffidence doubtless of your cause which you perceive so unjustifiable that no advocate will be found to patronize it for did not you in pag. 187. say that you suppose Christ Jesus hath obtained by his death that such efficacy and vertue should go forth of the ministery that whether it be law or Gospel the souls might be healed and converted And now you seem to be no longer of that minde that by the power of the law we come to obey the law which as you mean it is all one with conversion If we come not by the power of the law to obey then it is by the power of the Gospel onely and so we agree If you reply You mean by no power inherent in the law I say There is no inherent or physical vertue neither in the Gospel to effect our conversion 2. Now the question must be onely whether Grace may not use the law c. This is the liberty you can allow your self to alter and to state the question as best liketh you If you misliked the form and terms wherein you found it why became you opponent And now your expressions in this be so uncouth and improper as that grace may use the precepts c. and your meaning in the residue so obscure and doubtful and I so unwilling to wrong you the least jot that I had rather forbear then meddle any further I shall deliver my minde how pertinent to your question or satisfactory to your self it shall prove I know not thus This word of God which revealeth the riches of grace and exceeding kindness in giving righteousness and salvation to the soul is the true and proper instrument for the inslaming of the affections in love both to God his law and all the things of God and the law neither maketh to love God nor its owne commands And here you so mince it that your expression onely is to make us more holy as if already you granted now that the law doth not instrumentally initiate or work sanctification at first but increase it afterward consider this well Lastly Those Authors you mean are not beholden unto you for your so gross and
doth include others also even all that the Father gave him in that prayer I still incline to their judgement 4. You say the word doth not onely signifie c. whereas the word onely is not there but now is foisted in by you 5. And your meer reason why to sanctifie cannot comprehend justification or renovation is because these cannot be applyed to Christ who saith For their sakes I sanctifie my self that they also may be sanctified through thy truth Answ This is much against you as I conceive For 1. did not Christ sanctifie himself viz. his humane nature that he might be the root cause and means of communicating righteousness and holiness both to justifie renew and change them 2. Neither will it follow on the other hand that a word of so extensive a sense may not as it is aplyed to Christ be taken more strictly or in one sense onely and to his Elect more largely as it agreed to their condition M. B. If sanctification do here include justification how by the Antinomian principle can our Saviour pray for the justification of them that were already justified Answ Answer your self how do you aske forgiveness of sins in the Lords Prayer and yet believe they are forgiven in your Creed 2. His prayer is extended also to all that afterward should come to believe through their word and ministery M. B. But in the next place grant sanctification for renovation how doth this prove that the law is not used instrumentally for our Saviours argument is universal They word is truth and may not this be affirmed of the Law as well as of Gospel Answ Our Saviours words be indefinite But why pass you over these words in that very place pag. 164. which be so material so pertinent and satisfactory to this your query viz But if we note well what this word of truth is it will be more evident for this end compare with this that place Eph. 1.13 and Col. 1. where the word of truth is said to be the Gospel of salvation and the Antithesis used in John 1.17 sheweth that it is a special and peculiar prerogative of the Gospel to be called by that name by way of excellency as also Calvin Piscator c. affirm Thus far in the Assertion unto all which you stand not onely mute without a word of reply but here you ask a question which they answered before you formed it and so would have prevented It s granted the Law strictly taken is truth but as it is observed by all the learned the Gospel in many like places is so called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 M. B. The next instance is Tit. 2.11 12. For the grace of God bringeth salvation teaching t is c. Answ All this may be granted and nothing maketh against this opinion for none deny the Gospel to be instrumental Answ But the place doth import it to be peculiar to the Gospel for that word of grace or the grace of God appearing in that word that bringeth salvation teacheth to deny ungodliness c. And I put not in that word effectually ambiguously as you charge me but to avoid and prevent all ambiguity for I grant the Law teacheth these same things materially but not with efficacy and success as doth the Gospel the Spirit being pleased to utter such divine force and vertue in that Ministery unto the Elect. M. B. But is not here a contradiction The Author before made the Gospel and promise all one whereas here it doth command holiness and godliness Is not this with the Papists to make a new Law let him reconcile himself Answ You are better skilled in tying knots then in unloosing any If the Gospel and promise be all one that is not of my making I found them so Gal. 3.18 as is shewed before and see that you both take and leave them so according to the true intent of Scripture 2. You say It commandeth but there is no such word in the text but teaching to deny that is instrumentally The holy Ghost is that spiritual unction that teacheth believers and doth it effectually by the Gospel Unctio docet vos Spiritus S. efficax est per praedicat Evangelii saith Piscator on 1 John 2.27 And this they receive saith he as the members from the head the branches for the vine But this is not wrought by nor effected onely by a literal and outward command The Spirit moveth and teacheth a spirit and cometh from the union with Christ I wish your Tenets did not more interfere with Papists But I forbear Now you may see how your thoughts need reconciling not my opinions the light by this hath happily done it Lastly do you deny that grace moveth or teacheth effectually because that all are not thereby effectually turned unto holiness then God worketh nothing effectually in any because he doth not in every one not in Peter because not in Iudas else to what purpose do you make this flourish M. B. Beside the Argument may be retorted upon him What word teacheth to deny ungodliness c. that sanctifieth c. but the law doth so Psal 119. A young man whose lusts are strongest c. may be cleansed by attending thereunto Answ But as it is retorted it hath no force in it for every word that teaceth doth not sanctifie therefore although the Law do teach it is no consequence your proposition is not universally true so you conclude nothing What say you of Philosophical precepts and instructions and of the dictating and teaching of every natural conscience do these sanctifie onely this word of grace that bringeth salvation doâ—â— so indeed if you mean Pharisaical washing of the outside onely as of hands cares eyes c. these laws have washed their disciples and hearers witness Paul before his conversion to the faith a man touching the Law blameless the whole generation of the Pharisees Aristides Socrates c. but what soul insides had they full of pride malice envy infidelity c. And many that I know of your legal stamp which like him that was born of the bond-woman condemn and persecute the children of the promise Gal. 4.29 That place in Psa 119. proveth no more but that a young man may be cleansed by attending to the word and who is against that or what maketh it for your opinion But that of Peter Martyr is most for our assertion for if the Law attain such effects onely when it is written in the hearts or bowels which cometh by the new Covenant Jer. 31. then it is not by the outward commandments or ministry of it And surely he could not conceive as you say that the Spirit doth use the Law to write it self in the heart but as both he and others affirm this is effected by the Gospel so Lex sola fide suffulta est The Law is established by the preaching of Faith which is the thing we contend for and you have brought nothing to weaken much less to overthrow
the Law Rom. 3.20 Rom. 7.7 Also you are much deceived when you say that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is as much as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 See 1 Cor. 15.45 The first Adam was made 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a living soul nor as if he could quicken himself or others for that is peculiar to God himself no man as yet quickned his own soul And the opposition in that place sheweth the great difference between those two words for it followeth The last Adam was made 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a quickning spirit in that he both quickned himself being dead and quickneth all his members Lastly see that place Gal. 3.2 If there had been a Law which could have given life 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 righteousness should have been by the Law In which words Paul intimates that there was never Law given that could vivifie or which had any quickening vertue to impart or communicate unto any I will not trouble you with commentaries directly contradicting and overthrowing your exposition of that place because I perceive you so abound in your own sence that their judgement is not esteemed by you and you have greater store of them to satisfie you when you please then I have And lest you should be mistaken you adde Not that we could have life by vertue of any obedience but when we by grace are inabled to obey them c. Now I thought that you rather should have thus said as more pertinent to the question in hand But that they do instrumentally vivifie convert and give us life to obey them But in this saying of yours you grant as much as we contend for for if grace that cometh by the Gospel do inable us to obey the Law then it is not the Law that instrumentally doth convert and give life and strength to walk in it And your last clause is dangerously ambiguous seeming to import that Christ is not our salvation of himself without our works or obedience to the Law you will speak out more plainly and fully in some other place And you give us a poor reason why you inclined to this your opinion viz. because Socinians deny grace and justification under the Law or old Testament as if there were no middle way to take which could like you but either you must run on the rocks on one side or other Incidit in Scyllam c. Mr. B. And thus I come to another question which is the proper and immediate ground of strife between the Antinomians and us and from whence they have their name And that is the abrogation of the morall Law Answ Toto Coelo erras This is not the controversie except you mean that you do assert the Abrogation of it for it may sooner and more easily be concluded from your tenets then any of ours who hold the Law to be inviolable but this may appear afterward 2. If their name be from hence then if you prove them not guilty of the Abrogation of the Law you and others have falsly accused and standered them for Antinomians and now you for ever quit them from that aspersion I will be bold before the encounter if he that shall prove guilty of the abrogation of it in whole or in part shall be the Antinomian then mutato nomine de te narratur fabula look to your self Mr. B. Paul maketh an objection and he doth it for this end to take away the calumny and reproach cast upon him by his Adversaries as one that would destroy the Law Do we make void the Law Answ If you and your partners in your ministery did go with a right foot in the foot in the Gospel or tread in his steps the same would be charged upon you and you might be glad to pretend or wipe off such aspersions Hoc nomine pessime audiebat inter Judaeos non mode Paulus sed Dominus queque ipse acsi tota sua praedicatione legis abrogationem moliretur Nunquam tanta cautio c. Christ himself saith Calvin who is the wisdom of God could not so preach the doctrine of free-Grace but some took occasion from his words as you from ours to say or think he destroyed the Law hence was that prohibition Do not think I came to destroy the Law Matth. 5.17 Do you think your self more wise or wary in your Preaching then Christ or Paul was if not suspect your self in that you bear not the like reproach When innocency is thus traduced Presertim ver◠facile obtinet falsa hac imaginatio inter vos qui prepostera legis intelligentia c. Calv. and condemned quis stabit The Disciple is not above his Master if Christ and Paul were counted Antinomians Abrogaters of the Law who will not take up the same Cross And it is remarkeable by whom they were so opposed and aspersed even by the preposterous Zelots of Moses Law a generation which ever have and will hinder the free passage of the Gospel and disturb the peace of the Church like Cain Ishmael c. I thought here to have ended Sic ergo nes meminerimus Evangelium dispensare ut nostro decendi modo lex stabiliatur sed nulla alia firmitaetu quam fide Christi suffulta Id. but that in the closure I observe that you approve of Austins intepretation viz. The Law is established because by the Gospel we obtain grace in some measure to fulfill the law we obtain it not then by the Law and do obtain by faith in Christ still not by the Law then obedience in some degree to it Your eyes are strangely holden if you see not how this interpretation maketh fully for us and wholly against your self You adde Which obedience though it be not the Covenant of grace yet is the way to salvation Now there is nothing out of the covenant of grace can be proved to be in a strict and prosense the way to salvation Ubi ad Christum ventum est primum i◠eo invenitur exacta legi◠justitia quae por imputationem etiam nostra sit deinde sanctificatio qua sermantur cordae nostra ad legis observantiam c. Calv. To believe in Christ is the onely way to it Act. 16.31 Mark 16. Christ dwelleth in the heart by faith and he that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life Joh. 3.36 By attributing too much to the Law and our works you obscure the glory of Christ and of free-grace mingle Law and Gospel entangle and deject the hearts of the faithfull carry them from Christ and that union in spirit with him hinder the right exercise of faith and prayer c. for you teach that by the Law we receive grace conversion sanctification so that the Law enliveth filleth buildeth satisfieth It doth not make us poor feeble humble empty nothing in our selves that so we may seek out for all receive and live by faith in Christ our head grow up in him and so be built up in this way of
contradiction but it is in your own tenets which cross and overthrow one another And you deny God to have any Soveraigne or Reigning power in his Law but onely a Ruling and that also with much mitigation and abatement of rigour in his justice which yet is as indefinite as unwarrantable In ruling and commanding by his Law he may promise no peace life nor good say you unto the obedient nor threaten and condemn the disobedient Thus you exauthorize God in the Kingdom of his Law and put him down from two parts of his justice and power regall Mr. B. The Law is no more abrogated to a believer under the old Testament then to one under the new Answ You mean it is as much abrogated that is nothing at all Mr. B. They carry it as if it were abrogated onely to believers under the Gospel Now how can this ever be made good for either they must deny that there were any believers under the old Testament or if there were then they are freed from it as much as any man Answ Indeed we hold and teach according to the Scriptures that in the daies of the Gospel God calleth unto and maketh his elect partakers of a far more free excellent and comfortable state and condition then was before Christ as Galat. 4.1 2. Now I say that the Heire as long as he is a Child differeth nothing from a servant though he be Lord of all But is under Tutors untill the time appointed by the Father You say Either we must deny that there were any believers under the old Testament or they were freed as much as any now Let any of a mean capacity but mark the Apostles words The Heir so long as he is a Child differeth nothing from a servant c. this representeth the state of believers in that Infantile age which differeth not from a servant how then say you that they were freed from the Law as much as now will you make the condition of the Child being six or seven yeers old and so kept under his Guardian and Tutor to be as free as when being of full age he is at his own disposing You say If the Law be taken for the whole administration you grant it was Pedagogicall and more servile But was not this servility principally yea and as concerning the conscience and the spirituall state of the soul solely caused by the Morall Law which like a thick cloud and dark of sin and wrath Rom. 3.21 Rom. 4.15 did interrupt and hinder their light and make the Heavens black over their heads so that they could not all that while break perfectly thorow that veil which lay so on them the sacrifices and other ceremonies indeed were a burthen and bondage in respect of the outward state but not as pertaining to the conscience which is chiefly intended by Paul And therefore it must be understood of that servility they were in by the Morall Law more then now and in regard of this Morall Law especially saith Calvin were they said to be under a heavy yoke as Act. 15.10 And how can the Law Pedagogically taken be the same to them as to us in respect of justification and salvation as you tell us whereas you granted this Administration to be altogether antiqnated pag. 205. l. 20. Mr. B. If then we speak of the Law in regard of the essential parts of it which are directing and commanding threatning and promising life upon perfect obedience these are still equally in power or else equally abrogated to all believers under the old or new Testament Answ If these all and every of them be now confessed to be essentiall parts of the Law then none of these be appendices or meer accessaries as D. Tailer accounteth them and you in pag. 59. do make direction and obligation the onely essentiall parts of a Law and threatnings and premises to be but consequences required ad bene esse so inconsistent and mutable are you in your positions And if these also be essentiall why did you oppose it in the Assertion of grace Againe then to abrogate any of these is more then to diminish one Apex or Iota of the Law and so who now is become least in the Kingdome of God But lastly the Law in regard of these is not equally in power to the faithfull under both Testaments for it is more then evident that the believing Jews were put under the teaching and government of it as a Child in non-age is made subject to his Schoolmaster or Tutor and that by the will and appointment of God Gala. 4 13. Gala. 3.23 Before faith came we were kept under the Law c. 24. Wherefore the Law was our Schoolmaster unto Christ 25. But after faith is come we are no longer under a School-master Now the time appointed by God the Father was till the resurrection of Christ which he calleth the coming of faith or tempus Evangelii the time of preaching the Gospel to all for the obedience of faith and hereby he calleth and bringeth his Church into a more fice and happy condition therefore now is the Church said to receive the Adoption of the Sonnes Gala. 4.5 that is say Interpreters The liberty and right pertaining to Sonnes which was not granted before Christ was exhibited And saith Calvin Truly Paul doth not speak here only of the ceremonies nor of the Morall Law severally but comprehendeth the whole oeconomy or Ministery of Moses by which God then governed his people And if the whole then it followeth that the Law Morall is not now equally in power as then Also do not you say that the Morall Law is onely now of force to a believer in the mandative and directive part but not in the promissive or threatning So that it concerneth you to consider that those Arments for subjection under the old Testament are not so strong and valid against believersnow sith the Church is in the condition of the Heir that is grown up and of ripe age Mr. B. Therefore it is wild divinity of an Antinomian Hony C. pag. 6. who makes three different estates of the Church 1. Vnder the Law 2. Vnder John the Baptist 3. Vnder the Gospel Answ Why is it wilde In that it groweth not in your Garden or liketh not your fancy so also there are other pretious truths like choice flowers which are disliked and cast out as unsavory weeds by your Doctrine and Ministery You should have shewed some cause of distaste which you do not unless you include it in these words He compareth these together and sheweth how we under the Gospel exceed those of the Law c. but here I see that as you cannot receive it for truth so you dare not plainly reject it for errour The Authour in that point hath given full satisfaction to the indifferent Reader otherwise I should adde much more There is great difference between the time of promise and of exhibition or performance It was revealed unto the Prophets that
to meddle with by-matters You then shew what a Covenant is And as here you say You find much difference of judgement so I say You are unhappily perswaded to incline to the most unlikely unfound and palpably erronious opinion of all others if yet you have any to travel and go with you in your way but you love cross and by-wayes that you may be better noted to become famous or infamous Mr. B. The Law as to this purpose may be considered more largely as that whole doctrine delivered on Mount Sinai with the preface and promises adjoyned and all things that may be reduced to it or more strictly as it is an abstracted rule of righteousness holding forth life upon no terms but perfect obedience Now take it in the former sence it was a Covenant of grace take it in the later it was not of grace but of works Answ This is first to be premised and we take it as granted by you that however you consider the Law yet you mean onely the moral Law Yet you will not be contented with the simple and entire law as it is an absolute law in it self but do take in also unto it the preface promises and all things reduceable your extent of it is now become large indeed and to me indefinite What you draw in and reduce to it who knoweth But I smell some feare and diffidence in this great enterprize your own thoughts being apprehensive of the unjustifiableness of this strange and bold assertion you would not therefore be too narrowly kept in but will take more scope and ground then is allowable but let this pass and to come to a more particular reply Methinks the Pieface it self should have been sufficient to have stopt you in this your way or opinion Thus it is recorded Exod. 20.2 and Deut. 5.6 I am the Lord thy God which brought thee out c. out of which I collect and it is plain and undenyable That God was their God and Israel his people before the giving of the Law and that he did not in these words express his wilingness and consent to be their God if or upon condition they will keep these his Commandments which you call the first thing belonging to a Covenant therefore he saith Hear I am thy God that is I am now already thy God namely by free promise in the seed of the woman Gen. 3. or as it was made to Abraham and his posterity Gen 12.3 Gal. 3.6 To Abraham and his seed were the promises made And unto this promise or Covenant of grace then which I know no other in simple nature and essence or substance they had given and professed their consent formerly by their faith and externally by receiving circumcifion the signe of the Covenant and so avouched God to be their only God in Christ and themselves his people through him And he being their God and King it pleased him now to deliver unto them his will in this way and form of Government according to which he would rule them and they were to conform themselves to his pleasure herein 2. And this promise given by God and believed on by them so long before this promulgation and solemne delivery of the Law was entire of it self containing perfection of doctrine and holding out a free and clear way to pardon reconciliation and life And therefore it was singly made preached at first to Adam and Abraham with his posterity so that Paul saith Gal. 3.18 God gave the Inheritance that is all the blessedness belonging to a Child bylpromse denying and excluding the Law in this And hence is it that to prevent all objections against the doctrine of free grace Paul saith Rom. 5.20 Moreover the Law entered that the offence might abound 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 id est 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is the Law entered besides the promise of grace which was the prime and principall doctrine and it entered into the Church or among the people of God and yet neither to disannull nor to adde any thing unto the former Covenant or promise Gal. 3.15 as if of imperfect before it was to be perfected thereby Nor yet as if it were to be mingled with the promise and so to adulterate it but it was to be kept distinct from it as being of another nature and for another end contrary to that of the promise The Law was to uncover sin terrifie the conscience exclude the soul from Gods favour and presence the promise to cover to pacifie and comfort and to admit or give entrance again with confidence through faith in Christs blood The Law was to make sin abound that upon that occasion the ampleness and efficaciousness of the grace promised in Christ might be more abundant And as for the promises of the Law Piscator telleth you That they are to be excluded the Covenant of grace as being of a diverse nature or quality from those promises of grace The promise of grace is Nuda simplex gratuita the legall promises are Conditionales But now we will consider by what Scriptures and Reasons you would confirm it First you say Mr. B. There is nothing more ordinary with Paul in these controversies then to consider the Law so differently as take this instance Rom. 10.5.6 where he descibeth the righteousness of the Law from these words Do and live c. We find this in effect Deut. 30.16 and yet from this very chap. The Apostle describes the righteousness which is by faith And Beza doth acknowledge that that which Moses speaks of the Law Paul applieth to the Gospel Answ We might expect a more plain and clear text then this which is so knotty and difficult that it hath troubled the best commentators if yet you could produce any â—er verbum entelligit M. Legem quam Dominus voce sua promulgavit P. autom ad praedicationem Evangelii quae fuit Legis perfectio accommodat B. but your poor shift and nakedness is manifest If you stand here to Beza his words make directly against you What Moses speaks of the Law Paul applieth to the Gospel saith he Moses said thus of the Law and Paul of the Gospel Thus then by his interpretation 1. The Law is not one with the Gospel nor doth it comprehend it but containeth a doctrine in kinde differing from the Gospel or Covenant of grace 2. He seemeth to be of that judgement with many others that Paul doth but allude to that place in Moses and doth not directly and purposely cite Moses for confirmation and this is most probable in that something is added some left out and something altered Calvin thinkes the knot may easily be untied Sed totam in genere doctrinam quae â—vangelium sub se compreâ—endat c. thus If by the word we understand not the law but the whole doctrine of God in general as it comprehendeth the Gospel for saith he The word of the Law never cometh of it self to be in the
heart no not in the least syllable of it untill it be there implanted by the faith of the Gospel Note you well this by the way And however the learned vary somewhat about this yet I can read no word favouring your odde Opinion Now come we to your Arguments Mr. B. The first shall be taken from the relation of the covenanters Argn. 1 God on the one part and the Israelits on the other God did not deal as this time as absolutely considered but as their God and their Father hence God saith he is their God And when Christ quoteth the Commands he brings the Preface Hear O Israel the Lord thy God is one Rom. 9.4 Now unless this were a Covenant of grace how could God be their God who were sinners Answ God dealt with them now not absolutely indeed but yet with relation to his promise formerly made by meanes of which he had freely chosen and taken them to be his peculiar people having long before said to Abraham I will be a God to thee and to thy seed after thee Gen. 17.7 And hereupon the constant Martyr Mr. Bradford intending to comfort one dejected and distreffed in mind upon consideration of some failing or want of obedience as I remember writeth to this effect Let this cogitation be still in your mind that before God aske any thing of us he saith he is ours I am the Lord thy God giving himself and then all he hath to be ours And this he doth in respect of himself of his own mercy and truth and not in respect of us for then were grace no grace In consideration whereof saith the Martyr Whatever he commands though of duty we be bounden to accomplish and be culpable and guilty if not yet he requireth the same no further of us then to make more in love and more certaine of this his covenant That he is our Lord God which is made in respect of his grace in Christ Jesus and dependeth nothing on our obedience So this Covenant is most free and most sure for ever and the onely refuge and plea of the soul in the hour of tentation It is more then evident then that God as now so from the first stood reconciled to his people in Christ Jesus and in him became their God and took them into that happy relation of being his people his peculiar treasure and Children And all your Scriptures if now you look on them again do hold forth this and can speak no other truth What infirmity is this Cannot God take a people into Covenant with himself and become their God and Father in Christ his Son and yet govern and put them under the Law but we must then inferre either that all his grace and favour is conditional or else the Law we are made to live under for a time is a Covenant of grace Argn. 2 Mr. B. If we consider the good things annexed to this Covenant it must needs be a Covenant of grace for there we have remission of sin whereas in the Covenant of works there is no way for repentance or pardon In the second Commandment God is described to shew mercy to thousands c. Answ If God promise and shew mercy in this way of obedience as we Parents also commonly do deal with our Children looking pleasantly upon them using them kindly c. when we find them most dutifull and tendering and receiving them lovingly and gently upon their submission after some failing will you so farre forget the truth and your self as to infer and conclude thence that the Covenant is established on our obedience It is one word and way by which we are begotten and become Children to God our Father and he may rule us and shew us favour by another word and way especially whilst we be in minority as Gal. 4.1 2 3. And what could keep the Children of Israel in the conscience of their many faults and failings from despair or what could erect their spirits and preserve still a confidence and cheerfull hope in them was it not as Mr. Bradford said That knowledge and inward perswasion that God was their Father and they his Children by a free and faithfull promise of meer grace in Christ to come Mr. B. 3. Argn. 3 If we consider the duties commanded in the Law so generally taken it must needs be a Covenant of grace for what is the meaning of the first Commandment but to have one God in Christ our God by faith Answ What is said to the other Deus Pater seipsum in Christo abscondidit ita ut nusquam alibi quam in Christo quaeramus agnoscamus c. resolveth this also for this Commandment presupposeth that God was their God and did not now by his Law become their God by promise in the Messiah to come on his part and by faith receiving it on their side And to keep them to his faith in Christ and to prevent defection or Idolatry he propounds himself to be known and acknowledged onely in Christ the promised seed saying I am thy God in my Christ that so they might love him trust and delight in him Mr. B. From the ceremonial Law Argn. 4 All Divines say That this is reduced to the Morall so that sacrifices were commanded by vertue of the second Commandment Now all know that the sacrifices were Evangelical and did hold forth remission of sins c. then there must be grace included Answ Now I understand what you would have reduced to the morall Law And in this passage of yours I observe divers strange things as 1. That the ceremoniall should be reduced to the morall as if the one were not entire and absolute of it self without the other or that they were not distinct species under the same genus the whole Ministration by Moses being divided into Law morall ceremoniall judiciall so that every of the three is absolute of it self for the matter and doctrine contained in it and in respect of the end and use it was given for 2. You cannot let us see one syllable concerning the sacrifices in the second Command The Lord delivered by the same authority he had over them and as equally and immediately required the observation of each of these which in nature and office were so distinct And the charging of Israel with all and every of them is grounded still upon this I am thy God therefore was it that his people were to be instructed governed and ordered as he pleased He signified his will and mind in the matters of faith by the ceremoniall Law 2. Touching morality and duty in the morall 3. And what concerned the polity and republique in the judiciall Law I see not but that you may as well reduce the judiciall to the first Commandment or to the second Table as the ceremoniall to the second Commandment and thus confound all making but one Law 3. And I marke another thing viz. That in this you have one eye and respect to
the consent or opinion of Divines as the best yea sole reason and warrant you have for this whereas you regard not their concurrence in other things 4. Your inference is as strange viz. That there must then necessarily be grace included in the morall Law for suppose your reducement be true yet the same grace was still contained and kept in the ceremoniall as before and it could import no whit of its native vertue or as a physicall ingredient infuse its spirit strength or force to alter and qualifie the Law of works for then grace were no more grace nor works no more works If you make the morall so capacious as to receive into it the other as a greater Orbe the lesser or as your Chest doth a box of oyntment or the Ark the Pot of Manna yet there is no necessity of any influence from one into the other or of any thing to be poured out of one vessell into another but all that grace of remission of sins c. was still preserved and kept in the ceremoniall Law and so no grace in the morall 4. If the Apostle did speak as much against the ceremoniall as morall Law was it not because the people had no further respect then to the act observance or thing done resting in the bare use without faith in Christ the onely treasure hid and propounded in and by them and so they made that to be worke which was grace and so no difference between ceremoniall and morall things Sincere accepâ—â— non sunt proâ—â—ie opera hoâ—â—num sed â—â—ei nam niâ—â—l agimus sed â—â—ferimus nos â—â—eo ad recipiâ—â—ndam ejus â—â—vatiam Cal. And being thus perverted the continuance and use of circumcision and the sacrifices did oppose Christ and grace though they did not so as they were instituted and commanded by God to be used Sacrifices and Sacraments be Gods Ordinances which rightly understood and taken and purely used are not properly mans works but Gods He propoundeth and commendeth thereby unto us his grace and the work of redemption by Jesus Christ the sole object that our faith is to look at and to be exercised about in the use of them If we handle them sincerely we bring no work nothing for acceptation with God but onely are receivers of what he freely giveth unto us It s an easie and too common an errour to turn all into works even Baptism and the Lords Supper whereby the simple nature and verity of them is extinguished and lost Christ profiteth none but such as despairing of Law and works do by faith she onely unto the promise of his grace If a man seek help or comfort in any one act or work he is then bound to seek the same in all the works of the Law and so is a debter to fulfill the whole Law and is quite fallen from grace so is it Gal. 5.2 3 4. Behold I Paul say unto you that if you be circumcised namely in that perswasion that that act will avail you any thing Christ shall not profit you at all c. 5. Lastly This say you hath been alway a strong Argument to perswade you c. And there appeareth no strength in it but it is as weak silly and poor as any and whereas you say alwaies I understand you thus viz. since you entertained that conceit that the Law of works is a Covenant of grace by a mistake herein you might be confirmed in that errour but what bred or occasioned that opinion at first And we now having the same morall Law how is it if the ceremoniall be included in that second Commandment that it doth not bind us also to sacrifice be circumcised c. as it did the Jews else we have not all in the Law Mr. B. This will appear from the visible seal to ratifie the Covenant Argn. 5 which was by sacrifices and sprinkling the people with blood and this did signifie Christ the Mediatour of this Covenant Answ Interpreters vary about the meaning of that Covenant-book or Testament that was sprinkled with blood Exod. 24. If you will contend it was the Law largely taken even for what was delivered on Mount Sinai In which large acceptation that Law blood of sprinkling and other ceremonies then used were typicall and shadows of future good things Heb. 10.1 then you exclude the Morall Law strictly taken as a rule of righteousness for it was not typicall And now what have you gained by making this a Covenat of grace which the Jews lived under or where or what grace is found in the morall Law But when Moses took the blood and sprinkled it on the people and said Behold the blood of the Covenant which the Lord hath made with you Exod. 24.8 your Marginall note telleth you It was to signifie that the Law being broken by us could alone be satisfied by the blood and death of Christ Let Moses be typicall Mediatour yet it followeth not that it was not a covenant of works if you take it for the Law morall but contrarily that it was no other for a Mediator was therefore needfull because by the Law the people were convinced that there was dissention and variance between God and them in that they were proved to be transgressors of that his Law and the enmity was to be slain and abolished and a reconcilement made by a middle person Argn. 6 The residue of this Section I leave as dubious and obscure of whom you mean I know not Mr. B. If the Law was that same Covenant with that Oath God made to Isaac then it must needs be a Covenant of grace But c. Therefore God remembers what he had promised to Abraham Deut. 7.2 It shall come to pass if ye hearken to these judgements and do them that the Lord thy God shall keep unto thee the Covenant and mercy which he sware unto thy Fathers Answ Nothing is more evident by this place then that the Law requiring these judgements to be hearkened unto and done was a distinct doctrine from that Covenant made with them in their Fathers For 1. God requires of them the doing of the one but promises that he himself will keep the other the Covenant and the mercy so that this wholly rests and relyeth on him 2. He calls and commendeth himself first to be the Lord their God not upon condition of their doing or obedience but before he required it and as the ground of commanding it 3. The Covenant and mercy was made long before and confirmed by Oath in the dayes of their Fathers these stand all in that text fully against you and for us Yet he dealing with them as a Father with his Children is willing to manifest his faithfulness and love in keeping Covenant and promise made long before in that way of their obedience and dutifulness but that he made that Covenant the same with the Law is denied as utterly false If you say to your Child he shall find you a loving and kind
Father to him so that he will be dutiful and obedient to you now you are not his Father nor he your Child upon this condition though in this way you may manifest and express your affections at your pleasure Now take a view of your six Arguments and let us know what be your second thoughts of them and also your answer to those places so fully meeting and opposing you in this your way as the Angell did Balaam in his way is infirm and nothing satisfactory Mr. B. If that in Gal. 3.18 and Rom. 4.14 be rigidly and universally true then the doctrine of the Socinians would plainly prevail who from these do urge there was no grace nor faith nor nothing of Christ vouchsafed unto the Jews whereas they had the adoption though their state was a state of bondage Answ 1. Truth is to be received in love to it for it self though no errour nor danger a thing impossible should be prevented by it 2. If Socinians do urge those places to inferre that no grace c. come by the Law but by the promise onely made and given long before let us see how you would except against this but both you and the Socinians are wide and deceived though not in the same way 3. They had the adoption indeed but that was by faith in the promised seed and the putting them under that pedagogy of Moses made their state so servile What you say in the rest of this Lecture hath been presented to us before where also the answer and satisfaction is to be found LECT XXV Rom. 3.27 Where is beasting then c. I Cannot cease to muse that you so prosecute your matter in this large acception and sense of the Law knowing that the question is of the morall strictly taken You chuse rather to keep the thickets and bushes then to appear in the open plains we may guess why Yet take notice that the doctrine you raise doth not grow from your text no not in your own exposition for you expound it of the Law of works strictly taken as it is opposed to the Law of faith But your doctrine you so frame and carry as that you tell us The Law as a Covenant of grace given to the Israelites in some sense doth oppose the grace of the Gospel which assertion suppose true yet is no fruit of this tree hath not its rise from your text 2. Being witty to coyne and devise things of your own head without Scripture-ground you say it is for this end viz. To discover the nature of the Law and Gospel a fair pretence and promise without reality of performance for you rather cover and darken then otherwise 3. You bring in Calvin to little purpose who distributes the Law into three kindes and he doth not say that the morall Law differeth only from the Gospel in regard of clearer manifestation but denyeth it to have or contain any grace in it and so in nature and kinde to differ from the Gospel or word of grace and not gradually onely And the like may be said of Pareus 4. You have often received what is thought of your so often sod Coleworts presented here again to the Reader that they under the Law did enjoy grace c. viz. that they had it not by the Law c. Mr. B. That the doctrine of the Law in the more preceptive nature of it may be compared with the doctrine of the Gospel having the grace of God axnexed to it and going along with it now this in some respects is an unequall comparison Answ Why do you now more straiten the Law then did Calvin in that his testimony who takes the Law for that rule of life in which God requireth of us that which is his own giving us no ground of hope unless in every respect we walke according to it And you tell us of the Gospel having the grace of God annexed to it c. as if the Gospel could be separated from that grace which is the subject matter of it for doth the Gospel speak of or hold forth unto us any thing else beside the grace of God is so proper and peculiar to the Gospel that not one word of it is mentioned in the Law for the Law is of works and the Gospel is called the word of his grace But perhaps you will say By grace you mean the spirit of life that reneweth and quickeneth the soul if you do so yet it hath been cleared that although the Spirit do not alway and in all produce and work this work of renovation yet the Gospel is the ordinary instrument that is used for this and not the Law That expression of yours If you take the doctrine or letter of the Gospel without the grace of God is very improper for it is as if you could take the writing without the matter it specifieth and entreateth of Again observe that the difference between the letter of the Gospel and the letter of the Law as you call them is in that the Law is said then to kill when the spirit worketh effectually by it for then sin reviveth in the conscience and so J died saith Paul Rom. 7.9 and so the Commandment was found to be to death ver 10. but the Gospel then killeth and leaveth in death and condemnation when the spirit worketh not in the heart to receive and mingle it by faith Heb. 4.2 Joh. 3.19 2 Cor. 4.4 Your counsel is good to make the parallel equal but this is unequal in you still to make Law and Gospel equally and alike the instrument of grace and life Mr. B. pag. 2 3 4. I come to the Antinomian difference and there I finde such a one that I am confident was never heard of before In Hony Comb God saith he saw sin in believers of the old Testament but not in the new c. Answ Our weakness makes us stumble and to be offended where no cause is sometime and with too much confidence to condemn or reject such pretious truths as are received and justified by the Children of wisdome I have spoken before to this phrase In sobriety of mind ponder this The Scripture doth not say that Christ did actually take and do away sin till he came and shed his blood for that purpose and the object of their faith in the old Testament was the promise of future good things to be done and wrought by Christ when the fulness of time appointed came Gal. 4.4 so that God is said to have patience in bearing with his people till he received full satisfaction Rom. 3.25 and this finished and plenary work of redemption that the Gospel holdeth forth to us was the object of their hope who onely lived in a certain expectation of it according to the promise yet did that faith and hope both sustain save and serve them sufficiently according to that their condition wherein it pleased the Father to place them Their Gospel in brief was That Christ should appear and
grant you repentance Amen Mr. Rutherf pag. 575. There is a twofold keeping in of sinners one meerly legal they care not for Mr. T. Gaole Reply The law is not my Gaole but Gods and both they and you may be made to minde it more then either yet doth you speak too contemptibly Mr. Rutherf Mr. T. will have the believer so free so perfect as the law needs not to teach nor direct him in one stop he doth all without a keeper by the free compulsion of a Spirit separated from Scriptures which is right down A believer is neither under law nor Gospel but a Spirit separated from both guides him Reply When I say the Spirit of the Lord is his keeper do I teach then he hath no keeper 2. He receiveth the Spirit that leads him by the Gospel how false then is your charge who speak or dream of a spirit separated from Gospel and not I. And yet the Spirit breatheth and bloweth in the heart and the voice or sound of it is there heard when there is no sillable of outward Law or Gospel but you have sufficient answer before As for your instances of Joseph and David I ask of you whether it was the Spirit within that kept them from offending or the law T. pag. 5 6. I muse you omit to shew what it is to be under Grace Mr. Rutherf Dr. Taylor did not omit to shew what it is if you did not omit to read his words he is clear to any Reply Before you complained you could not see what was plain before you but now you can see what is not extant this is the fruit of partiality Mr. Rutherf But let your exposition stand you are not under the law as teaching directing regulating believers in the way of righteousness but the Gospel giveth power to subdue sin without any teaching or regulating power of the law But what is the power of subduing sin to the Antinomians not sanctification but justification that is a power to believe that Christ hath obeyed law for me we are obliged to no personal sanctification c. then to be inherently holy is unlawful to Antinomians Reply The exposition is not mine verbatim yet even in your owne expression the light of truth is so clear and convincing on our part that you turn your back on it as afraid to meddle And being disposed to take occasion to wrangle you demand what it is to subdue sin whereas it is set before you even the weakening of the power of sin within us that it domineer not over us Indeed the Prophet Micah 7.19 useth the phrase of subduing by justification and that is a true subduing it in the conscience that it there raign not to death condemnation And yet by your confession this must precede and is the proper cause of subduing it in conversation and then that will necessarily follow issuing out of this faith So that in fine this is but a Papistical cavil That to teach justification is the overthrow of holiness and good works Lastly whereas you tell of obliging to sanctification I answer we are to believe that God will sanctifie us and that throughout and put his Spirit into us to lead us in his wayes and so in that faith desiring and hungering after it to seek to him as a sick man longing for health unto his Physitian and to wait in the use of his ordinances that he may so perform The new Covenant properly requireth nothing of man but God knowing his spiritual poverty and utter disability calleth upon him to seek to him who worketh both the will and the deed of his owne pleasure Open thy mouth and I will fill it Psal 81. Your slanderous conclusion is both against the rule of Gods law and of all humane arts But such extravagancy becometh or still pleaseth Mr. Rutherford T. Assert pag. 6. I deny not the law to be an eternal and inviolable rule of righteousness yet the Grace of the Gospel doth truly and effectually conform us unto it Mr. Rutherf pag. 578. I ask to whom the law is a rule if to Believers then they must be under it 2. That rule the grace conformeth unto we must be under 3. An inviolable rule of justice cannot be violated without sin Then the Believer cannot violate the law and murder but they must sin and violate the rule c. Reply It s true the law is an inviolable rule but not to him as a Believer or in the things of his Faith but here he departs from it for he doth not the Law to be saved but believeth after the rule of the Gospel 2. If you consider him morally I see not but he may be conformed to the rule of the law and yet not under it but under grace and the rule of the spirit which conformeth him 3. In this your moral or civil conception of him you take him quite out of Christs kingdom where grace reigneth And now grant he doth murder and sin It is death and condemnation by the same rule and law so that he must be totally removed out of the limits of the law before he can be freed and secured from either sin or death You leave faith and fall from grace in all your arguments And they are as forcible to maintain the condemning power of the law to believers as the regulating for where the law regulates it may condemn and so it doth the best Saint here if you bring him and his life under it T. Assert pag. 7. Through faith is bred assured confidence lively hope c. M. Rutherf pag. 579. This is a close perverting of the word of truth the Antinomians faith may here be smelt then whoever once wavereth or doubteth are yet under the law of works A doctrine of despair to broken reeds who cry I believe help my unbelief Reply I must commend to you Jam. 1.6 7. But observe good Reader what is here excepted against viz. Through Faith in Christ is bred assured confidence lively hope pure love towards God invocation of his name without wavering fear or doubting not questioning his good will audience acceptance which would never be effected by all the zeal and conscience towards God according to the law of works And now judge impartially what truth can be current with Mr. Rutherf I aske 1. can assured confidence lively hope c. come or be effected any way else then by faith in Christ If there want light at Noon-day Read Heb. 3.9 where your Bible-Note saith That he calleth that excellent effect of faith whereby we cry Abba Father confidence and to confidence he joyneth hope which is termed a lively hope that God begets unto 1 Pet. 1.3 see also Heb. 10.22 23. Rom. 15.13 and 10.14 How shall they call on him on whom they have not believed But it is like this moveth M. Rutherf that it is said that these cannot be attained by all the zeal according to the law of works yet Paul clears it Eph. 2.18 That
through Christ we have entrance unto the Father and Eph. 3.12 By him we have boldness and entrance with confidence by faith in him If Mr. Rutherf object But these are not in full and absolute perfection where yet true faith may be Who saith so or who but Mr. Rutherf would so closely pervert the truth that I may retort his owne words Being justified by faith we have peace c. In whom believing ye rejoyce c. God hath begotten us againe to a lively hope c. Rom. 5.1 1 Pet. 1.3 8. Nay saith Mr. Rutherf This is a close perverting of the truth for he doubts not but that there are many weak believers of a trembling timerous and troubled spirit whose faith is not yet able to over-master their fears which cause torment and disquietness but I cease And Mr. Rutherf hereby smels our faith Reply Naribus utilis yet no unsavory errour And know it that it is the effect of the law of works upon the natural conscience and the unbelief of the Gospel that keep the soul in bondage through that slavish fear Mr. Rutherf ibid. The covenant of grace commands faith and also good works as witnesses of faith but Mr. T. will have good works in any Notion of an Evangelick command to stand at defiance with the covenant of grace Repl. What contend you for if you grant grace to be the fountain-cause of all holy walking then not the law 2. If it be a lively and free fountain then doth holiness issue out of it as a pleasant stream and how now do good works stand at defiance with the covenant of grace Besides it is said Catachrestiâ—â—s abusively and not properly that the covenant of grace commands faith and good works for it promiseth to give both to them who have power to neither Lastly these works are not done as conditions to obtain eternal life for that is said passim to be by faith without works faith for salvation good works for conversation Mr. Rutherf ibid. The man under the law cannot give himself to be ruled by the law after the minde and will of God as Mr. T. saith except Antinomians be Pelagians Reply It s a palpable wrong I have no such words as that a man under the law can give himself to be ruled by it after the mind and will of God you have a strange conscience that no better bridleth you though your affections be void of love to your Adversary I might more truely reply by your doctrine That a man under the law can do it for you free none from under it or else you are not ruled by it after the mind and will of God And that is most propable who now is the Pelagian But to deal plainly what say you of Paul and many zealous Jews who in earnest applied themselves to do the things of the Law so that Paul saith touching it he was blameless and that before his conversion to the faith To do it after the mind and will of God is your addition Mr. Rutherf Paul speaks of a man under the Law in the flesh and in opposition to that under Grace married to Christ he that is dead to the Law married to Christ and serves God spiritually And it 's clear the Apostle counts it a part of deliverance from the Law and a fruit of our marriage to Christ that we bring forth fruit to God walk holily and serve in newness of spirit Reply Jam convenimus What contend you for all is granted that I desire or said for 1. then Christ and not the Law as a husband makes fruitfull 2. Then there was a serving of God under the Law in the oldness of the letter 3. Where or how then find you me to be against holy walking and according to the rule of righteousness Is not this your false slander Assert How can Christ redeem us from the Law except in the same sense and extent that Christ was under it Mr. Rutherf 1. Christ was under the Law of Ceremonies I hope Gentiles were not under that Reply The question is of the moral and you talk vainly of ceremonial Mr. Rutherf If Christ was under the Law as a rule to free us from it why commands he to imitate him Reply Christ was under the Law for life even to obtaine favour and salvation for us so he is in the end of the Law for righteousness to all that believe 2. It is by his spirit and power any imitate him walking as he did and so do keep the Law as he did freely in love not for self-life or self-ends for so did Christ who sought not himself Assert pag. Mr. T. hath a strange evasion The spirit is free why will you controle and rule it by the Law whereas the nature of it is freely to conforme heart and life to the outward rule of the law without the help of the law as a crooked thing is made straight c. Mr. Rutherf To do the will of God meerly as commanded from the power of an outward commandment is legal saith Saltmatsh and Mr. T. saith it is to controul the free spirit Three means saith T. are passive to hear read receive Sacraments are so many restraints laid on the free spirit Reply I say again If the spirit rule you according to the Law then neither Law nor you do rule it but the Law is onely the rule or pattern according to which the Spirit formeth you What can be more plain to him that will see and grant any truth And this makes no contrariety but a sweet harmony between the word and the spirit yea and establisheth the Law by the faith and Spirit of the Gospel And here you would range us among the old Anabaptists Enthusiasts c. and love to expatiate having burst the banks and bounds of charity and truth I am not more strange to you then this is to me That you are of such a spirit 2. Where say I that meanes are passive The Spirit is pleased to blow sweetly by all Evangelical meanes as Preaching Prayer Sacraments c. and we rightly using them do carry our selves passively that the Spirit may thereby breath and give life to our Spirits and that we may have it more abundantly Mr. Rutherf What T. meaneth in saying The spirit freely conformeth the heart to it Reply The sense is easie and plain if your mind were not finister Mr. Rutherf If the meaning be that the Law of it self cannot convert a man to God Antinomians father most falsly such dreames on us but if the Spirit conform us to the outward rule of the Law then must the Law be yet a rule to our obedience Reply When you please you can spell out my meaning But 1. Whether it be your dream or no I leave it Yet you know that your Brethren so hold and teach and may be forced to own this brat or novell-assertion of theirs 2. As if Mr. Rutherf were in a dream he in his other book would seem
of the law and need no more make use of justification nor have Christ for our shadow and protection Mr. Rutherf p. 591. That the Saints are meer patients and blocks in all their holy walking is gross libertinisme Reply But how unjustly do you charge this upon your Adversary who saith onely in the act of sanctification in which the Spirit onely acteth Is not this to pervert what is spoken M. Rutherf No way cryeth to the conscience of the traveller This is the way as the law doth in its directing and ruling power c. Reply The law materially is resembled to the high-way and its true the high-way calleth not to the passenger to keep his way yet the authority of the King doth so call and require so then it is not the law as we consider it and speak of it but God the Author of the law who commandeth to walk in it And if God in so doing convince you of unrighteousness for your going astray Is not his grace in the Gospel your dayly needful refuge and plea or you still are in no danger nor fear because law cannot condemn for God say you is pleased with what the poor man can do or give Thus you live under a law securely which is as weak as your self and will be content with with any thing as you list or can obey Whereas I on the other side say that the law hath lost no power nor part of its perfection Matth. 5.17 18. And therefore it convinceth all of sin and condemneth such as are found under it because in many things we sin all In our best works we are found faulty and judged that we may finde no rest nor safety but in the righteousness of Christ by faith Let the Reader judge who is in the errour But it is no marvel you so mis-call mistake pervert your Adversary and falsly accuse him as you do passion and yet have no check of conscience for it seeing you are so principled that you may transgress and do any thing impure that is Scot-free by your law and are not led by a right-Gospel-Spirit Town pag. 10. The law wrappeth every man in sin for the least transgression Mr. Rutherf pag. 593. Still Antinomians bewray their engine If me say being justified we have no sin we lye 1 John 1.10 then there cannot be a man nyon the earth but he is under the curse of God Antinomians say the justified are freed from the curse then they have no sinne nay they cannot sinne by their Argument for they will have the curse essentially and inseparably to follow sinne which is most false Reply 1. If we be justified from the curse then from the sin which yet we have remaining in us Coram judieio Dei for the cause is taken away before the effect 2. Else by the contrary Christ is not our righteousness in justification which is opposed to sin but onely our blessedness in stead of the curse that was upon us how then is it said he brought in everlasting righteousness Dan. 9.24 And that we are made the righteousness of God in him 2 Cor. 5.21 So there is no man indeed but he is under the curse if the blood of Christ have not washed him from his sinne as Rev. 1.5 He hath loved us and washed us from our sinne 3. In order justification is after sinne and it being extensive to all sinnes past present and to come it must presuppose future sinnes also as done before it abolish either sinne or curse due for sinne 4. You say It s most false that sinne and the curse be inseparable but you neither prove nor can shew any thing to the contrary Indeed a carnally secure heart is apt to separate them and is thereby hardened presuming to sinne without danger or fear Deut 29.19 If you allow of his engine as better suiting with your own you may well mislike ours 5. Here you tell us of an unscripture-like and ungrounded distinction of a twofold misery and guilt and so of deliverance c. But I confess I understand not your meaning and would be loth to mistake or pervert you as you do me Your Simile giveth me most light viz. That as the rising of the Sun is the way to the full noon-day c. I answer but so it is no act of ours but of the Spirit sanctifying us throughout till we be perfected in our selves and so it is not simply our repentance and new-obedience which are consequences effects and expressions of that renovation or sanctification And I demand also Is not that blot it self so taken away ut non imputetur as not reckoned to us by the death of Christ though it abide physically or inherently yet in our accounts it is abolished and blotted out Lastly I must that you will except against that expression in Assert pag. 15. The Law of workes is so inwrapt and entwined together that if a man lay hold on any even the least link he inevitably pulleth the whole chaine upon himself And yet what you say is of no force Your repentance and love of brethren if you understand your self do pull the whole Law upon you as they be your acts You cannot oblige your self in part and in some degrees onely as you please Wo to that life most commendably passed over if the grace of the Gospel be not to pardon all imperfections All our righteousnesses are as filthy ragges Isa 64.6 Therefore durst not Paul be found in his own righteousness Phil. 3.9 Mr. Rutherf pag. 595. Our obedience is not full and perfect onely it 's so counted and accepted in Christ Reply If this were all your meaning that our obedience or works as proceeding from us or as we perform them are imperfect yet are accepted as perfect in Christ I could receive it But you explain your self otherwise 1. You say It is not so and yet it is accounted perfec doth not God account it rightly as it is 2. You are against all sound Protestant Divines if you hold of acceptance with God of any work because of any proper formal inherent dignity in it or if you do not make Christ the alone ground reason and cause of all acceptance whether of persons or performances 3. It is true God accounts not us non-sinners in our selves and free from all indwelling sinne for that were an untruth but he both justifieth us by faith in Christ and makes us pure and free from all spot of sinne before his Judgement seat Col. 1.22 1 Joh. 1.7 The blood of Jesus cleanseth us from all sinne Now you are pleased to expatiate and to amplifie your self needlesly and wilfully to wrest our words as if â— we did not hold the good works of the regenerate to be faulty in themselves 2 As if we meant by the removal as you call it or abolition of finne such an annihilation of sinne in its essence root and branch that it should not dwell in us here whereas you know and read the
contrary Yet that both Tree and the Fruit the believer and his work are acceptable in Christ is no new divinity but according to Scripture and all the Orthodox Tit. 1.15 To the pure all things are pure Your Scriptures 1 Joh. 1.8 Jam. 3.2 do speak of works as proceeding from us not as presented in Christ who justifieth and freeth us from all the evil and filth cleaving to them I retort If God can accept of us or our performances out of Christ what need we then continually to deal with God in Christ 1 Pet. 1.6 Heb. 13.15 By him let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually Whatsoever you do in word or deed Do all things in the name of our Lord Jesus giving thankes to God even the Father by him Colos 3.17 But this is open wrong which you do us in saying that we hold works perfect simply in themselves or to be accepted for any worth or inherent dignity in them which is your doctrine rather we teach That Abels sacrifice was accepted by faith that is by Christ believed on and not for any merit in it Heb. 11.4 The Scriptures and Testimonies of the Orthodox which you read in the Assertion might have prevented all this labour if you had been so advised Consider that of Calvin in that l. 3. cap. 17. sect 8.9 Qua jam sequuntur bona opera Sepulto etiam imperfectionis vitio quod bona opera fedare folet quae fiunt a fidelinus b. opera justa confentur c. c. Those good works which follow after justification are esteemed and valued otherwise then by their own desert or dignity for whatever imperfection is in them it is covered with Christs perfection whatever blemish or filthiness in them it is cleansed by his purity lest it should be questioned or examined before Gods judgement seat Therefore saith he the fault of all our transgressions being blotted out whereby men are hindered from bringing forth any thing acceptable to God and the imperfection and defect which is wont to defile all good works being buried all the good works of the faithfull are acknowledged to be just c. Thus may all see how palpably you have mistaken me in this as in the other passages And how indirectly and falsly you do inferre That we may be justified by works or we make them meritorious c. whereas we say plainly that the person is first justified without and before all works and that then they become accepted and pleasing by the same way and reason that the person came into favour For as God stands and appears propitious to us in Christ and so his works and dealings with us and disposals of us be pleasing and welcome to us even so we being received and accepted in Christ what we do through him is pleasant to God but not because of any formal and intrinsecal dignity in the work So that we study to deal with God onely in Christ and are now incouraged unto all good works for who can have a heart to do any good work till he by faith know that he pleaseth God by Jesus Christ So Christ alone is exalted and magnified Salus semel donatur ut oporibus acquirenda non sit To seek Heaven by works and deservings is to wrong yea to shame Christs blood and unto such it is shed in vain When the Gospel is preached unto us we believe the mercy of God and in believing receive the Spirit the earnest of eternal life and be in eternal life already and feel in our hearts already the sweetness thereof and are overcome with the kindness of God and of Christ and therefore love the will of God and of love are ready to worke freely and not to obtain that which is given already and whereof we be heirs by Grace freely Tindall Martyr A brief REPLY to the Exceptions taken by Mr. Rutherford in his Tryal and Triumph of Faith against the supposed Antinomian Errours 1 Exception THe first Exception is against the Assert of Grace pag 112 113. Where it is said That Christ onely did bear our sinnes and the punishment of them so that the justified are not punished for sinne Mr. Rutherf answereth with a twofold distinction 1. Of justice legal and sinne revenging 2. Of a mixt justice which is in a Father and so saith That the sinnes of the Saints are not onely against the legal but also a wrong done against his mixt justice Where God doth punish their sinnes though not satisfactorily to his Law Reply 1. To assert a mixt justice is to temper and mingle Law and Gospel without warrant and to hold forth God in a Covenant made up both of free-grace and works which yet be inconsistent Rom. 11.6 2. Our Divines distinguish indeed between punishment and chastisement and so call these corrections of Children and not punishment properly for that every punishment is in some sort satisfactory And so will that be inferred which by them is objected against the Papists viz. If the Saints be punished for their sinnes temporally then Christ satisfied for pounds and left us to satisfie for pence 3. The true and intrinsecal nature and property of all justice offended requireth satisfaction so that our punishments must be satisfactory also so far as the sinne deserveth else who or what satisfieth doth this mixt justice take its pennyworth and full due out of the flesh and bones of Gods Children so as God neither can cease beating till he hath given all the stripes the fault deserveth and when correction is past then the Fathers justice is quieted 4. And if you put them under the Government of justice tempered with mildness and mercy which is Law Evangelized a new crotchet and dream then the Law of strict justice which is the decalogue is no longer a rule our sinnes must be no longer examined and measured by it but judged as they are offences of this mixt and fatherly justice So now Christ may be set aside we shall no more need him for Advocate neither is there use of faith when we sinne but our sufferings must in this condition pacifie not Christs passion that onely was of use and efficacy to bring us into this state and under this Government Who now are become the total abrogators of the Moral and pure Law yea and as it is a rule to live and walk by Can you tell us how much of justice and what a measure of mercy is in this new rule and Government But the result is That our sins after justification have a double relation and had but one before one to the strict Law and that Christ contented the other is to a milder justice against which our stripes must be opposed that by them we may be healed It s granted during the Mosaical-pedagogie there was some shew yea ground for somewhat but not for all that here you assert for God did in that dispensation veil his Paternity which now in Christ is done away And your Scriptures
are onely of force for that and during Christ time 2 Exception 2 Against what is said to 1 Cor. 11. Mr. Rutherf saith Faith doth no more hinder a justified person to receive unworthily the Lords Supper then it doth hinder him to commit Adultery Reply It 's true faith is not alway effectual in all to hinder the doing of both these But what then Is it not for want of the exercise of faith in vigour life and perfection that these or any other sins are not prevented So if faith do not hinder what then can hinder what purifieth the heart and rightly principleth and disposeth the soul to all good actions but faith but not faith as a dead quality or habit lying still and idle within but as it 's lively and operative according to its nature and property 2. What else doth the Soul in eating and drinking the Lords Supper imploy or set on work but faith Nay is the act of eating and drinking formally any other thing but to believe So that if faith be not to be put forth and exercised and then where is justification there may be a bodily action in using the visible Elements which is unworthy indeed and not befitting a Christian but no spiritual eating as the Ordinance requireth You make your self sport saying Mr. T 's sense seemeth to carry That a justified person cannot sinne nor eat and drink unworthily because faith makes him worthy and if so the way is a wanton merry way Reply My words speak no such thing if you lift to spell them aright but if your ill-will suffer you not The Lord forgive and amend it Faith includeth all It presupposeth hunger and thirst before eating 2. a true and spiritual receiving 3. inward refreshing and satisfaction thereby whence 4. followeth love rejoycing with thanksgiving so that he who eateth and drinketh in faith cannot eat and drink unworthily The ground out of which all your seven Arguments grow and receive their supposed strength is that mixt-justice or that Mosaical-Government which we do not now live under And therefore that failing they will all totter and fall It needs then your second hand and labour to uphold and confirm it Moreover to the seventh and last requiring some more particular answer I say 1. That all afflictions are subservient to the Law and signes of wrath is no errour or position of ours neither is our assertion founded upon it 2. Yet as afflictions come from justice offended and provoked to inflict them for sinne so they are appendices of the Law and you cannot disprove it 3. You adde as a thing that we hold That as believers are freed from the ruling power of the Law so are they also from the Rod. Whereas 1. your doctrine by a direct and necessary consequence doth free the believer from the ruling power of the Law while you place him under a mixt-Government of justice and mercy for the Law is pure justice without mixture and a strict and exact rule without mitigation 2. It is false that we free believers from the Rod as your own eyes may witness while you read our positions for we do not cry down all Crosses and secure the justified from all affliction In this our way we have had and still expect many a scratch and prick from you and others and yet not for any desert or errour that all your diligence can finde and prove Your other pretended errour is cleared before Lastly though Christ paid for sins before yet the Law acquits them not nor conscience apperehends it not before actual justification 3 Exception is against the Covenant Mr. Rutherf Some teach this Covenant hath no condition so Dr. Crisp and other Libertines Reply We must have your lash and unworthy brand also You may sin and we are made to suffer but unless you bring in Free-will this Covenant of Grace will prove absolute no part of it lying on us for that presupposeth some power and goodness where is none for this Covenant is with man being fallen and so having lost all therefore it behoveth that it should be sutable to his broken state requiring neither promising no good conditionally where nothing could be first given by him 2. It is granted by all that all was transacted between God the Father and the Sonne from eternity and that the Covenant as it cometh and is commended to us is as the breaking up of that great seal the opening and manifestation of those secrets concluded upon so farre as they concern the raising of the Elect of God out of their sinful dust unto everlasting blessedness so that what is in the decree of heaven concerning them the same is contained in the Covenant then as God purposed to give repentance faith holiness so he hath included and promised all in the Covenant and these are truely parts and branches of it and not properly conditions Now we see that as there were thoughts of peace in God for us when we were in our lowest and worst condition and in what way and after what manner his mind is to recover our souls from their lost Estates and restore and give life favour and glory unto them so by this Covenant also he hath laid cleared to us a firm ground upon which we may with comfort and considence expect and wait for faith and all things to be given freely unto us This agreeth to the expressions of Zanchie Calvin Parous c. Indeed God observeth his due and set order in giving and working one thing before and another after so as a prius and a posterius is granted but the first suppose repentance or faith is not a condition of what followeth except with us and according to these Authors you will call it a condition of state that is Conditio statuâ— God bringeth the soul unto such a state or case as he humbleth it and then giveth Grace c. Thus many promises are with an if If ye repent if ye believe then thus it shall be unto you and denote onely order and consequence as Calvin saith not condition As a Husbandman soweth not his land till it be plowed and fitted if he be asked why he doth not commit his seed to it he will answer it must be prepared first but one part of his worke is not the condition of the other when the whole lyeth on him Again if the promise to give faith and repentance be not in the Covenant where is it to be found Is there any thing to be looked for not mentioned in the Covenant 3. You call it a Covenant of Grace now if it be of Grace then works are excluded yea repentance and faith as our acts and if it be free that necessarily fighteth against all conditions it cannot be free and conditional The more freely the riches of Gods Grace is held forth the more glorious and admirable is it in our eyes Besides it is your expression That Christ is a party contracting or a Covenanter undertaking for
all his so that I see not how you can make his Elect singly and simply to be any partys in undertaking and promising any thing You say Dr. Cr. giveth this reason why it is not on condition of our believing because man may fail in believing and so the condition failing Covenant faileth Reply His reason is good and sound for of it selfe faith is failing else Christ needed not to have prayed that Peters faith might not fail Luke 22.32 But all the whole Covenant being grounded on Christ as the foundation it is established on a firm Rock and so is everlasting Mr. Rutherf They object that God promiseth all as to give faith to put Law in the inward parts to cause to walk in his waies as Jer. 31. Ezek. 36.26 27. To circumcise our hearts Deut. 30.6 which the Arminians deny yet is the clear day-light of Scripture so that all lyeth on God Reply But you return not one syllable of a direct and satisfactory answer unto it you cannot deny but what God promiseth he is faithful to perform and do it You inferre some indirect and undue consequences as if you would rather wrangle against the truth which you cannot resist or were offended that it shineth forth so gloriously and convincingly in your face What if Dogs abuse it and Pharisaical Spirits otherwise principled spurne against it or mis-construe it as occasioning Libertinisme the sin be theirs yet this is the onely right ground and reason of prayer and using all Gods Ordinances in which the soul carrying it self passively waiteth that God may communicate and pour out his blessings according to his word Because God had promised first and that freely the building of Davids house and the King saw thereby that God had a gracious mind and purpose to do it and that it should be his act therefore David prayed that the Lord would bless his house that it might continue for ever before God For thou O Lord hast spoken it 2 Sam. 7.27 28 29. If all fulness be in the fountain and free access may be had it standing open to all It is an effectual invitation to come As for those opinions bred and breathed in New-England I know nothing of them neither am I so credulous or uncharitable towards any as to receive whatever an Adversary reporteth for if the liquor be never so pretious and pure yet if it come out of a fusty and tainted vessel it will taste of the Caske I see none of you so candid but in some things you wrong the Author in perverting his words or meaning even when it is printed and obvious to every eye But here you let all see that you cannot outwrangle the truth for at last you chide your self to agree and yeeld to it for 1 you say I grant God worketh the condition Then how is it mans condition or how can it be said to lye on him 2 Truth is say you It 's an unproper condition for the whole bargain is pure Grace Thus you are brought to grant all and no thanke to you for you would fain have it a condition still An unproper one must serve rather then none God indeed worketh orderly one thing after another the former as is said we may call a State-condition but not otherwise properly and without danger But ere you cease you tell us again of Libertinisme c. Reply Well receive the love of the truth and here shake hands and cast your stones against abusers of Free-grace if your side be not guilty of the like or worse You have a watchfull eye to look into our waies if in love to us we thanke you It might occasion us at least if we had any unfeigned desire that the good and fair way of the Lord might not be evil spoken of to walk more circumspectly but if the word of Grace leaven not the heart it will abide graceless And I rest perswaded that if it had not been either the licentious or loose life of some who are noted or because such as had been formerly wicked and prophane did flock after Dr. Crisp and attend to his Ministery as they did in Luke 15.1 2. and that it was more glorious and effectual then others else that you and your fellows would never have used tongue or pen against this way My reason is because it is so clear and undenyable that having searched and sifted it with all diligence there is found no solid and material cause of exception against it but all is resolved into envy and prejudice As for that question of justification before faith or after I have spoken to it in answer to Mr. Burgess It 's true God in his Gospels-dispensation onely pronounceth the sentence of absolution to the believer for he dealeth in it with men of actual understanding and the main end is to quiet and comfort the conscience for which purpose faith is mainly useful as to give glory unto God But you grant that the Covenant is with Christ and all his Heirs and kindred in him he being a publique person in whom all were acquitted and that is sufficient 4 Exception in pag. 102. Mr. Rutherf Can we saith Mr. Towne separate the directing or commanding power of the Law from the condemning power Is it a Law and hath no power to condemn Answ Actual condemnation may be separated as a Lyon is a Lyon though chained that he cannot actually devour it could not condemn Adam before sinne c. Christ hath removed the curse Reply The question is whether the Lyon be a devouring beast and you answer He cannot actually devour because he is chained but doth chaining change his devouring nature and so hath not the Law a condemning power still though it condemn not actually alway you see power to do it is not taken from it That it did not condemn Adam in innocency hath no more sinew of Argument in it then that the Law of the Land hath no power to condemn murther because there is no actual murtherer It hath power to do it but it is to exercise and put forth its power in a way of justice that is when the sinne is actually committed You say but they are vain words without light or weight that to condemn is accidental to a Law I reply as truely and in the like sense That to command and direct be as accidental so the whole of the Law in all its parts and offices shall be accidental for the Law doth not actually rule and govern Lawless rebels may not I then as solidly inferre It hath no authority nor power to do it yea in Hell among the damned as in our prisons there is Law onely actually condemning and tormenting but not ruling and directing in its way of holiness Lastly You should prove that Christ hath removed the curse from the Law he hath redeemed his from under it but left the Law with all the power it had But you speak what Mr. Burgess objected also If need be see more in Answer to
his book I muse that men of wisdom and parts will so fight and contend against so mnnifest truths You grant the believer sinneth dayly and that every sinne yea least omission is Hell by the Law and thus he is dayly brought under reverence of Divine justice now how can that be and yet no condemnation or curse left in the Law Hell is but a fiction or a painted fire the man need not fear it though he sinne nor he need no Faith nor Christ to preserve and secure him Thus one of your Tenets cutteth the nerves of another 5 Exception same pag. Mr. Rutherf They object That holiness and good works be not the way to salvation Answ There be three things 1. the will of God to save 2. Jus or Law-right to salvation 3. Actual salvation Now touching this last holiness is the way to it Reply 1. The way by which we can onely go and enter into Heaven is that New living way dedicated by blood Heb. 10.20 21. In which way the soul can onely walk and continue by believing Hence it is said That through faith they inherite the promises Heb. 6.12 He that walketh in Christ is holy and walketh holily but he walketh not in Christ by his holy life As ye have received Christ so walk in him Colos 2.6 In walking or living holily we as it were move in another sphere by faith we live and walk in Christ and in the way of peace and life which is by his righteousness by love we walk the legal way of our own active righteousness saith Luther Doth not the Scripture call us to come to Christ to be found in him to abide walk and continue in him All which can only be effected by faith In this way the soul meeteth with the most and strongest temptations and oppositions which it resisteth and overcometh by faith alone 1 Pet. 5.8 9. 1 Joh. 5.4 You tell us what the faith of Libertines is It may be you know it and what your own is to you but if you censure and asperse them for Libertines who are not so whose condemnation is that be not so rash in judgeing they stand and fall to Christ not to you Rom 14.4 And if your faith which should elevate and carry up the soul unto Christ and the way of free justification by his grace for continual peace favour acceptance and everlasting salvation do yet let you seek and labour to receive all in the way of your own works and obedience it may well then be questioned Gal. 2.19 20 21. Further your expression is not home but falleth short when you say that Christ onely giveth a right to salvation Christ and salvation cannot be parted you would place Christ in the beginning salvation in the end and your good workes maketh the way and leadeth and guideth from Christ to salvation this is your divinity But eternal life is in Christ He that hath Christ hath life 1 Joh. 5.11 12. You may as well say A believer hath not Christ but onely hath a right to him now Christ dwelleth in the heart by faith Eph. 3. And his Kingdom is in you which is in righteousness peace and joy in the holy Ghost Rom. 14.17 I am sure if you find and walk in a holy and clean way it is by faith or rather the blood of sprinkling cleanseth and maketh your way undefiled before God and no perfect obedience of yours But spiritual things are spiritually discerned Mr. Rutherf In answer to the fifth object The principle of Love and Law are not contrary Reply To work from a Law-principle is to work as a servant for hire Do and live but love is free and seeketh not her own 1 Cor. 13.5 You adde that the Law directing is not abolished by Grace or by Love Rep. True no more is the Law condemning for any thing you have yet or can shew We must still bear your indignities cast on us in your way but know full well that all your logick cannot number us amonst your old Libertines You delight your self in your witty expressions if you understand them it is well 6 Exception Of the Law converting the soul Reply In this you are one with Mr. Burgess also Read your answer there and study a second reply with him A legal reformation is no Gospel-conversion nor Christian sanctification Unto your answer of 6 Object I say I leave it to the Author because he is living and able also to satisfie you 7 Exception against Dr. Crisp Mr. Rutherf Dr. Crisp objects Christ putteth forth a general proclamation to all Answ It 's true the Gospel excepteth no man from pardon but the promise of the Gospel is not simply universal as if God intended all and every should be actually redeemed and saved 2. It 's most untrue that Christ belongeth to sinners as sinners for then Christ should belong to all unbelievers how obstinate soever Nay Christ belongs onely to sinners elected to glory and to believing sinners as believing in regard of actual union 3. It 's false that sinners as sinners receive Christ so should Judas receive him Onely believers receive him 4. It 's false that sinners as sinners believe in Christ This way of Libertines is a broad way for Sorcerers Theeves c. remaining in that damnable state to believe where as sinners as thus qualified are to believe that is humbled wearied self-condemned onely Reply You know that Dr. Cr. speaks onely of the proclamation and Gospel-tender which is to every creature Mark 16.15 and not of Gods intention which he granteth is onely to gather and save the elect Also you said a little before That the obligation of believing lyeth on all yea though they be damned so then the Gospel is to be preached indiscriminatim unto all for the obedience of faith Rom. 16.26 2. You here again pervert and restrain his meaning for he speaks of the free tender of Christ unto all and you say he is intended onely to sinners elected to glory This argueth a minde disposed to cavil and to let nothing pass without a Carp how pure soever Christ in the dispensation is to be preached and made known to unbelievers that they may become believers Gospel findeth not men believers it is well if it leave them so Faith cometh by hearing and after faith comes actual union To your 3. If sinners as sinners do believe then as sinners they receive Christ For what is it to believe but to receive Christ Joh. 1.12 Your expression is Christ belongs to believing sinners To receive is to take a thing offered or given as Joseph took unto himself Mary Matth. 1.30 So Rom. 5.11 To your 4. If sinners be wearied and self-condemned are they not sinners still Because they are sensbly so are they less so or not formally sinners Prove that further And though all be not so prepared or qualified yet it 's plain by your own confession before that they are bound to believe the obligation lieth on them 2. In
sinners he must be fain to look upon us in our Lord Jesus Christ and his righteousness you like to set the Law as a medium between God and you which presenteth you with sin and wrath c. And why do if not your self yet many others in their prayers say Lord behold us not in our selves but in our Lord Jesus c. If there be no such pure and secure estate why pray we to attain to it and if we be perswaded of the truth of it why wrangle we against it you might inform your self and others 1. what it is to continue of your selves separated or remote from Christ and 2. of the meaning of the phrase God seeth no sin you reserve this till afterward so do I and withal for more full satisfaction I refer the hony-combe of free justification and the Assertion of grace M. B. ser 3. You shall carefully distinguish between these two propositions good works are necessary to beleivers to justified persons or to those that shall be saved and this good work 's are necessary to justification and salvation Answ It 's too evident that your self do not heedfully observe this distinction Besides your sense in the tearms you use is doubtful when you say good works are necessary to justified persons Is it your meaning after justification according to that of Augustine Nulla sunt bona opera nisi quae sequuntur precedente fide In Psal 67. no works are good except they follow faith going before or that they are necessarily required in order to go before so that their presence must be had necessarily when God justifieth as your pleading hath been heitherto I know the tearms or words themselves are plain and distinct but you confound them in your afterprosecution 2. There be many kinds of necessary And if you understand them to be necessary after justification in a right sense you have no adversary But if good works be necessary to those that shall be saved I would ask you what you mean for do you not hold salvation to be the proper next and immediate effect or consequence of justification can a man be said or supposed to be justified and not to be saved if he be justified he hath Christ he that hath Christ hath eternal life Ioh. 3. ult the essence of eternal life or salvation is but one and indivisible You cannot make the full revelation or seasible fruition of it to be any part of it your error is that you will have good works necessary to come in between justification and salvation at least as a cause sine qua non or conditions of it or so requisite that the promise of eternal life is made to them and only by vertue of that their promise eternal life becomes his that doth the works But eternal life is the free gift of God Rom. 6.23 And salvation is in Christ alone Act. 4.12 Ioh. 5.12 He that hath Christ hath life and if he have not Christ he can have no life whatsoever works he have So that as a man may have Christ without works by faith so may he have salvation in order before good works unless you will say either that without Christ a man can do good works or that Christ may be nad as separate and a part from life and salvation Christ and salvation standing at a distance so after he be come unto Christ and have him he must do good works that by them he may come unto it but both these are impossible Works done in this sense with such a minde and for such an end as to help us to salvation as if Christ did not sufficiently content us these works saith Luther cannot be good but whatever they be for the matter of them are and ought to be numbered among the worst of evil works fornication stealing lying c. are not so hanious saith he neither is the danger and fearful effects and fruits of these evils comparable to the evil of such pretended good works While I do good to help me to salvation I in heart deny Christ to be my full and sufficient Saviour I make faith void and the promise to be of no effect I overthrow the whole Gospel of salvation I appropriate the promise of life not to Christ nor saith but to my works And if it be said it is onely the presence of good works that is accounted necessary to those that shall be saved I answer Gratia Dei remissio per justitia vita eterna in solo Christo mediatore proponuntur illum vero non apprehâ—ndimus bonis operibus sed sola fide Gratia Dei in christo 1 Cor. 1 data est quia hoc constâ—u um est a Deo u qui credit in chrisâ—um saluus sil sine opere sola fide Vnum illud asseveâ—averem quod sola fides per se salvum fecit Chrys Evangelium proponit justiti salutem credeâ—â—ibus in Christum gratis sine conditione bonorum operum Ger. Si bona opera sint nessaia tum promissiones Evangeliâ—ae non erunt gratuitae sedâ—onditionales Insidâ—luas solad mnaâ— hoc est repellâ—t Christum una cum Christo vitam eternam quae non misi in Christo offertur Aug. 1. How can they be present when I must have Christ and with him eternal life before I can do any good work 2. Is not the presence of Christ and his righteousness sufficient Why then did Paul desire to be found in Christ not having his own righteousness of works but only that which is through the faith of Christ the righteousness which is of God by faith Phil. 3.9.3 What comfort or pleasure can they afford or gain when as Calvin saith If God do respect or look upon them we be to us and there cannot be so little a fault or so small a blemish in our works but the same is enough to make them foul and leathsom unto God Thus all Abrahams vertues saith he if they had been examined could have brought him nought but damnation Abraham bad no other help nor comfort therefore but his faith in Christ in whom God did singly consider and accept him Rom 4.1 2.4 If as you affirm the promise of life be made to them and their presence then cannot the soul receive or lay bold of any promise of life till they come into sight And what promise then is made to the righteousness of faith or of Christ Paul was most diligent and faithful in his ministery abounding in the works of the Lord fought a good fight kept the saith finished his course but the crown which was laid up for him and which he certainly expected was the crown of the righteousness of faith 2 Tim. 4.8 See Dr. Foulk on that place against the Rhemists If the crown be not due to that righteousness to what purpose is it and if it belong and be annexed to it will God make promise of it to our good works It is true It shall be said at the
believing Faith onely is the condition or instrument that doth receive the Covenant but yet that a man believe is required the change of the whole man Answ They qualifie the subject believing in some sense is true but do they qualifie before he believe in believing or after Faith this you should have told us it may be concluded from your words that they must qualifie the subject before he believe and this is your reason because that a man believe is required the change of the whole man as if good works did change the man and so were pre-required to believe I answer 1. That the heart must be first changed I grant for the natural heart is evil and unbelieving And secondly It is a good work to renew and change it yet that is no work of ours but Gods Thirdly Do our good works qualifie towards God Coram judicio Dei as Melanct. or towards others Or to our own sight and sense Is not Christ in us put upon us formed and dwelling in us qualification sufficient for acceptance to salvation M. B. Vse Answ You are still ministring your vain Antidotes Take you heed of that spiritual Anti-Christ within man which strongly maketh head against the true Christ What you preach and profess may be a deceitful flourish you bid reconcile Law and Gospel Justification and holiness c. I know none making such jars between one and the other as doth your self Is the Law then against the Promise Gal. 3.21 That is a blinde conceit Christ was ordained to be the Righteousness of the sinful and lost soul of man and to be received by it in the feeling of the failing and want of all goodness in it self He dwelleth in the poor meek low and broken heart to receive heal and satisfie it We may think and talk of him out of us as held forth in the letter and outward Ministry and all this to small and no effectual consolation or purpose LECT V. 1 Tim. 1.9 Knowing this that the Law is not made for a righteous man M. B. COncerning the righteous man here we must not interpret it of one absolutely righteous but one that is so quo ad conatum desiderium Answ Why may we not understand it as well of one who hath attained to righteousness by Faith which is absolute and perfect as of inherent sanctification which is inchoat and imperfect or why is it that you do altogether exclude this passive and imputed righteousness You do not with the Papists hold it onely to be a putative and not real righteousness And you erre if you take that which is sensible inchoat and so defective to be yet more worthy to give the denomination M. B. pag. 49. The Antinomian and Papist do both concur in this errour though upon different grounds that our righteousness and works be perfect c. and that not only in Justification but in Sanctification also Answ Though the righteousness of Faith in Christ and sanctification by his Spirit which are inseparable in regard of the subject be two distinct things yet they argue not the party to be in a twofold estate towards God for acceptance to favour and life but his estate is peaceable and safe onely by the free grace of Justification You grant your sanctification is imperfect and defective Now sith the sinfulness remaining in us doth dispread it self throughout all the powers of the soul all parts actions and passages of the whole man When you then have gathered and summ'd up all in one do you not bring all your works in the end to yur Justification by your confession of weaknesses wants pollutions c. and so seek forgiveness of the sins of your Prayers Etiam bona opera egent remissione peccati your failings in your Sermons errours of heart and life And this is in effect to have all healed and justified by free justification or the blood of Christ knowing that otherwise all is damnable and in law and justice to be rejected know it and cause also your hearers to learn it that though Justification be one individual act yet the vertue and efficacy of it is necessarily to be extended throughout all the life and wayes of man It purifieth the man and maketh all pure also and acceptable Tit. 1.15 To the pure all things are pure Thus may you see that it is a truth that all are become perfect and the manner also how and lastly that all is in Justification and not in Sanctification and so know your mistake If you receive not this how shall what is imperfect be accepted except either by some mitigation of Gods Justice contrary to that place so much and that without cause urged against us Matt. 5.17 18 or that you will so far be beholding to the new Covenant with the Arminian as to seek for the Grace of it which may pardon or pass by our defects or in effect to deny the extent and continuance of the force and vertue of Justification and Christs blood unto the last end What you charge upon your old Antinomian Islebius I pass by as an Author I never read M. B. As for the latter Antinomian he speaketh very uncertainly and inconsistently Sometimes he grants the Law is a rule but very hardly and seldom then presently kicketh all down again for saith he it cannot be conceived that it should rule but that it also should reign and therefore thinks it impossible that one act of the Law should be without the other the damnatory power of the Law is inseparable from it Can you put your Conscience under the Mandatory power and keep it from the damnatory Assert of Gr. p. 33. Answ None can speak more uncertainly and inconsistently then you in these Lectures you make neither to appear in your adversary but he proveth you guilty of both For when you use these expressions Good works are necessary in the justified and then presently They are necessary in him that is to be justified Again onely Faith in Christ is necessary to salvation the promises of life are made to the believer and good works have the promises of life every good work thou canst do hath a promise made to it of eternal life c. you both leave your reader uncertain what your opinion is and these will in no wise consist together besides many other like passages Also here you say he grants it a rule and yet do charge him with the total abolition of it pag. 43. Is not this inconsistency You say he granteth it hardly nay doth it freely without constraint B. And seldom Ans If need require he will do it toties quoties This is not to kick all down again to say the Law if it rule it doth also reign the latter doth not overthrow the former but onely it crosseth and overthroweth your vain and ayry conceit of a Law ruling and not reigning You say he thinks it impossible that one act of the Law should be without the other