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SECT. 6. For the further understanding of this point, and of the sweet concord and concurrence between the will of man converted, and the effectual grace of God converting, we shall set down these few propositions ".

1. That there is in man, by nature, a power or faculty which we call free-will, whereunto belongeth such an indifferency and indeterminacy in the manner of working, that whether a man will a thing, or nill it,-choose it, or turn from it, he doth in neither move contrary to his own natural principles of working. A stone, moving downward, doth move naturally; upward, contrary to its nature,—and so violently. But which way soever the will moves, it moves according to the condition of its created being, wherein it was so made, as when it chose one part of a contradiction, it retained an inward and fundamental habitude unto the other; like those gates, which are so made, as that they open both ways. So that as the tongue, which was wont to swear or blaspheme, when it is converted, doth, by the force of the same faculty of speaking, being newly sanctified, utter holy and gracious speeches ;-so the will, which, being corrupted, did choose evil and only evil, being sanctified, doth use the same manner of operation in choosing that which is good; the created nature of it remaining still one and the same, being now guided and sanctified by different principles. This we speak only with respect to the uatural manner of its working for if we speak of liberty in a moral or theological sense 3, so it is certain, that the more the will of man doth observe the right order of its proper objects, and last end, the more free and noble it is; the very highest perfection of free-will standing in an immutable adherency unto God, as the ultimate end of the creature, and all ability of receding or falling from him being the deficiency, and not the perfection, of free-will: and therefore the more the will of man doth

Vid. Calvin. in Ezek. xi. 19, 20.-et Aug. contr. 2. Epist. Pelag. lib. 1. cap. 2. et lib. 2. cap. 5. • Folio-Edition, p. 581. P Gilauf. de Libert. Creat. 1. 1.-Melior est, cum totus hæret atque constringitur incommutabili Bono, quam cum inde vel ad seipsum relaxatur: Aug. de Doct. Christ. 1. 5. c. 22.Libero arbitrio male utens homo et se perdidit et ipsum. Sicut enim qui se occidit, utique vivendo se occidit, sed se occidendo non vivit, nec seipsum potest resuscitare, cum occiderit; ita cum libero peccaretur arbitrio, victore peccato amissum est et liberum arbitrium: Aug. Enchirid. c. 30. et Epist. 107.

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cast off and reject God, the more base, servile, and captive it grows. In which sense we affirm against the papists, That by nature, man, since the fall of Adam, hath no free-will or natural power to believe and convert unto God, or to prepare himself thereunto.

2. In man fallen, and being thereby, universally, in all his faculties, leavened with vicious and malignant principles, there is a native pravity and corrupt force, which putteth forth itself in resisting all those powerful workings of the Word and Spirit of grace, that oppose themselves against the body of sin, and move the will unto holy resolutions: for the wisdom of the flesh cannot be subject to the law of God. The flesh will lust against the spirit, as being contrary thereunto'. An uncircumcised heart will always resist the Holy Spirit. There is such a natural antipathy between the purity of the Word, and the impurity of the will of man, that he naturally refuseth to hear, and snuffeth at it, and pulleth away the shoulder, and hardeneth the heart, and stoppeth the ears, and shutteth the eyes, and setteth up strong holds and high reasonings against the ways of God; and is never so well as when he can get off all sights and thoughts of God, and be, as it were, without God in the world'.

3. According to the degrees and remainders of this natural corruption, so far forth as it is unmortified and unsubdued by the power of grace, this original force doth proportionably put forth itself in withstanding and warring against the Spirit of God ", even in the regenerate themselves. A notable example whereof we have in Asa, of whom it is said, that he was wroth with Hanani the Seer, and put him in a prison-house, and was in rage with him, when he reproved him for his carnal confidence *. And the apostle doth, in many words, both state and bewail the warring of the law of his members against the law of his mind,- so that when he did, with the one, serve the law of God,-he did with the other

Rom. viii. 7.

r Gal. v. 17.

s Acts vii. 51.

v. 3. vi. 10, 17, 23. xix. 15. Mal. i. 13. 2 Chron. xxxvi. 16.

t Jer.

u Habitat in

eis, et mentem resistentem repugnantemque solicitat, ut ipso conflictu etiamsi
non sit damnabilis, quia non perficit iniquitatem,--sit miserabilis tamen, quia
non habet pacem: Aug. de nupt. et concupis. lib. 2. cap. 2. contra Julian. Pelag.
lib. 5. cap. 7.
x 2 Chron. xvi. 10.

serve the law of sin, and was unable to do the thing which he would; and the evil which he would not, he did do by the strength of sin that dwelled in him ".

SECT. 7.--4. We are to distinguish of the wills of God, which are set forth in Scripture, two manner of ways. There is 'voluntas signi,' or that will of God, whereby he requires us to work, and which he hath appointed to be observed by us; his will signified in precepts and prohibitions. "This is the will of God," saith the apostle, "even your sanctification "." So we are said "to prove, to try, to do God's will, or that which is pleasing in his sight."-And there is 'voluntas beneplaciti ',' the will of his purpose and counsel; according unto which he himself, in his own secret and unsearchable good pleasure, is pleased to work; for he worketh all 'things after the counsel of his own will. Whatsoever the Lord pleaseth, that he doth in heaven and earth. And no second causes can do any thing else, though they never so proudly break the order of God's revealed will, but what his hand and counsel had before determined. The will of God's precept and command is every day violated, resisted, and broken through by wicked men unto their own destruction. "How often would I, and ye would not f!" But the will of God's counsel and purpose cannot be resisted nor withstood by all the powers of the world; the counsel of the Lord must stand; and those very agents that work purposely to disappoint and subvert it, do, by those very workings of theirs, bring it to pass :-and when by their own intentions they are enemies to it, by God's wonderful ordering and directing they are executioners of it.

5. According unto this distinction of God's will, we are to distinguish of his call. Some are called 'voluntate signi,'

Rom. vii. 14, 15.

John viii. 29.

z 1 Thes. iv. 3.
b Aquin. Part. 1. qu. 19.

e Acts iv. 28.

a Matth. vii. 21. Rom. xii. 2. art. 11. Ephes. i. 11.

d Psalm cxxxv. 6. f Matth. xxiii. 37. Jer. xiii. 11. Multa fiunt à malis contra voluntatem Dei, sed tantæ est ille sapientiæ tantæque virtutis, ut in eos exitus sive fines, quos bonos et justos ipse præscivit, tendant omnia, quæ voluntati ejus videntur adversa: Aug. de Civ. Dci, lib. 22. c. 1. Alii obediunt, alligantur; nemo leges Omnipotentis evadit :-de Agone Christiano, 6, 7.-Vid. Bradwardin. de Causa Dei, lib. 1. cap. 32. et Hug. de Sanct. Victor. Surf. Sentent. Tract. 1. cap. 13. et de Sacrament. lib. 1. part. 2. cap. 19, 20. et part. 3. cap. 5, 6, 13, 14, 15.-Anselm. lib. 1. Cur Deus homo, c. 15. Lumbard, Jib. 1. dist. 17. Folio-edition, p. 582. i Rom. ix. 19. Psalm xxxiii. 11. cxv. 2. Prov. xix. 21. Isai. xlvi. 10. Josh. xxiv. 9, 10.

by the will of his precept, when they have the will of God. made known unto them, and are thereby persuaded unto the obedience of it in the ministry of the gospel: in which sense our Saviour saith, "Many are called, but few chosen." And unto those who refuse to come unto him, that they might have life, he yet saith, "These things I say, that ye might be saved"-Others are called 'voluntate beneplaciti,'-ordained first unto eternal life by the free love and grace of God, and then thereunto brought by the execution of that his decree and purpose, in the powerful calling and translating them from darkness unto light. And this is to be called xатà półeσ, "according unto purpose "," namely, the purpose κατὰ πρόθεσιν, and counsel of showing mercy to whom he will show mercy".

6. They who are called, only as the hen calleth her chicken, with the mere outward call or voice of Christ in the evangelical ministry, may and do resist this call, and so perish. Chorazin, and Bethsaida, and Capernaum, were outwardly called by the most powerful ministerial means that ever the world enjoyed, both in doctrine and miracles; and yet our Saviour tells them, that they shall be in a worse condition in the day of judgement, than Tyre, Sidon, or Sodom°. So the prophet complains, Who hath believed our report,

or to whom is the arm of the Lord revealed P?" which the evangelist applies unto the argument of conversion : for so the hand or arm of the Lord is said to be with his ministers, when, by their ministry, men do turn to the Lord'. And the same prophet again, or Christ in him, complains, "All the day long, have I stretched forth my hands unto a disobedient and gainsaying people":" so disobedient and gainsaying, that we find them resolve sometimes point blank contrary to the call of God.

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SECT. 8.-7. They who are called inwardly and spiritually with a heavenly call, vocatione alta et secundum propositum,' with such a call as pursueth the counsel and purpose of God for their salvation, though they do resist

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'quoad pugnam,' and corruption in them doth strive to bear up against the grace of Christ,-yet they do not resist finally and quoad eventum,' unto the repelling or defeating of the operation of God's effectual grace but they are thereby framed to embrace, approve, and submit unto that call, God himself working a good will in them", captivating their thoughts unto the obedience of Christ, and working in them that which is pleasing in his own sight*.

And this is done by a double act :

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SECT. 9.-1. An act of spiritual teaching, and irradiating the mind and judgement with heavenly light, called, by the prophet, the writing of the law in the heart, and putting it into the inward parts,—and by our Saviour, the Father's teaching,' John. vi. 45. and the Holy Spirit's "convincing of sin, righteousness and judgement","—and by the apostle, "a demonstration of the Spirit and power a," a spiritual revelation of wisdom out of the Word unto the conscience ".' For though we are to condemn fanatic revelations besides the Word, and without it,-yet we must acknowledge spiritual revelation, or manifestation of the divine light and power of the Word, by the Holy Spirit, in the minds of men converted for the Word of God, being a spiritual object, doth, unto the salvifical knowledge of it, require such a spiritual quality in the faculty which must know it, as may be able to pass a right judgement upon it; for spiritual things are spiritually discerned. It is true, the hypocrites and other wicked men may have very much notional and intellectual knowledge of the scriptures, and those holy things therein revealed; but none of that knowledge amounteth unto that,

Illud nescio quomodo dicitur, frustra Deum misereri nisi nos velimus.' Si enim Deus miseretur, etiam volumus; ad eandem quippe misericordiam pertinet, ut velimus: Aug. ad Simplician. lib. 1. qu. 2.—Hæc gratia, quæ occulte humanis cordibus divina largitate tribuitur, à nullo duro corde respuitur: ideo quippe tribuitur, ut cordis duritia primitus auferatur :-De Prædestin. Sanct. c. 8. et contr. 2. ep. Pelag. 1. 1. c. 10. * Phil. ii. 13. 2 Cor. xix. 5. Heb. xiii. 21. z John xvi. 8, 11. a 1 Cor. ii. 4.

Jer. xxxi. 23. 2 Cor. iii. 3. Ephes. i. 17. e Cibus in somnis simillimus est cibis vigilantium, quo tamen dormientes non aluntur: Aug. conf. l. 3. c. 6. Sol non omnes quibus lucet, etiam calefacit: sic sapientia multos, quos docet, non continuo etiam accendit : aliud est multas divitias scire, aliud possidere: nec notitia divitem facit, sed possessio: Bern. in Cant. Ser. 23.—Týpnois évtoλŵv yvŵσis TOû Ceoû. Basil. de Martyre manente.-Hominis sapientia pietas est: Aug. Enchir. c. 2. Christiana, 1. 2. c. 6, 7. et l. 1.c. 35. d 1 Cor. ii. 14. Heb. vi. 4. 1 Pet. ii, 21.

de Doctr.

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