told us p. 157. That our Union to Christ is not an Union to his Person but confists in a sincere Union to his Church And so again p. 151. and yet now If Christ and Believers are united their Persons are united too for he cannot understand no not for his heart I warrant you how they should be united without their Persons 2. He charges the Doctor with owning an Adhesion nay a Natural Adhesion of Persons I confess I never admired any mans Confidence more that in the face of the Doctors words which he himself had quoted directly affirming the contrary should charge him with asserting a Natural Adhesion of Persons Thus he reports the Doctors words The Person of Christ and Believers are united and yet it 's no Personal Union Again the Doctor thus It 's a Spiritual and Supernatural Conjunction Our Author had need tell nothing but Truth for he is the poorliest qualified for a Lyar that I have met withal And now let it be referred to the Groom-Porter Whether Adhesion be not as like to choak narrow throats as Conjunction 3. He says Christ and Believers are united by mutual Relations And then makes a Quaere upon 't Whether all the Absurdities he would fasten upon the Doctors words will not recoyl upon his own For it signifies no more than if he had said Christ and Believers are united by their Union and related by their Relation and thus Christ is Christ and Believers are Believers and Union is Union The Truce is now expired and he is once again falling upon Dr. Owen For as the Serpents in Africa lay aside their Poyson whilest they drink and then presently suck it up again so I was pretty secure our Author would lick up that vomit again which he had cast in Dr. Iacomb's face that he might serve the other with the same sawce But whilst I am considering his Extravagances there comes to my hand an Answer from the Doctor wherein since he has condescended to chastise our Author in person it may justly supersede any further attempt of mine in his Vindication At p. 243. I meet again with our Author where he falls upon that weighty point of Justification In his exposing of which Truth he takes occasion from a passage in Dr. O. I see I must mention him again Com. p. 55. There is no man whatever that hath any wants in reference to the things of God but Christ will be to him that which he wants I speak of those N. B. who are given him of the Father Is he Dead Christ is Life Is he weak Christ is the Power of God! Hath he a Sense of Sin upon him Christ is Compleat Righteousness Jer. 23. 6. The Lord our Righteousness Which words being fortified with express Scripture it concerned our Author to take good advice and to go gingerly to work in perverting of them Two Artifices he uses which like Fire and Water will make the strongest Cloth shrink And 1. He lops off one whole Sentence p. 214. and then exclaims This sounds like Universal Redemption What down-right Arminianism Really I am sorry for 't Is the Doctor sheer gone over to the Remoustrants Come come Sir you have a Card in your Sleeve pray produce it I speak says the Doctor of those who are given him of the Father Now where are your ears Does this chink like Universal Redemption But so true is the old Observation He that is prepossest with an Opinion finds it in all he reads 2. If that way fails another will hit What Comfort is this to us says he that Christ was Righteous if we continue wilful and incorrigible sinners Yes says the Doctor hast thou a sense of sin upon thee Christ is Compleat Righteousness Fie upon it put on a Mask for shame Is the Soul that labours under the sense of some particular sin a wilful and incorrigible sinner It 's the repenting the broken and the sorrowful sinner that the Doctor directs to Christ. Our blessed Saviour has invited those that labour and are heavy-laden to come unto him promising that he will give them rest I wonder our Author could forbear twitting him that he encouraged wilful and incorrigible sinners But pray what would our Author say to a Soul that has the sense of sin upon him without peradventure Repent of thy sin forsake thy sin c. And does he think that Repentance will save a wilful and incorrigible sinner one that Repents and sins and sins and Repents again and goes on in a circle of sinning and halfrepentance Say but the same for the Doctor He Counsels the Soul under the sense of sin to believe but then it 's only the Repenting sinner that will that can that ought to make his Address to Christ that he may find rest to his Soul For our Author's Method in prosecuting this great Point I dare not warrant it Such as it is Reader shall have it as cheap as I had it my duty is to Follow and not to Dispute 1. His first enquiry will be In what sense Christ is called our Righteousness and what the Scripture intends by those Phrases of The Righteousness of God the Righteousness of Faith or The Righteousness of God by Faith He begins with that famous place Jer. 23. 6. where Christ is expresly called the Lord our Righteousness To which our Author returns three things A pitiful Scoff a woful Evasion and a wretched Answer worse than both 1. He begins with a Scoff A very express place to prove that Christ is our Righteousness that is that the only Righteousness wherewith we must appear before God is the Righteousness of Christ imputed to us Who these men should be that thus expound it I cannot Divine unless it be the first Reformers of this Church and they do indeed tell us Artic. 11. That we are accountted Righteous before God only for the Merit of our Lord and Saviour Iesus Christ and not for our own Works and Deservings Wherefore that we are justified by Faith only is a most wholesome Doctrine and full of comfort And I believe our Author experienced it to be a most sweet and comfortable Doctrine when he subscribed it for a fat Benefice But in the mean time these men whoever they be have a very hard task on t. For one while they must not draw one Conclusion from the Person of Christ which his Gospel has not expresly taught to use their own Reasons to deduce one single Inference from Gospel-premises is present Death But what now if they produce express Scripture that Christ is our Righteousness Why that 's as bad for this is to interpret Scripture by the sound of words 2. He retreats to a most woful Evasion Is there no other possible sense to be made of this Phrase If it be possible to procure another Sense for Love or Money it shall never go thus The Cause looks with a very desperate face when once it comes to this when men are ready to shoot the Pit
Hope and Expectations upon God through Christ The Knowledge of all which they owe alone to the Scriptures given forth by the Inspiration of the Holy Ghost The supposition therefore that our Author has proceedeed upon all this while is a meer Falshood yet had it been True what he charges them with he had very weakly overthrown their Errour and none can doe greater disservice to the Truth than by a weak and feeble defence of it or a weak Opposition to the contrary it 's enough to tempt some men to take up what he opposes and to presume there are no better Arguments one way or other because so confident a Designer could give no better For all the Misadventures in his Tedious Scheme he will make us believe hee 's not bound to answer for them for if the Proportions be but regular let the Doctrine be what it will he does but personate the Mode of others But yet we have discover'd here many of his own dear Notions sent abroad in Masquerade which will appear more bare-faced in the following sheets Imitating herein the famous Limner who would stand behind his Exposed Piece to Eaves-drop the Censure of the Critical Spectator Just thus does our Author skulk behind his New Model of Divinity and if it meets with an Imprimatur he will play a more Overt Game but if otherwise he can quickly pluck in his Horns CHAP. III. Sect. 4. How Men Pervert the Scriptures to make it Comply with their own Fancies IT 's storied of Messa la Corvinus once a Famous Orator that he got such a Crack in his Pericranium that he quite forgot his own Name the most unhappy man certainly in all the World to have been Employed in the Management of a Lye the Mystery whereof consists mainly in Tying both the Ends so handsomely together that it may not Ravel out into Thrums Our Author has Managed a severe Charge against some that they Deduce all their Religion from an acquaintance with Christs Person without consulting the Scriptures And yet now The truth is says he if you consult their Writings you will find them stuffed with Scriptures These things did not Cotten very Lovingly and he was as much put to his Trumps to make both ends meet as the Gentleman who told it with great Confidence That he shot a Deer with one Arrow through the right Ear and the left Foot behind But he has an old Friend that never fails his Servants at a Pinch and he lifted him over the Style with this They do but accommodate Scriptures to their own Fancies Their Crime then in the last Result is this That they are not so happy Interpreters of Scripture as himself They have the same Text but they want his Head-piece to Comment on 't They have the same Materials to work upon but they want his Tools Or as one of his Friends expres'd it they have his Fiddle but cannot get his Fiddle-stick But to reproach them upon this Account is to reproach by far the greatest part of Mankind All were not Born under his smiling Stars nor had the same benign Aspects of the Planets in their Nativity It 's not every mans happiness to have the Bees swarm about his Cradle or to be entranced upon the Top of Parnassus However after all the Scuffle we have gain'd this Point that we may joyn Issue with him upon the Question and modestly Debate it Whether he or they do best understand the Scriptures Two great Faults and they are great ones indeed he finds in their Writings First That they Expound Scripture by the sound of Words And secondly That they reason about the Sence of Scripture from their own preconceived Notions 1. They Expound Scripture by the sound of words Our Author had discovered to us p. 80. the Danger of using a way of Reasoning that would serve any Mans turn that had but any Quickness and Vigour of Fancy What a dangerous way then must this be that will serve any Mans turn though he be not blessed with his Quickness and Vigour of Fancy For though his Antagonists Pulse toll as heavily as Tom of Lincoln though he never drew his Breath but in Boetia nor ever had his Temples crown'd with the Ignis Lambens yet he can with as much ease and more truth Retort all his Rhetorick When mens Fancies are so possessed with Schemes and Idaea's of Religion what ever they look upon appears of the same shape and colour where with their Minds are already Tinctur'd like a Man sick of the Iaundies or that looks through painted Glass who seeth every thing of the same colour that his Eye or the Glass gives it Some such Medium the poor Priest used to Prove that the Virgin Mary was Prophesied of from the beginning of the World because he had made a shift to read Gen. 1. 10. Congregationem aquarum vocavit Maria And with the same learned skill did the Rector of Convince his obstinate Parishioners that it was their Duty to Pave his Chancel for him from Paveant illi ego non Pavebo And let me tell our Author for all his Vapouring and that he looks so goodly on 't he has not a more serviceable Engine than this one in all his Arsenal For having once double-dyed his Fancy with a strong Conceit that the word Christ signifies a Church an Office a Doctrine you cannot Quote that Text where the Word occurs but his Fancy Chimes all in just as Imagination thinks so Scripture clinks and every thing he sees turns round to that Crotchet when all the while the Wind-Mill is in his own Head If you should but venture to say that for an Orator our Author is truly excellent but for a Logician he is but Ordinary I l'e undertake from the sound of that one word he shall conceit himself at first Dash to be a Bishop So easie it is for a French Cook to make Suffolk-street Soupe of a Stool-foot and most Ravishing Minc't Pies of an Old Boot-top or a Leather Doublet As it is a Ridiculous procedure to make the sound of words the Measure of our Interpretation so is it no less perverse a Method to Expound Scripture by the Ranverse and go just cross to the sound of words The Plain and Literal sence commands our Reception unless the Context and Coherence Evident contradiction to some other plain Scripture or some gross Absurdity and insuperable Difficulty compell us to Recede from it But now according to our Authors Rule which he has most Religiously observed throughout his Book the further any Interpretation departs from the sound of words the better it is that is to say for his own purpose As suppose you should meet with this word Heaven let not the Chiming and Tinckling of your Fancy betray you into a Notion of some Glorious place where the spirits of Iust men made perfect are Blessed in the enjoyment of God for that would be but to Gratifie your Tinctured Imagination with the sound of a word
6. The Holy One of Israel Isa. 41. 14. Elect and precious 1 Pet. 2. 6. That he was also typified by most excellent and glorious Persons and Things By Moses David Solomon by the Pillar of Cloud by the Rose of Sharon In the pursuit of which Metaphors and Types perhaps he has a little overshot himself and alas how easie a matter is that It 's very hard to stop at a point when we are upon the full speed St. George himself straining for a blow at the Dragon had like to have come over These are Human Errours and I wish our Authors were of no worse Consequence But 1. Our Author forgets himself to say that Mr. W. uses these Metaphors to prove when all the Service they doe him is to illustrate his Doctrine sufficiently otherwise confirmed from innumerable Scriptures If our Author will not allow the Pearl to signifie Christs Preciousness yet it 's very clear that Christ is precious If he boggle that the circular Figure of Manna should denote Christs Perfection yet that he is Perfect is undenyable 2. Whatever was a Type of Christ represented some of his Personal Excellencies Actions or Sufferings c. If then we single out the most eminent of their Natural Excellencies and then consider which of Christs spiritual Excellencies syncretize with them all the hurt that 's in it is that those Types are more beholden to Christ than he to them And 3. We ought to consider that there 's a greater latitude of Expression allowed in Open handed Discourses ad Populum than in your Double-fisted Disputations in the Schools Our blessed Saviour does accommodate his Discourses to his Disciples and preach as they were able to hear him and Mr. Watson does not alwayes preach or write to such long-ear'd People as our Author is And thus after all Mr. Watson may be very Innocent but whosoever is in the the Right our Author will be sure to be in the Wrong for when all that Discourse had spent it self to perswade us that Christ is excellent that he deserves our Love our Service and Obedience our Author could make no better use on 't than to throw a Flout upon the very Person of our Redeemer Who says he can forbear being smitten with so lovely a Person Really he may do well to consider whether his License will justifie him to Scoffe at Christs Person toties quoties he meets with any that shall dare to give him a good word I have known some so prodigal of their Friends that they would sell the best they had for a sorry frothy Iest but should our Author forfeit the Favour of Christ when he shall most need it for a poor half-witted Conceit it would be more than he would ever get by it But hence we learn how difficult it is for any to have a little more Wit than his Neighbours and not to discover it though it had been more comely to have been facetious any where than against A Saviour and may he in time come to himself least he be smitten with Christ in a fence not to his good liking 2 The Second Way whereby these men Pervert the Scripture is that they argue from their own preconceived Notions and Opinions about the sence of Scripture And to have sav'd charges both these might have been mustered for one but then it would not have born such a Port nor carryed so much state and Majesty in its looks The first way was When they find any words in Scripture which chime to the Tune of their private Conceits they interpret them by the sound of words And this second way is the first way in other words when they Argue from their own pre-conceived Notions But perhaps there may be some subtle Essential difference between their own Conceits and their own preconceived Notions which though he can every one cannot discover Now of this first or second or same or New or no Way call it which he pleases he will give us some few Instances 1. There are says he a great many places which expressely tell us we are justified by Faith have Remission of sins by Faith c. Now the difficulty will be how we shall Reconcile these Scriptures to their Notion of being justified by Christs Righteousness For as he acutely observes Faith certainly is not the Righteousness of Christ in their Notion of it No nor in his neither if he rightly understands himself Now those other men have a way to Reconcile our being Iustified by the Righteousness of Christ onely and our being justified by Faith onely and it is this When Faith is said to justifie they understand not this Absolutely as if Faith did justifie either as it is a Work wrought iin us or an Act performed by us but relatively as t makes us one with Christ by whom we are justified And they assign this Reason for it Because had Iustification been promised to any thing wrought in us or done by us it had been by Works And this Conciliation of the true Interest of Faith and Christ in the business of Justification is justified by the Doctrine of the Church of England Art 11. We are accounted Righteous before God onely for the Merit of our Lord and Saviour Iesus Christ by Faith and not for our own Works or Deservings wherefore that we are justified by Faith onely is a most wholsom Doctrine Now our Author might with great Applause have placed out his Reconciling skill upon this Article How we can be Justified for the Merit of Christ onely and yet by Faith onely And again How we can be Justified by Faith onely or indeed at all and yet not for our own Works we find in Scripture that the same Effects are attributed to Faith which are attributed to Christ Iustified by Christ Isa. 53. 11. and justified by Faith Rom. 3. 28. We live by Christ Joh. 6. 57. and we live by Faith Gal. 2. 20. Are pardon'd by Christ Act. 13. 38. are pardon'd also by Faith Act. 26. 18. Have peace with God by Christ Col. 1. 20. have peace with him also by Faith Rom. 5. 2. Have Access to God by Christ Eph. 2. 18. have Access also by Faith Eph. 3. 12. Are sanctified by Christ Heb. 10. 14. and sanctified by Faith Act. 15. 9. Overcome the World by Christ Joh. 16. 33. and so also by Faith 1 Joh. 5. 4 5. The Sons of God by Christ Eph. 1. 5. and so by Faith Gal. 3. 26. These things being thus it seems to be a worthy Enquiry what Part and Share Christ may Challenge and what Faith may claim in the Justification of a Soul before God that so we may give unto Christ the things that are Christs and unto Faith the things that are Faiths And 1 It 's very evident that their Concerns are really Distinct Christ Justifies in one respect Faith ◅in another It 's possible that some ver 9. Infants may be Justified without Fāith in Christ but impossible that any should be Justified
we cannot Imitate them for those special Ends which Christ had in His Eye yet must we Imitate that Moral principle from which and the General End unto which he Levelled those Actions Thus we cannot Die for that end for which Christ Died especially to Attone sin yet may we must we Conform our Souls to that Love which carried him out to the Work and Eye the general Advantage of the Church in laying down our Lives when called to it 1 John 3. 16. Herein perceive we the Love of God that he laid down his Life for us and we ought to lay down our Lives for the Brethren And the Argument concludes strongly If Christ a Person so great laid down his Life a Life so precious for us so unworthy and in such a way to be a Propitiation for our sins how much more ought we Inconsiderable Creatures to lay down our Lives so useless for the Brethren so dear to God when our single Death may by the Providence of God prevent some Impending danger or notable Ruine that Threatens the Community So again Col. 3. 13. As Christ forgave you so also do ye We are to forgive as Christ forgave And yet the As is a Note of Similitude not of Equality Christ's forgiveness is one thing ours another they differ Specifically yet there 's a Moral equity which holds that if Christ freely pardons our sins much more ought we in our way to pass by and not Rigidly exact those Trespasses committed against us But the Actions of Christ as a Man Living in Obedience to the Moral Law and especially that Frame of Cheerfulness Readiness Sincerity therein these call for our Imitation 4 This assures us of the Infinite value of his Sacrifice and the power of his Intercession I have heard some Travellers when they have met with a spot of good way after long tedious laping in the Dirt say they could be tempted to ride it over again but the consideration how long they have been and how soon again they must be engaged in wayes of the same difficulty has reformed the vanity of that Crotchet I could gladly dwell upon some pleasant passages in this Chapter which prove undenyably that there 's no such thing as summum malum in the world but that I am importun'd by the approaching foul way to make haste into it that I may get the sooner through it Sun-shine is pleasant but it often proves a breed-storm and a Dead calm in our Master Aristotles Philosophy is the Prognostick and Prodrome of an Earth-quake But yet why should we kill our selves for fear of dying and make our selves miserable for fear another should do it for us We will then make the best we can of the present Halcyon tranquillity This assures us of the Infinite value of his Sacrifice and the Power of his Intercession 'T is so indeed for though the Manhood onely was the Sacrifice yet the Person God-Man was the Priest and though the Sacrifice was not God yet was it the Sacrifice of him who was God none can therefore wonder that our Author calls it of Infinite value Nor on the other hand let any surmise that he uses the Term Infinite to impose upon us though some perhaps may carry a jealous Eye over him because he has dropt an odde word or two elsewhere which seem to warp the sence of Infinite to Finite or Indefinite In p. 208. he denyes that the Divine Nature it self hath endless boundless bottomless Grace in it Though God be rich in Grace he hath no where told us that his Mercy was bottomless and boundless which yet is that Notion of Infinite that we have ever Received and yet the same Author in the same Page will allow Grace to be Infinite A world of sin is somewhat though it bear no Proportion to infinite Grace Hence I perceive some would inferre that if the Grace of the Father may be infinite and yet not boundless the Blood of the Son may be so too of Infinite value that is of a great uncertain worth in which sence Vorstius will allow God to be Infinite They do also foment their own suspicion from what here follows as it were by way of Exegesis His Sacrifice was of greater value than the Blood of Bulls and Goats Nay then if there was onely a Magis and a Minùs in the case all this might be and yet Christs Sacrifice come infinitely short of Infinite These things may be objected but for my own part though he be angry at it in other places when he is not concerned I shall interpret his words according to their Chime and clink and charitably expound his meaning by the sound of words That which follows is Truely excellent God cannot but be pleas'd when his own Son undertakes to be a Ransome and to make an Attonement for sinners which is so great a Vindication of Gods Dominion and Sovereignty of the Authority of his Laws the Wisdom and Iustice of his Providence that he may securely pardon humble and penitent sinners without reproaching any of his Attributes What pity 't is a single word should here be lost 1. God will not indeed cannot pardon any sin to the reproach of his Attributes The hopes of sinners are small if these be their hopes that to pardon them God will destroy Himself It would be the reproach of pardoning Mercy it self should we conceive it ready to pardon without respect to the Interest of other Attributes As therefore God is ready to pardon a way must be contrived that he may securely pardon and when 't is said he cannot 't is no Impeachment of His Omnipotency He is therefore Omnipotent because he cannot Doe some things the Doing whereof would imply want of Power He cannot Dye and is therefore the rather Omnipotent because he cannot He cannot Deny himself and therefore he can doe all things because he cannot doe that for he that can Deny Himself his Word Promise or Threatning may be presumed Able to doe very little Thus therefore God cannot pardon sin without security that his Attributes be not reproached for so to doe would argue a Remisseness and languid easiness in a Governour which is a weakness and no perfection 2. We gather from our Author That even humble and penitent sinners need the Interposition of Christ that God may securely pardon them for besides that even they are but imperfectly such and that sin still cleaves to their Repentance and Humiliation and further that the displicency of God against sin as it is sin small or great is essential to Him besides all this those however humble and penitent ones turning from sin for the future have yet old scores to discharge former Reckonings to clear and have need of Christ to cross the Book for old Arrears though for the time to come they should reach the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which yet it 's much to a little they will not doe but when Christ undertakes to be a Ransome God may securely
we Hatred hating and being hated Surely this is no Foundation for Agreement or upon that of Walking with God Nothing can be more remote than this Frame from such a Condition Let now the Reader and it 's no great matter whether he be ingenuous or disingenuous partial or impartial compare what the Doctor has written with what is fixt upon him The Doctor sayes Whilest we are such and such we can have no Communion with God cannot walk with him Nay says our Author the Doctor sayes the clean contrary that though we are as contrary to God as Light is to Darkness c. yet the Righteousness of Christ is a sufficient Foundation for Agreement So again p. 121 122. Com. There must be moreover a Way wherein we must walk with God and Christ is that way Isa. 35. 8. an High-way a Way of Holiness No sayes our Author though we be as contrary to God as universal Pollution to universal Holiness yet the Righteousness of Christ is a sufficient Foundation c. As the Doctor sayes The Error then of the Doctor being so gross the Confutation must needs be as easie for I observe our Author is very kind to himself and will not set himself a hard Task One Text will easily doe it 1 Iohn 1. 6 7. If we say we have fellowship with him and walk in darkness we lye and do not the Truth but if we walk in the light as God is in the light then have we fellowship one with another and then the blood of Iesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sins Where he has fallaciously foysted in a little word then though somewhat bigger than the Doctors by to seduce the unwary Reader into a Conceit then when we have walk'd in the light as God is in the light for some competent time at last we shall have some benefit by the blood of Christ to cleanse us from sin And now he falls to please himself in his old Humour of either ignorantly mistaking or maliciously abusing the Doctors words Our onely acquaintance with God and knowledge of him is hid in Christ which his Word and Works could not discover as you heard above It is very true we have heard our Author bespatter him thus above and shall do so again beneath before and behind on the right hand and the left but that the Doctor ever spoke a syllable that opposes the Person of Christ and the Revelations of the Gospel that he supposes any Mysteries learnt from an Acquaintance with Christs Person wherein the Gospel is deeply silent is a shameless Falshood which because we would give it a more gentle Name than it deserves may be called a Sherlocisme One blow more he must give the Doctor for a parting blow and then he will give us leave to take a little breath The Doctor it seems had said That in Christ we design the same End that God doth which is the Advancement of his Glory And is he a Christian that denyes it Ought not all that wear the Livery of a Redeemer to pursue the great End of Advancing Gods glory If the Doctor had affirmed twice Two to make Four our Author is bound in Conscience to deny it but is there never a Paraphrase that may dress them up in some ugly hew O yes one of his id est's will do the feat That is sayes he by trusting to the Expiation and Righteousness of Christ for salvation without doing any thing our selves we take care that God shall not be robbed of the Glory of his Free-grace by a Competition of any Merits and Deserts of our own That little policy there is in these words lyes in that short Parenthesis which with more cunning than honesty he has wedg'd into his own gloss Without doing any thing our selves But where when in what Book Chapter Section Page or Paragraph has the Doctor encouraged any to look for salvation by Christ without doing anything our selves Cannot we design the Glory of God trusting to the Expiation and Righteousness of Christ but all Obedience must presently be excluded And yet his Parenthesis is capable of a double sence 1. As excluding Obedience simply and absolutely and so they are none of the Doctors words but a crafty Insinuation of our Authors to mislead us into this Opinion that the Doctor has quite cashiered Obedience from having any place in our Salvation a thing so abhorred by all his Principles so contrary to all his Writings that nothing could have been either more unjustly forged against or basely fixed upon him 2. They may be construed as excluding Obedience in some respects for some Ends and Purposes and thus though the Doctor has not said it in that place yet I suppose he will say it and maintain it when he has done That Believers may and ought to expect Salvation from the Expiation and Righteousness of Christ without doing any thing themselves for those special and particular ends for which Christ Suffered We do nothing in Comparison of our Duty and those Obligations that are laid upon us yet whatsoever we do 't is not to satisfie Gods Iustice to appease his Anger to Iustifie our selves to Purchase and Merit eternal Life And hereby God has taken Care that he be not Robbâ—…dof the Glory of his Free-grace nor Christ of the Glory of his Sufferings by a Competition of any Merits and Deserts of our own And let all the Sons of Men take Care also at their utmost Peril how they do it Some men I see are wonderfully pleased with their own unsavoury Eructations though they offend their Neighbours with their Onyons and Garlick and accordingly our Author is so highly taken with his own Crudities and undigested Notions that he is resolved to give us them over again in a Scheme of Religion for this is all the Mode since Systematical Divinity grew out of Fashion and that some do begin to affect the Title of Schematical Divines In which admirable Product of his Wit and Phancy he brings nothing New his Rayling faculty like an old Skrub-broom being worn to the Stumps and offers as little Proof as Novelty and therefore gratis Negatum might serve for an answer to gratis Dictum yet that he may not Complain that we Overlook his Excellencies I shall Sprinkle a few soft Drops upon him as he goes along 1. In the entrance of his Scheme he stumbles at the same Block he once broke his Shins at supposing these men to assert That God appointed and ordained sin for the glory of his Vindictive Iustice and Pardoning Grace A Charge so Idle Vain and False that nothing can attone but his pleading invincible Ignorance God did not appoint and ordain sin that he might glorifie his Mercy and Justice thereby but upon Supposition that sin had been Introduced he Over-rules it he appoints it to another End orders it to another Purpose than in its own Nature it could ever have reacht And this the Doctor calls Putting a New end to sin p.
but the working of heated Fancy and Religious Distraction that to speak of Christs beauty loveliness fulness and preciousness are but Romantick Descriptions of him That is All is Fancy that comports not with his own extravagant Whimsâ—…y The Knowledge of Christ informs our Judgements affects our Hearts reforms our Lives and it will argue little love to our Redeemer if we entertain meaner thoughts of him by loud Clamour and impotent Reflections upon him 2. It moves their Passions and if we be a little passionately affected with the love of our Redeemer it 's a pardonable Errour When our Author would curry favour with his Reader and perswade him that for all his scandalous Expressions he was no Enemy to Christ he could say as much as that came to p. 184 185. This is a Sacrament wherein we celebrate the Love of our dying Lord and express our most passionate Love to him Here is Love passionate and most passionate Love and yet others Passions must not be moved for fear they set the Town on fire 3. They find great breakings of heart I would we experienc'd them more upon Condition we were ten times more reviled for them but I cannot well conceive how the Heart should be broken from sin that is not broken for sin and though this is grown so despicable a Matter in his eyes yet we have this Relief that a broken and contrite heart God will not despise 4. But they melt and dissolve into Tears when they remember what their Lord suffer'd for them They are content he should be called their Lord if others renounce him they are willing to own him It 's better to be reproached in this World that they have a Saviour than condemned in the next World because they have none and let it be their and all our Cares that Men may not hate us for professing Christ and God too because we do but profess him But is it so heynous a Crime to weep at the remembrance of what Christ suffer'd for us We pray that God would fulfill upon us that Promise Zech. 12. 10. That he would pour out his Spirit upon us that we may look upon him whom we have pierced and mourn over him and for him as one mourns for an onely Son and we say with Holy Herbert If thou hast no Sighs nor Tears Would thou hadst no Sins nor Fears Who hath These Those ill forbears But 5. They see him hang upon the Cross and have all his Agonies and dying groans in their ears Well if Faith represents to us a crucifyed Christ the Galatians were not called foolish upon that Account When we read that Christ was amazed and sore troubled that his Soul was exceeding sorrowfull even to death that it express'd from his Body clods of Blood all the Question is whether we ought to Read these things between sleeping and waking or get the most lively and powerfull Impressions of them upon our Souls The Primitive Church used to pray 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 libera nos Domine And the Present Church of England By thine Agony and bloody Sweat by thy Cross and Passion good Lord deliver us 6. They Curse their Sins that nayled him there The truth is they do not bless their Sins for crucifying Christ though he was a Person above our Authors scorn that used that Hyperbole Foelix Peccatum quod peperit Christum But sin has proved so dishonourable to our God so wounding to Christ so grievous to the Spirit so bitter to the Conscience that we would say the worst by it we can on this side Cursing And this we have good Authority for pag. 185. The Memory of what Christ has done and suffered excites in us a just Hatred of our sins So that were we but Masters of his Regular Proportions could we but find the just Measure of the Hatred of sin and Nick it exactly betwixt too much and too little hatred of sin we might escape the severity of his Censure Hitherto we have been taught That the just Measure of loving Christ is to love him without Measure and the just Measure of the Hatred of sin is to hate it without Measure but our Author good Man is very solicitous least we should over-love Christ or over-hate our iniquities 7. They tremble at the Thoughts of the Naturalness of Gods vindictive Iustice to him And if they doe consider God as one of purer eyes than to behold Iniquity if they do view his Holiness and in the sense of their own vileness cry out Woe is me for I am undone because I am a Man of unclean lips As good as they or he have trembled at 〈◊〉 sight of this Glorious Holy and Righteous Judge 8. But they feel all the Horrors and Agonies of damned Spirits I knew we should have a Rapper before we had done Is this the Fruit of Acquaintance with Christ I question not but a Cain a Iudas a Spira may have felt in this Life something of the horrours of the Damned The Apostle denounces some such dreadfull vengeance against Renegadoes from the Christian Faith Heb. 10. That there remains no more Sacrifice for sin but a certain fearfull looking for of Iudgement and fiery Indignation to devour the Adversaries v. 26 27. But these despairing horrours proceed not from an experimental Knowledge of Christ as our Author either ignorantly dreams or maliciously calumniates but from an Ignorance of him the true design of his Death in Reconciling God and Man This is one of their Extreams for at other times they are ravish'd with his Love charm'd and captivated with his Beauty refresht and ravisht with his Comforts c. It is easie to observe that our Author alwayes writes pro re natâ just as the present occasion invites him for he will tell you p. 396. That the Soul many times feels such great and Ravishing delights in all the Acts of Religion as infinitely excell all the pleasures of Sense they relish great Pleasure and Satisfaction in the sense of Gods Goodness P. 397. They must needs feel sometimes such divine Touches and Impressions as are the Effects if I may so speak of a mutual Love and Sympathy And had these men but the Happiness to have express'd themselves in his very words and Syllables they might have said either the worst or best of Religion they had pleased without Rebuke But all this he tells us may be no more than the working of a warm and Enthusiastick Fancy but then if it should prove the work of the Holy and Blessed Spirit which he ascribes to Fancy and Conceit how near it may come to the sin of those who ascribed that to Beelzebub which was effected by the Finger of God I must leave to his serious Consideration Enthusiasm is much reproached and little understood 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Enthusiasme is when the Mind is wholly enlightned by God In which sence I pray God make us all Enthusiasts And let the End of all that Ioy and Satisfaction that we have
of the Mediation of a third Person and that he is so well satisfied with what he hath done in order to it that he appoints it to be published to all the world to assure the Offender that if the Breach continues the fault lyes wholly upon himself The Second is when the Offender doth accept the Terms of the Agreement offer'd And these two we assert must necessarily be distinguished in the Reconciliation between God and us For upon the Death and Sufferings of Christ God declares to the World that he is so well satisfied with what Christ hath done and suffer'd in order to the Reconciliation between himself and us that now be publishes Remission of sins to the World upon those Terms which the Mediator hath declared by his own Doctrine but because Remission of sins doth not immediately follow upon the Death of Christ without supposition of any act on our part therefore the state of Favour doth commence from the performance of those Conditions that are required of us c. And now let the Authority of the Church of England interpose Art 31. Of the one Oblation of Christ finished upon the Cross The Offering of Christ once made is that perfect Redemption Propitiation and Satisfaction for the sins of the whole World both Original and Actual and there is none other Satisfaction for sin but that alone But we shall be soundly pelted with the Fathers and therefore he cites a great many more from Chrysostom and from all concludes That according to the sence of this Holy man particular Christians are united to Christ by Means of their Union to the Christian Church otherwise I cannot understand how our Union to Christ can be an Argument to Union and Concord among our selves But if that be the worst on 't that he cannot understand it Charity commands me to relieve his labouring understanding It 's a good Argument that Children should entirely love one another because they are Children of the same Father and yet for all that they become not Children to their Father by means of their Union one to another as Brethren but they are therefore Brethren because they are Children of the same Father It 's an Argument that Subjects should study and follow the things that make for Peace among themselves because they are all Subjects to the same Prince aud his honour the strength and security of his Kingdom lyes much in it and yet their Union among themselves is not the Means whereby they become related to their Prince but because they are all Subjects to him they become fellow-subjects each with other And now methinks a very ordinary pair of Brains might have understood how our Union to Christ is an Argument to Christians to unite amongst themselves though by their union amongst themselves they had not been united to Christ And thus he might as well have quoted the Ancient Father Mercurius Gallo-Belgicus as either Ambrose or Chrysostom but that we are all mightily concerned to know that he reads the Fathers to very little purpose But from hence he will give us a very seasonable word of Exhortation That they would seriously consider it who boast of their Union to Christ and yet rend his Church into a thousand little Factions I am glad however that they are not great Factions And I would have them seriously consider it also who broach such Doctrines so contrary to the main design of the Gospel that if owned by any Church must necessitate an absolute and total separation if we will be true to Christ. There have been many sad Controversies amongst us but they have been about Mint Anise and Cummin in comparison of the great and weighty things of the Gospel but the Question now must be Whether Christ be a true and proper High-priest whether 〈◊〉 death upon the Cross be a proper Sacrifice offer'd unto God to reconcile him to sinners The Question is now Whether we must hold Communion with God in Prayer or no Whether Faith and Repentance will unite us to Christ Nay whether there be any such thing as an Union with Christs Person or no Nay upon the Matter whether there be a Person of Christ or no or that all must not be interpreted into Doctrine Church Office and I cannot tell what Some I perceive are hugely afraid least differences should be accommodated they dread The tombe of Controversies almost as much as their Own they are more solicitous how Quarrels may live than about their own Deaths and therefore fearing those smaller Bones of Contention would not set the World together by the ears long they have thrown more considerable ones before us to entail Contentions upon Posterity and propagate Divisions to Eternity It 's the Interest of some men to make loud clamours against Divisions variety of Opinions difference in Judgements and yet to take special care that there shall never want matter for them to complain of the Fire and yet pour in Oyl to quench it and if they may but warm their own hands can sing over the flames which they have kindled and do still foment It has been the Policy of Rome to build partition-walls of Separation and then to rail at all that cannot leap over them to thresh the Wheat out of the Floor and then rage at it for Dividing from the Chaffe to beat their Servants out of doors and then send Huy-and-cry after them with all the Marks and Descriptions of Run-awayes Thus far our Author has led us out of the way and it will be high time to return The Fathers may now go to bed and sleep our Author will give them no further trouble Authority is but an inartificial Argument and now have at us with down-right Demonstration and Club-law Those Sacraments our Saviour hath instituted are a plain demonstration that our Union with Christ consists in our union with the Christian Church 1. For Baptism Baptisme is the Sacrament of our Admission into the Visible Church but in Baptisme we make a publick Profession of our Faith in Christ Therefore the Union of particular Christians to Christ is by Means of their Union with the Church This is that plain Demonstration we are threatned with and in a while if our Author does but eat a dish of Beans and Bacon it will be a plain Demonstration In Baptism we make a visible Profession of our Faith in Christ and if this Profession be true such a one as the Church of England requires as prerequisite to Baptism we are thereby United to Christ antecedently to our Baptism If Baptism finds us not in Christ it puts us not into Christ If it finds us not qualified for a Church state it makes us not so it is a Symbol but it supposes the thing signified and conferrs it not It is a Seal but presupposes a Covenant But that we are admitted into the visible Church by it he will prove and indeed he is excellent at proving what none deny and very untoward at proving the thing
and only watch for the Creep-hole of a bare Possibility If they intended honestly they would lay things together as well as they can labour to find out the meaning of God's Spirit with Sobriety and Humility and never strain their Wits and vex and torture the Scripture with utmost Possibilities The Text tells us that the namâ—… whereby Christ shall be called is the Lord our Righteousness Now it 's granted that this was not designed to be his Praenomen or Cognomen that which should distinguish him in Common Discourse from other persons and therefore He shall be called is no less than He shall Really be our Righteousness Thus 1 Iohn 3. 1. Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us that we should be called that is that we should become the sons of God Isa. 9. 6. His name shall be called i. e. he shall Really be Wonderful Counsellor The Mighty God the Everlasting Father The Prince of Peace The true intent and meaning of which place I know how some have attempted to elude by this fine device of the Possibility of another meaning and whether our Author sharpned his weapon at their forge he knows best But 3. He returns an Answer worse than both the other Righteousness in Scripture is a word of a very large sense and sometimes signifies no more than Mercy Kindness Beneficence and so the Lord our Righteousness is the Lord who does us good But 1. Is it not vainly supposed That for Christ to do us good is inconsistent with being our Righteousness 2. Though Christ be a Redeemer of Mercy Kindness and Beneficence yet he is no-where called The Lord our Mercy The Lord our Kindness The Lord our Beneficence Which clearly proves that when he is called and really is The Lord our Righteousness the expression implies more than an Imparting or Communication of good things to us Hence some would say That if our Author's Conscience were not larger than the sense of this word he had never given so stretching an Answer But says he Righteousness signifies that part of Iustice which consists in relieving the oppressed Isa. 54. 17. Their Righteousness is of me saith the Lord which is a parallel expression to The Lord our Righteousness and signifies no more than that the Lord would avenge their Cause and deliver them from all their Enemies So that all the benefit we are to expect from Christ is Temporal Salvation and Deliverance To which I answer 2. That the Reason of Christ's glorious Name The Lord our Righteousness assigned by the Prophet that in his days Iudah shall be saved and Israel shall dwell safely is interpreted by the Angel Matth. 1. 21. to be this He shall be called Iesus for he shall save his people from their sins And the end why God raised up his Son Jesus in the World is expresly assigned to be To bless his people in turning away every one of them from their iniquities Acts 3. 26. Thus Rom. 11. 26. Out of Zion shall come the Deliverer and he shall turn away ungodliness from Iacob To turn away iniquity from us and to turn us away from iniquity is I hope something of a more useful import than to relieve the injured and oppressed and deliver them from their Enemies I do not at all envy our Author therefore the glory of his discovery that for God to justifie good men is to deliver them from the violence and injuries of their Enemies And I would gladly hope that all good men have something better wherein to glory In Ier. 33. 16. the Church is called The Lord our Righteousness because she only glories in the Righteousness of Christ her Head and Husband to whom being so nearly related and with whom being so closely united his Righteousness is her Righteousness and therefore she who upon the account of the imperfection of her Inherent Righteousness can find no not the least matter of boasting before God yet has whereof to Triumph in Christ her Saviour Isa. 45. 24. Surely shall one say In the Lord have I Righteousness In the Lord shall all the seed of Iacob be justified and shall glory Now the Apostle whom I take to be a competent Interpreter of Scripture assures us that God has taken special care that in his dispensing of Grace to sinners No flesh shall glory in his presence 1 Cor. 1. 29. which he has well provided for ver 30. since Christ is made unto us of God for Righteousness and therefore he that glorieth let him glory in the Lord Which is exactly parallel to that of Isa. 45. 24. In the Lord shall all the seed of Iacob be justified and shall glory Come we now to our Author's Interpretation of Isa. 61. 11. which is of the same leaven with the former I will greatly rejoyce in the Lord my soul shall be joyful in my God For he hath clothed me with the garments of Salvation and covered me with the robe of Righteousness c. This Text one may perceive struck cold to his heart and he gives us as cold an Answer that 's ready to freeze between his lips The Garments of Salvation says he and the Robe of Righteousness signifie those great Deliverances God promised to Israel Signifie I would our Author would write a Dictionary of the Signification of words We use to say A bad Answer is better than none Reform the Proverb for shame for such an one is worse than none 1. It 's evident that the Triumph of the Church was upon the view of Jesus Christ vers 1. Anointed to preach Good-Tidings to the meek to bind up the broken-hearted to proclaim liberty to the Captives and the opening of the Prison to them that are bound To proclaim the acceptable Year of the Lord Which our Saviour Christ applies to himself Luk. 4. 18 19. when he was far from working out for the Iews those great Deliverances by improbable means which should make them glorious in the eyes of men 2. The Virgin Mary quotes this very place Luke 1. 46 47. My soul doth magnifie the Lord and my spirit hath rejoyced in God my Saviour where the joy of her heart broke out at her lips in Contemplation of that Eternal Redemption wrought out by him in whom she could more seriously glory as her Saviour than as her Son And it 's a wonder to me then men can patter over their Magnificat every day and not observe it 3. It 's observable that the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which we render Decketh signifies to Adorn as a Priest and implies that Christ as our High-Priest shall present us acceptable to God upon his Account 4. There 's nothing more familiar with the Spirit of God than to clothe Evangelical Mercies in a Mosaical Dress and to express New-Testament Salvation in Old-Testament Phrase Thus Gospel-Believers are understood by Israel the Church by the Temple Evangelical Ministers by the Legal Priests and the covering of Sin by the covering of Nakedness and by
of splitting upon that Rock They might have taken warning from the Churches Confession Isa. 64. 6. We are all as an unclean thing and all our Righteousnesses are as filthy rags All the warning in the World signifies nothing to them that are resolved to interpret Our own Righteousness by Ceremony and Hypocrisie Had Christ inculcated the danger even to Tautology all may be evaded by that happy Gloss which he keeps Leiger by him True indeed he warns us to beware of our own Righteousness but he intends no more hereby than the works of the Ceremonial and external acts of the Moral Law 3. Christ had indeed given them fair warning but if they will not take it the sin must lie at their own doors and the Condemnation upon their own heads Luke 18. 9. He spake a Parable to them that trusted in themselves that they were righteous and despised others c. Now it may seasonably be here remembred 1. What was the design of this Parable And that the Evangelist tells us was to meet with them that trusted in themselves 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 men that presumed very highly upon their own Abilities to answer the Law of God and therefore despised others who made such a stir about their own Impotency to keep it and kept such a coyl about the shortness of their obedience to it like the poor Publican who being conscious to himself of both makes his retreat to and shelters himself in the free Grace and rich Mercy of God to miserable sinners 2. It will be seasonable to enquire What that Righteousness was upon which the Pharisee in the Parable so stiffly insisted as that in which he durst adventure to appear before God And that as our Saviour puts the case was a Righteousness made up of obedience to Gods Commands And those both Prohibitory he was no Extortioner no Adulterer no Unjust Person and Affirmatively he paid his Tythes exactly which will go a great way and fasted twice a-week 3. Let it be considered that however many of the Pharisees of those days were Hypocrites yet our Saviour frames his Parable of a Pharisee not according to what many of them were but what they seemed to be and were reputed for amongst men who admired their Sanctity and reverenced their Devotions and therefore he describes not a Person acting his part well upon the Stage but living up to very high Attainments of Nature For 1. The duties instanced in are only some particulars in the name of all the rest He instances in his praying to and praising of God which comprehend all the duties of the First Table His freedom from Adultery Extortion and in a word from Injustice which is the whole of the Second Table Again He instances in duties of the Iudicial Law paying Tythes and of the Ceremonial Fasting with a little touch perhaps of Supereragation Twice in the week 2. When Christ introduces a person saying he was no Adulterer we may reasonably suppose he taught him to speak in the proper sense of the word which Christ himself allows Now in Christ's Dialect to be no Adulterer is not to commit it with the heart Mat. 5. still abating for Humane Frailties And 3. This is evident because our Savióur describes not this Pharisee as praying in the corners of the streets or in the Synagogues to be seen of men but in obedience to God's Command Going up to the Temple to pray and there praying to God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in his own heart between God and his own Soul All which evidently prove that our Saviour puts not the case of a stinking Hypocrite but of one who went as far as Natures legs would carry him But 4. The miscarriage of this Pharisee lay not in this that he was what he pretended he was not or was not what he pretended he was but that he trusted to himself for a Righteousness to be compounded out of all these Ingredients wherein he would dare to stand before God and in despising others which is the natural Product of Self-Righteousness And yet upon our Author's Principles I see not why he might not trust to himself that he was Righteous if Righteousness be to be made out of Obedience and despise others too since his own free-will exerted and natural strength improved had made him differ from another even from that Publican But yet 4. There 's one Prejudice more remaining which perhaps may stick more with him than all the rest He is apt to admire our Saviour's Sermons in the first place before the Writings of the Apostles though inspired men I should be loth to weaken his Admiration of our Saviours Sermons But he may do well to examine Whether his Aptness to admire them before other Sermons given forth by the same Spirit may not proceed from great Ignorance or a worse Principle For though our Saviour's Person had more Authority than the Persons of the Apostles yet the Writings of the Apostles are of equal Authority with those of the Evangelists to command our Faith and Obedience The Epistles of S. Iohn are indited by the same Spirit by which hepenned the Gospel 'T is the Authority of Christ in both the Infallible Spirit speaking in both which are the Reason of our Belief of both All Scripture is given by Divine Inspiration 2 Tim. 3. 18. The same Spirit of Christ that spake in the Prophets of the Old-Testament and the Apostles in the New 1 Pet. 1. 11. And such Comparisons must needs be very odious where the Spirit of God has made none But the total sum of all these Prejudices we shall have in one Dilemma Did not our Saviour instruct his Hearers in all things necessary to Salvation or have the Evangelists given us an imperfect account of his Doctrine If the first then our Saviour was not faithful in the discharge of his Prophetical Office If the latter you overthrow the Credit of the Gospel Well! I hope we may out-live this horned-Argument for all the terrour of its looks 1. Christ was faithful in his Prophetical Office he instructed his Hearers in all things necessary to Salvation But then there are some great and weighty Doctrines which it was necessary to the Salvation of the Gentile World to know wherein the Iewish Church had been sufficiently instructed already The Doctrine of Atoning God making Reconciliation for sin expiating Transgressions was abundantly clear from their Sacrifices The Theory of God's justifying a sinner was evident from thence they knew what Imputation signified by the transferring of the guilt of the sinner upon the head of the Sacrifice And therefore when Christ came his main business with the Jews was to convince them that he was the Messiah promised of old and typified in their Sacrifices His Work they knew all the Question was Whether he was the Person Matth. 11. 3. Art thou he that should come or do we look for another Joh. 10. 24. If thou beest the Christ tell us plainly Christ's Sermons
the Law only That all the World is not become guilty by the external deeds of the Moral Law and a failure therein he proves Rom. 5. 14. where he shews That death reigned over some who had not sinned after the similitude of Adam ' s transgression 5. Those deeds which David excluded from his Iustification the Apostle excludes from our Iustification for he quotes his Proposition from Psal. 143. 2. and therefore takes it in his sense or else he could not make use of his Authority But David excludes all his deeds whatsoever from Justification Enter not into judgment with thy servant for in thy sight shall no man be justified He durst not once think of God's entering into judgment with him upon the account of any thing he had attained From all which it appears that the Apostle exclâ—…es the Law the whole Law and the deeds thereof all the deeds thereof from having any concern in the Iustification of a sinner in the sight of God 2. We may observe hence That the Apostle opposes the Righteousness of God unto a Righteousness by the deeds of the Law But now says he the Righteousness of God without the Law is manifested vers 21. And as in vers 20. he says not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by the deeds of the Law but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by the deeds of Law of a Law of any Law So here he says not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 without the Law as if he intended some singular Law 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 without a Law without any Law And hence he fully silences and stops the mouth of our Authors Cavil that by the deeds of the Law is meant only an external Conformity of our Actions to it But the Apostles words leave no place for ambiguity For if the Righteousness of God without Law a Law any Law be manifested then without either Ceremonial or Moral Law then also without external or internal deeds of either But the Apostle shuts out Law simply and absolutely The Righteousness of God without Law is manifested As this term Law 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is more properly predicated of the Moral than of the Ceremonial Law so the deeds of Law are more properly predicated of internal than external deeds and Analogum per se stans stat pro famosior Analogato If then as our Author contends we are justified by the Moral though not by the Ceremonial Law or by internal Conformity to it though not by external Conformity to it only then the Apostles Doctrine is true in an improper or less proper sense but utterly false in the proper or more proper sense of the words For had 〈◊〉 words been inverted they had carried a clearer truth in them By the deeds the internal deeds of the Law the Moral Law shall all flesh be justified But now the Righteousness of God with the Law the Moral Law and it s internal as well as external deeds is manifested But this is not to interpret the Apostle but dictate a new Gospel to him But further Hence I have just occasion to complain of an unrighteous surmise with which our Author loads some men That because they exclude Law and Law-deeds from Iustification in the sight of God that therefore they exclude it from having any place in their Lives and Conversations The Apostle who is a zealous Vindicator of the interest of the Law as a Rule of our Obedience yet we see discharges it wholly from any from all use and service in the Justification of a sinner in the sight of God Therefore he adds Before God and the Psalmist In thy sight to teach us That though the Righteousness of God without Law is manifested as to the truth of the thing yet the Righteousness of God is not cannot be manifested to us without a sincere obedience to the Law There 's a Iustification before God to this the Law a Law any Law contributes nothing but there 's a Justification before Conscience before men and to this a sincere and evangelically universal obedience contributes much 3. The Apostle assures us That this Doctrine of his is no new fancy broached t'other day and set on foot lately in Gospel-times but the same way by which all the good men of old were justified v. 21. It 's witnessed by the Law and the Prophets Now as to the Prophets testimony though our Author approves not their Cryptick way of demonstrating but is all for plain Meridian demonstration yet they are full that Jesus Christ was the main consideration in the Justification of a sinner from of old Acts 3. 25 26. Ye are the Children of the Prophets and of the Covenant that God made with our Fathers saying to Abraham And in thy Seed shall all the kindreds of the earth be blessed unto you first God having raised up his Son Iesus sent him to bless you in turning away every one of you from his iniquities Whence it appears God's raising up Christ in the World to bless his people with spiritual blessings was no more than what he had covenanted with Abraham and promised to him even in that very Promise which our Author thinks was fulfilled in the numerous Posterity of Isaac But now that this Righteousness of God without Law should be witnessed by Law this seems strange Does the Law witness against it self Is it false to it 's own interest But the Law is God's Law and when it witnesses to a sinner it witnesses home convinces him of the perfect holiness of that God who gave the Law of the peremptoriness of God in not abating one jot or tittle of the Law of the sinners utter inability to come up to the Demands of the Law and therefore the utter impossibility of being justified by the Law of the severity of God's Justice in punishing the violater of his Law and therefore unless he can find another Righteousness he must utterly perish 'T is true the Law speaks its old Language still Do this and live but then it speaks it only to those who are upon a bottom of Innocency for to a Transgressor its language is Cursed is very one that continues not in all things 4. The Apostle acquaints us what that Righteousness of God is which is manifested vers 22. Even the Righteousness of God which is by the Faith of Christ. Now hence it 's evident that the Righteousness of God and Righteousness by the Faith of Christ are both one and therefore Faith in God and Faith in Christ are both one As is the Righteousness such is the Faith as is the Faith such is the Righteousness which perfectly overthrows that Arbitrary distinction which our Author had studied for more need Of Faith in God and Faith in Christ on purpose to shut Abraham out of Christ and by Consequence out of Heaven and to lock him up in the Limbus Patrum 5. The Apostle concludes That there 's no difference in point of Justification all that are sinners by
the First must be justified if ever they be justified by the Second Adam v. 22. The Righteousness of God which is by Faith of Iesus Christ unto all and upon all that believe for there 's no difference for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God As all men that ever were are or shall be are sinners under Condemnation so all that ever were are or shall be righteous in the sight of God are so by that righteousness which is by Faith of Iesus So that every pardoned accepted justified sinner must own that he is justified freely by the Grace of God through the Redemption that is in Christ. From these and such-like Scriptures it is that Christians ascribe their Iustification before God not to their own good Works but to the Free Grace of God through Iesus Christ but our Author has a way of proving his Sentiments worth a thousand of these Could men says he be reconciled to plain sence it would need no other Confirmation but the Natural evidence of naked and simple Truth It has been observed of the great Bellarmine from whom our Author has borrowed some things that he never comes in with a Procui dubio but the next words are a Rapper the same I observe in our Author that when he has done just nothing he always makes the loudest cackle It was a handsom Come-of if you did but mind it that when he had pester'd us with his prejudices surfeited us with Arbitrary distinctions filled our heads with empty Notions and when we looked to have been attack'd with one of his old plain kill-cow demonstrations he faces about and pops us off with this It needs no other proof than the Natural evidence of simple and naked Truth But now let the Reader take something warm next his heart let him use his phial of Essences for our Author is just now a-coming to examine those Texts of Scripture which are abused by these men to set up the personal Righteousness of Christ as the only formal Cause of our justification And must not those Texts of Scripture be miserably abused indeed that are thus prest in for such a service What the personal Righteousness of Christ the formal Cause of our justification I have heard some say it was the Meritorious Cause some the Impulsive Cause others the Material Cause and some that it is no Cause but our Author is the first that ever I heard this expression from There was once a good Orthodox Bishop as Orthodoxy past in that Age his Name Downham he has Written many a long page upon this Subject and he acquaints us with the sence of Protestants Lib. 1. Cap. 3. Sect. 1. That the matter of our justification is Christ's Righteousness and the form is God's Imputing it and this way go most of your Systematical Divines but from hence I learn it 's the Mode now-a-days for these Gentlemen to Confute that is to Rail at those long-winded Authors they never had the patience to read nor the Brains to understand but let this pass amongst our Authors Negligences or Ignorances till I understand better where to marshal it In examining the Texts which they abuse he will begin and end with Phil. 3. 8 9. Yea doubtless and I account all things loss for the excellency of the Knowledg of Iesus Christ my Lord for whom I have suffered the loss of all things that I may win Christ and be found in him not having my own Righteousness which is of the Law but that which is through the Faith of Christ the Righteousness which is of God by Faith The main Question here will be What was that Righteousness which the Apostle renounces from having any place in his Justification before God Upon this one hinge turns all the Controversie betwixt our Author and his Antagonists They say it was what-ever inherent Righteousness he had attained or could attain what-ever Obedience he had performed or could perform to the Commands of God Ay but says our Author what proof have they for this he can learn none but that they take it for granted that My Righteousness signifies Inherent Righteousness And really they are to be pittied if not pardoned that by His own Righteousness understand his own Righteousness for if Inherent Righteousness be not His own Righteousness it 's plain he could have none at all for an External Conformity of Actions to the Law alone is not Righteousness at all but Hypocrisie and Vnrighteousness but I shall inform him of some other proofs why they take His own Righteousness for Inherent Righteousness 1. That which he calls his own Righteousness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he tells you in the next words is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that which is from Law from a Law from any Law indefinitely now a Righteousness which is from a Law is such a one as the Law urges presses upon and prescribes to the Conscience but that without question is an Internal Conformity of soul to the holiness of the Law but this the Apostle rejects therefore he rejects Internal and Inherent Righteousness 2. The true Notion of My Righteousness is not to be fetcht from some sorry Conjectures from precarious Hypotheses which men when they are in streights invent to avoid present ruine but from the stable fixed constant use thereof in Scripture but so is this expression My own Righteousness and My own or your own Works used in Scripture viz. for real sineere Conformity of heart and life to a Law therefore so ought we to take it here till we see cogent Reason to the contrary That this is the fixed use of the expression in Scripture we shall see Gen. 30. 33. My Righteousness shall answer for me in time to come which our Author would paraphrase thus My Righteousness that is My Roguery Iob 27. 6. My Righteousness I hold fast my heart shall not reproach me as long as I live My Righteousness that is would he say My Hypocrisie Matth. 5. 16. That men may see your good works that is in the New Glossary Your Complement Dan. 9. 18. we present not our supplications before thee not for our Righteousnesses but for thy great Mercies The Prophet in the Name of the Church must be supposed here not to renounce real Righteousness but the Sceleton of Obedience Now had the Apostle designed only to reject his own Hypocrisie he was not so barren in expressions but he could have fitted it with its Proper Name 3. The Apostle expresly renounces both what-ever he had attained before or after his Conversion v. 7. These things that were gain to me whilst I was a Pharisee those I accounted 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 loss for Christ But is that all No! Yea doubtless v. 8. and I do now account 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 all things but loss I have accounted all things attained in my Iudaism loss when I was first convinced and I do now account all things even my own Righteousness loss and dung for Christ
is I will be nothing to thee do nothing for thee of what thou mainly wantest but for all my Promise to be thy God I will suffer thee to lye under the guilt of Sin at present and to fall under eternal Condemnation here-after though thou walkest before me and art perfect If then there was such an Implicite and Virtual Promise in God's Nature revealed by the works of Creation and Providence to Reason and an Explicite one too in the particular Revelation that God would bestow Pardon of Sin and Eternal Life to those who walkt before God inuprightness The Question is How did Christ procure such an Engagement from God when it was procured before But supposing that there was never any such Promise made by God till Christ by his Death procured it then how did the Death of Christ prevail with God to make such a Promise which otherwise he had never made 4. But I suspect more than ever that we are merely gulled for he tells us That the Blessings of the Gospel are the proper Effects of the Covenant but not of that Blood of Christ so that we are justified by the Blood of Christ is properly false but improperly true that we are Redeemed by the Blood of Christ in an improper Sense may be said to be true but in a proper Sense is utterly false and then if the Apostles had penn'd their Epistles clean backward they would have been properly true whereas now they are properly false And now who can tell but when he says The Blood of Christ procured this Covenant he may not mean in some improper odd Sense that is not worth a Button But yet our Author seems to go higher than all this p. 330. Our Righteousness and acceptation with God it wholly owing to the Covenant which he hath purchased sealed with his Blood To Purchase is a very good word when applied to the Blood of Christ therefore because we meet with so few I shall make as much of it as I can It denotes procurement in a special way by a valuable price paid The Covenant of Grace then Christ has purchased that Covenant is a Promise of Pardon and Life to those who believe and obey the Gospel In this Covenant there are three things First the Material part the pardon of sin and eternal Life Secondly the conditional part Faith and Obedience Thirdly The form of the Covenant A Promise of the Material part upon performance of the Conditional part Now when he owns the Blood of Christ to have purchased this Covenant the question is whether the whole or some part of it only If not the whole then what part is the purchase of his Blood 1. For the Conditional part Faith and Obedience I may secure my self our Author will not put them into the particular of the purchase for then it would be scarce worth the while to mingle Heaven and Earth with Tragedies what the conditions of the Covenant should be if Christ had purchased the conditions themselves and therefore as to these let every man trust to himself 2. As for the Material part Pardon and Life I doubt our Author will not yield us neither that Christ has purchased them because he denies that the Blessings of the Gospel are the proper effects of Christ's Blood whereas had he purchased them with his Blood they would have been the proper effects of it 3. Then it remains that Christ has purchased a Promise of bestowing the Material part upon our performance of the Conditional part And thus we are just where we were two miles ago and these great words of purchasing and procuring are shrivel'd up to Confirmation of a Promise but if he will say that the Blood of Christ his Death and dreadful sufferings were a proper price paid to God to procure or purchase a word from God that he would do that which was natural and essential to him then we shall thank him that he has such honourable thoughts of it as to judg it worth a good word The Scripture every-where ascribes the Blessings of the Gospel to the purchase and procurement of the Blood of Christ but if this be all that he has got a word from God it supposes the the Scripture to swell with Scenical Language and high Tragical Phrase which seems to carry sublime matters in it but when it comes to be stript of Metaphor and Allegory is a mere Anatomy From this precarious Hypothesis that the Apostles always write like himself that is improperly and impertinently and attribute such things to the Blood of Christ which are the proper and immediate effects of the Gospel-Covenant he will unriddle to us many Mysteries which are vulgarly reputed matters of weight and worth but if we can spare him a little Patience he will so uncase them that we shall confess they contain nothing that may deserve or need the Blood of Christ or any great matter to be made about them 1. Concerning Reconciliation The Apostle had said 2 Cor. 5. 18 19. All things are of God who hath reconciled us to himself by Iesus Christ and hath committed to us the Ministry of reconciliation to wit that God was in Christ reconciling the World unto himself not imputing their Trespasses and hath committed to us the word of reconciliation v. 21. For he hath made him to be sin for us what the import of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 reconciliation and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to reconcile is will not create us any great trouble because our Author allowing a reconciliation to be made between Iew and Gentile secretly confesses that Reconciliation implies the taking away of an enmity and bringing the differing parties into a state of Peace and Friendship But the Apostle in this place instructs us further 1. That the proper effect of this Reconciliation is not-imputing Trespasses God is by Nature a Holy God as he is Governour of the World he is a Righteous Iudg sin is both Contrary to his holy Nature and his Holy Law And therefore as a Holy God he cannot but hate sin as a Righteous Iudg he cannot but punish sin And because this sin is inherent in and committed by Man God hates the sinner upon the Account of his sin his Person and his best services are an abomination to the Lord. From hence it follows that sin being a transgression of the Law in its preceptive part renders the sinner Guilty that is obnoxious and lyable to the Law in its Sanction to the punishment Now this Righteous Iudg will certainly charge the guilty sinner with the penalty due to his sin but there is a way found out that he may be reconciled and not impute to sinners their Trespasses and this clearly shews that the Reconciliation here spoken of is a reconciliation of God to the Sinner such a one as makes provision that God shall not impute iniquity 2. The Apostle instructs us further in the way whereby Christ made this Reconciliation of God v. 21. He was
Matter of Justification before God and when it was attainable and it shall be once more the proper sence of being made righteous in Heaven where the spirits of just men are made perfectly perfect but to us in the way it 's not the proper sence of being made righteous but a Figurative sence as we may call an Aethiopian white because his teeth are so and it must be a stretching Synechdoche that will denominate a Christian Righteous by inherent Righteousness if he shall compare the Attainments of a Pilgrim with the perfect Law of God but the proper sence of being made righteous is that of the Apostle Rom. 5. 20. By the Obedience of one Man many shall be made righteous made so perfectly and compleatly by the Constitution of the Law of Righteousness and Faith for thus we are compleat in Christ Coloss. 2. 10. through whom we are presented to God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 unblameable and unreproveable in Gods sight so pure that there is not a spot or blemish to be found in a Believer in the sight of God himself which upon the Account of inherent Righteousness is impossible Inherent Righteousness is properly Righteousness for so much as there is of it but it is so imperfect that it will not denominate any man properly righteous in the sight of God 2 There is another thing which mightily discomposes this kind of Argumentation We may be said to be made righteous by the Righteousness of Christ in a proper sence Why so Oh! Because the Righteousness of Christ is one of those great Arguments of the Gospel that forms our Minds to the Love and practice of Holiness and so makes us inherently righteous Which is this The Righteousness of Christ and our Righteousness hang so loosely and contingently together that it seems very absurd to ascribe the Effect of the latter to the former If indeed the Righteousness of Christ did properly necessarily and infallibly produce an inherent Righteousness in us it were warrantable to say we were made righteous by it but when the Connexion is so accidental so uncertain that the Effect depends upon our own Free-will as in the New Theology it does we cannot properly be said to be made righteous in this sence by his Righteousness For when all these Arguments and Motives have done their best That which does the work is Free-will and Humane Endeavour and therefore properly are we said to be made Righteous by them 2. Sect. A Forensick sence which is this The Grace of the Gospel accepts and rewards that sincere and Evangelical Obedience which according to the Rigour and Severity of the Law could deserve no reward This Forensick is a hard word and if I might presume to soften it a little with Interpretation it should be thus A Forensick sence of Justification is a sence borrowed from Courts of Judicature where the Judge absolving or acquitting a Prisoner of those Crimes wherewith he stood charged does not doe it by making him innocent or honest by infusing into him the Habits of Vertue but onely declares That according to the Evidence he is found Innocent Righteous Just and therefore as the Law acquits him so the Judge as the Minister of the Law declares him to be acquitted Now the Question is Whether our Author has given us a true Forensick sence of Iustification or no His Sence is this The Grace of the Gospel accepts and rewards that sincere and Evangelical Obedience which according to the Severity and Rigour of the Law deserves no reward which seems to me so far from a Forensick sence that it 's the Forensick Non-sence of Justification for does a Judge pronounce and declare him righteous whom the Law says is unrighteous Can he justifie him whom the Law condemns The Judge sits not there as a good Natur'd Man with a Chancery of Charity in his own breast but as a Righteous Governour to render to every man according to his works weighed in the Ballance of that Law by which he is to judge And shall we dare to fancy that the Grace of the Gospel will pronounce that Man righteous reward that Man as righteous who is not righteous by the Law of God if that be the Law by which he must be Condemned or Acquitted I will grant that in a Criminal Cause which by the Law deserves Bodily Punishment if the Constitution of the Law will Allow it the Judge may lay the Punishment of the Guilty Person upon another who will freely undergoe it or that which is equivalent in the eye of the Law to it and acquit him that in the first Consideration of the Law was not innocent Let us apply it God is the righteous Iudge of all the World and by his Eternal Holy Law he will Judge the Sons of Men so true is God to his own Law that he will not acquit and justifie him whom the Law condemns nor Condemn him whom his Law Acquits nor is it possible he should To say the Sinner is righteous by the Verdict of his Law when by the Verdict of the Law he is not righteous is not consistent with the Veracity of that God who cannot lye But there is another Law the Law of Righteousnesse and Faith which Sovereign Grace has set up and this admits the satisfaction of Another admits a Sacrifice a Surety even Jesus Christ the righteous whom God hath set forth to be a Propitiation through Faith in his Blood to declare his Righteousness that he may be just and the Iustifier of him that believes in Iesus If now according to the Terms of this New Law of Grace the Righteousness and Sufferings of this Jesus may be accepted for the Delinquents then will there a genuine sence of a Forensick Iustification be found out Yet let us examine these things further 1 The Grace of the Gospel says he accepts and rewards that sincere Obedience Let it be supposed he means the Grace of God declared in the Gospel yet this is so far from being Grace that it is not good Moral Vertue Is that Grace or something that deserves Another Name to declare an Offender to be righteous when he is not so to pronounce he has kept the Law when he has broken it and yet thus must the Grace of the Gospel speak if it declares him righteous in a Forensick sence who is a Violator of the Law and yet has no Substitute to keep it for him Here is some Provision made for an Imaginary Grace to the destruction of real Iustice whereas in the true Covenant of Grace there is a blessed Accord of all Gods Attributes Mercy and Truth have met together Righteousness and Peace have kissed each other 2 If it be the Grace of God or the Gospel that accepts this sincere Obedience then how do we owe this to the Righteousness of Christ what Influence has that upon God to move him to accept and reward that sincere yet imperfect Obedience which his Law will not accept This is the thing