offended and many others at what you delivered But there was nothing said by me to contradict that not a word about that matter That I will now say reserving my peculiar thoughts till by and by is this The death of Christ may be considered as it avails to the purchasing of Remission of sin and Salvation upon condition Or as it redounds to the procuring the condition for Remission and Salvation The death of Christ was for All or Christ died for All in the first sense In the second I will suppose with him only for his Sheep or the Elect. There is no doubt but God or Christ may maius minus amare Who is the Saviour of all men says the Scripture specially of those that believe That which moved this Gentleman I believe and others if there were any other besides them he moved was my speaking of a General Pardon for all the world purchased by Christ the Saviour of the World This seemed new to him at the hearing but by that time I came down from the Pulpit to the Vestry his own reason did prompt him being I will suppose a judicious but perhaps conceited man and whether so or no Citizen or Scholar I know not to understand no other by my General Pardon but that Christs Redemption is Vniversal which therefore he alledged as the point offended him In whom we have redemption through his blood even the Remission of our Sins says the Apostle in two places Redemption therefore and Pardon are of equal extent out of question I quoted that Text and this other God was in Christ reconciling the World unto Himself not imputing their Trespasses If this Gentlemans Conception be True That Christ hath purchased a pardon only for the Elect then the Apostle should not have said Reconciling the World but Reconciling the Elect to himself And when the Apostles says the World why should he be offended if I speak after the Apostle and not him Then came the Disciples and said to him Knowest thou not that some are offended But he answered Let them alone In such a Case as this I must say after my Saviour is any any man offended 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 let them look to it Sir you know there are two sorts of such as oppose Arminianism One that is the high sort and the other the moderate sort that are for the middle way in these Controversies and I confess my self one who have wrote several peices so called We that are of this sort do hold Election to be of particular persons not the choosing Believers to be saved with the Arminian and Lutherans but the choosing Persons to believe But Redemption we hold to be Vniversal The Scriptures say Christ died for all and for every man God so loved the World says Christ that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life By the World this Gentleman must understand the Elect but when by the words that whosoever believeth in him Christ plainly intimates that there are some of those God loves do believe and some not the World must be more than the Elect. Of the world of those God loves so as to give his Son to dye for them some believe in him and have everlasting life and some believe not and perish But of the Elect all believe and none perish One Text more I will quote Whom he did predestinate them he called Whom he called them he justified Whom he justified them he also glorified And why is Redemption here left out of the Apostolical Chain but because those he hath redeemed are all the world If the Doctrine that this Gentleman hath received were right the Apostle would have said Whom he did predestinate them he Redeemed I shall use no more Arguments or Scriptures when so many may be had but because this Gentleman was apt to think me singular in what I said it is fit he know that the Church of England and consequently our Holy Martyrs Cranmer Ridley Latimer Bradford does in her Catechism assert this Doctrine when the child is made to answer there Who hath redeemed me and all mankind The excellent Dr. Bishop Davenant hath wrote a Book on purpose De Morte Christi to maintain this point Archbishop V sher not to name any of our Eminent forraign Divines hath done the like Mr. Baxter that every foot is commending this book of Davenants so highly is one I won't scruple to say now he is dead no less profound himself and chose to go this way with them There is a distinction which this Gentleman hath not I suppose ever considered which may bring light and some Conviction to him A distinction of Christ in the Flesh and of Christ in the Spirit It is we know a Scripture distinction What Jesus Christ now hath done for us in the flesh 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he hath and must have done for All and the direct and immediate fruit of it belong to all for he took on him our flesh not as the flesh of the Elect but as the flesh of Mankind the nature of man not that of Angels What he does for us in the Spirit is peculiar to some and if it be saving to the Elect only The work of Christs redemption being by his Blood was wrought for us through his Flesh in which all mankind have Union with him and that is therefore Universal with the benefit that does directly and immediately issue from it the giving us Faith and Repentance is the work of Christ through the Spirit in which his Members only have Union with him and is particular to the Chosen To come up closer then to this person speak exactly if I can The death of Christ as it is Redemptory Propitiatory or Satisfactory for sin hath this fruit I speak of Pardon It is this is the direct immediate proper fruit of it I think I may say too the only such fruit of it for Pardon for all sin of Omission and Commission and consequently a disobligation from all punishment of Loss and Suffering is passively taken no less than a right to Impunity and Life and this is held forth upon condition of Faith and Repentance to all the World But the Condition it self performed by some is not the fruit of Christs death as a Propitiation though by way of Redundancy it comes by it If you ask me what Redundancy or How I will tell you though I can't Peremptorily as thus In all things whatsoever we pray for suppose it be for fair weather as we have Collects for such Occasions we ask it in Christs name for his sake or through his merits when yet it would be a strange speech to say Christ dyed that we may have fair weather And nevertheless there is some sense in which there is a Truth in this for if Christ had not attoned God by his satisfaction for sin there is no blessing could be obtained for or by any Now when there
Truth And now I will crave leave for a little descant for the Matter and Use will bear it In all Tryals at our Judicial Courts there is a Statute upon which the Party or Parties accused are indited and according as they are found guilty or not by that Statute they are acquitted or condemned The Law by which Men shall be all tryed at judgment is not the Law of Works I have said but the Law of Grace I have need of saying this more than once because I know the notion of many Protestant Divines in their dispute with the Papist does bend them to another apprehension There is a Constitutive and Sentential Justification Juris Judicis The Law by which we are justified is that Law by which we must be judged It is by Faith we are justified and not by Works and that is all one as by the Law of Faith and not by the Law of Works Both is Scripture To maintain or to have any Conception that the Sentence at Judgment shall pass according to the Law of Works is an Errour and such as does tend to the subverting the Gospel and practical Religion It will be the great and only enquiry of that Day whether thou art a Performer of this Law the Law of Faith this Law of Pardon or Grace that is whether thou art a true or sound Believer If the Devil puts in his Accusation that thou art a sinner that thou hast done thus and thus and so art condemnable by the Law Christ will tell him streight I have put in bayl as to that I have satisfied my self in his behalf for that and there is at my Bar no question as to my part but as to his Not whether I have done mine but whether he hath performed his Have you any thing to prove the Man no Believer or no sound believer that he must be cast according to this Law or this Act Hear the Act read which is all one with Christs Will at his death Father I will that such an Act be passed which shall give a pardon to all the world and for all their sins with this clause in the Act The threat that is in the law of works to the contrary notwithstanding Only I will have every one that reaps the benefit of this Act which is laid in before to receive the Grace when promulgated with such a belief of it as working by love shall shew it self in a serious continued desire and endeavour to forsake their sins and cleave unto God in sincerity of heart and life And I will that such a sincerity shall be accepted notwithstanding all their failings nay very much gross and long sinning which they fall into through infirmity unto Life and Salvation This is the Tenour of this Act this Will of Christ that Law or Covenant of Grace by which we shall be judged Well now As for this servant of mine here at the bar accused by you will Christ say When I was a hungry he fed me and when naked cloathed me That is by such works of Charity as these and so of Piety and Sobriety or Temperance Justice and all other Vertue it does appear the man is a Believer and my Disciple These and these things are Manifestations and Evidences of a Sincere heart and a sound faith and therefore I declare him not guilty of the breach but a performer of this Law this Law of Faith upon which he is tryed By the way not here that the declaring a man righteous according to the Act he is tryed by is the most undoubted proper Justification As for the Mans Sins and the sins of the whole world I have my self bore them will our Judge say on the Cross I have satisfied for them by my death in the behalf of all men and this Act is a Declaration of a Vniversal forgiveness as of my Will upon these Terms Indeed the Act and my Will does require such Terms that all shall believe and repent that partake the advantage And this faith and repentance and upright life appearing in this person I do allow his right to the benefit I do allow that my Righteousness or the merits of my life and the Satisfaction or sacrifice of my Death be imputed to him unto this Effect I pronounce him righteous according to this Act and thereby justified and blessed And the righteous that is according this Law to life everlasting And now Sir there is a day when you and I and all the world must appear before God in judgment a day which for ought we know may last as some Learned Divines have thought a thousand years for a thousand years to God is but as one day I have some things that I have formerly thought on and writ and laid up in my heart as my small store to live upon and uphold me against the fear of that terrible day which is also a blessed day and a good day whensoever it comes It is upon the mercy of God and merits of Christ the most sanctified soul and the most miserable penitent sinner must both stand As David has a Psalm he calls A Psalm to bring to remembrance so shall the rest upon this subject which follows be We know that God hath appointed such a one to be our Judge who is a merciful high Priest touched with the feeling of our infirmities He knows our frame and that we are but dust We know that the Government of God we are all under is a gracious Government a righteous Government and a righteous one because gracious For I have learned this farther than some others that the very Righteousness of God in the New Testament towards fallen man is Grace We know that by the Law of Grace God expects we shall be righteous and that he accepts of an Evangelical obedience according to this Law as Perfection For when all that is ill done and all that is undone is forgiven us and not imputed that which we have done let it be never so little must according to this Law be Perfect We know for all that that the holiness of the most holy man living could never be accepted to Salvation but for the merits of Christ and when it is not for the value of the work done but upon the account of Christs merits that any man is accepted Whether my works be more or less if I be found sincere it is all one in regard to such an Acceptation Let me give my body to be burnt or let me give but a cup of cold water in Christs name if Christ sees integrity in it and his merits be imputed the one will be accepted as well as the other Let me have wrought but one hour or let me have wrought twelve my penny still is of Grace and for Christs sake We know farther that he whom God hath made to be our Judge is also and will be our Advocate and if there be any thing to be accepted as if there be any thing thou hast done
mortal does what he can Every man can do more good and less evil than he does I say if he does sincerely what he can which all the Elect from the four quarters of the Earth and the Elect only will surely do he shall have life notwithstanding all Imperfections This being premised as to the Possibility the Performance then it self shall be founded In Dono supernaturali a Viatore quocunque possibiliter recipiendo secundum legem ordinariam as the School speaks Of a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of Persons but in every Nation he that feareth Him and worketh Righteousness is accepted of him 'T is an Errour one of them called Vulgar which hath reigned too long in the Christian Church to think that none can be Saved by the Name of Christ who have not heard him Preached to them or that the extent of Christ's death and the benefit of it is commensurate with the knowledge of him This Errour hath arose through carelesness of Divines in not considering the point and the partiality of the People to their own Religion The Jew will have none but the Jews the Mahometan none but the Mahometans the Christian none but the Christians to be Saved But I am hugely-perswaded otherwise that there are Millions who have been and Thousands are living in the World that have never known and shall never know how much they are beholding to Jesus Christ till they come before him in Judgment and then they shall know it to their comfort and Christ will stay for his Thanks till that day when that Comfort and those Thanks shall be Everlasting To say that any man is was or shall be Saved without Christ is an Errour indeed and if any one should or shall go to preach up the Salvability of the Heathen without this foundation that is to lay any other Foundation than what is laid Christ Jesus the Eighteenth Article of the Church does Anathematize that person for such ignorance is truly accursed But that Article must not be thought to Curse or Condemn any that maintain Salvation alone by Christ though he hold also that some Heathen may be Saved Let the Title of the Article give the Interpretation Another thing is this We must take heed how we order our conceptions in the matter of our Salvation that we set not God aside either as Rector or Lord in it We must not advance and justifie his Rectorship so as to exclude his Lordship nor so advance and justifie his Lordship as to exclude his Rectorship in the business On one hand those persons that hold Christ dyed for all procuring Salvation on condition but leave the condition on Mans free will or on a cooperating with general Grace procured as some say thereby they do excellently illustrate Gods Rectorship and justifie Him in dealing with us according to Gospel-Law but they exclude his Lordship As on the other hand they that hold Christ dyed only for the Elect purchasing the Condition as well as the Benefit and that there is no Covenant but what is Absolute they do excellently advance God's Lordship but in effect do exclude his Rectorship from having a hand in Mans Salvation But as for those persons now that hold Christ hath dyed for All in purchasing Pardon and Salvation on Condition but that the Condition flows not from the power or cooperation of Man's Free-will nor directly from Christ's purchase but from Election These do most manifestly give God his glory both as Rector and Lord while they make Him as Lord to give the Condition to his Elect and as Rector to Judge of them as of all the World according to that Condition Qui perpendere potest perpendeat The third thing is this When some Scriptures say That Christ laid down his Life for his Sheep with the like appropriating his Redemption to the Elect this does not contradict such places as allow it to the World for Christ dying for All does include the Elect But the meaning is because that when Christ hath indeed dyed for All to purchase a Pardon upon Condition it is his Sheep only that hear his Voice the Elect only perform that Condition and reap the Be-Benefit of it And now At the Close of these Matters you may remember Sir I came to make mention of that passage of Abraham speaking to Lot when there was strife between their Servants and I said the same on this occasion I said it to your people I would say it to all others the like affected about London There hath been and there is Contention arising or risen the more is the pity among our Citizens some speaking for one Minister and some for another and so against one and against another But let us know that this strife is indeed between the Herdmen or the Parties when both Ministers are themselves minding only the same thing the opening the Scripture in reference to a right understanding of the Grace of God and the freeness thereof revealed in it even as it way among the Corinths one was for Paul another for Cephas when Peter and Paul preached but the same Truth And therefore let not I pray you the Herdmen fall out any longer among themselves for Abraham and Lot are Brethren FINIS