neither chasten me in thy hot displeasure. Have mercy upon O Lord, heal me, for my bones sore vexed; but thou, O Lord,

me, O Lord, for I am weak. are vexed. My soul is also how long? Return, O Lord, deliver my soul: O save me for thy mercies' sake, and restore to me the joy of thy salvation!" (Ps. vi.) "For in death there is no remembrance of thee." (Ps. li.) From hence, you see, there is ground enough for the Apostle's exhortation: "We desire that every one of you do shew the same diligence, to the full assurance of hope firm unto the end." (Heb. vi, 11.)

TIL. TEPID.-I know, Mr. Diodati, in his Annotations upon the fifth verse of that sixth Psalm, saith: "Hereby is shewn the fear of God's children, anguished and pressed by the feeling of his wrath, lest they should die out of his grace unreconciled; and by that means be excluded and debarred from their desired aim, to be everlastingly instruments of his glory." But it is probable David had no intelligence of that comfortable doctrine, (defined by the Synod in this last age,) as appears by his fearful complaint and expostulation, (if that Psalm were his,) in the Seventy-seventh Psalm : "I remembered God and was troubled. I complained, and my spirit was overwhelmed: My soul refused to be comforted. Will the Lord cast off for ever, and will he be favourable no more? Is his mercy clean gone for ever? Doth his promise fail for evermore? Hath God forgotten to be gracious? Hath he in anger shut up his tender mercies?" There could not have been this conflict of diffidence and anxiety in him, if he had been established in the principles of the Synod: For, annexing the Lord's public declarations, (by the mouth of Samuel touching him,) to the conscience of his own integrity, he might have collected a certainty of his present regeneration, (when he was anointed king,) and from thence have concluded undeniably his election from all eternity, and consequently the impossibility of his rejection from God's favour. But there is some likelihood, he thought, that in the designation of his everlasting mercy towards them, God considered men as faithful, (according to the way of the Arminians,) and as persevering in their faithfulness. For he saith, "Know that the Lord hath set apart him that is godly for himself." (Ps. iv, 3.) If that text will not serve the turn, yet

* 1 Sam. xiii, 14, & xvi, 6, 7.

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there is one unavoidable: "The mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting, upon them that fear him: to such as keep his covenant: and to those that remember his commandments to do them." (Ps. ciii, 17, 18.) And "to him that ordereth his conversation aright, will I shew the salvation of God." (Fs. 1, 23.) And governing his persuasions by these principles, there is no wonder he was so exceedingly transported with a fear of God's displeasure. And that such were his principles, may be collected also from hence, in that, when the paroxysm of the temptation was somewhat over, he doth not make his recourse to the immutable decree of God's Election, to cure the remanent palpitation of his spirits; but only to former experience of God's merciful dispensations towards his people. "I will remember the works of the Lord: Thou hast with thine arm redeemed thy people, &c. Surely I will remember thy wonders of old: &c. Thy way, O God, is in the sanctuary. Who is so great as our God?” (Ps. lxxvii, 11—15.) But since the clearing up of this soul-settling doctrine by the great judgment and piety of the Synod, he that hath once tasted the graciousness of the Lord in his effectual vocation, and firmly believes "that the things concerning his everlasting happiness are so established and carried on by the irresistible power of an irrespective decree,” (as is there taught,)-he may cast away all anxiety and care, and repose himself with confidence under the wings of that security.

DR. ABSOLUTE.-But the Synod declares, Fidelibus perpetuò esse vigilandum et orandum, ne in tentationes inducantur, &c. “That the faithful must watch and pray, lest they fall into temptations; and that when they grow remiss and torpid, quit their guard and neglect their duty, (as you do,) they are many times surprised of the flesh and the world, and carried captive into heinous and enormous sins; whereby they offend God, and grieve the Holy Spirit, and incur the guilt of death," and the like.

TIL. TEPID. It was well you stopped there, Mr. Doctor. But I had thought your worship had been better versed in this point. For my part, such Mormoes and bug-bears never trouble me. I am taught by the Synod to believe, "that ALL THE SINS IN THE WORLD shall never be able to separate an elect person from the love of God;" but [shall] rather make for his greater advantage.

INDEFECTIBLE.-But, suppose by your sins you should provoke God to anger, so far forth that he should cut you off, as our Saviour threatens the Jews: "Ye shall die in your sins." And, "When the righteous turneth away from his righteousness, and committeth iniquity, and doth according to all the abominations that the wicked man doth, shall he live? All his righteousness that he hath done, shall not be mentioned: in in his trespass that he hath trespassed, and in his sin that he hath sinned,-in them shall he die." (Ezek. xviii, 24.)

TIL. TEPID.-I did not expect such a supposition or objection from you, of all men living: For, to speak properly, God is never angry but with the Reprobates; and I know it is your avowed opinion, "that the Elect can neither fall finally nor totally," and all the Synodists are of the same judgment. They distinguish, therefore, of righteousness, into that which is inherent or the righteousness of works, and that which is imputed or the righteousness of faith. And they confess, the Elect may forsake his inherent righteousness, and fall into the most foul and horrid sins, but yet he doth not fall from his imputed righteousness,—the righteousness of Christ, which he hath by faith. They do also distinguish between death temporal, and death eternal; affirming that the sins of the Elect, though never so many or heinous, do not incur the guilt of eternal death, but only temporal,-which is never inflicted upon them, neither as a curse, nor before their restitution: For if you ask them, What doom had David lain under, if death had surprised him in his murder and adultery? they will tell you roundly, "It was impossible he should die without repentance."

DR. DUBIUS.—I suppose David's case was extraordinary; and a special reason is given by them of the Synod, why he could not die before repentance, viz. "because after his sin he was to beget a son, of whom the Messias should descend."

TIL. TEPID.-I conceive, that ground is too loose to bear the superstructure, [which] the men of that opinion would raise upon it: For they are not all saints, [who are mentioned] in our Saviour's Genealogy; neither did David's sin bereave him of the faculty of generation. The son of Jesse might have propagated a stem for the Messias to branch out of, and yet have died in his sin afterwards. The impossibility, therefore, of his dying without repentance, is grounded upon a more solid and impregnable foundation, viz. the eternal decree and love of

God, which equally concerns all the Elect. That immutable love wherein God elected them, doth exert itself and prompt Him infallibly to confer the grace of repentance upon them first or last, into how great and how many sins soever they run. And if men had the will to improve this most excellent comfortable doctrine, the advantage of it would be unspeakable. Men do beat their brains and exhaust their treasure in experiments to find out and extract the Elixir of Paracelsus, to preserve them in life and health to perpetuity. But here is the only infallible medicine, ten thousand times more sovereign than the poets' fabulous Ambrosia, or Medea's charms that are said to have restored Jason's father to his youth. Here is a moral antidote against death, easy to be made and pleasant to be taken; a receipt to make us shot-free, sword and pistol-proof; the ingredients are not many, nor chargeable, nor hard to be attained. Let a man get a firm persuasion that he is elected, (which, the Synodists say, every one is bound to believe,) then let him be sure to espouse some beloved lust, and keep it very warm in his bosom, being careful (as he hath free-will to evil, Matt. xvii, 12; John xix, 11; Dan. v, 19;) not to cast it off by repentance; and he may venture himself securely in the midst of the greatest perils. Let such elect persons take up arms against their lawful governors, in the pretended defence of their religion, rights, and liberties, and they shall hew down thousands of their enemies before them, and none of them shall fall in the attempt, (for they cannot die in sin,)—unless some few, whose pusillanimity and cowardice do melt their hearts into an unseasonable relenting and repentance of their rebellion, while they are in pursuit of their design.

IMPERTINENT. But, Mr. Tepidus, to grant you, "that the Elect can never fall from grace," (which is our avowed tenet,) yet, certainly, we are bound to be rich in good works," out of gratitude, that God may have the more glory.

TIL. TEPID.-I need not tell you, that it will be all our business to glorify God in heaven; and so we may adjourn that work, till we come thither: For our Divines hold, "that sin is as much a means for the setting forth of God's glory as virtue is, and that God decreed to bring it into the world to that purpose;" and if it be the riches of his grace that we should glorify, how can we glorify that better than by an absolute resignation of ourselves up to it, (in despite of raging sin,) and a confident

dependance upon the free pardon thereof? And, doubtless, if God would really have me shew my gratitude in any other way of service, he would irresistibly press me to it: For "whatsoever the Lord pleases, that he THUS effecteth;" (Ps. cxxxv, 6.) —for to that purpose this text is alleged by our Divines. And therefore it is the resolution of Maccovius, (he instanceth in David committing murder and adultery,) "that if we consider the power of the regenerate, in respect of the Divine decree, and in respect of the actual Divine providence, and in respect of the permission of sin, then (and in these respects, which are not in our power,) a man can never do more good than he doth, nor commit less evil than he committeth." His reason is, "that otherwise the will of man might be said to act independently to the will of God." Now if it be thus impossible to "add one cubit to the stature of the NEW MAN," it will (by our Saviour's argument, Matt. vi, 27,) be impertinent and ridiculous to take thought about it. See Luke xii, 26.

KNOWLITTLE-Mr. Tepidus, Mr. Tepidus! Whatever you say, the doctrine of the Synod doth not overthrow the practice of piety and the power of godliness, as you go about to infer from it: For we know, the Doctors of that assembly were very worthy, godly men; and so are many (as you cannot deny,) that embrace their tenets.

TIL. TEPID.-Though the persecution and banishment of their brethren, (only for dissenting from them in these opinions,) be no great sign of godliness, yet I speak not concerning the quality of the persons that hold such opinions, but of the nature and tendency of the doctrine, the conclusions which immediately and necessarily flow from it. They may be good men: But, then, they are ill logicians at least, [and] order not their works by their faith or principles: and their godliness is not the result of these principles, but flows from some other, with which these are inconsistent, if they were rationally improved and practised, as is now evident to you from this three-fold experiment already made.

IMPERTINENT.-The power of grace will subdue such carnal

reasonings.

TIL. TEPID.-That is, in those men who suffer their reason to be debauched, and then arrested by such principles. But you have yet another part for me to act: I shall not be satisfied till that is over. Another main end of the office ministerial,