of our Children to love the Lord our God with all our hearts to take the stony heart out of our bowells and give us an heart of flesh and to put his own spirit within us as he seeth our waies so to heale them yea to heale our back-slidings to heale our rebellions All this this sweet comforter takes no notice of contenting himselfe with such a grace to be merited for him by Christ as this if he will believe he shall believe if he will repent he shall repent if he will love God with all his heart he shall love him with all his heart Yet when a man doth believe they are able to give him no assurance of his salvation or of his election because they maintaine that a man may totally and finally fall away from grace And all because their doctrine is that Gods effectuall grace in working the act of faith and repentance is given meerely according to mens works Tempted God purposed that his Sonne should dye for all men and that in his name an offer of remission of sinnes and salvation should be made to every one but yet upon this condition that they will doe that which he meanes the greatest part shall never doe i. e. Repent and believe nor I among the rest CONSIDERATION How doth God meane that the greatest part of men shall never believe and repent by our opinion Is it in this sence that they shall not believe and repent if they will When was it ever knowne that any of our Divines ever wrote or taught this We think rather it is impossible it should be otherwise therefore say it is a very absurd thing to call this Grace as the Arminians doe Indeed we say that God doth not meane by his preventing grace to work the wills of the greatest part of men to believe repent Doe not the Arminians say so too Yes verily and a great deale more for they deny that he workes any mans will to believe and repent in this manner but we say God purchaseth thus to worke the wills of all his chosen ones and when he hath wrought them to keepe them by his power through faith unto Salvation and put his feare in their hearts that they shall never depart a way from him Jer 32. 40. And upon this ground we can assure believers of their election which Arminians cannot And them that believe not keepe from dispaire in better manner then the Arminians can for they leave them to themselves to believe whereas the Scriptures shew that to be impossible so that they take upon them to comfort such quite against the haire But we comfort them with a possibility of being converted unto God by representing his allmighty power whose voyce is able to pierce into the graves and make dead Lazarus heare it This power he shewed in converting Saul when he marched furiously Jehu like against the Church of God Therfore be thou of good comfort especially considering thou art as it were under the wings of God thou hearest his voyce many come out of their graves at his call some at one time some at another and so maist thou God knowes how soone then shalt thou be assured of thine election which by Arminianisme thou canst not be in the meane time thou hast no cause to conclude that thou art a Reprobate Minister God hath a true meaning that all men who are called should repent and believe that so they might be saved as he would have all to be saved so to come to the knowledge of the truth and as he would have no man to perish so he would have all men to repent and therefore he calls them in the Preaching of the word to the one as well as to the other CONSIDERATION He keepes his course to afford thee the best comfort his doctrine yeelds which is as much as is incident to a Reprobate and how that should make thee conceive better of thy selfe then as of a Reprobate I doe not perceive Gods meaning is that as many as heare the Gospell should believe and repent ex officio that is that it shall be their duty for he commands it but he hath no meaning to bestow on all and every one the grace of faith and repentance as appeares by experience And if God did will they should de facto believe and be saved then either God is not able to bring them to faith and to save them or else his will is changed In like sort if it were his will that all and every one should know his truth then God is not able to make all and every one know his truth for it is apparent that all doe not it is apparent that all have not the Gospell The Apostle saith That God will not have any of us to perish but all to come to repentance he doth not say he would but he will And this is true of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 such as the Apostle speakes of believers and elect But as for others the Scriptures plainly professe that God blinds them hardens them and of Israell in the wildernesse The Lord saith Moses hath not given you an heart to perceive nor eyes to see nor eares to heare unto this day Deut 29. 4. He calls all that heare the Gospell indifferently by the Ministry of the Word but he openeth not the heart of all to attend unto it as to the Word of God like as we read he opened the heart of â—idia Acts. 16. 14. Tempted God hath a double call outward by his word inward by the irresistible work of his spirit with this he doth not call every man to believe but a very few only whom he hath infallibly and inevitably ordained to eternall life and therefore by the outward call which I enjoy among many others I cannot be assured of Gods good will and meaning that I shall believe repent and be saved CONSIDERATION Our Doctrine teacheth not that God calls every one by his Word that is an Arminian interjection But the outward call belongs to many more then are chosen as our Saviour sayth many are called but few are chosen Indeed he gives faith and repentance to a very few which no Arminian denyes only the Question is Whether God gives faith and repentance to whom he will or according to mens works We saytis to whom he will proceeding herein according to the meere pleasure of his will and not according to mens workes which to affirme is manifest Pelagianisme and publikely condemned many hundred yeares agoe It is true if thou dost not believe Gods Word doth not assure thee that he will make thee believe that were to assure thee of thine election before thy vocation a most unreasonable thing to be expected But God by his word assures thee that t is his meaning that without faith thou shalt not be saved Yet there is no cause thou shouldest think thy selfe a Reprobate for this was the condition of every one of Gods elect before their calling
God willing it he denies not any more then Beza doth that it comes to passe by God's permission of it But Calvin rests not in a bare permissions and no marvaile For the Scripture saith not that God permitted Pharaoh to refuse to let Israel goe but plainly and energetically thus I will harden Pharaoh's heart that he shall not let Israel goe I will harden Pharaoh's heart that he shall follow after them I will rent the Kingdome from Solomon not I will permit it to be rented and so throughout Bellarmine himselfe contents not himselfe with a bare permission but farther saith God doth rule and governe the wills of wicked men yea torquet flectit he wrests and bends them And Austin often saith he enclines them unto evill And whereas it is farther added out of Calvin that a man is blind volente jubente Deo God willing and commanding it Is it not expresse Scripture Es 6. 10. Make the heart of this people fat make their eares heavy and shut their eyes So that Calvin doth but accomodate himselfe to Scripture phrase But when we come to the explication of this either in Christian reason or by comparing one place of Scripture with an other we say that to Make their hearts fat their eares heavy and to shut their eys And to give them the Spirit of slumber eyes that they should not see and eares that they should not heare Is no more then not to give them hearts to perceive nor eyes to see nor eares to heare Yet where Calvin saith this I cannot find the quotation here is so disturbed but I guesse the Authour would referre us to lib. 1. Institut cap. 18. prima secunda Sect But I find no such thing there but speaking of God's providence in blinding Ahab thus he writes Vult Deus perfidum Ahab decipi God will have perfidious Ahab to be deceived This is plaine out of the 1 Kings 22. 20. Who shall entise Ahab that he may goe and fall at Ramoth Gilead operam suam offert Diabolus ad eam rem The Divell offers his service for this saith Calvin And doth not the Scripture expresly testifie as much There came forth a Spirit and stood before the Lord and said I will entise him And the Lord said unto him wherewith And he said I will goe out and be a false Spirit in the mouth of all his Prophets Calvin goes on Mittitur cum certo mandato ut sit Spiritus mendax in ore omnium Prophetarum God sends him with a certaine command to become a lying Spirit in the mouth of all Ahab's Prophets This also the Scripture testifies as expresly as the former Then the Lord said thou shalt entise him and prevaile also Goe forth and doe so Now let the indifferent judge whether this Authour might not as well calumniate the Holy Ghost the Inditer of this Scripture as Calvin who proceeds but according unto Scripture in that which he delivers Now let every sober man judge whether hereby it doth not manifestly appeare Excoecari Achabum that Ahab was blinded by the Devill Deo volente ac jubente the Lord willing and commanding it but this taken apart from the instance in reference whereunto it is delivered a man might suspect his meaning were that God commands a man to shut his own eyes blind himselfe And judge I pray whether to say that this whole providence of God concerning Ahab was no more then permission deserves not to be called figmentum a fiction as indeed Calvin calleth it To this he addes the joynt profession of the Apostles touching God's providence in crucifying of Christ in Absalom's incest the Chaldees bloudy execution in the land of Iuda and the Assyrians before them which in Scripture is called the worke of God c. And concludes it to be manifest Nugari eos ineptire qui in locum providentiae Dei nudam permissionem substituunt that they doe but toy and trifle who in place of God's providence substitute a naked permission And this Authour doth but calumniate Calvin's expression in rendring the word ineptire by playing the foole Ineptire in the proprietie thereof is in this case to faile of fit and congruous interpretation and accommodation And may he not justly taxe those who understand such Scriptures as speake of God's smiting men with the Spirit of slumber and giddinesse of blinding their mindes infatuating and hardning their hearts of a permission and suffering of men to be blinded and hardned I had thought common sense might have justified him in this taking Calvin aright who denies not permission in all this but nudam permissionem naked permission as much as to say these Scripture passages doe signifie more then permission And as I have said before Bellarmin himselfe doth not satisfie himselfe with a naked permission in such like providence divine as here is mentioned I thinke he may justly say that to explicate excecation and obduration by permission is such an explication as will satisfie no sober man and that such a solution is too frivolous And as for God's prescience it is apparent that the horrible outrages committed upon the holy Son of God the Scripture testifies not to have been foreknowen only by God but by the hand and counsell of God predetermined also more then this cleare reason doth justifie that the ground of God's foreknowing ought is his foredetermining of it as I have often proved by invincible demonstration 2. Who mistakes the nature of permission most we or this censurer let the indifferent judge It is apparent that he puts no difference between permission humane and permission Divine Sure I am Suarez requires to permission divine a concurrence to the act the obliquity whereof is permitted And more then that both Scotus of old without question and the Dominicans of late and Bradwardine before them maintaine this concurrence to be by way of determining the will to every act thereof But all these mistake the nature of permission if we believe this Authour upon his word wherein he carrieth himselfe very authoritatively no Pope like him Yet he is ready to give his reason for it though with manifest contradiction to himselfe but let us consider it 1. Permission is an act of God's consequent and judiciary will by which he punisheth men for abusing their freedom c. Most untrue and manifestly convictable of untruth by that which himselfe delivered but a little before in this very Section where he said It is true that God hath decreed to suffer sinne for otherwise there would be none By this it is manifest that whensoever sinne is committed there had place God's permission of sinne otherwise there would have been no sinne therefore permission had place in the very first sinne that was committed by man and Angells Judge Reader with what felicity he comes to censure and correct the mistakes of others about permission As Austin sometimes said of one opposing him noverit se esse
prduce a vitall act hath life in him and consequently whosoever hath power to produce any act of the life of grace hath the life of grace in him But the acts of faith and repentance are the acts of the life of grace therefore whosoever hath power to produce these hath in him the life of grace But this is not true of all for the Scripture testifies of some that they are dead in sinne Ephes 2. 1. Are strangers from the life of God Ephes 4. 18. Againe then all should be regenerated but that is untrue for regeneration is signified Psal 19. in Scripture to be wrought by the word of God 1 Peter 1. 23. Iam. 1. 17. But all have not the word of God 4. If a man hath power to believe and repent then the reason why a man doth not believe and repent is not because he cannot but because he will not so that in the issue it comes to this that a man may believe if he will repent if he will But such a power is not grace but nature rather as appears by Austin l. 1. de Gtnesi contra Manich. cap. 3. where he professeth that omnes possunt credere si velint now compare this with that he hath in the same place where though he saith that omnes credere possint si velint yet posse credere simply taken ariseth meerely out of the gift of charity which he professeth to be gratiae fidelium de praedest Sanct. c. 5. But there he professeth that posse habere fidem is naturae hominum the very naturall condition of all men I farther prove it by reason thus Look by what power I can believe if I will by the same power I can refuse to believe if I will Now such a power is no other then whereby a man is indifferent to doe good or evill but such a condition is not grace for grace is goodnesse now goodnesse doth not dispose any either to good or evill indifferently but precisely to that which is good like as naughtinesse disposeth a man only to that which is evill He sleepes so sweetly upon his Arminian pillow that his very dreames make him confident of the evidence of his deductions And he gives reasons for it and that of most force for conviction namely the confession of his adversaries the maintainers of absolute reprobation for even they he saith doe not deny this but ascribe unto God sanctam simulationem duplicem personam duplicem voluntatem But he names none content to sing to himself his Muses throughout when he relats what our sides answer to his profound discourses And I commend his wisdome more then his honesty in this for if he had quoted his Authors herein it may be something might have bin discovered that would be little pleasing unto him yet herein he confounds things much different for as for a double will ascribed unto God all the Learned doe acknowledge so much and the Scriptures testify it as namely that his decree is called the will of God as what the Lord willeth that hath he done both in heaven and in earth and who hath resisted his will as also that Gods commandement is called usually the will of God as This is the will of God even your sanctification that every one should know how to possesse his vessell in holinesse and honour and not in the lust of concupiscence as the Gentiles doe which know not God 1 Thes 4. 4 5. as for duplicem personam that is a phrase which I never read before yet the phrase of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is usually in the Holy Scripture as when God takes unto him both the members of a mans body and the passions of his mind and so speakes in the way of condescension to our infirmities as to put upon himselfe the person of a man and this is undenyable by all that are not Anthropomorphites And as touching our blessed Saviour we acknowledge in him duplicem naturam a double nature though not duplicem personam a double person and accordingly sometimes he both speakes of himselfe and is spoken of as touching the nature of his God-head and sometimes as touching the nature of his Man-hood As for the first that alone is materiall to his present purpose namely as touching Sancta Simulatio ascribed unto God by our Divines Now it were worth the while to know who is his Author in this and that of the passages alleadged by this Author doth professe that they doe represent in God an holy kind of simulation How could he exspect that this should give any satisfaction seeing he conceales the Author of it And what reader would not be moved with a very greedy desire to know the Author of such an interpretation of the passages alleadged by this Divine that he might consider whether it be rightly alleadged or no and if rightly with what sobriety they deliver it Now I remember well to have read in Piscator that the Scripture attributes in a certaine place Simulation unto Christ not in any passage of this nature wee treat of as namely Luke 24. 28. Where it is said he made as though hee would goe farther like enough to irritate their devotions and to provoke their zealous desire so much the more to retaine him a little longer And I willingly professe not the Simulation but the Dissimulation of this Author in this case hath stirred up a desire in me to be satiâ—fied as touching the Author of this Sancta Simulatio Now I find in Piscator his answer to Vorstius his Parascâ—uen the first part pag. 29. both that place of simulation attributed unto Christ out of Luke 24. 28. And also how that in the examples of Gods messages sent to Hezekiah that he should dye and not live And to the Ninevites by Jonah Yet forty daies and Nineve shall be destroyed his opinion is that therein God doth signify care se velle quod non vult His words are these Adhaec etsi Deus interdum significet se velle quod non vult non tamen propterea hypocriseos insimulandus est for this Vorstius objected unto him Sed potius sapientia ejus agnoscenda in hominibus ad serias preces seriam poenitentiam adducendis ut liquet in exemplo Begis Ezekiae recuperantis sanitatem Ninivitarum conservatorum and whereas Vorstius laies to his charge that in saying God commands one thing and purposeth another he doth impute unto God Hypocrisy which is the very substance of this Authors answere in this place See I pray how he answers it without attributing any holy simulation at all unto God in this case Ad praecepta vero quod attinet non statim sequitur Deum agere Hipocritam si quid praecipiat quod fieri nolit etenim hypocritam is demum agit qui simulat pietatem quâ caret Sane quicquid praecipit Deus id vult voluntare approbante si fiat nisi interveniat praeceptum contrarium ut factum est in
for hereby many times men are drawen full sore against their wills to doe that which they would not It is true God's power cannot be resisted but neither hath any man any will to resist that motion of God whereby he workes agreable to their natures then indeed there were place for resisting If the Lord carrieth on a covetous person such as Achan to covet a wedge of gold and a Babylonish garment and coveting it move him accordingly to take it and convey it away secretly and hide it in his tent what resistance doth he make in all this Or what is done in all this lesse agreably to his covetous disposition then to the disposition of Toades and Addars when he moves them according to their nature to sting and poyson So he moved the Babylonians compared to Serpents and Cockatrices to sting a wicked people Doe not the Scriptures plainly professe that God did send them Is not Assur in this respect called the Rod of God's wrath and the staffe in his hand Was it not called the Lords indignation Is he not compared to an axe and a sawe shall the axe boast it selfe against him that heweth therewith Or shall the saw extoll it selfe against him that moveth it Still he confounds the act with the sinfulnesse thereof speaking of God's producing sinnes whereas sinne is never produced it being only an obliquity consequent unto the act of such a worker as is subject to a law And our Adversaries confesse that God is the cause of the act as well as we Yet will they not hereby be driven to professe that in producing the act he produceth the sin As for that which he speaks of Inforcing we may well pitty him that when he wants strength of reason he supplies that by phrases We deny that God inforceth any man's will Nay it is the generall rule of Schooles that voluntas non potest cogi the will cannot be forced We maintaine that every act of the will especially in naturall things such as a sinfull act must needs be for only gracious acts are supernaturall is not only voluntary which is sufficient to preserve it from being forced but free also by as much libertie as the creature is capable of only we deny that the will of man is primum liberum a first free agent that is the prerogative of God alone the first mover of all and the supreme Agent thus I have dispatched my answer to his first reason consisting of three parts I come unto the second Sect 4. If we could find out a King that should so carry himselfe in procuring the ruine and the offences of any Subjects as by this opinion God doth in the affecting of the damnation and transgressions of Reprobates we would all charge him with the ruine and sinnes of those his Subjects Who would not abhorre saith Moulin a King speaking thus I will have this man hangâ—d and that I may hang him justly I will have him murder or steale This King saith he should not only make an innocent man miserable sed sceleratum but wicked too and should punish him for that offence cujus ipse causa esset of which himselfe was the cause It is a cleare case Tiberius as Suetonius reports having a purpose to put some Virgins to death because it was not lawfull among the Romans to strangle Virgins caused them all to be deflouered by the hang-man that so they might be strangled Who will not say that Tiberius was the principall Authour of the deflouring of those Maides In like manner say the Supralapsarians God hath a purpose of putting great store of men to the second death but because it is not lawfull for him by reason of his justice to put to death men innocent and without blame he hath decreed that the Devill shall defloure them that afterwards he may damne them It followeth therefore that God is the maine cause of those their sinnes If a King should carry himselfe as God did in hardning Pharaoh's heart that he should not let Israel goe and when he had let Israel goe to harden his heart that he should follow after them we would acknowledge such a one not to be man but God And then surely whatsoever our Arminians would thinke of such a one we would thinke noe otherwise then Solomon did of him of whom he professed that he made all things for himselfe even the wicked against the day of evill If God doth but permit a man to will this or that necesse est saith Arminius it must needs be ut nullo argumentorum genere persuadeatur ad nolendum that noe kind of argument shall perswade such one to abstaine from willing it And I hope Arminius hath as great auhority with this Authour as Mr. Moulin deserves to have with us Noe King hath power to dispense any such providence as this St. Paul tells us plainly that God hath ordained some unto wrath and as he hath made of the same lumpe some vessells unto honour so hath he made other vessells unto dishonour The Lord professeth that he kept Abimelech from sinning against him Thus the Lord could deale with all if it pleased him Why doth he not is it not for the manifestation of his own glory For to this purpose he hath made all things And that he suffers with long patience vessells of wrath prepared to destruction And what to doe doth he suffer them But to continue and persevere in their sinfull courses without repentance the Apostle plainly tells us that it is to declare his wrath and make his power known This is not the voice of any Doctor of ours now a dayes but of St. Paul And shall Mr. Moulin be brought in to affront St. Paul For recompence let the Jesuits be heard to whom the nation of the Arminians are beholden for their principall grounds Wherefore doth God give effectuall grace unto one and not unto another but because he hath elected the one and rejected the other And I appeale to every sober Christian whether the absolutenesse of reprobation doth not as invincibly follow herehence as the absolutenesse of Election But touching Mr. Moulin I have heard that Doctor Ames somtimes wished that he had never medled in this argument I am not of Doctor Ames his mind in this though it were I thinke most fit every one should exercise himselfe in those questions wherein by the course of his studies he hath been most conversant so should the Church of God enjoy plus dapis rixae multo minus invidiaeque I doe admire Mr. Moulin in his conference with Cayer as also upon the Eucharist and on Purgatory he hath my heart when I read his consolalations to his Breathren of the Church of France as also intreating of the love of God I would willingly learne French to understand him only and have along time desired still to get any thing that he hath written I highly esteem him in his Anatomie though I doe not
diverse of my Brethren in both the Universities in the City of London have I should apply my selfe with an undeniable importunity to perswade them unto so good and great a Worke which will Purchase them a precious Memory with the Godly and Learned in all future Ages of the Church I have but one thing more to say of the Booke before I take my leave of Thee If any Arminian whatsoever will give a Just Full and Scholasticall Answer unto It I shall by God's helpe returne him a Reply For 't is De Causa Dei as Bradwardine Entitles his Booke And in defence of God's Cause I shall feare no Colours But if the Ignorant Paper-blurrers of the Time shall Snarle and Snap only at some few Passages they are not to expect that so much as any serious notice should be taken of them Thine In all the obligations of Charity and Truth HENRY JEANES THE FIRST BOOK IN TWO PARTS WHEREOF THE FIRST Containeth a Consideration of those Reasons for Which Mr HORD as he pretended First questioned the truth of Absolute Reprobation THE SECOND Examineth those Arguments against the Absolutenesse of Divine Reprobation which M. HORD took to be of a Convincing Nature OXFORD Printed by LEON LICHFIELD for THO ROBINSON Anno Salutis M. DC LIII A Table of the Principall Matters contained in this Treatise wherein the Answer unto Mr. Mason's Additions is referred in such order as that it is made aptly to cohere with the refutation of M. HORDS DISCOUERSE AN examination of the Epistle to the Reader lib. 2. p. 1 2 3 4 5. The maine 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Question in these Controversies propounded and stated together with the different opinions of Remonstrants and Contra-Remonstrants both Supralapsarians and Sublapsarians concerning it examined lib. 1. pag. 1 2 3. c. usque ad p. 14 and p. 32 33. usque ad p. 40. l. 2. p. 6 7 8 9 10 11 12. The absolute decree cleared from M r Hord's reasons both inducing and convincing 1. And first to begin with those for which as he pretended he first questioned the truth of absolute Reprobation where the absolute decree is vindicated from the charge 1. Of Novelty lib. 1. p. 40. c. usque ad p. 60. l. 2. p. 13 14 15 16 17 18 19. 2. Of Unwillingnesse to abide the tryall lib. 1. a p. 59. ad 84. l. 2. p. 19. 20. 21. 22. 3. Of Infamie lib. 1. a p. 83. ad p. 91. l. 2. p. 22. 23 24. 4. Of Affinity with the old and exploded errors of the Stoicks and Manichees lib. 1. p. 92 93. c. usque ad p. 102. 2. Those arguments against the absolutenes of Divine Reprobation according to both the upper and lower way which M r Hord tooke to be of a convincing nature are examined 1. M r Hord's or M r Mason's arguments against the upper or Supralapsarian way are answered lib. 2. p. 25. c. Where 1. The upper or Supralapsarian way is vindicated from the dishonouring of God in two particulars 1. It doth not charge him with mans destruction lib. 2. a p. 25. ad p. 51. 2. It doth not charge him with mens sinnes lib. 1. a p. 14. ad 28 l 2. a p. 51. ad 116. 2. The upper or Supralapsarian way is cleared from the overthrow of Religion and holy Life and that in foure particulars 1. It maketh not sinne to be no sinne lib 1. p. 10 28 29. l. 2. a p 110. ad 121. 2. It taketh not away the conscience of sinne lib. 1. p. 29 30 l. 2. p. 117 121 122. 3. It taketh not away the desert and guilt of sinne lib. 1. p. 10 30 31 32. l. 2. p 122 123 c. usque ad p. 131. 4. It maketh not the whole circle of mans Life a meere destiny lib. 2. p. 127 128 130 131 132 133. 2. Those pretended convictive arguments against absolute Reprobation which proceed as it is stated according to the Sublapsarian or lower way lib. 1. p. 103. c. And it is fully and clearly evinced that the Sublapsarian Doctrine is not repugnant unto 1. Testimonies of Scripture 2. Attributes of God 3. End of the Word and Sacrament with other excellent gifts of God to men 4. Holy and Pious endeavors 5. The Grounds of comfort whereby distressed consciences are to be relieved 1. The Sublapsarian Doctrine concerning absolute reprobation is not repugnant to Scripture lib. 1. p. 103 104. c. Particularly not to Ezek. 33. 11. As I live saith the Lord God I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked but that the wicked turne from his way live turne ye turne ye from your evill wayes for why will ye dye o House of Israel lib. 1. p. 103 c. Nor to Ezek. 18. 32. I have no pleasure in the death of him that dyeth saith the Lord God wherefore turne your selves and live ye lib. 1. p. 103 104 105 106. Not to Rom. 11. 32. For God hath concluded them all in unbeliefe that he might have mercy upon all lib. 1. p. 107 108. Not to Iohn 3. 16. God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son c. lib. 1. p. 108 109 110. Not to 1. Tim. 2. 4. Who will have all men to be saved and to come unto the knowledge of the Truth lib. p. 111 112 113 114 115. Not to 2 Peter 3. 9. not willing that any should perish but that all should come to Repentance lib. 1. p. 115 116 117. Not to those conditionall speeches which are in 1 Cron. 28. 9. And 2 Cron. 15. 2. And Gen. 4. 7. And Heb. 10. 38. lib. 1. p. 117 118 119 120. 2. The Sublapsarian Doctrine c. is not contrary unto Gods Attributes to the clearing of which a discourse premised concerning Gods Atributes in generall is refuted lib. 1. p. 121 122 c. unto p. 128. This done our Author comes to shew in speciall how that the Sublapsarian Doctrine doth not oppugne 1. God's Holinesse lib. 2. p. 133 134 c. unto p. 147. 2. God's Mercy lib. 1. p. 128 c. unto p. 145. l. 2. p. 147 148. 3. God's Justice lib. 1. a p. 145. ad 171. l. 2. a p. 149. ad 156. 4. God's truth or sincerity lib. 1. a p. 171. ad 187. l. 2. a p. 156. ad p. 167. 3. The Sublapsarian doctrine not contrary to the use and end of God's gifts to men lib. a p. 187. ad 222. l. 2. p. 166. 167. 4. The Sublapsarian Doctrine not prejudiciall to piety and a Godly life lib. 1. a p. 221. ad 255. l. 2. p. 167 168 169 170. 5. The Sublapsarian Doctrine no enemy to true comfort lib. 1. p. 255 256 c. usque ad finem By this Table Reader thou maist correct the mistitleing of pages as lib. 1. p. 86 87 88 89. 90. lib. 20. p. 22 23 24 25 26 27. p. 52 53 58 59. a p. 133 ad p. 147. READER I would advise thee
ought to doe or not in what manner he ought to doe it not one of all which is incident unto God All efficiency both divine and humane is found only about the act substrate unto sinne and all sides now a daies acknowledge that God is the author thereof as well as man by an effective concourse though difference there is about the manner of the concourse and particularly these Arminius will have Gods concourse to an evill act to be every way as much as his concourse to a good and that he concurres to the working of a good act no more then to the working of an evill act Which we utterly deny requiring a double concourse to every good act that is not supernaturall as touching the substance of the act One to the producing of the substance of the act another to the producing the goodnesse thereof that is the gracious manner of performing it For even a naturall man may abstaine from lying stealing whoring blaspheaming but no naturall man can abstaine from these in a gracious manner that is out of the love of God and that such a love as is Amor Dei usque ad contemptum sui the love of God to the contempt of himselfe For this manner of performing it is supernaturall Secondly as touching the matter of divine concourse to the substance of any naturall act We say God moves the will to the doing of it as it becomes the first cause to move the second but how agreeable to the nature of it that is like as he moves naturall agents to doe that which they doe necessarily so he moves all rationall agents to doe that which they doe contingently and freely What is the Arminian tenent to the contrary namely this that God workes in man 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Velle modo velit as absurd an assertion as ever any man breathed It is true many times our Divines in speaking of the secret providence of God in evill doe expresse themselves in phrases of a very harsh accent in the judgement of flesh and blood but herein they doe nothing exceed sobriety forasmuch as usually they contemper themselves to Scripture phrase rather within the compasse thereof then beyond it Yet Blasphemy is usually imputed unto them without all feare or wit not considering that herein they impute blasphemy to the language of the Holy Ghost As for example What an horrible sinne is it for Kings and Princes to imploy their power and authority not for the supporting of the Kingdome of Christ by whom Kings reigne but for the supporting and establishing of the kingdome of Antichrist as in the Martyrdome of Gods Saints delivered over to the secular power to that end and that by censures Ecclesiasticall Now if we should say that it is God that works thus in the hearts of Kings thus to imploy their power for the supporting of Antichrist we should be censured for blasphemers Yet the Holy Ghost spares not to professe that God hath put into their hearts to fulfill his will and to agree and give their Kingdome to the Beast untill the words of God be fulfilled In like sort from the first Preaching of the Gospell unto this day many there have been and at this day are who are disobedient unto it and stumble at it either in the whole or in part If we should say that they who thus disobey and stumble at the word of God are ordained thereunto such as this Author and his Complices are ready to cry out upon us as Blaspheamers and to professe that they will rather deny that there is a God then hold with the Contra-Remonstrants Yet S. Peter budgeth not to professe that Christ is a stone of stumbling and a rock of offence even to them which stumble at the word of God being disobedient whereunto also they were ordained When we professe that not any thing in the world comes to passe but Deo volente God willing it We are censured as Blasphemers in professing that God doth will that which is evill and sinne yet not only the Articles of Ireland Artic. 11. professe as much and Austin Enchir. 95. Non aliquid fit nisi Omnipotens fieri velit but the Apostles with one voyce as touching the contumelious usages of the Sonne of God both by Jewes and Gentiles Herod and Pilate in their picus meditation poured forth before the face of God professe that Both Herod and Pontius Pilate with the Gentiles and People of Israel were gathered together against the holy Sonne of God to doe that which Gods hand and Gods councell had before determined to be done In like sort when we speak of Gods giving men over to illusions to believe lies others to vile affections and to uncleannesse through the lusts of their own hearts to dishonour their own bodies between themselves which consisted in this that The Women did change their naturall use into that which is against nature and likewise the men leaving the naturall use of the Women burned in their lusts one towards another men with men working that which is unseemely and receiving in themselves the recompence of their errour which was meet and observe herehence that it is just with God to punish sinne with sinne And as it hath been observed before us from the daies of Austin who when Iulian the Pelagian said this was done deserendo replies taking him at his word who could not but professe that God doth thus the Scripture expresly testifying as much and touching the manner mentioned by him addeth whether God doth this deserendo or alio modo sive explicabili sive inexplicabili it matters not An Arminian spirit spares not to joyne himselfe with Iulian the Pelagian in affronting Austin thus discoursing out of the word of God and to professe that that doctrine of Gods punishing sinne with sinne is a common errour whereas the Apostle professeth in expresse termes that Herein they received such recompence of their errour as was meet and what is recompence here but punishment and wherein consisted it but in defiling themselves contrary to nature as the Scripture plainly testifies saying Men with men working that which is unseemely and receiving in themselves such recompence of their errour as was meet And Arminius spares not to professe that Omnis paena Deum authorem habet Wherein yet we concurre not with Arminius Wee deny that Omnis paena habet Deum authorem It is true that Paena positiva not of all punishment that consists in privation such as sinne is For Malum as Austin long agoe pronounced non habet causam efficientem but deficientem Yet we confesse that God could keep any man from any sinne but if he will not this is not sufficient to make him the author of it It is only a culpable defect that makes one the author of sinne that is when he failes of doing that which he ought to doe But God is bound to none to preserve him from sinne any otherwise then his own free will doth
Deum out of God Therefore if any cause hereof be to be found it must be within God otherwise it must be confessed that all things became future by absolute necessity of nature If to help this they will devise something within the nature of God to be the cause hereof let them tell us what that is Not the Science of God for all confesse that secluding the divine will Gods knowledge is the cause of nothing If they say the will of God they concurre with us in embracing the same Opinion which they so much abhorre Nothing remaines to fly unto but the Essence of God If they plead that I demand whether the Essence of God working freely be the cause of the futurition of all things or as working necessarily If as working freely that is as much as to confesse in expresse termes that Gods will is the cause thereof But if they say the divine Essence is the cause hereof as working necessarily hence it followes that all things good and evill come from God as working by necessity of nature See I pray and consider the abominable and Atheisticall opinions that these Arminians doe improvidently cast themselves upon when they stretch their witts to overthrow Gods providence as it is carryed in the 11 th Article of Ireland which is this God from all Eternity did by his unchangeable Counsell ordaine whatsoever in time should come to passe yet so as thereby no violence is offered to the wills of the reasonable creatures and neither the liberty nor contingency of second causes is taken away but established rather In the Conclusion that which he vaunts of as touching the Fathers is meer wind for he gives you nothing but his word for it which of what credit it deserves to be I leave to the indifferent to judge And as for the plucking up of the rootes of vertue which he fables of Consider I pray what Sect of Philosophers were ever known to be more vertuous then the Stoicks and how was Zeno himselfe honoured by the Athenians for his grave and vertuous conversation Hath not Erasmus delivered it as out of the mouth of Hierome that Secta Stoicorum was Secta simillima Christianae Yet I no where find that they brought in any necessity that was not subordinate to the Will of the supream God But these Arminians bring in a necessity of nature from without God to make him to doe this or that if he doth any thing or at least to make God himselfe a necessary Agent devoyd of all liberty and freedome contrary to that of Ambrose concerning the manner of Gods working namely that it is Nullo necessitatis obsequio but solo libertatis arbitrio But according to these Divines it must be quite contrary Nullo â—ibertatis arbitrio solo necessitatis obsequio And thus much as touching the first sort of this Authors Reasons which he accounts only Inducing I come to the other sort which he esteemes convincing THE SECOND PART OF THE FIRST BOOK Wherein are Examined those Arguments against the Absolutenesse of DIVINE REPROBATION WHICH M r HORD Took to be of a CONVINCING NATURE OXFORD Printed by Leonard Lichfield Printer to the Vniversity M. D. C. LIII The Second Part of this Discourse consisting of ARGUMENTS CONVINCING whereof there are Five sorts The First sort of Convincing Reasons Drawn from Scripture DISCOURSE SECT I. THOSE of the Second sort by which for the present I stand convinced that absolute reprobation is no part of Gods truth are drawn from these five following heads 1. Pregnant Testimonies of Scripture directly opposite unto it 2. Some principall attributes of God not compatible with it 3. The end of the Word and Sacraments with other excellent gifts of God to men quite thwarted by it 4. Holy and pious endeavours much hindered by it if not wholly subversed 5. The grounds of comfort whereby distressed consciences are to be relieved are all overthrown by it It it contrary to pregnant places of Scripture even in terminis as will appeare by these instances 1. Ezech. 33. 11. As I live saith the Lord I have no pleasure in the death of a sinner but that the wicked turne from his waies and live And least men should say 't is true God wills not the death of a repenting sinner the Lord doth in another place of the same Prophet extend the proposition to them also that perish Ezech. 18. 32. I have no pleasure in the death of him that dieth In this Scripture we may note three things 1. Gods affection to men set forth 1. Negatively I have no pleasure in his death that dyeth 2. Affirmatively But that the wicked turne 2. The persons in whose destruction he delighteth not wicked men such as for the rejecting of grace dye and are damned If God have no pleasure in their death much lesse in the death of men either altogether innocent or tainted only with originall sinne 3. The truth of this affection as I live cupit sihi credi saith Tertullian Lib. de paenit cap. 4. God would faine have us to believe him when he saith I will not the death of him that dyeth and therefore he bindes his speech with an oath O beatos nos quorum causa Deus jurat O miserrimos si nec juranti Domino credimus Happy are we for whose sakes the Lord vouchsafeth to sweare but most unhappy if we believe him not when he swears Now if God delight not in the destruction of wicked men he did never out of his own pleasure take so many millions of men lying in the fall and seale them up by an absolute decree under invincible damnation for such a kind of decreeing men to everlasting death is quite opposite to a delight in mens eternall life TWISSE Consideration TO say that this or that opinion is untrue because it doth in terminis contradict places of Scripture is a very superficiary consideration yet it is not the first time that I have found it to drop from an Arminians penne But that it is a very superficiary consideration I prove thus For to deny God the Sonne to be equall to the Father is in terminis to contradict a pregnant place of Scripture Phil. 2. Where it is expressely said of God the Sonne that he thought it no robbery to be equall to the Father yet notwithstanding it is agreeable to that of our Saviour where he saith the Father is greater then I and so vice versâ In like manner to say that God cannot repent is in terminis to contradict pregnant places of Scripture again to say that God can repent is in terminis to contradict other as pregnant places of Scripture yet neither of these is unsound because each phrase is agreeable to Scripture in some place or other And the reason hereof is because in terminis only to contradict the Scripture is not to contradict the Scripture But when we contradict the meaning of Scripture then and not till then are we justly said to contradict
such another speech in another place and concludes it with these Words Quare ergo Dominus nisi propter hoc Gallina esse voluit in sanctâ Scripturâ dicens O Jerusalem Jerusalem quoties volui te congregare ut gallina c. Our Lord and Saviour did therefore compare himselfe to a Hen rather then any other creature because of her singular expressions of love to her young ones even when they are out of her sight By these things we see how highly the Scriptures speak of Gods mercy especially in the expressions of it to Mankind To which testimonies let me adde these few more Psal 8. 4. Lord what is man that thou art mindfull of him c. Prov. 8. 31. In the children of men did the wisdome of God delight himselfe when the foundations of the earth were appoynted He took not the nature of Angells but the seed of Abraham Heb. 2. 16. When the bountifulnesse and love of God our Saviour toward man appeared Tit. 3. 4. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the originall word is where doe we read of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 More mercifull is God to man then to all other creatures With such a mercy cannot stand such a decree absolute Reprobation being once granted we may me thinks more properly call God a Father of cruelties then of mercies and hatred then of love and the Devills names Satan and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an adversary a destroyer may be fitter for him then 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Saviour which I tremble to think Doth mercy please him when he of his own will only hath made such a decree as shewes farre more severity towards poore men then mercy Is he slow to anger when he hath taken such a small and speedy occasion to punish the greater part of men in Hell torments for ever and for one sinne once committed hath shut up the greater part of men under invincible unbelief and damnation Is his mercy abundant doth it extend it selfe farther then justice when it is tackt up so short limited to a few chosen ones when 100 for one at least take in all parts of the World are unavoidably cast away out of his only will and pleasure Or doth his love passe knowledge when we see daily greater love then this in men and other creatures What Father and Mother that have not only cast off Fatherhood and Motherhood but humanity too so the Authors Copy hath it would determine their children to certain death or to cruell torments worse then death for one only offence and that committed too not by them in their own persons but by some other and only imputed unto them How much lesse would they give themselves to beget Children and bring them forth that they might bring them to the rack fire gallowes and such like tortures and deaths But to deliver things a little more closely Foure things in my conceit being well and distinctly considered doe make it apparent that this decree is incompatible with Gods mercy 1. That Adams sinne was the sinne of mans nature only and no mans personall transgression but Adams it was neither committed nor consented to by any of his posterity in their own persons 2. That it was the sinne of our nature not by generation for then the sinnes of our Grand-fathers and Fathers would be our sinnes also because we come from them and they would be our sinnes so much the more by how much nearer we are to the stock from which we doe immediatly spring then to the first root and common Father of Mankind It is the sinne of our nature by imputation only it was Gods will that he should stand up for a publique person and that in him all men should stand or fall This is generally granted by Divines and particularly by that excellent servant of God M. Calvin Neque enim factum est saith he ut a salute exciderant ommes unius parentis culpâ And a little after he saith Hoc cum naturae nequeat ascribi ab admirabili Dei consilio profectum esse minimè obscurum est And a little after thus unde factum est ut tot gentes uuà cum earum liberis infantibus aeterna morte involveret lapsus Adae absque remedio nisi quia Deo it à visum est 3. That God did pardon it in Adam who did actually and voluntarily commit it in his own person 4. That Christ came into the World to take away peccatum mundi the sinne of the World Ioh. 1. 29. That God either did or might have satisfied his wronged justice in the blood of the Covenant for all man kind and without any impeachment to justice might have opened a way of Salvation to all and every man These things being well considered will make no man I think to conclude in his thoughts that if there be any such decree God is not mercifull to man at all much lesse is he more mercifull supposing this decree to men then he is to other creatures but more sharpe and severe then he is to other creatures to the Devills themselves 1. To other creatures because the most of men are determined by his omnipotent decree to such a being as is a thousand times worse then no being at all whereas other creatures even the basest of them though they perhaps have but a contemptible being yet they have such a beeing as is much better then no being at all it is farre better not to be at all then to be eternally miserable without any possibility of the contrary for so saith our Saviour speaking of Judas It had been good for that man if he never had been borne Men would not have accepted of life and being when first they entred upon possession of it if they had known upon what hard conditions it was to be tendred and that it was to be charged with such an interest as can no waies be recompensed by the benefits of life or did men firmely believe this decree they would at adventure with Job curse their birth-day be willingly released from the right of creatures and desire that their immortall soules might vanish into nothing What Minutius saith of Pagans might be truly affirmed of men in generall Malunt extingui penitus quam ad supplicia reparari Nay Parents out of pitty to their Children would wish that they might be borne Snakes and Toads rather then men and creatures whose being shall at last be resolved into nothing rather then immortall Spirits 2. Then to the very Devills also who are set forth in Scripture to be the greatest spectacles of Gods wrath and irefull severity In one thing this decree makes most men and Devills equall Utrisque desperata salus they are both sure to be damned but in three things men are in a farre worse condition by it 1. In their appoyntment to Hell not for their own proper personall sinnes for which the Devills suffer but for the sinnes of
have I received this from three severall hands of Arminians each giving the same interpretation of it as if it were called a strange work because it is alienum a naturâ Dei I know none but Papists doe justify them in this interpretation in my judgement a most unreasonable exposition the Lord taking unto himselfe the execution of judgement as his peculiar saying vengeance is mine and I will repay And Magistrates are but Gods Ministers for this And he professeth his delight in this as well as in the execution of mercy It is true he doth not inflict judgement without cause for that were not a work of judgement in proper speech but of power and absolutenesse rather as in turning a holy and innocent creature into nothing And in that respect he is said not to afflict willingly sinne alwaies deserving it Mercy is of another nature and supposeth free grace though I find little or no notice this Author takes of this throughout his discourse Neither doe I find that he or any Arminian acknowledge that the change of a mans heart is wrought in a man of the meere grace of God without any motive cause in the creature Neither doe all Papists concurre in this interpretation for Lyra and Burgensis are together by the eares hereabouts and our Divines as Junius and Piscator doe render it opus insolens terribile an unusuall and terrible judgement interpreting it of bringing the Babylonians upon them so strange a worke that they should wonder at it And as Moses foretold that God should bring upon them Wonderfull judgements Deut. 28. So the Prophet Abakuk sets it forth in like manner Abak 1. 5. Behold among the Heathen and regard and wonder and marvaile for I will worke a worke in your daies you will not believe it though it be told you For loe I raise up the Caldeans that bitter and furious nation which shall goe upon the breadth of the Land to possesse the dwelling places that are not theirs And Jer. 19. 3. Behold I will bring a plague upon this place which whosoever heareth his eares shall â—ingle For seeing Gods lawes are strange things unto them Hos 8. 12. God would bring such judgements upon them that should be as strange unto them And in the same phrase it is said that destruction is to the wicked and strange punishment to the workers of iniquity Job 31. 3. Yet be this granted him it is nothing to the purpose For be it never so deere unto God yet if he restraineth his chiefe mercy which consists in changing the heart whereof this Author seems unwilling to take any distinct notice only to the Elect called accordingly in Scripture vessells of mercy in distinction from vessells of wrath which are the Reprobates this nothing prejudiceth the absolutenesse of reprobation And as for the frequent exercise thereof we read Zeph. 3. 5. That every morning God bringeth his judgements to light and as for the mercy which consists in regenerating man which alone is to the present purpose it is apparent that it is farre lesse frequently shewed then the contrary judgement in obduration And certainly the vessells of mercy are by farre fewer then the vessells of wrath and as for temporall mercies the more frequent they are the worse where the spirit of regeneration is wanting through the corruption of man that makes him thereupon the more obdurate The vanity of the next as touching the amplitude of the objects whereto mercy is extended though this alone is to the present purpose I have already sufficiently discovered it being apparent that in Scripture phrase only the Elect are counted vessells of mercy and all the rest vessells of wrath As there be examples of Gods long suffering and patience so we have fearfull examples of the suddainesse of Gods judgements taking Men and Women away in the very act of sinne Thus the Israelites in the Wildernesse when the flesh of Quailes was in their mouth the heavy wrath of God came upon them and sent them to the graves of lust Zimri and Cozbi perished in their incestuous act and gave up both lust and ghost together Balshazzar a King cut off in his drunken revells to make good the Prophecy of Isaiah The night of my pleasures hath he turned into feare unto me And in like manner the wrath of God seazed upon Herod in his pride But above all this appears in Gods dealings with his Angells who sinned once and fell for ever without all hope of recovery And as for Gods sparing a man in case God gives not repentance what will be the issue but filling up of the measure of their sinnes For to speak in Austins language Contra Julian Pelag. lib. 5. cap. 4. Quantamlibet praebuerit patientiam nisi Deus dederit quis agit paenitentiam Now the case is cleare God gives repentance to a very few who are in Scripture called vessells of mercy which nothing at all prejudiceth the absolutenesse of reprobation 5. Of the riches of Gods mercies to his children we nothing doubt but what doth this prejudice the absolutenesse of reprobating those whom he never meaneth to make his children But here it is to be suspected that this Author accounts all and every one the children of God for forthwith he confounds this notion with the notion of creatures quite contrary to the most generall current of Scripture not of the New Testament only which teacheth us that we are the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus Gal. 3. and if children then heires even heirs of God and heirs annext with Christ Rom. 8. But of the old Testament also Gen. 6 2. The sonnes of God saw the daughters of men that they were faire c. Exod. 4. 22. Thou shalt say to Pharaoh thus saith thè Lord Israel is my Sonne my first borne wherefore I say let my Sonne goe that he may serve me if thou refuse to let him goe behold I will visit thy Sonne even thy first borne Deut. 14. 1. Ye are the children of the Lord your God 2. Thou art an holy people to the Lord thy God and the Lord hath chosen thee to be a precious people to himselfe above all the people that are upon the earth That of the Hen though we give him liberty to amplify her naturall affections as one of the most affectionate Females among unreasonable creatures yet doth it nothing profit him for it represents Gods love appropriated to his Children which nothing prejudiceth the absolutenesse of his power reprobating others Nay rather as it justifies his absolutenesse in electing them if we consider the meere grace of God to have made the difference as the Scripture sheweth Deut. 7. 7. The Lord loved you because he loved you and Deut. 9. at large he beats them out of all conceit of any righteousnesse in them moving the Lord to plant them in the Land of Canaan so by consequent it justifies the Doctrine of absolute reprobation also for as much as the Apostle
make them confident and insolent and in a word Magnas Tragoedias excitare But take a way the confusion of things that differ their combes are cut their locks are shorne and they are but as another man Now having shewed in what sense every hearer is bound to believe that Christ died for him and in what sense not let us consider of what worth this Authors arguments are breathing nothing but smoak and fire I will not say like the great Potan but like fell Dragon but I nothing doubt we shall pare his nailes and make him calme enough ere we have done with him so that a little child shall be able enough to lead him Now that they cannot be justly bound to believe if they be absolute reprobates he takes upon him to prove by three reasons 1. The first is because it is Gods will that they shall not believe because it is his peremptory will that they shall have no power to believe I answere it is indeed the will of Gods decree that is he hath decreed not to give any Reprobate a justifying faith but hence it followeth not that therefore they cannot believe thus farre the contents of the Gospell namely that both Christ hath merited and God hath ordained that as many as doe believe shall be saved For this as I take it is not usually accounted by our Divines a justifying faith but rather it comes within the compasse of such a faith as is commonly counted faith historicall Secondly I answer it followeth not that because God hath decreed to deny them the grace of faith therefore they are not bound to believe which I prove by Scripture For was not Pharaoh bound to let Israel goe when Moses was sent to him from the Lord to command him in the name of the Lord to let Israel goe Yet the Scripture plainly teacheth us that the Lord told Moses that he would harden Pharaohs heart and that he should not let Israel goe What I pray is now become of his reason compared with the light of Scripture And what have we to doe to enquire into Gods counsells as whether he hath decreed to give us grace or no Is it not enough to bind us to obedience for God to command this or that unto us Did Abraham enquire in his thoughts whether it were his purpose yea or no that Isaack should be sacrificed Nothing lesse but upon the Lords command he forthwith addresseth himselfe to the worke rising early in the morning and going forward in the Lords businesse Then again we find by common experience that naturall men are too to confident rather and presumptuous of their power then diffident and distrustfull dicere solet humana superbia saith Austin si scissem fecissem it were better for them if they did acknowledge their impotency and by what means this corruption of theirs is brought upon them that would bring them nearer to the Kingdome of God But if I have a debtor whom I know to be a Bankerupt but he knowes it not but having many bagges of Brasse or Copper pieces which he takes to be Gold conceits himselfe able enough to pay all his debts and more too shall I be said to commit any indecent thing by urging him to pay that he oweth This argument is as old as Pelagius but what was Austin his answer In mandato cognosce quid debeas habere in corruptione cognosce t uo te vitio non habere in oratione cognosce unde possis habere 3. Lastly if God cannot justly command and by command bind man to obey in case he hath no power to obey in like sort God cannot justly complaine of their disobedience who being hardned by God cannot obey him And indeed as this Author argueth against the justice of Gods commands in this case so the Apostle brings in one arguing the injustice of Gods complaints in the like case For having delivered this Doctrine that God hath mercy on whom he will and whom he will he hardneth forthwith he brings in one tumultuating against it in this manner Thou wilt say then why doth he yet complaine for who hath resisted his will And if any man be not ashamed to argue as he did saith Austin let us not be ashamed to answer as the Apostle did and how was that Surely only thus O man who art thou that disputest with God shall the thing formed say to him that formed it Why hast thou made me thus Hath not the Potter power over the clay of the same lump to make one vessell unto honour and another unto dishonour And albeit this I trow should be sufficient to satisfy a Christian yet we observe farther how this Author confounds impotency Morall which consisteth in the corruption of mans powers naturall and impotency naturall which consisteth in bereaving him of power naturall The Lord tells us by his Prophet Jeremy that Like as a Blackamore cannot change his skinne nor a Leopard his spotts no more can they doe good that are accustomed unto evill Now if a man taken in stealth shall plead thus before a Judge My Lord I beseech you have compassion upon me for I have so long time inured my hands to pilfering that now I cannot forbeare it will this be accepted as a good plea to save him from the Gallowes Again it is observed that men are naturally prone to runne upon the committing of things forbidden them Gens humana ruit per vetitum nefas nitimur in vetitum yet this is no just excuse Lastly as for faith it is well known that Divines distinguish between fides acquisita and fides infusa that we may call a faith naturally acquired which is found in carnall persons whether prophane or Hypocriticall and this is a faith inspired by Gods spirit The object of each is all one and a Man may suffer Martyrdome for the one as well as for the other which manifesteth the pertinacious adherence thereunto And it appears that all professions have had their Martyrs Ucali Fartax a Calabrian borne endured the Gallies fourteen years rather then he would turne Turke yet at length he became a Turke and only in spleen to be revenged on a Turke who had given him a boxe on the eare and became a great man amongst them And at the famous battell of Lepanto he alone maintained his Squadron entire and beat the Christians But to returne albeit it be not in the power of nature to believe fide infusâ yet is it in the power of nature to believe the Gospell fide acquisitâ which depends partly upon a mans education and partly upon reason considering the credibility of the Christian way by light of naturall observations above all other waies in the World And when men refuse to embrace the Gospell not so much because of the credibility of it but because it is not congruous to their naturall affections as our Saviour tells the Jewes Light came into the World and men loved darknesse rather then light
because their deeds are evill Is there any reason why their condemnation should be any whit the easier for this Neither have I ever read or heard it taught by any that men shall be damned for not believing fide infusâ which is as much as to say because God hath not regenerated them but either because they have refused to believe or else if they have embraced the Gospell for not living answerable thereunto which also is in their power quoad exteriorem vitae emendationem though it be not in their power to regenerate their wills and change their hearts any more then it is to illuminate their minds yet I never read that any mans damnation was any whit the more encreased for not performing these acts Thus farre I have been content to expatiate in the way of reasonable discourse to meet with this Disputer in his own element though every sober Christian I should think should rest satisfied with the word of God which both teacheth us that the naturall man perceiveth not the things of God neither can he know them because they are spiritually discerned that all men are found dead in trespasses and sinnes before the spirit of regeneration comes that men cannot believe that they cannot repent that they that are in the flesh cannot please God and that a man hardned cannot obey and yet withall that God doth command faith repentance and obedience and complaines of default in performance And if any man charge such courses as unjust what is the Apostles course in meeting with such imputations but either to shew that the word attributes such a course to God and therefore it cannot be unjust as Rom. 9. 14. What shall we say then is there unrighteousnesse with God God forbid for he saith to Moses I will have compassion on him on whom I will have compassion and I will shew mercy on him to whom I will shew mecy or to fly to the consideration of the Lords dominion over all as Creator over his creatures I come to his second reason 2. And that is because it is impossible that they should believe they want power to believe and must want it still God hath decreed they shall have none to their dying day I answer This argument is the very same with the former not so much as differently drâ—st or crambe bis cocta and therefore my former answer will serve in every particular Yet adde this also this impossibility is only upon supposition of Gods Decree which nothing hinders the liberty of the creature in doing freely what he doth and freely leaving undone what he doth not as appears manifestly by divers instances For upon supposition of Gods decree that not a bone of Christ should be broken it was impossible they should be broken yet who doubts but that the Souldiers did as freely abstaine from the breaking of Christs bones as they did freely break the others bones And the Text notes the reason why they brake not Christs bones to wit because they saw he was dead already In like sort upon supposition of Gods decree that Josiah by name should burne the Prophets bones upon the Altar Cyrus by name should build him a Citty and let goe his captives it was impossible that it should be otherwise yet I think no wise man doubts but that Josiah did the one and Cyrus the other as freely as they did any thing in their lives And therefore this Author doth miserably overlash in the element of his Philosophy and rationall discourse in saying a man in justice can be tyed to believe no more then a man can be bound to fly like a Bird or to reach heaven with the top of his finger He might as well say that because God had determined that the Souldiers should not breake Christs bones therefore they had no more power to breake Christs bones then they had power to fly like a Bird or to reach Heaven with the top of their finger Certainly there is no man but by grace may be enabled to believe but never was any man known to affirme that by grace a man may be enabled to fly like a Bird or to reach Heaven with the top of his finger If this be not miserably to over-reach I know not what is As for his rule Nemo obligatur ad impossibile judge I pray of the truth of it by this What if a man by a vitious conversation hath made it as impossible for him to doe good as it is impossible for a Blackemore to change his skinne or a Leopard his spots Shall he therefore be obliged no longer to doe good And as by our own sinnes committed by our persons so by the sinne of Adam which was the sinne of our nature upon the whole nature of man was this impotency brought as the Scriptures teach and none that I know were known in the dayes of Austin to deny but the Plagians I come to the Third 3. Now this depends upon a notorious confusion of things that differ For I have shewed how the Lord hath given them a sufficient object of that faith which he requires of them as touching Christs dyeing for them namily to believe that Christ hath merited the pardon of sinne and salvation for as many as believe in him in such sort that if all and every one throughout the World should believe in him they should be saved by him And this depends meerely upon the sufficiency of Christs merits and undoubtedly it was the will of God that Christs merits should be of such a value as was sufficient for the salvation of all and every one otherwise it were not true that if all and every one should believe in Christ they should be saved by the vertue of Christ merits But as for any obligation to believe that Christ died to procure faith and repentance for all and every one I never yet heard or read of any Arminian that he believed it Nay in their Apologia Remonstrantium or Censura Censurae they plainly professe that Christ died not at all to merit faith and regeneration for any In like sort it is not credible to me that any Arminian believes that Christ dyed for any so as to procure pardon of sinne and salvation absolutely for him whether he believe or no provided that he live to be capable of faith and repentance and to enjoy the Gospell and the Preaching of Christ crucified And like as it is no lye but truth that Christ dyed to procure salvation to as many as believe in him so in being obliged to believe this or punished for not believing it is neither to be obliged to the believing of a lye nor punished for not believing it Therefore it is false to say there is no such matter For look in what sense they are bound to believe that Christ died for them in the same sense it is most true that Christ died for them they are bound to believe that Christ dyed to procure salvation for every one
his familiar spirit takes himselfe to be spares not to professe that about the reconciling of Gods predestination with the liberty of mans will a poynt that comes so neere to this in hand as a poynt can doe there are many distinctions devised by the learned but yet he saith of them that they did not qutetare intellectum and therefore that he did captivare suum in obsequium fidei and Alvarez no dwarfe neither in Scholasticall that is rationall Divinity addeth that herein Cajetan piissimè doctissimè loquitur But who they are that have taken notice of those arguments here specified and at the sight of them were so ston'd as at the sight of some Medusas head and thereupon came to this course of incantation or pacification he doth very wisely conceale and like a man of authority puts it upon us to take it upon his word Yet I doe not remember that I have rested my selfe upon any such course though the holy Apostle thinks it sufficient to cleare any course of God from injustice by proving that Scripture doth attribute such a course unto God as I have shewed out of Rom. 9. 14. It is true the spirit which this Author breaths is the right Pelagian spirit according to the Pelagians in Bradwardines daies for their vaunt was that they could not be refuted by any reason Philosophicall but only by certain naked authorities Theologicall as I have heard of a Schollar sometimes challenged by a friend and kinsman of his for being given as he heard to the Arminian Tenet made a ready answer with protestation that that opinion was very plausible but that S t Paul was against it And therefore Bradwardine undertakes to confute them by reason Philosophicall so farre off was he from being cowed with their vain boasts and braggs His words are these Sicut antiqui Pelagiani ventoso nomine secularium scientiarum inflati consistorium Theologicum contemnentes Philosophicum flagitabant ita moderni Audivi namque quosdam advocatos Pelagii licet multum provectos in sacris apicibus affirmantes Pelagium nusquam potuisse convinci per naturalem Philosophicam rationem sed vix arguebatur utcunque per quasdam authoritates Theologicas maxime autem per authoritatem Ecclesiae quae Satrapis non placebat Quapr opter per rationes authoritates Philosophicas ipsos disposui reformare And for my part though I affect not in those poynts to goe beyond Scripture and Christian reason yet I am content to be led whethersoever my adversary thinks good to lead me And as a Schollar of my acquaintance being left handed and accordingly casting his cloake over the right shoulder was answered by a Cittizen observing it when he enquired his way saying when you shall come to such a place you must turne on your right hand meaning indeed on the left so likewise I am nothing afraid of this mans Philosophy nor his Abettors neither nothing doubting but as many as I find opposing this divine truth which we maintain their best dexterity in Philosophicall and rationall discourse will prove but a left handed Philosophy and in this very field of argumentation I purpose to lay upon him ere we part But let us first consider the things that he replies 1. He saith There is nothing in Scripture abhorring from sound and right reason he addes Odious too as if his Philosophy had taught him that it is the part of reason to hate and not rather of affections This rule when we were initiates in the University we were soon acquainted with Yet this Author to vent his fulnesse casts himselfe upon an unnecessary proofe thereof and the mischiefe is that his proofe maketh his cause worse then it was before For having formerly made the comparison between the word of God and sound and right reason in his reason he states the comparison between faith and reason nature and Scripture not distinguishing between nature corrupt and uncorrupt reason corrupt and uncorrupt Our service of God is reasonable in as much as it is performed by reasonable creatures and the rule thereof is not naturall reason but meerely the word of God In whom was naturall reason more eminent then in Philosophers Yet were they wont to be called Haereticorum Patriarchae and the Apostle hath professe of all such that the things of God seem foolishnesse unto them 1 Cor. 2. 14. Now I pray consider soberly how reasonable such courses are judged to be which are accounted foolishnesse and what a sweet harmony there is between things revealed and mens understandings and whether reasonable and foolish be not a plain contradiction as well as wise and foolish If we enjoy a more pure and refined reason then they let us give illumination Divine the glory of it and say with him in Job verily there is a spirit in man but the illumination of the Almighty giveth understanding And seeing the word of God is the only means of Divine illumination let us thank Gods word for all I come to the second Materiall of his reply 2. And that is this that all those Doctrine which are adâ—erse and repugnant to understandings purged from prejudice and false principles are not to be taken for Doctrines of Scripture but devices of men corrupting Scripture by false glosses and interpretations No marvaile that when men oppose the misteries of Godlinesse they fall upon the mysteries of iniquity Here we have a rule given to try whether a Doctrine proposed be to be taken for a Doctrine of Scripture yea or no And mark it well I beseech you and I desire that every sober man will mark it well and judge whether it deserve not to be numbred amongst the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the depths of Satan And withall judge whether the pretended Author of this discourse can in any probability be the Author of this and whether it becomes not rather some old beaten Souldier in Arminianisme that takes upon him to be the Master and Dictator of Sentences About Regula fidei the rule of Faith there is much question between us and Papists the meaning whereof is what that is whereinto must be made the last resolution of our Faith We say it is the word of God contained in the Books of the Old Testament and the New Papists say it is the voyce of the Church This Author deviseth a new way which I think was never heard off before except among the Socinians namely that it is the judgement of understandings purged from prejudice and false Principles For albeit the Doctrine of Faith we judge to be contained no where but in Gods word yet notwithstanding as touching the meaning of it nothing must be taken to be the true meaning of Scripture how fairely soever grounded thereupon in shew unlesse withall it seem nothing repugnant to understandings purged from prejudice and false principles Into this therefore must be made the last resolution of our faith Again where shall we meet with these judges as they are here
naturall unto us all had Adam continued in his originall integrity But I am content to let that passe only whereas he saith that by such a law the Allmighty law-giver binds himselfe to his creatuees to give them such power as may enable them to keepe that law I think rather if any obligation had place in this case it were rather to maintaine the power already given them than to give it For every law-giver rather presupposeth ability of obedience in them to whom he gives a law then first gives a law and then gives ability to performe obedience thereunto And certainly God first created man after his owne image before he gave him any law to be a rule of his obedience unto his creatour So I take the multiplying vertue was given to his creatures in their creation before he said encrease and multiply In the curing of the lame man his word indeed was a word of power like as when he said let there be light and there was light For though it goe under the forme of a command yet it was not so properly a command which is to command obedience as the going forth of vertuous efficacy to create like as that also Ezek. 37. O ye dry bones heare the voyce of the Lord. And undoubtedly the strength of obedience given unto Adam preceded Gods command for his abstaining from the fruit of the tree in the midst of the Garden He had in his creation given him posse non cadere not non posse cadere the event manifested as much and it is as true according to the same Austin that God gave him posse stare si vellet not velle quod potuit But that God is bound to restore any such power unto mankind which they have wilfully lost is boldly avouched but let us consider how Scholastically it is proved 1. The first reason hereof is because God hath vouchsafed to enter into a new Covenant of Peace with men when he needed not To this I answer that God hath entred into a new Covenant with men is an indefinite proposition as touching the persons included in this Covenant and being not in a necessary matter but contingent this Covenant proceeding meerely from the good pleasure of God it hath no more force than to signify that God hath vouchsafed to enter into a new Covenant of peace with some men which we wilingly grant but not with all neither doth this proposition enforce any such meaning And that God hath not entred into a new Covenant with all I prove by these reasons 1. As many as are under the Covenant of grace sinne shall have no dominion over them Rom. 6. 14. Sinne shall not have the dominion over you for you are not under the law but under grace But sinne hath the dominion over too many even over the most part of the world as we find by lamentable experience therefore too many even the most part of the World are not comprised under the Covenant of grace 2. The covenant of Grace doth covenant on Gods part not only to give salvation upon condition of faith and repentance but for Christs sake to renew mens natures also and to give them faith and repentance As appears by diverse passages of Scripture Jer. 31. 31. Behold the dayes come saith the Lord that I will make a new Covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah v. 32. Not according to the Covenant that I made with their Fathers when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt the which my Covenant they brake though I was a Father unto them But this shall be the Covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those daies saith the Lord I will put my Law in their inward parts and write it in their hearts and I will be their God and they shall be my people Ezek. 36. 26. A new heart also will I give you and a new spirit will I put within you and I will take away the stony heart out of your bodies and will give you an heart of flesh and I will put my spirit within you and cause you to walk in my Statutes and ye shall keep my judgements and doe them Ezek. 20. 23. I will surely rule you with a mighty hand c. 37. And will cause you to passe under the rod and bring you into the bond of the Covenant Isai 57. 18. I have seen his waies and will heale him Hos 14. 5. I will heale their rebellions I will love them freely And that faith it selfe and repentance is the gift of God who hath taken upon him by his covenant of grace to be our Lord and our God to sanctify us is manifest by diverse pregnant passages of holy Scriptures 2. I come to his second reason And in that Covenant he requires obedience at mens hands even at theirs that perish God in his covenant of Grace requires obedience unto salvation but of his free grace undertakes to regenerate them and work them to obedience but how Agreeable unto their rationall natures that is by admonition instruction exhortation that is to work faith and repentance by exhorting and perswading them unto repentance And because this he performes by his Ministers to whom he hath not revealed who they are whom he hath chosen therefore he commands them to Preach indifferently unto all perswade all exhort all unto faith and repentance whereof also he makes this use even towards reprobates that whereas they are naturally confident of their ability to doe as much as any other and as Austin saith dicere solet humana superbia si scissem fecissem The Lord by his Ministry takes from them this excuse so that unto all that heare is this truth delivered whosoever believeth and repenteth shall be saved and thereupon every one is exhorted in the name of the Lord to believe and repent But God resolveth to worke faith and repentance in none but those whom he hath chosen according to that Acts 13. 48. As many believed as were ordained to everlasting life And withall the Doctrine delivered in the Gospell is such and so confirmed as may justly make them inexcusable that doe not believe when it shall appeare that many a vile legend they are apt to believe and in the mean time despise Gods holy Oracles by divine Authority many waies confirmed unto them 3. It is most true eternall life is promised to every on that obeyeth and keeps Covenant with God but God over and above worketh some unto obedience unto faith and repentance bestowing these gratious giftes on them even on whom he will when he hardeneth others even whom he will Rom. 9. 18. 4. He punisheth the disobedient with eternall death true but acording unto what Covenant Not according unto the Covenant of grace that is only a Covenant for Salvation but according unto the Covenant of the law the Covenant of works Whereas herehence this Author inferres that the most free God
like as none were more opposite to the Epicures then they so none were more religious and devout among the Heathens then they Yet there is no opinion so true or good but by a prophane heart may be abused But as for the efficacy of Gods will we are so farre from maintaining that it takes away either the liberty of mans will or the contingency of second causes that we professe with Aquinas that the root of all contingency is the efficacious will of God and with the Authors of the Articles of the Church of Ireland Artic. 11. That God did from all eternity ordaine whatsoever in time should come to passe and yet neither the liberty nor the contingency of second causes is thereby destroyed but established rather DISCOURSE The Fift and last sort of Reasons It is an Enimy to True Comfort SECT I. I Am come to my last reason against it drawn from the Vncomfortablenesse of it It is a doctrine full of desperation both to them that stand and to them that are fallen to men out of temptation and in it It 1. Leads men into temptation 2. Leaves men in it And therefore it is no part of Gods word for that is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 good newes to men a store-house of sweet consolations for them that stand and such as are fallen These things are written saith the Apostle Rom. 15. 4. That by patience and consolation of the Scriptures we might have hope implying that therefore was the word written and left to the Church that by the comforts contained in it those poore soules that look towards heaven might never want in any changes or chances of this mortall life a sweet gale of hope to refresh them and carry on their ship full merrily towards the Haven It leads men into temptation and into such a one too as is as sharpe and dangerous as any the tempter hath The Devill can easily perswade any man that makes absolute reprobation a part of his creed that he is one of those absolute Reprobates because there are more absolute Reprobates even an hundred for one then absolute chosen ones and a man hath a great deale more reason to think that he is one of the most then one of the least one of the huge multitude of inevitable castawaies then one of the little flock for whom God hath absolutely prepared a Kingdome Such a man is not only capable of but framed and fashioned by his opinion for this suggestion which is a very sore one if we may believe Calvin Bucer and Zanchius Calvin tells us Quod nulla tentatione vel gravius vel periculosius fideles percellit Satan that the Devill cannot assault a believer with a temptation more dangerous And a little after he saith It is so much the deadlier by how much commoner it is then any other Rarissimus est cujus non interdum animus hac cogitatione feriatur unde tibi salus nisi ex Dei electione Electionis autem quae tibi revelatio Quae si apud quempiam semel invaluit aut diris tormentis miserum perpetuo exeruciat aut reddit penitus attonitum So ordinary is the temptation that he who is at all times free from it is a rare man we are to conceive that he speakes of those that believe absolute reprobation and so dangerous it is that if it get strength he which is under it is either miserably tormented or mightily astonished And a little after this he saith againe Ergo si naufragium timemus sollicité ab hoc scopulo cavendum in quem nunquam sine exitio impingitur He that will not wrack his soule must keep from this rock Bucer also hath a passage like to this Vt caput omnis noxiae tentationis saith he repellenda est quaestio sumusnè praedestinati Nam qui de hoc dubitat nec vocatumse nec justificatum esse credere poterit hoc est nequit esse Christianus This doubt whether we are predestinated or no Must be repelled as the head of every pernitious temptation for he that doubts of this cannot be a Christian Praesumendum igitur ut principium fidei nos omnes esse a Deo praescitos Every man therefore must presume it as a principle of faith that he is elected This very speech of Bucers Zanchy makes use of to the same purpose We see then by the restimony of these worthy men that this temptation is very dangerous and ordinary too to such as think there are absolute reprobates The truth of both will farther appeare by the example of Petrus Hosuanus a Schoolemaster in Hungary who intending to hang himselfe signified in a letter which he left in his study for the satisfaction of his friends and Countrymen the cause of it in that writing he delivered these three things 1. That he was of Calvins and S. Austins opinion that men are not dealt withall secundum bona or mala opera according to their works good or evill but that there are occultiores causae more hidden causes of mens eternall condition 2. That he was one of that woefull company of absolute castawaies Vas formatum in ignominiam a vessell prepared to dishonour and that therefore though his life had been none of the worst he could not possibly be saved 3. That being unable to beare the dreadfull apprehensions of wrath with which he was affrighted he hanged himselfe For these are some of his last words there recorded Discedo igitur ad Lacus Infernales aeternum dedecus patriae meae Deo vos commendo cujus misericordia mihi negata est I goe to those infernall lakes a perpetuall reproach to my Country commending you to God whose mercy is denyed mee Out of this example we may easily collect two things 1. That men who think that there are many whom God hath utterly rejected out of his only will and pleasure may be easily brought to think by Satans suggestion that they are of that company And 2. That this temptation is very dangerous I conclude therefore the first part of my last Reason that absolute Reprobation leads men into temptation TWISSE Consideration AS I remember when this Author first had resort unto some prime stickler for the Arminian way to conferre with him there about it was told me that this Authour should alledge that our doctrine of election was a comfortable doctrine but then on the other side it was alledged that granting that yet with all it did expose to dessolutenes of life And therefore I little expect any such argument as this to be proposed least of all to be ranged amonst the nūber of those that are taken to be of a convincing nature Yet is it the lesse strange because the Apostle telleth us of some that their course is proficere in pejus to growe worse and worse But let us consider whether he speeds any better in this then in the former And whereas he saith It is a doctrine full of desperation both to them that stand
I will not leave thee nor give over all hope of thee for I am glad to heare thee confesse that though thou desirest thy sinne may be pardoned and thy soule saved yet thou hast no desire that thy soule should be sanctified therefore answer me but to one thing more and I have done with thee Is it thy griefe and sorrow that thou hast no desire that thy nature may be sanctified or is it no griefe at all unto thee If it be no griefe unto thee then still thou takest delight in sinne and how can delight in sinne stand with the feare of Gods judgements and if thou fearest not God how canst thou breake out into such complaints Woe is me for I am a Cast-away These motions usually proceed from the terrours of God And if thou art once acquainted with Gods terrours in consideration of thy sinnefull condition then be of good cheere for these symptomes are commonly as the pangs of Child-birth whereby it comes to passe that a Christian soule is at length brought forth into the world of grace And therefore the spirit of bondage to make us feare doth prepare and make way for the spirit of adoption whereby we cry Abba Father And by experience I have known some being thus cast downe and stricken with feares of being cast-awayes when they have been demanded which condition they have thought better of either this present condition of feare and terrour or the former condition of their prophanenesse when they were without all remorse or check of consciences they have readily professed that this present condition of feare and terrour was the better of the two Now let us heare how well the comforter plaies his part Minister God so loves all men as that he desires their eternall good for the Apostle saith he would have all to be saved and he would have no man perish nor thee in particular CONSIDERATION He proceeds very judiciously I confesse by way of gradation from the Apocryphall to the Canonicall but at once he makes use both of corruptor stilus and adulter sensus The very words of the Apostle he corrupts for the Apostle no where saith that God would have all to be saved that God would have none to perish 't is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 who will have all to be saved in the one and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not willing any to perish in the other Men would doe many things that they cannot it is not so with God And if it be not adulter sensus to apply this to all and every one here is comfort indeed with a witnesse For if God will save every one and withall can save them whereof there is no doubt to be made then there are no Reprobates at all every one is predestinate to salvation by the will that is by the decree of God And who hath resisted his will saith S. Paul And will he not have all every one to believe repent If not then seeing he will have all to be saved it follows that God wil have all men to be saved whether they believe or no repent or no But if he will have all to believe repent by that will whereby he will have all to be saved seeing God can give all men faith and repentance what followes but that all and every one shall believe and repent be saved and consequently there are no Reprobates at all But I know full well what their interpretation of this is namely that God is ready to give faith and repentance unto all to wit in case they will but doth not God give the very will to believe and repent Yes in case they will Take this comfort then into thy bosome and make the best use of it to perswade thee that thou art no cast-away For if thou believest and repentest all is safe thou hast as good assurance of thy salvation as Gods word can give thee And though faith and repentance be the gift of God yet this comforter doth assure thee that if thou wilt believe thou shalt believe if thou wilt repent thou shalt repent For God doth not give the grace of faith and repentance according to the meere pleasure of his own will but according to mens workes for albeit the Apostle saith God hath mercy on whom he will and whom he will he hardneth yet that is not to be understood of vocation but rather of justification And let it not startle thee that justification in Scripture phrase is opposed to condemnation and not to obduration but to thy comfort be it spoken it must be opposed to obduration here least otherwise faith and repentance should not be given according to mens workes but according to the meere pleasure of God which is a very uncomfortable doctrine But be thou assured that if thou wilt believe and repent thou shalt believe and repent such is Gods grace and though it be as true I confesse on the other side that if thou wilt not believe and repent thou shalt not believe and repent yet that is not to be accounted Gods grace least so we should say that Gods grace is as active to evill as it is unto good So that hereby thou maist still perceive that all thy comfort depends on this that the grace of faith and repentance is given according to mens works Tempted All is taken two waies for all sorts and conditions of men and for all particular men God would have all sorts of men to be saved but not all or mee in particular 2. Or if he will have all particular men to be saved yet he wills it only with a revealed Will but not with a secret will for with that he will have a great company damned Under his revealed will am I not the secret CONSIDERATION 1. That All is taken after these two waies in Scripture and that in this place 1 Tim. 2. it is to be taken of genera singulorum I have formerly proved both by the circumstances of the Text and by the analogy of faith for otherwise we should trench upon Gods omnipotency and unchangeablenesse and lastly by the judgement of Austin But take the meaning aright not that God would but that God will have all men that is of all sorts even of Kings and Princes some to be saved but not all and every one As for the distinction of a revealed will and secret will applyed to salvation thou maist learne that somewhere of Papists but not of us For the revealed will is Gods commandement now that which God commands is a part of his Law so is not salvation but rather a reward of obedience Yet they apply this distinction only in reference to faith and repentance whereunto God hath annexed salvation And it is Gods revealed will that all who heare the Gospell should believe and repent ex officio but it is not Gods will to give every one of them grace to believe and repent as we find by manifest experience It was Gods will in like
a true crimination but by flying to Gods absolute proceedings in giving or denying grace And albeit in this poynt wholly consists the Crisis of this Controversy yet this Author utterly declines the sifting thereof as some precipice and breake-neck unto his cause to wit Whether God gives and denyes grace according to the meere pleasure of his will or according to mens workes albeit the issue of all his comforts comes to this namely that either God is not the Author of our faith which now adaies the Remonstrants with open mouth professe that Christ merited for none or if to juggle with the World they pretend an acknowledgement that God is the Author of it yet they plainly professe that he dispenseth it to some and denyes it to others according to some good condition or disposition he findes in the one and which he findes not in another But let us take into consideration what these solid grounds of comfort are whereof a Minister is bereaved by our Doctrine Three I find here mentioned A treble Universality 1. of Gods love 2. Of Christs death 3. Of the Covenant of grace As if universality now adayes were a better Character of the Arminian faith then of the Roman Religion I may take liberty to equivocate a little when this Authour equivocates throughout and that in a case wherein iâ— is most intollerable in a case of consolation to be ministred to conscientia timorata as Nider calls it a poore afflicted soule as this Authour expresseth it To the discovery whereof I will now proceed having signified in the first place that all these consolations are no other but such as every Reprobate is capable of as well as the Children of God which is so apparent as needs no proofe only in the issue of their Tenet the faith of them freeth a man from the conceit of being an absolute Reprobate So that in effect it comes to this Thou poore afflicted soul be of good comfort for if thou wilt hearken unto me and imbrace those solid grounds of comfort which I will reveale unto thee assure thy selfe they shall be as the Balme of Gilead unto thy soule whereby thou maist be confident that albeit it may be thou art a Reprobate and that God from everlasting hath ordained thee unto damnation that yet certainly thou art no absolute Reprobate no more then Cain or Esau Saul or Judas or the Devills were For these my principles will assure thee that there never was nor is nor shall be any absolute Reprobate throughout the world 2. I come to the examining of them particularly to shew that every one of them is as it were against the haire So evident are the testimonies of Scripture against them all and they are obtruded upon a superficiary and most most unsound interpretation of Scripture in some places For 1. as touching the first the universality of Gods love For hereby Gods love is made indifferent unto all and consequently towards Esau as well as to Jacob whereas the Scripture professeth that God loved Jocob and hated Esau and this the Apostle makes equivalent to the Oracle dilivered to Rebekah concerning them before they were borne 2. He might as well have proposed it of the universallity of Gods mercy whereas the Scripture expressely distinguisheth between vessels of mercy vessells of wrath 3. This love is explicated by them to consist in a will to save all Now election is but Gods will to save and the Scripture plainly teacheth and it is confessed by all that I know excepting Coelius Secundus to whom this Authour it seemes is most beholding for his story of Spira that though Many are called yet but few are chosen And whereas it is confessed that the most part of men are Reprobates that is from everlasting willed unto condemnation yet never the lesse they beare us in hand that all men even Cain and Judas yea and as I think the Devills and all were willed by God unto Salvation And that there is no contradiction in all this And every poore afflicted soule must believe hand over head that all this is true what species of contradiction soever be found therein which this Authour from the begining of his discourse to the end hath taken no paines to cleare least otherwise he forfaits all hopes of comfort upon such soveraine grounds as are here proposed by faith wherein aman may be as well assured of his Salvation and freedome from damnation as any Reprobate in the World For albeit he be a Reprobate and God should reveale this unto him yet upon these grounds he may be confident that he is no absolute Reprobate 2. I come to the Second comfortable supposition and that is the universality of Christs death namely that he died for all Now this is opposite to Scripture evidence as the former yea and to Christian reason if not more For albeit God so loved the World even the whole World that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believes in him should not perish but have Life Everlasting which gives a fair light of exposition to those places where Christ is said to have dyed for the sins of the World yea of the whole world to wit in this manner that whosoever believes in him shal not perish but have everlasting life yet the Scripture speaks as often of Christs death in a restrained sense as where it is said Christ gave himselfe a ransome for many And that his bloud was shed for his Apostles and for many for the remission of their sinnes And that Christ should save Gods people from their sinnes And that God hath purchased his Church with his bloud And Christ gave himselfe for his Church And that he is saviour of his body And that he dyed for the elect And in the 17 of John our Saviour would not pray for the World but only for those whom God had at that time given unto him and who afterward should believe in him through their word And look for whom he prayed with exclusion of the rest for their sakes he sanctified himself Now that this is spoken in reference to the offering of himselfe up unto God upon the crosse it was the joynt interpretation of all the Fathers whom Maldonate had read as he professeth on that place and there reckons up a multitude of them Then againe Christs death and passion we know was of a satisfactory nature and therefore if he dyed for all he satisfied for all the sinnes of all men why then are not all saved Why is any damned Is it just with God to torment with everlasting fire for those sinnes for which he hath received satisfaction and that a more ample one then mans satisfaction can be by suffering the torments of Hell fire For therefore it shall never end because it shall never satisfie Againe how many millions were at that time dead and in hell fire and did Christ satisfy for their sinnes by his death upon the Crosse and they continue still to
be as ready to worke it in themselves 3. And now I come to this Authors third Topick place of consolation drawn from the universality of the Covenant of grace Now this is as strange as any of the former or rather much more and when the Covenant of grace is so much enlarged we have cause to feare that it is confounded with the Covenant of Workes And indeed if it were true as some of this sect professe namely that there is an universall grace given to al for the enlivening of their wills wherby they are enabled to will any spirituall good whereunto they shall be excited and to believe if they will and from the love of temporall things to convert themselves to the keeping of Gods Commandements if they will I see no reason but that the Law is able to give life though the Apostle supposeth the contrary and the way is as open unto man for justification by the workes of the Law as it was unto Adam in the state of innocency And if the Covenant of grace be universall and ever was for that I take to be this Authours meaning then God was no more the God of Abraham and of his seed then of all the World nether was the people of Israel more the Lords portion then any other Nation of the World yet Moses was sent unto Pharaoh in their behalfe with this Message Thus sayth the Lord Israell is my sonne my first borne wherefore I say unto thee Let my sonne goe that he may serve mee if thou refuse to let him goe Behold I will slay thy sonne even thy first borne Ex 4. 22 23. Thus God accounts them albeit they were miserably corrupted with Idolatry as it appeares Ez 20. 6. In the day that I lift up my hand upon them to bring them forth of the Land of Egypt 7. Then sayd I unto them Let every one cast a way the abominations of his eies and defile not your selves with the Idolls of Egypt for I am the Lord your God 8. But they rebelled against me and would not heare me for none cast away the abominations of their eyes neither did they forsake the Idolls of Egypt then I thought to poure out mine Indignation upon them and to accomplish my wrath against them in the midst of the Land of Egypt 9. But I had respect unto my name that it should not be polluted of the Heathen So he proceded in despite of their sinnes to carry them out of the Land of Egypt and brought them into the wildernesse and gave them Statutes and Judgments and his Sabaths v 10 11 12. But they rebelled against him in the Wildernesse whereupon he thought againe to poure out his indignation upon them in the Wildernesse to consume them v. 13. But he had respect unto his name v. 14. amd his eie spared them and would not destroy them v. 17. And againe when their Children provoked him by rebelling against him whereupon he thought of powring out his Indignation upon them v. 21. Neverthelesse he withdrew his hand and had respect unto his name v. 22. Then as touching the generation of that present time he professeth he will rule them with a mighty hand v. 33. And the issue thereof is no worse then this I will cause you to passe under the rod and bring you into the bond of the Covenant v. 37 And againe marke with what a gratious promise he concludes v. 43. There shall ye remember your wayes and all the workes wherein ye have been defiled and ye shall judge yourselves worthy to be cast of for all your evills which you have committed 44. And ye shall know that I am the Lord when I have respect unto you for my names sake and not after your wicked waies nor according to your corrupt worke O yee house of Israel saith the Lord God Here is the peculiar fruit of the Covenant of grace to master their iniquities to bring them unto repentance and to deliver them from the dominion of sinne and Satan If God performe this Grace to all and every one throughout the World then is the Covenant of grace universall and all and every one are under it but if there be few very few over whom sinne hath not the dominion then certainly very few are under the Covenant of grace For the Apostle plainly signifyeth this to be the fruit of the Covenant of grace where he saith Sinne shall not have dominion over you for ye are not under the Law but under grace Rom 6. 14. And the like we have Heb. 8. 8. I will make with the House of Judah a new Testament 9. Not like the Testament that I made with their fathers in the day that I tooke them by the hands to lead them out of the Land of Egypt For they continued not in my Testament and I regarded them not saith the Lord. 10. For this is the Testament that I will make with the House of Israell after those dayes saith the Lord I will put my Lawes in their mind and in their heart I will write them and I will be their God and they shall be my people 11. And they shall not teach every man his neighbour and every man his brother saying Know the Lord for all shall know me from the least of them to the greatest of them 12. For I will be mercyfull unto their unrighteousnesse and I will remember their sinnes and their iniquities no more According to this Covnant proceed those gratious promises whereof the Scriptures are full I have seen his wayes and I will heale them Es 57. 18. I will heale their rebellions Hos 14. 5. The Lord will subdue our iniquities Mich. 7. I will circumcise your hearts and the hearts of your children to love me with all your heart and with all your soule Deut 30. 6. I am the Lord your God which sanctify you c And therefore these comforts which here are so much magnified as only and fully sufficient for the releeving of an afflicted soul in the hour of temptation are but so many lies to speake in the Prophets phrase that this Author holds in his right hand and if through the illusions of Satan he take hold of them they may cast him into a dreame like unto the dreame of an hungry man who eateth and drinketh and maketh merry but when he awaketh his soule is empty For all these comforts so magnificently set forth have no force save in case a man believe them now if a man believeth our doctrine can assure him of Everlasting Life and so of his election which the Arminian cannot For we teach that which our Saviour hath taught us He that believeth in the Son hath Everlasting Life and he that obayeth not the Sonne shall not see life but the wrath of God abideth upon him But as for the performing of faith they leave that unto man together with Gods concurrence And in like sort for the maintenance of their faith they teach a man to put
that they shall come to passe in such a manner as joyned with a possibility of not cōing to passe otherwise they should come to passe not contingently but necessarily But it is growne to be this Authours naturall genius miserably to overreach while he keeps himselfe to his own formes inshaping the opinion of his adversaries impatient to be beaten out of them and to have his veteres avias à pulmone repelli oldgrandmothers vain conceits to be pulled out of Lastly this Authour shapeth us to make damnation an end intended by God which we conceive to be a very shallow project we know nothing but Gods owne glory that can be this end And therefore even there where Solomon professeth that God made the wicked against the day of Evill herewithall acknowledgeth that God made all thinges forhimselfe At length we have gotten cleare aboard to come acquainted with this Authours full discourse and not by patches as hitherto we have done For here he promiseth to acquaint us with the reasons that have convinced him of the untruth of absolute Reprobation as it is carried the upper way and like a Martialist a man at armes he tells us they fight against it and thus the interpolator discourseth The first part of the first Argument against the supralapsarians sect 1. They are drawen ab incommodo from the greater evils and inconveniences which issue from it naturally which may be referred to two maine heads 1 The dishonour of God 2 The overthrow of religion and government It dishououreth God For it chargeth him deeply with two things no wayes agreeable to his nature 1 Mens Eternall torments in Hell 2 Their sinnes on Earth First It chargeth him with Mens eternall torments in Hell and maketh him to be the prime principall 2nd invincible cause of the damnation of Millions of miserable soules The prime cause because it reporteth him to have appointed them to distruction of his owne voluntary disposition antecedent to all deserts in them and the Principall and invincible cause because it maketh the Damnation of Reprobates to be necessary and unavoydable thorough Gods absolute and uncontroulable decree and soe necessary that they can no more escape it then poore Astyanax could avoyd the breaking of his necke when the Graecians tumbled him downe from the Tower of Troy Now this is an neavy charge contrary to scripture Gods nature and sound Reason 1 To Scripture which makes man the Principall nay the only cause in opposition to God of his owne ruine Thy destruction is of thy selfe ô Israell but in me is thine help As I live saith the Lord I will not the death of the wicked c. Turne yee turne yee why will yee dye He doth not afflict willingly nor greive the Children of men To which speech for likeneile sake I will joyne one of Prospers Gods predestination is to many the cause of standing to none of falling 2 It is contrary to Gods nature who sets forth himselfe to be a God mercifull gracious long suffering abundant in goodnesse c. And he is acknowledged to be soe by King David Thou Lord art good and mercifull and of great Kindnesse to all them that call upon thee And by the Prophets Joell Jonah and Michah He is gracious and mercifull slow to anger and of great Kindnesse And who saith Micah is a God like unto thee that taketh away iniquity c. He retaineth not his wrath for ever because mercy pleaseth him 3 'T is contrary also to sound reason which cannot but argue such a Decree of extreame cruelty and consequently remove it from the father of mercyes We cannot in reason thinke that any man in the world can so farre put off humanity and nature as to resolve with himselfe to marry and beget Children that after they be borne and have lived a while with him he may hang them up by the tongues teare thir flesh with scourges pull it from their bones with burning pincers or put them to any cruell tortures that by thus torturing them he may shew what his Authority and power is over them Much lesse can we believe without great violence to reason that the God of mercy can so farre forget himselfe as out of his absolute pleasure to ordaine such infinite multitudes of his Children made after his owne image to everlasting fire and create them one after another that after the end of a short life here he might torment them without end hereafter to shew his power and soveraingty over them If to destroy the righteous with the wicked temporally be such a peece of injustice that Abraham removeth it from God with an Absit wilt thou destroy the righteous with the wicked that be farre from thee O Lord. shall not the judge of all the world doe right How deepely may we thinke would that good man have detested one single thought that God resolveth upon the destruction of many innocent soules eternally in hell fire Here this Authour carrieth himselfe like another Ptolomeus Ceraunus or as if he had some cheife place in the lightning legion not by his prayers but by his discourse he seemes to thunder and to lighten all along When the Lord appeared to Elias he was neither in the mighty wind nor in the earthquake nor in the fire but in the still and soft voyce I hope to prove all this to be but Ignis fatuus Mountebancks use to make great ostentation and crackes but commonly they end in meere impostures and it is no hing strange when men opposing the grace of God loose their owne witts and please themselves in the confusion of their owne senses For when men are in love with their owne errours they hate the light yea the very light of nature in the distinct notice of it would be an offence unto them Can this Authour be ignorant of that which every meane Sophister knowes that there be foure kinds of causes Materiall Formall Efficient Finall that he should expatiate thus in speaking of a cause without all distinction Is it strange that God should be a prime cause and principall in execution of vengeance Doth he not professe saying vengeance is mine and I will repay Is he not called the God to whom vengeance belongeth And are not his magistrates his Ministers to execute vengeance temporall here in this world And can any sober man dout whether God be invincible whom the Apostle pronounceth to be irresistable Againe an efficient cause admits farther distinction for it is either Physicall or Morall Physicall is that which really workes or executes any thing as every tradesman hath his worke which his hands doe make so God hath his worke which he executes and his worke is judgment as well as mercy I am the Lord which shew mercy and judgment and righteousnesse for in these things I delight saith the Lord and he would have us when we doe glory glory in this that we doe understand and know him to
on earth and makes him the Authour not of the sinne only that entred by Adam into the world but of all other sinnes that have been are or shall be committed to the worlds end No murthers robberies rapes adulteries insurrections treasons blasphemies persecutions or any other abominations whatsoever fall out at any time or in any place but they are the necessary productions of God Almightys decrees The Scripture I am sure teaches us another lesson Thou art not a God saith David that hast pleasure in wickednesse And the Prophet Esay tells the people that when they did evill in the sight of the Lord they did choose the things which he would not Let no man say when he is tempted I am tempted of God For God cannot be tempted with evill neither tempteth he any man but every man is tempted when he is drawen away with his own concupiscence And St. John when he had referred all the sinnes of the world to three heads the lust of the flesh the lust of the eyes and the pride of life tells us that they are not of the Father but of the world To which speeches let me adde the speech of Stracides though not of the same authority Say not thou it is through the Lord that I fell away for thou oughtest not to do the things that he hateth Say not thou he hath caused me to erre for he hath no need of the sinfull man 2. Pious antiquity hath constantly sayd the same and prest it with sundry reasons some of which are these as follow If God be the Authour of sinne then he is worse then the Devill because the devill doth only tempt and perswade to sinne and his action may be resisted but God by this opinion doth will and procure by a powerfull and effectuall decree which cannot be resisted This is Prospers argument who to some objecting that by St. Austin's doctrine when Fathers defile their own Daughters and Mothers their own Sonnes Servants murther their masters men commit any horrible villanies it cometh to passe because God hath so decreed Answereth that if this were layd to the Devills charge he might in some sort cleare himselfe of the imputation Quia etsi delectatus est furore peccantium probaret tamen sc non intulisse vim criminum Because though he be delighted with man's sinnes yet he doth not he cannot compell men to sinne What a madnesse therefore is it to impute that to God which cannot be justly fathered upon the Divell 2. He cannot be a punisher of sinne For none can justly punish those effences of which they are the Authors This is Prospers argument too It is against reason to say that he wich is the damner of the Devill would have any one to be the devills Servant This reason Fulgentius useth likewise illius rei Deus ultor est cujus Auhor non est Tertullian also before them hath sayd He is not to be accounted the Author of sinne who is the forbidder yea and the condemner of it 3. He cannot be God because he should not be just nor holy nor the Judge of the world all properties essentiall to God And this is Basil's reason who hath written a whole Homily against this wicked assertion It is all one saith he to say that God is the Author of sinne and to say he is not God 3 Upon these and the like considerations I may well conclude that the opinion which chargeth God with the sinnes of men is neither good nor true It is first layd to the charg of our Divines that by this their opinion they make God the Authour of sinne not of the first only that entred by Adam into the world but of all other sinnes that have been are or shall be committed in the world as murthers robberies rapes adulteries insurrections treasons blasphemies heresies persecutions or any other abominatiōs But in all these wastfull discourses not a word of proofe The charge is made in the first place the proofe last All that he labours to prove here is that God is not the Author of sinne Bellarmine hath bestowed or rather cast away a whole book on this crimination to him Arminius referrs Perkins telling him that he should have answered Bellarmine I have taken some paines to performe that taske upon that motion of Arminius I would I could receive from this Authour a reply to any materiall particular thereof the rather because I understand in part his Zeale for Bellarmine in his age correcting the harsh exceptions he hath made against him in his younger dayes And let every indifferent Reader compare this Authors discourse with that discourse of Bellarmine and judge indifferently what an hungry peece this is in comparison to that of Bellarmines And whether his paines had not been better bestowed in replying upō my answer thereunto then to adde such scraps as these to that full table of Bellarmin's provision and whether these deserve any answer that whole discourse of Bellarmine being refuted throughout Bradwardine disputes the question Si quomodo Deus vult non vult peccatum I say he disputes it indifferently on both sides and let every Schollar judge and weigh whether it be not a very ponderous argument and consider well his resolution and where he differrs any thing from our Divines in this Calvin observing how frequent the Scripture is in testifying God's hand to be operative in abominable courses thereupon writes a Treatise De occultâ Dei providentiâ in malo in all which he exactly conformes himselfe to Scripture expressions And these and such like vile Criminators may as well taxe God's word for making God the Author of sinne as Calvin who most accurately conformes himselfe to the testimonies of Divine Scripture I remember to have heard a disputation sometimes at Heidelberge on this Argument where Copenius the President or Moderator made manifest that look upon what grounds they criminated Calvin for making God the Authour of sinne upon the same grounds they might criminate the very word of God to make him the Author of sinne For Calvine throughout in his expressions conformes himselfe to the language of the holy Ghost Yet what one of our divines can he produce affirming that God takes pleasure in sinne Piscator confesseth that God taketh no pleasure in the death of him that dyeth upon that place in Ezechiel how much lesse in wickednesse And he illustrates it in this manner For albeit it cannot be denyed but that God willeth the death of him that dyeth For he is the God to whom vengeance belongeth yet he takes no pleasure in it Like as a sick-man would be content to take a bitter potion for the recovery of his health yet he takes no pleasure in that bitter cup. And in like manner albeit God hardened Pharaoh's heart that he should not let Israel goe and as the Apostle speaks hardeneth whom he will Whereby it comes to passe infallibly that they doe not obey
doe choose the things that God would not 2. If God doth will it but not by a powerfull and effectuall irresistable decree let him shew what that decree is whereby he wills sins Now this is commonly accounted a decree conditionall and let him speak plainely then tell us upon what condition it is that God doth will and procure sin in the world and I am verily perswaded he is to seek what to answer 3. If God doth will and decree it it cannot be avoided but it must be by a powerfull and effectuall decree which cannot be resisted seeing the Apostle saith plainly speaking of his decree that it cannot be resisted Upon these considerations I am perswaded that this Authour doth utterly deny that God doth at all will sin or decree that any such thing shall come to passe in the world that these attributes of powerfull and effectuall irresistable are used by him not for distinction sake but meerly for amplification that so he might speake with a full mouth Now having brought this Authour home to himselfe and delivering himselfe and his meaning plainely I am very willing to cope with him on this point Yet what need I having so fully disputed the point in a certaine digression in my Vindiciae lib. 2. Digrees 4. The title whereof is this Whether the holy one of Israel without any blot to his Majesty may be said to will sin And forthwith I answer that God may be said thus farre to will sin in as much as he will have sin to come to passe And for explication sake it is added that whereas God will have all the good things of the world whether naturall morall or spirituall come to passe by his working of them Only evill things he will have come to passe by his permitting them But this Authour affects to worke upon the ignorant and he doth not affect to trouble their braines with answering my reasons least thereby he should raise many spirits and afterwards prove unable to lay them And this discourse of M. Hord's some of that sect thought good to have it coppied out and communicated to people in the Country as accommodated to their capacities and so more fit to promote their edificatiō in the plausible way of Arminian religion well therefore in the proofe of this tenet namely that God will have sin come to passe by his permission I prove first by Scripture God hath put in their hearts that is in the hearts of the 10 Kings to fulfill his will Now marke what is the object of God's will in the words following and to agree and give their kingdōes unto the beast untill the words of God shall be fulfilled now by giving their Kingdomes unto the beast is not to depose or dethrone themselves or to part with their Kingdomes but only to submit their regall authority to the executiō of the beasts wrath against the Saints of God Like as in the dayes of Popery when the Saints of God were by Popish Prelates condemned for heresies then they were delivered into the hands of the secular powers the sherifes to burne thē at a stake Now this the holy Ghost makes the object of Gods will and their agreement thus to execute the Popes Antichristian pleasure is said to be Gods worke For God is said to put it into their hearts to doe this evill of his Of disobedient persons the Apostle professeth that they are ordained to stūble at Gods word wherein undoubtedly they sin Paul likewise testified of some that God sends thē strong delusions that they should beleive a lye of others that God gave them up to uncleanes through the lusts of their owne hearts to dishonour their owne bodyes betweene thēselves And to a Reprobate mind to do those things which are not convenient Now let every sober man judge whether when God blinded the eyes of the one and hardned the harts of the other it were not his will that those foule things which were committed by them should come to passe by his permissiō Then consider what the Apostles with one consent testifie concerning those abominable acts committed against the holy son of God namely that both Herod Pontius Pilate with the Gentiles people of Israel were gathered together to doe what Gods hand his coūsell had before determined to be done This the Apostles deliver to the very face of God in their prayers holy meditatiōs And let every Christian consider whether it the Scripture had not made mention of this any one of us had used the like prayer meditatiō this Author all that are of his spirit would not have beene ready to spit in our faces cry us downe for notorious blasphemers Yet the Apostles indued with the spirit of God feared not to be found guilty of violating the Lords holinesse in all this Hence I proceeded to the passages of the Old Testament for the confirmation of the same truth As namely that whereas the desolatiō of the holy Land begun by the Assyrians finished by the Babylonians could not cōe to passe without many enormous sins Who can deny that it was Gods will that these things should come to passe considering that Assur himself is acknowledged by God to be the rod of his wrath and the staffe of his indignation whom God would send against an hypocriticall nation against the people of his wrath would he give him a charge to take the spoyle to take the prey to tread them downe like the mire in the streets Hence I proceeded to shew how that it is Gods usuall course to punish sin with sin Now when God exerciseth his judgments shall not those things justly be said to come to passe by his will which are punishments of foregoing sinnes See the judgment of God denounced against Amaziah the Preist of Bethell Thou sayst prophecy not against Israel drop not thy word against the house of Isaac Therefore thus saith the Lord Thy wife shall be an harlot in the Citties thy sons thy daughters shall fall by the sword And in like manner Solomon saith The mouth of a strange woman is a deep pit he that is abhorred of the Lordshall fall therein The incest of Absolom defiling his fathers cōcubines in a shameles manner came it not to passe by the will of God whose word is this Behold I will raise up evill against thee out of thine owne house I will take thy wives before thine eyes give them unto thy neighbour he shall ly with thy wives in the sight of this sun The defection of the ten tribes frō the house of David came it not to passe by the will of God when God himselfe testifies that it was his worke not his will onely Thus saith the Lord the God of Israel I will rent the kingdome out of the hands of Solomon give ten tribes to thee speaking to Ieroboam here we have Gods will for it And
or ability at all in the issue of avoiding their sinnes but must of necessity commit them Thus they teach and therefore by just consequences they make God the Authour of sinne as it will plainly appeare by these following considerations Poets tell us there was a time when Giants on earth set themselves to fight against God in heaven because the place of his habitation was out of their reach they laid mountaine upon mountaine hill upon hill Pelion upon Ossa that so they might make their approaches unto him beseige him in his own fastnes this fable is a monumēt of the shipwrack of that truth among heathen-men which the Lord had preserved unto his Church upon record in his holy word For when after the great Deluge in the dayes of Noah men began to be multiplied upon the face of the earth they consulted how they might fortify themseves against the like inundation for the time to come and thereupon encouraged thēselves saying Goe to let us build us a City and a town whose top may reach unto the Heaven that we may get us a name least we be scattered upon the whole earth But how didthe Lord deale with these presumptuous adventurers The Poet 's faign that Iupiter destroyed them with his thunderbolts and as for one of them Typhoeus by name a proud fellow he laid him fast enough under the hill Aetna in Sicily where he breaths out smoak fire like the great Polan out of a Tobacco-pipe somewhat bigger then a good Caliver But the Scripture tels us how that for their saying Goe too let us build c. the Lord answered them with a Come on let us goe downe and there confound their language that every one perceive not one anothers speech This Author herhaps is but a Pygmie for bodily presence yet he may be a Gyant for his wit and found 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to fight against God in a spirituall way in the opposing of his truth As Gamaliel sometimes advised the high Priest with his counsell to take heed lest they were found even fighters against God It is true this Author no doubt perswades himselfe that he fights for God in as much as he affects to free him from being the Author of sin But let not the simple Reader be deluded with shewes but seriously consider whither all this doe which he makes about the point of Reprobation doth not clearly tend to the overthrowing of God's free grace in election which is so much the more foule because he doth it underhand as conscious to himselfe of his owne impotency to impugne it openly or fearing the generall opposition of our Church against him therefore he practiseth to undermine it And this I have found to be his course divers years agoe in his private undertakings to draw proselytes unto him namely to decline the point of grace of election to deale only upon Reprobation and there to put his concurrent to begin as if he would have a young Divine to inform a Sexagenarian as I have seen under his own hand But see the hand of God upon him in confounding his language as when he stands for Reprobation evitable avoidable reproacheth his adversaries for maintaining Reprobation inevitable unavoidable This is the phrase of his Schoole For I do not remember to have met with it any where but in him his disciples Now what man of common sense doth not observe this phrase to be appliable only to things that are to come but of a contingent nature so that they may be avoyded declined but by no means apply able to things already done that more then many thousand years agoe For what sober man could heare with patience another discourse of the avoidable nature of Noah's flood now in these daies to maintain that it is at this day avoidable what fustian like to this Might he not as well take liberty to discourse of the Aequinoctiall pasticrust It was wont to be said that this alone God himself could not perform namely to cause that which is done to be not done As Aristotle in his Eth relates a saying of one Agatho to that purpose Now reprobation is confessed by all to be of the same age with election election was as the Apostle tels us performed by God before the foundation of the world And is not this Author then besides himself when he pleads for evitable avoydable Reprobation But albeit this Author makes the worst of our opinions and expressions yet I will not requite him by making the worst of his that were base inglorious and to be overcome I will therefore hearken to the Apostles counsell where he saith Be not overcome with evill but overcome evill with good I will make the best of his and according to the distinction of God's will used in Schooles as it is taken either quoad actum volentis or quoad res volitas as touching the act of him that willeth or the things willed So I will imagine that he speaks of Reprobation which is the will of God not as touching the act of God Reprobating making such a decree but as touching the thing decreed this thing decreed he will have to be of an avoidable nature Now this we willingly grant utterly deny that this any way hinders the absolutenes of God's decree We say with the 11 article of the Church of Ireland that God from all aeternity did by his unchangeable councell ordain whatsoever should in time come to passe yet so as hereby neither the contingency nor liberty of the second causes is taken away but established rather So that whereas we see some things come to passe necessarily some contingently so God hath ordained that all things shall come to passe that do come to passe but necessary things necessarily contingent things contingently that is avoidably with a possibility of not comming to passe For every University Scholar knows this to be the notion of contingency yet will not I content my selfe with the article of Ireland for this Aquinas thus distinguisheth For having proposed this question Whether the will of God doth impose a necessity upon the things willed To this question this Author with whom I deale would answer affirmatively saying it doth impose a necessity on all such things or at least obtrude such an opinion upon us himself undoubtedly thinks that in case Gods will be absolute it must cause a necessity upon all things willed therby both which are utterly untrue this last utterly denyed by Aquinas For first every will of God is absolute in the judgment of Aquinas which I prove thus That will which hath noe cause or reason thereof is absolute This proposition I presume this Authour will not deny But the will of God hath no cause in the judgment of Aquinas therefore every will of God is absolute by his doctrine Yet this absolute will of God imposeth not a necessity upon all things
holy Ghost himselfe whose expressions are the same for substance with the expressions of Piscator It is farther observable that Piscator saith That Reprobates by reason of this Divine ordination doe sinne necessarily I answer Piscator was an excellent Scripture Divine but noe School-divine and therefore noe marvaile if he want the accuratenesse of Scholasticall expression Yet I salve him thus They sinne necessarily upon suspicion that God will have them to sinne by his permission but this is noe necessity simply so called but only secundum quid But God decrees the manner of things comming to passe as well as the things themselves as before I shewed out of Aquinas Soe that all be it it must needs be that sinne come to passe in case God hath decreed it shall come to passe yet if the question be after what manner it shall come to passe I answere not necessarily but contingently and freely that is not onely with a possibility of not comming to passe but with a free power in the creature to abstaine from that sin which is committed by him For God ordained that every thing that doth come to passe shall come to passe agreably to the nature thereof and accordingly moves every creature to worke agreeably to their natures Necessary agents necessarily contingent agents contingently Free agents freely And as formerly was mentioned every sinfull act is a naturall act and a man hath free power even in the state of corruption either to doe or to leave undone any naturall act And Piscator in other places dealing with Vorstius clearely professeth as I well remember though the the place come not to my memory that wicked men doe commit those things freely which are committed by them And it is an excellent saying of Austine that Libertas sine gratiâ non est libertas sed contumacia Liberty without grace is not liberty but wilfullnesse indeed they shew too much will therein rather then too little and in denying liberty to them that want grace he speakes of liberty morall which is only unto true good not of liberty naturall which hath place only in the choice of meanes and is inseparable from the nature of man But true morality sets a mans soule in a right condition towards his right end 4. It may be this Authour could not be so inconsiderate as not to perceive that even those expressions concerning Gods decree which he criminates in our Divines are Scripture expressions therefore to helpe his cause here he imputes unto them that they maintaine that God decreed this immutably as if himselfe could be content to grant that these things are decreed by God but not immutably And would this Authour have the will of God to be of a mutable condition like unto ours I am confident he dares not professe so much for albeit he licks his lips at a conditionall decree yet how doth he conceive this to be mutable For to resolve to save men upon condition of faith and repentance and perseverance and damne others in case they continue in infidelity and impenitency if accordingly none be saved but such in whom faith and repentance and finall perseverance therein is found none damned but such as persevere in sinne unto death what change is there in all this Unlesse this be it that God did not resolve to save any particular person untill his finall perseverance was accomplished And so God may be said in processe of time to change from not willing to willing one man's salvation and another man's damnation In which case God's decree also should not be eternall but begin in time Againe as touching that which followes of of God decreeing that Reprobates shall live and dye in sinne I answer to decree not to regenerate Reprobates is to decree that Reprobates shall not be regenerated for they are not able to regenerate themselves and to decree that they shall not be regenerated is to decree that they shall live and dye in sinne by God's permission he resolving never to shew such mercies to take them of from their sinfull courses by repentance And so long as they are not borne of God they will not heare his words as our Saviour testifies saying Yee therefore heare them not because ye are not of God As for sinne procured by the hand of God which he obtrudes upon our Divines not one passage doth he produce for that Yet as I remember I have read such an harsh expression in Piscator dealing against Vorstius which at this time doth not come to my remembrance but withall I remember that Piscator being charged therewith by Vorstius forthwith represents certaine passages of Scripture concerning Gods's providence in evill and appeales to the judgment of every sober Christian whether to do that which therein is attributed to God be not to procure sin It is apparent that Joseph acknowledgeth that the Lord sent him into Egypt yet was this brought to passe by the parricidiall hands of his brethren And it is no lesse plaine that God hardened Pharaohs heart that he should not let Israel goe And by Arminius his Definition of effectuall grace it is evident that by Gods denying it sin doth follow infallibly And so likewise upon Gods permission of willing this or that he professeth that it must needs be that by noe kind of argument shall such a one be perswaded to nill it I come to the meanes whereby he is said to procure it The first is by withdrawing grace necessary for the avoyding of sin Now of this he gives no instance out of any of our Divines 2 I know no grace which this Authour accounts necessary that any of our Divines teach to be withdrawen by God 3 God indeed doth not determine their wills to that which is good but this Authour doth not account any such determination necessary to the avoyding of sin 4 Prohibition denuntiation of judgment dehortation and such gracious actions God doth neither withdraw nor withhold from the wicked who are partakers of this grace as well as Gods children as often as they meet in the same congregation for the hearing of Sermons 5. An effectuall restraint from sin I know none but the feare of God yet this he withdrawes not from the wicked for they never had it nor from the children of God only he doth not stirrre it in them at all times so often as he suffers them to sin which yet may be to gracious ends As I for the confirmation of their faith that nothing no not sin shall separate them from the love of God when they shall find the goodnesse of God minding them of their errours and bringing them to repentance 2 As also to make them smart for their former security and wantonnesse in beholding the uncomfortable issue of it 3 To provoke them to walke more carefully and circumspectly for the time to come standing upon their guard and keeping the watch of the Lord. 4. To cure their pride according to that of Austin Audeo dicere
Utile est superbis in aliquod apertum manifestumque cadere peccatum I am bold to speake it It is good for a proud man to to fall into some open and manifest sin I come to the second stay whereby he objects to our Divines that they maintaine that God procures the sinnes of men and that is by his moving and inclining them by his irresistable and secret workings on their hearts to sinfull actions To which I answer first that not any of the passages alleadged by him out of Calvin who alone makes totam paginam in this of his makes mention of Gods irresistable working or of moving or inclining unto sinfull actions And let every sober man judge whether a bridle is fit to urge men to action and not rather to restraine from action and this is the force of the first Quotation But this Authour through heat corrupting his imagination tooke a bridle for a spurre His second testifies only this that man doth nothing but what God decreed and by his direction appointeth and this also upon pregnant testimonies of scripture never undertaking to shew Calvins interpretation to be false or his accommodation of them to be incongruous In the third he grants that God workes in the mind of men In the 4. he saith that God stirrs up the wills and confirmes the purposes of wicked men for the execution of his judgment by Satan the minister of his wrath Where consider he doth this by Satan that is he gives them over to Satan for this so that 't is Satan that stirres up their wills and confirmes their endeavours by Gods permission without restraint either immediate or mediate by the ministry of his good angells and all this is but to execute Gods judgments And that it is just with God to punish sin with sin both scripture testifies in divers places and Austin confirmes with variety of Scripture testimonies in his lib. 5. contra Julian Pelag cap. 3. The last is that God's worke it is to harden mans heart and thereby prepare him to destruction And let every sober reader that is not willing to be cheated both of his faith and honesty all at once examine these places in Calvin and the Scriptures whereby he proves that which he affirmes and let him but aske the Authour these questions If Calvin delivers nothing in all this but what he proves out of Scripture why is he found fault with more then the word of God If Scripture be mis-alleadged and mis-understood by him why do not you confute him 2 Though Calvin in all this makes no mention of Gods inclining wicked men to sinfull actions yet Austin doth as before I have shewed and that by variety of Scripture testimonies And if this be to make God the Authour of sin why hath he not so much ingenuity as to confesse at least in the close of all that Calvin makes God the Authour of sin no more then Austin doth and neither of them more then the word of God doth and therewithall renounce the Scriptures and turne Atheist 3 As the Lord hardened the heart of Pharaoh to his destruction so did he the heart of Sihon also Nowsee what Cardinall Caietan writes upon thisvery place Utramque homines partē spiritum cor hoc est superiorem inferiorem male dispositam à Deo intellige negativè penes dona gratuita positivè autem quoad judicium inclinationem prosecutionem bòni sensibilis Ita quod Deus spiritum Regis durum hoc est non cedentem petionibus reddit non dando ei gratiam acquiescendi coo operando eidem ad affectum securitatis boni proprii similiter roboravit cor ad affectum boni victoriae hujusmodi Each part of King Sihon his spirit and heart that is the upper and lower part being ill disposed by God understād this negatively as touching guifts of grace but positively as touching his judgment affection and prosecution of a sensible good So that the Lord made the Kings heart hard that is not to yeild to the request made both by not giving grace to rest satisfied and by cooperating with him to the affecting of security and his own good And in like manner he hardned his heart to the affecting of victory and the like I have not heard that this my opposite hath been ever ready to censure Caietan for making God the Authour of all this yet noe passage I am perswaded throughout all Calvin's works can be found comparable unto this Yet was Caietan noe Jesuite he need not spare his censures I come to the sum of that which he hath delivered in a whole leafe The first whereof is this that we teach That God appointed many miserable men from all eternity to unavoidable torments Now that God appointed many fom eternity to everlasting torments this Authour acknowledgeth as well as we As for the avoidable condition of them it is confessed on both sides that they are avoidable only by breaking off their sinnes by repentance before their death and by this we acknowledge them to be avoidable of all and every one as well as they But we say God doth not grant this grace to all For he is not bound to give it to all noe nor to any but he vouchsafeth this grace to whom he will and he denieth it to whom he will and this St. Paul hath taught us where he saith God hath mercy on whom he will and whom he will he hardneth The second is that we teach that God to bring about their intended ruine decreed that they should without remedie live die in a state of sin To this I answer that it is a most absurd conceite to make the tormenting of any man God's end We have learnt of King Solomon that God made all things for himselfe here is the end of his actions the manifestation of his own glory And albeit he made the very wicked also against the day of evill yet the end thereof was for himselfe as formerly specified that is for the manifestation of his just wrath and that God hath power without any difference in the matter to make some vessells of wrath and some of mercy as he thinkes good The Apostle plainely teacheth us where he saith Hath not the Potter power over the clay of the same lump to make one vessell unto honour and another unto dishonour And if any man's wicked proud heart make insurrection against this truth the Apostle hath taught us to stop his mouth with this shall the the thing formed say to him that formed it why hast thou made me thus Shall not God have as much power over the masse of mankind as the Potter hath over the clay So that this is God's end not man's damnation but his own glory Haec loquendiratio saith Calvin this manner of speech finem creationis esse interitum aeternum the end of man's creation is his everlasting destruction nusquam apud me occurret shall never be found
his own hand still and hereby occasions and opportunities are offered from time to time for a man to advantage himselfe in sinfull courses either in the way of profit or satisfying his unclean lusts And Arminius confesseth that the administration of Arguments and occasions which provoke to such an act as cannot be committed by the creature without sinne if not by Gods intention yet at least according to the creatures affection and often according to the events that arise therehence This administration I say Arminius confesseth doth belong to the Divine providence And these arguments he saith are objected ther to the mind of man or to his senses outward or inward and that either by the mediate worke of the creatures comming between or by God's immediate action And that the end of this Divine administration is to make tryall whether the creature will abstaine from sinne even then when it is provoked thereunto As for the triall of David was Bathsheba going â—oâ—th to wash her selfe objected to David whereupon he was inflamed with lusts Ioseph was not though farre more strongly sollicited by the temptations of his wanton Mistris Secondly to necessitate the will or determine the will are noe phrases of our Divines The first is used only by Bradwardine as at present I remember sometimes Arch-Bishop elect of Canterbury The other is that phrase of the Dominicans Now they are of age and able to answer for themselves Why doth not this Authour answer a chapter or two in Bradwardine a chapter or two in Alvarez where they dispute this and resolve the question affirmatively Surely hereby he should performe a worke more worthy of a Scholasticall Divine then by so hungry a discourse as this Secondly consider neither Bradwardine maintaines that God necessitates nor Alvarez that God determines the will to sinne but to every naturall act in which kind of acts sinne is to be found Why then should this Auhour carry himselfe thus in his crimination We know sin is meerly privative in the formall notion thereof an obliquitie such as concerning which Austine hath long agoe deliverd that it hath noe efficient cause but deficient only And divers waies Divines have shewed how God may be the authour of the act yet not the Authour oâ— the sin and illustrated it by various similitudes As of a man riding upon a lame horse he makes him goe but doth not make him halt The sun shining upon a dung-mixton makes it evaporate but doth not make it stinke The sun makes flowers to evaporate and send forth their favours as well as a dung-mixton but that the one evaporates a sweet odour the other an unsavory is froÌ„ the nature of things themselves on which the sun beates In like sort the Sun by the heat thereof provokes all things to engender according to their kinds even frogs and toades snakes as well as other creatures profitable for the use of man in the way of food yea of vipers flesh good use is made in the way of physicke And God knowes how to make good use even of the sinnes of men and of the rage and malice of Satan If an underw-heele being out of his place the upper wheele in a jacke or clocke will set him going in a wrong way as well as all the rest in a right way his motion is from the upper whele his irregular motion from himselfe A good Scribe meeting with moist paper will make but sorry worke The writing is from himselfe the blurring from the moistnesse of the paper on this very question whether the act of sinne be from God Aquinas maintaining the affirmative illustrates it by a distinction of the halting motion of a lame legge the motion saith he is from the soule the 〈◊〉 is froÌ„ the imperfection of the Organ the infirmitie of the legge Yet this Authour carrieth it hand over head as if to be the Authour of the action were to be the sinne not considering that himselfe maintaines that God is the Authour of the action and that in the kind of a cause efficient naturall Thirdly when Bradwardine maintaines that God necessitates the will to every good act thereof he withall professeth that he necessitates it ad liberum actum suum that is to worke every act thereof freely Soe when Alvarerz maintaines that God determinates the will to every act thereof he withall maintaines that God determines the will to worke free ye and so Aquinas For when he workes upon contingent causes he moves theÌ„ to bring forth their effects contingently like as when he workes upon necessary causes he moves them to produce their effects necessarily And like as to move contingent causes to produce their effects contingently is to move them to produce their effects with a possibility to the contrary Soe to move free causes to produce their effects freely is to move them to produce their effects with an active power to the contrary But to proceed whereas he saith that sinne must needs follow the determination it is as true 1. In this Authour's judgment that it must needs follow upon God's coÌ„currence to this act If he say that this concurreÌ„ce is necessary to every act I answer it is necessary to the substance of every act but not at all required to the sinne though this Authour carieth it blindfold after this manner Secondly so say we is determination required to the substance of every act And Gods concourse with the creature is not coordinate like as one man concurres with another in moving a timber logge which is the expression of the Jesuites thereby manifesting the vilenesse of their opinion as we can demonstrate and that more waies then one by evident demonstration as I have allready shewed in my Vindiciae Let this Authour answer those digressions if he can I am confident he will never answer them while his head is hot nor all the Rabble of the Arminians We know God is the first cause and all other are but second causes in comparison to him Yet we willingly confesse that the providence of God is wonderfull and of a mysterious nature in this but such as whereunto the Scripture gives pregnant testimonie as scarce to any thing more So jealous he is least his providence should be denied in evill wherein indeed it is most wonderfull and he takes unto himselfe the hardning of men's hearts and blinding of their mindes and prostituting them to abominable courses even to vile affections and thereby to punish sinne with sin as Rom 1. Therein saith the Apostle they received the recompence of their errour This hath Austine also by Scripture suggestion testified at large in his book De gratiâ Libero arbitrio in two large chap likewise in his fifth book against Iulian the Pelagian third chap this also the Adversaries have been driven to confesse in a strange manner as to give instance first in Bellarmine whose words are these God saith he praesidet ipsis voluntatibus easque regit
built upon the freenes of the other in not being given according unto men's merits As it appeares de bono perseverantiae cap. 15. Where having proposed some exceptions of the Massilienses made against his doctrine of predestination comming to make answer thereunto he begins thus Ista cum dicuntur saith he ita nos à confitenda Dei gratia id est quae non secundum merita nostra datur a confitenda secundum eam predestinatione sanctorum deterrere non debent When these things are objected they must not deterre us from confessing God's grace I meane such a grace as is not given accordiog unto works nor from confessing the predestination of Saints according thereunto Now if the absolutenesse of predestination be grounded upon this that grace is not given according unto merits the scripture phrase denies it to be given according unto workes But Bellarmine acknowledgeth that in this Argument merits and workes are taken by the Ancients in one and the same sense it followeth that as many as deny the absolutenesse of predestination must therewithall maintaine that Grace is given according to men's merits or works And the reason is evident For if God doth not give grace according unto men's works but of his mere pleasure decreed to give grace unto some and not upon consideration of their works And this is to elect absolutely and antecedently without the foresight of any deserving yea of any works though by that expression which this Authour useth he doth sufficienty manifest that his opinion is that God elects not only upō the foresight of men's workes but upon the foresight of men's deservings It is farther considerable to prevent the reaches of such crafty foxes as we have to deale with whose course is in joyning the decree of conversion and salvation together to translate that which belongs unto one unto the other most unreasonably For albeit God proceeds according to the mere pleasure and without all respect to workes in conferring grace and decreeth accordingly to conferre it Yet he proceeds not merely according unto pleasure and without all respect of works in conferring glory but according unto a Covenant which is this whosoever beleiveth shall be saved and accordingly he bestowes the kingdome of heaven by way of reward for faith repentance and good workes This hath Christ deserved at the hands of his Father that our weake performances should be thus rewarded Lastly it is farther to be considered that God as he thus bestoweth salvation by way of reward of our faith repentance so from everlasting he did decree to bestowe salvation namely by way of reward Not that either faith or repentance or good workes any or all of these were the cause least of all the deserving cause of God's decree or antecedaneous to his decree but of his mere pleasure decreed both to give the grace of faith and repentance and to bestow eternall life by way of a reward thereof as may farther be proved and that clearly divers waies 1. By the Apostl's discourse where he discourseth after this manner Before Esau and Iacob were borne or had done good or evill it was said that the Elder shall serve the younger therefore election is not of workes But if election did proceeed upon the foresight of faith repentance and good workes or any of them then it might justly be said that it were of faith repentance or good workes or of all of them And the force of the Apostles argument extends to conclude that election is noe more of faith or of repentance then of workes not only because faith and repentance are workes and so accounted in Scripture phrase as it appeares Io 6. 29. But cheifely because before men are borne they are uncapable of faith and repentance as of good workes 2. If faith were a motive cause unto election then either it were so of it 's own nature or by constitution Divine not of it's own nature as it is apparent If by constitution divine mark what strange absurdities follow namely this that God did ordaine that upon the fore sight of faith he would ordaine men unto salvation whereby God's eternall ordination is made the object of his ordination whereas the Objects of God's decrees are alwaies things temporall never any thing that is eternall 3. It cannot be said that God giveth salvation to the end he may give them faith but it may farre more congruously be said that God gives faith to the end that he may save them therefore the intention of salvation is rather before the intention of giving faith then the intention of giving faith is before the intention of giving salvation Or better thus if God foresee faith before he decrees salvation then the intention of giving faith without which God cannot foresee faith is before the intention of giving salvation and consequently the giving of faith should be the last in execution that is men shall first be saved and aferwards have faith bestowed upon them to wit in another world where they live by sight and not by faith I come to the decree of reprobation the Objects whereof are two proportionable to the two objects of election or predestination The first is permission of sin the second is Damnation for sinne according to that of Aquinas Reprobatio includit voluntatem permitendi culpam damnationem inferendi pro culpâ Reprobation includes a will to permit sinne and to inflict damnation for sinne The first object of reprobation I say is permission of sinne not Sin as this Authour would have it but permission of sinne Because these decrees to wit of permitting sinne and inferring damnation for sinne are decrees of meanes conducing to a certaine end For like as in election God decreeth to bestowe faith repentance and obedience on some and to reward it with everlasting life for the manifestation of his glory in the way of mercy mixt with justice So in Reprobation he decrees to permit others to sinne and finally to persevere therein and to damne them for their sinne to manifest his glory in the way of vindicative justice Now whosoever intends an end must also be the Auhour of the meanes conducing to that end Now God though well he may be the Authour of permission of sinne yet he cannot be the Author of sinne Albeit upon God's permission of sinne it followeth that sinne shall exist Now to permit sinne is all one with denying grace whether it be grace Custodient to preserve from it or grace healing to pardon and cure it after it is committed Now like as the Lord hath mercy on whom he will in pardoning their sinne and healing it by faith and repentance So he hardeneth whom he will by denying faith and repentance So that as God of his mere pleasure grants the grace of faith and repentance unto some so of his mere pleasure he denies it unto others And so in Reprobation he decreeth of his mere pleasure to deny it But albeit the Lord of mere
his will to be regusated thereby can the will be said to be the rule of justice to the will without contradiction The rule propounded was this God's will is the rule of all righteousnesse but the other rule is the rule corrupted by this Authour when he talks of a will as a rule of justice to the will 2. But whether things are therefore just because God wills them or that therefore God willeth them because they are just undoubtedly that which here is proposed is a truth namely that whatsoever the Scripture sets downe to be the will of God that must needs be just Neither have we any need to improve it any farther then thus For it is well known that our Divines in their doctrine of predestination and reprobation doe depend on nothing so much as the evidence of God's word As this Author throughout this discourse of his depends on nothing lesse And therefore he hath cast himselfe upon a strange practice in the former passage namely to evacuate all our reasons drawn out of the word of God to confirme our doctrine pleading that the interpretations we make of Scripture are all false because the contrary doctrine which he maintaines is justified before the tribunall of humane reason purged from prejudice and false principles corrupt affections and customes Which is as much as to professe in plaine termes that to find out the truth concerning the decrees of predestination and reprobation we must leave the oracles of God and hearken to the oracles of reason provided that it be purged from prejudice and false principles from corrupt affections and customes Now I had thought that the spirit of God alone could purge us from such prejudice and false principles corrupt affections and customes And that this spirit of God worketh only by the word herein which is called in Scripture the sword of the spirit Yet this Author tells us not where this reason thus purged is to be found save that in generall he saith that is just or unjust which is so esteemed in the judgment both of best and worst that stand indifferent to the entertainment of any truth as is to be seen in the former reason according to M. Hord's discourse Now who these best are but the Arminians in this Authours fancy the worst but Anabaptists or heathens or both I know not Sure we are none of them in his understanding purged from false principles and prejudice from corrupt affections and customes because we doe not stand indifferent to the entertainment of his tenets which he calls Truths 3. Where can he shew that I have made use of any such principles to answer any argument of his against us I doe not find that any where he can drive me to this though this be the Apostles course as we may see Ro 9. Is there any injustice with God God forbid how doth he prove it but thus because the Scripture attributes such a course to God I will shew mercy on whom I will shew mercy and I will have compassion on whome I will have compassion 4. But where hath he learnt to be so audacious as to say that Things are not therefore just because God wills them but that his justice is rather a rule of his will and works Before he told us that justice in man and God were of the same nature Now that justice which is the rule of our will is Justitia obligans justice binding us to doe this or that and is Gods justice obligatory likewise to bind him In making the world I doe not doubt but God did that which was just but was there any justice in God obliging him to the making of the world who seeth not what an Atheisticall conclusion followeth herehence namely that the world was from everlasting if not necessarily by necessity of nature yet necessarily by obligation of justice otherwise for an infinite space of time wherein the world was not made which must needs have been if the world were not from everlasting God had been and continued to be unjust The Schooles have taught me that there is a justice of condecency consequent to all the actions of God noe justice of obligation precedent to it And whereas St. Paul tells us that God works all things according to the counsell of his will both Alvarez and Suarez though School Divines of opposite families yet concurre in this that this Counsell is à libera voluntate acceptum accepted of Gods free will And it is observable that the Apostle calls it not the Counsell of his understanding but the counsell of his will And Vasquâ—z and Suarez both Jesuites but very opposite about the nature of justice in God yet both concurre that there is no justice in God towards his creature but upon supposition of the determination of God's will It is most true that supposing the end which God intends the wisedome of God directs in the right use of congruous meanes and no other justice then this his wisedome doth Aquinas acknowledge in the Divine nature And great is the wisedome which God manifests in the goverment of this world yet the same wisedome as great as it is doth not equall the infinite wisdome of God But of this I have disputed more at large in my Vindiciae Where this question is discussed Whether the will of God be circumscribed or regulated by justice To no parcell whereof doe I find the least savour of an answer in this Authour But let us examine how well he proves his own Tenet And that is first by the authority of Hierome in his preface to his commentaries on Hosea 2. By the authority of Zanchy whereto I answer 1. That if the interpretations of Scripture must be judged of before the Tribunall of reason purged from prejudice and false principles from corrupt affections and customes must not the opinions of such as Hierome and Zanchy be judged of before the same tribunall also 2ly touching Hierome himselfe 1. It is true Hierome in that preface understands that command given Hosea to be only in a Type and for the reason here mentioned but in his Commentary he interpreteth it secundum historiam litterally Neither was the Prophet as he saith to be blamed in this For he was not the worse but he made her the better Praesertim especially he was not to be blamed because he did this not luxuriously or lustfully or of his own will but in obedience to the command of God Now let the indifferent judge whether Hierome be not as much for us upon the text as for our adversary in the preface 2. Observe that Hierome is nothing for him in the preface For Hierome speakes there of God's will of command but we treate of God's will as it signifies not his command given to man but his own purpose and decree to doe this or that himselfe Judge of the extravagancy of this Author by this and whether his understanding be sufficiently purged from prejudice and false principles from
words ye therefore heare them not because ye are not of God now what reasonable mā can deny but that it is a sin not to heare God's words then doth not our Saviour plainly professe that the true cause hereof is because they are not of God Now if to be of God in this place doth signifie God's Election then the cause of their sinnes hereby is made God 's not electing of them But if this phrase To be of God signifie God's regenerating of them as I thinke it doth then God's not regenerating of them is made the cause of this their disobedience in not hearing God's word 's and indeed the evill of sinne hath noe efficient cause but deficient only as Austine hath delivered long agoe And God is not bound to any either to elect him or regenerate him so that in failing to regenerate mā he doth not deficere or faile in any culpable mā ner now let every indifferent Reader judge whether here be not Dignus vindice nodus a knot worthy to be loosed it will require some worth of learning in him that solves it And is it decent for this Authour to censure a man for a conclusion made by him out of the word of God without shewing the faultinesse either of his interpretation thereof or of his consequence framed therehence So that this Author's wit cunning is more to be cōmended in not specifying the place where Piscator delivers this doctrine then either his learning or his honesty He was loath to raise spirits afterwards to prove unable to lay them Therefore thus I answer in behalfe of Piscator though God her by me made the cause why sōe heare not God's words to wit in as much as he doth not regenerate thē nor give the eies to see nor eares to heare an heart to perceive according to that of Moses Yet he doth not make God any culpable cause neither indeed is he any culpable cause while he failes to performe so gracious a worke towards thē the reason whereof is this He and he alone is a culpable cause who failes in doing that which he ought to do ut God all be it he doth not regenerate a man yet he failes not of doing that which he ought to doe For it is no duty of his to regenerate any man for he is bound to none Now to be the Authour of sinne is not only to be the cause thereof but to be a culpable cause thereof Undoubtedly God could preserve any man from sinne if it pleased him and if he doth not he is nothing faulty Secondly I answere that in true account God is only the cause why our naturall infidelity is not healed our corruption not cured Like as a Physitian may be said to be the cause why such a man continues sicke in as much as he could cure him but will not Soe God could cure the infidelitie of all but will not Only here is the difference the Physitian may be a culpable cause as who is bound to love his neighbour as himselfe but God being bound to none is no culpable cause of man's continuance in sinne and in the hardnesse of his heart albeit he can cure him but will not As for Piscator's saying here mentioned Reprobates are appointed precisely to this double evill to be punished everlastingly and to sinne and therefore to sinne that they may be justly punished Hereing are two things charged upon Piscator 1. That Reprobates are precisely appointed by God to perish everlastingly To this I answer that noe Arminiā that I know denies Reprobates to be appoinby God to everlasting damnation All the question is about the manner of appointing them namely whether this appointment of God proceeds meerly according to his meer pleasure or upon the foresight of sinne We say it proceeds meerly according to the good pleasure of God and not upon the foresight of sinne preceding And this we not only say but prove thus If reprobation proceed upon the foresight of sinne then it were of men's evill workes Now looke upon what grounds the Apostle proves that election is not of good workes upon the same ground it is evident that reprobation is not of evill works for the argumēt for the one is this Before Iacob Esau were borne or had done good or evill it was said to Rebekah the elder shall serve the younger therfore election is not of good works In like manner thus I reason concerning Reprobation Before Iacob and Esau were borne or had done good or evill it was said to Rebekah the elder shall serve the younger therefore reprobation is not of evill workes 2. If God doth ordaine any man to damnation upon foresight of sin then this sin foreseen is the cause of the Divine ordinance but sin foreseen cannot be the cause why God ordained man to damnation as I prove thus If it be the cause then either by the necessity of nature or by the ordinance of God not by necessity of nature For undoubtedly God if it pleased him could ordaine to annihilate them for their sinnes instead of punishing them with eternall fire Nor can it be the cause of any such decree by the free ordinance of God For if it were marke what intolerable absurdityes would follow namely this That God did ordaine that upon the foresight of sinne he would ordaine men unto damnation whereby God's eternall ordination is made the object of God's ordination whereas all know that the Objects of God's decrees which are all one with his ordinations are things temporall not things eternall 3. If the foresight of sinne goes before the decree of damnation then the decree of permitting sinne goes before the decree of damning for sin that is the permission of sinne was first in intention and consequently it ought to be last in execution that is First man should be damned for sin and not till afterwards permitted to sinne The second thing charged upon Piscator is this that Reprobates are precisely appointed to sin Now here the crimination grates not upō the manner of being appointed thereunto otherwise a way could be opened for a progresse in infinitum Now why should it be any more a fault in Piscator to say of some that they are appointed to sinne then in Peter to say of some that they are appointed to disobedience or in all the Apostles to professe that all the outrages committed by Herod and Pilate by the Gentiles and people of Israell were such as Gods hand his counsell had before determined to be done or why doth Piscator make God to be the Authour of sinne in this more then Peter and all the Apostles And considering this man's unconscionable carriage in this let the Reader take heed how he suffers himselfe to be gull'd by this Authour and drawne to censure such speeches in Piscator as making God the Authour of sinne when hereby he is drawne ere he is aware to passe the like censure on the Apostles And the