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To conclude; If God has taken such particular care to clear himself from the charge of absolutely appointing even Judas to be a son of perdition: Nay, if Christ himself asserts, that the Father gave him Judas, as well as the other apostles :-And if the Holy Ghost declares by the mouth of David, that Judas was once Christ's familiar friend, and trust, says he; and I thank Christ, who hath ena! led me, for that he counted me faithful, putting me into the ministry," 1 Tim. i. 11, 12. Now if we represent Christ as putting Paul into the ministry because he counted him faithful, and Judas because he counted him unfaithful,-a thief-a traitor-a cursed hypocrite do we not make Christ a Proteus ? Are his ways equal? Has he not two weights ?-God, I grant sets sometimes a wicked king over a wicked people, but it is according to the ordinary course of human affairs, and in his anger to chastise a sinful nation with a royal rod. But what had the unformed christian church done, to deserve being scourged with the rod of apostolic wickedness? And what course of human affairs obliged our Lord to fix upon a wicked man in a new election to a new dignity-and, what is more striking, in an election, to which he proceeded without the interposition of any free agent but himself?

O Zelotes, mistake me not: If I plead the cause of Judas's sincerity, when he left all to follow Christ, and when our Lord passed by thousands, immediately to choose him for his own familiar friend in whom he trusted, for a preacher of his gospel, and an apostle of his church; do not do it so much for Judas's sake, as for the honour of Christ, and the comfort of his timorous, doubting followers. Alas! if Christ

1. Ye believe not, because ye are not of my sheep, as I said unto you: [John viii. 37. He that is of God, heareth God's words: ye therefore hear them not, because you are not of God,-i. e. because ye are not godly, what ever ye pretend.] My sheep [those that really belong to my dispensation, and com pose my little flock,] my sheep, I say, hear my voice, [they mind, understand, approve, embrace my doctrine] and they follow me [in the narrow way of faith and obedience:] And [in that way] I give unto them eternal life, and [in that way] they shall never perish, neither shall any pluck them out of my hand. [For, Who shall harm them, if they be followers of that which is good? 1 Pet. iii. 13.] My Father who gave them me, [who agree that where my dispensation is opened, those who truly believe on him as Creator, should be peculiarly given me, as Head of the Christian Church, to make them Christian priests and kings unto him.] My Father, I say, who gave them we, is greater than all, and none shall pluck them [that thus hear my voice and follow me] out of my Father's hands: for I and my Father are one [in nature, power, and faithfulness, to shew that The way of the Lord is strength to the upright; but destruction shall be to the work ers of iniquity, Prov. x. 29.] John x. 26, &c. 1. No man can come unto me except the Father draw him, [and he be faithful to the Father's attraction]-every man therefore, that hath heard and learned of [i. e. submitted

as such honoured with his trust and confi. dence; is it not evident, that the doctrine of free-wrath, and of any man's [even Judas's] absolute, unconditional reprobation is as gross an imposition upon bible-christians, as it is a foul blot upon all the divine perfections?

could shew distinguishing favour and familiar friendship to a man, on whom he had absolutely set his black seal of unconditional reprobation,-to a man, whom from the beginning of the world he had without any provocation marked out for a goat, and for unavoidable damnation: if he could converse, eat, drink, travel, lodge, and pray, for years with a man, to whom he bore from everlasting, and will bear to alieternity, a settled ilwill, an immortal hatred, where is sincerity? Where, is the Lamb without blemish? The Lamb of God in whose mouth no guile was ever found? If Christ is such a sly damner of one of his twelve apostles as the "doctrines of grace" [so called] represent him to be. who can trust him? What professor,-what gospel minister can assure himself, that Christ has not chosen and called him for purposes as sinister as those, for which it is supposed that Judas was chosen, and called to be Christ's familiar friend? Nay, if Christ barely on account of Adam's sin, left Judas in the lurch, and even betrayed him into a deeper hell by a mock call; may he not have done the same by Zelotes, by me, and by all the professors in the world? O ye doctrines of grace," if you are sweet as honey, in the mouth of Zelotes, as soon as I have eaten you, my belly is bitter: poison corrodes my vitals; 1 must either part with you, my reason, or my peace.

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2. He that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed, &c. And this is the [ground of unbelief and] condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. every one that [buries his talent of light, and] doeth evil, hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved. But he that doeth truth [he that occupies till I come with more light] cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God, John iii. 18, &c. [All that our Lord meant then, when he said to the Pharisees, Ye believe not because ye are not of my sheep, is explained in such scriptures as these ] He that is faithful in that which is least, is faithful also in much, Luke xvi. 10. How can ye believe, who receive honour one of another, and seek not the honour that cometh from God? [Had you been faithful to the light of conscience, you would have believed Moses: and] had ye believed Moses, ye would have believed me: But if ye believed not his writings, how shall ye believe my words? John v. 44, &c. [If ye believe not in God, how shall ye believe in ME? If you dishonour my Father, how can you honour MB ?]

2. [FIRST PROPOSITION. The Father draws all to himself, and gives to the Son all those who yield to his drawings: witness the following scriptures.] All the day long I have

to] the Father and to his drawings, cometh unto me.-There are some of you that believe not, &c. Therefore said I unto you, that no man can come unto me, except it be given him of my Father, John vi. 44, 45, 64, 65.

The meaning is, that no man can believe in the Son, who has not first a degree of true faith in the Father. Ye believe in God, believe also in me, says Christ. All must honour the Son, as they honour the Father.All therefore that do not learn of, i. e. submit to, and honour the Father, cannot come to the Son, and pay him homage. He that obstinately refuses to take the first step in the faith, cannot take the second. To shew there fore, that Zelotes cannot, with propriety, ground the doctrine of Free-wrath upon John vi, any more than upon John x, I need only prove the three propositions contained in the opposite Scale.

THIRD PROPOSITION. These drawings of the Father, and of the Son, are not irresistible, as appears from the following Scriptures: Because I have stretched out my hands, and no man [comparatively] regarded [my drawings,] I will mock when your destruction cometh, as a whirlwind, Prov. i. 24, 27.-These things I say unto you, [obstinate Pharisees] that you might be [drawn unto me, and] saved &c. and [notwithstanding my drawings] ye will not come unto me, that ye might have life, John v. 34, 40. The preceding propositions are founded upon the proportion of faith, upon the relation of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, and upon the doctrine of the dispensations explained in the Essay on Truth.

Should Zelotes compare these propositions, he will see, that if the Father does not particularly give all men to his Son, that they may receive the peculiar blessings of the Christian dispensation; and if the Son does not explicitly reveal the Father to all men by the Spirit of adoption, or the baptism of the Holy Ghost; it is not out of free, reprobating wrath; but merely for the two following reasons: 1. As in the political world, all men are not called to be princes and kings; so in the religious world, all are not blessed with five talents,-all are not called to believe explicitly in the Son and the Holy Ghost, or to be made kings and priests to God in the Christian Church. 2. Of the many who are called to this honour, few (comparatively) are obedient to the heavenly calling; and therefore, few are chosen to receive the crown of Christian righteousness: As our Lord ex

stretched forth my hand to [draw] a disobedien people, Rom. x. 21.-Despisest thou the riches of God's forbearance, not considering that his goodness leadeth [i. e. gently draw eth] thee to repentance, [and of consequence to faith in a Mediator between God and man] Rom. ii. 4. Of those whom thou hast given me, none is lost [hitherto] but [one, Judas, who is already so completely lost, that I may now call him] a son of perdition, John xvii. 12.

SECOND PROPOSITION. The son likewise, who is the light that enlightens every man, draws all to himself, and then brings to the Father those who yield to his attraction, that they may receive the adoption of sons. Witness the following scriptures :--And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me, John xii. 32.-Come unto me, all ye that labour [and are restless] and I will give you rest. If you come to me, I will plainly reveal to you the Father: I will enable you by my peaceful Spirit to call him Abba, Father, with delightful assurance : man [thus] knoweth the Father but the Son, and he, to whomsoever the Son will reveal him [by the Holy Ghost,] Matt. xi. 27, 28.

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presses it, few are counted worthy to stand before the Son of Man among them that have been faithful to their five talents. But, as all men have one talent till they have buried it, and God has judicially taken it from them ;as all men are at least under the dispensation of the Father, as a gracious and faithful Creator:-as Christ, the light that lighteth every man who cometh into the world, draws all men implicitly to this merciful Creator: while the Spirit, as the saving grace, which has appeared unto all men, implicitly teaches them to deny ungodliness, and to live soberly, righteously, and piously in this presert world: As this is the case, I say, what can we think of the absolute Election or Reprobation of individuals which ensures saving grace and heaven to some, while (through the denial of every degree of saving grace) it secures damning sin and everlasting burnings to others? Does it not follow that these twin doctrines [great Diana and grim Apollyon] are a queer couple? Study their pedigree, and you will find, that, like the Helena and Pollux of the ancients, they can equally boast that a fabulous Jupiter transformed into a swan is their godlike Sire. It can be said of each of them, Ovo processit eodem a fair lady, who some call, Leda, and others Voluntary Humility, was courted in Babel, by a surly gentleman, whom some call Jove, and others Pharisaic Pride. His excessive ugliness obliged him to transform himself into the above-mentioned Swan. Leda in the dark took him for the heavenly Dove, and from her mistake sprung the conception of our twins. They were

brought forth in Moses's decayed chair at Jerusalem, nursed by Austin at Hippo, fondled by Bellarmine at Rome, educated by Calvin at Geneva, and, to the disgrace of the Reformation, publicly christened and married at Dort by a number of divines, who named them Orthodoxy, and recommended them to the world as the Doctrines of Grace!

If it is asked, what induced those divines to take such a step? I reply: it was chiefly their inattention to the doctrine of the dispensations. Being altogether taken up with the particular dispensations of the Son and of the Holy Ghost, they overlooked, as Peter once did, the general dispensation of the Father, which is the basis of all the superior ceconomies of divine grace. They paid no manner of attention to the noble testimony, which that Apostle bore, when parting with his last scrap of Jewish bigotry, he said: "Of a truth, I perceive, that God is no respecter of persons; but in every nation he that feareth him, and worketh righteousness, is accepted of him." As if he had said, though distinguishing grace should never give two talents to a heathen that fears God and works righteousness: Though he should never explicitly hear of the Son and of the Holy Ghost yet shall he enter, as a faithful servant, into the joy of his merciful Lord, when many children of the kingdom shall be thrust out. For it is revealed upon earth, and of consequence it is decreed in heaven, that they who are chosen and called to partake of the divine Peace, which is essential to the peculiar dispensation of the Son; and of the unspeakable Joy, which is essential to the peculiar dispensation of the Holy Ghost, shall be reprobated or thrust out, if they do not make their high calling and election sure: Whilst they, that were only chosen and called to the Righteousness essential to the general dispensation of the Father, shall receive the reward of the inheritance, if they do but walk worthy of their inferior election and calling.

Methinks that Zelotes, instead of producing solid arguments in favour of his doctrines, complains, that I bring certain strange things to his ears; and that the distinction between the Christian dispensation, and the other economies of grace, by which I have solved his calvinistic difficulties, has absolutely no foundation in the scripture. That I may convince him of his mistake in this respect, to what I have said on this subject in the Essay on Truth, I add the following proof of my dealing in old truths, and not in "novel chimeras." St. Paul, 1 Cor. ix. 17, declares, that the dispensation of the gospel of Christ, [which in its fulness takes in the ministration of the Spirit] was committed unto him: Eph. i. 10, he calls this dispensation, "the dispensation of the fulness of time in which God gathers in one all things in Christ." Chap. iii. 2, &c. after mentioning the dispensation of

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the grace of God given him as an apostle of Christ, he calls it a preaching among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ," and the "making all men see, what is the fellowship of the mystery, which had been hid in God from the beginning of the world.” Col. i. 25, &c. speaking of the Christian church, in opposition to the Jewish, he says, "Whereof I am made a minister, according to the dispensation of God, which is given to me for you, &c. even the mystery which had been hid from ages, but now is made manifest to his saints:" And he informs them, that this mystery, now revealed, is "Christ in you the hope of glory."-Again, what he calls here" the mystery hidden from ages, but now made manifest to Christians," he calls in another place, "The new Testament, the ministration of righteousness,-where the Spirit of the Lord is, and where there is liberty," even the glorious liberty of the children of God; observing that, although the Mosaic dispensation or ministration was glorious, yet that of Christ exceeded in glory, 2 Cor. iii. 6, &c.

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To deny the doctrine of the dispensations, is to deny, that God made various covenants with the children of men since the Fall: It is at least to confound all those covenants, with which the various gospel dispensations stand or fall. And to do so, is not to divide the word of God aright, but to make a doctrinal farago, and increase the confusion that reigns in mystical Babe!. From the preceding quotations out of St. Paul's epistles, it follows, therefore, either that there was gospel in the world, before the gospel which was hid from ages, and made manifest in Paul's days to God's saints, when this mystery, Christ in them, the hope of glory, was revealed to them by the Holy Ghost: Or, [which to me appears an indubitable truth] That the evangelical dispensation of Adam and Noah was bright: that of Abraham and Moses brighter; that of initial Christianity, or of John the Baptist, explicitly setting forth the Lamb of God that taketh away the sins of the world," brighter still; and that of perfect Christianity, [or of Christ revealed in us by the power of the Holy Ghost,] the brightest of all.

SECTION XI.

A rational and scriptural view of St. Paul's meaning in the ninth chapter of Romans.Some of the deepest passages of that chapter are thrown into the Scripture Scales, and by being weighed with parallel texts, appear to have nothing to do with free-wrath, and calvinistic reprobation -A solution of the difficulty arising from confounding the vessels or persons, whom God's distinguishing grace makes comparatively to dishonour, with those vessels or persons, who positively make

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themselves vessels of wrath, and upon whom, I am before-hand with him and appealing as such, God judicially pours his deserved wrath.

If Zelotes finds himself pressed by the weights of my Second Scale, he will probably try to screen his "doctrines of grace," by retreating with them behind the ninth chapter of the Epistle to the Romans. But

1. I. TO deny that God out of mere distinguishing grace, may, and does grant church-blessings, or the blessings of the covenant of peculiarity, to some men, making them comparatively vessels to honour, and making of consequence other men comparatively vessels to dishonour, or vessels less honourable :-To deny this, I say, is to oppose the doctrine of the dispensations, and to rob God of a gracious sovereignty, which he justly claims.

1. II. God is too gracious unconditionally to reprobate, i. e. ordain to eternal death any of his creatures.

1. III. In the days of initial salvation, they, who through grace believe in their light are conditionally vessels of mercy, or God's elect, according to one or another dispensation of his grace.

1. IV. God justly gives up to final blindness of mind, and complete hardness of heart, them that resolutely shut their eyes, and harden their hearts, to the end of their day of initial salvation.

1. V. There can be sovereign, distinguishing free-grace in a good God; because good ness can bestow free, undeserved gifts.

to that chapter, I beg leave to shew, that the passages in it, which at first sight seem to favour the doctrine of Free-wrath, are subversive of it, when they are candidly explained according to the context, and the rest of the Scriptures. Five couple of leading propositions open the Section.

2. TO insinuate that God, out of mere distinguishing wrath, fixes the curse of abso lute rejection upon a number of unborn men, for whom he never had any mercy, and whom he designs to call into being only to show, that he can make and break vessels of wrath: To insinuate this, I say, is to attribute to God a tyrannical sovereignty, which he justly abhors.

2. God is too holy and to just, not to reprobate his obstinately rebellious creatures.

2. In the day of initial salvation, they, who unnecessarily do despite to the Spirit of grace, and disbelieve, are conditionally vessels of wrath, that fit themselves for destruction.

2. Perverse Free-will in us, and not Freewrath in God, or necessity from Adam, is the cause of our avoidable unbelief: And our personal, avoidable unbelief is the cause of our complete, personal reprobation, both at the end of the day of grace, and in the day of judgment.

2. There can never be sovereign, distinguishing free-wrath in a just God; because justice cannot inflict free, undeserved punishments.

Reason and conscience should alone, one would think, convince us, that St. Paul in Rom. ix. does not plead for a right in God so to hate any of his unformed creatures, as to intend, make, and fit them for destruction, merely to shew his absolute sovereignty and irresistible power. The apostle knew too well the God of love, to represent him as a mighty potter, who takes an unaccountable pleasure to form rational vessels, and endue them with keen sensibility, only to have the glory of absolutely filling them, by the help of Adam, with sin and wickedness on earth, and then with fire and brimstone in hell. This is the conceit of the consistent admirers of unconditional election and rejection who build it chiefly upon Rom. ix. Should you ask, why they fix so dreadful a meaning to that portion of scripture; I answer, that "through inattention and prejudice they overlook the two keys, which the apostle gives us to open bis meaning, one of which we find in the three

first and the other in the three last verses of that perverted chapter.

In the three first verses St. Paul expresses the continual sorrow, which he had in his heart, for the obstinacy of his countrymen, the Jews, who so depended upon their national prerogatives, as Jews; their church privileges, as children of Abraham; and their pharisaical righteousness of the law, as observers of the Mosaic cer monies, that they detested the doctrine of salvation by faith in Jesus Christ. Now, if the apostle had believed, that God, by a wise decree of preterition, had irreversibly ordained them to eternal death, "to illustrate his glory by their damnation," as Calvin says; how ridiculous would it have been in him, to sorrow night and day about the execution of God's wise design! If God from the beginning of the world had absolutely determined to make the unbelieving Jews personally and absolutely vessels of wrath, to the praise of the

glory of his soverign free-wrath; how wicked would it have been in St. Paul to begin the next chapter by saying, My heart's desire and prayer to God for unbelieving Israel,-for the obstinate Jews, is, that they might be saved? Would he not rather have meekly submitted to the will of God, and said like Eli," It is the Lord Let him do what seemeth him good?" Did it become him ;-nay, was it not next to rebellion in him, so passionately to set his heart against a decree made (as we are told) on purpose to display the absoluteness of divine sovereignty? And would not the Jews have retorted his own words? "Who art thou, O vain man, that repliest against God," by wishing night and day, the salvation of vessels of wrath," of men, whom he had absolutely set apart for destruction.

"But if the apostle did not mean to establish the absolute, personal preterition of the rejected Jews and their fellow-reprobates what could he mean by that mysterous chap. ter ?" I reply: He meant in general to vindicate God's conduct in casting off the Jews, and adopting the Gentiles. This deserves some explanation. When St. Paul insinuated to the Jews, that they were rejec ted as a church and people, and that the uncircumcised Gentiles, [even as many as believed on Jesus of Nazareth] were not the chosen nation,-the peculiar people and church of God, his countrymen were greatly offended: And yet as the apostle of the Gentiles, to provoke the Jews to jealousy, he was obliged peculiarly to enforce this doctrine among them. They generally gave him audience till he touched upon it. But when he waxed bold, and told them plainly that Christ had bid him depart from Jerusalem as from an accursed city; and had sent him far thence unto the Gentiles, they could contain themselves no longer and lifting up their voices, they said, "Away with such a fellow from the earth," Acts xiii. 46. xxii 21.* When St. Paul wrote to Rome, the metrop olis of the Gentile world, where there were a great many Jews, the Holy Spirit directed him to clear up the question concerning the general election of the Gentiles, and the general rejection of the Jews and this he did, both for the comfort of the humble Gen

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It is remarkable, that Jewish rage first broke out against our Lord, when he touched their great Diana,the doctrine of their absolute election. You think, said he, to be saved, merely because you are Abrahan's children, and God's chosen peculiar people. But I tell you of a truth, God is not so partial to Israel as you

suppose: "Many widows were in Israel in the days of Elias, but to none of them was Elias sent, but to a Zidonian (heathen) widow. And many lepers were in Israel in the time of Elisha, yet none of them was cleansed, saved Naaman the Syrian," Luke iv. 25, &c. The Jews never forgave our Lord, that levelling saying; If he narrowly escaped their fury at Nazareth, it was only to meet it encreased seven-fold in the holy city. So fierce and implacable are the tempers, to which some professors work up themselves, by drinking into unseriptural notions of election!

tile believers, and for the humiliation of his proud, self-elected countrymen; that being provoked to jealousy, they, or at least some of them, might with the Gentiles, make their personal calling and election sure, by believing in Christ. As the Jews were generally incenced against him, And he had a most disagreeable truth to write, he dips his pen in the oil of brotherly love, and begins the chapter by a most awful protestation of his tender attachment to them, and sorrowful concern for their salvation; hoping that this would sorten them, and reconcile their prejudiced minds. But if he had represented them as absolute reprobates, and vessels of wrath irreversibly ordained of God to destruction, he would absurdly have defeated his own design, and exasperated them more than ever against his doctrine and his person. That he told them with one breath, he wished to be accursed from Christ for them whilst with the next breath he insinuated, that God had already absolutely accursed them with unconditional, personal reprobation, is a notion so excessively big with absurdity, that at times Zelotes himself can scarce swallow it down. Who indeed can believe, that St. Paul made himself so ridiculous, as to weep tears of the most ardent love, over the free-wrath of his reprobating Creator? Who can imagine, that the pious apostle painted out the God of all grace, as a God full of immortal hatred to most of his countrymen ; while he represented him/ self as a person continually racked with the tenderest feelings of a matchless affection for them all; thus impiously raising his own reputation, as a benevolent, man, upon the ruins of the reputation of his malevolent God?

Come we now to the middle part of the chapter. St. Paul having prepare the Jews for the disagreeable message which he was about to deliever, begins to attack their pharisaic prejudices concerning their absolute right, as children of Abraham, to be God's church and people, exclusively of the rest of the world, whom they looked upon as reprobated dogs of the gentiles. To drive the unbelieving Jews out of this sheltering place, he indirectly advances two doctrines: 1. That God, as the Creator and supreme Benefactor of men, may do what he pleases with his peculiar favours; and that he had now indubitable a right freely to give five talents of church-privileges to the Gentiles, as he had once to bestow three talents of churchprivileges upon the Jews. And 2. That God had as much right to set the seal of his wrath upon them, as upon Pharoah himself, if they continued to imitate the inflexibleness of that proud unbeliever; inexorable unbelief being the sin, that fits men for destruction, and pulls down the wrath of God upon the children of disobedience.

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The first of these doctrines he proves by a

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