A Treatise of Justifying Righteousness
To deliver thee from those Learned Obscurities, read but the Scripture impartially, without their Spectacles and ill-devised Notions, and all the Doctrine of Justification that is necessary, will be plain to thee: And I will venture again to fly so far from flattering those, called Learned Men, who expect it, as to profess that I am persuaded the common sort of honest unlearned Christians, (even Plowmen and Women) do better understand the Doctrine of Justification, than many great Disputers will suffer themselves or others to understand it, by reason of their forestalling ill-made Notions: these unlearned Persons commonly conceive, 1. That Christ in his own Person, as a Mediator, did by his perfect Righteousness and Sufferings, merit for us the free pardon of all our sins, and the Gift of his Spirit and Life Eternal, and hath promised Pardon to all that are Penitent Believers, and Heaven to all that so continue, and sincerely obey him to the end; and that all our after-failings, as well as our former sins, are freely pardoned by the Sacrifice, Merits, and Intercession of Christ, who also giveth us his Grace for the performance of his imposed Conditions, and will judge us, as we have or have not performed them]. Believe but this plain Doctrine, and you have a righter understanding of Justification, than many would let you quietly enjoy, who tell you, [That Faith is not imputed for Righteousness; that it justifieth you only as an Instrumental Cause, and only as it is the reception of Christ's Righteousness, and that no other Act of Faith is justifying, and that God esteemeth us to have been perfectly Holy and Righteous, and fulfilled all the Law, and died for our own sins, in or by Christ, and that he was politically the very Person of every Believing Sinner]; with more such like.
And as to this distinction which this Doctor will make a Test of the Orthodox, (that is, Men of of his Size and Judgment) you need but this plain explication of it.
1. In Law-sense, a Man is truly and fitly said himself to have done that, which the Law or his Contract alloweth him to do either by himself or another; (as to do an Office, or pay a Debt by a Substitute or Vicar). For so I do it by my Instrument, and the Law is fulfilled and not broken by me, because I was at liberty which way to do it. In this sense I deny that we ever fulfilled all the Law by Christ; and that so to hold subverts all Religion as a pernicious Heresy.
2. But in a tropical improper sense, he may be said to [be esteemed of God to have done what Christ did; who shall have the benefits of Pardon, Grace, and Glory thereby merited, in the manner and measure given by the free Mediator, as certainly as if he had done it himself]. In this improper sense we agree to the Matter, but are sorry that improper words should be used as a snare against sound Doctrine, and the Churches Love and Concord. And yet must we not be allowed Peace?
§. 4. But my free Speech here maketh me remember how sharply the Doctor expounded and applied one word in the retracted Aphorisms: I said (not of the Men, but of the wrong Opinion opposed by me) [It fondly supposeth a Medium betwixt one that is just, and one that is no sinner] one that hath his sin or guilt taken away, and one that hath his unrighteousness taken away: It's true in bruits and insensibles that are not subjects capable of Justice, there is, &c. There is a Negative Injustice which denominateth the Subject non-justum, but not injustum, where Righteousness is not due. But where there is the debitum habendi, its privative. The Doctor learnedly translateth first the word [fondly] by [stolide]; and next he (fondly, though not stolide) would persuade the Reader, that it is said of the Men, though himself translate it [Doctrina].
And next he bloweth his Trumpet to the War, with this exclamation, [Stolide! O vocis mollitiem, & modestiam! O stolidos Ecclesiae Reformatae Clarissimos Heroas! Aut ignoravit certe, aut scire se dissimulat, (quod affine est calumniae) quid isti statuant, quos loquitur, stolidi Theologi].
Answ. 1. How blind are some in their own Cause? Why did not Conscience at the naming of Calumnie say, [I am now committing it?] It were better write in English, if Latin translations must needs be so false! we use the word [fond] in our Country, in another sense than [foolish]; with us it signifieth any biased Inclination, which beyond reason propendeth to one side: and so we use to say, That Women are fond of their Children, or of anything over-loved: But perhaps he can use his Logic, to gather by consequences the Title of the Person, from the Title of his Opinion, and to gather [foolishly] by consequence out of [fondly]. To all which I can but answer, That if he had made himself the Translator of my Words, and the Judge of my Opinions; if this be his best, he should not be chosen as such by me. But it may be he turned to Riders Dictionary, & found there [fondly, vide foolishly].
2. The Stolidi Theologi then is his own phrase! And in my Opinion, another Mans Pen might better have called the Men of his own Opinion [Ecclesiae Reformatae clarissimos Heroas] compared with others! I take Gataker, Bradshaw, Wotton, Cameron, and his followers; Ursine, Olevian, Piscator, Pareus, Wendeline, and multitudes such, to be as famous Heroes as himself: But this also on the by.
§. 5. But I must tell him whether I abhor the Scripture Phrase, [We are dead, buried, and risen with Christ].
I answer, No; nor will I abhor to say, That in sensu forensi, I am one political Person with Christ, and am perfectly holy and obedient by and in him, and died and redeemed myself by him, when he shall prove them to be Scripture Phrases: But I desire the Reader not to be so fond, (pardon the word) as by this bare question to be enticed to believe, that it is any of the meaning of those Texts that use that Phrase which he mentioneth, that [Legally, or in sensu forensi, every Believer is esteemed by God to have himself personally died a violent death on the Cross, and to have been buried, and to have risen again, and ascended into Heaven, nor yet to be now there in Glory, because Christ did and doth all this in our very Legal Person. Let him but 1. consider the Text, 2. and Expositors, 3. and the Analogy of Faith, and he will find another sense; viz. That we so live by Faith on a dying, buried, risen and glorified Savior, as that as such he dwelleth objectively in our Hearts, and we partake so of the Fruits of his Death, Burial, and Resurrection, and Glory, as that we follow him in a Holy Communion, being dead and buried to the World and Sin, and risen to newness of Life, believing that by his Power we shall personally, after our death and burial, rise also unto Glory. I will confess that we are perfectly holy and obedient by and in Christ, as far as we are now dead, buried, and risen in him.
§. 6. And here I will so far look back, as to remember, That he (as some others) confidently telleth us, That [the Law bound us both to perfect Obedience, and to punishment for our sin, and therefore pardon by our own suffering in Christ, may stand with the reputation, that we were perfectly Obedient and Righteous in Christ.]
Answ. And to what purpose is it to dispute long, where so notorious a contradiction is not only not discerned, but obtruded as tantum non necessary to our Orthodoxness, if not to our Salvation? I ask him,
1. Was not Christ as our Mediator perfectly holy habitually, and actually, without Original or Actual Sin?
2. If all this be reputed to be in se, our own as subjected in and done by ourselves political, or in sensu forensi; Are we not then reputed in foro, to have no original or actual sin, but to have innocently fulfilled all the Law, from the first hour of our lives to the last? Are we reputed innocent in Christ, as to one part only of our lives, (if so, which is it?) or as to all?
3. If as to all, is it not a contradiction that in Law-sense, we are reputed perfectly Holy and Innocent, and yet sinners.
4. And can he have need of Sacrifice or Pardon, that is reputed never to have sinned (legally)?
5. If he will say that in Law-sense, we have or are two Persons, let him expound the word Persons only, as of Qualities and Relations, (nothing to our Case in hand); or else say also, That as we are holy and perfect in one of our own Persons, and sinful, unrighteous, or ungodly in another, so a Man may be in Heaven in one of his own Persons, and on Earth, yea and in Hell in the other: And if he mean that the same Man is justified in his Person in Christ, and condemned in his other Person; consider which of these is the Physical Person, for I think its that which is like to suffer.
§. 7. pag. 224. He hath another touch at my Epistle, but gently forbeareth contradiction as to Num. 8. And he saith so little to the 11th, as needeth no answer.
§. 8. pag. 127. He assaulteth the first Num. of N. 13. That we all agree against any conceit of Works that are against or instead of the free Mercy of God].
And what hath he against this? Why that which taketh up many pages of his Book, and seemeth his chief strength in most of his Contest, viz. [The Papists say the same] and [so saith Bellarmine]. It's strange that the same kind of Men that deride Fanatick Sectaries, for crying out in Church-Controversies, [O Antichristian Popery, Bellarmine, &c.] should be of the same Spirit, and take the same course in greater Matters, and not perceive it, nor acknowledge their agreement with them! But as Mr. J. Humfrey saith in the foresaid Book of the word [Schism, Schism] oft canted out against them, that will not sacrilegiously surrender their Consciences, or desert their Ministry, [The great Bear hath been so oft led through the streets, that now the Boys lay by all fear, and laugh or make sport at him] so say I of this Sectarian Bugbear, [Popery, Antichristian, Bellarmine] either the Papists really say as we do, or they do not. If not, is this Doctor more to be blamed for making them better than they are, or for making us worse? which ever it be, Truth should defend Truth. If they do, I heartily rejoice, and it shall be none of my labor anymore (whatever I did in my Confession of Faith) to prove that they do not. Let who will manage such ungrateful Work. For my part, I take it for a better Character of any Opinion, that Papists and Protestants agree in it, than that the Protestants hold it alone. And so much for [Papists and Bellarmine] though I think I know better what they teach, than his Book will truly tell me.
§. 9. But he addeth, [Human Justifying Works are in reality adverse to the free Mercy of God, therefore to be accounted of no value to Righteousness].
Answ. 1. But whose phrase is Justifying Works?
2. Doth not the Holy Ghost say, That a Man is justified by Works, and not by Faith only? Jam. 2.
3. Doth not Christ say, By thy words thou shalt be justified?
4. Do not I over and over tell the World, That I hold Justification by Works in no sense, but as signifying the same as [According to Works] which you own? And so both Name and Thing are confessed by you to be Scriptural.
5. I have before desired the Reader to turn to the words, [Righteous, Righteousness, Justification, &c.] in his Concordance. And if there he find Righteousness mentioned as consisting in some Acts of Man, many hundred times, let him next say if he dare, that they are to be had in no price to Righteousness: Or let him read the Texts cited by me in my Confession of Faith.
6. Because, Faith, Repentance, Love, Obedience, are that whose sincerity is to be judged in order to our Life or Death ere long; I will not say that they are to be vilified as to such a Righteousness or Justification, as consisteth in our vindication from the charge of Impenitency, Infidelity, Unholiness, Hypocrisy, &c. The reading of Mat. 25. resolved me for this Opinion.
§. 10. Next he noteth our detesting such Works as are against or instead of Christ's Sacrifice, Righteousness, Merits, &c. To this we have the old Cant, The Papists say the like.
Reader, I proved that the generality of Protestants are agreed in all those twenty Particulars, even in all the material Doctrines about Man's Works and Justification, while this warlike Doctor would set us all together by the ears still, he is over-ruled to assert that the Papists also are agreed with us. The more the better, I am glad if it be so, and will here end with so welcome a Conclusion, that maketh us all herein to be Friends: only adding, That when he saith that [such are all Works whatever, (even Faith itself) which are called into the very least part of Justification]; even as a Condition or subordinate personal Evangelical Righteousness, such as Christ and James, and a hundred Texts of Scripture assert; I answer, I cannot believe him, till I cease believing the Scriptures to be true; which I hope will never be: And am sorry that so worthy a Man can believe so gross an Opinion, upon no better reasons than he giveth: And yet imagine, that had I the opportunity of free conference with him, I could force him to manifest, That he himself differeth from us but in mere words or second Notions, while he hotly proclaimeth a greater discord.
AN ANSWER TO Dr. TULLIES Angry Letter.
By Rich. Baxter.
LONDON, Printed for Nevill Simmons and Jonath. Robinson, at the Princes-Arms and Golden-Lion, in St. Paul's Church-yard, 1675.
An Answer to Dr. Tullius Angry Letter.
Reverend Sir,
IF I had not before perceived and lamented the great Sin of Contenders, the dangerous snare for ignorant Christians, and the great Calamity of the Church, by making Verbal Differences seem Material, and variety of some Arbitrary Logical Notions, to seem tantum non, a variety of Religions; and by frightning Men out of their Charity, Peace, and Communion, by Bugbear-Names, of this or that Heresy or dangerous Opinion, which is indeed but a Spectrum or Fantasm of a dreaming or melancholy Brain, your Justificatio Paulina, and your Letter to me, might be sufficient means of my full Conviction. And if once reading of your Writings do not yet more increase my love of the Christian simplicity, and plain old Divinity, and the amicable Communion of practical Christians upon those terms, and not meddling with Controversies in a militant way, till by long impartial studies they are well understood, I must confess my non-proficience is very inexcusable.
With yourself I have no great business: I am not so vain as to think myself able to understand you, or to be understood by you: and I must not be so bold as to tell you why, much less will I be so injurious to the Reader, as by a particular examining all your words, to extort a confession that their sense is less or worse than I could wish: For cui bono? What would this do but more offend you? And idle words are as great a fault in writing as in talk: If I have been guilty of too many, I must not so much add to my fault, as a too particular examination of such Books would be. But for the sake of your Academical Youth, whom you thought meet to allarm by your Caution, I have answered so much of your Treatise as I thought necessary to help even Novices to answer the rest themselves. For their sakes (though I delight not to offend you) I must say, That if they would not be deceived by such Books as yours, it is not an Answer to them that must be their preservative, but an orderly studying of the Doctrines handled; Let them but learn truly the several senses of the word [Justification], and the several sorts, and what they are, and still constrain ambiguous words to confess their sense, and they will need no other Answer to such Writings.
And as to your Letter (passing by the spume and passion) I think these few Animadversions may suffice.
§. I. Between twenty and thirty years ago, I did in a private Disputation prove our guilt of the sins of our nearer Parents; and because many doubted of it, I have oft since in other writings mentioned it: About three years ago, having two Books of Mr. William Allens in my hand to peruse, in order to a Publication, (a Perswasive to Unity, and a Treatise of the Two Covenants); in a Preface to the latter, I said, [That most Writers, if not most Christians, do greatly darken the Sacred Doctrine, by overlooking the Interest of Children in the Actions of their nearer Parents, and think that they participate of no guilt, and suffer for no original sin, but Adam 's only, &c.] You fastened on this, and warned seriously the Juniors, not rashly to believe one that brings forth such Paradoxes of his (or that) Theology, which you added to your [O caecos ante Theologos quicunque unquam fuistis]: The charge was expressed by [aliud invenisse peccatum Originale, multo citerius quam quod ab Adamo traductum est]. Hereupon I thought it enough to publish that old private Disputation, which many before had seen with various Censures: Now you send me in your Letter the strange tidings of the success: You that deterred your Juniors by so frighful a warning, seem now not only to agree with me, that we are guilty of our nearer Parents sin, and contract additional pravity from them as such, (which was my Assertion) but over-do all others, and Truth itself in your Agreement! Now you take it for an injury to be reported to think otherwise herein than I do: yea, and add, [Which neither I, nor any Body else I know of, denies as to the thing, though in the extent, and other circumstances, all are not agreed, and you may in that enjoy your Opinion for me]. This is too kind: I am loath to tell you how many that I know, and have read, deny it, lest I tempt you to repent of your Agreement.
But doth the World yet need a fuller evidence, that some Men are de materià agreed with them, whom they raise the Country against by their Accusations and Suspicious?
But surely what passion or spatling soever it hath occasioned from you, I reckon that my labor is not lost: I may tell your Juniors, that I have sped extraordinary well, when I have procured the published consent of such a Doctor. Either you were of this mind before or not: If not, it's well you are brought to confess the Truth, though not to confess a former Error. If yea, then it's well that so loud and wide a seeming disagreement is confessed to be none, that your Juniors may take warning, and not be frightened from Love and Concord by every melancholy Alarm.
Yea, you declare your conformity to the Litany, [Remember not our Offences, nor the Offences of our Fore fathers], and many words of indignation you use for my questioning it. All this I like very well as to the Cause; And I matter it not much how it looks at me: If you agree more angrily than others disagree, the Cause hath some advantage by the Agreement. Though methinks it argueth somewhat unusual, that seeming Dissenters should close by so vehement a Collision.
But yet you will not agree when you cannot choose but agree, and you carry it still as if your Alarm had not been given without cause: Must we agree, and not agree? What yet is the Matter? Why it is [a n • w original sin]. My ordinary expressions of it may be fully seen in the Disputation: The phrase you laid hold on in a Preface is cited before, [That we participate of no guilt, and suffer for no original sin but Adam 's only], I denied. And what's the dangerous Error here? That our nearer Parents sin was Adams, I may presume that you hold not. That we are guilty of such, you deny not: That it is sin, I find you not denying: sure then all the difference must be in the word [ORIGINAL].
And if so, you that so hardly believe your loudnoised disagreements to be but verbal, must patiently give me leave here to try it. Is it anymore than the Name ORIGINAL that you are so heinously offended at? Sure it is not: Else in this Letter purposely written about it, you would have told your Reader what it is. Suffer me then to summon your Alarm'd Juniors to come and see what a Spectrum it is that must affright them; and what a Poppet-Play or dreaming War it is, that the Church is to be engaged in, as if it were a matter of Life and Death? Audit juvenes! I took the word [ORIGINAL] in this business to have several significations. First, That is called [ORIGINAL] Sin, which was the ORIGO of all other sins in the Human World: And that was not Adam 's sin, but Eves.
2. That which was the ORIGO of sin to all the World, save Adam and Eve, communicated by the way of Generation: And that was Adams and Eves conjunct, viz. 1. Their first sinful Acts; 2. Their Guilt; 3. And their habitual pravity (making it full, though in Nature following the Act). This Sin, Fact, Guilt, and Habit, as Accidents of the Persons of Adam and Eve, are not Accidents of our Persons.
3. Our personal participation; 1. In the guilt of the sin of Adam and Eve; 2. And of a vicious privation and habit from them, as soon as we are Persons. Which is called Original sin, on three accounts conjunct; 1. Because it is a participation of their Original Act that we are guilty of; 2. Because it is in us ab Origin, from our first Being; 3. And because it is the Origo of all our Actual Sins.
4. I call that also [ORIGINAL] (or part of Original Sin) which hath but the two later only; viz. 1. Which is in us AB ORIGINE, from our first personal being; 2. Which is the Root or ORIGO in ourselves of all our Actual Sins: And thus our Guilt and Vice derived from our nearer Parents, and not from Adam, is our Original Sin; That is, 1. Both Guilt and Habit are in us from our Original, or first Being; 2. And all our Actual Sin springeth from it as a partial Cause: For I may presume that this Reverend Doctor doth not hold that Adam 's sin derived to us is in one part of the Soul, (which is not partible) and our nearer Parent 's in another; but will grant that it is one vitiosity that is derived from both, the latter being a Degree added to the former; though the Reatus having more than one fundamentum, may be called diverse. That Origo & Active & passive dicitur, I suppose we are agreed. Now I call the vicious Habits contracted from our nearer Parents by special reason of their own sins, superadded to the degree, which else we should have derived from Adam, a part of our original sinful Pravity, even a secondary part. And I call our guilt of the sins of our nearer Parents (not Adam 's) which you will, either a secondary Original Guilt, or Sin, or a secondary part of our Original Guilt. See then our dangerous disagreement: I call that ORIGINAL, which is in us ab Origin, when we are first Persons, and is partly the Root or Origo in us of all our following Actual Sin: though it was not the Original Sin of Mankind, or the first of Sins. The Doctor thinks this an Expression, which all Juniors must be warned to take heed of, and to take heed of the Doctrine of him that useth it. The Alarm is against this dangerous word [ORIGINAL]. And let a Man awake tell us what is the danger.
But I would bring him yet to agreement even de nomine, though it anger him. 1. Let him read the Artic. 9. of the Church of England, and seeing there Original Sin is said to be that corruption of Nature whereby we are far gone from Original Righteousness, and are of our own Nature inclined to evil, so that the flesh lusteth against the Spirit. The lust of the flesh called 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , which some do expound the Wisdom, some Sensuality, some the Affection, some the desire of the Flesh, not subject to the Law of God]: Seeing a degree of all this same Lust is in Men from the special sins of their Fore-fathers, as well as from Adam 's; Is not this Degree here called Original Sin? (why the Church omitted the Imputed Guilt aforesaid, I inquire not).
2. If this will not serve, if he will find me any Text of Scripture, which useth the Phrase, [ORIGINAL Sin], I will promise him hereafter to use it in no other sense, than the Scripture useth it.
3. If that will not serve, if the Masters of Language will agree, (yea, to pass by our Lexicons, if the Doctors of that University will give it us under their hands) that the word [ORIGINAL] is unaptly and dangerously applied to that sinful Guilt and Pravity which is in us ab Origin Nostrae existentiae, and is the internal Radix vel Origo of all our Actual Sin, in part of Causality, I will use that Epithet so no more.
4. If all this will not serve, if he himself will give me a fitter Epithet, I will use it: And now we over-agree in Doctrine, a word shall not divide us, unless he will be angry because we are agreed, as Jonas was that the Ninevites were spared, because it seemed to disgrace his Word.
§. II. pag. 4, 5, &c. You invite me to, [a full entire retractation of my Doctrine of Justification (you add, By Works) and the secondary Original Sin].
1. Will you take it well if I retract that which you profess now to hold, and know none that denieth, then there is no pleasing you: If I must be thought to wrong you for seeming to differ from you, and yet must retract all: What, yours and all Men's?
2. Do you mean the words or the sense of Justification (as you call it) by Works? For the words, I take you f • r a subscriber to the 39 Articles; and therefore that you reject not the Epistle of St. James: And for the s • nse, I confess it is a motion suitable to the Interest of your Treatise, (though not of the Truth): He that cannot confute the Truth, would more easily do his Work, if he could persuade the Defencers of it to an Entire Retractation. Hereupon, pag. 5. you recite my words, of the difficulty of bringing some Militant Divines to yield: Your Admonition for Self-Application of them is useful, and I thank you for it: But is it not a straight that such as I am in, between two contrary sorts of Accusers? When Mr. Danvers, and Multitudes on that side, Reproach me daily for Retractations, and you for want of them? How natural is it now to Mankind, to desire to be the Oracles of the World, and that all should be Silenced, or Retracted, which is against their Minds? How many call on me for Retractation? Mr. Tombes, and Mr. Danvers, for what I have Written for Infants-Baptism: The Papists for what I have Written against them: And how many more? And as to what I have Retracted, One reproached me for it, and another either knoweth not of it, or persuadeth others that it is not done.
You say, pag. 6. [A great out-cry you have made of me, as charging you with things you have Retracted— And pag. 7. What's the reason you have not hitherto directed us to the particulars of your Recantation, what, when, where?—You direct one indeed, to a small Book, above Twenty years a-go retracted.—All I can pick up of any seeming Retractation, is that you say, that Works are necessary at least to the continuation of our Justification.
Answ. Either this is Written by a Wilful, or a Heedless mistaking of my words. The first I will not suspect; it must therefore be the second, (for I must not judge you Unable to understand plain English). And is it any wonder if you have many such Mistakes in your disputes of Justification, when you are so heedless about a matter of Fact? Where did I ever say, that I had Recanted? Or that I Retracted any of the Doctrine of justification, which I had laid down? Cannot you distinguish between Suspending, or Revoking, or Retracting a particular Book, for the sake of several Crude and Incongruous Expressions, and Retracting or Recanting that Doctrine of Justification? Or can you not understand words, that plainly thus Distinguish? Why talk you of what, and when, and where, and conjecture at the words, as if you would make the Reader believe, that indeed it is some confessed Errors of mine, which you Confuted? and that I take it for an Injury, because I Retracted them? And so you think you salve your Confutation, whatever you do by your Candour and Justice: But you have not so much as Fig leaves for either. It was the Aphorisms, or Book, that I said was above Twenty years a go Revoked: When in my Treatise of Infant-Baptism, I had craved Animadversions on it, and promised a better Edition, if I Published it anymore; I forbad the Reprinting it, till I had time to Correct it; and when many called for it, I still denied them. And when the Cambridge Printer Printed it a second time, he did it by Stealth, pretending it was done beyond Sea. In my Confession Twenty years ago, I gave the Reasons, Preface, pag. 35. [I find that there are some Incautelous Passages in my Aphorisms, not fitted to their Reading▪ that come to suck Poison, and seek for a Word to be Matter of Accusation and Good for their Censuring opinionative Zeal.— And pag. 42. If any Brother understand not any word in my Aphorisms which is here Interpreted, or mistake my sense about the Matter of that Book, which is here more fully opened; I must expect, that they interpret that by this. And if any one have so little to do as to write against that Book (which is not unlikely) if he take the Sense contrary to what I have here and else-where since then Published, I shall but neglect him as a Contentious, Vain Wrangler, if not a Calumniator]. I Wrote this sharply, to forwarn the Contentious, not knowing then that above Twenty years after, Dr. Tully would be the Man. Pag. 43. [If any will needs take anything in this Book to be rather a Retractation, than an Explication, of what I have before said, thougb I should best know my own Meaning; yet do such commend me, while they seem to blame me: I never look to write that which shall have no need of Correction.— And Cap. 1. pag. 2. [Lest I should prove a further Offence to my Brethren, and a Wrong to the Church, I desired those who thought it worth their Labor, to vouchsafe me their Animadversions, which I have spent much of these Three last years in considering, that I might Correct whatever was discovered to be Erroneous, and give them an account of my Reasons of the rest. I have not only since SUPPRESSED that Book which did offend them, but also laid by th • se Papers of Universal Redemption, which I had written, lest I should be further offensive, &c.] In my Apology else-where I have such like Passages, ever telling Men that [It was the first Book I wrote in my Unexperienced Youth; that I take the Doctrines of it to be sound and needful, save that in divers places they are unskilfully and incautelously worded. (As the Word [Covenant] is oft put for [Law,] &c.) And that I wrote my Confession, and Disputes of Justification, as an Exposition of it; and that I Retracted, or Suspended, or Revoked, not the Doctrine, but the Book, till I had Corrected it, and did disown it as too unmeet an Expression of my Mind, which I had more fully expressed in other Books.
And is not this plain English? Doth this warrant a Wise and Righteous Man, to intimate that I accuse him of writing against that Doctrine of Justification which I Recanted, and to call for the What, and Where, and When? Yea, and tell me, that I [refer you to a small Book] when instead of referring you to it, I only blame you for referring to that alone, when I had said as before?
When many Divines have published the first Edition of their Works imperfectly, and greatly corrected and enlarged them in a Second (as Beza his Annotations, Polanus his Syntagma, and many such) all Men take it for an Injury for a Neighbor twenty years after, to select the first Edition to confute as the Author's Judgment: Much more might I, when I published to the World, that I Suspended the whole Book, and have • h • se twenty four years hindered the Printing of it; professing that I have in many larger Books, more intelligibly and fully opened the same things.
Yea, you fear not pag. 23. to say, That I tell you of about 60 Books of Retractations, in part at least which I have Written]; when never such a word fell from me. If I say, Th •• one that hath published his Suspension of a small Book written in Youth, not for the Doctrine of it, but some unfit Expressions, and hath since in all-most thirty Years time, written about sixty Books, in many or most of which is somewhat of the same Subject, and in some of them he fullier openeth his Mind; should be dealt with by an Adversary, according to some of his later and larger Explications, and not according to the Mode and Wording of that one Suspended Book alone: Shall such a Man as you say, that I [tell you of about sixty Books of Retractations]? Or will it not abate Men's reverence of your disputing Accurateness, to find you so untrusty in the Recitation of a Man's words? The truth is, it is this great Defect of Heed and Accurateness, by hasty Temerity, which also spoileth your Disputations.
But, pag. 7. the Aphorisms must be, [The most Scholar-like, and Elaborate (though Erroneous) Book in Controversy, you ever Composed]. Answ. 1. Your Memory is faulty: Why say you in the next, that I appeal to my Disputation of Justification and some others; but you cannot Trudg up and down, to every place I would send you, your Legs are too weak? Either you had read all the sixty Books which you mention (the Controversal at least) or not: If not, How can you tell that the Aphorisms is the most Elaborate? If yea, Why do you excuse your Trudging, and why would you select a Suspended Book, and touch none that were Written at large on the same Subject? 2. By this (I su • pose to make your Nibble to seem a Triumph) you tell your Reader again, how to value your Judgment. Is it like that any Dunce that is diligent, should Write no more Scholar-like at Sixty years of Age than at Thirty? And do you think you know better what of mine is Elaborate, than I do? Sure that Word might have been spared; When I know that one printed Leaf of Paper hath cost me more Labor than all that Book, and perhaps one Scheme of the Distinctions of Justification, which you deride. If indeed you are a competent Judge of your own Writings, Experience assureth me, that you are not so of mine. And pag. 25. you say, You desire not to be preferred before your Betters, least of all when you are singular; as here I think you are.
§. III. Pag. 9. You are offended for being put in the Cub, with divers mean and contemptible Malefactors.]
Answ. O for Justice! 1. Was not Bellarmine, or some of the Papists and the Socinians, as great Malefactors, with whom (as you phrase it) you put me in the Cub? 2. Are they Malefactors so far as they agree with you in Doctrine, and are you Innocent? What is the Difference between your Treatise, in the part that toucheth me, and that of Mr. Eyres, Mr. Crandon, and some others such? Dr. Owen, and Dr. Kendale, indeed differed from you; the latter seeking (by Bishop Usher) an amicable Closure, and the former (if I understand his Book on the Hebrews) less differing from me in Doctrine, than once he either did, or seemed to do. (And if any of us all grow no Wiser in thirty years Study, we may be ashamed). But to give you your due Honor, I will name you with your Equals, as far as I can judge, viz. Maccovius, Cluto, Coccejus, and Cloppenburgius, (I mean but in the Point in Question; it's no Dishonor to you to give some of them Precedencie in other things). It may be also Spanhemius, was near you. But (if I may presume to liken my Betters) no Men seem to me to have been so like you, as Guilielmus Rivet, (not Andrew), Mr. George Walker, and Mr. Roborough. (I hope this Company is no Dishonor to you). And very unlike you are Le Blank, Cameron, Davenant, Dr. Hammond, Mr. Gataker, Mr. Anthony Wotton, and in Complexion Scotus and Ockam, and such as they: If yet I have not Chosen you pleasing Company, I pray you choo se fo yourself.
But you say on, [Had you not (in your Memory many Scores of greatest Eminence and Repute in the Christian World, of the same Judgment with me—Know you not, I speak the same thing with all the Reformed Churches, &c. —For shame let it be the Church of England, with all the rest of the Reformed, &c.]
Answ. 1. I know not what you hold, even when I read what you write: (I must hope as well as I can, that you know yourself): How then should I know who are of the same Judgment with you?
2. Yet I am very confident, that all they whom you mention, are of the same in something or other; and in particular, that we are Justified by Faith, and not by the Works of the Law, or any Works in the sense denied by St. Paul, &c.
3. Do not I, with as great Confidence as you, lay Claim to the same Company and Concord? And if one of us be mistaken, must your bare Word determine which it is? Which of us hath brought the fuller Proofs? I subscribe to the Doctrine of the Church of England, as well as you; and my Condition these thirteen or fourteen years, giveth as much Evidence, that I am loath to subscribe to what I believe not, as yours doth of you. And you that know which of my Books is the most Elaborate, sure know, that in that Book which I Wrote to explain those Aphorisms (called my Confession) I cite the Words of above an Hundred Protestant Witnesses, that give as much to Works as I do: And that of this Hundred, one is the Augustine Confession, one the Westminster Synod, one the Synod of Dort, one the Church of England, each one of which being Collectives, contain many. (And here I tell you of more). And have you brought more Witnesses? Or any to the contrary? Did you Confute, or once take Notice of any of these?
4. Do you not here before you are aware, let your Reader know that it was, and still is, in the Dark, that you Alarm the World about our dangerous Differences, and run to your Arms undrest, before your Eyes are open? Qui convenient in aliquo tertio, &c. They that agree with the Church of England, in the Doctrine of Justification by Faith, do so far agree between themselves: But Dr. Tully, and R. B. do agree with the Church of England, in the Doctrine of Justification by Faith. Ergo.— The Article referreth to the Homilies, where it is more fully Explained.
5. May not I then retort your Argument, and bid you [For shame let it be no longer Bellarnine, and R. B. but the Church of England, and all the Reformed, and R. B.]? Disprove the Witnesses twenty years ago, produced by me in this very Cause; or else speak out, and say, [The Church of England, and the rest of the Reformed, hold Justification by Works, just as Bellarmine and the Papists do] which is it which you would fasten on me, who agree with them (as if you had never there read my Answer to Mr. Crandon, objecting the same thing).
§. IV. Your Censure, pag. 10, 11. of my Windings, Clouds of Novel Distinctions, Preambles, Limitations, &c. is just such as your Treatise did bid me expect: Till you become guilty of the same Crime, and fall out with Confusion, and take not equivocal ambiguous Words unexplained, instead of Univocals, in the stating of your Questions, I shall never the more believe that Hannibal is at the Gates, or the City on Fire, for your Allarms.
§. V. Pag. 11. Where you tell me, that [You have no Profit by my Preface: I shall not deny it, nor wonder at it; you are the fittest Judge: Where you say, that [I have no Credit,] You do but tell the World at what Rates you write. Honor est in honorante. And have all my Readers already told you their Judgment? Alas! How few? In all London, not a Man hath yet given me Notice of his Dislike, or Dissent. And sure your own Pen is a good Confuter of you. It is some Credit, that such a Man as you, is forced to profess a full Consent to the Doctrine, though with passionate Indignation.
You tell me of [Nothing to the Question]. But will you not be angry if I should but tell you, how little you did to state any Question, and in Reason must be supposed, when you assaulted my Doctrine, to take it as I stated it; which I have fully shown you?
You tell me, that You Charged me only with new Original Sin, underived from Adam, unknown, unheard of before, in the Christian World.
Answ. De re, is not our Guilt of nearer Parent's Sins such which you and all that you know (now at last) confess? De nomine, 1. Tell the World if you can, when I called it [New Original Sin, or underived from Adam, or unknown, or unheard of]. There are more ways than one of Derivation from Adam. It is not derived from him by such Imputation as his first Sin; but it is derived from him as a partial Causa Causae, by many Gradations. All Sin is some-way from him. Either you mean that I said, that it was not Derived from Adam, or you gather it by some Consequence from what I said. If the First, show the Words, and the Shame shall be mine. If not, you know the old Law, that to false Accusers, it must be done as they would have done to the Accused. But if it be your Consequence, prove it, and tell the World, what are the Premises that infer it.
§. VI. Pag. 12. You friendly help me to profit by myself, however you profess that you profit not by me! What I have said to you against [Hasty Judging], I have first said to myself, and the more you warn me of it, the more friendly you are: If it be not against such as you but myself, it is against myself that I have a Treatise on that Subject; but I begin to think myself in this more Seeing than you; for I see it both in myself and you, and you seem to see it in me, and not in yourself. But with all Men, I find, that to see the Spots in our own Face immediately is hard, and to love the Glass which showeth them, is not easy; especially to some Men that neither are low, nor can endure to be so, till there is no Remedy.
But, Sir, how easy a Way of Disputing have you happily light on, Who instead of Examining the hundred Witnesses which I brought, and my else-where oft proving the Doctrine opposed by me to be Novel, and Singular, do in few words talk of your holding the Doctrine delivered to the Saints, and of the many Worthies that concur with you, and of my pelting at their Heads, and draging them by the Hoary-heads, as a Spectacle and Byword to all, (by proving their consent by express Citations) what Armies, and of what Strength appear against me, whose Names I desie and wound, through yours?
Answ. And is not he a weak Man that cannot talk thus upon almost any Subject? But who be these Men, and what be their Names? Or rather, first, rub your Eyes, and tell us what is the Controversy? Tully sometimes talked at this rate in his Orations, but verily much better in his Philosophy.
And you see no cause to repent, but you bless God that you can again and again call to all Youth, that as they love the Knowledge of Truth, they take me not for an Oracle in my bold dividing Singularities].
Answ. That the Name of Truth is thus abused, is no News; I would the Name of God were not: And I am sorry, that you see no Cause to repent. I am obliged to love you the better, for being against dividing Singularities in the general Notion; I hope if you knew it, you would not be for them, as in singular Existents. But sure, none at Oxford are in danger of taking me for an Oracle? This is another needless Work. So Spanhemius took that for a Singularity, which Dallaeus in a large Catalogue, hath proved the Common Judgment of the Church, till Contention of late caused some Dissenters.
Will you cease these empty general Ostentations, and choose out any one Point of real Difference between you and me about Justification, and come to a fair Trial, on whose side the Churches of Christ have been for 1500 years after Christ; yea, bring me but any two or one considerable Person, that was for a thousand years for your Cause against mine, and I will say, that you have done more to confute me by far, than yet you have done; and if two only be against me, I will pardon you for calling me Singular.
§. VII. Pag. 13, 14, 15. You again do keep up the Dividing Fear, are offended that I persuade you, that by Melancholy Phantasms you set not the Churches together by the Ears, and make People believe that they differ, where they do not: And you ask, Who began the Fray?
Answ. 1. Do you mean that I began with you? You do not sure: But is it that I began with the Churches, and you were necessitated to defend them? Yes, if Gallus, Ambsdorsius, Schlusselburgius, and Dr. Crisp, and his Followers, be the Church? But, Sir, I provoke you to try it by the just Testimony of Antiquity, who began to differ from the Churches. In this Treatise I have given you some Account, and Vossius hath given you more. which you can never answer: But if my Doctrine put you upon this Necessity, what hindered you from perceiving it these twenty years and more, till now? O Sir, had you no other work to do, but to Vindicate the Church and Truth? I doubt you had.
§. VIII. But pag. 15. You are again incredulous, that [All the Difference betwixt you and me, or others of the same Judgment in the Point of Justification, is merely Verbal; and that in the Main we are agreed]. And again you complain of your weak Legs.
Answ. 1. I do agree with very many against their wills in Judgment (because the Judgment may be constrained), but with none in Affection, as on their part. Did I ever say, that I differed not from you? I tell you, I know not what your Judgment is, nor know I who is of your Mind? But I have not barely said, but oft proved, that (though not the Antinomians) the Protestants are mostly here agreed in the Main. If you could not have time to read my larger Proof, that short Epistle to Mr. Allen's Book of the Covenant, in which I proved it, might have stopped your Mouth from calling for more Proof, till you had better confuted what was given.
But you say, [Are perfect Contradictions no more than a difference in Words? Faith alone, and not Faith alone? Faith with and without Works? Excuse our Dullness here].
Answ. 1. Truly, Sir, it is a tedious thing, when a Man hath over and over Answered such Objections; yea, when the full Answers have been twenty years in Print, to be put still to say over all again, to every Man that will come in and say, that his Legs are too weak to go see what was answered before: How many score times then, or hundreds, may I be called to repeat.
2. If I must pardon your Dullness, you must pardon my Christianity (or choose) who believe that there is no such [perfect Contradictions] between Christ's, [By thy Words thou shalt be Justified] and Paul's, [Justified by Faith, without the Works of the Law] or [not of Works]; and James 's [We are justified by Works, and not by Faith only]. Must we needs proclaim War here, or cry out, Heresy, or Popery? Are not all these Reconcileable? Yea, and Paul's too, Rom. 2. The Doers of the Law shall be justified.
3. But did I ever deny that it is [by Faith alone and without Works]? Where, and when? But may it not be, by Faith alone in one sense, and not by Faith alone in another sense?
4. But even where you are speaking of it, you cannot be drawn to distinguish of Verbal and Real Differences. Is it here the Words, or Sense, which you accuse? The Words you dare not deny to be God's own in Scripture, spoken by Christ, Paul, and James. My Sense I have opened to you at large, and you take no Notice of it; but as i • you abhorred Explication and Distinction, speak still against the Scripture Words.
§. IX. Pag. 16. But you say, [Let any discerning Reader compare the 48 §. of this Preface with the Words in pag. 5. of your Appeal to the Light, and 'tis likely he will concur with me, in that Melancholy Phantasm, or Fear: For 'tis worth the noting, how in that dark Appeal where you distinguish of Popish Points, i. e. some-where the Difference is reconcilable, others in effect but in words; we have no Direction upon which Rank we must bestow Justification, nothing of it at all from you, Name or Thing: But why, next to the All-seeing God, you should know best yourself].
Answ. Alas, Sir, that God should be in such a manner mentioned! I answered this same Case at large in my Confession, Apology, Dispute of Justification, &c. Twenty years ago, or near; I have at large Opened it in a Folio (Cathol. Theol.) which you saw, yea, in the very part which you take Notice of; and now you publish it [worth the Noting, that I did not also in one sheet of Paper, Printed the other day against a Calumnie of some Sectarian Hearers, who gave me no Occasion for such a work. Had it not been a Vanity of me, Should I in that sheet again have repeated, how I and the Papists differ about Justification? Were you bound to have read it in that sheet, anymore than in many former Volumes? It's no matter for me; But I seriously beseech you, be hereafter more sober and just, than to deal with your Brethren, the Church and Truth, in such a manner as this! But by this Talk I suspect, that you will accuse me more for opening no more of the Difference in this Book. But, 1. It is enough for to open my own Meaning, and I am not obliged to open other Men's: And my own I have opened by so many Repetitions, in so many Books, as nothing but such Men's Importunity and obstructed Minds, could have Ex • used. 2. The Papists minds sure, may be better known by their own Writings, than by mine: The Council of Trent, telleth it you: What need I recite it? 3. I tell you again, as I did in my Confession, that I had rather all the Papists in the World agreed with us, than disagreed: I like a Doctrine the better, and not the worse, because all the Christian World consenteth to it. I am not ambitious to have a Religion to myself, which a Papist doth not own. Where they differ, I am sorry for it: And it pleaseth me better, to find in any Point that we are agreed, than that we differ. Neither you, nor any such as you, by crying [O Popish! Antichristian!] shall tempt me to do by the Papists, as the Dominicans, and Jansenists, and some Oratorians, do by the Calvinists: I will not with Alvarez, Arnoldus, Gibieuf, &c. make the World believe, that my Adversaries are much further from me than they are, for fear of being censured by Faction, to be one of them. If I would have been of a Church-Faction, and sold my Soul to please a Party, I would have begun before now, and taken a bigger Price for it, than you can offer me if you would.
Pag, 17. You say, [Pile one Distinction or Evasion on another, as long as you please; as many several Faiths, and Works, and Justifications, as you can name, all this will never make two Poles meet].
Answ. And do you cry out for War in the Darkness of Confusion, as long as you will, you shall never tempt me by it to renounce my Baptism, and List myself under the grand Enemy of Love and Concord, nor to Preach up Hatred and Divis •• n for nothing, as in the Name of Christ. If you will handle such Controversies, without Distinguishing of Faiths, Works, and Justifications, I will never persuade any Friend of mine to be your Pupil, or Disciple. Then Simon Magus 's faith, and the Devils faith, and Peters faith must all pass for the same, and justify accordingly. Then indeed, Believing in God the Father, and the Holy Ghost, yea, and Christ, as our Teacher, King and Judge, &c. must pass for the Works by which no Man is Justified! If Distinction be unsound, detect the Error of it: If not, it is no Honor to a disputing Doctor to reproach it.
§. X. But pag. 17. you set upon your great undeceiving Work, to show the evil of ill using Words: [Words (you say) as they are enfranchised into Language, are but the Agents and Factors of things, for which they continually negotiate with our Minds, conveying Errands on all occasions, &c. (Let them mark, that charge the vanity and bombast of Metaphors on others, one word [Signa] should have served our turn instead of all this). [Whence it follows, that their use and signification is Unalterable, but by the stamp of the like public usage and imposition from whence at first they received their being, &c.]
Answ. O Juniors, Will not such deceiving Words save you from my Deceits? But, 1. Is there a Law, and unalterable Law for the sense of Words? Indeed, the Words of the sacred Text must have no new Sense put upon them. 2. Are you sure that it was Public usage, and Imposition from whence they first received their being? How shall we know that they grew not into public use from one Mans first Invention, except those that (not Public use, but) God Himself made? 3. Are you sure that all or most Words now, Latin or English, have the same, and only the same use or sense, as was put upon them at the first? Is the change of the sense of Words a strange thing to us? 4. But that which concerneth our Case most, is, Whether there be many Words either of Hebrew and Greek in the Scripture, or of Latin, English, or any common Language, which have not many Significations? Your Reputation forbids you to deny it. And should not those many Significations be distinguished as there is Cause? Are not Faith, Works, Just, Justice, Justification, words of divers senses in the Scripture? and do not common Writers and Speakers use them yet more variously? And shall a Disputer take on him, that the use or signification of each is but one, or two, or is so fixed that there needeth no distinction? 5. Is the change that is made in all Languages in the World, made by the same public usage and imposition, from which at first they received their being? 6. If (as you say) the same thing can be represented by different words, only when they are Syn • nym • us, should we not avoid seeming to represent the same by Equivocals, which unexplained are unfit for it▪
Pag. 20. You tell me what sad work you are doing, and no wonder, Sin and Passions are self-troubling things: And it's well if it be sad to yourself alone, and not to such as you tempt into Mistakes, Hatred, and Division. It should be sad to every Christian, to see and hear these whom they are bound to Love, represented as odious: And you are still, pag. 19. feigning, that [Every eye may see Men dealing Blows and Deaths about, and therefore we are not wise if we think them agreed.
But doubtless, many that seem killed by such Blows as some of yours, are still alive? And many a one is in Heaven, that by Divines pretending to be Orthodox, were damned on Earth! And many Men are more agreed than they were aware of. I have known a Knavish Fellow set two Persons of quality on Fighting, before they spake a word to one another, by telling them secretly and falsely what one said against the other. Many differ, even to persecuting and bloodshed, by Will and Passion and Practice, upon a falsely supposed great -difference in Judgment. I will not so suddenly repeat what Proof I have given of some of this in the place you noted, Cath Theol. Confer. 11, 12, & 13. There is more skill required to narrow differences, than to widen them; and to reconcile, than to divide; as there is to quench a Fire, than to kindle it; to build, than to pull down; to heal, than to wound.
I presume therefore to repeat aloud my contrary Cautions to your Juniors.
Young-Men, after long sad Experience of the sinful and miserable Contentions of the Clergy, and consequently of the Christian World, that you may escape the Guilt, I beseech you, whoever contradicteth it, consider and believe these following Notices: 1. That all Words are but arbitrary Signs, and are changed as Men please; and through the Penury of them, and Mans imperfection in the Art of Speaking, there are very few at all, that have not various Significations.
2. That this Speaking-Art requireth so much time and study, and all Men are so defective in it, and the variety of Men's skill in it is so very great, that no Men in the World do perfectly agree in their interpretation and use of Words. The doleful plague of the Confusion of Tongues, doth still hinder our full Communication, and maketh it hard for us to understand Words ourselves, or to be understood by others; for Words must have a three-fold aptitude of Signification. 1. To signify the Matter, 2. And the Speakers conceptions of it. 3. And this as adapted to the hearers Mind, to make a true Impression there.
3. That God in Mercy hath not made Words so necessary as Things, nor necessary but for the sake of the Things: If God, Christ, Grace, and Heaven, be known, believed, and duly accepted, you shall be saved by what Words soever it be brought to pass.
4. Therefore Real Fundamentals, or Necessaries to Salvation, are more easily defined than Verbal ones: For more or fewer Words, these or other Words are needful to help some Persons, to Faith, and Love, and Holiness, as their Capacities are different.
5. But as he that truly believeth in, and giveth up himself to God the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, according to the sense of the Baptismal Covenant, is a true Christian, to be loved, and shall be saved; so he that understandeth such Words, as help him to that true Faith and Consent, doth know so much of the Verbal part, as is of necessity to his Christianity and Salvation.
6. And he that is such, holdeth no Heresy or Error inconsistent with it: If he truly love God, it's a contradiction to say, that he holdeth an Error inconsistent with the Love of God.
7. Therefore see that you Love all such as Christians, till some proved or notorious inconsistents nullifying his Profession disoblige you.
8. Take yourselves to be neither of Roman, or any other Church as Universal, which is less than the Universality of all Christians headed by Christ alone.
9. Make this Love of all Christians the second part of your Religion, and the Love of God, of Christ, of Holiness and Heaven, the first; and live thus in the serious practice of your Covenant, even of Simple Christianity: For it's this that will be your Peace, in Life and at Death.
10. And if Men of various degrees of Learning (or Speaking-skill) and of various degrees of Holiness, Humility, and Love, shall quarrel about Words, and forms of Speech, and shall hereticate, and revile, and damn each other, while the Essentials are held fast and practiced, discern Right from Wrong as well as you can; but take heed that none of them make Words a snare, to draw you injuriously to think hatefully of your Brother, or to divide the Churches, or Servants of Christ: And suspect such a Snare because of the great ambiguity of Words, and imperfection of Mans Skill and Honesty in all Matters of debate: And never dispute seriously, without first agreeing of the Sense of every doubtful term with him that you Dispute with].
Dr. Tully 's Alarm, and other Men's militant Course, persuaded me as a Preservative, to commend this Counsel to you.
§. XI. Pag. 19. You next very justy commend Method, ordering, and expressing our Conceptions, of which (you say) I seem to make little account in Comparison].
Answ. 1. Had you said, that I had been unhappy in my Endeavors, your Authority might have gone for Proof with many: But you could scarce have spoken a more incredible word of me, than that I seem to make little account of Method, I look for no sharper Censure from the Theological Tribe, than that I Over-do in my Endeavors after Method. You shall not tempt me here unseasonably, to anticipate what Evidence I have to produce for my acquittance from this Accusation.
2. But yet I will still say, that it is not so necessary either to Salvation, or to the Churches Peace, that we all agree in Methods and Expressions, as that we agree in the hearty reception of Christ, and obedience to His Commands? So much Method all must know, as to know the Beginning and the End, from the Effects and Means, God from the Creature, and as our true consent to the Baptismal Covenant doth require; and I will thankfully use all the help which you give me to go further: But I never yet saw that Scheme of Theology, or of any of its Heads, which was any whit large, (and I have seen many) which was so exact in Order, as that it was da • g •• ous in anything to forsake it. But I cannot think meet to talk much of Method, with a Man that talketh as you do of Distinguishing, and handleth the Doctrine of Justification no more Methodically than you do.
§. XII. But pag. 19. you instance in the difference between Protestants and Papists, about the Necessity of Good works, which is wide in respect of the placing or ranking of them, viz. The one stretching it to the first Justification, the other not, but confining it to its proper rank and province of Inherent Holiness, where it ought to keep].
Answ. Wonderful! Have you that have so loudly called to me to tell how I differ about Justification, brought your own, and as you say, the Protestants difference to this? Will none of your Readers see now, who cometh nearer them, you or I?
1. Is this distinction our proof of your accurateness in Method, and Order, and Expression? What meaneth a distinction between [First-Justification,] and [Inherent Holiness]? Do you difference them Quoad ordinem, as First and Second? But here is no Second mentioned: Is it in the nature of the things [Justification, and Inherent Holiness]? What signifieth the [First] then? But Sir, how many Readers do you expect who know not, 1. That it is not to the First Justification at all, but to that which they call the Second or Increase, that the Church of Rome asserteth the necessity or use of Mans meritorious Works? See what I have fully cited out of them for this, Cath. Theol. Lib. 2. Conf • r. 13. pag. 267. &c. saving that some of them are for such Preparatives as some call Merit of Congruity, and as our English Divines do constantly preach for, and the Synod of Dort at large assert; though they disown the name of Merit, as many of the Papists do. They ordinarily say with Augustine, Bona opera sequu • tur Justificatum, non praecedunt Justificandum.
2. But, I hope, the word [First] here overslipt your your Pen, instead of [Second]: But suppose it did so: What's the difference between the Papists first or second Justification, and the Protestants Inherent Holiness? None that ever I heard or read of: Who knoweth not that the Papists take Justification for Inherent Holiness? And is this the great difference between Papists and Protestants, which I am so loudly accused for not acknowledging? viz. The Papists place Good-Works before Justification, that is, Inherent Holiness; and the Protestants more rightly place them before Inherent Holiness? Are you serious, or do you prevaricate?
The Papists and Protestants hold, that there are some Duties and common Grace, usually preparatory to Conversion (or Sanctification); which some Papists (de nomine) call Merit of Congruity, and some will not. The Papists and Protestants say, that Faith is in order of nature, at least, before that Habitual Love, which is called Holiness, and before the Works thereof. The Papists and Protestants say, that Works of Love and Obedience, follow our First Sanctification, and make up but the Second part of it, which consisteth in the Works of Holiness. If you speak not of Works in the same sense in each part of your Assignation, the Equivocation would be too gross, viz. If you should mean [Papists rank the necessity of preparatory Common Works, or the Internal act of Faith, or Love, stretching it to the First Justification; and Protestants rank other Works, viz. The fruits of Faith and Love, with Inherent Holiness. All agree, 1. That Common Works go before Sanctification. 2. That Internal Love, and other Grace, do constitute Sanctification in the First part of it. 3. That Special Works proceeding from Inward Grace, are the effects of the First Part, and the constitutive Causes of the Second Part of Sanctification; as the word extendeth also to Holiness of Life: And whilst Papists take Justification for Sanctification, in all this there is De re no difference. (But your accurate Explications by such terms, as [Stretching, Confirming, Province, &c.] are fitter for Tully, than for Aristotle).
And is this it in the Application that your Zeal will warn Men of, that we must in this take heed of joining with the Papists? Do you mean [Rank Good-Works with Inherent Holiness, and not with the First Sanctification, and you then do widely differ from the Papists]? Will not your Reader say, 1. What doth Inherent Holiness differ from the First Sanctification? 2. Do you not invite me thus herein to be a Papist, when they rank them nowhere but, as you say, the Protestants do? 3. Do not you here proclaim, that Papists and Protestants differ not about the necessity of Good-works to Justification? But yet I that would make no Differences wider than they are, can find some greater than you have mentioned.
Truly Sir, I am grieved and ashamed, to foresee how Learned Papists will make merry with such Passages; and say, See here how we differ from the Protestants! See what it is for, that the Protestant Doctors separate from the Church of Rome! viz. Because we make Good-Works necessary to the First Justification, which unless equivocally spoken, is false; and because the Protestants rank them with Inherent Holiness, as we do]. What greater advantage will they desire against us, than to choose us such Advocates? And to show the World that even where their keenest Adversaries condemn them, and draw Men from them, they do but justify them? who knoweth what a Temptation they may make of such passages to draw any to Popery? It is my assurance, that such Over-doing, is Undoing; and that mistaken Accusations of the Papists greatly advantage them against us, which maketh me the more against such Dealing; besides the sinfulness, of pretending that any differences among Christians, are greater than indeed they are.
But may not I think that you take the word [Justification] here in the Protestant Sense, and not in the Papists, when you say that they rank Good-work's-necessity as stretched to the First Justification? No sure: For, 1. Protestants use not to distinguish of a First and Second Justification, which Papists do, but of Justification as Begun, Continued, and Consummate. 2. If it were so, it were not true: For the First Justification in the Protestant Sense, is our first right to Impunity and Life Eternal, freely given to Believers, for the Merits of Christ's perfect Righteousness and Satisfaction. And Papists do not make Good-works (unless Equivocally so called) necessary to this; but as a Fruit to follow it.
As for Remission of Sin, I have else-where proved, 1. That most commonly by that word the Papists mean nothing, but that which we call Mortification, or Putting away, or destroying the Sin itself, as to the habit and ceasing the Act. 2. That most of them are not resolved, where the Remission of the Punishment (which Protestants call Remission of Sin, or Forgiveness) shall be placed: They differ not much as to its Time, but whether it be to be called any part of Justification: Some say, yea; some make it a distinct thing. Most describe Justification by itself, as consisting in our Remission of, or Deliverance from Sin itself, and the infused habit of Love or Righteousness (all which we call Sanctification), and the forgiveness of the Penalty by itself, not meddling with the Question, whether the latter be any part of the former; so much are they at a loss in the Notional part among themselves. But they (and we) distinguish of Forgiveness, as we distinguish of Penalties: We have a right to Impunity as to everlasting Damnation, upon our first being Justified; but our Right becometh afterward more full, and many other Penalties are after to be remitted.
§. XIII. Pag. 20. In my 42. Direct. for the Cure of Church-divisions, telling the Weak whom they must follow, I concluded, 1. That the necessary Articles of Faith must be made our own, and not taken merely on the authority of any; and we must in all such things of absolute necessity keep company with the Universal Church. 2. That in Matters of Peace and Concord the greater part must be our Guide. 3. That in Matters of human Obedience, our Governors must be our Guides. And, 4. In Matters of high and difficult Speculation, the judgment of one Man of extraordinary Understanding and Clearness, is to be preferred before the Rulers and the major Vote. I instanced in Law, Philosophy, Physic, Languages, &c. and in the Controversies of the Object of Predestination, the nature of the Will's Liberty, Divine Concourse, the determining way of Grace, of the definition of Justification, Faith, &c.] Here I was entreated before God and my Conscience, to search myself, with what Design or Intent I wrote this, and to tell you, Who that One is, that we may know whom to prefer, and to whom, in the Doctrine of Justification, &c.
Answ. How greatly do you dishonor yourself, (and then you will impute it to me) by insisting on such palpably abusive Passages? Had you not been better, have silently past it by? 1. Doth not the World know, that Heathens and Christians, Papists and Protestants, are Agreed on this general Rule? 2. And will you make any believe that Definition of Justification is none of these Works of Art, which depend on human Skill? How then came you to be so much better at it than I? I find not that you ascribe it to any special Revelation which you have. And if you should ascribe it to Piety, and say, Hoc non est Artis, sed Pietatis opus: I would go to many a good Woman before you. Nor do you plead general Councils, nor the Authority of the Church. 3. And what sober Scholar will you make believe, that by laying down this common Rule, I signify some One singular Person, as an Individuum determinatum; whom therefore I must acquaint you with? These things are below a Grave Divine.
Pag. 21. Where you called me to seriousness or diligence in my search, and I told you by what, and how many Writings, I have manifested my almost thirty years Diligence in this Controversy, and that I am now grown past more serious and diligent Studies; that I might show you what a trifling way it is, for a Man to wrangle with him that hath written so many things, to tell the World what his studies of this Point have been, and never to touch them, but to call him a -new to serious diligence: You now expostulate with me, whether you accused me for want of diligence? I talk not of Accusing, but I tell you, that I have done my best; and that it were a poor kind of dealing with yourself, if you had written against many, as you have done against me twenty five years ago, and very often, if instead of taking any notice of your Labors, I should call you now to diligent Studies.
As for your Lesson, pag. 22. that tumbling over many Books without meditation, may breed but Crudities, &c. It is very true, and the calamity of too many of the literate Tribe, who think that they have deserved Credit and Reverence, when they say the words which others, whom they would be joined with, have said before them: Want of good Digestion is a common Disease of many that never complain of it, nor feel any present trouble by it.
Pag. 22, 23. You insinuate that about Retractation, which I before detected: I told you when, and where, I Suspended or Retracted the Book, and for what Reasons, and you presently feign a Retractation of the Doctrine, and of about sixty Books of Retractions.
It's well that pag. 23. you had the justice not to justify your [Nec dubito quin imputatam Christi justitiam incluserit]; But to confess your Injustice, was too much: It is not your own Retractation that you are for, it seems.
§. XIV. Pag. 23, 24. You talk as if my supposing that both [Justice] and [Imputation], are capable of Definitions which are not the Things, were a Fallacy, because [or] is a disjunctive; viz. When I say that the Definition of the one, or the other, is not the Thing. Do you grant it of them Disjunctively, and yet maintain the contrary of them Conjunct? Yes, you say, [Imputed Justice cannot differ from its true definition, unless you will have it to differ really from itself]. And, pag. 34. you say, [I am ashamed you should thus over and over expose yourself—as if supposing (Definitions) true, they were not the same Re, with the Definitum. —Good Sir, talk what you please in private, to such as understand not what you say, and let them give you a grand 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 for your pains; but you may do well to use more Civility to the reason of a Scholar, though he hath not yet worn out his Freshmans G • wn • .
Answ. This is no light or jesting Matter: The comfort of Souls dependeth on it. I see some Men expect that Reverence of their Scholarship should give them great advantage: But if one argued thus with me for Transubstantiation, I would not turn to him, to escape the Guilt of Incivility.
If the Definition, and the Definitum, as in question now, be the same Thing, woe to all the Unlearned World, and woe to all Freshmen, that yet have not learnt well to define, and woe to all Divines that differ in their Definitions, except those that are in the right.
I know that a Word and a Mental Conception, are not Nothing: They may be called Things, but when we distinguish the Things from their Signs, Names, or Definitions, we take not the word [Things] so laxly, as to comprehend the said Signs, Names, &c. When we say, that the Thing defined is necessary, but to be able to Define it, or actually to Define it, is not necessary (to Salvation) it is notorious that we take Definition (as Defining) actively, as it is Actus definientis, and Definire sure is not the same with the Thing desined. I have heard before your Letter told me, that Definitum & Definitio idem sunt: But, I pray you, let us not quibble almost all the World under a sentence of Damnation. As long ago as it is since I read such words, I remember our Masters told us, (I think Schibler in his Topics for one) that when they are taken Pro terminis Logicis defini • io & definitum non sunt idem; but only when they are taken Pro rebus per eos terminos significatis; and that there they differ in Modo significandi essentiam, the definitum signifying the Essence confusedly, and the Definition distinctly. If you will take the Res definita, for that which is strictly nothing but Rei conceptus inadaequatus seu partialis, (that is, a Species) and that not as the thing is Existent extra intellectum, but as the conception is an operation of the Mind, so I confess, that he that hath a true Conception of a Species as merely denominated, or as defined, hath the same conception of it: And also the Thing named, and the Thing defined, is the same thing •• itself. Homo & Animal rationale, are the same, that is, it is the same essence, which is denominated Homo, and defined Animal rationale. And it is the same Conceptus mentis, which we have (if true) when we denominate, and when we define. But as Things are distinct from the knowledge and signs of Things, nothing is Res, that is not existent; and nothing existeth but in Singulars (or Individuals): And as nothing can be defined but a Species, so a Species, or any Universal, is nothing but a Notion, or Ens rationis, save as it existeth in the said Individuals. And in the Individuals, it is nothing but their being as partially, or inadequatly taken, or a Conceptus objectivus partialis, (whether it be of a thing really, or only intellectually partible, or anything which our narrow Minds cannot conceive of, Uno & simplici conceptu activo). Now if you take the word [Definition] for the Species, as existent in Individuals, it is really a part of the thing, that is, a Partial objective conceptus, or somewhat of the Thing as Intelligible: But this is to take [Definition] in Sensu passivo, for the Thing defined; which our Case distinguisheth.
But Sir, I crave your leave, to distinguish Real objective Beings, from, 1. The Knowledge. 2. and the Names, and other Logical Organs, by which we know them, and express our knowledge of them: God, Christ, Grace, Glory, Pardon, Justification, Sanctification, the Gospel-Doctrine, Precept, Promises, Faith, Hope, Love, Obedience, Humility, Patience, &c. are the Res definitae in our Case, not as they are in esse cognito, or in the notion or idea of them, but in esse reali. To Define properly, is either, 1. Mentally to conceive of these things; 2. or Expressively, to signify such Conceptions, agreeably to the nature of the things known, or Expressively defined: Which is, if the Definition be perfect, under the notions of a Genus, and Differentia. The Definition as in Words, is but a Logical Organ, (as Names are also Notifying signs): Mental defining, is but the said distinct knowledge of the thing defined, and is neither really the Thing itself, nor usually of necessity to the Thing: Which two, I shall prove distinctly as to the sense of our Case.
1. The Definition of Justification, is either our Distinct knowledge, or Expression of it: Justification is not our Distinct knowledge, or Expression of it: Therefore the Definition of Justification, and Justification, are not the same.
Justification In sensu activo, is not an Act of God, and In sensu passivo, is the Relative state of Man thereby effected: But the Definition of Justification is neither.
The Definition of Justification, is a work of Art; but Justification is a Work of Grace.
A wicked damnable Man, or a damned Devil, may define Justification, and so have the Definition of it; but not Justification itself.
The Definition of Justification, Faith, Love, &c. is Quid Logicum; but Justification, Faith, Love, &c. are things Physical and Moral.
A Man is Justified (or hath Christ's Righteousness imputed to him) in his sleep, and when he thinketh not of it; but he hath not the Active definition of Justification in his sleep, &c.
Other things be not the same Really with their Definition, therefore neither is Justification, Faith, &c.
The Sun is not really the same thing with a Definition of the Sun; nor Light, Heat, Motion, &c. A Brute can see, taste, feel, smell, that cannot define them. If you have a Bishopric, because you define a Bishopric, or have a Lordship, a Kingdom, Health, &c. because you can define them, your Axiom hath stood you in good stead.
The Definition is but Explicatio rei: But Rei explicatio non est ipsa res.
Individuals (say most) are not Definable: But nothing is truly Res, but Individuals. Universals as they are in the Mind, are existent Individual Acts, Cogitations, Notions: As they are out of the Mind, they are nothing but Individuorum quid intelligible.
The Definition of Learning, of a Doctor, &c. may be got in a day: If Learning and Doctorship may be so, what useless things are Universities and Books?
Perswade a hungry Scholar, that he hath Meat and Drink; or the Ambitious, that he hath Preferment; or the Covetous, or Poor, that he hath Money, because he hath in his Mind, or Mouth, the Definition of it; and quibble him into satisfaction by telling him, that Definitio & definitum sunt idem re. We know and express things narrowly by Names, and largely and distinctly by Definitions: The Definition here, is Explicatio nominis, (as Animal rationale, of the name Homo); and both Name and Definition, as they are Verba mentis vel ori • , or Verborum significatio, are surely divers from the things named and defined, known and expressed; unless by the Thing you mean only the Knowledge, or Notion of the Thing.
Therefore though Cui competit definitio eidem quo{que} competit definitum, & contra, & quod convenit definitioni convenit definito: Yet say not that Imputed Righteousness in Re, is the same with the Definition, as it is the Definers act.
By this time you have helped Men to understand by an Instance, why St. Paul so much warneth Christians to take heed lest any deceive them by vain Philosophy, even by Sophistry, and abused arbitrary Notions.
Remember, Sir, that our Case is of grand Importance; As it is stated in my Direct. 42. which you assaulted; it is [Whether if the Question were of the Object of Predestination, of the nature of the Will's liberty, Divine concourse, and determining way of Grace, of the Definition of Justification, Faith, &c. a few well studied Divines are not here to be preferred before Authority, and the major Vote. Such are my words. I assert, 1. That the Defining of Justification, Faith, &c. is a work of Art. 2. And I have many and many times told the World (which you seem to strike at) that Christians do not differ so much in their Real conceptions of the Matter, as they do in their Definitions. 1. Because Definitions are made up of Ambiguous words, whose Explication they are not agreed in; and almost all Words are ambiguous till explained, and ambiguous Words are not fit to define, or be defined, till explained. And, 2. Because both selecting fit terms, and explaining them, and ordering them, are works of Art, in which Men are unequal; and there is as great variety of Intellectual Conceptions, as of Faces. 3. And I have often said, That a Knowledge intuitive, or a Simple apprehension of a thing as Sensate, or an Internal experience, or Reflect act, and a general notion of some things, may prove the truth of Grace, and save Souls, and make us capable of Christian Love and Communion, as being true saving Knowledge. 4. And consequently I have often said, that many a thousand Christians have Faith, Hope, Desire, Love, Humility, Obedience, Justification, Adoption, Union with Christ, who can define none of these: Unless you will speak equivocally of Definition itself, and say as good Melancthon, and as Gutherleth, and some other Romists, that Notitia intuitiva est definitio, who yet say but what I am saying, when they add, [Vel saltem instar definitionis]. If all are without Faith, Love, Justification, Adoption, who cannot give a true Definition of them, how few will be saved? How much more then doth Learning to Men's salvation, than Grace? And Aristotle then is not so far below Paul, or the Spirit of Christ, as we (justly) believe.
The Case is so weighty and palpable, that you have nothing to sa • ; but as you did about the Guilt of our nearer Parents sins, to yield all the Cause, and with a passionate clamour to tell Men that I mistake you, or wrest your words; of which I shall appeal to every sober Reader, that will peruse the words of mine which you assault, and yours as they are an Answer to mine.
In a word, you go about by the abuse of a trivial Axiom of Definitions, 1. To sentence most Christians to Hell, and cast them into Desperation, as wanting the Grace which they cannot define. 2. And to destroy Christian Love and Concord, and tear the Church into as many Shreds, as there be diversities of Definitions used by them. 3. And you would tempt us to think much hardlier of yourself, than we must or will do; as if your Faith, Justification, &c. were unsound, because your Definitions are so.
I know that Unius rei una tantum est Definitio, speaking, 1. Not of the Terms, but the Sense. 2. And supposing that Definition to be perfectly true; that is, the truth of Intellection and Expression consisting in their congruity to the Thing; while the thing is one and the same, the conception and expression which is perfectly true, must be so too. But, 1. Our understandings are all imperfect, and we know nothing perfectly but Secundum quaedam; and Zanckez saith truly, that Nihil scitur, if we call that only Knowledge which is perfect: And consequently no Mental Definition is perfect. 2. And Imperfections have many degrees. 3. And our Terms, which make up that which you know I called a Definition in my Dir. 42. (as it is in words) are as aforesaid, various, mutable, and variously understood and used.
§. XV. Pag. 24. Again you are at it, [Whom do you mean by that one rare Person, whose single Judgment is to be preferred in the point of Justification, and to whom].
Answ. 1. No one that knoweth not the difference between an Invididuum vagum & determinatum. 2. No one that is of so hard Metal, as in despite of the plainest words, to insinuate to the World, that these words [A few well-studied Judicious Divines] do signify only one; and that these words [One Man of extraordinary understanding and clearness], (is to be preferred before the Rulers and major Vote, in difficult speculations) do signify one individuum determinatum in the World, and that the Speaker is bound to name the Man. No one that thinketh that Pomble, who in his Vind. Grat. hath almost the very same words, said well, and that I who repeat them, am as criminal as you pretend: No one who either knoweth not, that almost all the World (even Papists) agree in this Rule, or that thinketh his judgment fit herein to bear them all down: No one who, when his abuses are brought into the open Sun-shine, will rather accuse the Light than repent.
But, pag. 25. After some words to jeer away Conviction, you tell me, [We must have some better account of you, quem quibus, than what you have given us yet. I shall take leave to present our indifferent Readers with a more ingenuous and truer state of the Question, far more suitable both to my plain meaning and the clear purport of your Direction. Let the Case be this: There is One who of late hath raised much dust among us, about the grand Article of Justification; Whether it be by Faith without Works, or by Faith and Works too? All our old Renowned Divines on this side and beyond the Seas are unanimously agreed, that Justification is by Faith alone, i. e. without Works. This one Person hath often published his Judgment to the contrary—so that a poor Academical Doctor may very rationally inquire of you, Who in this case is to be preferred? That one, or those many?
Answ. There was a Disputant who would undertake to conquer any Adversary: When he was asked, How? He said he would pour out upon him so many and so gross untruths, as should leave him nothing to answer congruously, but a Mentiris; and then all the World would judge him uncivil, and condemn him for giving such an irreverent answer. But you shall not so prevail with me, but I will call your Reader to answer these Questions:
1. Whether it be any truer, that [This is the clear purport of my Direction], than it is that I say, There is but one Star in the Firmament, because I say that one Star is more Luminous than many Candles?
2. Whether if a diseased Reader will put such a Sense upon my words, his Forgery be a true stating of the Question between him and me, without my consent?
3. Whether an intimation that this ONE is either Unicus, or Primus, or Singular, in the definition of Justification, or the interest of Works, be any truer, than that he is the only ejected Minister in England, While the writings of Bucer, Ludov. Crocius, Joh. Bergius, Conrad. Bergius, Calixtus, Placeus, le Blank, Dave. Gatak. Wott. Prest. Ball, and multitudes such are visible still among us?
4. Whether he deals truly▪ wisely, or friendly with the holy Scripures, and the Protestants, who would persuade the Ignorant, that this is the true state of the Controversy, [Whether it be by Faith without Works, or by Faith and Works too, that we are justified] While the Scripture speaketh both, and all Protestants hold both in several senses? And whether this easy stating of Controversies, without more Explication or Distinction, be worthy an Academical Disputant?
5. Whether it be true or notoriously false, that [All our Renowned Divines on this side, and beyond the Seas, are agreed], of that in this Question of the interest of Works, which this one contradicteth?
6. Whether this Doctors naked Affirmation hereof be better proof, than that one Mans citation of the words of above an Hundred (yea many Hundred) as giving as much to Works as he doth, is of the contrary?
7. Whether it be an ingenuous way beseeming Academics, to talk at this rate, and assert such a stating of the Question and such consent, without one word of notice or mention of the Books, in which I state the Question, and bring all this evidence of consent?
8. If such a Doctor will needs inquire, whether the secret thoughts of the Writer meant not himself, when he pretendeth but to accuse the Rule there given, and should inquire but of the meaning of the words, whether it favor more of Rationality, or a presumptuous usurping the Prerogative of God?
§. XVI. Pag. 27. Though your approach be wrathful, you are constrained to come nearer yet, and you cannot deny my Rule of Direct. in other Points, but only those of [High and difficult speculation]: And do you deny it there? You will deal with it but as the application of that Rule to the Definition of Justification? (And shall we lose your favor, by forcing you to lay by your Opposition as to all the rest?) But here you say you [exceedingly differ from me]; Or else you would be ashamed of so much Combating in the dark: Exceeding oft signifieth some extreme.
Your Reasons are, 1. You hold not the Doctrine of Justification to be properly of Speculative concern, but wholly Practical: Where yet you confess, that in all Practical knowledge, there be some antecedent contemplations of the Nature, Properties, End, Object, and that to know the certain number of Paces home-ward, is a Speculative nicety].
Answ. And can you find no fairer a shift for disagreement? I would such as you made not the Doctrine of Justification too little Practical? I am far from thinking that it is not Practical: But is not a Logical definition the opening the Nature, Properties, End, Object, or some of these which you call Contemplations? Make not plain things dark, Sir: The use of Art is not shut the Windows, and confound Men's Minds. I take all Theology to be together, Scientia-affectiva-practica; for our Intellect, Will, and Practice, must be possessed or ruled by it: But it is first Scientia, and we must know before we can will and practice. And though all right knowledge tend to Practice, yet forgive me for telling you, that I think that many holy Persons in Scripture and Primitive times, loved and practiced more than you or I, who knew not how to form an exact Logical Definition. And that he that knoweth the things of the Spirit spiritually, by Scripture Notions, may practice them as fully, as he that knoweth and speaketh them in the Notions of Aristotle; or else the School-Men excel the Apostles. Though ambling be an easy Pace, which Horses are taught by Gives and Fetters, it followeth not that a Horse cannot travel as far in his natural pace. When you have said all, Logical defining shall be a work of Art, and the Church should not be torn, and Souls shall not be damned, for want of it. He that Loveth, Believeth, Hopeth, Obeyeth, and by doing them hath a reflecting perception what they are, and hath but such a knowledge of the Gospel as may be had without a proper Definition, shall be saved.
2. Pag. 28, 29. you say, [Nor is the Doctrine of Justification so high and difficult, but that the meanest Christian may understand it sufficiently to Salvation, so far as words can make it intelligible].
Answ. Your own blows seem not to hurt you. I thank you for granting so much hope to the meanest Christians. But what's this to your Case? 1. Do the meanest Christians know how to define Justification, and all the Grace which they have? 2. Are they acquainted with all the [Words that should make it intelligible?]
Pag. 29. you add, [You have done little service to your weaker Christians to persuade them otherwise (as well as to the great blessed Charter of Salvation) and to lead them out of the plain road into Woods and Mazes, to that one Man of extraordinary Judgment and Clearness; nobody must know what his Name is, or where he dwells, and so to whirl them about till you have made them giddy—].
Answ. How easy is it to talk at this rate for any Cause in the World? Is this Disputing or Reasoning? Cannot I as easily say thus against you? But the question is of Things visible: I willingly appeal to any intelligent impartial Divine, who will read what you and I have written of Justifification, which of us it is that hath done more to bring Men out of Woods and Mazes, into the plainest Road? Let them, that have leisure for no more, read but my Preface to my Dispute. of Justif. and mark which side wrongeth weak Christians, and the Charter of Salvation.
§. XVII. Pag. 29. you add, [Sir, I understand something at these years, without your Tutorage, of the duty both of Pastors and People: But I know not what you mean to make the way to Heaven (revealed sufficiently to all, &c.) to be a matter of high abstruse Speculation, as if none but great Scholars, and Men of extraordinary Judgment, could by the right use of Scriptures, and other ordinary common means, be able to find it out, till they have met with that Elias, &c.]
Answ. Still I see we shall agree whether you will or not: O, Sir, it is just the contrary that I wrote for: And I need but repeat your words to answer you. I am not disparaging your understanding, otherwise than you may so call the vindicating of needful truth: Nor did I ever presume to offer you my Tutorage: You speak all this with too much tenderness. But that which I have written almost all my Books of Controversy against, is this making the Way to Heaven more difficult and bewildering, than the Scriptures make it. Therefore it is that I have persuaded Men to lay less stress on arbitrary human Notions: But the question is now, whether it be your Course or mine, that is guilty of this? Are Logical Definitions the necessary Way to Heaven? Doth the Scripture sufficiently reveal such Definitions to all? Do all ordinary Believers by the use of the Scripture, know how to define? Do not Logicians make true defining one of the surest signs of clear and accurate knowledge? Why should you and I dispute thus about Matters of Fact? I know by the principles of Conformity, that your Judgment is not like to be narrower than mine about the state of determinate Individuals: I suppose you would take as many to the Lord's Supper as Believers, as I would, and absolve as many, and pronounce as many saved at Buryal. Let you and I call but a dozen of the next Families together, and desire every Man and Woman of them, to give you a Definition of Justification, (out of the hearing of the rest) and if they all give you a true definition, and one definition, I will write a Retractation. I know you not; but by your now telling me, of your understanding of the duties of Pastors and People, I may suppose that you have been a Pastor, (else—). And if so, that you have had personal conference with most (if not all) of your Flock. If you have found them all such able concordant Definers of Justification, you have had a more learned Flock than I had. I doubt your Learned Scholars could not do it, till they met with some such Elias or Aristotle, as you! Yea, let us take only such as by their Lives we commonly judge truly Godly Christians: And if all these give you one and a true definition of Justification, then do you tell them that Defining is no such difficult work, but ordinary Christians may and do attain it, and I that make it difficult, make the way to Heaven difficult, for Defining is the way to Heaven: But if not one of many Score or Hundred (till you teach them anew) do give you a true and the same Definition; I will go on and still say, that They wrong Souls, the Gospel, and the Church, who pretend such necessity and facility of defining, and will censure, reproach, or damn all that agree not with them in a Definition, when they have as real though less distinct a knowledge of the thing.
I doubt not but you know how much difference there is among Learned Men about Definitions themselves in general: Whether they belong to Metaphysics, Logicks, or Physicks? Whether Definitio Physica (as Man is defined per Animam, Corpus & Unionem) be a proper Definition? Whether a true Logical and Physical definition should not be the same? Whether Definitio objectiva be properly called Definitio, or only Formalis? Whether Accidents may be properly defined? An Genus definiri possit? An pars Logica definiri possit? An individua possint definiri? (Inquit Hurtado, Negari non potest Individuis definitio substantialis; & quidem essentialis Physice; est enim de essentia hujus hominis haec anima cum hoc Corpore; Imo & essentialis Metaphysice—si individua recte possent penetrari, illorum definitio esset omnium perfectissima) An ea quae differunt definitione distinguantur realiter? With a multitude such. And is the Art of Defining so easy, as that ordinary Christians salvation must lie upon it, when so many things about Defining are among the subtilest Doctors undetermined?
And as Ignorant as I am, while you suppose me unable to define Justification, I would wish you (not for my sake, but theirs) that you will not sentence all as unjustified to Damnation, that are not more skillful in defining than I, and that you will not reject all such from the Sacrament and Communion of the Church.
§. XVIII. Yet again, pag. 30. you tell me, [I cannot well swallow down in the lump, what you would have me and others to do, when you direct us to prefer that one Man before the Rulers and majority of Votes, till you acquaint us who that Gentleman is, and what sort of Rulers and Majorities you mean].
Answ. What you cannot swallow you must leave: I will not cram or drench you. I could wish for your own sake, that you had not thus often told the World of such a Malady, as that must needs be which hindereth your swallow: When, 1. You yourself receive the same Rule in other Instances, and make all this stir against it only, as to the Definition of Justification, even the Logical definition, which is Actus definientis, called Definitio formalis, and not the Definitio objectiva, as the Ipsum definitum is by some improperly called. 2. And when the words in that Instance are not [ONE MAN] but [a few Men] which your Eyes may still see; and when in the General direction where one Man is mentioned, there is no such word as [that one Man], or the least intimation of an Individuum determinatum; You greatly wrong your Honor by such dealing; As you do by adding,
1. [For the single Person (that Monarch in Divinity) to whom we are upon differences to make our Appeals, &c.]
Answ. If you hold on thus to talk as in your sleep, and will not shut your Chamber-door, but commission the Press to report your words to the World, how can your best Friends secure your reputation? Is not all this talk of single Person, and Monarch in Divinity, and Appeals, the effects of a Dream, or somewhat worse? These Fictions will serve no honest ends. But you next come indeed to the true difficulty of the Case, and ask:
[I beseech you Sir, how shall your ignorant or weaker Christian be able to judge of fitness?—He had need to have a very competent measure of Abilities himself, who is to give his verdict of another's, &c.]
This is very true and rational: But it concerneth you as much as me to answer it, unless you will renounce the Rule. And seeing you grant it in other Instances, if you please to answer your own question as to those other, you have answered it as to this: And if you will not learn of yourself, I am not so vain as to think, that you will learn of me.
In case of Subtilties which depend upon Wit, and Art, and Industry, in that proportion which few, even faithful Men attain, I remember but one of these ways that can be taken; Either wholly to suspend our Judgments, and not to meddle with them, till we can reach them ourselves; Or to take them fide humana, or as probabilities on the Credit of some Men, rather than others: As to the first, I am for as much suspension of Judgment, 〈1 page duplicate〉 〈1 page duplicate〉 as will stand with the part of a Learner (where we must learn; and in useless things for a total suspension). But where Learning is a duty, all Men come to Knowledge by degrees, and things usually appear to them in their probability, before they appear in ascertaining evidence. Therefore here the Question is, Whose judgment I shall take as m •• t probable? (Were the case only, how far we should Preach our Judgment to others, there Rulers must more determine; or if it were, How to manage our Judgment so as to keep Unity and Concord, the Church, or major Vote must over-rule us). But it being the mere Judgment or Opinion that is in question, either we must adhere to the Judgment, 1. Of Rulers as such, 2. Or the major Vote as such, 3. Or to those that are most Excellent in that part of Knowledge: Why should I waste time to give you the Reasons against the two first, which are commonly received? When even the Papists, who go as far as any I know living in ascribing to One Man, and to major Votes, yet all agree, that a few subtle Doctors, yea one in the things in which he excelleth, is to be preferred before Pope or Council: And therefore the Scotists prefer one Scotus, Lychetus, Memisse, Rada, &c. before a Pope or Multitude, and so do the Nominals, one Ockam, Gregory, Gabriel, Hurtado, &c. and so the other Sects.
The thing then being such as neither you, nor any Man can deny, the difficulty which you urge, doth press you and all Men: And it is indeed one grand calamity of Mankind, and not the least hindrance of Knowledge in the World; that he that hath it not, knoweth not what another hath, but by dark Conjectures. 4. And therefore Parents and Pupils know not who is their best Tutor: The hearers that are to choose a Teacher, hardly know whom to choose; for, as you say truly, he must know much that must judge of a knowing Man.
God hath in all Arts and Sciences given some few Men an excellency of Wit and Reach above the generality of their Profession, and they have a more clear and solid Judgment: If all Men could but know who these be, the World would in one Age be more recovered from Ignorance than it hath been in ten. But the power of the Proud, and the confidence of the Ignorant, and the number of all these, and the Slanders and Scorn, and p •• vish Wranglings of the common Pride and Ignorance against those few that know what they know not, is the Devils great means to frustrate their endeavors, and keep the World from having knowledge. This is certain and weighty Truth, and such as you should make no Malignant applications of, nor strive against. Mankind must needs acknowledge it. Your urgent questioning here [Do you not mean yourself?] doth but expose you to pity, by opening that which you might have concealed.
And to your Question I say, could I enable all Ignorant Men to know who are the best Teachers, I should be the grand Benefactor of the World: But both the blessing of excellent Teachers, and also of acquaintance with them and their worth, is given by God, partly as it pleaseth Him, freely, even to the unworthy, and partly as a Reward to those that have been faithful in a little, and obeyed lower helps; (for there is a Worthiness to be found in some Houses, where the Preacher cometh with the voice of Peace, and unworthiness, which oft depriveth Men of such Mercies.) Both absolutely Free-Grace, and also Rewarding-Grace, do here show themselves.
But yet I add, 1. That Light is a self-demonstrating thing; and will not easily be hid. 2. And those that are the Children of Light, and have been true to former helps and convictions, and are willing to sell all for the Pearl, and fear not being losers by the price of Knowledge, but would have it whatever Labor or Suffering it must cost, and who search for it impartially and diligently, and forfeit it not by Sloth, or a fleshly, proud, or worldly Mind, these, I say, are prepared to discern the Light; when others fall under the heavy Judgment of being deceived by the Wranglings, Scorns, Clamours and Threatenings of PROUD IGNORANCE. And thus one Augustine was a Light in his time, and though such as Prosper, Fulgentius, &c. knew him, Pelagius and the Massilienses wrangled against him: And Luther, Melancthon, Bucer, Phagius, Zwingli, Calvin, Musculus, Zanchius were such in their times; and some discerned them to be so, and more did not: If Men must have gone by the judgment of Rulers, or the major Vote of Teachers, what had become of the Reformation? If you can better direct Men how to discern God's Gifts and Graces in His Servants, do it, and do not cavil against it.
As for your [One single Protestant in such a case as Justification], and your [I wish it be not your meaning] Pag. 31. they deserve no further answer, nor I all the anger, pag. 31, 32, 33.
§. XIX. But pag. 34. Note again, 1. That it is not Objective Definitions, (as some call them) but [Logical, Artificial Definitions,] supposed to be Men's needful Acts, which you say are Re, the same with the Definitum. 2. And that yet you must have it [supposed that these Definitions are true]. And I suppose that few Good Christians comparatively know a true one, no, nor what a Definition, (or the Genus and Differentia which constitute it) is.
You say, [I absolutely deny what you so rashly avow, that the Definition of Justification is controverted by the greatest Divines: This is one of your liberal Dictates: The Reformed Divines are all, I think, before you, agreed about the nature of Justification, its Causes, &c. and consequently cannot differ about the Definition].
Answ. 1. But what if all Divines were so agreed? So are not all honest Men and Women that must have Communion with us: Therefore make not Definitions more necessary than they are, nor as necessary as the Thing.
2. You must be constrained for he defending of these words, to come off by saying, that you meant, That though they agree not in the Words, or Logical terms of the Definition; but one saith, This is the Genus, and this is the Differentia, and another that it is not this but that; one saith this, and another that is the Formal, or Material Cause, &c. yet de re, they mean the same thing, were they so happy as to agree in their Logical defining terms and notions: And if you will do in this, as you have done in your other Quarrels, come off by saying as I say, and showing Men the power 〈1 page duplicate〉 〈1 page duplicate〉 of Truth, though you do it with never so much anger, that you must agree, I shall be satisfied, that the Reader is delivered from your snare, and that Truth prevaileth, what ever you think or say of me.
3. But because I must now answer what you say, and not what I foresee you will or must say, I must add, that this passage seemeth to suppose that your Reader liveth in the dark, and hath read very little of Justification. 1. Do all those great Divines, who deny the Imputation of Christ's active Righteousness, and take it to be but Justitia Personae, non Meriti, and that we are Justified by the Passive only, agree with their Adversaries, who have written against them, about the Definition and Causes of Justification? Will any Man believe you, who hath read Olevian, Ursine, Pareus, Scultetus, Piscator, Carolus Molinaeus, Wendeline, Beckman, Alstedius, Cameron, with his followers in France, Forbes, with abundance more, who are for the Imputation of the Passive Righteousness only? Were Mr. Anth. Wotton, and Mr. Balmford, and his other Adversaries, of the same Opinion in this? Was Mr. Bradshaw so sottish as to write his Reconciling Treatise of Justification in Latin and English, to reduce Men of differing minds to Concord, while he knew that there was no difference, so much as in the Definition? Was he mistaken in reciting the great differences about their Senses of Imputation of Christ's Righteousness, if there were none at all? Did Mr. Gataker agree with Lucius and Piscator, when he wrote against both (as the extremes)? Did Mr. Wotton, and John Goodwin, agree with Mr. G. Walker, and Mr. Roborough? Doth Mr. Lawson, in his Theopolitica agree with you, and such others? Doth not Mr. Cartwright here differ from those that hold the Imputation of the Active Righteousness?
What abundance of Protestants do place Justification only in Forgiveness of Sins? And yet as many (I know not which is the greater side) do make that Forgiveness but one part, and Imputation of Righteousness another. And how many make Forgiveness no part of Justification, but a Concomitant? And many instead of [Imputation of Righteousness] put [Accepting us as Righteous, for the sake, or merit of Christ's Righteousness imputed] (viz. as the Meritorious Cause). And Pareus tells us, that they are of four Opinions, who are for Christ's Righteousness imputed; some for the Passive only; some for the Passive and Active; some for the Passive, Active, and Habitual; some for these three and the Divine. And who knoweth not that some here so distinguish Causes and Effects, as that our Original Sin (or Habitual say some) is pardoned for Christ's Original (and Habitual) Holiness: Our Omissions for Christ's Active Obedience, and our Commissions for His Passive? Or as more say that Christ's Passive Righteousness as Satisfaction, saveth us from Hell or Punishment, and His Active as meritorious, procureth Life as the reward? When many others, rejecting that Division, say; That both freedom from Punishment, and right to Glory are the conjunct effects of His Habitual, Active, and Passive Righteousness, as an entire Cause (in its kind); as Guil. Forbes, Grotius, Bradshaw, and others truly say: Besides that many conclude with Gataker, that these are indeed but one thing and effect, (to be Glorified, and not to be Damned or Punished); seeing not to be Glorified is the Paena damni, and that the remitting of the whole Penalty damni & sensus, and so of all Sin of Omission and Commission, is our whole Justification.
And I need not tell any Man that hath read such Writers, that they ordinarily distinguish of Justification, and give not the same Definition of one sort as of another, nor of the Name in one Sense as in another.
Many confess (whom you may read in Guil. Forbes, and Vinc. le Blanck) that the word [Justify] is divers times taken in Scripture (as the Papists do) as including Sanctification: And so saith Beza against Illyricus, pag. 218. as cited by G. Forbes, [Si Justificationem generaliter accipias, ut interdum usurpatur ab Apostolo, Sanctificatio non erit ejus effectus, sed pars aut species]: And as I find him (mihi) pag. 179. Quamvis Justificationis nomen interdum generaliter accipiatur pro omni illius Justitiae dono quam a patre in Christo accipimus, &c.
And how little are we agreed whether Reconciliation be a part of Justification or not? Yea, or Adoption either? Saith Illyricus [Hoc affirmo, recie posse dici Justificationem esse Causam omnium beneficiorum sequentium: Nam justificatio est plena Reconciliatio cum Deo, quae nos facit ex hostibus filios Dei:] To which Beza ibid. saith, (distinguishing of Reconciliation) Neutro modo idem est Reconciliatio ac Justificatio.—Si Remissio peccatorum est Justificationis Definitio, quod negare non ausis, &c.
Of the three sorts or parts of Christ's Righteousness imputed to make up three parts of our Justification, see him de Predest. pag. 405. Col. 2. which Perkins and some others also follow.
Olevian (as all others that grossly mistake not herein) did hold, that God did not judge us to have fulfilled all the Law in Christ; and that our righteousness consisteth only in the Remission of Sin, and right to Life as freely given us for another's Merits: But Beza insisteth still on the contrary, and in his Epistle to Olevian, (pag. 248. Epist. 35.) saith, Quid vantius est quam Justum arbitrari, qui Legem non impleverit? Atqui lex non tantum prohibit fieri quod vetat,—verum praecipit quod jubet.—Ergo qui pro non peccatore censetur in Christo, mortem quidem effugerit; sed quo jure vitam praeterea petet, niso omnem justitiam Legis in eodem Christo impleverit? (This is the Doctrine which Wotton and Gataker (in divers Books largely) and Bradshaw, after many others do Confute). Yet saith he, Neque vero id obstat, quominus nostra Justificatio Remissione peccatorum apt & recte definiatur], Which is a contradiction. Yet was he for Love and Gentleness in these differences; ibid.
Yet Qu. & Resp. Christ. pag. 670. He leaveth out Christ's Original Habitual Righteousness, [Non illa essentialis quae Deitatis est, nec illa Habitualis, ut ita loquar, Puritas Carnis Christi.—Quae quum non distingueret Osiander faedissime est hallucinatus.
And ibid. 670. he giveth us this description of Justification.
Qu. Quid Justificationem vocat Paulus hoc loco? R. Illud quo Justi fimus, id est, eousque perfecti, integri, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , ut plenissime, non tantum aboleatur quicquid in nobis totis in est turpitudinis, qua Deus sum purus offendi ullo modo possit, verum eti • m in nos comperiatur quicquid in hac humana natura usque adeo potest eum delectare, ut illud vita aeterna pro bona sua voluntate coronet].
Yet (as in his Annot. in Rom. 8. 30. & alibi) he confesseth that Justification in Scripture, sometime is taken for Sanctification, (or as including it) so he taketh our Sanctification to contain the Imputation of Christ's Sanctity to us. (Qu. & Resp. pag. 671.) 1. Dico nostras Personas, imputata ipsius perfecta sanctitate & integritate, plene sanctas & integras, ac proinde Patri acceptas, non in nobis sed in Christo censemur. 2. And next the Spirits Sanctification; and thus Christ is made Sanctification to us.
Dr. Twisse, and Mr. Pemble, Vind. Grat. distinguish of Justification as an Immanent Act in God from Eternity, and as it is the notice of the former in our Consciences: But doubtless the commonest Definitions of Justification agree with neither of these: And Pemble of Justification otherwise defineth it (as Mr. Jessop saith Dr. Twisse did).
Lud. Crocius Syntag. pag. 1219. thus defineth it, [Justificatio Evangelica est actus Divinae gratiae, qua Deus adoptat peccatorem per approbationem obedientiae Legis in sponsore atque intercessore Christo, & per Remissionem peccatorum ac Justitiae imputationem in eo qui per fidem Christo est insitus]. And saith, pag. 1223. [Fides sola justificat quatenus notat Obedientiam quandam expectantem promissionem ut donum gratuitum—& apponitur illi Obedientiae quae non expectat promissionem ut donum omnino gratuitum, sed ut mercedem propositam sub Conditione operis alicu • us praeter acceptationem & gratitudinem debitam, quae sua Natura in omni donatione quamvis gratuita requiri solet. Et ejusmodi Obedientia peculiariter opus ab Apostolo, & Latinis proprie Meritum dicitur; & qui sub hac conditione obediunt Operantes vocantur, Rom. 4. 4. & 11. 6. This is the truth which I assert.
Conrad. Bergius Prax. Cathal. dis. 7. pag. 983. tells us that the Breme Catechism thus openeth the Matter: [Qu. Quomodo Justificatur Homo coram Deo? R. Accipit Homo Remissionem peccatorum & Justificatur, hoc est, Gratus fit coram Deo in vera Conversione, persolam fidem, per Christum, sine proprio Merito & dignitate.
Cocceius disp. de via salut. de Just. pag. 189. Originalis Christi Justitia correspondet nostro Originally peccato, &c. vid. coet. plura vid. de foeder.
Macovius College. de Justif. distinguisheth Justification into Active and Passive, and saith, Justificatio Activa significat absolutionem Dei, quae Hominem reum a reatu absolvit: And he would prove this to be before Faith, and citeth for it (abusively) Pareus and Tossanus, and thinketh that we were absolved from Guilt from Christ's undertaking our Debt, Thes. 12. thus arguing, [Cujus debita apud Creditorem aliquis recepit exsolvenda, & Creditor istius sponsionem ita acceptat, ut in ea acquiescat, ill jam ex parte Creditoris liber est a debitis: Atque Electoram omnium in singulari debita apud Deum Patrem Christus, ex quo factus est Mediator, recepit exolvenda, & Deus Pater illam sponsionem acceptavit, &c. Passive Justification, which he supposeth to be our application of Christ's Righteousness to ourselves daily as oft as we offend. Th. 5. (And part 4. disp. 22. he maintaineth, that There are no 〈1 page duplicate〉 〈1 page duplicate〉 Dispositions to Regeneration). Others of his mind I pass by.
Spanhemius Dispute. de Justif. saith, that [The Form of Passive Justification consisteth in the apprehension and sense of Remission of Sin and Imputation of Christ's Righteousness in capable Subjects] grossly: Whereas Active Justification (Justificantis) ever immediately causeth Passive (Justificationem justificati) which is nothing but the effect of the Active, (or as most call it, Actio ut in patiente): And if this were the Apprehension and Sense (as aforesaid) of Pardon and imputed Righteousness, then a Man in his sleep were unjustified, and so of Infants, &c. For he that is not Passively justified, is not at all justified.
I told you else-where, that the Synops. Leidens. de Justif. pag. 413. Th. 23. saith, That Christ's Righteousness is both the Meritorious, Material, and Formal Cause of our Justification.
What Fayus, and Davenant, and others say of the Formal Cause, viz. Christ's Righteousness imputed, I there shown: And how Pareus, Joh. Crocius, and many others, deny Christ's Righteousness to be the Formal Cause.
Wendeline defineth Justification thus (Theol. Lib. 1. c. 25. p. 603.) Justificatio est actio Dei gratuita, qua peccatores Electi, maledictioni legis obnoxii, propter justitiam sen satisfactionem Christi fide applicatam & a Deo imputatam, coram tribunali Divino, remssis peccatis, a maledictione Legis absolvuntur & justi censentur. And pag. 615, 616. He maintaineth that [Obedientia activa, si proprie & accurate loquamur, non est materia nostrae Justificationis, nec imputatur nobis, ita ut nostra censeatur, & nobis propter eam peccata remittantur, & debitum legis pro nobis solvatur; quemadmodum Passiva per imputationem censetur nostra, &c. Et post [Si dicus Christum factum esse hominem pro nobis, hoc est, nostro bono, conceditur: Si pro nobis, hoc est, nostro loco, negatur: Quod enim Christus nostro loco fecit, & factus est, id nos non tenemur facere & fieri, &c.
Rob. Abbot approveth of Thompsons Definition of Evangelical Justification, (pag. 153.) that it is, Qua poenitenti & Credenti remittuntur peccata, & jus vitae aeternae conceditur per & propter Christi obedientiam illi imputatam: (Which is sound, taking Imputatam soundly, as he doth).
Joh. Crocius, Disp. 1. p. 5. thus defineth it, [Actio Dei qua ex gratia propter satisfactionem Christi peccatoribus in Christum totius Mundi redemptorem unicum, vere credentibus gratis sine operibus aut meritis propriis omnia peccata remittit, & justitiam Christi imputat ad sui nominis gloriam & illorum salutem aeternam. And he maketh only [Christ's full satisfaction for Sin, to be the Impulsive-External, Meritorious, and Material Cause; as being that which is imputed to us; and the Form of Justification to be the Remission of Sin, Original and Actual, or the Imputation of Christ's Righteousness (which he maketh to be all one) or the Imputation of Faith for Righteousness].
Saith Bishop Downame of Justif. p. 305. [To be Formally Righteous by Christ's Righteousness imputed, never any of us, for ought I know, affirmed. The like saith Dr. Prideaux, when yet very many Protestants affirm it.
Should I here set together forty or sixty Definitions of Protestants verbatim, and show you how much they differ, it would be unpleasant, and tedious, and unnecessary.
And as to those same Divines that Dr. Tully nameth as agreed, Dr. Davenants and Dr. Fields words I have cited at large in my Confes. saying the same in substance as I do; as also Mr. Scudders, and an hundred more, as is before said.
And let any sober Reader decide this Controversy between us, upon these two further Considerations.
1. Peruse all the Corpus Confessionum, and see whether all the Reformed Churches give us a Definition of Justification, and agree in that Definition: Yea, whether the Church of England in its Catechism, or its Articles, have any proper Definition: Or if you will call their words a Definition, I am sure it's none but what I do consent to. And if a Logical Definition were by the Church of England and other Churches held necessary to Salvation, it would be in their Catechisms (if not in the Creed): Or if it were held necessary to Church-Concord, and Peace, and Love, it would be in their Articles of Religion, which they subscribe.
2. How can all Protestants agree of the Logical Definition of Justification, when 1. They agree not of the sense of the word [Justify,] and of the species of that Justification which Paul and James speak of? Some make Justification to include Pardon and Sanctification, (see their words in G. Forbes, and Le Blank); many say otherwise. Most say that Paul speaketh most usually of Justification in sensu forensi, but whether it include [Making just] as some say, or only [Judging just] as others, or Nolle punire, be the act as Dr. Twisse, they agree not. And some hold that in James Justification is that which is coram hominibus, when said to be by Works; but others (truly) say, it is that coram Deo.
2. They are not agreed in their very Logical Rules, and Notions, to which their Definitions are reduced; no not so much as of the number and nature of Causes, nor of Definitions (as is aforesaid): And as I will not undertake to prove that all the Apostles, Evangelists and Primitive Pastors, knew how to define Efficient, Material, Formal and Final Causes in general, so I am sure that all good Christians do not.
3. And when Justification is defined by Divines, is either the Actus Justificantis, and this being in the predicament of Action, what wonder if they disagree about the Material and Formal Causes of it?
Nay, it being an Act of God, there are few Divines that tell us what that Act is: Deus operatur per essentiam: And Ex parte agentis, his Acts are his Essence, and all but one. And who will thus dispute of the Definition and Causes of them, Efficient, Material, Formal, Final? when I presumed to declare, that this Act of Justifying is not an immanent Act in God, nor without a Medium, but God's Act by the Instrumentality • f his Gospel-Covenant or Promise, many read it as a new thing; and if that hold true that the First Justification by Faith, is that which God's Gospel-Donation is the Instrument of, as the Titulus seu Fundamentum Juris, being but a Virtu •• •• d not an Actual Sentence, then the Definition of it, as to the Causes, must differ much from the most common Definitions.
But most Protestants say that Justification is Sententia Judicis. (And no doubt but there are three several sorts or Acts called Justification, 1. Constitutive by the Donative Covenant, 2. Sentential, 3. Executive.) And here they are greatly at a loss, for the dec • sion of the Case, what Act of God this Sententia Jucis. What it will be after death, we do not much disagree: But what it is immediately upon our believing▪ It must be an Act as in patiente, or the Divine • ss • nce denominated from such an effect. And what Judgment and Sentence God hath upon our believing, few open, and fewer agreee. Mr. Tombes saith it is a Sentence in Heaven notifying it to the Angels: But that is not all, or the chief: some run back to an Imma • ent Act; most leave it undetermined: And sure the Name of Sentence in general, signifieth no true Conce • tion of it at all, in him that knoweth not what that Sentence is, seeing Universals are Nothing (out of us) but as they exist in individuals. Mr. Lawson hath said that wihch would reconcile Protestants, and some Papists, as to the Name, viz. that God's Execution is his Sentence; He Judgeth by Executing: And so as the chief punishment is the Privation of the Spirit, so the Justifying Act, is the executive donation of the Spirit. Thus are we disagreed about Active Justification (which I have oft endeavored Conciliatorily fullier to open.)
And as to Passive Justification (or as it is Status Justificati) which is indeed that which it concerneth us in this Controversy to open, I have told you how grossly some describe it here before. And all agree not what Predicament it is in: some take it to be in that of Action, ut recipitur in passo; and some in that of Quality and Relation Conjunct: But most place it in Relation; And will you wonder if all Christian Women, yea or Divines, cannot define that Relation aright. And if they agree not in the notions of the Efficient, Material, Formal and Final Causes, of that which must be defined (as it is capable) by its subjectum, fundamentum and terminus.
I would not wish that the Salvation of any Friend of mine (or any one) should be laid on the true Logical Definition of Justification, Active or Passive, Constitutive, Sentential or Executive.
And now the Judicious will see, whether the Church and Souls of Men be well used by this pretence, that all Protestants are agreed in the Nature, Causes and Definition of Justification; and that to depart from that one Definition (where is it?) is so dangerous as the Doctor pretendeth, because the Definition and the Definitum are the same.
§ XX. P. 34. You say [You tremble not in the audience of God and Man to suggest again that hard-fronted Calumny, viz. that I prefer a Majority of Ignorants before a Learned man in his own profession.
Answ. I laid it down as a Rule, that They are not to be preferred: You assault that Rule with bitter accusations, as if it were unsound (or else to this day I understand you not.) Is it then [a hard-fronted Calumny] to defend it, and to tell you what is contained in the denying of it. The audience of God must be so dreadful to (you and) me, that (without calling you to consider whether the Calumny be not notoriously yours) I heartily desire any judicious person to help me to see, that I am here guilty, if it be so. But you add,
Answ. 1. It would trouble me: because (though I know you not) our fame here saith that you are an honest, and very modest man, and those that are Nicknamed Calvinists prefer you before most others of your rank. But alas, what is Man, and what may Temptation do?
2. did you think that your Scarlet or Mastership did allow you to write copiously, as you did, against your Neighbor who never meddled with you, and made it a crime in him, whom you accuse, to defend himself, and a righteous cause? I see in this age we deal on hard unequal terms with some Men that can but get into Scarlet.
3. You would make your Reader believe by these words that you are really Melancholy, and fear where no fear is. A Reverend Doctor, whose Book hath the Patronage of one of the greatest Bps. of England writeth against one of no Academical degree, who hath these 13. years and more been judged unworthy to preach to the most ignorant Congregation in the Land, and by the (Contrived) distinction of Nonconformists from Conformists, goeth under the scorn and hatred of such, as you pretend to be in danger of, and hath himself no security for his liberty in the open Air; that this Learned man in his honor, should conceit that an Answer from this hated person might endanger his degradation and turning out of his place, is so strange a fancy, as will make your Readers wonder.
4. But whether you are Melancholy or no I know not; but if you are not unrighteous, I know not what unrighteousness is. Will you bear with the diversion of a story?
When the Moors were sentenced to ruin in Spain, one of the Disciples of Valdesso (a Scholar) fell into the displeasure of the Bp. of Toledo: A Neighbor Doctor knowing that the Bps. favor might bestead him—(whether accidentally or contrivedly I know not) hit upon this happy course: The Scholar and he being together in a solemn Convention, the Scholar was taking Tobacco, and the Dr. seeing the smok threw first a Glass of Beer in his face, and cried Fire, Fire; The Scholar wiped his face, and went on; The Doctor next threw an Ink-bottle in his Face, crying still Fire, Fire; The Scholar being thus blackt, perceived that he was like to be taken for a Moor, and ruined, and he went out and carefully washed his face: the Doctor charged him openly for affronting him (yea and injuriously calumniating him) by the fact: For saith he, there was necessary Cause for what I did: There is no smoke without some fire: that which fired you might next have fired the House, and that the next House, and so have burnt down all the City: and your action intimateth as if I had done causelessly what I did, and done you wrong: The Scholar answered him; I knew not, Sir, that it was unlawful to wash me, but I will take no more Tobacco that I may no more offend you; But if in this frosty weather the thickness of my breath shouid be called smoke may I not wash my face, if you again cast your Ink upon it? No, saith the Doctor, It is not you, nor any private man that must be judge whether you are on Fire or not, in a public danger: Must the City be hazarded, if you say that it is not Fire? The Scholar asketh, ma • I not refer the case to the standers-by, and wash my face if they say, It was no Fire? No, saith the Dr. that is but to call in your Associates to your help, and to add Rebellion and Schism to your disobedience: I perceive what principles you are of. Why then, saith the Scholar, if I must needs be a Moor, my face and I are at your mercy.
But pardon this digression, and let you and I stand to the judgment of any righteous and competent Judge, whether you deal not with me in notorious injustice, so be it the Case be truly stated.
The person whom you assaulted is one, that attempted (with success) the subversion of Antinomianism and the clearing of truth; their Ignorance of which was the Cause of their other Errors. But having let fall, (for want of use in writing) some incongruous words (as Covenant for Law, &c.) and that somewhat often, and some excepting against the Book, he craved their animaversions, and promised to suspend the Book till it were corrected; and purposely wrote a far greater Volume in explication of what was dark, and defense of what was wrongfully accused, and many other Volumes of full defense: No man answereth any of these: but after twenty years, or thereabout, (though I protested in print against any that would write against the Aphorisms, without regard to the said Explications) you publish your Confutation of part of those Aphorisms, and that with most notorious untruth, charging me to deny all Imputation of Christ's Righteousness, when I had there professed the Contrary, and taking no notice of any after-explication or defense, and parallelling me with Bellarmine, if not with Heretics or Infidels (for I suppose you take the deniers of all Imputation to be little better.) This Book you publish without the least provocation with other quarrels, dedicating it to that R. Rd. B. who first silenced me; (as if I must go write over again all the Explications and Defences I had before written, because you (that are bound to accuse me) are not bound to read them:) and this you do against one that at that time had been about 13 years silenced, ejected, and deprived of all Ministerial maintenance, and of almost all his own personal Estate, desiring no greater preferment than leave to have preached for nothing, where is notorious necessity, could I have obtained it, sometimes laid in the common Jail among Malefactors, for preaching in my own house, and dwelling within five miles of it: after fined at forty pound a Sermon for preaching for nothing; looking when my Books and Bed are taken from me by distress, though I live in constant pain and langour, the Constable but yesterday coming to have distrained for sixty pound for two Sermons; hunted and hurried about to Justices at the will of any ignorant—Agent of—that will be an Informer, and even fain to keep my doors daily locked, if it may be to save my Books a while: Yet the exciting of wroth by public Calumny against one so low already, and under the persecuting wrath of your friends, was no fault, no injustice in you at all! (nor indeed did I much feel it.)
But for me who am thus publicly by visible Calumny traduced, truly to tell you where you mistake, and how you wrong God's Church and Truth more than me, and if also I offer peaceably to wash my own face, this is hard fronted Calumny, dragging a Doctor in Scarlet at the Wheels of my Chariot, which might occasion his degrading and turning out, &c.
This over-tenderness of your honor as to other men's words, (and too little care of the means of it, as to your own) hath a cause that it concerneth you to find out. Had you the tenth part as many Books written against you, as are against me (by Quakers, Seekers, Infidels, Antinomians, Millenaries, Anabaptists, Separatists, Semi-separatists, Papists, Pseudo-Tilenus, Diocesans, Conformists, and many Enemies of Peace, (to whom it was not I, but yourself that joined you) it would have hardened you into some more patience. If you will needs be militant you must expect replies: And he that will injuriously speak to the World what he should not speak, must look to hear what he would not hear. But you add;
Sir, the Name and Quality of a DOCTOR and Master of a Literate Society, might have been treated more civilly by you.
Answ. 1. I am ready to ask you forgiveness for any word that any impartial man (yea or your Reverend Brethren of that Academy themselves, whom I will allow to be somewhat partial for you) shall notify to me to be uncivil or any way injurious. 2. But to be free with you, neither Doctorship, Mastership nor Scarlet will Priviledg you to fight against Truth, Right, and Peace, and to vent gross mistakes, and by gross untruths in matter of fact, such as is your [Omnem ludibrio habet imputationem] to abuse your poor Brethren, and keep the long-consuming flàmes still burning, by false representing those as Popish, and I know not what, who speak not as unaptly as yourself, and all this without contradiction. Were you a Bp. my Body and Estate might be in your power, but Truth, Justice and the Love of Christians, and the Churches peace, should not be cowardly betrayed by me on pretense of reverence to your Name and Quality. I am heartily desirous that for ORDER-sake the Name and Honor of my Superiors may be very reverently used. But if they will think that Error Injustice, and Confusion must take sanctuary under bare Ecclesiastical or Academical Names and robes, they will find themselves mistaken: Truth and Honesty will conquer when they pass through Smithfield flames: Prisons confine them not; Death kills them not; No siege will force an honest Conscience by famine to give up. He that cannot endure the sight of his own excrements must not dish them up to another man's Table, lest they be sent him back again. And more freedom is allowed against Peace-Breakers in Frays and Wars, than towards men that are in a quieter sort of Controversy.
§ XX. P. 36. 37. You say [For your various Definitions of Justification, Constitutive, Sentential, Executive, in Foro Dei, in foro Conscientiae, &c.—What need this heap of distinctions here, when you know the question betwixt us is of no other Justification, but the Constitutive in foro Dei, that which maketh us righteous in the Court of Heaven? I have nothing to do with you yet in any else, as your own Conscience will tell you when you please: If you have not more Justice and civility for your intelligent Readers, I wish you would show more Compassion to your Ignorant Homagers, and not thus abuse them with your palpable Evasions.
Answ. Doth the question, Whether the several sorts of Justification will bear one and the same Definition, deserve all this anger (and the much greater that followeth)?
1. Seeing I am turned to my Reader, I will crave his impartial judgment: I never received and agreed on a state of the question with this Doctor: He wri • eth against my books: In those Books I over and over and over distinguish of Justification, Constitutive, Sentential, and Executive (besides those subordinate sorts, b • Witness, Evidence, Apology, &c.) I oft open their differences: He writeth against me, as denying all Imputation of Christ's Righteousness, and holding Popish Justification by works, and never tells me whether he take the word [Justification] in the same sense that I do, or in which of those that I had opened: And now he passionately appealeth to my Conscience that I knew his sense: What he saith [my Conscience will tell me] it is not true: It will tell me no such thing: but the clean contrary, that even after all his Disputes and Anger, and these words, I profess I know not what he meaneth by [Justification.]
2. What [Constitutive in foro Dei, that which maketh us Righteous in the Court of Heaven] meaneth with him, I cannot conjecture. He denieth not my Distinctions, but saith, what need they: I ever distinguished Making Righteous, Judging Righteous. Executively using as Righteous: The first is in ourselves; The second is by Divines said to be in foro Dei, an act of Judgment; the third is upon us after both: now he seemeth to confound the two first, and yet denieth not their difference; and saith, he meaneth [Constitutive in foro:] He that is made Righteous is such in se; and as such is Justifiable in foro:] We are Made Righteous by God as free Donor and Imputer, anteceden • lie to judgment: We are in foro sentenced Righteous by God as Judge: so that this by sentence presupposeth the former: God never Judgeth us Righteous and Justifi • th us against Accusation, till he have first Made us Righteous and Justified us from adherent Guilt by Pardon and Donation. Which of these meaneth 〈◊〉 ? I ask not my Ignorant homagers who know no more than I, but his Intelligent Reader. He taketh on him to go the Commonest way of Protestants: And the Commonest way is to acknowledge that a Constitutive Justification, or making the man Just, (antecedent to the Actus forensis) must need go first: but that it is the second which Paul usually meaneth, which is the actus forensis, the sentence of the Judge in foro, contrary to Condemnation: And doth the Doctor think that to make Righteous and to sentence as Righteous are all one? and that we are made Righteous in foro otherwise than to be just in ourselves and so Justifiable in foro, before the Sentence? or do Protestants take the Sentence to be Constituting or Making us Righteous? All this is such talk as had I read it in Mr. Bunnyan of the Covenants, or any of my Ignorant H • magers, I should have said, the Author is • stranger to the Controversy, into which he hath rashly planged himself: but I have more reverence to so learned a man, and therefore blame m • dull understanding.
3. But what if I had known (as I do not yet) what sort of Justification he meaneth? Doth he not know that I was then deba • ing the Case with him, whether the Logical Definitions of Justification, Faith, &c. are not a work of Art, in which a few well studied judicious Divines (these were my words) are to be preferred before Authority, or Majority of Votes. And Reader, what Reason bound me to consine this Case, to one only sort of Justification? And why, (I say, why) must I confine it to a sort which Dr. Tully meaneth, when my Rule and Book was written before his, and when to this day I know not what he meaneth? Though he at once chide at my Distinguishing, and tell me that All Protestants agree in the Nature, Causes, and Definition, (and if all agreed, I might know by other Men's words what he meaneth) yet to all before-said, I will add but one contrary Instance of many.
Cluto, in his very Methodical but unsound Idea Theol. (signalized in Voetii Biblioth.) defineth Justification so, as I suppose, best pleaseth the Doctor, viz. [Est Actio Dei Judicialis, qua redemptos propter passions justitiae Divinae satifactorias a Christo sustentatas, redemptisque imputatas, a peccatis puros, & consequenter a poenis liberos, itemque propter Obedientiam a Christo Legi Divinae praestitam redemptisque imputatam, justitia praeditos, & consequenter vita aeterna dignos, ex miserecordia pronunciat]. In the opening of which he telleth us, pag. 243. (against multitudes of the greatest Protestants Definitions.) [Male alteram Justificationis partem, ipsum Justitiae Imputationem statui, cum Justificatio non sit ipsa Imputatio, sed Pronunciatio quae Imputatione, tanquam fundamento jacto, nititur.
And he knew no sense of Justification, but [Vel ipsam sententiae Justificatoriae in mente Divina prolationem, sive Constitutionem, vel ejus in Cordibus redemptorum manifestantem Revelationem: And saith, Priori modo factum est autem omnem fidem, cum Deus omnes, quibus passions & justitiam Christi imputabat, innocents & justos reputaret, cum ejus inimici, adeoque sine fide essent, (so that here is a Justification of Infidels, as innocent for Christ's Righteousness imputed to them): Quare etiam ut jam facta fide apprehendenda est. The second which follows Faith, is Faith, ingenerating a firm persuasion of it. Is not here sad defining, when neither of these are the Scripture -Justification by Christ and Faith?
And so §. 32. the time of Justification by Faith he maketh to be the time when we receive the feeling of the former: And the time of the former is presently after the Fall; of all at once: And hence gathereth that [Ex eo quod Justificatio dicitur fieri propter passions & obedientiam Christi, quibus ad perfectionem nihil deest, nobis imputatas (before Faith or Birth) consequitur innocentiam & justitiam in Redemptis quam primum perfectas & ab omni macula puras esse—] and so that neither the pronunciation in mente Divina, or imputation ullis gradibus ad perfectionem exsurgat.
But what is this pronunciation in mente Divina? He well and truly noteth, §. 29. that [Omnes actiones Divinae, fi ex eo aestimentur quod re ipsa in Deo sunt, idem sunt cum ipso Deo, ideoque dependentiam a Causa externa non admittant: Si tamen considerentur quoad rationem formalem hujus vel illius denominationis ipsis impositae in relatione ad Creaturas consistentem, ipsis causae impulsivae assignare possunt, &c. This distinction well openeth, how God may be said to justify in His own Mind: But what is that effect, Unde essentia vel men's Divina ita denominatur justificans? Here he is at a loss, neither truly telling us what is Justification Constitutive, Sentential, nor Executive (but in the little part of [Feeling] God's secret Act) yet this dark Definer truly saith [Ex sensu Scripturae verissime affirmetur hominem per fidem solam justificari, quia ex nostra parte nihil ad Justificationem conferendum Deus requirit, quam ut Justificationem in Christo fundatam credamus, & fide non producamus, sed recipiamus.
If yet you would see whether all Protestants agree in the Definition of Justification, read the multitude of Definitions of it in several senses; in Learned Alstedius his Definit. Theol. c. 24. §. 2. pag. 97. &c. [Justificatio hominis coram Deo est qua homo in foro Divino absolvitur, seu justus esse evincitur contra quemvis actorem, Deo ipso judice, & pro eo sententiam ferente]. But what is this Forum? Forum Divinum est ubi Deus ipse judicis partes agit, & fert sententiam secundum leges a se latas? But where is that Est internum vel externum? Forum divinum internum est in ipsa hominis Conscientia, in qua Deus Thronum justitiae erigit in hac vita ibi agendo partes actoris & judicis: Forum Conscientiae. (But it is not this that is meant by the Justification by Faith). Forum divinum externum est, in qua Deus post hanc vitam extra hominem exercet judicium, 1. Particulare, 2. Universale. This is true and well: But are we nowhere Justified by Faith but in Conscience, till after Death? This is by not considering, 1. The Jus ad impunitatem & vitam donatum per foedus Evangelicum upon our Believing, which supposing Faith and Repentance is our Constitutive Justification, (virtually only sentential). 2. And the Judgment of God begun in this Life, pronounced specially by Execution. Abundance of useful Definitions subordinate you may further there see in Alstedius, and some wrong, and the chief omitted.
The vehement passages of the Doctors Conclusion I pass over; his deep sense of unsufferable Provocations, I must leave to himself; his warning of the dreadful Tribunal which I am near, it greatly concerns me to regard: And Reader, I shall think yet that his Contest (though troublesome to me that was falsely assaulted, and more to him whose detected Miscarriages are so painful to him) hath yet been Profitable beyond the Charges of it to him or me, if I have but convinced thee, that 1. Sound mental Conceptions of so much as is necessary to our own Justification, much differ from proper Logical Definitions: And that, 2. Many millions are Justified that cannot define it: 3. And that Logical Definitions are Works of Art more than of Grace, which require so much Acuteness and Skill, that even worthy and excellent Teachers may be, and are disagreed about them, especially through the great ambiguity of Words; which all understand not in the same sense, and few are sufficiently suspicious of, and diligent to explain. 4. And therefore that our Christian Love, Peace, and Concord, should not be laid upon such Artificial things. 5. And that really the Generality of Protestants are agreed mostly in the Matter, when they quarrel sharply about many Artificial Notions and Terms in the point of Justification. (And yet after all this, I shall as earnestly as this Doctor, desire and labor for accurateness in Distinguishing, Defining and Method, though I will not have such things to be Engines of Church-Division.)
And lastly, Because he so oft and earnestly presseth me with his Quem quibus, who is the Man, I profess I dreamed not of any particular Man: But I will again tell you whom my Judgment magnifies in this Controversy above all others, and who truly tell you how far Papists and Protestants agree, viz. Vinc. le Blank, and Guil. Forbes, (I meddle not with his other Subjects), Placeus (in Thes. Salmur.) Davenant, Dr. Field, Mr. Scudder (his daily Walk, fit for all families) Mr. Wotton, Mr. Bradshaw, and Mr. Gataker, Dr. Preston, Dr. Hammond, (Pract. Cat.) and Mr. Lawson (in the main) Abundance of the French and Breme Divines are also very clear. And though I must not provoke him again by naming some late English men, to reproach them by calling them my disciples, I will venture to tell the plain man that loveth not our wrangling tediousness, that Mr. Trumans Great Propit. and Mr. Gibbons serm. of Justif. may serve him well without anymore.
And while this worthy Doctor and I do both concord with such as Davenant and Field as to Justification by Faith or Works, judge whether we differ between ourselves as far as he would persuade the World, who agree in tertio? And whether as he hath angrily professed his concord in the two other Controversies which he raised (our Guilt of nearer Parents sin, and our preferring the judgment of the wisest, &c.) it be not likely that he will do so also in this, when he hath leisure to read and know what it is that I say and hold, and when we both understand ourselves and one another. And whether it be a work worthy of Good and Learned men, to allarm Christians against one another for the sake of arbitrary words and notions (which one partly useth less aptly and skillfully than the other) in matters wherein they really agree.
2 Tim. 2. 14. Charging them before the Lord that they strive not about words, to no profit, but to the subverting of the Hearers (yet) study to show thyself approved unto God, a workman that need not be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of Truth
Two Sparks more quenched, which fled after the rest from the Forge of Dr. Tho. Tully.
§. 1. DId I not find that some Men's Ignorance and factious Jealousy is great enough to make them combustible Recipients of such Wildfire as those Strictures are; and did not Charity oblige me to do what I have here done, to save the assaulted Charity of such Persons, more than to save any Reputation of my own, I should repent that I had written one Line in answer to such Writings as I have here had to do with: I have been so wearied with the haunts of the like Spirit, in Mr. Crandon, Mr. Bagshaw, Mr. Danvers, and others, that it is a work I have not patience to be much longer in, unless it were more necessary.
Two sheets more tell us that the Doctor is yet angry; And little that's better that I can find. In the first, he saith again, that [I am busy in smoothing my way where none can stumble in, a thing never questioned by him, nor by any Man else, he thinks, who owns the Authority of the second Commandment]. And have I not then good Company and Encouragement not to change my Mind?
But, 1. He feigneth a Case stated between him and me, who never had to do with him before, but as with others in my Writings, where I state my Case myself. 2. He never so much as toucheth either of my Disputations of Original Sin, in which I state my Case and defend it. 3. And he falsely feigneth the Case stated, in words (and he supposeth in a sense) that I never had do do with: Saying, [I charge you with a new secondary Original Sin, whose Pedegree is not from Adam: I engage not a syllable further]. And pag. 8. [You have asserted that this Novel Original Sin is not derived from our Original Father; no line of Communication between them; a sin besides that which is derived from Adam, as you plainly and positively affirm]. I never said that it had no Pedegree, no line of Communication, no kind of derivation from Adam. 4. Yea, if he would not touch the Disputation where I state my Case, he should have noted it as stated in the very Preface which he writeth against; and yet there also he totally overlooketh it, though opened in divers Propositions. 5. And the words in an Epistle to another Mans Book, which he fasteneth still on were these; [Over-looking the Interest of Children in the Actions of their nearer Parents, and think that they participate of no Guilt, and suffer for no Original Sin, but Adams only]. And after, [They had more Original Sin than what they had from Adam]. 6. He tells me, that [I seem not to understand my own Question, nor to know well how to set about my Work]; and he will teach me how to manage the Business that I have undertaken, and so he tells me how I MUST state the Question hereafter, (see his words). Reader, some Reasons may put a better Title on this Learned Doctors actions; but if ever I write at this rate, I heartily desire thee to cast it away as utter DISHONESTY and IMPUDENCE.
It troubleth me to trouble thee with Repetitions. I hold, 1. That Adams Sin is imputed (as I opened) to his Posterity. 2. That the degree of Pravity which Cain's nature received from Adam, was the dispositive inclining Cause of all his Actual Sin: 3. But not a necessitating Cause of all those Acts; for he might possibly have done less evil and more good than he did. 4. Therefore not the Total principal Cause; for Cain's free-will was part of that. 5. Cain's actual sin increased the pravity of his nature. 6. And Cain's Posterity were (as I opened it) guilty of Cain's actual sin; and their Natures were the more depraved by his additional pravity, than they would have been by Adams sin alone (unless Grace preserved or healed any of them).
The Doctor in this Paper, would make his Reader believe that he is [for no mere Logomachies] and that the difference is not in words only, but the thing. And do you think that he differeth from me in any of these Propositions, or how this sin is derived from Adam? Yet this now must be the Controversy de re.
Do you think (for I must go by thinking) that he holdeth any other Derivation than this? Or did I ever deny any of this? But it is vain to state the Case to him: He will overlook it, and tell me what I should have held, that he may not be thought to make all this Noise for nothing.
He saith pag 8. [If it derive in a direct line from the first Transgression, and have its whole Root fastened there, what then? why then some words which he sets together are not the best sense that can be spoken. It is then but words, and yet it is the thing: What he may mean by [a direct Line], and what by [whole Root fastened] I know not; but I have told the World oft enough what I mean; and what he meaneth, I have little to do with.
But if he think, 1. That Adams Person did commit the sin of Cain, and of all that ever were since committed; and that Judas his act, was Adams personal act. 2. Or that Adams sin was a total or necessitating