neglect it These reasons and authorities together will I doubt not justifie a particular application of this Parable Notwithstanding that there may be the fullest security against the mischiefs specified in the entrance of this point I will take care that in the following discourse no doctrine shall be obtruded upon the bare warrant of similitude or figurative resemblance but whatsoever shall be delivered shall be both grounded upon some express and literal Texts of Scripture and attested by the consent of the Ancient Fathers And now these things premised I proceed more closely to pursue my purpose in the particular handling of the Parable CHAP. II. The occasion and exposition of this Parable THE CONTENTS § I. The adversaries of our Saviour's Doctrine contradict each other some accusing it of too great difficulty others as a Doctrine of licentiousness the occasion of this latter misprision of it amongst the Gentiles a fabulous story of Constantine's conversion the occasion of the Jew's misapprehension § II. Three ranks of Jews a maxime of theirs built upon that distinction the crasse sense they had of the Mosaick Covenant which things in special gave rise to their calumnies against his doctrine and practice from which he vindicates himself by this Parable § III. A literal paraphrase upon the Parable § IV. The true interpretation of the Parable who is meant by the elder and who by the younger brother the parts of the Parable and of the ensuing discourse IT is a necessary rule amongst all Expositors to look attentively on the occasion and from the rise to judge of the scope and tendency of the discourse and this is most especially requisite to be done in the interpretation of figurative passages in regard there is nothing so like but it is also unlike nor so resembles any one thing but in some respects it may resemble another and therefore here like those that sail in a narrow channel where the Stars or the Card are too general directors they are forced to sail by coasting as they call it so must we in the explication of a Parable where there is not alwaies to be expected a determinate and necessary sense of every phrase as in more direct discourses govern our selves by the general aim and be sure to set out right at first from the design of it Now in order to the discovery of the true occasion of this Parable it is of use to note That as it was the lot of our Saviour himself when he was arraigned by the Jews to be accused by such as agreed no better amongst themselves then with the truth and whose several testimonies more impeached the credit of each other then pressed him against whom they were suborned so it hath often fared with his Doctrine and Religion to be accused of things inconsistent with each other insomuch that commonly the several imputations mutually confuting each other have jointly vindicated instead of aspersing Christianity The special instance which I am now concerned to assign of this matter is that the same institution hath by different persons been accused of difficulty and facility as an intolerable burthen by some as a doctrine of looseness and licentiousness by others The former of these accusers have commonly been a sort of loose pretenders to Christianity who because the Gospell requires that we love the Lord our God with all our hearts and soul and strength that we live in all good conscience both towards God and man that we restrain not onely the outward acts of sin but subdue the very passion and inclination thereto and upon such like accounts cry out durus sermo that it is a strict and severe Law and if this be Evangelical obedience it is impossible and who then can be saved And to help themselves out of these difficulties they run into wild persuasions that either Christ Jesus himself who delivered this institution must in his own person so perform it instead of all that are to be saved as to excuse them the doing it or else God must be pleased by miracle to overbear them into the performance of it But since these men profess Christianity I leave them to be silenced by the express declaration of our Saviour Matth. 11. 10. My yoke is easie and my burthen is light The contrary sort are those I am more concerned in at present namely such as reproach Christianity as a doctrine of ease and looseness Touching whom it is plain by the former objections that this second sort of men must be absolute strangers to the tenour of the Religion they thus accuse i. e. they must be either Jews or Gentiles For the Pagans they either hearing that Faith was insisted upon as the prime qualification of a Christian looked therefore upon the whole Religion as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a bare credulity a meer facility of mind or a supine abandoning ones self to the dictates and suggestions of others or else considering that this Religion neither required nor practised the troublesome and costly sacrifices then in use amongst other people nor so much as made any account of those nice observances and very austere rites that were in great reputation with all the world besides judged it therefore to be a very cheap and easie thing to be a Christian or lastly observing that many who were conscious of having lived wickedly heretofore betook themselves to and found both cure and comfort in this institution they thereupon concluded it to be an Asylum and Sanctuary to looseness and debauchery Upon some or all of these accounts the Pagans were generally abused into the aforesaid misprision of Christianity touching the third and last of which stumbling blocks I think it will not be unacceptable to the Reader that I rehearse a famous story from the Ecclesiastical Historians to this effect When the great Constantine to his own immortal glory and the great advantage of Christianity espoused that Religion the Pagans to slurr him and Religion together devised this tale of him That he having basely murthered his brother Crispus and others of his near kindred and feeling some remorse in his conscience for so great Barbarities applied himself to Sopater the Philosopher and Successor of Plotinus to be directed by him to some 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or expiation But Sopater tells him that Philosophy afforded no remedy in so desperate a case He then saith the Story goes to the Christian Bishops to get ease to his guilty and affrighted conscience and they readily receiving and incouraging him that a little Baptismal water would wash out all that stain and ease the smart he hereupon finding this a Religion wherein a man might reconcile the gratification of the most exorbitant passions with a quiet mind became a Christian Theodoret who relates this fable thinks as well he might that it concerned his profession of Christianity to shew the falshood of it And therefore after he had first retorted it upon the Pagans themselves shewing that if it had been true
called thy Son I deserve to be utterly abandoned excluded your care and cast out of your thoughts as I cast my self out of your family And so the Penitent I am so far Lord from deserving thy favour or eternal life that I deserve not the least Crum from thy Table less then the least of all thy mercies Nay I acknowledge I have deserved to goe with sorrow to my grave and to undergo the dreadfullest viols of thy wrath IT is very remarkable that the Prodigal doth not only thus condemn himself whilest he anxiously stands expecting his doom from his Father but even then when his Father had expressed compassion to him had ran to meet him and kissed him for so vers 21. we find him repeating his own condemnation in the same words as before And in like manner we observe the Apostle St. Paul after he had obtained pardon and the great favour of Apostleship to be continually ripping up his former sins and condemning himself for them as if the wound bled afresh as often as it was touched THUS the Penitent always judges and condemns himself that he may not be judged of the Lord. By severity towards himself he recommends himself to the Divine Mercy for as Tertullian expresses it In quantum non peperceris tibi in tantum Deus tibi parcet If we like Phineas stand up and execute judgement the Plague will be stayed He that anticipates the day of Judgment by erecting a private but impartial Tribunal prevents the dreadfullness of that day In short if we be just God will be mercifull and therefore when the Penitent hath been accuser witness and judge against himself he may then with hopes of success become 4. IN the fourth place Intercessour for himself also and deprecate the divine displeasure and implore his favour So the Son doth here make me as one of thy hired servants q. d. Let me not be utterly cast out of thy Family but have at least this instance of thy favour that I may still retain some relation to thee And so the Penitent now that he hath received his sentence of condemnation within himself sues out his pardon O take not my confession meerly as an argument of my guilt but as an evidence of my contrition Break not the bruised reed nor quench the smoaking flax 'T is thy prerogative O Lord to pardon and what pleasure is there in my blood Will the Lord be angry for ever will his jealousy burn like fire O consider my frame remember I am but dust and ashes call to mind thy mercies of old thou art God and not man and as much as the Heavens are higher then the Earth so are thy mercies above the mercies of a man Turn thy face away from my sins and blot out all my transgressions Make me a clean heart O God and renew a right spirit in me Cast me not away from thy presence and take not thy Holy Spirit from me Give me the comfort of thy help again and stablish me with thy free Spirit c. Psal 51. 9 10 11 12. SAINT Cyprian reports it to have been the Custome of the Primitive Penitents out of their quick and pricking sense of sin and the more effectually to recommend themselves to the mercies of God and the favour of his Church earnestly to implore the Martyrs that in the midst of their sufferings and sharpest agonies they would remember them in their prayers thinking such affectionate intercession of those that poured out their blood and requests together must needs be available both with God and man But the Penitent addresses himself also to a higher and more prevalent Advocate who adds the incense of his own sacrifice to the prayers of men and makes them come up as sweet odours before the Almighty and who is exalted at God's right hand to this end that he may give success to the prayers of such contrite persons To which adde that not only the deep apprehensions of guilt and of danger which such a person we now speak of is under must needs mkee him ardent and importunate and to cry mightily to God but also the Scripture assures us that the Holy Ghost is wont to assist such with sighs and groans which are unutterable § II. NOW for the acceptableness of this penitent confession of which we are speaking Although it be certain that our heavenly Father takes no delight in the pityfull moans in the tears and lamentations of his Creatures and most true that he is not to be wrought upon by addresses and complemental forms by the accent of men's voice by the rhetorick of tears nor any thing of that nature because he is not subject to passions as men are yet having demonstrated already in the former Chapter that the Divine Majesty hath no restraint upon him but what himself pleases and that all his actions towards his Creatures are so subject to his wisedom that when-ever there is just cause for mercy he can shew it notwithstanding the unchangeableness of his Nature the rigour of his Laws or the demand of his Justice If now we also make it appear from his own mouth and from those discoveries which he hath been pleased to make of himself that the aforesaid humble and contrite addresses are agreeable to the designs of his wisedom and therefore required by him as the conditions of pardon then there can be no doubt but that they will in their kind be as acceptable to his Divine Majesty and as successfull on the part of the sinner as the penitent Son's submission was with his earthly Parent AND this will be easily evident if we consider that whereas the evil of sin lies principally in the dishonour it reflects upon the divine perfections such penitential acknowledgments as we have described do in great measure repair that injury and do right to all the Divine Attributes as we will instance in particular 1. SIN is an invasion of God's Authority and Sovereignty over us inasmuch as he that willfully breaks any Law of God proclaims himself sui Juris or Lawless and saith with those in the Gospel we will not have this Lord to rule over us Now penitent acknowledgment though it cannot recall the act which is past yet it revokes and retracts the affront and settles God's authority again 2. SIN is an impeachment of God's wisedom justice and goodness at once for he that allows himself in the commission of a sin lays an imputation upon God as if he had either not foreseen what liberty was fit to be allowed to his Creatures or had not ordered the frame and constitution of things with that decency and benignity that mankind could comfortably acquiesce in without temptation to intrench upon that for his own necessary accommodation Now on the contrary confession takes shame and folly and unreasonableness to our selves and justifies the wisedom and equity of all God's constitutions In this sense we may take that expression Luk. 7. 29. The Publicans justified God
have deserved or with the same in the Lamentations It is the Lord's mercy that we are not consumed and wherefore doth a living man complain a man for the punishment of his sins He not only considers the irresistible power of God and yields as knowing there is no contending with him but he acknowledges also his sovereignty and the right which the great Creatour of the world hath to dispose of him and all other Creatures as he pleases and therefore quarrels not prerogative but saith with Old Eli It is the Lord let him doe what seemeth him good and with the Psalmist I was dumb and opened not my mouth for it was thy doing q. d. If I saw nothing but rigid fate over-bearing me though I knew it was even then to no purpose to contend yet I should be tempted to repine at my hard fortune but when I saw God in it I laid my hand upon my mouth for that word speaks wisedom justice and goodness as well as power every of which are infinitely above my match And when I reflect upon my self I cannot but discover that it is not meer power and will in God that oppresses me but it was just with him to appoint me this adversity nay I cannot but own his wisedom too in it he understands my frame and therefore is best able to judge what is good necessary for me My heavenly Father knows what things I have need of And consequently I must conclude since he hath ordered it so that it was best for me that I should be put into the condition I am in He saw I was not able to bear a full tide of prosperity and therefore sent cross winds to check me he foresaw I should be apt to luxuriate and run riot again should he have planted me in the warm Sun and therefore he made choice of the shade for me UPON all these considerations and especially that which I first suggested namely his modest reflection upon his own demerits and therewithall the contemplation of that transcendent happiness in another world which will abundantly compensate all defects in this the Penitent is brought intirely to surrender himself to the divine will So that he doth not only patiently abide what he cannot help but in some good measure of chearfullness harmoniously falls in with the divine providence I will saith he no longer have any will of my own but thy will be done as I will indeavour to frame the course of my life and actions by thy Laws and revealed will so my mind my will and passions shall be shaped in conformity to thy secret will THIS temper every true Penitent must and doth arrive at in good measure for untill this be done the principle of pride which was the first spring of apostasie is not destroyed in him and it will be impossible that he should discharge the former part of active obedience unless this passive frame be in conjunction with it since a malecontent and murmuring spirit can never become a good and dutifull subject of God's Kingdom because he plainly betrays that he neither loves nor reverences him and therefore will not obey him Besides that most assuredly such a temper affords perpetual invitation and incouragement to the Devil to be attempting upon him to inflame him into some rebellion against God Whereas the man that is contented with his condition that submits to God discourages Satan in all his attempts of stirring up sedition he gives him no hold he disarms and defeats him THIS therefore with the two former make up the summ of Religion and consequently the intire character of a true Convert and the just terms of his reconciliation with the offended Majesty of Heaven By these three steps the Son recovered himself and his Father's favour And thus the sinner returns to God CHAP. V. Of the necessity of Actual Reformation THE CONTENTS § I. A recital of several loose opinions about repentance which debauch men's practice in this important affair § II. Four arguments demonstrating the absurdity of all those opinions jointly and the necessity of bringing forth such fruits of repentance as are described in the former Chapter 1. From Scripture 2. From the nature of God 3. From the nature of Heaven and Hell 4. From the nature of Conscience WHILST in the foregoing Chapter I indeavoured in three instances plainly and accurately to describe actual returning to God as the condition of reconciliation with our heavenly Father as I think I out-went not the figurative intimations of the Parable so I am most confident that therein I dealt faithfully with the Souls of all such men as are concerned in that discourse neither requiring more nor admitting less then what is both fit for God to accept and for men to yield to him therefore it was reasonably to be hoped that men's judgments being convinced herein they would practise accordingly and so I might proceed immediately to the third and last part of the Parable and there shew the admirable success of this method and the comfortable greeting betwixt the Father of Spirits and his returning Children NOTWITHSTANDING partly because I am aware in the general how willing men are even to put a cheat upon themselves for a cheap and an easy cure and that to such that which we have been discoursing will seem to be durus sermo a hard Chapter as we say and partly also I am not ignorant that there are abundance of Mountebanks in Theology who pretend to administer comfort to troubled Consciences upon far easier terms that therefore I may wholly omit nothing that I conceive usefull in this important affair I will here though briefly demonstrate the truth and absolute necessity of what we have now laid down but first I think it not amiss to take notice of the principal of those mistakes which make it necessary that I so doe and they may be reduced to these four heads 1. IT was the opinion of some of the Jewish Doctours that when the Messias came there would be no necessity of repentance at all as if his intercession should perfectly excuse men all the trouble of working out their own salvation with fear and trembling And a like absurd conceit hath possessed some Christians that nothing is to be done by us but trusting and relying upon Christ Jesus and his sacrifice and satisfaction as if he had not only satisfied for the transgressions of the old covenant but having brought in no new one had set men perfectly at liberty from all moral obligation or as if it were a derogation from the merits of Christ's death that any thing should be required of us in order to justification This is the doctrine of the Antinomians Which some carry yet higher and suppose justification from eternity founded meerly in the secret decree of God and so not only exclude repentance but even the mediation of Christ Jesus himself 2. THERE is a second sort of men and those called Christians too that require
recollect himself to emerge out of his folly to remember his Father's house and to thirst after eternal life he is infinitely pleased with it and cherishes such blossoms THUS it was prophesied of the Messias and interpreted and applied to our Saviour by the Evangelist Matth. 12. 20. A bruised reed shall he not break and smoaking flax shall he not quench untill he send forth judgment into victory i. e. He will neither precipitate those upon utter ruine who are very near it and have cast themselves upon the brink of danger so long as there is any hopes remaining of their recovery nor much less will he despise and extinguish the least sparks and beginnings of good but incourage and promote them AND this we observe to be verified in the young man in the Gospel of whom we have taken notice before he made some Conscience of his ways and inquired after eternal life and was willing to do something to attain it wherefore though he was far from being generously good nevertheless the Text tells us Jesus look'd upon him and loved him IN short therefore whatsoever God's proceedings shall be with impenitent and incurable sinners in the other world who have withstood the whole day of grace and abused all his patience and kindness I say whatever severity his wisedom and justice may then require when men have treasured up wrath against the day of wrath and fitted themselves for destruction yet certainly in this life and whilst there is any hope God is compassionate towards them he pities those he cannot love and loves those that pity themselves and delights in those that love him But this pity of the Almighty which yet is one of the lowest instances of his benignity consists not as it doth often in men in a soft sympathy with the miserable or ineffective wishes of their good but is like himself great and powerfull in its effects For in the next place § IV. 3. As the Father not only admits his Son when he returns to him but runs to meet him so doth the Almighty help and bring on sinners in their way to himself St. Jerom I confess understands this passage in the mystical sense to point at the Incarnation of our Saviour wherein God may very properly be said to meet man taking our humane nature that he might make us partakers of his Divine But I rather apply it to the efficacious assistance which God gives by his Grace to all beginnings of good in men Miraris homines ad Deos ire saith Seneca Deus ad homines venit imò quod propiùs est in homines venit nulla sine Deo mens bona est And a little before he had said Non sunt dii fastidiosi non invidi admittunt ascendentibus manus porrigunt Which words of his may thus be rendred in a Scripture phrase God though he be the high and lofty one inhabiting eternity yet is not stately and disdainfull he neither envies nor grudges men's happiness and though he dwell in the high and holy place yet to this man will he look that is of a broken and contrite spirit and he will be so far from repulsing his endeavours of ascending up to him that he reaches out a hand of mercy to pull him up to himself Wonder not then that men attain to God when he vouchsafes to come down to them nay to come in to them for never was any vertuous mind without his help TO that purpose speaks the excellent Moralist but the Holy Scripture most expresly Phil. 2. 12. It is God that worketh both to will and to doe and Jo. 6. 44. No man cometh unto me except my Father which hath sent me draw him And this temper is that which the Prophet magnificently describes the Messias by Isai 40. 11. He shall feed his flock like a Shepheard he shall gather the Lambs with his arms and carry them in his bosome and shall gently lead those that are with young And thus also the Prophet Hosea sets forth God's dealing with his people Israel Hos 11. 3. I taught Ephraim to goe taking them by their arms I drew them with the cords of a man with the bands of love In which passages though God by the Prophets describe the way of his providence with literal Israel the Jewish Nation yet as that People was a type of the spiritual Israel so did God's methods with them resemble the gracious condescension he uses towards the Souls of men in their conversion to himself I cannot upon this occasion omit a most affecting and remarkable story which Eusebius reports upon the credit both of St. Irenaeus and Clemens Alexandrinus to this effect St. John the Apostle in his visitation of the Churches near about Ephesus happens there to fix his eyes upon a certain young man who he conjectured from the comeliness of his shape vigorous chearfullness of his eyes and other indications of a generous spirit might become an eminent and usefull person if effectual care was taken of his education He therefore calls to the Bishop of the place and solemnly conjures him in the presence of Christ and his Holy Church to spare no pains or care in cultivating the mind and manners of the young man The Bishop undertakes it and accordingly takes him into his own house uses him as his own Son instructs him baptizes and at length confirms him in the Christian Faith which having done he thinks now he might be a little more secure of him and trust him to his own conduct But he had no sooner done so but certain loose young men presently insinuate themselves into his acquaintance and first debauch him with light caresses and jovial assignations and then as it often happens to maintain those excesses they draw him into a confederacy of robbery and in that flagitious society this young man quickly becomes so great a proficient as to be Captain and leader of the Fraternity At this season as God would have it the Apostle returns again into those parts and presently requires an account from the Bishop of the young man committed to his trust the good old man with sorrow in his heart and tears in his eyes replies Alas he is dead dead I say to God and all goodness he is become a common Thief and cut-throat hath deserted the Church where I trained him up and now keeps his station in the Mountains hard by from whence he makes his frequent sallies to commit all kind of villany The Apostle aged as he was considers not his own infirmity but the recovery of the young man and therefore calling for an Horse and a Guide presently issues forth into the Mountains where he had been told his haunts were There he no sooner arrives but he is arrested by the Centinel Thief whereat he betraying no fear or surprizal as having in part attained what he sought Shew me saith he your Captain The Captain hearing this and wondring what should be the errand presents himself armed
very pitifull plight either quite naked or at most covered with rags he therefore calls for the best Robe and puts it on him that not only necessity may be provided for and his nakedness covered but he will have him appear in an equipage suitable to the Son of such a Father AGAIN Secondly whereas the Son in contemplation of his present distress and former miscarriages had no higher ambition then to be admitted into the condition of an hired Servant now the Father on the other side will have him adorned with the Ensigns of a person of quality and of a Son and therefore puts a Ring on his Hand which hath in all Ages and amongst most Nations been used to denote either eminent quality or singular favor THIRDLY the Son in the time of his rebellion amongst other misfortunes became a slave as we have observed before and amongst most Nations it hath been the custom for such to goe bare-foot and only Freemen to be shod now the Father in token of his Son's emancipation commands to put shooes on his feet ALL which three things together amount to this That the Father having forgiven his Son upon his submission and return now puts him into as good a condition in all respects as he was in before his rebellion And from thence according to the Analogy of the Parable we may infer that our Heavenly Father upon the sincere repentance of sinners is so fully reconciled to them that they stand upon the same terms with him as if they had never sinned they are restored to as good a condition as that of Adam in innocency And we might content our selves with this general application but that St. Chrysostom St. Jerom St. Austin Theophylact and the generality of the Ancients carry it further and make a particular interpretation of these several passages in conformity to whose judgments we will thus render the meaning of the three aforesaid favours 1. By the best Robe is to be understood the excellent ornament of more compleat holiness and fuller Sanctification which God works in and bestows upon a sinner upon his reconciliation to himself 2. By the Ring is intimated the gift of the Holy Ghost which is conferred upon those men that are justified and sanctified as the pledge of their adoption and earnest of their inheritance 3. By the Shooes the honour of being imployed in the service of God for the drawing others home to him The grounds of which interpretations I will assign as I handle the particulars severally and I begin with the first 1. THE Best Robe Stolam saith St. Jerom quam Adam peccando perdiderat stolam quae in alia parabola dicitur indumentum nuptiale The Robe which Adam lost when he sinned and in defect of which he covered himself with Fig-leaves that Robe which in another Parable is called the Wedding Garment And St. Chrysostom 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. The Garment of an heavenly contexture the white Robe which they are cloathed with that are baptized with the Holy Ghost and with Fire agreeably herewith Theophylact the best or first Robe for so the Greek word in the Text imports that is saith he 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the ancient Robe which we wore before we sinned that which the Scripture means when it saith put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ that is put ye off the old vicious habits and practises and imitate the example of Christ Jesus and put on the holy temper of the Gospel WHOSOEVER hath been ever so little conversant in the Holy Scripture cannot but have observed it to be the usual stile thereof to denote both the inward qualities of the mind and the outward accustomary actions of the life by the garments of the body and it would be unnecessary and therefore tedious to recite the many passages there to be found to that purpose But I cannot omit that in the Revelations Chap. 19. Vers 8. To her was given to be arrayed in fine linnen clean and white for white linnen is the righteousness of Saints By the Woman is there meant the Church of Christ called the Lamb's wife whose ornaments are righteousness and holiness and they are metaphorically represented by white garments AND if we consider all the uses of Garments there is nothing more exactly corresponds therewith nor more fit to be figuratively expressed by allusion to them then holy and vertuous qualifications For if Garments are used for distinction what makes a greater and truer distinction betwixt man and man then their lives and tempers It is not being high or low rich or poor noble or ignoble learned or idiotical which makes so great a difference betwixt them as when one is good and vertuous and another vicious and prophane IF Garments are for ornament and to cover our uncomeliness what is there represents a man more lovely and beautifull then the ornament of a quiet mind a just temper an holy life and what disguises and deforms men like to vice and debauchery IF again Garments are for defence against the injuries of weather and other accidents what is there that gives a man that security and confidence which innocency of life and sincere piety affords him and on the other side what exposes and lays a man open to all the calamities of this life and to the wrath of God in the world to come but naughty and evil practises proceeding from a corrupt and vicious temper Wherefore there is both plain reason and good authority of all kinds to make this application of the first favour which the reconciled Father vouchsafes his returning Son and to say that thereby is denoted in the figurative sense that God when he hath pardoned the penitent then confers further measures of sanctification upon him § II. BUT if it shall be said that Sanctification must goe before Justification inasmuch as though an earthly Parent may be reconciled to his Son that is not truely good yet God cannot be reconciled to sinners continuing so or untill they become new men and therefore some other allegory is to be sought here and not that which we concurrently with the Fathers have pitched upon I answer the doctrine is true which this objection is grounded upon but the inference therefrom will not reach us for I have shewed already that some measure of real sanctification must goe before justification and pardon because God though he bear a constant good-will to mankind yet as the objection well suggests and we have acknowledged before is he not transported with any fondness towards any man's meer person so as to be reconciled to him whilst he stands at defiance with himself because he is a pure holy and just Majesty and consequently cannot without denying himself and contradiction to his own nature either delight in a vicious person or hate a good man And besides if it were consistent with his nature yet will not his wisedom and the interest of his government of the world permit that he cause