THE Scripture Gospel defended AND Christ Grace and Free Justification Vindicated Against the Libertines Who use the names of CHRIST FREE GRACE and JUSTIFICATION to subvert the Gospel and Christianity and that Christ Grace and Justification which they in zealous Ignorance think they plead for to the injury of Christ the danger of Souls and the scandalizing of the weak the insulting of Adversaries and the Dividing of the Churches Yet charitably differencing the wordy Errours of unskilful Opiniaters from their Practical Piety And the mistaken Notions of some Excellent Divines from the gross Libertine Antinomian Errours In Two Books The first A Breviate of Fifty Controversies about Justification written about thirteen years past and cast by till now after many provocations by Press Pulpit and Backbiting The second upon the sudden reviving of Antinomianism which seemed almost extinct near Thirty four years And the re-printing of Dr. Crisp's Sermons with Additions with twelve Reverend Names prefixed for a decoy when some of them abhor the Errour of the Book and know not what was in it but yielded by surprize only to declare that they believed him that told them that the Additions were a true Copy By RICHARD BAXTER an Offender of the Offenders of the Church by Defending the Truth and Duty which they fight against Lux oculos vexat ubi noctua luminis osor Putrida suspecti vexabunt ulcera tactus LONDON Printed for Tho. Parkhurst at the Bible and Three Crowns at the lower end of Cheapside 1690. HEB. 11.5 6. Without Faith it is impossible to please God He that cometh to God must believe that He is and that He is the Rewarder of them that diligently seek him Luke 19.17 Well thou good Servant Because thou hast been faithful in a very little have thou Authority over ten Cities So Mat. 25.21 Mat. 25.34 40 46. Inherit the Kindgom prepared for you from the Foundation of the World For I was hungry and ye gave me Meat In as much as ye have done it to one of the least of these my Brethren ye have done it to me And these shall go into Everlasting Punishment and the Righteous into Life Eternal Gen. 22.16 17 18. By my self have I sworn saith the Lord because thou hast done this thing and hast not withheld thy Son c. John 16.27 The Father himself loveth you because you have loved me and have believed that I came out from God 1 John 3.12 13. Whatsoever we ask we receive of him because we keep his Commandments and do those things that are pleasing in his sight and this is his Commandment that we believe on the Name of his Son Jesus Christ and Love one another Rev. 3.4 They shall walk with me in white for they are worthy Rev. 3.10 Because thou hast kept the Word of my Patience I will keep thee c. Mar. 7.29 For this saying go thy way the Devil is gone out c. Mat. 5.20 Except your Righteousness exceed the Righteousness of the Scribes and Pharisees you shall in no case enter into the Kingdom of Heaven Mat. 12.36 37. Every idle Word that Men shall speak they shall give account thereof in the day of Judgment For by thy Words thou shalt be Justified and by thy Words thou shalt be Condemned Jam. 2.24 You see then that by Works a man is Justified and not by Faith only So v. 13. to the end Rom. 8.29 30. Whom he foreknew them he predestinated to be conformed to the Image of his Son that he might be the first born among many Brethren And whom he did predestinate them he also called And whom he called them he also justified and whom he justified them be also glorified Luke 18.13 14. I tell you This man went down Justified rather than the other Prov. 17.15 He that Justifieth the wicked and he that condemneth the Just even they both are abomination to the Lord. Of Faith imputed to Righteousness and our being Justified by Faith See Rom. 3.30 26. Rom. 4.11 22 23 24. He that considereth the different sence of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the first usually signifying the Practical or Preceptive matter that is Righteousness the second Active efficient Justification and the third the State of the Just Qualitative or Relative or ipsam Justitiam will the better expound the Word Justification as it is in our Translations Rom. 4.24 25. For us also to whom it shall be imputed not is before we believe if a Conditional we believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead Who was delivered for our offences and was raised again for our Justification Not only obeyed and suffered for our Justification but was raised for it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 efficiently to make us just relatively and qualitatively and so to justify us and consequently to judge us just Exodus 23.7 I will not justify the wicked Obj. Rom. 4 5. He justifieth the ungodly Answ Yes By making him Just by Pardon Adoption and Godliness As he healeth the sick and raiseth the dead in sensu diviso Acts 2.38 Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of the Lord Jesus for the remission of sins 13.38 By him all that believe are Justified from all things from which ye could not be justified by the Law of Moses See Titus 3.6 7. 1 Cor. 6.8 9 10 11. Rom. 2.13 14. 1 Peter 1.16 17. 2 Co◠9.6 Rev. 20.12 13. And the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the Books according to their works c. Which is oft said in Scripture John 5.22.29 The Father judgeth no man but hath committed all Judgment to the Son and hath given him authority to Execute Judgment They that have Done Good to the Resurrection of Life and they that have done evil to the Resurrection of damnation 2 Tim. 4.7 8. I have fought a good fight Henceforth there is laid up for me a Crown of Righteousness which the Lord the righteous Judge shall give me at that day and not to me only but to all that love his appearing See Heb. 6.10 1 Cor. 15.58 Col. 3.24 Heb. 11.26 2. Thes 1.5 6 7. Mat. 5.12 Mat. 6.2.4.6 5.12 10.41.42 10.29 1 Cor. 9.17 Rom. 2.5.10 Mat. 7.4 1 Joh. 1.9 If we confess our sins he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness So Rom. 10.10.13 Mat. 6.14 15. If ye forgive men their trespasses your heavenly Father will forgive you But if ye forgive not men Neither will 1 Joh. 3.17 Let no man deceive you He that doth Righteousness is Righteous Isa 1.16 17 18. Cease to do evil c. Come now If your sins be red as crimson Isa 55.6 7. Seek the Lord while he may be found c. Let the wicked forsake his way c. Let him return to the Lord and he will have mercy on him c. Acts 10.35 In every nation he that feareth God and
explaining in what sense Christs Righteousness is imputed to us and how not 3. And do they tell us with any agreement what Righteousness of Christ they call Imputed Some say only the Passive some also the Active Some also the habitual and some also the Divine Much less agree they to what Effects it is imputed and how far 4. Also the name of Faith is used without a due and true explication of their meaning One by Faith meaneth not Faith but Christs Righteousness Another calls it an Instrument and yet denieth it to be the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 credere that is the Act of Faith indeed as if any thing else was that instrument Another saith it is but one Physical act and not like contracting a Moral complication of many Physical Acts One saith it is but one Act and all other Acts of Faith he that looketh to be Justified by denieth the Doctrine of Grace or true Justification and so leave men to despair because they can never tell which that single is and how to escape the damning Doctrine of Justification by works One saith it is the Understandings assent Another that it is the Wills recumbency or trust One saith it is only Faith in Christ that Justifieth and not in God the Father or the Holy Ghost One saith it is only Faith in Christs Priestly Office and not in Christ as Prophet or King some say it is not Faith in his whole Priestly Office either his Intercession or Heavenly Priesthood but only in his Sacrifice and Obedience Another that it is only the trusting on his Imputed Righteousness Another that it is none of all these but only the belief that we are already Justified by Christ One saith we are Justified only at once by the first numerical Act of Faith and never by any after Act Another that an Act of the same Species continueth our Justification And this confusion is from the vain fantasy of men that will divide and mince and yet will not sufficiently distinguish and know not that by Faith is meant our becoming Christians and continuing such 5. So they talk loud against Works in the Case of Justification and know not what either Paul or James or Christ meaneth by works But they dream that Works and Acts are of the same signification As if every humane Act were that which Paul meaneth by works contrary to his express explication And so to be Justified by Faith must be to be Justified by Works One saith we will grant Justification by Faith if you take it aright to be a going wholly out of our selves and denying all our own righteousness and going to Christ and his Righteousness alone But is their chosen Metaphor of Going out and Going to an Act or no Act If an Act than it is works if they may be believed If no Act then their meaning is we confess that you are Justified by Believing if you do not believe You are Justified by Faith if Faith be nothing and by coming to Christ if you come not to him or it be nothing Such is the sence of these Confounders and Corrupters But these and many such mistakes are to be opened in their proper place That which I here intend is not a confutation of this or that writer but to give them a breviate of my own Judgment who will not read what I have largely written in many books long ago pretending that the length of the books is their reason and yet have not so much conscience as to suspend their censures no nor their back-biting false accusations of that which they have not leisure to understand or read They judge hard cases which they never digested by any answerable Study and Scruple not Judging and Slandering perâ—ons unheard Corrupting the Gospel and so excellent a Subject as the Doctrine of Grace and of the Office and Merits and Judgment of Christ and so of Christianity it self is a matter that conscience should more tenderly fear than wearing a Surplice or kneeling at the Sacrament or communicating with a Church that useth the Common-Prayers To think those unworthy of their Communion that use such Ceremonies or forms of prayer and at the same time to prophane so high a part of the name of God as is his Grace in Christ and his Justifying Governing and Saving works and this quoad verba by corrupting it even in Essentials and then to defame as erroneous those that are not as Ignorant and Erroneous as themselves and to foment malice and errour and Sects by such lying defamations This is a Nonconformity which I earnestly desire that no man that loveth Christ or Free grace or the Church or his own Soul may ever take for his duty or his honour or rashly as a sequacious admirer of any mistaken leader be ever guilty of What is straining at a Gnat and swallowing a Camel if this be not And of how ill a constitution is such a blind and partial conscience I shall here study brevity and first explain the Doctrine of Grace and Righteousness and Justification in some self-evident Propositions And next briefly resolve about fifty doubts or Controversies hereabout THE CONTENTS 1. THe nature of Justification explained Controv. I. Whether it be an Immanent Act in God and from Eternity Cont. II. Whether the Covenant of Grace be made only with Christ or with us also Cont. III Whether the Covenant of Grace have any condition required of us Cont. IV Whether our performance of the Condition efficiently justify us Cont. V. Whether we are justified by Christs righteousness imputed to us And whether the Scripture say we are Cont. VI. In what sense is Christs Righteousness imputed to us Cont. VII What Righteousness of Christ is it that is ours and imputed to us the Passive the Active the Habitual or the Divine or all Cont. VIII Whether Christs Righteousness be the Efficient Material or Formal cause of our Righteousness or Justification Cont. IX Whether the Vnion between Christ and believers be not so near as maketh them the same Subject and so the Accident of Christs righteousness to be ours in itself Cont. 10. Are we not so righteous by an Vnion with Christ as we are sinners by our Vnion with Adam Cont. XI Is not Christs Righteousness ours as our sins were his by imputation Cont. 12. Doth Christs Righteousness cause our Sanctification in the same sort of Causality as it causeth our Justification Cont XIII Is it faith itself that is said to be imputed to us for Righteousness or only Christs or Christs Righteousness Cont. XIV Whether Grace be Grace and free if it have any condition Cont. XV. Whether Repentance be any condition of Pardon and Justification and to affirm it do not equal it with Faith Cont. XVI Whether faith justify us as a meritorious cause or as a dispositive cause of receiving Justification or as a meer condition or an Instrumental cause Cont. XVII Is Justifying faith an act of the understanding or of the Will Cont.
20. it 's said The blood of God It s a sad case that partiality can so much prevail as that they that cry out of some doubtful words as damnable heresies do yet think it tolerable language to say that by Imputation of the very sin itself to Christ as his sin he was the greatest sinner the greatest Murderer Lyer Adulterer c. in the world I beseech you abstain from such words till you find them in the Scripture Christ never was reputed of God a sinner who did so much to shew his hatred of it Nor ever took our sin unto him any further than to suffer for it to expiate it And if this be the similitude by which we must understand how his Holiness and Righteousness is made ours it will make all very plain It is ours or imputed to us so far as to be reputed the true cause of our Justification Adoption Sanctification and Glory as our sin was the cause of his suffering and death Cont. 12. Doth not Christs righteousness cause our Sanctification in the same sort of causality as it causeth our Justification Ans The effects are divers but both from the same meritorious cause But it is more unapt to say that it is the material cause of our Sanctification than that it is the material cause of our righteousness Though it merit both Because our habitual and actual holiness hath a nearer material cause in itself which our pardon and meer adoption have not Cont. 13. When it is said that faith is imputed to us for righteousness is it faith indeed that is meant or Christs Righteousness believed on Ans A strange and bold question What occasion hath the Holy Ghost given us to raise such a suspicion that when it is so often said by him that Faith is imputed or accounted for righteousness men should make a doubt whether it be Faith indeed that he meaneth If it be not the context is so far from relieving our understandings that it contributeth to our unavoidable deceit or ignorance Read over the Texts and put but Christs Righteousness every where instead of the word Faith and see what a scandalous Paraphrase you will make The Scripture is not so audaciously to be Corrected It 's wiser to believe Gods Word than to contradict it on pretence of expounding it Obj. But it is said also that Righteousness is imputed And that must be either Christs Righteousness or our own But not our own therefore Christs Ans We are not now questioning whether Christs Righteousness be imputed to us Though it be not the Phrase of the Scripture I have shewed you that it is true in a sound sence But the question is Whether Faith be imputed for righteousness And what is the meaning of all such Texts To have righteousness imputed to us plainly signifieth to be Reckoned Accounted Reputed or Judged righteous And it 's strange that it must not be our own righteousness that is imputed or reckoned to us as our own If it were never so well proved that the very Habits and Acts of Christ are by Gift or Union made our own in themselves and not only as the causes of their effects yet still our own they would be and the righteousness given by them our own in order of nature before they are imputed accounted or reckoned to us as our own Some way that righteousness which is reckoned to constitute us righteous is surely made our own Psal 106.30 31. Phinehas's executing Judgment it is said to be accounted to him for righteousness And of Abrahams Justification God saith Because thou hast done this c. What man that ever read the Bible can doubt but that every man that will be saved must have a personal faith repentance and holiness which is called righteousness many hundred times in the Scripture besides the righteousness that was or is in Christ And will not God reckon him righteous that is righteous He that doth righteousness is righteous And shall it not be imputed to him if God account not a man a believer can he be justified and saved Christs Righteousness hath made Satisfaction for all our sins and for our unrighteousness as to the Law that doth condemn us But he made us not lawless but put us under a Law of Grace which saith He that believeth shall be saved and he that believeth not shall be damned And must we not be judged by this Law and be justified or condemned as we keep or break it wonderful is the power of prejudice that any good men that read the Scripture can doubt whether Christ himself hath made us a Law of Grace according to which as performers or non-performers we must be justified as righteous in subordination to Christs Righteousness or else be condemned as neglecters of so great Salvation Is any thing plainer in all the Gospel Obj. But it is the Object and not the Act Christs Righteousness and not our Faith the Gold and not the Hand that taketh it that is our Riches and Righteousness Ans 1. No question but the Faith that we talk of is Faith in Christ even the Believing Receiving of a Saviour and his Grace freely given us And therefore Christs Righteousness is ever connoted when we talk of Faith For what is the very Specification of the Act but the Object But it is not the essence of Christ or his Righteousness that constituteth Faith but Christ in esse coâ—nito objectivo even as it is not the essence of Sin that constituteth Repentance but the notion of Sin in esse cognito as an Oâ—ject And there is no doubt but Christ is the Souls Riches which Faith receiveth But if the King by Law should restore all the Rebels in Ireland to their Estates and give them their Lives that lay down Arms and ask Mercy and accept it if it come to the Tryal whether they are Accepters or Refusers their Acceptance must be so far their justifying Righteousness though their Lives and Estates be their Treasure and the Kings Act be their Title to it Faith is reckoned or imputed to be that which by the Redeemer himself is required of the Sinner to make him partaker of Christ and his Benefits Reconciliation and Salvation and it is no other Righteousness Christs Righteousness is not imputed to us instead of our Faith and Repentance and sincere holiness which is made by himself the condition of Life As he died not for the Sins which we were never guilty of and are no sins so his Righteousness is not instead of that Righteousness which by his Grace we have but instead of that which we have not Not instead of our being penitent Believers and sanctified before we die but instead of that perfect innocency which we want Not that we are reputed perfect innocent obeyers because he was such but that our want of it shall not hinder our Justification or Adoption Grace or Glory Christ hath done all his part but he hath appointed us a necessary part
to be first called and then justified and then glorified Rom. 8.30 2. That which goeth before Pardon and that as a Condition goeth before Justification But Repentance goeth before Pardon Acts 5.31 Luke 24.47 3.3 Acts 2.38 3.19 8.22 1 John 1.9 Mark 4.12 But of this I have given large proof elsewhere 3. All the grace of the Spirit is a preparation for Heaven But that eminent gift of the Spirit which in Scripture is called the Seal Earnest and first Fruit is promised upon repenting and believing and therefore followeth them and is 1. The Habit of Divine Love which is the New Nature and more than the first seed of grace 2. And the Spirit related to us as an in-dwelling possessing Agent of Christ to sanctifie us to the end 3. And in those times to many the extraordinary gifts of Miracles Tongues c. 1. Faith and Repentance went before Baptism in the Adult even as a Condition of it and its benefits Mark 1.4 Acts 13.34 19.4 Matt. 3.11 John 1.26 Mark 16.16 John 4.1 Acts 2.38 41 8.12 13 36 37 38. 9.18 22.16 But that gift of the Spirit which is called the Farnesâ— Seal and first Fruit was either given in or after Baptism ordinarily though to Cornelius before but not before Faith and Repentance It is called therefore Baptizing with the Holy Ghost See Mat. 3.11 Acts 1.5 2.33.38 8.15.17 10.2 Rom. 5.5 Tit. 3.5 2. And the Spirit is said to be promised and given to believers after faith and because they were adopted sons Eph. 1.13 Prov. 1.23 Gal. 4.6 3.14 Rom. 8.15 16.30 2 Cor. 1.22 5.5 Therefore our Divines commonly put Vocation as giving the first acts of Faith and Repentance before Sanctification as Rom. 8.30 doth before Justification and Glorification And yet Faith and Repentance are gifts of the Spirit too and so are many commoner gifts in unsanctified men But as the daylight is seen before the Sun rising and as Satan is not said to possess all that he tempteth So some gifts of the Spirit and some motions and operations of it go before the proper giving of the Spirit itself and his possessing us 3. It is no absurdity but the wise order of God that one gift of the Spirit shall be antecedent to another and the reception and exercise of it by us be a condition of that other For God will morally induce us to our duty by suitable motives He that denieth this subverteth the Gospel 4. I have elsewhere at large proved the falshood of this Doctrine that Impenitent Infidels are justified by the imputation of Christs Righteousness It is enough that Christs righteousness is reputed by God to be the meritorious cause of all our grace even of justification before we are justified Qu. 48. How can faith or repentance entitle us to that righteousness of Christ which must first give us a right to themselves and all Grace Ans 1. Faith and Repentance give us not a Title in strict sence but the Covenant or Promise that is the Gospel Donation is our Title and Faith and Repentance are but Conditions of our Title which on several accounts make us morally capable receivers of Right 2. Christs Righteousness did merit all grace of God before it justifieth us and we are reputed righteous by it It is a great error to say that we must be reputed righteous by Christs Righteousness given and imputed to us to that use before we can have any fruits of the merits of his righteousness Even the outward call of the Gospel is a fruit of it Qu. 49. Is it true that we must be practical Antinomians unless we hold that only Christs active righteousness merited grace and glory for us Qu. 50. Is this proved by Rom. 7.4 Ans 1. Some mens words are used to hide the sense and not to open it What is the meaning of Practical Antinomianism Is it to be the opposers of all Gods Laws or only some and which And doth he not mean that the judgment must be first against them How far are we under the Law and how far not 1. The Law of Innocency as a Covenant requiring perfect personal obedience as the necessary condition of life we are not under It ceased by the first sin cessante subditi capacitate We must not suppose that God saith to all sinners You shall be saved if you be not sinners Conditiâ—nâ— prateâ—◠〈◊〉 transit in sententiam We are not under the Law of Mâ—â—â—s as such even that which was written in stone is done away 2 Cor. 3.7 c. If this be Antinomianism I am an Antinomian that â—â—ve written so much against them 3. We are only under the Law of Christ into whose hand all power is given And that is 1. The Law of reprieved and redeemed nature 2. All his supernatural revelation and so much of Moses Law as he hath assumed If the objecter think that we are under any other so do not I except the subordinate Laws of men 2. That Law of Grace which we have and that freedom from the Law of Works are merited both by Christs Active and Passive righteousness Ad. Qu. 50. Rom. 7.4 hath no such thing but only that Christ hath delivered men from the bondage of the Law of works which did neither justify nor sanctify and hath subjected and engrafted us unto himself that we might by him be made holy unto God Conclusion THe Reader may now perceive what abundance of great notional errours some men have corrupted the Doctrine of Justification with by presumptuous spinning webs out of their own fancies raising one errour out of another departing from the Word of God I. A radical errour is that the Law of Innocency made to Adam is it that justifieth us by its â—â—c hâ—c vivâ—s as fulfilling it in Christ II. Another is that is that Covenant of perfection which Paul meaneth by the Law of Works and the fac hoc c. And that the Jews Law was such as made Innocency its condition of life III. That the sense of Adams Law was Do this by thy self or another or else thou or thy surety shall die IV. That Christ did obey and suffer merit and satisfy in so full and strict a representing and personating every one of the Elect as that they did and suffered it in and by Christ in the sence of the Law of Works or in Gods account and that it was not in the third person of a mediator to communicate the Effects freely as he pleased by another Covenant And so that Gods imputing righteousness to us is his accounting us to have done and suffered in Law sense what Christ did This is the root of all the rest subverting the Gospel itself V. And so that God accounteth us to be Innocent and never to have sinned by Omission or Commission from birth to death and to have all that is required to merit Heaven because we did it in Christ and also to have suffered in
good men as Mr. Fowler and Mr. Cole by telling the World how unstudied and yet how confident they have been in some points But he did worse in citing Dr Manton that incurr'd their Censure for defending me in that very Pulpit where he saith I Preach'd against such accusers as he and was wholly of my judgment And reciting Arch-Bishop Usher who perused my Confession written against the Antinomians and altered not a word in it before I published it I got him and Mr. Gataker to read it and it was the last Work that Mr. Gataker did in the World as his Epistle and his Sons shew Had the Prefacer read but that one Book my Confession written in 1655. and there the explications of the Coâ—troversies and the many score plain Texts and Arguments and the hundred Testimonies of Synod and Protestant Divines for the Doctrine which I defend and specially if he have read my Explication of all these Controversies in my Catohlick Theology and Methodus and Dispute of Justification and of Justifying Righteousness and yet hâ—d call'd for an answer to Mr. Cole or Mr. Fowler I should have told him that he and such as he are too hard or deaf for me to answer But he impertinently citeth other men that say we are justified by Free Grace and the Righteousness of Christ and not by Works as if he would falsly intimate that I deny it when I neither trust to nor know any Righteousness that is not meerly subordinate to the Rigâ—teousness of Christ and take his Righteousness Habunâ—l Active and Passive to be the only and perfect Meritorious Cause of our Justification and Salvation of Grace and Glory And I wonder not that Paul counted his own Righteousâ—ess by the â—aw to be dung in compaâ—ison of being found in Christ having his Righteoâ—sness But I abhor the opinion that Câ—rist's Righteousness given us is all without us and none within us when Christ dwelleth in us as if 600 Texts of Scripture were all false that speak of the necessity of an inherent and actâ—ve Righteousness I abhor the opinion of any works necessary to Justification or Salvation or to any common Blessings in the sense of Paul such as make the reward to be of Debt and not of Grace I think few men living are less tempted to magnify or trust to any worth of thâ—ir own than I am I look not for a bit of Bread or an hâ—urs Ease or Life or the Pardon or Acceptance of one Duty or of my Holiest Affections so faulty are they by their great Imperfection but meerly from the Free Grace of God and the Merits and Intercession of Christ But should I take all for Errour that this Preface reciteth as such and all for truth that Dr. Crispe and such men write I should look for wiser men than him or Mr. Cole to Anathematize me rather as an Anti-Gospeller than a meer Antinomian And I am the sorryer for the prefixing of tâ—e Twelve Reverend Names when I find by their Epistles that they had read this Preface so full of false Citations and gross Errour and say not a word against it nor against such a Book Mr. Cockain in his Epistle directing it to them that live Godly in Christ Jesus tâ—lls them that the Kingdom of God within them shall never be shaken and the Divine Nature that hath swallowed them up shall for ever satisfy them with variety of Contentments And is not that ours which is within us And is this Kingdom and Divine Nature nothing but that which Christ did without us imputed to be done by us And if this be no subordinate Righteousness what doth the word signify so many hundred times used in the Scripture Let them but grant Justification by Faith and let them assign Faith what Office therein they can reasonably imagine without flat denying all Pauls Doctrine and they will confute Dr. Crispe Say but that Faith is imputed to us for Righteousness and give not the lye to Paul and sure we shall be reconciled But if they will tell us that by Faith Paul meaneth not Faith but Christ's Righteousness they must prove that they have more than a Papal Power to make God's Word by making the Sense when God maketh but the Letter before we can renounce the Scripture and believe them And yet if they will expound Imputation soberly we shall grant them the matter that Christ's Righteousness is accounted to us of God as the only Meritorious Cause of our Justification and Salvation tho' we believe that by Faith Paul meaneth Faith But if they still say that by Faith is meant only the Object of Faith and not the Act could we but get them to forbear Anathematizing Men for being so Learned as to understand English we might yet hope at least to keep the flame of their Zeal out of the thatch within the Chimney by telling them the difference between the Object of Faith as such and the person that is the Object otherwise considered In real Existence Christ tho' not yet believed in is the sole meritorious Cause But it is only in esse cognito that Christ is the Object of Faith And School-Boyes that have no damnable Learning may teach these confident men that the Object as an Object believed is the very form in specie of the Act of Faith It is an Act without it but not this Act viz. the Christian Faith As sin in esse reall is damning but in esse cognito objectivo it is the form of the Grace of Repentance so is it here But if they will grant that by Faith is meant Faith and not say that Paul condemneth Justification by Faith as being but Justification by Works let them but tell us how it justifieth I say not efficiently at all but only as a meer receptive qualification If they say as an Efficient Instrument they give it much more than I do and lay it on the Act or the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Credere as they speak For what else is the Instrument I hope they mean not that Christ and his Righteousness is but the Instrument But of this more after I thought it meet to have recited many hundred Texts of Scripture which they directly contradict which good Men should rather believe than them But if the Reader will peruse my Confession he will find it there done already And I thought it necessary to commend the good Lives of many of them excepting the Schism and Vnrighteousness that Faction doth involve them in lest the Grosness of their Verbal Errours which come from unskilfulness in Words and Methods should tempt many to judge of the Men by their Words and Opinions and should harden the malignant to justifie all their hard Censures and Vsage of the Non-Conformists for their sakes And yet Mr. Crispe is one of my sharp Censurers for charitably excusing Men from lesser Errours than his own while he falsifyeth my Words about our difference with the Papists I have said oft and long agoe that
either the Objectiors speak de nomine or de re If but of the Name One they shall call it One if that will please them and let them only distinguish the Parts of that One If they â—ill say that the Covenant made by the Father with the Mediator and the Law made for him are one and the same with the Covenant made by the Fatâ—â—â— and Son and Holy Spirit with us and that our Baptismal Covenant is no Covenant but only a part of the Covenant of which that with Christ aforesaid is another part I will not use their phrase but let me understand them that it is only the Name of One or Two that they contend about and we will fit our words accordingly I think on several accounts they are to be called Divers Covenants If they dislike it let us enquire whether the various Precepts of one Covenant make not various duties to Christ and to us and whether the various Promises of it have not various Conditions some to be performed by Christ and some by us Our present Question is Whether that part of the Covenant which promiseth and giveth Pardon of sin Justification Adoption and right to Glory have any Condition as the Modus of the gift We will rather follow them in unmeet terms than leave them thence a pretence to confound names and things and hide their errour by the confusion All Divines ancient and modern reformed and and unreformed that I know of agreed with us in the conditionality of the said Promise and by the form of Baptism shewed the Churches consent till Maccovius in Holland and Dr. Crispe and other Antinomians in England began to subvert the Gospel on pretence of magnifying the freeness of Grace and yet they durst never attempt to alter the Form of Baptism as this Opinion will require Contr. 4. By what hath been said the fourth Controversie is already resolved viz. Whether our performance of the Condition of Justification doth efficiently justifie us Some say because we say that Christ doth not justifie us till we perform the condition by believing that therefore we make our own Faith or performance to justifie proximately and Christ but remotely and so to do more than Christ to our Justification Ans 1. As to the phrase Scripture saith that we are justified by Faith that word not signifying an eâ—â—â—ciency but a receptive qualifying condition but it never saith that Faith doth jusâ—ifie us much less thâ—t we by it justifie our selves Our performance or Faith is no efficient cause but as to two parts of our Justification it hath a twofold Office 1. As to our Justification by the Merits of Christs Righteousness against this charge that damnation is due to us for sin our Faith is the Condition of our Pardon and Justification that is the moral qualification which God hath made necessary to make us capable receivers of it As laying down Arms and taking his Pardon thankfully may make a Rebel capable of Pardon but doth not pardon him if the pardoning Act say This shall be the Condition And by his Pardon he is justifiable against the charge of being liable to death 2. But as to the subordinate part of Justification against the falâ—e charge that we are no believers nor repent and so have no part in Christ here our own Faith is the very Matter of Righteousness by which we must be in tantum so farâ— justified As truth and innocency is against every false accusation And to say that because Christs Merits justifie us not before and without our Faith and performance of the Condition therefore our Act justifieth us more than Christ or efficiently at all is a thing unworthy of an answer being below the thoughts of an intelligent Disputer How much the capacity or incapacity of the Receiver doth as to all the various changes in the world both physical and moral when yet efficiently it doth nothing is not wholly unknown to any sober thinking man As the same sun-shine maketh a Weed stink and a Rose sweet so the same Act of Oblivion or conditional Justifying Law or Covenant doth justifie the capable and not the uncapable though no mans Faith doth effect any part of his own Justification Mr. Troughton and such others denying Faith to be the Condition of our Justification by the Promise hath drawn me to speak the largelier of this Contr. 5. Whether we are justified by Christs Righteousness imputed to us and whether the Scripture say so Ans The Scripture oft saith that Faith is imputed to us for Righteousness and that is Faith in Christ And it saith that Righteousness is imputed or reckoned to us that is we are reckoned or reputed righteous Rom. 4.11 22.6 And that sin is not imputed that is not charged on us to punishment or damnation Rom. 5.13 4.8 Psal 32. v. 2. 2 Cor. 5.10 The words of Imputing Christs Righteousness to us I find not in Gods Word and therefore think them not necessary to the Churches peace or safety But as for the sense of those words no doubt but it may be good the Papists themselves own them in the same sense as many Protestant Divines profess to use them as I have proved Contr. 6. In what sense is Christs Righteousness imputed to us Answ It is accounted of God the valuable consideration satisfaction and merit attaining Gods ends for which we are when we consent to the Covenant of Grace forgiven and justified against the condemning Sentence of the Law of Innocency and reconciled and accepted of God to Grace and Glory Q. But did not Christ represent our persons in his Righteousness so that it is imputed to us as ours as if we our selves had been and done what he was and did as righteous Ans This being the very heart of all the Controversie should be decided only by Scripture and nothing added or diminished That Christ is the second Adam and called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Sponsor Surety or Interposer and a Mediator between God and Man that suffered for us the just for the unjust a price and a sacrifice is all found in scripture Wise and peaceable men here will be as fearful of humane Inventions and Additions as in Discipline or Ceremonies at least But because all are not such we must speak to men as they are There are several sorts of Sureties or Sponsors Few represent the very person at least not all If men will needs impose on us their own word of Representation for peace sake we accept it in a sound sense In a limited sense it is true that Christ represented us that is he suffered in our stead that we might not suffer He obeyed and was perfectly righteous as Mediator in our Natures and so far in our stead as that such perfect Righteousness should not in our selves be necessary to our Justification But he did not absolutely represent us he was not our Delegate Our persons did not in a law-Law-sense do in and by Christ what he
did or possess the habits which he possessed or suffered what he suffered Nor doth God account us so to have done for that were to mistake I have rendred a multitude of reasons to prove this in my Treatise of Justifying Righteousness The contradiction is enough that we are accounted never to have sinned because Christ never sinned and yet we are accounted to have suffered or satisfied for sin because Christ did so or at least that we need a pardon by his blood and must ask for pardon and must suffer correcting punishments and long be without necessary grace and glory when yet we are accounted never to have sinned but from birth to death to have fulfilled all Gods Law in Christ I have fully proved that this Doctrine subverteth the sum of all the Gospel and Religion to which I refer you Contr. 7. What Righteousness of Christ is it that is ours and imputed to us the Passive the Active the Habitual or the Divine or all Answ Divines are here fallen into four Opinions I. Many of our most famous Divines say that it is only Christs sufferings that are imputed to us as our Righteousness to Justification being Justitia Meritâ— the rest being Justitia Personae to qualifie Christ to merit for us Thus Paraeus Scultetus Wendeline Beckman Vrsine Piscator Olevian Camero with his followers and many more These are far from thinking that we fulfilled all the Law in Christ or are righteous because he fulfilled it II. The second sort think that the Active and Passive Righteousness are imputed to us as our Righteousness III. The third sort are for the Passive Active and Habitual imputed IV. The fourth think so also of the Divine which is the Deity it self for there is nothing in God but God Andrew Osiander is for our Justification by the Divine Essence but I think rather by Communication than Imputation Thus hath our weakness distracted and disgraced us But Mr. Bradshaw truly noted that if the sense of Imputation were well agreed of the rest might well be reconciled viz. that no Righteousness of Christ is imputed to us in the strict sense of Representation as if we our selves were legally accounted to have been done or suffered what Christ did was and â—uffered But in the just sense of Imputation all is imputed to us that is Christs Habitual Active and Passive Righteousness fulfilling his own part of the Covenant advanced in dignity by the Union of the Divine nature and perfection was the true meritorious cause of our Justification and not any one of these alone Cont. 8. Whether Christs righteousness be the efficient material or formal cause of our Righteousness and Justification Ans It s pity that poor people must be thus tempted with Controversies of Logick But what remedy Christs righteousness as materially and formally his merited our Justification But for the accidental relation of righteousness in Christ to be the accidental relation of righteousness to every believer is impossible unless the Subject be the same If Christ be the believing sinner and as many persons as there be such or all these be the same person with Christ then his individual righteousness is formally theirs else not For as noxa caput sequitur so no accident is the same numerically in various Subjects They that deny this wanted but the same advantages to have believed Transubstantiation and renounce the common principles But that Christs righteousness is the meritorious cause of ours is past doubt And therefore they that affirm and they that deny it to be the material cause which is the common Doctrine of Protestant disputers do but differ about a name For if Adam had merited his own glorification had not his works been both the meritorious cause and the material that is the matter of that meritorious righteousness And why may we not say so of Christ It is therefore the material because it is the meritorious that is the meriting matter For righteousness being a Relation hath strictly no matter but a Subject And Christs Acts and habits were the first Subject of that righteousness of his person whose merit justifieth us But the believer is the Subject of his own personal righteousness thus merited by Christ It 's pity that holy things should be brought down to such Logical trifling but more pity that Church teachers that will do so should abuse them by their ignorance in their own way The matter of the righteousness which meriteth our Justification from the Laws damnation of us is Christs own righteousness unless by the matter you mean the Subject person But the matter of our subordinate righteousness is in and of our selves of which anon Cont. 9. Whether the Vnion between Christ and believers be not so near as maketh them the same Subject and so the accident of Christs righteousness to be ours Ans So some think but this tremendous mystery must not be rashly and profanely handled In a Union Specifick of humanity all mankind is one with Christ that is of one Species of humane nature And so that which is predicated of one as such is predicated of the other In a Political Vnion Christ as the head and the Church as the body make one Society as parts constituting the whole And so whatever is predicated of a part meerly as a part is predicable of both But that which is predicated of the whole as a whole is properly predicable of neither alone And that which is predicated of the Head as a head is not predicable of the body nor that of the head which is proper to the body nor that of one member which is proper to another But some things by way of Communication may be predicated of the whole for the sake of a part So the Church is called sinful and imperfect for our sake though Christ be not so And it is eminently holy and glorious because Christ is so that is secundum quid But no Vnion will make us righteous and personally happy by anothers righteousness and happiness unless it were a personal Union natural or Legal at least as to Relative rights The question then is whether every believer be one person with Christ And if so whether one natural person or one Legal as a lawful vicarius is They that hold the first plead that the same Spirit that is in Christ is the same divine nature and maketh us one natural person But where doth the Scripture say so The Sun is not one Individual with every Plant that it quickeneth nor every plant with it A nettle or rose is not the Sun nor is it the illuminater of the World that maketh day c. But they have so much from the Sun as it communicateth and no more So we are not Christ nor the Eternal and Natural Son of God nor infinite in Wisdom and Goodness nor perfectly just and glorified as Christ is But we have from Christ so much of the Spirit as he communicateth And nothing is ours meerly because it is his and
the nâ—â—â—ssary qualification of the Patient or Reâ—â—iver i. e. naturally and legally necessary such as dispositio materiae is said to be in Physicks 3. And as for the notion of an Instrumental Cause of Justification it is past doubt that properly taken neither Faith nor any act of ours is any such nor doth justifie us efficiently at all But if any be so fond of the invented notion of an Instrument as that they will use it though unaptly they must say 1. That it is not an Efficient but a Recipient Instrument Dr. Kendall calls it like Boys catching the Ball in their Hats or as a Spoon is in eating But it is not an Instrument of Physical Reception but Moral To Trust is no more a Reception than to Love The active Acceptance of a Saviour given with his benefits is a Moral Receiving of him which disposeth us as the Condition of the Covenant to receive Justification that is to be justified And in this lax sense you may call it all these if you please viz. a Condition a Dispositive Cause and a Receiving Instrument 4. A Meritorious Cause it is not in a Commutative or strict sense But if you will call that meritorious which is pleasing to God as congruous to his free gift and design of grace whence some are called Worthy in the Gospel so the thing is not to be denied and so all are reconciled Contr. 17. Is justifying Faith an act of the understanding or will Ans Both and therefore it is no one Physical act only nor Instrumental in a strict Physical sense Contr. 18. What act of Faith is it that justifieth as to the Object whether only the belief of the truth of the Promise or of the whole Gospel also or the affiance on Christs Righteousness or on his Truth or on his Intercession or taking him wholly for our Saviour Prophet Priest and King And whether Faith in God the Father and the Holy Ghost do justifie or all these And if but one which is it and wheâ—her all the rest are the works which Paul excludeth from Justification Ans To say that only one Physical act of Faith is it that we are justified by and all the rest are those works is a perverse corrupting of Christianity and not to be heard without detestation For it will utterly confound all persons to find out which that one act is which they indeed can never do And it will contradict the substance of all the Gospel There is no such thing as Faith in Christ which containeth not or includeth not Faith in God as God both as he is our Creator and as reconciled by Christ and as the Giver of Christ to us John 3.16 and as the end of all the work of Redemption Nor is there any such thing as Faith in Christ which is true and saving that includeth not or connoteth not the Knowledge of Christ and Love and Desire and Thankfulness and Consent Nor did ever God tell us of a Faith in Christs Imputed Righteousness only that must justifie us which is not also a Faith in his Person Doctrine Law Promise and Example and his Intercession in the Heavens And to say that only the Act of Recumbency on Christs Righteousness as imputed to our Justification is that act of Faith by which we are justified and that Believing in God his Majesty Truth Wisdom Goodness and the believing in Christ as he is the Prophet Teacher King of the Church and the Resurrection Life and Judge of all and believing in the Holy Ghost as the Sanctifier Comforter and Witness and Advocate of Christ and believing and trusting the Promise of God for Life Eternal or for any grace except Christs Righteousness imputed that all this Faith in God in Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit and all our Love to Christ and desire after him and prayer for his grace and thankfulness for it c. are all none of the Faith which Justification is promised to but are the Works by which no man is justified and that he is faln from grace that seeketh to be justified by such works that is by true Faith in God as God and in Christ as Christ This is a new Gospel subverting Christs Gospel and making Christianity another thing and this without any countenance from the Scripture and contrary to its very scope The Faith by which we are justified is one Moral act containing many Physical acts even our fiducial Consent to the Baptismal Covenant and dedication of our selves to God the Father Son and Holy Ghost to be our Reconciled God our Saviour and our Sanctifier to give us Pardon Adoption Holiness and Glory which is our Christianity it self as such Contr. 18. But though this be the Faith quae justificat which justifieth us is it not only Recumbency on Christs Imputed Righteousness quâ— talis which hath the Office of Instrumentality and is â—ides quâ— justificans Ans Such quibbling and jingling of a meer sound of words is usual in ludicrous Disputations of Lads But it 's pity it should pass as the last remedy against plain truth in so great a matter First it must be remembred that no Faith justifieth efficiently and therefore neither quae nor quâ justificans is to signifie any such thing but a meer Moral qualification of the recipient subject so that to be justified by Faith is but to be justified by it as that which God hath promised Justification on as the qualifying Condition But if it be not the same thing that is here called Fides quae and quâ but in the first part they speak of the Habit and in the second of the Act had it not been plainer to say The same Habit of Faith hath several Acts as believing in God in Christs Intercession Kingdom c. but none of these Acts do justifie us but one only viz. trusting to the Imputation of his Righteousness And so both the quae and quâ is â—denied to all Acts save that one This is their plain meaning which is denied to be truth and is a human dangerous invention Yet it 's granted them that it is not every Act of Faith that is made the Condition of Justification or Salvation It is necessary that the formal Object Gods Veracitâ— be believed to make it true Faith and that the Gospel or Covenant of Grace be believed with Consent as aforesaid to make it to be the true Christian Faith in essence and it 's of necessity that every thing be believed which we know that God revealeth But it is the Christian Faith that hath the Promise of Justification and that not any one single Act of it but all that is essential to it and that which belongeth but to its Integrity ad bene esse when it existeth is also so far conducible to our Justification as Abrahams believing that Isaac should live and have seed when he went to sacrifice him yet Justification may be without some Acts as Salvation may without many due Acts of Obedience
Christ for our sins the curse threatned to us and as the last objecter saith eternal damnation equivalently And so we had sin and no sin And Christ must die and we must pray for the pardon of that sin which in Gods account or imputation we never had VI. When the Text tells us that Faith is imputed to us for Righteousness that Righteousness is imputed to believers that is They are accounted righteous according to the justifying Covenant of Grace upon their believing in Christ for his meritorious Righteousness and Sacrifice giving them by the new Covenant their gracious relation to God the Father Son and Holy Ghost with right to further Grace and Glory they tell us that by Faith is not meant Faith but Christs Righteousness and by Righteousness imputed to us is meant God 's accounting us to have done all that Righteousness by Christ which he did for us Many more such humane inventions corrupting our Faith at least in notion too many fight for as if they were necessary truths of God Postscript REader the Author of the following objections is Mr. Stephen Lob I had thought not to have named him till I saw but Yesterday his Books of Free Grace which I never before heard of though it was printed almost ten year ago It is so considerable a confutation of Antinomian errours that I commend it to thy reading And being my self in great pain expecting death and like to write in these Controversies no more that I have once more as a Speculator or Watchman blown the Trumpet to warn men of the danger of the Other Gospel that subverteth the Gospel of Christ I have this Peace of Conscience that the blood of the seduced will not be required at my hands And if that M.S. of Mr. Stone of New-England which Mr. Lob so praiseth may by him be yet recovered I intreat his endeavour In which I cannot doubt but Mr. Increase Mather will assist him tho his name be prefixt among the twelve And I commend to some honest Bookseller to reprint Mr. Thomas Welds History of the New-England Antinomian Libertinism it being out of press And I hereby intreat Mr. William Manning of Suffolk if living to Print the excellent Treatise of Justification of his which I have long ago read And Mr. Samuel Clerk Author of the Annot. to Print his sound Treatise which I long ago read on the same Subject And though my own Judgment be for the Imputation of Christs Passive Active and Habitual righteousness dignified by the Divine as the full and the sole meritorious cause of all Grace and Glory as making up the condition of his Mediatorial Covenant imposed on him by God Yet I intreat the Learned Reader to peruse the Writings of those great Divines that are for the Imputation of the Passive only Ursine Olevan Paraeus Scultetus Wendeline Beckman and the rest with Camero Placaeus and all that party of famous French Divines who all effectually confute the false sense of Imputation of the Active Righteousness which Mr. Bradshaw confuteth with many others as if we had done it by Christ and were our selves the Subjects of it and are justified by that Law that condemneth us Jan. 20. 1690. R.B. An Answer to some Animadversions of a Friend tending to the further explication of some passages which through brevity were not understood § 1. SIR Your notes have so much Judgment and moderation and so little if any thing contrary to what I assert that they require nothing from me but a repeated explication of that which you observed not as before explained But when it is enough for me to explain my own Words and Doctrine you put me on another task to seek after the explication of another mans which I am not obliged to on any account but for your Satisfaction It is enough for me to speak true Doctrine in the most intelligible manner that I can without examining whether other mens expressions be sound or apt § 2. I begin with your own Notes And 1. I hope that few are so ignorant that meddle in these matters as to doubt of what you say that no one term much less one Metaphor or similitude can adequately express any of the Mysteries of Grace and no one Metaphor must be carried too far Omne simile est etiam dissimile And all set together so far as they are thereto intended must instruct us § 3. I know none but the Socinians that think a Mediator and a Sponsor inconsistent or deny Christ to be a Sponsor And methinks your words for their consistency import a greater difference between them than there is It is part of Christs Mediation to be a Sponsor These terms therefore express no difference but between the whole and the part But what a Sponsor Christ is is all the doubt which I a little opened and you pass by It is not agreed by expositors what the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 meaneth in that one only place of Scripture where it is used Very learned expositors think that as Moses was called Gods Mediator or Sponsor to the people as being his Spokesman and in his name assuring them that this was Gods Covenant which he would perform and returning the peoples answer to God and praying for them but not undertaking for them and personating them so Christ is here likened to him and called the Mediator and Sponsor of the new and better Covenant not as he personateth or undertaketh for Covenanting Subjects but only as he representeth God the Father to man and is his Sponsor to us But as Paul saith he is not a Mediator of one so I see not but though chiefly he be Gods Sponsor to man yet withal he be there called a Sponsor also as well as a Mediator for man to God But all the doubt is what a Sponsor for man he is And first we must enquire what Covenant he is a Sponsor of No doubt but Gods Covenant with the Mediator as such is one and Gods and the Mediators Covenant with man solemnized in baptism is another And yet no doubt but these two have such relation as that in some sort or respect they may be called one He that saith they are not two is plainly confuted by the constitutive defining parts the Divers Parties Matter Terms and Ends. It was not said to Christ but by Christ Repent and believe in Christ or be damned Pardon and Salvation are not offered to Christ to be received by Faith in himself Yet as the Laws of the Land though several are One Instrumentum Regiminis So we call all the Laws of Nature usually singularly The Law of Nature and so we say The Civil Law the Canon Law Gods Law c. Now the question is what Covenant Christ was the Sponsor of 1. In his own proper Covenant he did Spondere praestare to suffer for us and to obey for us in the just sence in due place explained to rise and ascend for us to intercede for us to
never sinned And if we suffered in him for all sins of Omission and Commission we merited glory without any other obedience For the Law requireth nothing but Innocency as necessary to life He that hath no sin doth perfectly obey And pardon of all sin of Omission and Commission is the pardon of all punishment of Sense and Loss and so of the loss of promised Life Besides that one that is reputed to have Legally fulfilled the Law must be unjustly corrected by the punishment of temporal afflictions or death or loss of the Spirit and Grace and hath present right to the reward of that Covenant or deliverance from all penal evil at least so that this Doctrine of strict Legal personating Representation overthroweth the New Covenant and Law of Christ and all his Kingdom of Grace and all Religion III. The third fundamental Errour which we deny and oppose is that the Vnion between Christ and the Elect say some or Believers say others is so near as that his very personal Holiness Righteousness and Sufferings are in Law sense truly our Holiness Righteousness and Sufferings as the accidents of our persons As if Christ and Adam and every Christian were one and the same subject of Holiness Righteousness Suffering Merit or Satisfaction Yet they dare not say that the Union like the hypostatical warranteth such a community of Properties or Attributes as that we may be said to be Divinely Righteous perfectly Holy never to have sinned to have satisfied for our selves to have merited our own Salvation and many such like as seeing the evil of the consequents though not of the premises And here sometime they abuse the similitude of a Husband and Wife whereas they are distinct persons and one is not wise just or guiltless because the other is so nor hath the Wife any propriety so much as in extrinsick goods but by contract in the proportion granted by the Husband Some abuse the similitude of a Head and Members whereas Natural Head and Members make one Natural Body but so do not Christ and Believers And a Political Head and Members are distinct persons and one is not guiltless righteous wise or good because the other is so But of this more before and elsewhere Some here abuse the similitude of Christs being the second Adam which you here though not to this Errour insist upon And then they feign us 1. To have beeâ— otherwise in Adam than we were 2. And his sin to be otherwise imputed to us than it was And 3. The similitude to extend further than it doth I. They feign us to have been Personally in Adam whenas we were but seminally in him and personally from him 2. They feign us to have been in him by a certain Covenant more than we were by Natural In-existence And that his sin was arbitrarily by God through that Covenant imputed to us further than we were guilty of it by any natural In-being or derivation As if God made all men sinners by his arbitrary imputation of that to them which in their natures they were not really guilty of And as if our guilt of Adams sin were just of the same sort as his yea and our guilt and his guilt were individual accidents of the same individual persons But this which Dr. Twisse oft confuteth in most of his Books I have so largely and lately cleared in my published Disputations of Original sin that you shall excuse me for not reciting it here 3. The guilt of Adams sin being ours by Natural Derivation cometh to all alike entirely according to the subjects capacity and necessarily without the consent of Parent or Child Were Adam and all Parents unwilling to communicate it in generation it would nevertheless be done But Christ being not a Natural but a contracting voluntary Root and Cause doth communicate the fruits of his Righteousness only voluntarily by gift of Contract at the time in the â—anner and measure and on the terms that he seeth meet Here it is observable 1. That both Generation and Regeneration have much unsearchable How Souls generate Souls and how the Spirit of Christ communicateth Grace to Souls will never here be clearly apprehended â—ohn 3.8 2. But it 's certain that the Soul of the Parent is not the Soul of the Child but some cause of it and so that they are not one person 3. We were not persons in Adams person either the same or distinct 4. But Adam caused us not as a man maketh a garment house c. but as one Candle doth light another by some mysterious communication of its essence so formae se multiplicant by the Divine benediction Increase and multiply and primary causation 5. Though we were not persâ—nally but virtually and seminally in Adam yet when that seed becometh a person that person is from Adam and so must proportionably be guilty For who can bring a clean thing out of the essence of an unclean 6. Adam had the common Nature of all men specifically and radically and causally though as their nature individually constitute their persons they existed not in him as extra causam 7. So Jesus Christ did more assume the common Nature of faln Man than the persons of any or the Nature as extra causas constituting the individual person 8. Ponum est ex causis integris malum ex partiali Any defeâ—t maketh sin but good must have entire causes Adams sin causeth Original sin in all ex privatione causationis boni But if Adam had not sinned every sin of their own would have made his Children unrighteous 9. Christ having suffered in the common nature of man so far did it in their stead and if you will needs so call it so far represented fallen mankind as that if they will personally receive him by faith in the New Covenant they shall not perish for Adams sin or their own supposing that the parent is the accepter for the Infant none perish for Original sin alone without the addition of neglected and refused grace and remedy 10. It is not only the Spiritual off-spring that Christ was a second Adam to but partly to all mankind For by a resurrection though not to glory all men are made alive by Christ Joh. 5.22 23 29. 1 Cor. 15. And all have a general conditional reconciliation and pardon 2 Cor. 5.19 20. Joh. 3.16 So that actual Justification resulteth to no man from Christs meer representation of him but from his free donation by the New Covenant 11. It 's doubtless that all and only the holy seed or faithful are justified actually by Christs Righteousness But in what sence it is imputed to them is all the doubt 12. It 's also doubtless that Christ suffered in our stead But in what sense how far is all the doubt Because we deserved it he voluntarily assumed it to demonstrate Gods Justice Mercy and Wisdom and deliver us You say before that It was strictest Justice that was shewed on Christ I would not strive about the
word It was strictest Justice as upon Christ It was perfect Justice as to the ends of Government But it was not strictest Justice as to us nor as strictest signifieth the strict fulfilling or executing of the threatning of the Law For it was not so executed but the sinner mercifully pardoned § 6. You note that Christ must take our guilt on him or else he could not take our punishment Ans 1. He took not the Reatum facti or the Reatum â—ulpae For 1. Our guilt was the accident of one Subject and that which Christ took of another Therefore the accidents were not the same 2. Else sin however taken in its reatus culpae would have made him culpable and formally a sinner and hateful to God and like to Satan Which he was not 2. He took upon him the Reatum poena seu obligationem ad â—oenam But not ours individually the same but one of his own instead of ours Christs guilt and ours were divers accidents of divers persons The obligations nor the Subjects were not the same Our obligation to punishment was an act of the Law which we broke So was not Christs That Law never bound him to punishment But his own voluntary undertaking and his Fathers imposition Our guilt was the occasion and reason of Christs assumed guilt As our punishment individually was not it that he suffered but his own punishment to prevent ours He suffered the just for the unjust to redeem us to God God tells us plainly that Christ suffered for our sins and was made sin that is a Curse or Sacrifice for sin for us that we might not suffer And cannot we receive this plain Gospel without spinning so many additional webs of our own Christs taking our guilt and puniâ—hment is no more but his voluntary suffering in our stead that we might be pardoned not by that suffering immediately but by his free donation in the Law of Grace in his time and on his terms § 7. You note that though we are justified by our own Faith Repentance and Obedience to the Gospel against the false charge of being unbelievers impenitent and ungodly Yet to be free from the curse of the Law and obtaining right to life it is Christs Righteousness that we must plead Ans Very true thus 1. It is only Christs Righteousness that we must plead as the Satisfying and meriting cause 2. It is only the free Donation of the New Covenant which we must plead as our Title or Fundamentum juris and conveying cause of right 3. It is our Faith and Repentance in various respects which we must plead as the conditio tituli praesâ—iâ—a which is the necessary moral receptive disposition of the Subject receiving These things are all very plain and sure § 8. You seem to doubt whether by the Law of Works Paul meant not the Law of Innocency And first you seem to mistake me as if I had said that he meant only the Ceremonial Law I say no such thing But the whole Law of Moses considered meerly as a law and by the Jews ill separated from Faith and Grace was an operous Yoak and of severe penalties to the transgressours and though it gave pardon for some faults it was not meerly for the task of sacrificing but for the great Sacrifice typified The Law as a Law doth only Command and threaten and promise life to them that do all things written but gave not grace to do it The Jews left out the true sence of the types and promise which intended the Messiah in whom it was that the promissory part of the Law was made and thought the very task of duty or works would procure their acceptance and pardon when they failed If you are not satisfied with this reason why Paul calleth it the Law of Works find out a better if you can But most certainly that is a great mistake that Moses and Paul describe the Law of Innocency It 's tedious to recite the proof 1. It 's enough that the Law of Innocency as a Covenant was before ceased cessante capacitate subditorum When all men had 2000 years been Originally and Actually sinners will you feign God with all that solemnity to make such a Law as this I know and you must know that no Son of Adam is Innocent And I make now a Law that if you â—re and will continue innocent you shall live Else you shall die This is too gross to be feigned of God 2. It is enough that when the Law was made they were all under actual mercy which was the grace of the new pardoned Covenant 3. Yea that the Covenant of Grace had so long before been made with all fallen mankind in Adam â—nd Noah and renewed to Abraham with speâ—ial promises And doth God now repeal or hide it 4. What need we more proof than so many Laws about Sacrificing and Confessing for forgiveness Which the Law of Innocency knew not And why else did God deliver the Law as a God of Redeeming mercy I am the Lord thy God that brought thee out of Egypt proclaiming his name Exod. 34.6 7. The Lord the Lord God Merciful and Gracious forgiving Iniquity Transgression and Sin 6. Peruse all the Contexts in Pauâ— and you will be satisfied See Camero de triplice faedere which Dr. Bolton of Liberty was so taken with and magnifieth and Anthony Burges of the Law proving Moses Law to belong to a Covenant of Grace But I have more fully opened all thiâ— in my Methodus Theologiae No doubt but Pauls dâ—sputes have great difficulty but this much is very plain § 9. Your next question is about the nature of Faith whether if it be placed in the will and include consent it be not confounded with Love whose object is goodness I have answered this oft and largely in divers Books and therefore must here be excused from saying any more than this viz. 1. You must distinguish between Faith Physically taken and Faith morally taken 2. Between its formal act and its material I. Physically some one natural act constituted by one Object is called Faith But morally taken it comprehendeth divers Physical Acts both of the Intellect and Will And as it is Justifying and Saving it is so taken Yea morally it is sometime in Scripture taken largelier for our Christian Faith as God the Father Son and Holy Ghost the Promise Grace and Glory are all the constituting Objects of it in their truth and goodness and sometime more narrowly as altogether distinct from Hope and Love It is taken in the first sense when it is said to be the condition of Justification and Salvation And here what you said of the necessity of conjoyning the many similitudes which express Christs Office to us when but one of them in a Text is named the same must be said of Faith in Christ A Moral act which hath many Physical acts must be named by some one the rest being connoted or implied for it would be uncomely to name
them all in every mention of it Note also that the name is varied according to what is specially noted in the Object sometime Truth sometime Goodness So Christ saith The Father hath loved you because ye have loved me And Paul Grace be to all them that love the Lord Jesus in sincerity If any man love not the Lord Jesus let him be Anathema Maranatha And Christ Luke 14.26 and Mat. 10. He that loveth any better than Christ cannot be his Disciple And to be a Disciple a Christian and a Believer are all one in Scripture But when it is the Goodness of another Object that is mentioned the Act is another thing I suppose you will confess that no Faith in Christ and the Promise justifieth us which doth not in that same instant include 1. A belief of the Goodness as well as the Truth of both 2. A willingness to receive Christ and Grace as good and a consent to the offer And if these must concur in the same instant as necessary Conditions of our Justification or Reception of Christ and Grace call them how you will and say Consent is an Effect of Faith or a part of it all 's one to me But I will say that Consent is an Effect of one Act of Faith strictly taken viz. Assent but a part of it taken for Justifying Saving Faith II. After many and long thoughts of this matter I think they that will pretend to exactness must say that Trust is the Formal Act of Faith as Trustiness or Fidelity is the Formal Object And that the Material Act is threefold Assent Consent and Practice and none of these no not Assent is the Formal Act. Both 〈◊〉 and Fides signifie Trust yea and Credere too And so Fides as it signifieth Fidelity and Fides as it signifieth Faith or Trust are the Formal Object and Act. I Assent to the Truth of the Gospel because I Trust the Veracity or Fidelity of the Author I Coâ—â—â—nt to the Covenant because I Trust the Revealer Offerer and Promiser I actually give up my self to Christ because I Trust him Mr. Pemble Vindicat. Grat. hath accurately opened this I have in my Aphorisms and oft said that a Christian should rather try his Faith by the Consenting act than the Trusting act because many a one cannot find that they can Trust Christ that yet find Consent But I explain this or recall it as not well spoken For indeed though it be Consent by which we may surely know our Interest in the Justifying Covenant specially when practically exprest yet Assâ—ance or Trust is the Formal Act of Faith and that Consent is but the Material For if we Trust not Christs Fidelity we can neither Assent Consent or Practiâ—e But when I spake as aforesaid I followed the sense of most complaining Christians who say They cannot Trust Christ meaning by Trust that Quieting of the mind which is but an effect of Trust Whereas at that time they take Christ to be Trusty and a suâ—â—â—cient Saviour but are hindered from the applying and quieting Effect by Ignorance or doubting of their own Trustiness and not of the Trusâ—iness of Christ If I be tedious in repeating again my old similitudes you must blame your self that are the câ—use Only one Physician can cure the Plague Sâ—me slander him as a deceiver He promiseth to câ—re all that will take him for their Physician and trust him Trusting or believing him here inâ—ludeth materially Believing his Word Consenting to be his Patienâ—s and coming to him for Physick A Prince in India buyeth the Irish Rebels that had forfeited their lives of the King that they may laâ— down Arms and go with him and become his Subjects He promiseth to every one of them a Lordship in India a safe Ship thither and pardon here some call him a Deceiver and distrust him He tells them if they Trust him he will perform all this Here Trust the Formal Act includeth as the Material Acts 1. Assenting to his Word as True 2. Consenting to his Offâ—r and Terms 3. Practically venturing to lay down Arms and go with him in the Ship and forsake their own Countrey Such is Faith in Christ when it is made the Condition of Justification and Life The Formal and Materiâ—l Acts together constitute Faith and not the Formal or one of the Material Assent alone Nor hath Bishop Downame well confuted Mr. Pemble about the Formal Act. In a word true and plâ—in Baptism our â—hristening best tells us the Essence of Justiâ—yinâ— Faith For that is the Sealing to us the â—uâ—â—â—fying Covenant that it may actually and solemnly deliver to us our part in Christ and riâ—ht to Pardon and Life which is given us on no lower terms than the Fiducial Assent Consent and Dedication professed by us essentially in Baptism § 10. Your next doubt is about the various Objects of Faith in exercise Gods Omnipotency Truth c. and the various uses of Faith accordingly This is the point which Mr. Lawson and I seemed somewhat to differ about And I have in my Treatise of Justification said so much of it that you shall now excuse me from any more than telling you that in Sanctification where one act really produceth one effect on our hearts and another act another effect each effect must be ascribed to its proper act But you must not think it is so in our Justification or Adoption where that which we receive is a RIGHT Jus impunitatis vitae which is not the Immediate Effect of our Act no nor any Effect of it at all but of Gods Donative Covenant of which our Faith is but a Condition and no Efficient Cause of our Right And therefore I doubt not still to say that we are thus justified as much by a Consenting to Christs Teaching and Sanctifying Grace as by Consenting to be justified by his Righteousness or by fiducial taking him for our Teacher Intercessor and King as taking him for a Satisfier and Meriter for us Indeed it is undivided Taking Christ as Christ that is the Justifying Condition John 1.10 11 12. 1 John 5.10 11 12. § 11. In the end you desire me to answer What Rightâ—ousness is meant Rom. 5. By the obedience of one many are made righteous Ans The meaning is By the Merit of Christs Active and Passive yea Habitual Righteousness also exalted in dignity by his Divine Perfection all faln Mankind is Conditionally pardoned and hath the gift of Life enacted in the Law or Covenant of Grace and all true Believers have by that Covenant actually given them a Right of Vnion with Christ and with him Pardon and Adoption or Right to Grace and Glory and have the Spirit of Holiness as the first fruits All this is included in that Righteousness § 12. Lastly you ask What Righteousness Faith is imputed to Whether that which is by Christs obedience and by Faith be the same and perfect or unperfect Ans Here also you may take the blame that I say things
long ago so oft said By Righteous is meant Justifiable in general And the plain meaning is Christ having merited and freely given Pardon and Life to all sinners that will fiducially accept his purchased Gift it is not now keeping the Law of Innocency or Works but only the said fiducial Acceptance of Christ and his free Grace that is required on their part to their Right or Justification If by Imputed we meant Reputing it the MATTER of our total Righteousness then it were an unsound sense But briefly and plainly Faith in Christ is reckoned to us as the Matter of our imperfect personal subordinate Righteousness and as the Instituted Medium of our Reception of our Vnion with Christ and our Right to Pardon and Life for the Merit of his Righteousness And I think this is plain and full For Righteousness to be imputed is meant no more but that Gâ—d accounteth the person Righteous But the imputing Faith to this is but to reckon it to be what it is 1. As the Matâ—er of one 2. As the Medium or Condition of the other § 13. You here give me an Epitome of Dr. John Owens Book of Justification which you judge the best that you have seen and say it is faithfully collected to save me the labour of reading it to shew me how nearly we agree Ans I have perused the Book but being now absent from it cannot judge whether you have rightly epitomized or recited it and therefore shall speak to it as yours and not as his Thanking you for endeavouring to spare my labour but not for calling me to judge of other mens Writings Only I must say I am glad of so much Moderation as is in it but I â—etter understand many other Books of Justification eâ—pecially Mr. â—ruman Sir Charles Wolsâ—ey Mr. Gibbâ—ns Sermon Mr. Wotton Mr. Gataker a Manuscript of Dr. Twisses though I agree not with him in his exclusion of Christs Active Righteousâ—â—ss as justifying us Le Blâ—nk Placaeus yea â—ohn Goâ—dwin Mr. Hoteâ—kis and many others § 14. Yâ—u take Imputing Righteouâ—ness to be the foundation of Reputing us righteous and not the same thing Ans The Controversie is de re or de nomine De re we agree that a man must be made Righteous before he is Reputed so De nomine I deny that St. Paul by imputing doth mean making us Righteous 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is by all confessed to signifie Accounting Reckoning or Reputing Making us Righteous goeth before Reckoning it to us on account John Goodwin will tell you of many more senses of Imputation than you recite and more considerable § 15. II. You suppose an Imputation of Righteousness to us which was not ours before that Imputation Ans Again de re there is a Donation of such But de nomine I deny that this is it that the Scripture calleth Imputing You make this to contain two Acts and you Name three 1. A grant or Donation of the thing it self to be ours 2. A will of dealing with us accordingly 3. An actual so dealing with us Ans 1. De nomine I deny that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 doth in Scripture signifie the giving of Righteousness to him that had it not but the reckoning it on account to him that by gift first had it 2. Nor doth it primarily signifie willing to use and using as righteous but only by consequence inferreth it But 2. De re here is no Explication how Imputing is giving or how Righteousness is given us There is no question but all the Righteousness that we have is given us by God But the very heart of the Controversie is How the Righteousness of Christ is given us and made ours In that Righteousness is found 1. The Matter 2. The Form 1. The matter is 1. The Habits 2. The Acts of Christ in the Divine and Humane Nature Are these given us and do we possess them in themselves The Acts are past and so are nothing now and nothing is no bodies actual possession The Acts and Habits were Accidents which sine interitu cannot pass from Subject to Subject Divers Subjects prove diversity of Accidents 2. The Form is a Relation and so an Accident also And they must needs be two Accidents that are Formal Righteousness in Christ and us unless we are the same Subject Person Therefore neither matter nor Relative form in Christ and Man is the same individual Accident How then is it ours What is there in it besides matter the subject and fundamentum and form it's plain that 1. The Benefits are given us and are our own by that Gift All that consist in jure in right as to Christ to the Love of the reconciled Father the Communion of the Spirit to further Grace Pardon Glory are all given us instrumentally by the new Covenants donative Act The inherent habits and the Acts are given us by the Holy Ghost And 2. These Benefits being given us for the Sacrifice and Merits of Christ the price is said by a Metonymy of the cause for the Effect to be given us because it is given for us It was God the Father to whom Christ paid the price of our Redemption and gave his Active and Passive Righteousness for us But Morally and Reputatively it is no unmeet phrase to say that is given to us which is given for us in our necessity and to purchase us all this If the King would ransom all his Subjects that are Slaves to the Turks and paid a million for their Freedom he may well be said to give them a million though it be but a Metonymical Speech seeing he gave it for them Though it was the Freedom or Benefits and not the Money which indeed they received And so it is here So God giveth us Christs Righteousness Merits and Satisfaction but not properly the things themselves If there be any more to be said as given us I should have been glad to know what it is but your Words shew it not Were it the very same Individual Righteousness that Christ hath Acts Habits and Formal Relation made in themselves our own accidents it would follow that we are really perfect in Acts Habits and Relation and need neither more Pardon nor increase of Grace nor should pray for any nor use means for any nor are we liable to any corrective Penalty nor to any want of the Spirits help but have present right to all that is due to a perfect righteous man with much more such which is all false Yet is it truly and fitly said that Christ is our Righteousness that is the purchaser and giver of it and that he is made of God to us Wisdom Righteousness Sanctification and Redemption on the same account Yea though some deny it his Righteousness may be called the material cause of our Righteousness as ours is our Jus ad impunttatem vitam because it is the matter of it 's meritorious cause For if Adam had merited Life himself his meritorious Acts and
it is another The Doctrine which I bend all these words against is that we must have or have as our own any such righteousness as is a conformity to the precepâ—ive part of the Law of innocency whether done by us or Christ Prove that we have any such Righteousness and I yield all the cause to them that plead for the Imputation which I deny If we have such a Righteousness we have no sin nor ever had in the sense of the Law And have no need of Christs Sacrifice or are capable of pardon or punishment I dare plead no Righteousness as mine but subordinately as a condition and medium my faith â—r performance of the conditions of the Covenant and its gifts and principally my right to impunity and life for the sake of the Merits Sacrifice and Intercession of Christ freely given by him in the New Covenant It was Christs perfect Righteousness which meriteth mine but I have no perfect Righteousness of my own either in me or done by me by my self or by my Instrument or Vicar nor given to me saving as metonymically that is said to be given to me which was given for me and the Effects or fruits of it given to me Besides my imperfect Faith and sincere devotion to Christ I know of no Righteousness that I have but that which saveth me from the Laws Condemnation and giveth me right to life which is not perfect obedience to the precept made mine but pardon of disobedience and a freely-given Adoption merited by another whose merits were never mine so much as by proper gift or imputation though figuratively they may be so called mine I tire my self and you with tedious repetitions because I find that without theâ— I am not understood Therefore your next inference that Paul speaâ—eth of that which was not ours before Imputation is not true as is proved And your second that the imputation of Faith as a work is not of Grace is cloudy or untrue or both If by a work you mean a work in Commutation obliging God or any work which maketh the reward to be of debt and not of Grace it 's true that if faith were such a work it would be an act of Justice so to judge it But Faith is no such work and therefore it would be errour so to judge it But if by a work you mean but a Moral act as made by the Law of Grace the condition of pardon and life then to Impute Repute or Judge it to be what it is so made is an act of Truth and Justice but such Truth and Justice as is Evangelical and consistent with Grace and is founded on Grace It is Grace that we have a Saviour to purchase and give all It is grace that we are not under the Law of Innocency which justifieth none but the innocent and perfect that never sinned It is Grace that we have a Covenant and Law of Grace which maketh sincere faith a Mediate or Subordinate Righteousness requiring no more at our own hands instead of what the Law of innocency required It is of Grace that as this faith is the matter of this subordinate Evangelical Righteousness so it is the receptive medium of our right to Christ pardon and life which is our full saving righteousness It being therefore of Grace that it is made so and also that we are made believers it must be of Grace though of Truth and gracious Justice that it is reckoned or imputed to us for Righteousness By debt opposed to Grace Paul meaneth not Debitum Dâ—â—ness by free gifts thankfully accepted but quod debetur ex operis propria dignitate as a workman earneth his wages § 19. Your Description of the Imputation of Christs Righteousness is either to be understood as spoken in proper words or as figurative If the latter it 's unintelligible still till explained If the first it is that same Doctrine which I take to subvert all the Gospel viz. That God maketh an effectual Grant and Donation of a true real perfect Righteousness even that of Christ himself to all that believe accounting it as theirs God accounteth not Christs Divine Righteousness to be our Righteousness nor yet his Humane Habitual Righteousness nor his Obedience to the Law proper to the Mediator nor his Obedience to the Law of Moses which as such bound not you or me nor his perfect fulfilling the Law of Innocency nor his satisfactory Sacrifice for sin nor his Resurrection Ascension Intercession c. But he only accounteth these to be the Causes of our Righteousness and not our Righâ—eousness it self Though the Meritorious Cause may be called the Meritorious Matter in a remote sense as purchasing the free Gift of our Formal Righteousness Though this also is but an unnecessary Logical name the thing being without it plainlier opened Relations having properly no Material Cause and the Subject being it that is usually so called and our Jus being our Formal Righteousness and the Covenant Donation the Fundamentum Juris and Christs Meritorious Righteousness being but the cause of that Fundamentum or Titulus it can be called the Matter of our Right but in a remote sense and such a Matter as is without us paid for us but not ours in it self but the CAVSE of that Relation which is ours The plain inconsistency of a Perfect Conformity to the Law made our own with Christs dying for sin and our need of pardon constrained a great part of the famousest Divines of the last Age to go too far in my Judgment in excluding Christs Active and Habitual Righteousness to our Justification and confining it to the Passive only Such as Olevian Vrsine Piscator Paraeus Scultetus Wendeline Beckman and others in Germany and Camero with his most Judicious and Learned followers in France and Dr. Twisse whose M.S. I before mentioned Mr. Wotton Mr. Gataker and others in England And yet the two last I think go not so far as the rest But Mr. Bradshaw truly told them that it is not the excluding the Active from Imputation that must untie the knot but the taking Imputation it self in a sound sense and forsaking the unsound rigid notion of it both as to the Active and Passive Righteousness Grotius de Satisfactione hath gone the middle way and if that Book had been more studied fewer would have made us a new Gospel in terms who I hope in sense do mean better than they speak § 20. In your explication you further own the subverting sense viz. That Christs perfect Righteousness is made the Righteousness of Believers forma dat nomen and is accordingly judged esteemed and reputed theirs being by free Gift made theirs to all ends and purposes whereto it would have served if it had been their own without any such Imputation Donation or Communication and God dealeth with them accordingly Ans This is plainer dealing than we had before If this were true 1. We are as righteous as Christ 2. We may deny that ever we were sinners
will end in their Damnation And so Conscience hath no just Accusation in Hell or here as for any sinning against Mercy nor do they owe God thanks for any XLVI Whereas God hath made through Christ a general Act of Grace or Gift of Christ Pardon and Life eternal to all the World on condition of fiducial Acceptance of it as a Free Gift and commanded the Offer of it to all and will doubly condemn the final Refuser and by this Gospel-gift as his Instrument pardoneth and justifieth the believing accepters These men deny the very being of this Gospel Act They deny it to be either Christ's Law or Covenant or Grant XLVII They hold that Christ in our stead did all that the Law bound us to do as if he had been a Husband a Father a Souldier c. XLVIII They say That Christs satisfaction by Sacrifice was the the sâ—lutio ejusdem the payment of the same debts of suffering that was due to us and not properly satisfaction which is Redditio aequivalentis or tantidem alias in dâ—biti as if he had suffered death Spiritual by loss of Holiness and the torments of Hell by an accusing Conscience and the hatred of God XLIX They say That by the Imputation of his Righteousness habitual and actual we are judged perfectly Just that is such as have no sin yet he suffered in our Person for our sins which we are reputed never to have L. They say That the Inherent and Active Righteousness which consisteth in our Faith Repentance Love and sincere Obedience wrought by Christ in us doth not Constitute us Righteous in Subordination to Christs meritorious Righteousness in any part or degree that is that it is Righteousness that in tantum maketh no man ever the more Righteous than if he had it not q.d. Albedâ— quae non fâ—cit album or Patâ—rnitas quae non constituit Patrem not distinguishng universal and particular Righteousness LI. They talk of Justification in meer ignorant confusion not knowing the various senses of the Word or the divers parts of the Work They deride that distinctions which no reason can deny they confound Justifying Efficiently Justifying Constitutively Justifying Virtually by the Gospel-Gift or Law of Grace Justifying by Eâ—iâ—eâ—ce Justifying by Witness Justifying by Plea and Advocate Justifying by Judicial Sentence and by Execution They set the Causes against each others as if it were a thing that had but one Cause when they meet with the word used for Senâ—e and Justification by decisive Judgment they Exclude all the included and supposed Acts that is making Men just Efficiently constitutive Matter and Form or Subject and Relation the Gospel Donation and Condonation and all such previous Acts And when they have done not knowing what they affirm or deny they only cry up the name of Christs Righteousness Imputed not knowing what Imputation is nor what sort of Cause Christs Righteousness is whether Efficient or Material or Formal by Constitution and and think its true Meritorious Causality is too little And in their description excluded sentential decisive Justification which they had denominated it to be making it to be only the Donation of Christs perfect Righteousness as in its Essence to be ours and so joyning the efficient and constitutive Causes yet leaving out the Instrumental Efficient which is the Gospel Donation or Covenant-Gift and calling Faith the instrumental Cause which is no Efficient Cause but a Moral Reception of the Free-Gift and a Moral Qualification as a Receptive Condition for our Title to the possession And whereas God never Judged a man Righteous till he had made him Righteous they say That to Justify is not to make Righteous but to judge Righteous and yet describe judging by making Yea and exclude the sentential Justification at the day of Judgment thinking that it is all perfectly at our first Justification Sentenced As if God the Father Christ as King or Prophet the Holy Ghost the Covenant of Grace Faith had no hand in our Justification but Christs Righteousness imputed only LII They talk much against being Justified by the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Credere the Act of Faith and when they have done ignorantly are the maintainers of it against those that deny it For when we say that Faith doth not Justify us as that Phrase signifieth Efficiency but that we are only said to be Justified by it as signifying a Receptive Condition or Qualification they say that it Justifieth us as an Instrument which is an Efficient Cause And it is the very Act or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Credere or nothing which they call that Instrument And thus they make a War against themselves while they ignorantly accuse they know not what LIII They blindly take Paul by Works to mean all humane Acts when as 1. The whole scope of his disputing is against Justification by the Worâ—s which are set in opposition or competition with Justification by Christ and by Free Grace such as the Jews thought the keeping of Moses's Law was which is the Law that he doth all along speak of 2. And he expresly describeth the Works that he excluâ—eth to be those that are supposed to make the Reward to be of Debt for the value of the Work and not of Grace And do they know any Protestant that is either for Justification or Salvation by any such Works or for the being of any such 3. And is not Faith a humane Act And doth not Paul most plainly and frequently say we are Justified by it And did he call Faith Works LIV. But to answer this they erre as grosly saying that by Faith imputed for Righteousness and our being Justified by Faith is not meant the the Act or Habit of Faith but the Oâ—ject Christ's Righteousness not sticking hereby to turn all such Texts into worse than Nonsence Put Christ's Righteousness instead of the Word Faith in all those Texts and try how it will run And why is Faith named if it have no part in the Sense They say That it Justifieth not as a Work I say it Justifieth not efficiently at all much less as a Work in Paul's sense that maketh the Reward to be not of Grace but of Debt Nor doth it Justify as an Act in genere for then a quatenâ—s ad omne every Act would Justify nor yet as a meer good Act or Work For then every good Act would Justify as it doth But we are Justified by 1. This Faith in specie which is our Fiducial Reception of Christ. 2. And that as it is formally made by God the condition of our participiation of the Gift which is Christ and his Justifying Meritorious Righteousness Christ is not instead of Faith and Faith is not instead of Christ It is Christ believed in and received and not Christ without belief and reception And when they say That it is the Object and not the Act they multiply the Proclamations of their undistinguishing ignorance unskilfully pretending to distinguish For the Object Christ
Dyet and Rest and not to work or eat or sleep till the Spirit moveth them And God maketh use of Reason and Order in things Spiritual as well as in things Natural And the Spirits of the Prophets are subject to the Prophets LXXVI They reprove us for perswading Unconverted Men to Pray because the Prayer of the Wicked is abominable and they â—â—ould stay till they have the Spirit of Prayer And is a Tavern or a Whore-house a sitter plâ—ce to get that Spirit than on their knees by Prayer when God himself saith To thee shall aâ—l flâ—sh câ—me seâ—k the Lord while he may â—e founâ— call upon him wâ—ile he is near Let the Wickâ—d â—â—â—sak his way c. wicked Prayers of wicked men that are but to quiet them in sin are abominable and no prayer of an Impenitent unbeliever hath any promise of certain success But Aâ—ab and Niâ—eve and millions of Sinners have found that there are some prayers of the unregenerate that are better than none Aâ—d do they think when we perswade them to Pray that we perswade them to continue Impenitent No it is but perswading them to Turn and Live For praying is a returniâ—â— motion and we say but as Peter Repent and Pray if perhaps the thoughts of thy heart may be forgâ—â—â—â— thee Not to exhort men to Pray is not to exhort them to desire Grace and true Conversion Common Grace and Natural Self-love have their desires which are not all in vain it s better to be near the Kingdom of God than to be dispisers of it God hath fixed the time of the Lord's day and the undisposed must not say we will not keep it till the Spirit move us As it is a dutâ— to Relieve the Poor so it is to Pray as soon as God commandeth it and none must say I will not Give or Pray till the Spirit move me but wait for more help of the Spirit in the way of duty LXXVII That because no man can come to Christ too soon therefore no man can too soon believe that he is Elect and Justified though he have no evidence to prove it and though he know not God or Christ or the Spirit or the Gospel LXXVIII That men are bound to Believe that Christ Believed for them and Repented for them and must no more question their Faith and Repentance than they must question Christ as Saltmarsh speaketh as if Christ had had Sin to repent of or a Saviour to save him from it and as if this were no Covenant-Condition required of our selves as necessary to our Justification They may next say Christ that is Holy for them shall be Saved in stead of them LXXIX That to Believe that we are Elect and Justified is fides Divina a Believing the word of God because his Spirit 's witness of it by inspiration is his word LXXX That nothing done by an unregenerate man by common Grace maketh him any fitter to Believe and be Converted that if he were without it because it is sin LXXXI That it is no Grace which is not unresistible and because we cannot Merit it we cannot resist and forfeit it LXXXII That Pardon and Justification being perfect the first Moment of our Faith therefore it is only one momentous Act of Faith only that Justifieth us and no Act of Faith it self Justifieth us after that hour This is held by the more moderate sort who say not that we are Justified before Faith LXXXIII That we must act from Lâ—â—â— but not â—or Life as if Natural Life were not to be used for Spiritual Life LXXXIV They hold That Sin being all past present and future Pardoned at first we must not ask Pardon any more but only the fuller Belief and Sense of Pardon LXXXV They hold that no Sin or declining of a Justified Person should ever make him doubt of his Justification LXXXVI They hold that the meaning of Rom. 8.28 is That all the sin that an Elect or Justified man committeth shall certainly work for his greater good when the Text speaketh but of Enemies and Sufferings and all the Providences of God As if it were the way of God's Wise and Holy Government so far to encourage men to sin as to assure all that love God beforehand that the more they sin the better it shall be for them whereas he hath filled the Scripture with so many terrible threatnings against Sin and Backsliding And as if â—o â—ustiâ—ied person by sin did ever gnow worâ—e than â—efore or love God lâ—â—â— or at all displeâ—se him Or it were for our good to be worse and love God less or displease him or lose aâ—y meâ—sures of Grace and Glory 〈◊〉 Title LXXXVII They take Justification in the Great day of Judâ—mâ—â—t to be none of our proper Justification by Faith because that was done before but a Declaâ—â—â—â—â—â— of â—â— As if Justification had but one degree and the word but one sence or any were persectâ—r Justification than that and a Deâ—isive Sentential Declaration were not the most eminent LXXXVIII Those that confess works of Obedience to Christ to be the Condition of Glorification yet deny it to be a Condition of Justification in Judgment when as to Justifie us in Judgment is to Justifie our right to Impurity and Glory and so the Condition must be the same LXXXIX Though God oft and plainly saith That all men shall be judged according to their works and according to what they have done in the Body good or evil and to judge is either by decisive sentence to Justifie or to Condemn or executively to Reward and Glorify on to Punish yet many that Confess that men shall be so Judged do deny that they shall be so Justified though Justifying be Judging XC Though the word According to their works do plainly signify The Cause to be then decided in order to the sentence of Salvation or Damnation and Christ Mat. 25. and elsewhere hath largely enumerated the parts of the Cause and call it Righteousness and that with a Caâ—â—al particle and though the Scripture mention our inherent and acted Righteousness in terms of the same signification above Six â—undred times and that as the thing that pleaseth God and that he loveth hateing the contrary telling us that the unrighteous shall not enter into Heaven c. Yet do they feign that all that Godliness which hath the promise of this Life and That to come and which God is said as a Righteous Judge to Reward and Crown is mentioned only as a sign of the Elect and Rightâ—ous and of Faith and not as the Cause to be then decided or as a Rewarded thing And for whom is this sâ—â—n so solemnly produced God knoweth us without Signs His Light in our Consciences will make us know our selves by Internal Perâ—eption And if it be to confute the Devil and his servants that slander us it is for want of Righteousness and not only for want of siâ—â—s of it that we are accused and it is more than
They 〈◊〉 thâ—â— to hold that Câ—â—â—sâ— Righteousness and Meâ—iâ— iâ— to make our Fâ—iâ—â— and holy Obedienâ—e 〈…〉 is a Pâ—â—â—sh Dâ—ctrine against Fâ—â—â— Gracâ— Aâ— if Câ—risâ— had 〈◊〉 â—â—me to save his People from their sins and to make them holy and zealous of Lâ—ve and â—ood Works or God were grown so indifferent to his 〈◊〉 and to Christ within us and so forgetful of all his Promises of Reward that he would acâ—ept and reward our Fidelity and Obedience to Christ â—ever the more for all Câ—râ—st's meritorious Sacrifice Righteousness and Intercession which is the only Price that purchaseth our Acceptance and as if Judgment should make no difference between mens rewardableness but only judge Christ to have been a Saviour to the Elect. XCVII They devise a Plea for the justifying of all the wicked damnable Hypocrites in Judgment while they tell them that there will be no need of a Justification against the Charge of Hypocrisie and Unholiness but only against the Charge of being sinners and so they can say that all were sinners as well as they and that Christ was offered them as a Saviour that had made a sufficient Sacrifice for their forgiveness And they professed to believe in him as their Saviour And as to the soundness of their Faith there will be no need of Justification And if Christ say I was hungry and ye fed me not I was naked and ye cloathed me not c. They are taught to say The Righteousness of their own personal Holyness or Obedience is none of the Cause of the day to justifie them or to be tryed and justified XCVIII Some say that Christ Reconciled Man to God but did not Reconcile God to Man because God was at no enmity with the Elect but loved them from Eternity and to the Reprobate he is unreconciled It is true that Christ made no real change on God by his Reconciliation But by his Sacrifice and Merits and Intercession he made it a thing Just and Meet for God to forgive and save us notwithstanding all our Guilt all his Holiness Justice and Truth and so dissolving our obligations to punishment and removing the impediments of our Reconciliation he is by extrinsick denomination said to be Reconciled to us when he is no way bound to Damn us and this without any change in God But the Clouds being thus dispelled that were between God and us his Face as Reconciled shineth on us God was in Christ Reconciling the World to himself by making them capable of personal plenary Reconciliation by purchasing a Free Pardon to be offered to all tho' they have after need to be intreated to be personally and actually Reconciled to God 2 Cor. 5.19 20. Gods Love of Benevolence goeth before his Love of Complacence tho' the change be really in the Object only XCIX Dr. Crispe and all that say that our own Obedience and Duties and personal Righteousness do us no good nor further our Salvation Christ doing all that and that it hindereth Salvation to do any thing for Salvation do plainly make Heavenly Blessedness and God himself as sought loved and enjoyed to be against our Salvation For all our Sanctity is but our Love of God and our Fruition of him And the perfection of this is our Heaven and Happiness and Holiness is here the beginning of it And if it be against the Grace of Christ to seek Heaven and the Fruition of God and to be receptive of it by Holyness and to seek God be the way to keep us from him as not going out of our selves to Christ How then is Christ the way to the Father How doth he bring us to God Why doth he Sanctify us and bid us seek and strive to enter Will Heaven be against Heaven and God against God to us If so then striving to be saved from Sin and Hell is the way to bring us to Sin and Hell which none would hold that knoweth how much of Hell Sin it self is and how much Holiness is of Heaven C. They falsly reproach the Orthodox that erre not with them as Enemies of Free Grace and as not going out of themselves and by odious Words as being for Justificatioâ— by Works When it is thâ—y themselves that overthrow all Justification and tâ—e Gospel as Justifying us and Justiâ—â—cation by Faith it self calling it Tò Creâ—â—re and a Work Ridiculously making Tò Credâ—re and Faith to signify diversly And tell us not when it is the Phrase and when it is the the Meaning that they oppose If it be the Phrase that they oppose they condemn Christ and the Scripture that say Men are Justified by their Words and Works If it be the Sence let them tell what that Sence is which they accuse and not consound the Controversies of the Name and of the Thing Those that they reproach Renounce all Works for Justification or Salvation that arrogate the least part of the Office Merits or Grace of Christ or that make the Reward not of Grace but of Debt Yea all that Honour not Christ and Grace more than if he had not required them and did not as dwelling in us by his Spirit cause them and make them acceptable to God But we will not renounce Christ living in us nor the use and worth of the Image of God CHAP. III. To moderate Mâ—â—s 〈◊〉 Câ—nsâ—riâ—g thâ— Eâ—râ—â—◠〈◊〉 Recâ—â—cil HAving enumerated a Centurâ— of their Errours I shall next tâ—ll â—ou how and why notwithstanding all these gross Corruptions you should mâ—â—erate and regulate your Censure of the Men and of other such Ortho. Yoâ—â—av◠〈◊〉 sufficieâ—tly wâ—at to think of them wheâ— you have told me what they hold I must nâ—ither judge of the Faith by the Man â—or forbear judging â—f the Man by â—is Faith Can any man judge 〈◊〉 hardly of men that overthrâ—w all Religion They sâ—â—m to me to be Atheists Infidels Anti-Christians Prophane and open Enemies of all that is Holy and Good â—ave only the Name of God aâ—d Christ and Frâ—e Grace and that Good which they oppâ—se This Charactâ—r of them I gather from yâ—ur â—wn Words I. They deny the only true God and feign or make us another God The true God is Holy and hateth sin But they feign a God who is the maker of sin yea that 〈◊〉 his own Son the greatest sinner in the World by mâ—king all the sins committed by all the Elect to be really his sins and so making him the worst of men II. Yea whereas Devils can but tempt men to sin they feign God to translate our sins themselves Essentially on Christ and so to make him a sinner that could not be tempted to it III. They make us another pretendeâ— Christ and so deny the true Christ and so are Anti-christs The true Christ had no sin but only became a Sâ—crifice for our sin which were laid upon him no further than to suffer for us But they feign a Christ that was a hater of God an Atheist a Servant of the Devil