use and by one he merited this and by the other that when though each part of his Condition or Duty had its proper reason yet it was only the entire performance that was the Condition of the Benefits and so of our Iustification and Salvation § 17. But I say before his Exaltation because the Benefits being of several sorts some of them were given upon Christ's merit presently and some upon Man's believing and some not till long after by application But to all these what Christ did only as under the Law of Mediation was properly his merit by which they were procured But his undertaking what he after did in gathering his Church and interceding and ruling may be numbered with the parts of his foresaid merit and still as a Creature he is under his Creator's Law even the Law of perfect uniting Love and so doth eminently merit § 18. It was neither the Covenant nor Will of the Father and Son that we should either have full possession deliverance or right thereto immediately upon Christ's Merit and Sacrifice as we should if we had done all by him as our Person But that we and all things being delivered to Christ's Power and Will he should convey the Benefits of his Death and Merits upon terms and in an Order suitable to the interest of his Wisdom Love Mercy and Justice even by a Law of Grace and a Ministry and Means adapted to the end and in the time and degrees which his Wisdom should make choice of Which accordingly is done This Covenant which giveth Right and Reward to Christ is not it that giveth any Right or Reward to us SECT III. Of the Law or Covenant of Grace in the first Edition § 1. AS God delivered the Law of Innocency partly by natural and real and partly by supernatural and verbal significations of his will so hath he done the Law of Grace which is the signification of his Will concerning Pardon and Life granted to guilty Sinners and the terms thereof § 2. The Promise Gen. 3. 15. The seed of the Woman shall break the Serpents head c. was a Breviate of the supernatural signification but it is not unlikely that God did more fully acquaint them with his Law of Grace and Redemption than those words alone could make us understand Because we find in their sacrificing some such intimation and in other signs § 3. God's actual Continuance of forfeited Life Liberty Health and other comforts and his actual Collation of many great Mercies by the course of Nature to such as by Sin have deserved present Damnation is a degree of signification of his pardoning will and mercy by these natural signs which they were not before sin and forfeiture § 4. Man being after guilt of death thus reprieved and enriched with manifold Mercies and his life and faculties continued with many instructing providential helps and means the very Law of Nature now obligeth him to love and thankfulness to God that sheweth him so great kindness § 5. And the same Law of Nature obligeth him to take that God still for a God of Love and Mercy and to believe that what Mercy he hath already shewed the World and us is on terms which he knoweth to be very well consistent with his Holiness Truth and Justice And it obligeth us therefore to seek to him for Mercy and to use all possible means for further hope and pardon and recovery and not to sit down in despair § 6. The common sence of all Mankind from Adam to this day acquainteth us by that experience That these Hopes and Duties are found in the Law of lapsed Nature For all the World that never heard the Gospel do yet take God to be a merciful forgiving God and take themselves to be under some duty for the obtaining of further mercy recovery and felicity § 7. Though want of the sense of Sin and its desert and Man's misery may be thought by some to be the only cause of this and so that it is but sinful presumption and no part of Nature's obligation yet this upon trial will prove false Though what they alledge be one part of the Cause For 1. These men do acknowledge themselves Sinners and to deserve punishment from God 2. They find some misery and fear more 3. It is not presumption to judge God to be merciful when they and all the World do find him so 4. It is not presumption to judge that he can and will pardon Sin when full Experience assureth us that he hath already pardoned much To remit the Sin is as we now speak of it to remit the deserved punishment And He that giveth Man forfeited life health time and all the abundant Mercies which the World is full of doth thereby so far actually forgive Sin Saith Christ Whether is it easier to say thy sins be forgiven thee or to say arise take up thy Bed and walk that is Executively to forgive them which is the full forgiveness by taking away the punishment 5. It is no presumption to believe such Duty to be incumbent on us as the remaining Law of Nature doth oblige us to 6. Nor yet to take God's own Encouragements to seek our own recovery and felicity § 8. The Light and Law of lapsed Nature doth convince men of the duty of repenting and returning to God and oblige them to it So that as Perfect Obedience was the duty of entire Nature so Repentance is the duty of laepsed Nature And I think few will say that all men are not hereby obliged to repent and that in hope of mercy § 9. Hence it is that it is found among the Communes notitiae and all the World as well as Christians acknowledge it and plead for it § 10. They that by God's Patience and Mercy are invited to Repentance which is a return from sin to God and are by Nature obliged to it ought to believe that it is not made their Duty in vain nor shall they lose by it if they perform it for that were to accuse God of making Mans Duty in vain or to his loss which is not to be suspected § 11. Therefore they are bound not to despair of Paâ—don and Salvation for an obligation to use means as tending to recovery is inconsistent with an obligation to despair Therefore hope of Mercy and use of some means Mankind is obliged to by the Law of lapsed Nature § 12. This is not the obligation of the Law or Covenant of Innocency for that Law bound us only as Innocent to keep our Innocency and perfectly therein obey But it giveth no pardon nor appointeth Man any Duty in order to pardon and recovery Whatever doth this is a Law of Grace § 13. The sum of that Duty which the Law of Nature now obligeth Man to is To consider of all the Mercies which God vouchsafeth Sinners and thankfully to improve them to repent of sin and turn to this God who sheweth himself a merciful â—aeâ—doniâ—g God To resign
Similitudes in our Thoughts of God while we exclude all the Imperfections of such Similitudes § 15. But after all till the Love of God be shed abroad on our Hearts by the Holy Ghost and God as LOVE look on us with his attracting and exhilarating Aspect or Communication all these notions will be dull and barren and will leave the Soul under fears and despondency It is Love by vital Influence warming the Affections that must give us a sweet taste of what we know and overcome the fear of Death and Wrath and give us comfortable Boldness and Courage in all the Dangers that we must go through And seeing Christ telleth Philip If thou hast seen or known me thou hast known the Father we must by Faith see the Father in the Son incarnate who came into our Nature to be a Mediator of our Thoughts and Conceptions of God and especially as he is LIFE and LIGHT and LOVE and I think in his GLORY will in Heaven be the Mediator of our LIFE INTUITION and FRUITION Come Lord Jesus Amen CHAP. 2. Of Trinity in Unity § 1. WHen I wrote the foregoing Treatise I found the generality of Christians Protestants and Papists agreed about the Trinity but Heresie and Debauchery encreasing together the Case seemeth partly altered And the ambitious rich and worldly sort being from their Childhood bred up in fleshly pleasure and in ignorance and contempt of serious Christianity having really no true Religion but a Name and Image of it at last by their Tongues declare what is in their Hearts and living in a Land where Atheists and Sadducees are in splendid Dwellings whilst fear of sinning maketh Confiscations Jails and Ruine the Lot of multitudes who are zealous Protestants they take the advantage decrying what they never had But before they disown all true Religion and declare themselves Sadducees or Brutes they begin as Disputers at the points where they think Difficulty will excuse them and especially at the Trinity and the Godhead of Christ and Socinian Errors § 2. I have perhaps over-tediously and prolixly handled the Doctrine of the sacred Trinity in my Latin Methodus Theologiae opening the various Opinions about it reciting the words of the Fathers School-Doctors and Protestants who handle it And through the whole Book I have shewed That the Image of Trinity in Unity is imprinted by God on the whole known frame of Nature and Government or Morality and that Doctrine of the Trinity which to the ignorant is a Stumbling-block greatly helpeth to confirm my Belief of the truth of the Gospel and Christianity while I find it so congruous to the foresaid Impress and attested so much by all God's Works especially on Man § 3. It is a truth unquestionable that without some knowledge of God there can be no true Religion no Love to God no Trust no Hope no Obedience no true Worship of him Prayer or Praise § 4. And it is as certain that no man can have an adequate knowledge of God that is adequate which comprehendeth the whole Object knowing it perfectly and leaving nothing of it unknown And with such an adequate Knowledge we know nothing not a pile of Grass nor a Worm or a Hair Much less God With such a proper Knowledge nihil scitur is true and yet aliquid rerum is known of all § 5. Yea it is certain that of God who is incomprehensible we have here no partial Conception that reacheth so high as to be strictly FORMAL but only such as are called analogical aequivocal metaphorical or by similitude Neither Substantia Vita Perfectio Potentia Actus Intellectus Voluntas Love Truth Goodness Mercy c. are formally and univocally the same in God and in the Creature Scotus excepteth only ENS Which is true as ENS is only a Logical term signifying no more than EST or Quoddity and not QUID est or Quiddity § 6. Yet this Knowledge by similitude is not â—ull or vain but the greatest advancement of Man's Understanding All that which is formally excellent in the Creature is EMINENTLY and transcendently in God Though he have not that which we call Knowledge Will Love c. he hath that which is infinitely more excellent which these in Man have some likeness to whereby we know him § 7. Man's Knowledge beginneth at our selves and not at God We do not first know God But first we perceive our own Souls Acts and thereby we know our Power and our Substance and thereby we know what all is that is such as we and so what a Spirit is and so what GOD is As by seeing hearing feeling we perceive that we see hear feel c. every Sense having essentially a self-perception So by thinking knowing willing â—illing loving joying we perceive that we do it essentially yet though the famosius significatum be our own Act as to formality and priority it is God's as to Eminency and Perfection § 8. It is certain that as all God's Works bear some notifying Impress of his own Perfection so Man is especially made in his Image and therefore our Knowledge of God must there begin seeing we have no immediate and formal knowledge of him § 9. As God is the God of Nature Grace and Glory so he hath made on Man the Image of these three 1. The natural Faculties of his Soul are his natural Image on Man as Man For which it is said Gen. 9. that blood shall be punished with blood because Man is made in the Image of God 2. His moral gracious Image is Holiness of Intellect Will and executive Power 3. The Image of his Majesty Glory and Greatness is 1. in all men the Dominion over the lower Creatures 2. And in Governours a Power over Subjects or Inferiours § 10. To begin where our Perception beginneth 1. It is certain that the mental Nature in Man hath three distinct Faculties in one undivided Substance That is 1. Vital Active Power Intellect and Will The Vital Power being considerable first as exciting Intellection and Will and after as Executive The same Essence or Substance is this vital Activity Intellect and Will But the Active Power is not the Intellect nor the Intellect the Will nor the Will the Intellect c. And as Melanchton told his Hearers to the admiration of George Prince of Anhalt and the Duke of Saxony That the Concrete and Abstract were here differently to be used we may say that the Intellect may be said to be willing but not to be the Will the Will to be Intellectual but not to be the Intellect c. § 11. I have fully proved in Methodo Theol. parte 1. in a peculiar Disputation that these three Faculties are not Accidents of the Soul but its essential form in a triple inadequate Conception and fully confuted all that Zubarel saith to the contrary who epitomizeth all the Thomists Arguments and vindicated Scotus and added many Arguments of my own and therefore must thither referr the doubtful § 12. Not
per se and independant for so none is good but God only And all this is the Effect of Grace § 45. 2. But saith Ian senius there is some grace which is not gratiâ— Christi the grace of Christ and such is all that cometh from meer fear without Love which is a kind of providential preparatory grace but not the grace of Christ. Ans. It is not that eminent and special grace of Christ But to think that it befalleth men without Christ's procurement and is not a commoner sort of Christ's grace when all Power in Heaven and Earth is put into his Hand and he is made Head over all things to the Church is below a Christian Divine to imagine and too injurious to Christ. But by all this it appeareth that even Iansenius differeth from others more about the Names of Good and Christ's Graces than about the Matter CHAP. XIV Of Mans Power and Free-will since the Fall § 1. SO much is said Chap. 9. of Mans natural Power and Free-will and so much now Chap. 13. of grace and the Power given by it as may allow me to be short in what is here to be added § 2. All that natural Power and Liberty which was essential to the Will remaineth in it since the Fall For Man is of the same Species § 3. The Will is still a self-determining Principle supposing 1. God's necessary Influx as he is the first Cause of Nature 2. And the Being and convenient Position of Objects 3. And the Perception of the Intellect 4. And the concourse of necessary concomitant second Causes § 4. The three Faculties of mans Soul are all vitiated by sin 1. The vital active Power is so far dead to God and Holiness as to need the cure of quickening and strengthening and exciting Grace 2. The Intellect is so far blinded as to need the cure of illuminating grace 3. And the Will is so far turned by Enmity from God to the inordinate Love of carnal self-interest and Creatures as to need the cure of converting sanctifying Grace § 5. Grace healeth the Will of this Enmity and vitious perverseness so far as it prevaileth which is 1. common Grace enableth it to common good and prepareth it for better 2. Special Grace causeth it actually and habitually to will and love special Good that is God as God and the Creature for God and Holiness as his Image 3. Perfecter Grace bringeth up the Will to perfecter holy Acts and Habits § 6. Nature it self is not in lapsed man divested of all moral or Divine Principles Abilities and Inclinations In the Intellect there are commen Notices of a Deity that is That there is one God who is infinitely powerful wise and good And in the Will there are some Inclinations still to good as good and therefore to God as far as he is truly conceived of as good and so far as that conception is not conquered by a cross Conception of some Enmity And so of other Good § 7. Nature and common Grace may cause a man to go as far in Love and Religion as those whom we call the highest Hypocrites or almost-Christians may do which our practical Preachers do frequently tell the People at large in Books and Sermons § 8. Such may have a common sort of Faith in Christ even formerly to the working of Miracles and of Repentance and Reformation and of good Desires and love to goodness and good Men yea to God himself § 9. For men are not so corrupt by Nature much less under the Effects of common grace as to hate all goodness or to hate all that is in God They may love God as he is the Almighty Creator Preserver and Natural-Orderer of the World and the Cause of its Being Motion Beauty Harmony and all natural Good And they may love him as he is the Giver of life and all natural Blessings to themselves and as he is the Preserver of them and their only Security and Help in Danger and not only as his Blessings gratifie their Senses but as all their Hope of everlasting Happiness is in his Power and Love They may love him as he doth this good to others also and is the common Benefactor to the World without whom it could not subsist a moment And they may love him as he maketh such Laws as preserve their lives and Properties and Rights from Fraud and Violence and by making other Men conscionable just and charitable to all do both gratifie themselves and tend to the common Order Peace and Welfare of Societies and of Mankind § 10. I am not able to confute or deny what Adrian afterwards Pope hath written in his Quodlibets That an unsanctified Man not in a state of Salvation may so far love God even above himself as to consent rather to die and be annihilated than were it possible God should be annihilated or not be God For a Heathen might consent to die for his Country And he is a Bâ—ast and no Man that would not rather be annihilated than all the World yea or all the Kingdom or all the City should be annihilated or than the Sun should cease to be or to shine And he that knoweth that if there were no God there could be no World no Being Motion Knowledge Goodness or Felicity in the World besides that which is worse the Cessation of the Infinite Good himself must be yet more unmanly if he would not rather be annihilated alone if per impossible you suppose he could live alone than all this greater Evil should come to pass He that tells men that they shall be saved if they would rather be annihilated than that there should be no God doth make them a promise which God hath not made § 11. But as the same Author observeth that which the unholy cannot do is to love God as God as the ultimate Object and most amiable Good to be known and by Love and Holiness enjoyed and pleased by a holy Soul and this above all sensual terrene Delights and to love him as the holy Ruler of the World who forbiddeth all sinful sensuality and all mens inordinate Conceits Desires Delights and Practices and requireth holiness and purity of Mind and Life and Sobriety and Temperance and Self-denial in all that will be saved And as he is a just Judge who will execute all these Laws and condemn the ungodly to endlers Misery They love not God as he is the holy Goâ—â—â—â—our and righteous Iudge of men that would restrain them from their sinful Wills and Pleasures and damn them if they will not be holy And consequently they love not his Laws and other means by which this is to be done Because loving the pleasure of their Lusts and being averse to things spiritual high and holy they love not that holiness and rectitude in themselves which God commandeth Rom. 8. 5 6 7 8 c. § 12. Though God as the Fountain of Nature continue the natural power and liberty of the Will yet its moral
their Office nor how our Souls do use the Corporeal Spirits c. And when Christ hath told us That the Wind bloweth where it listeth and we hear the sound of it but know not whence it cometh and whither it goeth and so is he that is born of the Spirit Ioh. 3. 8. Should not this with the experience and consciousness of our Ignorance suffice to keep us from bitter Contendings about that which is certainly beyond our reach and from presumptuous boldness with the unsearchable things of God § 11. Whether you will with Bradwardine and many others say That it is God's meer Volition that effecteth all things ad extra or whether you will say with the most That it is not his Will alone but his Will as operating by his executive Power the meaning seemeth to be the same and the difference to be but notional as is aforesaid For they that speak in the first manner mean That it is not God's Will as in it self immanently considered but his will as going forth to produce an effect which emanation or exertion is from the effect called by those that speak in the second manner God's Executive Power § 12. The prime Reason of the Effect is God's Wisdom Will and Power as the Cause And so the prime reason why Means and Grace become effectual whenever they are effectual must be from God the prime Cause § 13. The first Impress on the Soul moving it toward the Act e. g. Faith is the first Grace internal sub ratione effecti And this God himself worketh on man as on a meer Patient tho' not antecedently to all former acts of Man or all preparative dispositions usually yet antecedent to that Act of Man to which it moveth So that as to this 1. Man is passive 2. and the Divine Operation or the powerful Will of God is not only sufficient but effectual for that Impress or Motus is effected § 14. Though God being a Spirit moveth not by such Contact as Bodies do on each other yet must we conceive of his motion and the motion of all Spirits on Bodies as analogous to corporeal Contact and as a motion by Efflux and eminent Contact of Virtue and Essence according to the more excellent nature and operation of Spirits or else we cannot conceive positively of them § 15. It is already proved that God useth various degrees of Impress or Motion on Souls of which some do by their proper power or degree so ascertain the effect that the Argument is alwaies good as a causa where-ever God doth so move there the Effect that is the Act e. g. Faith or Consent followeth And this Grace is effectual ex propria vi vel virtute But that God sometime operateth by a less Impress or Motion which doth not from its own force inferr the effect but so far disposeth the Mind or Will to the Act that the man can do it without any more grace which is it that is called Sufficient Grace as aforesaid § 16. It is a thing not to be believed that this latter degree of Divine motion is never eventually effectual to the Act Seeing 1. it is granted that there is such a Power in Man's Will as câ—n act in some cases by that degree of Grace called Sufficient And frustra fit potentia quae nunquam reducitur in actum 2. And it 's granted that the Angels and Adam did act by such help Therefore as to acts preparatory before special Faith few do affirm that they are all done by such Grace as is necessarily effectual ex propria vi alone but that sufficient Grace leaveth them often to Man's Will § 17. Therefore all that remaineth is to resolve what is the reason of the certain effect when we believe To which I say 1. It is ever an effect of two Causes at least God's motion and man's faculty and so both must be said to be the Cause of the effect 2. But man's will is no Cause save a recipient Cause of God's Part or Impress 3. God sometimes at least maketh so powerful an Impress as doth necessarily determine man's will by a Necessity consistent with his Liberty 4. It cannot be proved by any man that no man believeth by that sufficient Motion which doth not necessarily determine his will seeing many preparatory acts are done by such a motion And it 's probable that it is oft so 5. But the certainty of this or when and how oft it is so no man can know § 18. But by which degree of Grace soever the effect be produced still God's Will is the chief cause of it which can procure the effect infallibly when it doth not necessitate Yea and his premotion or impress called Sufficient is incomparably more the cause than Man's Concourse is though God leave some part of the Causation to man's Free-will § 19. But when the Effect doth not follow that is when men believe not it is man's will by omission and resistance that is the chief cause and culpable and not God's omission or non-determination § 20. The same degree of divine Impress or Motion which prevaileth with a Soul predisposed by common Grace is not enough to prevail with some others that are ill or indisposed Though God's Absolute Will and Answerable Operation would prevail with any how bad soever CHAP. XVI Of the State of Heathens and others that have not the Gospel § 1. THE opening of the several Laws or Covenants of God before hath taken up most that is necessary to be said about this point The question Whether any but Christians are saved is agitated on both sides by so much the sharper Censures by how much the nearer it seemeth to concern the Fundamentals of Religion § 2. On one side some say That nothing is more fundamental than God's Nature and Government and Beneficence and the Attributes which belong to him in respect to each And they say That for God to be the Ruler and Benefactor of the World and to be also gracious and merciful and Love it self and a Rewarder of them that diligently seek him are our Fundamentals which are not consistent with this That all the World since Adam except a few Believers or Jews and Christians that were born from Adam under as absolute a necessity of being remedilesly damned as of dying § 3. Here they use first to consider of the number viz. 1. That it is not past the sixth part of the World that are called Christians 2. That the far greatest part of these perhaps twenty to one have not competent means to understand what that Christianity is which giveth them their name and which as to the name they profess The Circassians Mengrelians and other Georgians the Armenians the Muscovites the Cossacks the most of the Greeks and Abassines yea and Papists besides the Copties Syrians Nestorians Iacobâ—tes Maronites Christians of St. Thomus c. and too many Protestants are bred up in so great ignorance that multitudes of them never are
of Grace and Pardon which he committed to his Ministers to proclaim 2 Cor. 5. 19. But 2. on mans part it is not the knowledge and belief of this Iesus incarnate personally that was made necessary to all before his coming and therefore not to all after No man ever came to the Father but by the Son's Merit and Spirit nor without a consenting Belief and Affiance in God's redeeming or recovering pardoning saving Mercy and true Repentance and a sanctified Soul which is in love with God and goodness And whatever was absolutely necessary in the terms of the first Edition of the Covenant of Grace even to all the World before Christ's Incarnation But Christ never meant that no man before his Incarnation or since that heard not of him did come to the Father without believing that which the Apostles themselves long believed not after they followed Christ. § 27. The rest of the World were not bound to know so much of the Messiah as the Iews as having not the same Revelation § 28. 1. Having proved that it is a Law of Grace that all the World is to be ruled and judged by it remaineth to be enquired Whether any of them that have not the Gospel do keep the Conditions of this Law and so are justified by it and saved To which I answer 1. That being a matter of fact it is not of so great Importance for us to be certain of it as some imagine And who can be certain of the Affirmative unless the Scripture affirm it when if we knew all the World one man cannot be certain of anothers Sincerity And much less can any be certain of the Negative without Scripture Negation seeing no man can know every man in the World and every Heart § 29. 2. But it is exceeding probable at least That God would never govern many hundred parts of the World compared to the Iews before Christ's Incarnation and five sixth parts since his Incarnation by a Law of Grace which yet no person should ever have effectual Grace to keep as far as was necessary to his Salvation Every Law of God is a Means and appointeth the Subjects the use of much Means for their own Salvation These means they are bound to use and shall be condemned if they use them not and that none should ever use them savingly is an Assertion so unlikely that he that hath the boldness to affirm it should bring certain Proof of it which the Scripture I think doth not afford him § 30. But what numbers do perform the Condition and are saved no mortal man can tell But in general we know that God usually worketh in Congruity to his appointed means and consequently that far fewer are saved where less means is vouchsafed than among Christians who have herein the unvaluable pre-eminence above others § 31. For as the Jews had both the common Covenant of Grace and also the Covenant of Peculiarity setting them above all others so the Christian Church hath both the common Covenant of Grace and by the second edition of it a Covenant of Peculiarity both sealed by Baptism and the Lord's Supper as the Jews Covenant was by Circumcision and the Passover Yea our Covenant Privileges set us above the World incomparably higher than the Jâ—ws were § 32. Yet should we take warning by the example of the Jews Pride who were so confident that none were saved or beloved but themselves that they despised the rest of the World and provoked God to cut them off and call the Gentiles into higher privileges So some Christians so trust to their Gospel-Peculiarities as the Jews did to their Law that they despise all the World besides themselves and can easilier believe that God will damn a thousand millions that never heard the Gospel than one of them who have no more real Holiness than many of those whom they despise But it is our Duty to be thankful both for our excellent Peculiarities and also for the commoner Mercies unto others And I wish the impartial Reader to study Mal. 1. 10 11. whether even this be not the sence Nor will I accept an Offering at your hand for from the rising of the Sun to the going down of the same my name is great among the Gentiles and in every place Incense offered to my name and a pure Offering For my name is great among the Heathen saith the Lord of hosts but ye have polluted it Our Translators have as Expositors thrice at the least added the future Tense shall be But all the old Translations Syriack Caldeâ— Paraph. Greek Latin c. put it in the present Tense is great is offered I do but desire the Reader to study it It 's strange that all the ancient Churches should misunderstand it It seems more probable by the Context that the Hebrew Text understood the present Tense none being expressed § 33. If we might imitate our Father Abraham who yet saw Christ's day and rejoiced we should suppose the number of the saved through the world to be very considerable For as I said elsewhere though God had told him that Sodom was so much worse than the rest of the World that God would destroy it yet Abraham thought there might be fifty righteous persons there It 's like he thought not worse of the rest of the World § 34. Obj. You seem to make the rest of the World happier than the Iews for they had a Law that would justifie them and so had not the Iews Ans. The second assertion is false The Jews were under the Law of Grace which Paul calleth the Promise and might be justified by it and had greater helps to know and keep it than the rest of the World had But when they foolishly separated their Mosaical Law from the Promise or common Law of Grace Paul tells them by the Deeds of that Law no flesh could be justified § 35. Obj. Do you not thus confound the World and the Church Ans. No I ask you Did he confound them before Christ's Incarnation who thought that more than the Jews were saved Certainly no No more do I now § 36. The word Church is sometime taken so properly and strictly as to signifie only those that are under the Covenant of Peculiarity And so the Jews before Christ's Birth and Christians since make up the Church and some few perhaps before the Iews Covenant But sometimes it is taken more largely for the Kingdom of God For all that are in a state of Salvation under the several editions of the Law of Grace And so Iob and his Friends and Melchizedeck and many others before and all now that love God and Holiness sincerely are of the Church Accordingly by the World is meant either 1. All Men as under the Redeemer's Law of Grace antecedently to their Consent and so all the World belong to God's Kingdom as subditi obligati 2. Rebels that refuse Consent And so they are of the Kingdom by obligation but condemnable for Rebellion And
these are the World in the worst sence 3. Consenting Subjects under the Common Law of Grace who yet were not Iews nor are not in the Covenant of Peculiarity And such are in a state of Salvation though not in the Church of the peculiar as the Subjects of Melchizedeck Sem c. and so are both in the Church and in the World in several sences § 37. Having delivered that in this great Question which seemeth to me agreeable to God's Word I advise those that use to assault such things with reproach which they find reproached by their Party to remember that God is Love and Christ is the Saviour of the World and the Pharisaical Appropriators of Mercy and Salvation do seldom know what spirit they are of CHAP. XVII Of the Necessity of Holiness and of Moral Uirtue § 1. HOLINESS is our Dedication Separation or Devotedness to God and alienation from all that stands in competition or contrariety to God § 2. It is our Separation to God as the Creator of our Nature and our Redeemer and the Author of Grace and our Felicity and the Cause of Glory As the first Efficient supreme Dirigent and ultimately final Cause § 3. It is our separation to God as our Owner by Resignation as our Ruler by Obedience and as our Benefactor and ultimate End by Thankfulness and Love in the acknowledgment of his infinite power wisdom and goodness as essential to himself and related to his works § 4. Holiness is our dispositive actual and relative separation to God 1. When our Souls are habitually inclined to God and to his Will 2. When we actually give up our selves to God and to his will by Consent first and Obedience and Love after 3. It signifieth the relation of the Person as thus habitually and actually separated A holy Priesthood 1 Pet. 2. 5 9 11. § 5. Holiness is the Habit and Act of all the three Faculties of the rational Soul viz. 1. Of the vitael Active Power by Quickening and Strength 2. Of the Intellect by Illumination 3. Of the Will by Conversion Love or Complacency § 6. The Soul as sensitive and the body it self are said to be sanctified so far as they are dispositively and actually subject and subservient to a holy Soul in Holiness and related accordingly as separate to God § 7. Our Holiness is no alienation from the Creature as a Creature in its due place and subordination to the Creator but contrarily containeth our Honour of and Love to all God's Creatures for his sake and impress and a devoting of all that is ours to his use But it containeth a renunciation of that which is against his Honour and Government and Love as such § 8. As God communicateth Holiness really and relatively to Man so holy persons communicate such Holiness to Creatures below them as consisteth in the use and relation of things separated to God by a due separation of them by their dedication and holy use and that in various degrees § 9. True Holiness is the Health the Rectitude the Honesty the Justice of man's Soul and therefore necessary as his Duty by God's Law even of Nature and to his Happiness both in the very nature of the thing and by the determination of God's Law It is a contradiction to be happy and unholy Rev. 20. 6. § 10. Holiness is the end or perfection of our Nature and God's chief Interest in man and is begun by Grace and perfected in Glory § 11. The Fear of God and his Iudgments and a Care of our own Souls and a Sorrow for Sin and a desire of Happiness may be not only Preparatives but lower parts of Holiness but the true formal specifying nature of it consisteth in a love of God's infinite goodness and a Will addicted to obey his Will or a Pleasedness in pleasing Him This is Holiness § 12. Because a man is denominated according to the predominant bent of his Will or Soul he is not to be called Holy who hath some slight inclination to please God and more to please his own carnal Appetite and Will or greater love to the Creature than to God § 13. Christ himself came into the World to recover sinful Man by Holiness to God and disdained not to be a means of Man's Sanctification and to make this the notable operation of his Holy Spirit on us § 14. Whatsoever Law Men are under before Christ or since Jew or Gentile Works or Grace no man can be saved and happy without Holiness that is unless they be devoted in Obedience and Love to GOD and Goodness § 15. No man can be damned that is holy while such nor can God hate and make miserable those that truly love him and his governing Will. § 16. Yet a person that is holy may deserve Damnation by deserving to be denied that help of the Holy Spirit by which his Holiness must be continued And as to be saved is to be perfectly sanctified so to deserve Hell is to deserve to be forsaken to the â—oâ—al loss of Holiness And so though it be hard for us to know whether Adam's first loss of Innocency was a total loss of Holiness yet if it were not it was a forfeiture of divine help and so a mediate loss of it And so a man that loveth God sincerely may by great Sin deserve to be deprived of the Spirit and therefore we must pray for the pardon of such desert for the sake of Christ though we cannot be damned or miserable while holy § 17. Obj. But how doth God love a holy Soul if he forsake him and with-hold his Spirit And if he be not loved of God he is miserable If he be loved he will not be forsaken Ans. Answer this your self as to the Case of the Angels and Adam God loved them and yet not so as to secure them from the loss of Grace But he so far loved them efficiently as to give them that grace by which they could persevere but not that by which they necessarily should persevere and he loved them complacentially according to the goodness which was in them and yet they lost it § 18. Obj. That is because they were left to their Free will and had but sufficient Grace and not efficacious determining Grace But it is now otherwise with all true Believers Ans. True Believers have not determining efficacious Grace to prevent all sin nor all such sin as Noah Lot David Peter did commit And that sin deserveth an answerable desertion of God it being a deserting him first so far And though God pardon it yet the desert is presupposed to the pardon for it is desert of punishment that is pardoned § 19. Quest. If a man were holy that is an obedient Lover of God and Goodness without Faith in Christ would that save him Answ. 1. The Covenants of Grace requireth various degrees of Faith according to its several editions and promulgations It is not the same degree of
Slave and also promiseth him great Possessions and Honours in a Kingdom in the East Indies or at the Antipodes if he will leave his Servitude and his Country and all that he hath there and go with him in his Ship and patiently endure the Sea-trials till he come thither Here he must 1. believe that the Prince hath paid his ransome 2. That he is a wise man and knoweth what he promised and skilful to conduct him safely through all the perils of the Seas 3. That he is an honest man and intendeth not to deceive him 4. That he is sufficient or able to perform his word 5. And if upon this belief he trust him he will let go all and venture in his Ship and follow him And here one tells him that the Ship is unsound another tells him that the Prince is a Deceiver unable to perform his Word or unskilful or dishonest and some way untrusty and another tells him that small matters in his own Country are better than greater with so much hazard and sets out the dangers and terribleness of the Seas Now if the man be ask'd Do you believe or will you trust me or will you not here every one by believing and trusting knoweth that a practical Trust is meant which lieth in such a confidence as forsaketh all and taketh the promised Kingdom for all his hope Such is our Saving Faith § 12. As many Acts and many Objects go to constitute Saving Faith so if you will logically anatomize it all these following must be taken in § 13. 1. The principal Efficient Cause is God the Father Son and Holy Ghost respectively according to their several operations § 14. 2. The Instrumental Cause is the Word of God and the Preaching and Preachers of it or Parents Friends or some that reveal the Word unto us § 15. 3. Subordinate auxiliary means are Providential Alterations by some awaking Judgments or inviting Mercies or convincing Examples c. § 16. 4. The Soul of Man in all its three Faculties Vital-active Intellective and Volitive is 1. the Recipient of the Divine Influx and then 2. the immediate Efficient or Agent of the Acts of Faith § 17. 5. Preparatory Grace and Duty is ordinarily Man's Disposition as he is the Recipient of God's Grace and the Agent of believing But God is free and can work on the unprepared but it is not to be taken for his ordinary way § 18. 6. The formal Object of the assenting Act of Faith is veracit as Dei revelantis the Veracity or Truth of God revealing his Will § 19. 7. The formal Object of the accepting and receiving Act is the Goodness of the Benefits offered us by the Covenant as offered § 20. 8. The formal Object of our Trust or Affiance is God's fides Fidelity because of his aforesaid Veracity in promising and his Power Wisdom and Benevolence as a Performer and this full Act comprehendeth all the rest It is God's Trustiness § 21. 9. The material Objects of the assenting Act in genere are all God's Assertions or Revelations More especially the Gospel or the Christian Faith objective according to the Edition of the Covenant which we are under § 22. The Essentials of our objective Christian Faith constitute the Essence of our active Saving Faith and the Integrals of it constitute the Integrity § 23. And it is of great importance to distinguish here as to the Word and Objects between 1. the signa or words 2. the signification or sence 3. the things matter or incomplex objects as distinct from words and sence viz. God Christ Grace Heaven Goodness Iustice Men c. And to hold 1. That the words are not necessary for themselves but for the sence and therefore Translations or any words which give us the same sence may serve to the being of Saving Faith 2. That the sence it self is not necessary for it self ultimately as if Holiness lay in notions but for the things which that sence revealeth viz. God to be loved and obeyed Christ to be received the Holy Ghost to be received and obeyed Holiness and all Grace to be received loved used encreased our Brethren to be loved Heaven to be desired c. All sence will not bring us to the reception of the things for all is not apt but any that doth this which must be divine and apt will constitute us true Believers § 24. 1. The material Objects of our acceptance and consent are the Word of God commanding offering and promising and the good of Duty and Benefit commanded offered and promised that is All that is given us in the baptismal Covenant God the Father and his Love the Son and his Grace and the Holy Ghost and his Communion The Father as reconciled and adopting us the Son as having redeemed us to teach rule justifie and save us the Holy Spirit to sanctifie comfort and perfect us § 25. 11. The material Object of our Trust or Affiance is God himself the prime Truth Power and Good and Christ as his Messenger and our Saviour and the Holy Ghost as the Author of the Word and the Word as being the Word of God You must pardon us as necessitated to call God a material Object analogically for want of words § 26. 12. The ultimate or final Objects of Saving Faith are 1. God himself the ultimate ultimum that is the perfect Complacency of his will in his Glory eternally shining forth in our Glory and the Glory of Christ with all the Church triumphant 2. Next to that This Glory it self which is a created thing and the Perfection of the Universe and of Christ's Church and our selves in which it consisteth And therein our own Perfection and our perfect sight love and praise of our glorious God and our Redeemer 3. And next under that the first fruits of all this in this World in the foresaid love of the Father and Grace of the Son and Communion of the Holy Spirit and the Church § 27. If therefore we were put to give a full description of Saving Faith we must be as large as this following or such-like in sence viz. The Faith which the Adult must profess in Baptism as having the Promise of Justification and Salvation is a sincere fiducial practical Assent to Divine Revelations and especially to the Gospel revealing and offering us God himself to be our God and reconciled Father Christ to be our Saviour viz. by his Incarnation meritorious Righteousness and Sacrifice Resurrection Doctrine Example Government Intercession and final Judgment and the Holy Ghost to quicken illuminate and sanctifie us that so we may live in the Love of the Father the Grace of the Son and the Communion of the Holy Spirit and of the Christian Church being saved from our Enemies Sin and Misery initially in this Life and perfectly in eternal perfect Glory With a fiducial acceptance of the Gifts of the Covenant according to their nature and a sincere federal Consent and with a sincere
Salvation it self and the Image and Glory of God upon us § 63. V. About the next Question I may yet be shorter How far any Works of ours may be trusted in I think all agree 1. That nothing of ours or any Creature should be trusted to for any thing proper to God or proper to Christ or any thing that belongeth not truly to it self He that ascribeth any thing to our Faith Love or Obedience which is proper to Christ's Merits or God's Mercy and so trusteth them doth greatly sin and he that trusteth them for more than God hath assigned to them to do § 64. 2. That we must take heed of scandaous Language and therefore must not talk of trusting on any act of our own when it is like to be understood as put in Competition with God or with Christ's Merits as if the Question were Whether we must trust God or our selves Christ's Righteousness or our own For our own is not in the least measure to be trusted for that which belongeth only to Christ's Righteousness to be or do § 65. 3. That yet it is a great Duty to trust every means of Salvation appointed by God in its own place and for its own part alone even to preaching Sacraments Afflictions c. And accordingly to trust our own Faith Love Prayer Obedience so far as they are Means and have God's Promise and no further which is no more than to trust in God that he will bless such means He that trusteth his Sword doth not trust it to fight of it self without his Hand When God hath promised Mercy upon Prayer and to the Obedient or Penitent for a man to think that God will yet do no more for us if we repent pray and obey than if we do not is to be Unbelievers and say rebelliously It is in vain to serve the Lord. He is so far to trust to Faith Repentance praying hearing meditating diligence as to trust that God will bless them and reward them and look for more from him when we use means than when we do not CHAP. XXVI Of Confirmation Perseverance and Danger of falling away § 1. I Shall reduce all that needs to be said on this point to these following controverted Questions 1. Whether all Grace procured and given by Christ be such as is never lost 2. Whether that degree of Grace be ever lost which giveth the posse credere without the act of Faith commonly called sufficient Grace in Adult or Infants 3. Whether any lose actual true justifying Faith 4. Whether any lose true Holiness or love of God in the Habit 5. Whether any degree of this be ever lost or all special Grace have such Confirmation as the Angels have 6. Whether if Holiness be never lost it be possible to lose it and be in danger 7. Whether there be a state of confirmed Persons besides the meerly sanctified that from the degree or kind of their grace never fall away 8. Or whether Perseverance depend on meer Election and God's Will which secureth only some of the justified 9. Whether all or most or many Christians are themselves sure to persevere 10. Whether Certainty of perseverance be fit for all the justified 11. Whether it be unfit for all and a more unsafe Condition than doubting 12. Whether the Comfort of most Christians lie upon the Doctrine of such Certainty 13. Whether the Doctrine of Eventual Apostacy infer any mutability in God 14. Why God hath left this point so dark 15. What was the Judgment of the ancient Churches after the Apostles 16. Whether it be an Article of such evidence and weight as to be put into our Church-Confessions and we should force men to subscribe to it or make it necessary to Ministration Communion or Christian Love and Concord § 2. Q. I. Whether all Christ's Grace given us be such as is never lost Ans. No except Iansenius and his Followers I know of no Christians that ever affirm it and he doth it on this false supposition That the common Grace which worketh only preparatorily by fear is not the Grace of Christ but a grace of other Providence and only Love is the grace of Christ. But it is injurious to Christ who is the Lord and Light and Saviour of the World and God's Administrator-general into whose Hands all Things and Power is given to say That since the Fall there is any Grace in the World that is not his Grace and that our preparatory grace and all that 's common is aliunde some other way He that readeth Ioh. 15. Matth. 13. Heb. 6 and 10. may see the contrary § 3. Q II. Whether sufficient grace to believe which giveth the meer power of believing to Infants or Adult be ever lost Ans. These Questions suppose that there are these several sorts of Graces disputed of by Divines 1. Common grace 2. Power to believe and repent 3. Actual Faith and Repentance given by that called special Vocation 4. The Habit of love and all grace called Sanctification to pass by Relative grace as Justification c. 5. Confirmation of these Habits And we now speak only of the second And the very Being of that Grace is controverted Whether God ever give besides the natural Power a moral Power to believe to any that never do believe And 1. it is certain by Adam's instance that he gave him a power to have perfectly obeyed when he did not 2. And therefore no man can prove that now he giveth no man a moral Power to believe that doth not 3. But it seemeth most probable that he doth because his Government and Man's Nature are not tota specie changed 4. And it is certain that still all men have power to do more good than they do 5. And even the Dominicans grant this Sufficiency of grace 6. But yet for my part I am not certain of it § 4. But if there be such a power given which never acteth Faith which I think most probable it is either in the Adult or Infants if in the Adult no doubt it 's lost for they that will not believe to the last retain not still the moral power in their Rebellion § 5. But in the Case of Infants I think those of them that die before the use of reason lose it not nor any of the Elect that live to full Age But as to others after long doubt How far Infant-Grace is loseable this seemeth now the most probable solution to me § 6. Viz. There is a Grace that reacheth but to a moral Power to repent and believe before men have the Act or proper Habit Such Grace to persevere did put Adam in a present state of Life or acceptation with God this Grace Adam lost Accordingly such grace that containeth but this mâ—â—al power in an Infant 's Disposition with relative grace of Pardon is sufficient to provâ— his right to Salvation if he so die because he is not bound to the Act nor capable of it and even the Adult
of everlasting glory through Faith § 7. This Repentance is the same thing with Conversion and as I said before Faith it self includeth Repentance in its Essence as denominated from the terminus a quo it being a Turning from Unbelief to God by believing in him as God and to Christ by believing in him as our Saviour and to the Holy Ghost by believing in him as the Agent and Witness of Christ and our Sanctifier § 8. Particular Repentance is our turning with Sorrow from a particular Sin to our contrary obedience to God § 9. Without that universal Repentance or Conversion which turneth the Mind Will and Life to God from created Vanity and this World no Man can be saved because he continueth an Idolater and Rebel and doth not indeed take God for his God nor Christ for his Saviour nor the Holy Spirit for his Sanctifier but is an ungodly Man and a Forsaker of God and his own Felicity § 10. Repentance as towards God is sometime distinguished from Faith in Christ And then Repentance is our turning to God as God by Faith Trust Love and Obedience resigning our selves to him as our Owner subjecting our selves to him as our Ruler and loving him as our Benefactor and chiefly as the Infinite Good in himself our ultimate objective End And this is the greater Duty respecting God as our End even the same with Love to God for the procuring of which Christ came into the World and Faith is given us And then Faith in Christ is the mediate grace and duty by which we are brought to this Repentance § 11. Not that any man can truly take Christ for his Saviour before he taketh God for his God for the Love and Intention of the End is before our Choice and Use of the Means But Christ being our Teacher first bringeth us to assent to the Truth of God's Perfections and Relations to us and then to the Truth of his own Gospel and by this Assent bringeth us first to a common and then to a special Consent at once that God be our God and Christ our Saviour but so that we desire God as our End and Christ as Mediator as the Means § 12. Universal Repentance or Conversion doth virtually contain all particular future Repentance but not actually Therefore where this is that Soul may be saved without actual Repentance for some particular sins or sorts of sin As e. g. if we are ignorant that such or such a thing is sin for want of necessary Instruction or if in a crowd of business some sinful Thought Passion or Word pass unobserved or if we do our faithful endeavour to find out a sin and cannot remember it as who can remember at Conversion one of many that he has committed in Unregeneracy and after many are forgotten And every Man dieth in some sin which he hath no time here to repent of viz. in some sinful imperfection of all grace and duty and omission of due degrees of Love and other Acts For all which virtual repentance will be accepted § 13. But great and heinous sins must needs have actual repentance because it will not consist with the Truth of Holiness to be so indifferent or easâ—e towards them as not to observe them and remember them And if they be known and remembred they will be repented of when the Soul hath opportunity to consider what it hath done For habitual repentance is necessary to Salvation and Habits will act when they are not extraordinarily hindred having notable Objects and Opportunity § 14. Yet some sins that are great materially in their nature may be lessened much to some persons by unavoidable ignorance and so may not have an actual repentance As e. g. in times of War to kill men in a wrong Cause is one of the greatest â—ins in the World and yet when by the darkness of State-cases the Question who is in the right is so difficult that very few can decide it and after their utmost search each Party thinks that God bindeth them to fight for their King or Country such persons cannot have a particular repentance while they are not able to see that they were deceived § 15. It is therefore a Case of exceeding difficulty what sins may stand with Iustification not particularly repented of and what not or as some speak which are mortal and which venial sins or sins of Infirmity § 16. But he that hath a care of his Salvation must hate all sin in the general as sin and keep up his watch and be willing to know all the worst in himself and diligently use the means to know it and resolve to forsake it to his power when he knoweth it that so he may not be wilfully impenitent And he that will sin as far as he thinks will stand with grace either hath no true grace or shall not know that he hath it § 17. The time of repentance or mercy may be said in two Sences to be past 1. When a man shall not be accepted and pardoned though he should repent And so the Day of grace is never past in this Life and the Damned do not truly repent in our present Sence so that for a penitent person to fear that the Day of grace is past or his Repentance too late if true is to contradict the Scope of the Gospel which giveth pardon to every one that truly repenteth 2. When a man that before had some motions and helps to repent and obstinately resisted them shall be given up to his Obstinacy and never have such motions more Thus the Day of grace may be past with many And such persons turn from God to Wickedness and are hardened in the love of sin and usually blinded to defend it and hate a holy Life But those that do repent or fain would repent or yet feel God moving them to repent have no cause to think that God hath thus forsaken them For it is only obstinate and continued forsaking God that is the sign of one forsaken by him § 18. And this also is no proof to us that such a Person is finally forsaken For many that have rejected grace many years are afterward converted by that grace So that all that we can say is That such as God hath forsaken do continue to the end to reject his Mercy and prefer their Lusts but that he will so continue to the end no man himself can tell before the end § 19. About the unpardonable sin there are two Coâ—â—oversies 1. What it is 2. Whether it be absâ—â—â—â—ely unpardonable That final impenitency is unpardonable is undoubted But the sin in question is called The Blasphemy against the Holy Ghost of which having written a special Tractate I now only say That it is the Sin of such as believing not Christ to be the Son of God but a Deceiver and yet being convinced of his and his Disciples Miracles do in their judgments think and blasphemously say and maintain that they were done by