the words of Mark arguing manifestly from the right and authority which he had received to the lawful exercise of it in making and ordering to be published that Law or Act of Pardon whereof he doth then and there appoint his disciples to be Ambassadours I confesse I cannot imagine what can here be said unlesse it be one of these two things Either 1. That remission of sin is not contained in that salvation which is here promised to them that believe But this me thinks should be too harsh for any Christians eares to endure seeing it must contain all that good which is opposed to condemnation and therefore primarily remission of sins which is also expresly mentioned by the other Evangelists Luke 24. 47. John 20. 23. and by the Apostles in the execution of this their commission as a prime part of that salvation which they preached in the Name of Christ Acts 2. 38. and 3. 19 c. Or 2. That those words He that believes shall be saved are a meer description of the persons that shall be saved which I think is the sense that Mr. Eyre somewhere doth put upon them but this to me is more intolerable then the former partly for the reasons mentioned before chap. 5. and to be mentioned hereafter partly because according to such an interpretation the words will be no more then a simple affirmation or relation of what shall come to passe whereas by their dependance upon the foregoing All power is given to me in heaven and in earth it is manifest that they are an authoritative Sanction of the Lord Christ's an act of that jurisdiction and legislative power which he hath received from the Father and so the standing rule of remission of sins 2. If it be by the Promise of the Gospel He that believes shall not perish §. 19. but shall have everlasting life If I say it be by this Promise that God gives sinners a right to impunity and eternal life then by this Promise he justifies them But by the foresaid promise doth God give sinners a right to impunity and eternal life Ergo. The Proposition I passe as manifest by its own light The Assumption is delivered in several Scriptures Thus Paul Gal. 3. 18. God gave the inheritance to Abraham by Promise Ergo it is by Promise also that a right to life is given to all that have it This Promise is either particular or general The former it is not for God doth not now make any particular Promises to particular men such as was his Promise to believing Abraham Ergo it must be the general Promise wherein the same blessings as were given to Abraham are proposed to all men to be obtained by the same faith that Abraham had and by the same Promise given them when they believe which Promise is that before mentioned of life and salvation by faith in Jesus Christ the Apostle himself being Interpreter ver 22. But the Scripture hath concluded all under sin that the Promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe The same doth he assert at large Rom. 4. 13 14 16 23 24. 3. The Lord Jesus sayes expressely John 12. 48. That the §. 20. Word which he spake shall judge unbelievers at the last day If a judgment of condemnation be ascribed to the Word in reference to unbelievers how can it be denied a judgement of Justification in reference to believers Non potuit magis splendido elogio extolli Evangelii authoritas quà m dum illi judiciâ— potestas defertur Conscendet quidem ipse Christus Tribunal sed sententiam ex verbo quod nunc praedicatur laturum se asserit saith Calvin upon the place Yea the Lord ascribes to the same Word a judgement of Justification ver 50. And I know that his Commandment is life everlasting that is the cause of it as Moses also speaks Deut. 32. 47. i See also Deuâ— â—â— v 15 â—â— It is your life though God be the principal cause and the Word but the k Vid. Synops pâ—r theol disp â—3 §. 10 Down of Jâ—stif c. â— â— 5. â—libi passim instrumental and therefore the power which it hath of judgement it hath from hence that it is the Word of God ver 49. For I have not spoken of my selfe but the Father which sent me he gave me a Commandment what I should say as the instrumental cause works not but in the vertue of the principal To this plain testimony let me adde an Argument as plainly deduced from it If judgement shall passe at the last day according to the Word then the Word is that Law which is the rule of judgement and by consequence to one is given by the Word a right to life and another is obliged to condemnation by the same Word But the antecedent is most true Ergo so is the consequent It is the work of judgement to give unto eâ—ery one according to what is due to him by Law if then a judgement of Justification passe upon any some Law of grace must be supposed according to which it becomes due for such a gracious sentence to passe upon him 4. And this is that which the Apostle James saith chap. 4. 12. §. 21. There is one Lawgiver who is able to save and to destroy Beza observes that in foure ancient Greek Copies l As also in the Kings MS. See Dâ— Hammond Annot. in loc as also in the Syriack and the Latine Interpreter the word Judge is extant There is one Lawgiver and Judge who is able to save and destroy that is to whom pertaines the soveraign right and power of saving and destroying But whether the word be expressed or no it is surely implied for the Apostles scope is to disswade us from judging one another ver 11. because there is one Lawgiver to whom the power of judgment and so of absolving and condemning of saving and destroying doth appertain Now he that saves as a Lawgiver saves by absolution and he that absolves as a Lawgiver absolves by Law Ergo God absolves men that is pardons and justifies them by Law And when he shall judge all men at the last day his judgement whether of salvation or destruction shall proceed according to Law 5. Adde to this that the Apostle commends the excellency and glory §. 22. of the Gospel that God doth thereby justifie 2 Cor 3. 9. For if the ministration of condemnation he glory much more doth the ministration of righteousnesse exceed in glory The ministration of condemnation is that which ver 7. he calls the ministration of death written and engraven in stones His scope is to shew the excellency of that Gospel which himself and other Apostles did preach and publish to the world above the ministration of the Law committed to Moses As then the ministration of death and condemnation was the ministration of that Law which did condemn unto death the effect being put for the cause so the
why Because it was the Will of God that none of the elect should perish or be condemned Answ True not executively But Mr. Eyre knows we put a difference between perishing and condemnation in this debate and that by condemnation we mean not the execution of punishment or wrath but a legal obligation to the suffering of it And though God did purpose that the elect should not perish or be condemned executively quoad eventum yet should Mr. Eyre prove that he purposed that the elect should not stand obliged equally with other sinners for some time to the suffering of wrath This if he prove I will yield the cause The purpose of God in it selfe makes no difference between men whose cause is the same before the just and impartial Judge Do we not know that a Prince may purpose to save the life of a Malefactour against whom notwithstanding the Law is in force and judgement proceeds and sentence passeth and the man thereby as much obnoxious to death as any other Melefactours till some other act of the Prince besides his meer purpose interpose and prevent his death But of this we have spoken largely already The Assumption namely that all the world is under condemnation §. 4. before faith I proved from the expresse testimony of the Lord Jesus John 3. 18. He that beleeveth not is condemned already That is saith Mr. Eyre He that never believeth as chap. 8. 24. If you beleeve not i. e. not at all you shall die in your sins Our Saviour had no intent at all to shew the state of the elect before believing but the certain and inevitable misery of them that beleeve not by reason of the sentence of the Law that had passed upon them All the rest of the answer consents well enough with that Explication of the text which I gave in my Sermon Rep. First for that which is pretended to be our Lords intent in these words let me intreat thee Reader to peruse and ponder the text for I think thou shalt hardly meet with the like abuse of the Oracles of God in any Authour that acknowledgeth the Divinity of Scriptures ver 14. As Moses lift up the Serpent in the wildernesse so must the Son of man be lifted up ver 15. That whosoever beleeveth on him should not perish but should have everlasting life ver 16. for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Sonne that whosoever believeth on him should not perish but should have everlasting life ver 17. for God sent not his Sonne into the world to condemn the world but that the world through him might be saved ver 18. He that beleeveth is not condemned he that beleeveth not is condemned already c. Thou seest Reader that the words contain a most serious and faithful testimony to a sinful world that though they had brought upon themselves eternal miseries yet God had sent his Sonne into the world not to condemn the world but to save them and if any man perish 't is not for want of a sufficient remedy provided in the death of Christ but for their own wilful refusal to embrace and make use of it as himselfe tells us ver 19. And this is the condemnation that light is come into the world and men have loved darknesse rather then light Now what sayes Mr. Eyre why he will have us beleeve that the Lords intention is quite against his expression and that he is come to testifie to the world that their misery is certain and inevitable by reason of the sentence of the Law that had passed upon them It is time to burne our Bibles if such glosses as these must be received for truth 2. If the misery of those that beleeve not be inevitable by reason of the sentence of the Law how is this to be understood either that the Law passed sentence upon them as unbelievers but this I suppose is too unreasonable to be affirmed or that the same men who afterwards prove unbelievers were before sentenced by the Law to certain and unavoidable misery But then their unbeliefe contributed nothing to make their misery unavoidable whereas our Lord chargeth the unavoidablenesse of misery upon wilful unbelief ver 19. This is the condemnation not that men are in darknesse but that light is come into the world and men have loved darknesse rather then light Were it not for this men might do well enough notwithstanding all that the Law had done against them Ergo misery is not made certain and inevitable to any by the Law before unbelief be added 3. Mr. Eyre told us but now that the Law condemned all men equally that 's the sense of his words if there be any sense in them The Law saith he doth not consider men as elect or reprobate I know not how it should for the Law is neither God nor man nor Angel as believers or unbelievers c. how comes it then to passe that misery should be made unavoidable to one and not to another by the same Law Next we shall enquire into Mr. Eyres Exposition of ver 18. §. 5. He that beleeveth not is condemned already that is saith he he that never beleeveth which is not only gratis dictum spoken without so much as a pretence of Reason but is manifestly inconsistent with the text Indeed condemnation is executed upon none but final unbelievers but unbelievers in the text are to be understood generally of all unbelievers whatsoever and not to be confined to final unbelievers 1. Such unbelievers are here meant who are part of that world into which Christ is sent for after the Lord had said ver 17. God sent not his Sonne into the world to condemn the world but that the world by him might be saved He distributes this world into two parts Beleevers and Unbeleevers ver 18. He that beleeveth is not condemned he that believeth not is condemned already But final unbeleevers as such are no part of that world into which Christ is sent for a final unbeleever is he that dies in unbelief if he beleeve but one minute before his death he is not a final unbeleever And Christ is not sent to the dead but to the living 2. Such unbelievers are here meant whom Christ was sent to save ver 16 17. But Christ was not sent to save final unbelievers as such Ergo such unbelievers are not here meant 3. We have also mention of a double condemnation in the text one which Christ findes men under when he comes into the world and which he comes to deliver them from ver 17 18. The other which men are left under for final unbelief and rejecting of Christ the light of life ver 19. This is the condemnation c. for Christ could not finde men condemned for a final rejecting of him till he had been preached and tendered to them Ergo they that beleeve not ver 18. are unbeleevers in general 4. The condemnation here spoken of is
that which is avoidable and is actually avoided by beleeving Ergo it is not the condemnation of final unbeleevers The Antecedent I proved in my Sermon from ver 36. He that believeth not the wrath of God abideth on him implying that the wrath of God by the Law is upon every sinner for he is condemned already yet not so necessarily and remedilesly but that by beleeving he may escape it but if he beleeves not then it abides on him To this Mr. Eyre tells me That to say the place hints there is a wrath of God which is done away by believing is but an attempt to suborne the Spirit to serve our turne A short way of answering Arguments y Contra Crell p. 452 453. This very interpretation doth Essenius vindicate at large against Mr. Eyres friends in the point of eternal reconciliation the Socinians and urgeth the significancy of the Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 abideth according to its constant use in Scripture though I stand not so much upon the bare word The same interpretation doth z Tract 14. in Joan. Non dicit Ira dei venit ad eum sed manet super eum c. Augustine give of it and many others Protestants and Papists Chemnitius a Analys in loc Piscator Aretius Beza Dyke Jansenius Tolet Ferus c. Who being such professed enemies in religion cannot be rationally suspected of a confederacy against the Spirit I had thought a Minister might have said not only to each man distributively but to the whole world collectively if he were able to speak to their hearing believe in the Lord Jesus and you shall be saved without being guilty of suborning the Spirit to serve his own turne And yet surely in so saying he doth more then hint that the wrath of God may be escaped by believing 5. And that I do not erre in the meaning of the holy Ghost I am yet farther convinced because the Lord came not into the world to §. 6. give life simply but to give salvation v. 17. that is to give life to them that were dead Ergo they whom he saves were dead de jure or de facto as the Apostle argues 2 Cor. 5. 14. If one died for all then were all dead And to be dead in Law is to be under condemnation Now whom doth Christ save not final unbeleevers but such as are unbeleevers for a time only Ergo they who are now beleevers were sometime under condemnation or else Christ never saved them If they are only condemned in themselves or by the Law in that diminutive respective sense in which Mr. Eyre useth that phrase they are never a whit the more in danger of perishing for that and therefore not capable of being saved properly 6. The comparison which our Lord proposeth v. 14 15. and upon which this whole discourse dependeth puts it yet farther out of doubt As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wildernesse even so must the Sonne of man be lifted up that whosoever beleeveth on him should not perish but have eternal life Concerning which words we debaâ—e more particularly under the third generall Argument following and therefore here I shall only make some brief observations upon the coâ—parison and passe on 1. As then the people for whom the serpent was lifted up were all mortally stung of the fiery serpents see the story it self Numb 21. 6 7 8 9. So is all the world become subject to condemnation through sin for the people that were stung in the type are the world in the Antitype and their mortal wound there is condemnation here by our Lords own exposition v. 16 17 19. 2. That as the serpent was by Gods appointment lifted up in the wildernesse that whosoever looked on him might be healed of the mortal bites of the fiery serpent and live so is the Sonne of man lifted up that whosoever beleeveth on him should not perish but should have everlasting life by Gods appointment in like manner v. 15 16. 3. That as the serpent was not lifted up to destroy any of the people for they were mortally wounded before but to heale them so Christ was not sent into the world to condemn the world for they are condemned already but to save them v. 17. 4. Yet they that looked not on the serpent so lifted up did thereby procure unto themselves a certaine death because it was to be absolutely unavoydable by any other means whatsoever so they that beleeve not on the Sonne of God but love darknesse rather then light do thereby procure to themselves certaine and remedilesse condemnation v. 18 19. There remaining no more sacrifice for sin as the Apostle speaks Heb. 10. 29. Hence I deduce these four Corollaries 1. That condemnation lyes upon all men without difference for sin 2. Yet there is a remedy and way of escape from this condemnation revealed in the Gospel 3. That the way to escape condemnation is to beleeve on Jesus Christ 4. The contempt of Christ by positive unbelief makes condemnation unavoidable Ergo every man in the world whiles an unbeleever or so long as he continues in unbelief is under condemnation And as to the Text which Mr. Eyre brings in for illustration §. 7. Joh 8. 24. If you beleeve not you shall die in your sins I consent to Mr. Eyres interpretation that the meaning is if you beleeve not at all or if you never beleeve you shall die in your sins And it informes us in the truth of those two things which I have been hitherto contending for 1. That because of their sins they became lyable to eternall death 2. That yet their condemnation was not peremptory and irrevocable unlesse to all their other sins they added unbelief final for if at any time they did beleeve they should escape that wrath which was due to them for sinne As when Paul saies Act. 27. 31. Except these men abide in the ship you cannot be saved He shews them that they were in eminent danger of perishing in the waters and yet that they might be safe enough if the men aforesaid continued in the ship That place therefore makes against Mr. Eyre altogether SECT II. BEfore we speak any further of this place we must attend M. §. 8. Eyre who interposeth another Text which I mentioned not under this but under the former Argument to the same purpose and that is Eph. 2. 3. Where the Apostle tells the Ephesians whom God had chosen to eternall life chap. 1. 4. that they were by nature children of wrath as well as others Mr. Eyre answers 1. That the Text doth not say that God did condemn them or that they wâ—re under condemnation before conversion Rep. This might have been spared if this text had been answered in the place where I produced it and so it may yet for wrath and condemnation often signifie one and the same thing in Scripture Joh. 3. 19 36. 1 Thes 1. 10. Rom. 1. 17 18. 2.
brazen Serpent else they could not have seen it so they that look upon Jesus Christ i e. beleeve in him are spiritually alive or else they could not put forth such a vital act Rep. But wherein doth this make against me The most that follows from hence is either that the habit of faith is before the act as the faculty of sight before the operation of it which is no part of the Question between Mr. Eyre and me or that a man is quickened internally by faith before he is quickened morally by Justification and pardon even as they put forth the vital act of seeing before they received that healing which prevented their approaching death which is the very thing I am proving 2. But in every similitude there is some dissimilitude and if Mr. Eyre will instance in things that do not come into the comparison he may as well inferre that faith is an act of natural power because their looking to the brazen Serpent which represented faith was so I say therefore that they that were stung with the fiery Serpents though they were not dead as to the utmost and last act of death which consists in the separation of the soule from the body yet they were dead in effect and as much as the nature of the type and the scope of the comparison requires as having received their deaths wound which would soon have prevailed over the remainders of their life if it had not been prevented by looking up to the brazen Serpent And therefore of him that looked on the Serpent of brasse 't is said that he lived Numb 21. 9. That is saith Mr. Eyre he had ease from his anguish And §. 4. so by looking up to Christ by faith we finde ease and rest to our wearied soules A man is said to live when he lives comfortably and happily Rep. Which is neither true in the Proposition nor Reddition of the comparison Not in the first for in the type the opposition is not between ease and paine but between life and death Numb 21. 6. The fiery Serpents bit the people and much people of Israel died and ver 9. It came to passe that if a Serpent had bitten any man when he beheld the Serpent of brasse he lived as Hezekiah is said to live Isa 38. 21. when he recovered of a mortal disease not only from the pain and anguish of it but principally from the mortality of it Nor in the second for though life in Scripture may sometimes signifie a happy prosperous and comfortable life yet in our Saviours use of it it hath not that sense precisely though that may very well be included consequently partly because the life obtained by looking up to Christ is opposed not to pain and sickness precisely but to the death and destruction of the whole person John 3. 15. The Sonne of man must be lifted up that whosoever beleeveth on him should not perish but have everlasting life partly because the same life is called salvation ver 17. God sent not his Sonne into the world to condemn the world but that the world through him should be saved Now though a man may be said to live when he lives comfortably yet he is never said to be saved in Scripture precisely because he lives comfortably When Paul sayes Now we live if ye stand fast 1 Thes 3. 8. I think he is to be understood of a joyful comfortable life But it had been very uncouth to expresse the same life thus Now we are saved if ye stand fast But Mr. Eyre hath a sad quarrel against me for reading that §. 5. text John 6. 40. thus It is the Will of God that he that seeth and beleeveth the Sonne shall be justified whereas the words are That whosoever seeth the Sonne and beleeveth on him may have everlasting life Herein he saith I have corrupted and falsified the text Rep. What you please Sir provided you take in all manner of Commentators as well as my selfe for I know no man but you that excludes Justification from being there contained in eternal life As when the Law sayes Do this and thou shalt live the life promised includes Justification primarily so when it is said He that believes shall have eternal life life includes Justification in like manner And though there be many more blessings included then that single one of Justification yet that only being to my purpose I thought I might mention it only without being guilty o◠corrupting or falsifying the text I had thought also the believer may be said to have eternal life in right as well as in possession as the Lord speaks a little below ver 47. He that believeth on me hath everlasting life And to have right to life or life in right is to be justified and therefore is our Justification called Justification of life Rom. 5. 18. And grace reignes through reghteousnesse unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord ver 21. SECT II. THe next comparison I made use of for illustration and proof §. 6. of this matter was out of John 6. 51 52 53 54. where faith is compared to eating and Justification to the nourishment we receive by our meat As then we are not first nourished and then eat the meat that nourisheth us but we eat our meat that we may be nourished by it so neither are we first justified and then beleeve on Christ that hath justified us but we beleeve in Christ that we may be justified Mr. Eyre answers That this is a mistake like the former for it is Christ himself who throughout that Chapter is compared to bread and food whom by faith we receive for our refreshment consolation and spiritual nourishment Rep. As if Justification were none of that nourishment which we receive by faith because Christ himself is the meat on whom we feed This answer is a plain yielding of the Argument unlesse Mr. Eyre intend that it is only comfort and refreshment and not Justification and pardon which is the nourishment we receive by feeding on Christ which if he doth intend we oppose from the text 1. That Christ invites us to eat of his flesh that we may live not simply that we may be refreshed and comforted it s in vain to talk of refreshing and comforting him that is dead ver 33. The bread of God giveth life to the world the very substance and being of life not only the well-being which consists in refreshment and consolation And though life may now and then though very rarely signifie precisely a comfortable life yet here surely it signifies more as being opposed to eternal death under which the world is supposed to be till Christ give them life ver 50. to be I mean in respect of guilt and that very life in the losse of which consists the whole misery of unbelievers ver 53. Except you eat the flesh of the Sonne of man and drink his blood you have no life in you 2. And that Justification or
rewarding of the believer with a right to blessednesse I gather from ver 4 5. To him that worketh the reward is not imputed of grace but of debt but to him that worketh not but believeth his faith is imputed to him unto righteousnesse Where the imputing of faith unto righteousnesse is directly opposed to the imputing a reward according to works Ergo as the imputing works unto righteousnesse were to give a right to blessednesse according to works sub ratione mercedis so on the contrary to impute faith unto righteousnesse is to give the beleever a right and title to blessednesse sub ratione mercedis The difference only is this the former is of debt the latter of grace as we shall further shew anon 2. Thus also we finde the Apostle interpreting the phrase for after he had said that Abraham was made the father of all them that beleeve that righteousnesse might be imputed unto them also ver 11. he explains himself ver 13. for the Promise was not to Abraham or his seed by the Law but by the righteousnesse of faith The reason whereof he renders ver 16. That it might be by grace that the Promise might be sure to all the seed So that the establishing of the Promise to Abraham and all that walk in the steps of his faith by which a right to life is given both to him and them is the imputation Vid. Dav Paraeum Dub. exâ—lic in Rom. 4. Dub. 3. of righteousnesse to them 3. The same phrase is used of Phineas Psal 106. 30 31. Then stood up Phineas and executed judgement And it was imputed to him unto righteousnesse unto all generations for evermore The meaning of which words is easie to be learned from the story it self Numb 25. 12 13. Wherefore say Behold I give unto him my Covenant of Peace And he shall have it and his seed after him even the Covenant of an everlasting Priesthood The Promise of the continuance of the Priesthood in his line from one generation to another as the reward of his zeal is that which the Psalmist calls the imputing it to him unto righteousnesse to all generations Indeed the phrase there is not altogether so comprehensive as it is here because the Promise made him was but of one particular blessing and so could not constitute him righteous universally but only in part and as to that particular blessing which the Promise gave him right to Yet it shews the Scripture-sense of the phrase as sufficiently as when the same phrase is used with reference unto faith to shew that thereby we obtain the reward of an universal righteousnesse 4. The imputation of righteousnesse in respect of the terminus à quo is all one with the non-imputation of sin ver 6 8. and what is it to non-impute sin but not to render the wages of sin by destroying the guilt and punishment of it 2 Sam. 19. 19. 2 Tim. 4. 16. Ergo to impute faith unto righteousnesse is to reward it with a right to impunity and blessednesse though this reward be not of debt but of grace This therefore being the sense of the phrase throughout the whole Chapter we leave Mr. Eyres glosse to go seek entertainment where it can finde it SECT V. THere remain three texts more which I mentioned in my Sermon §. 13. to prove that Justification follows faith namely Acts 10. 43. Through his Name whosoever beleeveth on him shall receive remission of sin And 26. 18. To turne them from darknesse to light and from the Power of Satan unto God that they may receive forgivenesse of sin and an inheritance amongst all them that are sanctified through faith And 13. 39. By him all that believe are justified from all things from which you could not be justified by the Law of Moses To the two former Mr. Eyre answers That the giving of remission and receiving it are two things The former is Gods act and the latter is ours A Prince may pardon a Malefactour and he thereby is secured from punishment though it come not to his hands for a good whiles after Rep. The word receive in Scripture is taken sometimes actively as when we are said to receive God and Christ and his Word Matth. 10. 40. John 13. 20. Acts 2. 41. namely by believing Sometimes it is taken passively in which sense giving and receiving are not two acts but one and the same as when we are said to receive the reward of inheritance Col. 3. 24. to receive eternal life Luke 18. 30. to receive a hundred fold Matth. 19. 29. In all which and the like places our receiving is all one with Gods giving the reward of inheritance eternal life a hundred fold And thus to receive remission of sin is all one with Gods giving remission or to have our sins remitted and pardoned In this sense do our Protestants understand Receiving remission through faith as was before observed out of Contarenus So do the Scriptures also Gal. 3. 22. All are concluded under sin That the Promise to wit of Justification by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that beleeve In which place Gods giving righteousnesse by the Promise and our receiving it are one and the same act compare ver 14. 18. So Rom. 5. 17. They that receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousnesse shall reigne in life c. Whence also it is manifest that Gods giving and our receiving are both one act Therefore this giving or receiving of righteousnesse is called the coming of grace or righteousnesse upon us ver 18. As by the offence of one judgement came upon all men to condemnation even so by the righteousnesse of one the free gift came upon all men unto Justification 2. The receiving of remission must be understood in the same sense as the receiving of the inheritance for they are joyned both together in the text Acts 26. 18. That they may receive forgivenesse of sin and an inheritance But for us to receive the inheritance is no more then to be made partakers of the inheritance not by any act of ours but by the free and effectual gift of God 3. To receive remission what act of ours is it Mr. Eyre doth not tell me plainly but by his answers to former texts and his instance here of a Malefactour pardoned before he knowes it I presume he meanes that it is our knowledge of our sins being remitted But such a knowledge is not wont to follow so presently and immediately upon believing as pardon of sin is every where in Scripture supposed to do unlesse it be in those who have the perfect knowledge of the moment and minute of their first Conversion unto God But most Christians attain not to such a knowledge till after long searchings and experience and it is very improper to say a man receives such an act of his own which himselfe works out with much labour and travel of minde if our knowledge of remission were by immediate
this It is an unsound Assertion that we are said to be justified by faith because that faith doth evidence our Justification before faith The proof of this is the manifest tendency of every branch of this Argument and of each Argument under each branch And I am apt to think Mr. Eyre himself so understood me when he comes to particulars for he doth not once charge them with impertinency which he might have done with advantage enough if it had not been clear that they were all levelled at another scope then simply to prove that faith is of no use to evidence Justification As to the thing it self I am so far from denying faith to evidence our Justification that I do assert as followeth 1. As the word evidence signifies that which is affected to argue another thing so faith doth â—vidence our Justification yea and is the first thing that doth evidence it 2. Faith doth also evidence Justification axiomatically to all those that have a particular testimony from God that they are justified As those whom Christ tells in the Gospel that their sinnes were forgiven them Matth. 9. 2 5. Luke 5. 20 23. and 7. 47 48. If any man now living hath the like testimony from God that his sins are forgiven he hath no better way to evidence it to himselfe then without any more ado to beleeve that they are forgiven 3. Faith doth also concurre to the evidencing of Justification syllogistically but then the whole evidence is not of faith as we shall shew by and by I do therefore acknowledge the use of faith in evidencing Justification in all those wayes by which it may be evidenced though not of faith only in the last nor at all in the second unlesse there be any man that hath heard God saying to him Thy sins are forgiven thee Come we on then to the proof of particulars And first that we §. 12. cannot be said to be justified by faith in respect of faiths evidencing our Justification as an Argument or particularly as an effect thereof To evidence Justification as an Argument is no more then for faith to have such a relation unto Justification as that where the one is the other must needs be also and he that knows the relation they have to each other cannot but know that where faith is there Justification must needs also be Even as laughing and crying may be said to evidence reason in a childe though it may not evidence it to the childe himself because he knows not the dependance of these actions upon his reason so we say where there is smoak there is some fire Groanings argue some ill affection in the body and generally every effect doth argue and evidence its cause to them that know the connexion between the cause and effect Mr. Eyre disclaims faiths evidencing in this way though in answer to Rom. 4. 24. above debated of his Book pag. 44. § 6. he hath as plainly yielded it as can be in these words Hereby we may know and be assured that Christs righteousnesse is imputed to us that we whether Jewes or Gentiles are the persons to whom this grace belongs if God hath drawn our hearts to beleeve and obey the Gospel in regard that none do or can beleeve but such as are ordained to life and to obtain salvation by Jesus Christ What is this but that faith doth evidence our Justification as an Argument seeing that where one is the other is also where there is faith there is Justification It seems the same thing is good Divinity out of Mr. Eyres mouth but out of mine an errour Yet though Mr. Eyre will not owne that faith doth evidence Justification in this way he thinks fit to give his Reader his sense of my Reasons There are therefore three Reasons in my Sermon why we cannot be said to be justified by faith in respect of faiths evidencing our Justification as an Argument The first is this Because then Justification by faith is not necessarily so much as Justification in conscience A Christian may have faith and yet not have the evidence that he is justified As a childe may laugh and cry and yet not have the evidence or clear knowledge that himselfe hath reason c. Mr. Eyre answers 1. By intimating that this agrees not with what I allege out of the Apostle 1 John 3. 20. to prove that if our hearts condemn us God doth much more condemn us 2. If faith did evidence only as a signe it would be a dark and unsatisfying evidence 3. Nothing that precedes faith doth prove a man justified nothing that follows it is so apt to prove it as faith it selfe 4. Wheresoever there is faith there is some evidence of this grace In the least spark of fire and the least twinkling starre there is some light Rep. To the first I say that it never came into my minde to prove that God condemns every one whom his own conscience condemns but that if conscience condemns truly then the judgement thereof is according to the judgement of God and so God condemns as well as conscience But if a beleevers heart shall tell him that he is not justified and his sins not pardoned his conscience is erroneous and judgeth otherwise then God judgeth 2. The two next answers are like chips in pottage that do neither good nor hurt as I see When I can understand whether they make with me or against me I shall consider them farther 3. The fourth answer that whosoever hath faith hath some evidence of his Justification for that he meanes by grace or else it s nothing to the purpose I deny utteâ—ly if by evidence he mean not that which would prove it if it were rightly understood but a mans actual knowledge that he is justified And how doth Mr. Eyre prove it why the least spark of fire hath some light and the least twinkling starre True So the least degree of true faith hath that in it which if it were rightly apprehended would make some discovery that a man were justified But these sparks of fire give no light at all when they lie buried under heaps of ashes and such black and dâ—smal clouds may cover the face of the Heavens that we cannot see not only the lesser stars but not those of greatest magnitude And the Scripture testifieth not only positively that a gracious soule may walk in darknesse but to expresse the greatnesse of this darknesse addes an universal negative And may see no light that is as f Childe of light page 5. 6 8 9 10. Dr. Godwin hath excellently proved he may be without all evidence of his Justification of which the said Doctor gives several instances in David Job Heman and Christ himself and proposeth largely the causes and cure of such darknesse in all which he hath bestowed a great deal of excellent and acceptable paines to no purpose if Mr. Eyres doctrine here be true How many soules have I known and g See Mr. Tho.
Tim. 2. 21. If a man purge himself from these he shall be a vessel unto honour and Heb. 3. 6. whose house are we if we hold fast our confidence unto the end As to the former place it should have been proved and not said only that the particle If is not a note of a condition if to be a vessel of honour be to be glorified in heaven Or if to be a vessel of honour do signifie a man specially and eminently serviceable unto God sanctified and meet for the Masters use and prepared unto every good work as the Apostle in the same verse expounds it then the particle If is a note of more then a condition even of a true proper cause of an effect that follows naturally and not by Promise for the more a man purgeth himself from spiritual defilements and defilers the more prepared and disposed he must needs be to every spiritual employment The next place Heb. 3. 6. is nothing to the purpose if the particle If be there granted to be meerly a description of the person because the consequent part of the Proposition is not promissory but simply affirmative The text saith not whose house we shall be if we hold fast but whose we are if we hold fast Neverthelesse g Parall l. 3. in loc Junius upon ver 14. which in sense is much the same with this doubts not to affirme the holding fast of our confidence to be a condition A nobis verò conditionem unicam desiderat scil Christus nempe ut maneamus in ipso atque hanc conditionem nâ—tat Apostolus his verbis siquidem principium illius subsistentiae c. which testimony I quote the rather that Mr. Eyre may know that Junius was no enemy to faiths being a condition as he doth somewhere represent him yea and on this verse he is expresse that continuance in the faith is the condition of our continuing to be Gods house §. 4. And that the words Rom. 10. 9. If thou beleeve with thine heart c. cannot be a description of the person meerly I prove largely below in a particular debate of that place I have here only one word to speak against it Either it describes the person from his faith to signifie that as such that is as a believer he is the subject of Justification and then faith must needs be antecedent to Justification and if it be antecedent as an act required of us in point of-duty to a blessing consequent by vertue of a promise then is it antecedent as a condition Or it is a meer description of the person shewing that that is the man that shall be justified though his faith have no order nor tendency to his Justification but may as well follow after it as go before it But 1. This cannot be current sense if Justification be either from eternity or immediately in the death of Christ or at any time before this description be made for example Is it sense to say If thou be the man that dost or at any time shalt beleeve thou shalt be elected or Christ shall die for thee when both election and the death of Christ are long since past or if a man should say If thou shalt be glorified thou shalt be justified would not such a speech suppose that the person to whom those words are spoken was as yet not justified though the Scripture is not wont to speak after this manner in any place 2. Let us take some parallel place and see how it will accord with it As the words of Christ to the father of the childe that was possest Mark 9. 23. If thou canst beleeve all things are possible to him that believeth Or the same words to his disciples Matth. 17. 20. If you have faith as a grain of mustard-seed nothing shall be unpossible unto you If faith do here only describe the person and not propound the condition then whether the father had at present believed or no his childe must have been presently healed notwithstanding supposing him to be a person that at any time should believe and whether the disciples beleeve or no at present all things are possible to them presently they being the persons whose property it is to believe some time or other But more of this hereafter Another note of a condition is the particle if not or except which §. 5. we finde also used in Scripture in this matter for men are threatened that they shall not be justified except they beleeve John 8. 24. If you beleeve not or except you believe you shall die in your sins when men are threatened with damnation except they believe are they threatened absolutely or conditionally if the first then all the men of the world shall be damned for this is to be preached to all men that if they believe not they shall be damned If conditionally then faith is the condition of deliverance from damnation And is not God to be thus understood in all his speeches of like nature Gen. 44. 23. Except your youngest Brother come down with you you shall see my face no more Josh 7. 12. Neither will I be with you any more except you destroy the accursed from amongst you Can the Sun shine more bright in the firmament then it is clear from hence that their destroying the accursed from amongst them was a necessary condition of their enjoyment of Gods Presence Acts 27. 31. Except these abide in the ship you cannot be saved See also Luke 13. 3 5. Rev. 2. 5 22. and multitudes of other places In all which the same particle is a note of a condition unlesse we shall have the modesty to think that the Scriptures were penned on purpose to puzzle and confound our understandings All those texts of Scripture which promise remission of sins to §. 6. them that believe prove the same thing particularly Mark 16. 15 16. Go preach the Gospel to every creature He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved but he that believeth not shall be damned John 3. 16. God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten sonne that whosoever believeth on him should not perish but have everlasting life and 6. 40. This is the Will of him that sent me that whosoever seeth the Son and believeth on him may have everlasting life with many places of like nature To all which I guesse what Mr. Eyres answer will be by what he saith of the last of these chap. 13. § 14. pag. 135. This text saith he and others like it do only shew who have the fruition and enjoyment of the benefits of Christ to wit They that beleeve Many such cathedral determinations we have from him without §. 7. so much as a pretence to proof especially in his answers to Scriptures alledged against him yet might he very well think that we would expect some solid reason for this his perpetual wresting and abuse of words from their obvious and common sense 1. It
believer as much subject to condemnation of conscience as the unbeliever Upon the second branch of the Argument there is nothing I shall §. 20. need reply to saving only that passage of Mr. Eyres That Christs merits will not save those whom God doth condemne To which I say that though none other can justifie those whom God condemnes yet God himself may and doth justifie those whom he had before condemned or else no sonne of Adam ever was or shall be justified Rom. 5. 18. As by the offence of one judgement came upon all men to condemnation even so by the righteousnesse of one the free gift came upon all men unto Justification of life A third Argument proving that the condemnation mentioned â— 21. John 3. 18. was not to be meant of condemnation in conscience only was because it is called the wrath which shall abide on unbelievers ver 36. Mr. Eyre answers Therefore we say no elect unbeliever is condemned of God because the wrath of God doth not abide upon him Rep. It is yielded then that the condemnation about which we dispute is not meerly condemnation in conscience which is as much as I ever sought from the place and that Mr. Eyre knows well enough 2. We have shewed before that the wrath of God is upon every one that is an unbeliever at present though it do not abide upon any but final unbelievers Lastly thus I argued The condemnation here spoken of is opposed §. 22. to salvation v. 17. Ergo it is more then condemnation in conscience Mr. Eyre answers That the condemnation opposed to salvation is damnation and then by Mr. Eyres Argument the Elect because they are sometimes unbelievers must all be damned Rep. Sure Mr. Eyre believes not our English Proverb As good never a whit as never the better Salvation is sometimes taken strictly for an executive deliverance from wrath Rom. 5. 9. And so none are saved in this life Sometimes more largely and so it containes both that compleat salvation and the beginnings of it in this life viz. that right which is given us to it in our Justification Luke 19. 9. Rom. 1. 16 17. and 10. 9 10. He that beleeveth not is under condemnation as it is opposed to salvation in the latter sense The second answer is replied to already CHAP. VIII A Reply to Mr. Eyres twelfth Chapter My third fourth and fifth Argument for the Antecedent of faith to Justification vindicated SECT I. A Third Argument by which I proved Justification to §. 1. be consequent to faith was taken from the several similitudes by which Justification by faith is illustrated I instanced particularly in two The first was that of the brazen Serpent John 3. 14 15. As Moses lifted up the Serpent in the wildernesse supply that whosoever looked on him might recover of the sting of the fiery Serpent See the story it selfe Numb 21. 8 9. so must the Sonne of man be lifted up that whosoever beleeveth on him should not perish but have everlasting life And John 6. 40. It is the Will of God that whosoever seeth and believeth the Sonne should be justified Mr. Eyre doth utterly deny that it was the intent of the Holy Ghost to shew by these comparisons in what order or method we are justified in the sight of God Wherein he fights not only against me but against a Comparamus fidem cum intuitu serpentis aen i. Intuitus ille vim medicam in se non habuit sed ut instrumentum conditio est à Deo ad sanâ—tatem impetrâ—ndam ordinata Anton. Wallaeus oper Tom. 1. p. 423. all men that I can read upon the place and against common sense which upon the reading of the words cannot but apprehend the order and method of our spiritual healing represented by that bodily cure wrought upon those that looked up to the brazen Serpent But it may be he intends to deny Justification to be included in the Promise of not perishing but having eternal life Let us try it His second answer therefore is The stinging of the fiery Serpents did plainly shadow forth the effects of the Law in conscience Now as the Israelites when they were stung by those fiery Serpents found no ease till they looked up unto the brazen Serpent so the soule that is smitten and wounded by the Ministry of the Law will never finde rest till it look unto him in whose wounds and stripes is the healing of sinners Rep. The effects of the Law in conscience might very well be shadowed §. 2. forth by the stinging of the fiery Serpents as part of that punishment which is due to sinners but that it should represent no more is spoken gratis Sin stings because it kills the person as well as because it disquiets the conscience 1 Cor. 15. 55 56. and a fiery sting it is because it makes the sinner obnoxious to the displeasure of God who is a consuming fire and whose wrath burnes to the very bottome of hell not in the conscience only but upon the whole person unlesse it be prevented by faith and repentance 2. Observe also Reader how Mr. Eyre is constrained to mince the matter that he may make his Interpretation the more current The Israelites saith he being stung of the fiery Serpents could find no ease till they looked up to the brazen Serpent As if their wound had been only painful but not mortal And as if they had looked up to the brazen Serpent not for life but only for ease whereas they were all mortally stung many died actually all had received their deaths wound death was begun upon them all and would unavoidably have grown on to the last and utmost degree if it had not been prevented by the brazen Serpent To teach us though Mr. Eyre will not learn it that every unbeliever is in a state of death and condemnation nor can escape the last and sorest part of this death but by looking up to Jesus Christ 3. The reddition of the comparison is this in our Lords words So must the Sonne of man be lifted up that whosoever believeth on him should not perish but have everlasting life which according to Mr. Eyres sense is this That whosoever beleeveth on him should not be disquieted in conscience but should have rest and ease in his Spirit This indeed for the most part doth in some measure follow upon our Justification as no doubt but the Israelites recovered life and ease together But to be delivered from perishing and to have everlasting life in right or possession is surely more then to have ease from present anguish of spirit Should I take this liberty of interpreting Scripture Mr. Eyre might justly have been angry with my forehead In the third place Mr. Eyre tells his Reader that this very comparison §. 3. makes against me I had need look to that But how doth it make against me As saith he the Israelites were alive when they looked upon the
if they be both in the very same bond and obligation hath some thing of truth in it though then also the surety hath the same action against the debtour which the creditor had before otherwise it is most notoriously false and the contrary determined frequently in the y I. in summa l. Si poenae D. de condict in deb l Si quid possessor ff de Pet. Haered l. Papin ff Maâ—d civil Law If the payment of the surety do presently discharge the debtour it is because he agrees with the creditour that the payment which he makes shall be accepted for the present and immediate discharge of the debtour which is the second thing I beganne to mention before and shall now farther explaine The death of Christ being not the very same which was in the obligation therefore that it may be effectual for our deliverance there is a double act required on Gods part to whom this payment is made the one is to admit or give way that satisfaction be made the other factam ratam habere to accept it when made and consequently to discharge and free the debtour for Christs satisfaction was admitted that our obligation might he destroyed by the intervening act of God the supream Governour of mankind Rom. 3. 25. Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation that he may be the justifier of him that beleeveth in Jesus Moreover Christ being not a sinner but a surety and his payment not the payment of the principal debtour but of a surety therefore it is in his power to agree whether his payment shall be accepted and be effectual for the discharge of the sinner presently or for some time to come absolutely or upon condition Whence by the way appears what little strength there is in Mr. Eyres second exception viz. That Christs payment is lesse efficacious then if we had paid our selves if we be not thereby discharged presently because Christs satisfaction produceth its effects according to the agreement between his Father and himself and no otherwise and the virtue of it is to be measured by the greatnesse of the effect which could not be wrought by any meer created cause whether it produce it sooner or later upon condition or without Wherefore if we prove that the Father and Son agreed that none §. 35. should have actual discharge by the death of Christ till they do beleeve we carry the cause by Mr Eyres owne judgement Yet in yielding thus much he hath not a little prejudiced the authority of his own determinations so I call them because he lays them downe so peremptorily and axiomatically as if they needed no proofe How often doth he tell us before and after this concession that our discharge in the death of Christ must needs be present and immediate as pag. 68. § 7. Our discharge from the Law was â— not to be sub termino or in diem but present and immediate And in this chapter § 13. The death of Christ as it is a satisfaction or payment so the discharge thereby procured must needs be present and immediate As if it were a contradiction in the nature of the thing that we should not presently be discharged if Christ hath made satisfaction And yet here yeelds that by a contract or agreement between the Father and the Sonne the discharge obtained in Christs satisfaction may be suspended It is therefore a thing possible that Christ may have satisfied and yet we the elect I mean not be presently discharged And what then means the must needs were it a thing denyed it were easie to give innumerable instances of satisfaction made when yet the person for whom it is made is not presently freed but because it is not denied I hasten to the service which Mr. Eyre challengeth me to performe with a promise that if it be performed he will yeeld the cause and that is to shew that it was the will of the Father and of the Sonne that none should have actual reconciliation by the death of Christ till they do beleeve For proofe of this I quoted the words of the Lord Jesus wherein §. 36. he gives us an account both of his own and his Fathers will in this matter Joh. 6. 40. This is the will of him that sent me that whosoever seeth the Sonne and beleeveth on him may have everlasting life To which Mr. Eyre answers This Text and others like it do only shew who have the fruition and enjoyment of the benefits of Christ to wit thâ—y that beleeve Rep. An answer which lets me see something of what the wit of man can do in darkening plaine testimonies whose sense is obvious at first view even to vulgar capacities This is not the first time we have met with this answer in Mr. Eyre and it hath been already convicted and cast by more then a jury of Arguments in â—hap 5. 8. two places and therefore here I shall speak but briefly to it 1. Iâ— this and the like Texts do only shew â—â—o are the persons that have the enjoyment of Christs benefits namely beleevers then either they shew that beleevers as such in seâ—s◠〈◊〉 are the subjects of that life which is here promised and then I have what I would have for if men as beleevers are the subjects of this life then the prooâ—â—s full that they do not begin to partake in this life before they are beleevers much lesse before they are borne and least of all at the time of the death of Christ nor was it the will of the Father or of the Sonne that they should so do Or the meaning is that the persons who enjoy this life are such whose property and priviledge it is to be beleevers some time or other sooner or later though they may not be beleevers when they first begin to partake therein and so they are described à câ—nsâ—quenti from their faith as a consequent of their first partaking in this life And if so I shall return Mr. Eyre his offer namely that if he will shew me but one place of Scripture from the beginning of Genesis to the end of the Revelation wherein persons that shall enjoy a benefit are described from the consequent of that benefit with a distributive particle preposed such as is the particle whosoever in the present Text and I will yeeld him the cause at lest so farre forth as it is concerned in these Texts But if Mr. Eyre cannot give one instance of the like phrase of speech in all the Bible as I know he cannot then let him take heed least he become guilty of that which he doth elsewhere groundlesly charge upon me I meane of attempting to suborne the spirit to serve his own turne And what I speak of the description of a person in order to his receiving of a benefit is true also in respect of any evil threatned How many hundreds of times are such sentences in Scripture As for example Matth. 5. 22. Whosoever is
to our Justification before God the contrary to which he had spoke but just before upon v. 5. Obj. Nulláne igitur utilitas erit circumcisionis Respondet in Christo nihil valere ideoque justitiam in fide sitam esse c. Perkins his words are these in answer to the objection of the Papists from those words Faith worketh by love Paul saith he doth not shew in this verse what justifieth but what are the exercises of godlinesse in which Christians must be occupied And he doth not shew how faith justifieth but how it may be discerned to be true faith namely by love But neither doth this intend any thing more then to shew the reason why Paul describes justifying faith as working by love viz. not that it justifieth as working by love though it be the property of that faith by which we are justified to work by love But he was far from thinking that faith was no whit available to our Justification before God It is his own observation upon this very verse not far before The second Conclusion Faith is of great use and acceptation in the Kingdome of Christ By it first our persons and then our actions please God and without it nothing pleaseth God And immediately after these words which Mr. Eyre refers to disputes for Justification by faith without works against the Papists The last place I mentioned was 1 John 5. 11. He that hath §. 40. the Sonne hath life he that hath not the Sonne hath not life Mr. Eyre answers He doth not say that all who have not faith except final vnbelievers have not the Sonne or any beneâ—t by him Rep. This upon the matter is to deny that the testimony is true 1. Life doth here signifie all that blessednesse which God hath given us in Jesus Christ ver 11. Ergo he that hath not the Son hath no benefit by him But he that believeth not hath not the Sonne for to have the Sonne is to believe on him Ergo he that believeth not hath not the Sonne nor any benefit by him That we have the Sonne by believing on him is manifest 1. From the Apostles own interpretation for having spoke in general He that hath the Son hath life he applies it particularly to those to whom he writes v. 13. And these things have I written unto you that believe on the Name of the Sonne of God that you may know that you have eternal life 2. From the perpetual sense of the phrase throughout all these Epistles as chap. 2. 23. Whosoever denieth the Sonne the same hath not the Father but he that acknowledgeth the Sonne hath the Father also suitable to what this John records in his Gospel chap. 12. 44 45. He that beleeveth on me believeth not on me but on him that sent me And he that seeth me seeth him that sent me And more expressely in his Epistle 2 ep v. 9. Whosoever transgresseth and abideth not in the doctrine of Christ HATH NOT GOD But he that abideth in the doctrine of Christ HE HATH both the Father and the Sonne Compare 1 ep 2. 24. 2. If we are said in Scripture any where to have the Son in any other sense then by believing or as excluding believing why have we no intelligence of it Mr. Eyre might very well think we should interpret his silence partly in that he declares not how we may be said to have Christ any otherwise then by faith partly in not attempting to justifie it from the phrase of Scripture as an argument that himself is conscious that the doctrine which he here suggests hath no footing in the Scriptures Briefly the Apostle speaks without distinction or limitation He that hath the Sonne hath life even that eternal life whereof he spake in the verse immediately foregoing If the Son may be had without believing then eternal life may be had without believing also wherefore we winde up the Argument If it were the Will of God that none should have the life which is in his Sonne till by believing he had the Sonne then was it his Will that none should be justified by the death of Christ till they did beleeve The reason is because the life of pardon or Justification is an eminent part of that life which God hath given us in his Sonne and virtually includes all that life we have by Christ But the antecedent is proved true from the text Ergo the consequent is true To these texts mentioned in my Sermon and now vindicated let §. 41. me adde one or two more If God hath set forth Christ to be a propitiation through faith in his blood then was it not the Will of God that any man should have actual remission or Justification by the blood of Christ till he did beleeve But God hath set forth Christ to be a propitiation through faith in his blood Ergo. The Assumption is the Apostles own words Rom. 3. 25. The reason of the Proposition is plain because if any man be pardoned and justified immediately in the death of Christ then is not Christ a propitiation z Inseriâ— fidem ut doceat fidem esse conditionem sub quà Christus nobis datus est propitiatorium Dav. Paraeus in loc through faith but without it Not that our faith contributes any degree of worth or sufficiency to the blood of Christ by which it may be made in its kinde a more perfect cause of our remission but because God hath so constituted that our remission shall not follow and so our sins not be propitiated quoad â—ffectum in the blood of Christ till we beleeve Again the Compact and Agreement between the Father and the Sonne in his undertaking the work of Redemption is set down at large Isa 53. throughout particularly ver 10. 11 12. where also the Justification of those for whom he died is mentioned as the fruit and effect of Christs offering himselfe for them and bearing their iniquities but not before their faith but through it ver 11. By his knowledge shall my righteous servant justifie many that is by the knowledge of him where knowledge as elsewhere in Scripture often signifies faith And what shall I say more we have proved from multitudes of Scriptures that God requires commands and exhorts all men to beleeve that they may be justified by the blood of Christ And what stronger evidence can we need then this that it was not the Will of God that men should be justified by that blood before they did beleeve even as under the Law there was no propitiation by sacrifice typical but supposed on the offendors part the concurrence of some act as a Lev. 5. 5. câ—nfession b Chap. 23. â—9 30. humiliation c â—b 1. 4 3 2 â—assim laying his hand on the head of the sacrifice d Lâ—v. â— 16. â—ide Joma Peâ—râ—k 8 8 â— or the like signifying that faith by which sinners should be justified when Christ the true sacrifice should
the following discourse Yet that the Reader may know what Justification it is which we speak of I shal here speak something briefly for explication of it leaving whatsoever is controverted to be proved in its proper place Justification then by our late Reverend a Larger Catech pag 94. in 12. Assembly is thus defined An act of Gods free-grace unto sinners in which he pardoneth all their sinnes accepteth and accounteth their persons righteous in his sight not for any thing wrought in them or done by them but only for the perfect obedience and full satisfaction of Christ by God imputed to them and received by Faith alone This for substance is the Justification which the Question speaks of if thou wouldest have it Reader more particularly take it as followeth The efficient ut quod of our Justification is God himself that justifieth §. 4. and his grace the efficient ut quo for he justifies us freely of his grace Rom. 3. 24. Jesus Christ also as King and Lord of life is joyned by special commission with the Father in his great Act of justifying sinners John 5. 22. 26 27. Acts 5. 31. Matth. 28. 18 19. with Mark 16. 15 16. and Luke 24. 47. The righteousnesse and obedience of Jesus Christ is the onely meritorious cause of our Justification but whether his active or passive obedience either or both I do not dispute nor do I account it needful because all the active obedience of Christ was passive for it was part of his humiliation that being b See Bp. Usher Imman pag. 10 at the end of his Body of Divinity a Son he would subject himself to the payment of that tribute of obedience which was due onely from servants and all his passive obedience was active for he laid down his life of himself John 10. 18. The formality of Justification consists as I take it in a legal discharge of a sinner from his obligation to punishment and a donation of right and title to eternal life which discharge and gift because it was merited by the obedience of Christ without any contribution of merit from the sinner himself is truly called the c Christi justitia in justificatione fidelibus imputatur quatenus ejus merito justi coram Deo reputamur Ames Medul Theol. l. 1. c. 27. th 12. imputation of Christs righteousnesse and this is the sense of that phrase in the use of our Divines And these things I here take for granted reserving the proof of what is disputable in them to its proper place SECT II. THe second and more material labour is to explain in what sense §. 5. we are said to be justified by Faith Mr. Eyre gives us five senses of the phrase first of those that take Faith in a tropical and figurative sense as thus We are justified by Faith i. e. by the obedience and righteousnesse of Jesus Christ in whom we believe and upon whom we rest for life and righteousnesse Secondly of those which say we are justified by Faith instrumentally and relatively Thirdly Of the Papists who ascribe a meritoriousnesse to Faith and do also make our Justification to be by inherent righteousnesse or doing of righteous actions Foutthly of the Arminians who explode the word Merit and deliver their opinion to this effect That God in the legal Covenant required the exact obedience of all his Commandments but now in the Covenant of Grace he requires Faith which in his gracious acceptation stands instead of that obedience to the Moral Law which we ought to performe Fifthly of those that say that Faith doth justifie as a condition or Antecedent qualification by which we are made capable of being justified according to the order and constitution of God The last of these is that which I contend for according to the explication given of it in my Sermon pag. 9. 10. which why Master Eyre should account a new opinion and charge it here upon Master Baxter and elsewhere upon Doctor Hammond as the first parents and patrons of it I know not much lesse why he should so very often accuse it as a piece of Arminianisme and Popery seeing it is a thing so well known that the Synod of Dort and almost all our Protestants do very frequently call Faith the condition of our Justification d De reconcil pecc par 1. l. 2. cap. 18. pag. 99. 100. Mr. Wotton doth purposely dispute for it and hath saved me the labour of transcribing the testimonies of many famous Protestants who say the same either in expresse termes as Fox Perkins Paraeus Trelcatius G. Downham J. Downham Schaâ—pius Tho. Mathewes or equivalent as Calvin Aretius Sadeel Oleviaâ— Mâ—lancthon Beza to whom I might adde e Disser de morte Christi pag. 63. Est autem hic ordo stabilitâ—s haec conditio expresse posita in â—vangelio quod reconciliationis gratia beneficium vitae aeternae ad peccatores ex morte Châ—isti redundaret si crederent Idem in praelect de Just Habit. act pag. 395 396. Davenant f Collat. cum Til pag. 6â—7 â—taque in vocatione aliam habet fides rationem quam in Justificatione nam in Justificatione conditio est praerequisita ut ita dicam in vocatione gignitur fusius in Disput de satisfact pag. 365. Cameron g Praelect Controv. 2. de not Eccles Q. 5. pag. 331. in 4. Cum primùm credo tum justus sum cum justus sum tum credo veluti si malefico cuiquam veniz cum hac conditione proponatur si eam amplecti velit c. Praelect de Sacram. cap. 4. Promissio gratiae conditionalis est requirit enim fidem c. Whitaker h De vocat pag. 16 17. Reliquum est ut videamus foederis gratuiti conditionem ea auâ—em sola est sides Deus promittit justificationem vitam sub conditione fidei passim Rollock i Syntag. Theol. l. 4. c. 10. de Evang. pag. 1106. Promissiones Evangelii de remissione peccatorum vita aeterna pertinen quidem ad omnes homines non tamen abâ—olutè sed sub conditione apprehensionis per fidem infra ibid. verum absolutae tamen non sunt sed hac conditione circumscriptae ut credant in Christum Grotius k De Evang Decad. 4 â— 1. pag. 238 Proposuit enim Deus Christum propitiationem nimirum ut is esset râ—conciliatio nostra propter quem placatus nos adoptat in filios Dei Verum non alia ratione quam per fidem in ejus sanguinem id est si credamus c. Bullinger l De remiâ—s peccat cap. 6. pag mihi 621. Discernendum inter eam gratiam Dei quae nullas haber adjectas conditiones qualis est quòd sâ—lem suum producit super bones malos pluitque super gratos ingratos eam quae conditionaliter confertur ad quem modum peccatorum nobis remissio contingit cap. 4.
salvation for us that whosoever beleeveth on him should not perish The p Ibid. p. 128. â— 11. English consent Tantùm propter c. Onely for the merit of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ by Faith not for our works and merits are we reputed just before God So q Ib. p. 157. 25. Scotland Sed qui corde c. They that do in heart sincerely beleeve and with their mouth confesse Jesus Christ do most certainly receive those blessings First in this life remission of sinnes and that by Faith alone in the blood of Christ The r Ib. p. 173 22 Belgick Confession in like manner Meritò igitur jureque dicimus c. We do therefore well and rightly say with Paul that we are justified only by Faith or by Faith without the works of the Law But to speak properly we do by no means understand Faith it self by it self or of it self to justifie us as which is onely as it were an Instrument by which we apprehend Christ our righteousnesse Christ then himself is our righteousnesse who imputes to us all his merits but Faith is the Instrument by which we are coupled unto him in the society and communion of all his good things and are continued therein Of the same Faith are all the other s Argent p. 223 c. 3. Paâ—t 2. August p. 22 c. 1. Saxâ—n p. 79 80 81. Wiâ—â—emberg p. 14â— c de justif Palat p. 210. si â—emissionem Churches whose Confessions follow Thus t Just lib. 3 c. 11. §. 10. Calvin Fateor hoc tam incomparabili beno nos privari donec Christus noster fiat Non ergo eum extra nos procul speculamur ut nobis imputetur ejus jusâ— itia sed quia ipsum induimus insiti sumus in ejus corpus unum denique nos secum efficere dignatus est ideo justitiae societatem nobis cum to esse gloriamur Thus u Ubi supra Epist 45. Beza Quae obedientia Christi viz. nobis per fidem Christo unitis datur nostraque fit per imputationem x Loc. com clas 3. c. 4. §. 65. Thus Peter Martyr Si quid Deus condonat vel remittit id facit hominibus jam regeneratis non autem à se alienis filiis irae quales necesse est eos esse qui nondum sunt justificati Istis inquam nihil remittitur Quare obligati sunt ad â—mnia And thus all our more ancient Protestants that I can read but it is a tedious thing to me to transcribe so much of humane testimony and what is written is sufficient to demonstrate that Mr. Eyre differs from our ancient Protestants notwithstanding his pretended agreement almost as farre on the one hand as the Papists do on the other in the very foundations of his discourse For first it is manifest by the testimonies produced that our Protestants when they plead for Justification by the righteousnesse of Christ intend the very first act of Justification which Mr. Eyre rejects and ascribes no more to the righteousnesse of Christ then that it obtaines the effects of our justification but not the Act pag. 62. § 4. 2. Our Protestants do so plead for Justification by the righteousnesse of Christ as that they require and assert the necessary existence of Faith in us as the instrument or condition or antecedent of our Justification Mr. Eyre contends for a Justification by the righteousnesse of Christ without Faith at present coexisting 3. They plead for a Justification which begins upon believing and therefore must needs be a transient not an immanent act of God He for a Justification which is an y Augustan Confes de fide p. 21. Non est hic opus disputationibus de praedestinatione aut similibus immanent act and included in the decree of election as part of it pag. 65. § 5. 4. They when they speak of Justification by Faith meane Justification before God He the manifestation and declaration thereof onely to the conscience So that Mr. Eyres opinion and that of the ancient Protestants look so little like Countrey-men that it may not expect to be owned by them though it challenge kindred of them CHAP. II. An Answer to Mr. Eyres seventh Chapter What is meant by Gods sight Two parts or degrees thereof Mr. Eyres Exposition contradicts it selfe and the Truth Gods Will or Purpose never called by the name of Justification in Scripture The consequences which Mr. Eyre denies to follow upon his doctrine necessary and unavoidable A large enquiry whether Justification consist in Gods Purpose not to punish Imputation and non-imputation what in the use of Scripture Gods electing love no Justification Rom. 8. 33. answered Several Arguments proving that Justification is not Gods purpose of not punishing The foure objections which Mr. Eyre makes against himselfe not answered by him Not the first Nor the second Nor the third Nor the fourth of Mr. Eyres second and third Proposition SECT I. NExt we shall enquire what it is to be justified before God or in Gods sight 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Gal. 3. 11. or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Rom. 3. 20. by which the Septuagint render the Hebrew 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Psal 143. 2. a word that hath many faces and significations in a Drus observat cap. 17. Scripture But in the matter of Justification which is a forensical terme unlesse the whole body of our Protestants be mistaken it signifies as much as Gods judgement As to be justified in mans sight or before men is to be justified in mans judgement or for man to justifie and to be righteous in a mans own eyes is to be righteous in a mans own judgement or to justifie a mans selfe In like manner to be justified in Gods sight is to be justified in Gods judgement or for God to justifie Compare 1 Cor. 4. 4. Luke 16. 15. Numb 32. 22. and many other places Now this judgement of God is either a judgement of justice by which no flesh living shall be justified Psal 143. 2. or a judgement of mercy and grace 2 Sam. 22. 25 26. Col. 1. 22. Heb. 13. 21. by which only a sinner can be justified or stand in the sight presence and judgement of God In this judgement of God we consider these two degrees or parts §. 2. The first is that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Apostle calls it Rom. 1. 32. Jus b Vid Joh. Driâ—d de capt Redempt c. 2. mem 3. de Reg. dogmat Sac. Script l. 3. p. 96 97. Dei that Rule Law or Constitution of God determining of rewards and penalties whence Gods Precepts Statutes Threatenings and Promises are so often called in Scripture his judgements The second is the sentence which God the righteous Judge shall passe upon all men according to this Law 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the day of judgement Accordingly my opinion is that a sinner is justified in Gods sight either ipso jure
by the Law or Constitution of grace the immediate effect whereof is to give the sinner a right to impunity and to the heavenly inheritance or by the sentence of the Judge at the last day by which he is adjudged unto the immediate full and perfect possession of all those immunities and blessings which were given him in right by that grand Promise of the Gospel John 3. 16. He that believeth on me shall not perish but shall have everlasting life Even as amongst men an Act of grace and pardon gives imprisoned rebels a right to deliverance from their present and legally future punishments though the effects of this right he do not possesse any otherwise then in hope till his cause be tried and himself absolved in Court by the sentence of the Judge In reference to the former a sinner is justified presently upon believing in reference to the latter he is not justified till the day of judgement Therefore Peter exhorts the Jewes to repentance that their sins may be blotted out when the times of refreshing shall come from the Presence of God And he shall send Jesus Christ Acts 3. 19 20. And Paul prays for Onesiphorus that God would grant him that he may finde mercy of the Lord in that day 2 Tim. 1. 18. which questionlesse is meant of the day of judgement of which himselfe also speaks a little before ver 12. I am perswaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed to him against that day And in the name of all Christians he tells us Gal. 5. 5. That we by the Spirit do wait for the hope of righteousnesse by faith that is Justification through faith as it stands in opposition to Justification by works ver 4. and throughout the whole Epistle So doth the Lord Jesus promise to him that overcometh a white stone Rev. 2. 17. c Vid. Paraeum Aretium Brightman Dâ—od Eng. Annot in loc which having allusion to the custome of the Romanes in judgement condemning by a black stone and absolving by a white doth therefore signifie that eminent eternal and universal absolution from all guilt which shall be given to the Saints that overcome and continue faithful to the end So Rom. 2 13 16. Not the hearers of the Law but the doers of the Law shall be justified In the day when God shall judge the secrets of meâ— by Jesus Christ the 14. and 15. verses are to be read in a parenthesis This is my opinion in this matter which I have therefore set down the more distinctly that Mr. Eyre may understand how ignorant or impudent his Informer was that told him I maintained that we were not justified till the day of judgement page 19. Now to Mr. Eyre he gives us a threefold sense of the sight of §. â— God in the Question 1. As it signifies Gods knowledge 2. As it signifies his legal justice 3. As it signifies his making of us to see To which I shall need to give no other answer then his own words in the same paragraph of the last thus he speaks This phrase must have some other meaning in this debate for else that distinctiction of Justification in foro Dei in foro Conscientiae would be a meer tautology Of the first thus Although in articulo Providentiae in the doctrine of divine Providence seeing and knowing are all one yet in articulo Justificationis in the doctrine of Justification they are constantly distinguished throughout the Scripture and never promiscuously used the one for the other Thus of three senses of the phrase himselfe rejects two as impertinent to the matter in hand and yet states his answer thus If we take Gods sight in the last construction viz. for his making us to see then we are not justified in Gods sight before we believe 2. If we referre it to the justice of God we were justified in the sight of God when Christ exhibited and God accepted the full satisfaction in his blood 3. If we referre it to the knowledge of God we were justified in his sight when he willed or determined in himselfe not to impute to us our sins c. As who should say If you take Gods sight in such a sense in which it is never taken in all the Scripture by Mr. Eyres own confession such is the first sense which is here the last then thus But if you take it in such a sense in which it may not be taken in the present question such is the last of the three which is here put first then so If some other senses of the sight of God as when it signifies his favour his assistance his approbation and witnessing c. had been set down that we might have known when we are justified in Gods sight in those senses it had been every whit as conducible to the clearing of the Question As first to tell us that Gods sight doth never signifie his knowledge in the matter of Justification and then to adde in the same breath that to be justified in Gods sight is to be justified in his knowledge 2. Nor is it a lawful distinction because the members thereof do interferre for Justification in the death of Christ and in our own consciences is Justification in Gods knowledge for surely he knows both these no lesse then his Purpose and Determination within himselfe 3. We shall see by and by that Mr. Eyre maintaines that the righteousnesse of Christ is imputed to sinners by the eternal Act of Gods Will I ask then whether that imputation be Justification in Gods legal justice if it be then there is a farther implication in the members of the distinction if it be not I would know how God doth justifie us in his legal justice and yet not by imputing the righteousnesse of Christ to us 4. God knows us not to be justified till we be justified for it is impossible that the same thing should be and not be Indeed he may well know that he intends to justifie us but if he know that then he knows we are not yet justified for he knows that what he intends to do is not yet done But because Mr. Eyre refers us to his following discourse for the better understanding of these mysteries I attend his motion that I may spare tautologies as much as I can SECT II. He therefore delivers his judgement in three Propositions The first is this Justification is taken variously in Scripture §. 4. 1. For the Will of God not to punish or impute sinne unto his people 2. For the effect of Gods Will to wit his not punishing or his setting of them free from the curse of the Law That Justification is put for this latter act he supposeth none will question The only scruple is concerning the former which he confesseth he hath been sparing to call by the name of Justification because some grosse mistakes have sought for shelter under the wings of that expression As 1. That absurd conceit that Christ
just the effect which follows upon it is that we shall therefore be saved from wrath It seemes the distinction between the velle and the res volita in the matter of Justification was unknown to him 5. And his discourse supposeth that the love and grace of God is nothing so much commended by giving the effects as by putting forth the act of Justification for herein God commends his love towards us that while we were yet sinners he gave his Son to death for our Justification and then as a lesser matter he infers much more being now justified we shall be saved from wrath So also ver 10. Now if by Justification in Christs blood be meant the effects and not the act of Justification then the love and grace of God is nothing near so great in justifying us through the blood of Christ as in justifying us before without his blood But this is most notoriously false as is manifest not from this text only but from all the Scriptures which proclaim that temporal Justification which we have through the blood of Christ to be an act of greatest love and richest grace Rom. 3. 24 25. and 5. 20 21. Eph. 1. 6 7. and 2. 4 5 6 7. 1 Tim. 1. 14. Tit. 3. 4 5 6 7 6. The effects of Justification follow upon the act by moral necessity and without impediment Ergo the Justification here spoken of is not the effect precisely but the act The reason of the consequence is because the Justification mentioned in the text follows not upon any simple precedent act of Justification but is set forth as an act of such moral difficulty that it required no lesse then the precious blood of the Son of God to remove the obstructions and hindrances of its existence and to make it to exist The Antecedent is proved from his manner of arguing à majori ad minus being now justified much more shall we be saved implying that salvation follows as it were necessarily upon the position of the act of Justification Yea and I appeal to Mr. Eyre himselfe or any man else whether that act be not unworthy of the many glorious titles and epithets which are every where in Scripture put upon Justification and consequently unworthy of that name which being put in actu completo can yet produce no good effect to a sinner nor set him one degree farther from wrath then he was before unlesse some other more sufficient cause do interpose to midwise out its effects This mindes me of another Argument and that is this 7. Justification is not an act of grace simply but of powerful grace or of grace prevailing against the power of sin for this is that which creates the difficulty and so commends the excellency of the grace of Justification that it is the Justification of sinners Were it the Justification of such as had never sinned but had been perfectly righteous there were no such difficulty in that And therefore in the following part of the Chapter the Apostle expresly declares the quality of this grace in justifying us in that it abounds and is powerful to justifie above the ability of sin to condemn ver 15 17 20 Ergo the Justification here spoken of is the very act of Justification or there is no such thing at all for if we place it in a simple eternal volition there could be no moral difficulty in that no more then in the will of creating the world because from eternity there could be no opposition or hindrance for an act of grace to overcome 8. The Justification merited by Christ is not the effect but the act The reason we shall shew anon because it is absurd to make Christ the meritour of the effects when the act is in being before his merit But the Justification here spoken of is that which is merited by Christ Ergo I might also argue out of the following part of the Chapter from the opposition between Justification and the act of condemnation which passeth upon all men by vertue of the first transgression and therefore sure cannot consist in any eternal act of Gods will and from the method there used in comparing Adam and Christ and of our partaking first in the image of the first Adam in sin and the effects thereof before we be conformed to the image of the second Adam in Justification and the effects thereof but these Arguments out of the text it self shall suffice Other Scriptures also there are in abundance which testifie that Justification §. 18. doth make a change in a persons state ab injusto ad justum As Col. 2. 13. You being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh hath he quickened together with him having forgiven you all trespasses To be dead in sins in this place is clearly to be dead in Law that is to be obliged by Law to the suffering of death for sin for it is opposed to that life which consists in remission of sin or Justification so 1 Cor. 6. 11. such were some of you but ye are justified of which place more hereafter See also Rom. 3. 19 20 21 22 23 24. and 5. 18 19 20 21. Eph. 2. 12 13 14 15 16. And indeed all the places of Scripture which speak of Gods justifying sinners If there be found out a new Justification which the Scriptures are not acquainted with may they have joy of it that have discovered it But I hasten to the second part of Mr. Eyres answer The change of a persons state ab injusto ad justum ariseth from the Law and the consideration of man in reference thereunto by whose sentence the transgressour is unjust but being considered at the Tribunal of grace and cloathed with the righteousnesse of Christ he is just and righteous which is not properly a different state before God but a different consideration of one and the same person God may be said at the same time to look upon a person both as sinful and as righteous as sinful in reference to his state by nature and as righteous in reference to his state by grace Now this change being but imputed not inherent it supposeth not the being of the creature much lesse any inherent difference c. Answ These words are mysteries to me and I confesse have occasioned §. 19. me more perplexity and vexation of thoughts then all the book besides Before I can give any answer to them I must make some enquiry into the meaning of them And for avoiding of confusion in the words just and unjust their importance in this place is no more then to have or be without a right to salvation and life Now to be unjust by nature or in our selves may be understood in a threefold sense 1. Positively and then the meaning is that for the sin of nature or for mens sinfulnesse in themselves they stand obliged before God to the suffering of eternal punishment This is so far from being Mr. Eyres meaning that I suppose
it is the very thing which he intends to deny by these obscure expressions as he also often doth in other parts of this book for it is impossible that a man should stand before God obliged to punishment and disobliged at the same time 2. Or purely negatively as denying nature to be the cause of our Justification But neither do I think this to be Mr. Eyres meaning because the sense will be so pitifully jejune for thus to be just by grace and unjust by nature is no more then that it is grace and not nature which justifies us and he that sayes a man is justified by grace and not by a piece of bread and butter or by the flying of the clouds over his head speaks every whit as much to purpose 3. Diminutively in sensu diviso secundum quid that if we suppose there were no act of grace to hinder men must needs be condemned there being in themselves sufficient cause of condemnation and in the Law sufficient power to oblige them to it but the grace of God doth hinder both the one and the other from coming forth into act so that they never stand actually obliged to the suffering of punishment notwithstanding their own sinfulnesse and the Lawes rigour This if any thing must be our Authours meaning as best suiting with what he sayes here and elsewhere as page 111. § 5. By nature or in reference to their state in the first Adam the Elect were children of wrath they could expect nothing but wrath from God And again beleevers considered in themselves and as they come from the loines of Adam are sinful and cursed creatures And again page 113. § 7. The Law shews not who are condemned of God but who are guilty and damnable in themselves if God should deal with them by the Law Let us see then what Mr. Eyre would have this I think it is That there is in all men even the Elect themselves sufficient cause of condemnation that is sufficient cause on their part why they should lose all right to salvation and life and be actually damned and also that there is nothing wanting in the nature and constitution of the Law which is required in a Law to make it able to binde or oblige men even the Elect themselves unto punishment And all this is true questionlesse But it is withal affirmed that the Elect by the gracious and eternal act of Gods Will are absolutely just before God and by the same Will is the Law though broken by them disabled from binding them actually unto punishment So that they are said to be unjust by the Law or in themselves or by nature not that they are at any time absolutely unjust or without all right to life for they are supposed to be absolutely just from eternity but as it were materially because if the foresaid act of Gods Will had not prevented they had been unjust simply and absolutely Against which doctrine I have several things to oppose 1. In §. 20. general whereas the intent of it is to prove that a sinner may be justified and unjustified both at once it is manifest that these words are used in some other sense then what the Scriptures are wont to take them in because to be a sinner and to be righteous to be justified and to be condemned to have ones sins retained and remitted according to Scripture are contraries and never agree to the same person at the same time John 3. 17 18. Rom. 8. 1 33 34. and 5. 8 9. John 20. 23. 1 Cor. 6. 9 11. and many other places 2. If an elect sinner be never unjust but in this respective diminutive sense then it is impossible for the act or effects of Justification to make any change upon him because it is impossible but that he who is justified meerly of grace should be unjust in himself even glorified Saints are to all eternity unjust by nature or of themselves or in reference to their state in the first Adam 3. If this be the whole of a sinners unrighteousnesse then by the Law of nature sinners are not unjust simply and universally so as to have no right at all to life but only in some respect so as to have no right by that Law which they have transgressed But all sinners are universally unjust by the Law of nature which I thus prove 1. If Adam while he continued obedient had by his obedience a right to life and had no right at all but by his obedience according to the Law then upon his disobedience he became universally unjust by the same Law The reason 's plain because if there be but one rule of righteousness in being then he that is not righteous by that rule is not righteous at all Sublat â causà totali tollitur effectus totaliter But Adam whiles he continued obedient had by his obedience and by the Law a right to life and had no right at all but by his obedience Ergo. The Assumption is thus confirmed If Adam had any other right then by the Law then it must be by some grace of God But this cannot be according to Scripture because to have a right by grace and works too is inconsistent according to Scripture Rom. 11. 6. If by grace then not of works otherwise grace is no more grace If by works then not of grace otherwise work is no more work How long Adam continued innocent I cannot tell If but half a day if but half an houre it is all one to my purpose it being concluded by Divines that Adam and Eve one or both were saved and therefore were elect and Adams case was then the case of all men one as well as another he being as it were the epitome of all mankinde in what he did and in what befell him 2. The Apostle also witnesseth that the Gentiles whiles they continued in their Gentilisme were all of them equally alienated from God Col. 1. 21. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 separate from Christ strangers from the Covenant of Promise and without hope Eph. 2. 11 12. till by the faith of that Gospel which the Apostles preached ver 20. they ceased to be any more strangers and forreigners and became fellow-Citizens with the Saints and of the houshold of God ver 19. Had the Apostle spoke these words concerning reprobate Gentiles I am perswaded it would never have come into any mans minde no not Mr. Eyres himselfe to deny but that they did signifie those Gentiles to be without all right to life and salvation and other priviledges immunities and dignities given by the great Charter of the Gospel to the City and Family of God But the Apostle doth here describe the miseries of a Gentile state and therefore of every one that was a Gentile for their condition is equally the same till they turne Christians Ergo these Gentiles that now beleeved were yet sometimes without all right to life that is they were universally unrighteous or unjust
and not acquitted discharged and not discharged what can be more contradictorious or who can conceive what is that security discharge and acquittance from all sin wrath punishment condemnation which yet leaves a man under the power of a condemning Law and without freedome from punishment till Christ buy it with the price of his blood 3. Our discharge from the Law and freedome from punishment may be understood either de jure in taking off our obligation unto punishment and this cannot be the effect of the death of Christ for Mr. Eyre doth over and over deny that the Elect did ever stand obliged by the judgement of God to the suffering of punishment as the Reader shall largely see below in the debate of John 3. 18. and Eph. 2. 3. or it may be understood de facto in the real and actual removal of all kindes and degrees of punishment but neither can this be the effect of the death of Christ by it self or with the former The Purpose of Gods Will saith Mr. Eyre chap. 10. § 10. pag. 108. secures the person sufficiently and makes the Law of condemnation to be of no force in regard of the real execution of it So that what is left for the death of Christ to do I must professe I cannot imagine seeing the act of our Justification and our disobligation from wrath and our real impunity do all exist by vertue of another cause But for further confirmation of this Proposition Mr. Eyre refers us to chap. 14. where we shall wait upon him and say no more to it till we come thither His third Proposition is this Justification is taken for the declared sentence of absolution and §. 27. forgivenesse and thus God is said to justifie men when he reveales and makes known to them his grace and kindnesse within himselfe Answ Understand Reader that when we say Justification is a declared sentence of absolution it is not meant of a private manifestation made to a particular person that himself is justified or pardoned but of that publike declared Law of faith namely the Gospel it self which is to be preached to every creature under heaven He that believeth shall not perish but shall have everlasting life By which Promise whosoever believeth shall receive remission of sin 2. I wonder Mr. Eyre will not give us throughout his whole book so much as one text wherein Justification must signifie a manifestation or declaration made to a person that he is justified and yet tell us here that Justification is so taken If he mean it is so taken in Gods language let him shew where if in mans I will not dispute with him how men take it And as to that text Gen. 41. 13. me he restored but him he hanged which Mr. Eyre doth here instance in to prove that things in Scripture are said to be when they are only manifested if he had consulted Junius he would have told him that the word He relates not to Joseph but to Pharaoh Me Pharaoh restored but him that is the Baker he hanged The following part of this Chapter is spent in a discourse concerning §. 28. the several times and wayes in which God hath manifested his Will of non-imputing sin to his people In which there is nothing of distinct controversie but what hath its proper place in the following debate some where or other And most of what he sayes may be granted without any advantage to his cause or prejudice to thâ— truth there being no act of grace which God puts forth in time but declares something of his gracious purpose as every effect declares and argues its cause And so our Justiâ—â—cation it selfe declareth that there was a purpose in God to justifie because he acteth nothing but according to his purpose I shall not therefore make any particular examination of this remnant of the chapter though there be many things therein which I can by no meanes consent to but set down in the following Propositions how far I consent to each of his 1. I consent that God hath declared his immutable Will not to impute sin to believers in his Word and particularly in the Promise given to our first Parents The seed of the woman shall break the Sâ—rpents head 2. That Gods giving of Christ to the death for our sins and his raising of him up for our Justification doth manifest yet more of the same purpose 3. That baptisme sealing to a believer in act or habit the remission of sins past and entring him into a state of remission for the future doth also further declare something of the same purpose 4. That the same purpose of God is sometime or other in some measure manifested to most true Christians by the work of the Spirit But whether every true Christian hath a full assurance of this purpose of God towards himselfe or any immediately upon their first believing at least in these dayes I am in doubt 5. And that our Justification in the great day of judgement doth most fully perfectly and finally declare the same purpose as being the most perfect compleat and formal justification of all And so much for a discovery of the genius and issues of Mr. Eyres doctrine I come next to a vindicaiton of my own CHAP. III. My Reply to Mr. Eyres fifth Chapter His exceptions against the beginning and ending of my Sermon answered Rom. 5. 1. vindicated And the Antecedency of faith to Justification proved from Gal. 2. 16. and Rom. 8. 30. and Rom. 4. 24. and other places of Scripture SECT I. FOr proof of our Justification by faith the doctrine §. 1. insisted on in my Sermon I advanced several places of Scripture to which Mr. Eyre shapes some answer in his fifth Chapter which we shall here take a view of that the Reader may yet better understand how unlike Scripture-Justification is to that eternal Justification which Mr. Eyre pleads for But before he gives his answer to particular places he thinks fit to informe the Reader that I began my Sermon and concluded it with a great mistake The mistake in the beginning is that I said the Apostles scope in the Epistle to the Romanes was to prove That we are justified by faith i. e. that we are not justified in the sight of God before we beleeve and that faith is the condition on our part to qualifie us for Justification which is a mistake I intend to live and die in by the grace of God The Apostle tells us himself that his scope is to prove that both Jewes and Gentiles are all under sin Rom. 3. 9. and that by the deeds of the Law neither Jew nor Gentile shall be justified in Gods sight ver 20. that so he may conclude Justification by faith ver 28. and if this be not to prove that men are unjustified but by faith I know not what is And that faith here is to be taken properly we prove at large below If this be not the Apostles scope
revelation or enthusiastical inspiration the expression were much more tolerable 4. To the instance of a Malefactour that may be pardoned though he do not know it till a great while after I answer in the words of k Christ set forth p. 26 â—7 Reverend Dr. Godwin Gods Promises of forgivenesse are not as the pardons of a Prince which meerly contain an expression of his royal word for pardoning But as if a Prince should offer to pardon a Traitour upon marriage with his childe whom in and with that pardon he offers in such a relation So as all that would have pardon must first seek out for his childe and thus it is in the matter of believing The Promises hang all upon Christ and without him there is no interest to be had in them He that hath the Sonne hath life 1 John 5. 12. Thus the Doctor To Acts 13. 39. Mr. Eyre answers That the Apostle shews §. 14. the excellency of the Gospel above the Law in that 1. The Law did not cleanse from all sin 2. And but in an external typical manner 3. And that by sacrifice after sacrifice c. Rep. All which things I readily grant Yet 1. Some kinde of pardon there was under the Law which did necessarily suppose a coming unto those sacrifices Heb. 10. 1. The people were not first pardoned and then came to the offering of sacrifice or to the Priest So doth also the more perfect pardon under the Gospel necessarily presuppose a coming by faith to the true High-Priest the Lord Jesus that sinners may partake therein 2. When the Scriptures do so constantly require faith unto Justification and faith only for proof of which Mr. Eyre confesseth my Concordance would furnish me with many more places then I have taken notice of I will never be brought to beleeve that it is required as a consequent of Justification for all Christian graces and duties are required as consequents as well as faith even by Mr. Eyres grant Nor yet that by Justification is meant our knowledge and assurance that we are justified because unto that also many other things may be required and not faith only As for example self-examination and proving of our selves 2 Cor. 13. 5. diligence in adding one grace to another 2 Pet. 1. 5 6 7 10. a good conscience towards God and man and a keeping of the Commandments of Christ 1 John 3. 20 21. John 14. 23. love of the brethren 1 John 3. 18 19 14. and the like And thus much for the Vindication of the Texts proving Faith's antecedency to Justification By all which the Reader may see that when I said the only answer made to these Texts was That Justification is to be understood of that which is evidenced in conscience this account is true and perfect though Mr. Eyre tell him it be very imperfect there being not one of all the places mentioned but what he answers to by such a temperament of the word Justification It was therefore necessary that I should prove that when the Apostle pleads for Justification by faith he is to be understood of Justification before God and not of that which is in the Court of Conscience To which end I advanced foure Arguments in my Sermon the asserting of which against Mr. Eyres exceptions is my next undertaking CHAP. IV. An Answer to Mr. Eyres eighth Chapter and part of the Ninth His saying and unsaying Many Arguments proving that when we are said to be justified by faith faith is to be taken proving that when we are said to be justified by faith faith is be taken properly for the faith in us and not for Christ Faith and works how opposed in the matter of Justification That we cannot be said to be justified by faith in reference to faiths evidencing our Justification virtually or axiomatically or syllogistically Sinners according to Mr. Eyre the causes of their own Justification Nor is Justification taken properly in all the Scriptures as he expounds it SECT I. THe first Argument proving that when the Apostle §. 1. pleads for Justification by faith he is to be understood of Justification before God or in the sight of God and not in the Court of Conscience is this The Question between him and the Jewes was not whether we were declared to be justified by faith or works but whether we were justified by faith or works in the sight of God And he concludes that it is by faith and not by works Rom. 3. 20 21. Gal. 3. 11. All this Mr. Eyre grants but will have the Apostle by the word faith to understand not the act or habit of faith but the object scil Christs righteousnesse or righteousnesse imputed His reason is because else there were no opposition between faith and works seeing faith or the act of believing is a work of ours no lesse then love Yet when the Apostle disputes for Justification by faith Gal. 2. 16. and that in a direct opposition to works and for the imputation of faith unto righteousnesse Rom. 4. still as opposed to works ver 4 5. we were told that justifying and imputing were the manifestation of Justification and Imputation But now we have another answer which overthrows the former namely that faith is to be taken for Christ and his righteousnesse What aileth thee O Jordan that thou art turned backward Yea he will not allow that the Apostle hath any question with them about the time when or the conâ—tion upon which we are justified Yet I think all men besides himself will grant that his designe is to shew the way and meanes by which a sinner may come to be justified Though I confesse I see not how Mr. Eyre can grant this For if the Justification of all that are justified be absolute and perfect in the death of Christ as he supposeth then from that time there can no way be prescribed to a sinner no counsel given him what course to take that he may be justified Only he may be told that if he be justified the way to know it is to beleeve And when the Jewes say We must be justified by works and the Apostle By faith they are both out for we are justified by neither And the Gentiles were in an errour in seeking to be justified by faith as well as the Jewes in seeking it by works if they seek any thing more then to know that they are justified But because Mr. Eyre doth so often take Sanctuary at this notion §. 2. that saith is put for its object Christ and his righteousnesse though he give us not one text that may convince us of it we must of necessity examine the truth of it And yet when I consider how presumptuous and irrational the conceit is in it selfe and how solidly already confuted by Mr. a De reâ— onâ— pâ—c par 2. l 1. c. 15. Wotton who also hath set down the testimonies of no lesse then fourty Authours Fathers and Protestants besides Papists all
adde Dâ—ut 30 from v. 11. to the end of the chapter §. 17. 4. And whereas Mr. Eyre tells us again that the Purpose of Gods Will doth sufficiently secure the sinner and make the Law of condemnation to be of no force as to the real execution of it we have before shewed at large the mischievous consequences of this doctrine If this be so to what purpose imaginable did Christ die at least there was no need he should die to redeem us from the curse of an abrogated Law which by an eternal Act was made of no force at all to condemne Before when the satisfaction and merits of Christ lay at stake for the credit of an eternal Justification Mr. Eyre was content to yield them this honour that they purchased the effects though not the act of Justification which effect he told us was our non-punition But here he tells us that the purpose of Gods Will doth sufficiently secure us from punishment which though I confesse it be more rationally spoken because that act is most unworthy to be called the cause of our non-punition or non-condemnation which is not able to effect it without the help of another more sufficient cause yet is it most perniciously spoken as not leaving so much as the effects of our Justification and by consequence excluding both act and effects from any dependance upon the merits of Christ for their existence 2. Were Adam and Eve either or both obliged by the Law to punishment upon their disobedience or no If not their sin did them no harme nor was there any truth in that severe commination In the day you eat thereof you shall surely die and it is past dispute they died by force of that Law and all their posterity to this day Rom. 5. 12 13 14. 1 Cor. 15. 22 56. And if so then was not that Law made of no force by the eternal purpose of God for if that Purpose of God do not hinder but that men are legally obliged to condemnation upon breach of the Law neither will Gods Justice and Faithfulnesse permit that they go unpunished unlesse his Law be satisfied some other way Numb 23. 19. God is not a man that he should lie neither the Son of man that he should repent hath he said and shall he not do it or hath he speken and shall he not make it good Therefore it is that we have before denied that there is in God any purpose precisely of not punishing 3. The Supreme Magistrate may neglect the execution of Laws with impunity to himselfe because if he be Supreme he is not accountable to any other humane authority but not without such a Prostitution of the authority of his Lawes and the honour of his own Government to contempt and obloqâ—y as God will never endure to be cast upon Himselfe or his Law by men or devils His Honour and his Lawes are dearer to him then a thousand worlds M. Eyre answers thirdly the publishing of an act of grace is for the § 17. comfort of an offendor rather then for any need the Magistrate hath thereof as the act of Oblivion was a real pardon when it passed the House So the publication of the New Covenant was for the comfort of Gods Elect and not for their security in foro Dei Rep. Our question is not precisely what is the end of promulgation but what is the effect of the Law promulged which say I is to give offendors a right to impunity which Mr. Eyre cannot deny though it be very true that such a Law be also for the comfort of an offendor namely secondarily and consequenter for it comforts him in that it gives him a right to deliverance from deserved punishment His right and his comfort are not opposites but both the effects of the same Law and the latter subordinate to the former so that hitherto there is nothing that contradicts me 2. It is also true that it is not the Magistrate who needs an act of grace but offendors need it for if the same authority which bound them under punishment do not also discharge them from it they cannot legally escape it 3. When it is said the Act of Oblivion was a real pardon when it passed the House it hath reference to what I said in my Sermon That a Vote in the House or a Declaration that an Act of Pardon shall come out is no legal security to a Delinquent by which I intended to declare that neither the Purpose of God within himself but the Law of grace which in time he established according to his eternal purpose was that act which pardoned the sinner which if Mr. Eyre would have contradicted he should have affirmed that the meer purpose or resolution of the House to make such an Act is that very pardon which dischargeth Delinquents The Act it self being once passed may be yielded to be a Law as being the declared will of the Lawgivers constituting a right to impunity though by printing writing or proclamation it be afterwards made more publick Neverthelesse I expected some proof that it is a compleat Law before publishing if after the pâ—sâ—ng it had been i Nic. vig. de Drâ—is Iust Jur. c. 1. p. 8. c. 2 p. 1â— ordered not to be published till some moneths or a yeare after I much question whether in that interim it had been Law or no though I am not so well acquainted with the customes of our own Nation as to determine peremptorily The Senatus-Consulta amongst the Romanes had not the force of a Law before publishing But it is quite besides our question to debate what promulgation is necessary to the compleating of a Law It cannot be denied but that when subjects are involved in common guilt as all the world is before God their pardon must be by Law which is as much as I needed or intended for illustration of the way and manner of Gods forgiving us by the Gospel or Law of grace He that believeth shall not perish but shall have everlasting life which because Mr. Eyre denies not disproves for that 's impossible it being a truth of God we shall yet farther evince by the following Arguments SECT III. ANd first from Mat. 28. 18 19. compared with Mark 16. §. 18. 15 16. And Jesus came and spake unto them saying All power is given to me in heaven and in earth Go ye therefore into all the world and preach the Gospel to every creature He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved but he that believeth not shall be damned from hence I inferre 1. That God hath given unto Christ the Kingdome and Government over all men 2. That this Government containes a power of remitting sins 3. That this power is exercised in enacting that gracious Law He that believes shall be saved for so doth the Lord speak Go ye therefore into all the world c. which particle therefore I have borrowed from Matthew ver 19. and put it into
ministration of righteousnesse is the ministration of that Law or Word that justifies the effect being put for the cause in like manner Ergo Justification is by Law 6. To this purpose speaks the same Apostle Rom. 1. 16 17. I §. 23. am not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth â—o the Jew first and also to the Greek for therein is the righteousnesse of God revealed from faith to faith That which I observe is 1. That the Gospel is here called the Power of God to salvation that is a mighty and effectual instrument of salvation as Expositors agree 2. That the power for which the Apostle here extolls it is in that it saves them that beleeve 3. That Justification is here included yea and primarily intended in salvation in which large sense the word salvation is often taken elsewhere Rom. 10. 9 10. Eph. 2. 8. Tit. 3. 5. Luke 7. 48 50. for the reason why he calls it the Power of God to salvation is because it reveales the righteousnesse of God upon all that beleeve Hence 4. The Gospel is the Power of God unto Justification as it is the revealed declared Will of God concerning the Justification of them that beleeve m Vid Calv. Com. in loc Quia nos per Evâ—ng lium justificat Deus because God justifies us by the Gospel I cannot better expresse my minde then in the words of Beza Hoc ita intelligo c. This saith he I so understand not as if Paul did therefore only commend the Gospel because therein is revealed and proposed to view that which the Gentiles before were ignorant of namely that by faith in Christ we are to seek that righteousnesse by vertue of which we obtain salvation of God and the Jewes beheld afar off and under shadows but also because it doth so propose this way of Justification as that it doth also really exhibit it that in this way it may appear that the Gospel is truly the Power of God to salvation that is a mighty and effectual instrument which God useth for the saving of men by faith Thus he simply and historically to declare that some men are justified is not enough to denominate the Gospel the Power of God to salvation but it is required withal that it have authority to give right to salvation to them that beleeve it Therefore the Gospel wherein is manifested the righteousnâ—sse of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ is called the Law of faith Rom. 3. ver 21. 22 27. compared 7. Justification by works should have been by that Law Do this §. 24. and thou shalt live and if those words cannot be denied to have authority to give a right to life to them that fulfilled the Law upon what pretence of reason is the same authority denied to the word of faith Beleeve and thou shalt be saved Rom. 10. 5 8 9. To conclude Therefore is the Gospel called n Heb. â— 8. a Scepter of Righteousnesse o 2 Cor 5. 19. a Word of reconciliation p Eph. 1. â—3 a Gospel of salvation q Rom. 8. 2 3. Dav Par. ibid. a Law of the Spirit of life that makes free from the Law of sin and death r Isa 61. 1 2 3. an opening of Prisons s See the Reverend and most incomparable Dr Reynolds in Ps 110. p. 140. and a proclaiming of liberty to Captives because God doth thereby justifie sinners I had also drawn up foure Reasons from the nature of Justification proving that it must be by Law but because I since finde the substance of them in Mr. Baxter Red. Digr page 141. 142 143. I shall therefore desire the Reader to have recourse to him for his farther satisfaction herein and shall excuse my selfe from the paines of transcribing my own Argâ—ments CHAP. VII A Reply to Mr. Eyres eleventh Chapter John 3 18. and Eph. 2 3. vindicated All unbelievers under condemnation Ergo none justified in unbelief SECT I. MY second Argument by which I proved that men are not justified before faith was this They that are under condemnation cannot at the § 1. same time be justified But all the world are under condemnation before faith Ergo none of the world are justified before faith Mr. Eyre first enters a caution against the major which I had briefly and as I thought and yet think sufficiently proved in my Sermon in these words Justification and Condemnation are contraries and contraries cannot be verified of the same subject at the same time Justification is a moral life and condemnation a moral death a man can be no more in a justified state and a state of condemnation both at once then he can be alive and dead both at once or a blessed man and a cursed man both at once What that the Apostle describes Justification by non-condemnation Rom. 8. 1. and opposeth it to condemnation as inconsistent with it on the same person at the same time ver 33 34. and are at as moral enmity one with another as good and evil light and darknesse Upon these grounds I said that the Proposition must needs be true This as if I had not so much as pretended any reason for it Mr. Eyre tells his Reader is my confident assertion but in the mean time never goes about to remove the grounds upon which it stands This is a sad case but who can help it Yet he will grant the Proposition with this Proviso That these seeming contraries do refer ad idem i. e. to the same Court and Judicatory not otherwise for he that is condemned and hath a judgement on record against him in one Court may be justified and absolved in another He that is cast at common Law may be quitted in a Court of equity He that is condemned in the Court of the Law may be justified in the Court of the Gospel Rep. Which is very true otherwise our Justification were no pardon But I would ask Are these two Courts coordinate and of equal power or is the one in power subordinate to the other If the former how shall a man know whether he be cast or absolved as in our own case If the Law be of as much power to condemne as the Gospel is to justifie how shall a man know whether he be condemned or justified or what sentence shall a poor soul expect when he is going to appear before Gods Tribunal if of absolution why the Law condemnes him if of condemnation the Gospel justifies him and which of these two shall take place But if the one be subordinate to the other then the sentence of the superiour Court rescindes the judgement of the inferiour and makes it of no force and so the man is not absolved and condemned both at once This is the very ground of u L. 1 ss de Appellâ—â— L. Si qâ—is 〈◊〉 appeales from any inferiour Judicatory to a higher
righteousnesse and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation Hence it is manifest that faith and faith only is requisite to justification but confession also is required of them that are justified unto salvation according to what our Lord himself speaks whosoever shall confesse me before men him will I also confesse before my Father but whosoever shall deny me before men him will I also deny before my Father Matth. 10. 32 33. Luk. 12. 8. Indeed our compleat and final justification at the day of judgement is no small part of our salvation but the Apostle here distinguishing justification as a thing going before from salvation as a thing following after teacheth us to understand him of our initial justification or of the first right to the inheritance of life which by the promise is given a man as soone as he believes which yet is to be understood not as if confession were of as universal and absolute necessity to salvation as faith it self for if a man believe in the very last moment of his life when he hath neither opportunity nor ability of body to make confession he shall be saved notwithstanding but that it is k Vid. Amâ—s Cas Con. l. 4 c. 3. q. 2. necessary in its time and place but faith only absolutely universally and indispensably necessary as the Apostle also intimates in his proofe subjoyned v. 11. mentioning faith without confession whosoever beleeveth on him shall not be ashamed Even as our l Chaâ— pâ—nstrat de Baptis l. 5. c 9 §. 3. Spanhâ—â— dub evang part 3. dub 96. pag. 493 494. Protestants argue against the Papists that though it be said Mark 16. He that beleeveth and is baptized shall be saved yet is not Baptisme hereby made as necessary to salvation as faith it self because it is not mentioned in the negative proposition presently added He that beleeveth not shall be damned Not he that is not baptized shall be damned Nor finally is confession required as by it self and in coordination with faith but as in subordination thereunto being indeed the natural effect thereof and that wherein the truth and life of faith doth exert it self To what is added that the Apostles scope is to answer that question §. 13. how a man may know that he shall be saved and that he doth describe the persons that shall be saved by two markes or characters faith and confession I reply we have been too often imposed upon by pretended scopes and Mr. Shepheard is falsly alledged as a witnesse that the Apostles scope is to answer the foresaid question for he saith it not but is purposely arguing in that very place which m Sound beleev p. 230. Mr. Eyre referres to out of this very Text that we are not justified before we beleeve Yet is it most true that a man may come by faith to know that he shall be saved and the ground of it is because faith is appointed of God to be medium fruitionis a means of obtaining salvation and therefore cannot be denied to be medium cognitionis a means by which a man may know that he shall be saved Even as the same Law which made workes the means of life do this and live if a man had kept it would have also bred the assurance and knowledge that he should have lived But 1. As it is not the knowledge of life simply but life it self which is promised in those words for it were too grosse to paraphrase them thus do this and thou shalt thereby know that thou shalt live so it is not simply the knowledge of justification and salvation but salvation it self which is promised in these beleeve and thou shalt be saved The righteousnesse which is of the Law sayes thus do this and live v. 5. But the righteousnesse which is of faith sayes this if thou beleeve thou shalt be saved v. 6 8 9. What can be more plaine 2. When it is said v. 10. with the heart man beleeveth unto righteousnesse and with the moutâ— confâ—ssion is made unto salvation must we read it thus with the heart man believeth unto the knowledge of righteousnesse and with the mouth confession is made unto the knowledge of salvation What will become of the Scriptures if men may interpret them after this rate 3. And here to see how it falls out Mr. Eyre is forced to contend that the Apostle mentioneth faith as that which evidenceth justification as a mark or character which way of evidencing he could by no means approve of when I urged it p. 77. § 3. and 4. of his book 4. If thou beleeve thou shalt be saved That these words propound §. 14. the condition or means of salvation and not only describe the persons that shall be saved we have proved n chap. â— sect 1. before by several Arguments And according to my promise there I shall adde something here that if it be possible Mr. Eyre may suspect the truth of that notion which he cannot defend but by turning the Scriptures into a nose of wax And 1. I say that if the foresaid words do only describe the persons that shall be saved then are they here used otherwise then the like words or manner of speech is used any where else in Scripture Mr. Eyre hath not yet produced us one place where such phrase of speech is a bare description of a person at least unlesse we will take his bare word that so it is meant And though it be hard to be peremptory in such a nicety and deny universally that there is any example in Scripture of such phrase of speech used in such a sense yet upon the most diligent and critical observation which I have made on purpose to discover it I can find none neither in the Old nor New-Testament and therefore shall deny it till Mr. Eyre not only say it but prove it For if the foresaid words If thou beleeve thou shalt be saved do only describe what manner of persons they are that shall be saved then do they not suspend salvation upon the act of beleeving but their meaning is this If thou be one of those who be or shall be believers thou shalt be saved Shew us the like in all the Scriptures And hence 2. It follows that these words do not present believers as such reduplicativè as the objects of salvation but only Specificativè the men that are believers but under some other respect and notion For example Peter gives a legacy to Simon the Tanner that lives in Joppa by the sea side The messenger that carries the legacy knows not the man but tells him if he be the Tanner of Joppa this legacy is his Which words do not indeed propound the condition but the description of the Legatee from his place and profession and the legacy is not given him in respect of either of these circumstances but immediately as the person whom these circumstances describe or it is not given the man Quatenus he
is a Tanner but it is given the Tanner Quatenus he is the man whom Peter meant in his will In like manner when it is said if thou beleeve thou shalt be saved if the meaning be this if thou be one of them that do or shall believe thou shalt be saved then salvation pertaines not to men as believers but to believers as men under some other notion and capacity And that must be either 1. As they are men simply or 2. As they are sinful men or finally which I suppose Mr. Eyre will say for to affirme either of the former were intolerably absurd as they are elect And so the issue will be this believers Quatenus they are elect Specificativè are the objects of salvation Now see Reader what this will come to at the long runne 1. Hereby is faith devested of all necessity and usefulnesse in order to salvation farther then it is a mark or sâ—gne as all other saving graces are of a man that shall be saved Even as the profession and place of the Tanner forementioned contributed nothing to his obtaining of Peters legacy it served only to describe the person to whom it was given And is this that precious faith 2 Pet. 1. 1. more precious then gold 1 Pet. 1. 7. the Christians riches Jam. 2. 5. by which he obtaines and inherits promises Heb. 11. 33. 6. 12. righteousnesse Heb. 11. 7. salvation Eph. 2. 8. and all good things whatsoever 2 Pet. 1. 3. so highly every where commended in Scripture and urged upon such tearms of necessity How can we be said to obtaine promises righteousnesse and salvation by faith if faith serve only to describe the person It may be this new divinity will shortly produce a new Rhetorick and that is no more then needs 2. If the elect had been described by their names parents time and place of their birth and habitation they might be said to obtaine promises righteousnesse salvation by these as well as by saith if there be no other necessity of faith to righteousnesse and salvation then as it is a description of the persons that shall be saved 3. And according to this glosse there can be no ground of exhorting beseeching and commanding sinners to believe on and accept of a Saviour no more then of exhorting or commanding them to be elected as we have demonstrated in the place before mentioned 4. Nor have the words according to the same glosse the forme and nature of a promise but of a meer conneâ—e Axi me affirming the consequent upon supposition of the Antecedent For if thou beleeve that is if thou be such a one as art or shalt be a believer is but a periphrasis of election unto faith for the down right meaning without circumlocutions is this If thou be one of those whom God from eternity purposed to make a believer thou shalt be saved And why not because of the Promise by which God hath obliged himself to give salvation upon their believing who before had no right to it that will infer a conditional Promise which Mr. Eyre abhors but because he that purposed the one purposed the other also and this he commanded to be declared and published to the world And I say in like manner If the Sun rise we shall have light upon the earth and if God make stones the children of Abraham they shall be able to speak But we know from the Scriptures that the inheritance of life and salvation is given by Promise Gal. 3. 18. Rom. 4. 13 16 20. Heb. 6. 13 15. 5. And we know from the same Scriptures that righteousnesse and salvation is not given to believers quatenus they are elect but rather to the elect quatenus they are believers that is they are not only given to the men that are believers but given to them as they are believers It was Abrahams faith that was imputed to him unto righteousnesse Rom. 4. 3. and the Promise was to him and to his seed through faith ver 16. Rom. 3. 22. The righteousnesse of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that beleeve where we have distinctly set down the righteousnesse which justifies us The persons justified They that believe The means or condition of their Justification By faith of Jesus Christ The same distinction is accurately observed Gal. 3. 22. That the Promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that beleeve The Promise is that of salvation and blessednesse Compare ver 6. 9 18. Here then we have again the persons to whom the Promise is given namely believers the condition or meanes by faith To teach us that the Promise of life and salvation is not only given to men that are believers but given to them as believers Righteousnesse not only upon them that are faithful but righteousnesse by faith a Promise not only to them that do beleeve but a Promise by believing 6. If thou beleeve thâ—â— shâ—lt be saved or Beleeve and thou shalt be saved Life and salvation is here promised as the reward of faith a reward I mean not properly but metaphorically as the word is used in Scripture often not for a reward of debt but for a reward of grace Now I would ask why it is called a reward Mr. Eyre will tell me because it follows faith Be it so though I think there is much more in it But faith may be conâ—dered either as an act required of us or as the work of God in â—s Now I would know whether life and salvation be the reward of faith as it is our act or as it is Gods work If the former as most certain then Mr. Eyre must quit his beloved glosse for if salvation by the Promise be made consequent to faith as an act required of us and performed by us then faith is the condition upon which we are entitled to salvation by the same Promise and so salvation pertaines to us as believers formaliter and not only as to the men whose property and priviledge it is to be believers sooner or later If the second be said namely that salvation follows faith and so is the reward thereof as it is the work of God in us then God rewards himself he doth not reward us Even as if I should call Gods preserving the world the reward of his creating it or the destruction of the world the reward of his preserving it or his glorisying our bodies the reward of his raising them out of their graves or his calling us unto faith the reward of his predestinating us for each of these actions is consequent to the foregoing And yet I doubt not but if a man should talk after this rate he would be accounted to utter strange kinde of tropes 7. Mr. Eyre may do well to remember that he hath yet given me no similitude of Answer to the main Argument When the Law sayes Do this and live or If thou do this thou shalt live or He that doth these
faith is rather a hinderance then a furtherance of their happinesse for they have right to heaven even while they live in all manner of ungodlinesse only that which hinders their enjoyment is that there is a purpose of giving faith which must be accomplished before they can inherit were it not for that purpose they might go to heaven presently and as they are 4. And that without all gain-saying of the Law which though it be a bug-beare even to the elect themselves to terrifie and affright the conscience while they live in sin and ungodlinesse yet hath no authority it seemes to debarre them from entrance into heaven no more then if it never had been violated And so if it might be supposed per pâ—ssibile vel impossibile that an unrighteous man might go to heaven yet were this no impeachment to the justice of Gods government but would argue at most some kind of mutability in God in not doing according to his purpose Whereas the Lord himself professeth that if he should give life to an impenitent sinner it were against his equity The waies of the Lord are equal Ezek. 18. throughout Fiftly If ungracious men have a right to heaven onely they cannot §. 25. possesse it till they have the evidence of faith either this evidence is of such necessity that if they have it not they shall lose that life to which they are adjudged or no. If not then whether they believe or no they shall be saved if so then there is no absolute justification before faith and justification must be conditional To this Mr. Eyre answers 1. By this Argument not only faith but all other works of sanctification and perseverance in them must be the conditions of our justification and then we may be said to be justified and saved by them but this is no good Argument No man is saved or glorified without works Ergo men are saved by works 2. This reason makes as much against absolute election before faith as against absolute justification 3. The answer is election and justification are absolute because they depend upon no antecedent condition not because they are without consequents that depend on them Rep. To the first we reply That if the question be concerning our first entrance into a state of justification we have already with the Apostle Rom. 10. 10. excluded works from being at all necessary thereunto But if the question be of our last and universal justification at the day of judgement which the Apostle there calls salvation Mr. Eyre knows we maintaine that perseverance in the faith to the end and in a Christian conversation is a necessary condition of salvation according to Scriptures Rev. 2. 17. and 22. 14. Colâ—s 1. 23. 2 John 8. Heb. 10. 26 36. and the places quoted by M. Eyre Prov. 28. 18. 1 Tim. 4. 16. Matth. 24. 13. And the consent of c Ames Bellar. enervat tom 4. lib. 6. cap. 6. de nâ—ces oper ad salut ad obj ex Rom. 8. 13. Mortific tio igitur est conditio aâ— vitam quis negat Gerhard de bonâ—â— operib c. 9. §. 55. 4. Zanchius Gry 〈…〉 Sohnius Piscator ibid. §. 45. Chamier 〈◊〉 de bon Oper. Neceâ—â— cap. â— sect 7. 11 15 17 20 〈◊〉 c. appellat 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 quibus non 〈◊〉 ◠〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Davenant de 〈◊〉 Act cap. 〈◊〉 5. 6. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Protestants But when he infers then we may be said to be saved by works I deny the consequence partly because of the ambiguity of the word works which in our use generally hath another sense then with the Apostles who oppose them not only to faith as we have largely proved before but sometimes also to sanctification Tit. 3. 5. Not by works of righteousnesse which we have done but by the renewing of the holy Ghost partly because the works of saâ—ctification are not the condition properly of our obtaining but of not losing our right to the heavenly Kingdom As if Titius upon 〈◊〉 his intreaty give him a farme to be held by him jure feudi the non-performance of that homage and fidelity which the feudatory is bound to forfeits his right neverthelesse his title is grounded in the Donors benevolence In like manner we are saved by grace through faith though if we do not by the spirit mortifie the deeds of the flesh we forfeit our life Rom. 8. 13. To the second I reply That there is no comparison between §. 26. election and justification as is at large above demonstrated Let us set Mr. Eyres parallel before us that the dissimilitude may the better appeare Thus then he argues Faith is of such necessity that they that have it not shall lose the life to which they are elected or not if not then whether the elect believe or no they shall be saved if it be then there is no absolute election before faith Here 1. The comparison is between an Act that giveth a right to life such is justification and an Act which giveth none such is election which indeed doth make the donation of right to be a thing future but is not it selfe the Act which giveth it as we have shewed before Now if a sinner have a right to the inheritance and yet it be necessary for him to believe that he may inherit then is his inheriting suspended upon believing that is faith is the condition of his inheriting and so the right he had to it before must needs be conditional more then this neither reason nor the civil Law requires to denominate a gift to be conditionall In election the case is otherwise which because it doth not transmit or conveigh any right but is only a preparation or preordination in the mind of God of those causes by which it shall be made to exist in time therefore may the purpose it self be absolute yea though it be of things which do not exist but upon condition Thus Dr. d In Coâ—vin dofens Armin. Cont. Tilen pag. 355. Twisse Neque enim negamus decreta Dei quoad res volitas dici posse conditionata quatenus scil neque vita aeterna nisi sub conditione fidei conferenda sit nec damnatio c. and particularly of justification or pardon of sin he addes Remissionem peccatorum salutem omnes consentiunt nemini contingere nisi sub conditione fidei i. e. All agree that pardon of sin and salvation betides none but upon condition of faith God may absolutely will or purpose to give a right to life upon condition of faith but he cannot absolutely give a right to life and yet afterwards require us to believe under a penalty of forfeiting or losing that life for then the gift is not absolute but conditional 2. The word necessary must be distinguished for it may be understood either in reference to God and so whatsoever he purposeth is necessary because his purposes being immutable and his power irresistable it must needs be that whatsoever he purposeth
degree according to that authority dignity or eminency in any kinde wherein he is exalted above him And this for example is the friendship between h Aristot ibid c. 8 11. a Prince and §. 25. his subjects consisting on his part in his providing for their liberty and welfare by and according to Law and on their part in their subjection and obedience to him according to the same Law As on the contrary the enmity between them consists on their part in their breaking of the Laws established and maintained by his authority and on his part in the egresse and exercise of his authority in inflicting punishment upon them for their offence according to the same Lawes so that a supream Governour as such is at peace with all those against whom his Lawes have no quarrel and an enemie to all with whom his Laws are at enmity Thus stood the case originally between God and man God being engaged by his Covenant to reward obedient man with life and to punish him if he should be disobedient in the least the former of which was his friendship and the latter when the Law was broken his enmity Rom. 5. v. 10. 13. 15 16 17. compared As on the other side mans love and friendship to God consisted in his obedience to the Law Matth. 22. 37 39. and his enmity in rebellion against it Rom. 8. 7. From which grounds it will be easie to understand how God may §. 26. be a friend an enemy reconcilable and reconciled with the same persons successively for while the Will of God I mean his revealed royal Will or Law is to do good and nothing but good to man God is so long his friend when upon mans disobedience the same rectoral Will of God was to inflict evil upon him he was an enemy When the New Law of grace is enacted detracting so far from the rigour and poremptorinesse of the former as to make it possible for the sinner to obtain life upon other termes God is said to be reconcilable when upon the intreaty of those Ambassadours whom the King and Lawgiver sends into the world sinners are prevailed with to accept of and performe the termes of peace then is God said to be reconciled Reconciliatio saith judicious i Antisynod de morte Christi c. 1. p. â—5 12â— Davâ—n dissert de mort Christi p. 65. 68. Ames non infert aliquam intrinsecam mutationem in Deo sed talem mutationem in dispensatione extrinseca quâ fit ut influentia propensae ejus volunt atis in peccatores ordinatè possit derivâ—ri ad eorum salutem perficiendam Sicut post Augustinum Lombardum Thomam Commentatores omnes Calvinus instit lib. 2. cap. 16. c. Yea so farre is all this from making any change in God that he must of necessity be changed unlesse this be true Should he be an enemy to man perfectly righteous or not an enemy to him while a sinner or not reconciled to him when penitent and a believer he must deny himself so little cause hath Mr. Eyre to charge us with Vorstian Divinity Then for the second thing I wish Mr. Eyre had told us more §. 27. plainly what he would have when he contends for the reconciliation of the elect immediately in the death of Christ Doth he mean that they were then perfectly reconciled This I am so farre from believing that though I thankfully acknowledge that Christ merited a perfect reconciliation as he did also a perfect sanctification yet I cannot beleeve that the elect are perfectly reconciled during this life no nor till the Resurrection For 1. If the elect be already perfectly reconciled then Christ is no longer a Mediatour between God and them But Christ is most certainly a Mediatour between God and them not an arbiter only or internuntiâ—s but a Mediatour The Assumption all Christians yield The reason of the Proposition is because it is the very nature and work of a Mediatour to k Vide Hug. Grot. de satisfact p. 172. ex Suidâ make peace and common sense informes us that there is no need of a Mediatour where there is no disagreement and the Scripture is expresse Gal. 3 20. A Mediatour is not of one that is of them that are at perfect friendship and agreement one with another And therefore when all enmity between God and man shall be destroyed perfectly Christ shall cease to be any longer a Mediatour For he must reigne till all enemies be put under his feâ—t and then shall Christ deliver back his mediatory Kingdome into his fathers hands 1 Cor. 15. 24 25 26 27 28. To say he a Mediatour still not to perfect but to manifest reconciliation is to say nothing For the want of the manifestation of reconciliation is some part of enmity or not If it be then God and believers are not yet perfectly reconciled if not then shall not Christ need to be a Mediatour between God and them for that end 2. If it be the work of Christ in heaven to make reconciliation for sinners on earth then those sinners are not perfectly reconciled to God at present But the first is true Ergo. The text is plain Heb. 2. 17. It behoved him in all things to be made like unto his brethren that he might be a merciful and faithful High Priest in things pertaining unto God to make reconciliation for the sins of the people The Apostles scope is to shew the necessity of Christs sufferings on earth before he went to heaven ver 9 10. namely that from the experience of his own sufferings and temptations here he might be the more merciful and faithful to make reconciliation for our sins Compare Heb. 4. 15. Nor can this be meant of making known or manifesting reconciliation For 1. The Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 notes such an act as is conversant first about God that he might be faithful in things pertaining to God sayes the text even as the object of the service of every High Priest ordained for men is things pertaining to God primarily and in the first place Heb. 5. 1. But to manifest reconciliation is an act primarily and totally conversant about us not an act to God-ward for us 2. The manifestation of reconciliation being wrought by the Spirit of Christ is most properly an act of Christ as King but the reconciliation here spoken of is precisely and formally the act of Christ as Priest 3. And as the Greek word is not so much as pretended to signifie a manifestation in any other place so in this especially it cannot have that sense because the construction will not bear it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to reconcile sins is as much as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to make a reconciliation or propitiation with God for their sins But if Mr. Eyre mean no more then that the death of Christ did immediately effect an imperfect and initial reconciliation he knows that I yield it in part viz.
angry with his brother without a cause Whosoever shall say unto his brâ—ther Racha Whosoever shall say thou foole shall be in dangâ—r of such and such punishments Can these or the like expressions any where else be onely the descriptions of persons that shall be punished and that from the consequent of their punishment as already begun 2. The Lord by comparing faith to seeing seems to allude to Israels §. 37. looking up to the brazen serpent for healing Numb 21. As he also doth almost in the same words altogether in the same sense Joh. 3. 14 15. As 〈◊〉 lift up the Serpent in the wildernesse so must the Sonne of man be lifted up that whosoever beleeveth on him should not perish c. Now I would know when it is said Numb 21. 8. Every one or whosoever looketh upon it sâ— the Serpent do the words onely describe the persons that should be healed from their property oâ— looking up or do they also proâ—â—â—â— the Act upon which their healing was suspended If the latter 〈◊〉 those words Whosoever seâ—â— and beleeveth the Sonne 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 life must be understood in the same sense If the former thâ—n the Israelites might also have been healed before they looked up to the serpent for to denominate them lookers it is sufficient that they looked up at any time whether before or after they â—â—re healed But I will not do one work twice enough hath been spoken already against this notion unlesse it had some better authority then meerly mans invention The next place I mentioned was â—â—l 5. 2 4. without faith Christ §. 38. shall profit us nâ—thing 〈◊〉 it was not the will of God nor of Christ that any man should be justified by the death of Christ till he doth beleeve But sâ—ith Mr. Eyre this place is pâ—lpâ—â—ly abâ—â—eâ— Thâ— Apostle doth nâ—t 〈◊〉 withoâ—t faith Christ shall profit â—s nothing but if we 〈◊〉 any thing 〈◊〉 Christ as necessary to attaine salvation we are not beleâ—vers our profession of Christ shall profit us nothing Rep. Where doth the Apostle say these words If M. Eyre give us onely the sense of them we shall shew presently that what I say is included as part of the sense But I will never beleeve while I live that Mr. Eyre hath rightly expressed the Apostles sense As if the Apostle spake against joyning of any thing with Christ as necessary to attaine salvation unlesse by joyning with Christ he mean in an equal degree of causality or as sharing in that kind of causality which Christ put forth for our salvation For out of doubt Faith and Repentance are necessary to be joyned with Christ that we may be saved 2. But to discover how palpably Mr. Eyre hath abused me in charging me with an abuse of the Text let us transcribe the words v. 2 3 4 5 6. If you be circumcised Christ shall profit you nothing For I testifie againe to every man that is circumcised that he is a debtor to the whole Law Christ is become of no effect to you whosoever of you are justified by the Law you are fallen from grace For we through the Spirit wait for the hope of righteousness by faith For in Jesus Christ neither circumcision availeth any thing nor uncircumcision but faith which worketh by Love 1. I do here observe the Apostles Argument by which he proves that if they be circumcised Christ shall profit them nothing Thus it runs He that is bound to keep the whole Law for justification to him is Christ of no effect for justification He that is circumcised is bound to keep the whole Law for justification v. 3. Ergo Christ is of no effect to him or as the Apostle varies the words v. 4. Ergo he is fallen from grace whosoever he be that expects to be justified by the Law In opposition to this he declares in his own and other Christians example the only way how Christ may become profitable and of effect to us for justification and that is by faith without legal performances v. 5. For we through the Spirit wait for the hope of righteousnesse by faith And have I yet abused the Text because I say it hath this sense that without faith Christ shall profit us nothing yea 2. The whole discourse of the Apostle proceeds upon this ground that legal observances make Christ of none effect to us because they overthrow faith For he that will be justified by the Law must keep the whole Law and that destroys faith as he had also often and plainly told them before chap. 3. 12. 10 11 17 18. compare Rom. 4. 14. 3. Mr. Eyre himself acknowledgeth in the very next words that the Apostle attributes that to faith which he denyes â—o other works v. 6. In Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth any thing nor uncircumcision but faith which worketh by love I assuâ—â— But the thing denied to other works is that they are able to justifieâ— yea rather that they make it impossible for us to be justified because they make Christ to become of none effect to us v. â— 4. Ergo the thing ascribed to faith is that by it we are justified and through it doth Christ become profitable and grace of effect to our Justification Ergo without it Christ profits us nothing as to that end and purpose Therefore Mr. Eyre contradicts himself immediately in his Comment upon that v. 6. When he sayes that the intent of the Apostle here was not to shew what it is that doth justifie but what are the exercises of divine worship in which Christians should be conversant But out of doubt his meaning was to shew how Christ and grace become effectual to our Justification if he do here ascribe to faith that which before he had denied to other works which is Mr. Eyres own grant and the Apostles unquestionable intent for the words as appears by the particle for in the beginning of the verse are the reason why through faith he expected Justification and not in the way of circumcision ver 5. to wit because circumcision availeth nothing no nor uncircumcision neither but faith which worketh by love which reason of his faith he had also given before chapt 2. 16. As to those two truly godly learned Authours Calvin and Perkins whom Mr. Eyre alledgeth as abetting what he saith concerning the Apostles intent if the cause were to be carried by number of voices we could quickly dispatch it But neither do either of these gratifie Mr. Eyre a whit Calvins words are these Quantum ad praesentem locum attinet Paulus nequaquam disputat an charitas ad justificandum cooperetur fidei sed tantùm indicat quae nunc sint vera fidelium exercitia i. e. As to the present place Paul doth by no meanes dispute whether love do cooperate with faith unto Justification but only intimates what are now the true exercises of the faithful Is this all one as if he had said faith availes us nothing in order
be offered up And as to Mr. Eyres two evasions that to be justified by faith doth sometimes signifie By faith to know that we are justified He might as well say the world was made by faith For by faith we know that the world was made Heb. 11. 3. And that otherwhile faith signifies Christ believed on we have often and I trust satisfactorily discovered that they are inventions from beneath not doctrines from above Let us now see what Mr. Eyre brings to prove that it was the §. 42. Will of God and Christ that his death should be available to the immediate and actual reconciliation of sinners without any condition performed on their part Foure principles he lays down which neither singly nor joyntly can bring forth the Conclusion they are in travel with 1. Christ by the Will of God gave himseâ—f a ransome and sacrifice of a sweet smelling savour unto God Answ But the Question is Whether it were the Will of God that remission should follow immediately upon the offering up of this sacrifice before the sinner beleeves and repents 2. That this ransome was alone and by it selfe a full adequate and perfect satisfaction to divine Justice for all their sins Answ But the Question is whether satisfaction may not be made by a voluntary surety with this agreement that they for whom it is made shall not be freed by it till they performe such or such a condition If it may as Mr. Eyre granted but now then he should have told us not only that Christ made satisfaction but that he made it with this intent that the elect should be presently discharged by it Otherwise he begs the Question a second time 3. God accepted it and declared himself well-pleased therewith insomuch that he hath thereupon covenanted and sworne that he will never remember their sins nor be wroth with them any more Isa 43. 25. and 54. 9 10. Answ The Question is still begg'd No doubt but God was well-pleased with the death of Christ as with a sacrifice or satisfaction in it self so perfect that his justice could not require more But whether he accepted it and was well-pleased with it so as that it should presently without the intervention of faith produce the pardon of any is the question which is here resolved by a go-by It is certain that some effects of Christs satisfaction are not communicated to the elect before they believe much lesse immediately in the death of Christ and seeing we are to grow up in him in all things till we have attained to the fulnesse of the life of Christ I confesse it is beyond my comprehension how we come to be perfect in one part of his life that is in one fruit and effect of his death while we remain imperfect in all the rest As to the Covenant which Mr. Eyre speaks of that God will never remember the sins of the elect nor be wroth with them any more Isa 43. 25. and 54. 9 10. The former place proves no more then that God takes it as one of his royal prerogatives to be a God that pardoneth sin as he also doth elsewhere Exod. 34. 6 7. Mich. 7. 18. the latter that the pardon which he gives is eternal neither that the elect are pardoned immediately in the death of Christ or while they continue in unbelief But the contrary is plainly supposed Isa 54. 1 2 3. 4. That by this ransome of Christ they are freed and delivered from the curse of the Law Gal. 4. 4. and 3. 13. Answ Quoad meritum not quoad effâ—ctum till they believe as we have shewed before Christs death hath redeemed us from the power of sin as well as from the curse of the Law 1 Pet. 1. 18. were the elect therefore sanctified immediately in the death of Christ He hath redeemed our bodies as well as our soules yet are not our bodies redeemed quoad effâ—ctum till the Resurrection Râ—â— 8. 23. till then they lie in their graves by vertue of that common obligation unto death which the first Adam brought upon all men 1 Cor. 15. 22 49 56. And thus thou seest Reader with what successe Mr. Eyrâ— hath attempted to prove That it was the Will of God in giving his 〈◊〉 death and the Will of Christ in giving himself that his 〈◊〉 should be available to the immediate and actual reconciliation of sinners without any condition performed on their part â—is next undertaking is to prove That there was no such compact and agreement between the Father and the Son that his death should not be available to the immediate reconciliation of sinners but only upon conditions performed by them In the issue of which whether he hath been any whit more happy then in the former we come now CHAP. X. An Answer to Mr. Eyres fourteenth Chapter and all the Arguments therein contained by which he endeavours to prove that there was not any Covenant passed between God and Christ to hinder the immediate and actual reconciliation of Gods elect by his death and to suspend this effect thereof upon termes and conditions to be performed by them but contrariwise that it was the Will both of God and Christ that his death should be available to their immediatâ— and actual reconciliation and Justification without any Condition performed on their part SECT I. HIs first Argument is this There is no such Covenant doth appear in Scripture Ergâ— there is none §. 1. Answ That the Antecedent â—s false hath been already proved from John 6. 40. and 3. 15 16 19. and Gal. 5. 2 3 4 5 6. and 1 Joh. 5. 11. and Rom. 3. 25. and Isa 53. 11. and all those places which declare Justification to be consequent to faith or wherein men are perswaded and commanded to turne unto God that their sins may be forgiven them Many such places have been already produced and vindicated against Mr. Eyres exceptions and it were no hard matter to produce many more as Jâ—r 26. 2 3. Stand in the Court of the Lords house and speak unto all the Cities of Judah all the words that I command thee diminish not a word If so be they will hearken and turne evâ—ry man from his evil way that I may repent me of the evil which I pâ—rpose to do unto them And Jer. 36. 3. It may be that the house of Judah will heare all the evil which I purpose to do unto them that they may returne every man frâ—m his evil way that I may forgive their iniquity and their sin Plainly discovering our conversion unto God to be the condition of our partaking in his pardoning mercy Which doth also notably appear by the contrary steps which sinners tread in working out their owne damnation Mark 4. 12. That seeing they may see and not perceive and hearing they may heare and not understand lest at any time they should be converted and their sins should be forgiven them But of this we have spoken enough before His second
similitude So saith he the cloud of our sins being blotted out the beams of Gods love have as free a passage towards us as if we had not sinned What are these beams of love Is pardon of sin any of them if it be then behold the sense of the comparison viz. Christ having satisfied God can now pardon sin as freely as if men had no sin and so had never needed pardon This is a rare notion but there is yet something worse then non-sense included in it namely that sinners are discharged without pardon as having in Christ paid to the full the debt which they owed as swearers and drunkards are discharged upon payment of the mulct enjoyned by Law without the Magistrates pardon and become from thenceforth immediately as capable of the benefit and protection of the Law as if they had never broken it If immediately upon Christs satisfaction the elect become in like manner as capable of the blessings of the promise as if they had never sinned there is then no need that they should beleeve and repent in order to the obtaining of life and salvation The fifth Argument succeeds If it were the will of God that the §. 9. sin of Adam should immediately overspread his posterity then it was his will that the satisfaction and righteousnesse of Christ should immediately redound to the benefit of Gods elect for there is the same reason for the immediate transmission of both to their respective subjects for both of them were heads and roots of mankind But the sin of Adam did immediately over spread his posterity All men sinned in him Rom. 5. 12. before ever they committed any actual sin Ergo. Ans I deny both proposition and assumption First for the assumption I deny that any man is guilty of Adams sin till he exist and be a child of Adam He that is not is not under Law to be capable of breaking it or fulfilling it of receiving or enduring any good or evil effects of it And as to Rom. 5. 12. which M. Eyre quotes to prove that all men sinned in Adam before they had any being of their own neither doth the text say so but only that death passed upon all men fâ—r that all have sinned which if M. Eyre will render in whom all have sinned as I deny not but he may by the help of an ellipsis thus Death passed upon all men by him in whom all have sinned yet will it be short of his purpose Doth not the Apostle say in the same verse Death hath passed upon all men and v. 15. through the offence of one many be dead which many himself interprets of all v. 18. for as Beza notes well v. 15. many in this comparison is not opposed to all but to one Is it therefore lawfull to inferre that men are actually dead before they are borne Nothing lesse The meaning then of this speech All men are dead in Adam is no more but this That sentence of death passed upon Adam by virtue of which all that are borne of him eo ipso that they derive their being from him become subject unto the same death In like manner all are said to have sinned in him not that his posterity then unborne and unbegotten that is no body were immediately guilty of his fact but because by the just dispensation of God it was to be imputed to them as soone as they had so much being as to be denominated children of Adam His offence tainted the blood and according to Gods Covenant and way of dealing with him was interpreted as the act of the humane nature then existing in himself for tota natura generis est in qualibet specie but was neither imputed nor imputable to particular persons partaking in that nature before their own personal existence In short we sinned in Adam no otherwise then we did exist in him for operatio sequitur esse but to exist in Adam is not to exist simply but rather the contrary for when men are men and have a personal existence of their own they exist no longer in Adam but out of him as every effect wrought exists out of its causes but onely notes a virtue or power in him productive of us positis omnibus ad agâ—ndum requisitis So to sin or be guilty in him is not to sin or be guilty simply but onely notes the cause of the propagation of guilt together with our substance to be then in being If we apply this it will follow that as no man partakes in Adams guilt till he be borne a child of Adam so none partake in the righteousnesse of Christ nor the benefit of his satisfaction till they be borne unto him by faith And that doth the Apostle put out of question in this very dispute Rom. 5. 19. For as by one mans disobedience many were made sinners so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous which words were written many years after Christs death and yet then there were many who in times and ages to come were to be made righteous by Christs obedience Ergo they were not made righteous immediately in his death That for the minor The proposition comes next to be canvased where I deny that §. 10. there is the same reason for the transmission of Adams sin and Christs righteousnesse to their respective subjects for though both of them were heads and roots of mankind as the Apostle shews Rom. 5. 14. and so farre forth they agree both communicating their effects to their children Adam sin and death to his natural children Christ righteousnesse and life to his spiritual children yet the same Apostle in the same place shews that there is a divers dissimilitude or disagreement betwixt them and that in several respects v. 15 16 17 18. particularly in that he calls our justification by the obedience of Christ the gift and free gift in opposition to that judgement which by one came upon all to condemnation v. 15 16. implying the obedience of Christ to be so performed as that there is yet required an act of grace on Gods part to give us the effect of it as well as an act of faith on our part that it may be given to us or that we may receive it of which the Apostle speaks in the next verse v. 17. They that receive abundance of grace shall raigne in life for we receive the grace of God by faith 2 Cor. 6. 1. suitable to what this Apostle had said before chap. 3. 25 26. that Christ was set forth to declare the righteousnesse of God that he might be thâ— justifier of him that beleeveth in Jesus But the effects of Adams disobedience came upon his posterity by the necessity of the same judgement which passed upon himself as the natural father of all men so as there needs no other act either on Gods part or on our part but eo ipso that we are borne of Adam we become liable both to guilt and punishment But
requires of us Let him clear it up from Scripture lâ—t him shew us the text that saith that God hath purposed to have Infants in one way and men in another 3. And yet I know not whether he hath so much charity to Infants as to allow them any room in the Kingdome of Heaven he cannot if his Argument be good for the text is expresse Mark 16. He that believeth not shall be damned and Infants are uncapable of believing for they cannot hear the Word nor have they any knowledge of good or evil nor doth God save them in one way and men in another 4. But to what he speaks here of the incapacity of Infants having the seed or habit of grace the answer is easie It is true they know neither good nor evil but it will not follow I trow that they are neither good nor evil They have the habits of sin in them even whiles they are uncapable of the act Ergo they are capable of the habits of grace too otherwise sin and grace were not contraries for contraria tribuuntur eidem And it is certain that as all are now borne in sinne so all should have been borne righteous if Adam the father of us all had not transgressed And to the second exception viz. That faith cometh by hearing §. 15. of the Word preached Rom. 10. 17. the same answer will suffice faith may be considered either in its compleat act and so no doubt it comes by hearing the reason is rendred by the Apostle in the same chapter ver 14. How shall they beleeve on him of whom they have not heard Or 2. In its seed root or habit and so I deny that it is alwayes and in all persons wrought by hearing of the Word preached The Christian and godly instructions of Parents as they are ordained of God to be a meanes of instilling his feare into the hearts of their children Eph. 6. 4. Isa 28. 9 10 11. so are they not unfrequently blessed with successe according to the capacity of children as in Timothy 2 Tim. 3. 14 15. And sometimes God by his own immediate working may inspire that grace into the heart of an Infant which it is not possible any means should be used by men to effect David seems to have been gracious from a childe Psal 22. 9 10. and 71. 5 6. and Isaac Gâ—l 4. 29. and Christ blessed Infants Mark 10. 16. and he blesseth by doing or working that in them which godly Parents can do no more then desire may be done when they are said to blesse their children But we have a famous instance which puts all out of doubt of John §. 16. the Baptist who was filled with the Holy Ghost even from his mothers womb Luke 1. 15. What sayes Mr. Eyre to this He cites these words and gives answer to others a great way off ver 41. whereupon Mary's salutation of Elizabeth the babe is said to leap in her wombe and tells us That this exultation Divinitús facta est in Infante non Humanitùs ab Infante and therefore is not to be drawn into an example or urged as a rule to us what to think of others Aliquando bonus dormitat Homerus We cite the words of v. 15. and so doth Mr. Eyre too to prove Infants capable of the habit of grace and he answers to v. 41. which is no part of the objection he had proposed against himself But whereas he sayes it is not to be urged as a rule to us what to think of other Infants he should have given us the reason too for it proves invincibly that Infants are capable of the habits of grace which is all intended to be proved by it and by consequence that Mr. Eyres two Arguments to the contrary from Infants want of knowledge and inability to hear are nothing worth d Viâ—â— Bâ—coâ—m de side â—ustif Q â—1 per tot Ergo the Scriptures contradict not them that say Infants may have the seed of faith Nor yet do they say any thing contrary to Scripture who assert §. 17. that Infants performe the conditions of reconciliation and salvation by their Parents forasmuch as it is manifest throughout the Scriptures that Infants follow the condition of their Parents whether they be the Infants of Gentiles or of the people of God And as the former are strangers from the Câ—venant together with their Parents and thereby liable to all the evils that accompany such a condition Ezra 10. 3. Deut. 7. 2 3 6. Isa 56. 3. so doth the Lord claim a special right and propriety in the children of his people Ezek. 16. 20 21. in regard of which they are called holy 1 Cor. 7. 14. the greater is their sacriledge who refuse to giâ—e unto God the things that are Gods but will needs have their children kept at liberty to choose whether they will serve God or the devil when they come up to ripenesse of understanding which relation of theirs to God as some of his people and of him to them as their God by vertue of their Parents faith Deut. 7. 6 7 8. Nehem. 9. 8. for never since the world was made did God make a Covenant with a faithful man the blessings and beneâ—it of which should reach no farther then his own person witnesse his Covenant with Adam Noah Abraham Jacob Phineas David c. doth signally include the Promise of pardon of sin Jer. 31. 33 34. and 32. 38 39 42. And if Noahs faith was available to the saving not of himself only but his family also Heb. 11. 7. and the faith of godly Parents for the life of their children Matth. 15. 28. John 4. 50 51. I see no reason why it should be denied to be of as great acceptance with God for the salvation of such of them as die in their infancy Yet a double Argument Mr. Eyre hath against it 1. Hence §. 18. it will follow that all the children of believing Parents are justified which he supposeth no man will say Answ But he might have known that the Lutherans say so and that without any great inconvenience which I am able to foresee That which I apprehend will be readiest objected against it though Mr. Eyre object not it nor any thing else is that many children of godly Parents live and die in sin Ergo They were never justified But this inference will not passe for it will be answered That the Parents faith remains no longer the condition of his childes pardon and salvation then during the state of infancy when he is growen up to the use of his own understanding and will a personal faith of his own is required upon the same termes of necessity as of others who from their birth were without God and strangers from his Covenant Israel in Egypt is likened to a child Ezek. 16. 5 6 c. Hos 11. 1. and in Gods dealing with them there when they were in their Infant-age we have a type and embleme of
Indeed it were ridiculous to suppose that God should make any action which is wholly and immediately from himselfe the condition of any blessing he gives as that he should promise to glorifie us upon condition he raise us from the dead to raise us upon condition he justifie us to justifie us upon condition he give us faith But the same faith which God worketh in us is also our act for it is we that beleeve and not God though he make us to beleeve and as it is our act so is it performed voluntarily and a fit object of a command or promise I mean capable of being commanded or rewarded or of being made the condition of a reward And thus for example obedience was the condition of that life which was promised to Adam this Mr. Eyre grants Neverthelesse to the exercise of that obedience the concurrence of God was necessary as of the first cause for creatures essentially depend on God not only for their being but for their motion and operation Acts 17. 28. Ergo a voluntary act of ours may be the condition of our salvation though God work that act in us How many orders doth God give to Joshua Gideon David and others concerning the times and places when and whither they should remove their host that they might put their enemies to the rout or escape an overthrow by them These motions were the conditions of those special victories or deliverances which God would give them yet by the efficiency of Gods power and providence did they move from place to place Hundreds of like instances are obvious One thing more Mr. Eyre addes If saith he any shall say that §. 28. God did will that by Christ we should have faith and after that reconciliation yet 1. It will follow notwithstanding that our reconciliation is an immediate effect of the death of Christ as Owen proves against Baxter page 34. And 2. Then all the controversie will be about Gods order and method in conferring on us the effects of Christs death Answ That reconciliation is an immediate effect of the death of Christ may be understood in a double sense either 1. By comparing the effects with the cause and then the meaning is that the death of Christ contributes an immediate efficiency to our reconciliation whensoever it is that we are reconciled and this is all that Mr. Owen sayes in the place mentioned Meritorious causes saith he do actually ipso facto produce all those effects which immediâ—tâ—ly slow from them not in an immediation of time but of causality I doubt not but the death of Christ hath in its kinde an actual and immediate influence upon our eternal glorification which yet is the last effect or benefit we receive by him Or 2. By comparing the effects with the cause and one with another and so that is the immediate effect of the death of Christ which exists immediately upon the death of Christ without the interposition of any other cause to produce it Of this only is the Question as also Mr. Eyre himself hath hitherto understood it otherwise I am perswaded himself will grant that all the Arguments he hath hitherto used one or two at most only excepted come not within sight of the Conclusion they aime at As to the second thing that then all the controversie will be about Gods order and method in conferring on us the effects of Christs death though if there were nothing else but this in question it will be of very dangerous consequence to pervert and trouble that order which God useth in bringing sinners to life yet is there much more in question viz. whether upon supposition of Christs Purchase and Gods special purpose of giving faith to some the same faith as it is a voluntary act of ours may not by Gods Will of Precept be made the condition of our partaking in righteousnesse and reconciliation by the death of Christ This is the thiâ—g which Mr. Eyre should have disproved if he had intended his Argument should have concluded any thing We have already shewed at large the monstrous inconveniences that attend the denial of it and so much hath been spoken by those that are for the middle way of universal redemption especially the French Divines that I cannot think it worth my labour to adde any thing more The Lord Jesus hath put the matter out of Question to me John 6. 39 40. And this is the Fathers Will which hath sent me that of all which he hath given me I should lose nothing but should raise it up again at the last day And this is the Will of him that sent me that every one that seeth the Son and believeth on him may have everlasting life and I wil raise him up at the last day The former verse declares his own and his fathers special Will to save the elect The latter that yet the condition of beleeving is imposed on all men the elect as well as others that they through the performance thereof may be saved And so we are come to the last Argument which in brief is this §. 29. The imputing of our sins to Christ was formally the non-imputing of them unto us But our sins were accounted or imputed to Christ without any condition on our part Ergo they are discounted or non-imputed to us without any condition performed by us Answ I deny the Proposition namely that the imputing of our sins to Christ is formally the non-imputing of them unto us because 1. If this be true then doth not God for Christs sake forgive any mans sin as the Apostle saith he doth Eph. 4. 32. the reason is plain because it was not for Christs sake that himself was punished Our pardon is not the effect of Christs punishment but on the contrary his punishment is the effect of our pardon if the imputation of our sins to him be formally the non-imputation of them to us 2. What then is the meaning of Pauls prayer for them that deserted him 2 Tim. 4. 16. The Lord grant that it may not be imputed to them that is the Lord grant that Christ may be punished for them or what is the meaning The Lord grant they may be some of those for whom Christ hath been punished that were all one as to pray that they may be elected from all eternity Whatsoever sense M. Eyre will put upon the words it will either not agree with sense or not with himself or not with the text 3. Upon the same principle it will follow that the death of Christ as it was a satisfaction and his resurrection from the dead contributes nothing to our justification neither by way of influence nor by way of evidence for might it be supposed that the Lord Jesus had lyen for ever under the power of death that had been the best evidence to us that we should never be punished if his punishment were formally our nonpâ—nition and by way of influence it can do nothing because
common person is the act of them whom he represents But Christs satisfaction merits redemption and perfect obedience are not our act so as that we can be said to have satisfied merited redeemed our selves perfectly obeyed the Law and borne the curse thereof things for ever impossible for sinners to do Rom. 8. 3. and 5. 6. Ergo they are not representable as doing of them Would Mr. Eyre would give an example amongst men of a common person representing others in such an act which is impossible for them to put forth But the Scripture is expresse that as it was by the one offence of one man that all are condemned so is it by the one righteousnesse of one Jesus Christ that all are justified Romanes 5. 17 18. The Resurrection of Christ I acknowledge to be of another consideration §. 12. and that he may with much more reason be said to be a common person in his Resurrection then in his death Nevertheless neither in that do I approve the tearme unlesse it be understood in the second sense mentioned for the reason already given And to what Mr. Eyre addes of Parents being examples to their children he must again remember that I am not contending that Christ is the example but the exemplary cause of our Justification Sodom and Gomorrah are set forth for examples of what judgements God will execute upon such sinners but they are not exemplary causes thereof This for the fallacie 2. Saith Mr. Eyre it is impertinent because Christs discharge §. 13. may be ours though we did not choose him but God did constitute and appoint him to be the Head Surety and common Person to the Elect. We did not choose Adam and yet his sin was imputed to us Answ 1. Nor do I intend any thing more in changing the terme of a common person into that of an exemplary cause then to expresse that preheminence which Christ hath as in all things else so in his Justification which the terme of a common person is so farre from doing as that it supposeth the just contrary for the action or passion of a common person is not so properly his own as his whom he represents As what an Ambassadour doth is not so properly his own act as the Kings and what is done to him as such is more properly done to the King then to him In like manner if Christ were raised precisely as a common person representing us then are we properly the first risers from the dead and his Resurrection hath no causal influence at all upon ours 2. That God appointed his Sonne to be the Head Surety and common Person of the Elect is a contradiction if a common person be taken in Mr. Eyres sense for one that represents others in what he doth and in what is done to him Christ is undoubtedly a Head and Surety to the Elect so the Scriptures call him and both expressions imply a causal influence of life from him to us But the common Person described as such is neither Head nor Surety because the operations of a Head and Surety are his own peculiarly none other do the like and therefore are not capable of being represented in doing of them the case is the same in what he receives or in what is done to him as Head and Surety 3. Concerning Adam I do also deny that he is fitly called a common person in Mr. Eyres sense of that phrase and in what sense we may be said to have sinned in him we have already largely opened His sin is indeed imputed unto us not that it is imputed to us that we have done it or committed it for that is in it selfe an errour of falshood and besides is contrary to the Apostle who supposeth this sin to be imputed unto many who never sinned after the similitude of Adams transgression neither in individuo nor in specie Rom. 5. 14. but because by vertue of that sin we his children stand obliged to the suffering of death natural he being the common Parent who by Covenant received righteousnesse and life to be communicated to his children if himself continued obedient otherwise to lose it both to himself and us That the Reader might see how inconsequent Mr. Eyres argument §. 14. is inferring our Justification before saith from our Justification in some sense in the Resurrection of Christ I said we may as justly inferre that our Resurrection is past already because we are risen in Christ as that our Justification is past before we beleeve because we are in some sense justified in Christ We are also in some sense sanctified in Christ Rom. 6. 6. 1 Cor. 1. 30. yet we may not infer Ergo we are sanctified before faith In answer to this Mr. Eyre speaks many words to little purpose the summe of them is Our personal Resurrection necessarily supposeth our life and death But to our actual discharge there needed no more then the payment of our debt c. Rep. The difference between our Resurrection and Sanctification on the one hand and Justification on the other is plain and obvious but the whole strength of Mr. Eyres Argument lieth in this one thing that we were justified in Christ as a common person Now if our rising in Christ as a common person will not infer that our Resurrection is before faith then neither is our Justification proved to be before faith because we were justified in Christ as a common person and if we were justified simply in his Resurrection â—t must be upon some other account then because we were justified in him as a common person 2. Therefore Mr. Eyre doth tacitly deny not publickly for feare of the people that we are risen in Christ as a common person Christ saith he fully merited our Resurrection to glory in which respect we are said to be risen with Christ a strange and unheard of interpretation that we should be said to be raised with Christ because he in his death merited our Resurrection which might have been true though himself had never been raised but Mr. Eyre might easily foresee that as he interprets our Resurrection in Christ so might we interpret our Justification in Christ rising a phrase not used in Scripture but admitted by me as agreeable or not contrary thereunto not for our Justification in him as a common person but for his merit or purchase of our Justification Truly this doth Mr. Eyre own too though very privately and thereby quite and clean desert his whole argument in the very next words It is saith he no such absurdity to say Christ hath purchased our Râ—surrection though we are not risen as to say he hath purchased our discharge and yet we are not discharged for to say a debt is discharged and yet justly chargeable is a contradiction Purchased why I thought we had been now disputing whether the discharge of Christ as a common person in his Resurrection were really and formally the discharge of sinners and not whether he purchased
arguments advanced with my answers then given to them to which I do not intend to digresse so far as to reply 1. Because the Basis and foundation of his whole Argument as he hath now proposed in print is laid in this that we were justified in Christs Justification and therefore as to the summe is answered already 2. Because there is no proof of any particular branch of the Argument but is proposed again before he hath done and therefore must be answered hereafter 3. Because though I have altogether forgotten the order of his arguments and of my own answers yet I very well remember that as I understood his argument in no other sense then as it is set down in my Sermon printed so many things I spake by way of answer whereof his relation takes no notice but I must desire him to take more notice of before he and I part My answer then to the foresaid argument was double 1. That upon supposition that we were in Covenant before we beleeve yet would it not follow that we were justified before we believe because the blessings of the Covenant have an order and dependance one upon another and are enjoyed successively one after another To this Mr. Eyre replies in the second paragraph of this his sixteenth chapter and says That though a man be not sanctified and glorified before faith yet if he be in Covenant with God i. e. one of the elect he is certainly justified For 1. God from all eternity did will not to punish his Elect which is real Justification Rep. To this Reader thou must expect no other answer from me then what I have at large given already 2. Saith he Justification is the first benefit that doth accrew to us by the death of Christ for Justification goes before Sanctification and faith is a part of Sanctification Rep. I acknowledge that our English Divines whom I confesse in matters of this nature I preferre before any other are wont to place Sanctification in order after Justification which also is so plain from Scripture that it cannot be denied But Mr. Eyre also knows that they are wont to distinguish faith and sanctification as two things as the Scriptures also do 1 Tim. 2. 15. Acts 15. 9. and 16. 18. 1 Pet. 1. 13 14 15 16. though I do not finde that they do all expresse this difference in the same manner Should I interpose my own opinion it may be I should finde little thank for my labour and therefore I shall say no more then what others have said before me 1. It being plain that faith and holinesse are tâ—o things in the use of Scripture Mr. Eyre should have proved and not laid it down so rawly without any distinction that faith is a part of sanctification I deny it provided I may be tried by Scripture-language 2. As faith is in the understanding a perswasion of the truth of the Gospel and the Promises of life and glory contained therein so is it wont to be distinguished from sanctification 2 Thes 2 13. is not so much a part of it as a cause for by how much the more stedfastly we beleeve and see the glory of the Promises by so much the more are we changed into the image of Gods holinesse 2 Pet. 1. 3 4. 2 Cor. 3. 18. and 7. 1. 3. As faith is in the will an acceptance of Christ that by him we may be brought unto God it hath much the same difference for as God hath made Christ to us sanctification 1 Cor. 1. 30. so doth faith receive him and in that respect is not properly any part of our sanctification but the turning of the soul to Christ as unto a most sufficient principle and authour thereof Acts 26. 18. and so much for the exceptions against my first answer My second answer was a flat denial of the Assumption viz. that we are in Covenant with God before we beleeve if the phrase of §. 2. being in Covenant be understood properly for such an interest in the Covenant as gives a man right and title to the blessings of the Covenant Mr. Eyres proof is this Some benefits of the Covenant to wit the Spirit which works faith is given us before we beleeve My answer to this was large and distinct though Mr. Eyre reproach it sufficiently with a designe of darkening the truth and blinding the Reader but that 's no matter I shewed 1. That the word Give had a double sense in Scripture 1. When no receiving follows and so it signifies no more then the Will of God constituting and appointing Acts 4. 12. Eph. 1. 22. and 4. 11. 2. Sometimes it includes a receiving and possession of the thing given Thus the Spirit is given when we receive him and are as it were possest of him and he dwells in us In this sense is the Spirit never said to be given in Scripture but unto them that do beleeve Luke 11. 13. Gal. 3. 14. Eph. 3. 16 17. with Rom. 8. 10. 11. 2 I shewed also that the Spirit may be said to be given three ways essentially personally or in regard to some peculiar operations which he worketh in us Now there being no peculiar work of grace before faith it self which may not be wrought in an hypocrite which hath not the Spirit as well as in a childe of God therefore the Spirit is neither given nor received before faith be wrought but is given and received together with faith and not before This is the summe the further explication the Reader may see in my Sermon at leisure Mr. Eyre thus expounds the giving of the Spirit That God according to his gracious Covenant doth in his appointed time give or send his Spirit in the preaching of the Gospel to work faith in all those that are ordained to life Rep. Then see Reader what a proof we have that the Spirit is given us before faith Mr. Eyre should prove that we have some benefits of the Covenant before faith viz. the Spirit when he explains it he tells us the Spirit is given before faith not in that sense in which the word give or given includes our receiving but as it signifies the sending or constituting of the Spirit to be by way of specialty the efficient cause or worker of faith Mr. Eyre doth not so much as open his mouth against what I said before that the Spirit is said to be given to us in reference to some peculiar work of his upon or in us which work is faith Here when he should shew how he is given us before faith he says he is sent to work faith in which sense the Spirit may be said to be given in the first sense mentioned of that word but not given to us so as that we can be therefore said to receive him eo ipso because he is sent to work faith and therefore this is but a deserting of the Argument in hand nor are we yet proved to have received any benefit of the
promise to the same purpose 1. If every conditional promise be contrary to grace then neither can God encourage us to any act of obedience by a promise of rewarding it nor may we take encouragement to obey out of respect to the reward without prejudicing the Grace of God The Reason is because do thus or thus and I will give thee this or that is a conditional promise more then such a forme of words we have not to prove that God ever made a conditional promise But the consequence in both the parts of it is grossely false for God doth make conditional promises to encourage us to obey his will and we are to take encouragement from them for that end For example he promiseth Lev. 26. 3 12. If ye walk in my statutes and keep my commandments and to them I will walk among you and will be your God and ye shall be my people Which that it pertaines to Christians as well as to the Jews the Apostle expresly teacheth 2 Cor. 6. 16 17 18. And from thence inferres immediately Chap. 7. 1. Having therefore these promises let us cleanse our selves from all filthinesse of the flesh and Spirit c. The promises he mentions aâ—e Gospel promises therefore promises of grace Yet out of respect to the good promised are we to come out and separate from all filthinesse of flesh and Spirit and God hath given us these promises for this end Moses rejected the pleasures of sin because he had respect to the recompense of reward Heb. 11. 25 26. So Paul 2 Cor. 4. 16 18. So Christ himself Heb. 12. 2. Multitudes of conditional promises we have in the Gospel which therefore surely are not inconsistent with grace Mat. 6. 14 15. Joh. 14. 21 23. Rom. 8. 13. Mat. 7. 7 c. If a man promise another to whom he hath no natural relation but out of a meer desire of his good that he will make him heire to five hundred per annum on condition he will go no more into an Alehouse or into none of the Popes dominions in such a promise there would be found every thing which according to Scripture or Philosophy as we have shewed before chap. 5. is required to an act of grace and yet the promise is conditionall If Mr. Eyre shall use his old evasion and say that in the places forementioned there is no proposing of a condition but onely a declaring of the persons who shall enjoy such and such blessings besides what hath been spoken against it before I shall onely adde this that then the said places and innumerable others like them do not declare that faith or righteousnesse or prayer or any other duty to which the promise is made is any whit more acceptable to God then unbelief or unrighteousnesse or neglect of prayer but onely that the person beleeving the person that keeps the Commandements of Christ the person that prayeth c. is more acceptable to God then he that doth not these things which is such a prodigious assertion that till I know whether Mr. Eyrâ— will own it I will not go about to confute it 2. If the condition being performed be it of what kind it will be the thing promised do eo ipso become a due dept then is it unjust to make the full price of a thing the condition of any contract The reason is Because whatsoever becomes a debt by contract supposeth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 repassum as they call it or an equality between that which I part with and that which I receive for it If then the full price be the condition another is bound to then have I double as much as what I part with is worth For if the condition had been the payment of six pence for what is worth a 100. l. the six pence being paid it becomes by virtue of the contract proportionable to that which is worth a 100. l. otherwise it could not make it a due debt If then I have in six pence what is proportionable to that I part with then if the said 100. l. had been the condition of the contract I had had double as much as that I part with is worth because the said 100 l. is in it self proportionable and againe it becomes proportionable by being made the condition of the contract so that it hath a double proportion of worth to that I part with for it In the next place Mr. Eyre brings in his adversaries as objecting §. 5. against this his third argument and clearing themselves from any impeachment of Gods grace though they assert the covenant to be conditional But in none of his objectionss doth he take notice of what he might very well suppose would be principally insisted upon for wiping off his aspersions As 1. That the Covenant of grace is not made with righteous persons but with sinners and enemies and children of wrath who if they had had their due and the rich grace of God had not prevented had been past all capacity of having any new terms of life and peace proposed to them 2. That the conditions required are neither so much as is Gods due nor yet so much as man was once able to performe which the Apostle mentions as a glorious difference between the righteousnesse of the Law and the righteousnesse of faith Rom. 10. 5 8 9. God accepteth the heart though in many things we sin all Therefore these conditions are such as are indeed available for our good through the acceptance of a gracious and mercifull governour as Benhadads servants prevailed with the merciful Kings of Israel when they supplicated for life with sackcloth upon their loyns and ropes about their heads 1 Kings 20. 31 32. though they availe us nothing in the tryal of justice But let us see Mr. Eyres objections First he supposeth us objecting thus We ascribe no meritoriousnesse §. 6. to these conditions as the Papists do unto works His answer is 1. The Papists assert no other works and conditions to be necessary to justification and salvation then we do 2. They ascribe no more meritoriousnesse to works then we do for Mr. Baxter says that the performers of a condition may be said to merit the reward 3. The condition required of Adam himself was not meritorious in a strict and proper sense Rep. 1. The first is a calumny The Papists some of them dispute that it is a thing possible to keep the Law of God and that facile parvo negotio they are Bellarminâ—s words dâ— Jâ—stif lib. 4. cap. 11. 2. The second is a calumny as Mr. Baxter a man borne to reproaches hath sufficiently shewed in his admonition to Mr. Eyre Reader if thou art not read in the fathers do but peruse Vâ—ssâ—â— Theses De bonor opâ—r merit or Bp. Vshers answer to the Jesuits challenge or any other Protestant who replies to the testimonies of the fathers which the Papists are wont to boast of and thou wilt find that they do all
justifie the sense in which the fathers use the word merit though they disclaime the terme as Mr. Baxtâ—r also doth The Fathers indeed intending no more thereby then simply to obtainâ— As when they say of the Virgin Mary Mâ—ruit â—sse mater redemptoris Shee obtained this honour or priviledge to be the mother of the Redeemer Sine merito nostro meruimus we have obtained it without our merit and the like 3. The third I confesse is to me a very difficult question viz. Whether Adam in the state of perfection did or could merit any thing of God on the one hand I see the Apostle asserting roundly that to him that workâ—th the reward is imputed of dâ—bt nâ—t of gracâ— Rom. 4. 4. On the other hand I am not able to conceive how the creature can lay an obligation of justice upon his maker Rom. 11. 35. Who hath first given to him and it shall be râ—compensâ—d to him againâ— Nor am I certaine what life it was that was promised to Adam Some Divines are of opinion that it was the same and â—o other which is now promised through Christ to them that beleeve others and particularly Mr. Bâ—rrâ—â—gâ—s are peremptory that the a Gosp converâ— â—er 3. pag. 43. Law to Adam had onely the promise of a naturall life to be continued I shall wave all dispute concerning it and deliver my opinion in these foure conclusions 1. There is a proportion between a spotlesse perfect sinlesse righteousnesse and the reward of a happy and an unafflicted life That he that never did any evil should never suffer any evil unlesse he become a surety for another that hath wrought evil is but just So much at least is signified by the Apostles expression Râ—m 4. 4. To him that worketh the reward is imputed of debt not of grace And the law of nature the rule of naturall justice written and acting in mens consciences in their excusations and justifications of themselves for what they have well done Rom. 2. 15. attests the same 2. God as author of his creatures being and all his faculties and abilities hath a right of absolute soveraignty and dominion over him by virtue of which he may justly challenge the utmost service the creature can performe without engaging himself to give him a reward It was therefore I do not say of grace but oâ— his goodnesse and bounty that he would condescend to promise a reâ—ard to man for his obedience to the Law This â—â—ay down as a concession 3. Gods promise of rewarding mans obedience doth not make himself a debtour to man properly but makes the life promised to become a debt Life may be legally and in justice due and yet God not a debtour For there is dâ—bitum reale as well as personale suitable to the distinction of actions in the b Uâ—pian l. Action Gen. ff de oblig Act. Law into real and personal the former per quam remâ—â— stram quae ab â—liâ— pâ—ssiâ—â—â—r pâ—timâ—s though he be c Justit l. 4. c. 6. §. omnium autem â—â—lâ—o jure nobis obligatus of which they give d Ibid. § aeque si agâ—t severall instances The latter Quâ— cum eo agimâ—s qui â—â—ligatus â—st nâ—â—is ad faciâ—ndum aliquid vel dandum e Inst eod §. omnium aâ—tem idque vel ex câ—ntractâ— vel â—x 〈…〉 lâ—ficio Whence it is manifest that an action purely reall and not mixed with a personall as sometimes it is supposeth no person to be in justice obliged as a debtour and yet the thing a due debt In like manner life might have been given to Adam as a due debt he being worthy of such a reward and yet God in promising it become a debtour to none but to himselfe onely 4. Therefore Gods rewarding Adam supposing him to have continued perfectly righteous is an act of goodnesse and faithfulnesse quoad exercitium but an act of justice quoad specificationem That is it was Gods goodnesse to promise a reward of life to him and his faithfulnesse to execute it but upon supposition that he deale in rewarding him jure rectorio as a good and equitable Governour 't is just that he reward him with a life as perfectly free from all mixture of evill as his obedience was free from all mixture of sin Gen. 18 25. That be farâ—e from thee to do after this manner to slay the righteous with the wicked and that the righteous should be as the wicked that be farre from thee â— all not the Judge of all the earth do right The next objection he thus proposeth The conditions required §. 7. of Adâ—m were legall but the conditions of the New Covenant are evangelicall He answers All conditions performed for life are legall conditions the precepts both of Law and Gospel have the same matter Rep. Repentance towards God and faith towards the Lord Jesus Christ were neither required in the Law given to Adam nor in that given to Israel Gal. 3. 12. 2. The conditions required of Adam were as much as justice it self could exact of him The conditions required of us are such as neverthelesse justice might condemn us and availe us nothing but in Gods gracious and mercifull acceptation Jer. 3. 1 12. Thou hast played thâ—â—â—rlot with many lâ—vers yet return again to me 〈◊〉 and I will not cause miâ—â—â—ngâ—r to fall â—pon you for I am mâ—rcifull saith the Lord. Hence thirdly perfect sinlesse obedience of it self commended man unto God his equitable Governour as worthy not onely not to be punished but to be rewarded suitably to his nature that it did not merit of God so as to lay an obligation of justice upon him to reward it is meerly by accident because of the infinite distance and supremacy of God over man But faith and repentance do onely dispose us to be enriched enlivened and perfected by the fulnesse and sufficiency of another even the Lord Jesus Christ even as poverty may be said to commend one to a liberall man inasmuch as it disposeth him to be a fit object for liberality to exercise it self upon And this is intimated in the place which Mr. Eyre quoated but now Isa 55. 1 2. if his exposition of it be true viz. the conditions which men performe are their money for v. 1. it is said come buy wine and milk without money and without price which coming is saith and this faith as it is the condition upon which we partake in the blessings promised is therefore metaphorically called a buying and thus farre forth it agrees with legall conditions but as it is a buying without money or price it supposeth the said blessings to be freely given as Rev. 22. 17. it is expounded and thus farre forth it is opposed to legall This I put here because I had forgot to do it in its right place which was § 4. Thirdly he supposeth us thus objecting Evangelical conditions are more facile and easie then legal were His answer is
they were but hypocrites now both which are absurd If he use the distinction in any other sense I know neither Scripture nor reason to justifie it 4. What manner of people they now were and formerly had not been is set down v. 9. Yea are a choice generation a royall priesthood an holy nation a peculiar people c. all which they were internally if Mr. Eyres glosse be true even while they were a generation of Vipers base idolaters a prophane people defiled with all manner of abominations yea and multitudes many years before they are borne for this internall covenant is nothing else but Gods election or Christs purchase 5. These words in Peter are taken out of Hos 2. 23. which text Mr. Eyre urged but even now in that very sense which here he opposeth 6. The former part of the verse is an universal negative you are sometimes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not a people Ergo whatsoever God had done for them towards their salvation before their conversion was not sufficient to denominate them to be a people of God 7. Especially when it follows but now you are the people of God which being the accomplishment of that promise so frequent in Scripture they shall be my people containes more then a promise of that whereof a hypocrite or a hypocritical people is as capable as themselves CHAP. XVII A Reply to Mr. Eyres 21 Chapter being a vindication of the additionall Arguments proving the Covenant to be conditionall SECT I. AT the close of my Sermon I added foure brief Arguments proving that we are not in Covenant §. â— with God beâ—ore we beleeve The first was this Isa 55. 3. Come unto me that is beleeve on me Joh. 6. 35. and I will make an everlasting covenant with you Mr. Eyre answers 1. The particle vaâ— may be taken illatively thus come unto me For I will make an everlasting covenant with you Rep. 1. If this be the sense of the words yet at first sight 't is evident that the rationall particle for notes the following words to be a reason or motive to that act which is here called a coming unto God that is beleeving Ergo the words still suppose that we must beleeve before God make a covenant with us for his making the Covenant is proposed as the end of our coming Or 2. saith he If we take the words as they are rendred they are all one as if he had said I will performe or give you all other benefits promised in my everlasting Covenant Rep. This also yeelds the Argument for hereby it is acknowledged that faith is required as the means which we are to use for obtaining all other blessings of the covenant and a means for obtaining good things by anothers promise is formalissime a condition faith therefore is yeelded to be the condition of obtaining pardon of sin and all other blessings besides it self which is that Mr. Eyre hath hitherto disputed against What follows in this answer hath been spoken to largely already and to what purpose it is mentioned here againe I apprehend not My second Argument was this The voice of the Gospel which §. 2. is the covenant of grace is every where Beleeve in the Lord Jesus and thou shalt be saved in opposition to the covenant of works which saith do this and live Rom. 10 5. 6 9. This is the Covenant whereof Christ is mediatour Heb. 9. 15 that they that are called unto faith shall receive the promise of the eternall inheritance Mr. Eyre answers The Gospel properly and strictly taken consists neither in precepts nor promises of the New-Testament but in the declaration of these glad tidings that the promises which God made unto his people in the Old-Testament are now fulfilled Rep. This is indeed a prime part of the Gospel but no otherwise then as it tends to hold forth Christ Jesus as the onely and most sufficient cause or author of salvation to as many as will beleeve on him and therefore the whole doctrine of the Gospel is summarily comprehended in this that whosoever beleeves shall be saved Mark 1. 14 15. and 16. 15 16. Matth. 4. 17. 23. Heb. 4 1 2. Act. 20. 20 21 and a hundred other places If the Gospell have no precept how are men then professedly subject to it 2 Cor. 9. 13. Or what is it to obey or not obey the Gospel Rom. 10. 16. 2 Thes 1. 8 1 Pet 4. 17. But what is the direct answer to the Argument This. The command of beleeving with the promise of life to beleevers are parts of our ministry they are not the tenor of the Gospell or New Covenant Rep. 1. A strange answer our ministry is the ministry of the Gospell Ergo when we command men to beleeve with a promise of life we preach the Gospel Ergo such a command and promise are parts of the Gospel 2. Yea they are the summe of all we preach if we preach no more then the Apostles Rom. 10. 8 9. The word of faith which we preach and yet surely the Apostles were ministers of the New Covenant 2 Cor. 3. Then Mr. Eyre tells us againe that the tenor of the New Covenant is I will put my Laws into their hearts c. And I can but answer him againe that not the tenor but the matter of the effects of the New Covenant are there described Act. 5. 31. Christ is said to be exalted to give repentance and remission of sin to Israel Is not therefore repentance to be preached in his Name for the remission of sin or may we not say repent that your sins may be blotted out To Heb. 9. 15. He answers as to other texts formerly that it describes onely the persons that are saved but not the tearmes or means by which they do obtaine salvation Seest thou not Reader how faith is denyed to be so much as the meanes of salvation and no more ascribed to it then to eating drinking sleeping reasoning crying or the like which do all of them in some degree describe the quality and condition of the persons that shall be saved Though I confesse not from that which is proper and peculiar to them but that alters not the case But of these things more at large before Hitherto we have not one Scripture example of such phrase of speech serving onely for a description My third Argument is this The Covenant which is to be preacheed §. 3. to every man and every man called upon to fulfill the conditions of it namely faith that he may receive the blessings of it is not an absolute promise The Covenant of grace is to be preached to every man and every man called upon to fulfill the conditions of it that he may receive the blessings of it Ergo I have put it thus into forme because Mr. Eyre quarrels at the forme He yeelds That the Gospel or Covenant of grace ought to be preached to every creature Marke 16. 15. Matthew 28. 19. But denyes that