Chap. 4. all? The total managery of things no way demonstrating Sin to be odious, or Holiness grateful; Obedience failing, and there being nothing vicarious, no Punishment to fupply the room of it; How could the order between the Creator and the Creature be preserved? or what would become of that moral dependance and fubjection which we owe to our Maker? Doubtless no defect, no jeofail can be in his Sacred Government. His juft Anger requires, that Difcipline fhould be kept, Manners corrected, and Licentiousness fuppreffed. As an Ancient speaks: Surgimus ad Man being under a Law, God must needs be Revindictam, non &tor; and being fuch, He cannot chufe but act like quia tafi fu mus, fed ut dif- himself, in a juft decorum to his holy Attributes and ciplina ferve Law: No blot or irregularity can light upon his vigantur, licen. Government. Sin, which makes a breach upon the tia comprima facred Order, must be reduced in fuch a punitive tur: hæc eft ju fla ira, que fi way, as may bear witness to his Rectitude and cut in homine Juftice. There are two things in Sin; a Macula, a neceffaria eft ita in Deo, & corrupting Spot; and a Reatus, an obliging Guilt. quo ad homi- The Spot is fuch a Turpitude and ill-temper of nem pervenit mind, that the Soul, in which it is refident and regexemplum. Lat. de Ira nant, cannot have Happiness; the Guilt is fuch a Chain and strong binder unto Wrath, that the Soul, to which it adheres, cannot have Impunity. tur, mores cor Dei. The Wisdom of God fecures and ascertains the first, Why should not his Juftice fecure and ascertain the fecond; feeing God by the Law of his Effence, is as much bound to act in congruity to his Justice, as to his Wisdom? 4. Upon fuppofal that a Punishment or Satiffaction were not neceffary, What should those millions of Sacrifices and flain Beasts under the Law mean? mean? If the substance, the Sacrifice of Chrift might Chap. 4. have been fpared, what should the types and shadows do? Nay, why fhould the Son of God come, and fweat, and bleed, and dye upon a Crofs under Divine Wrath, if all this might have been fpared? God doth not multiply things without caufe, much less -did he make his dear Son the Curse causeless. The Apostle tells us, That it was not poffible that the blood of Bulls and Goats fhould take away fin, Heb. 10. 4. But why fo? if a meer nothing, a no-facrifice might do it? He signally diftinguishes; the blood of Beasts purifies the flesh, and takes away Ceremonial Guilt. But, which is infinitely more, the blood of Chrift purges the Confcience, and takes away real Guilt, Heb. 9. 13, 14. But will not this diftinction be altogether vain, if no blood at all were requifite to take away guilt? Also the Apostle afferts, That we are juftified by Chrifts blood, Rom. 5.9; But why not without it, if a Satisfaction were unneceffary? It is very hardly imaginable, that the All-wife God fhould fetch a compafs, and go round about by his Sons blood, when a word, a merciful pleasure, might have done the work without it. These things premifed, I now proceed to fhew how Punitive Juftice was manifested in the Sufferings of Chrift. The Apostle speaks memorably, God fet forth Chrift to be a propitiation to declare his righteoufnefs, for the remission of fins, as if he had faid, There could be no remiffion without it: and to make it the more emphatical, he doubles the phrafe, To declare, I fay, at this time his righteousness; and withal he adds, That he may be juft, Rom. 3. 25, 26. Righteousness, that is, Punitive Justice was eminently demonstrated H Chap. 4. monftrated in the propitiatory Sufferings of Chrift; unless this were fo, no fufficient account could be poffibly given of them. The Socinians, who deny Chrift's Satisfaction, cannot give a tolerable reafon thereof: For what say they? Chrift in his Sufferings was an example of Patience. I anfwer, he was. fo 5 but there was a Cloud of fuffering-Martyrs before his Incarnation: and then what fingular thing was there in his Paffion? It's true, he was the greatelt Pattern that ever was; but had that been all, why did he fuffer as our Sponfor and Mediator? why did. he bear the Sin of a World, and the Wrath of God: due to it? Here he was alone, no man, no Angel. was able to trace or follow him. The Saints may fill up the Sufferings of Chrift in his myftical body; but they cannot, dare not afpire fo far, as to go. about to imitate him in those fatisfactory Ones, which were in his own proper body. Had he been only an exemplary Saviour, he could have faved none at all: Not thofe under the Old Teftament; for Example doth not, like Merit, look backward to thofe who were before it: Nor thofe under the New ; for no meer Example, no, not that of an Incarnate God, could have railed up Man out of the ruins of the Fall, unless there had been in his Sufferings a Satisfaction to Justice, The Guilt of Sin could not have been done away, unless there had been therein a Merit to procure the Holy Spirit, The Power of Sin could not have been fubdued; a meer exemplary Christ would have been but a titular Saviour. The great defign of railing up a Church out of the corrupt Mafs of Mankind would have failed, a Pattern only being too weak a bottom for it to stand upon. Again they fay, Chrift fuffered, that he might con- Chap. 4. firm the Covenant with his own blood. I answer, the Covenant was confirmed in Abrahams time, Gal. 3. 17. It was made immutable by Gods Word and Oath, Heb. 6. 17. It was ratified by the glorious Miracles of Chrift; it was fealed up by the precious blood of Martyrs: and why muft the Son of God dye for it? or if he muft, might not a fimple death serve? Why was there a Curfe, and an horrible Desertion upon him? There can be no imaginable coherence or connexion between his bearing the tokens of Gods Wrath, and his confirming the Covenant of Grace; the one can have no congruity or fubferviency to the other. The Scripture therefore, which gives a better account, tells us that he dyed to pay a drev, a Ransom for us; obtain eternal Redemption, abolish and make an end of fin; deliver from the world, and the wrath to come; reconcile to God, purchase a Church, and bring in everlasting Righte oufnefs, and an happy Immortality fuitable thereunto. These noble and excellent ends could not be compaffed, but by Sufferings penal and fatisfactory, fuch as had the bitter ingredients of Divine Wrath and difpleasure in them. Chrift was not a meer Witness, but a Priest, Redeemer, and Mediator: His blood was not only agree, a Teftimony, but insicur a Propitiation; neither was it only confirmative of the Covenant, but fundative: all the Promifes of Grace and Glory fprung up out of his fatisfactory and meritorious Paffion. Further they fay, that in his Sufferings the immenfe Love of God was manifested. I answer, His immenfe Love was indeed very Illustrious in giving his Son ; but to what purpofe H 2 was Chap. 4. was he given, but to be a Propitiation? iv túty, In this was love, that he fent his Son to be a propitiationfor our fins, faith the Apostle, 1 John 4. 10. When inexorable Justice stood as an Obftacle in the way; when Satisfaction must be made, or mankind eternally perish; then infinite Love appeared in giving the only begotten Son to be an expiatory facrifice for us, to fatisfie Juftice, that we might partake of Mercy. But if a Satisfaction were needlefs, if the Sufferings of Christ might have been fpared; Where is the vehemence of Love? It may feem rather to be in Remiffion of fin, than in the Paffion of our Saviour. That Remiffion should come to us through his intervenient Death, when that Death was not ne-ceffary, looks not so much like an act of Love, as of Sapience: and yet how Sapience should unneceffarily, and without just cause, order fo great a thing as the Death of Chrift to be, I cannot understand. Moreover they fay, Christ suffered, that his Death intervening, we might be affured by his Resurrection, of our own, and of life eternal to be obtained in a way: of Obedience. But I answer, This is rather to affign the end of Chrifts Refurrection', than of his Death: for his Death here comes in only by the by, as a meer intervenient thing, a caufa fine qua non, a thing which hath no proper end of its own. It is not to me imaginable, that fuch an one as he was, fhould dye meerly to teftifie to thofe things, which were before fecured by the immutable Word and Oath of God himself. O beatos nos, quorum caufà Deus jurat! miferos, fi ne juranti credimus! faith Tertullian: his Oath cannot but be a fufficient fecurity. It's true, Chrifts Death and Resurrection do affure |