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ART. another nature to them. In this single instance we plainly X. see, that there was no previous disposition to the first preaching of the Gospel at Ephesus: many expressions of this kind, though perhaps not of this force, are in the other Epistles. St. Paul, in his Epistle to the Romans, Rom. iv. 2. puts God's choosing of Abraham upon this, that it was of grace, not of debt, otherwise Abraham might have had whereof to glory. And when he speaks of God's casting off the Jews, and grafting the Gentiles upon that stock from which they were cut off, he ascribes it wholly to the Rom.xi. 20. goodness of God towards them, and charges them not to be high minded, but to fear. In his Epistle to the Corin1 Cor. i. 26, thians he says, that not many wise, mighty, nor noble, were 27, 29.

chosen, but God had chosen the foolish, the weak, and the base things of this world, so that no flesh should glory in his presence: and he urges this farther, in words that seem to be as applicable to particular persons, as to communities or 1 Cor. iv. 7. churches: Who maketh thee to differ from another? and what hast thou, that thou didst not receive? Now if thou didst receive it, why dost thou glory as if thou hadst not received it? From these and many more passages of the like nature Isa. Ixv. 1. it is plain, that in the promulgation of the Gospel, God was found of them that sought not to him, and heard of them that called not upon him; that is, he prevented them by his favour, while there were no previous dispositions in them to invite it, much less to merit it. From this it may be inferred, that the like method should be used with relation to particular persons.

14.

We do find very express instances in the New Testament of the conversion of some by a preventing grace: it is said, Acts xvi. that God opened the heart of Lydia, so that she attended to the things that were spoken of Paul. The conversion of St. Paul himself was so clearly from a preventing grace, that if it had not been miraculous in so many of its circumstances, it would have been a strong argument in behalf of it. These words John i. 13. of Christ seem also to assert it; Without me ye can do noxv.5, 16. thing; ye have not chosen me, but I you; and no man can come to me, except the Father which has sent me draw him. Those who received Christ were born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of the will of God. God is said to work in us both to will and to do of his own good pleasure: the one seems to import the first beginnings, and the other the progress of a Christian course of life. So far all among us, that I know of, are agreed, though perhaps not as to the force that is in all those places to prove this point.

Phil. ii. 13.

There do yet remain two points in which they do not

agree; the one is the efficacy of this preventing grace; some think that it is of its own nature so efficacious, that it never fails of converting those to whom it is given; others think that it only awakens and disposes, as well as it enables them to turn to God, but that they may resist it, and that the greater part of mankind do actually resist it. The examining of this point, and the stating the arguments on both sides, will belong more properly to the seventeenth Article. The other head, in which many do differ, is concerning the extent of this preventing grace; for whereas such as do hold it to be efficacious of itself, restrain it to the number of those who are elected and converted by it; others do believe, that as Christ died for all men, so there is an universal grace which is given in Christ to all men, in some degree or other, and that it is given to all baptized Christians in a more eminent degree; and that as all are corrupted by Adam, there is also a general grace given to all men in Christ. This depends so much on the former point, that the discussing the one is indeed the discussing of both; and therefore it shall not be farther entered upon in this place.

ART.

X.

ARTICLE XI.

Of the Justification of Man.

We are accounted Righteous before God only for the Merit of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, by Faith, and not for our own Works or Deservings. Wherefore that we are justified by Faith only, is a most wholesome Doctrine, and very full of Comfort, as more largely is expressed in the Homily of Justification.

IN N order to the right understanding this Article, we must first consider the true meaning of the terms of which it is made up; which are Justification, Faith, Faith only, and Good Works; and then, when these are rightly stated, we will see what judgments are to be passed upon the questions that do arise out of this Article. Just, or justified, are words capable of two senses; the one is, a man who is in the favour of God by a mere act of his grace, or upon some consideration not founded on the holiness or the merit of the person himself. The other is, a man who is truly holy, and as such is beloved of God. The use of this word in the New Testament was probably taken from the term Chasidim among the Jews, a designation of such as observed the external parts of the law strictly, and were believed to be upon that account much in the favour of God; an opinion being generally spread among them, that a strict observance of the external parts of the Law of Moses did certainly put a man in the favour of God. In opposition to which, the design of a great part of the New Testament is to shew, that these things did not put men in the favour of Joh. iii. 18. God. Our Saviour used the word saved in opposition to condemned; and spoke of men who were condemned already, as well as of others who were saved. St. Paul enlarges more fully into many discourses; in which our being justified and the righteousness of God, or his grace towards us, are all terms equivalent to one another. His design in the Epistle to the Romans was to prove that the observance of the Mosaical Law could not justify, that is, could not put a man under the grace or favour of God, or the righteousness of God, that is, into a state of acceptation with him, as that is opposite to a state of wrath or condemnation: he upon that shews that Abraham was in the favour

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22.

Rom. iii.24.

of God before he was circumcised, upon the account of ART. his trusting to the promises of God, and obeying his XI. commands; and that God reckoned upon these acts of his, as much as if they had been an entire course of obedience; for that is the meaning of these words, And it Gen. xv. 6. was imputed to him for righteousness. These promises were Rom. iv. 3, freely made to him by God, when by no previous works of his he had made them to be due to him of debt; therefore that covenant which was founded on those promises, was the justifying of Abraham freely by grace. Upon which St. Paul, in a variety of inferences and expressions, assumes, that we are in like manner justified freely by grace through the redemption in Christ Jesus. That God has of his own free goodness offered a new covenant, and new and better promises to mankind in Christ Jesus, which whosoever believe as Abraham did, they are justified as he was. So that whosoever will observe the scope of St. Paul's Epistles to the Romans and Galatians, will see that he always uses justification in a sense that imports our being put in the favour of God. The Epistle to the Galatians was indeed writ upon the occasion of another controversy, which was, whether, supposing Christ to be the Messias, Christians were bound to observe the Mosaical Law, or not: whereas the scope of the first part of the Epistle to the Romans is, to shew that we are not justified nor saved by the Law of Moses, as a mean of its own nature capable to recommend us to the favour of God, but that even that Law was a dispensation of grace, in which it was a true faith like Abraham's that put men in the favour of God; yet in both these Epistles, in which justification is fully treated of, it stands always for the receiving one into the favour of God.

In this the consideration upon which it is done, and the condition upon which it is offered, are two very different things. The one is a dispensation of God's mercy, in which he has regard to his own attributes, to the honour of his laws, and his government of the world: the other is the method in which he applies that to us; in such a manner, that it may have such ends as are both perfective of human nature, and suitable to an infinitely holy Being to pursue. We are never to mix these two together, or to imagine that the condition, upon which justification is offered to us, is the consideration that moves God; as if our holiness, faith, or obedience, were the moving cause of our justification; or that God justifies us, because he sees that we are truly just for though it is not to be denied, but that, in some places of the New Testa

XI.

ART. ment, justification may stand in that sense, because the word in its true signification will bear it; yet in these two Epistles, in which it is largely treated of, nothing is plainer, than that the design is to shew us what it is that brings us to the favour of God, and to a state of pardon and acceptation: so that justification in those places stands in opposition to accusation and condemnation.

The next term to be explained is faith; which in the New Testament stands generally for the complex of Christianity, in opposition to the Law, which stands as generally for the complex of the whole Mosaical dispensation. So that the faith of Christ is equivalent to this, the Gospel of Christ; because Christianity is a foederal religion, founded, on God's part, on the promises that he has made to us, and on the rules he has set us; and on our part, on our believing that revelation, our trusting to those promises, and our setting ourselves to follow those rules: the believing this revelation, and that great article of it, of Christ's being the Son of God, and the true Messias that came to reveal his Father's will, and to offer himself up to be the sacrifice of this new covenant, is often represented as the great and only condition of the covenant on our part; but still this faith must receive the whole Gospel, the precepts as well as the promises of it, and receive Christ as a Prophet to teach, and a King to rule, as well as a Priest to save us.

By faith only, is not to be meant faith as it is separated from the other evangelical graces and virtues; but faith, as it is opposite to the rites of the Mosaical Law: for that was the great question that gave occasion to St. Paul's writing so fully upon this head; since many Judaizing Christians, as they acknowledged Christ to be the true Messias, so they thought that the Law of Moses was still to retain its force: in opposition to whom St. Paul says, Rom. iii.28. that we are justified by faith, without the works of the Law. Gal. ii. 16. It is plain that he means the Mosaical dispensation, for he Rom. ii. 12. had divided all mankind into those who were in the Law,

and those who were without the Law: that is, into Jews and Gentiles. Nor had St. Paul any occasion to treat of any other matter in those Epistles, or to enter into nice abstractions, which became not one that was to instruct the world in order to their salvation: those metaphysical notions are not easily apprehended by plain men, not accustomed to such subtilties, and are of very little value, when they are more critically distinguished: yet when it seems some of those expressions were wrested to an ill sense and use, St. James treats of the same matter, but

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