A Treatise of Justifying Righteousness, Book 2 · Aphorism 119 – Aphorism 126
Aphorism.
THat we are justified by sincere Obedience Page 310.to Christ, as the secondary part of the Condition of our Justification, is evident also from these following Scriptures, Matth. 12. 37. & 11. 25, 26. Luke 6. 37. Matth. 6. 12, 14, 15. 1 Joh. 1. 9. Acts 8. 22. & 3. 19. & 22. 16. 1 Pet. 4. 18. Rom. 6. 16. 1 Pet. 12. 22.
Animadvers.
Some of these places prove, that justifying Faith must shew it self by the fruit of sincere Obedience, as Mat. 12. 37. Mar. 11. 25, 26. Luke 6. 37. Mat. 6. 12, 14, 15. Rom. 6. 16. Some of them shew, that Repentance and turning to God is required as Antecedent to Justification, as 1 John 1. 19. Acts 3. 19. But this turning to God is by Faith; and without Faith all Repentance is vain and unprofitable, as that of Judas was. To the same purpose is that, Acts 8. 22. where together with Repentance, is joyned Prayer; but it must be the prayer of Faith, James 5. 15. So that still it is Faith that doth all in point of Justification. That Acts 22. 16. Arise and be baptized, and wash away thy sins, calling on the name of the Lord, imports only (I think) thus much, that by being baptized, Paul was to have the washing away of his sins confirmed to him; for he was already a Believer, and so his sins through faith in Christ's blood were washed away: His Baptism therefore was only to confirm this to him, and to assure him more fully of it. What 1 Pet. 1. 2, 22. & 4. 18. are to the matter in hand, I cannot see: Perhaps these places are misprinted.
Reply.
1. Your word, [must shew it self, &c.] expresseth a necessity: What is the necessity of the addition of Obedience? Is it only ex necessitate Praecepti, that is, Obedience is a Duty? Then a man may be saved without it; which is not true. Is it necessitas medii? What kind of medium then is it? It is too much to say, a Cause: I know no other than to say a Condition: Antecedens qua tale non est medium.
2. Let's peruse some of the Texts, Matth. 12. 37. By thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned. What expressions would you expect to satisfie you, if these be not plain enough? Is not this as plain as, [We are justified by Faith?] Mark 11. 25, 26. Mat. 6. 12. 14, 15, Luke 6. 37, &c. Are you able to invent words, wherein the nature of a Condition is expressed more plainly than in these, [For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you: But if ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your heavenly Father forgive your trespasses.] Prove if you can, that Faith is a Condition, by plainer words than these! So 1 John 1. 9. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness? Acts 3. 19. Repent ye therefore and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, when the time of refreshing shall come, &c.] Is here nothing but Antecedency? Can you plainlier express necessitatem medii? So Acts 8. 22. [Repent and pray, &c.] I never believed that Repentance and Prayer are but Antecedents of Forgiveness, and no means? nor ever mean to believe it. We have got an honest custom of calling Prayer a means, which will disadvantage you herein. Hath Prayer and Repentance no Conducement to the obtaining of the end? This would much cool Prayer, if throughly received. And what means below a Condition, can you imagine these to be, for Remission of sins? yet I call them but the secondary part of the Condition. And if I had but said, they are Conditiones conditionis ut à Deo acceptandae, I had said as much as this: For as Causa causae est causa causati; so Conditio acceptandae conditionis est conditio conditionati. To that Acts 22. 16. I shall say little, having said so much in my Book of Baptism. As the solemnizing of a King's Coronation, or a Mayors or Bailiffs Instalment in his Office, by taking his Oath, is not the Confirmation of that which before was compleated, but the compleating of that which before was incompleat; so is Faith of the heart without solemn Baptismal Covenanting (where it may be done) but a means of Justification, not yet compleated. In 1 Pet. 1. 22. there is this to the matter in hand, that Sanctification of the Spirit is a means or cause of Obedience, and Obedience a means to the sprinkling of Christ's blood, and the Soul is purified by obeying the Truth; which may include Purification from the guilt of sin, as well as the power. And 1 Pet. 4. 18. the Righteousness and diligence of the Righteous, is a means to their Salvation, as it is opposed to the ungodlie's not standing in Judgment. Many more Texts might be brought to this end, besides those in the Aphoris. Perhaps I shall add some when we come to speak of the Conditions of Salvation.
Aphorism.
OƲr full Justification, and our everlasting Ibid.Salvation, have the same Conditions on our part: But sincere Obedience is without all doubt the Condition of our Salvation; therefore also of our Justification.
Animadvers.
Our Justification here is full, though the fulness of it doth not so fully appear as it shall hereafter. For Christ being received into our hearts by Faith, we are fully justified, even acquitted from all sin, and freed from all Condemnation, Ads 13. 39. Rom. 8. 1. 33.
Reply.
This is a mistake that, methinks, it should not be hard to convince you of. You are at first believing acquitted from all sin that you are then guilty of, and all Condemnation which the Law virtually hath at that time against you (Actualiter enim condemnare judicis est, non Legis:) But you are not acquit of all or any of the sins of your whole life afterward.
2. And you hold that same Justification, but on the performance of a further Condition than the first which begun it.
3. And sentential Justification is the most proper Justification and full; and that is not full (if at all) till Judgment. I laid great weight on this Thesis (seeing Scripture is so plain, that Obedience is a Condition of Salvation, that our Divines ordinarily acknowledge it) (as our Assembly fully in the Catech.) I expected therefore that you should either deny the major or minor, but you deny neither, if I understand you, but only take hold of the word [Full.] But I will not so leave you, but desire you to tell me: 1. Whether sentential Justification at Judgment, be properly Justification or not? 2. If it be, (as doubtless it is) then, Whether that Justification and our Salvation have not the same Conditions? If you say, No: I expect some Reason of your Negation: And I undertake to prove the contrary from Scripture. 3. Whether Obedience joyned to Faith and Perseverance in both, be not the proper Condition of our Salvation? It is beyond doubt as much as the truth of Scripture I think.
Aphorism.
IT would be as derogatory to Christ's Page 311.Righteousness, if we be saved by Works, as if we be justified by them.
Animadvers.
True, if we be saved by the merit of Good-works: Yet they are via Regni, though not causa Regnandi: therefore they must go before Salvation, I mean the full accomplishment of it: But not so before Justification▪ First, we must be justified, and then do good Works, Tit. 3. 8. But we must first do good Works, and then be saved, Rom. 2. 6, 7.
Reply.
Your Answer would much confirm me in my judgment, if I doubted: 1. I reasoned from the common Argument that is brought against me, as being invalid (which is, That it is an encroaching on the honour of Christ and his Righteousness, and free Grace, for a man to be justified by sincere Obedience to Christ, as the secondary part of the Condition of continued and sentential Justification) thus: If it be not derogatory to Christ's Righteousness that we be saved by such Works, then it is not derogatory to it that we be justified by them: But, &c. therefore, &c. To the minor only you answer, [True if we be saved by the merit of them.] A true and sound Answer! But why say you not so of Justification also, nor yet give a Reason of the difference? If we were justified by the merit of Obedience, then it would be derogatory to Christ's Righteousness: But we are not justified by the merit of it; therefore, &c. 2. I would I knew what you mean by via Regni. Sure via is more than an Antecedent. And if a means, you should tell us, what it is less than a Condition. 3. Must not Obedience go as much before Justification at Judgment, as before Salvation? Or must you indeed be first justified at Judgment before you obey? If you should insist on it, that Justification at Judgment per sententiam judicis is no proper Justification, but a Declaration of it, you will have all the World of Lawyers and Divines against you, and I need not say more. Indeed it is not such a constitutive Justification as that per Legem, but it is more, a proper and full Jutification of another kind, to which this is but a means.
Aphorism.
THat which a man is justified by, he is Ibid.saved by.
Animadvers.
He is thereby put into a state of Salvation. For whom he justified, them he also glorified, Rom. 8. 30. Yet are we not fully possessed of Salvation, not glorified without good Works, as we are fully justified without them. They follow Justification as fruits of that Faith whereby we are justified: But they go before Glorification, as making way for the enjoyment of it.
Reply.
1. They go as much before Justification by Sentence, and as continued, as before Glorification.
2. Our debate is about conveyance of Right. In justifying, it is the same thing to give Right to it, and to give the thing it self. In Glorification, and all real Mutations it is not so. You yield the thing that I assert.
Aphorism.
YEt here I say still, [our full Justification,] Ibid.because as I have shewed, our first possession of it is upon our mere Faith and Contract with Christ.
Animadvers.
Our first possession of Justification is so full, as that there is no Condemnation belonging to us: And what can be more full, but only a more full manifestation of it.
Reply.
I have troubled you too oft already with repeating the same things. Though there be now no Condemnation to you, yet to morrow there will be, if you should not sincerely obey: For you would cease to be in Christ.
Aphorism.
I Think our Glorification will be acknowledged Ibid. & 312.to have the same Conditions with our first Justification at the Bar of Christ, and why not to our continued Justification on earth?
Animadvers.
Our Justification in the last Judgment is not properly a compleating of our Justification, as if it were only begun here, and left imperfect till hereafter: But it is only a publick manifestation of it. Thus your self expresses it, Append. p. 158. [Indeed there is a Justification by publick Declaration at the great Judgment, &c.] But Glorification being the compleatment of Salvation, whatever is requisite as Antecedaneous to compleat Salvation, is required as a Condition of our Glorification.
Reply.
Ad eadem sunt eadem dicenda. Justification at Judgment is not a mere constituting us Righteous, but a declaring us Righteous. But it is a declaring of a Righteousness in Question, and that by a Supreme Judg against a publick Accuser, which is requifite ad plenam possessionem Praemii per Legem justis debiti: And so it is not only Declarare, sed statuere & jus Vindicare: And is more properly called justifying, than [making just] is: (You here confess a Condition of Glorification.)
Aphorism.
ANd hath that no hand in their Justification Page 312.that giveth them right to the tree of Life, &c.
Animadvers.
They that keep God's Commandments, are said [to have right to the Tree of Life,] Rev. 22. 14. because such have true Faith in Christ: And that it is indeed that giveth them that …ight. You are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus, Gal. 3. 26. And if Children, then heirs, heirs of God, joynt-heirs with Christ, Rom. 8. 17. We may also distinguish between jus ad rem, and Jus in re. Faith in Christ alone gives the former right to the Tree of Life: But Works help to the attainment of the latter.
Reply.
1. The Text saith, [That they may have right, and may enter in, &c.] Doth Obedience get Faith? (surely no: not as it is here meant.) Doth it only manifest it? How then doth Obedience procure right? Will you again say here, that by [keeping the Commandments,] is not meant [keeping the Commandments,] but [a working Faith.] It is not only James, but multitudes of other plain Texts that must be forced, if your Opinion must stand. If this Text do not plainly make Obedience to be a means of our right to the Tree of Life, I know not how to understand sense by words.
2. Faith may give them right, and so may Obedience too. You argued thus even now [Repentance will not serve without Faith; therefore Faith doth all:] nego sequelam.
3. If you mean properly by [Jus in re] right to mediate Possession, and not the Possession it self (which is no right) you grant as much as I need.
4. But the Text doth most plainly ascribe both sorts of right to Obedience. Ad rem [right to the Tree of Life:] Jure, [may enter in by the gate.]
5. Do you indeed believe, that a man can have jus ad gloriam by Faith, without Obedience, if he live to age.
6. Or will you debase Faith so much as to say, that it is sufficient to give only jus ad rem, and not jus in re: Indeed it is the same right that comes by both: Even jus ad rem & in re.
Aphorism.
BEsides all those Texts under Thes. 22. Page 313.which prove a personal Righteousness, so called from the Conformity to the Gospel.
Animadvers.
A personal Gospel-Righteousness is acknowledged to be requisite, but not as that whereby we are justified.
Reply.
Enough of this already.