counsel and the will of God, that even they who would not turn, would not repent and accept of salvation, should have repented and have been made partakers of it. And were it otherwise, it follows, that by their unbelief and their impenitence, they did not really resist his will and counsel, but comply rather with it.

Moreover, those whom God calls to faith, repentance, and obedience, he is truly willing that they should repent, believe, and be saved: For what is it to call a man to such a thing, but to declare that you are truly willing and desirous that he should be partaker of it? Now it is certain that God calls and invites all those to whom his word is preached, to faith, repentance, and salvation; and therefore it is certain that he is truly willing they should believe, repent, and be saved. To this effect are these expressions, "Repent and believe the gospel; " whoso is simple, let him turn in hither; let him forsake the foolish and live. Whosoever will, let him come and drink of the waters of life freely”;— To omit many other places of like nature.

h

Again. The end for which God sends his messengers, is to invite all persons, to faith, repentance, and salvation. The business of his watchmea is to warn the wicked to turn from his iniquity, that he may not die; "in meekness to instruct them that oppose themselves, if God peradventure will give them repentance; to warn every man and to teach every man in all wisdom, that they may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus.” m Now are they not commauded to use these exhortations, calls, instructions, as means conducive to these ends? And to all those whom God doth require to use these means, must he not will the end designed by them? Do not ministers beseech men, in the name of God, to repent, and to be reconciled to him? Must they not pray that God would bless their labours, and render them successful to these ends, in all that hear them? And can they, in the name of God, exhort unto, or pray in faith for, that effect of their labours which is not suitable to the decree or will of God? Was not the gospel of Christ writ, that they who read it might believe, and believing might have life through his name?" And must it not be preached for the same end for which it was written? Doth not

h Mark i. 15.

i Prov. ix. 1-6.
m Col. i. 28.

j Rev. xxii. 17. k Ezek. xxxiii. 8.
n John xx. 31.

2 Tim. ii. 25.

CALI

83

Christ plainly tell the Jews, this was the end of all his preaching to them, in these words, these things I say unto you that ye might be saved? And yet he, of those very persons, saith, You will not come to me that you might have life." He therefore se◄ riously intended their salvation, who would not come unto him for it. To think to salve all this, as Bishop Davenant in his " Answer to Hoard" doth, by saying "there is in God a true will revealed in the gospel, of saving all men that shall believe, and a true will liking, embracing, and rewarding faith, holiness, and perseverance, in all men whatsoever, without distinction of persons; and this is the will called voluntas simplicis complacentiæ, or a will of complacency. And that when the Apostle saith, God will have all men to be saved,' the meaning only is, if all men shall believe in Christ; and that 'to believe in Christ' is an act so agreeable, and so well pleasing to his will, that, wheresoever it is found, it will be rewarded."--I say, it seemeth strange to me, that any man should think this a sufficient answer to this argument. For

(1.) How incongruous is it to ascribe such a will to God as this? viz. Holiness is a thing so agreeable to my nature and my 'essential attributes of purity and righteousness, that it is absolutely necessary for me to like and be well pleased with the ho'liness and perseverance of all men in it; and therefore to reward 'them for it with the enjoyment of myself. But yet I absolutely 'purpose not to afford to the greatest part of mankind that aid which 'I see to be absolutely necessary to enable them to be holy, or to 'persevere in it: and my will is to leave them (though they e'qually want, and equally are capable of it, and equally fit to 'be the objects of my grace and favour,) under an absolute 'incapacity of being holy, and, by my decree of reprobation, make 'their want of holiness an event unfrustrable.'-No man can think that man hath a true love for holiness, who will do nothing which is in his power to make others so, as far as he is able and it is fit for him to do it. Can then that God, whose love to holiness doth infinitely transcend the love which the most holy man bears to it, and who commands us to be holy, as he is holy,' have passed a decree from all eternity, which renders the want of holiness in most men an unfrustrable event?

(2.) If this be all intended by those words, "God would have all men to be saved,' why may it not be said, He would have all the fallen angels to be saved? "Because faith and holiness, were it found in them, would be an act so well pleasing, and so agreeable to God's will, that wheresoever it is found, it will be rewarded by him;" but yet because they, since their fall, are in no capacity of believing or of being holy, no man hath ever dared to say, God would have all the fallen angels to be saved." If then the absolute decree of God, not to give faith, repentance, and eternal life to any that are not elected, is, as he saith, that which they understand by reprobation; and this act renders all those fallen men, who are the objects of that black decree, as incapable of having faith and holiness as the very devils, why is it said, 'He would have these fallen men,' rather than fallen angels, 'to be saved?'

b

(3.) Be it, as he saith, that "the final obduration and impenitency of reprobates is not a foreseen antecedent condition, but a following event of negative reprobation;" yet if that event follows necessarily upon that eternal act of God, to what end doth he after it command all men every where to repent, or exercise the riches of his goodness, patience, and forbearance towards them, 'to lead them to repentance, or say he is long-suffering towards them, because he is not willing they should perish, but should come to repentance;" when this decree of not giving that repentance, which can alone rescue them from perishing, hath left them in that utter incapacity of repenting which no long-suffering of God can or ever was intended to remove? Why doth he send his ambassadors to beseech them to be reconciled to him,'d because he hath made his Son to be a sacrifice for sin, that they might be made righteous with the righteousness of God in him? Why doth he call them to repent, that 'their sins may be blotted out,' and encourage them to do so by this gracious promise, that 'then all their iniquities shall not be remembered any more? Why doth God, as he says, "patiently expect their conversion," when he hath decreed to deny them those means which can alone effect it, or use those means and methods to that end which, he before knows, not only that they will frustrate, but also that they must

a Page 227. b Rom. ii. 4.

c 2 Pet. iii. 9.

d 2 Cor. v. 20, 21.

e Ezek. xviii. 22.

f Page 224.

frustrate? To say, "God seriously requires them who are not elected, to make their calling and election sure," is what we call "a bull." To say "God seriously invites, exhorts, and requires all men to work out their salvation'," and yet by his decree of reprobation hath rendered that event to the most of them impossible; "that he requires all men to repent that they may not perish,' and yet by his decree, or secret will, hath rendered that event to most of them, to whom he speaketh in his word, impossible;is to make the gospel of Christ a mockery, by making it to require a condition, in order to an end, which his own secret will of denying to them that faith and that repentance which can alone produce that end, hath made impossible to be obtained. And if this be not to make the secret will of God to contradict his revealed will, it is to make his revealed will following that secret one, a mere falsehood, unless his revealed will can make contradictions true. For to make God to will this or that for such an end, which, by virtue of his secret will, can never come to pass, makes contradictions at the same time to be the object of his will. And to say he wills this or that, to exempt men from that event which his secret will hath made necessary to come to pass, is also to will at the same time a contradiction. So that if God's declared will is, that all men should believe unto salvation, and his secret will is, that most of them should not be saved, it being his will to withhold what is necessary to their salvation; if his revealed will be this, that the reprobate should repent that he may not perish, and his secret will be this, that he should die, and not live, as being a will to withhold that grace from him without which he cannot live, but must die;—the contradiction betwixt these two wills is as evident as words can make it.

And if these decrees be plainly contrary to the declarations of the will of God now mentioned, how impossible is it to reconcile them with his delarations that he deals thus with men, because he hath compassion on them; that he could not have done more to make them bring forth good grapes;'r that he ('would have purged' [Hebrew]) had purged Israel, and she was not purged; he would have gathered Jerusalem, and she would not be gathered;'* when there not only was an incurable impotency in their will,

Philip, . 12. • 2 Chron. Xxxvi. 15. p Isa. v. 4. q Ezek. xxiv. 13. r Luke xiii. 54.

which rendered the event impossible to them, but also a decree which rendered God unwilling to do that towards their gathering and purgation without which, he well knew, he used all other means in vain! How can they possibly comport with his compassionate enquiries? Why will you die? O Jerusalem, wilt thou not be made clean? When shall it once be? How long shall vein thoughts lodge within thee?" Or with his vehement desires that it might be otherwise? For to say, 'Oh that there were such an heart in them that they would fear me! Oh that my people had walked in my ways,"" is, if so, in effect, to wish that they had frustrated the event, which his decree, from all eternity, had made inevitable.

II. ARGUMENT SECOND. This decree is absolutely false in the foundation of it; that being laid in the sin of Adam imputed by God's arbitrary will to his posterity. For,

First. It is confessed by these men that "it was not by any natural necessity that Adam falling, his posterity should be either universally tainted with original sin, or liable to death, but that both these depended a libero Dei decreto, 'from the free decree or compact of God;' that if Adam persevered in his righteousness, he should transmit it to his posterity; if he rebelled, he should make his posterity liable both to the corruption of sin and danger of punishment."" For if it be asked, How it comes to pass that the sin of Adam so unavoidably and generally layeth hold upon all the sons of Adam, they are driven to confess, that "this dependeth upon a free constitution or decree of the divine will, because natural propagation would not have stripped Adam's posterity of any habitual righteousness which God had bestowed upon him;" or charged them with the guilt of any sin personally committed by him, had not God enacted and constituted a decree that so it should be, when it stood in his power and pleasure to have ordered it otherwise." They add that "therefore are we not guilty of any other sin of Adam, because though natural propagation be the means of conveying Adam's sin to us, yet it would not have done so had there not been a free decree established by God to that purpose; and therefore Adam's sin can no far

s Jer. iv. 14. xiii. 27. t Deut. v. 29. u Psalm lxxxi. 13. v Bishop Davenant's Animad. p. 244.