The Principles then upon which, as so many Pillars, we build our assertion of a natural Law, may be reduced to four. The first is this: There are some things in themselves dissonant and incongruous to the Divine Nature, and that dependence we have on God. The perfections of God are not arbitrary adjuncts, to be put off and on at pleasure: what-ever he is in himself, He is by the necessity of his Nature, and by consequence he cannot approve or disapprove otherwise than as may be consonan • and agreeable to the Attributes of Wisdome and Sanctity, which are fundamental Laws of his Being. The Holiness o • God is that essential perfection of his Being whereby he cannot but act suitably to the Dignity of his own Rational Nature. To imagine one thing as congr • ous to him as an other, is at once to Blas • pheme him and to establish contradictions the Philosopher well stiles him, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 ; an eternal Law inclining on every hand to what is just and equal, Arist. d • mundo. cap. 16. There are many thing • the goodness and badness of which, depend not so much on Gods Will as his Nature. There is that congruity in some things to the Being of God, and that incongruity in others, that he cannot allow the one and disallow the other, without ceasing to be what he is. That some things are loathsome to him, is not from the determinations of his Will, but from the Sanctity of his Essence. Thou art of purer Eyes, than to behold iniquity, and canst not look on evil saith the Prophet, Heb. 1.13. Indeed nothing properly good, is so 〈◊〉 positive Sanction and Precept, but 〈◊〉 the result of Gods own being and the •• bitude we stand in to him, from which 〈◊〉 can no more swerve than destroy him •• lf, or render rational Creatures unrea •• nable. And if at any time we acknow •• dg the Divine Will the measure of • hat is Good and Evil, we do not un • erstand it with respect to its Soveraign •• and Arbitrariness, but with respect to 〈◊〉 Sanctity and Holiness: what ever he • ills is Good not because his Will is • rbitrary and Unlimited; but because 〈◊〉 can will nothing unbecoming his Puri • y. The Manichees themselves under •• ood Sin to be so thwart to the Nature • f a God that is Good, that they fram'd 〈◊〉 supreme Evil, to salve the intro • uction of it. And to suppose all things • o be alike equal to the Divine Being is • o blaspheme and prevaricate in a degree • eyond what they did. The second is this, God creating Man a rational Creature, endowed him with Faculties and Powers capable of knowing what was congruous to the Nature of God and his dependance on him, and what was not. We do not say that we are brought forth with actual congenite notions of Good and Evil; with labels of Vertues and Vices append • to our minds. This were to establish 〈◊〉 Platonick preexistence, and that all kno •• ledge is by Reminiscency. But our m ••• ning is, that we are furnished with 〈◊〉 Faculties, which if we exert and exerc • in comparing such acts and their objec • it is impossible but that we should percei •• some Acts to be congruous, and others 〈◊〉 be incongruous: Namely, that it is 〈◊〉 that we should love God, and uneq ••• that we should hate him. Now that 〈◊〉 minds can compare Acts and their o •• jects together, and discern whether th •• are equal or unequal, is evident from 〈◊〉 daily operations of our faculties: 〈◊〉 doth this depend totally upon the 〈◊〉 but upon the essential rectitude of the • which no man can call into questio • without razing the foundations of M •• thematicks as well as of Ethicks; and ma • as well say, that the Determinations whic • men make upon the plainest Demonstr •• tions of Geometry, depend not upon th • certainty of the rational faculty; as 〈◊〉 say, that their determinations about Go •• and Evil do not do so: For the one 〈◊〉 as connate to the judgment of Reason a • the other do. There is that proportion • etwixt some acts and their objects, and • hat disproportion betwixt others: That • hen ever we are led to particular con •• derations of them, and to pronounce 〈◊〉 sentiments concerning them; we can • ot without a manifest repugnance to our • atural Powers judg otherwise of them, 〈◊〉 have other conceptions about them, • ut that the one sort of Acts (whether 〈◊〉 Mind, or Tongue, or Hand) are un • qual, and the other equal. These are • hat the Philosophers called 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , •• mmon Notions, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , anticipations, 〈◊〉 previous Images of the moral Beauty • nd congruity, or deformity and incon •• uity of things in the Soul. The 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , the rudimental Princi • les of the Rational Nature. There are 〈◊〉 well indubitable maximes of Reason, • elating to Moral Practice, as there are • elating to Science: and these not only stand • pproved by the universal assent of man • ind, but they demonstrate themselves 〈◊〉 their agreeableness to the Rational Faculty. It is not more certain, that one • nd the same thing cannot at once be and • ot be; That if equals be substracted from equals, what remains will be equal, &c. Than that of whomsoever we hold our Beings, Him we ought to love and 〈◊〉 That God being Veracious, is to be bel ••• ved; That we are to do by others as 〈◊〉 would be done by our selves, &c. And 〈◊〉 deny these is in effect to deny Man to 〈◊〉 Rational: for as much as the faculty 〈◊〉 call Reason exists in us necessarily 〈◊〉 these Opinions. Now these Deter ••• nations, being the natural Issues of 〈◊〉 Souls in their rational exercise, in co •• paring Acts with their objects, come to 〈◊〉 called ingraft-Notions and universal C ••• racters wrought into the essential Co •• position of our Nature. And besid • what we have already said, to demonstra •• that some things being compared 〈◊〉 the Holy Nature of God, and the rel •• tion that we stand in to him, are intri •• secally Good, and other things intrins •• cally Evil: It is inconsistent with the pe •• fections of the Divine Being, partic •• larly with his Sanctity, Veracity an • Goodness, to prepossess us with such con • ceptions of things, as are not to b • found in the Nature of the things them • selves. In a word the Effluvia of the ran • kest and worst-scented Body, do not strik • more harshly upon the olfactory-Orga • nor carry a greater incongruity to th • Nerves of that Sensatory; than what we call moral Evil, doth to the intellectual • aculty. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 ; There are some things • hich all men think, or wherein all Men agree, and that is common Right or In • ustice by Nature; although Men be not • ombined into Societies, nor under any Covenants one to an other, Arist. Rhet. • ib. 1. c. 14. Paul tells us that there are some • hings which are 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , • ust and honest in all Mens esteem; Rom. 12.17.

The Third is this; There being some • hings so differenced in themselves with • espect to the nature of God, and our dependance on Him (as hath been said;) and man being created capable of knowing what is so: It is impossible that God should allow us to pursue what is contrary to his nature, and the Relation we stand in to him; or to neglect what is agreeable to it, and the dependance we have on him. God having made man with faculties, necessarily judging so and so; He is in truth the Author of those judgments, by having created the faculties, which necessarily make them; Now what-ever judgment God makes a man with, must needs be a Law from Go • given to man, nor can he ever depart fro • it, without gainsaying, and so offendi •• Him that was the Author of it. Whatev •• judgment God makes a man with, concer •• ing either himself, or other things; it 〈◊〉 Gods judgment: and whatsoever is his judg • ment, is a law to man, nor can he negle •• or oppose it without sin; being in his exi • stence made with a necessary subjection t • God. Such and such dictates being the n •• tural operations of our minds, the Being 〈◊〉 essential Constitution of which, in right re •• soning we owe to God; we cannot but estee • them the voice of God within us and conse • quently his law to us: saith Sr. Ch. Wolseley o • Scripture belief, p. 32, 33. And accor • dingly these dictates of right Reason, wit • the Superadded act of conscience, are stile • by the Apostle, the Law written in the heart • 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 ; For when the Gentiles whic • have not the Law, (viz. in writing as the Iews had) do by Nature (natural light or the dictates of right Reason) the things contained in the Law (those things which the Moral Law of Moses enjoyned) these having not a Law, (a written Law, or a Law • ade known to them by Revelation) are a • aw to themselves: (have the Law of na •• re congenite with them) Which shew the • ork of the Law (that which the Law in ••• ucts about, and obligeth to) Written in •• eir Hearts: Rom. 2.14, 15. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 ; • ational Beings do in the light and through • he conduct of Reason, chuse and pursue •• ose very things, which the law of God the Divine Law) enjoyns: saith Hierocles 〈◊〉 vers. 29. Pythag. Sponte sua sine lege •• dem, rectumque colebant; as the Poet •• ith. Hierocles in vers. 63. & 64 Py • hag. assigns this as the cause, why men • o not escape the entanglements of lust • nd passion; 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 ; because they attend not • o those common notions of Good and Evil, which the Creator hath ingrafted in rational Beings for their conduct and Government. It is of this Law that Austin speaks lib. 2. confess. cap. 4. Lex Scripta in cordibus hominum, quam ne ipsa delet iniquitas; A Law written in our hearts, which sin it self cannot expunge. The Fourth and last is this; that God for the securing the honour of his own wisdome and sanctity, the ma ••• taining his rectorship, and the preservi •• the dependance of his creature upon hi • annexed to this natural Law, in case of me • failure a penalty. The constituting of the ••• ness of punishment, on supposition of tra ••• gression, doth so necessarily belong 〈◊〉 Laws, that without it they are but lu •• crous things. Tacite permittitur, quod 〈◊〉 ultione prohibetur; what is forbidden wit •• out a Sanction, is silently and implicitely a •• lowed; Tertul. Where there is no penal •• denounced against disobedience, Gover •• ment is but an empty notion. The fear 〈◊〉 punishment is the great medium of Mo •• Government: coaction and force wou •• overthrow obedience, and leave neithe • room for Vertue nor Vice in the worl • The means of swaying us, must be accom • modated to the nature of our Beings; no • are rational Creatures to be otherwise in • fluenced than by fear and hope. Th •• Ruler governs at the courtesie of his Sub • jects, who permits them to rebel with im • punity. Not only the Poets placed 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 in the throne with Jupiter for the punishment of disobedience: but the Moralist makes Justice to wait on God, to avenge him on those that Transgress his Law; 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 ; • lutarch. As every law then must have penalty annexed to it, so had this of which • e are treating: 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 : Their conscience also bearing • itness, and their thoughts in the mean • hile accusing or else excusing one another; saith the Apostle, Rom. 2.15. of those • ho were under no other law than the law of Nature. Conscience is properly nothing else; but the soul reflect • ng on it self and actions, and judging of both according to Law: Now where there is no Law there • an be no guilt, and where there is no possibility of guilt, there can be no Con • cience. If there be no Law constituting • he distinction of good and evil in mens • ctions; Men can neither do well nor ill: and by consequence can have no inward • lace in the sense of one course of life, nor r • gret on the score of an other. Where all things are indifferent, there can be neither joy nor grief through reflection on what a man doth. All the actings of Conscience relate to a Law under the Sanction of which we are, and suppose a judg who will accordingly proceed with us. Whe • e • here is sense of guilt and a fear of wrath, it is impossible to preclude Law, the 〈◊〉 being the Correlate of the other. 〈◊〉 that there is in every man a Conscience a • ingraft apprehensions of hope and fear, 〈◊〉 need no other proof of it, than to appe •• every mans experience.

The Apostle tells us that even 〈◊〉 who had no revealed Law, and were 〈◊〉 filled with all unrighteousness, fornicat ••• wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; 〈◊〉 were full of envy, murther, debate, 〈◊〉 malignity, &c. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 Yet they knew the judgment of God ( 〈◊〉 which God hath constituted and deno ••• ced) that they who commit such things worthy of death; Rom. 1.29, 30, 31, 3 •

It is in reference to this Law, that •• ings either not determined by humane •• ws, or not cognizable by them, men 〈◊〉 themselves in the closets of their own •• asts. The actings of Conscience with ••• pect to Law, and our being judged by 〈◊〉 , and that there is such a faculty in us, is propossest with the sence of the distin •• ion of good and evil, and accordingly 〈◊〉 in way of fear or hope, suitably to 〈◊〉 course that is steered, and that these 〈◊〉 apprehensions are neither acciden • al frights, nor delusions cunningly 〈◊〉 upon Mankind, may be further 〈◊〉 by a brief consideration of these 〈◊〉 things: (1) The perplexity that haunt's 〈◊〉 soul on the commission of secret sins, •• ich as others do not know so they can •• t punish. Now even in reference to these • oth the sinner: Nocte dieque suum gest • re in pectore testem. —Day and Night opprest, Carry about his Witness in his Breast.

(2) the lashes and scourges the sinner • eel's for such things as the world is so far from punishing, that it doth rather reward • hem. The crimes committed with the applause and gratulation of the world, do • escape the censure and condemnation conscience.

(3.) That those who through Pow •• and Greatness, have been above 〈◊〉 punishment of others, have yet fou •• tormentor in their own Breasts. I 〈◊〉 alleadg no other Witness, than Tibet 〈◊〉 his confession in an Epistle to the Sen ••• Dij me Deaeque omnes pejus perdant, 〈◊〉 quotidiê me perire sentio: Let all 〈◊〉 Gods and Goddesses torment me worse, 〈◊〉 I every day feel my self Tormented; 〈◊〉 eton. in his life: and likewise Tacitus 〈◊〉 . lib. 6. cap. 6. Who take's occas ••• thence to add, that if the Hearts of 〈◊〉 Lay in view, we should see 〈◊〉 they are Flayd and Torn with lashes 〈◊〉 scourges: si recludantur Tyrannorum 〈◊〉 , posse aspici laniatus & ictus.

(4.) That when Men are going out of • he World, and the reach of punishment • re; That then the fear of punishment • ost revives in them. The approach of • eath which sets out of danger from • en, fills with the greatest trembling with respect to punishment from God. • pon this account among others is Death •• lled the King of Terrours; Job 18.4. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , of all Dreadfuls be most Dreadful, as Aristotle stiles it.

(5.) That those who with all their S • ill, endeavour to disband their fears, cannot get rid of them. Hence that of Cotta in Cicero concerning Epicurus; 〈◊〉 quenquam vidi, qui magis ea quae ti • enda esse negaret timeret; mortem dico & Deos: I never knew one (saith he) that stood more in fear of those things, which he reckoned to minister no ground for it, namely Death and God, then he did; de • at. Deor. lib. 1. And these are the foundations upon which the existence of a natural Law bears: and from which so • ar as the brevity we are obliged to study would admit, we have endeavo •• to demonstrate it.

I shall now add some further consid •• tions, for the Existence of a Law of •• ture, as so many Arguments there posteriori; by which I hope to mak • further appear that the contrary hy ••• thesis is both absurd and mischiev ••• The first shall be the universal conse •• Man-kind in this matter. Where 〈◊〉 there at any time been a Nation or Peo ••• that did not acknowledg a distinctio • Good and Evil? They might and often prevaricate in the defining 〈◊〉 was Good and what was Bad; but 〈◊〉 Universally agreed in this, that all thi • were not naturally alike. Of this 〈◊〉 Plato de legib. Cicero de legib. & de off •• is; & Arist. Rhet. lib. 1. cap. 14. omit others. We meet with no N ••• on so barbarous, but we find ackn ••• ledged Principles, as well as exces •• instances of Morality amongst the • Now de quo omnium Natura consenti •• verum esse necesse est; Wherein all 〈◊〉 agree that cannot be otherwise than 〈◊〉 saith Cicero. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 every Man holds to be so is so: old He •• clitus. Nor is it sufficient to reply that: • en have not at any time been nor yet 〈◊〉 of this mind. For athing is not the less 〈◊〉 because some either through sottish •• ss, wilfulness or depravedness of Mind ••• pose it. There have been some who h • ve contradicted the first Principles of Science, affirming that one and the same t • ing may at the same time be, and may not • e; as well as there have been others • ho have opposed the first Theorems of Moral Doctrine. Nor is it improbable, 〈◊〉 that some people talk so out of crosness, as loving to run Counter to the common sence of Mankind. And for others, I question not but they are sunk into this bruitishness, either from supine • ess and sloth in not exercising their facul • ies to consider the habitude of things, and to compare Acts with their objects; or else through too great familiarity with Sin, which hath tinctured their Souls with false Colours, and filled their Mindes with prejudices and undue apprehensions. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 : Now we are to judg of what is natural from those who live according to the dictates of Reason; and not from those whose Minds are depraved by Lust and Passion: saith Aristotle lib. 1. Polit. That is the Law of Natur • 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 ; Which prevails among Men gove •• ned by Reason, not that which prevails •• mongst p • rsons debauched. Mich. Ep •• ad Nicomachia. For as Andronicus inf ••• meth us; 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 : The 〈◊〉 of Nature is unchangeable among such 〈◊〉 are of a sound and healthful Mind, 〈◊〉 doth it make any thing to the contrar • that men of Distempered and depraved ••• d • rstandings think otherwise; for he dot • not mistake who call's Honey sweet, thoug • sick and diseased Persons be not of 〈◊〉 judgment. The Second is this; that there be no Law of Nature constituting what is Good and what is Evil, an • tecedently to Pacts and Agreements a • mongst Men, then all humane Laws signifie in Effect just nothing. For if there be no antecedent obligation binding to obey the just Laws and constitutions of the Commonwealth, then may they at any time be broken without Sin: and Rebellion will be as lawful as obedience, • or needs any one to continue longer • oyal, that he hopes to mend his con ••• ion by turning Rebel. Nor doth it • ffice to plead Promises, Pacts and Co • enants to the contrary. For if it be not 〈◊〉 it self a duty to keep ones Word, and • o perform what a man hath promised, • hen are promises but W • ths to be broken at pleasure, and serve for nothing • ut to impose on the easiness of good-natured men. According to this Hypothesis we are discoursing against, no Man is bound to be honest if he can once hope to promote his interest by being otherwise: and we may be either True or False, Just or Unjust as we find it most for our turns. All Humane Laws, suppose the Law of Nature; And seeing Revelation extends not to every place, where Humane Laws are in force, that Civil Laws do at all oblige, must be resolved into Natural Law. Obligation of Conscience with respect to the Laws of Men, is a conclusion deduced from two Premises; whereof the First is, the Law of Nature enjoyning Subjection and Obedience to Magistrates in whatsoever they justly command; The Second is, the Law of Man under the Character of Just; from both of which results the obligat ••• of Conscience to such a Law. In a 〈◊〉 if there be no Natural Law, then 〈◊〉 ever hath either Wit enough to 〈◊〉 Humane Laws, or Power and Strength •• nough to despise them, is innocent; 〈◊〉 do men deserve punishment for be •• wicked; only it is their unhappiness 〈◊〉 they are weak, and cannot protect the •• selves in their Villanies. The Third 〈◊〉 this, supposing all things originally 〈◊〉 in themselves indifferent, as there can no sin in disobeying the justest La • of the Common-Wealth, so no 〈◊〉 can offend by despising and transgr •• sing the Laws of God. Yea, precluding ••• tural Law, it is not possible for God to 〈◊〉 an obligation upon us by any positive La • and that upon two accouts: (First) in 〈◊〉 after the clearest Revelation and prom ••• gation of it, I am still at liberty to belie •• whether it be a law from God or not. U •• less it be in it self good and a duty to belie •• God, (because of his Vera • ity) whensoev •• he declares himself; it will be still a ma •• ter of courtesy to believe it to be a 〈◊〉 from God notwithstanding that it come a •• compained with all the evidences and m •• tives of credibility, that a Divine declar •• tion is capable of being attended with. (Se • ondly) because supposing we should be 〈◊〉 courteous, as to believe God to be the Author of such and such Laws, & that it is with all his will & command, that upon our Allegiance to our maker and the greatest • enalty that angry God can inflict, or finite creatures undergo, that we be found in the practice and pursuit of such and such things: I say, supposing all this, it still remains a matter of liberty and indifferency whether we will obey him or not. For if there be not any thing that is Good in it self, nor any thing that is in it self bad; then it is not an evil to despise the Authority of God, nor is any man obliged to obey him further then he himself pleaseth and judgeth for his interest; the Authority of God being, according to the principles we are dealing with, a meer precarious thing.

The Fourth and last that I shall name is this; If all things be in themselves ad • aphorous, and good and evil be only regulated by customs and civil constitutions; Then if men please they may invert the whole moral frame of things, and make what the world hath hitherto thought Vertues▪ to be adjudged Vices, and Vices to come into the place of Vertues. Yea a man may be bound to 〈◊〉 his opinion of Truth, Honestly, Ver •• Justice, &c. both according as he chan •• eth his Country, and according as the 〈◊〉 Laws of the Nation where he lives 〈◊〉 alter: So that what is Truth to day, 〈◊〉 be Falshood to morrow; and what he ••• tertain's as Religion in one place he 〈◊〉 detest as Irreligion in an other: Nor it more lawfull to worship Christ in En •• land, than it is to worship Mahomet in 〈◊〉 Levant: Nor do the idolatrous heath • adore a stock or a stone, upon weaker re •• sons or worse motives, than we do the Go • that made the World. For as Tully sai • well; Si populorum jussi • , si Princip •• decretis. si sententiis judicum jura co •• stituerentur; jus est latrocinari, jus adulteerari, si haec suffragis aut scitis multitudinis probarentur: If justice be regulated b • the Sanctions of the People, the decrees o • Princes or the opinions of judges; then it is lawfull to rob, to commit adultery, when • soever these things come to be established by the acts and ordinances of the civil power. de Legib, lib. 1. This inference is so natural and clear, that the Authors of the Hypothesis we are examining have granted no less. The Scripture of the new Testament is there only Law, where the civil power hath made it so, saith Hobbs, Leviath. cap. 24. The Magistrate can only define what is Scrip • ure and what is not; saith the same Author • n the same Book. That the Scripture obligeth any man is to be ascribed to the Authorty of the civil power; nor are we bound to obey the laws of Christ, if they be repugnant to the Laws of the Land; idem ibid. All which a man of any Reason as well as Conscience, must have an abhorrency for. And indeed these things pursued to their true issues, will be found so far from befriending any Religion, that they are shapen to overthrow all Religion. And this for the third pr • mise, that man was created at first under the Sanction of a Law.

§ 4. The Fourth thing we are to declare, is the nature of this Law that man was created under the obligation of; and the manner of its Promulgation. Learned men do wonderfully differ, and some of them strangely prevaricate, in stating the Measure of natural Law and in defining what Laws are natural. Some would have that only to be a natural Law; quod Natura docuit omnia ainimantia, which beasts are taught by instinct. Iustinian, lib. 1. Institut. But though the consideration of 〈◊〉 things in Brute creatures, to which the •• are directed by instinct, may conduce • instruct men what becomes us that are Ra • tional; particularly Parents may learn th • obligation they are under to their childre • and the care they ought to take for the •• education and subsistence in the worl • from the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 or Natural Affection whi •• we find in Brute Animals, to their young yet this is no certain, much less sufficie •• Indication of Natural Laws For Bru • creatures being under no Law at all, it 〈◊〉 unreasonable and ridiculous to judg of 〈◊〉 is a Law of Nature, and what is not, 〈◊〉 them.

They devour one another because they hav • no right nor law amongst them: says Hesiod. Beasts may do hurt but they canno • sin. They may exercise cruelty in pursuing the satisfaction of their appetites but they cannot be injurious. And therefore when God commands that the bea •• which hath killed a man should be put to death, Exod. 21.28 It is to shew the horridness of the fact of murther, not the •• ligation of the beast to Law; nor is it •• tended as a punishment to it, but to de •• re Gods detestation of the like in us. • here are many things generally practised 〈◊〉 the Brute Animals, the imitation of • hich would be abominable in men. That which in us would be incest, is not so in them: For I suppose there are few of Diogenes and Chrysippus mind; who, from the example of Cocks Treadding their own • ames, in fer the Lawfulness of the like cop • lations in Men. The Poet hath determined much better in this case, then the above-named Philosophers.

Others judg of the Law of Nature, by the consent and harmony of Mankind: what men universally agree in is accounted by some, if not the only, at least the best medium of arriving at a sure knowledg of the law of nature. In re consensio omnium gentium jus natura putanda est. The consent of all nations in any thing, is to be thought the Law of Nature; Cicero. 1. Tusculan. But neither is this a sure indicat ••• of Natural Laws; nor shall a Person 〈◊〉 attain to satisfaction in this method of p ••• ceed. For the Laws and customs of 〈◊〉 have been so different and oppos • that what hath been accounted v • ce one nation, hath been held for vertue •• nother. The Athenians punished theft, 〈◊〉 the Egyptians & Lacedemonians allowe • When God forbade the Iews the imitat • of the customs of their neighbouring N •• tions, He reckon's up vile and abomina •• lusts as their national customs; Deut. •• 30, 31.14.1, 2.18.10, 11. There 〈◊〉 been vices not only countenanced, but 〈◊〉 commended by Laws in the wisest and b • policyed Commonwealths of the Worl • In the Third Place, the dictates of rig •• Reason are contended for by others to 〈◊〉 the Law of Nature. Lex est ratio insita • Naturâ, quae jubet ea quae facienda sunt, pr •• hibet que contraria Law is natural: Reas •• commanding what ought to be done, 〈◊〉 forbidding the contrary: Cicer. de Legi • lib. 1. But I cannot acquiesce in this account either. For right Reason is rathe • the instrument of discerning the Law of N •• ture, than the Law of Nature it self. The Law of Nature is not so much a Law which 〈◊〉 nature, prescribes unto us, as a law •• scribed unto our nature. It is the table which this law was originally written, and exercising of which in its rational func ••• s we came to understand it. Law • he will of the Rector signified, but this 〈◊〉 knowing and perceiving of it: and • his our Reason was originally 〈◊〉 But Alas! Reason is now so 〈◊〉 by sin, and misled by prejudice, 〈◊〉 and self-interest; that it frequently 〈◊〉 Evil Good, and Good Evil.

Hence men pretend to right Reason in 〈◊〉 contradictory: Nor do we in any 〈◊〉 find the great improvers of 〈◊〉 at greater variance one with another, 〈◊〉 about what is just and what is unjust. 〈◊〉 man determining as humour, 〈◊〉 , lust, or profit swaye's him: but 〈◊〉 of this chap. 3. Though there be 〈◊〉 evident congruity betwixt some acts 〈◊〉 their objects, that if we exercise our 〈◊〉 in comparing the one with the 〈◊〉 , it is impossible but that we should discern it: yet there are others, wherein we arrive at the knowledg of that propor ••• n only be deduction, and long haran ••• es of argumentation. By the Law of 〈◊〉 then we understand the whole Law given by God at first unto our Natures: Whereof our Reasons exercising themselves in the consideration of the Nature of God, our own Nature, the relation we were created in to him, the habitude we stood in to our Fellow-Creatures, and the Divine method and order in the production of all; was a sufficient Instrumental conveyance while we abode in the state of Integrity. It is true, since the fall it is otherwise, many Dictates of the Law of Nature being grown inevident, obscure, subject to controversie, not easy, if at all, to be defined, without the advantage and assistance of Scripture-light. There are various degrees of evidence in those things which relate and appertain to the Law of Nature: in some the Moral congruity betwixt the Act and the Object is manifest & apparent; in other it lye's more remote and out of view: So that now the only sure, universal, perfect System of natural Law, is the Decalogue of Moses: This is a true draught of what by the Law of Creation we were under the Sanction of; A transcript and written impression of the whole Originall Law; not at all differing in its nature from what was imposed on man in innocency; but distinguished only in the the manner of its Promulgation; that which was formerly internal and subjective, being now external and objective. But though we affirm that never any since the fall did so act his Reason, as to comprehend Universally the Law of Nature, with the bounds and consequences of it: yet we also readily grant that our Reason at first was a sufficient Instrument of conveying the knowledg of the whole Law of Nature to us. Seeing then that no man can justly come under obligation by a Law, unless it be sufficiently promulgated, promulgation being an essential qualification of a Law; for Law can have influence upon none that do not know it. Leges quae constringunt hominum vitas, intelligi ab omnibus debent: Those Laws which have influence upon mens lives ought to be understood by all, say Civilians. We shall in the next place therefore endeavour to lay open the several fountains, in which the whole Law of Nature was at first fully understood.

Now there were Five ways which our Rational Faculties exercising themselves in, should before that sin had darkned the mind and disordered the creation, have attained to a full and perfect knowledg of the Law of Creation by. The First was by considering the nature of God and the habitude we stood into him, as our Creator, Preserver and Benefactor. There was in mankind an ability of soul, of ascending unto the knowledg of the invisible Being, and First cause, by the effects of his Power Wisdome and Goodness; of knowing as much of God as was needful for our living to him and our dependance on him in that state and under that Covenant that we then stood. From which there could not but have resulted a clearer and more distinct knowledg, than we can now imagine, of that love, Gratitude, Reverence which we owed to him; and these would have been attended with a recognition of our own nothingness, a dependant frame of spirit, and a resignation of our selves and all things to his will. The Second was the consideration of our selves, that amphibious kind of Nature we are made with (it is Hierocles's expression) being allied in our constitution and make to several Species of creatures. And the observing the Subordinations of the parts of our Composition one to another: That the Animal and sensitive powers are to be governed by the Intellectual and Rational. From which would have arisen a plenary and steady knowledg of the unsuitableness of earthly things to constitute us happy. That our Blessedness lay not in the pleasing of our senses, and gratification of our Animal part. In a word, that the Soul was to be principally regarded, and that Reason was to be our only conductor: which I suppose was enough to have precluded all intemperance▪ incontinence and, the subjecting of our selves to the Animal life &c. A third way was, an ability of penetrating more fully (than now we can) into the natures of the several creatures, their fabricks, orderly operations, various instincts, relations both to us and one an other: in all which as in a glass, much of our duty, had we abode in the state of integrity, would have become plain and evident to us. If notwithstanding the fall and all that darkness and confusion which hath ensued thereupon; We abide still directed to the creatures for the learning many parts of our duty: See Iob. 12.7. Prov. 6.6. Jer. 8.7. Deut. 32.11. Should we not have been capable of learning more from them and that more clearly and distinctly, when there was no tincture of sin or shadow of darkness on the mind, nor fallacious medium in the whole Creation. A Fourth was, an ability of mind of knowing the Relation which we stood in one to another. How that we were not self-sufficient, but brought forth under a necessity of mutual assistances: and that we could not subsist without the mutual aids of love and friendship. That we arose not like mushromes out of the earth, nor were digged out of parsly-beds, neither came into the World by a fortuitous Original; That we sprung not Originally from diverse Stocks, much less were created at first multitude of us together: But that the whole race of mankind was propagated from one single Root. That each of us was intended as a part of the Rational System, and made for society and fellowship. From all which we should have been able by easy deductions and short dependencies to have argued out the whole of those duties we are under the Sanction of, either to parents, children, or neigbours. In a word, doing as we would be done by; which epitomiseth the whole duty that one man oweth to another, would have proved the natural issue of the foregoing considerations. The Fifth and last way was, through observing Gods order and method in the Works of Creation. As the works of God themselves were to be instructive unto man not only of the Being, Power, Wisdome, and Goodness of God, but of the Moral duties that God expected from us: Psal. 19.1. Rom. 1.20, 21. So God's Order and Method in the Production and Disposal of his Works into their several Relations and Subordinations, was likewise intended to be instructive to mankind, and it was the will of God that we should learn our duty thereby. Thus the Preeminence of the man over the Woman is confirmed by the Apostle from the order of the Creation; I suffer not, (saith he) the Woman to usurp over the man, for Adam was first formed then Eve; 1 Tim. 2.12, 13. Christ himself establisheth Monog • my upon the same foundation, namely God's Method of Creation at first. From the beginning of the Creation he made them Male & Female; for this cause shall a Man cleave to his Wife, and they two shall be one flesh; Marc. 10.6, 38. Thus also with respect to God's order in the Creation, did the observation of the Sabbath become a part of the Law of Nature: And on the seventh Day God ended his Work which he had made; and he rested on the Seventh Day from all his Work which he had made; and God blessed the Seventh Day, sanctified it, because that in it he had rested from all his work,See Dr. Owen of Sacred Rest; Ex • • cit • . which he had created and made, Gen. 2, 2, 3. All these instances do fully evidence, that there was both a sufficiency of objective light in the things themselves to instruct man into his duty, and of Subjective light in man to discern & improve it to the ends aforesaid. Nor doth it at all weaken what is said, that the Light of Reason as it reside's in us now, seems defective and insufficient to direct us unto the knowledg and observance of these things. For, it is enough, that we have proved them to have been originally designed by God for these ends; and that there is ground and evidence in the things themselves to conduct to them. Nor is the ex • ent and effects of Primitive light to be measured by the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 or Ruines of it which remain in us since the fall. Alas! our present light is faint, Languid, Scant, Superficial, Distracted, leaving us under uncertain guesses, dubious hallucinations, exposing us to fallacious and delusive appearances, unable to minister due indications of vertue and vice, even in such things, as, according to All, come under the Sanction of the Law of Creation: Witness the Idolatry, Uncleanness, Rapine &c. that Nations and Persons pretending to the greatest improvement of Reason and natural Light, have lived in. But Original Light was pure, clear, certain, not tinctur'd with false images and colours, nor darkness by lust and sensuality; capable if it had been exercised and attended to, of preserving us secure as well from Doubt, as Error.

§ 5. God having thus prescribed a Law to man, the Notices of which lay sufficiently plain in the exercising of his faculties: He also endowed him with a proportionate strength for the observance of the precepts of that Law. That a law be obligatory it is necessary that it enjoyn nothing but what is possible to be performed. That none can be bound to impossibilities is an indubitable axiom. It is not consistent with the Wisdome, Justice, Righteousness, and Goodness of God to command that which we never had strength for the performance of, nor can he call men to account for what was never in their power to do. He cannot expostulate with men for their sins, if he created them destitute of the means and power of obedience. In such a case we might be pitied, but could not be blamed. In a word, this were to charge our sins upon God in a degree beyond what the asserters of fate and destiny ever did. I may usurp therefore what the Philosopher say's in the like case: 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 ; to ascribe our wickedness to necessity, is to justifie our selves and to condemn God: Sal •• st. de diis & mundo cap. 9. An ability then of answering the Law of Creation, man must at first have been endow'd with. What this was, and the nature of it, is next to be declared. God then having created man, He not only made him a Rational Creature furnished with a soul of an immaterial and immortal nature, which was his essential perfection, and did perfect him in genere Physico, as he was such a particular being in the universe: which may be stiled the Natural Image of God in man: Being in its spiritual immortal nature a representation of the Divine nature, and is accordingly alluded to under that notion by the Holy Ghost, Gen. 9.6. But besides, He impressed a Rectitude on the soul of man, perfecting him in Genere Morali, as he stood in Relation to God as his Rector and Governour, and was under such and such Laws. Lo this only have I found, that God made man upright, Eccles. 7.29. i. e. endowed with divine Wisdome to understand his duty, and with perfect ability to perform the same. And this is principally intended Gen. 1.26. Where God saye's Let us make man in our Image, after our own likeness. For the likeness of man to God consists chiefly in purity: Be ye Holy, as I am holy, 1 Pet. 1.15. And be ye perfect even as your Father which is in Heaven is perfect: Mat. 5.48. A moral resemblance can in both these places, only be understood. And that this is the primary & proper intendment of that phrase, our being created in the Image of God; The Apostle Paul in more than one place, doth confirm: Put ye on the new man which after God is created in Righteousness and true Holiness, Eph. 4.24. with Col. 3.10. And this we may call the Moral Image of God in man, not only because it consists in Moral perfections, answerable to what we conceive in God under that notion, but especially because it adapts and qualifies us for the observance of the Law of Morality appointed us as the Rule of our living to Him. Now this Moral Image, though it was no part of our essence, nor belonged inseparably to our faculties, nor did our being Rational creatures consist in it; yet it was not only concreated with Humane nature, consentaneous to it, and perfective of it; but was in the state of Creation naturally due: considering the end man was made for, and the duties which were required of Him. Had God sent man out of his hand without this Divine impressed Image, Si hoc adjutorium vel Angelo vel homini, cum primùm facti sunt, D • fuisset, quoniam non talis natura facta erat, • t sine Divino adjutorio posse • manere si vellet, non uti que suâ culpâ cecidissent. Adjutorium quippe defuiss • t sine qu • manere non possent. Aug. de corr. et Grat. cap. 11. he had not had that goodness which 'tis necessary every work of God should have, & which the Holy Ghost tells us that every work of God had: And God saw every thing that he had made, and behold it was very Good. Gen. 1.31. That is every Creature was not only furnished with such perfections as might Render it a Being of such a species and kind in the creation; but besides was endowed with whatever might qualify and adapt it to the ends, that it was made for. In this superadded rectitude & image (I mean superadded with respect to our essence; but Natural as well as connate with to the respect State and Law we were made in and under) con • isted our ability of living to God, in an observance of the Law of Creation, commonly stiled the Law of Nature. Nor could man even in the State of innocency have so lived to God in the single strength of his Rational faculties as to be accepted with him. Natural Grace (I stile it so not with respect to the kind but the dueness) was as necessary in order to our observing the Law of Creation then, as Supernatural is to the obeying the Law of faith now. This I would have due heed given to, forasmuch as there will be considerable occasion to improve it afterwards.

§ 6. Though man was created under the Sanction, and in the knowledg of a Law and every way qualified and adapted for the keeping of it, had he not been wanting to himself: Yet if we consider him precisely as under the Law of Creation without any farther stipulation from God; he was the meer object of Gods Dominion, made at his will and for his pleasure, and annihilable by the same will, to which he owed his subsistence. I readily grant that Gods Dominion which is nothing else but a right of disposing his Creatures according to his own pleasure in way's becoming Holiness, Justice & Goodness, did no way Warrant him to damn them without the intervention of sin. For this were to inflict a torment on them outweighing the Good of existence which he had given them. If God should create a Creature only to make it miserable, in stead of bestowing a benefit on it, He would do it the greatest injury he possibly could. Though bare existence be a term of perfection, yet when it is over-ballanced with an extream and infinite misery it becomes an unhappiness, and can be no longer eligible. While we are then asserting the Soveraignty of God, we would not affront his Justice and Goodness. Now to reduce an innocent Creature into a worse estate than that out of which it was taken, we cannot but esteem it inconsistent both with the Justice and Goodness, which essentially belong to the supreme Being. Nor can we once admit into our thoughts that he whose ways are weight and measure, can inflict on any an extream and endless torment, without the consideration of an antecedent crime: There is nothing more repugnant to the notions of justice and equity than to damn a harmless Creature, meerly out of will and pleasure. The Savage allowances in the Heathen Worship, have been alway's reckoned a just impeachment of the Deity of those they adored; and shall we admit a worse Barbarity to be an appendage of the Dominion of the Holy Jehovah? God forbid! Nor do I in the second place deny, but that tranquillity and serenity of mind would have necessarily accompanied Rectitude and Obedience. Light is not more inseparable from a Sun-beam, than pleasure and peace of Soul is from a state of purity and uprightness. The obedient Soul • asts its own acts, and keeps a Jubilee in its self. Had there been no other reward annexed to Obedience, the pleasure of • cting conformably to Reason would have been a sure and momentous one. Whatever calamities God in Soveraignty might have inflicted on us, and whatever comforts of life, he could have taken from us, yet anxiety and remorse would never have arrested us. Yea the continual recognition of that nothingness, out of which by the arbitrary fiat of our Creator we were taken, would have rendred all our thoughts of reducibleness back into that state again, both satisfactory and delightful. The apprehensions of our disposableness at the will of our Maker, would not have grated upon our innocent mind. In a word, we should have esteemed the very observance of the Law of Creation, a considerable reward. And the innocent soul should have been satisfied from its self. For as the Poet saith.

It is likewise confessed that there is a great condecency, and admirable suitableness in it to Divine Wisdome and Goodness; that a perfect, and spotless innocency should be attended with a happy and unafflicted life: But yet all that carries such a proportion is not necessary. For there is an admirable condecency to Divine Sapience and Benignity, that the whole race of mankind should not be utterly lost: that God should not loose active glory in way of thanksgiving and praise from a whole Species of Rational Creatures: and yet I suppose it will not be affirmed that God was obliged to re-instate fallen man in all the circumstances of that felicity, which by his disobedience to the Law of his Creation he had forfeited. Surely no property of the Divine Nature had been impeachable, had God suffered Mankind to perish under the guilt they had wilfully contracted. All that I contend for then is this, that had not God ratified the Law of Creation into a Covenant, and thereby set bounds to his own Dominion, we could have had no foundation of expecting any thing from him, after the utmost & exactest of obedience, save the pleasure of having performed it. There is no property in God which antecedently to his own pleasure, obligeth him to remunerate our obedience; nor precluding a Covenant could we warrantably have expected any such thing from him. First, not his Justice ▪ For (1) There is strict Distributive Justice observed, where God taketh no more away than he freely gave. Every superior Authority, if it hath not abridged it self▪ by some promise or Covenant, hath still liberty to revoke all the free issues of its own power and bounty. Where benefits are freely bestowed, there the Donor retain's a right of rescinding his own donations. God having therefore made us of his Meer will, and for his pleasure Rev. 4.11. He had full power arbitrariously to destroy the Beings he had conferred. The whole interest that we have in our selves, is from the free gift of our maker, and by resuming what he hath given, he may cancel that interest when he pleaseth. Nor is God's donation of being to the Creatures any silent contract (as is alledged by the Author of Deus Justificatus, p. 266) That He will never destroy them: For we have the experience of Brute Animals to the contrary, who in the vertue of their Beings conferred on them, cannot plead a title to continuance. Perceptive capacities they have as well as we, though not of that kind; and are allowed Gratifications suitable to them; yet this hinders not, but that without the least fault in them or injury in God, they are at once deprived both of the Delights of the Animal life, and of Being it self. (2) For Commutative Justice, there neither is nor can be any such thing betwixt God and Creatures. For that supposeth an equality between what is performed and what is received; and only there, where there is an equalitas dati & accepti can Commutative Justice take place. We can therefore neither plead nor enter a claim upon this foundation, unless we could have brought as much benefit to God as we had received as well in his conferring our beings on us, as in the after-reward. Gods raising us out of nothing by his alone power and goodness, and furnishing us with those faculties which made us fit for Moral Government, did sufficiently entitle him to the utmost service we could perform, without laying him under any obligation in point of Justice of remunerating it when we had done. Merit from a Creature to its Creator is a Contradiction not only to Scripture, Job. 22.3. &. 35.7. but to Reason. I am sure that of the Apostle is enough to render it indubitable; For if Abraham were justified by Works, he hath whereof to glory, but not before God; Rom. 4.2. Justification could not be strictly merited, no not by works. The very Law of Works excluded glorying before God: and let me add, that the Law of Faith excludes not only that, but also glorying before men; which is enough if carefully attended to, to overthrow some of the chiefest Pelagian and Arminian notions.

Secondly, not his Mercy and Goodness; forasmuch as all the effects of Goodness, (as Goodness is taken for Beneficence and Bounty, which is the only proper notion of it here) are free and elective. And indeed it is necessary it should be so: Because no kindness can oblige, but what proceed's from one who is vested with Power and Right not to bestow it. Nor do we pay thanks for what is derived to us by the necessity of an Agents Nature, but only for what arriveth with us from the choice of his will. Though the Holy and Rational nature of God determines him as to Moral Good, without the least infringement of his liberty; yet the case is not the same in reference to Physical good; There being no property in God obliging him to produce all the creatures he can, and to do them all the Good he is able: But the application of his Omnipotence and exercise of his Beneficence depend as to both on the choice of his will. To drive the opposite notion to its issue, would prove the world to have been if not from eternity, at least many Myriads of ages sooner than it was? and that every Creature is as perfect, as it was possible for Omnipotent power and infinite Fecundity to make it, and that that there are no more Creatures possible than what are already: with a hundred absurdities more, which contradict not only Reason but Experience.

I shall Subjoin but one thing farther in proof of the conclusion I am establishing, but in my Opinion such a one as may stop the mouths of the Amyraldians in this particular, who affirm that for the bare performance of what was antecedently our duty, Amyr • ld. in Animadve • s. Speciaibus contra Spanhemium. part. 4 ad Ero • ema 13. God is not only obliged to continue our existence, but to recompence us with the reward of Heaven and Eternity. And it is this, namely that Gods Covenanting with mankind in the state of integrity to reward them provided that they persevered in their dependance on him, by obedience to the Law of their Creation: This doth abundantly testifie that He was under no antecedent obligation to it. For the very Nature of a Covenant and Covenanting supposeth the thing Covenanted about to be free and in his power to do or forbear that makes the Covenant. Where there is an Eternal and natural necessity, a Covenant is not only superfluous but absurd. What-ever accrueth to us either from intrinsick Equity, or Essential Goodness, we neither need, nor do derive it from Graunt and Agreement. Now that there was such a Covenant no man that hath read either his Bible, and believes it, or a System of Divinity, though but a Dutch one, can deny▪ However see Heb. 8. from the sixt verse to the end, and Heb. 12.24. All essentials to the constitution of a Covenant, occur in that transaction, as might be with ease evinced, if we did but suspect that it came into question. Now all this as it declares the wonderful condescension of God, that He should humble himself to set bounds to his own Dominion, and come to terms of agreement with a puff of precarious breath, and a little enliven'd dust. So it enhanceth the guilt of the first transgression, being as well against Love as Soveraignty, an act not only of Rebellion but Ingratitude.

§ 7. Seventhly: God having ratified the Law of Creation into a Covenant by annexing a Reward to the observance and keeping of it: He took special care therein for the preserving and securing his own Glory what-ever should be the Event on Mans Part. Though he trusteth us with the mannage of our own happiness, yet he would not trust us with the mannage of his Glory. In case we should make an invasion on his Honour, by transgressing the Law of our Creation, and violating the terms prescribed us; He did not leave himself to the necessity of retrieving it, but provided for it in his first transaction with mankind. Though▪ the felicity of the Creature depend necessarily on its obedience, yet the Glory of God doth not. God having then in the Covenant of Works provided for the exaltation of the Glory of his Faithfulness, and Goodness in the rewarding of man, had he persevered in obedience to the Law appointed him; He likewise in the same Covenant, by constituting a penalty proportionable in his Justice to the demerit of sin; took care for the securing of his Glory in the exaltation of his Holiness, Righteousness, Rectorship, &c. in the punishment of man, supposing him to transgress the terms prescribed him. However things should fall out, no prejudice was to ensue thereon to God's Glory. Had he therefore left us to stand or fall accordingly as we should demean our selves in reference to the tenor of that Transaction; Though misery would have fallen out to be our Lot, yet no d • triment would have arisen thereby to the honour of Gods Perfections of Government. On the one hand then, as man, supposing his perseverance in integrity, had gro • nd afforded him of expecting good things from God on the account of his Fidelity and Righteousness; his promise making life a debt, though even in that case God did not become properly a debtor to us; but what he was of that kind, was to his own Veracity▪ Which made one say Reddit debita nihil debens, donat debita nihil pendens. So on the other hand, being once fallen the whole of our recovery can have had its rise in nothing but in the free and meer mercy of God. For had he left us in our forlorn state, He had lost no more honour by us, than he doth by the Angels who kept not their first Habitation.

§ 8. Man falling and thereupon forfeiting all that title to life which he had settled on him by the Covenant we have been discoursing of, abode nevertheless still under the obligation of the Law of Creation. For that resulting from the Nature of God, and the Nature of man, and the relation that man stood in to God as hi • Creator, &c. so long as those continue, the Sanction of that Law must continue. What-ever obligation ariseth upon us from our Nature must be as perpetual as our Nature is. Now though the Lapse hath deprived us of the Rectitude of our Natures, yet it hath taken nothing from us that is essential to our constitution as men. Though we be transformed into Beasts and Demons in a Moral sense, yet not in a Physical. Though we have lost our Souls legally in that they are obnoxious to, & under the wrath of God; yet we are not brought forth deprived of them, nor of any thing essentially belonging to them. Such a loss would render us unfit for Moral Government, nor should we be so any longer men, or that species of the Creation, which supposing that we are at all, we necessarily must be. What we have said in proof of a Natural Law §. 3. is all applicable to that we have now in hand; so that all farther confirmation of it might have been here superseded. But having met with a late Book of one Mr. George Bull, stiled Harmonia Apostolica, and therein with some principles altogether inconsistent with the proposition we have now asserted; it will not be amiss to prosecute it a little farther. Now the doctrines in the foresaid Author, subversive of what we have been affirming are mainly two. (First) That there is no Law of God now requiring perfect obedience, or that any man is bound to live free from sin; and his reason is, quod justitiae Divinae repugnet, ut quisquam ad plane impossibilia▪ (sub periculo presertim aeternae mortis) teneatur. Because it is repugnant to the Righteousness of God, that any man should be obliged to that which is impossible. And that a spotless, sinless life is so to every one in the circumstances we now stand. Dissertat. poste • . cap. 7. p. 105, 106.

(2.) That there is no Law now in being, threatning future death, but the Law of Faith: That the promises and threatnings of the Law of Moses were only Temporal and Earthly, p. 210. If either of these be true, that which I have affirmed must needs be false. A refutation of these is so far then from being superfluous, that it is a necessary service to the design which I have in hand.

First then, If there be no Law now in Being, threatning future death, but the Law of Faith, then of all men in the world, the condition of the Heathen is the most eligible; And the enjoyment of the Gospel is so far from being a priviledg, that it is a snare. For, seeing where no Law is, there is no transgression, Rom. 4.15. Then, for as much as the Gentiles are not under the obligation of the Law of Faith▪ it naturally follows, that what-ever courses they pursue, or what-ever sins they are found in the practice of; yet eternal Death they are not obnoxious to. Instead therefore of pittying and bewailing the condition of the Gentiles for their want of the Gospel, we ought rather to lament their case that have it, being brought only thereby under a hazard of Damnation, which antecedently they were free from.

Secondly, If there be no Law threatning Eternal Death, but the Law of Faith, then is there no such thing as forgiveness and remission of sin in the world. The Reason is plain, because all pardon supposeth guilt; nor can any properly be discharged from that to which he is not obnoxious. Now the Gospel denounceth damnation only against final Impenitency and Unbelief; As on the one hand, therefore, these are neither pardoned, nor pardonable; so on the other hand, if there be no Law threatning eternal death, besides the Gospel, then is there no other sin that we either need, or are capable of having forgiven; And by consequence there is no such thing as remission of sin in the World.

Thirdly, If there be no Law threatning eternal Death, but the Law of Faith, then Christ never dyed to free any from wrath to come. For it is non-sence to say that he hath freed us from the Curse of the Gospel; yea, it is a Repugnancy, unless you will introduce another Gospel to relieve against the terms of this; nor will that serve the turn, unless you likewise find another Mediator to out-merit this. If Christ then have at all delivered us from wrath to come, it must be that of the Law; and if so, there must be a Law besides the Gospel, that denounceth future wrath, vid. Gal. 3.13.

Fourthly, To say that there is no Law now in Being, requiring perfect Obedience, and that no man is bound to live wholly free from Sin, is in plain English to affirm a contradiction. For, There being nothing that is sin, but what is forbid, or what we are under obligation against; (all sin being a transgression of some Law, 1 Joh. 3, 4.) To say that no man is bound to live free from sin, is to tell us that he is not obliged to that, that he is obliged to. See Mr. Truman his endeavour to rectifie some prevailing opinions, &c. pag. 4. & 14. I know well enough that some of these Consequences are things which the foresaid Author doth plainly detest, but they are naturally the issue and birth of his Assertions. For I would not fasten an odious inference upon any mans discourse, if the cohaesion were not necessary and clear. I reckon it an Unmanly, as well as an Unchristian thing to wring conclusions out of others premises. Nor would I drive the doctrine of any, farther than it is apt to go, and with the greatest Gentleness may be led.

§. 9. That we are still under the Sanction of the Law of Creation hath been already demonstrated. That which come's next to be declared, is, How that every Law of nature is of an Unchangeable obligation. A late Author tell's us, that there are Rules of Moral Good and Evil, which are alterable according to the accidents, changes and conditions of humane life. Eccles. polit. p. 83. And accordingly a power is pleaded to belong to the Magistrate over the consciences of men, in the essential duties of Morality; Eccles. polit. 68. And it is affirmed that He hath power to make that a particular of the Divine Law, that God hath not made so; ibid. p. 80. And from the power of the Magistrate over the consciences of men in Moral vertues (which our Author tell's 〈◊〉 are the most weighty & essential parts of Religion) the like power is challenged as appertaining to him over our consciences in reference to Divine Worship; Eccles. polit. p. 67, 77, 78: & def. & continuat. p. 356, 357, 358, 371. &c. I shall not at present meddle with his Consequence, nor indeed can I without a digression: Though I think it easy upon the Grounds that he states the Alterableness of Natural Laws, to evidence the impertinency and incoherence of it. For if either the matters of worship be already stated by God; or if God should have precluded the magistrate by a declaration of his will, as to medling in this matter, and bequeathed that trust into other hands; his Consequence falls to the ground. But it is the Antecedent that I am to deal with, and it is some comfort to me, that there are men of equal learning with the foresaid Author, who have been of a perswasion widely different from his. Grotius a person of some account in his day, and who will continue so while Learning is had in reputation, judged otherwise in this matter: Est autem jus naturale adeo immutabile ut ne a Deo quidem mutari queat; De jure Belli & Pacis lib. 1. cap. 1. §. 10 Natural Right (or Law) is so unchangeable that it cannot be altered by God himself. And that it may appear that he mean's those Rules of Good and Evil, which have reference to contracts and positive Laws, and in some sence depend upon them, He adds a little after; fit tamen interdum ut in his actibus de quibus j • s Naturae aliquid c • nstituit, imag • quaedam mutationis fallat incautos, cum reverà non jus naturae mutetur quod immutabile est, sed res de qua j • s naturae constituit, quaeque mutationem recipit. It comes to pass sometimes, that a kind of resemblance and shadow of change in those acts which the Law of nature hath determined and unalterably fixed, imposeth upon unwary men, While indeed the Law it self is not at all altered as being immutable, but the things which the Law regulates and about which it determines, undergo an alteration. ibid. It was of this Law that Philo gives us this character: Lex corrumpi nescia, quippe ab immortali natur • insculpta in immortali intellectu; A Law neither subject to decay nor abrogation, being engraven by the Immortal God into an immortal soul. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 ; in men or not distracted there remains an immoveable unalterable Law, which we call the Law of Nature, Andron. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 ; Nothing determined by Nature can be any wayes altered. Arist. lib. 2. Eth. Hence he stiles the Laws of Nature 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , immoveable and immutable. For the further demonstration of this; we desire it may be observed, that Law is nothing else but the will of the Rector constituting our duty, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 : Hierocl. made known to us by sufficient promulgation. Now in order to the obtaining a signification of the Rector's will enacting what he exacts of us. (1) a Rational faculty and a free use of it is necessary, that being the only instrument by which we discern what the will of the Soveraign is. Hence, meer ideots, children, and men totally deprived of the use and benefit of Reason are under the actual Sanction of no law, Not that there is any cessation, abrogation, or alteration of Law thereon, but because through the incapacity of the subject, it was never the Rector's will in those circumstances to oblige them. For as Plutarch say's, there are some 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 ; distempers & infirmities of soul which do Unman us. (2) Our obligation as to the exercise and discharge of some Natural duties, is by the Law of Nature only bound upon us, on supposition of some fundamenta or relations and circumstances that we are brought into. Now though the thing be alway's a duty in it self, and the Law requiring it unalterable, yet antecedently to my entring into that Relation or those circumstances, it was not my actual Duty. For example, the Law commanding a Husband to love and cherish his Wife, or a Father to provide for his Children, is immutable and invariable; though in order to my being under the sanction of it, as to the actual discharge of these duties, it is needful that I have a Wife and a Child: Si creditor quod ei debeo acceptum ferat, jam solvere non tencor, non quia jus Naturae desierit praecipere solvendum quod debeo, sed quia quod debeb am deberi desiit: If a Creditor should forgive me what I owe and am justly indebted to him, I stand no longer under Obligation to payment, not because the Law of Nature ceaseth to command me to pay my just debt, but because that which was a debt is no longer so, Grot. de jure belli & pacis, lib. 1. cap. 1. §. 10. By what hath been said 'tis easie to discover how weak and impertinent the Ecclesiastical Politician is in all the instances he brings of Natural Laws alterable as circumstances do require▪ or as the Magistrate thinks fit. It is well, if upon every times changing our condition, or upon every humour of the Magistrates altering the civil penalty of a moral crime, the Law of Nature must change also. Yea, according to the rate that any Laws of Nature are alterable, I will undertake to prove that they are all so. We readily grant that a man by putting himself into new circumstances, or new relations, is thereon obliged to performance of many duties which as so circumstantiated he was not bound unto before, but we altogether deny that, therefore the Laws of Nature suffer the least alteration; and the Reason is, because they did never bind to such duties, but on supposition of such Relations and Circumstances. In a word, the whole Law of Nature bearing upon the Nature of God, and the Nature of Man, while these are unchangeable, it is unchangeable. It is strange that we should envy the Pope to dispense with a Natural Law, if the Magistrate at pleasure may.

§ 10. That mankind notwithstanding the fall abode still under the obligation of the Law of Creation, and that every Precept of the Law of nature is of an unchangeable & unalterable obligation, hath been already unfolded and made Good. The evils which overtook us through the lapse in reference to that Law, come next to be disclosed and manifested. And besides what befel us in relation to it, as it was ratified into a Covenant, whereof I shall not now treat; there were two mischiefs arrested us in reference to it, under the reduplication of its being a Law; namely, Darkness and Ignorance, that we do neither clearly nor fully discern it; and Weakness and Enmity whence we neither can nor care to keep it.

First Darkness and Ignorance; and these are grown upon us two ways. (1) From an Eclipse of primigenial light in the mind it self. The Soul at first was a lucid orb, embellished with all the Rayes of light, created 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 in knowledg, Col. 3.10. in 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 true holiness, Eph. 4.24. that is, in sanctitate voluntatis veritatem • mplectentis; Cocc. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , Holy with Wisdome, Plat. in theat. But Alas! an Universal darkness hath arrested us: 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 ; The eye of the Soul is drowned or immersed in the barbarick gulf of Ignorance: Plat. de Repub. lib. 7. The concreated beams of light are lost and vanished. There remain none of those Radii Solis, or lucida tela diei. What the Poet says of dyed Wool —Nec amissos colores Lana refert medicata fuco; is applicable to the Soul deprived of the Image of God, and tinctur'd with Sin and Lust. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , There is none that understandeth, Rom. 3.11. We are born 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , without Understanding, Rom. 1.31. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 blind, 2 Pet. 1.9. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , darkned or benighted in our minds, Eph. 4.8. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , darkness, Joh. 1.5. Our light is not only too dim to preserve us from the mistakes of Error and Ignorance, but abuseth us with false representations. The Minde is now like an Icterical Organ, which imagineth all the objects of sight tinctur'd with false colours. (2.) This Ignorance of the Law of Nature, may be partly ascribed to that disorder and confusion which have invaded the Creation; 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 . The Creature is subjected to Vanity, Rom. 8.20. An 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 or disorder hath overspread the Universe through the Curse inflicted upon the Creation for mans sin; objective mediums are become in a great measure both dark and fallacious. They have lost much of that fulgor, by which the glory of God's Wisdome and Goodness, and our duty to Him, our selves, and others was at first visible. The present calamitous scene of things not only with reference to Brute Animals, but inanimate Beings doth strangely impose upon our easie and distorted minds.

Secondly, Weakness and pravity hath arrested us in all our faculties, so that we are neither able nor careful to observe and perform what we know. Impotency and corruption cleave to our very Natures, by the loss of that Rectitude which was concreated with us, and impressed upon our faculties; the subordination and subjection of the appetite to Reason, is in a great measure lost likewise; so that the animal life doth now sway us; our passion doth both baffle our Judgment and enslave our Wills, we are at once not onely weak, but corrupt; Impotent and averse to Good, and propense and disposed to evil. As darkness doth naturally ensue on the withdrawment of light, or as lameness doth necessarily attend the interruption of the Loco-Motive-faculty; so doth inability and aversation to good, and positive inclination and adaptedness to evil, ensue on the loss of that Rectitude which disposed us to live to God. Ungodly and without strength, is the just and due Character of every one of the Posterity of Adam. But more of this chapt. 4.

§ 11. Notwithstanding the Ignorance, Darkness, Weakness, Corruption, &c. that man was thus sunk into; yet retaining still his Faculties, he retain'd likewise some knowledg of the Duties he was obliged to by the Law of Nature, and in the vertue of his abiding, still endowed with Intellective and Elective powers, he continued likewise able for the performance of the substance of these duties, and that in his own strength. A promptitude, readiness, and facility of acting in reference to these, is what we commonly call Moral Vertue. And in many of them did some of the Heathen excel. It were to be wished, that as to Graveness of deportment, Amiableness of Conversation, Moderation in the pursuit and use of the Creatures, Acquiescence in the dispose they were brought into, Candor, Fidelity, Justice, &c. We who pretend our selves Christians did but equal them; And as appears by what Paul asserts of himself, The Pharisees were eminent in many of the instances of Morality; Hence what he expresseth, Phil. 3.5. by being in reference to the Law a Pharisee; he stiles v. 6. Being touching the Righteousness of the Law blameless. And now I must either contradict the Apostle, or take the liberty of differing from a late Author, who not onely assumes a confidence, wherein none have preceded him, of divesting them from all title to Moral Righteousness, but attaques withal, and that in a very pert and clamorous manner, the Wisdom, Honesty, and Conscience of a Learned man, for but presuming to say that the Pharisees were a People Morally Righteous: See def. & continuat. p. 350, 351. Go thy way (saies he) for a woful guesser; no man living beside thy self could ever have had the ill fortune to pitch upon the Scribes and Pharisees for Moral Philosophers, &c. This I dare say, that on what-ever evidence the Pharisees are condemned in their claim to Moral Righteousness, there is the same reason why the Philosophers should be cast also. Did the Pharisees paraphrase the Law, as regarding only the external act, without deriving the Sanction of it to the mind, intention, and disposition? The Heathen Moralists were no less guilty herein, than they; which made Tertullian say of their Moral Philosophy, non exscindit vitia sed abscondit; it cutteth not off, but covereth vice • , lib. 3. cap. 25. See Rom. 7.7. I bad not known Lust, except the Law had said, thou shalt not Covet. Were the Pharisees defective in the true end of obedience, designing instead of Gods glory, ostentation and applause? The best of the Philosophers were herein also criminal, which made Austin say, that cupiditas laudis humanae, was that, quae ad facta compulit miranda Romanos. Pride had as much leavened the Spirit and way of the Philosopher, as of the Pharisee. What-ever grosser vices they abandoned, Pride was congenial to them. Hence Antisthenes seeing a Vessel wherein Plato's Vomit lay, said, I see Plato's bile here, but I see not his Pride; meaning that his Pride stuck closer to him, than to be vomited up. Curius, though he supped upon roots, yet Ambition was his sauce. Diogenes in censuring Plato's Pride by trampling on his Carpets, discovered his own. Did the Pharisees pretend to communion with God? Did not the Philosophers the same? What else was the meaning of Socrates's Demons? Did not the most eminent of them neglect the conduct and guidance of sober reason, and addict themselves to Magick and Divination! Witness as well Pythagoras as those of the new Academy. But to wave the further prosecution of this. An ability, notwithstanding the fall, of discerning some considerable part of our duty, and of performing it as to the substance and material part thereof, was never gain-sai'd by any who understood whereof he spake, and what he affirmed. This we also acknowledg to be in it self desireable, praise-worthy, of wonderful advantage to humane societies, and that which seldome misseth its reward in this World. However it is always thus far useful to its Authors, quod minus puniantur in die judicii, that I may use a saying of Augustines, lib. 4. contra Julian. cap. 3.

§. 12. Man having brought himself into the condition of weakness and corruption already declared; and having by sin lost all title to life in the vertue of the Covenant first made with him; yet still continuing under obligation to all the duties of the Law of Nature, and obnoxious to the Wrath and Curse of God upon the least faileur: God might here have left him, and have glorified himself in the same way and method upon the posterity of Adam, as he hath done upon the Angels that sinned. No property of his nature, no word of promise bound him to the contrary. The terms of the first Covenant being violated, all was devolved upon the Soveraignty of God again. If an end was not to have been put to obedience, by the immediate destruction and perishing of the Creature; yet at the least an end was put to God's acceptance of any Moral service from the seed of Adam; and they lay under an utter incapacity of performing any such service as might with respect to the nature and quality of it be accepted with Him. Matters being thus, God out of his Soveraign pleasure, and infinite free Grace, proposed a Remedying-Law, treating with us upon New terms, and giving us a New standing in a Covenant-Grace. And herein he engaged his Veracity, providing we complyed with the overtures now made us, for the pardoning of our sins, the delivering us from Wrath to come, and the stating us at last in the happy enjoyment of himself. Now in the vertue of this transaction, there arose New Relations betwixt God and us, with new duties thereon. So that henceforth the Law of Creation was but one part of the Rule of that obedience we owed to God, the condition of the New Covenant making up the other part of it. Whoever then shall now state the whole of Religion in Moral duties, bids a plain defiance to the Gospel, either by telling us that there is no Remedial Law at all, or that the terms of it are universally the same with the terms of the Old Covenant. Of this complexion are several expressions in a late Author, viz. That Religion, for the substance of it, is the same Now, as it was in the state of Innocence. For as then the whole duty of man consisted in the practice of all those Moral Vertues that arose from his Natural Relation to God, so all that is superinduced upon us since the fall, is but helps and contrivances to supply our Natural defects, and recover our decayed powers, and restore us to a better ability to discharge those duties we stand engaged to by the Law of our Nature, and the design of our Creation. So that the Christian Institution is not for the substance of it any new Religion, but onely a more perfect digest of the eternal Rules of Nature and Right Reason. All its additions to the Eternal and Unchangeable Laws of Nature, are but onely means and instruments to discover their Obligation, Def. & Continuat. p. 315. That there are Duties to which we stand obliged by the Law of Faith, which we were not under the direct, immediate Sanction of by the Law of Creation; yea, the repugnancy of them to our Original state, and the habitude we were at first placed in to God, shall be afterwards (God willing) demonstrated, cap. 3.

§ 13. The Relation and habitude of the Original Law to the Law of Faith, is that which bespeaks our next enquiry. The present existence of neither of them can be called into question; for, without the overthrowing the Nature of God, the Nature of Man, and the Decalogue of Moses, we cannot suspect the Being and Obligation of the first. Nor can the existence of the second fall under debate, without disclaiming the Gospel, not only in all the conditions of it, but our hopes by it. A consistency betwixt them must also be granted, it being unbecoming and repugnant to the Wisdom of God to keep in establishment two several Laws, whereof the one is wholly subversive of the other; nor can Subjects in justice and equity be at one and the same time obliged to Laws which neither in their demands nor designs are consistent one with another.

The Apostle hath long agoe determined this: Do we then make voyd the Law through Faith? God forbid; yea, we establish the Law, Rom. 3.31. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 make voyd: 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 signifies inutilem, inanem, ignavam, omnibus viribus destitutam reddere; to render idle, fruitless, destitute of all binding power, to evacuate the obligation of a thing, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 : That through death he might destroy him that had the power of death, Heb. 2.15. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 we establish; legem statuimus, vulg. stabilimus, i. e. firmam & efficacem reddimus; Bez. We fix and settle it in its Sanction and force. Think not that I am come to destroy the Law (saith Christ) I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil, Mat. 5.17. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 : whereas 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 signifies to dissolve the obligation of the Law, to abolish and abrogate it; 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , to overthrow the Democratie or popular Government; Homer. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , leges tollere, to evacuate or cancel Laws often in Greek Authors. So 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 being put in opposition to 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , signifies to maintain the obligation of the Law; consistent then they are. Yet coordinate they can not be, their terms being not only different but opposite. It is true each of them in their own kind, sense and way, requires perfect obedience; For no Law can remit what it self exacts: but then it is only perfect obedience to its own demands. And with respect to its own terms the Gospel is as strict as the Law. As the one denounceth Eternal death to all those who transgress its terms, so doth the other to all those who violate its. He that • ailes in Repentance from dead works, Faith towards Jesus Christ, and sincere obedience to the Moral Law is left as remediless by the Covenant of grace; as he that fails in obedience to the Law of Creation is brought and left under the curse by the Covenant of Works. Only the terms of the one are not so severe and strict as the terms of the other; The Remedying Law being purposely introduced for the pardoning our trespasses against the Original Law. The Law threatens death absolutely, repent or not repent: The Gospel threatens that the legal curse shall be executed except we repent. And herein they are not only so distinct and different, but distant and opposite in their demands the one to the other; that whoever pleads on a personal fulfilling the terms of the one, is not at all capable of pleading on the terms of the other. The Subject of justification by the Original Law must be one perfectly innocent; The man that doth these things shall live by them, Rom 10.5. Whereas the Subject of justification by the Remedying Law, must be supposed a sinner and a criminal; They that be whole need not a Physician, but they that are sick: I am not come to call the Righteous, but sinners to repentance, Mat. 9.12.13. The Original Law both as it was first Subjective in our natures, and as it is now Objective in the Decalogue to our natures, requires perfect obedience: Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine Heart, and with all thy Soul, and with all thy Strength; Deut. 6.5. Moses describeth the Righteousness which is of the Law that the man which doth those things, shall live by them; Rom. 10.5. And accordingly in case of the least faileur, it denounceth eternal death; Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the Law to do them; Gal. 3.10. Nor can sincere obedience give any title to life, by the Law of Creation: all the Right that it states us in to happiness is by the Law of Faith. The obedience which gives a claim to life by the Original Law, must be perfect, and perpetual as well as sincere: Seeing then none of the sons of Adam even in their best state, doth good and sinneth not, Eccl. 7.20. 1 Kings. 8.46. But in many things we offend all; Jam. 3.2. And if we should say that we have no sin we deceive our selves, and the truth is not in us; 1 John 1.8. It Naturally follow's that by the Deeds of the Law, there shall no flesh be justified in God's sight, Rom. 3.20. But that as many as are under the works of the Law, are under the curse, Gal. 3.10. The Papists do here grosly erre, by affirming that Mankind is still able perfectly to keep the Original Law. But in order to this they are necessitated to hold that some sins are in their own Nature venial, and that they are not contra sed praeter legem, against, but besides the Law; Bellarmin. lib. 4. de justif. cap. 14. The whole of which as it is false, so it is absurd and non-sensical. For if they be against no Law, they are not at all sins, but acts in themselves indifferent and Lawful. And if they be violations of any Law of God, i. e. if they be at all sins they demerit eternal death; That being the penalty annexed by God to the breach of every command; Rom. 6.23. Gal. 3.10. Deut 27.26. Rom. 2.9. Besides did we remain able to fulfil & observe the Law of Creation perfectly, there could be no place nor room for the Law of Grace; For (as the Apostle saith) if there had been a Law given, which could have given life, verily Righteousness should have been by the Law; Gal. 3.21. It being then impossible that they should be Coordinate, it remains that the one lye in a subordination to the other. And seeing that the Gospel in all its super-structions supposeth the Original Law still in Being, though not Universally to the same ends that it first served; and for as much as the Law of Faith is provided and introduced of God, to minister relief against the Law of Nature; it likewise appears that the Original Law is now brought into a subserviency and subordination to the Remedial-Law. How and wherein this is, shall be farther laid open.

First then; Our Lord Jesus hath in the Gospel adapted the Decalogue (which is a compleat transcript of the Natural Law) to be the alone measure of Moral Rectitude and Obedience. Though the Gospel strengthen the Duties of Morality by new Motives, and improve them upon New Principles, yet it no where gives us any New Precepts of Moral Goodness. It is true, Christ once and again, particularly in the fifth of Matthew, vindicates the Moral Law from the corrupt glosses and flesh-pleasing expositions of the Scribes and Pharisees, who had restrained and perverted it from, and besides the meaning of the Law, and the intent of the Law-giver; But he no where superinduceth any New Moral Duty that was not designed in the Sanction of it at first. He hath retrived the old Rules of Nature from the evil customs of the World, and rebuk'd the false expositions put upon the Decalogue by those who both then, and for a considerable time before sat in Moses's Chair. But he hath no where made new additions to them by putting his last hand (as some men take upon them to say) to an imperfect draught. And indeed, to affirm that the Decalogue was an imperfect and defective edition of the Natural Law, is to assert that which no way accords with the design of God's Wisdom and Goodness in giving it. For God's intendment in giving the Law of the Ten Commandments, being to relieve us against the Darkness of Moral Good and Evil, which had seized us by the Fall; we must suppose it a sufficient draught of the Original Law of Morality, otherwise we must conclude it not proportionable and adequate to the end it was given for, which to assert, is no less than an impeachment of the divine Sapience, Faithfulness and Goodness. Nor doth the bringing up such a report upon the Moral Law, accord with that account which the Scripture every where gives of it; The Law of the Lord is perfect, Psal. 19.7. Not onely essentially perfect, in respect of its purity and holiness, but integrally in respect of its plenitude and fulness. As it is in nothing superfluous which it ought not to have, neither is it deficient in any thing that it ought to have. Thy Commandment is exceeding broad, Psal. 119.96. This it could not be, if it were not a perfect measure of all Moral Duties. Shall I add that the institution of New Moral precepts seems not at all consonant to the design that Christ came upon. The Holy Ghost entirely allots the giving of the Law to Moses, telling us that the work, errand, and business of Christ was of another Nature: The Law came by Moses, but Grace and Truth came by Jesus Christ, Joh. 1.17. Christ's work was to bring into further light the Law of Faith, and to redeem us from the Curse of the Moral Law; not to augment the number of Natural Duties. This may suffice to perstringe among others a late Author, whose words are, that the Decalogue was never intended for a perfect System of the Moral Law. That • e cannot imagine, that by thou shalt not make to thy self any Graven Image, is meant, Thou shalt not institute Symbolical ceremonies; or that by thou shalt not Murther, alms and fraternal Correption are enjoyned, &c. Def. & Continuat, p. 312. It is likely, that he and those of his persuasion would take it ill if I should tell them with whose Heifer they here Plow: Therefore I shall irritate no man, onely recommend those who desire farther confirmation in this matter, to such who have debated the Socinian Controversies. Now with respect to Christs having made the Moral Law of the Family of the Christian Religion in the place already assigned it, a threefold subordination of that to this, is easie to be manifested. (1.) That it is upon the alone score of the Law of Grace, that God will accept any service at the hands of Sinners: For though the Law, as to the Obligation of it, remain still in force, and for the substance of it, will do so to all Eternity; yet that God will accept the service of Sinners, is to be wholly attributed to God's transaction with them in the Covenant of Grace by Jesus Christ. (2.) It is in the alone vertue of the Law of Faith, and God's Mercy and Faithfulness therein displayed and declared, that an ability is ministred to us of performing any part of Moral Obedience, so as to be accepted with the Lord, and afforded ground of expecting a reward thereupon. This Grace comes not by Moses: The Law as such, administers no strength for the performance of what it requires; this comes alone by Jesus Christ, out of whose fulness, we receive Grace for Grace, Joh. 1.16, 17. (3.) Though the Original Law continue both to claym perfect Obedience, and to threaten Death in case of the least faileur, yet because of the introduction of the Law of grace over it, the penalty shall not be executed, provided we be sincere Christians, & flie to the hope set before us, Heb. 6.18. Rom. 8.1. Not-withstanding both our manifest faileurs in that Obedience which the Law exacts, and its severe denunciation of wrath upon the least sin, yet our condition is not left hopeless, providing we fulfil the terms of the Law of Grace.

Secondly. The Original Law is brought into subserviency to the Law of Grace in this. That though in it self, and abstractedly considered, it be only shapen to drive us from God, and to fill us with thoughts of fear and flight, and accordingly that was the effect of it upon Adam as soon as he had sinned; yet through the introduction of the Remedying-Law, it is become a blessed means in the hand of the Spirit, to conduct us to Christ and God through him. Hence it is stiled our 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 Schoolmaster to bring us to Christ, Gal. 3.24. And Christ is called 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , The end of the Law for Righteousness, &c. Rom. 10.4. The scope and drift of the Law; He, to whom the Law guides and conducts: Thus the word is used likewise elsewhere, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 ; Now the end (i. e. finis intentionis, the scope) of the Commandment is Charity, 2 Tim. 1.5. And not as Moses, who put a vail over his face, that the Children could not stedfastly look 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , to the end of that which is abolished; To that which God aym'd at in, and by the Mosaick Ceremonies, 2 Cor. 3.13. That Righteousness which the Law becoming weak through the flesh cannot confer upon us, Rom. 8.3. It conducts and leads us to Christ for the obtaining of. This is a blessed subserviency, that all that is frightful and perplexing in the Original Law, whether the amazing strictness of its precepts, or the severe dreadfulness of its denunciations, is made contributory and influential to bring us to Christ, and to God by him.

Thirdly. Herein also is the Original Law subjected and made subservient to the Law of Grace: That Faith in the Messiah is constituted an ingredient in every Moral act in order to its acceptance with God; 'tis this which mainly gives every action its Moral specification. Though the foundation of all Moral Duties be laid in the Law of Nature; yet the practice of every Duty, with respect to acceptance with God since the fall, is regulated by that great positive Law of the New Covenant which enjoyns the tendring of all things through the Messiah. Now the manner of performance being an essential ingredient into the determination of the Moral quality of an action, and the New Covenant determining this as the manner in which every Moral action ought to be performed; it naturally follows, that Faith in Jesus Christ is become an ingredient into, and a part of every Moral Duty.

§ 14. Having intimated the introduction of a Remedying-Law, and the subordination of the Original Law thereunto: That which we are next to address to, is the unfolding our impotency and inability for the performance of the Duties and Conditions of this Law of Grace. We here suppose, that the New Covenant hath its terms and conditions as well as the Old. Every Covenant of God, made with us, as with parties Covenanting, doth by vertue of the Nature of the thing, require some performance or other of us antecedently to our having an interest in, and benefit by the promises of that stipulation. We take likewise for granted, that Repentance towards God, and Faith towards our Lord Jesus Christ, Act. 20.21. are the terms and conditions of the New Covenant. The state and condition of Weakness, Alienation and Enmity, that we are in to these great Duties of the Gospel, is what I intend a little farther to treat.

First then. The terms of the Gospel, together with the foundations on which they bear, were not discernable by Natural Light. They take their alone Rise in the soveraign will and pleasure of God, nor is there any medium by which we can know the free determinations of the Divine Will, but his own Declaration. These things have no foundation in the imagination of any Creature. They are 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 things not possible to be found out by sense or reason: It is only Faith on the Word of God that gives 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 evidence and convincing demonstration of them, and that begets an 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 or confidence and full assurance concerning them, Heb. 11.1. Hence it is that the Gospel is so often stiled 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 a mystery; see Math. 13.11. Rom. 16.25. Eph. 1.9. & 6.19. 1 Cor. 4.1. &c. Some take the word to be of a Hebrew Original, and to be equivalent to 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 or 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 a secret, or a thing hidden; others derive it from 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 nicto, clausos oculos habeo. Whencesoever we fetch it, the unsearchableness and hiddenness of the Gospel is intended in it. The New Covenant both in the Doctrines and Duties of it, lies in a higher Region than humane Reason in its most daring flight can mount to. The matters and concerns of it, are omni ingenio altiora, out of the reach of Reason to discern, till brought nigh by the Revelation of them in the Gospel, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 ; The world by all their Natural and Metaphysical Wisdom, knew not God, viz. as reconciling Sinners to himself by Christ, till by the Gospel, and the Preaching of it, he made it known, 1 Cor. 1.21. How should it come under the Apprehensions of men, when it lay out of the reach of the Angelical Understanding, Eph. 3.10? Unto Principalities and Powers in Heavenly places is made known by the Church, the manifold Wisdom of God. Had it not been for God's revealing it to the Church, the Angels themselves had abode in everlasting ignorance of it. There are no footsteps of it in the whole Creation, nor evidence of it in the works of Providence. The Placability of God through Christ is no part of the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 . of that which maybe known of God, by the things that are made. Alas! How shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard? Rom. 10.14. That sin is pardonable, we can only learn it there, where we are taught how it is actually pardoned. Before we can be sure of the Reconcileableness of God, or the remissableness of Sin upon Faith and Repentance: We must first be perswaded of one of these three: (1.) Either that God both can & will forgive Sin without any satisfaction: But this according to the Amyraldians themselves, contradicts that idea of Righteousness, Holiness, and Justice which we have of God. Or (2.) That the Sinner himself can make satisfaction▪ but that is repugnant to Natural light as much (if not more) than the former. Or (3.) That God hath found out a way of satisfying himself, and that either by the death of his Son, or by some other means; not the first, for as much as there is not one Iota of the incarnation, death, satisfaction, &c. of Christ, in the whole book of Creation and Providence; neither the second, because notwithstanding the advantages which we, through the enjoyments of the Scripture have beyond the Heathen▪ of knowing what could have been, and what could not have been, we are yet so far from any clear certain grounds of believing the possibility of Salvation in any other way, that we are furnished with very momentous arguments to the contrary. Besides, if I should not not be counted Young, Raw, Petulant, &c. I would ask the Disciples of Amyrald, whether the works of God do naturally, and by a vertue intrinsecal to them, declare this Placability of God, and Pardonableness of Sin on Faith and Repentance; or whether they do it by vertue of a Divine Institution? If they affirm the last, pray how come the Heathens without a Revelation acquainted with that Institution? Where, and by whom had God told the world so much? If they assert the first, which alone carries probability in it: Then (1.) Adam from his own, and his Wifes not being instantly destroyed upon the commission of Sin, had sufficient assurance of the Placability of God, and pardonableness of Sin, previously unto, and abstracting from all promulgation of the Covenant of Grace. (2.) How is it, that seeing there are in the Government of the World as manifest instances of God's severity, as his Lenity, that forgetting all thoughts of the Wrath and Anger of God, they should only possess a perswasion of his Mercy and Kindness. (3.) Suppose that God had preserved the Creation in Being, without transacting with Sinners in a Covenant of Grace (which I think implies no Contradiction,) pray what then of the Placableness and Compassion of God could it have taught us? In a word, all the Notices which the Heathen have, or at any time had of the Reconcileableness of God, they had it by Tradition from the Church, nor do they resolve themselves into any other Original. Shall I add in the last place, that I never understood the consistency of the Amyraldian Hypothesis, either with the Wisdom or Goodness of God. A Reconcileableness on terms which (according to those we are dealing with) men neither will, nor can come up to, and where there is no provision for their relief, signifies not very much, nor accords with infinite Wisdom which adapts one thing to another. Of all the defenders of Universal objective Grace, they spake most coherently, who affirmed the Heathens to have been saved by Philosophy, as well as the Jews were by the Law, or we by the Gospel. vid. Clem. Alexand. Strom. lib. 7. Just. Mart. Apolog. 2.

Secondly: such is the disproportion betwixt our intellectual faculties and the great objects of the Gospel, that they can neither fathom nor bear the Majesty of the doctrines of the New Covenant, though they be never so clearly revealed The Sun doth not more overpower and dazle the eye, than those things of the Gospel from which all our pardon and peace flow's, do overmatch our understandings. The Natural man ( 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 the man of a large inte •• ect) Receiveth not ( 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , non est capax, is not adapted, a metaphore, saith Beza, taken from a small vessel, which cannot admit any large body into it) the things of the Spirit of God ( 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 in contradistinction from the 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 .) We may gather cockles on the shore, but we cannot dive to the bottom of these depths. It is enough that we are perswaded of the infallibility of the Testimony, we must not hope to comprehend the things testified. Our work is not so much to look after the evidence of the things themselves, as the Evidence of the Revelation of them. And herein we have an instance of the Love, Care, and Wisdome of God that what is most incomprehensible in its own Nature, is above all other things revealed in terms most plain and intelligible. The obscurity of the Mysterious truths of the New Covenant is not to be reflected on the darkness of the Declaration, but is to be ascribed to the Majesty of the things declared. Est enim objectum ita sublime, ut a mente nostra perfectè comprehendi nequeat, non etiamsi careret omni labe: tantae scilicet rei creatura modus capax non est: The things are in themselves so sublime, that were our understandings pure and unspotted they could not be grasped or comprehended; Our f •• ite capacities bearing no proportion to them; Amyrald. Therefore, as one says, sicut in Logicis argumentum facit fidem, sit in Theologicis fides facit argumentum: as demonstration begets faith in Philosophy, so faith begets assurance in Divinity; Alex. A • ens. The Scripture of whose Divineness we have all the evidence that is possible, is the truest ground for the certainty of particular Doctrines, that our understandings can rest in. Jansenius therefore say's well, that quemadmodum intellectus Philosophi • suscipiend • propria facultas est, ita memoria Theologia. Ille quippe intellecta principia penetrando Philosoph • m facit; haec, ea quae sibi script • a • t praedicatione tradita sunt recordando, Theologum Christanum: As the understanding is the proper faculty for Philosophy, so is the memory for Theology: for as that by penetrating into the Principles of things makes a Philosopher, so this by remembring what it meets with in, and hear • from the Word, maketh a Divine; Tom. 2. lib. pro •• m. cap. 4. pag. 4.

Thirdly, There is not only a Physical disproportion through the finiteness of our faculties, betwixt us & the objects of the Gospel, but there is also a contracted adventitious Moral ineptitude, through the priv • tion and loss of that Rectitude which was at first concreated with us. I grant that the Doctrines of the Gospel being attended with so great subjective and objective evidence of their truth, neither indwelling lust nor practical immorality can prove a total bar to the assenting to them. Unregenerate men may perceive the truth of Scripture-Propositions, as well as of those of Humane Authors; The word revealing things as clearly, and being accompanied with more & stronger motives of credibility than any other writings are. But through want of a Vital alliance to the things they are conversant about, there is a Threefold unhappiness such men labour under. (1.) They are Sceptical and fluctuating in the belief of Gospel-truths. Every temptation can fetch them off. In stead of a firm settledness of mind in the perswasion of them, they are loose and Aporetical. Their assents are weak and vanishing. Divine truths having no cognation with the subject they are in, they are easily blown away or wither; whatever certainty be in the object, there is little in the Mind. They want the full assurance of understanding of the Mystery of God, and of the Father, and of Christ. No man (saith the Apostle) can say that Jesus is the Lord, but by the Holy Ghost: 1 Cor. 12.3. He cannot say and profess it from a full perswasion of heart, till the Holy Ghost have taught it him, See Heb. 11.1. And remember the notion we have already given of the design and meaning of those words. (2) Their knowledg of Gospel-mysteries is not affective. They do not savour the things they assent to. Objects have quite an other aspect to an unregenerate person, than they have to one that is renewed in the Spirit of his mind; and the act of seeing is of a different kind. How tastless are the great truths of the Gospel to unregenerate souls, and how faint are the Rayes of Gospel-Light! The mind being deprav'd by impure and vitious tinctures, it doth not relish the things which it is even perswaded of. Unless a man (saith Christ) be born again, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 he cannot see (know or understand) the Kingdome of Heaven (the mysteries and doctrines of the Gospel.) Hence it is that the believing soul, though otherwise simple and ignorant, hath an insight into the things of God, which the Learned, whose hearts are not connaturalized to the Gospel, have not. It is one thing to know in the Light of Reason, and another thing to know in the Light of the Spirit. Therefore the doctrines of the new Covenant being 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , Spiritualiter▪ res divinas cognoscere est eas agnoscere judicio, ductu & illuminatione Spiritûs; sicut animaliter, vel rationaliter cognoscere aliquid est ex judicio rationis cognoscere, Musc. ad. 1 Cor. 2. Animalis homo intelligi • quidem vocabula & aliquot sententias: S • iritualem autem corum sensum▪ percipere & fidem • is habere no • potest. Par. ad. 1 Cor. 2▪ 14. Spiritually discerned; 1 Cor. 2.14. They lye out of the Gust and true perception of a Carnal man. For as to discern Rationally is to perceive it in the vertue of a Rational Principle, and through the influence of Reason: So to discern a thing Spiritually, is to do it by a Spiritual Principle and through the illumination of the Holy Ghost. It is an excellent expression of Amyralds. Quod sicut operationes omnium animantium, quantumvis subtilissimae, nihilominus cum iis quae a mente hominis proficiscuntur, collatae, defectum Rationalis facultatis arguunt; similiter &c. that as the operations of Brutes how sagacious soever they be, yet being compared with the operations of men, do manifest a want of a faculty in them, that we are endowed with; so the sublimest actions of Natural men, being compared with the operations of such as are born of God do as plainly argue the lack of a faculty in those which these have. Thes. Salm Tom. 1. p. 139. (3.) Their knowledg of divine truths is not transformative Their assent is accompanied with a disaffected heart to the things they assent to. Under all the imbellishments of knowledg, they are not attempered into the likeness of what they believe and profess. Their hearts are not changed into the vital Image of truth, but remain Animal and Brutish, notwithstanding all the Notions their heads are fraught with. They are not cast 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , into the form and mo • ld of the doctrine they believe. Their hearts and affections are not framed into the similitude and figure of it. The Word is not 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 an Ingrafted Word, turning the whole stock into its own nature and likeness. But they do 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , hold or imprison the truth in unrighteousness. Inest homini sanct • legis scientia, nec • amen sanatur vitiosa concupiscentia. Aug. lib. de gest. Pelag. cap. 7. see Rom. 7.8.

Fourthly. Because of Weakness through the loss of the Divine Image; and because of Enmity through indwelling lust; we are altogether unable in our selves savingly to comply with the terms of the Gospel. There is an 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 a want of power in every one of us to those things. No man can come to me except the Father draw him: Joh. 6.44. To come is as much as to own Christ as the sealed and Anointed of God, and to believe in him as the alone Mediatour and Surety (Joh. 5.40. Joh. 6.35, 37.) And without the Fathers drawing i. e. without an efficacious work of God ingaging the Soul in a most sweet but powerful manner no one will be ever found in the practice and exercise of those things. There is both that disproportion of faculty, and that wicked aversation from the terms of the Gospel in every one; which only the Divine Spirit can relieve and conquer. Objective grace or the Moral Swasion of the word is not enough, we need also subjective Grace and a new principle. What a dead man is to vital operations, that every one by Nature is to Spiritual acts. The soul is not more necessary to the body, for the functions of Life, Sense, and Reason; than the Spirit of life in the New Birth is to all holy performances. We not only need insinuations of Spiritual light to awaken our slumbring minds, but to elevate and dispose them for the due perception of the things of God; nor do we only need grace to court our perverse wills, but to determine them to the choice of holiness. An impotency is acknowledged by all who measure their conceptions about these things, either by the declaration of the Word, or the Universal experience of Mankind. The Natural man 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 cannot know the things of the Spirit of God, because they are spiritually discerned; 1 Cor. 2.14. The Carnal mind; 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 (the wisdom of the flesh, i. e. the best thoughts, affections, inclinations and motions of the mind of a Natural man; 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 being as much as homo corruptus, Joh. 3.6. Gen. 6.3.) is Enmity against God, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 in the abstract: For it is not subject to the Law of God, neither indeed can be, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , Rom. 8.7.

Fifthly; How this impotency is now to be called, is not of so great consequence as some men make it. For on the one hand all are agreed, that it consists not in a Deprivation of any Essential Power or Faculty of our Rational Being: This Spanhemius as well as Amyrald, Twiss as well as Truman are at an accord in. And it is granted likewise on the other hand, that it is not only Congenite with us, and so in that sense Natural, wherein we are said to be by Nature the Children of Wrath; but farther, that it implies both á want of concreated Rectitude, and a connate pravity and aversation from God; and that it is only God who can overcome our opposition, and relieve our weakness; and that secluding his work upon the soul, we neither will nor can comply savingly with the terms of the Gospel: so that whether it ought to be stiled a Moral, or a Natural Impotency is for the most part but a strife about words. There is a perfect harmony as to the sense and meaning, the alone contest is about the manner of expressing and phrasing it. Philosophy is only concerned in it, not Divinity. Nor is the question, who speaks most truly, but who speaks most properly. It is the dispute of Divines, not of Divinity. The terms might have been avoided without prejudice to truth; Nor do I know any reason for the use of them, but to confound mens apprehensions. I heartily wish that those Learned persons who have made so great a noise about Moral and Natural power, would have been so ingenuous as to have told the World that they impeached no man of error, but only of solecism, and that their adversaries were as sound in the matter contended about, as themselves, only that they had not the luck of declaring it in so apt words: as this would have contributed more to the peace of the Church, so hereby private Christians would have judged their concern but small in these debates. But seeing for Reasons that I think not fit to enquire into, this needful Advertisement hath been neglected, I hope it will not prove an unacceptable service that we have here suggested it; presupposing then that Agreement in the Main which hath been intimated; All that lies upon our hand, is to enquire who express themselves most Philosophically in this matter. And though I must confess that 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , Dion. Halicarn. apt words are of great import to a clear apprehension of things; yet I must withal add, that I am no friend to a 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , or a co • ning of new terms when old ones will serve the turn. And I am so far from seeing any solid ground, why in the matter and case before us, we should wave the word Natural for the word Moral; that I think there is a great deal of reason for the contrary. (1.) The most likely way of arriving at a distinctness of understanding our present inability, is by considering what at first was communicated to us, and for what ends; and according to this method of proceed, I would argue thus. That impotency which consists in the want of a principle not only concreated with us, but Naturally due to our undefiled Natures in order to our living acceptably to God, may I think not unfitly be called a Natural Impotency; and that the impotency under consideration, is such, were easie to demonstrate from what our Divines have proved against the Papists, viz. That Grace was Natural to man at first, not Supernatural. (2.) As the strength and malignancy of a Disease is best known by the powerful remedies which are necessary to conquer it; So the quality of our inability will be best understood by considering the Nature of the means which can relieve us against it. That inability then, which Moral means are not sufficient to relieve us against, is more than a Moral inability; Now that Moral means are not sufficient to relieve us against the impotency we labour under, might be easily proved by producing the arguments for Inward Efficacious Grace, against those who admit only a Moral Suasion; but this I suppose sufficiently done against Pelagian, Jesuits, and Arminians; and in the matter both of the necessity of efficacious Grace, and the way in which it is wrought we have both Amyrald and Truman harmonizing with us. (3.) Let us measure our thoughts by the report which the Scripture makes of our inability, and we shall find abundant cause of judging it a Natural Impotency. For the better clearing of this, we may observe that in order to our readier conceiving our ineptness and indisposition to the things of God, the Lord is pleased to represent it under such Metaphors and Similitudes as are of a familiar and easie perception, and to wave others which possibly may be more Emphatical: I shall only take notice that the Holy Ghost upon this occasion frequently stiles us Blind. Now Blindness properly is affirmed of the eyes of the body, and thence transferred to the Soul. As we do not call him blind, who wants a visible object,

Intellectus humanus non est id qu • d in oculis corporis est facultas videndi; cui satis est si lux ex • erna offeratur, Muscul. in Isa. 42. Caecitas est privatio Luminis interni: cui tamen deest externum, privatur quidem actu videndi, cui vero internum deest privatur potentiâ videndi, quantum ad organum spectat.

Strang. de Volunt. Dei lib. • 4. cap. 8.