compassionate he must want Power to help us and that destroys the hope of Sinners as much as want of Compassion It must be want of Will or Power in him that he does not deliver us from Purgatory as well as Hell and if he want Power to deliver us from Purgatory for my part I should more question his Power to deliver from Hell for that is the harder of the two if his Bloud could not expiate for the Temporal punishment of Sin which the Merits of some Supererogating Saints or the Pope's Indulgence or the Priests Masses can redeem us from how could it make expiation for Eternal punishment If his Interest in the Court of Heaven will not do the less how can it do the great There is no Doctrine more irreconcileable with the perfect Love and Goodness of God and the Merits and Intercession of our Saviour which are the Fundamental Doctrines of the Gospel which is a Dispensation of Love and Grace than this of Purgatory and therefore we may safely conclude that this is no Gospel-Doctrine 2. Let us now examine the Doctrine of Invocation of Saints and Angels as our Mediators with God and see whether it does not disparage the Grace of the Gospel the Love of God and of our Mediator and Advocate Jesus Christ to penitent Sinners Now a very few words will decide this matter 1. With respect to God now can that man believe that God is so very gracious to Sinners for the sake of Christ who seeks to so many Advocates and Mediators to interceed for him with God. To imagine that we want any Mediator to God but only our High-Priest who mediates in Vertue of his Sacrifice is a reproach to the Divine Goodness The Wisdom and Justice of God may require a Sacrifice and a High-Priest to make Attonement for Sin but Infinite Goodness needs not any Entreaties and meer Intercessions to move him A truly good man who knows a proper Object of his kindness needs not to be asked to do good The use of such Advocates and Mediators among men is either to recommend an unknown Person to the favour of the Prince or fairly to represent his cause to him which has been mis-represented by others or to procure favour for an undeserving person or among equal Competitors to procure some one to be preferred this is all the use of Intercession among men for a good and wise and just Prience will do what is wise and just and good not only without Intercessors but against all Intercessions to the contrary Now I suppose no man will say that God wants Mediators and Advocates upon any of these accounts for he knows every man understands perfectly his cause will never be perswaded by any Intercessions to shew kindness to unfit Objects that is to impenitent Sinners and his Goodness is so unconfined and so extensive to all that there can never be any competition for his Favour and therefore to multiply Advocates and Mediators to God must argue a great distrust of his Mercy and Goodness which a kind and good Prince would take very ill of us God indeed has commanded us to Pray for one another in this World as he has to pray for our selves but this is not by way of Interest and Merit as the Church of Rome pretends the Saints in Heaven pray for us but by humble Supplications which is very reconcileable with the goodness of God to make Prayer a necessary condition of granting Pardon and other Blessings we want but as the use of Prayer for our selves is not to move God meerly by our importunities to do good to us for we must pray in Faith that is with a humble assurance and confidence that God will hear us which includes a firm Belief of his readiness to grant what we pray for so neither are our Prayers for others to move God by our interest in him that is they are not the Intercessions of Favourites but of humble Supplicants There was great reason why God should make Prayer the condition of our receiving though he wants not our importunities to move him because there are a great many excellent Virtues exercised in Prayer such as great sorrow for Sin great humility of Mind faith in God's Promises the acts of Love and affiance and trust in God and a constant dependance on his Grace and Providence for all spiritual and temporal Blessings and there was great reason why he should command us to pray for others tho' he wants none of our Intercessions for them because it is a mutual exercise of Charity of Love to our Brethren and Forgiveness to our Enemies and is a mighty obligation to do all other acts of kindness for those who know it to be their Duty to pray for one another will think themselves bound to do good to one another also This becomes those who live and converse together in this World because it is a great instrument of Virtue and that is a reason why God should encourage the exercise of it by promising to hear our Prayers for each other But as far as meer goodness is concerned the Gospel represents God as so very good to Sinners that there is no need of any Intercessor for them For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life 3 John 16. This was an act of goodness antecedent to the Incarnation and Death of Christ and the highest act of goodness that God could manifest to the World and therefore secures us of God's love and goodness to Sinners without a Mediator and Advocate for that love which provided a Mediator for us was without one and proves that it was not for want of goodness or that he needed entreaties that he gave his Son to be our mediator And therefore hence S. Paul proves how ready God is to bestow all good things on us He that spared not his own Son but delivered him up for us all how shall he not with him also freely give us all things 8 Rom. 32. And our Saviour himself represents the goodness of God by the tenderness and compassion of an earthly Parent If ye then being evil that is less good than God is know how to give good things to your children how much more shall your heavenly Father give good things to them that ask him 7 Matth. 11. especially in the Parable of the Prodigal where our Saviour describes the goodness of God to Sinners by that passion and joy wherewith the Father received his returning Prodigal nay he assures his Disciples that there was no need of his own Intercession to incline God to be good and kind to them At that day ye shall ask in my name and I say not unto you that I will pray the Father for you for the Father himself loveth you because ye have loved me and believed that I came out from God 16 John 26 27. God is so infinitely good that he
Sinners which are much weakned by some Popish Doctrines 2. THe Gospel of Christ was intended to give the highest demonstration of God's Love to Mankind and the greatest possible Security to all humble penitent Sinners of the Forgiveness of their Sins Hence the Gospel is called the Grace of God and the Gospel of Grace as being a Dispensation of Love and Goodness and therefore whatever lessens and disparages the Gospel-Grace can be no Gospel-Doctrine As to consider this particularly The Gospel magnifies the Grace of God in giving his own Son for us God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life 3 John 16. In this was manifested the love of God towards us because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world that we might live through him Herein is love not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins 1 John 4.9 10. And St. Paul assures us that this is such a glorious manifestation of God's love as will not suffer us to doubt of any other expressions of his Goodness He that spared not his own Son but delivered him up for us all how shall he not with him also freely give us all things 8 Rom. 32. So that the Gospel of our Saviour gives us much higher demonstrations of God's love and goodness than either the Light of Nature or the Law of Moses did Love is the prevailing Attribute of God under the Gospel-dispensation For God is love and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God and God in him 1 John 4.16 Thus the Gospel of Christ gives a humble Penitent as great assurance of Pardon as his own guilty Fears can desire for Repentance and Remission of Sins is preached in the Name of Christ He has expiated our Sins by the Sacrifice of his Death God commendeth his love towards us in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us much more then being justified by his bloud we shall be saved from wrath through him for if when we were enemies we were reconciled unto God by the death of his Son much more being reconciled we shall be saved by his life 5 Rom. 8 9 10. For as he was delivered for our Offences so he was raised again for our Justification And him hath God exalted to be a Prince and a Saviour to give repentance unto Israel and remission of sins So that if any man sin we have an Advocate with the Father Jesus Christ the righteous who is able to save all them to the uttermost that come unto God by him seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for them 7 Heb. 25. These are the fundamental Doctrines of Christianity and therefore nothing can be a Gospel-Doctrine which weakeâ—s or overthrows them Let us then examine the Popish Doctrine of Purgatory and the Invocation of Saints and Angels as our Mediators with God and see how they are reconcileable with the Gospel-notion of God's love and that security it gives us of Pardon through the Merits and Intercession of Christ. 1. Let us consider the Doctrine of Purgatory which is but the outward Court or Region of Hell where the Punishments are as severe as in Hell itself only of a less continuance and yet as short as they are they may last many hundred nay thousand Years unless their Friends and the Priests be more merciful to them or they themselves have taken care before Death to pay the Price of their Redemption This is a barbarous Doctrine and so inconsistent with that mighty Love of God to penitent Sinners as it is represented in the Gospel of Christ that it is not reconcileable with any notion of Love and Goodness at all you may call it Justice you may call it Vengeance if you please but Love it is not or if it be it is such a Love as no man can distinguish from Hatred for my part I declare I do not desire to be thus loved I should rather chuse to fall into nothing when I die than to endure a thousand Years torments to be happy for ever for Humane Nature cannot bear the Thoughts of that And is this that wonderful Love of God to Sinners which is so magnified in the Gospel to torment those who are Redeemed by the Bloud of Christ some hundred or thousand Years in the Fire of Purgatory which is not cooler than the Fire of Hell The Light of Nature I confess never taught this for Mankind never had any Notion of such an outragious Love they always thought that the Love of God consisted in doing good not in damning those whom he loves for so many Ages And if this be all the Discovery the Gospel has made of the Love of God we have no great reason to glory in it He who can believe that God who so loved the World as to give his only begotten Son for the Redemption of Sinners will torment a penitent Sinner so many Years in Purgatory till he has either endured the punishment of his Sins himself or is released by the Charity of his Friends or the Masses of some Mercenary Priests deserves to lie in Purgatory till he thinks more honourably of the divine goodness and be convinced that it is no such extravagant commendation of the love of God to send penitent Sinners to Purgatory There are two extravagant Notions whereon the Doctrine of Purgatory is founded which overthrow all the natural Notions men have of Goodness and destroy all the hope and confidence of the most penitent Sinners in the goodness of God. As 1. That God may forgive Sins and yet punish us for them for no man can go into Purgatory according to the Doctrine of the Church of Rome whose Sins are not already forgiven but though his Sins are forgiven he must make satisfaction for that temporal punishment which is due to them either in this World or in Purgatory Now how reconcilable these two are to forgive and to punish let all mankind judge I believe very few men think they are forgiven when they are punished for that which all men desire should be forgiven them is the punishment they have deserv'd What is it men are afraid of when they have sinned is it not that they shall be punished for it What is it men desire when they desire Pardon is it not that they may not be punished And is it any comfort to a Malefactor to be pardoned and to be hanged Does any man boast of his love and kindness or take any comfort in it who freely forgives him but exacts the payment of the Debt or the punishment of his fault And if this be so contrary to the very notion of goodness and forgiveness among men how comes it to be the notion of goodness and forgiveness in God How comes that to be love and goodness which the Sinner receives no benefit by for love and goodness I think signifies
to do good or if this be goodness let those take comfort in it that can If it be said that it is an Act of goodness to exchange the eternal punishment of Hell which is due to sin into the Temporal punishment of Purgatory I grant this is something but only ask whether it would not have been a more perfect expression of love and goodness to have remitted the Temporal Punishment also of it may be some thousand years Torment in Purgatory whether this might not have been expected under a dispensation of the most perfect love and from that God who sent his only begotten Son into the World to save Sinners Whether those sins are perfectly forgiven which shall be avenged thô not with Eternal yet with long Temporal Punishments in the next World Whether any man thinks himself perfectly forgiven who is punished very severely tho' not absolutely according to his deserts And consequently whether the Doctrine of Purgatory be not a very great diminution of the Love of God and the Grace of the Gospel And whether that can be a true Gospel Doctrine which represents the Love of God much less then the Love of a kind and good man who when he forgives the Injury forgives the whole Punishment of it Nay Whether that can be a Gospel Doctrine which represents the Love of God less than infinite and I suppose an infinite Love may forgive true Penitents the whole Punishment of their Sins and then there is no need of Purgatory 2 ly In Purgatory God does not only punish those whom he has pardoned but he punishes for no other reason but punishment-sake For thus the Roman Doctors tell us that the Souls in Purgatory are in a state of Pardon and in a state of Perfect Grace and they suffer the pains of Purgatory not to purge away any remains of Sin or to purifie and refine them and make them more fit for Heaven but only to bear the punishment due to Sin for which they had made no satisfaction while they lived Now I dare boldly affirm this is irreconcileable with any degree of Love and Goodness to make any Punishment just it must have respect to the guilt of sin to make it an act of goodness it must be intended for the reformation of the sinner but when sin is pardoned the guilt at least is taken away and therefore such punishments can have no relation to guilt and when the sinner is in a perfect state of Grace and needs no amendment such punishments can have no respect to the good and reformation of the sinner and therefore such punishments are neither just nor good and this is the exact notion of Purgatory and methinks we should consider whether this agrees with that account the Gospel gives us of the love and goodness of God should a Prince have a Jayl of the same nature with Purgatory where for several years he torments those whom he pretends to have pardoned and who are grown very good men and good Subjects and need no correction or discipline I believe all the World would laugh at those who should call this love and goodness pardon and mercy Hell is very reconcileable with the goodness of God because it is prepared only for those who are the Objects of a just a righteous Vengeance and a very good God may be very just but Purgatory can never be reconciled with the superabundant goodness of God to sinners through Jesus Christ unless men think it a great kindness to suffer the pains of Hell for several Months Years or Ages for no reason which makes it either just or good to suffer them So that a Popish Purgatory is inconsistent with the belief of God's great Love and Goodness to sinners in Jesus Christ and destroys the hope and confidence of sinners for if they may lie in Purgatory for some thousand years as they may do notwithstanding the Love of God and the Merits of Christ if the Pope or the Priests or their Mony be not more merciful unto them they have no great reason to glory much in the Goodness of God though they should go to Heaven at last so that our Protestant need not dispute much about Purgatory let him only ask a Popish Priest How the Doctrine of Purgatory can be reconciled with that stupendious Love of God declared to penitent sinners in his Son Jesus Christ for it is a contradiction to the Notion of Goodness among men to inflict such terrible punishments in meer Grace and Love even when the sin is pardoned and the sinner reconciled and no longer in a state of Discipline and Tryal Secondly The Doctrine of Purgatory destroys or weakens that Security the Gospel hath given Sinners of their Redemption from the Wrath of God and the just punishment of their Sins One great Security is the Love of God declared to the World by our Lord Jesus Christ but if the Love of God to penitent Sinners who are Redeemed by the Blood of Christ be consistent with his tormenting them in Purgatory so many thousand years as you have already heard it will be a very hard thing to distinguish such Love from Wrath and a Sinner who is afraid of so many thousand years punishment can take no great comfort in it but besides this the Doctrine of Purgatory destroys mens hope and confidence in the Merits and Intercession of Christ and in the express promises of Pardon and Remission of Sins in his Name 1. It destroys mens hopes in the Merits of Christ and the atonement and expiation of his Blood For if the Blood of Christ does not deliver us from the punishment of Sin what security is this to a Sinner Yes you 'll say Christ has Redeemed us from Eternal tho' not from Temporal Punishments and therefore penitent Sinners have this security by the expiation of Christ's Death that they shall not be eternally Damned This I know the Church of Rome teaches but I desire to know How any man can be satisfied from Scripture that Christ by his Death has delivered us from Eternal Punishments if he have not delivered us from Temporal Punishments of Sin in the next World I thankfully acknowledge and it is the only hope I have that the Gospel has given us abundant assurance of the expiation and atonement made for Sin by the Blood of Christ but what I say is this that if these Texts which prove our Redemption by the Death of Christ do not prove that Christ has redeemed us from the whole punishment due to Sin in the next World they prove nothing and then we have not one place of Scripture to prove that Christ by his Death has redeemed us from Eternal Punishments which is enough to make all Christians abhor the Doctrine of Purgatory if it destroy the Doctrine of Salvation by Jesus Christ. As to show this briefly The hope and security of Sinners depends upon such Scripture expressions as these that Christ has died for our sins that he has made atonement
when Christ was come who was the true Emmanuel or God dwelling among us and had by his Incarnation accomplish'd the Type and Figure of the Temple God would no longer have a Typical and Figurative Presence I will not quarrel with any man who shall call the Christian Churches and the Utensils of it holy things for being employed in the Worship of God they ought to be separated from common uses and reason teaches us to have such places and things in some kind of religious Respect upon the account of their relation not to God but to his Worship but this is a very different thing from the Typical Holiness of the Temple and Altar and other things belonging to the Temple and there are two plain differences between them the first with respect to the cause the second with respect to the effect the cause of this legal Holiness was God's peculiar Presence in the Temple where God chose to dwell as in his own House which Sanctified the Temple and all things belonging to it the effect was that this Holiness of the Place Sanctified the Worship and gave value and acceptation to it the first needs no proof and the second we learn from what our Saviour tells the Scribes and Pharisees Wo unto you ye blind guides which say whosoever shall swear by the temple it is nothing but whosoever shall swear by the gold of the temple he is a debtor ye fools and blind for whether is greater the gold or the temple that sanctifieth the gold And whosoever shall swear by the altar it is nothing but whosoever sweareth by the gift that lieth upon it he is guilty ye fools and blind for whether is greater the gift or the Altar that sanctifieth the gift So that it seems there was such a Holiness in the Temple and Altar as conveyed a Holiness and Sanctity to other things even to the Oblations and Sacrifices which were offered there But now whatever Holiness there is in Christian Churches and Oratories they are sanctified by the worship that is performed there not the worship sanctified by them It is the Assembly of Christians themselves that is the Church the House the holy and living Temple of God not the building of Wood or Stone wherein they meet God and Christ is peculiarly present in the Assemblies of Christians though not by a Figurative and Symbolical Presence and thus he is present in the places when Christians meet and which are Consecrated and Separated to Religious Uses and there is a natural Decency in the thing to shew some peculiar Respects to the places where we solemnly Worship God but the presence of God is not peculiar to the place as it was appropriated to the Temple of Jerusalem but it goes along with the Company and the Worship and therefore the place may be called Holy not upon account of its immediate relation to God as God's House wherein he dwells but its relation to Christians and that Holy Worship which is performed there and I suppose every one sees the vast difference between these two and thus all that vast number of Ceremonies which related to this external and legal Holiness of Places Vessels Instruments Garments c. have no place in the Christian Worship because there is no Typical and Symbolical Presence of God and consequently no such legal Holiness of places and things under the Gospel 4 ly Nor are material and inanimate things made the Receptacles of Divine Graces and Vertues under the Gospel to convey them to us meerly by Contract and external Applications like some Amulets or Charms to wear in our Pockets or hang about our Necks There was nothing like this in the Jewish Religion though there was in the Pagan Worship but under the Gospel Christ bestows his holy Spirit on us as the principle of a new divine Life and from him alone we must immediately receive all Divine Influences and Vertue and not seek for these heavenly Powers in senceless things which can no more receive nor communicate Divine Graces to us then they do Wit and Understanding to those who expect Grace from them For can Grace be lodged in a rotten Bone or a piece of Wood or conveyed to our Souls by perspiration in a kiss or touch 5 ly The Christian Religion admits of no External or Ceremonial Righteousness In Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth any thing nor uncircumcision but a new creature and obedience to the commandments of God and faith which worketh by love The great design of the Gospel and of all our Saviour's Sermons being to make us truly holy that we may be partakers of the Divine Nature having escaped the corruption which is in the world through lust There is nothing our Lord does more severely condemn than an External and Pharisaical righteousness which consisted either in observing the External Rites of the Law of Moses or their own Superstitions received by tradition from their Forefathers and expresly tells his Disciples except your righteousness exceed the righteousness of the Scribes and Pharisees ye shall in no wise enter into the Kingdom of Heaven Now this cuts off every thing which is External in Religion at a blow because it cuts off all hopes and relyances on an External Righteousness and I believe men will not be fond of such Superstitions when they know they will do them no good 6 ly And hence it appears that there can be no place for any thing that is external in the Christian Religion but only for some foederal Rites such as the two Sacraments of the Gospel are Baptism and the Lords Supper the first of which is our admission into the new Covenant the second the exercise of Communion with Christ in this Gospel Covenant And such Rites as these are necessary in all Instituted Religions which depend upon free and voluntary Covenants for since Mankind has by sin forfeited their natural right to Gods favour they can challenge nothing from him now but by promise and Covenant and since such Covenants require a mutual stipulation on both sides they must be transacted by some visible and sensible Rites whereby God obliges himself to us and we to him but these being only the signs or seals of a Covenant are very proper for a Religion which rejects all External and Ceremonial Righteousness and Worship for it is not our being in Covenant with God nor the Sacraments of it that can avail us without performing the conditions of the Covenant and therefore this does not introduce an External Righteousness Now whoever has such a Notion and Idea of the Christian Worship as this and let the Church of Rome confute it if she can will easily see without much Disputing how unlike the Worship of the Church of Rome is to true Christian Worship For whoever only considers the vast number of Rites and Ceremonies in the Church of Rome must conclude it as Ritual and Ceremonial a Religion as Judaism itself the Ceremonies are as many more