Spiritual Perfection

I will now particularly consider those graces that are of a more excellent nature, and have a more powerful causality and influence in the lives of Christians. Faith and love, hope and fear, are the internal principles of the Christian religion.

I. I will first discourse of divine faith, the first principle and foundation of religion, as the apostle declares: "he that comes to God, must believe that he is, and the rewarder of them that diligently seek him." Heb. 11. The belief of his being and bounty, is the motive of holy worship.

This grace is most honourable to God, and beneficial to us. The understanding is our supreme faculty, and by submitting it to divine revelation, we pay the most humble homage to him. By faith we conceive of God, becoming his divine perfections: in believing the revelation he has made of his nature, which is as incomprehensible as it is invisible, and the declaration of his will, though the things promised are encompassed with opposition and seeming impossibilities, we glorify his perfect veracity and omnipotence in the highest manner. He that believes the divine testimony, "sets his seal that God is true; ratifies his word in the most solemn manner.

Faith is most beneficial to us. It is the root of the spiritual life, from whence all other graces derive their flourishing and fruitfulness. It is not only productive of its own acts, but excites and animates every grace in its distinct exercise: like the animal spirits, that give motion and vigour to all the senses. Faith in Christ conveys to a weak Christian a kind of omnipotence: the apostle declares, "I can do all things through Christ that strengthens me." Heb. 11. The most eminent effects of other graces, either active or suffering, fortitude, zeal, self-denial, patience, are attributed to faith; as the honour of a victory is ascribed to the general, by whose conduct and courage the battle is managed, though it is obtained by the valour of the soldiers.

"By faith we are justified" "Rom. 5. 1. from the guilt of our many and mighty sins. "We are purified from their deep pollutions:" Acts 15. we are adopted into the line of heaven; and are saved from misery extreme and eternal.

I will consider divine faith under three heads.
1. Doctrinal faith.
2. Justifying faith.
3. Faith in the disposal of all things, by the ruling providence of God.

. 1. Doctrinal faith I will consider,
1. In its nature.
2. The objects of it.
3. The motives.
4. The efficacy.

The nature of it. All the notions of faith agree in this; it is a dependance upon the truth of another. Thus trust is called faith; because it relies upon the truth of a promise: and one is said to keep his faith inviolate, when he performs the promise that another relied on. Faith in the propriety of expression, is an assent for the veracity of the speaker: accordingly, divine faith is a firm assent of the mind to things, upon the authority of divine revelation. It is distinguished from imagination, and from comprehensive reason.

Fancy draws a copy of those objects that are perceived by the external senses, or compounds many copies together, but creates no images of things not perceptible by the senses. We can imagine mountains of gold, because we have seen gold and mountains: we conceive monstrous mixtures in dreams; but no actors can appear on the theatre of fancy, but in borrowed habits from sensible things. But the objects of faith are such things, "as eye hath not seen, nor ear heard," and transcend the capacity of the imagination to conceive, and of the external senses to represent: yet infidels blaspheme the eternal truths of divine things, as the fictions of fancy.

Faith is distinguished from science, acquired by study, and from reason. Reason implies a progress from one degree of knowledge to another, by consequences drawn from the first to the second: but faith assents to things upon the account of superior authority that reveals them, and commands us to believe them. The same things may be the objects of faith and of reason, but in different respects: reason may discover them, by ascending from effects to their causes, or descending from causes to their effects: faith receives them as revealed in scripture; "by faith we know the worlds were made;" Heb. 11. which may be proved by clear reason.

The objects of faith. The general object of faith is the word of God; the special, are those doctrines, and promises, and things, that reason cannot discover by its own light, nor perfectly understand when revealed. The word of God contains a narrative of things past, and predictions of things to come: the destruction of the old world by a deluge of waters, and the consumption of the present world by a deluge of fire, are objects of faith: but the unity of the divine nature, and the trinity of divine persons, the incarnation of the Son of God, his eternal counsels respecting man's redemption, never entered into the heart of man to conceive; but are as far above our thoughts, as the heavens are above the earth, and cannot be comprehended.

God may be considered absolutely in himself, or as revealing himself and his will to ns. We have some knowledge of his being and divine attributes, wisdom, power, goodness in his works of creation and providence; but we believe in him, as declaring his mind and, will to us in his word. We may know a person, and his excellent virtues intellectual and moral, but we cannot believe in him without some discovery of his thoughts and affections to us.

The motives of belief are to be considered. Divine faith must have a divine foundation. Faith may be absolutely true, and relatively false. Many believe the doctrine of the gospel, upon no other grounds than the Turks believe the alcoran; because it is the reigning religion of their country, and by the impression of example: from hence their faith is like the house built on the sand; and when a storm arises, is in danger of falling. The firm foundation of faith is the essential supreme perfections of God; unerring knowledge, immutable truth, infinite goodness, almighty power. It is equally impossible that he should be deceived or deceive. His infinite understanding is the foundation of his perfect veracity. And whatsoever is the object of his will, is the object of his power; for to will and to do are the same thing in him.

It is true, the knowledge of things by experimental sense, is a clearer perception than the persuasion of them by faith. The first is to see the original, the other is to see the copy, that usually falls short of it. It is therefore said, "we now see in a glass darkly:" but the divine testimony in itself has the most convincing evidence, above the assurance we can have by the report of our senses, which often deceive us, through the indisposition of the faculty, or the unfitness of the medium, or distance of the objects, or the knowledge of things by discursive ratiocination. The objective certainty of faith is infallible. We know with the highest assurance, that God can no more lie, than he can die. It is said, "all things are possible with God;" but to lie or die are not possibilities, but passibilities; not the effects of power, but proceed from weakness. We know the sacred scriptures are the word of God, by the signatures of his perfections, wisdom, holiness, goodness, justice; and by the miracles performed by the penmen of them, that proved they were divinely inspired; and consequently infallible in what they wrote.

From hence faith is often expressed by knowledge. Nicodemus gives this testimony of our Saviour, we know thou art a teacher come from God. John 3. 2. "We believe and are sure, thou art that Christ, the Son of the living God." "We know that if the house of this earthly tabernacle be dissolved, we have a building made without hands, eternal in the heavens." 2 Cor. 5. 1. "We know that he was manifested, that he might take away sin." John 1.5. "We know that when Christ shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is." 1 John 3. 3.

I will not insist upon the particular supernatural doctrines revealed in the gospel, for there is little new to be said upon these points: if men with renewed minds and hearts considered the testimony of scripture, there would need no more arguing: but I will lay down some considerations, that prove divine faith to be the reasonable act of the human understanding.
2. Answer the objections alledged to justify the disbelief of divine doctrines, that we are not able to conceive nor comprehend.

1st. That God is true, is a principle immediately evident, not dependently upon an antecedent motive. This, by its native irresistible evidence, is beyond all dispute, and exempted from all critical inquiries. There is no principle written in the minds of men with clearer characters. It was the saying of a wise heathen, "if God would converse visibly with men, he would assume light for a body, and have truth for his soul." God is most jealous of the honour of his truth." "Thou hast magnified thy word above all thy name." Truth is the supreme character of the Deity. The apostle builds the assurance of christians upon the promises, and their strong consolation upon this infallible rock, "God that cannot lie." Heb. 6. From hence it follows, that in supernatural doctrines, we must first consider the authority of the revealer, and then the nature of doctrines.

2dly. God's jurisdiction extends to our understandings, as well as to our wills: he rules our understandings by light, our wills by empire. If God did command us to believe only truths in themselves evident, our receiving them would not be an undoubted respect to his authority; but to believe his testimony, without the evidence of things, is an obedience worthy of him. And we are equally obliged to believe his testimony concerning the truth of things, notwithstanding the reluctancy of the carnal mind, and their seeming repugnance to the natural notions of reason; as to obey his precepts, notwithstanding the reluctancy of the corrupt will, and the inclinations to forbidden things.

3dly. God never requires our assent to supernatural things revealed in his word, but affords sufficient conviction that they are divine revelations. When God deputed any by commission for an extraordinary work, he always afforded a light to discover the commission was uncounterfeit. Moses was sent from God with a command to Pharaoh to release the Israelites from their cruel servitude; and he had the wonder-working rod, to authorize his commission, and confirm the truth of his message by miracles. The divinity of the scripture, the rule of faith, shines with that clear and strong evidence, that only those whose minds are prevented with a conceit of the impossibility of the doctrines contained in it, and perverted by their passions, can resist it. Coloured objects are not discerned more clearly by their colours, nor light by its lustre, than that the scriptures are of divine revelation.

Reason is an essential faculty of man, and by it we are directed why to believe, and what things are revealed as objects of faith. To believe, and not to understand the reason of our belief, is to turn faith into folly and extravagance. The men of Samaria were first induced to believe in Christ, "for the testimony of the woman that told them, come and see the man that has told me all that ever I did:" John 4. but when they heard Christ speak, they said, "now we believe, not for thy words, for we have heard, and know, that he is the true Saviour of the world." The understanding is convinced by reason of the divinity of the scriptures: and as a pole supports a vine, but does not give life and virtue to its root, so reason assists faith in directing it to the scriptures, the rule of it, but faith in the mysteries of the gospel derives its life from God the author of them. By reason we discover the relation, order, distinction, and dependance of revealed truths: and reject the vain opinions of men, when proposed as divine oracles; and the fruits of fancy, that are proposed as mysteries of faith.

4thly. God reveals himself to us in scripture by humane expressions, according to our capacity of receiving the knowledge of divine things: and we are to understand them in their apparent sense, unless the precise literal sense contains an evident contradiction to what is certainly known by reason, and disparaging the divine perfections. The sure rule of interpreting them, is to separate whatever is defective in them, and apply them to God in the highest degree of perfection. We read of the hands and eyes of God in scripture, which signify the perfection of God's knowledge and power: they are the organs by which men do and know things: but it is infinitely unworthy of God to think that the divine operation has need of such instruments.

Thus the communicating of the divine nature from the Father to the Son, is expressed by generation, which is the most noble production of one living creature from another, especially of an intelligent creature, with all its properties: "but who can declare his generation?" We must not conceive it with the imperfection of human generation, wherein the effect is separate from the cause, and successive to it. For it is a contradiction, that God should beget a Son in his most perfect image, but he must be eternal as the Father; otherwise, he would be defective in the resemblance of the first perfection of the Deity. All resemblances of God in scripture have their disparity and defects, which must be separated from him. But excepting such cases, the word of God is to be understood in its proper sense. For we must suppose that God speaks to us with an intention that we should understand him, otherwise it were not just to require us to believe it: our minds could not firmly assent to his word, but would be floating between faith and doubts. And if, God intends we should understand his meaning, how can we reconcile his wisdom with his will, if he does not speak to us in the same sense as men do to one another.

Sthly. We are obliged to believe supernatural doctrines no farther than they are revealed. God does not require our assent to an object beyond the merit of it: that is, the degrees of its revelation. We cannot see an object more fully than it is visible. The truth of evangelical mysteries is clearly revealed, the manner of them is not discovered. To attempt the comprehensive knowledge of them, is perfectly vain: for it is impossible, impertinent, and of dangerous consequence.

It is impossible. Supernatural truths cannot be primarily and immediately discovered by reason, but are only known to the divine mind, and communicated to created understandings according to the pleasure of God. "No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, has declared him." John 1. 18. The gospel is called the mystery of "Christ, the mystery of God the Father, and of Christ," Eph. 3. 4. Col. 4. 3. Because God and Christ is the author, and revealer of it. God contrived in the secret of his eternal wisdom, the design of our redemption, and revealed it in his own time: it is therefore "called the mystery of his will." Eph. 1.9. It is called "the mystery of faith:" 1 Tim. 3. 9. that is, it is received by faith. It is called "the mystery of the kingdom of God; Mark 4. 11. Rom. 1. 19, 20. concealed from the world, and only known in the church. The sublime doctrines of the gospel it is impossible for the clearest spirits of men to discover, without special revelation, were they as pure as they are corrupt, and as sincere as they are perverse. This word mystery is never applied to the revelation that God has made of his wisdom in the framing the world, and in the effects of his providence, because since the creation, it has been exposed to the sight of all reasonable creatures. Men were not commanded to believe in order to salvation, till by experience they were convinced of the insufficiency of reason to direct them how to be restored to the favour of God. The apostle declares, "for after that in the wisdom of God, the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God, by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe." 1 Cor. 1. 21. The doctrine of the Trinity is purely supernatural: for the internal distinction of the persons in the divine nature, by their incommunicable characters, is only proper to God. The counsels of the divine will are above any created understanding: "who knows the things of a man, but the spirit of a man? so none knows the things of God but the spirit of God." The angels are superior spirits to us, and excel us in sublimity and perspicacity of understanding, but they could never know the decrees of God, though in his immediate presence, but as gradually revealed: it is said of the mysteries of his counsels, "they desire to look into them." We cannot form a conception in our minds, but what takes its rise from sensible things.

The attempt is impertinent: for God has revealed those great mysteries sufficiently for saving faith, though not to satisfy rash curiosity. There is a knowledge of curiosity and discourse, and a knowledge of doing and performance. The art of navigation requires a knowledge how to govern a ship, and what seas are safe, what are dangerous by rocks and sands, and terrible tempests, that often surprise those who sail in them: but the knowledge of the causes of the ebbing and flowing of the sea is not necessary. To believe savingly in Christ, we must know that he is the living and true God, and true man, that died for our redemption; but it is not necessary that we should know the manner of the union of his two natures. It is prudent to confine our inquiries to things which are possible and profitable to be known. The discovery of the manner of divine mysteries is not suitable to the nature of faith, "for it is the evidence of things not seen:" the obscurity of the object is consistent with the certainty of the assent to it: and it is contrary to the end of revelation: which is to humble us in the modest ignorance of divine mysteries which we cannot comprehend, and to enlighten us in those things which are requisite to be known. "It is the glory of God to conceal a matter." He saveth us by the submission of faith, and not by the penetration of reason. The meanest understanding, as well as the most raised, are equally capable of salvation. The light of faith is as much below the light of glory, as it is above the light of nature.

It is of dangerous consequence. There is an hydropic curiosity, that swells the mind wih pride, and is thirsty after the knowledge of things unsearchable. This curiosity has often been fatal to faith. It is like a man's endeavour to climb up to the inaccessible point of a rock that is very hazardous, to see the sun in its brightness, which may safely be seen from the plain ground. The searching into the unsearchable things of God's nature and decrees, has been the occasion of many pernicious errors. It is like the silly moth's fluttering about the burning light, till its wings are singed. Beside, the affecting to be wise above what is written, and to attempt to make supernatural doctrines more receivable to reason by insufficient arguments, weakens the authority and credit of revelation: the endeavour to make them more easily known, makes them more hard to be believed. To venture to explicate them beyond the revelation of them in scripture, is like a man's going out of a fortress wherein he is safe, into an open field, and expose himself to the assaults of his enemies.

I will now consider the objections against supernatural doctrines.

First. It is alledged they are irreconcileable with reason; and it is not possible for the understanding to believe against its own light and judgment. In answer to this specious objection, the following particulars are to be considered.

1st. Sense, reason and faith, are the instruments of our obtaining knowledge. Sense is previous to reason, and reason prepares the way to faith. By our senses we come to understand natural things, by our understandings we come to believe divine things. Reason corrects the errors of sense, faith reforms the judgment of reason. The stars seem but glittering points; but reason convinces us they are vast bodies, by measuring the distance, that lessens their greatness to our sight. We cannot imagine that there are men whose feet are directly opposite to ours, and are in no danger of falling; but reason demonstrates there are Antipodes. It is as absurd for reason to reject divine testimony, and violate the sacred respect of faith, as for sense to contradict the clearest principles of reason. To deny supernatural truths, because they are above our conception and capacity, is not only against faith, but against reason, that acknowledges its own imperfection.

It is true, reason and faith are emanations from the father of lights, and consequently there cannot be a real repugnance between them; for "God cannot deny himself:" errors are often contrary; but truth is always harmonious with truth: if there seem to be an opposition, it proceeds not from the light of the reasonable mind, but from the darkness that encompasses it. It is certain, that a proposition that contradicts right reason, the general light of nations, that have nothing common between them but the human nature, cannot be true: as the doctrine of Epicurus, "that God was not to be worshipped, because he had no need of our service;" and the popish doctrine of transubstantiation, that imputes contradictions to God.

We must distinguish between things that cannot be discovered by reason, nor comprehensively known when they are revealed, and those that are contrary to reason. In paradise reason was an inferior and imperfect light: Adam could not perfectly know God. He dwells in light inaccessible, not only to mortal eyes, but to the immortal angels: they cannot penetrate to the centre of his perfections. The propositions that involve a contradiction, have the plain characters of falsity; but the doctrines of the gospel, that are incomprehensible, have the characters of sublimity. Reason cannot measure the extent, nor reach the "height of the love of Christ, that passes knowledge." Eph. 3. 19. That supernatural doctrines are incomprehensible now they are revealed, is one argument to prove they could never be invented and discovered by men: for that which naturally cannot enter into the mind of man, cannot naturally proceed out of it.

2dly. Since the fall reason is weakened, and its light is clouded. In the narrow and low sphere of natural things, how often is reason mistaken and lost in a labyrinth? There is not a flower, a fly, a stone, but is a mystery: we cannot fully understand the vegetation of the one, nor the sensation of the other, nor the motion of the other. Let us make a trial of the light of reason upon ourselves, and we shall discover its defects. Who can discern the vital bands wherewith the soul and body are combined? By what power does the soul represent absent objects? Sounds without noise, colours without tinctures, light without clearness, darkness without obscurity. What account can be given of the admirable operations of the soul in dreams, when the senses are suspended from working, and the body seems to be a warm carcass. It is one of those secrets, that human wits labour in vain to explain, how it composes discourses so just and regular, as to the invention and style, which by their impression in the memory, we know were not the effects of wild fancy, but of sober judgment; and that awake, and intent, we could not so speedily and orderly frame. It is as strange as that an artificer should work more exactly with his eyes covered, than seeing; that a painter should draw a face better in the dark, than in open day-light. That man were totally deserted of reason, who not being, able to see things that are but a just distance from his eyes, would not acknowledge that things distant from him the extent of the horizon, are beyond his sight. We are finite beings; there is some proportion between our minds and our natures: if we cannot understand ourselves, what folly is it to presume that we know God? "Canst thou by searching find out God? Canst thou find out the Almighty unto perfection? It is high as heaven, what canst thou do? Deeper than hell, what canst thou know? The measure is longer than the earth, and broader than the sea.", Job,11. 7,8, 9. Who can unfold the divine attributes? They are not confused in their unity, nor divided in number; they are not separable qualities, but his essence: he is not only wise, but wisdom; not only lives, but is life. We cannot speak of some attributes without distinction, wisdom and power; nor of others, without a seeming opposition, justice and mercy; yet they are the same divine nature, and cannot be separate but in our thoughts. He is eternal without succession; with him there is no past, and to come: he sees all things with one view; not only events that proceed from the constraint of natural and necessary causes, but that depend upon causes variously free and arbitrary. "This knowledge is too wonderful for us." To believe no more than we can understand, proceeds from the ignorance of God's nature, and our own: for the divine nature is truly infinite, and our minds are narrow and finite.

3dly. The human understanding in our lapsed state, is dark and defiled, weakened and vitiated. Of this we have innumerable instances. Although the Deity be so illustriously visible in the creation, yet even the wise heathen represented him in such a degree of deformity, as is highly blasphemous. They could not conceive his infiniteness, but made every attribute a God. They transformed the glory of the immortal God, into the likeness of an earthly dying man. And the papists transform a mortal man into the likeness of the great God. They attribute to the pope a power of contradicting the divine laws: for though God, in the second commandment, so strictly forbids the worship of images, and has annexed to the prohibition the most terrible threatening, of "visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon their children, to the third and fourth generation;" yet in defiance of the majesty of the Lawgiver, the pope commands all his adorers to worship the images of the dead saints: he arrogates a power to dispense with oaths, the most sacred bands of human society, and thereby authorizes perjury.

4ly. Though reason is not able to conceive and comprehend supernatural mysteries, yet it can never demonstrate that they cannot be. Who can prove by irresistible evidence, that God, who is an infinite good, cannot by an infinite communication of himself be in distinct subsistencies? It is true, our reason may find unaccountable difficulties, that one should be three in the subsistence of persons; and three, one in nature: but there can be no proof that it is impossible, without the perfect understanding the nature of God. The incarnation of the Son of God, is matter of astonishment, that two natures so different and immensely distant, as finite and infinite, mortal and immortal, should be so intimately and inseparably united in one person, without confusion of their properties: but we have the strongest reason to believe, that God knows his own nature, and is to be believed upon his own testimony. If the matter of his testimony be inconceivably great, we must exalt faith, and depress reason. If we will believe the word of God no farther than it is comprehensible by our reason, we infinitely disparage him: for this is no more than the credit we give to a suspected witness.

5ly. The doctrine of the Trinity and incarnation have a clear connexion with other truths, that right reason comprehends and receives without reluctancy. That men transgress the laws of God, natural conscience is their accuser, an essential faculty of the human nature, that can neither die with them, nor without them; that every sin needs pardon, is most evident: that God is just, is known by the general light of reason in all men: that it is becoming God to pardon sin in a way honourable to his justice, is as certain: now the satisfaction of divine justice requires the enduring the punishment ordained by the law, and equal to the guilt of sin. The guilt of sin rises from the majesty of the Lawgiver, who is dishonoured by it, and the satisfaction must be by a person of equal dignity, and consequently only God can make satisfaction. Now reason dictates, that he that satisfies, and he that receives satisfaction, must be distinguished: for it is not reasonable that the same person be the judge and the criminal; therefore there must be two distinct persons in the Deity: from hence the reason of the incarnation is evident; for the Deity is incapable of suffering, and it was necessary that the dignity of the divine nature should give value to the sufferings. It was therefore requisite that the Deity should assume our nature capable of suffering, and the salvation of the work should result from their conjunction. This doctrine is very honourable to God, and beneficial and comfortable to man; which are the conspicuous characters, and strongest evidence of a doctrine truly divine: this maintains the royalty of God, and the rights of justice; this secures our pardon and peace, and removes all the difficulties and doubts that are apt to rise in the minds of men, whether God infinitely provoked by our rebellious sins, will be reconciled to us? It is our duty to admire the mysterious doctrines of the gospel, which we do understand, and to adore those we do not. We may observe the same connexion in errrors as in divine truths; for they who rob our Saviour of his natural glory, his eternal Deity, vilify and disbelieve the value and virtue of his priestly office, by which our pardon is obtained. In short, the fabric of our salvation is built on the contrivance and consent of the divine persons, and the concurrence and concord of the divine attributes.

6ly. The belief of supernatural things may be confirmed by comparisons and examples of things in nature; for they prove and persuade that a thing may be. Our Saviour, to cure the infidelity of the pharisees, tells them, "Ye err, not knowing the scripture, and the power of God." In the book of scripture we read the declaration of God's will; in the book of nature we see the effects of his power: The apostle says, "The weakness of God is stronger than men." The expression is strange to a wonder; for it seems to attribute a defect to God: but he speaks in that manner, to declare with emphasis, that God is always equal to himself, and has no need to strain his power to overcome the strongest opposition. The same apostle argues against infidels, that say, "How are the dead raised up? And with what bodies do they come? Thou fool, that which thou sowest is not quickened except it die; and that which thou sowest, thou sowest not that body that shall be, but bare grain; it may chance of wheat, or some other grain; but God giveth it a body as pleaseth him." If our eyes are witnesses of such an admirable resurrection in nature, which our understandings cannot comprehend, shall it not confirm our belief of the resurrection of the body, the wonder of grace, when it is promised by God the author of both. All difficulties vanish before infinite power. St Paul declares, "I know in whom I have believed, that he is able to keep that I have committed to Him till that day." We are assured "the Lord will change our vile bodies into the likeness of his glorious body, by the power whereby he can subdue all things to himself." The belief of the resurrection is drawn from the clearest springs of nature and scripture.

71y. It is a prudent foundation of judging things attended with difficulties, to compare the difficulties, and to determine our judgment for that which has least. Now it is certainly much more suitable to the reasonable mind to acknowledge, that things may be true which we are not able to conceive and comprehend, than to deny the natural and proper sense of many clear and express texts of scriptures, that declare those things. And by this we may judge of the glosses of Socinus, and his followers, who without reverence of the majesty of God, and the sincerity of his word, rack the scriptures to make them speak what they do not, and use all arts to silence them in what they do reveal. Unhappy men! that affect to be esteemed ingenious and subtile, to the extreme hazard of their own salvation. How much safer, and more easy is it to believe the plain sense of the scriptures, than the turns and shifts that are invented to elude it, and extricate heretical persons out of the difficulties that attend their opinions ?

I shall add, the doctrine of the Trinity is so expressly set down in the gospel of Christ, that it is impossible that the Son of God, who is infinite and eternal love, who gave himself for our redemption, should have declared it, and engaged his disciples in all ages and places in an error of such dreadful consequence, as the worshipping those who are not God.

Secondly. It is alledged, that if a person sincerely searches into the scripture, and cannot be convinced that the supernatural doctrines of the Trinity, and others depending upon it are contained in them, he shall not be condemned by the Righteous Judge of the world for involuntary and speculative errors. To this I answer,

This pretence has deceived many who were guilty of damnable heresies, and there is great reason to fear deceives men still. "The heart is deceitful above all things," and most deceitful to itself. Who can say that neither interest nor passion, neither hope nor fear, neither anger nor ambition, have intervened in his inquiry after truth, but he has preferred the knowledge of divine truths before all temporal respects, and yet he cannot believe what the scripture reveals of the nature of God, and the economy of our salvation: let this imaginary man produce his plea, for I believe there was never any such. There are many that make reason the sovereign rule of faith, and determine such things cannot be true, because they cannot understand how they can be true. Prodigious inference! the most absurd of all errors, that makes the narrow mind of man the measure of all things. This is the proper principle of that horrible composition of heresies and execrable impieties, which so many that are Christians in profession, but antichristians in belief, boldly publish. They will choose to err in matters of infinite importance, rather than confess their ignorance. And which is astonishing, they will readily acknowledge the defectiveness of reason with respect to the understanding of themselves; but insolently arrogate, a right to determine things in the nature of God.

It is true, ignorance the more invincible, is the more excusable: but when the error of the mind is from the vicious will, both the error and the cause of it are sinful and inexcusable. When the corrupt will has an influence upon the understanding, and the mind is stained with some carnal lust, when a temptation diverts it from a serious and sincere considering the reasons that should induce us to believe divine doctrines, their unbelief will be justly punished. The scripture declares, "that an evil heart is the cause of unbelief:" pride, and obstinacy of mind, and carnal lusts, are the cause that so many renounce those eternal truths by which they should be saved.

Thirdly. It is alledged, that speculative errors cannot be damnable.

To this I answer,

The understanding of man in his original state, was light in the Lord, and regular in its directions, now it is dark and disordered: and in the points of religion that are revealed, any error induces guilt, and if obstinately defended exposes to judgment. Some truths are written because necessary to be believed, others are to be believed because written.

According to the quality of the truths revealed in scripture, such is the hurtfulness of the errors that are opposite to them. Some truths are necessary, others profitable: some errors are directly opposite to the saving truths of the gospel, others by consequence undermine them. "Those who deny the Lord that bought them, are guilty of damnable heresies," capital errors, "not holding the head." Col. 2, 19.

The doctrine of the Trinity is not a mere speculative truth, nor the denial of it a speculative error: the trinity is not only an object of faith, but of worship. In baptism, we are dedicated to the Sacred Trinity, "in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost," which clearly proves they are of the same authority and power, and consequently of the same nature: for it is impossible to conceive of three infinite beings, for by necessity one would limit another. The apostle declares, "Without controversy great is the mystery of godliness, God manifest in the flesh:" the nature and end of this divine mystery, is to form the spirits of man to believe, and love, and obey God. For in it there is the clearest revelation of God's admirable love to men, of his unspotted holiness, his incorruptible justice, the great motives of religion. In that divine doctrine we have the most ravishing image of piety and virtue, the most becoming the nature of God to give, and of man to receive.

Briefly; God commands us to believe in his Son: without faith in him we are incapable of redemption by him. When Christ performed miraculous cures, he required of the persons whether they did believe in his divine power, and what he declared himself to be. Electing mercy ordains the means and the end: the apostle "gives thanks to God, because he has chosen the Thessalonians to salvation, through sanctification of the Spirit, and the belief of the truth." 2 Thes. 2. Holiness and faith in the doctrine of the gospel, are indispensable qualifications in the learned and igporant, that would be saved by the Son of God. It is a high contempt of the truth and goodness of God, not to yield a firm assent to what he has revealed concerning out salvation by his incarnate Son. He that believes not the record that God hath given of his Son, "makes God a liar." 1 John 5. 10. This infinitely provokes him, and inflames his indignation. To disbelieve the testimony that Jesus Christ has given of the divinity of his person and doctrine, is to despise him, it robs him of his essential and his acquired glory by the work of our redemption: There can be no true love of God without the true knowledge of him, as he is revealed not only in his works, but in his word. Our Saviour, who is "the way, the truth; and the life," has declared, when he gave commission to his apostles to preach the gospel to the world, "whoever believes and is baptized, shall be saved, whoever believes not shall be damned." We cannot make laws to be the rule of God's judgment, but must receive them. However some may flatter erring persons in their security, it will be found in the great day, that infidelity in the light of the glorious gsspel, will have no excuse before God.

The doctrine of the gospel is like the pillar of cloud and of fire, that was darkness to the Egyptians, but enlightend the Israelites in their passage out of Egypt: it is concealed from the proud, and revealed to the humble. The human mind is imperious and turbulent, and averse from submitting to God's authority, who commands the wise and most understanding to yield full assent to his word, as the meanest capacities. "The natural man receives not the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned." There is no proportion between the faculty and the object. You may as well see an angel by the light of a candle, as see the great mysteries of the gospel by the natural mind, their reality, beauty, and excellency, so as savingly to believe them. "Faith is the fruit of the Spirit;" Eph.l.17. who is styled the "Spirit of wisdom and revelation," who discovers the object, and enlightens the mind to see it, and by free preventing grace inclines the will to embrace it. "The Holy Spririt alone can pull down strong holds, and cast down imaginations, and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, and bring into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ." I Cor. 10. The Spirit overcomes the pride of ther natural understanding by the authority of the revealer, and enlightens the ignorance of it by the infallible revelation. Violence, and temporal respects, may by terrors and allurements make men hypocrites, but cannot make them sincere believers: there will be a form of religion without, and atheism within. It is special grace inspires the elect of God with light to see spiritual things, and requires special thankfulness.

Let us humbly pray to the Father of mercies, and of lights, that be would reveal the mysteries of his kingdom to the minds of men. "If the gospel be hid, it is hid to those that are lost, in whom the God of this world hath blinded the minds of them who believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine into them." 2 Cor. 4. 3,4.