- intended unto it thereby. And shall we now, can we, entertain any other thoughts of it but that (having constantly hitherto been denied and opposed by the most zealous, painful, godly, successful preachers of the gospel that these latter ages have been, through the goodness of God, blessed withal, entertained chiefly by men of loose, dissolute principles and practices, enemies to the power of godliness and the profession thereof, and strongly suspected to corrupt the minds and conversations of men that do embrace it) it is the only serviceable relief and assistance for the making of the ministry of the gospel useful and fruitful, ingenerating holiness and obedience in the lives and ways of men?

CHAPTER XIV.

ARGUMENT AGAINST THE DOCTRINE FROM THE EXHORTATIONS
OF THE GOSPEL.

Mr G.'s third argument proposed and considered-The drama borrowed by Mr G. to make good this argument-The frame of speech ascribed to God by the Remonstrants, according to our doctrine, weighed and considered-The dealing of God with man, and the importance of his exhortations, according to the doctrine of the saints' perseverance, manifested-In what sense and to what end exhortations and threatenings are made to believers-The fallacious ground of this argument of Mr G.-Mr G.'s fourth argument proposed to consideration, considered-Eternal life, how and in what sense a reward of perseverance-The enforcement of the major proposition considered-The proposition new moulded, to make it of concernment to our doctrine, and denied, from the example of the obedience of Jesus Christ-Efficacy of grace not inconsistent with reward-The argument enforced with a new consider. ation-That consideration examined and removed-Farther of the consistency of effectual grace and gospel exhortations.

A THIRD argument is proposed, sect. 18, chap. xiii., in these words: "That doctrine which representeth God as weak, incongruous, and incoherent with himself, in his applications unto men, is not from God, and consequently that which contradicteth it must needs be the truth; but the doctrine of perseverance, opposed by us, putteth this great dishonour upon God, representeth him weak, incongruous, etc.: ergo." For the proof of the minor proposition, to make good the charge in it exhibited against the doctrine of perseverance, there is a dramatical scheme induced (to whose framing and application Mr Goodwin contributed no more but the pains of a translator, taking it from the Anti-synod., pp. 276, 277), in these words: "You that truly believe in my Son, and have been once made partakers of my Holy Spirit, and therefore are fully persuaded and assured, from my will and command given unto you in that behalf, yea, according to the infallible word of truth which you have from me, that you cannot possibly, no, not by all the most horrid sins and abominable prac

tices that you shall or can commit, fall away either totally or finally from your faith, for in the midst of your foulest actions and courses there remains a seed in you which is sufficient to make you true believers, and to preserve you from falling away finally, so that it is impossible you should die in your sins; you that know and are assured that I will, by an irresistible hand, work perseverance in you, and consequently that you are out of all danger of condemnation, and that heaven and salvation belong unto you, and are as good as yours already, so that nothing but giving of thanks appertains to you, which also you know that I will, do what you will in the meantime, necessitate you unto;-you, I say, that are fully and thoroughly persuaded and possessed with the truth of all these things, I earnestly charge, admonish, exhort, and beseech, that you take heed to yourselves that ye continue in the faith, that there be not at any time an evil heart of unbelief in any to depart from the living God, that you fall not from your own steadfastness. Yea, I declare and profess unto you, that if you shall draw back, my soul shall have no pleasure in you; that if you shall deny me, I will deny you; that if you be again overcome of the lusts of the world, and be entangled therewith, your latter end shall be worse than your beginning; that if you shall turn away, all your former righteousness shall not be remembered, but you shall die in your sins, and suffer the vengeance of eternal fire. On the other hand, if you shall continue to the end, my promise is that you shall be saved. Therefore, strive to enter in at the strait gate, quit yourselves like men, labour for the meat that endureth unto everlasting life, and be not slothful, but followers of them who through faith and patience inherit the promises.' He that shall duly weigh and consider what a senseless and indeed ridiculous incongruity there is between these exhortations, adjurations, threatenings, and latter promises, and those declarations, applications, and former promises, doubtless will confess that either the one or the other of them are not from God or according to the mind of God."

Ans. The incongruity of this fiction with the doctrine it is framed against is so easily manifested, that it will not much concern us to consider the incongruity that the several parts of it have one with another; for,

First, The whole foundation of this fanatic fabric is ridiculous in itself, and ridiculously imposed on the doctrine of perseverance: for whereas it says not that all saints have any comfortable assurance of their perseverance, and so may, by all gospel ways whatever, by promises and threatenings, be stirred up to the use of those means whereby perseverance is wrought and assurance obtained; so it says that no one saint in the world ever had, can have, or was taught to expect his perseverance, or the least sense or assurance of it, under

such an uncouth supposition as falling into and continuing in sins and abominations. The promises they have to assure them of their inseparable abode with God to the end are, "that he will write his -law in their hearts, and put his fear in their inward parts, that they shall never depart from him;" and that they shall be kept up thereto by the use of means suitable, as appointed of God for the attaining of the end proposed, being "kept by the power of God," but "through faith, unto salvation." God doth not call (nor doth the doctrine of the perseverance of the saints, or of the stability and unchangeableness of his promises in Christ to believers, assert it) any to believe that they shall never fall away from him, what sins and rebellions soever they fall into; neither hath he promised any such thing unto them, but only that he will, through his grace, preserve them in the use of means from such rebellions as are inconsistent with his love and free acceptation through Christ, according to the tenor of the covenant of grace. So that instead of the first part of this fiction, whose inconsistency with the latter is after argued, let this, according to the analogy of our doctrine, be substituted:

"You that truly believe in my Son Jesus Christ, and are made partakers of my Holy Spirit, who being heirs of the promises, and so have a right to that abundant consolation, that joy in believing, which I am willing all of you should receive, I know your fears, doubts, perplexities, and temptations, your failings, sins, and backslidings, and what sad thoughts, on the account of the evil of your own hearts and ways, you are exposed to,-as, that you shall never abide nor be able to continue with me and in my love to the end. Let the feeble knees be strengthened, and the hands that hang down be lifted up. Behold, I have ordained good works for you to walk in, as the way wherein you are to walk for the attainment of the end of your faith, the salvation of your souls. And to quicken you and stir you up hereunto, I have provided and established effectual ordinances, revealed in the word of my grace; whereunto you are to attend, and in the use of them, according to my mind, to grow up into holiness, in all manner of holy conversation, watching, fighting, resisting, contending with and against all the spiritual enemies of your souls. And as for me, this is my covenant with you, that my Spirit, which gives efficacy to all the means, ordinances, and advantages of gospel obedience, which I have afforded unto you, by whom I will fulfil in you all the good pleasure of my goodness, and the work of faith with power, so making you meet for the inheritance of the saints in light, and preserving you to my heavenly kingdom, shall never depart from you; so that you, also, having my law written in your hearts, shall never utterly and wickedly depart from me. And for such sins and follies as you shall be overtaken withal, I will graciously heal your backslidings, and receive you freely."

This is the language of the doctrine we maintain; which is not, we. full well know, obnoxious to any exceptions or consequences whatever, but such as bold and prejudiced men, for the countenance of their vain conceits and opinions, will venture at any time to impose and fasten on the most precious truths of the gospel. That God should say to believers, as is imposed on him, "fall into what sins they will, or abominations they can, yet he will have them believe that, by an irresistible hand, he will necessitate them to persevere,' -that is, in and under their apostasy, which is evidently implied in their falling into sins and abominations in the manner insisted on,-is a ridiculous fiction, to the imagination whereof the least colour is not supplied by the doctrine intended to be traduced thereby.

Secondly, For the ensuing exhortations, promises, and threatenings, as far as they are really evangelical, whose use and tendency is argued to be inconsistent with the doctrine before proposed, I have formerly manifested what is their proper use and efficacy in respect of believers; and their consistency with the truth we maintain, apprehended as it is indeed, and not vizarded with ugly and dreadful appearances, will, I presume, scarcely be called in question by any who, having "received a kingdom that cannot be moved," do know what it is to "serve God acceptably, with reverence and godly fear." It is true, they are made unto, and have their use in reference unto, them that believe and shall persevere therein; but they are not given unto them as men assured of their perseverance, but as men called to the use of means for the establishing of their souls in the ways of obedience. They are not, in the method of the gospel, irrationally happed on such intimations of unchangeable love, or proposed under such wild conditionals and suppositions as here by our author; but annexed to the appointment of those ways of grace and peace which God calls his saints unto, being suited to work upon the new nature wherewith they are endued, as spreading itself over all the faculties of their rational souls, wherein are principles fit to be excited to operation by exhortations and promises.

Thirdly, All that is indeed argumentative in this discourse is built on this foundation, that a spiritual assurance of attaining the end by the use of means is discouraging and dissuasive to the use of those means;—a proposition so uncouth in itself, so contradictory to the experience of all the saints of God, so derogatory to the glory and honour of Jesus Christ himself (who in all his obedience had, doubtless, an assurance of the end of it all), as any thing that can well fall into the imaginations of the hearts of men. Might not the devil have thus replied unto our Saviour, when he tempted him to turn stones into bread, and to cast himself from a pinnacle of the temple, and received answer that "Man shall not live by bread

alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God:" "But, alas! thou Jesus, the Son of the living God, that art persuaded thou art so, and that God will preserve thee, whether thou usest any means or no, that thou shalt never be starved for want of bread, nor hurt thyself by any fall, whatever thou dost, the angels having charge that no evil shall come nigh thee, nor thy foot be hurt against a stone, thou mayst now cast thyself headlong from the temple, to manifest thy assurance of the love and faithfulness of God in his promises to thee?" If our Saviour thought it sufficient to stop the mouth of the devil, to manifest from Scripture that notwithstanding the assurance from God that any one hath of the end, yet he is to use the means tending thereunto (a neglect whereof is a sinful tempting of God), we shall not need to go farther for an answer to the same kind of objection in the mouth of any adversary whatever.

His 19th section containeth his fourth argument, in these words:"If there be no possibility of the saints falling away finally, then is their persevering incapable of reward from God; but their final perseverance is not incapable of reward from God: ergo. The minor proposition, I presume, contains nothing but what is the sense of those who deny the conclusion; or, however, it contains nothing but what is the express sense of the Lord Christ, where he saith, that 'He that endureth to the end, the same shall be saved.' Therefore I suppose we shall be excused from farther proof of this, without any prejudice to the cause in hand."

Ans. I grant eternal life may be called the reward of perseverance, in the sense that the Scripture useth that word, applied to the matter in hand. It is a reward neither procured by (properly and morally, as the deserving cause) nor proportioned unto the obedience of them by whom it is attained. A reward it is that withal is the free gift of God, and an inheritance purchased by Jesus Christ; a reward of bounty, and not of justice, in respect of them upon whom it is bestowed, but only of faithfulness in reference to the promise of it; a reward, by being a gracious encouragement,-as the end of our obedience, not as the procurement or desert of it. So we grant it a reward of perseverance, though these words of our Saviour, "He that endureth to the end, the same shall be saved," express a consequence of things only, and not a connection of causality of the one upon the other. Of the foundation of this discourse concerning a possibility of declining, immediate consideration shall be had. He proceeds, then :

"The consequence of the major proposition stands firm upon this foundation: No act of the creature whereunto it is necessitated, or which it cannot possibly decline or but do, is, by any law of God or rule of justice, rewardable. Therefore, if the saints be necessitated