"You will not come unto me that ye might have life," i. e. You will not use the power, which my preventing grace has given you, that you might live here a life of faith and holiness, and be hereafter rewarded with a life of happiness and glory:In a word, I should give up the second gospel-axion, and tacitly reproach my Maker, who says "6 Why will ye die, O house of Israel? for I have no pleasure in the death of him that dieth, wherefore turn yourselves, and live ye." *3. To convince you, that free-agency, and a right use of it, are by no means inconsistent with divine grace and genuine humility, I ask, Did not God endue our first parents with free-will? Are not even some rigid Calvinists ashamed to deny it? If free-will in man is a power dishonourable to God, did not our wise Creator mistake when he pronounced man very good, at the very time that man was a free-willer? For, how could man be very good, if he had within him a power that necessarily militates against the honour of God, as the Calvinists affirm free-will does? *4. I go one step farther and ask, Did God ever endue one child of Adam with power to avoid one sin?-If you say, No: you contradict the Scriptures, your own conscience, and the consciences of all mankind; you fix the blot of folly on all the judges, who have judicially punished malefactors with death; and, when you insinuate, that the Lawgiver of the universe will send all workers of iniquity into hell, for not "doing what is lawful and right to save their souls alive;" or for not avoiding sin, when he never gave them the least power personally so, to do; you pour almost as much contempt upon his perfections, as if you said, that he will one day raise all creeping insects, to judge them according to their steps, and to cast into a place of torment as many as did not move as swiftly as a race horse? *If you answer in the affirmative, that God has graciously endued one child of Adam with power to avoid one sin, so far you hold free-will, as well as Moses and Jesus Christ. Now if God has bestowed free-will upon one ehild of Adam, with respect to the avoiding of one sin; why not upon two, with respect to the avoiding of two sins? Why not upon all, with respect to the avoiding of all the sins, that are incompatible with the obedience of faith? 5. Again, as it would be absurd to say, that God gave a power to avoid one sin, only to one child of Adam: so it would be impious to suppose, God gave him this power, that, in case he faithfully used it, he should necessarily boast of it. Pharisaic boasting is then by no means the necessary consequence of our moral liberty, or of a proper use of our free-will. Thus it appears, that your specious objection is founded upon an heap of paradoxes; and that to embrace free-wrath, lest we should not make enough of free-grace, and to jump into fatalism, lest we should be proud of our free-will, is not less absurd than to run to an house of ill fame, lest we should be proud of our chastity. 6. Our doctrine secures the honour of free-grace as well as Calvinism. You will be convinced of it, if you consider the following articles of our creed with respect to freegrace. 1. Before the Fall, the free-grace of our Creator gave us in Adam holiness, happiness, and a power to continue in both. 2. Since the fall, the free-grace of our Redeemer indulges us with a reprieve, an accepted time, a day of visitation and salvation; in a word, with a better covenant, and a "free gift, that is come upon all men unto [initial] justification of life," Rom. v., 18., 3. That nothing may be wanting on God's part, the free grace of our sanctifier excites us to make a proper use of the free gift, part of which is moral liberty. 4. Thus even our free-will, to good, is all of creating, redeeming, and sanetifying grace: therefore, with regard to that glorious power, as well as to every other talent, we humbly ask with St. Paul, "What hast thou,that thou hast not received?" 5. This is not all: we are commanded to account the long-suffering of God [a degree of] salvation; and so it is: for without forcing, or necessarily inclining our will, God's providential free-grace disposes a thousand circumstances in such a manner, as to second the calls of the everlasting gospel. The gra cious Preserver of men works daily a thou sand wonders to keep us out of the grave and out of hell: a thousand wheels have turned ten thousand times in and out of the church, to bring us the purest streams of gos. pel truth. Countless breathings of the Spirit of grace, add virtue to those streams; freegrace therefore not only prevents, but also in numberless ways accompanies, follows, directs, encourages, and assists us in all the work of our salvation. * And yet, while God thus works in us, as the God of all grace, both to will and to do of his good pleasure, that is, while he thus gives us the faculty to will, and the power to do; and while he secretly by his Spirit, and publicly by his ministers and providences, excites us to make a proper use of that faculty and power; yet, as the God of wisdom, holiness, and justice, he leaves the act to our choice; thus treating us as rational creatures, whom he intends wisely to reward or justly to punish according to their works, and not according to his own. *Hence it appears that we go every step of the way with our Calvinist brethren, while they exalt Christ and free-grace in a rational and scriptural manner and that we refuse to follow them only when they set Christ at nought as a Prophet, a Lawgiver, a Judge, and a King; under pretence of extolling him as a priest; or when they put wanton free-grace, and unrelenting free-wrath, in the place of the genuine free-grace testified of in the scriptures. IV. OBJ. "One more difficulty remains: if I freely obey the gospel and am saved: and if my neighbour freely disobeys it, and is damned, what makes me to differ from him? Is it not my free obedience of faith?" *ANS. Undoubtedly: and his free disobedi ence makes him differ from you or it would be very absurd judicially, to acquit and reward you rather than him, according to your works. And it would be strange duplicity to condemn and punish him, rather than you in a day of judgment, after the most solemn protesta tions, that equity and impartiality shall dictate the Judge's sentence. As to the difficulty arising from St. Paul's question, 1 Cor. iv. 7. "Who maketh thee to differ?” To what I have said about it in the preceding sermon, I add : 1. According to the covenant of works," all fall short of the glory of God:" and when any one asks, with respect to the law of innocence, "Who makes thee to differ?" The proper answer is, "There is no difference every mouth must be stopped: all the world is guilty be fore God:" 66 Enter not into judgment with thy servant, O Lord," But, according to the covenant of grace, be that freely believes and obeys in the strength of free-grace, undoubtedly makes himself to differ from him, that by obstinate disobedience does despite to the Spirit of grace. If this point is given up, the Diana and the Apollo, or rather the Apolly on of the Antinomians [I mean wanton free grace and merciless free-wrath] are set up for ever. However, 2. If the question, Who maketh thee to differ? Is asked with respect to the number of our talents, the proper answer is, "God's distinguishing grace alone maketh us to differ." And that this is the sense, which the apostle had in view, is evident from the context. He had before reproved the Corinthians for saying every one, I am of Paul, and I of Apollos, &c. and now he adds, "These things I have in a figure transferred to my self and to Apollos, that ye might learn in us not to think [of gifted, popular men, or of yourselves] above that which is written, that no one of you be puffed up one against another; for who maketh thee to differ?" Why is thy person graceful? And why art thou naturally an eloquent man like Apollos, whilst thy brother's speech is rude, and his bodily presence weak and contemptible like mine? But, * 3. If you ask, Who maketh thee to differ with respect to the improvement or non-improvement of our gifts and graces? If you enquire, whether God necessitates some to disbelieve, that they might necessarily sin and be damned; while he necessitates others to believe that they may necessarily work righteousness and be saved; I utterly deny ३ the last assertion; and in this sense St. Paul, answers his own misapplied question thus, Be not deceived: what a man (not what God) soweth, that shall he also reap, perdition if he soweth to the flesh, and eternal life if he soweth to the Spirit. Nor am I either afraid or ashamed to second him by saying upon the walls of Jerusalem, that in the lastmentioned sense, We make ourselves to differ. And scripture, reason, conscience, the divine perfections, and the trumpet of God, which will soon summon us to judgment, testify, that this reply stands as firm as one half of the Bible, and the second gospel-axiom on which it is immoveably 'founded. * Nay, there is not a promise or a threatening in the Bible, that is not a proof of our Lawgiver's want of wisdom, or of our Judge's want of equity, if we are not graciously en. dued with a capacity to make ourselves differ from the obstinate violaters of the law, and despisers of the gospel; that is, if we are not free-agents. There is not an exhor tation, a warning, or an entreaty in the sacred pages, that is not a demonstration of the penman's folly, or of the freedom of our will. In a word, there is not a sinner justly punished in hell, or a believer wisely rewarded in heaven, that does not indirectly say to all the world of rationals: "Though the God of grace draws thee to obedience; yet it is with the bands of a man. For after all, he leaves thee in the hands of thy counsel, to keep the commandments, and perform acceptable obedience if thou wilt. Before man is life and death, and whether him liketh, shall be given him." Eccles. xv. 14, &c. But, although your obedience of faith makes you to differ from your condemned neighbour, you have no reason to reject the first gospel-axiom, and to indulge a boasting+ contrary to faith; of this St. Paul speaks, where he + There is a two-fold glorying; the one Pharisaic and says, BOASTING is excluded &c. by the law of faith, Rom. iii. 27. The other, evangelical and agreeable to faith; since it is a believer's holy triumph in God, recerning it the Apostle says, Let every man prove his sulting from the testimony of a good conscience. Conown work, and then shall he have rejoicing, (BOASTING) in himself alone, and not in another, Gal. vi. 4. and Kauchema in the other.] These seemingly con[The word in the original] is Kauchesis in one passage, trary doctrines are highly consistent: their opposition answering to that of the gospel-axioms. The first alone fulfilled the law of works, or the terms of the axiom allows of no glorying but in Christ, who has first covenant: But the second-axiom allows obedient believers an humble Kauchema, upon their personally fulfilling the law of faith, or the gracious terms of the second covenant, 2 Cor, i. 12. This Kauchema answers to what St. Paul calls the witness of our own spirit; or the testimony of a good conscience, which next to the witness of the word and Spirit concerning God's merey and Christ's blood, is the ground of a Christian's confidence. Beloved, if our heart condemn us not, then have we confidence towards God, &c. because we keep his commandments 1 John iii. 21, 22. And yet, astonishing! this blessed Kauchema, so strongly recomknew something of the gospel, is now represented by some mended by St Paul, and St, John, who, one would think modern evangelists, as the quintessence of Pharisaism! contrary to faith and free-grace: for your Christian faith, which is the root of your obedience, is peculiarly the gift of God; whether you consider it as to its precious Seed (the word nigh :) as to its glorious Object (Christ and the truth :) as to the Means by which that object is revealed (such as preaching and hearing) as to the Opportunities and Faculties of using those means (such as life, reason, &c.) or as to the Spirit of Grace, whose assistance in this case is so important, that he is called the Spirit of Faith. And yet that Spirit does not act irresistibly; all believers freely yielding to it; and all unbelievers freely resisting it; so far only does the matter turn upon free-will. Thus it appears that although the act of faith is ours, we are so much indebted to free-grace for it, that believers can no more boast of being their own saviours, because they daily believe and work in order to their final salvation; than they can boast of being their own preservers, because they daily breathe, and eat, in order to their continued preservation.> On the other hand, although your condemned neighbour's disobedience makes him differ from you, he has no reason to reject the second gospel axiom, and to exculpate him self by charging heaven with capricious partiality and horrid free-wrath; because God, whose mercy is over all his works, and who is no respecter of persons, graciously bestow ed a talent of free-grace upon him as well as upon you, according to one or another of the divine dispensations: for the royal master «mentioned in the gospel, gave a pound to the servant that buried it, as well as to him that gained ten pounds by occupying till his Lord " to the poor :-His shocking by preternatural earthquakes the consciences of the Philippian jailor, and the two malefactors that suffered with him. If you mean this, by distinguishing grace, we are agreed: for, grace displayed in as distinguishing a manner as it was toward Capernaum, Chorazin, and Bethsaida, greatly illustrates our Lord's doc trine: "Of him to whom little is given, little shall be required; but much shall be required of them, that have received much," the equality of God's ways not consisting in giving to all men a like number of talents, any more than making them all archangels; but in treating them equally, according to the various editions of the everlasting gospel, or law of liberty; and according to the good or bad uses they have made of their talents, whether they had few or many. *To return to your grand objection: You suppose (and this is probably the ground of your mistake) that when a deliverance, or a divine favour turns upon some thing, which we may do, or leave undone at our option, God is necessarily robbed of his glory. But a few queries will easily convince you of your mistake. When God had been merciful to Lot and his family, not looking back, made all the difference between him and his wife; but does it follow, that he claimed the honour of his narrow escape? Looking at the brazen type of Christ made some Israelites differ from others, that died of the bite of the fiery serpents; but is this a sufficient reason to conclude, that the healed men had not sense to distinguish between primary and secondary causes, and that they ascribed to their looks the glory due to God, for graciously contriving the means of their cure? One of your neighbours has hanged, and another has poisoned himself: so that not hanging yourself, and taking wholesome food has so far made the difference between you and them: but can you reasonably infer, that you do not live by divine bounty, and that I rob the Preserver of men of his glory, when I affirm that you shall surely die if you do not eat, or if you take poison? "But, upon that footing, what becomes of distinguishing Grace?" If by distinguish. ing grace, you mean calvinistic partiality, I answer, it must undoubtedly sink, together with its inseparable partner, unconditional reprobation, into the pit of error whence they ascended to fill the church with contentions, and the world with infidels. But if you mean scriptural distinguishing grace, that is, the manifold wisdom of God, which makes him Permit me to make you sensible of your proceed gradually, and admit a pleasing va- mistake by one more illustration. An antiriety in the works of grace, as well as in the Calvinist, who observes that God has susproductions of nature; if you mean his good pended many of his blessings upon industry, pleasure to give the Heathens one talent, the diligently ploughs, sows, and weeds his field. Jews two, the papists three, the protestants A fatalist over the way, lest free-grace should four: or if you mean the different methods, not have all the glory of his crop, does not which he uses to call sinners to repentance, turn one clod, and expects seed to drop from such has his familiar expostulation with the clouds into furrows made by an invisible Cain; his wonderful warning of Lot's sons- plough on a certain day, which he calls" in-law; his rousing king Saul by the voice day of God's power." When harvest comes, of Samuel, and Saul of Tarsus by the voice of Christ; [Samuel and Christ coming from the invisible world for that awful purpose]-His audibly inviting Judas, and the rich ruler, to follow him, promising the latter heavenly treasure, if he would give his earthly possessions a This is not spoken of pious Calvinists, for some of them are remarkably diligent in good works. They are Solifidians by halves-in principle, but not in practice. Their works outshine their errors. I lay nothing to their charge but inattention, prejudice, and glaring inconsistency. the one has a crop of wheat, and the other a THIRD PART. Flattering myself, that the preceding answers have removed the reader's prejudices, or confirmed him in his attachment to genuine free-grace, which stands at an equal distance from wantonness and free-wrath; I shall con clude this Essay by some reflections upon the pride, or prejudices of those who scruple working with an eye to the rewards, that God ofers to promote the obedience of faith. precious grace of faith, so far as it is exer. cised about divine promises and threatenings, is indirectly made void. 2. It decries godly fear, a grand spring of action, and preservative of holiness in all free agents, that are in a state of probation; and by this means it indirectly charges God with want of wisdom, for putting that spring in the breast of innocent man in Paradise, and for perpetually working upon it in his word and by his Spirit, whom St. Paul calls the Spirit of bondage unto fear: because he helps us to believe the threatenings denounced against the workers of iniquity, and to fear lest ruin should overtake us, if we continue in our sins. If ever there was a visible Church without spot and wrinkle, it was when "the multitude of them that believed, were of one heart and of one soul. The worldly-mindedness of Ananias and Sapphira was the first blemish of the Christian, as Achan's covetousness had been of the Jewish Church on this side Jorhad done of Achan, and St. Luke observes, dan. God made an example of them as be that upon it, Great fear came upon all the church: even such fear as kept them from falling after the same example of unbelief. Now were all the primitive Christians mean spirited people, because they were filled with great fear of being punished as the first backsliders if they apostatized? Is it a reproach to righteous Noah, that "Being moved with be a crown of life, is to act as a mercenary fear he prepared an ark for the saving of his wretch, and not as a duteous child, or a faith-house?" And did our Lord legalize the gosful servant." "If heaven, [say such mistaken persons] if the enjoyment of God in glory, is the reward of obedience; and if you work with an eye to that reward, you act from self, the basest of all motives. Love, and not self-interest, sets us, true believers, upon action: We work from gratitude, and not for profit; from life, and not for life: To do good with an eye to a reward, though that reward should This specious error, zealously propagated by Molinos, Madam Guion, and her illustrious convert, Archbishop Fenelon [though after wards renounced by him] put a stop to that great revival of the power of godliness abroad in the last century; and it has already struck a fatal blow at the late revival in these kingdoms. I reverence and love many that contend for this sentiment; but, my regard for truth, overbalancing my respect for them, I think it my duty to oppose their mistake, as a pernicious refinement of Satan transformed into an angel of light: I therefore attack it by the following arguments. 1. This doetrine sets aside, at a stroke, a considerable part of the Bible, which consists in threatening's to deter evil workers, and in promises to encourage obedient believers: For, if it is base to obey, in order to obtain a promised reward, it is baser still to do it in order to avoid a threatened punishment. Thus the The reader is desired to observe, that we recommended working from life and gratitude, as well as our opponents. Life and thankfulness, are two important springs of action, which we use as well as they But thankfulness and life, are not all the springs necessary, in our imperfect state, to move all the wheels of obedience; and we dare no more exclude the other springs, because we have these two; than we dare to cut off three of our fingers, because we have a little finger, and a thumb. pel, when" he began to say to his disciples Promises, and good things to come. clares, “Every man that hath this hope in all believers, "I am thy exceeding great 4. God says to Abraham, and in him to Reward:" Hence it follows, that the higher we rise in holiness and obedience, the nearer we shall be admitted to the eternal throne and the fuller enjoyment we shall have of our God and Saviour, our Reward and Rewarder. Therefore to overlook divine rewards, is to overlook God himself, who is our great Reward; and to slight the life to come, of which godliness has the Promise. 5. This error, I suppose, may be put in a still stronger light. Not to strive to obtain our great reward in full, amounts to saying: Lord, thou art beneath my aim and pursuit: I can do without thee, or without so much of thee. I will not bestir myself, and do one thing to obtain either the fruition, or a fuller enjoyment of thy adorable self." Wo to him that striveth in generosity with his Maker! Let the potsherd strive thus with the potsherds of the earth; but let not the clay say to him that fashioneth it, "What doest thou, when thou stirrest me up to good works by the promise of thy rewards? Surely, Lord, thou forgettest, that the nobleness of my mind, and my doctrine of finished salvation, make me above running for a reward, though it should be a life of glory and Thyself. Whatever I do at thy command, I am determined not to demean myself; I will do it as Araunah, like a king." What depths of Antinomian pride may be hid under the covering of our voluntary humility. 6. The Calvinists of the last century in their lucid intervals, saw the absolute necessity of working for heaven and heavenly rewards. We have a good, practical discourse of John Bunyan upon these words, "So run that you may obtain." The burden of it is, "If you will have heaven, you must run for it." Whence he calls his sermon, "The Heavenly Footman." And Matthew Mead, a staunch Calvinist in his treatise on The good of early obedience, p. 429, says with great truth: "Maintain an holy, filial fear of God: This is an excellent preservative against apostacy. By the fear of the Lord men depart from evil, says Solomon; and he tells you, The fear of the Lord is the fountain of life whereby men depart from the snares of death; and backsliding from Christ is one of the great snares of death. Think much of the day of recompence, and of the glorious reward of perseverance in that day: Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life.' It is not those that begin well, but those that end well that receive the crown. It is not mercenary service to quicken ourselves to obedience by the hope of a recompence. Omnis amor mercedis non est mercenarius &c. David said, 'I have hoped for thy salvation, and done thy commandments.' He encouraged himself to duty by the hope of glory, &c. Hope of that glorious recompence is of great service to quicken us to perseverance. And to the same end does the Apostle urge it: Be unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, for as much as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord.'' 7. When voluntary humility has made us wise above what is written by the Apostles, and by our forefathers, it will make us look down with contempt from the top of our fancied orthodoxy, upon the motives, by which the prophets took up their cross, to serve God and their generation. When St. Paul enumerates the works of Moses, he traces them back to their noble principle, faith working by a well-ordered self-love: [a love this, which is inseparable from the love of God and man; the law of liberty binding us to love our neighbour as ourselves, and God above ourselves :] "He chose, says the apostle, to suffer affliction with the people of God, rather than to enjoy the pleasures of sin," &c. Bit why? Because he was above looking at the prize? Just the reverse because he had respect to the recompence of reward, Heb. xi. 26. 8. In the next chapter, the apostle bids us take Christ himself for our pattern in the very thing, which our gospel-refiners call mercenary: 66 Looking to Jesus, says he, who, for the joy that was set before him, endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God?" the noble reward this, with which his mediatorial obedience was crowned, as appears from these words, 'He became obedient, unto death; wherefore God also hath highly exalted him." If the scheme of those who refine the ancient gospel appears to me in a peculiarly-unfavourable light, it is when I see them impose upon the injudicious admirers of unscriptural humility, and make the simple believe, that they do God service when they indirectly represent Christ's obeence unto death as imperfect, and him as mercenary, actuated by a motive unworthy of a child of God. that is perfect, shall be as his master:" but we [such is our consistency !] loudly decry perfection, and yet pretend to an higher de gree of it than our Lord and Master: For he was not above enduring the cross for the joy of sitting down at the right hand of the throne of God: but we are so exquisitely perfect, that we will work gratis. It is mercenary! it is beneath us to work for glory! He says, 66 Every one 9. St. Paul's conduct with respect to rewards, was perfectly consistent with his doctrine. I have already observed, he wrote to the Corinthians, that he, "so ran and so fought, as to obtain an incorruptible crown;" and it is well known, that in the Olympic games, to which he alludes, all ran or fought with an eye to a prize, a reward or a crown. But in his epistle to the Philippians, he goes still farther; for he represents his running for a crown of life, his pressing after rewards of grace and glory, as the whole of his business. His words are remarkable : one thing I do; forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those "This |