when a Serpent swallows a Serpent he becomes a Dragon What then could we expect less than Legion from the Teeming Womb of such Big-bellied Monsters For though in point of Argument his Mountain is often delivered of a Mouse yet in point of Errour his Mouse alwayes brings forth a Mountain 2 It was a Spur to my duller Temper to Observe how he had raked all the Kennels and common Sewers of Friendly Debates Ecclesiastical Polities which with Martial Law and Civil War make up the Four great Soloecismes of this last Age and borrowed Auxiliaries from the Scavinger to compose an Oleo to throw in the Faces of the Innocent some of the particulars the Reader will find wiped off by these Papers and returned with that Correction and Chastisement which it became me to give them though not with what they deserved to Receive but for fouling my fingers with them all I must beg Excuse it had been a work no less irksome and tedious than the cleansing of Augaea's Stable and no otherwise to be effected than by Letting in the Thames from Billings-gate through Buttolph-lane Yet one Instance of the Many omitted and one is too much for a Taste I shall here give the Reader hoping it may not turn his stomach against the Rest Dr. Owen Com. p. 177. has said By the Obedience of Christ I intend the universal Conformity of the Lord Iesus Christ as he was or is in his being Mediator to the whole Will of God c. Now this Obedience of Christ N. B. as Mediator may be considered two ways 1. As to the habitual Root and Fountain of it 2. As to the Actual parts and Duties of it 1. The habitual Righteousness of Christ as Mediator N. B. p. 178. in his Humane Nature was the absolute complete exact Conformity of the Soul of Christ to the Will Mind or Law of God 2. The Actual Obedience of Christ was his willing chearful obediential Performance of every Thing Duty or Command that God by vertue of any Law whereto we were subject did require and Moreover to the Peculiar Law of the Mediator Hereof there are two parts 1. That whatever was required of us by the Law of Nature c. He did it all 2. There was the Peculiar Law of the Mediator which respected himself Merely and contained all those Acts and Duties which are not for our Imitation Thus far the Doctor But now what a world of wit has our Author shewn upon this Occasion or rather no Occasion Declaiming for four five or six pages together upon the Trite and Common Theme of his own Ignorance pag. 298 299 300 301 302 303. So that by the Law of Mediation sayes he He understands whatever Christ was bound to doe as our Mediator whatever was proper to his Mediatory Office All this is not imputed to us as though we had done it I hope we shall find something at last to be imputed to us but there 's nothing left now but thirdly that which concerns him in a Private Capacity as a Man subject to the Law Now had this Gentleman been pleased to have understood the Doctor a little before he had pretended to Confute him he might have seen that He supposes 1. A general Law of the Mediator whereby he gave Obedience to the Law of Nature c. in our stead 2. The peculiar Law of the Mediator which respected himself merely to this he gave not Obedience in our stead But still whatever Obedience he performed 't was as Mediator though not according to the peculiar Law of the Mediator But alas this would have spoyled a great deal of excellent Wit and dear Drollery which no man engaged in a Design of Raillery and Scolding would willingly lose for a World especially when he was practising like the great Balsac in some of his Letters to make an Experiment what The Height of forced Fancy can produce out of a barren and dry Subject or placing his Draining Engines to Recover the Boggs and Fenns upon New-Market Heath 3 His Subtle and Politick Method of venting Blasphemies was that which mainly pressed me to this Service For it 's now grown the solemn Mode of this Tribe of Men to vomit out the most opprobrious Language against the Lord and his Christ and then to wash their hands in Pilate's Innocency by saying These are the Consequences of other Mens Opinions And herein lies this Authors singular Excellency and proper Talent Thus when some affirm That God is a Holy God a Righteous Governour a Iust Iudge who will by no means clear the Guilty one that will not fail to recompense to every man according to his Works and yet in infinite Wisdom and Mercy has made Provision in the Death of his Son for securing the Glory both of his Essential and Rectoral Righteousness that he may be and appear to be just and the Iustifier of him that Believes in Iesus You shall now guess at the Lyon by his Claw and see what nasty dirty filthy stuffe he can extract out of this Doctrine Pag. 46. The Iustice of God hath glutted it self with Revenge in the Death of Christ and so henceforward we may be sure he will be very kind as a Revengefull man is when his Passion is over And pag. 47. The summe of which is this That God is all Love and Patience when he has taken his fill of Revenge as others use to say the Devil is very good when he is pleased Again whereas the Church of England Art 17. has express'd her Conceptions about Predestination in these words Predestination to life is the everlasting Purpose of God whereby before the Foundation of the World was laid he hath constantly decreed by his Councel secret to us to deliver from Curse and Damnation those whom he hath chosen in Christ out of Mankind and to bring them by Christ to Everlasting Salvation Our Author is pleased to droll upon this Tremendous Mystery at this pleasant Rate Pag. 57. This falls hard upon those miserable Wretches whose ill Fortune it was without any fault of theirs to be left out of the Roll of Election Thus when one had ventured to say by Warrant from Christs own Mouth John 3. 14. That Christ was compared to the Brazen Serpent c. he comes in with this snearing Droll p. 115. Who can forbear being smitten with so lovely a Person In all which and a hundred times more we are bound to suppose That there is Nihil bonis moribus contrarium quò minùs cum publicâ Utilitate Imprimatur Now if no Reverence of the Majesty of God no Regard to the Authority of the Holy Scriptures no Respect to the Harmonious Confessions of Faith of All Protestant Churches could oblige his Pen to observe a due Temperament yet methinks Civility to that Church whereof He is a Member which has not been Uncivil to him and may exercise more kindness to to him might have commanded more becoming Language about those things wherein she has
draw with him towards a Conclusion Our Author is beginning to make an end but he must first discharge his stomach of a little froth and gall and spit up some venome that lies in his chest in the face of his Adversaries without which he could not possibly conclude his Chapter He tells you summarily what great feats he has done and what greater Atchievements he will adventure on What he has done amounts to this he has discovered great Mistakes in other mens Divinity but cannot espy any in his own he can spy a Mote in his Neighbours eye but considers not his own Beam He has also discover'd the rise of these Mistakes to be from the various usage of the Name Christ in the Writingâ—… of the Apostles The more excusable it seems they are if they had occasion from thence to erre which they might the more easily doe because as he observes well the Writings of Paul are obscure He has also discover'd to us the temper and humour of those Mistaken men They are zealous to advance Christs Person to the prejudice and reproach of his Religion which yet our Author himself when a Qualm of sweet Nature comes over his Heart thinks to be Impossible p. 17. The greater Opinion we have of his Wisdom and Reverence for his Person the more sacred Regard we have for his Lawes He has also discovered a horrid Plot to introduce a fancifull Application of Christ to our selves instead of the substantial Duties of the love of God and Men and an universal Holiness of Life But this is but a plot of his own making unless he had some supernatural Assistances from Beneath He has also for ever discharged the world upon his Blessing from closing with Christ getting into Christ and above all from overloving Christ and admiring his Excellencies and Perfections his Fulness Beauty Loveliness and Riches Wherein if he prevail to his mind he has for ever Obliged the Prince of Darkness to him and done more service to his black Kingdom than he with his Legions hath been able to effect these Sixteen hundred years What he intends further to doe he has reduced to four heads to which I referre the Reader and upon the whole Matter doe onely make this one Observation That through this whole Chapter he has cheated and tormented us with a sorry old Threadbare fallacy A benè compositis ad malè divisa The Persons whom he reviles dare not put asunder those things which God hath joyned together They love the Person of Christ and not therefore break but keep his Commandements They think that Faith in our Lord Iesus Christ and Repentance from dead works are very consistent may and must sweetly meet together and Kiss each other They would be glad to see those who revile them to love and admire Christs Person and shall be content to be reproved so far as they neglect and undervalue his Precepts but they are not to be frighted out of their Love to Him who loved them and gave himself for them They do freely confess that they admire at the Love of the Father in sending his onely begotten Son into the World upon such a design as to save Sinners and they do equally admire the Love of the Lord Jesus Christ that he was so willing to come into the world to be tempted persecuted reproached and at last to dye and give his Life a Ransome for many And though they have heard many Reproaches and Blasphemies uttered against their Saviour yet they have not met with one solid concluding Argument why they should not love him And therefore if they must be vile upon these Accounts they resolve in the strength of Christ to be vile more vile still and shall bind all the Ignominy that is cast upon them for Christs sake unto their Temples as a Crown and Diadem For indeed they do persist in that perswasion with some Obstinacy that it was the Person of Christ who dyed for them it was He upon whom the Chastisement of their Peace did lye it was He whose Soul was made an Offering for sin and upon whom God laid the Iniquities of us All. And therefore our Author must bear with them if they love him as much as they can because they have reason to fear they shall not love him as much as He has deserved They remember a Dreadfull word If any man love not the Lord Iesus Christ let him be Anathema Maranatha and would not for all the world fall under the weight of it Their love to his person makes them studious to please him fearfull to offend him zealous to glorifie him and if the will of God be so humbly content to suffer for him They have not met with any Author that has till of late endeavoured a Confutation of Christs personal Excellencies perfections fulness beauty loveliness and riches and they that have made the Attempt have exposed themselves to the universal censure of all that wear the Name of Christian and therefore they do ingenuously acknowledge that they doe admire and honour them and do humbly hope Christ at his coming will not rebuke them for it And when they are invidiously traduced as setting the Person of Christ at oddes with his Gospel they are satisfied that they have not done it in Principle and lament that they have in any the least degree done it in Practice And as they know that the Charge as apply'd to them is a pure impure slander so they conceive it 's vey difficult if not impossible in it self nor can they apprehend how any can really and truely maintain a due esteem of Christ in their hearts but they must have a proportionable value and regard for all his Commandments and Injunctions That these things are become Riddles to any professing the Name of Christ they tremble at as a sad symptome that the Gospel is hid to them and from them They do also in the general approve of any Labours managed with a due regard to the Majesty of God and the Lord Jesus Christ in order to the discovery of any Expressions in their Writings or Discourses which might in the least be misinterpreted to degrade and thrust down Holiness from its Throne but withall they are unwilling to be railed out of a good Opinion of Christs Person seeing that however they may have sinned in breaking his Laws it will not mend the matter to lessen the honour they justly have for Himself and had rather be severely chidden for their sin than scoffed out of their Duty But of these Matters thus far CHAP. II. Of what use the Consideration of Christs Person is in the Christian Religion IN the Entrance of this Chapter I observe our Author is feelingly concern'd to amove from himself the sinister suspition of a Design to render Christ useless And he makes a solemn Protestation not onely of his own Innocency but is ready to become Surety and Compurgator for all his Accomplices A design sayes he which I confess I
am wholly a stranger to as I believe all those are who are so much charged with it When we hear a man zealously purging himself of some Notorious Crime noysed abroad onely in the general without praevious Accusation it 's apt to fly-blow our Heads with jealousie he may be Tardy an over-forward Vindication being reputed more than half an Accusation But I dare be one of his Twelve-Godfathers in this matter that he does not make Christ useless but will allow him to be of some use that is to say that Christ is good for something and in effect a little Better than though next to Nothing and I can with more security become Bound for Him because he has given me good Counter-security that I shall not forfeit my Recognizance P. 330. I could never perswade my self no not for your heart though you had attempted it that the perfect Obèdience and Righteousness of His Life was wholly excluded So that whatever rendred Christ beloved of God contributed something to our Acceptation P. 331. We ought not to think that we receive No Benefit by the Righteousness of Christ. And I hope something is better than Nothing Nay such is his Charity he can be content to Allow that God was somewhat more pleased with the Obedience of Christ than the Faith of Abraham ibid. And that his Sacrifice was of greater value than the Blood of Bulls and Goats p. 19. Naughty men are they then that wrong Him and Them so as to insinuate that they design'd to make Christ useless the rather because they proceed upon so bad a Ground We are charg'd with making Christ useless onely because we dare not make his Laws so And thus it seems they have unhandsomely payd him in his own Coyn who charges them with making his Laws Useless onely because they dare not make his Person so And yet to deal plainly with Him for all this I find a Double charge upon the File against him 1 That though he has not made Christ altogether Useless yet he has made him Needless Though he can use Him yet he could have spared him though he can make a shift with him he could have made a Rubbing shift without Him Ut tecum possum vivere sic sine te So p. 46. I should rather have thought that Gods requiring such a sacrifice as the Death of Christ was not because he could not do otherwise And if Gods Iustice could be contented without that sacrifice I may presume it shall not stick at our Authors good Nature p. 43. Had Christ never appeared in the World yet we had Reason to believe that God is thus Wise and Good viz. to Pardon sinners And as he labours to Prove Enoch Noah Iews and Gentiles who knew nothing at all of Christ p. 44. yet understood God to be a God pardoning iniquity without him And surely if the World jogg'd on for four thousand years without Christ it might have worn out the Remainder without him too 2 I find a second Charge against him That though he make not Christ useless as to some common ordinary and general Ends which might have been attain'd and reach'd without him yet he renders him wholly Useless as to those special those main and glorious purposes for which he came into the World The making satisfaction to Divine Iustice the Imputation of his Righteousness to Believers his powerfull and effectual sanctifying them by his Spirit for whom he undertook Whereof we shall meet with abundant Evidence in the progress of his Discourse So that a Declaration contrary to the Fact is of small weight with considering Readers and sinks it self below all consideration But to return Two things fill up this Chapter First That the Person of Christ is of some Consideration and Secondly That the consideration of his Person is of some use onely the difficulty to be assoyled by His Abilities is Of what use the consideration of his Person should be 1. Then the Person of Christ is of some consideration but e're he ventures upon that Province he bethought Himself it would be a Task worthy his great Parts to indoctrinate our Plumbeous Cerebrosities in the Nice Point What the Person of Christ is P. 15. By the Person of Christ I mean what all men ought to mean nay there 's no doubt of that All men at their utmost Peril ought to mean to a hairs breadth just as our Author means Christ Himself Had it not been a Prodigy as great as ever was in the World if by Christs Person had been meant any body else Such then is Christ's Person The Consideration thereof follows And as he assures us the onely proper consideration here is the Greatness of his Person This is the onely or however The onely Proper or at least the onely Proper consideration here whatever other improper considerations of it there may be in other places or cases upon other accounts or occasions at other times it skills not for Here at this Time and in this place the onely Proper Consideration is the Greatness of his Person And yet methinks the exceeding loveliness of his Person standing betwixt God and lost Sinners his laying down his Life as a Ransome payd to God his standing as a Surety in our stead his bearing our sins in his Body on the Cross might have claimed a Place and come in for a share in our consideration of his Person But thus much for that 2 The Use of this consideration follows And some good Use he has assign'd it 1 And first it 's a plain demonstration of Gods love to Mankind that he sent so dear and so great a Person into the World as his onely begotten Son to save Sinners It is so indeed but a very weak demonstration of Gods Love to his own Son to send him into the World to grapple with all those Miseries he met withall in his Soul in his Body from Enemies from Friends from Men from Devils nay from himself whom it pleased to bruise him and lay upon him the Iniquities of us all to make his soul an Offering for sin nay to be made sin for them who himself knew none to Die a cursed Death and all this without any Absolute or Indispensible necessity Contrary to all the Rules of Decorum Nec Deus intersit nisi dignus vindice Nodus inciderit And it would be of use to consider also the Love of Christ his Willingness to Accept the Terms of being a Redeemer though He knew well they were severe and would cost him Sweat and Blood and yet He cheerfully Undertook Underwent and went through with them He voluntarily assumed a Body that He might become a Sacrifice Heb. 10. He was willingly for a little while made lower than the Angels by Dispensation who was above them by Nature for the suffering of Death Heb. 2. 9. He understood well the Debtor was Insolvent and yet he became Surety He knew well the Righteousness of God and yet He was ready to put in sufficient
sayes he for though it be not exact and perfect in every thing yet if it be sincere we shall be accepted for the sake of Christ by vertue of the Covenant that he hath Sealed with his Blood But I am afraid he has conjured up a Spirit that he cannot lay again with so sorry a Charm For 1. I do not find that God has abated any thing of his Law but is as peremptory as ever for Do this and live Nothing will please God less than exact and perfect Obedience though in the Covenant of Grace he is pleased to admit Another a Mediator to doe it for Believers I had rather he would hear the Reverend and Learned Bishop Reynolds upon Psal. 110. p. 492. In point of Validity or Invalidity there can be but Five things said of the Law 1. Either it must be Obeyed and that it is not for all have sinn'd and come short of the Glory of God Rom. 3. 23. Or 2. it must be Executed upon Men and the Curse and Penalty thereof inflicted and that it is not neither for there is no Condemnation to them that are in Christ Jâ—…sus Rom. 8. 1. Or 3. it must be Abrogated or extinguish'd and that it is not neither for Heaven and Earth shall sooner pass away If there were no Law there would be no Sin for sin is the Transgréssion of the Law And if there were no Law there would be no Iudgement for the World must be judged by the Law Or 4. it must be Moderated and favourably interpreted by Rules of Equity and that it cannot be neither for it 's inflexible and one jot or tittle must not be abated Or lastly the Law it self remaining the Obligation thereof notwithstanding must towards such or such Persons be so far forth dispensed withall as that a Surety shall be admitted upon a Concurrence of all their Wills who are therein interested God willing to Allow Christ willing to Perform Man willing to Enjoy both to doe all the Duties and to suffer all the Curses of the Law in behalf of that Person who in Rigor should have done or suffer'd all so that the Law nor one jott or tittle thereof is abrogated in regard of the Obligation therein contained but they are all reconciled in Christ Thus far he But 2. That Sincerity which he talks of is indeed allow'd in the Gospel in the Matter of Inherent Righteousness and Sanctification there it has a proper and excellent place but comes not into the business of Iustification at all And 3. This Sincerity will be but a Cover-slut for the Omission and Neglect of our Duty for if Sincerity will do the work without Universality and Integrity of Obedience the best way will be to shrowd our selves under a profound Ignorance of Gods Commandements and then the less we know of Gods Will the safer we are under the shelter of Sincerity And 4. The Question will be How much shortness of Obedience will this Sincerity compound for It may be our Author will prescribe a Drachm of Sincerity to a Scruple of Disobedience but then Another will make a Grain of Sincerity a very little upon a knifes point serve to sweeten a whole Pound of Defect in Duty and thus every Mountebank with a dose of his Electuary of Sincerity will pretend to heal mens Consciences of those wounds that Sin has given them 5. Whereas our Author addes that we shall be accepted for the sake of Christ it 's a meer Iuggle for when he comes to enquire What Influence the Righteousness and Death of Christ have upon our acceptation with God he professes he can find nothing in the world but that God will pardon us if we believe and obey the Gospel p. 320. which doubtless he would have done without him But this is onely to make the same use of Christ that Politicians doe of the Foxes Case to piece the Lyons skin when it 's too short just so must Christ serve to eke out the shortness of their Obedience with his own and when they have stretcht their own Righteousness upon the Tenters as far as it will hold to be beholden to Christ for the Rest God for Christs sake does indeed accept our imperfect Duty Obedience Service and pardon the shortness of it according to the Tenour of the Covenant of Grace but not that it should thereby stand for our Iustification which we have onely upon the Account of what he has done and suffered for us made ours by accepting him upon his own Terms 3. We are come with much adoe to the third and last Addition that these men make or are supposed to make to the Gospel Viz. Concerning our Wisdom to walk with God To which thinks Doctor Owen there is required Agreement Acquaintance Way Strength Boldness and aiming at the same End and all these with the Wisdom of them are hid in the Lord Iesus It were worth the while to transcribe the Doctors discourse upon all these Heads but our Author has saved me the Labour The summe of all is this That Christ having expiated our sins and fulfilled all Righteousness for us though we have no Personal Righteousness of our own but are as contrary to God as Darkness is to Light and Death to Life and an universal Pollution and Defilement to an universal and glorious Holiness and Hatred to Love yet the Righteousness of Christ is a sufficient nay the onely Foundation of our Agreement and upon that of our walking with God Now without doubt our Author would have his Reader believe that the Doctor has said all this and that he intends we may have Communion with God whilest we continue thus I confess at the reading hereof I was amazed knew not what to think Have I been all this while so narrowly watching the Doctor that a false Print much less a false Doctrine could not escape me and is our Author come after me and findes all this filth and abominable stuffe Once again therefore because I durst not trust my own Eyes or Ears and am under a Vow never to trust our Authors Tongue or Pen speaking evil of the Doctor I took down the Book and what I find I will transcribe and let all the world judge Com. p. 119. The Prophet tells us that two cannot walk together unless they be agreed Amos 3. 3. Untill Agreement be made there is no Communion God and Man by Nature or whilest Man is in the state of Nature are at the greatest Enmity He declares nothing to us but wrath neither do we come short of him yea we first began it and continue longest in it In this state the wisdom of walking with God must needs be most remote from the Soul He is Light and in him is no Darkness at all we are Darkness and in us is no Light at all he is Life a living God we are dead Sinners dead in Trespasses and sins he is Holiness and glorious in it we wholly defiled and an abominable thing he is Love
never told us that he was bottomless and boundless And if God be not a God of bottomless and boundless Mercy it will not bear a regular proportion to enquire Whether Christs Goodness became less Infinite and boundless than it was before 3. He considers The Holiness and Innocence of Christs Life that he was a great Example of unaffected Piety towards God c. Hence does he reasonably conclude that he came to restore the Practice of Piety c. which had been banisht out of the world by the hypocritical pretences of a more Refined Sanctity in washing of Hands and Dishes in tything Mint and Cummin as he calls it Now this is to be fear'd is not very regular and exaâ—… for some would conclude as if Christ came to destroy the Ius Divinum of Tythes but we are to understand that the Venome and Villany of this Hypocrisie did not lye in Tything Egges or Pigs Chickens Ducks or Goslings Apples Pears or Plumbs much less those fatter Praedial Revenues of the Church but only in those uncanonical things Mint Annise Cummine and bate but those two or three and Tythes are Sacred out of all things from the Cedar in Lebanon to the Hyssop upon the Wall 4. Our Saviour by his Example as well as Laws taught us Another Lesson that as we lost our Happiness at first by Sin so the way to regain the Favour of God and an Immortal Life is by the practice of a Sincere and Universal Righteousness I must freely confess I would never desire any man to be more ridiculous whilest I live than our Author in these few words If he has forgot his design or lost himself in a Wood yet does he presume the Reader also has his wits gone after him a Wool-gathering He has pretended over and over that he would give us Another Scheme of Religion from acquaintance with Christs Person more beautifull for Colour more exact for Proportion than what all other men have been able to shew and all this without Gospel-Revelation And yet here contrary to all the Laws of Proportion he takes in Christs Laws from which we must learn this other Lesson but though his Laws came in by an Anomaly surely his Example is Regular and that teaches us that The way to regain Gods Favour is by the practice of a sincere and universal Righteousness Now if Christ has taught us this by his Example we must suppose that He had once lost Godâ—… Favour but happily regain'd it by this Expedient of a sincere and universal Righteousness Whether this be a Truth or no in it self is out of our Charter to examine for we are obliged onely to consider the Regularity of his Proportions and the self-consistency of his Notions 5. When We remember that Christ died as a Sacrifice and Propitiation for sin this gives Us a great demonstration of Gods good will to us how ready he is to pardon former sins in that he hath appointed an Atonement for us and given no less a Person than his own Son for our Ransome It 's very strange that none else may be allowed to gather all this from the Revelation of the Gospel and yet our Author with his Scrues of Artificial Connexions and Regular Proportions can draw it every Letter and Syllable from an Acquaintance with Christs Person But by what secret wayes he became Master of this Mystery is to me a greater mystery How the Person of Christ the Death of Christ should teach us the proper Ends and Designs of his Death unless he had Acquainted us with them I am yet to seek and so was our Author himself within these few leaves pag. 78. The Incarnation and Life and Death and Resurrection of Christ were available to those Ends for which God designed them but the Virtue and Efficacy of them doth depend upon Gods Institution and Appointment and therefore can be known onely by Revelation 6. He assures us That the Death of Christ assures him of the Desert of Sin and what it is And I aâ—… heartily glad to hear the News and wish it had been attended with Proof from Scripture which is pregnant in it and not shuffled off with that which is next dore to none Surely then there was somewhat in the Death of Christ which Answer'd the Demerit of it which was Gods Anger and Displeasure against it or it will be impossible from Christs Death to learn Sins Demerit without a Scripture-Comment upon the Text of his Crosse and Sufferings 7. Christs Death seals the irrevocable Decree of Reprobation That 's as terrible News as the other was comfortable but I fear he must be beholden to the Gospel for his Intelligence or he will never learn it from a bare acquaintance with Christs Person And now we may fairly presume there is such a Decree so irrevocable so immutable else how does the Death of Christ seal it It 's supposed ever that the Decree is made e re it be sealed but the vigour and quickness of our Authors Fancy is incredible and so at length those poor wretches whose hard Fortune it was in our Authors phrase to be left out of the Roll of Election without any fault of theirs are in the same Predicament they were in before Our Author has reserved one thing for the shutting up of this Section which being a matter of very great importance and yet so easie and accountable we may not doubt but he has handled it with much Exactness It is the True Method of a Sinners Recovery by Christ. From hence says he it 's easie to understand what is the True Method of a Sinners Recovery by Christ. And there are two parts of his Undertaking 1. The Erecting of his own regular and exact Method 2. The demolishing the confused Method of others And First For his own Method for so he is pleas'd to Nick-name it for divers good and valuable Considerations him thereunto especially moving it is no more but this When we are so affected with all the powerfull Arguments to a New Life which are contained in his Christs Incarnation and Life and Doctrine and Example and Miracles and Death and Resurrection and Ascension into Heaven and his Intercession for us as to be sensible of the Shame and Folly of Sin and to be reconciled to the Love and Practice of true Piety and Holiness Then What then O then we partake in the Merits of His Sacrifice and find the benefit of his Intercession and have A Title to all the Blessings and Promises of the Gospel This is the True Method of a Sinners Recovery But still I doe not see the Regular Proportion of it to his Design for as has been oft observed he pretends to give us a Scheme of Religion from the Person of Christ never medling with his Doctrine and yet now when he thinks it so easie to give us from thence a Method of a Sinners Recovery he is glad to be beholden to the Doctrine of Christ for he sayes When we are
pretended to Love the Lord Jesus Christ provided we have but our Authours license to love him but now the Question will be this whether our Union to Christ consists in a mutual and reciprocal love And if our Authour had been judge a little while since he would have resolved it in the Negative That our Union to Christ consists in our Union to a particular Church and that it is a political union such a one as is between Prince and Subject and consists in a belief of his revelations obedience to his Laws and subjection to his Authority I shall only note a few things and dismisse it 1. That there is a love of Benevolence and good Will a designing purposing love in Christ towards us before we bear his Image and Superscription this love he bears towards those that are unlike him Rom. 5 8. God Commendeth his love to us that when we were yet sinners Christ dyed for us verse 10. When we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son 2. There must of necessity be the intervention of an Union a likenesse a Conformity of Natures before there can be supposed a love of mutual complacency and reciprocal delight in each other for this love this delight must have something to work upon As there must be a Conjugal Relation before the Husband can take delight in his Wife as his Wife and the Wife in her Husband as her Husband 3. That this love of good will in Christ is the Original Reason of our transformation into the Image of Christ whereby we become meet objects for that other love of Complacency 4. It s true that we love him as partaking of his Nature but then it s also as true that those Acts of love to and delight in Christ proceed from that New Nature which we derive from him 5. The Love wherewith Christ Loves us as the price of his blood is a differing love from that wherewith he loves us as his workmanship created in Christ Jesus to good works 6. I rejoyce however that we are owned to be Christs workmanship Created to good works which it were not so we had more reason to love our selves to admire and deifie our own natural Abilities which effected that glorious workmanship And I see of late our Authour takes to the Church Catechism which had he attended to in time had saved him half the Labour of his Book My good Child know that thou art not able to do these things of thy self to love God to believe in him to fear him with all thy heart with all thy mind withal thy strength to worship him to give him thankes to put thy whole Trust in him c. nor to walk in the Commandements of God and serve him without his special Grace which thou must learn at all times to call for by diligent prayer 7. The more we exercise our selves in the Love of Christ the more like him we grow and the stronger bonds are layd upon our Souls to maintain the Union inviolable but still there must precede an Union which is the true Foundation of the Exercise of this Love of Delight and mutual Complacency Ay but says he Love is the great Cement of Union which unites Interests and thereby more firmly unites hearts Let him call it the Cement or the Soder or the Glew it 's all one to me I conceive that Interest is the Cement of Love and not Love the Cement of Interest Men love because it 's their Interest so to doe but whether that Love that flutters up and down the world a thing so unstable and desultory that we cannot tell where to have it be a fit Pattern for the heigths and lengths and depths and breadth of the Love of Christ ora just Measure of it I very much question Many things we meet with that are full of delight but one may take a Surfeit of Sweet-meats and therefore I shall onely trouble the Reader with his Concluding Argument taken from the Sacraments Which are says he the Instruments and Symbols of our Union with Christ. And if by Christ he understands the Church it 's not worth the while to make a Controversie on 't we will grant That Union with the Church consists in Union with it and the surest Means to be United to the Church is to be United to it and this way seldom fails But if he had a mind to conclude something else he had done like a Neighbour to have informed us for I must needs confess I am in the dark But yet we shall not lose all our labour For these Sacraments represent both our external and real Union with him And it 's worth all our pains and patience to hear one of his Lectures upon this Subject First for our External Union Baptism is a publick Profession of the Christian Religion that we believe the Gospel own his Authority and submit to his Government Secondly These Sacraments signifie our Reall Union to Christ Thus Baptism signifies our Profession of becoming New men our profession of Conformity to Christ in his Death and Resurrection Now look how much Conformity to Christs Death and Resurrection is better than owning his Authority and submitting to his Government just so much is our Real Union better than our external which if one so exactly versed in the essential differences of things as our Author had not told us other wise ordinary Capacities had judged to be both one That little advantage there is the External Union carries it For as to our External Union Baptism he tells us is a Profession of it but as to our Real Union Baptism onely signifies a profession of it and then it will be somewhat better to make a Profession of submission to Christs Government than to make a signification of a Profession of Conformity to his Death I shall therefore rather acquiesce in the Judgement of the Catechism about the Signification of Baptism than in our Authors which makes this Question What is the inward and spiritual Grace Ans. A death unto sin and a New Birth unto Righteousness for being by Nature born in sin and the children of wrath we are hereby made the children of Grace 4 His last and most famous Observation is That Fellowship and Communion with God signifies what he calls a Political Union And would we knew what that was why it is this To be in fellowship with God and Christ signifies to be of that Society which puts us into a peculiar Relation to God that God is our Father and we his Children that Christ is our Head and Husband and Lord and Master and we his Disciples and followers his Spouse and Body It 's below the generosity of the Eagle to catch Flies an Employment more suitable to the impertinent humour of Domitian and therefore it may be expected that our Author should scorn to play so mean a Game as to impose upon our weakness with the Ambiguity of a poor word To be in Fellowship
admirable and to be placed amongst the wonders of the New-Divinity that God should enter into a Covenant with all the World to Pardon and save them upon condition of Faith Obedience and yet not let many of them know a syllable of it Nay that he should expresly countermand the promulgating of the Gospel to them And yet so has God done even by the preaching of the true Covenant of Grace Acts 16. 6 7. Now when they had gone throughout all Phrygia and the Region of Galatia and were forbidden by the Holy Ghost to Preach the word in Asia After they were come to Mylia they assayed to go into Bithynia but the Spirit suffered them not 2. Let us now briefly consider his Assertion That the Covenant of Grace such a one as he has made for us is owing to the Sacrifice of Christ's death and the Righteousness of his Life That God being pleased with these for Christ's sake entred into a New Covenant with Mankind I must tell the Reader that I have narrowly pryed into this Section wherein I find frequent assertions of this Doctrine That the Covenant of Grace is owing to procured by founded on the Obedience of Christ's Life and the Sacrifice of his Death and yet so unhappy have I been in my search that I cannot find any Proof or any attempt to prove it and therefore till I see evidence to the contrary I shall take it for granted that the Covenant of Grace is owing to founded on and given forth by that free Grace of God from whence it is justly denominated A Covenant of Grace though the intervention of a Mediator such a Mediator was absolutely necessary to put us into the Actual possession of those rich mercies designed for us by God in that Covevenant which Mediator himself is owing to founded on that Covenant of Grace and therefore the Covenant of Grace is not founded upon him but indeed for that Covenant which he is pleased to call a New-Covenant and a Covenant of Grace it 's no great matter where 't is founded and therefore let him dispose of his own Creature as he pleases 3. He supposes that Christ's Obedience and Sacrifice had no other influence upon our acceptance with God but that for his sake he entred into such a Covevenant with Mankind This is all however that he can find But this is a most miserable All and either is just nothing or very near it For § 1. Let him of Courtesy Answer one Question more since he is so good at it Whether God was ever at any time unwilling to pardon sin and give Eternal Life to those who did believe his Promises and obey his Precepts If he was unwilling Then let him shew how Christ's Obedience and Sacrifice did operate upon God to alter his will and of unwilling to make him willing what could there be in the Sacrifice of Christ's Death or the Righteousness of his Life that should make God more in Love with Faith and Obedience than he had been before But if God was willing and that without respect to Christ then how does he give the Pardon of sin and Eternal Life to them who Believe and Obey for Christ's sake I am sure of our Authors good-Nature in this point he will say he has said it That some that many were saved without respect to Christ The mercy and Grace of God it seems accepting their Belief of particular Revelations and their sincere Obedience to his Commands Repentance supplying the defects and shortness of their Conformity to the Law Now if God did all this without regard to Christ how does he do it for the sake of Christ But there 's an Answer to this that lies Dormant in the word Promise God did indeed Pardon sin and give Eternal Life to those who believed his Revelations and obeyed his Commandements but he never promised he would do it But now he has drawn out his Grace and good-will into a Promise to pardon sin and give Eternal Life upon the terms aforesaid and this he has done for Christ's sake And let us Audit the Account and all the influence that Christ's Obedience and Sacrifice bath upon our acceptation with God is that we have got a promise from God to do that which he would have done before to give us that he would have given us before only he would not promise to do it for us to give it to us Two things I shall briefly return 1. That God under the Old-Testament made explicite promises of the pardon of Sin and Eternal Life and if under that Dispensation I am sure our Author will say without respect to Christ that this was the Doctrine of the Old-Testament the Apostle asserts Act. 13. 40. To him give all the Prophets witness that through his Name whosoever believeth in him shall receive remission of sins 2 Sam. 7. 14. I will be his Father and he shall be my Son and there 's enough in that to secure a promise of pardon to a repenting Child Mal. 3. 17. They shall be mine and I will spare them as a Father spares his own son that serves him but it it is added If he sin against me I will chasten him with the Rod of Men but my Mercy shall not depart from him Ps. 99. 8. Thou answeredst them O Lord our God thou wast a God that forgavest them though thou tookest vengeance on their inventions And as the pardoning Grace that was in God's Nature was revealed to them as the foundation of their Faith and obedience Ps. 130. 4. There is forgiveness with thee that thou mayst be feared So it is drawn out into a promise v. 8. He shall redeem Israel from all his Iniquities which without the pardon of them is simply impossible As for the Promises of Eternal Lise we find good old Iacob now giving up the Ghost and having no hope in this Life expressing his Faith thus Gen. 49. 18. I have waited for thy Salvation O Lord Which doubtless was Eternal Salvation beyond the Verge of that short time of his Life which he knew was expired Ps. 73. 24. Thou shalt guide me with thy Counsel in my pilgrimage and afterwards receive me to glory but a more convenient place will offer it self for the discussing of this matter 2. If then this be all that the Obedience of Christ's Life and the Sacrifice of his Death do contribute to our acceptance with God that for Christ's sake we have got a Promise or a more explicite Promise of the pardon of sin and Eternal Life than before then I must be of the same mind still that it contributes just nothing to the acceptance of our Obedience with God Let me have Liberty to put the Case of two Persons v. g. David and Paul let us suppose these two equally obedient to God's commands the former without such an express and explicite promise of Reward the other encouraged by stronger Arguments of clear and numerous Promises of Pardon and Eternal Life Which
vouchsafed them but not the Foundation of their Religion under any Notion When God gave the Law upon Mount Sinai He Prefaces it with this strong Inducement I am the Lord thy God which brought thee out of the Land of Egypt out of the House of Bondage Thou shalt have no other Gods before me May we now upon our Authors Warrant say That Gods delivering them out of Egypt was the Foundation of their Religion in Worshipping the true God and none besides Him or rather that it was an Additional Enforcement to command Obedience to that Law which yet Antecedent to such particular Obligation approved its Authority to their Consciences But that these Deliverances and Providences were no Foundation for the Mosaick Religion I shall endeavour to prove 1. In that God himself declares that he had laid another Foundation Isa. 28. 16. Behold I lay in Zion a sure Foundation And this is not constitutive of what was New but declarative of what was Old not only a Prophesie of what he would do but a clearer Discovery of what he had done that he might lead them into stronger Expectations of that Messiah which from time to time was promised would come and in fulness of Time should come and this Foundation God laid in Zion Which though it may express the Gospel-Church yet surely must not exclude the Iewish to which the Name Primarily appertains 2. In that God had actually laid another Foundation from the Foundation of the World for sinners to Build their Hopes upon in their addresses to God Thus was Christ the Lamb slain from the Foundation of the World Apoc. 13. 8. Slain particularly in the Sacrifices which commencing with the New Covenant ran a Line parallel with the Old World to the one great Sacrifice of Christ our High Priest upon the Cross. In that first Promise then made to our first Parents and afterwards Amplified to Abraham was the Foundation of all acceptable Religion and Worship Gen. 12. 2 3. God promises to Abraham In thee shall all the Families of the Earth be blessed which promise that it contained Christ the Apostle assures us Gal. 3. 8â—… The Scripture fore-seeing that God would justifie tâ—… Heathen through Faith Preacht before the Gospâ—… to Abraham In thee shall all the Nations of tâ—… Earth be blessed ver 16. Now to Abraham aâ—… his Seed were the Promises made he saith not tâ—… Seeds as of many but as of one and to thy Seeâ—… which is Christ. Now unless we will find out â—… Quintum Evangelium that has nothing of Chriâ—… in it Abraham had Christ for he had the Gospâ—… Preacht to him and I do not understand what Gospâ—… signifies without Christ. Our Author I me sure of all the Men under Heaven has Reason to alloâ—… it for he would have Christ signifie Gospel anâ—… therefore cannot blame us who would have Gospâ—… to include Christ because we are loth his Persoâ—… should be quite shut out of it And again Thâ—… Promises were made to Abraham And is it not strange that Promises should be made to him and he not understand one word of them What waâ—… the Foundation of Abraham's was the Foundation of the Iewish Religion Nothing at all in their Service or Worship could plead for Acceptation bâ—… as it came under the Influence of those Types which were of no value in themselves but upon the Account of Christ. In Levit. 6. 1 2 3 4. If â—… Soul sin and commit a Trespass against the Lord c. I cannot but give the Reader a Breviate of some Remarkables in this Scripture 1. That the Sins here mention'd were not ceremonial Pollutions legal Defilements but such Wickednesses as were discoverable by the Light and condemned by the Law of Nature Lying Cozening False-swearing Unfaithfulness in Trust c. 2. That these sins did bring a proper Guilt upon the Conscience as being committed against the Lord and therefore the Sinner was guilty before God that is Obnoxious and liable to his Displeasure and bound over in conscience to answer it at Gods Tribunal ver 1. If a Soul sin and commit a Trespass against the Lord ver 4. Then it shall be because he hath sinned and is guilty 3. That for that part of his Fact which was Injurious to his Neighbour that which he violently took away or the thing he hath deceitfully gotten or that which was delivered him to keep or the lost thing which he found he was to restore the principal in Specie and to add a fifth part more because of the Damnum emergens 4. That notwithstanding he had thus compounded with man he must bring his Trespass-offering to the Lord a Ram without blemish ver 6. 5. The Priest was to receive the Trespass-offering at his hand and offer it up to the Lord. 6. The design of this Offering was Attonement procuring Favour from God 7. Here 's a Promise of the full Pardon of sin annexed unto this Sacrifice ver 7. It shall be forgiven him for any thing of all that he hath done in Trespassing therein Now upon the whole Matter we observe here was Pardon of sin annext to a Sacrifice and yet their Reasons could tell them as Paul has told us Heb. 10. 4. It 's not possible that the blood of Bulls and Goats should take away sin And I think we may venture to say the same of the blood of Rams too How shall these then be Reconciled I know no other way but by owning the Respect which they bore to the Lord Iesus Christ who was from the Foundation of and all along the World the only Lamb slain of value for these ends in Gods Account Thirdly The Christian Religion is founded on the Incarnation Death and Resurrection of the Son of God Our Author had founded his own and the Christian Religion on the Sacrifice and Intercession of Christ p. 15. But perhaps fearing or finding the Foundation too narrow has here widened it at the bottome and taken in the Incarnation of Jesus Christ. But I hope now the Storm will blow over and the Indignation conceived against those Persons who Love Honour and admire Christs Person a little Slake for if their Religion the Acceptation of their Persons and Services be built upon Him as Sacrificed for them on the Cross and Interceding for them on the Throne they do judge it their duty to love him against the World Nay what will you say if our Author himself should become a Convert his own Hope and that 's his All he says is Built on the Sacrifice and Intercession of Christ And can you imagine but he should Admire and Adore his Person And then may there not arise a danger that he should set up a Religion of Christs Person However that goes This I know it was Christs blessed Person that endured the Shock and abode the Storm of that Displeasure which was due to our sin and no Reason can be assigned why a Person should endure all the Sorrow and not have
also the Love Honour and Admiration of them for whom he endured it And if some few Holy men be a little Transported with the Love of Christ methinks it 's easily pardonable very few die of that Disease no danger this Age should be Hot in the fourth Degree of Love to a Redeemer that our Author should be necessitated to Write a Book for fear it should Poyson us For my part I meet with no such Paroxisms of Divine Love that his Iulip should be so much cry'd up but I would fain please my self with this that whilst he seems Frigidam suffundere his Real Design is to make us all more in Love with Christ by a Spiritual Antiperistasis 2. This gives great Reverence and Authority to his Gospel that it was Preacht by so Great a Person as the Son of God And therefore whilst he is in the good Humour let him Retract those Severe and Toothed Satyrs wherewith he has Torn and Lasht those poor Honest Men for loving his Person but Neglecting his Laws when he tells us here The greater Reverence we have for his Person the more sacred Regard we have for his Laws Perhaps he was then under an Accession of Gout Stone or Cholick or some of the peevish Distempers which made him so Testy and Teachy with his best Friends but now he 's a little come home to himself he 's in as Sweet Treatable and Debonaire a Humour as one could wish if it would but last I confess some may think that All this is nothing but a Complement which he passes upon Christ's Person or a little Holy-water he sprinkles in his Face and that there Lurks a Snake under these fair Flowers For he plainly makes Laws and Gospel Edaequate and Commensurate Terms This gives Reverence to the Gospel for Laws always partake of the Fate and condition of the Law-giver The Gospel as Contradistinguisht to the Covenant of Works denotes the glad Tidings of Salvation by a Mediatour or the joyful News that there was Forgiveness with God that He might be feared As contradistinguisht to the Old Testament-state it is the glad Tidings of the Son of God sent into the World that taking upon him our Nature he might therein become a Curse for us and by his perfect Obedience to the Law might Purchase and Procure Eternal Life And are Christs Laws and His Gospel become Convertible Is there no Revelation No Promise Nothing done for us which cannot come under the Nature of a Law The Laws of Christ then are Holy and Just and Good that the Greatness of his Person Consiliates Reverence and due Regard to them we acknowledge that Law and Gospel are words of equal Extent we deny and do think our Author will be harder put to it to prove Christ to signifie Law than to signifie Gospel Much less are we satisfied in his Comparison Numa pretended he received his Laws from the Goddess Aegeria to procure a greater Veneration to them Thus God c. Say you so Did God procure Veneration for his Laws with such a cunning Trick a Pia fraus as Politick Numa did Or is Christ grown an Instrument of Government as he tells us hereafter Gods Justice is Well I hope he Meant honestly or else it will be somewhat hard to be tied to Mean just as he Means 3. The Greatness of his Person gives great Authority to his Example for he came to be our Prophet and our Guide to Teach us by his Precepts and his Life Believe it this is something like The World is well amended since pag. 5. For then Preaching the Gospel was the Exercise of his Regal Power And now here he has brought it into Decorum again and at present is under a Pang of Modern Orthodoxy But his Example gives us an Evident Demonstration wherein the Perfection of Humane Nature consists for he lived up to the Perfection of Humane Nature and the only way to be Perfect is to Live as he Lived Why then I doubt we must never be in any sence Perfect all the days of our Lives for in the very next Page he proves That Christs becoming Poor though he was Rich a Servant though he was Lord of Life are such Expressions of Love as we can never fully Imitate and so Adieu to all Perfection to the Worlds end It was indeed Prudently done to Imitate the Wisdome of Nature to Plant his Antidote so near his Poyson that if he scatter'd Infection in one Page to fortifie our feeble Spirits against the Impressions of it in another A little Observation will Dismiss this Period And 1. One would think that to live as Christ lived was not so much the way to Perfection as Perfection it self Your dull Syntagmatical Divines use to distinguish between the Means and the End or the way to the Wood and the Wood it self but great Spirits are above Pedantick Laws and therefore to please all Parties for once let the way to be Perfect be to be Perfect 2. I observe that the Scripture owns some to be Perfect who never lived all out nay nothing near so well as Christ lived 1 Chron. 15. 17. The heart of Asa was perfect all his days and yet we read that In his Disease he sought not to the Lord but to the Physitian he took not away the High places he was wroth with the Prophet Hanani and put him in Prison and yet perhaps our Author can Evade That notwithstanding this he might come up to his Pattern for Christ himself once or twice put on the Person of a Iewish Zealot There was then a time when a man might have been perfect and yet not Live up to the absolute Perfection of Christ but I perceive it s lost and is to be numbered amongst the Resperditae of Pancirol To conclude How far Christ is to be Imitated is a Question of greater Difficulty than at first sight may be Imagined Some Works he performed as God others as Mediatour and others as a Man Those which he performed as God the Miraculous Operations of the Deity none need be disswaded from Imitation of for no stronger a Reason than because 't is Impossible To Raise the Dead cast out Devils Cure Diseases with a Word or Touch are Matter of our Admiration not Imitation I know indeed some of our Modern Schoolmen will tell us That though we cannot Imitate Christ herein to the height yet we may imitate him as far as we can Thus though Raising the Dead be a little too Many for you yet you may come to the Grave of your dead Friend command him to come forth but if he be Sullen and will not stir hand nor foot let him take his Course and lie there still like his Grace in cold Clay clad You have done your Duty and may satisfie your Conscience that you have Imitated Christ as far as you can by as Useful a Figure as any is in Rhethorick called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Works which Christ performed as Mediatour though
Sacrifices and operose services arising from the beggarliness and poverty of all Types fully to represent the Messiah in whom they did more abundantly meet yet herein might they as in a Glass eye a Redeemer and in him God appeased sin pardoned and their Persons justified and accepted The satisfactory Reason whereof lay onely in him who was the Lamb slain from the foundation of the World in Gods Acceptation and representation to the Faith of Believers Now whilest God did thus Train up the Jewish Church in the hopes and expectation of a Deliverer he offered also to others of the World though forfeiting Gods especial Notice by the general revolt and common Apostacy a joynt Interest in those priviledges stated and settled upon the Iudaical Church as her Dowry provided they would come under the bond of the Covenant and joyn themselves to the people of God and thereby attend the great Ends and reach of Divine Grace to save sinners by the Intervention of the seed of the Woman And further to leave some standing hints upon Record that in due time he intended to throw open the bedge and let the Gentiles into the Priviledges of the Iews who seem'd the Monopolizers of all true Religion and Worship it has graciously pleas'd the same God to reveal to some few others out of the Purlieus of that Body as to Iob the Doctrine of a Redeemer as early pledges to the World that those favours should not alwayes lye under Sequestration How miraculously God preserved this Church and State is needless to insist on but remarkable was his Care over Iudah that though she had justifi'd her sister Samaria and out-done those in sin whom she had out-gone in Mercy yet when the ten Tribes were hurried away into Captivity God remembred that ancient Promise that Scepter and Law-giver were not to depart from Iudah till he that should come was come and therefore notwithstanding as heynous provocations all Circumstances considered and proportionable dangers as ever yet exposed a people to utter ruine still Iudah lived And though the Holy God in Vindication of his wronged Honour before the world was concern'd to visit their Iniquities with a Seventy years Captivity in Babylon yet still he kept a fixed Eye upon the Tribe of Iudah and especially the Family of David to which e're this the producing of the Messiah had been entaiâ—…ed And it was not for Nothing that after their Return they were so precise and punctual in their Genealogies that there might no scruple arise in after-times when Christ should come but that he was of the Stock of Abraham of the Tribe of Iudah of the seed of David according to the flesh In contemplation of which stupendious design the wisdom of its management his Arm made bare to second and back the work how the Great God preserved the Iewish Polity from utter dissolution till it had done its work and teem'd the Messiah into the World and when that was done how all things conspired for its dissolution how the greatest Convulsions and Earthquakes which would have unhinged other Kingdoms and have thrown them from their Consistency yet made that Common-wealth take deeper root whilest God would serve himself thereof and when he had no more service for that Tribe how it was scatter'd How Providence marvellously secured the Vessel in the midst of those waves which the Malice of Hell endeavoured to lift up as high as Heaven wherein the Salvation of the World was embarqued and when it had once safely landed a Saviour in the habitable parts of the Earth where his delights had been how the Ship sprung a leak and sunk of it self These things make me with the Divine Herbert pause and say How dear to me O God thy Councels are Who may with thee compare But our Authors lips doe not like these Lettuces Two things he industriously sweats at in this Section First To shew us Wherein Happiness consists and then to inform us in the Way and Means to reach that Happiness A glorious Undertaking indeed wherein though he should founder yet an Attempt has its praise and may at least plead for Phaëtons Epitaph Quem si non tenuit Magnis tamen excidit Ausis It was Austins Censure of the Platonists Patriam viderunt Viam ignorârunt They were convinc'd that true Happiness must needs consist in enjoying the True God The chiefest Good 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A Being Self-being Essential being but they were wretchedly bewildred in finding out the way to the enjoyment of him and for all their skill could never double the Cape of good Hope Where Plato ended our Author begins Ubi desinit Philosophus incipit Theologus and wherein he fail'd he undertakes to write his Supplement 1 Then though there be less need of that would you know wherein true happiness consists you are answer'd In the Knowledge and Love of God who is the greatest and best Being If he means the utmost happiness Mans Nature is capable of it wants a word or two This Knowledge must be a perfect Knowledge and this Love a perfect Love and to this Knowledge and Love of Man to God you must adde the Sense of Gods Love to and delight in Man and Mans reciprocal satisfaction and complacency in God as his Portion It 's a tedious Question bandyed amongst the School-men wherein the Formale of Blessedness lyes some contend for the Vision others for the Love of God but he seems to me to have determin'd best who has joyn'd both Faelicitas hominis consistit quidem in Visione sed Charitativâ in Amore sed Oculatissimo The Happiness of Man consists in the most Loving Sight and in the most Seeing Love of God but the Controversie will not lye here 2 For the Means of Reaching this Happiness he assigns this God hath made known himself and will to the World Our Author is now obliging Posterity with a Discovery of the North-east Passage to China and the Indies the old way round about Africa is tedious and dangerous and therefore let him not want the Trade-wind of your Prayers that he meet not with Sir Hugh Willoughbies Fate whilest he attempts to make out a shorter Cutt. Now concerning this you must understand That God who is never wanting to his own Glory and the Happiness of his Creatures hath taken care in all Ages by one Means or other to make known himself and his Will to the World Our Author presumes he has penn'd this Discourse with much Artifice and laid a train of fallacies for us which if not timely discovered and prevented will irrecoverably blow us and our Cause up into the Aire in the next Section But indeed the best part of his Policy is the confounding of things and involving them in such Intricacies and Perplexities that it 's much harder to discover his Errors than to confute them being once discovered like what Physicians tell us of the Hectick Fever that in its first Rise it 's hardly discerned but otherwise
that God can be just in destroying without the least Impeachment of his Mercy and Goodness since Mercy it self is not obliged to plead for the Sinner without respect had to the other Properties of that God who is Essentially what he is But has our Author never a Stone to throw at the head of this Truth Two things he offers most lamentable Ignorance and horrid Blasphemy 1 Here 's most wretched Ignorance A happy Change sayes he this from all Iustice to all Love No Sir don't trouble your self here 's no Change at all happy or unhappy God is the same holy just righteous gracious and loving God that ever he was onely sayes the Doctor he 's otherwise discovered Justice and Mercy are not contrary things in God he can be all Love and Mercy and yet punish the Sinner that cannot plead the Death of Christ for his Discharge and he can be all Iustice too and yet pardon the believing repenting Sinner through Jesus Christ The Change is not made in God with whom is no variableness nor shadow of turning but the Change is made in the State and Condition of the Creature who once standing upon his own bottom and so considered by a holy and righteous God was the Object of just displeasure but now being found in Christ and so eyed by God is in another Capacity and meet to enjoy the benefit of that Grace and Love to which before such Qualification he had no right and whereof he was utterly incapable 2 I wish Ignorance had been the worst that might be charg'd upon his Discourse for certainly here 's a vein of the most unparallel'd Blasphemous Drollery that ever faced the World with an Imprimatur except Friendly Debates Ecclesiastical Policies and some few others of the same Kidney And first he will represent the Holy God in his taking Vengeance or requiring Satisfaction like an angry passionate Man and the Grace of God upon the Account of Christ's Death and Sufferings to the Kindness of a revengefull Man when he has glutted himself with Revenge and his Passion is over I think it might become our Author or the proudest Worm on Earth to have spoken more reverently of the way of Gods dealing with repenting Sinners through our Lord Jesus Christ That discomposure and perturbation of Mind to which frail man is obnoxious falls not upon the great God he can turn the wicked into Hell and all those that forget God without Passion Fury is not in me saith God Isa. 27. 4. An earthly Judge in his private Capacity may weep when he pronounces Sentence of Death against a Malefactor and yet remember that he is a Iudge and cut off from the City of God the wicked of the Land Nihil minùs quam irasci punientem decet Nothing is more uncomely in him that punisheth than Passion And though we read of Gods Anger Wrath and Fury yet it becomes us to conceive of God according to his Dignity even when he represents himself to our Capacity Though God humble himself we have no warrant to abase him whatever things are attributed to God which are common to Men it 's our Duty to garble out all the Imperfections and Frailties that those Qualities are mixed and attended with in Men before we ascribe them to God But this is not the worst he will strain his impious Drollery a few Notes higher The summe of which is that God is all Love and Patience when he has taken his fill of Revenge as others use to say the Devil is good when he is pleased This is indeed the summe of all our Authors blasphemous Froth but neither the total summe nor any particular of what the Doctor has ever asserted The summe of the Doctors words is this That God is the righteous Iudge of all the Earth and that it 's a righteous thing with him to render to every Man according to his Works and yet he has pleased to admit of Satisfaction to be made by his Son Iesus Christ who most willingly offer'd himself a Propitiatory Sacrifice to God In which Son of his whoever shall believe God is ready to pardon and forgive him And now must the plain Truth of the Gospel be thus muffled up and disguised in ugly Expressions to render it lyable to scorn and contempt Thus have the Papists array'd the Martyrs of Jesus in the Sambenit or Devils-Coat first shewing them as Hereticks and then sacrificing them to the flames I see he has furnish'd himself with a Creep-hole It 's not as he but as others say Sed malè dum recitas incipit esse tuus As 't is applyed it 's his own and yet it hits not neither For the Devil is never so pleased as to become Good nor God ever so displeased as to become Evil Nay the Devil is then worst when he is pleas'd for the greatest evil pleaseth him best and God is gloriously excellent when he is displeased for the greatest Evil is the Cause of his displeasure But let this pass for an Ornament of our Authors style which is indeed embellished with Figures but none more beautifies it than this which we may well call a Satanismus He has not yet done he has not loaded the Truth with Reproach to his mind and therefore one id est will doe it That is he would not believe God himself should he make never so many Promises of being good and gracious to Sinners unless he were sure he had first satisfi'd his Revenge But let him not be angry We believe every Promise that God has made of being gracious to Sinners but we say we cannot find one such without Provision first made for the securing Gods Righteousness Shew us a Promise that is Yea and Amen and not in Christ. Produce that Promise wherein God is engaged to justifie a Sinner and not be just himself quote us the place from whence we may flatter our selves that God will destroy any of his Attributes to save a Sinner However therefore our Author has represented God he has thus represented himself 1. That he is a Holy God A God of purer eyes than to behold evil and that he cannot which is the Word so displeases the Man look on iniquity he cannot but see it wherever it is as he is omniscient and yet he cannot see it cannot look on it wherever it is without Abhorrency He is a holy God and from his Natural and Essential Holiness does it arise that he cannot behold sin with Approbation and therefore must and will punish it Thus has he represented himself Psal. 5. 4 5 6. Thou art not a God that hath pleasure in wickedness neither shall evil dwell with thee The foolish shall not stand in thy sight thou hatest all the workers of Iniquity 2. God further testifies of himself that he is the righteous Iudge of all the Earth Governing and Judging the World according to his own holy Nature and the Rules of his holy Law and not according to our Authors good
despised As that they argue from Fancies and Imaginations from some pretty Allusions Similitudes and Allegories which have no certain shape Yet I am well assured that no man was ever more firmly bounden and indebted to an Allegory than our Author unless I saw him clapt up for one upon Execution in the Kings-Bench pag. 6. He did but meet with the word Salem upon the Road and he presently spies the New Ierusalem coming down from Heaven in it pag. 161. He had heard that Eve was taken out of Adams side and he sets his Allegorical Machine awork and hales the Church taken out of Christs crucified Body Out on 't Though to Qualifie the Matter he says it was but with a Quasi as it were or if he might so say but by and by he grows more flesht with Success and Peremptorily concludes That the Church is taken out of the crucified Body of Christ which says he in the Mystical sence answers to the Womans being taken out of the Man and from this pretty Allusion grounds his Interpretation of Ephes. 5. 30. 1 Col. 21. 22. Although the state of Innocency had no proper instituted Types however the passages of Gods Providence therein may be accommodated by the Penmen of the Holy Scriptures Infallibly inspired to Illustrate Evangelical Verities But let a taste of these things stay the Readers Stomach a while and if his Mouth waters at such Theology he shall have his Belly full even to Surfeit of such Luscious Allegories in due time Thus much to his first Argument taken from the uncertainty of this way of arguing 2. His second Reason follows drawn also from the uncertainty of this way of arguing For thus his Argument runs This way of reasoning will serve any mans turn Which is nothing but the uncertainty of it and had not our Author who alway argues as occasion serves from the Essential differences of things told us it was another reason it might have Militated under the colours of the former But he puts in a Caveat against all the World but himself and his Brethren For though it will serve any mans turn yet you must always Interpret it with this restriction who have any Quickness and Vigour of Fancy which clearly cuts out all the rest of Mankind as shall appear from the Fag end of this Section What remains of this Discourse is laid out upon the Equipping of another Scheme of Religion from an acquaintance with Christs Person Where in the Quickness and Vigour of his Fancy doe Triumph The World shall now see I that they shall what other-guise work our Author can make on 't when he comes to the Trimming of this Matter than those clumzy Fellows ever could who have attempted that way and shall see that Scanderbags Sword and Arm together can work Wonders It 's ordinary to find the Physitians Trencher loaden with that Meat which he Prohibits his Patient upon pain of Death If any else had presum'd to have finger'd this Theme he had got a rap o th' Knuckles and yet here we find our Author up to the Elbows in 't Great Spirits know how to give Laws to others and yet themselves to Live above them I have openly owned it that this Section is unanswerable and that my Reader may not Censure me for a Dictator I am Obliged to give him an Account of the Impregnableness of it The Scheme which he here presents us withal is not supposed to be his own Iudgment but meerly an Imitation of other Mens way though the Copy out-doe the Original If therefore any one shall Essay to Answer it he comes over you I did but play the Fool because I supposed others had done so and I was willing to let you see I could do it as neatly as another To meddle therefore with the substrate Matter and main Doctrine thereof would be lost Labour to Examine whether it be stufft with Orthodox or Heterodox propositions shall be all one to me but one thing I confess I am tempted to search into because he Boasts so highly of his Skill in it how easie it is to present us with many more Schemes with fair Colours Exact and regular Proportions and artificial Connexions viz. Whether there be that regular proportion betwixt his Confidence and his Performance whether he has put such fair Colours upon things but that the Morphew of the skin shines through the Ceruss whether his Matters be Linckt together with such artificial connexions Or whether the Sun in the Firmament and as the Battoon in the Chimney coâ—…ner do not as well shake hands that is whether the Wind-Mill be not alive for all Don Quixot 1. He tells us Since we see Christ come in the Nature and Likeness of a Man nothing dreadful in his Countenance having all the sweetness of Innocency his Miracles Great and Glorious but not Frightful and Astonishing his Almighty Power displai'd in Methods of Love and Kindness healing the Sick dispossessing Devils c. From all this we may safely Conclude He came upon an Embassy of Peace to assure the World of Gods good Will to them and to Reconcile the Differences betwixt God and Man Now for my own part my Eyes are not a whit Dazled with the fairness of his colours nor my Thoughts much ravisht with the exactness of the Symmetry of this Piece For 1. It 's very Disproportionable to his main assertion How unsafe and dangerous it is to found Religion upon an acquaintance with Christs Person Whereas in this Period he assures us We may safely conclude thence that Christ was an Ambassador of Peace that he came to reconcile the Differences betwixt God and Man Which I promise you makes a shrewd Hole in Religion 2. It bears no better proportion to its self for I hope the Reader has not forgotten how he is Erecting a Scheme of Religion from an acquaintance with Christs Person not taking in Gospel Revelation Now here he supposes Christ to have been the Eternal Son of God leaving his Fathers Throne coming into the World which he could never have concluded from his Person had he seen him in the flesh unless the Mystery of it had been revealed to him from above Math. 16. 16 17. Thou art Christ the Son of the Living God Blessed art thou Simon Bar-Iona for flesh and blood hath not revealed it to thee but my Father which is in Heaven 3. He pretends to gather Christs design in coming into the World from his Person Miracles Behaviour and sweet demeanoâ—… towards men yet here we want Proportion if we may believe himself pag. 76. Had we seen Christ in the flesh and been witnesses of the many Miracles he wrought of his Death upon the Cross and his Resurrection from the dead had he not acquainted us with the End and Design of all this we might have ghess'd our selves weary and never have hit upon the right But Now what a happy change is here we may safely Conclude now who could not sorrily Ghesse
his little Glosses Why they offend against his great standing Rule Interpreting things by the sound of words For says he what better proof can you desire for all this than Express words Really the Laws upon which we must be permitted to discourse with our Author are very severe for p. 78. he laid it down as a Law of the Medes and Persians that none must dare to Draw one Conclusion from the Person of Christ which his Gospel hath not expressely taught Well we accepted the Tearms and have brought him expresse and expressely express words and do speak as Volkelius commands us dilectis luculentissimisque verbis and yet we are never the nearer for now we offend in trusting to the sound of words Just thus did Procrustes entertain his Guests wracking out them that were too short and lopping off their feet that were too long for his Bed All men I perceive are awake to their Concerns in this Rule as well as our Vigilant Author When it is urged that Christ is called expressely God the True God He that was in the beginning by whom were all things made who upholds all things by the Word of his Power the Socinians have now a compendious Answer Ay this is to interpret Scripture by the sound of words And the Atheist has an inckling of it too he can subscribe all the Scriptures as True but when you urge him that God created all things out of Nothing that he is the Owner Governour Iudge of the whole World they are provided with a short Answer Yes this is interpreting Scripture by the sound of words And whether every Drunkard Swearer Adulterer all the Rakehells and Rakeshames upon Earth may not in time make their advantage of it I cannot tell That Ministers do but fright them with a sound of words Thus have some dealt with the Sacerdotal Office of Christ He is a Priest they confess he offer'd a Sacrifice was a Propitiation made an Atonement did expiate sin but have a care you do not interpret these things as the words sound he did indeed something like a Priest offer'd something like a Sacrifice but truely and properly he was nothing did nothing of All this It had been therefore more plain-heartedly and ingenuously done had our Author written a Confutation of the Scripture proving that the Spirit did not speak intelligibly but All in good time he has Materials ready for the work P. 100. The wildest and most extravagant Opinions that were ever yet vented under the Name of Religion have pretended the Authority of Scripture for their Patronage And yet he knew how first to break its head and then make it a Playster This famous Rule of our Authors may be applyed to all things under the Sun but there are two Principles onely that he will examine by it at present 1. The spiritual Impotency of all men without grace to perform that which is Acceptable to God This says he they prove wonderfully from our being dead in trespasses and sins and therefore as a Dead man can contribute nothing to his own Resurrection no more can we towards our Conversion I wonder when the Scripture will be able to speak so plain that deaf men will understand it One would have thought the Spirit of God should never have chosen that Expression of being Dead in trespasses and sins to signifie what mighty power and abilities the Creature has to Obey But we are instructed better from this usefull Caveat not to interpret Him by the sound of his words for now we must understand by Being dead Being Alive and proportionably by Sins and Trespasses we must understand Duty and Obedience and then to keep close to our Instructions and far enough from the sound of words To be Dead in Sins and Trespasses is to be Alive to all Duty and Obedience And thus that other vexing place Rom. 5. When we were without strength in due time Christ dyed for the ungodly must be Paraphrased When we were strong and Active and had no need of Christ he dyed for the godly And this I think if that be good for ought is very remote from grating our Ears with the unpleasant sound of words Ay but says our Author This is true of Natural Death but will be hard to prove of a Moral Death Hard to prove Methinks we want his wonted out-facing Confidence But why so hard to prove Has not the Spirit of God selected those words borrowed from the Condition of one Naturally dead to instruct us in the true Condition of one Morally dead It 's true of a Natural and therefore not of a Moral Death Nay it 's therefore true of a Moral Death because it is so of a Natural Death What wild Similitudes would he impose upon the Holy Scriptures Even as one that 's Naturally dead can contribute Nothing to his Resurrection just so one that 's Morally dead can contribute something to his Conversion This is the great Illustrator of dark Metaphors But wherein doth this Morall Death consist Oh says he In the prevalency of vicious habits contracted by long Custom which was the Case of the Heathens whom the Apostle there speaks of which do so enslave the Will that it 's very difficult though not impossible for such Persons to return to the love and practice of Vertue But who can tell whether by enslaving the Will which is a Luscious Metaphor our Author would not have us understand enfranchising the Will lest we should border too near upon a sound of words But I am not illuminated with our Authors Reasonings For 1 Moral Death doth not consist in the prevalency of vicious Habits it is the general Condition of all men born into the world who are privatively Dead in respect of that Life we all once had in the first Adam and Negatively Dead in respect of that Life which is attainable by the second Adam And in those dayes when men studyed not Aequivocations to subscribe every thing and believe Nothing it was not question'd in the Church of England Art 10. The Condition of Man since the Fall is such that he cannot Turn and prepare himself by his Own Natural Strength and good Works to Faith and calling upon God wherefore we have no power to doe good works pleasant and acceptable to God without his Grace preventing us that we may have a good Will and working with us when we have that Will. But 2 Supposing that this Moral Death did consist in the Prevalency of vicious Habits contracted by long Custom yet such may be the prevalency of them into such a slavery may the Will be brought that it may be not onely diâ—…ficult but impossible without the effectual assistance of the Spirit for the Sinner to return to God Ier. 13. 23. Can the Ethiopian change his skin or the Leopard his spots then may ye also doe good that are accustomed to doe evil Whence the Prophet shews that such is the prevalency of a vicious Habit contracted by long Custom
but the working of heated Fancy and Religious Distraction that to speak of Christs beauty loveliness fulness and preciousness are but Romantick Descriptions of him That is All is Fancy that comports not with his own extravagant Whimsâ—…y The Knowledge of Christ informs our Judgements affects our Hearts reforms our Lives and it will argue little love to our Redeemer if we entertain meaner thoughts of him by loud Clamour and impotent Reflections upon him 2. It moves their Passions and if we be a little passionately affected with the love of our Redeemer it 's a pardonable Errour When our Author would curry favour with his Reader and perswade him that for all his scandalous Expressions he was no Enemy to Christ he could say as much as that came to p. 184 185. This is a Sacrament wherein we celebrate the Love of our dying Lord and express our most passionate Love to him Here is Love passionate and most passionate Love and yet others Passions must not be moved for fear they set the Town on fire 3. They find great breakings of heart I would we experienc'd them more upon Condition we were ten times more reviled for them but I cannot well conceive how the Heart should be broken from sin that is not broken for sin and though this is grown so despicable a Matter in his eyes yet we have this Relief that a broken and contrite heart God will not despise 4. But they melt and dissolve into Tears when they remember what their Lord suffer'd for them They are content he should be called their Lord if others renounce him they are willing to own him It 's better to be reproached in this World that they have a Saviour than condemned in the next World because they have none and let it be their and all our Cares that Men may not hate us for professing Christ and God too because we do but profess him But is it so heynous a Crime to weep at the remembrance of what Christ suffer'd for us We pray that God would fulfill upon us that Promise Zech. 12. 10. That he would pour out his Spirit upon us that we may look upon him whom we have pierced and mourn over him and for him as one mourns for an onely Son and we say with Holy Herbert If thou hast no Sighs nor Tears Would thou hadst no Sins nor Fears Who hath These Those ill forbears But 5. They see him hang upon the Cross and have all his Agonies and dying groans in their ears Well if Faith represents to us a crucifyed Christ the Galatians were not called foolish upon that Account When we read that Christ was amazed and sore troubled that his Soul was exceeding sorrowfull even to death that it express'd from his Body clods of Blood all the Question is whether we ought to Read these things between sleeping and waking or get the most lively and powerfull Impressions of them upon our Souls The Primitive Church used to pray 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 libera nos Domine And the Present Church of England By thine Agony and bloody Sweat by thy Cross and Passion good Lord deliver us 6. They Curse their Sins that nayled him there The truth is they do not bless their Sins for crucifying Christ though he was a Person above our Authors scorn that used that Hyperbole Foelix Peccatum quod peperit Christum But sin has proved so dishonourable to our God so wounding to Christ so grievous to the Spirit so bitter to the Conscience that we would say the worst by it we can on this side Cursing And this we have good Authority for pag. 185. The Memory of what Christ has done and suffered excites in us a just Hatred of our sins So that were we but Masters of his Regular Proportions could we but find the just Measure of the Hatred of sin and Nick it exactly betwixt too much and too little hatred of sin we might escape the severity of his Censure Hitherto we have been taught That the just Measure of loving Christ is to love him without Measure and the just Measure of the Hatred of sin is to hate it without Measure but our Author good Man is very solicitous least we should over-love Christ or over-hate our iniquities 7. They tremble at the Thoughts of the Naturalness of Gods vindictive Iustice to him And if they doe consider God as one of purer eyes than to behold Iniquity if they do view his Holiness and in the sense of their own vileness cry out Woe is me for I am undone because I am a Man of unclean lips As good as they or he have trembled at 〈◊〉 sight of this Glorious Holy and Righteous Judge 8. But they feel all the Horrors and Agonies of damned Spirits I knew we should have a Rapper before we had done Is this the Fruit of Acquaintance with Christ I question not but a Cain a Iudas a Spira may have felt in this Life something of the horrours of the Damned The Apostle denounces some such dreadfull vengeance against Renegadoes from the Christian Faith Heb. 10. That there remains no more Sacrifice for sin but a certain fearfull looking for of Iudgement and fiery Indignation to devour the Adversaries v. 26 27. But these despairing horrours proceed not from an experimental Knowledge of Christ as our Author either ignorantly dreams or maliciously calumniates but from an Ignorance of him the true design of his Death in Reconciling God and Man This is one of their Extreams for at other times they are ravish'd with his Love charm'd and captivated with his Beauty refresht and ravisht with his Comforts c. It is easie to observe that our Author alwayes writes pro re natâ just as the present occasion invites him for he will tell you p. 396. That the Soul many times feels such great and Ravishing delights in all the Acts of Religion as infinitely excell all the pleasures of Sense they relish great Pleasure and Satisfaction in the sense of Gods Goodness P. 397. They must needs feel sometimes such divine Touches and Impressions as are the Effects if I may so speak of a mutual Love and Sympathy And had these men but the Happiness to have express'd themselves in his very words and Syllables they might have said either the worst or best of Religion they had pleased without Rebuke But all this he tells us may be no more than the working of a warm and Enthusiastick Fancy but then if it should prove the work of the Holy and Blessed Spirit which he ascribes to Fancy and Conceit how near it may come to the sin of those who ascribed that to Beelzebub which was effected by the Finger of God I must leave to his serious Consideration Enthusiasm is much reproached and little understood 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Enthusiasme is when the Mind is wholly enlightned by God In which sence I pray God make us all Enthusiasts And let the End of all that Ioy and Satisfaction that we have
fitted to return the Glory due to a Redeemer which an unhumbled unbelieving unconverted unsanctified Sinner could not possibly be 2 The Death of Christ devested of those its proper respects of a Sacrifice offered to God to atone and reconcile him a price paid to ransom and redeem us and a Punishment born to satisfie Divine Iustice was no infallible proof of the Doctrine which he preached For 1. Many have laid down their lives to Abett and endured extremity of Tortures rather than renege the Doctrine they have openly preached their Confidence the mean while supported either by a mistaken Conscience or perhaps some sinister respects All that it can prove in the largest judgment of Charity is That they suppose their Doctrine to be true or else would hardly lose their All rather than lose a Principle but not that therefore the Doctrine is true because the Preacher dies for it That which is false in it self will not become true by laying down our life for it In the Memory of the last Age there were some who sacrificed their lives to the Flames in defence of Contradictory Doctrines So that to say that the Death of Christ has no other use but To confirm the Truth of that Doctrine which he preacht is but a more modest civil and gentle way of saying it has no use at all 2. To whom should the Death of Christ confirm the Truth of his Doctrine to his Enemies or his Friends For his Enemies Many of his Sufferings the very greatest and sorest of his Sufferings were out of their notice either privately in the Garden or more privately in his Soul such as whereof they could take no cognizance and for these which were visible they looked on them as the just rewards of his violation of the Law As for his Friends his Death considered singly in it self without respect to its proper Ends was so far from confirming of their Faith or Belief of his Doctrine that it was that which shook their hopes and dasht their expectations out of countenance their Hearts died in his Death and those two expressed the Sense of more than their own diffidence Luk. 24. We trusted that it had been he that should have redeemed Israel But whether to Friends or Enemies the Death of Christ considered without his antecedent Miracles and subsequent Resurrection and concomitant Sacrifice was so improper a means to confirm that it had proved the clearest Confutation of his Doctrine that malice could have desired 3. The Death of Christ was so far from confirming this Doctrine That God would pardon Sinners that separate this one Consideration of it as satisfactory to Divine Iustice from his Death and it quite overthrows the credibility of the Doctrine and runs all the World down into utter despair For our Author must have a happy dexterity if he can conclude that because God dealt so severely with an innocent holy Person that therefore he will not fail to pardon repenting Sinners We must despair that ever repentance should make us personally equal with Christ If then God did these things in the green Tree what will be done in the Dry If Iudgment begun at God's own House where shall the Ungodly and Sinner appear He that spared not his own Son how much less will he spare the Sinner It could not be expected that any should believe Christ telling them God would pitty and pardon others who found him so severe to himself But that indeed the true Reason why God deals so graciously with the repenâ—…ing Sinner is because he had dealt so justly with his own Son voluntarily becoming his Surety and Substitute 4. There were proper proofs designed by God for the Confirmation of the Doctrine of Christ and no need at all to take sanctuary in that which nakedly considered was not so Those frequent clear stupendious Miracles wrought by Christ were fully adequate and commensurate to that End Reason will teach us to believe that God will not alter the course of Nature nor reverse its standing Laws to confirm a Lye to bear witness to a grand Imposture And surely they who would not believe Christ to be sent of God upon his Testimony to him in those Extraordinary Works would never believe it for his Death which was no wonder at all otherwise than as the fruit of his ineffable Love offering himself to God as a Sacrifice for Sin and so indeed it was the greatest Wonder of them all The Enemies of Christ triumpht in his Death that they had nailed his Cause with his Person to the Cross and that which they feared was his Resurrection A Miracle so far beyond all exception to confirm that he was sent of God and therefore his Doctrine must needs be true that their greatest care was to have prevented it by sealing the Stone and setting a Watch. 5. But supposing that the Death of Christ had confirmed his Doctrine and particularly this That God would pardon and save the Believing and Obedient Sinner Yet still what influence has this upon our Acceptance with God Will God accept our Obedience the more because we have greater helps to obey May our duty expect a greater Reward because we come easier by it But when all is said that our Author can say it 's our Obedience that hath the Influence upon our Acceptance with God and Christ's Death has only an Influence upon our Obedience The same Obedience given to the Commands of the Gospel without the motive of his Death had found equal if not greater Acceptance from him than when drawn from us by so cogent an Argument But if the Death of Christ may be said to have any influence upon our Acceptance with God because he thereby confirmed his Doctrine then the Death of the Martyrs also may be said to have an Influence upon our Acceptance with him for they by their Death 's confirmed the Truth which they preacht which Truth was the true Covenant of Grace And whereas many of them laid down their Lives with that Heroical Magnanimity with that gallantry of Spirit with more than that boasted Stoical valour kissing the Stake embracing the Flames triumphantly singing in the midst of their Torments professing they felt no more pain than in a Bed of Roses as if they were to ascend Heaven in that fiery Chariot to the Confutation of their Enemies the encouraging of their Friends and the credit of that Gospel they died for evidently assuring all that they were immediately supported from above to bear with patience nay with exultation those extremities which to Flesh and Blood were intolerable We see our Blessed Saviour on the contrary in his Sufferings strangely dejected amazed troubled in Soul earnestly begging that if it were possible that Cup might pass from him and crying out in the bitterness of his Soul That he was forsaken of God which consideration is enough to satisfy an impartial Enquirer That the Sufferings of Christ were fitted for some higher design than the confirming of
immediate Effects of the Covenant and not of the Blood of Christ What should move the Apostles always to speak improperly to affix Reconciliation Atonement Redemption c. to the Blood of Christ and never to our Obedience when yet we are neither properly reconciled properly redeemed nor God properly atoned by Christ's Blood but all these are the proper Effects of our Obedience And now one word to the Therefore And therefore says he All the Blessings of the Gospel are owing to the Blood of Christ because the Gospel-Covenant it self was procured and confirmed by the Blood of Christ A very learned Argument that is to say We owe the Blessings of the Gospel to that which is no true and proper cause of them The Blood of Christ is not the proper Cause of our Justification therefore we owe our Iustification to it His Blood is not the proper Cause of our Reconciliation and therefore we are indebted to his Blood for our Reconciliation All Effects are owing to their proper Causes whatsoever therefore is the proper Cause of our Iustification to that we are indebted for it But how naturally would this Conclusion follow from his Premise The Blood of Christ is not the proper Cause of Iustification Reconciliation and Redemption and therefore we do not owe our Justification Reconciliation and Redemption to the Blood of Christ Or thus We owe all the Blessings of the Gospel to the Blood of Christ and therefore the Blood of Christ is the proper Cause of those Blessings And now let the Reader observe how his Reason brought up in the Rear has routed his Reason that marched in the Van. The Blood of Christ is not the proper Cause of the Blessings of the Gospel there 's your Reason in the Front why we do not owe the Blessings of the Gospel to it And again The Gospel-Covenant was procured and confirmed by it There 's your Reason in the Rear why we do owe the Blessings of the Gospel to it But to do our Author justice I shall look over these things more severely The Gospel-Covenant it self says he was procured by the Blood of Christ. And does not this sound more honourably for the Blood of Christ than to say it only confirm'd a Covenant To procure if we might measure the import of the Word by its sound implies that the Blood of Christ had some Influence upon God that moved him to enter into such a Covenant with Mankind which without that Consideration he had never done but to confirm a Covenant that supposes there was such a Covenant in being only the Blood of Christ gave security to Men that it should be made good So that if we know when we are well we had best keep our selves so and sit down contented with this NewHonour and Efficiency ascribed to the Blood of Christ that it procured as well as confirmed the Gospel-Covenant lest whilst we labour to engross more than is due we lose what the Charity of our Author has given us But they who think they have right to All will hardly be perswaded to be put off with half and therefore I must a little further enquire into this new-start-up Notion of procuring the Covenant What this Gospel-Covenant is which our Author so frankly attributes to the Procurement of Christ's Blood he has told us p. 320. A Promise of the Pardon of Sin and Eternal Life to those who believe and obey the Gospel I confess a clear and distinct Notion of what he calls Gospel would very much befriend us in our Enquiry The best I can find and it 's but a half-faced one neither is p. 34. To preach Christ says he is to preach his Gospel that is to expound all those Rules of Life and Articles of Faith which are contained in it Whether this be Gospel or no I shall not enquire or whether this be the Covenant of the Gospel I shall not torment him with but this is that which Christ has procured for us with his Blood A Promise of Pardon and Life to those who believe and obey all that 's revealed and commanded either in the Scriptures or the New-Testament or the Four Evangelists or in one of Christ's Sermons I think that must be it Now I must here entreat the Reader to open his Eyes and see how he has been cheated all this while 1. It 's very well known he propounded a Question at first What Influence the Righteousness of Christ's Life and the Sacrifice of his Death have upon our Acceptance with God To this he answers separately concerning the Death of Christ and its Influence and will come all in good time to shew us What Influence the Righteousness of his Life hath upon God for that End Concerning the Influence of his Death he has been perswading us that it confirms the Covenant and now in the Close he has stollen-in a Word we never dreamt of that i procures this Covenant Now I suspect some fraud for what Influence has the Death of Christ upon God to procure us such a Govenant Had he shew'd us that he had deserved better of his Readers than by all this Amusing Sophistry 2. He has told us p. 42. That the Light of Nature the Works of Creation and Providence do assure us that God designs the Happiness of all his Creatures according to their Capacities and they are capable of being justified and saved And that God is so Holy that he has a Natural Love for all good Men and is as ready to pardon them when they return to their Duty as a kind Father is to receive a Humble and Penitent Prodigal And p. 43. Had Christ never appeared in the World yet we had reason to believe that God is thus good and merciful Now having such good security from the Light of Nature Reason being clear in the Point and the thing so natural and essential to God that he will pardon and is ready to it upon Repentance and Obedience though Christ had never appear'd what has the Death of Christ done to procure this Favour or more Favour from God We will grant that the Death of Christ has confirmed the Truth of it more but what has it added to the Procurement of the thing If it be said that Christ's Death did not procure a Willingness in God to Pardon but only a Confirmation of his Willingness I would ask what greater Confirmation a rational Creature could well desire than an Assurance from the Light of Nature that this was Natural and Essential to God And I would further know what the Procuring of a Confirmation amounts to more than a Confirmation 3. The Scripture has assured us Gen. 17. That God gave an explicite Promise to Abraham that he would be his God or a God to him that is that whatever Abraham should want and yet could not want but he must be eternally miserable that thing God would be to him For 't is an uncouth Interpretation of the Promises I will be thy God that
God might have held us close and tyed us up to the Terms of the Old Covenant and righteously have exacted of us a Personal compleat Obedience to every jot and tittle of the Law as the Condition of Justification but though he has not abated of his Law yet he has admitted a Surety called therefore the Surety of the Covenant not only because he has undertaken for God but for us also for a Mediator is not of one Gal. 3. 19. And our receiving this abundance of Grace is not the Receiving of inherent Grace into us but our accepting by Faith this New Gospel-Law or Constitution of God with the whole Man closing with this gracious way of Justifying a Believer by Christ. But here our Author unhappily crosses me the way with one of his id est's That is says he Those who by the Gospel of Christ which is called Grace the abundant Grace of God are made Holy and Righteous To which I say as I have sometimes said That the Gospel as he describes it is not the Grace of God but a real Doctrine of Justification by Works blanch'd a little to make it vendible 2. The Gospel as it is a Revelation of Grace is not the whole of the Grace of God the Gospel reveals more Grace to be in God in Christ in the Holy Spirit for us than the Revelation of it There is an Operation of Grace upon us a Constitution of Grace with us as well as a Revelation of Grace to us but this he will grant us That Righteousness is called a Gift so far good But is it really a gift or onely called so as Christs is called a Redeemer called a High-Priest called a Sacrifice I doubt this will prove nothing but Phraseology at last He answers 1. Negatively It 's called a gift because it is not owing solely to Humane Endeavours Not solely But then it may be almost and very near altogether owing to Humane Endeavours The Grace of God may come in for a share though a poor pitiful share as he would not exclude the Righteousness of Christ wholly totally from having any concernment in our Iustification so out of his generosity he will not shut out Grace wholly from interposing in our Sanctification Haerebit in aliquâ saltem parte Well commend me to the memory of honest I. G. who though a high trotting Arminian would allow Free-grace ninety nine parts in the Conversion of a sinner provided always and upon Condition nevertheless that Free-will might have one in a hundred But what a Company of Rigid Bigots are these Calvinists that will not abate one ace not forgo a single Unite in a Hundred but they pretend they have no Commission to compound between Free-grace and Free-will and that God will not put his Right to arbitration and indeed it were hazardous for what sad terms had our Author made for the Rich effectual Grace of God had the determination been put into his hands Righteousness is not owing solely to Humane endeavours Natural strength free-will humane ability shall have ninety nine parts in the Dividend and Grace that deserves all must be content with one single lot and perhaps a smaller pittance And now what if this will not denominate it a gift just so much as you add to these Humane Endeavours you substract from free-grace and whether that little that very little concern that grace has in this work shall denominate it a Gift or that much that very much which Humane Endeavours have in it No gift must stand to the Courtesie of the Criticks and great Masters of Language 2. Affirmatively It is wrought in us says he by supernatural means by those powerful arguments and motives and Divine assistances which God in infinite Love hath afforded the World by Iesus Christ. I cannot express the transport of my mind at the first sound of these words supernatural means powerful arguments Divine assistances I began to suspect our Author was turn'd Calvinist as he suspected Dr. Owen was turned Arminian and with equal Reason for I presently found my Errour The word Grace has a Considerable Name and carries a good repute in the Scriptures and therefore our Author will behave himself as decently towards it as he can afford But what is the meaning of these supernatural means Why to speak liquidly Means of Supernatural Revelation at best but of no supernatural Operation Some arguments suggested which the light of Nature could not discover and some institutions which depend meerly on the will and pleasure of God for his powerful arguments and Divine assistances they are such Motives as being given by God externally are left to the self-determining power of that great Idol Free will For when all is done 't is the man who Converts himself but this and a great deal more will not satisfie the claim of effectual Grace in the Conversion of a Soul to God Who by the same power whereby Christ was raised from the dead works Faith in the Soul Eph. 1. 19 20. Who works in us both to will and to do of his own good pleasure Phil. 2. 13. Who gives us the new Heart and causes us to walk in his Statutes Ezek. 36. 26. Who takes away the resistibility of the Soul the stony heart and Circumcises the Hearts of his People to Love the Lord their God with all their heart Deut. 30. 6. But with such Cantings did Pelagius cover his abominations talking of ineffable grace wonderful grace when all was but Revelation or Grace the Name suborned to destroy Free and effectual Grace the thing it self After all these windings and turnings our Author will give us a fair account How we may be said to bâ—… made Righteous by the Righteousness of Christ I hope it shall be an honest account as well as a fair one and then it 's welcome but whose hopes could have been so vain as to flatter him he should live to see an account and a fair account too given by our Author of such a Paradox But we attend Not that his Actual Obedience is reckoned as done by us which is impossible There 's the Negative And this seems to go a great way in the Account How we may be said to be made Righteous by anothers Righteousness Because it 's impossible we should be righteous by anothers righteousness But why is this so impossible There 's no more impossibility in it than that Adams Disobedience should be reckoned as mine which if it be not let men shift and evade with all their cunning they shall never be able to justifie Gods procedure with his Posterity in entailing evils many evils and Death it self upon them for Adams sake if they be not guilty of the Crime Suppose we had been in Adams place had committed his sin eaten the forbidden Fruit in his stead in our own Persons what had the penalty been in our Authors Judgment but evils a great many evils Death it self And what in the Apostles account but Iudgment unto Condemnation