Faith in him or else we must feign that a Believer hath a Spiritual Life in him that is not from Christ if he have Faith before he is united to Christ as some pretend and so there would be two Spiritual Lives in a Believer one before Union to Christ which works Faith and the other from Christ upon acting our Faith But this Ass of our own Spiritual Life and the Oxe of Christ's Life in us will not draw well together So that I think I may safely conclude this is no Heresie to say that Union to Christ is before Faith much less is that which follows an Heresie to say that we partake of the Spirit by vertue of that Vnion This is brought in as part of the fifth Heresie Whence do the Branches partake of the Sap of the Vine but from the Root by Vertue of Union to the Vine 'T is strange to admiration that this should be question'd by those who like Peter seem to be Pillars in the Church to call it an Antinomian Heresie to say We partake of the Spirit by vertue of Vnion to Christ If the Spirit be not in us before Faith how can he convince of Sin in not believing and thereby work Faith Doth not the Scripture say plainly 1 Cor. 12.8 9. To one is given by the Spirit the word of Wisdom to another Faith by the same Spirit Doth the Spirit give Faith and is he not then in the Soul to work Faith before it is wrought Is not the Former before the Thing formed If so then sure my Dear Kratiste was in a great Mistake and has sadly imposed on those that profess Faith in our Lord Jesus to rank this for a Heresie That we partake of the Spirit by vertue of our Vnion to Christ which in Naturâ is before Faith The sixth as being much akin to the former I pass only with the naming of it 'T is Heresie he saith to say Justification in regard of Application must be before Believing Whose Saying this is or whence it is taken I know not If the meaning be that God applies it to us or reckons it to us before our Believing that we are Justified This is so far from Heresie that I think the contrary is a Contradiction Or 't is Nonsense for me to believe a Thing is mine before it is given me or applyed to me and so made mine And in that Sense the Application of Justification by God's Spirit to my Conscience that God hath loved me and given his Son for me this must first be applyed to me before I can believe it or else my Believing is but Presumption But if by Application of Justification before Believing he means that the Soul doth apply it to himself before his Believing I think he is to seek for any that hold that Tenet §. XXVII His seventh Heresie is this That the first Application ordine Naturae saltem is to an Vngodly Man eo nomine that he may believe That this is a blessed Gospel-Truth and no Heresie appears by what our Blessed Lord Jesus saith That he came not to call the Righteous but Sinners And his immediate Call made them follow him as Levi from being a Publican to be a believing Disciple Nay saith our Lord Publicans and Harlots enter into the Kingdom of God before you Ye believed not but the Publicans and Harlots believed Matth. 21.31 32. Here was Application to ungodly Wretches eo nomine that they might believe and when Publicans and Harlots they did believe and so came off from their Ungodliness Yea the Dog Syrophenaecian as Christ called her she had Faith given her while she was a Dog even to the Admiration of Christ himself who said O Woman great is thy Faith And saith the Apostle for a full Proof that the Application is to an ungodly Man eo nomine While we were Enemies we were reconciled to God by the Death of his Son Nay as God will have it the very word ungodly which they oppose as Heresie is asserted in the Scripture that the first Application of Christ is to an ungodly Man in Rom. 4.5 To him that believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly his Faith is counted for Righteousness If the Blessed Apostle saith God justifieth the ungodly I trow this is no Heresie in him but if Heterodox Dr. Crisp say the same words then 't is an Antinomian Heterodoxy Now there 's a great out-cry what do you make God to be Is God such a Friend to Sin as to justifie the Vngodly Doth it become the Holiness of God to justifie an ungodly Man This is the way to vindicate all licentious Antinomianism That God justifies the Vngodly and that while he is an Enemy he is reconciled to God O out upon such profane Antinomians We can allow the Apostle Paul to use such Language because we can distinguish this into he doth not justifie the Vngodly that the Apostle means so whatever he saith but we cannot bear it that Apochryphal Tobias should say so nor that Mysterious Nonsense say so as Mr. Williams called Mr. Cole we cannot bear it in him for this is to open a gap to Profaneness to say God justifieth the Vngodly §. XXVIII The eighth Heresie is to assert That we believe that we may be justified declaratively The Case I take to be thus The Apostle saith in Gal. 2.16 We believe that we may be justified by the Faith of Jesus from whence the Neonomians conclude that the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 credere our Act of Faith is that very Thing which justifies us or that we are justified by our Work of Faith if not by Works of Faith and Holiness which sometimes they joyn yet at least by a Work by our Act of Believing Whereas the Orthodox according to the Homilies and Doctrine of the Church of England from plain Scripture put Faith it self from us as that Act that justifies and say Faith justifies only declaratively as it manifests to the Conscience our being justified by Christ's Blood Rom. 5.9 and freely by his Grace not our Grace of Faith through the Redemption that is in Jesus Rom. 3.24 Titus 3.7 It is still ascribed to his Grace not any Grace in us our Grace of Faith being only the Instrument or Hand given us of God to receive Christ and all in him If Justification be as they would have it from any Act of ours as the Ground or Cause of it then we are not freely justified by his Grace but by our Work of Believing which if not a Popish is an Arminian Tenet to blemish the Free Grace of God in Jesus Christ So that it may be safely concluded that it is no Heresie to say our Justification by Faith is declarative in as much as the Essence of Justification is by the Blood of Jesus and the Grace of God imputing it to us is the form of our Justification which being received by Faith is thereby manifested or declared to the Conscience by the Illumination of the Holy
which is laid Jesus Christ 1 Cor. 3.11 and all hay and stubble upon it shall be burnt Which every sincere lover of our Lord Jesus daily prays may be hastened Even so come Lord Jesus §. LXXX Our Rebuker like some Captain General in the Confederates Army in Flanders where most of them are Papists or very sorry Protestants is in the next place giving orders for a kind of Popish Barriere to be set about the Divine Justice in pa. 51 though by the way a Barriere against an Enemy had been more like a General 's Word of Command but let it go for the Neonomian Word of Command a Barriere about Divine Justice his Sentence is this I would have I your General a Bar a Barriere about the Divine Justice that Men may not dare to represent him or it for better sense as a Tyrant in making so many millions to damn them eternally to damn them without respect had to their demerits This is plain Arminius or worse and such as I never suspected from my Dear Kratiste to justifie the general out cry of corrupted Natural Religion What did God make us to damn us How could we help our first Parents Sin But doth not the Scripture say In Adam all dyed for that or in whom all have sinned and by the offence of one judgment came upon all Men to condemnation Rom. 5. And will you now run with the Herd and cry God made Millions to damn them as a Tyrant without respect to their Demerits because they are condemned in Adam Now I see some Reason why the Rebuker said once in the Pulpit in Pinners Hall We did not sin Adam ' s Sin But I am sure he must own that in Adam all dyed then he must own with Augustine In Adam all are damned Damnati antequam nati Damned before Born and yet God no Tyrant but Holy and Just as well as Gracious and Merciful Hath not the Potter power over the Clay of the same lump to make a hundred Chamber-pots and but five drinking Vessels Shall proud insolent Man teach God what Vessels of Wrath prepared of old to this Condemnation to make Jude 4. and what Vessels of Mercy Or whom he will to have Mercy on and whom he will to harden O that Men were wise and not to set Barriers of their divising God hath set his Barriere and let Men stand and adore and tremble at that word What if God willing to shew his Wrath and to make his Power known endured with much long-suffering the Vessels of Wrath fitted for destruction Is God by saucy prophane Man to be called a Tyrant for shewing his Wrath on Vessels of Wrath before of old ordained to this Condemnation having fitted themselves by their Sin in Adam for this destruction Shall we say it is without their own Demerits when God saith in Adam all dyed O that Men were wise to Sobriety and would not think to jostle God out of his Throne Let us adore Free Rich Sovereign Grace that is published in the Gospel that whoever will may take the water of Life freely Rev. 22.17 All in the sound of the Gospel being invited to come to Christ and they shall find rest for their weary Souls Those that charge God as a Tyrant for damning Millions without respect to their Demerits when they are lost and condemned in Adam will not condemn a Temporal Prince for a Tyrant to take and sieze the Estate of a Traytor condemned and to take it from all his Posterity ever after to the Worlds end And shall Man be justified as no Tyrant and God be charged so arrogantly Let us adhere to God's Barriere that in Adam all sinned and the Wages of that Sin is Damnation to all that have not an Interest in Christ §. LXXXI In his hedge about Justification I take notice of his indispensable Bulwark that is That Faith be made indispensably necessary to it in all the Adult Here one might ask what precise time should be fixed for the Adult it being an odd word and unscriptural The Scripture saith He that believes shall be saved he that believes not is condemned already And if there be not the Seed of Faith in Infants before they dye which God alone gives as Sanctification in the Womb or afterwards when he pleaseth I know not how according to the Scripture our only Rule to judge by they can be saved if they have not the Seed of Faith in Sanctification Would you have one way for Infants to be saved and another for the Adult when Christ alone is the Way the Truth and Life But passing by that it may be ask'd what kind of Faith is it that is to be so necessary There is bare assent to the Truth and this many call a Faith sufficient provided they live good Lives as they call it but this Faith the Devils have and tremble Then there is Historical Faith and Temporary Faith There is above and beyond these a Faith of assurance which some make absolutely necessary I would hope he means none of these but a Faith of adherence to the Lord Jesus for Life and Salvation by him and him alone of relying on him trusting to him renouncing our selves and our best performances as loss and dung in the matter of Justification or as any cause of our Salvation This might have given some Light into his indispensably necessary 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 about the Doctrine of Justification I fear there lyes a snare in this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 this indispensably necessary Some and those mighty Friends to the Arminians make Faith necessary as a Cause or Co dition that stands in the place of Works of the Law Some make it a Condition as joined with Repentance and pers verance in Gospel-Obedience and so put it in the place of Christ's Righteousness imputed to us and make Faith as it is our Work to be imputed to us for Righteousness And so the Hedge is become a hodge-podge of our Gospel Righteousness joyned with Christ's Righteousness under the notion of Faith a Condition O how good is it for us to fence our selves with God's Word that the Foundation of God stands sure Whom he did foreknow them he did predestinate and them he called and them he justified and them he glorified Here 's not a word of what we do that we predestinate we call we justifie or we glorifie our selves 't is God doth all And if instead of our pleading to justifie and glorifie our selves we would indeavour to justifie and glorifie God for his free justifying and glorifying us through and for the sake only of his dearly beloved Son our Dear and Blessed Lord and Saviour it would be much better than to make a pother about the Conditionality of Faith when all is of Grace But I hope in this indispensably necessary Faith to Justification he doth not exclude some mixture of doubting with Faith though he names not the least allowance for that and yet where is the Faith
Christ Exalted AND Dr. CRISP Vindicated IN Several Points called Antinomian being Cleared From Neonomian Suggestions Alledged By some Remarks on Mr. A his Rebuke to Mr. Lob. Shewing from Scripture and most Orthodox Authors the Invalidity of his Rebuke in taxing the Doctor to be Apocryphal and his Doctrine Antinomian WITH Some Observations on the Bishop of Worcester's Letter concerning the great Point of the Change of Persons between Christ and Believers wherein he differs from the Doctor but yet mildly and genteely treats him though he comes short of the Truth as contained in the Doctrine of the Church of England With a Table to find the Heads insisted on Done by a Happy tho' Vnworthy Branch of the said Doctor It was needful for me to write to you and exhort you that ye should earnestly contend for the Faith which was once delivered to the Saints Jude 3. And once profest by the Church of England His Neighbour cometh after him and searcheth him Prov. 18.17 LONDON Printed for the Author and are to be had at Mr. John Marshall's at the Bible in Grace-church-street 1698. ERRATA PAge 11 Line 22 for thereof read there of 25. l. 6. r. Arminian 34. l. 22. r. Arminian 36. l. 1. r. as Believers 45. l. last r. She. 46. l. 1. of r. our 47. l. 22. r. by the Power 48. l. 20. r. laid 65. l. 5. 6. r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 68. l. 37. r. Racovia 81. l. 24. make the stop at allowed 83. l. 9. r. he bare 27. r. and act 96. l. 27. r. Reporter 97. l. 5. the stop at for 98. l. last r. zanachta 100. l. 5. r. reprobavit 10. r. kareu 103. l. 15. r. perfection 109. l. 5. for them r. him 111. l. 15. r. chattathi 115. l. 27. r. with a Passage 31. make the stop at doing 116. l. 10. for as to say r. by saying To his several Particular Friends of the late House of Commons Assembled in Parliament Gentlemen and Right Honourable Patriots MANY Daughters have done Vertuously and thou excellest them all was a Motto on the Memorial of Q. Elizabeth hung up in most Churches for the good Laws she made against Popery What high Encomiums of Praise and great Retributions of Thanks then are due to you right Christian Senators for your warm Addressing His Majesty to suppress the Blasphemy and Debauchery which the Nation abounds with And upon His wise referring back so great a Work to your selves to effect it by an Act of Parliament for your thereupon forming the late good Act wherein it is to your great Honour Enacted That if any Person ........ shall by Writing Printing Teaching or advised Speaking deny any One of the Persons in the Holy Trinity to be God or shall assert or maintain there are more Gods than One or shall deny the Christian Religion to be True or the Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testament to be of Divine Authority shall suffer so and so Although there be no Reward to the Prosecutor it is hoped you have thereby in a good measure put a stop to the carriere of the Prophane Tongues and Pens of a debauched Crew of this Age that Impiously deny the Trinity of Persons in the Godhead that mock at all Revealed Religion as contained in the Scriptures that call the Scriptures an Inken Divinity and the Blood of our Lord Jesus as the Blood of another good Man and make his dreadful Agony and Sufferings but Facile Representations of what Christ doth in us and that could Print That when God hath glutted himself c. as in the Book For your Zeal to God's Glory in which may you have an Eternal Reward above and many good days of God's Blessing here is my Supplication to the Throne of Grace But besides these Dragons against the Christian Religion which you have been quelling we have the Foxes running about that spoil the Vines those that under the fair Species of Man's Holiness would undermine God's Righteousness in our Justification For going about to establish their own Righteousness they have not submitted to the Righteousness of God Rom. 10.3 That is they are against being justified freely by his Grace through the Redemption that is in Jesus against having his Righteousness imputed to them to be unto and upon all that believe though the Scripture is clear herein But besides the pure Word of God which is the Sheet-Anchor of our Religion it is a great Mercy that in Disputes with Men of corrupt Minds that we have the Fundamentals of Christianity contained in the Doctrines established by Law in the Book of the Homilies wherewith to incounter such Foxes as would spoil our tender Grapes by denying our very Sins to be born by Christ and bringing in some degrees of our Obedience though imperfect to joyn as it were with Christ's Righteousness for our Justification and to make such our Obedience pass currant by bringing in God making a Law that in effect allows of Sin which are excepted against in the ensuing Treatise which I put forth to vindicate according to my poor Talent not so much Dr. Crisp but the Doctrine of God our Saviour delivered by the Doctor consonantly to the Sacred Scriptures and to the said Homilies as you may perceive upon perusal of these my Collections from Scripture and sound Authors Which I humbly recommend to your leisurely serious Considerations hoping you will think it necessary in this degenerate Age to contend for the Faith delivered to the Saints and that your selves so many of you as shall be chosen for the next Parliament which I suppose will not be a few that you will think it worthy your Pains and Labour to indeavour to suppress all Socinian and Arminian Tenets that to uphold Man's Free Will to do good strike at our being saved freely by God's Grace contrary to God's Word We are saved by Grace through Faith and that not of our selves it is the Gift of God Not of Works lest any boast Our Holy Fore-Fathers in the Nations shaking off the Popish Yoke spake plainly We in Christ paid the Debt We in him are fulfillers of the Law He on his Cross made a perfect cleansing of thy Sins But this will not go down with Arminianizers of this day that bring in our Gospel-Holiness to concur with Christ's Righteousness in our Justification This I address to your Pious Thoughts and I suppose not improperly to you as expected Members of the House of Commons hoping the next Parliament may begin where the last left off in taking Care of the True Christian Religion And that you may be the better fortified I quote a Vote of a former House of Commons March 2. 1628. Whosoever shall bring in Innovation of Religion or by Favour or Countenance seem to extend Popery or Arminianism or other Opinion disagreeing from the Truth and Orthodox Church shall be reputed a Capital Enemy to the Kingdom and Common-Wealth VVhich Spirit against Popery
I have loved thee with an Everlasting Love Which Everlasting Love all agree is as well from Eternity past as to Eternity to come and if loved from Eternity what is that short of being then justified For God loved them as he saw them in Christ undertaken for to be justified by his Righteousness But that which goes higher they were the Delight of Christ from all Eternity Prov. 8.26 30 31. While as yet he had not made the Earth I was by him as one brought up with him I was dayly his Delights and my Delights were with the Sons of Men. Here was the high Effect of Eternal Love Jesus Christ the Wisdom of the Father he from all Eternity and in all Eternity he was the Delights of the Father and during the same Eternity the Son's Delights were with or in the Elect given him of the Father Thine they were and thou gavest them me So that there was an Eternal Complacency in the Lord Jesus in and to all that he was to redeem by laying down his Life and if so did not he delight in them as having Grace given to them in Christ before the World was And so he looks on them as Redeemed as Justified and as Sanctified by him though it was not actually accomplished in their Persons yet it was actually concluded between the Father and Son in the Council of Peace Zach. 6.13 and God thereupon took Christ's Word or Covenant for it as if it were actually done upon which account Abraham and all the Old Testament Believers were justified and saved before Christ had actually paid the Ransome for many Thus being undertaken for by Christ from Eternity they were lookt on by God as having a representative being in Christ from all Eternity when chosen in him and Grace given them in him from all Eternity in 2 Tim. 1.9 And this our Representative being from all Eternity in Christ even Mr. Clark himself in his Notes on the Bible was forc d to allow Therefore to renounce absolutely that the Elect are justified in the sight of God before their effectual calling is to bear hard on those Scriptures that declare God's Everlasting Love to them and Christ's Delight in them from all Eternity and Grace given them in Christ before they are effectually called of which see Mr. Pemble and Dr. Twiss by and by §. XIX I cannot pass without a Remark on the different Epithets the Rebuker gives to Socinianism and his Crispian Antinomianism How softly doth he tread on the Graves of Horrid Socinians and how ruffly he deals with the Independants for that which he calls in them Antinomianism It is in fol. 25 where Socinianism he calls but an Error but Antinomianism is Heresie thus The Vnited Brethren had given demonstration against all Socinian Errors They did try these Dissenting Brethren Mr. Griffith Cole Mathers whether they were sound in the Faith in opposition to the Antinomian Heresies of which he gives a Catalogue of 21. So that with them it is but an Error or a small Peccadillo a little Trip to deny the Deity and Satisfaction of our Lord Jesus with the Socinians but it is an Heresie a damning Heresie to say That an Elect Person is in the sight of God justified before effectually called or to say A Believer works from Life and not for Life with those he counts Antinomians O Kratiste Theophile so I call the Rebuker now where is your Zeal for our Lord Jesus to be so favourable to the Socinians as to call it only an Error in them to deny our Lord Christ's Deity §. XX. I cannot but stand in admiration and can scarce believe my Eyes when I look on this Catalogue or Bed-roll of 21 Antinomian Heresies my Dear Kratiste hath loaded his Brethren with for dissenting from Mr. Williams his Gospel-Truth stated a-mis I hope it may not be unprofitable to my self and some others to spend a few Thoughts by searching what the Scriptures of Truth say about them for which I implore the Holy Spirit 's assistance that he would bring to remembrance the blessed Truths therein relating hereunto §. XXI The first is That a Gospel Threat if not a Katachresis is a Bull. This methinks is ridiculously called a Heresie to say a Gospel Threat is a Bull. What of Heresie can you make this But let us see what the Spirit saith concerning the Gospel what it is He saith by the Angel Behold I bring you glad Tidings a Saviour is born or I Gospelize this to you that Christ is born And what is it but a Bull or a Calf like a Bull to put a Threatning to Glad Tidings and call that Gospel One may as well say that Cursed is every one that continues not in all things written in the Law is Gospel as any other Threat But if Curses because written in the New Testament are the Gospel then our Neonomians have done their Business effectually and we have a new Thing a Curse for what they call Gospel besides the Lord Christ's Gospel which is that he Jesus is come to save his People from their Sins not but that the Threat is made use of in the hand of Christ in publishing the Gospel of Salvation by him but to say that the Threat is the Gospel is the same as to say that Condemnation is a Pardon which whether Bull or Calf matters not but to be sure it is very near to a Contradiction and my Dear Kratiste must strain hard to make the saying so to be an Antinomian Heresie But here he marshals it as the Captain-General of the 21 how formidable then must the following 20 be if this Man of Straw must lead the Van that 't is an Heresie to say a Gospel-Threat is a Bull. But leaving this Moon calf §. XXII His second Heresie is That Pardon is rather the Condition of Faith than Faith is of Pardon That is to say That Faith rather flows from Pardon than Pardon from Faith and for any to say so is with him an Antinomian Heresie which is a strange Strain for the Scripture saith We are justified freely by his Grace which Justification includes Pardon then we are Pardoned freely by his Grace not of Works lest any boast if so then we are not pardoned upon account of Faith as a Condition of it but upon account of Christ's Blood washing away our Sins which is called the Righteousness of God and this is received by Faith but Christ with this Righteousness of his first receives or apprehends us and then being apprehended by him we by his Spirit are enabled to apprehend him by Faith and so the Righteousness of God is revealed from Faith to Faith The Apostle doth not say the Righteousness of God wherein our Pardon is included that this is made ours by Faith or that Faith is the Condition of our having it but Faith is that whereto it is revealed to us It was given to us before when Christ first apprehended us but it is Revealed made manifest to
nevertheless is no Encouragement to any to Sin but a Devil and if all works for good to those that love God then though Sin may bring dreadful Chastisements they are for good and not for real hurt to a Believer not that we are to continue in Sin that Grace may abound God forbid §. XXXIX The Fourteenth God is not displeased with his People nor angry with the Persons of Believers for their Sins I answer God saith whom he loves he loves to the end whom he loves he may Rebuke and Chasten and yet not be angry with them he is angry with the Wicked every day but as to his People he is God and changes not and his Kindness endures for ever This is such a Maxim that 't is the conclusion of every Verse of the 136th Psalm we translate it His Mercy endures for ever but the word is chasdo his Kindness 't is that which endures for ever I know the Rebuker loves a learned Testimony from Man to concur with the Word of God take it then from one never accounted an Antinomian though in this as great an one as Dr. Crisp nay such another as the Apostle Paul I say in this particular concerning the Unchangeableness of God's Love to his People even Famous Pemble who saith thus in his Tract of Grace and Faith Fol. 22. I would have you saith he learn a Distinction between God's Love in it self and its Manifestation to us The first is PERPETVAL from all to all Eternity without CHANGE Increase or Lessening towards every one of the Elect But the Manifestation of this to our Consciences begins in time at our Conversion We may truly say that God's Love to us when he decreed to Save us is one and the same without Addition with that which he manifests to us when he glorifies us if not say I there is a Change in God That holy Flame of Love burns as hot to us now as then his Love to their Persons is from Everlasting the same nor doth their Sinfulness lessen it though it may hide it nor their Sanctity increase it because God in loving their Persons never considered them otherwise than as most perfectly Holy and Vnblameable in Christ God approves of their Persons while he disallows their Corruptions and when his fiercest Wrath was shewed against their Sins in the Person of Christ then did God most compassionately love the Persons both of Christ and of all the Elect. O! that our New-law Men would or could well weigh these Passages highly consistent with the Unchangeable unvariable immutable Nature of God This Testimony though but Humane is founded on good Ground I the Lord change not Had Dr. Crisp written this then we had had an Out-cry of Notorious Antinomian Heresie But we must wait at the Throne of Grace in behalf of Opposers for 't is God alone gives Eye-salve to see into the Mystery of the unsearchable Riches of his Grace to poor Sinners in Christ that their Sinfulness doth not lessen his Love to the Elect though he still hates Sin in them as much as if they were Damned to Eternal Burnings for every Sin which is due to them but they are borne and suffered for by our Blessed Lord Jesus the Just for the Unjust by his once Suffering for Sins even for all and every Sin of those given to him from Eternity that he might bring us to God To whom be Glory for ever §. XL. The Fifteenth Heresie as he calls it is Legal Convictions before Saving Faith are no more than Sin it 's but the filthy Conscience polluting Guilt of Sin Answer Surely my Dear Kratiste forgot himself here or rather the Word of God which he should ever steer his Course by Doth not the Scripture say plainly Whatsoever is not of Faith is Sin Rom. 14.23 And doth not the Apostle shew what he got by his Legal Convictions before Faith that the Law wrought in him all manner of Concupiscence Rom. 7. I was alive without the Law but when the Command came when Legal Convictions came Sin revived and I died and Sin taking occasion by the Command or by Legal Convictions wrought in me all manner of Concupiscence Here we see the Fruit of Legal Convictions O! how ill doth it become such as would be accounted Ministers of the Gospel to run thus to Moses and to talk at that rate as if any Work of ours before true Faith were ought but Sin and if Sin it must be Conscience-polluting And where is the Heresie now If there be Sin in our best Duties after Faith or else why was the High Priest to have a Plate of Gold on his Fore-head to take away the Iniquity of their Holy Things what then are Works before Faith but Conscience-polluting I desire my Kratiste to take another Turn with the Reverend Assembly and see what they say of this viz. Works done by Vnregenerate Men because they proceed not from an Heart purified by Faith they are sinful Titus 1.15 To the Defiled and Vnbelieving is nothing pure §. XLI The Sixteenth All imperfect Holiness is Sin This methinks the Rebuker may blush to mention for an Heresie seeing the Scripture saith He that errs in one point is guilty of all and Cursed is he that continues not in all things written in the Book of the Law to do them So that the discontinuance a moment from doing all things commanded in the Law brings a Curse if there be but the least Deviation from the perfect Rule So that if our Holiness be in the least short of the full Requirement of the Law it brings a Curse which it could not do if it were not Sin But here lies the Core the Heart of the Armenian Spirit as I take it That God accepts imperfect Holiness for Christ's sake in the stead of perfect As for the first part that God accepts imperfect Holiness for Christ's sake the Orthodox do hold but it is only as Christ hath taken away the Sin of the Imperfection by his once offering himself for all the Sins of the Elect but God never accepts it as perfect or in the stead of perfect that would be to accept it for what it is not much less doth God accept us for our imperfect Holiness Besides the Scripture saith All our Righteousnesses are as filthy Rags What is that but Sin And the Assembly say The best Works wrought by us are defiled and if so then 't is no Heresie to say All imperfect Holiness is Sin And one would wonder how it should enter into the Thoughts of these Antagonists to subscribe what they have done of the Assemblies Confession and yet assert that to be Heresie which is owned by them for solid Truth §. XLII The seventeenth Heresie is to say Turn ye Turn ye why will you dye is but the triumph of the Law over a dead Sinner Answer The bare outward Call to Sinners to turn you will grant is not sufficient to turn them for they are by Nature dead
standing in Christ's Person being found in him having put on Christ and his Righteousness as the Apostle Paul hath it in Phil. 3.9 who according to some Mens way of dogmatizing and making Antinomians is the King-leader of them all by saying as we frequently must quote That God made him Sin for us and us the Righteousness of God in him I must beg Pardon for casting this Salt so oft into the bitter Waters to make them sweet these two Passages into their Broth of Antinomianism and until you race them out of the Bible they will be a good defence of the Change of Persons between Christ and Sinners §. LXX These Two Pillars are the Jakin and Boaz Establishment and Strength in him that King Solomon our Lord Jesus hath erected before the Temple the Basis of the Commutation of Persons Christ made Sin for us and Righteousness to us and I am sure The Gates of Hell will never prevail against them let the Socinians or Deists or Quietists and let their Friends the Arminians be never so rampant One Athanasius one Hylary one Mr. Cole could withstand Ten Thousand Batteries and be no more shaken than a pair of Three penny Fellows can shake down the Monument and so extinguish the Memory of the Papists burning of London in 1666 witness Mr. Cole's sealing his Doctrine with Triumph at his departure dying in the Joy of what he had preach'd though by Mr. Williams called Mysterious Nonsense he saying a little before his Death in opposition to our Modern 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the resisters of the Truth Now I can spit in the Face of the Devil and so dyed in the Joy of having preach'd the Doctrine of Justification by Free Grace through Christ without any Works of ours concurring thereunto §. LXXI In Page 43 he asks Where has this Doctrine of Justification been settled all this while since the Reformation This is just copying after the Papists Where was your Religion before Luther We answer It was in the Scripture and in abundance of faithful Witnesses and so was this Doctrine in particular Read but the Apostle Paul and he 'll tell you where it was settled viz. In our being chosen in Christ before the World was and in Grace given us then in him and in Christ's being made Sin for us and the Righteousness of God to us Besides if you will read Calvin Twiss and Luther with multitudes more in your Study you will find how they settled it Antisozzo hath it in part also and why may not Dr. Tho. Goodwin come in for an Author O no now I remember a great Reason for said Kratiste he speaks in his Treatise on the Ephesians of the Spirit himself dwelling in Believers but I utterly deny it said he And I affirm said he he dwells in Believers only by his gracious Operations To which was opposed The Spirit himself witnesses with our Spirits that we are the Children of God And besides the Rebuker 't is like will say he is as dreadful an Antinomian as wild a Monster as the Dregs of it Dr. Crisp therefore I will not allow him to be an Author in this great Point of Justification for he is all for Free Grace §. LXXII He proceeds It is strange to me That Councils General and Provincial Synods Assemblies of Holy Learned Men should so oft so strenuously assert and confirm by the Word of God this great Truth and yet never once dream of Dr. Crisp ' s Commutation of Persons upon which to superstruct the Doctrine of Justification But it will appear more strange by and by I am perswaded that my Dear Kratiste with his Eagle-eyed Talent should so far over-shoot himself as to talk as if he had read all Councils and Synods c. when it will appear he has not well read our English Homilies setting forth clear Gospel-Truth in the Doctrine of the Church of England He is got into a large Field with a mighty Challenge like a Goliah defying all Councils c. to shew the Commutation of Persons He wages War under the Banner of all Councils c. as he thinks whereas one little David with a Stone out of the Brook of Life the River that makes glad the City of God one Text of Scripture will answer all his Rodomantado Challenge What if Councils c. that contract principal Articles of Faith into short Terms have not used the Doctor 's very words yet if they are consonant to Scripture one would think they may pass without such a strangeness Are there no Sentences in Antisozzo and Melius that are not in Synods and Councils and yet pass for Authentick I am confident the Doctor could not think it worth his while to tumble over the Records of all Councils c. to authorise him to speak to the Rebuker's approbation if the Scripture do but warrant him in his Change of Persons 't is enough and that is very abundant in Terms that may bear him out As where it speaks of Christ in us the hope of Glory do not we sustain his Person there or rather he being in us our hope he sustains our Persons in hope It speaks of our putting off our Sins in the circumcision of Christ Col. 3.11 which cannot be otherwise than by Christ's sustaining our Persons when he was circumcised and so our putting off our Sins is by our being in him representatively when the Fore-Skin of Christ's Flesh was cut off in order to the putting off our Sins in our Faith in a circumcised Christ It speaks of our being buried with him of our being raised in him of our being found in him What is this but a Change or Commutation of Persons I live saith the Apostle yet not I but Christ lives in me Is not this a Change of Person that answers Dr. Crisp's Commutation And yet still we are not Christ Personal but Christ Mystical and Christ was not Paul Personal but Paul and all Believers Mystical as sustaining their Persons as many Eminent Divines besides the Doctor speak without being accounted strange Monsters §. LXXIII For further Satisfaction in this great Point I refer the Rebuker to the great Pains of Dr. Chancy who hath gathered the Sentiments of very great Men among whom take this of Luther on Gal. 3.14 who saith It behoveth him to bear the Punishment and Wrath of God not for his own Person but for our Persons and so making A HAPPY CHANGE with us he took upon him our Sinful Person and gave unto us his Innocent and Victorious Person Is not this as monstrous a wild Sense as Dr. Crisp's But my Dear Kratiste hath more Sense than to call this new uncooth unintelligible Non-sense because of the great Name of Martin Luther Another of Dr. Chancy's Quotations is out of Mr. Stone of New England no Antinomian unless made so by the Rebuker he adds in the same Page 102 of Dr. Chancy There must be an Exchange between the Mediator and us 1 Tim. 2.6 There must be an
Exchange of Person for Person which is the surest Exchange in War or Captivity when nothing but one Person will be taken in the room of another §. LXXIV One would wonder how it should happen that my Dear Kratiste and his Friends should be ignorant of such Passages as these so as he should speak as if this Term was never dream'd of before when the Great Luther is so precise in the Term and other Excellent Men. Therefore I beseech you be not too confident of your grasping all Things in all Councils Synods and Assemblies lest you lose all O how much better is it to say with the Apostle He that thinketh he knoweth any thing knoweth nothing as he ought to know it and with Agur I have not the Vnderstanding of a Man than to Challenge all the World with what is said in all Councils General and Provincial The humble he will teach and the mock he will gâ—â—â—â— in Judgment Which the Lord grant to us all and that we may be ever learning of our Blessed Lord and Master to be meek and lowly §. LXXV My Dear Kratiste goes farther in Bontering the Phrases of Christ's taking our Person and we his Person and spares not to call them Apocryphal Phrases though they are such as many Holy Men have made use of to clear up the great and comfortable Doctrine of Christ's being our Surety and making Satisfaction for us Well may he call Tobias Apocryphal if he calls his great Teacher under Christ the Apostle Paul Apocryphal as I shall shew by and by He is pleased to come forth in great State in Page 49 as my Lord Chief Baron of the Exchequer with his Quo Warranto against the Commutation of Persons and thus Harangues the World Quo Warranto Why must all the World be Hereticated that dare not subscribe to these Apocryphal Phrases which neither Scripture nor Antient Fathers nor General nor Particular Councils nor Synods nor Assemblies nor single Churches ever brought into their Creeds c. What a scampering flourish is here over all Councils Fathers c. circuating the Universe as if our Author were the Magazine of all Learning and had fortified himself on every side against this Change of Persons and Christ's sustaining our Person as if the Phrase were intollerably uncooth I shall only attack one Fort which is the first Out-Fort the Scripture and if that be taken he must yield all the rest The Scripture is the Pillar and Ground of Truth We will see if that doth not bring into our Creed this Term of Christ's bearing our Person and we his Person or that which is plainly tantamount doth not the Apostle say Col. 2.6 7. As ye have received the Lord Jesus Christ so walk in him Rooted and built up in him What is this but to be in his Person by Faith joined to the Lord and so he coming one Spirit as the Apostle saith which is the same as to be one Person But as if God would at once by one stroke quell all the Quarrels and Exceptions against the Truth and calling it unintelligible Nonsense as in Truth it is to the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Philosophers he condescends to the very Term of our being in the person of Christ and saith in 2 Cor. 2.10 by the Apostle Paul If I forgave any thing for your sakes forgave I it in the Person of Christ What thinks my Dear Kratiste now Is this Term so novel as never to be brought into our Creed by Scripture Councils or Fathers O how good is it to be humble and not to tower to the top of all Learning denying this phrase to be in Scripture Fathers or Councils when at the very threshold we see one may fall For here the very express Scripture uses the phrase of the Apostles being in the Person of Christ and forgiving an offending Brother in the Person of Christ And so I hope we shall all learn to forgive one another and not to rebuke with immoderate strains as our Rebuker hath very unwarrantably done in charging the Doctor with wild monstrous Sense and Apocryphal Phrases when he speaks the Apostle Paul's Language §. LXXVI I hope you will allow the Apostle to bring this Term of our sustaining Christ's person into our Credenda or Things to be believed though the Doctor whom for it you charge with Antinomian Heresie may not use the word without a severe Lash Is this to learn of our Lord Jesus who would excuse his Disciples under failings and not presently bring them to the block much less would he tax them with a wild monstrous Sense of Things when they spake only the Sense of the Scriptures But why this Expression should be Heresie in the Doctor though Orthodox in the Apostle I can quickly tell It being I reckon from his having some Mens persons in admiration Our Kratiste having some time since prest hard on the Conscience of Mr. Williams he is now raising up his Reputation which he might suppose this a proper way for by loading the Doctor with the Title of a Dreggy Apocryphal Heretick because Mr. Williams had written so much against him in his Gospel-Truth stated and so the Rebuker here seconding Mr. Williams in aspersing the Doctor would redintegrate the said Mr. Williams into the good esteem of those who had occasion given them for low Thoughts of him upon account of what the Rebuker had reflected on Now to make him amends if Mr. Williams hath criminated the Doctor the Rebuker must do so also or how can Mr. Williams stand Rectus in Curia or in statu quo with those who had taken some Offence at those Things he was charged with So that Things being thus Mr. Williams being to be redintegrated into publick applause now if Mr. Williams say I deny a Change Kratiste can do no less than say The term of a Change is novel and unintelligible If Mr. Williams say This is Dr. Crisp ' s Error or Mistake Kratiste will exemplifie enlarge and perfect the Crimination and call it Heresie Which how Christian like it is or the contrary I hope the Lord will one day convince him §. LXXVII In Page 51 he offers us a moot Point worthy to be taken notice of thus I would propound a moot Point whether the Socinians who have blasphemously degraded the Person of Christ into a God by Office though a meer Man by Nature or the Antinomians who own him to be a God by Nature yet affirm him to have been a Sinner the greatest of Sinners nay Sinfulness it self do more derogate from the Honour of our Redeemer For Answer This is so far from being a moot Point that it is no point at all unless you can find any of your Antinomians that assert what you here say they affirm You cannot but know your Antinomians own and assert strenuously That the Lord Jesus was ever holy harmless separate from Sin a Lamb without spot in his own person being perfect God and perfect Man nay they
Penalty of Sin may be inflicted there 's a necessity that the Guilt of Sin be imputed Now to talk of Guilt imputed and not the Fault is Nonsense For what Guilt is there where there is no Fault Did Christ bare Sin and Guilt without Fault Then he bare faultless Sin and faultless Guilt which is ridiculous Well but my Dear Kratiste goes on currently for his Antinomians and saith It 's impossible indeed that we should personally have committed Adam 's Sin or performed that very Obedience which Christ performed but not impossible that the Disobedience of the one or Obedience of the other should be reckoned AS committed and performed by us How doth this agree with his equal Astonishment and Indignation at the horrid Opinion to say That the Fault of Sin was laid upon Christ O! that he would humbly own his hasty heat O! that he might recover himself and return to the Truths he owned in Antisozzo and not call it an horrid Opinion That the Fault was laid on Christ when himself owns the Guilt was lest he exasperate his tart Answerers to call him not only an Ecclesiastical Droll but a Terrae Filius Droll to talk of Guilt without Fault This might possibly occasion that severe Reflection of Fits in the Rebuker not fit to be mentioned but meliora speramus we hope better Things and such as accompany Salvation by his freeing himself from halting in the Point of Christ's Satisfaction which the Reporter chargeth him with §. CIX I proceed to convince if it may please God my Dear Kratiste of his unbenign Temper in his treating the Opposers of Mr. Williams in Pa. 60. O! how unlike are those Passages to any thing we find of our beloved Lord and Master Jesus the meek and lowly who had no Guile in his Mouth and who being reviled reviled not again But so it fares not with the Rebuker who though he was not reviled in the Report yet he Banters and Jeers his Friends that concur not with him in Page 60 with this Expression speaking of his Opposers he saith of them They will make no farther Contest with Mr. Williams I mistake saith the Rebuker but private Whisperings and evil Surmizes and insinuated Slanders and clandestine Reproaches may be multiplyed while Mr. Williams lives O what a dire Charge is here in this climax and constellation of Accusations Here are Whisperings Surmises Slanders and Reproaches and these epethited with being private evil insinuated and clandestine Nay 't is to be feared they will feed upon his Carcase See here what Cannibals he makes all the Gospel-Ministers that cannot that ought not to concur with Mr. Williams his unsound stating of Gospel-Truth May not Men write and plead for the Truth which it is obvious Mr. Williams hath wronged as on that Text Phil. 3.9 but they must be invidiously loaded as above O my Dear Kratiste I beseech the Lord to mollifie your Temper and to give you an humble broken Gospel-Sense of your too much giving way through the Temptation of the Floridness of your Stile to an excess of Carnal Passion in your Rebuke Doth not the blessed Apostle tell us in 2 Tim. 4.2 that his beloved Timothy though but a Young Divine that he should rebuke with all long-suffering How much more is it a Duty for the Elder Divines to exercise long suffering yea all long-suffering in their Rebukes cujus contrarium we see Some talk of having a Commission from all the Systematical Divines as Antisozzo had but I fear you have exceeded that as well as the Apostle's Admonition in your Rebuke to the Report §. CX Are all accounted by the Rebuker as Cannibals that write against Mr. Williams How then shall I escape who put my Mite into the Treasury of pleading for Free Grace Every one hath not a Face of Brass neither doth God say to all Contenders for the Truth as he did to Ezekiel in Ezek. 3.9 As an Adamant harder than a Flint have I made thy Forehead therefore fear them not and must we not therefore plead for Truth for fear of being called Man-Eaters I hope my Dear Kratiste will remember what Antisozzo saith in his Preface That Austin would have every Man that can hold a Pen write against Pelagius that sworn Enemy to free discriminating effectual Grace And if so why may not the Reporter or any Pen-Man write against Mr. Williams and all those Forty Nine Vouchers who declares That a degree of our Gospel-Obedience to a Law that admits Sin doth concur to our Justification quite contrary to the Scripture which saith We are justified freely by his Grace through the Redemption that is in Jesus Are we bound to contend earnestly for the Faith and will you load with multiplyed Sarcasms those that cannot swallow such distastful Morsels as he cuts out Such as this That our being found in Christ Phil. 3.9 is principally meant of being found in our own Gospel-Holiness Than which nothing is a greater misprision of Treason against the Righteousness of Christ imputed to Sinners for their Justification O! that God would shew that such prophane words do eat as doth a Gangreen What bring in our Holiness to sit jigg by joul with Christ's perfect Righteousness And for opposing this shall the Servants of the Lord be accounted Cannibals to feed on Mr. Williams his Flesh §. CXI The next hard word bestowed on Free-Grace maintainers is calling them Bigots nay Bigots that never will forgive That is because they do and must contend for the Truth therefore they are accounted implacable Though I am bound to forgive all Injuries done to my self am I ever bound to suffer the Truth to be invaded and silently to sit down satisfied with it Was not meek Moses in a Transport when Aaron made the Calf yet not implacable Must many whole Churches of our Lord Jesus be called unforgiving Bigots for holding fast the Faith once delivered to the Saints Is not the Spirit to war against Fleshly Principles as long as they war against the Spirit O! that my Dear Kratiste might obtain to descend from his lofty strain and follow our dear Lord who dyed for us leaving us an Example that we should follow his steps in being meek and lowly of Heart and not fly into Astonishment and Indignation for being mildly opposed §. CXII O! how unlike is this treatment of this Rebuker to the treatment our blessed Lord Jesus gave to his Disciples when instead of watching with him when he was under the dreadful conflict in his Agony and instead of praying with him they fell a snoring Did he scour them off as our Rebuker has done No he sweetly gently mildly reproves them with an Excuse The Spirit is willing but the Flesh is weak Nay when they call'd for Fire from Heaven on the Samaritans doth he call them wild Monsters as our Rebuker No but tenderly reproves them Ye know not what Spirit ye are of He doth not cast Fire-brands Arrows and Death at them calling them horrid