Apology Against the Exceptions of Black and Kendall, Section Baxter 24 – Section Blake 25
§. 24.
R. B. I Should tremble to ſay ſo: What Romaniſt by the doctrine of merit gives more to man in the work of Juſtification! If our faith give efficacy and power to the Goſpel to juſtifie us, then we juſtifie our ſelves when the Goſpel juſtifies us! then the Goſpel is our inſtrument of Juſtification! And can this be unleſs it be alſo ſaid that we made the Goſpel? Then God and we are concauſes in the Goſpels act of Donation: And is it the ſame power and efficacy for juſtifying, which the Goſpel receives from God, and which it receives from faith? or are they divers? If divers, ſhew us what they are; and which part of its power and efficacy the Goſpel receives from faith, and which from God? If they are the ſame, then God muſt convey juſtifying efficacy and power into faith firſt, and by faith into the Goſpel: which who imagineth? or why ſhould I be ſo vain as to ſtand to confute it? O that you had condeſcended ſo far to your Readers weakneſs, as to have deigned to ſhew him, Quomodo patitur Evangelium recipiendo? & Quid recipit ut ſiat potens & efficax? & quomodo haec potentia & efficacia fuit in fide? utrum eminenter an formaliter? aut utrum fides id communicavit quod nunquam habuit? & quomodo agit fides in hoc influxu cauſativo in Evangelium? with many more of the like, which you make neceſſary to be enquired after. And why gave you no proof from Scripture or reaſon for a point that is ſo new, that I think never man printed before you, for ſo far as I can learn at preſent: That ſaith gives efficacy and power of ſanctifying or exciting Grace, perhaps ſome before you have delivered: but that it gives efficacy and power of juſtifying, I think not any.
2. And ſure you do not take the foregoing words for proof: If you do, I deſire your Reader may not do ſo, What though only Believers are juſtified by the Covenant? Doth it follow that faith gives efficacy and power to the Covenant to juſtifie? Then either there are no conditions or cauſes ſine quibus non: or elſe they all are efficient…, and give efficacy and power to other efficients: What if your father bequeath by his Teſtament 110 a piece to each of his ſons? to one on condition he will ask it of his elder brother, and thank him for it: to another, if he be married by ſuch a time: to a third, if he will promiſe not to waſt it in prodigality: Do any of theſe conditions give efficacy and power to the Teſtament? No: Yet the Teſtament doth not efficaciter agere till they are performed. Why is that? Becauſe all ſuch inſtruments work morally, only by expreſſing ut ſigna the Will of the Agent: and therefore they work both when and how he will; and it is his Will that they ſhall not work till ſuch a time, and but on ſuch terms; and ſo he frames the conditions himſelf, as obices to ſuſpend his Teſtament or other inſtrument from acting or effecting, till they are performed: but not to give efficacy and power to his Teſtament. If the gift be in diem, the inſtrument receives not efficacy and power from the Time, quando venit dies: no more doth it per praeſtationem conditionis.
3. Your terms of [Faiths giving power through the Spirit] tell me, that ſure you ſtill look at the wrong act of the Goſpel; not at its moral act of Conveyance or Donation, but at its real operation on mans heart: For neither Scripture nor Divines uſe to ſay, The Goſpel remitteth ſin, or juſtifieth by the Spirit: Nor doth the Spirit otherwiſe do it, then by enditing the Goſpel; unleſs by the Spirit you mean the Godhead in Eſſence, and not in Perſonality. Sanctification is aſcribed to the Spirit as the efficient, but ſo is not forgiveneſs and Juſtification. Nor do I like your phraſe, as to ſanctification it ſelf, That faith conveys efficacy and power to the Goſpel through the Spirit: For 1. I had rather ſay, The Goſpel and Spirit, or the Spirit by the Goſpel, convey efficacy and power to faith, then faith to the Goſ…el. 2. How faith ſhould convey this through the Spirit, is quite beyond my reach: Doth the Spirit receive any influx from faith, and thereby a power, and then convey this to the Goſpel from our faith? But its like you mean, the Spirit doth it through faith.
§. 25.
Mr Bl. SO that neither the Goſpel, nor faith in the Gospel, ſhould in this office of an inſtrument in Juſtification be denied their due honour. The Gospel received by faith, is a plenary inſtrument in this work: and faith embracing the tender and promiſe of the Goſpel. The Goſpel is an outward inſtrument, ſaith Ravanelly: faith an inward: they both make up one inſtrument full and compleat: yet faith is more aptly and fitly called an inſtrument: Seeing that faith gives efficacy, as an inſtrument to the Word: the Word may be without faith, and ſo no inſtrument at all: but faith alway preſuppoſeth the Word of promiſe: it is not without its object.