Full text of "The works of Thomas Goodwin"

^y OF PRI^•Cf73x 
OCT 101988 j 



BX 9315 .G66 1861 v. 9 
Goodwin, Thomas, 1600-1680. 
The works of Thomas Goodwin 



NICHOL'S SERIES OF STANDARD DIVINES. 

PUEITAN PEEIOD. 



THE 



WORKS OF THOMAS GOODWIN, D.D. 

VOL. IX. 



COUNCIL OF PUBLICATION. 



W. LINDSAY ALEXANDER, D.D., Professor of Theology, Congregational 
Union, Edinburgh. 

JAMES BEGG, D.D., Minister of Newington Free Church, Edinburgh. 

THOMAS J. CRAWFORD, D.D., S.T.P., Professor of Divinity, University, 
Edinburgh. 

D. T. K. DRUMMOND, M.A., Minister of St Thomas's Episcopal Church, 
Edinburgh. 

WILLIAM H. GOOLD, D.D., Professor of Biblical Literature and Church 
History, Reformed Presbyterian Church, Edinburgh. 

ANDREW THOMSON, D.D., Minister of Broughton Place United Presby- 
terian Church, Edinburgh. 

Central €^Dttor. 
REV. THOMAS SMITH, M.A., Edinburgh. 



THE WORKS 

OF 

THOMAS GOODWIN, D.D, 

SOMETIME PRESIDENT OF MAGDALENE COLLEGE, OXFORD. 



Mit^ (Bmtxul f rrfaa 

BY JOHN C. MILLER, D.D., 

LINCOLN COLLKliE ; HONOKAUr CANON OK WORCKSTKK ; KECTOll OF ST JIAUTIN's, BlKMINf;n\>I. 

BY ROBERT HALLEY, D.D. 

PRINCIPAL OK THE INDEPENDENT NEW COLLEGE, LONDCN. 



VOL. IX. 

CONTAINING I 

A DISCOUBSE OF ELECTION, &c. 
A DISCOURSE OF THANKFULNESS. 



EDINBURGH : JAMES NICHOL. 

LONDON: JAMES NISBET AND CO. DUBLIN: G. HERBERT. 



M.DCCC.LXIV. 



EDiyBORGH : 

PRINTED BY JOHN GREIG AND SON, 

OLD PHYSIC GARDENS. 




TH"^ 



CONTENTS. 



A DISCOUESE OF ELECTION, &c. 



Pagk 
BOOK I. 

Wherein is proved the necessity of an election grace, if any of 
the rational creatures be certainly saved : and that God hath 
made an election of some out of pure grace, proved by the 
event, out of the stories of all times, throughout the Old 
and New Testament. ..... 3 



BOOK 11. 

Of the order of God's decrees about man's election and reproba- 
tion. — Of the end to which we are ordained ; a supernatural 
union with God and communication of himself. — The infinity 
of grace discovered therein. .... 84 

BOOK III. 

The infinity of grace in God's choosing us, proved from the nature 
of election, both simply considered in itself, and also com- 
pared with that other act of reprobation. . . 150 

BOOK IV. 

The mighty and powerful grace which God dispenses to his elect, 
in effectually calling them, in preserving them from tempta- 
tions and sin, in strengthening and enabling them to persevere 
unto the end, and in bringing them at last securely to an 
eternal glory, by all which, the greatness of election grace 
is more fully cleared and proved. . . . 231 



VI CONTENTS. 



BOOK V. 



Page 



Election, in the ordinary course of it, runs in a line of succession 
from believing parents to their posterity. — The covenant of 
grace is entailed on the children of believers. — God most 
usually makes such his choice. — What judgment we are 
thereupon to have of them. . . . . 426 



A DISCOUESE OF THANKFULNESS. ... 499 



A DISCOUESE OF ELECTION, &c. 



VOL. IX. 



A 

DISCOURSE 

F 

ELECTION, 

OF THE 

Free and Special GRACE of GOD 
Manifested therein ; 

THE 

Absoluteness and Unchangeableness of his DECREES ; 
and their Infallible Accomplishment. 

BY 

THOMAS GOODWIN, D.D. 

LONDON, 

Printed in the Year, MDCLXXXII. 




OF ELECTION. 



BOOK I. 



Wherein is proved the necessity of an election r/race, if any of the rational 
creatures be certainly sav^d: and that God hath made an election of some 
out of pure grace, proved by the event, out of the stories of all times, through- 
out the Old and New Testament. 



CHAPTER I. 

Tlie necessity of an election, or super creation grace, if either angels or men 
(ichether fallen or unfallen) be certainly and securely saved. 

By the necessity of an election, I mean not as if God had been necessitated 
thereunto, for nothing with him is more free ; and that it is termed an election 
of grace sufficiently testifies it ; but the necessity lay in respect of the eter- 
nal salvation of either angels or men. 

Nor, secondly, do I mean, as if it must have been an act of election ; 
understanding it a calhng forth but of some persons only ; for that way of 
salvation, which is the grace itself, God might have saved all of either sort 
by, and not have made an election of it, that is, of some, although he was 
pleased so to do. It is true, indeed, in making an election but of some, the 
freeness of God's grace was the more manifested ; that is, in the point of the 
freedom of it ; and that, de facto, there was such an election but of some, 
both angels and men, I shall after shew ; but the dint of my present asser- 
tion, whilst yet I term it election of grace (because de facto so it was), lies 
in this : that, take the substance of that grace itself, which election hath 
chalked out as the way of salvation thereby, and that is it I now alone 
affirm to have been necessary ; I add securely, to bring to salvation both 
angels and men. And my assertion issues in this, that not any one of his 
creatures were, or had been eternally and efi'ectually saved (that is, none of 
his understanding rational creatures), without such a grace as election hath 
pitched upon ; no, not one of either sort, neither angels nor men, as, de 
facto, it appeared. 

God, though he made angels and men in a state of perfect holiness, able 



4 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

to stand with the inDate pondus, or poise and bias of hoh'ness, joined with 
that concurrence or assistance of God's that did accompany it ; yet that 
assistance being then suited to the laws and dues of creation merely ; that 
is, look what preservation in that state a creature could challenge, by the 
covenant of creation, as a due from God as his creator, so far forth there 
was an assistance did accompany that holiness ; and therefore was but such 
an assistance as was proportioned to that present state, whereby the will of 
the creature had a power to continue, if he would use that assistance, and 
those creation powers and principles, as he ought, so as it was every way 
such as the creature could not, but at any time (till the act of falling), say, 
I find myself able to stand if I will ; but so as the keeping of this holiness 
with that assistance, was committed to the free-will of man, as likewise of 
angels, which at the best was a mutable slippery thing, fickle and change- 
able. To make instance in the angels, by and from the example of whom it 
is that I make forth this necessity of election for the creature to be saved. 
In Job iv. 18, ' Behold, he puts no trust in his servants, and the angels he 
chargeth with folly.' We have the like in chap. xv. ver. 15, * He putteth 
no trust in his saints.' The angels were perfectly holy, but if he would give 
them no other assistance but what was their due from creation, there was no 
trust to be put in them, or their standing. If they were holy to-day, they 
might sin to-morrow. If God but sent them of an errand down into this 
world, they might sin before they came up again. The folly there was their 
mutability ; and to be carried on unchangeably to eternity, without the 
hazard and danger of miscarriage, was beyond the due of creation, which 
was their fii'st creation covenant they all appeared afore God in ; and there- 
fore immutably to have kept them, had been grace, which must flow from 
another well-head and original than the pure covenant of works or of crea- 
tion, and that can be no other than grace ; and the indispensable ground 
why the creature, by the law and covenant of creation, should be thus dealt 
with as aforesaid, and so be left to a mutability, is, that it is only proper unto 
God, and that essentially, not to be subject to change. And it was fit this 
difi"erence betwixt God's being, and the being of the creature (which it had 
by creation) should be thus stated by the creation -law as purely it came out 
of God's hand ; and so as that if God would impart the image of his immu- 
tability of holiness to any, and fix them in it, it might appear to be of grace. 
This is grace, and grace to the angels themselves. In James i. 13, you 
have it, that it is * God only that is not tempted with evil, nor can be 
tempted.' The creature, by what from the law of creation they have upon 
the terms of creatureship, may be tempted to sin ; and not only so, but fall 
and be lost, and then never to be able to recover itself again. 

This being our creation state, God foresaw that if all of these his creatures 
were left to the conduct of their wills, assisted but only with these creation 
helps, that they were in a continual hazard of falhng, and that they would 
all fall at one time or another, one after the other ; he therefore made an 
election of grace to put all out of hazard in some ; and if you will not see 
the truth of it through the doctrine, you may view it by experience, for it 
fell out, as to their fall, both of angels and of men. Jude tells you, there was 
a first estate in which angels were created, but they feh from it ; and the 
rest would have done so too, at one time or another, for they were all made 
of the same metal, if they had been left to the mutability of their wills. It 
proved true of men. Take Adam and Eve their wills, they were perfectly 
holy, and yet what became of those two stout wills ? If but one of them 
indeed had fallen, you would have thought the other might have been immu- 
table ; but you may see they both fell, and so it was experimented they were 



Chap. I.] of election. 5 

mutable ; and that all their children they should have put forth were such, 
and would at one time have fallen as these have done, who were all of man- 
kind that were then in the world. Well, God foresaw all would be a-going ; 
there is a happy word in the text, Rom. xi. 4, xariX/'Trov, he made a reserve 
of some before the world was ; he laid his hand upon them ; nay, said he, 
I will have a remnant ; I will have some. He made a reserve when he fore- 
saw all would, or might in the end, be lost ; and that reserve was made by 
election. It was election itself; the apostle interprets that word, ver. 5. 
The great God had reason (shall I say, or rather that his infinite grace joined 
with wisdom) to have something out of all what he had made (for whom are 
all things) that should live with him, be happy in him, blessed of him, that 
might eternally bless him again. And accordingly he kept some of the 
angels, and caused them to abide with him, and ordained some of men, 
though when fallen, who should return to him again ; and this was done by 
election, which is that other well-head of all super-creation, or supernatural 
grace, opposed to that of creation-holiness and assistance. 

You read of the angels who stood, 1 Tim. v. 21, that they are called the 
' elect angels.' You read elsewhere that they are called ' the holy angels,' 
for they never sinned ; and they had as great a holiness as any creature 
could be capable of by creation ; also ' they excel in strength,' and so their 
holiness was a strong holiness. But was it that which kept them ? No ; 
you heard God could not trust them in the hands of their own wills ; there- 
fore it was that they were elect angels ; that kept them. In that new super- 
added title, you read the grace of God expressed as that which kept them in 
that holiness, and so fixed them. 

Now, further, consider that where election is, there is grace ; whether the 
creature be fallen or not fallen, it is called ' the election of grace ;' and what- 
soever is above the dues of creation, and the rules thereof, is grace, and as 
truly such as that which is called mercy, as shewn to a sinner or creature 
actually fallen, is called grace. Grace and works, we read in the words of 
Rom. xi. 6, are so opposed, as those which intermingle not. The privileges 
of grace are eternally separated by an eternal law. If a thing be of grace, it 
is no more of works ; and if of works, it is no more of grace. It was not, 
therefore, their creation holiness fixed them, for that was works, both in 
the principle and in the assistance of it. Indeed, without their holiness they 
had not stood ; but what was it fixed their holiness but grace ? To ascribe 
their standing unto their own holiness, is to found a privilege of grace upon 
works. Grace were no more grace, if that took place. A perfect holiness, 
and a stronger hohness than man's, was their due by creation ; but to be 
kept by so strong an assistance as should eliectually fix their wills, and for 
ever after keep them so, this was above the ordinary creation-law, and so 
above the law of works. Had the evil angels had such a prevalent super- 
creation assistance, they had not fallen ; and therefore it must be super- 
creation grace kept those other. And all grace that saves is from election ; 
and election is the fountain of such a gracious stream, the channel of which 
should run on to eternity without failure or drying up, as this in them did 
and doth. Election and grace are never to be served y^ the angels then 
were saved by it, and not any one angel, but those who were elect, were 
saved : for all that stood are called elect. And, on the contrary, all of them 
that were elect were saved, and none miscarried. The election obtained it 
amongst them ; and you know what became of ♦ the rest.' Thus you see 
what made the ditference even amongst them also. Oh, let us therefore 
adore God for his election grace, as without which none of his creatures had 
* Qu. 'severed'? — Ed. 



6 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

infallibly been saved. Thus much for a demonstration of this, taken from 
the angels. 

For the case of mankind, now they are fallen, if God had not made an elec- 
tion among them, what would have become of them, if it were so with angels 
that never sinned ? brethren, how much more with filthy man ! as Job xv. 
15, 17, 'Behold, he putteth no trust in his saints; yea, the heavens are 
not clean in his sight ; how much more abominable and filthy is man, which 
drinketh iniquity like water?' and we may argue on this point as he doth 
there in that other. If not the angels, not one of them, were saved from 
the ruins of their nature but by election, then surely not man fallen. If 
election were necessary but for their confirmation in holiness, as our divines 
say (though I think there is a farther privilege joined with it), then how 
much more for man, that was irreparably fallen, as by himself, and that 
needed the whole of salvation for substance, and continuance therein also ! 
What a blessed provision did God make to make an election ! There is a 
scripture that hath often afi'ected my heart: Rom. ix. 29, * As Esaias said 
before,' saith Paul out of him, 'Except the Lord of Sabaoth had left us a 
seed, we had been like unto Sodom and Gomorrha.' It is spoken of elec- 
tion, he had discoursed of in that chapter. And what is that seed there ? 
It is plainly a reserve, a relic or remnant. And that speech in Rom. xi. 5, 
of a ^remnant according to the election of grace,' is all one with that 'seed' 
there; for many passages in the ninth chapter and in this hold a correspon- 
dence. my brethren, if God had not taken such a remnant, not Israel 
only, but all mankind, had been like unto Sodom and Gomorrha. Not a 
man, woman, or child in Sodom or Gomorrha were saved, but whom God 
took out. Lot and his family. Therefore, say I, bless God for election, we 
had been undo;.c else to a man. And shall not this afi'ect ? Oh, despise 
not election ! therein lies all your hope, that there is a remnant shall infaUibly 
be saved. 

After this narration of the angels, suppose that the case of us men were 
res Integra, and that we were still in that happy estate God at first created 
our first parents, and us with him, and were you now all as holy as Adam 
was — I will make that supposition — yet the case of us was but the same for 
changeableness, and would have been the same in the issue with that of the 
fallen angels, who are besides the weaker creatures of the two, and in that 
respect more subject to mutability. So as suppose Adam had stood, by the 
assistance of the power vouchsafed him by the covenant of works, so long till 
he had put us forth an holy seed, yet we must all have then personally stood 
upon our own single bottoms, which himself did at first stand (shall I say, or 
fall ?) upon, and so been in the same continual danger to drop away from 
God one after another. And as for that if he had stood, that both he and 
we should have been immutably confirmed in grace, as the good angels, there 
was no such promise made either to him or us under that his covenant and 
state by creation ; for if there had, it must have been by election-grace super- 
added to the covenant of works, which in the case of the angels is said to 
be; and if so, then promises proper to election must be supposed made to 
works of creation and the covenant thereof, and so grace be brought into 
works, founded upon works, which the apostle in Rom. xi. 6 makes incom- 
patible : ' And if by grace, then it is no more of works ; otherwise grace is no 
more grace. But if it be of works, then it is no more grace ; otherwise work 
is no more work.' 

But I will make this further supposition, that if we in that state had heard 
that there was an election of grace, such as the holy angels stood by, whether 
would you have stuck and betook yourself unto creation-holiness barely, with 



Chap. I.] or election. 7 

the mutability of it, or election of grace for the way of your eternal salva- 
tion ? Were I as perfect as Adam, I promise you I would for my part 
betake myself to that of election, that super- creation privilege, [rather] than 
adventure my eternal condition in any free-will holiness, were it never so 
perfect. 

Well, but we all with his holiness soon miscarried, we are irrecoverably 
(as of ourselves) fallen by it ; yet there is a fancy that hath possessed the 
minds of men, and hath run down throughout all ages of the world, — nothing 
can root out or dispossess men of it, neither constant experience, nor the view 
of the ruins of the generality of mankind that have perished by it, — and it is 
this, that if God doth set up the will and heart of man by furnishing it with 
new helps and assistances, vamp or recruit this old degenerate frame with 
fresh and new supplies, that then their wills may make a second hopeful ven- 
ture to obtain, although no such election-grace (as our doctrine sets forth) 
should be superadded nor strike in, to work the will and deed itself over- 
comingly on their hearts, or undertake for them invincibly so to work. And 
the use as to this respect which they make is, that Christ should have been, 

1, intended (as a second Adam), for he was to purchase the pardon of sins; 

2, to purchase helps for all; 3, and to give grace and assistance so far as 
they may, if they will use those helps well, with promise that if they do, and 
by these come to believe and be converted, then, 4, God's electing grace 
comes upon them, and then it is he chooseth them to eternal life, upon the 
intuition of this good usage of their wills; election only follows hereupon, and 
hath no influence at all afore their wills have cast it thus ; if God would but 
set up the will and heart of man anew, vamp this old, worn, and degenerate 
frame, assist it and furnish it with new helps and advantages. 

And thus men will needs wilfully perish a second time, by venturing to sea 
again in that rotten leaking old vessel, their own free wills, in which and by 
which they shipwrecked so miserably once before, when they had wind and 
tide, and a new vessel, strong, and tight, and well built, with all other advan- 
tages to have preserved her; but this their will being pilot, so steered as all 
was cast away, and yet they will adventure to sea again therein. Adam's 
will had, besides the concurrence of God's assistance (such as was sufficient), 
an inward principle of habitual and inherent holiness, the image of God as a 
vital principle of motion within him, whereby not only to be able to act 
holily, but which also as a weight or pondiis did sway and incline his will to 
act holily, even as sin dwelling in us doth, as a weight hung on, incline us now 
to evil. 

But, alas, there is now that vast difference and disadvantage in our case, 
beyond, infinitely beyond, what was in his as to these respects ; that instead 
of a perfect holiness possessing and inclining the will and mind, there is no 
such vital habitual principle in our hearts left ; nay, an utter disability unto 
what is spiritual, holy, and good ; yea, contrary enmity and opposition there 
is unto * holiness in truth,' as the apostle calls it. Men err, not knowing 
the power of original sin, nor the depth of corruption that is in their own 
hearts. The will of man now is the prime and proper seat of sin, and the 
throne thereof is seated therein. And as no prince's will, in full and actual 
possession of regal power, can be brought by ordinary or any persuasions to 
be willing, much less to be indifferent, to be dethroned, so nor may we think 
that sin in our wills will upon easy terms lay down his crown : * The flesh is 
enmity to God, and is not subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be,' says 
the apostle. The will and mind, and whole heart of man, must first have that 
corruption which is in possession dethroned from its dominion, and then the 
same vital habitual principle of inherent holiness created in it anew : ' A new 



8 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

heart and a new spirit' must be given it, and *a heart of stone taken away' 
(whereof with the affections the will is the subject, as the reins are of the 
other stone in our bodies). The will and affections are the seat of this spiri- 
tual stone, and as incapable to act one holy act as the stone in the kidney is 
to act an action of life or vital motion. They must be made an heart of flesh 
that hath a new life, and sense, &c., given it, and thereby that which must 
be the cause and subject of any one the least such living operation, other- 
wise you may as well * gather grapes of thorns, and figs of thistles, as good 
fruit of a corrupt tree.' Mat. vii. 16, 17, 'The tree must therefore be 
made good ere its fruit can be made good,' as Christ (the root) hath told us. 
Mat. xii. 33, 'Either make the tree good, and his fruit good; or else 
make the tree corrupt, and his fruit corrupt: for the tree is known by 
his fruit.' And what are all those helps they talk of, either that rb yvuGrbv 
roj ©fcoD, that light of God from the works of creation which God gave to 
heathens of himself, Rom. i. ; or the light of conscience, of the law, Rom. 
ii. ; and a natural devotion suited to it in the will and affection, whereby 
men have a reverence and addiction to a Deity, accompanied with impressions 
of moral honesty (which we call virtue) ; and let these be impregnated with 
the light of the law and gospel, delivered with all the signs with which God 
once did enforce the law, and Christ the gospel, yet the coiTupt will will 
inwardly and habitually be a corrupt will still. And though all these helps, 
with the assistance from God they speak of, may stir and affect it, yet they 
will never be able to write the holy and spiritual law in the heart in new and 
living characters, and dispositions conformable and suitable unto the inward 
hoHness of it, unless God put forth an omnipotent power and efficacy to 
change it. All the 'helps they speak of, they are all short and deficient; 
helpers of no value, as in Job xxx. 13. A refiner or chemist may as soon, 
by his common earthly fire, with the mixtures and arts he useth, sublimate 
a clod of earth or a globe of brass into a star, such as are in heaven, as 
these helps, and the use of them all, can take away the innate con-uption of 
the will, and make it spiritual, or endow it with a spiritual life ; for nothing 
works above the sphere of its activity. Those helps, elevated with the afore- 
said light of the law and gospel, and enforced with outward signs and wonders 
to the utmost, and accompanied with a striving power of the Holy Ghost, 
may wonderfully stir, and affect, and demulce this will of man ; but if God 
do not over and above endow it with a new principle of inherent holiness and 
workmanship created to good work, it will be still utterly unable to bring forth 
one act that is pleasing to the holy God. 

This truth was experimented both under the law and gospel. The Jews 
at Sinai had God's voice uttering the law to them. You have the manner 
of it both in Exodus, and in brief recapitulated by Moses : Deut. v. 22-28, 
* These words the Lord spake unto all your assembly in the mount, out of 
the midst of the fire, of the cloud, and of the thick darkness, with a great 
voice ; and added no more : and he wrote them in two tables of stone, and 
delivered them unto me. And it came to pass, when ye heard the voice 
out of the midst of the darkness (for the mountain did burn with fire), that 
ye came near unto me, even all the heads of the tribes, and elders ; and ye 
said, Behold, the Lord our God hath shewed us his glory, and his greatness, 
and we have heard his voice out of the midst of the fire : we have seen this 
day that God doth talk with man, and he liveth. Now therefore why should 
we die ? for this great fire will consume us. If we hear the voice of our 
God any more, then we shall die. For who is there of all flesh, that hath 
heard the voice of the living God speaking out of the midst of the fire, as 
we have, and lived ? Go thou near, and hear all that the Lord our God 



Chap. I.] of election. 9 

shall say; and speak thou unto us all that the Lord our God shall speak 
unto thee, and we will hear it, and do it. And the Lord heard the voice of 
your words, when ye spake unto me ; and the Lord said unto me, I have 
heard the voice of the words of this people, which they have spoken unto 
thee: they have well said all that they have spoken.' And yet all this did 
not change the will, nor give the generality of that people an heart spiritually 
to obey; for in the next words, ver. 29, God himself doth thereupon make 
this remark upon it, * Oh that there were such an heart in them, that they 
would fear me, and keep all my commandments always, that it might be well 
with them, and with their children for ever ! ' 

And again, at last, Deut. xxix. 2-4, * And Moses called unto all Israel, and 
said unto them, Ye have seen all that the Lord did before your eyes in the 
land of Egypt unto Pharaoh, and unto all his servants, and unto all his 
land ; the great temptations which thine eyes have seen, the signs, and 
those great miracles. Yet the Lord hath not given you a heart to perceive, 
and eyes to see, and ears to hear, unto this day.' Not their wills only 
remained as they were, but they had not understandings enlightened with 
spiritual light, spiritually to discern and perceive the holiness in truth that 
was therein. 

The case and condition of the whole world I gave instance in afore. They 
had all those helps, with the advantages of time and improvement of them, 
living so many years. They had also the Spirit of God striving with them, 
Gen. vi. 3, and the righteousness of the gospel preached with power, from 
the assistance and concurrence of the divinity of Christ, appearing in it with 
power; of whom yet Peter, by the Holy Ghost, declares, 1 Peter iii. 8, 
'Christ,' says he, 'being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the 
Spirit' (namely, of his Godhead); ver. 19, 'By which also' (that Spirit, 
namely) 'he went and preached to the spirits in prison' (that is, that are 
now in hell), ' which sometimes in the days of Noah were disobedient' unto 
that Noah's preaching the gospel to them, with which Christ's Spirit had 
gone forth and preached in and by Noah to them. And yet, with all these 
helps of free-will grace (as we may call it), they remained flesh, or unrege- 
nerate and ungodly, as Moses in Gen. vi. and the same Peter tells us; yea, 
an whole 'world of ungodly' ones, 2 Peter ii. 5, and but one Noah with his 
family were saved. And how came that to pass, but as God says of him, 
'Noah hath found grace in my sight;' answerable unto 'By grace you are 
saved,' as the apostle to the elect Ephesians, chap. i. 4, 5 compared with 
chap. ii. 4, 5, whilst the world round about them continued 'dead in tres- 
passes and in sins' (with all their helps, that could not quicken them), Eph. 
ii. 1-4. I might go over the instances in Christ's and the apostles' times, 
wherein you would see the same issue; but let these suffice. 

Only because some may perhaps inquire, that if the wills and aff'ections 
of these Jews were really aff'ected and stirred, then they had the power to 
will and to turn ; and wherein were these helps defective then, and not 
sufficient ? 

The answer is, that they still wanted a power spiritually to will and dis- 
cern, as hath been said. Their wills remained still in their native corrup- 
tion, and had not new inherent habitual power infused into them, without 
which they could not will any one act truly good. This habitual change 
of heart is that new heart which God complained was wanting, even whilst, 
and in the midst of their being so affected. The will of man is, as was said, 
the proper seat of sin ; and the strength of that sin, that is therein seated, 
is the predominancy of self-love ; and that self-love remaining in its pre- 
dominancy, is that which the Scriptures do term flesh, as well as any other 



10 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

last. And this self in the will remaining still in its predominancy, as it doth 
until a new principle of holiness towards God chiefly be infused, may be 
affected with many things, both in law and gospel. And from out of that 
principle so affected and stirred, man's will may use those helps and assist- 
ances, and act accordingly ; and so the issue falls as it did afore ; that the 
heart and will remaining a thorn as afore, and not turned into a fig-tree, you 
cannot gather figs on it. There is a work, and it is the highest work, of 
the word and gospel, that is short of saving ; it is a work accompanying the 
word and Spirit, which greatly affects the heart, so as to suffer persecution, 
and yet is short of a saving work, or of the heart its being made the ' good 
ground,' and an * honest heart.' It is the ' thorny ground,' as Christ in the 
parable hath told us, that though the word took root in it, yet it changed 
not the thorns, but was the thorny gi'ound still ; and so the heart remaining 
inwardly such, is therefore in all it brings forth, plainly said to be unfruitful : 
Mark iv. 19, ' And the cares of the world, and the deceitfulness of riches, 
and the lusts of other things entering in, choke the word, and it becometh 
unfruitful ;' yea, ver. 7, ' to yield no fruit.' Why ? For all actings of the 
heart, though about things spiritual, that are only for a man's self, are said 
to be ' no fruit to God :' Hosea x. 1, ' Israel is an empty vine, that bringeth 
forth fruit to itself;' which whilst it doth only for and to itself, self-love then 
is said to continue in its predominancy. And it is said, that regeneration is 
* not of the will of the flesh,' John i. 13, that is, of the will still remaining 
flesh, which yet it is, though a man be never so much affected with what 
the word delivers, if his will and affection be moved chiefly or only by what 
affects self-love, without having an higher principle ingenerated or begotten 
in it by election-grace. And therefore no wonder if the apostle says, ' It is 
not of him that runs, or him that wills ;' for men's wills may be greatly 
moved and incited unto a running, which is the swiftest motion, and yet be 
deficient of regeneration. So that to conclude ; — 

One of the foundation causes of this error, doating on this free-will grace, 
is, that whilst they imagine such helps and assistances as they define may 
give a TO jjosse, a power to turn, &c., leaving it to the will to cast the act, 
they withal do suppose the will to remain a principle in itself, as it were 
inclinable in itself unto spiritual good, and able to move to good, if its 
shackles were once off, and that the knowledge of God and the gospel doth 
but once visit it, and come in, and that the Spirit presents the motives 
thereof to it, in a way of persuasion, &c. Oh, but I demand who or what 
shall create a new principle of holiness, * a new spirit' in the will, and take 
the ' heart of stone' out of it ? Until which be done, the will is the most 
averse principle, and fullest of enmity, both to God and his law, in the 
spiritualness and true holiness of them, and cannot rise or act (though never 
BO much otherwise affected) beyond the sphere of its own inward activity, 
as no creature else we see can do ; as a stone will not ascend upward, but 
whilst it is moved by force, and some outward hand that throws it out, for 
it hath not a natural principle thereto, as fire hath. But this is not all that 
goes unto calling, to give a new spirit of habitual holiness, and then assist 
it in acting, but so far as Adam's holiness was assisted by the law of creation ; 
and that it is the most which the highest of free-willers do desire of God, to 
be out of his grace assisted withal. Nor are these all that the omnipotent 
power of God is laid forth upon in our calling, and afterwards in keeping us ; 
but there is an exceeding greatness of power concurs to every act or work 
that is good and holy all along, even the same that wrought in Christ his 
rising from the dead, according to that Eph. i. 19, 20, ' And what is the 
exceeding greatness of his power to us-ward who beheve, according to the 



Chap. I.] of election. 11 

working of his mighty power, which he wrought in Christ, when he raised 
him from the dead, and set him at his own right hand in the heavenly places,' 
&c. It is not such an assistance only as Adam had, but as Christ had in 
rising from the dead. A principle of holiness, though it be a disposition 
and inclination to holiness, may and doth lie dead, and besides, is clogged 
and hindered in its motion with a weight of sin that is contrary to it in us 
(read Itom. vii. 23, 24) ; if electing grace strikes not in with an omnipotent 
Bweetnetis (as Austin's word is), or an invincible secret power (for by that 
place now quoted, the saints are not always sensible of the greatness of it) 
that draws this will and its principle of holiness into act. And upon the 
Spirit's drawing forth, and carrying on, the actings of holiness in us, it is 
that Austin, and Jansenius out of him, do set the crown, as that which is 
the complete eminency of eflicacious grace ; for since the fall, all other helps 
are short of causing us to act, thougli holiness be dwelling in us without 
effecting power. The promise therefore is not only to give a new heart, as 
in Ezek. xxxvi. 26, ' A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will 
I put within you ; and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, 
and I will give you a heart of flesh ;' but it further follows, ver. 27, ' And 
I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and 
ye shall keep my judgments, and do them ;' that is, I will work in you the 
act itself also, even the will and the deed. 

Now the giving of this new heart, &c., in which doth consist the mark of 
the true inward power, is the proper fruit of election-grace, and of that alone, 
with diflerence from what this free-will grace, as it is stated by these men, 
doth suppose necessary ; and the covenant of grace (which is the transcript 
of election-decrees indefinitely expressed) runs in those terms, ' a new heart 
will I give you, and a new spirit,' &c., Ezek. xxxvi. 26. And thereupon 
also it is that election-grace doth always infallibly and invincibly, at one 
time or another, work this by effectual calling in those it hath predestinated, 
as many Scriptures shew ; as Rom. viii. 28, 30, ' And we know that all 
things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the 
called according to his purpose. Moreover, whom he did predestinate, them 
he also called ; and whom he called, them he also justified ; and whom he 
justified, them he also glorified.' And in Rom. ix., in the case of Jacob, he 
speaks thus, ' That the purpose of God according to the election might 
stand, not of works ' (wrought by free will), * but of him that calleth.' "Which 
shews that God, having from everlasting first elected, doth manifest the 
firmness of that his purpose to save by effectual calling, as he did in Jacob, 
by virtue of election. The same you have also confirmed towards the con- 
clusion of his discourse about election, in the same chapter. Having just 
afore said, ver. 23, * That he might make known the riches of his glory on 
the vessels of mercy, which he had afore prepared unto glory ;' he imme- 
diately subjoins, as adequate thereto, ver. 24, ' Even us whom he ha,th 
called, not of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles.' As if he had said, 
even us whom he hath thus ordained by electing mercy, to make known the 
riches of his glory upon, are those that are called, and likewise those that 
shall be. So as let no man think that when we say, ' the election hath 
obtained it,' that we should mean, that the elect by election only, without 
an efi'ectual work of calling, doth obtain. No ; none that are grown up to 
years of knowledge but God calleth if he hath elected them ; and by calling, 
endows them with a new heart, and a new spirit (as hath been spoken). 

Also, understand between, that when the apostle speaks of election grace, 
Rom. xi. 6, we confine it not to those purposes of grace in God's mind from 
everlasting, but take in that operative grace in calling, as comprehended 



12 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

under it, the whole grace in calling us in that election grace in the text ; for 
election set it a-work, and did design it. And the same election grace is 
that which runs along, and is immediately at the head of calling, &c., it is 
the same grace. The one is the grace of purposing, as it is abstractly con- 
sidered in the decree and intention ; the other in calling is the grace of 
execution. My conclusion from all this therefore is, that we, the fallen sons 
of men, would see and be convinced of the necessity of this election grace, 
so far beyond what the draught of their free-will grace sets forth, as which if 
God had not peremptorily resolved in his purposes to put forth to work in 
us, to save those of mankind whom he chose ; or if less than this, not any 
of mankind had obtained ; but now the election, through the operation of 
this grace, hath and doth obtain salvation to a man. And do you in reason 
consider, that there being but those two ways to obtain salvation by, ever 
started or pretended unto by the sons of men ; and all being reducible to 
one of these two, as in the fore-cited text, Rom. xi. 6, you see works (the 
head and principle of which is man's will, acting in and by itself) and election 
grace, divide them into these two, and do but set them in opposition one to 
the other, as the Scriptures likewise throughout ; both which the apostle 
hath summed up in that short sentence, ' It is not of him that runs, nor of 
him that wills, but of God who sheweth mercy ; ' namely, the true and right 
act of willing and running by an election grace (and election grace is his 
argument there in hand), round about, and afore, and after. For otherwise, 
without running and willing no man is saved : as in Philip, iii. 12, 13, 
* Not as though I had already attained, either were already perfect : but I 
follow after, if that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended 
of Christ Jesus. Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended ; but 
this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching 
forth unto those things which are before.' Our salvation is wrought out by 
God's giving the will and the deed. If, then, the first hath failed them that 
have betaken themselves unto it, and never no man was yet saved by it (as 
hath been already declared), nor could be for the reasons aforesaid, and that 
the Scriptures still cry, and peremptorily, * Not by works,' and then posi- 
tively and conclusively, by being ' called with an holy calling, according to 
his purpose and grace given us in Christ Jesus before the world begun,' 
then let us not only be convinced, but further adore and bless God for this 
election grace, without which also Christ had died in vain, and not saved a 
man, and been in heaven alone, to lament that he had come short in this 
work, by having omitted to put in one clause into his covenant in dying, 
viz., that besides his purchase of helps, whereby men might be saved if they 
would, he had not further purchased an invincible overcoming of their wills 
for whom he died, but had left to the will of man itself, to use or not to use 
those according to the pleasure of their wills, and had not meritoriously 
also procured of God efficaciously to work the will and the deed, * according 
to his good pleasure.' And so Christ should be left to satisfy himself with 
this rehef, that he had done his part, but the obstructions lay in man's will, 
that would not put forth the act of willing, though he had given them suf- 
ficiency of helps to do it. Yea, God himself must have suspended, and have 
forborne his dearest delight and highest first blessing, as Eph. i. 4, 5, viz., 
the exercise of his electing grace, ' according to the good pleasure of his 
will ' towards any, until man's will had first used those helps well, and put 
itself forth into willing out of its liberty to ast, or not to act ; and so all 
electing grace might have been for ever frustrated. All which necessarily 
follows, that it might thus have been, upon the doctrine of free-will grace, if 
the way thereof had been God's way for salvation ; and if that God should 



Chap. I.] of election. 13 

have kept to the laws thereof, which men have set for the salvation of them- 
selves and others. But, oh ! blessed and thrice blessed be he, the God of 
all grace, who foreseeing all this, peremptorily struck in with an election 
grace, whereby to be sure he would save some, whom he had afore by elec- 
tion given to Christ, who a few hours afore his death professeth to die for 
all that God gave hira, John xvii. 

Use. Now, then, we may enter a just complaint against the world, that 
although election grace is thus necessary unto salvation, yet all the thanks 
God hath from the unthankful sons of men, ignorant of their own interest, 
and the ways of God, is, for him to be quarrelled at for this his election, in 
that he took not all, as well as some (for in so much as they quarrel with 
those that hold it, they quarrel with God himself therein, even as Christ 
said, ' In that ye did it to those, ye did it unto me') ; that whereas God 
before the fall was free of any obligations unto the creature, but those by 
the laws of creation, which he exactly performed, and yet notwithstanding 
man fell ; and whereas by the fail he was absolutely quit and discharged of 
all obhgations to men, by the forfeitures of the dues and assistances by all 
the laws of God due to them ; yea, and on the contrary, was by his justice 
provoked to damn them, that it had been infinite grace to save, though but 
one man ; yet these would impose upon him a necessity to give forth a com- 
mon grace, and that he should purpose upon free-will terms to save all, or 
else with them, it is not grace to mankind, nor worth the name of it ; so 
zealous are they in pretence for their own nature. Whereas, on the con- 
trary, according to their draught of what is their common grace, when all is 
summed up, and it comes unto the event, it w^ould not save a man ; corrup- 
tion in man is so strong, and their assisting grace which they propose is so 
weak. I do not say that those that hold that way of free-will grace, none 
of them are saved ; but this I say, if God should deal with them but only 
according to their own model and draught, to the measure and proportion of 
that grace and the works of it, which they do judge sufficient, that work 
w^ould not save a man of them, if God should not out of grace work beyond 
the extent of their opinions. It is as if the angels should have said, out 
of zeal to their common natures, that because God has let go so many of 
us, that is our nature, to fall, whom he did not choose, but suffered to 
perish eternally, that therefore we will not accept that grace of election by 
which we stand, and w^hich was offered us at first for confirmation of us. 

But this is not all, viz., this unthankfulness, but there is an higher 
encroachment made upon God in their denying him this way of salvation by 
election, and an entrenchment made upon his freedom ; I do not now say, 
upon his sovereignty. They will not allow him the ordinary privilege of 
choice, to and for himself, of whom he will. They would restrain him in 
what is ordinarily the privilege of kings, yea, of all men. They allow to 
every man to choose their wives, because they choose for themselves ; to 
choose their friends, because it is for themselves. The Persians allowed it 
as a due and just maxim, * What shall be done to the man whom the king 
will honour ? ' They allow to kings to have their friends and bosom 
favourites, as Solomon had Zabud, 1 Kings iv. 5, that is called the king's 
friend ; yet they quarrel with God if he chooses Abraham to be his friend, 
unless it be with a respective decree, that he foresees he will be so through 
the creature's free will. They quarrel with him that he chooses the seed of 
Abraham his friend, as Isaiah xli. 8, * But thou Israel art ray servant, Jacob 
whom I have chosen, the seed of Abraham my friend,' as rather than others; 
where as it is in his freedom to choose the person, so it is in his power to 
make that person his friend, and work him so to be. 



14 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

Yea, and in this they quarrel with him that he should bestow what is 
properly his own, which to give and communicate as a man pleases is an 
allowed principle by all the sons of men. Now there is nothing so much his 
own as election grace ; yea, and is purely his own, without any pretence of 
a dueness upon creation, or any the like condition from the creatures, for it 
is the bestowing himself. It is to admit them to see his face immediately, 
which election grace ends in, and creation grace reached not unto. Now 
the promise made to Adam it is* to carry the will of a creature on invin- 
cibly to love himself, who hath an overcoming sweetness and goodness in 
himself, when he shall but manifest it to the creature, invincibly to persuade 
it omnipotente suavitate, as Austin's word is. The super- creation grace is 
most properly his own riches, and called ' the riches of his grace.' To give 
holiness to Adam was a creation due ; but to give grace and glory, which 
election doth, this was a super-creation grace to Adam as it was to the 
angels. Our Saviour Christ enforceth that maxim that is so common amongst 
men: Mat. xxv. 15, * Shall not a man do what he will with his own?' Now 
this grace was so his own as no creature could lay claim to it. As in the 
city freedoms one-third of a man's estate his wife may claim ; another third 
his children, but they have reserved a liberty that one-third part is so their 
own as to bestow it where they please, and in this case yourselves would 
think much to be deprived of this privilege, or that laws must be set you 
how you must bestow that third part you call appropriatively your own. 
Now, is not God's grace God's own ? Why is it called free ? As the 
Israelite ' limited the holy One of Israel,' so these would do the gracious 
One of Israel. 

Well, but the iniquity of these stay not here. For the sake of whom is it 
that they do this ? It were well if out of such a commiseration to the 
nature of mankind in general, as Paul professes he had for his own flesh, 
that he was in continual sorrow of heart for them ; it were well, I say, if out 
of such a commiseration they did the like. And yet Paul wholly submits it 
to God's will. But it is to set up against God's free-will grace (which is the 
fountain of this election) that other fluid, fickle, yea, and corrupt principle 
in the heart of man, and that is the freedom of man's will, and that as now 
fallen ; and to preserve the liberty thereof (forsooth), and that that may be 
no way entrenched upon, they would deprive God of the liberty of his will, 
and the dominion thereof, and also of a power invincible to work upon man's 
will infallibly ; as if that God had made a creature which he could not 
rule ; whereby they put God into Darius his straits, that he should all the 
days of a man's life strive with a man to save him, yet so as man's will 
may cast it otherways, and he cannot help it, but must submit to man ; and 
they frame such a model and way to salvation as shall be proportioned to 
that freedom of man's will, and unto such a kind of freedom of a man's 
will that he may do or not do, when God hath done all. And that this is 
the opinion they have set up against election, and the ground of the quarrel, 
all ages testify. 

* Qu. ' reached not unto, nor the promise made to Adam ; it is ' ? — Ed. 



Chap. II.] of election. 15 



CHAPTER II. 

That there is 'an election of grace, with a non-election or passing by others, — 
That difference to be out of the pure grace and good pleasure of God. — 
Which purpose of election is the cause of their effectual calling and salvation, 

J say then, Hath God cast away his people? God forbid. For 1 also am an 
Israelite, of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin. God hath not 
cast away his people which he foreknew. Wot ye not uhat the scripture 
saith of Klias? how he maketh intercession to God against Israel, saying^ 
Lord, they have killed thy prophets, and digged down thy altars ; and I am 
left alone, and they seek my life. But what saith the answer of God unto 
him? I have reserved to myself seven thousand men, who have not bowed 
the knee to the image of Baal. Even so then at this present time also there 
is a remnant according to the election of grace. And if by grace, then it is 
no more of works ; otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of ivorks, 
then it is no more grace ; otherwise work is no more work. What then ? 
Israel hath not obtained that which he seeketh for ; but the election hath 
obtained it, and the rest were blinded. — Rom. XI. 1-7. 

It was a great exercise to Paul's spirit, as appears by chapter ix., in the 
beginning, and unto the carnal Jew a stumble, a shrewd objection against 
Christianity itself, that after the Messiah, our Christ, was come in the flesh, 
and was ascended to heaven, and his gospel had had its course among that 
nation, both by Christ's own ministry amongst them, and of his apostles 
after him, that there should be so few of that nation that believed on him ; 
yea, that the generality of that nation were cast off by God upon their hav- 
ing rejected him for their Messiah, when as yet there had been made all 
along the Old Testament such large and abundant promises to that nation, 
of whom Christ was to come, which might have been expected should have 
been fulfilled unto them upon his coming amongst them in the flesh. The 
consideration of which might and did lie in the way, as a great stumbling- 
block unto his former doctrine of salvation by faith on Christ. This you 
have insinuated from the coherence of the fourth and fifth verses of chapter 
ix. : * In that they were Israelites, to whom pertaineth the adoption, and 
the glory, and the giving of the law, and the service of God, and the pro- 
mises; whose are the fathers, and of whom, as concerning the flesh, Christ 
came, who is over all, God blessed for ever,' as the Christians professed 
their Christ to be. And that yet these Israelites should so few of them be 
professors of him, was a strong presumption that therefore it was not he 
that was the true Messiah. And this objection is again revived in the first 
verse of this second chapter : * Hath God cast away his people ? ' (meaning 
the Jews.) Now unto this he there gives two answers. 

His first ansiver. That God had not * cast away his people whom he fore- 
knew,' or whom he aimed at in his promises of the covenant of grace, the 
word of promise. The carnal Jew understood by God's people the whole, 
or at least the generahty of their nation, unto whom yet, but as in a type, 
those forecited privileges and promises were made ; and under that respect 
it was they made up the church of the Old Testament. He therefore care- 
fully puts in, you see, by way of distinction, ' He hath not cast away his 
people uhom he foreknew ; ' as if he had said they were his people in outward 
profession, and endowment of outward privileges, but those really and indeed 
his people, whom he hath chosen to salvation, and they [who] were so foreknown 



16 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

by him only are his, as he emphatically indigitates, and he hath cast off not 
one of them. All and every one of them he intended and had in his eye when 
he made those promises of the covenant of grace, those he hath not, nor 
ever will cast off. And as for the rest, they were his people but by outward 
profession, rather typically such, as in a shadow of the other hidden ones 
amongst them, for whose sake it was those promises and privileges were 
continued to the community of that nation ; these only are said to be the 
children of the promise and the children of God, and none other : Rom. 
ix. 6, 7, * Not as though the word of God hath taken none effect. For they 
are not all Israel which are of Israel : neither because they are the seed of 
Abraham, are they all children : but, in Isaac shall thy seed be called.' 
And what he understands by * children of promise,' he exemplifies by Isaac, 
whom he proves to have been a child of promise in respect of the election of 
his person without foreseen conditions in him, and by virtue of which elec- 
tion, had been called. This he doth, ver. 9, 11, as I shall shew when I 
come to speak unto his instance in the following story of election, which 
manifestly dissolves the strength of their objection that they were all 
Israelites, and that to them the adoption pertained, in ver. 4, 5. For that 
to have been but in respect of outward profession, title, and external calling, 
and also because they w^ere types and shadows of the true seed to come, this 
distinction of typical Israelites, and Israelites indeed, and in truth, plainly 
appears to be in his intent to avouch, in that he flatly denies that all of Israel 
were Israel ; that is, as Christ says of Nathanael, an Israelite indeed. He 
denies also that they were children of God, ver. 7, or rightly the children of 
Abraham according to God's intent in his promise to the seed, although 
according to the flesh they were, as you find it express in ver. 7, and 
although of them he had said, 'that to them belonged the adoption,' or title 
of children. 

His second answer. Observe that word, ver. 5 of chap, xi., 'For the pre- 
sent time ; ' it is that there are so few, but in ver. 25, 26, ' He would not 
have them ignorant of this mystery, that blindness in part is happened to 
Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in. And so all Israel shall 
be saved.' 

Now that which I intend in the words is, that he clearly resolves the 
utmost account of that paucity or fewness of them, who at that present were 
saved, into election, &c. Thus in those words, ver. 2, ' His people whom 
he foreknew,' and then again, those who ' at that present time,' he says, 
were then saved, he calls in ver. 5, 'a remnant,' and a 'remnant according to 
the election of grace ;' and in ver. 7, 'What then? Israel hath not obtained 
that w^hich he seeketh for ; but the election hath obtained it, and the rest 
were blinded.' 

I shall therefore further, to lay a foundation for this my subject, open 
these two verses, 2d and 5th. Wherein, 

First, That by ' his people whom he foreknew,' ver. 2, is meant his elect 
out of grace. 

His people; and made his by election. God casting his eye upon them, 
said within himself of them, Those are mine; as John xvii. 6, 'Thine are 
mine, and thou gavest them me.' The elect, afore ever they are converted, 
are styled by God his people: Acts xviii. 10, 'I have much people in this 
city.' And Christ saith, ' Sheep I have not of this fold' (Gentiles), ' them 
I must bring.' They were sheep afore they were brought in, and they were 
so determinately, fixedly, and resolutely God's sheep, foreknown by him to 
be such, as that Christ himself (to whom God hath committed the salvation 
of them) saith, ' I must bring them in,' as upon God's peremptory command 



Chap. II.] of election. 17 

to have them saved. And therefore election, or foreknowledge of them, is 
as the cause joined with their being his: 2 Tim. ii. 19, 'The Lord knows 
who are his.' 

Secondly, This their election, that makes them his, and is here signified 
by foreknowled,£je — 'whom he foreknew' — is a word appropriated to the 
elect and their election by God; and election is ascribed unto it, as in Rom. 
viii. 29, 'Whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate;' and 1 Peter 
i. 1, ' Elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father;' that is, out 
of that special foreknowledge which God took of those whom he chose ; even 
such a foreknowledge as is common to no other creatures or persons, although 

* known unto God are all his works from the beginning.' And as several 
interpreters have observed on the same word. Ram. viii. 29, he saith not 
oug 'TToofihi, whom he knew, as but with a bare, simple act of knowledge, for 
so he doth all things ; but oZg vrposyvu, whom he acknowledged, approved of 
with a knowledge of liking and love. And so he notes, 

1. A singular love joined with the foresight of them, or God's casting a 
loving eye with aflfection upon them. Words of knowledge import affection ; 
conjugal communion which is transacted between man and wife, and riseth 
from the entirest love, is styled knowledge of each other; as, on the contrary, 

* I know you not,' and ' I never knew you,' doth in Christ's speech express 
an utter rejection and privation of affection to them. 

2. There is T^h (or before) added to this knowledge; by comparing other 
scriptures to which, imports that this his love was before the foundation of 
the world, and so from everlasting. And so that particle is explained in the 
same chapter of Peter, ver. 20, when Christ's election is spoken of, whose 
election is the pattern of ours : ' Who verily was foreordained afore the 
foundation of the world;' and Christ himself, John xvii. 25, 'Thou lovedst 
me afore the foundation of the world.' 

3. It was not such a foreknowledge as that whom he foresaw would believe, 
and be holy, that them, as such foreseen, he chose and loved; that were un- 
worthy of God, qui scientiam non accijiit a rebus, and had been an uncertain 
foundation for God to build upon, who builds not upon sand, the mutable 
will of the creature; but 'the foundation of God' is said to be 'sure,' by 
this, that he knows who are his; qui, not qua, that is, the individual persons, 
who they are; not who, that is, so or so qualified. And in Rom. viii. 29 it 
is not said he predestinated those whom he foreknew that would be conform- 
able to the image of his Son. No ; but, on the contrary, that those whom 
he foreknew, and so loved, ' he predestinated to be conformable unto the 
image of Christ his Son.' Yea, and in this place, Rom. xi. 6, he expressly 
puts it wholly upon grace, and utterly excludes works foreseen, as the motive 
unto God: 'And if by grace, then it is no more of works; otherwise grace 
is no more grace. But if it be of works, then it is no more grace ; otherwise 
work is no more work.' 

And thus the sense or meaning of this foreknowledge riseth up to this, that 
those particular persons, whom out of pure grace and love, without any con- 
sideration of works of any kind that were to be in them, he casting his love 
freely upon them, did, from everlasting, and out of that love, choose to be 
his, and they are alone his people. And so for substance and in effect, both 
these words in verse 2, 'whom he foreknew,' and those that after follow, ' a 
remnant according to election of grace,' prove both to be one and the same. 
The doctrine I draw the words summarily forth into is, 
That there is an election of some, with a non-election, or passing by, of 
others ; which election is out of the pure gi'ace of God, and is the cause of 
their effectual calling and salvation. 

VOL. IX. h. B 

r % 



18 OP ELECTION. [Book I. 

There is another general doctrine to follow from out of the interpretation 
of the fourth and fifth verses, viz., 

That those two companies, or forces of men, the election, and the rest, 
or non-elected, have been extant in all ages of the world, and have divided 
mankind past, and will be found in the world, to the end thereof, for time 
to come. 

The former of these two is indeed the ultimate subject in my aim, which 
that latter serves to confirm ; but the second shall be the doctrine which I 
shall more largely insist upon, and that but so far as it is a medium of proof 
to evidence the first, that there is an election, &c. ; and my handling of that 
(the first) shall be only so far out of an interpretation of the first, second, 
and third verses, which, when performed, I shall leave the further evidence 
thereof unto the instances and story of the second doctrine ; for which also 
I shall find a good specimen and ground in the text itself, in verse 4, when 
they come to be opened. 

As for the first doctrine proposed, and the interpretation of verses 1, 2, 3, 
5, 6, &c., I shall go over the words thereof by parts, as they are placed in 
that doctrine. 

1. That there is an election. That is in the letter of the text, wherein the 
elect are called * the election ;' and election imports a calling, or singling 
some from others; as 2 Thes. ii. 13, on s'tX^ro, exernit, selegit, he exempted, 
excepted some; or, as it is here in verse 4, * reserved to himself.' If some 
were not passed by, there were not an election. On the opposite side, the 
other are called 'the rest,' ver. 7; that is, non-elected. And to say 'the 
rest,' is the mildest and softest word that could be given of it, and importeth 
merely a non-election, as it stands in this distinction here from the election, 
which is its opposite. Again, 

2. Of the one he says God did foreknow them, — ' his people which he fore- 
knew,' — and by his foreknowing took them to be his: 2 Tim. ii. 19, ' The 
Lord knows who are his;' he speaks it of election. But there is another 
part of that distinction (for such those words in verse 2 are), there is a rest^ 
whom he never knew. Although he foreknew them as he foreknows all 
things, yet without a love or owning of them; thus Christ, Mat. vii. 23, •! 
never knew you ;' there is the badge of the rest, that he says he never knew 
them. That never reacheth up as high as eternity, and that from thence 
even unto that hour he never knew them. And as he never did know them, 
80 he never will to eternity. You see here are two companies, the elect, and 
the rest; one foreknown, and the other never known. 

8. There are diflerent issues and events befall these two; proceeding, the 
one from God's foreknowing the one, and the other, that God never knew 
them. The first doth infallibly obtain: 'The election have obtained it.' 
Obtained what ? and how ? Efi'ectual calling first, and salvation at last 
thereby. What, then, does befall the rest ? ' They were blinded ;' so the 
text, ' And the rest were blinded.' In like equipage Christ speaks in the 
10th of John, that he had sheep which were not yet to be called; so at 
verse 16, ' And other sheep I have, which are not of this fold : them also I 
must bring, and they shall hear my voice ; and there shall be one fold, and 
one shepherd ;' and that his Father had given them him. And then oppo- 
sitely he speaks of another company : ver. 26, ' Ye are not of my sheep ;' 
and the same difi'erent events do follow upon each that are here said to 
befall these two companies here. Even as here, of those that were his 
sheep he says, ver. 16, * They shall hear my voice, and them I must bring;* 
and verses 27, 28, ' My sheep hear my voice, and I give unto them eternal 
life ; and they shall never perish.' But of the other, ' You believe not, 



Chap. II.] of election. 19 

because you are not of my sheep,' ver. 26. Observe, it is not tbat Christ 
says they were not of his sheep because they beheved not; but, on the con- 
trary, they believed not because they were not of his sheep. And it was 
election of the first sort that put the difierence; for the first, he calls his 
sheep, because the Father had given them him, and that before their calling 
and believing ; for, says ho, * I have sheep which are not of this fold : them 
also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice ; and there shall be one fold, 
and one shepherd.' So it was his Father's gift of them afore calling, for 
which they are in these places called his sheep ; and given by his Father 
with such a command as, I must bring them in, says Christ. 

4. This separation by election is out of pure grace ; that was another 
thing I put into the doctrine. And so it is here said to be 'according to 
the election of grace;' that is, grace was the founder and sole author of that 
decree, and that election merely of grace ; for it follows, ver. G, * If it be of 
grace, then it is no more of works; otherwise grace is no more grace;' which 
plainly excludes works of man, as foreseen, and therewith shuts out also the 
will of man, which is the author of works, to be in any way the cause of such 
an election as foreseen. He makes these two utterly exclusive one of the 
other, that is, as to the point of electing; as it follows, * If it be of works, it 
is no more of grace ; otherwise work is no more work.' Admit but the least 
of works, it is no more of grace out of which God electeth ; they are two 
contradistinct, opposite things. 

For the farther confirmation of this main doctrine, now gathered out of the 
eleventh chapter, I might here largely shew that the same is the very scope 
of the ninth chapter, and withal give the correspondencies which these pas- 
sages in this eleventh chapter do hold, with the like in the ninth chapter ; 
in which ninth he had treated the doctrine of election and preterition, as in 
the proper seat for them ; and this eleventh chapter that follows is a part of 
the application and praxis of that very same doctrine treated in chapter ix. 
And it is as evident to me that he treats in that ninth chapter the doctrine 
of the election of persons, without the consideration of any worth or dignity 
in them foreseen, as certainly as that the coming of Christ in the flesh, 
and his being crucified, were foretold in Psalm xxii. or in the 53d chapter of 
Isaiah. 

He had indeed begun in a way of general thesis, or summary position, to 
propound the doctrine of election in the chapter afore, and how effectual 
calling, &c., flows from thence, and depends thereupon, as so many links 
upon the first link of that golden chain ; that is, in chapter viii. from verse 
28-30, * We know that all things work together for good to them that love 
God, to them who are the called according to his purpose. For whom he 
did foreknow, he did also predestinate to be conformed to the image of his 
Son, that he might be the first-born amongst many brethren. Moreover, 
whom he did predestinate, them he also called; and whom he called, them 
he also justified; and whom he justified, them he also glorified.' And upon 
occasion of that grand objection I fore-specified, that God had left the com- 
munity of that nation of the Jews to obstinacy against Christ and unbelief, 
whose yet were the promises, &c., and that so few of that nation had enter- 
tained the gospel, he was necessitated thereupon to prosecute and clear 
the same doctrine more at large, as that which had put the difference between 
those few that were saved of that nation, and that generality that were left 
to blindness. And this he begins to do from the instances of the fathers of 
that nation, in those eldest, primitive times thereof; shewing how that, from 
the first, election by grace of the persons of Isaac and Jacob in Abraham's 
family (the founder of that nation) had put the vast discrimination between 



20 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

them two, and the persons of Ishmael and Esau, whom God had rejected. 
And therefore no wonder if the same difference fell out upon the same foun- 
dation, in the succeeding children of Isaac and Jacob. These being leading 
examples, and types of what was to come ; notwithstanding the promise made 
"was to ' Abraham and his seed,' for inheriting eternal life, which the Jews 
understood to be universal of their whole nation, but was indeed but inde- 
finite, which the apostle's argument, ver. 7, 8, doth shew they were. 

The occasion of his proceeding upon this argument, in the 9th chapter, 
being thus stated, you then have the main subject of that 9th chapter sum- 
marily proposed in ver. 11, the latter part of the verse, viz. : 

That the purpose of God, according to election, might stand ; not of works, 
but of him that calleth. 

And this doctrine, as thus stated, he fetcheth out from those two instances 
of Isaac and Jacob, as a genuine inference, and conclusion thence deduced ; 
-which I shall but give the sense of in brief : and this inference or conclusion, 
though drawn but from those two instances among the Jewish nation, he yet 
proposeth as a general maxim, appliable to all other men in the world that 
are elect, whether they be Jew or Gentile. The same reason holds of them 
as it did of these two, Isaac and Jacob. 

That, &c., chap. ix. ver. ] 1. This particle shews the final cause or intent 
of God, and of Paxil's alleging these two examples according to God's true 
intent in them ; as if he had said, to this end or purpose, God hath in 
the Scriptures put this open difference of Isaac and Jacob's persons from 
that of Ishmael and Esau's, that he might give forth a most manifest and 
general demonstration of the like in the condition of all others. 

That God's purpose according to election. Which, Jirst, always imports with 
it a singling forth one, or divers, from others who are not chosen ; and so 
here doth connotate the rejection of others, namely, Ishmael and Esau ; or 
else, secondly, that clause is put in to distinguish it to be that sort of pur- 
poses which are election purposes ; that whereas to reject, or pass by others, 
is from a purpose too ; but this is his purpose according to election ; or, 
thirdly, that clause may be thus understood : that God's purpose made 
according to the way, mode, or manner of election ; which in the eleventh 
chapter, he using the same phrase, doth there intend it to express that it is 
out of pure grace. And snch was this of Isaac and Jacob's : it was after 
the way and mode election useth to hold ; out of the principle of pure 
grace, whence election always proceeds. This further to have been, to 
the end, 

That it might stand ; that is, firm, or sure ; as being built upon the 
unchangeable will and good pleasure of gmce in God himself. That did not 
stand waiting, or suspend upon man's will, to see how it would work, and 
cast the matter, and use his grace, ere he would decree or purpose their 
salvation. 

isot of works : as they are in us, and from us. And his reason insinuated 
in that word, might stand, shews why he took that course ; for if it had been 
of works, that might make the decree or purpose wavering and uncertain. 

But of him that calleth. That whereas God had also decreed that works 
of faith and obedience should exist in them, he saith yet that his purpose of 
election to save them depended not on those works, but on his grace, to 
work those works efficaciously in them ; which when he did elect, he withal 
decreed to put forth by calling them, which was God's act on them, and 
gives an invincible demonstration that no work, as theirs, either afore call- 
ing or after, was the measure or condition that in election God went by ; 
but his calling immediately proceeding from election, begins first with them, 



Chap. II.] of election. 21 

and works all in them ; that so the whole glory might be * his that calleth,' 
and not of them that are called : he working that calling, and the works in 
and of them thence flowing, from his own almighty power and grace ; and 
therein executing but that which his purpose of election had from everlasting 
determined. 

This doctrine and maxim the apostle professeth to be a just inference from 
both the examples of Isaac and Jacob (whom he accordingly wrought an effec- 
tual calling in) ; but had chosen their persons in his eye and purpose simply 
considered, thus to call and work upon them, and by so calling them, to 
save them. And from the particular examples of these two, his scope is to 
shew in them, as examples and types, that God doth the like with the rest 
of the sons of men, especially that live in the church and household of God. 

And this is no other but the sum of the doctrine of election as we teach 
it, and state it out of him ; which thus in these instances at the first pro- 
pounded, he then pursues in the rest of the chapter, from ver. 14 to ver. 
24 : * What shall we say then ? Is there unrighteousness with God ? God 
forbid. For he saith to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have 
mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. So 
then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that 
sheweth mercy. For the Scripture saith unto Pharaoh, Even for this same 
purpose have I raised thee up, that I might shew my power in thee, and 
that my name might be declared throughout all the earth. Therefore hath 
he mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth. 
Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault ? For who hath 
resisted his will ? Nay, but man, who art thou that repliest against God ? 
Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it. Why hast thou made 
me thus ? Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to 
make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour? What if God, 
willing to shew his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much 
long-suffering the vessels of wrath, fitted to destruction : and that he might 
make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he had 
afore prepared unto glory. Even us, whom he hath called, not of the Jews 
only, but also of the Gentiles.' In which words he further proceeds by 
answering some queries, and three objections, to clear the same assertion 
laid down in ver. 11 ; which I shall not now enlarge upon, they all so broadly 
speaking the same very thing which he has thus declared in ver. 11, and 
inferred from those particular examples of these two, as examples as well as 
types of the rest of the sons of men, who prove to be either vessels of mercy 
or of wrath. 

And then, when he had thus delivered the doctrine of God's decrees about 
mankind, unto ver. 24, he then proceeds to the execution thereof upon those 
elect, which, in ver. 11, he had said was by calling : * Of him that calleth,' 
according to that decree ; which calling he, in the last words of ver. 23, 
expresseth to be a preparing of them for that glory, which was by his decree 
ordained them. And so he goes on, ver. 24 : * Even us, whom he hath 
called, not of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles.' And the difference 
which effectual calling, proceeding from election, puts between the elect and 
others, he handles from that verse unto the end of the 10th chapter. 

That which, in the third place, I observe, is the correspondency, or rather 
identity, which the foremcntioned passages in the 11th chapter (wherein my 
text is) do hold with the like in that foregone, chap. 9th, which shews that 
his scope as to this point of election is one and the same in both, and which 
do therefore give light each to the other. 
. In this 11th chapter (the scope whereof I have last given), 1, he revives 



22 OP EiiECTioN. [Book I. 

the application of that doctrine to the Jews, upon the very same occasion he 
had entered upon it in ver. 9. And there it was said that these Jews had 
the privilege of being Israelites, and that to them pertained the adoption or 
title of the children of God, the covenants and the promises ; and that 
* theirs were the fathers,' meaning especially Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob ; 
thus in ver. 4, 5 ; and yet that nation should, in the community of it, be 
left to infidelity, and but so few whom the promises had taken eifect upon. 
This he insinuates in those words, as containing the substance of an objec- 
tion, * Not as though the word of God had been of no efi'ect,' or had been 
wholly void and frustrate ; which implies that such an objection did lie in 
men's minds, or at least might do, and so weaken the truth of that doctrine 
of Christ, which he had delivered in the former part of this epistle, as being 
utterly inconsistent with so great and high titles of privileges enumerated in 
the verses afore. 2. They imply that there were yet some whom the word 
of God had taken hold upon, and these enough to vindicate the truth of God's 
word declared concerning them ; and, thirdly, those words, not as thoiujli, chy^ 
okv, sound plainly a prevention or pre- occupation of that objection ; fourthly, 
the word there spoken of is meant the promise made to Abraham, and his 
seed, to be heirs of eternal life, which is thus expressed concerning Isaac and 
Jacob, the two persons here instanced in the text, that they were * heirs of 
the same promise with him,' as Heb. xi. 9, which the Jews understood to be 
universal unto all his seed after the flesh ; and that, therefore, they were 
' all the children of God,' as their reply to Christ shews in John viii., which 
the apostle his answer and arguing in ver. 7, 8, — ' Neither, because they are 
the seed of Abraham, are they all children : but, in Isaac shall thy seed be 
called ;' that is, They which are the children of the flesh, these are not the 
children of God : but the children of the promise are counted for the seed, — 
shews to have been at the bottom, as the cause and occasion of this his vin- 
dicicB, or apologetical discourse, as I may well call it. 

Now, then, look at this false supposition, that all the people of Israel were 
the children of God, by reason of their being Abraham's and Israel's or 
Jacob's seed ; and hereupon those their titles and privileges aforesaid were 
the occasion, in that ninth chapter, of his treating of the doctrine of election 
there ; so here, in this eleventh chapter, he reassumes the very same occa- 
sion, when he goes on to apply it to the Jews, beginning at the very first 
verse, ' I say then. Hath God cast away his people ?' He speaks in reality 
the same thing ; to which he answers, ver. 2, with that distinction taken 
from election, ' God hath not cast away his people whom he foreknew.' The 
occasion is the same, and the answer is the same ; and the objection is solved 
by the doctrine of election. 

2. The difierence put between the true Israelite and the outward, is 
resolved into election, and that of pure grace as the foundation thereof: ' The 
election obtained it,' ver. 7, * and the rest were blinded.' And that election, 
such as was out of pure grace, by virtue of which it was that they obtained 
it, by obtaining through that election an effectual caUing ; for want of which, 
the rest, or non-elect, were left to their hardness. Such a grace as was 
purely grace, unintermingled with works foreseen, as in the verses afore, 
when he said, * a remnant, according to the election of grace,' ver. 5. He 
then explains what that grace was, and indeed that word carries its own inter- 
pretation with it : ' For if by grace,' saith he, ' then it is no more of works : 
otherwise grace is no more grace,' ver. 6. Insomuch as Austin, comparing 
these passages of both chapters together, and especially that of ver. 11 of 
chap, ix., * For the children not being yet born, neither having done any 
good or evil, that the purpose of God according to election might stand ; 



Chap. II.] of election. 23 

not of works, but of him that calleth ;' with these now mentioned in chap, 
xi. ver. 5 and 6, observeth the accord* and agreement of the same scope 
in both. 

3. And, thirdly, the accord appears in that the apostle termeth those few 
of the Jews called the election, * a remnant,' in both places ; also in chap. ix. 
ver. 27 : ' Though the number of the children of Israel be as the sand of the 
sea, a remnant shall be saved ;' which, as relating unto the words, ver. 25 
and 2(), De Dieu interpreteth as spoken of election, and so fully accords with 
ver. 5, chap, xi., * There is a remnant according to the election.' 

The corollary brought ofi* from these references and respects of these two 
chapters, one to the other, as touching election, is, that if election to life 
and salvation out of pure grace be the subject of the eleventh chapter, it 
must be also intended in the ninth chapter. Now the difl'erence that is put 
between the election and the rest, in that eleventh chapter, is purely and 
clearly that which is in order unto the obtaining of eternal life, and there- 
lore must be intended in the instances of Isaac and Ishmael, Jacob and Esau, 
bJso ; which some have gone about to divert, by contending the scope of both 
to have been solely in respect of temporal things, and that in their posteri- 
ties also. 

And surely, if many of the several passages in either chapter be compared 
together, this election we contend for, without respect to the foreseen con- 
ditions, will appear to have been the subject in both, if in either of them ; 
they both speak ad idem, unto the same thing. 

This for the interpretation of 1st, 2d, 3d, 5th, 6th, and 7th verses of the 
eleventh chapter. 

I shall now proceed to the instance alleged by the apostle of an election 
and non-election, in Elias's days, among the people of that nation ; or to an 
interpretation of the third, fom'th, and fifth verses of the eleventh chapter. 

Lord, they have killed thy j^rophets, a7id digged down thine altars; and lam 
left alone, and they seek my life. But what saith the answer of God unto 
him ? I have reserved to myself seven thousand men, who have not bowed 
Vie knee to the ima/fe of Baal. Even so then at this present time also there 
is a remnant according to the election of grace. 

The allegation of this single instance for all other is to confirm his asser- 
tion, viz., that there was an election ; for so he closeth it at last, in ver. 5, 
* Even so then at this present time also there is a remnant according to the 
election of grace ; ' also to confirm what he had last said, that ' God had not 
cast away his people whom he foreknew ; ' but had an election of grace con- 
tinued in that nation of the Jews, when yet the face of the generality of that 
nation were apostates from God, and his true worship ; and that yet God 
had a people whom he foreknowing had reserved to himself, whom the pro- 
mises made to that nation had taken hold of, and with an eye and respect unto 
whom, and for whose sake the nation had the promises indefinitely given to 
them, even as in chap, ix., in the fore-part thereof, he had in like manner 
discoursed. And his inference from thence accordingly is, ver. 5. And 
therefore it followed not that because the generality of that nation believed 
not in Paul's time, but were hardened, that therefore Christ Jesus, whom 
the apostle preached, was not the true Christ, because it had no greater 
efl'ect upon the multitude of that nation, who were, in profession, and in the 
style of the old covenant, the outward people of God, whilst yet God had 
a very considerable number that had embraced Christ, and the promises 
made in him, and were the true people of God ; that is, ' whom God 
* Cui loco satis iste locu3 coacordat. — Ep. 106 ad Sixtum. 



24 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

foreknew,' says he, should be existent in those days. Even as there were 
seven thousand in Elias's time in God's list and catalogue, which were 
enough then to make this good, that though the generality of that people 
were left to unbelief, yet God having a number, though but of some, whom 
election had saved, and preserved from a froward generation, that God had 
not cast away his people now, when Christ was preached to them ; not now, 
when so few believed ; for God had far fewer in Ehas's time among the 
ten tribes ; for still God had them, and as many of them for a people to 
him, embracing his Son, whom he foreknew, and had chosen for his ; and 
this was sufficient to break the force of the objection they made. But why 
God foreknew so few among them in that age, this the apostle resolves into 
God's good pleasure and foreknowledge. 

This is a pat and pertinent instance to this purpose, and in many parti- 
culars parallel to the state of things in the apostle's days, which is likewise 
the apostle's scope, besides the former, as the apostle's own words in the 
applying of the instance shews, ' Even so then also at this time.' I shall 
therefore compare them in a few things. 

1. In himself. God hath not cast off his people, * for I also am an 
Israelite ; ' so Elias had instanced in himself alone : ver. 3, ' I am left alone ; ' 
which shews, if there had been but one IsraeUte that had believed in Christ, 
it had solved the cavil. 

2. Elias makes intercession against Israel : ' They have killed thy pro- 
phets, and digged down thine altars ; and they seek my hfe ; ' and so now 
might Paul have said in like manner in his times, that his countrymen, the 
Jews, had stirred up persecution everywhere ; their great business was to go 
about to throw down the churches, and sought his life above all others ; of 
which you may read in the story of the Acts, and in the epistles, summed up, 
1 Thes. ii. 15, 16. 

3. It was election made the difference in men's spirits then and now, which 
election of those in Elias's time, is expressed by this, ' I have reserved to 
myself,' says God, ver. 4, * I have left,' as the words of God are in the story 
of the Kings; answerably election that now was in Paul's time, he calls them 
Xs/x/ita, or xaraXs/x/xa, ' a remnant, a residue, or reserve,' the word reserved 
in ver. 4 answering to /J/x/xa in ver. 5. 

4. They are parallel in the fewness. There were then but seven thousand, 
and now in Paul's time not many thousands in comparison ; for although at 
first there was a great flush, and that. Acts xxi. 20, the brethren of Jerusalem 
say unto Paul, * Thou seest, brother, how many thousand of the Jews which 
beheve,' yet afterwards there was an ebb, both in a cessation of any more 
being converted, as also by so great an apostasy of many that had professed 
Christ ; as it was evident to Paul God had cast off the generahty of that 
nation. 

But the main thing I observe is the force of this word xargX/Tov ; it im- 
ports, first, a laying hold on some when all were going, and they are there- 
fore said to be reserved, as things that are left when others are gone. And 
of those that be elected, he says that he reserved them to himself; oppositely, 
the other, he left them [to] go where they would : he let them go after Baal ; he 
suffered them to * walk in their own ways,' as in Acts xiv. 16; 'He left them 
to their own counsels,' Ps. Ixxxi. 12 ; he left them to themselves; but, says 
God, those I reserve for myself. 

And this expresses the grand end of election, with difference from what 
becomes of others. Election is a reservation unto God; it is his own reserv- 
ing persons for himself ; they have the whole of him ; all the love, all the 
blessedness he hath, they have among them. It is not only he chooses them 



Chap. II.] of election. 



2^ 



from within himself, as having no motive out of himself why he should do 
it; therefore it is said of election, 'which he purposed in himself;' but 
further, it is ' for himself,' he reserves himself for them, and reserves them 
for himself. 

Use 1. And therefore it is as grand an evidence as any other, that thou 
are elected, if thou sequesterest thyself unto God, and choosest him for him- 
self, and say est of him, ' My lot is fallen in a good ground ; the Lord is my 
portion, says my soul.' 

2. Let the saints therefore not live to themselves. We live not to our- 
selves, nor die to ourselves, but to the Lord ; for we are God's, reserved 
by election. 

3. Let men take heed how they meddle with the saints ; they are God's, 
reserved for himself. Says David to Saul's courtiers and his own enemies, 
' Know that God hath chosen the man that is godly' (David means himself) 
* to himself,' and therefore take heed of wronging or opposing of me, Ps. iv. 

4. God is engaged to carry thee on, and to carry thee through, for he 
hath reserved thee for himself; therefore he will not lose what is so selfly* 
designed and chosen for himself. * The Lord's portion is his people.' 

5. You see what keeps men in evil times, as these seven thousand were 
kept in the times of Elias, from the superstitions and idolatries of the times ; 
it is election. Rev. xiii. 8, ' And all that dwell upon the earth shall worship 
the beast, whose names are not written in the book of life of the Lamb slain 
from the foundation of the world.' 

6. The worst and most persecuting times that are, cannot extinguish the 
elect. Ahab and Jezebel could not, nor yet cause them to defile their con- 
sciences. Jezebel searched every corner, and yet Elias lives ; and three 
hundred t prophets were hid with him in a cave, and lived, though with 
bread and water. 

7. If you be the elect ones of God, that God hath reserved for himself, 
it is no matter what times you live in. The Lord hath appointed in several 
successions, greater and lesser difficulties. Some times wherein the churches 
have peace, and some wherein they stand in jeopardy of their lives every 
moment ; and some must have the worst, for as the day is his, so the dark- 
some night is his, as the psalmist speaks of good and evil times. Thus 
those did in Ahab's time ; and what matter was it, seeing God had reserved 
them to take them to himself. If it be thy lot to live in as bad as they 
did, yet whereas heaven is reserved for thee, and God hath reserved thee 
for himself, thou needest not be anxious ; thou shalt stand up in thy lot, as 
the angel comforted Daniel, who would fain have lived to have seen those 
blessed days the angels told him of. When times in any age are upon the 
tropic of turning from bad to good, there are some precious ones shall die 
just in the vertical point, as old Simeon did, and never enjoy the prosperity 
of them. 

8. Be content with little in the world, and out of the world. Thou seest 
that God, that made the world, contents himself with but a few, but a rem- 
nant ; and so he hath them safe with him to heaven, he satisfies himself 
with the enjoying them to eternity. Were thy houses and thy goods burned, 
care not, seeing God hath reserved thee wholly for himself. 

, * That is, particularly or exclusively —Ed. t Qu. ' an hundred ' ?— En. 



26 OP ELECTION. [Book I. 



CHAPTER III. 

That^ de facto, God hath made an election of some out of pure grace, with a 
non-election of others, proved by the story of all ages of the world, through 
tlie Old and New Testament. 

I found upon the same text of Rom. xi. 4th, 5th, 6th, and 7th verses, 
this second assertion, that these two companies or sorts of men, thus diffe- 
renced, the election, and the rest not elected, have been in all ages of the 
world, and have divided mankind, and shall to the end. 

1 . All the world are and have been either the election or the rest ; yea, 
and therefore those other are termed the rest (the tenderest word that could 
have been used), as being the other whole remainder when the elect are 
taken forth. As if you have a great heap afore you, and you cull out some, 
and what are the remainder are called the rest, there is not a third company ; 
and they are so distinguished, as that none of the elect do become of the 
number of the rest, nor of the rest do become of the number of the elect. 
And therefore you must never intermingle them, by thinking that a man may 
be of the elect to-day, and at their death reprobate; for these two, as contra- 
distinct sayings, remain such to eternity. If any of the elect were finally 
hardened, then this other saying, ' the rest were blinded,' were not true ; or 
if any of those that are the rest did obtain it, then that first, ' the election 
have obtained ' (as they stand thus differenced one from the other), were not 
true. The elect and the rest stand severed in such a contra-distinction, by 
two such events appropriate to each ; you must take election and obtained it 
as eternally yoked, and belonging to the company alone ; and on the con- 
trary, tJie rest were blinded, as the issue of that company alone ; who are not 
eaid to be the rest, because they are blinded, but being the rest that is 
severed from the election, it comes to pass that they are blinded; as on the 
contrar}', the election being a company chosen out from the rest, they obtain 
it, and are not finally blinded. 

2. That this division is and hath been in all ages, &c. I found it thus 
far upon the text. You see the apostle instanceth in two ages, and parallels 
them together in this very respect. Elijah's times in the old, in which God 
had an election (though the worst of times), seven thousand men, and the 
rest fell all to Baal ; so even in this present age, says he, it proves to be 
among my countrymen the Jews. And the word so then is an inference from 
the former instance to prove it, as well as it is a parallel to exemplify it. So 
that although he instanceth but in two, these ages past and present, yet it 
leads on and gives a just occasion to extend inquiry into all ages. How doth 
he prove that there is an election now as well as a parallel ? Or how doth 
this follow, that if he had an election before, he hath now ? Because elec- 
tion nunquam excidit, saith Parens, election never ceaseth to be in the 
world. A church unto God must then cease to be extant, for whose sakes 
the world doth stand, and will continue no longer than till God hath all his 
elect out of it, and then will the end be. 

To evidence the demonstration of this, that there is an election, &c., I 
ehall make use of no^ other argument than a representation and scheme of the 
course and current which runs down through all times, as the Scripture stories 
have purposely, in a continuation of instances of persons elected, drawn a 
line of election, and oppositely, together there is a line of rejection through- 
out all ages ; which way of proof is most proper and suitable to the course 
of the text, which hath recourse to an exemplary instance of election, con- 



Chap. III.J op election. 27 

tinned in an age as deplorate as whatever in the Old Testament. This 
draught of the whole, set in one view, may prove pleasant to you, and will 
be profitable for your instruction. 

There are those in the world that say God hath loved all mankind alike as 
to salvation, and to that purpose hath in all ages given them helps and divine 
assistances in common, more or less, which we usually term common grace, 
which, if their wills, being stirred up and moved thereby, will use well, then 
they may and do obtain faith, and an efi'ectual calling unto salvation. And 
upon the right use of those common adjutories it is that God doth then elect 
them, and not till then ; or upon the foresight from all eternity that they will 
do so. But if they do not use those helps well, then they are reprobated or 
rejected. 

But from that rehearsal of instances through all ages, when put altogether, 
it will appear that the special grace of election hath put the difi'erence, the 
one obtaining (as the word in the text is) by virtue thereof, ' the election 
bath obtained it,' while the rest of mankind, with all their common helps, 
have perished, being left to the blindness and hardness of their own hearts 
in the use of them: 'And the rest were blinded.' And the story of the 
one sort set oppositely to the other, as the Scripture in all ages doth, will 
evince it. 

Now my argument from matter of fact, or from the examples recorded in 
such a continued series, to prove that this proceeded from God's eternal pur- 
poses and decrees, and that one are argumentative of the other, is founded 
upon this rule, which will not deceive us, that what hath been done and 
fallen out in the world, and as it hath been done, that God afore decreed and 
determined should come to pass, yea, and in that manner as it hath come to 
pass, the infallibility of which maxim is abundantly evident in Scripture 
declarations, and from undeniable reason, drawn from the perfections of God. 
If, therefore, in the stories of all ages, this difiering condition and dispose- 
ment of persons be found, then certainly the decrees of God must have been 
the supreme cause and determiner thereof. But above all things else, this 
general rule will undeniably hold in the matter of grace and election out of 
grace ; for there is nothing more God's own, to dispose of to whom he 
pleaseth, than grace in us, and glory to us, out of the freedom of the grace 
in himself, and so are evidently dependent on his sovereign will : ' Shall he 
not,' says Christ of him, < do what he will with his own ?' 

And for the confirming of this rule in this special case touching election, 
that the matter of fact, or what doth fall out in persons, as touching their 
salvation, doth come to pass in the event, according to God's everlasting 
decrees thereabout. I shall only mention what an apostle, in an assembly 
of apostles, Acts xv., did only mention and allege to this very purpose, as 
the ground why the Gentiles came now, and but now, to be converted, which 
was newly begun to be done afore their eyes in that age, ver. 14 ; yea, and 
together therewith, the falling down or decay of the house of David, or the 
church of the Jews, and the building of that church in the room thereof; 
applying for the issue, or fulfilling of both these, the prophecy of Amos, 
chap. ix. His words the apostle rehearseth in Acts xv. ver. 16, 17, 'After 
this I will return, and will build again the tabernacle of David, that is fallen 
down ; and I will build again the ruins thereof, and I will set it up : that the 
residue of men might seek after the Lord, and all the Gentiles, upon whom 
my name is called, saith the Lord, who doth all these things.' And to cause 
this great alteration foretold to have the more weight upon the minds of 
that assembly, and cause the greater observation by them, he adds, ver. 18, 
* Known unto God are all his works from the beginning of the world.' 



28 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

The coherence of which passage with that afore, brings forth this conclu- 
sion, that as God had foreknown and decreed, even so he had foretold ; and 
as he had both decreed from eternity and foretold, even so in the events it 
came to pass, and that at that time wherein he had foretold and decreed they 
should. Therefore in the close of the 12th verse, you read how the prophet 
Amos doth add these words to his prophecy of it, * saith the Lord, who doth 
all these things.' It was not therefore his simple foreseeing what man would 
do, nor what these Gentiles would do in their turning to God, and that this 
conversion of them should fall out at that very time or age ; for the prophet 
notes that circumstance also, ' After this, I will return, says God,' to do so 
and so. Whereby it appears that the conversion of the Gentiles, and that 
at that time, and not for two thousand years' time afore, notwithstanding all 
those common helps that had been (as must be supposed) continued to them ; 
this, he says, was the ' Lord's doing, and was marvellous in their eyes.' It 
was the Lord that ' doth all these things,' that so foretold it all, and every 
particular of them, who is said to ' work all things according to the counsel 
of his will,' as Eph. i. And the apostle, he imputes and ascribes it there- 
unto : ver. 18, ' Ivnown unto God are all his works from the beginning of the 
world.' He brings this matter of fact or event, or that these things thus 
fell out, and God's everlasting foreknowledge of them as his sole work, to- 
gether, and shews how the issue or event and his decree corresponded, and 
were answering one to the other. He had foretold them long afore he did 
them or brought them to pass, and foretells withal that it should be his 
doing, and not man's, that effected them. And both his foretelling and the 
effecting them, he tells us, were from out of his foreknowledge and decree 
so to do. 

So that my conclusion from all these three stands firm, that all these 
things, or these matters of fact and real events (as he terms them), as they 
fall out, so they were foreknown and decreed : and that therefore bv the like 
issues and events m pomt of men's having had grace and being saved, we 
may infallibly judge and infer what were his decrees. Let us hold, then, 
the contemplation of this rule in our eye in all the instances that I shall 
give of persons. That look w^hat we find fell out in the execution, was but 
the effect of God's foreknowledge, even as the conversion of the Gentiles at 
that time was the same, and will hold true of the conversion, faith, and sal- 
vation of every person recorded in the Scripture story of their godHness ; 
yea, and therefore also we find matters of fact, or things to be done and 
come to pass, are said to be written in God's fore-decrees, as in the Scrip- 
ture of truth : Dan. x. 21, 'I will tell thee,' saith the angel, * what is noted 
in the scripture of truth.' And yet there was no outward scripture as yet 
had spoken of it. God's decrees, therefore, are the scriptures in which 
matters of fact are fijst written. And therefore, what our Scriptures have 
set down and written, are all but extracts and copies taken out of the scrip- 
tures in God's heart, in which they were written from everlasting ; wherein 
it is equally said, the names of all those particular persons that are elect 
men were first written as the first- bom, and thus Clement, and those with 
him, * whose names are in the book of life,' Philip, iv. 3, says the apostle ; 
and therefore by the same law and rule, we conclude that all those particular 
persons whom out of the Scriptures we shall make recital of as just, and 
holy, &c., we may safely write upon each and every person of them, that 
they were elect, and that they become holy and righteous, it was by election ; 
and of the other sort, of wicked and ungodly, left to their natural blindness, 
we may say, they never were written in that book of life, but under the title 
of the rest, left out ; yea, and as the apostle's word is, Jude 4, forewritten 



Chap. III.] of election. 29 

too in another book. We may say of every one of each sort the Scripture 
gives the different catalogue of, Concordat cum originali. 

And so I come to the story I proposed ; which is the map of God's decrees 
in the execution of them, who doth all these things exactly, according to his 
everlasting purpose about them, whose his works are known to him from 
the beginning. 

I begin from the fall, with the first two that were put forth into the world ; 
next after Cain, an election brake forth in Abel : he was of the election, and 
Cain was the first-born of the rest, or seed of the serpent. You know that 
God, when he preached to Adam and Eve, had by prophecy divided all into 
two seeds. Of the one, Christ was to be the head, * the seed of the woman,' 
&c. ; and of the other, the serpent. And the seed of the serpent are not 
all men as by nature, but those that prove wicked, and have an enmity 
against the saints. Now, 1 John iii. 12, Cain is said to be of that wicked 
one ; there began the seed, as election of grace and works here in the 6th 
verse, make up the fundamental division. So the covenant of grace and the 
covenant of works are the concomitants that follow thereupon. And to shew 
that the covenant of grace followed upon election, and so the other upon 
works, they accordingly did work in the hearts of these two first men, the 
sons of Adam : Cain betook himself to the covenant of works, as God speak- 
ing to the way of his heart shews, ' If thou dost well, shalt thou not be 
accepted ?' but Abel being of the election, he betook himself to faith, he 
dealt with godly faith : Heb. xi. 4, ' By faith Abel ofiered unto God a more 
excellent sacrifice than Cain, by which he obtained witness ;' that is, he 
was righteous. And faith betakes itself to the grace of God, or God's 
special grace and love, and is proper to the elect. So, then, Abel was of the 
election of gi'ace. Now, Titus i. 1, it is called the faith of God's elect. And 
to manifest that Cain was a castaway, he was presently upon it cast out of 
his father's family, where the presence of the Lord was, and never returned ; 
but he and his people fell a-building cities. The election obtained it, as the 
phrase is of Abel, Heb. xi. 4, and Cain and the rest were blinded. 

But then Seth, he through election obtained it, and election ran in that 
line among his seed, and then men that were of him ' began to call upon 
the name of the Lord.' They were worshippers of God, and professed 
themselves to be of the separation from Cain and his posterity ; and though 
few of them were elect (as by and by), yet among them we have some, as in 
those godly persons, whose catalogue you have in that of Seth's children, 
Enoch, Methuselah, &c. But in process of time, as the world was filled 
and multiplied, even those that professed themselves the sons of God cor- 
rupted themselves, as you see Gen. vi. There was few of them regenerate, 
they were of the company of the rest ; for you read in the Gen. vi. 3, speak- 
ing of the sons of God, * My Spirit shall not always strive with the sons of 
men, for they are all but flesh.' They had the gospel preached, as 1 Peter, 
chap, iii, by Enoch, &c. ; and God's Spirit strove with them, so as to assist 
their wills to turn, but not to overcome their wills, and so they remained but 
flesh. And again, at ver. 5 of Gen. vi., * And God saw that the wickedness 
of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of 
his heart was only evil continually.' God had cast up the accounts of the 
whole world after sixteen hundred years, and he brings in this general, that 
* every imagination of their thoughts were evil, and only evil, and that con- 
tinually,' even in these sons of godly professors, who yet, notwithstanding, 
were thereby evidently unregenerate. For a regenerate man's thoughts are 
not only evil, for he hath a world of good thoughts and aflections. And 
again, ver. 12, 'And God looked upon the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt : 



80 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

for all flesh had corrnpted his way upon the earth.' All flesh, of one and 
the other sort, of Cain's seed and Seth's. It is worth the inquiry into the 
original cause of this. Why, one there is, they were left to their free-will 
grace ; that is, those common helps of light of nature, &c., to assist their 
wills. They had the preaching of Enoch, Noah, a preacher of righteous- 
ness, and the Spirit of God accompanying their ministry ; for he did strive 
with them. And Christ was preached to them, 1 Peter iii. And the Spirit's 
striving must be supposed to move and assist their wills, and these opera- 
tions men call free ; yet the poiidas, or weight of flesh and corruption, pre- 
vailed, and carried them another way, and they were blinded. 

But you will say. Was there none of the elect among them ? Yes, Noah 
was, and some of his family. Well, but still what put the difference of 
Noah from the rest of the whole world ? Look into the same chapter, 
Gen. vi. and the 8th verse, * But Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord.' 
Pray, what do you think to be the meaning of finding grace in the eyes of 
the Lord ? It expresseth election in the words of my text. As also when 
God says of Moses, the chosen of God, * I have known thee by name, and 
thou hast found grace in my sight;' and is all one with the apostle's 'By 
grace you are saved,' Eph. ii. ; and so he * became heir of the righteousness 
of faith,' Heb. xi. 7, for faith follows election inseparably. So, then, the 
election obtained it, and the rest, with all their free-will helps (yet being left 
to flesh), were blinded and hardened. This is a strange thing, that among 
an whole world of people there should not be found one whose free will, 
assisted by common and general grace, should have obtained it; for he 
styles them the ' world of ungodly.' What ! not one ? And that Noah by 
election-grace should obtain it. Who would not venture to be saved by 
the way of election-grace, when it is a world to one that a man is saved no 
other way ? 

Thus the old world, as the apostle calls it, both began and ended in * By- 
grace you are saved.' 

Let us now view the world that now is, as the same apostle calls it. No 
sooner doth Noah with his three sons come forth from the ark, which was 
the epoc/ia from whence the new world began, but the election and the rest 
began anew to be declared, even among those three sons that had been pre- 
served from the flood. And this appeared by prophecy of Noah, directed 
thereto by God: 'Blessed be the Lord God of Shem,' says he. Gen. ix. 6, 
which imports that God was his Lord, and had chosen him, and blessed him 
with all manner of blessings. But what of the other, ' Cursed be Ham, he 
shall be a servant of servants,' which is still that whereby rejection is ex- 
pressed. Japhet and his posterity should one day be persuaded to ' live in 
the tents of Shem,' which was meant of the calling of the Gentiles, the 
European Christians, ver. 27, fulfilled more than two thousand years after. 
For which, with difference from Ham, when Shem's genealogy comes to be 
recorded. Gen. x. 21, it is first prefaced, ' Shem, the father of the children 
of Eber;' that is, of the church that was to be of the Hebrews or Jews. 
And then it is added, ♦ The brother of Japhet.' Was not Ham the brother 
of Shem also ? Yes ; but Japhet was to be the father of the Gentiles, of 
whose race the church of the Gentiles was afterwards most to consist; and 
80 they are yoked as brethren in this blessing, as Simeon and Levi in evil. 

From these sons of Noah did come the division of the nations that then 
rose up. God divided their languages, appointed the bounds of their habi- 
tations, according as the three sons of Noah, and their sons that came of 
them, did disperse themselves. The number of which nations, in their 
division, you have recorded in the catalogue of those fathers of them that 



Chap. III.] of election. 81 

descended from Noah's three children, Gen. x., which to be the scope of 
that chapter the last verse shews : * By these were the nations divided in the 
earth after the flood.' And the number of those fathers, and so of the 
nations, is found to be just seventy. 

At this division of the nations, which in his counsel God appointed, Acts 
ivii. 26, God was then to choose again in what nation or nations he would 
have the great current of his election to run. This division of the nations 
is said to be made in Eber's time, Gen. x. 25, who was the great-grand- 
child of Noah, or the third succession descended from his son of blessing, 
Shem ; for until then all the children of Noah and his sons lived together, 
and were of one language. But after so long a time it was that they were 
confounded in their language, and began to scatter at Babel (and not afore 
his time), and from that time to be scattered, and so did first begin to be 
set up those several nations, which yet at the first must needs be supposed 
to have been done in some succession of time. 

But why is it with such a special notoriety said, this division was made in 
Eber's time ? Even to signify that upon the division God began to separate 
the Jewish nation to himself in Eber, whom he first set out to be the father 
of the Hebrew nation, or the church of the Jewish nation, to begin with 
him. At the division of other nations, the elect of Noah's family havinrr 
before that division lain promiscuously intermingled with those that were 
those nations, but not till then divided. Therefore, chap, x., at the very 
entrance of Shem's genealogy, Moses doth with the like observancy begin it 
thus, ver. 21, * Shem, the father of all the children of Eber.' And why of 
Eber's children, when Shem had other children, whose genealogy he also 
there records, as Elam and Ashur (the fathers of the Assyrians and Persian 
nations), who were the elder brethren to Arphaxad the father of Eber, and 
Eber, too, was the third from Noah by this Arphaxad. 

It is high time now to demand what should this long narrative tend to ? 
Even unto this, to make way for and to discover that next great and long 
stage of election in its new race after the flood, upon this division of the 
nations, how and what course it took and held, viz. that when God was now 
after the flood to begin to choose among the nations when they were first 
divided (which we have heard was in Eber's time), that then he chose the 
Hebrew nation from among all those nations, through whom this mighty 
current of election should run for above two thousand years' continuance. 
Every tittle of this is the result of the foregoing passages, compared together, 
as any intelligent reader, by putting things together, will easily discern ; for 
in that it is said in Eber's days the nations were divided, is imported withal 
that in him and from him did the Hebrew nation begin to be divided from 
the rest, as the other nations were from one another. And accordingly we 
find his posterity (when even few) was called Hebrews, as their national 
denomination and distinction from those other nations they lived amongst: 
Gen. xiv. 13, * Abram the Hebrew,'' it is said, and ' Joseph the Hebrew,' 
Gen. xxxix. 14. And therefore also when they grew up into a great body, 
and were multipHed so as to deserve the name of a nation for their numbers, 
and as then living in one of those divided nations, viz. among the Egyptians, 
they then re-assume that title, and are again styled Hebrews, Exod. xv. 16. 
But yet more expressly in Balaam's prophecy the whole nation is- styled 
Eber: Num. xxiv. 25, 'They shall afflict Asshur' (meaning the Assyrian 
nations, so called from their father), * and they shall afflict Eber,' that is, 
the Hebrew or Jewish nation, named Eber from this their forefather in 
like wise. 

And then for the other part, that at the division of the nations God caused 



82 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

his election to take its course through the heart and howels of that Hebrew 
nation, with diflference from the other sixty-nine nations, as the event suffi- 
ciently evinceth ; so another scripture, added to these, doth signify and con- 
firm. And you have it as a memorial set down in that highly divine song of 
Moses, which was his last to that people : Deut. xxxii. 7-9, ' Remember the 
days of old, consider the years of many generations: ask thy father, and he 
will shew thee ; thy elders, and they will tell thee. When the Most High 
divided to the nations their inheritance, when he separated the sons of Adam, 
he set the bounds of the people according to the number of the children of 
Israel : for the Lord's portion is his people ; Jacob is the lot of his inherit- 
ance.' He bids them look back unto ancient days, the traditions whereof 
their fathers had left down to them, and among other, how his eye of grace 
and favour was upon them, to single their fathers forth then, when he divided 
the nations (relating to that famous division, Gen. x.). The number of the 
children of Israel being, when first in Egypt, seventy souls; and just so many, 
even seventy heads, or fathers of the nations, is the number they are divided 
into, Gen. x. ; and from thence to have continued to that day the same to 
themselves, who were their posterity, with this great difi'erence, that unto 
the nations he appointed (as also Paul, Acts xvii.) ' bonds of habitations' as 
their portions and inheritances on the earth, as in verse 8 ; but had that 
eye of grace upon this nation, as to make them a portion and inheritance 
unto himself; for (says he) as thereby expressing God's special love by this, 
ver. 9, ' For the Lord's portion is his people ; Jacob is the lot of his inherit- 
ance.' And by these and the like expressions it is that election is signified 
in many places parallel to this ; as Deut. vii. 6, * The Lord thy God hath 
chosen thee to be a special people unto himself, above all people that are 
upon the face of the earth ;' Ps. cxxxv. 4, * For the Lord God hath chosen 
Jacob unto himself, and Israel for his peculiar treasure.' And you see it is 
so in my text; which, though as it is spoken of that whole nation, was but 
in a type ; yet in that type was shewed that in that nation peculiarly there 
were those his chosen people that were ordained to eternal communion with 
himself. 

Well, but you may demand what became of the other nations, and what 
was the general condition of them ? Truly, their lot fell to be the rest, to 
speak in the language of the text. The apostle hath given a brief resolve ; 
and that being added doth make the proof of the other part of the doctrine, 
and so the whole of it complete. Acts xiv. 15, 16, * We preach to you,' 
says Paul to the Lystrians, ' that you would turn from these vanities ' (so he 
terms their idols and false gods they generally worshipped) * to the living 
God. We preach unto you, that ye should turn from these vanities, unto 
the living God, which made heaven and earth, and the sea, and all the 
things that are therein : who in time past suffered all nations to walk in 
their own ways ; ' which he adds, to shew how the condition of all nations 
was the same with that of these Lystrians, given up to the same idolatry. 
The issue, then, of all comes to what is in the text, that ' the rest were 
blinded.' God took [the] election out from among the Jews for himself, 
and the rest were left to the counsels of their own wills. 

We might here leave oS", and sit down and take breath, for the two thou- 
sand years' and upwards space that follow, as having seen how, and where 
[the] election was disposed of, together with the preterition of the rest. 
That God had alone known, and owned the Jewish nation, and an election 
proceeded forth from amongst them, as by the prophet Amos, a long while 
after the times we have been now upon, God utters himself. And so we 
might come immediately to the times of the New Testament ; but that we 



Chap. III.] of election. 83 

find among Eber's children, both before and after it grew up into a body aa 
a nation for numbers, some eminent observations in the story of the Old 
Testament, how election went on to make the like difference, even amongst 
them ; and hath (as if the Holy Ghost delighted to do it) recorded many 
apparent particular instances of an election, and the rest, to have run 
along in their families and tribes ; and this I am bound to do, the rather 
because our apostle in these 9bh, 10th, 11th chapters to the Romans insists 
especially on those instances as most apparent examples of what I pursue. 

1. Before they grew up to be a nation for number, as in Egypt they 
became, the genealogy of Shem and Eberis set down, Gen. xi., from ver. 27 
to the end of the chapter, and centres in Abraham. 

So then we are to begin anew in him, and from him, whom God made 
his covenant with, for him and his seed after, saying, * I will be thy God, 
and of thy children,' which was indefinitely spoken ; but the apostle informs 
us all were not children, but those were the children that were children of 
promise ; that is, those whom God in giving out the promises did intend 
therein, and they were only his elect. 

The prophet Isaiah, chap. li. 1, 2, calls upon that people to consider 
Abraham their founder and original : ' Look unto the rock whence ye are 
hewn, and to the hole of the pit whence ye are digged. Look unto Abra- 
ham your father, and unto Sarah that bare you : for I called him alone, and 
blessed him, and increased him.' And unto what should they look at in 
him or her ? 1. At what his condition was afore his calling : a server of 
other gods ; until his calling, an idolater ; from the midst of whom God did 
single him out, which Joshua lays afore that people to look at and consider: 
chap. xxiv. 2, 3, ' And Joshua said unto all the people, Thus saith the Lord 
God of Israel, Your fathers dwelt on the other side of the flood in old time, 
even Terah, the father of Abraham, and the father of Nahor : and they 
served other gods. And I took your father Abraham from the other side 
of the flood, and led him throughout all the land of Canaan, and multiplied 
his seed, and gave him Isaac' Was it, then, his well using of natural helps, 
or additional light by education ? Surely no. But as degenerate children 
of Eber, he and his father both were servers of other gods. Therefore 
look, 2, that it must be election or electing love that moved God so to 
call him, and could be no other. Moses in the general layeth afore their 
consideration God's love and choice of their father: Deut iv. 37, ' He loved 
thy fathers,' of whom Abraham is counted first and chief. And chap. x. 14, 
* Only he had a delight to love them, and so set his heart upon them.' And 
that word only singly points out that his love to have been the sole cause ; 
it was only that he loved them, &c., and so in like manner chose you after 
them. As it follows in Deut. x., but more particularly and expressly, 
Nehemiah in his solemn prayer says it of Abraham, chap. ix. 7, * Thou art 
the Lord the God, who didst choose Abram, and brought him forth out of 
Ur of the Chaldees, and gave to him the name of Abraham.' For an election 
of grace was most conspicuous in his example. Therefore, ver. 3, ' I called 
him alone' (says God by the prophet there). Consider that too. I know 
that that word alone interpreters wholly carry to import that he was called 
a single or an alone man when God called, as in reference and in way of 
opposition to what follows ; and I increased him in so numerous a pos- 
terity out of that one man's loins. But why not also, and perhaps rather, 
that God singled him out alone in respect that he was the first that was 
called ; and his father, and Lot, and Sarah were by and upon his calling 
moved to turn with him to the true worship of the true God ? But he alone 
fitst, and so was the restorer of religion in that family; and therefore in him 

VOL. IX. 



34 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

election did first eminently break forth in God's so extraordinarily taking 
him forth alone as he did, as Paul difierenceth his conversion from other 
Jews, without being instructed by man, but by revelation. And this 
Stephen observes, as with difi'erence from those others that left their country 
with him. Thus, Acts vii. 2, ' The God of glory appeared unto our father 
Abraham, when he was in Mesopatamia, before he dwelt in Charran ; ' the 
title of ' the God of glory' is thus given him, because God appeared in a 
glorious manner to him, and he also is alone there mentioned ; because he 
was the he goat, and first leader of his father and them into Charran, and 
after his father's death, of Lot into Canaan. And this Ainsworth hath also 
observed upon the 31st verse of Gen. xi., especially from those words in 
that verse, that ' Lot and Sarah went forth with them from Ur of the Chal- 
dees ; ' that is (saith he) with Abraham and his father ; whom Abraham 
acquainting with the oracle of God to himself, his father repenting of his 
false worship went out with him (as Ainsworth's words there are) and so 
Lot with them ; that is, with Abraham and his father. 

And that God revealed to Abraham his electing of him, and so that his 
first call proceeded therefrom, as also of all the spiritual seed, that one 
passage cited and interpreted by Paul, Heb. vi., hath abundantly satisfied 
me ; Abraham being therein made the pattern of us in election, the original 
of salvation, as well as he is in point of believing and justifying, the way to 
salvation : Heb. vi. 13, ' God sware by himself, saying. Surely blessing I 
will bless thee, and multiplying I will multiply thee ; ' that is, first, I will 
bless thee in thine own person, and then in multiplying thee into a spiritual 
seed, the heirs of promise with thee ; of whom thou shalt have the honour 
to be styled the father, because therein thou bearest the type of my Christ, 
who is the everlasting Father, and my first chosen, and others in him. Now 
the apostle in applying this to the comfort of elect believers, who were 
intended in that part of the promise, ' in multiplying I will multiply thee,' 
as is plain in the place he cites, — Gen. xvii. 22, ' In multiplying I will 
multiply thy seed,' — he interprets this promise to have proceeded from, and 
to declare God's eternal purpose of election, by his inserting by way of 
gloss those few words, ' the immutability of his counsel,' as that which his 
promise proceeded from, and expressed, ver. 17, ' Wherein God willing more 
abundantly to shew unto the heirs of promise the immutability of his counsel, 
confirmed it by an oath.' And what is the immutability of his counsel, but 
his unchangeable decrees ? A promise made by God to us is one thing, 
and God's counsel is another ; his counsels are his decrees within himself 
from everlasting, as Eph. i. 4, 9, 10. And what other is a promise with an 
oath but God's immutable counsel, or election, put into promise? And who 
are ' the heirs of promise,' but the same whom in Kom. ix. he terms ' the 
children of promise' ? ' And if children, then heirs,' such as Isaac there is 
said to have been, Eom. ix. 7, 8. ' Neither because they are the seed of 
Abraham are they all children, but in Isaac shall thy seed be called ; ' 
that is, * they which are the children of the flesh, these are not the children 
of God : but the children of the promise are counted for the seed.' 

But though we have seen the election to have obtained it in faithful 
Abraham, yet that is but one part of my assertion ; you may yet inquire 
concerning the other part. Are there none recorded to have been the restj 
as those that were blinded, so to set ofi" the grace of Abraham's election, 
and render it the more conspicuous ? Yes, verily, even in his father's house, 
his own brother Nahor. You not only read not of his not removing* with 
Abraham, as converted with him to his religion, which his father Terah 
* Qu. 'his removing'? — Ed. 



Chap. III.j of election. 85 

repenting did, and Lot, of which you may read. Gen. xi., but Nahor would 
not stir, not he, a foot, though father, and brothers, and sister went out from 
Ur of the Chaldees, but remained still with his idolatrous countrymen, and 
continued an idolater, and derived it down as his religion to his posterity. 

You know, or have heard it, I suppose, out of the story of Laban's 
(Nahor's grandchild) his images, Gen. xxxi. 19, which himself calls his gods, 
ver. 30 ; as also how, when Jacob and he came to take an oath, ' Jacob sware 
by the god of his father Isaac,' who was then living ; and Laban sware by the 
god of his ^grandfather Nahor, ver. 53, yea, and in the plural calleth them 
the gods ^'^7^^, ' the (/olIh of Abraham, and the fjods of Nahor, judge between 
us ;' whether meaning thereby that at first Abraham himself had served the 
same gods that Nahor had done, or that Laban joined Nahor's gods with 
Abraham's, the true God, and so that Nahor served both, so to blind* him- 
self and Jacob by oath, I have not time now to dispute ; for, however, 
thereby it is plain that Laban professed to worship those gods, and so other 
gods besides the true, which the jealous God will in no wise bear in those 
he calls to draw near unto him to worship him. Whereas Jacob swears 
only by ' the fear of his father Isaac,' that is, whom Isaac feared ; and 
answerably, Laban professeth further, that these gods he swore by were the 
gods which his father Bethuel, and his grandfather Nahor, Abraham's own 
brother, had worshipped as their gods. So, then, you see of what religion 
they of that line were of, and that they had continued idolaters in their suc- 
cessive generations, and thereby are manifestly declared to have been of the 
rest that were blinded. 

Abraham's family (as a worthy interpreterf hath observed) did in his next 
and immediate succession bear the type or resemblance of the future condi- 
tion of the church ; and in his family and next successors there fell out, of 
all other, the most pregnant instances of election and preterition ; for as his 
family was the first part, so the epitome of the ensuing whole ; and accord- 
ingly the Scripture hath made the most singular observations hereof. There 
are two pairs of instances in that family ; 1st, of Isaac and Ishmael, the 
immediate sons of Abraham ; then, 2dly, of Jacob and Esau, the sons of 
Isaac, extant whilst Abraham was alive. 

That Isaac was a child of pure election-grace, as the aforehand cause 
of his faith and holiness, and not the subsequent, of election without works, 
and that as such he was cast into Abraham's bosom, as a precious gift, whilst 
Ishmael was excluded from that blessing, is evident enough from the story 
itself in Moses, although the apostle should not have moreover expressly told 
us so, and alleged it to that purpose ; for that God, ere he was conceived, 
should declare him heir of the same salvation with Abraham, and immutably 
and irreversibly estate the covenant of grace upon him, as an inheritance 
settled on him by an entail, with a professed diiference from Ishmael : Gen. 
xvii. 19-21, * And God said, Sarah thy wife shall bear thee a son indeed; 
and thou slialt call his name Isaac : and I will establish my covenant with 
him for an everlasting covenant, and with his seed after him. And as for 

* Qu, ' bind' ?— Ed. 

t See Rivetus in Genesim. Exercit. 102, cap. 21. — Cum tamen certura sit domum 
Abrabami per ilium tempus fuisse typum ecclesise, non solum aualogia sumpta a parte 
ad totum, quae tamen in hoc argumento negligi non debet ; sed maxima a constantis- 
sima Dei natura, cujus una est semper sibi constans erga ecclesiam voluntas, unaque 
ratio quaB ex homiuibus sibi facit filios ; quemadmodum igitur in familia Abraharai 
per electiouem suam discrevit fratres ut unus esset hseres, alter excluderetur dome, 
quamvis ipse Abraham aliter statuisset ; sic enim per electionem suam aeternam dis- 
crevit filios promissionis, quibus fidem dare voluit, ut in semine Abrahami censeren- 
tur, ab iis qui carnis prserogativa turgentes, non sunt Israelitae secundum spiritum. 



36 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

Ishmael, I have heard thee : Behold, I have blessed him, and will make him 
fruitful, and I will multiply him exceedingly : twelve princes shall he beget, 
and I will make him a great nation. But my covenant will I establish with 
Isaac, whom Sarah shall bear unto thee at this set time the next year ;' 
which you know how the apostle applies unto the covenant of grace and 
works : Gal. iv. 22-26, * For it is written, that Abraham had two sons, the 
one by a bond-maid, the other by a free woman. But he who was of the bond 
woman was born after the flesh ; but he of the free woman was by promise. 
Which things are of allegory : for these are the two covenants ; the one from 
mount Sinai, which gendereth to bondage, which is Agar. For this Agar is 
mount Sinai in Arabia, and answereth to Jerusalem which now is, and is in 
bondage with her children. But Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the 
mother of us all.' And that afterwards, whilst Isaac was but young, and lay as 
a sacrifice bound upon the altar, God should by an oath confirm the promises 
made of blessing him, and with him his spiritual seed: Gen. xxii. 16, 17, 'By 
myself have I sworn, in blessing I will bless thee, and in multiplying I will 
multiply thy seed as the stars of the heaven, and as the sand which is upon 
the sea-shore ; and thy seed shall possess the gate of his enemies.' Whereof 
Isaac was the first included and intended, for it was in reference to, and upon 
occasion of him that God uttered it. ' Thou hast not withheld thy son, 
thy only son, from me,' ver. 13, * therefore I will multiply thee in him in so 
numerous a seed as are the stars or sands.' This oath, as we afore observed 
out of the apostle's interpretation of it, was intended of the spiritual seed, 
the heirs of promise, such as Isaac was, the declared son of promise ; and 
this oath declared how that promise proceeded from God's immutable coun- 
sel, as the apostle interprets it, which is election, that sure foundation, * the 
Lord knows who are his,' and knew well what he then did in so swearing. 
And shall we think that God's oath and irrevocable promise was built and 
founded upon the immutability of Isaac's free-will grace, and such helps, as 
he should by free-will use them, which he should for the future have in 
Abraham's family, in common with Ishmael ? Isaac was yet to live a long 
while in the world, and might, according to the principles of free-will grace', 
have fallen away and proved unregenerate ; and God could have no such 
sure and certain assurance of him as to venture, as I may so say, an oath 
upon him, with a peremptory irreversible blessing of him. What! and 
establish his everlasting covenant with him upon the uncertain fickleness and 
mutability of free-will, no otherwise ? Nay, would God have pawned by oath 
his own self, • by myself have I sworn,' so as to cease to be God, if Isaac 
and Abraham both should cease to persevere in faith to the end of their 
lives, for it was Abraham's case also, according to their position, to have been 
assisted but according to the rule of free-will grace's assistance, as surely as 
God said, ' surely,' &c. The foundation of this oath lay deeper in God's 
own heart ; it lay in the immutability of his own counsel, which he purposed 
within himself, wherewith he invincibly resumed and undertook to carry on 
Isaac's and Abraham's wills to the end ; not in the stability of what he fore- 
saw was within themselves. But we need spend no more time upon this of 
Isaac, nor would have done, had it not made for a comfortable issue to us 
all, of which by and by. 

The apostle, therefore, to confirm that distinction of his, of an election, 
from the common Israelite, he instanceth to that end in the persons of Ish- 
mael and Isaac, and then Esau and Jacob ; which instances do manifestly 
declare, first, that the promises of God to Abraham, that God would be ' the 
God of his seed,' Gen. xvii., were limited in their intent to the persons of 
Isaac, and so to Jacob, as leading examples unto the rest of that seed of his 



Chap. III.] of election. 87 

that should be children of the promise ; in affirming of these, in particular, 
that they were, in God's foreknowledge, the only children of the promise, 
and not those other, either Esau or Ishmael ; only with this difference, from 
others of the elect to follow, that Isaac and Jacob were definitely and by 
name declared children of the promise, whereas the elect seed, which were 
to come after, are but indefinitely spoken of in the promise to Abraham. 
I will be a God of tiry seed, not naming who, and yet not intending all of 
his carnal seed, are therefore indefinitely delivered and uttered, and so are 
to be understood ; yet so as, in that indefinite promulgation of them, God 
did intend within himself (who alone knows personally who are his) those 
very individual persons whom he had chosen, and these only ; and they 
only are the children of promise, even as Isaac and Jacob are said to be. 
Only Isaac and Jacob came by name to be mentioned in personal promises 
of them ; but the other of the seed elect, their names are concealed, yet still 
80 as the promises are only theirs, and they only children of the promise, as 
well as Isaac and Jacob were. All the indefinite promises of salvation are 
but the expressions of election, and its intendments, indefinitely declared as 
touching the persons ; yet those persons were fixed upon by God, and for 
their sakes those promises are given. And this is evidently the scope of the 
apostle's argument there, to prove that * all are not Israel, that are of 
Israel,' nor all children of the promise ; or else his proof of this from those 
instances had not held. Though the promises were, because indefinite, to 
be promulgated to all, that none knowing but that himself might be a per- 
son intended, as well as any other, might be moved to seek for an assured 
interest in the promise, by efi'ectual calling and conversion. And because 
of this general promulgation, it is that Peter exhorts the Jews in that man- 
ner as he doth : Acts iii. 25, 26 : * Ye are the children of the prophets, and 
of the covenant which God made with our fathers, saying unto Abraham, 
And in thy seed shall all the kingdoms of the earth be blessed. Unto you 
first God, having raised up his Son Jesus, sent him to bless you, in turning 
away every one of you from his iniquities.' 

Now, as the apostle proves by these two pair of instances of Isaac and 
Ishmael, &c., that this was a leading case of the like difference among the 
people of Israel to come, so he as plainly resolves this difference put between 
them (and so in their example among others) into God's election, who, hav- 
ing pitched his eye and grace on some, doth in the foresight and intuition of 
them, effectually designed bj' him, give forth and utter those promises of 
salvation, which are but the very declaration of an election amongst the sons 
of men ; and the matters or things that are promised therein are but what 
election did design, only declareth them, as to us, but indefinitely as to per- 
sons ; so that still these elect only are ' the children of the promise ' in- 
tended ; which that they are so is in the end discovered by effectual calling, 
and conversion wrought in them and not in others. That all this is so (and 
it is a great so), is evident by the 11th verse that follows in that 9th chapter, 

* For the children,' namely, Esau and Isaac,* * being not yet born, neither 
having done any good or evil, that the purpose of God according to election 
might stand, not of works, but of him that calleth.* 

It is clearly resolved into God's purpose by election, and shews how that 
election discovers itself upon the children of promise, by causing the pro- 
mises to take hold, by working faith in the hearts of those who are intended 
by God in the promise, and are only the * true children of the promises,' 

* sons of peace,' as Christ aforehand, when he sent his apostles to preach the 
gospel of peace, enstyles them ; and thus it was that election manifested 

* Qu.' Jacob'?— Ed. 



38 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

itself in Isaac and Jacob. And election manifested itself in the effectual 
calling both of Isaac and of Jacob. As the last words in ver. 11 [shew], * that 
the purpose of God according to election might stand, not of works, but of him 
that calleth.' And although in the instance of Isaac, he hath not mentioned 
a scripture that hath the election of him (and yet that in Gen. xvii. 21, ' My 
covenant will I establish with Isaac,' is a plain declaration of the thing itself), 
and then the difference professedly here put between him and Ishmael, and 
others of Abraham's children, doth sufficiently evince the grace of election 
to have been the cause of the difference. And however the drift and current 
of the apostle's discourse clearly insinuates it ; for in the other instance 
about Jacob, he manifestly declares it in those words, ver. 11, ' that the 
purpose according to election might stand.' And his allegation of Jacob's 
instance, and of Isaac's, are both to one and the same purpose, which is to 
prove an election, which he proposed as his thesis or assertion, in the words 
afore. If, therefore, the one doth so expressly mention an election of him as the 
cause of this difference of him from Ishmael, then, certainly, the same holds 
as intended in that of him as well as that of Jacob. Now, that election was 
the declared cause in the case of Jacob, he produceth two testimonies out of 
the Old Testament, the one given his mother whilst both were in the womb, 
* the elder,' namely, by birth, ' shall serve the younger ; ' the other uttered 
by the prophet, * Jacob have I loved, Esau have I hated.' Servitude was 
used to express the curse of rejection, as Gen. ix. 25, ' Cursed be Canaan ; 
a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren.' And in Esau it signi- 
fied also the loss of the inheritance which he had by birth-right, which was 
the type of heaven; all which agrees with the case of Ishmael, Gal. iv., ' The 
son of the bond-woman shall not be heir with the son of the free woman.' 
And so thereby the inheritance of heaven was declared not to be designed 
by God to him, and so the promises not to intend him. And this was said 
of him when yet he had not done good or evil ; that is, without the con- 
sideration of the difference of any works in either to have moved God to 
have put the difference. And this comprehended with Esau, first, the 
Edomites who came of him, in whom the curse began, and descended to 
them, as in the same prophet, Mai. i. 4, ' They shall call them the people 
against whom the Lord hath indignation ; ' whereas on the contrary, the 
love and blessing took hold first on Jacob, and so descended down to those 
that were the children of promise amongst his seed. Thus much for what 
of this argument is in the 9th chapter of the Epistle to the Romans. 

Now, how punctually doth the apostle continue to prosecute this same 
argument here in this 11th chapter, though more amply and in plainer terms, 
yet to the same issue and effect, whilst he assumes the same distinction of 
children of promise, there distinguished from the rest of Israel, as children of 
the flesh, as here he doth of 'his people whom he foreknew' as the ori- 
ginal cause of that difference now in the apostle his days put between a few 
and the rest of Israel, that were passed by; which he doth in plain words, 
ver. 5, ' Even so then at this present time also there is a remnant according 
to the election of grace.' And ver. 7, 'What then? Israel hath not obtained 
that which he seeketh for ; but the election hath obtained it, and the rest 
were blinded.' So as whoever will but consider the reference and respect 
these and other passages in this chap, xi., have with those other in chap, ix., 
must withal acknowledge, that if election to salvation be meant in this 11th 
chapter (which no man can deny), that it must also be intended in chap, ix., 
which scope divers have gone about to frustrate and make null. 

Well, I come to those. Now when Israel grew up to be a nation, and to 
be a church unto God, as they are called in the 7th of the Acts, why that 



Chap. III.] of election. 89 

God did take the whole nation in the type, because he had an election 
among them, it is put upon election, as you will sec in Deut. xiv. 2. Says 
he, * The Lord thy God hath chosen thee to be a peculiar people to himself 
above all the nations that are upon the earth.' That he chose them above 
all the nations, was it because they used their free will better, for which he 
thus chose them ? Oh no ; he tells them along that they were ' a stiff-necked 
people ; ' and he tells them he did foreknow what they would be : Deut. 
xxxi. 21, * I know the imaginations which they go about, for I see their 
wickedness, yet have I chosen them.' ' Their vine was the vine of Sodom,* 
Deut. xxxii. 32 ; their vine worse than the vine of Sodom. If you read it 
as it is in the margin, * worse than the heathen about them,' Ezek. v. 6. 
He justified Sodom and Gomorrah in comparison of them, Ezek. xvi. 47, 48. 
Yet election pitched among them, though they had changed his statutes more 
than any people ; * Thou wast corrupted more than they in all thy ways ; ' 
look in Ezek. v. 6, ' And she hath changed my judgments into wickedness 
more than the nations, and my statutes more than the countries that are 
round about her; for they have refused my judgments and my statutes, they 
have not walked in them.' Yet the election took place among them. 

My brethren, it is to me a great observation, though he chose them to be 
his people in a type, that there were a company among them on whom his 
heart was set. There was Moses, as he is called, ' the chosen of God,' and 
Aaron. What, to ofiice only ? No ; there was more in it: Exod. xxxiii. 12, 

* I know thee by name ; ' and at the 19th verse, when God was to proclaim 
his mercies, he said, * I will make all my goodness to pass before thee, and 
I will proclaim the name of the Lord before thee ; and will be gracious to 
whom I will be gracious, and will shew mercy on whom I will shew mercy.' 
The Lord professes this aforehand, that he intends this but to some special 
ones among them: * I will be merciful but to whom I will be merciful.' The 
apostle quoting it in the case of election, adds, ' Whom he will he hardens.' 
It was an election whom he knew by name. What is election ? Why, it 
is, I will be merciful to such and such. Merciful, * saith the Lord, that 
hath mercy on thee ; ' that is, that hath chosen thee, and pitched his mercy 
on thee. 

Well, then, when the people were come into the land, and the worship of 
God began to be settled, still election ran one way more than another. 
There were, you know, ten tribes and there were two tribes ; election shewed 
which way it bended. I shall give you a place out of the Psalms : Ps. 
Lxxviii. 67, 68, * Moreover he refused the tabernacle of Joseph, and chose 
not the tribe of Ephraim : but chose the tribe of Judah, the mount Zion 
which he loved.' He speaks of the times of the judges. The rejection of 
the ten tribes began to shew itself soon ; he says, he refused the tabernacle 
of Ephraim, but he chose Judah. After Solomon's time, they fell to wor- 
shipping of calves (let me tell you, it is the declining of election that undoes 
a nation, when election grows low, and ceases in an age), till at last the ten 
tribes were cast off, and they are at this day ; but the tribe of Judah had 
election among them. 

Well, come to gospel times. When Christ first sent his disciples out, he 
gave them a command, and he gave them an instruction, as you may read 
in the 10th of Matthew, and the 10th of Luke. In Mat. x. 5, 9, says he, 

* These tw^elve Jesus sent forth, and commanded them, saying. Go not into 
the way of the Gentiles, and into any city of the Samaritans enter ye not : 
but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.' Yet afterwards, 
when the regions were white unto harvest, then he bids them * go and preach 
to every creature,' Mark xvi. 15. You have a direction which he gives them, 



40 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

Luke X. 6, * Go ye and say, Peace be unto this house ; ' but be not troubled 
if it be not entertained, * If the son of peace be there, your peace shall rest 
upon it ; ' that is, one that is ordained to peace and salvation. What says 
Paul ? * Hath the word taken none effect ? ' * Brother,' says he, ' there be 
many thousands of the Jews that do believe.' If there be a son of peace, it 
shall rest upon that soul. Why now, then, when our Saviour Christ was 
gone off the earth, gone up to heaven, he sent the apostle, and where the 
election took place, they obtained salvation. What is the reason that the 
apostles were forbidden to preach in some places amongst the Gentiles, and 
bid to stay in other places ? It was because that God had much people 
there. Look in Acts xvi. 6, * Now, when they had gone through Phrygia 
and the region of Galatia, and were forbidden of the Holy Ghost to preach 
the word in Asia, after they were come to Mysia, they assayed to go into 
Bithjmia : but the Spirit suffered them not.' What is the reason, on the 
other side, when they were at Corinth ? chap, xviii. ver. 9, 10. Paul being at 
Corinth, the Lord spake to him by a vision : * Speak, be not afraid: for I am 
with thee, and no man shall set on thee to hurt thee ; for I have much people 
in this city.' And when they came to a city, one expelled them, others 
entertained them. What is the account that Paul gives of it ? Acts xiii. 48, 
* As many as were ordained unto eternal life believed.' There were but a 
few among those Gentiles that believed, others stirred up persecutions, and 
they expelled them their coasts. 

Jesus Christ from heaven forbids Paul to stay any longer at Jerusalem, 
but to go to the Gentiles: Acts xxii. 18, 21, *I was in a trance, and saw 
him saying unto me, Make haste, and get thee quickly out of Jerusalem : for 
they will not receive thy testimony concerning me.' Whither shall he go, 
then? Ver. 21, 'And he said unto me, Depart: for I will send thee far 
hence unto the Gentiles.' It was as election ceased, or was found, so they 
were sent accordingly to preach. Where there was a good company of the 
elect, the gospel ran like wild fire. 1 Thes. i. 4, says Paul, ' I know your 
election to be of God.' Why? ' For our gospel came not to you in word, 
but in power, and in the Holy Ghost, and in much assurance.' You know 
what manner of men we were among you. God did mightily raise up my spirit, 
and did a great deal of good. I need not tell you why the Jews were cast 
off and the Gentiles called; you may read from the 9th to the 11th chapter 
of the Romans. 

Come to the dark times of popery, after the apostles were gone off the 
stage. He tells you that all the world should wonder after the beast; it is 
in two places : Rev. xiii. 8, 'All that dwell on the earth shall worship him, 
whose names are not writtan in the Lamb's book of life.' Look in the 17th 
chapter, ver. 8, 'And they that dwell on the earth shall wonder, whose names 
were not written in the book of life from the foundation of the world, when 
they behold the beast that was, and is not, and yet is.' 

You are come now to our very times. There will come a time when those 
hardened people the Jews, that they say spit at the name of Christ; con- 
tinually hardened more and more, and caked in hardness this sixteen hun- 
dred years ; the Rom. xi. tells us that there is a time coming wherein ' all 
Israel shall be saved;' ver. 25, 26, ' I would not, brethren, that ye should 
be ignorant of this mystery, lest ye should be wise in your own conceits ; 
that blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles 
be come in. And so all Israel shall be saved,' &c. Why? But what is 
the case of these elect? *As concerning the gospel, they are enemies for 
your sakes ; but as touching the election, they are beloved for the fathers' 
sake,' ver. 29. ' For the gifts and callings of God are without repentance.' 



Chap. IV.] of election. 41 

The Gentiles have had it so many hundred years. What is the reason of 
difference ? It is election ; therefore he concludes, ' Oh the depth of the 
riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! how unsearchable are his 
judgments, and his ways past finding out!' 



CHAPTER IV. 

The instance of Noahy and his heinff saved in an ark, and God's covenant made 
with him, proved more largely and f idly to he a great exemplar and typical 
representation of election and the covenant oj grace. 

In that draught of the line of election that runs through the whole Scrip- 
tures, I could but briefly touch upon that one particular instance of Noah 
and his sons ; but my meditations have been since more especially enlarged 
about this Noah, that not only himself, in his own person, as recorded in 
his story, to have been a special instance and example of electing grace, and 
of the covenant thence flowing, but farther, that God's covenants made with 
him and his seed, and God's dealings with him according to those cove- 
nants, were prophetic figures of his covenant with his church, in the times 
of the New Testament; who were, by virtue of the election of grace, to be 
raised up out of his loins. And the demonstration of this out of the Scrip- 
tures is the design and subject of this appendix, which I chose thus to sever 
from the former, because it would have taken up too much room in that brief 
enumeration of so many other persons that are instances of election in that 
catalogue ; and yet it subserveth to the same end and purpose. I therefore 
annex it thereunto, as an appendix to that discourse. 

I have a long time looked at that which both the Old Testament and the 
New style the ' covenant of grace,' or the ' new covenant,' to be but election 
purposes and designs put into promises; God expressing therein the gracious 
intentions and resolutions of himself towards his elect, which had been taken 
up by him from eternity; only whereas election in God's heart then did 
design the individual persons, together with the things decreed to them ; he 
hath in the promises and revealed declarations of the covenant of grace, con- 
cealed the particular persons, and doth only indefinitely propound the sub- 
jects of those promises, touching the persons intended, that they are ' sinners 
of mankind,' and that of all sorts and conditions, to whom, and upon whom, 
God therein declareth that he will certainly and infallibly make good that 
covenant and the promises thereof. And himself hath therein undertaken 
to perform it in them, though not for them, as to give them ' new hearts and 
new spirits,' to ' teach them to know him' and his Son Christ, the mediator 
of that covenant, and the like ; and in such absolute terms of promises on 
God's part doth that covenant run, with difierence from the covenant of 
works, so as the materials of the covenant of grace are all one with election 
decrees in the things decreed, though the persons are not named whom God 
will infallibly bestow them upon, but yet with greater certainty declared that 
God will perform it to and amongst mankind; and yet the persons uho being 
left indefinite, that ought to set all a-work to seek to come under it, in such 
ways as God hath commanded all men that [are] within the hearing of it [to] 
seek him in [it]. 

Noah's story doth partly in the reality to his own person, partly in the 
type of things in that story, [contain] these two eminent parts concerning 
our salvation. 

1. God's covenant of grace, and God's everlasting kindness therein, 



42 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

which is the spring of that covenant, and for that I take Isa. liv. 9, 10 for 
my text. 

2. The type of the mediator of that covenant, Christ, which was the ark; 
and how that Christ, as signified in our baptism, is the sole author of salva- 
tion to us; and for that I refer to the 1 Peter iii. 20, 21, 'Which sometime 
were disobedient, when once the long-suffering of God waited in the days of 
Noah, while the ark was a-preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls, were 
saved by water. The likejfif/ure whereimto even baptism doth also now save us 
(not the putting away the filthiness of the flesh, but the answer of a good 
conscience toward God), by the resurrection of Jesus Christ.' 

3. The work of the covenant in us and upon us, namely, of faith, &c., 
which God hath as peremptorily also ordained to be the means of the appli- 
cation of Christ for salvation to us, and without which we shall not be saved. 
And for this take Noah's instance : Heb. xi. 7, ' By faith Noah, being warned 
of God of things not seen as yet, moved with fear, prepared an ark to the 
saving of his house ; by the which he condemned the world, and became heir 
of the righteous [ness] which is by faith.' The example of Noah there in the 
type set out, gives us a lively pattern of the work of salvation in us, answer- 
ing to his faith about the ark (that is) through the work of application to us 
by faith on Christ. 

4. The difficulties, distresses, hazards, temptations, through which we 
pass (after our being in Christ), under the covenant of grace, ere we arrive 
at heaven; and for this I take those words in the fore-cited Isa. liv. 11, '0 
thou afflicted, and tossed wath tempest, and not comforted ! ' speaking to his 
church, which in their coherence with the verses afore, 9 and 10, have mani- 
festly a respect to Noah's condition in the ark, which in those 9th and 10th 
verses God hath first made mention of. 

And it is the first of those, upon Isa. liv. 9, 10, which I single forth for 
my present argument ; which is an exemplification of election, and of the 
covenant of grace in Noah's person and story. 



SECTION I. 

Of election, and the covenant of grace, and the church of the New Testament, 
the subject of both, as typified forth in Noah's story. — That Noah, in his 
own j)erson, was intended as an example of election; the covenants made 
with him before the flood, and vjith him and his sons after, were types of the 
covenant of grace; proved in a discourse on Isa, liv. 7-11. 

For a small moynent ham I forsaken thee; hut with great mercies will I gather 
thee. In a little wrath I hid my face from thee for a moment; but with 
everlasting kindness will I have mercy on thee, saith the Lord thy Redeemer. 
For this is as the waters of Noah unto me: for as I have sworn that the 
waters of Noah should no more go over the earth; so have I sworn, that I will 
not be wroth with thee, nor rebuke thee. For the mountains shall depart, 
and the hills shall be removed; but my kindness shall not depart from thee, 
neither shall the covenant of my peace be removed, saith the Lord that hath 
mercy on thee. thou affiicted, tossed with tempest, and not comforted ! — 
IsA. LIV. 7-11. 

That these words speak, in the first place, the pure covenant of gi'ace, and 
the everlastingness and perpetuity of that grace and covenant, as it flows in 
God's heart in and from election, may be apparent in the very reading the 
words; and, secondly, that they refer to the story of Noah's covenant and 



Chap. IV.] of election. 43 

waters at the flood, as the figure and exemplification thereof, I hope, 
through God's grace, to make evident throughout this whole discourse ; but 
at present, 

1. For the first, you have not only the very word covenant in express 
terms, — ver. 10, ' My covenant,' and that *of my peace,' — but also the pure 
grace and kindness of God, out of which he made the covenant, and which 
he exerciseth throughout in all the dispensations of it. This those many 
words that surround the text do declare ; as that, ' with everlasting kindness 
will I have mercy on thee,' ver. 8; 'my kindness shall not depart from thee, 
saith the Lord that hath mercy on thee,' ver. 10. And that the grace of 
election, though it be not under that term or word mentioned, yet in sense 
and reality is specified, that word, 'with everlastinrj kindness,' insinuates, as 
grasping within it both everlastings ; a kindness everlasting for time to 
come, being but the continuation of an everlasting mercy and kindness that 
hath been for ever of old : Ps. xxv. 6, ' Remember, Lord, thy tender 
mercies and thy loving-kindnesses ; for they have been ever of old ;' that as 
God's own everlastingness comprehendeth both, — Ps. xc. 2, ' Even from 
everlasting to everlasting thou art God,' — so doth and is his loving- 
kindness towards us. And those other words, * Says the Lord that hath 
mercy on thee,' miserator tuus; which is a periphrasis of election, and is 
tantamount as to say, * The Lord who hath chosen thee,' as Rom. ix. (where 
election is handled), the apostle expressly doth shew. 

2. For the second of these, that these things are found in and may be 
fetched out of Noah's story and covenant, declared to him upon occasion of 
the flood, appears from this in the text, that God, to verify the truth of his 
covenant to his church, allegeth and referreth both himself and us to the 
waters of Noah: * This is the waters of Noah to me,'' saith he. 

Three general heads of the first part of this discourse drawn forth out of 
the words, ver. 9. 

In which words, and those that follow, God doth (for they are his words by 
the prophet, as his mouth), 1, at once point us both to Noah's person (whom 
therefore he twice mentions), and his waters in his salvation from them, as 
an example of that covenant and mercy which now he promiseth unto his 
church, and all her children (as ver. 13 they are called), to perform the 
same to them as he had done it then to him ; as likewise, 2, that the 
story of him and his waters or flood, and God's covenant with him, his sons, 
&c., and oath thereabouts, though in the letter the semblance they bear was 
but of the temporal salvation and deliverance from the flood, yet in the 
mystery thereof they were (as is here signified) intended as figures of God's 
eternal covenant and mercies unto his elect church, which were to come out 
of Noah's and his sons' loins ; 3, which church, that is here specially 
pointed at concerning his covenant, with which he says, ' This is to me the 
waters of Noah,' is the church under the New Testament, and the seed of 
Japhet especially, whom this covenant and promises do more particularly 
concern, as in ver. 1, 2, 3 of this chapter will appear. 

And these are the three heads and branches of this general part of this 
discourse. 

1. The first of these three heads hath two branches in it. 

(1.) The first, concerning Noah's particular person, that he was first 
intended in it as an example as well as a type of that grace, and election, and 
covenant here declared to the church. 

(2.) The second, that the covenants made with him afore the flood, and 
with him and his sons after, were figures of the same, &c. 



44 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

(1.) Noah in his own person was intended as an example of the covenant 
of grace. 

That himself was the principal and first covenanter, declared heir of the 
covenant of grace, and that made known to him by God himself upon that 
occasion of the flood, is evident by this, that he is said by faith to have 
entertained it, and accepted on his part God's declarations made then to 
him, as understood by him to be the declarations of the covenant of grace. 
And therefore it must be that God also on his part had with that intention 
nttered that covenant unto him personally. Now that Noah did well under- 
stand and apprehend that under the type of the ark and his salvation thereby, 
that a further salvation than temporal was signified thereby to him, and 
another manner of ark than that of gophir wood, even Christ the promised 
seed, to save him from a more dreadful inundation of wrath to come, and 
80 from a greater destruction than that which the waters only brought upon 
the lives of the ungodly of that present age ; that, I say, he understood by 
faith these things, the Holy Ghost, that knew both Noah's heart and God's 
also in his covenant to him, and transactions thereupon with him, hath 
informed us: Heb. xi. 7, ' By faith Noah, being warned of God of things not 
seen, prepared an ark to the saving of his house; by the which he condemned 
the world, and became heir of the righteousness which is by faith,' which 
last words, ' he became heir of the righteousness which is by faith,' do give 
us the true intent of the former words, by shewing us that Noah had in 
those dealings of God with him the very same righteousness for the object 
of his faith, which our gospel now proposeth to us, and which our faith doth 
lay hold upon ; for why else doth he propose it as an example of that faith 
he exhorteth us now to have ? which the same apostle in his other epistles 
doth in the same phrase and language style the righteousness of God, and 
the righteousness of Christ, which is by faith : Philip, iii. 9, ' Not having 
mine own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the 
faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith ; ' which right- 
eousness for justification he more setly treateth of in the epistle to the 
Romans, under the same very words : Rom. iii. 21, 22, * But now' (that is, 
under the gospel) * the righteousness of God without the law is manifested, 
being witnessed by the law and the prophets ; even the righteousness of God 
which is by faith of Jesus Christ.' Now Noah was a prophet. Gen. ix., and 
among other prophets witnessed to this righteousness, himself first believ- 
ing in it, and then being a public preacher of righteousness, as the other 
apostle calls him ; and not only of that righteousness of an holy life, in which 
he himself so exceeded, which follows upon believing, but of that right- 
eousness which is by faith, as it hath Christ for its object. And certainly, 
if he were a righteous preacher, as he was, then that righteousness himself 
had recourse to [forj himself and his own salvation, that he preached unto 
others for their salvation. Nov/ it was that righteousness Noah had an eye 
upon (as typified by his ark, and from thence had learned it), and had recourse 
unto for his eternal salvation, as the apostle to the Hebrews testifies ; although 
he were, as is testified of him in respect of his own inherent righteousness, 
the most righteous man in his generation : ' A perfect and just man.' And 
in sign and token that yet he had his eye upon this righteousness out of 
himself to save him, it was through the same faith he betook himself to that 
ark, a means wholly out of himself, to save him from the waters, which 
otherwise all his own righteousness would never have done ; for why else is 
it there said, that by preparing the ark, ' he became heir of the righteous- 
ness which is by faith ' ? Which righteousness by faith, to be Christ's right- 
eouness, all sound protestants do profess ; and as the righteousness he 



Chap. IY.] op election. 45 

believed on, and was made heir of, was this gospel righteousness, signified 
to him by the ark, so the rest of those things there mentioned did in their 
several designs much type out to him things spiritual, and of like spiritual 
mystery. As the flood typed forth the wrath of God unseen by carnal eyes ; 
and the condemnation of the world there spoken of was the condemnation 
to hell, and not to the waters only, as Peter informs us ; yea, and he con- 
demned the world more by preparing that ark, and by preaching a gospel 
righteousness to men, or the Messiah to come, whom he is also said to have 
preached in the figure, 1 Peter iii. 19, 20, than by all his holiness, as that 
Heb. xi. 7 doth witness. 

Let us now approach to bring together what I premised concerning the 
covenant, and grace, and election, which are the subject of the text in 
Isaiah, and mine also, and the passages which we find in Genesis concern- 
ing Noah, together, and see how appositely they correspond and agree to 
this my purpose. 

[l.J It is greatly observable, that in the sacred story Noah was the first 
of the sons of men unto whom God ever spoke of a covenant. There was 
promise indeed of Christ, the woman's seed, uttered before, which all the 
patriarchs before the flood lived upon ; but under the title of a covenant 
never no mention, no, nor of the word grace till now. Noah had the first 
honour of both these expressions, grace and covenant. And therefore most 
properly and meetly hath God here in Isaiah singled out the instance of 
Noah for both ; for, jwiimim in quolihet geiiere est mensura reliquorum. The 
first in every kind is the measure of the rest of that kind that do after fol- 
low. This of covenant you find in Gen. vi. 18, ' But with thee will I estab- 
lish my covenant ; ' there is the first ; and, 2dly, the expression of grace is 
to him, and first to him in ver. 8, ' But Noah found grace in the eyes of 
the Lord.' And it is God's own speech unto him, though spoken by God 
as in the third person of himself. And it is not the addition of Moses the 
penman, but it comes in a continued sermon made to him by God himself, 
and uttered privately to none but him ; and that speech is pure New Testa- 
ment language : to * find grace,' and * obtain mercy,' as Heb. iv. 16. And 
after it had been thus first uttered to Noah, this speech came after into more 
frequent use, both in the Old and New Testament, as unto Moses, Exod. 
xxxiii. 12 ; ' Unto David his chosen,' Acts vii. 45 ; and the blessed Virgin 
Mary, Luke vii. 70, thou art 'ingratiated,' gratia donata, endowed with 
God's favour ; and the sense is the same. And this title Noah was the first 
that bore it, as a new addition to the coat of arms of God's elect, which 
from that time they have worn as the highest title of honour. 

[2.] And it was not afore now given to Noah ; yea, grace in the Hebrew (as 
Ainsworth observes) is in a manner the anagram of Noah his name, thou^rh 
the letters in the name Noah do in their direct order signify rest ; yet such 
a rest as is out of grace given and bestowed, which an inverted order of the 
letters signifies. See for this Ainsworth on Gen. vi. 6. 

[3.] And, thirdly, it was the grace that is and was in God's heart towards 
him, that is meant, as that additional shews, ' in the eyes or mind of Jeho- 
vah ;' and not that grace which was in Noah's heart : that was but the 
efiect. To find grace in one's eyes, is indeed a phrase used likewise of man's 
being favoui-able to another (as in those places Gen. xxxiv. 11, 1 Sam. i. 18, 
and many other) ; which yet comes then to be used, when the kindness 
sought, or to be bestowed, depends merely on the good will of the man who 
is to cast it upon the other, and wherein they that seek it, when that man- 
ner of speech is used by them, do acknowledge no merit or worth in them- 
selves, why that favour should be shewn them ; and therefore much more it 



46 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

hath that import, when it is spoken of God, and of his grace towards man, 
of whom the apostle says, ' who hath first given to him ?' &c. ; and moreover 
imports, that God's eyes and foresight saw nothing in the creature why he 
should endow him with it ; yea, furthermore, to find grace in God's eyes, is 
when God prevents the creature, in its very seeking of it ; as Isa. Ixv. 1, ' I 
am found of them that sought me not ;' which was because they had found 
grace in God's eyes afore they sought it, and without their having done any 
thing to move him to it. And the word found, also, which is added unto 
grace (as here), doth superadd to this import. The Grecians call a thing 
unlooked for, not dreamt of, or freely cast on one (by chance as it were) 
without his looking for it,— they call it ?y^7;/xa, a thing found ; and such 
is God's grace, as that word, ' found grace,' intimates : all which expressions 
suit perfectly with grace in God electing, or with electing grace. The emi- 
nentest person to whom grace (as electing) is attributed, was Moses, who 
bears that title, ' Moses his chosen,' Ps. cvi. 23 ; and the election of him is 
expressed by this very phrase : Exod. xxxiii. 12, ' I know thee by name, and 
thou hast also found grace in my sight ;' that is, God had chosen him freely, 
to be personally and individually his. And we find God's foreknowledge is 
put to express election, as it is * God's foundation :' ' The Lord knows who 
are his ;' and God's people ' whom he foreknew,' in Rom. xi. 2, are in ver. 5 
but ' a remnant according to the election of grace ;' and so towards Moses, 
God's grace cast on him was the sole product of God's will : so ver. 19 of 
Exod. xxxiii. interprets it, and applies it to him, * I will be gracious to whom 
I will be gracious,' God therein giving Moses the true ground and account 
why he was gracious unto him, when not to others ; and therefore those very 
words are cited under the instance and case of Moses, by way of discrimina- 
tion from Pharaoh, as the opposite person whom Moses had to do with, to 
prove election, Rom. ix. 15 ; and in the same tenor and meaning of speech, 
it is, that God declares of Noah, Noah hath ' found grace in the eyes of 
Jehovah ;' and it may also be said of him, that God knew him by name ; for 
to testify his having pre-ordained him, and separated him from the womb (as 
Paul speaks of himself), unto salvation ; as also that deliverance in the flood, 
out of his mere free grace, he inspired his father with a prophecy about 
him at his very birth. Look as God inspired his great prophet Enoch, to 
give his son Methuselah a name that foretold the flood, and the year of the 
commct of it, being by interpretation, he dieth, the emission, or dart cometh, 
meaning the flood : Enoch, being a prophet, foretelleth this his son should 
die, and then the flood should be emitted ; and therefore our days, as Methu- 
selah's were, are appointed and set ; in like manner God inspired Noah's 
father with a name, which foretold the restoring of the earth from that curse,* 
even from Adam, all along due to it, from the flood ; and for the giving both 
the earth, and a new world of inhabitants, rest in it again, by that Noah, who 
was then bom unto him : thus Gen. v. 29. And this being foretold of him 
at his birth, ' when he had done neither good nor evil' (as in the case of Jacob's 
election out of grace, and Esau's rejection, the apostle argues), doth plainly 
argue it was God's free grace towards him, which had separated him from 
the womb hereunto, and no righteousness at all of his ; and out of the same 
grace still continued towards him, now when he acquaints him with his pur- 
pose to bring the flood, he teUs him he would deliver him out of it ; and that 

* I might at large give an interpretation of his father Lamech's prophecy of him, 
and shew how he was declared an exact type of Christ to follow. The founder of the 
new world, the church, the remover of the curse, by being himself made a curse ; the 
easer of our toil, and all sorts of miseries we labour under, and giver to us of rest, 
Mat. xi., Heb. iv. 



Chap. IV.J of election. 47 

it was his sole grace, borne to him from the first, that was the cause and 
designer of that his salvation, * thou hast found grace in my sight,' and there- 
with utters a covenant, obliging himself so to do. And though God mentions 
the grace, or righteousness, that was in Noah also, yet as that which that 
free grace which had been in God's heart towards him from his birth, yea, 
from everlasting, had wrought in him, to make him meet for that mercy and 
deliverance. Yea, and further, to testify he knew him by name, and had 
ordained him out of pure grace unto this, he gave him a name, that in the 
letters inverted bore the stamp and impress of the grace of God (as was before 
observed) ; even as at the Baptist's birth, he by a wise disposement ordered 
him a name, signifying in the indirect placing of the letters, grace, shewing 
that he was out of that grace separated from the womb unto his work, &c., 
as Noah here had been. 

[4.] And, fourthly, this was done (as I added) with a discrimination or dif- 
ference put between Noah and the rest of the world, out of special grace to 
him ; and election, or choice, which is to single one out from others, always 
supposeth a leaving out of others ; and the occasion whereupon it comes in, 
is with a hut ; * But Noah found grace,' &c., which is spoken even whilst on 
the other hand God just afore had told him, in the verse afore, ' I will 
destroy man whom I have created from off the earth,' ver. 17 ; and then, at 
the 18th verse, ' But with thee will I establish my covenant.' He is at his 
hut again ; thereby denoting the same discriminating grace of election, as if 
he had said. But icith thee (singling thee forth personally, and by name, from 
the rest of the world) / ivill establish my covenant (that is, make this as a sure 
and stable covenant with thee : as afterwards David speaketh of God's cove- 
nant of grace with him, 2 Sam. xxiii. 5) ; ii-hich I do not with others. So 
then, do but join ver. 8, * But Noah found grace,' &c., together with the 
words of ver. 18, * But with thee will I establish my covenant ;' and then 
you have, 1, grace declared to be the foundation or spring of this covenant, 
ver. 18 ; and, 2, that covenant itself declared to be stable and irrevocably 
firm from out of the same grace, ' I will establish,' &c. ; and, 3, all put 
together rising up to this, as if he had plainly styled it, the covenant of 
grace. Thus it was to Noah's own person ; yea, and such a covenant as we 
usually describe the covenant of grace to be, proceeding from election grace 
at first, and continued stable and firm out of the same, as we have before in 
Noah's example explained it. 

And, that it was the covenant of grace unto Noah's person, and proposed 
in him as a pattern and example to us, who were after to believe, there is 
further reason for it. If the same covenant, as it was afterwards estated 
upon Abraham and David, are so to be understood (as generally we acknow- 
ledge), then surely the first covenant that under that title and notion God 
did promulgate to mankind, and whereof grace by name was the foundation, 
established with this man ; a man of as great holiness and acceptation with 
God as any of them were, for which you may take the judgment of God 
himself, who ranks him in the head of the first three (I allude to David's) 
worthies of the Old Testament, Ezek. xiv. 14 ; a man perfect in his gene- 
ration, and singled forth of an whole world destroyed before his face, unto 
which he had been the preacher of righteousness, the ' righteousness of faith,' 
whereby men are to be saved in all ages, and thereby condemning them for 
neglecting and refusing that salvation, Heb. xi. 7, even to hell, 1 Pet. iii. ; 
and further, the beginner and founder of a new world ; and, in that respect, 
a type of the second Adam, yea, and the father of him, namely, Christ 
according to the flesh, yea, and with him of all the elect, whether Jews or 
Gentiles, that after succeeded ; then surely, I say, this covenant was to 



48 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

himself the covenant of grace, as well as unto any of them, and promulged 
to him, as the father and head, as on behalf of the elect his sons, to proceed 
out of him ; as theirs also was in them to their children. 

If it be said, that this covenant respected only the temporal salvation of 
Noah in the ark, 

Besides, that it may be answered, that so did the covenant declared to 
David (in the first delivery of it, in 2 Sam. vii. from ver. 12, and so on) 
speak but of his house, and establishing of his kingdom to his seed ; whilst 
yet his own salvation (2 Sam. xxiii. 5, 'God made with me a covenant, and 
this is all my salvation') and the salvation of the elect through Christ, was 
intended therein ; so here, it may also be replied, that the word grace, as 
it is spoken of God, and to express his grace, is too deep a word to be 
bestowed only upon a mere temporal salvation ; but only used where the 
eternal grace and love of God is the fountain of it. The favour God bore 
even to Adam in innocency is nowhere so far ennobled as to be styled grace ; 
nor are the gifts in temporaries termed grace, though they be called ' spi- 
ritual gifts,' in their kind, and freely given to the rebellious also. 

But, besides such returns as these to this objection, that which will make 
the answer complete, is the consideration of the second branch afore pro- 
posed, namely, 

(2.) That Noah's covenant, over and besides its being to his person the cove- 
nant of grace, and he an example thereof to us therein ; that also both that 
covenant afore the flood for his temporal salvation in the ark. Gen. 6th and 
7th chapters, and that other after the flood, Gen. ix., were figurative or pro- 
phetic types in God's intention of eternal salvation, unto himself, and the 
elect of his posterity to come, especially under the New Testament. 

When this is joined and added to the former, and proved that it was the 
covenant of grace to Noah's person, &c., makes not only the answer to the 
objection sufficiently complete, but also will prove a foundation to the main 
things to be built up in this following discourse. 

This position, the apostle Peter doth in terminis affirm, in his 1st Epistle 3d 
chap. ver. 20, 21, ' God waited in the days of Noah, whilst the ark was 
a-preparing, wherein few, that is, eight persons, were saved through water. 
The like figure whereunto even baptism doth also now save us.' It is 
express, that the salvation of him and his sons was intended as a figure, and 
a figure that did bear a likeness, or parallel in it, unto our everlasting salva- 
tion, and the things thereof. And further, that it was not only to Noah 
himself a figure of his own everlasting salvation, as figuring forth to him 
thereby that God would save his soul eternally, but prefiguring that salva- 
tion which is now revealed unto us (as his words are) and therefore prophetic 
of ours ; for what under the Old Testament is called a figure, or a type of 
things of the gospel, that did God and his Spirit intend by that as a sha- 
dow, to signify and foretell a substantial reality of those things to come under 
the New, in the truth and verity of them ; for so in the like case the apostle 
warrants us to understand: Heb. ix. 8, 9, 11, ' The Holy Ghost signifying 
thereby,' says he, ver. 8, &c., * they being a figure for the time then present,' 
as ver. 9, * of good things to come ;' so ver. 11, namely, those good things 
under the gospel, and the same must hold here in this ; for the apostle as 
expressly calls it a figure here as therein those mentioned. 

If that salvation, then, in the ark was a figure of that gospel salvation now, 
then Noah's covenant out of special grace (in compare to the world) for 
that salvation of him and his sons, was in like manner intended for a figure 
of that covenant for our salvation under the gospel ; yea, and also of that 
discrimination of grace, which was the foundation of Noah's covenant. And, 



Chap. IV.j of election. 49 

moreover, this must have been the figure also of a far more transcending 
grace, to be the foundation of our covenant, proportionably in an excelling 
glory of it, unto what the greatness of our salvation bears (as being the 
effect thereof as the cause) in compare with that temporal salvation of Noah's ; 
and that grace of ours is no other than that ' exceeding riches of grace' our 
gospel so extols, Eph. 1st and 2d chap. These all are of a like com- 
mensuration and elevation in this their kind and proportions, as an everlast- 
ing covenant, an everlasting salvation, proceeding from an everlasting 
grace and love. And then that which was the sole outward means of Noah's 
salvation, the ark, must have, it being a figure in this round, a super-excelling 
outward means answerably thereunto ; as the sole means prefigured, and 
that is Christ, the mediator of that covenant, in whom alone we are gra- 
ciously accepted, and who is the author of that eternal salvation. These all 
hang together (as we say) on one string ; are all connexed, coherent, and 
inseparable, covenant and salvation : ' Thou hast made a covenant with me,' 
saith David, ' sure and stedftist, and this is all my salvation,' 2 Sam. xxiii. ; 
and grace and salvation joined : ' By grace ye are saved,' said twice over, 
Eph. ii. But you have them all joined, even Christ our ark, and all use 
and universal suffrage of all the prophets that have been since the world 
began : Luke i. 69-73, ' And hath raised up an horn of salvation for us in 
the house of his servant David, as he spake by the mouth of his holy pro- 
phets, which have been since the world began ; that we should be saved 
from our enemies, and from the hand of all that hate us ; to perform the 
mercy promised to our fathers, and to remember his holy covenant, the oath 
which he sware to our father Abraham ;' yea, and I may say, w^iich in the 
figure he sware to Noah too. And my argument for this is fetched, not from 
the real inseparable connexing and hanging together of the things themselves ; 
and that therefore if but one of them be set forth in the type, the other must 
be, by consequence, and from the conjunction of the things themselves in 
the verity itself, be supposed also to exist. This argument, though it might 
hold (I say) to prove the existence of those other things that are so connexed 
together, yet might prove an argument that would fail us, if we should go 
about to argue from the type itself ; for then the things argued must be also 
found to have a lineament of similitude in the typing of it forth in the type 
itself. Now no one type also is in all things a complete representation of 
the w^hole substance of all that are connexed with, and appertain to, the thing 
signified in the t3'pe. And therefore it was, that God hath drawn and 
painted out the things of the gospel in so many several pictures, that one 
might foreshadow more specially the resemblance of one thing, another of 
some other. Yet this I will affirm concerning this type of Noah's, that this 
one of Noah, as it is instanced in by our apostle Peter, hath the likeness of 
as many, and specially of all those four we have insisted on (which are the 
main studs and substantial of our salvation), as perhaps will be found in 
any other single instance of any type whatever. Our apostle in that place 
terms our gospel salvation not barely figure, ruro;, but avTirwro;, a like 
figure (as we translate it) ; a correspondent figure (as others). TU'-rog, a 
figure, imports a likeness, but avrlrvrov, a like likeness;* that is, an 

* " AvtI in composition doth enhance the signification of that which it ig com- 
pounded with. As Xur^ov signifies a price, avrlXvr^ov imports a full and adequate 
price, every way answering ; it speaks equivalency, and when it is added to the like- 
ness, that is, in a fif^ure to the thing figured, or, e contra, in a thing figured unto a 
figure, it imports somewhat more than what is ordinary and common between things 
of that nature ; that is, than is between other usual figures and things figured in 
comparison unto this. And if it be said that the word here, avr/Vurov, is applied 

VOL. IX. D 



50 , OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

exceeding likeness, as far as a shadow may be supposed to represent a sub- 
stance ; at least, that there is a more than usual likeness than is found 
ordinarily in other figures ; if not a nearer, yet that a larger extensive like- 
ness shall be found in this, if narrowly observed ; the parallel lines of each 
run along further, and correspond in very many things alike. Now, there- 
fore, it being thus spoken in respect of similitude or likeness, we might 
warrantably go by this rule (which in expounding the signification of types, 
is a good and sure rule), that when and where w^e find a type of the Old 
Testament applied by the Holy Ghost, to some good thing that was to come 
under the New, which is the main substance of that type ; yea, and although 
it prove to be the thing prefigured in the New be instance*^ in, and pointed 
at, but in some one particular ; yet this warrants our application of other 
parts wherein a likeness or resemblance doth appear between the figure in 
the Old and the thing figured, as we find them scattered up and down, 
though they be not punctually and precisely applied to each of the particulars, 
between which and the figure the likeness proves to appear. The Holy 
Ghost pointing us, though but to one parallel, sanctifies all the rest that 
appear parallel also. This rule holds in expounding parables, and it must 
needs be safe in expounding types. So then, if Peter had only instanced 
but in one particular, that the salvation in the ark, &c., was a type of gospel 
salvation, sealed up in baptism, we might warrantably have made up those 
other we have mentioned ; as that this ark was the figure of our Christ, as 
he is applied to us in baptism ; yea, and of whatever else we find to be in 
baptism touching our salvation, analogous, or bearing resemblance with 
those passages about Noah's salvation in the ark. We see that the apostle 
himself makes an application of the very number of persons that were saved 
in Noah's ark, to have had a significancy in it of the paucity or fewness of 
the persons who shall find the like special grace under the gospel, to be 
efi'ectually partakers of salvation, although multitudes shall profess Chris- 
tianity, and be outwardly partakers of baptism, as in Noah's days there 
were many that professed themselves to be the sons of God, that perished 
in the w^aters. Thus our apostle makes use of that small circumstance of 
the paucity of the persons ; and because our Lord had foretold in his hear- 
ing, that there be few that find the narrow gate and way that leads to life, 
Mat. vii. 14, and few that shall be saved, Luke xiii. 23, and that for this 
cause that few are chosen, in comparison of the many that are called ; 
especially of the many that go to hell, therefore Peter observeth the few- 
ness, but of eight persons that were saved in the ark, puts that into his 
figure, there, of the ark : ' wherein few,' says he, ' that is, eight souls were 
saved.' He intends not, though retaining the number of eight, the definite 
number of persons, that is, of eight only, under the gospel to be saved, the 
number of his fellows, the eleven apostles, exceeding in his view that number ; 
but he set down few, as indefinitely signified by that eight, then compara- 
tively to the whole w^orld. 

Now, then, to confirm my argument, that the Holy Ghost by Peter's pen, 
having pointed us to Noah's salvation, and his sons' with him, as that which 
was the figure of our like, though far super- transcending salvation now under 

unto the thing figured, as denoting our baptism, and gospel salvation to be the truth, 
the substance figured, I answer, that however it is for the likeness, for the near 
resemblance that is between them, whether it be attributed to the figure or thing 
figured, it shews that, in respect of mutual similitude, it is given for this respect to 
the other. For the figure and things figured are relatives, in respect of their like- 
ness ; and so it comes all to one, with which of the two ccvt'i is compounded ; for in 
Heb. ix. you have avrlrv^ra applied to the shadows of heavenly things. 



Chap. IV.] of election. 51 

the gospel, God hath by that one particular instance (if there were no 
more) sent us to the story of Noah, and therein unto all that concerned that 
of his salvation in the ark. And therein we finding also not a promise, but 
a covenant established with Noah for that salvation ; a grace likewise in the 
heart of God to have been the foundation of that covenant ; an outward 
means, an ark, the only means that could have been of that salvation, and 
this wholly of God's inventing, and therein Noah to have been preserved in 
midst of waters ; and then viewing over the New Testament (and the Old 
too, so far as pure gospel is up and down manifested therein), we there do 
find up and down a covenant made, and established with, and for the said 
salvation (which salvation Peter expressly guides us unto) of God's elect 
under the gospel ; and an exceeding abundant grace, the original cause and 
fountain of that salvation and covenant ; and Christ, whom God hath set 
forth as the only means, or name under and whereby men should be saved 
from that wrath, that, if found out of him, will full upon all the world. 
These things, and all these things, being so expressly set out unto our view, 
both on the one hand in Genesis, and in this conjunction mentioned, and 
those other, all of them which are the substantial points of our Christian 
religion, we finding in our gospel as causes of oar salvation, %a^/; avr/ 
;/a^/rog, grace for grace, covenant for covenant, salvation for salvation, and 
an ark for Christ, how shall w^e otherwise but conclude that these are 
parallels ? Or in Peter's language, as/r/ruca, 'like figures,' the one of the 
other, for in likeness and resemblance they correspond one to the other. 

But we are not put to it for the proof of all this, to proceed by this way 
of consequential inferences ; for behold they are all the four of them more 
than impliedly specified and yoked together, in this one text of the apostle 
Peter ; for as there is Noah's salvation for our gospel salvation, so his ark 
typifying forth our Christ, and that as expressly ; for his adding as his last 
words in the verse, ' saved in baptism by the resurrection of Jesus Christ,' 
is a manifest reference unto and resemblance of the manner how Noah was 
saved in the ark from out of the waters, and in being carried through the 
waters safe to land, it still rising up under them as the storms did fall, by 
parts or by wholesale, upon it, and endangered the overwhelming of it, till at 
last it arrived safe, and rested on mount Ararat : an exact figure and 
semblance of Christ in passing through the waters of death, storms of that 
wrath and curse due to us, poured forth upon him, by and under which it 
was not possible for him to be holden, as Peter speaks. Acts ii. ; and so 
Noah received it as Abraham did that of Isaac's delivery, as a figure of the 
resurrection of his ark Christ, and of all in him. 

And whereas, here, baptism is said to be the figure of the ark, not Christ, 
I answer, * Know j^e not' (as Ilom. vi. the apostle Paul speaks) 'that as 
many as were baptized into Christ, were baptized into the likeness of his 
resurrection ?' as also of his death first, * that like as Christ was raised up,' 
&c., so we being planted together in and with him, should after baptism 
walk in newness of life. So then it is Christ, in whose name we are baptized, 
and into whom we are implanted, which is the significancy of baptism. 

Again, 3dly, that the baptism is made the thing figured, doth as evidently 
prompt us to the covenant of grace, as included in baptism, and so to have 
been prefigured therewith ; for what more properly doth baptism serve, or 
was instituted for, as an end containing in it, than to be the seal of the new 
covenant of grace, even as circumcision was of the old covenant ? Gen. xvii. 
And baptism also succeeding in the place and ofiice of it, as Col. ii. tells ; 
yea, and circumcision was then suddenly* the seal of the covenant of grace, 
♦ Qu, ' certainly,' or ' similarly '?— Ed. 



52 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

to the elect that were then, Rom. iv. 11 compared with Gen. xvii. This 
will perfectly convince us, that therefore baptism now much more is the seal 
unto us of that covenant, yea, and the broad seal too of the whole covenant ; 
that is, of all things that are contained in the covenant, and is therefore 
administered but once for all ; because it at once comprehendeth all that 
belongs to the covenant for our salvation. For therein not only the grace 
of Jesus Christ, the mediator of the covenant, and of our implanting into 
him, and into his death and resurrection, are represented ; but we are 
baptized * in the name of the Father, as of the Son,' yea, and also ' in the 
name of the Holy Ghost.' And therefore ' the love of God the Father,' who 
is the founder of the covenant, ' and the communion of God the Holy Ghost,' 
the applier of the covenant, are sealed up unto us, even all of these, and 
whatever the covenant doth comprehend, and all these things at once. And 
therefore full well might the apostle (as he doth) tell us, that Noah's salva- 
tion was the figure of ours ; for in the figuring our baptism, it contained, as 
in a figure, all these things in it ; all that belong to us now, that is, under 
the gospel ; both which words he with an inculcation urgeth upon our 
observation, that we might be deeply apprehensive of the abounding sig- 
nificancy of this though but one type, how much of our gospel truth's 
substantial salvation were included in it alone, to the end to engage and set 
our thoughts a- work, to search out the full mystery thereof at large in all 
the particulars of it. 

This as to Noah's covenant afore his entering into the ark, &c. 

There was a covenant (I must not call it another covenant, but yet) a 
second time renewed with enlargement, and withal said to be 'established' 
with Noah and his sons af er his and their coming out of the ark, and pro- 
mulged upon his having ofi'ered up that famous sacrifice in Gen. viii. the last 
verses. And then in Gen. ix. in the 8th verse, * God spake unto Noah, and 
his sons with him' (so it runs there unto them as well as to him), * saying. 
And I, behold, I establish my covenant with you, and your seed after you;' 
and again, ver. 11, 'And I will establish my covenant with you: neither 
shall all flesh be cut off any more by the waters of a flood ; neither shall 
there any more be a flood to destroy the earth.' This, say I, was the figure 
of the covenant of grace, to the church of the new testament, that were to 
be the seed of him and his sons (of which hereafter). And unto the words 
of this second covenant with Noah more especially, it is that the words of 
my text in Isaiah relate : ver. 9, * For as I have sworn that the waters of 
Noah should no more go over the earth; so have I sworn that I will not 
be wroth with thee, nor rebuke thee;' that is, my everlasting wrath shall 
never ovei-whelm thee ; for of that wrath, that universal flood, that passed 
over the rest of mankind, children of wrath, was the figure. "Which words, 
'not to destroy the earth,' are found in and do belong to that covenant in 
Gen. ix., as you will clearly gee if you compare the even now fore-cited 
words out of verse 11 of Gen. ix. And this covenant God styles here in 
Isaiah 'the covenant of his peace,' ver. 10; for as that covenant in Genesis 
viii. ix. chapters was upon Noah's offering that sacrifice and peace-offering 
in it, chap. viii. 20, with which God professed himself so well pleased as it 
is said, ' he smelled a sweet savour,' ver. 21, so signifying himself at peace, 
and atoned with Noah and his sons, and propitious unto the new world 
they were to be the restorers of (for that was the season God took to express 
this covenant in). Now, this sacrifice was in the figure, as the former sal- 
vation in the ark had been (as you heard out of Peter) a figure, &c., of a 
greater sacrifice than this of Noah's, even of Christ's; with which, and for 
which, and in the intuition of which, God establisheth this covenant, which 



Chap. IV.] of election. 53 

he termeth ' the covenant of his peace,' both because he [is] pacified by 
Christ's sacrifice, * who is our peace,' Col. i. 20, 21. As also because he 
promiseth peace, his peace to those the elect of mankind, to come out of 
Noah's sons' loins. 

And that Christ's sacrifice was figured out by that of Noah's, the apostle 
hath discoursed; whilst in speaking of Christ's, he useth the very words 
wherewith God's acceptance of Noah's is expressed by: Eph. v. 2, * And 
walk in love, as Christ also hath loved us, and hath given himself for us, an 
ofiering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling savour;' which latter are 
the very words in Genesis. And besides it is certain that, unless God had 
smelt so fiir ofl" aforehand this sacrifice of Christ's that was to come, the 
smoke of beasts sacrificed had but an unsavoury scent in God's nostrils as 
well as man's ; but the smell and savour thereof (though so long afore) per- 
fumed this of Noah, and went up into the nostrils of Jehovah. 

Bat not only Christ's sacrifice is thus in these speeches pointed at by the 
apostle, as signified in Noah's (and a covenant was then, and at all times, 
used to be ratified by a sacrifice, Ps. 1. 5, Heb. ix. 18, 20, and so on); but 
furthermore, as touching our covenant of grace, it is evident that when God 
himself did most solemnly proclaim and set forth that covenant as to come 
in the days of the new testament, that he hath likewise recourse unto like 
words and passages, taken out and borrowed from that latter covenant of 
Noah, thereby to express that new covenant of grace by, and confirm the 
stability of it to us ; which is a consideration of some moment to our subject 
afore us. There are three chapters in Jeremiah following one another, 
wherein this covenant of grace is set by, and professedly handled, by way of 
prophecy, so as nowhere else the like in the Old Testament: first, chap, 
xxxi. ver. 33, 34, ' But this is the covenant that I will make with the house 
of Israel,' thus speaking with difierence from the old covenant then more in 
\iew, and it is his new gospel covenant, the same which, Heb. viii., the 
apostle citeth, as that *to write the law in their hearts,' &c., as you may 
read in those verses. Now, to confirm to them this covenant, he adds in 
that place, ver. 35, ' Thus saith the Lord, which giveth the sun for a light 
by day, and the ordinances of the moon and of the stars for a light by night, 
which divideth the sea when the waves thereof roar ; The Lord of hosts is 
his name;' where what our translation reads, 'which divideth the sea,' &c., 
our English Annotation out of the Hebrew renders, which ' stilleth or raaketh 
quiet the sea,' or 'settleth the sea when the waves thereof roar;' that is, (as 
they) do keep the sea within compass, and make it rest within its bounds. 
The tendency of this to my present purpose you will perceive when I have 
added what in the other chapters we find to follow. Then again in the 32d 
chapter, God rehearseth more pieces that belong to the same covenant of 
grace : ver. 38-40, * And they shall be my people, and I will be their God : 
and I mil give them one heart, and one way, that they may fear me for 
ever, for the good of them, and of their children after them: and I will 
make an everlasting covenant with them, that I will not turn away from 
them, to do them good; but I will put my fear in their hearts, that they 
shall not depart from me ;' though promised to begin upon his elect 
people that were to return from Babel to their own land, as the rest of that 
chapter shews ; for the covenant of grace had a secret efiicacy to the elect 
in the old testament as well as in the new. Then, thirdly, in the 33d 
chapter God receiveth * other particulars belonging to the same covenant, 
and that as they were more evidently to be performed in the days of the new 
testament; for to those days do the words of the 15th verse refer (which 
* Qu. * revieweth ' ?— Ed. 



54 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

comes in amongst the midst of those promises in that chapter) : ' In those 
days, and at that time, will I cause the Branch of righteousness to grow up 
unto David ; and he shall execute judgment and righteousness in the land ;' 
and verse 16, 'In those days shall Judah be saved, and Jerusalem shall 
dwell safely : and this is the name wherewith she shall be called, The Lord 
our Righteousness;' that is, when Christ, who is the mediator of that cove- 
nant, should come in the flesh, in which days the covenant of grace should 
appear nakedly and openly in its pure glory; and the outward crust of the 
old covenant with the Jewish church (under which this of the new did then 
run undermost, hidden, as arteries under the veins) should decay as grown 
old, as the apostle in the said Heb. viii. doth argue. 

Now, God having thus so explicitly set forth the substantial materials of 
this new covenant in these three chapters, then for a close to all he had said 
about them there cometh a special word to Jeremiah : ver. 19, 'And the word 
of the Lord came unto Jeremiah, saying,' &c. And it is to verify the stabihty 
or everlasting sureness of this covenant, as in Isa. Iv., the next chapter to 
my text, is celebrated. He doth insert, and (as it were) call in for witnesses 
to attest and confirm the said stability thereof, divers of those passages 
which we find in the covenant made with Noah, which purpose they serve 
most aptly and suitably unto; for in making that covenant with Noah, God 
had uttered himself in these words of everlastingness, ' I will establish my 
covenant with thee,' so to certify and assure the like stability of this covenant 
of grace, the materials whereof had been in these three chapters so largely 
insisted on. Now, moreover, as his transition, ver. 19, is, a special word 
must come, and is added on purpose, and alone, and over and above the 
former, to verify the unalterableness of it, and that as exemplified by those 
unalterable things promised to Noah in his; for what follows first in 
verse 20 ? ' Thus saith the Lord, If you can break my covenant of the day, 
and of the night, and that there should not be day and night in their 
season;' there is one passage in Noah's; and verse 21, the reddition follows, 
' Then may also my covenant be broken with David.' Then may also my 
covenant (that is, my gospel covenant) be broken with David, unto whom, 
as we all know, was made the promise of Christ, who himself was the spiri- 
tual David, the mediator, and with whom the new covenant for all the elect 
was published by God in David's time (which I need not enlarge upon the 
jDroof of to be meant in this place of Jeremiah). Then again a second pas- 
sage of Noah's is inserted in verse 25, ' Thus saith the Lord, If my covenant 
be not with day and night, and if I have not appointed the ordinances of 
heaven and earth;' and it follows, ver. 26, ' Then will I cast away the seed 
of Jacob, and of David my servant.' As God produceth the materials pro- 
mised and specified in Noah's covenant, so he expressly utters them under 
the word covenant; yea, and calls that with day and night his covenant: 
my covenant, twice mentioned, ver. 20 and 25, thereby manifestly calling us 
to look back to Noah's covenant, made for day and night; as in the making 
of which he had an eye to his like ratification and firm establishment of his 
covenant of grace, and as hiddenly intended by him then, when he uttered 
this of Noah's. 

And now let us but review those passages in Genesis and in Jeremiah, 
and compare them together. First, those in Jeremiah : ver. 20, ' If you 
can break my covenant with the day, and my covenant with the night,' &c., 
where do we find mention of a covenant that God made with the day and 
with the night, which God should term Ids covenant with them or about 
them, not a covenant, one with another? And observe the language in 
both: in Gen. viii. 22, 'Day and night shall not cease,' saith God there 



Chap. IV.] of election. 55 

upon his sacrifice ; which are in the sense of them the very words used in 
Jeremiah xxxiii. 20, ' If you can break my covenant of the day, and my 
covenant of the night, that there should not be day and nUjht in their season.' 
This is all one as to have said, I have made a covenant that they shall not 
cease — and even so we find in Genesis, and where else it is* to be found 
under the name of a covenant — and if you can break that my covenant, &c., 
then may also my covenant of grace with David be broken. Again, in Jere- 
miah, the 25th verse, he joins to his covenant with day and night (as his 
too) an alike settled appointment of the ordinances of heaven and earth : 
'If I have not appointed the ordinances of heaven and earth;' appointed, 
that is, settled in a certain, constant, and perpetual course, with which 
sense the fore-cited words, chap. xxxi. 35, 30, do agree, and withal explain 
them: 'Thus saith the Lord, that giveth the sun for a light by day, and 
the ordinances of the moon and of the stars for a light by night, If these 
ordinances depart from me, saith the Lord.' And we all see that these 
have not fiiiled nor departed, or (as God's word is) ceased from or before 
him. But you will say. These last mentioned in Jeremiah are the ordi- 
nances of heaven only, and they are not mentioned in Genesis ; and again, 
demand what are those on earth; I answer, these two, or both, come all to 
one in the real intention of them ; for the ordinances for revolutions and 
courses of the heavens, sun, moon, and stars, being the causes of the ordi- 
nances and vicissitudes of seasons on the earth, as the etfects of them, which 
are indeed the ordinances of the earth. And of these we read. Gen. i. 14, 
18, ' And God said, Let there be lights in the fii-mament of the heaven, to 
divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, 
and for days, and years; and to rule over the day, and over the night; and 
to divide the light from the darkness.' Hence, then, seeing both these 
ordinances do coalesce in one and the same issues, for those in the heavens 
are ordained for those on earth ; and that also you find these ordinances of 
the earth in Gen. viii. 22, ' Whilst the earth remaineth, seed-time ^ and 
harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and^ night, 
shall not cease. Hence, therefore, all that Jeremiah says of the ordinances 
in the heavens, of sun, moon, and stars, are in effect comprehended in Gen. 
viii. 22, as if there they had been named. And although the settlement of 
both these ordinances began at the creation (as in Gen. i.), yet God havmg 
cursed the ground for man's sake upon Adam's fall, which God in the 21st verse 
afore of that Gen. viii. professedly doth make a recognition of to this intent, 
to shew that he now began with Noah upon a new covenant ; and that else 
there had been an end and dissolution of both sorts of ordinances, whether 
on earth or heaven; but that God upon a new account and score, even the 
intuition of Christ's sacrifice, typed forth in that of Noah's, did anew say in 
his heart, and declared also to Noah, ' I will not again curse the earth for 
man's sake. But whilst the earth remains, seed-time and harvest, and cold 
and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night, shall not cease. So, 
then, it is not the natural covenant by the first creation, if appointments of 
these then might be called his covenant, for God declares that to have been 
void by his curse for sin ; and therefore the appointment for the continuance 
of these ordinances, now, since Noah's time, renewed by a covenant of 
mercy, its making and institution, whereby the grand charter of these was 
de novo, begun to be verified and confirmed. 

And now will you take notice of that other piece of God's covenant with 
Noah about the waters, their not returning any more to cover the earth, 
which you find in Gen. ix., which is expressly alleged by God in ter minis in 

* Qu. 'is it'?— Ed. 



56 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

my text in the prophet Isaiah, and to the same effect in Jeremiah, and in 
both still ascertaining the firmness of the covenant of grace. Now, in Jere- 
miah the words run, ' Thus saith the Lord, that stilleth the sea when the 
waves thereof roar ;' and he says it to the end, to confirm his covenant of 
grace. And then it is said, he stilleth them when the waves raged most, roar- 
ing to recover their lost prey, and threaten another deluge, but that God 
restraineth them from overflowing the earth again ; for in order to their not 
overflowing the earth again, it is there spoken elsewhere, his stilling them, 
and setting bounds to them, is noticed to be with that intent: Ps. civ. 9, 
* Thou hast set a bound that they may not pass over, that they turn not 
again to cover the earth; and Jer. v. 22, ' Who hath placed the sand for 
the bound of the sea by a perpetual decree, that it cannot pass it; and 
though the waves thereof toss themselves, yet can they not prevail; though 
they roar, yet can they not pass over it ? ' and Ps. Ixv. 7, ' Who stilleth the 
noise of the seas, the noise of their waves, and the tumult of the people.' 
Now, bring this to Genesis; is not this express in Noah's covenant? Gen. 
ix. 11, 15, 'And I will establish my covenant w^ith you : neither shall all 
flesh be cut off any more by the waters of a flood ; neither shall there be 
any more a flood to destroy the earth. And I will remember my covenant, 
which is between me and you, and every living creature of all flesh ; and 
the waters shall no more become a flood to destroy all flesh.' And so now 
you have God's promise and covenant for and wuth both earth, heaven, and 
sea, and the waters thereof, alleged by God as witnesses long ago, forelaid 
and ordained, — shall I say, suborned ? — yea, and you see God gageth and 
pawneth one covenant to perform another, the covenant of Noah to make 
good this covenant of grace. And that whenever we read this covenant, he 
would have our faith look back to this in Genesis, which we see hath not to 
this day failed in performance, thereby to confirm us in the belief of this 
gospel covenant, made and dehvered under David's name for the w^hole elec- 
tion. We all acknowledge David's covenant to have been an example of, at 
least figurative of, the covenant of grace. 

The rest of the passages in that covenant of Noah, I shall have occasion 
to meet with in the application of several other particular parallels that are 
found between Noah's covenants and this of the covenant of grace ; if these 
alleged, and thus compared, be not sufficient for the proof in the general. 

SECTION II. 

The application made hy God himself of Noah's covenants to exenijAify and 
confirm his covenant of grace, as it is in Isa. liv. 9. 

For this. is as the waters of Noah unto me : for as I have sworn that the waters 
of Noah shall no more go over the earth ; so have 1 sworn that I would not 
be wroth with thee, nor rebuke thee. — Isa. LIV. 9. 

Having hitherto been a-producing other scriptures to prove that both 
Noah's covenant to his own person is an example and pattern of the like 
grace to the elect, and likewise that those his two covenants, afore and 
after the flood, were figurative of the same covenant of grace to the church 
of the new testament, I return now anew with the more confidence to further 
exposition of this text, which I chose for the ground of this subject ; as in 
which I found God himself alleging it, and applying it to the foresaid intents 
and purposes ; and this is the first application that was made of it by the 
prophet Isaiah ; and the other out of Jeremiah, &c., which I have run'over, 



Chap. IV.J of election. 57 

followed after this of Isaiah. And this in Isaiah is so signal as God doth 
plainly point to it : * This is as the waters of Noah to me.' 

And that the thing aimed at here is the covenant of grace, the coherence 
of the words with what went afore, and follows after, doth in the general 
shew. 

In the words just afore, the 7th and 8th verses, the promises to the 
church of the Gentiles, under the new^ testament, are : * For a small moment 
have I forsaken thee ; but with great mercies will I gather thee. In a little 
wrath I hid my face from thee for a moment ; but with everlasting kindness will 
I have mercy on thee, saith the Lord thy Redeemer.' After which immediately 
succeed the words of this 9th verse. Now these promises in verse 7 and 8 
are a prophecy of what mercy and groce he would shew, in saving those his 
elect from first to last ; and these words that follow my text come in as a 
confirmation and illustration thereof, by alleging a most lively figure and 
correspondent tj'pe that had long before passed between God and Noah ; in 
a way of covenant, as on God's part, declared by God towards him, w^hich 
upon this occasion of his prophesying this new covenant to his church, the 
sons of Noah, God calling that of Noah to his fresh remembrance, breaks 
out thereupon : ' This is as the waters of Noah to me.' As if he should 
say. This is that very thing which I intended to prefigure and fore-signify, 
then when I sat at the flood (as Psalm xxix. 11) in and by those passages 
with Noah, which were at and about his flood, which God calls the waters 
of Noah. This, even this, which I even now have spoken of, my grace and 
mercy to my church, who are his sons and posterity, in the words imme- 
diately afore ; even this was the mind and mystery of those my promises, 
which I made then to him upon occasion of and about those waters ; which 
is just such a hke speech, as I shall after in the particular explication shew, 
as that of Christ to the Jews, where, pointing to the type of himself, he 
says, I give you the sign of Jonas. And this Noah's w^aters were to me, 
which latter word hath also a great emphasis in it, as to this import in hand. 
They were such in my account, and ordination in mine own secret intent, 
which I had within myself when I uttered them ; and this I therefore now 
upon this occasion declare to have been the mystery of them according to 
this matter ; that so you may have your faith confirmed in this covenant of 
gi-ace the more, in that it was in my heart so long afore, and in my intentions 
then fore-signified, by what I spake and acted toward Noah. 

Then in the words after he doth in express terms call those promises of 
ver. 7, 8, * The covenant of my peace,' or ' my covenant of peace,' as 
others ; because those promises contain (as I said) in them the principal 
substance of the covenant of grace and peace ; and by expressing it thus 
under the title and notion of his covenant, he gives us to understand what 
he meant by Noah's w^aters, and sends us to the story of the things that 
passed then about it to know the meaning of his saying, ' This is the waters 
of Noah.' 

About which we shall find that he had established two covenants with 
Noah, both before and after them waters ; whereof the first prefigured some 
eminent pieces of the covenant of grace ; the other signified other particu- 
lars thereof, and in a special manner the stability of it ; and therefore it was 
they were tw^o in a figure, because no one figure is sufiicient to signify the 
whole ; and therefore God revealed it at those sundry times, by parts, but 
yet so as in their tendency both served to be figures of that covenant ; for 
so the covenant of grace is, which is but one, and is therefore styled in the 
•singular, the covenant of his peace, but typified forth by those two of Noah's, 
which in that respect do coalesce in one. 



^8 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

Now, 2dly, there be two eminent things contained in those promises, 
verse 7, 8. 

First, That whereas God had for some time (which in comparison of 
eternity he calls a moment, though it had been a space of two thousand 
3'ears) forsaken the Gentiles, as if he had rejected them from ever being a 
church to him, that yet he had in his eternal purposes designed a gatherwfi 
of them — observe that word, ver. 7 — a taking of them into his bed, as an 
husband his spouse (for he carries it under the metaphor of an husband 
taking again his wife unto him : ver. 5, ' Thy Maker is thy husband ') ; s'o 
that his forsaking and rejecting of them so long had been but to magnify 
and greaten his own mercies towards them in the end the more ; and this 
first piece of his prophetic covenant, to gather them, you have in ver. 7, 
' For a small moment have I forsaken thee ; but with great mercies will I 
gather thee;' wherein observe also how he puts the attribute of r/rm^ mercies 
upon this their gathering, and great in two respects therein. 

(1.) In relation to what they should be so long afore this grace breaks 
forth upon them, which you exactly find set out, even then when accom- 
plished (as here it is promised and prophesied of), Eph. ii., where the 
apostle impresseth this very consideration upon them ; ver. 11, 'Wherefore 
remember,' says he, * that ye in times past. Gentiles in the flesh, that at 
that time ye were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of 
Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and 
without God in the world.' And in speaking this to the Ephesians, he 
speaks the same to all the rest of the converted Gentiles, Romans, Colossians, 
Philippians, &c. And he remembers them of this, to that end they might 
thereby acknowledge that infinite great love and riches of mercy in electing 
them from everlasting ; and out of that electing love and grace freely first 
set upon them, it was that he had now called and gathered them. The con- 
sideration of this he had promised, and forelaid into the apprehensions of 
them, in chap. i. ver. 4, which he drives home in the same chap. ii. ver. 4, 
' But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us ; ' 
his great love and mercy, that is his word, and it is God's own word in 
Isaiah, you see, upon the very same consideration. 

(2.) Observe, it is the grace and mercy of his hrst gathering and convert- 
ing them that God in Isaiah puts this greatness of mercy upon ; and the 
same doth the apostle there, in Eph. ii. 5, ' Even when we were dead in 
sins, hath quickened us together with Christ ; by grace ye are saved ; ' 
quickening here in the apostle's language, is gathering of them in God's here. 
It was their first gathering then, and so on of their posterity, that God speaks 
of in that 7th verse in Isaiah. 

The second eminent thing in God's prophetic promise in Isaiah to his 
Gentile church, is in the other following, ver. 8, *In a little wrath I hid my 
face from thee for a moment ; but with everlasting kindness will I have 
mercy on thee, saith the Lord thy Redeemer.' In which the eminent thing 
to be superadded to the former is the everlastingness of the kindness, after 
their being gathered. And otherwise the other words in both verses come 
unto one. The meaning of which is, that he would continue unto the persons 
of them, after he had gathered and converted them, an unchangeable kind- 
ness — ' with everlasting kindness will I have mercy on thee' — to last ; and 
that is, which shall not only not fail to follow them unto everlasting, and 
never be taken away or removed, but further, should be so rich a treasury as 
should last the spending upon them in ages to come, even to eternity (as in 
Eph. ii. 7, ' That in the ages to come he might shew the exceeding riches of 
his grace, in kindness towards us through Christ Jesus'), and never be spent. 



Chap. IV.] of election. 



59 



Now, answerably, there are two eminent distinct parts or pieces in God's 
application of Noah's covenants, which in their principal scope do correspond, 
as in the figure, with the eminent matters of those two aforesaid promises 
of God's : the one more specially respecting the one ; the other, the other 
of them. And, if you observe withal, there are two rational particles of 
for, which (according to what our translation hath rendered) are distinctly 
placed and set afore each. 

1 . ' For this [isj the waters of Noah to me.' There is the first for; and that 
serves more especially as the reason or illustration of the matter of that first 
promise in ver. 7, and likewise in further correspondency to that 7th verse, 
I take it, those words have a more special reference unto the first covenant 
of Noah's, made afore his entering into the ark, and whilst in the ark, to save 
him in and from the waters or flood ; for that bears a resemblance with 
God's promise to gather, of which by and by. 

The second /or, afore the second sentence that follows it : * For as I have 
sworn that the waters should no more go over the earth ; so have I sworn I 
will not be wroth with thee,' &c. This passage doth evidently, and without 
possibility of contradiction, refer to that second covenant made with Noah, 
after he was come forth of the ark, and had escaped the waters ; and unto 
that alone doth that passage refer, as by comparing Gen. viii. 21, and Gen. 
ix. 11 appears : * And the Lord smelled a sweet savour; and the Lord said 
in his heart, I will not again curse the ground any more for man's sake ; 
for the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth : neither will I 
again smite any more every living thing, as I have done. And I will estab- 
lish my covenant with you : neither shall all flesh be cut off any more by 
the waters of a flood ; neither shall there any more be a flood to destroy the 
earth.' And this latter passage hath a more peculiar and proper respect 
unto the matter of the promise in the 8th verse, namely, the everlasting 
continuance of that kindness of God's; the unchangeable fixedness of his 
mercy not to be removed or taken ofl' from that Gentile church, or his elect 
therein, after they are gathered. And for the confirmation and illustration 
of this everlastingness, &c., it is that he refers unto that latter covenant of 
Noah's, whereof he speaks thus : ' For as I have sworn that the waters of 
Noah should no more go over the earth ; so have I sworn that I would not 
be wroth with thee, nor rebuke thee.' In which words he gives the greatest 
evidence and demonstration of that fixedness of his mercy that could be, in 
that the matter of his oath sworn unto is, that from out of that mercy, and 
the resolved everlastingness of it, he undertakes to have so watchful a care to 
prevent whatever it be, might, and would otherwise provoke him unto ever- 
lasting wrath against them. And that must be supposed to be such sinnings 
as by the rules of his word should put them into a state of wrath again ; for 
in that he says, ' I will not be wroth with thee,' &c., there must be supposed, 
yea, and intended, a preventing the cause of such a wrath in the person he 
swears for ; for if they in such a manner sin, as unregenerate men do, which 
the apostle terms doing sin, in a continued course, with full consent of will, 
then according to the rules of his word an eternal wrath must fall upon them, 
and they become ' children of wrath' again after gathering, 'dead in sins 
and, trespasses,' as afore. Again, this effect and fruit of his everlasting 
kindness in the 10th verse answers to the figure of God's oath to Noah, to 
see to it, and take order by his omnipotency, to still the rage of the waters, 
that they overflow the earth no more in wrath. And he here says he hath 
sworn he will do the like to the hearts of his elect, and thereby professeth 
himself to be as able to take order, and rule men's hearts and lusts, as he 
doth the waters ; and both are alike joined : Ps. Ixv. 7, ' Who stilleth the 



60 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

noise of the seas, the noise of their waves, and the tumult of the people.' 
Tumults are from the raging of men's ' lusts that war in their members,' 
James iv. 1, 2. And this everlasting kindness, and the firmness and fixed- 
ness of it, and the unchangeahleness, unalterableness of the covenant that 
proceeded from it, he further amplifies and enlargeth upon, ver. 11, upon 
occasion of this oath : * For the mountains shall depart, and the hills shall 
be removed, but my kindness shall not depart from thee ; neither shall the 
covenant of my peace be removed, saith the Lord that hath mercy on thee.' 

If any be not satisfied in this order and disposement of these two several 
sentences in ver. 9, both in these two references to the 7th and 8th verses 
respectively, and then also concerning that other unto Noah's two covenants 
respectively, under so distinct and different an allusion peculiar to each, I 
shall further add this account touching either of them. 

1. As to the first sentence, ' this is the waters,' &c., its special reference to 
Noah's first covenant, about his salvation in the waters, there is this reason 
to induce me, which ariseth from putting these few considerations together. 

(1.) A fresh remembrance is had and uttered by God of Noah's covenant, 
in this 9th verse, to confirm his covenant of grace, that appears by what 
hath been said. 

(2.) That in the pursuit of this allegory, from the mention made of Noah's 
waters, ver. 9, we meet with a most passionate exclamation, proceeding from 
God's deepest affection, uttered in ver. 11, ' thou afflicted and tossed with 
tempest,' but with and under so manifest an allusion unto the like com- 
passionate bowels towards Noah and his doleful condition, whilst he was 
a-saving him in the waters and in the ark,* as no man that will look to 
and again upon the aspect wliich the words, ver. 9, and of these ver. 11, do 
cast one upon the other, can be able rationally to deny. Now those affec- 
tions towards Noah, as considered in that condition, and whilst in that con- 
dition, were as manifestly stirred up in God's heart upon the remembrance 
of that first covenant made with Noah when he was to enter into the ark, 
and which in the letter of it concerned God's saving him in the waters, 
which punctually agrees with what we read in the story of Noah's waters in 
Genesis, where, after the continuance of so many days' tempests, by flood- 
gates of waters from heaven, and prevailing of waters from beneath, related 
chap, vii., it is thereupon said, chap. viii. 1, that ' God remembered Noah, and 
those with him,' &c. It was a remembrance, that, of tenderest compas- 
sions, as we know that word remembrance useth to connotate and import. 
And in allusion unto this, you have his passions and compassions break 
forth towards his chnroh, and uttered with a most pathetic outcry, ' thou 
tossed,' &c., proceeding from the remembrance of his covenant towards his 
elect, which had been the main subject of tha fore-pavt of the chapter ; and 
you know how frequently in Scriptures it is spoken, God did this or that, 
* remembering his holy covenant.' And so it was here. 

(3.) Hence, thirdly, there being first a memoir, a mention, or remem- 
brance of Noah's waters, as notifying (by a metonymy) God's covenant with 
Noah about his waters, ver. 9, whereby to set out this his covenant to his 
church, and then afterwards by occasion thereof, and in coherence there- 
with, these sympathising expressions break out in ver. 11. Certainly, then, 
that covenant with Noah, the remembrance of which was it that is said to 
have caused that commiseration in God towards him at that time, that must 
be found somewhere in the 9th verse, at the bottom of those words, if we 

• Videtur Deii3 adhuc respicere tempora Nose, quando totum mundum generalis 
jnundatio delevit : appellat ecclesiam, respiciens arcam, quae cum octo tautum ani- 
mabus jactabatur in fiuctibus.— Sanctius in verba. 



Chap. IY.] of election. 61 

will dive unto the bottom of the scope of the mention of them. Now that 
covenant was (of his two) the first of them, touching God's saving him in 
the waters, as by the story is undeniable. And therefore that covenant must 
necessarily have been alluded unto ; for otherwise the correspondence in the 
allusion between the two parts of it, had fallen quite besides, and had been 
disproportioned. For Noah's second covenant was to secure him against 
the waters any more to return upon him and his posterity. And that cannot 
in any reason be supposed that such this passionate exclamation, ' thou 
tossed,' &c., should be referred unto; for it looks upon Noah as viewed in 
the height of those waters and tempests, and supposeth him in the midst of 
those waters ; so as between Noah's first covenant, and such an exclamation 
as that which was occasioned by it, there is a full congruily and proper 
coherence. The first part, giving just occasion for the latter, these suit as 
cause and effect ; but not so at all doth Noah's second covenant and this 
condolement match and correspond. But that alone considered gives not 
an occasion for it, and cannot comprehend in it the whole scope of Noah's 
waters, which yet generally interpreters would have it do. 

So then, here being these two sentences or speeches in the 9th verse, — 
* For this is the waters of Noah to me,' the first ; ' For as I have sworn the 
waters of Noah shall go no more over the earth,' which is the second, — and 
there being two covenants made with Noah about his waters (as they are 
called), differing in this, that the first was with promise to save him in the 
waters which were inevitabl}^ decreed to come upon the world for their 
destruction ; the other only to secure him, that they should not any more 
return to drown him and the earth ; it seems most probable, if there were 
no more reason on our side, that the first of those speeches should cast its 
eye of allusion and aspect upon the first of those covenants, as its pretended 
correspondent, and the second sentence upon the second covenant. The 
latter is apparent in the words, and was it that drew interpreters' eyes 
wholly thereupon, to attend that, and overlook the first. 

But that so emphatical an indigitation, or pointing so as with the finger 
in the first, * This is the waters of Noah to me,' which are in the first uttered, 
seem to me to point rather to those waters which we read, de facto, did come 
upon the earth, and which Noah escaped, than to speak of another flood 
which did not come upon him, and which is yet termed the waters of Noah 
in the sentence following, meaning only that not the like waters, to those 
that did come upon Noah, should any more go over, &c., yea, that not 
another such ; whereas in this first instance he points to the flood itself that 
did come, from which the other not to come hath its denomination of Noah's 
waters, but tralatitiously, or at a second derivative hand, taken from the 
waters that had foregone, supposeth that positively such a flood had been. 
And that is it which properly and originally bears the name of Noah's waters, 
which is all one as we use to say Noah's flood, meaning that flood which de 
jacto did come, and the latter mention of it is but the promise of a negative, 
a preventive promise, namely, that God would not again overflow the earth 
a second time with the like, and supposeth the danger of the flood already 
past, or at least Noah saved in it. Is it not, then, more proper and direct 
(may we not think) for that first speech, * This is the w\aters,' &c., to intend 
rather that positive salvation which Noah then was to have, and had, upon 
the first covenant, and which must necessarily be first supposed he should 
have ere the latter could be so much as spoken of, and which the promise 
of it necessarily implies in that word, * no more go over the earth,' that this 
first flood to have gone over is afore, yea, and that salvation of Noah's from 
that flood being that great salvation of which the Scripture speaks ? Can we 



62 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

think that God, in making a remembrance of his covenant about his waters, 
and so of his promise to save him in them, should omit and pass that over 
altogether in silence ? Now, and if it be to be found at all in this 9th verse, 
it must be in these first words, ' This is the waters of Noah to me,' as point- 
ing to those then present waters that came upon the whole earth, which Noah 
was saved out of bv virtue of that first covenant with him, and therefore must 
be supposed to have been intended. 

If any object, and say. Yea, but the second sentence, and the very expli- 
cation he gives why and for what purpose he had spoken the first, as first 
proposing the mention of Noah's waters in general, ' this is the waters of 
Noah,' but with a purpose, and no otherwise but to bring in and declare this 
alone, that as he swore of those waters, they should no more return, so nor 
his wrath, &c., and so that this is the sole and whole intent of his mention 
of them. And to this do the generality of interpreters narrow it, and make 
both sentences to be in the scope of them, all one, and adequate, and only 
to serve to express God's faithfulness in not casting ofi" his people, or in not 
giving them up to wrath again, after he hath taken them to be his people. 

I answer, 1, That it often falls out in alleging of a type more generally, 
that but some one particular part or branch of what it typifies proves to be 
instanced in, when yet there may be many other particulars of as great 
moment that are not explicitly mentioned. As when Christ says to- the 
Pharisees, Mat. xii. 39, 40, as his after words shew, in indignation for asking 
of him a sign, who had given them so many, to testify invincibly that he was 
their Messiah, ' An evil and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign ; and 
there shall be no sign given to it, but the sign of the prophet Jonas : for as 
Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale's belly, so shall the Son 
of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.' The sign 
of the prophet Jonas ; that is, who was an intended sign by way of type of 
me to come, and that in more respects than one. Yet our Saviour seems 
expressly to instance but in that one particular of his being ' three days and 
three nights in the whale's belly ; ' as which signified (as Christ explains it) 
his own being in the grave, or * the heart of the earth three days,' so is it 
here. The like might be instanced in the case of many other tyP^^' ^^ ^^ 
that of Noah's salvation in the ark, to be the figure of baptism, 1 Peter 
iii. 20, 21, which yet contains many other parallels not mentioned. ..■ 

Ajhs. 2. It is true that the mention of Noah's waters here doth serve fitly 
to usher in, leads on unto that one particular that follows ; but yet if any 
will allow me but that this speech, ' This is the waters of Noah,' is a general 
proposal of them first made, as notifying in general God's covenanting with 
Noah about those waters, whereof that one that succeeds is a particular com- 
prehended in it, I should not much contend ; but to confine the scope of 
God's allegation of it unto that one branch instanced in, and thereupon so 
to exclude altogether its aspect, or any reference to the waters or flood of 
Noah that de facto came upon the earth, and in which, though Noah was 
saved, yet was tossed with tempests, this cannot be allowed ; for that in the 
remembrance of God's covenant made with him, God did commensurate* 
him in those waters, as a type of our great initial salvation from a state of 
wrath, which those that would make the scope to concern only God's oath, 
that the waters should return no more, do and must thereby includef it. 
This I do and must contend for to be included and intended (yet with pro- 
fession to submit to cogent reason, that shall be made to the contrary) ; 
having this further to be added as a reason for it, that if this part of Noah's 
first covenant and salvation from the waters be excluded here, then is the 
* Qu. ' commiserate ' ? — Ed. t Qu. * exclude ' ? — Ed. 



Chap. IV.] of election. 63 

great type of our main, great, and first salvation by Christ excluded, to be 
meant here also, whilst yet his purpose is to illustrate and set out to his 
church his covenant of grace for the whole of their salvation, which in this 
chapter, yea, and in the two following chapters, he insists on, by way of 
promising and prophesying thereof, and inviting men to come under it as 
offered. See chap. Iv. and Ivi. 

If any shall yet object that the second /or, set afore the said speech, ' for 
as I have sworn,' &c,, is apparently the reason why he said first, 'This is 
the waters of Noah,' and therefore it is to bo restrained unto that one 
particular, 

I answer, I do as yet rather incline to think that there being two of these 
causal conjunctions oH fur, the one set before the first speech, 'for this is 
the waters of Noah,' another afore the second speech, ' as I have sworn.' 
And although the latter for is otherwise rendered by some interpreters, yet 
I take the version of the word as our translation and most others have 
turned it ; for, warranted by the same use of the word in the Hebrew so 
signifying, in 1 Sam. xv. 15, as Mr Gataker hath observed; and so I under- 
stand the two fors as partitively to notify two distinct reasons of two several 
matters or things about these waters, in the sense before explained, and not 
that jointly they fall into one and the same thing only. I take the latter 
for not to denote a subordinate reason of the former /or, or reason, but each 
to be distinct and co-ordinate, and to stand alone in their connection with 
the matter in the former verses ; and that the first should be a reason 
specially of that part of the covenant mentioned in the 7th verse foregone ; 
the latter specially as the reason and confirmation of that part of the cove- 
nant in ver. 8. And the like distinct references made by causal particles, 
though immediately following one another, yet the first to relate as a reason 
of some matter foregone that is further off, and another later to somewhat 
that went more immediately afore, you meet so ordinarily withal in the 
Scriptures, specially in Paul's discourses, as I need not give instances 
of them. 

Thus much for the account of the first branch proposed, why these first 
words, ' For this is the waters of Noah to me,' should have, and especially 
have respect to Noah's first covenant to save him in the waters ; and as for 
the words that follow, ' as I have sworn,' that they respect his second cove- 
nant there is no question ; I must further add the second branch proposed, 
and so I shall make this head complete ; viz.. 

The special analogy that is between Noah's first covenant and waters, and 
the matter of the promise in the 7th verse ; and for the other, the corres- 
pondency between the matter of the 8th verse (in what it differs from that 
in the 7th verse) with Noah's second covenant, namely, the everlastingness 
and stability of the covenant to be the thing aimed at in both ; this doth 
more clearly upon first sight appear, that there needs no large discourse more 
than in order to clear the first. 

1. In general, as touching both. 

Noah's two covenants w^ere both of them for his salvation from the waters, 
but with this difference : the first was with this promise, to save him from 
those present waters that did drown the rest of the earth ; the second, to 
preserve him, and the earth for his sake, from any more such a flood of 
waters its coming upon the earth, and so to secure him from all fears of 
destruction thence ; which considering the danger of their so doing, and sin- 
ners' desert of it, might truly be called a salvation preventive ; and a secur- 
ing to him that great salvation positive, which God had vouchsafed him in and 
from the waters past ; and that second promise for the future, made that 



64 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

first salvation in the waters to be salvation indeed, and without which it had 
onlv been but a reservation of him and his unto a second destruction from 
another flood. Thus you see in Noah's case, that these two are distinct, and 
yet both concur to make that his salvation perfect and complete. 

Answerably unto the type of these in general, the like difference may be 
discerned, and must be acknowledged to be in the matter or point of our 
eternal salvation, to perfect it ; and so both of which are distinctly provided 
in that one covenant of his grace, whereof those his two covenants were 
imperfect shadows. Gal. i. ; first, our being called out of this evil world, or 
the rest of mankind, and by faith put into Christ, and thereby into a state of 
salvation, or the grace wherein we stand. This is everywhere in Scripture 
termed salvation, as in Eph. ii., ' By faith ye are saved,' even upon their 
first believing ; and ' by grace ye are saved.' Ye are at present, both from 
the wrath that is inevitably coming upon all the world of ungodly, and by 
havinfT the inheritance of eternal salvation (as to the jus, or right, or title to 
it) settled and established upon you ; but there being an interstition or space 
between this of the right and entering into the full enjoyment and posses- 
sion, there are therefore promises for perseverance, to keep and preserve you 
safe unto that possession, which is termed also salvation: 1 Pet. i., ' Being 
the end and final period of your faith, the salvation of your souls.' And 
unto this possession of salvation we are said to be ' kept by the power of 
God,' 1 Pet. i. 5 ; and to that end the promises are for perseverance : 1 Thes. 
V. 23, 24, ' And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly : and I pray God 
that vour whole spirit, and soul, and body, be preserved blameless unto the 
coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. Faithful is he that calleth you, who also 
will do it ;' as also, ' sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are under 
grace,' or in the covenant of grace ; and both these are promised together in 
the covenant of grace, as to ' give a new heart and a new spirit,' Jer. xxxi., 
whereby we are first wrought upon, so ' to put his fear within us, that we 
shall not depart from him.' In the succeeding chapter of the same pro- 
phet, Jer. xxxii. 40, ' I will make an everlasting covenant with them, that I 
will not turn away from them to do them good ; but I will put my fear in 
their hearts, that they shall not depart from me ;' and again, you have both 
together as parts of his covenant (as it is here called) Luke i. 60-72 ; whereof 
one main part is, ver. 74, 75, ' That he would grant unto us, that we, being 
delivered out of the hands of our enemies, might serve him without fear, in 
holiness and righteousness before him, all our days.' Now it is the first 
salvation that puts us into the state thereof in the right of it, which is Noah's 
first covenant, to be saved in the waters, which the apostle Peter makes the 
figure of our baptism. 

Now the promise to put us into the state of salvation in the whole right 
thereof, is that which answers to God's promise to Noah, to save him from 
and in the waters ; and it is the main and great promise of the two, and 
which the promise afterwards to keep us doth and necessarily first suppose 
to have existed. And this salvation we call initial salvation ; that of our 
being kept to persevere, and that sin shall never have dominion over us 
totally and finally, is but the continuation of us in that state of first salva- 
tion, until we come to the full possession, even as providence is of creation; 
' in them is continuance, and we shall be saved.' And God's estating us at 
first therein is the performance, of his covenant, and from out of the same 
grace out of which he after continues and preserves us in that estate ; and it 
is the whole covenant, for the performance of it, which God calls to remem- 
brance with himself, * the waters of Noah to me ;' and as a witness and attes- 
tation thereof, here produced unto us : so as we must either wholly cut off 



Chap. IV.] of election. 65 

that great first performance of it in calling us, as no way here intended, or 
we must take it into the figure, Noah's waters, here remembered upon occa- 
sion of it. These things in general. 

As for the particular analogies between Noah's first covenant for his sal- 
vation in the waters ; and this of our salvation at first. 

1. As that was made in order, Noah's first covenant, &c., so this initial 
salvation is also the first, and foundation for perseverance. 

2. We may be certain that our first initial salvation was typified out by 
Noah's first covenant ; for the Holy Ghost so applies it: 1 Pet. iii. 20, 21. 
Noah was saved in the waters, which is a figure of our baptism, which now 
saves us. Now baptism is first the sacrament which seals up initial salva- 
tion ; our being put into Christ, and born again ; and seals up the whole 
of salvation as in the right thereof unto us. And most pertinently doth the 
apostle make Noah's waters the figure ; for as Ainsworth* has fully, though 
briefly, expressed it : ' Noah was baptized into Christ's death, and burial (in 
the ark), but raised up again with him also.' 

And 3dly, How congruous a correspondency and affinity doth the first part 
of the covenant, for gathering his church at first, and calling them by grace, 
and their first being put into union with Christ (and this to do is certainly 
the performance of his covenant, and the first part thereof also) ; hold with 
both these, as the 7th verse doth utter it : * For a little moment have I for- 
saken thee ;' and left thee to thy natural darkness and deadness ; ' but wich 
great mercies will I gather thee.' This denotes his first, making of the Gen- 
tiles his church, and bringing of them unto, and uniting of them to his Son ; 
for the first and second verses tell us, that they had been barren, and had 
brought forth no children for a long time. And as it denotes their being 
gathered out of the world, so especially unto Christ, and their union with 
him. And under that word Jacob prophesied of him : Gen. xlix. 10, * Unto 
him shall the gathering be.' 

4. And how fitly doth Noah and his family, their being called out from 
the whole world, — ' Come thou, and all thy house, into the ark,' saith God, 
Gen. vii. 1, — yea, and the beasts, which bear the resemblance of the fore- 
gone state of the Gentiles that were newly gathering, made a church unto 
him, as I shall after shew ; gathered out of the rest, and by special 
instinct coming unto Noah, and into the ark. And how great a correspond- 
ency doth the working by God upon Noah's spirit upon the fore-belief of the 
flood (and he fearing the wrath of God therein, prepared the ark), hold with 
the work of conversion and gathering souls into Christ, whereby men ' save 
themselves from the rest of a froward generation,' asPeter's word i^, Acts ii., 
will afterwards be shewn in the uses. And though Noah was a godly man 
afore, yet that high dispensation of God's saving him in the ark was as new 
conversion to him, and bore the lively resemblance of a soul's first gathering 
to Christ. 

5. And, as upon his entering into the ark, there ensued storms and tem- 
pests, and rains from above, and waters from beneath, and this for some 
months, so tlie time of souls' first conversion and gathering into Christ, 
is usually accompanied with violent temptations, doubts whether in the state 
of grace or no ; fears at every cast that comes, lest they should be over- 
whelmed, split upon rocks, and. OTQrturned, by mountains ; which occasion- 
eth God to cry out in pity to them, . ' thou afflicted and tossed with tem- 
pest !' though viewing them in a safe condition in their ark, Christ. This 
Peter gives notice of to his converted brethren, 1st Epistle, chap, v., ver. 10, 
' The God of all grace, after you have sufi'ered awhile, make you perfect : 

* Ainsworth on the 16th verse of Genesis vii. 
VOL. IX. E 



66 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

stablisb, strengthen, settle you!' The suffering here is not chiefly those 
outward, of persecutions, for they were not freed from them all their days ; 
hut these were such as arose from the special malice of the devil, who is ' a 
roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour,' ver. 8. But these are such 
afflictions as they are settled against, and yet common, more or less, unto 
all converts throughout the world, ver. 9, after their conversion, and whilst 
they are weak : the issue of which is some better strength and rest unto 
their souls. 

These parallels you see between Noah and his first covenant and salva- 
tion, &c., and our first gathering, &c., in the 7th verse. 

As for the second part of the 9th verse, which contains the promise of 
preservation, and a security against the return of that curse of these waters 
any more, that this alludes unto Noah's second covenant, after he came out 
of the ark, as none can deny that reads the words ; so the parallel between 
them is more obvious, and that the scope thereof is to confirm us of the 
everlastingness of God's kindness that shall follow us all our days after con- 
version, which is promised, ver. 8. This I partly have shewed afore, and 
shall furthermore, in the explication of the words that follow that passage, in 
declaring and engaging an everlasting unchangeable kindness and mercy, and 
that by oath, against all such fears of sins in our hearts that threaten to over- 
flow again ; and that * sin should never have dominion over us, because we 
are under gi-ace.' This I need not largely insist upon. 

But instead of an enlargement that way, it will be more behoveful to 
answer some objections that may be made against this latter part, to have 
been intended as a type, but at all only brought in by God, as a mere allu- 
sion and bare similitude, by which God illustrates only and confirms the 
stability of his covenant of grace. 

And the objection is this. 

That that covenant wdth Noah, Gen. ix., was but a covenant of common 
providence, and the concerns thereof, as that summer and winter, day and 
night, should not cease ; yea, and was made with every living thing, as well 
as with Noah ; and answerably had but an outward natural sign to confirm 
it, the waters should no more destroy the earth ; and hath nothing to do 
with the covenant of grace, nor can be supposed to be a figure of that cove- 
nant under gospel times. 

For answer, 1. As to that, that it is but a providential promise of conti- 
nuance of the world from the judgment of waters any more ; outwardly it 
was no more ; but this hinders not from its being in the mystery a typical 
promise to Noah, and those of his seed elect that were to succeed, to signify 
the perpetuity of the covenant of grace to them, and that God would never 
sufl'er his loving-kindness to depart ; this, I say, no more hinders, than that 
that promise under that other former covenant to Noah, to preserve him and 
the beasts in the ark, should not be the covenant of grace (in the figure), as 
yet we have for certain heard out of Peter that it was ; for both were but for 
outward salvation in the letter. 

2. To that next part of the objection, that it was made with the very 
beasts. 

Nor doth this rationally prejudge it from bearing this figure. 

1. No more than that because the beasts and cattle came forth of Egypt 
with the Israelites, that therefore their redemption typified not forth redemp- 
tion by Christ. 

2. Nor no more, than that because the cattle drank of the rock, as well as 
the Israelites ; that, therefore, that rock was not Christ figuratively and 
sacramentally ; which yet the apostle expressly telleth us it was, 1 Cor. x. 



Chap. IV.] of election. 67 

Nor, 3dl3% was that covenant made primarily, or in a direct and principal 
respect, with the beasts, but with Noah and his sons ; and with the beasts 
but secondarily for his sake, and as appurtenances to man, and belonging to 
him ; otherwise they are not capable of a covenant, because no way to be 
made sensible of it ; and, therefore, but as an accidental appendix of man's 
charter, or lease granted, it is that they are put in. And, again, look as for 
man's sake the earth, and all things in it, were accursed. Gen. iii., and then 
they were destroyed for man's sake by this flood, as God professeth, Gen. 
vi. 6, 7 ; so, on the contrary, God declareth, that when he saw* those crea- 
tures in the ark, that it was for his sake ; and therefore this clause is twice 
added. Gen. vi. 19, 20, to keep them alive with thee ; that is, for thy sake. 
And in like manner it is said, Gen. ix. 1, 2, 3, ' And God blessed Noah and 
bis sons, and said unto them. Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the 
earth. And the fear of you, and the dread of you, shall be upon every beast 
of the earth, and upon every fowl of the air, upon all that moveth upon the 
earth, and upon all the fishes of the sea : into your hands are they delivered. 
Every moving thing that liveth shall be meat for you : even as the green 
herb have I given you all things.' So as it was to preserve mankind that 
these creatures were preserved, and that they might have subjects to have 
dominion over. 

4. Yet further; all the creatures may well be said to come under this our 
covenant by Christ ; for we profess and believe, not only that Christ, by 
his death, made a purchase of all, and by his sacrifice procured the standing 
of the world, in order to the elect for their good, and so their preservation 
comes to be included in the elects' covenant and promises ; but there is by 
Christ a liberty one day to be conferred upon the whole creation, in their 
being * delivered from the bondage of corruption, into the glorious liberty of 
the sons of God :' so as in their capacity they have a share in the privileges 
of the new world, that world to come, typified forth by Noah's new world, 
and promised upon his having offered his sacrifice, wherein he was Christ's 
type. So that this is so far from being an objection, that it serves, on the 
contrary, to render the analogy more complete. 

But as to this of the beasts and the rainbow, there is another notion yet 
to be cast in, of a figurative representation, that these beasts in the ark did 
hold with the elect themselves to be converted under the gospel, as will put 
a farther end to this or any other objection of this sort ; but I reserve it to 
a greater advantage, to bring it in the particular parallels between these of 
Noah's covenants and our covenant of grace. 



SECTION III. 

A more jmrticular explication, both of the phraseology, manner of speech, and 
matter in the 9th verse, confirming the foregoing interpretation. 

TJiis is, he says it of the promises he was speaking of, and of his covenant 
to his church, ver. 7, 8. 

But you will ask, how is it such promises, and the matter of them, should 
be called the waters of Noah ? 

The waters of Noah are in this first sentence metonymically used to signify 
all those passages at and about the flood, concerning Noah's salvation, 
figuratively applied to promises of God's covenant ; it being usual in all 
languages, by mentioning one circumstance or eminent occuiTence, as the 

*■ Qu. ' saved ' '? — Ed. 



68 OP ELECTION. [Book I. 

day or the place whereon or wherein such memorable things were done or 
spoken, to denote the things or facts done on that day or place, together 
with that eminent occurrence ; as when it is said, ' The day of provocation 
in the wilderness,' it serves to mind and notify all the singular provocations 
of that day or time ; so in like manner, as when our Saviour said, ' The days 
of Noah,' he intends thereby to notify the things done in those days. Mat. 
xxiv. 37 and 38 verses compared. In like manner, by * the days of Lot,' Luke 
xvii. 28, he intends to notify the things then done : ' They did eat, they did 
drink,' says he, * they bought, they sold, they planted, they builded,' &c. 
In like manner it is usual to mention some one eminent occurrence instead 
of all the rest, to hint all the rest that were at the same time acted together 
with it or that belonged thereto. Thus here, ' the waters of Noah ; ' that is, 
all the occurrences, passages then, or things done ; and the remembrance of 
those things being so like, yea, in many things the same, occasioneth him in 
the midst of his declaration of those promises of grace to cry out, * This is 
the waters of Noah to me,' the very same I did then. 

Now the things that were then done at those waters, were an uttering a 
covenant by God for Noah's salvation in those waters ; likewise God's 
secret purposes and intendments, then only known to himself, by those 
transactions with Noah as in a type did fore-signify his like gracious pur- 
poses towards his church, which he utters and declares ; also Noah, his 
tossing and trials in the waters, and God's remembrance of him then in the 
midst of them. 

And thus, in saying * this is the waters of Noah to me,' it is as if God had 
there said, the promises and covenant I have but now declared towards my 
church make me call to mind what I said to Noah at the flood, when the 
waters w^ould have destroyed him ; and also to remember what my grace, 
my intentions, purposes, my affections, my heart was then, and at that 
time ; and those my transactions with him then, I intended, and aimed to 
prefigure, and portray out these my like gracious purposes to my church, to 
come out of his loins, which I meant in after ages and in due time to 
declare and open the mystery of ; and accordingly I now upon this occasion 
do declare it in my prophet Isaiah : ' This is the waters of Noah to me ; ' I 
then had them all in contemplation afore ; I had all my elect church to come 
in my view ; all my promises of grace, all my promises of salvation were 
afore me then ; I intended them all in the figure and type of Noah's salva- 
tion, and of his sons ; and when the time of the accomplishment shall come, 
I shall further and more amply declare this to have been in my heart and 
design by my apostles. 

To me. There is a great deal of emphasis in that adjection, and serves 
for confirmation of these things which have now been spoken. 

1. It imports that God so looked at it, and intended it as such. A man 
useth to say of a thing that we account to be such and such, it is so to me : 
' To us there is but one God,' &e., says the apostle in the name of Christians, 
so we judge and believe; these waters were my covenant; so it stood in my 
thoughts, and so it should stand in yours. 

2. It imports that a thing is privately and secretly, and within one's breast, 
so or so intended and esteemed. It is to me, who am privy to my own 
intentions ; so to God, between God and himself. And this imports the 
next sentence suggested, * For as I have sworn, the waters of Noah shall no 
more go over the earth.' Now, look over all that story in Genesis, then 
over the whole book of the Old Testament, and you find not the least inti- 
mation of an oath which God had taken about this matter. And if God 
bad kept his own counsel, we could never have challenged him with this 



Chap. IY.] of election. "^ 

parallel of an oath to both his covenant and ours ; his intentions therein 
were known only to himself ; but himself knowing his own mind utters it 
here ; for it is to me that the waters of Noah are my covenant of grace. 

3. Lastly, This to me imports God's acknowledging himself obliged to 
fulfil his covenant of grace to the elect; for though none did know this to have 
been his intentions in it, yet it was enough for him, within himself to have 
intended it so. And it is enough to us for him to say, ' This is to me the waters 
of Noah ; ' and as I performed that then, so I hold myself obliged now. 
My own purposes had then, are my bonds between me and myself ; and I 
can no more alter my purposes in it than I did recall my covenant made 
to Noah then, when I made it. 

This being the true intent and meaning of these words ; further, as for 
the form of speech itself, to say of the promises of his covenant of grace, 
' This is the waters of Noah ; ' this form or manner of speech is usual. As, 

1. When we would parallel two things that are alike, we use to say, this 
is such or such a thing, namely, to which it is like. Thus Christ speaks of 
John Baptist : Mat. xi. 15, * This is Elias ; ' he speaks it of John in coher- 
ency with ver. 13. And why, but because he was such another man in his 
course of life, zeal, office, and way of ministry as Elias was, and Hving in 
hke corrupt and depraved times ; as the angels described him, and foretold 
against his birth : Luke i. 17, * In the power and spirit of Elias, to turn the 
disobedient to the wisdom of the just.' Thus here, God paralleling his 
covenant with Noah, &c., with that to his elect church, and upon the remem- 
brance of the likeness and sameness, says, ' This is the waters of Noah.' Even 
as Christ calls Jonah's being in the whale's belly three days and three nights, 
' the sign of Jonah ; ' that is, of being in the grave, and rising then up again. 

2. But specially this is and may be used when one thing is the prophetic 
figure, type, or sign of another, that they are mutually and indifferently 
named the one the other, ' That rock was Christ,' the figure hath the name 
of Christ that was intended and prefigured in it, 1 Cor. x. 2. And vice versa, 
or on the other wav, * Christ our passover is sacrificed for us,' 1 Cor. v. 7. 
There Christ, the thing prefigured, is styled the figure ; and in this case it 
is not by way of simple metaphor, in that the things are like one the other, 
but there is this further special foundation for it, that when one thing is 
intended for the type of another it is all one, and to be a fore-running pro- 
phecy of the other, which must therefore necessarily be fulfilled, and come 
to pass. If Adam be the type or figure of Christ, then what follows, but as 
the apostle argues it, that Christ is 'he that is to come'^? Rom. v. 14. 
Adam, says he, was 'the figure of him that was to come.' And so the 
things prefigured by any type must of necessity be things to come, and to 
come to pass ; for they are prophecies, and prophecies must have their 
accomplishment. 

And in this case, the figure and thing figured do both bear the same name ; 
therefore Christ being the prefigured, in and by the ' first Adam,' is termed 
the ' last Adam,' 1 Cor. xv. But you shall find the very same^ form of 
speech used, and the same indigitation made in the like case. Gal. iv., when 
the apostle would prove the different conditions of two sorts of persons, into 
one of which all mankind do fall, namely, either to be under the covenant of 
works, or the law, or of grace, that is, the gospel ; having for the proof of 
these (for types rightly applied are argumentative) alleged how Abraham 
had two sons, the one by a bond woman, the other by a free woman, and 
dilated thereupon, he claps his hand down upon it, and with the like indigi- 
tation cries, ' For these are the two covenants ;' teiTning the intended types 
or figures under the Old, by the name of the substance, or things signified 



70 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

under the New. So in like manner, Rev. xi. 4, of the two witnesses under 
the New Testament, typified out by Zechariah's two olive-trees under the 
Old : * These are the olive trees,' &c. Again, Eph. v., when the apostle 
had related the passages at Adam and Eve's marriage as they are found in 
Genesis, of a man's being 'joined to his wife, and they two being one flesh,' 
he in a like form of speech, quasi digito monstrans, instantly subjoins, ' this 
is a great mystery,' as being intended of Christ and his church. God in his 
secret intention had that aim in it. So here, whilst God had begun to 
express his loving-kindness, and was going on to do it, he as it were, 
suddenly struck with the remembrance of it, claps down his hand, ' This is 
the waters of Noah to me.' This ; there is indeed this difference, that 
whereas in that of Adam's marriage he takes, as I may say, his finger off 
from his relating the thing signifying, and lays it upon the thing signified : 
* This is a great mystery ; ' but here, vice versa, on the contrary, as Jacob his 
hands, he takes off his speech from the thing signified (namely, his covenant 
of grace), and lays it upon the thing signifying : ' This is no other than the 
waters of Noah.' But it is all one (as I observed) for the thing figured to be 
denominated by the name of the figure, as e contra, the figure by the title of the 
thing figured. And so the paraphrase upon the words may run thus, as if 
God had said : In the passages of the waters of Noah I was a-drawing a 
model, a shadow of what I meant to form up, and make a substance and 
reality of in after ages, in my covenant of grace. 

This to be the import of that weighty addition, to me, the paraphrase of 
some doth concur in. Tale quid concejn apud me. I was in my thoughts con- 
ceiving, and forming such a like thing within myself : that is, whilst I was 
making those transactions with Noah. Others thus : Videor mihi esse in 
diehus Noe ; that is, whilst I am declaring, and speaking, talking of, and 
resolving to perform my covenant of grace, I think with myself, I am at the 
flood, as in the days of Noah ; and doing the same things over again, which 
I did then about Noah's salvation, and with the same heart, and out of the 
same gracious resolutions ; and being privy to his own intentions, he tells 
us plainly, ' This to me was the waters of Noah.' And now I utter my 
secret purposes therein, that were as then private to myself. 



: SECTION lY. 

So7ne special particular parallels betiveen. what is found in Noah's covenant 
and the covenant of grace, 

1. Absoluteness; which, how, and what it will appear by comparing 
things with things spoken of in that history, and the order of their being 
spoken of first in chapter vi. When God's counsel or intention within him- 
self about saving Noah and destroying the world is held, and there laid open, 
God's grace towards him is in the first place solely and abstractly mentioned 
as the cause thereof, whilst no mention at all, not the least, is made of Noah 
his holiness as mingled therewith ; as for which, and upon which, God did 
cast that grace upon him, in ver. 8, ' But Noah found grace in the eyes of 
the Lord.' But pure and unmixed grace, which* works, by being alone 
mentioned, is made the total and only cause of that matter : ver. 8, ' But 
Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord.' And then, indeed, in the story 
of his generation which follows, ver. 9, &c., there comes to be recorded 
Noah's holiness, ' These are the generations of Noah : Noah was a just man, 
» Qu. 'without'?— Ed. 



Chap. IV. J of election. 71 

and perfect in liis generations, and Noah walked with God.' So as Noah's 
personal righteousness follows as the effect of that grace which God bore to 
his person, and is no way connected with that grace, as that for which God 
cast that grace upon him. He was first found the object of God's grace and 
favour, and not grace first found in him ; thereby plainly to insinuate, that 
for no righteousness in him it was that God did first absolutely pitch his 
grace upon him, abstractly from the consideration of his holiness, and that 
was the fruit of that grace of God's ; as was also the case of the blessed 
virgiu, ' Oh thou that art graciously accepted or graced.' That thou of all 
other women shouldest be the mother of the Messiah, the Son of God, says 
the angel, Luke i. 28, 32. To be sure this privilege could by no worthi- 
ness in herself come to be bestowed upon her, so nor this of Noah.* Nor 
is anything of his inserted as a condition of that grace. Again, at the 18th 
verse, * But with thee will I stablish my covenant.' Hence again, there is 
no mention of condition on Noah's part, but only of what God by covenant 
would do on his ; and therefore absolutely declareth himself, that he not 
only makes a covenant, but establisheth it ; and under this word undertakes 
to perform it, and bring it to a full perfection, so as whatever should be neces- 
sary and requisite on Noah's part, God at once undertakes to work in him 
as part of his own covenant. If you read over the whole covenant of grace, 
as it is prophesied of by Jeremiah, chap, xxxi., and quoted by the apostle, 
Heb. viii., you will find that all that is requisite to salvation on man's part, 
God undertakes to work it in them, and causeth efi'ectually their hearts to 
concur therein. 

But it may be said (which also the Romanists object), that in chap. vii. 1, 
when God did put Noah into the ark, he said, ' Come thou into the ark : for 
thee have I seen righteous afore me in this generation.' 

I answer, That the performance of promises, when they are to come to 
execution, do require such and such qualifications in the persons to whom 
they are performed, when yet the decree and purpose of those promises, and 
the making of those promises, depend wholly and immediately upon God's 
grace as the spring and fountain of them. Thus heaven and glory, as they 
are in God's purpose designed, are merely of grace, when yet God executively 
bestows them not, nor brings us to salvation [but] by and through faith and 
holiness. As 2 Thes. ii. 13, * God hath chosen you to salvation, through 
sanctification of the Spirit, and belief of the truth.' Now, observe how this 
was spoken of Noah, when the thing came to be done, and he was to set his 
foot into the ark. And it comes in order after the declaration which God's 
grace utters of his counsel and purpose, which we read in the aforesaid 
chapter vi. 8, 18. God considered not Noah's being first righteous ere he 
did cast his gi'ace upon him, and thereupon did it. The like language unto 
this of God's to Noah will Christ use to his saints when they are at latter 
day to enter into heaven, but shewing w^ithal how his grace hath put a differ- 
ence between them and others, and had made them meet for that inheritance : 
Mat. XXV. 34, 35, ' Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom 
prepared for you from the foundation of the world : for I was an hungered, 
and ye gave me meat : I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink : I was a 
stranger, and ye took me in.' So first, and it imports God the Father's 
first choosing of them to have been the cause of all they inherit. 

For any man to interpret the absoluteness of the covenant to be that God 
saves men absolutely without any requisite qualifications wrought in them, is 
manifestly to cast a reproach upon the grace of God itself in the doctrine of 

+ Hoc enira habent a gratia, qua Deo fuerunt accepti, priusquam aliquid ab iis 
acceptaret. — Kivet. in locum. 



72 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

it. "^IMiilst it is professed that his grace covenanteth to work in them, and 
accordingly worketh both the will and the deed, according to his good plea- 
sure, where he means to save, and never saved any without they be wrought 
in them ; nor doth that doctrine (if not perverted by men's presumptuous- 
ness) encourage men to use no endeavours, because God covenants to work 
all ; for God, when he will save, setteth men's will a-work to use all endea- 
vours in a subordination to his grace ; as in that exhortation you find it, 
' Work out your salvation ; for it is God works the will and the deed,' yet 
still, ' according to his good pleasure.' And this absoluteness of electing 
grace the apostle sets forth, Eom. ix., ' It is not of him that wills, nor of 
him that runs,' that useth means and endeavours, ' but of God that sheweth 
mercy.' Yet without men's willing and running (such as wherewith souls 
trust not therein, or think to obtain by their endeavours), God that sheweth 
mercy saveth no man ; yea, shews his mercy in causing so to will and to 
run as to obtain. 'According to his abundant mercy he begetteth us,' 
1 Peter i. 8. He shews the mercy in working that ; and being savingly 
wrought on, keeps us through the same mercy ; so says my text here in 
Isaiah, * My kindness shall not depart from thee, nor the covenant of my 
peace be removed, saith the Lord that hath mercy on thee.' 

Nor indeed are those we call conditions of the covenant on our part, as 
believing on Christ, turning from sin, other than necessary means of being 
made partakers of Christ and salvation. As if one should say to an hungry 
man, there is meat which shall be yours, to live by it, if you Vill eat it and 
digest it, else not. In this case, who will say this is barely a condition, for 
it is the very partaking of the meat itself whereby a man makes it his own. 
So for a father to say to one he bestows his daughter upon in marriage, Lo, 
she is youi' wife, take her and marry her. This is not a condition of her 
being his wife, as external to it, but it is that very intrinsecal and essential 
act whereby she becomes his, and he her husband. Take the instance in 
hind. Noah's preparing the ark, and his entering into it to be saved, are 
not so properly to be styled conditions which God took from him, and so 
thereupon to save him, but they were necessary means for Noah to save 
himself; yea, his entering into the ark and abiding therein (whereunto the 
act of our faith on Christ answereth) was his salvation itself. God himself 
says to him, ' Come, enter thou,' Gen. vii. 1, and he was safe and saved by 
so doing. Unto which that of Christ's answers, * Whoever sees the Son, 
and comes to him,' John vi. 35 ; 'And he that cometh I will raise up at 
the latter day,' ver. 37, which is interpreted, 'he that believeth,' ver. 
40, 44, 45. All Noah's holiness would not have saved him from the waters, 
but his being in the ark saved him from the waters. And that salvation as 
so considered, is that which bears the figure of our salvation. And when he 
was in the ark all the while, although his meat and drink kept his bodily 
spirits alive as a man, yet his salvation, considered as it was a salvation in 
the waters and from the flood, was his being in the ark ; and that salvation, 
precisely as such, is that which is in the figure. This for the first absolute- 
ness of this grace and covenant. 

2. The second parallel is the everlasting stability, sureness, fixedness, and 
constancy of the grace of the covenant, which, ver. 8, is termed, 'everlasting 
kindness ; ' and the covenant itself as unmoveable as are the mountains ; 
* Then may the covenant of my peace be removed,' ver. 10, and this signi- 
fied by the stability of Noah's covenants, both first and second. And there- 
fore the word, 'I will establish my covenant,' is used of the first. Gen. 
vi. 18, and of the second, Gen. ix. 11. And the same word is repeated 
here in Isa. liv., ' In righteousness shall be established,' ver. 14. And to 



Chap. IV.] of election. 73 

typify forth this stability of the covenant did Noah's second covenant in a 
special manner serve ; and therefore the very words thereof are to this very- 
purpose rehearsed in this verse of my text. And to this very purpose I 
shewed how many of the words and passages thereof are referred unto and 
transposed into the grand charter of the covenant of grace, to confirm the 
perpetuity thereof, as in three several chapters set together of Jeremiah you 
find them, which I must remit the reader unto. And for this purpose it is 
that God produceth his oath in the text, as that which he professeth to have 
intended in this covenant with Noah, ' As I have sworn,' &c. ^ And the like 
parallel oath, in correspondency thereunto, he afiixeth to his covenant of 
grace here, * So have I sworn I will not be wroth with thee ; ' that is, with 
a wrath to destruction ; even as he had sworn ' the waters of Noah should 
no more go over the earth to destroy it.' And an oath, we know, is immut- 
able, as Heb. vi. 18. Yea, moreover, God professeth himself resolute and 
peremptory in it, concluding, ' Thus saith the Lord that hath mercy on 
thee ; ' that is, that God who is set in his heart, and purposes to exercise 
nothing else but mercy towards thee, even as God, to express his peremptori- 
ness in shewing mercy to Moses, ' I will be merciful to whom I will be merci- 
ful.' And truly there is this considerable about God's alleging his oath to 
Noah, that if God had not said that he intended an oath, in that he intended 
an oath in that his covenant with Noah, we could never have challenged him 
of it if he had kept his own counsel. For read the whole story there, and 
there is no mention of an oath, or any words that tend that way, only that 
God should have said in his heart, * I will not curse the ground any more,' 
Gen. viii. 21. But God was privy to his own intention, and so upon this 
occasion declares it ; and his manner of speaking here secretly imports it, 
* This is the waters of Noah to me ; ' that is, between me and myself, who 
knew my own intentions. 

But you will say, will not men's sins break this covenant, though God 
will not ? 

I answer, They would infallibly break between God and us, if God should 
not take order to keep us from such ways of sinning as would bring ever- 
lasting wrath upon us. Promissis se curaturum (saith Piscator well). He 
will have a watchful eye and powerful hand to prevent such sinnings. As 
upon occasion of his like oath to the perpetuity of his covenant of grace, he 
declares to David, in Ps. Ixxxix. 30-32, ' If his children forsake my law, and 
walk not in my judgments ; if they break my statutes, and keep not my 
commandments ; then will I visit their transgressions with the rod, and their 
iniquity with stripes.' And by those chastisements I will reduce them 
again. But, as ver. 34, ♦ My covenant will I not break, nor alter the thing 
that is gone out of my lips.' And that God had all our sins before him, and 
well considered what they would be, when he takes this deliberate oath, the 
very parallel instance (afore us) of what is inserted by God in Noah's cove- 
nant, may inform us. The words in Gen. viii. 21 are, ' God said in his 
heart, I will not curse the ground any more for man's sake ; for the imagination 
of man's heart is evil from his youth : neither will I again smite any more 
every living thing, as I have done.' Thus the oath in the figure speaks. 
And that which answers it in the covenant of grace is, that God foresees 
what our sins will be ; and yet he knows what he hath to do, obliges him- 
self with a non obstante, thus everlastingly to save us ; for he views them afore- 
hand, and takes care they shall not be such that he should be everlastingly 
wroth with us; * He knows our frame,' as Ps. ciii., and considers it to be 
merciful to us, and nevertheless goes on to establish this covenant with us. 
This for the stability of his covenant. 



74 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

3. A third parallel is, that God hath made and confirmed his covenant of 
grace sure and stable, and in and through the sacrifice of Christ the Mediator. 
Covenants, we know, were wont to be made with sacrifice, Ps. 1. 5. Now 
God's covenant on his part was to be ratified, Heb. ix. 18-20. And when 
God's covenant is in this 9th verse styled ' the covenant of his peace,' it 
imports as much as, not of grace simply, but of peace ; as of God being 
pacified by an atonement of a mediator. And the aspect this word ^jeace 
may seem to have here unto what in the chapter afore had foregone, where 
the sacrifice of Christ being prophesied of, it is said, ' He was bruised for 
our iniquities, and the chastisement of our peace-' was upon him ; ' through 
which, God being pacified towards us, makes a covenant of peace with us. 
Now as Christ is styled our peace, Eph. ii., and so it being made by him, 
through the appointment of the Father, it is called by God the covenant of 
his peace : Col. i. 20, ' It pleaseth the Father, that Christ, having made 
peace by the blood of his cross, to reconcile to himself,' &c. And in this 
respect the parallels fall most fitly between that covenant. Gen. ix., made 
with Noah, a figure of God's with us. It is worth our comparing the one 
with the other ; for not only, de facto , it is found to have been so, that ere 
God established his covenant with Noah, when come forth of the ark, he 
ofi'ered burnt- ofl'erings on the altar to God, and that God was well pleased 
therewith: Gen. viii. 20, 21, ' The Lord smelled a sweet savour,' a savour 
of rest, as in the Hebrew, that is, of peace ; ' and said in his heart, &c., he 
would curse the earth no more,' and thereupon established that covenant 
that follows. And that Noah, the father of that new world to come, was 
herein a type of Christ, and that this sacrifice of his was the type of Christ's 
sacrifice, we all acknowledge from the warrant of that allusion, and same- 
ness of language the apostle useth of Christ's sacrifice that had been uttered 
of this of Noah : Eph. v. 2, ' Christ gave himself for us an offering, a 
sacrifice to God, for a sweet smelling savour,' which I insisted upon afore. 
But it may further be noticed, how that he makes the parallel yet more con- 
spicuous, and as setly designed, by comparing the order and coherences of 
this 54th chapter of Isaiah with the foregone chapter, the 53d. That that 
chapter treats of Christ's sacrifice, and then this 54th chapter, and also the 
55th and 56th chapters, do treat of the covenant of grace, the covenant fol- 
lowing thereupon. And they succeed each other in the very same imme- 
diate coherence that Noah his sacrifice and covenant did one the other in 
those two fore-mentioned chapters in Genesis. For look, as in the latter 
part of that 8th chapter he relates the story of Noah's sacrifice, that then in 
the 9th chapter he records that covenant thereupon, just answerably in 
Isaiah, after he had in the foregoing 53d chapter foretold Christ's great 
sacrifice of himself: 'Bearing our sins and sorrows, making his soul an 
ofi'ering for sin,' with promise that 'many should be justified thereof; and 
he should see his seed,' &c. Immediately after this he subjoins, how upon 
this sacrifice God covenants to rear up a new Christian church (of which the 
next branch is to treat), and estabhsheth this covenant therewith under this 
very figure of the waters of Noah. And as no prophecy speaks more fully 
and clearly of Christ's sacrifice than that 53d chapter of Isaiah, so nor none 
more perspicuously and evangelically of the gospel covenant than the 54th 
chapter, and the two other that follow. And in the 55th chapter, the 5th 
verse, this covenant is called ' the sure mercies of David,' that is, of Christ, 
having purchased them for us by his death, and by rising again having 
applied them to us. 

* As Mr Gataker, English Annot., rather ' My covenant of peace,' Ezek. xxxiv. 25, 
and xxxvii. 26, that is, of reconcilement to thee. 



Chap. IV.] of election. 75 

4. The fourth parallel is, the tenderness of God's mercies to his elect, 
whom he takes into his covenant, in all these distresses and extremities. 
This is by the parallel of Noah's story set forth to us ; for what can be sup- 
posed more sympathising with his people, or argues a deeper sense and 
sounding of bowels, than to hear God, in the midst of their afflictions and 
temptations, cry out on the sudden, and with the greatest vehemency, ' 
thou afllicted, and tossed with tempests, and not comforted ! ' There is no 
speech or passage which we find our God to utter in Scripture more pathetic 
or passionate than this ; and yet you see (as before I touched) it is repre- 
sented under a perfect allusion to and compassionate remembrance that 
God's heart still had retained of Noah whilst in the ark, floating in those 
waves and horrible tempests, which coming in immediately with coherence 
with the remembrance of Noah's waters, ' This is the waters of Noah,' &c., 
in verse 9, as a remembrance of his covenant with his people, could not have 
been more probably carried over to any other similitude or allusion in Scrip- 
ture whatsoever, suppose this coherence had not been ; but for the pertinency 
of it, I shewed before what remembrance God had of Noah whilst in the ark, 
Gen. viii. 1. And if Noah's instance had not been alluded to, I appeal to 
any what exemplification they can find to set out to the life the sympathis- 
ings of a condoling heart of another in misery like unto it, nor could the 
movings of God's bowels have been more elegantly uttered. Methinks it is 
as if the dearest friend, or most loving husband or father, having his dearest 
relations of wife, and children, and friends in a ship at sea, and viewing them 
to sit within the rage of wild waves and winds, which he, standing himself 
safe on the immediate shore, sees and beholds with his own eyes, and at 
every bending of the ship near to a suppression under those waves, his heart 
beats, and he lamentably cries out at every toss and motion, and thinks with 
himself, how must their hearts be afflicted, and not comforted in the midst 
of all, that are shiftless and helpless in this storm, and know not what to do ! 
Like to such an one doth God express his aff'ection here. 

5. As touching the eminent subject of this new covenant, and of election 
of grace, that is, the persons to be saved, or that church this covenant is 
established withal, our comparing together what is prophesied thereof in this 
54th chapter of Isaiah, and the prefigurations thereof in Noah's ark and 
story, and his own prophecies given out about it, will afibrd another (if I 
may not call it a parallel, yet) concordant harmony, yea, identity, to be the 
same in both. 

Who and what that church should be, is lively set forth in Noah's story, 
under a double notion or consideration of them. 

(1.) Of their persons, whom that church should specially be made up of. 

(2.) In respect of their condition, viz. all sorts of sinners. 

(1.) For the first, this 54th chapter of Isaiah informs us, that the church 
which God applies all these promises unto, and intends all these his com- 
forts to, was the Christian church of the new testament, which was to rise 
up soon after Christ's death (which many other prophecies had foretold), and 
in a special manner the coherence of the 53d chapter, and this 54th chapter, 
shews ; this also (as it served afore for the former purpose, so now for this) 
you have in chapter liii., the most renowned of all other records in the Old 
Testament, prophesying of Christ's death, and therein a promise as his pur- 
chase and reward: ver. 10, ♦ Thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin ; he 
shall see his seed,' &c. And as in the event it proved, that soon after Christ's 
death a new Christian church began to be reared, so in order follows next 
in the prophet a prophecy of that church ; for immediately upon it, in chapter 
liv., fi'om the first verse and so on, succeeds this church, as therefi'om exist- 



76 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

ing, which was to he both his seed and spouse, — * Thy Maker is thy hus- 
band,' — and children to be brought forth to him. See the first verse: 
* Sing, barren, [that didst notj bear; and cry aloud, thou that didst not 
travail with child : for more are the children of the desolate, than the 
children of the married wife.' Here is a former wife-mother spoken of, and 
here is a new wife (that formerly had been barren and desolate), and a new 
seed, or children more numerous than those by the former wife, and these 
are manifestly discriminated, the one from the other; and it is to this new 
spouse that God applies this his oath of Noah's covenant and waters, which 
is nowhere else to any such purpose at all mentioned in all the Old Testa- 
ment. Well, but who is this barren woman, this anew received spouse ? 
Let us hear the apostle's intei-pretation of it, who those are whom he applies 
it unto: Gal. iv. 25, 'Jerusalem that now is.' He speaks of that Judaical 
church under the name of the mother city, which then was existing, and as 
not yet destroyed, when he wrote this epistle. And this church, the old wife 
would needs hold up in opposition to that new church and wife; that frame 
and form of worship of the old testament, though she kept thereby herself and 
her children still in bondage, as it is there ; but there is (says he) ' another 
Jerusalem, which is above, and is free, the mother of us all;' which new 
Jerusalem was noic, under the new testament, declared to be the mother of 
us all, the venter of a new generation. To prove which, he citeth this very 
place, Isa. liv. 1, as a prophecy thereof: * Kejoice, barren,' &c. So, 
then, here is a new church this chapter of Isaiah concerns, and an old one 
which it is severed from. 

And it will not be a block in the way of the application of this scripture, 
which I shall drive at (which is, that the new church out of the Gentiles is 
principally aimed at), whether the Christians of the Jewish nation, and the 
churches at Jerusalem and Judea be understood, and taken in to have made 
up, during those gospel times, part of this new church. Although there 
is this against that in that very chapter, that the church he now foretells he 
would anew assume, the wife he had cast off, [he] would cast off no more after 
he had received her, whereas he hath cast off the Jewish nation from having 
children by her, or out of her, for these fourteen hundred years. She was 
in a manner cut off in Paul's time, whereas out of the Gentiles he hath con- 
tinued a numerous church to this day. It matters not, I say ; for the chil- 
dren out of the Jewish nation then (though the first gospel fruits), were but 
a few in comparison to those the Gentiles have brought forth to God, and 
soon became barren again. 

And yet it will not be enough for the full completing my drift, that this 
new wife, the church under the new, is that which is prophesied of here by 
Isaiah, unless in the next place I also shew that this was either typified or 
prophesied of Noah's story, that we may say of it, ' This is the waters of 
Noah,' &c. 

[1.] In the general, the allusion from thence will hold, that Noah and his 
sons were ordained by God to be the founders and beginners of a new world ; 
as we use to say, they began the world anew. Thus in the letter they were, 
which Peter's phrase insinuates, whilst he calls that afore Noah's times 'the 
world that then was.' And answerably thereunto, the times of Christ and 
his apostles are styled, in the current language of the New Testament, stilo 
novo, to have begun a new world. Thus Christ speaks, ' the kingdom of 
heaven is at hand ;' and as a new sera or account, the gospel times are called 
' the last days ;' so the apostles ; and ' the world to come,' saith Paul, Heb. ii., 
which did then begin ; for it is set in opposition to the time of the law given 
by the angels, ver. 2 ; and so of the Jewish state. The analogy holds thus 



Chap. IV.] of election. 77 

between them, that look as when in the old world, * all flesh had corrupted 
their way,' as Gen. vi. 11, 12, and among the Jews, religion being afore so 
corrupted, and among the Gentiles, ' God having sufiered in times past all 
nations to walk in their own ways,' Acts xvii. 16, 'After dumb idols as they 
were led,' 1 Cor. xii. 1, that then God raised up this new gospel church as 
a new world (the time of which is called ' the time of the reformation,' or 
change of the old, Heb. ix.), — the saints and churches you read of in the 
epistles superscribed unto them, to the Romans, Corinthians, Galatians, 
Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, and the Hebrews. Thus in general for 
the type, but, 

[2.] Furthermore, when Noah came forth of the ark to begin this new 
world, he falls a-prophesying, and prophesies after that second covenant 
made with him of this same new church : Gen. ix. 27, * God shall enlarge 
Japhet to dwell in the tents of Shem,' which was when the Gentiles were 
converted. And now let us return again to Isaiah, and see whether he doth 
now also prophesy in a language conform to this of Noah's, as if he had re- 
newed but Noah's old prophecy, as intended of this new church. Read on 
the next two verses of that chapter: * Enlarge the place of thy tent, and let 
them stretch forth the curtains of thy habitations : spare not, lengthen thy 
cords, strengthen thy stakes, for thou shalt break forth on the right hand, 
and on the left; and thy seed shall inherit the Gentiles, and make the desolate 
cities to be inhabited ;' which repeats but the punctual fulfilling of that pro- 
phecy of Noah in Japhet's seed, under the same language of enlarr/ing Japhet 
there, and enlarge thy tents here, and of dwelling in the tents of Shem there, 
through the efficacious persuasion of the word that went out of Sion and from 
Jerusalem in the apostles' ministry. For after this Moses, the relator of 
these things, setting down who were the sons of Japhet in chapter x. verses 
2-4, in the 5th verse he shews what parts of the world their allotment 
was : ' By these were the isles of the Gentiles divided in their lands, every 
one after his tongue, after their families, in their nations. Now, we may 
know that those isles of the Gentiles are those of Europe, the Grecians, 
Germans, Britains, &c. ; and so called by a special denomination, Europe 
abounding with islands more than Asia or Africa by far. And we find 
among the heathen records that they styled themselves Japeti genus, the 
seed of Japhet. You, brethren, even you, are a portion of that seed, 
Japetians all ; and whose forefathers have been persuaded to dwell in the 
tents of Shem, and the gospel is amongst you to this day; you are, with 
other nations, the church in all these prophecies pointed at, and children of 
this covenant, which hath taken hold of many of you. And we have heard 
with our ears, and our eyes have seen it, the fulfilling of that which follows 
in that 13th verse of this chapter: ' Your seed shall inherit the Gentiles, and 
make the desolate cities to be inhabited.' 

This as to the persons, or what generation of men, simply considered. 

(2.) For the condition of the persons this new church was to consist of, it 
had a representation made for it to prefigure that, namely, they should be 
sinners of all sorts that the worst of nations in the world brought forth, 
according to the several kinds of their degeneratings and profaneness. I 
must now again retrieve that objection which I before have made, namely, 
that there were all sorts of beasts, and fowls, and creeping things in the ark, 
which were saved from the waters, in a corporeal salvation, as well as Noah 
and his sons ; yea, and with whom, after Noah and they came forth of the 
ark, that second covenant was made. And the objection is, that therefore 
this covenant cannot be drawn into a figure of the gospel covenant with the 
church, his elect. 



78 OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

Besides those answers then given, I then made a reservation of one for 
this place, and I have now on purpose proposed the objection anew, to 
usher in this new parallel that is now to follow, from what the very beasts 
prefigured. We read, Acts x. 11, 12, how in the first beginning of the 
gospel, or of this new Christian church (as Peter speaks of it. Acts xv.), 
there was a vessel let down from heaven in a vision to Peter, wherein were 
* all manner of four-footed beasts in the earth : wild beasts, and creeping 
things, and fowls of the air.' And the interpretation of this to Peter was, 
that the catholic church under the new testament should consist as of men 
from out of all nations of Noah's seed, whether clean or unclean, Jew or 
Gentile, who should now be converted to the faith of Christ ; and that this 
was signified unto Peter by all these sorts of creatures. Now, bring this to 
Noah's ark and covenant. Genesis 7th and 9th chapters, the ancients (as 
Austin*) readily understood the coming in of all nations under the gospel 
into the church to have been prefigured thereby. And how usual it is 
Scripture to set out the several sorts of wicked men under the similitude of 

beasts as Herod by a fox, Nero by a Hon, the circumcision by dogs — needs 

not be enlarcred upon. I may therefore apply what God doth in Ezekiel 
touching his people, whom he had represented under the figure of sheep 
throughout chapter xxxiv. He in the last verse, by way of exposition of 
that parable, ' The flock of my pasture are men,' says he ; so, on the con- 
trary, I may say, these beasts are men, the wickedest of men, and all kind 
of sinners of them. And truly when I consider how much that one alone 
in the Acts answers to the other in Genesis, and find in comparing both 
places the very same enumeration as to the kinds of these in both places, to 
be these generals, ' fowls of the air, beasts, and creeping things,' and how 
< some of every sort' of these, are in both places pointed at, I could not 
reject this as a mere phantasm of man's imagination, it having so far the 
name of a scripture for its warrant, as by this comparing these scriptures 
together doth appear. 

Obj. And whereas it may again be objected, that the covenant. Gen. ix., is 
made with Noah and his sons and their seed distinctly, and apart from that 
of the beasts and all living things ; and so the figure of these beasts cannot 
be brought into this account. 

Ans. The answer is, that what some part of a type doth not serve to reach, 
that another shall ; types are but imperfect shadows, and therefore are so 
formed as one to represent one piece of the substance to be shadowed out 
under one resemblance, and another piece, or limb under another, whereof 
multitudes of instances might be given. So, then, although the church of 
his elect, whom God made his covenant with, and for, were to be men, as 
for their persons, of Noah's seed and posterity, and in that respect the cove- 
nant is by name made with them ; yet their condition, as sinners, was in the 
several variety of their bestialities as sinners, set forth under the figure of 
those several sorts of living things, to the taking in of the most venomous of 
sinners, serpents, and creeping things. And so by both the representations 
the figure is made the more complete, which under one alone would have 
been too imperfect. It is then but putting this double consideration respec- 
tively upon either, and the objection is solved, and the full mind of the figure 
appears to the life. 

6. Lastly, that very rainbow, which is said to have been and then served 
to be but an outward providential remembrance to God, no more to drown 
the earth by waters, hath yet in the new testament another rainbow, whereof 

* Sicut cuncta genera animalium in area clauduutur, sic omnes gentes ecclesia con- 
tinet. — August, contra Manichceum^ lib. xi. e. 14. 



Chap. IV.] of election. 79 

that in Genesis was but the rh (patvo/xsvov. You may behold its appearance 
when you will, twice in the Revelation. The first time, set and constant; 
the second, occasionally; and both set up for the comfort of this new 
Christian church (which we have shewn was the subject of the covenant), as 
that in Genesis had been for the confirmation and establishment of Noah's 
world. 

The first appearance of this rainbow you may behold Rev. iv. 3, where 
it is placed for a constancy, to endure and continue unto the end of 
the transactions of that book, at which chapter beginneth the general pro- 
phecy of the fates of this universal Christian church, gathered (as was ob- 
served) * out of all nations, tongues, and kindreds,' as where 3'ou also read, 
chap. V. 9. And in that 4th chapter, at the first entrance to the prophecy, 
and by way of prologue to the whole, is God presented as sitting on his 
throne, ordering and governing all occurrences that should befall this 
church, having a representative of that whole church in all ages, even as a 
parliamentary assembly before their prince and king, standing afore him and 
his throne. And there appears a rainbow round about that throne of God, 
ver. 3, which is in a perfect allusion to this of Noah ; for the fate of the 
church of the new testament was all along throughout all ages more afflicted, 
tossed with tempests, than ever the Jewish church had been; for, ver. 5, 
* Out of the throne proceeded lightnings and thunderings ' (which always 
accompany tempests), of the breaking forth of which you may frequently 
read in that book. Now for their support, and constant comfort, against those 
dreadful dispensations of God's, doth this rainbow appear. 

To signify to us that memorial which God himself hath of his everlasting 
kindness to his church in the midst of all thundering dispensations whatever, 
as a sign and symbol unto his church of the light of his countenance shining 
on them in their thickest and darkest clouds ; for a rainbow only appears 
where and when the sun also shineth. 

And this new testament rainbow excels (as the substance always doth the 
figure) that other, take it but as it was in the figure. 

(1.) In that it is constant and fixed for all times, whereas that of Noah's 
covenant appears but occasionally. 

(2.) The old was but as a half-moon rainbow, a semi-circle, whereas this is 
round about the throne, and encompasseth it ; it is a whole circle. And his 
church are encamped likewise in a round, and he in the midst of them. So 
let God turn himself in various dispensations, and look which way he 
pleaseth, yet still he doth, and must necessarily, view his church through his 
rainbow, putting him in mind of mercy. Yea, and all those lightnings and 
thunderings, though never so fiery, he shoots, must pass through his rain- 
bow, and so proceed out of mercy, and pass through loving-kindness unto 
them, shewing withal that in the midst of his fiercest anger he still remem- 
bers mercy, and that ' all his ways are mercy and truth unto them ;' ever 
fulfilling that in Psalm iii., ' The Lord is gracious and merciful, and will 
ever be mindful of his covenant.' To shew both that all his ways are 
mercy and truth, for even all those thunderbolts and lightnings do come 
through that rainbow, which doth blunt the force and draw out the venomous 
vapour that is in them, as they come forth and are directed to his people ; 
as also that himself is ever mindful of his covenant, Ps. iii. 

The second appearance of this rainbow is occasional, and for a special 
purpose. There is, upon many forbodes, and seeming more than probabiH- 
ties, out of the Revelation, one great fate to come upon the churches of 
Christ, the last kiUing of * the witnesses,' that hath been so long forewarned 
of by many witnesses. How long first, or how soon, none but God knows ; 



80 ^ OF ELECTION. [BoOK I. 

it may perhaps lie at the door, which, when it comes, will prove the most 
violent of all the foregone ; even as that of Dioclesian (the last of the ten 
persecutions upon the primitive saints) was the greatest of all forewent it. 
And so, this being to be the last, from antichrist and his followers, may 
likewise prove to be of all persecutions the sorest, and in which shall be 
accomplished, and so ended, the scattering of the power of the holy people, 
Dan. xii. And indeed, so great is it like to be, as it occasioneth Christ him- 
self (the same angel that appeared in the 12th of Daniel) to come down from 
heaven on purpose, in an extraordinary appearance, to support the saints in 
a special manner against that trial. And this angel is no other than Christ 
himself, as appears by one speech of his in the 11th chapter, ver. 3 ; for 
the narrative in the forepart of that chapter is uttered by the same angel, ' I 
will give power to my two witnesses,' saith he. And to call them his wit- 
nesses, none but Christ must be allowed to speak, no mere created angel 
might do it. 

Now, see what an appearance he comes down withal, when he cometh 
with this sad message, which we find in chap. xi. His appearance in 
cbap. X. 1, is, that ' his body was clothed with a cloud, his face shining as 
the sun, and a rainbow upon his head,' and all of these significant unto the 
purpose specified. 

(1.) There being so violent and huge a, storm a-coming immediately upon 
his church, and that should come upon his whole church, that is, his body ; 
his body is therefore said to be clothed with a cloud all over, for his head 
and feet are otherwise there particularly described, and therefore it is 
intended it was his body was that of him which the cloud environed. Other 
slaughters of his members have been at various times particular, upon several 
parts of his body apart ; but this last is to be universal, to the whole that 
remain in the streets or jurisdiction of the great city. Even as the waters 
of No£fh was the only universal flood, though particular floods have been 
before and since. 

(2.) Yet, secondly, his face shone as the sun, to shew that his everlasting 
grace and kindness was not only inwardly within himself, and in reality in 
this sad hour still the same that ever it had been to his people in their 
utmost prosperous times ; and that his heart had nothing but graciousness 
of intents, thoughts of peace towards them ; but that outwardly his face 
(which is the index of his heart) should shine upon their souls, in lifting up 
the light of his countenance thereon, whilst their outward man was under 
those sore persecutions. 

(3.) And the sunshine of his face and favour, causeth a rainbow to shine 
on the cloud about his head, for a memorial and assurance to his church, 
that this flood shall not destroy them. Though it may afflict and toss them 
sore, even as in Gen. ix. 14 (in the figure), it is said, * it shall come to pass, 
that when I bring a cloud over the earth, that the bow shall be in the cloud ; 
and I will remember my covenant.' And truly I conclude, let Christ come 
with what clouds he pleaseth, and cover us his body all over with tbem, so 
as his face shine as the sun, and he lift up the light of his countenance upon 
us ; and set up his rainbow, the symbol of his everlasting kindness and 
mercy, and we shall have sufficient to support us. 



Chap. IV.j of election. 81 

SECTION V. 

TIoiv the story of Noah ivas a type of the Mediator of the covenant of y race ^ 
Christ which was the ark. 

By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison ; which sometime 
were duohedient, when once the lonf/-si(Jferiny of God waited in the days of 
Noah, while the ark was a-prepariny, wherein few, that is, eiyht souls, were 
saved by water. The like fujure whereunto even baptism doth also now save 
us (not the putting away the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good con- 
science towards God), by the resurreciion of Jesus Christ. — 1 Pet. III. 19-21. 

That which Peter holds forth concerning this our salvation, is reducible 
to two heads, which, drawn forth and set out, will give us a full exposition 
of the apostle's scope therein. 

I. Noah was then a preacher of the gospel, and of salvation by Christ, 
even as we the apostles now ; that is Peter's scope. 

1. We read in the second epistle of our Peter ii. 5, that this Noah was 
then * a preacher of righteousness.' What righteousness ? That of the 
law. That is, of the righteousness of a rigid repentance only ? No ; it is said, 
Heb. xi. 7, * By faith Noah, being warned of God of things not seen as yet, 
moved with fear, prepared an ark to the saving of his house ; by the which 
he condemned the world, and became heir of righteousness which is by 
faith.' Noah himself was taught of God from that figure, being saved by 
the ark (which Peter here applies to the salvation of the soul by Christ) ; 
he being thus instructed by God to have his recourse unto the righteousness 
of the Messiah by faith, he became, says the text, Heb. xi. 7, * the heir of 
the righteousness of faith ; ' that is, of the same righteousness that we 
Christians do now believe in. There was a new and clearer illustration then, 
and thereby added and revealed to Noah's faith, besides that had been afore 
through the promise of that seed to Adam. And Noah's faith being thus 
more fully and explicitly enlightened in that point, than any or all before 
him, it is said, he thereupon ' became the heir of the righteousness of faith ' 
anew ; and because he was with a fresh light and clearer discovery brought 
to embrace that righteousness of the Messiah, which had been but darkly 
and obscurely, in comparison, before revealed, thereupon out of his own 
personal faith and experience, he became a preacher of the same righteous- 
ness unto the world, for their eternal salvation also ; for as he believed, so 
he spake. And further, he is declared to be a free-grace man in his faith 
as to God's acceptation of him, he wholly relying on the sole favour of God 
for salvation ; wherefore God says. Gen. vi. 8, ' But Noah found grace in 
the eyes of the Lord,' and not upon the account of works. And so in like 
manner for the Messiah, he understood that his ark, he was forewarned to 
prepare, was the figure of him ; even as of Abraham it is said, in the same 
Heb. xi. ver. 19, that he understood and received his son Isaac, in a figure 
of the resurrection, namely, of Christ, and so of us, himself and all in 
Christ unto eternal life ; and still, I say, as he believed, so he preached this 
gospel, the same with ours, that is for the substance of it. 

2. The gospel being thus preached by Noah, it is further said by Peter, 
that Christ in his divine nature was he that preached in Noah's ministry, 
as really as now he doth in the apostles' (when gone to heaven), he is said 
to do : Eph. ii., ' He came and preached peace to you which were afar ofi*,' 
&c. Thus afore flesh assumed, as well as now since, for it was he who 
being o Xoyog, the word, that still spake in all those dispensations to the 
fathers ; and so Peter here, * In which Spirit he went and preached,' &c. 

VOL. IX. F 



82 OP ELECTION. [Book I. 

3. Only there was but one Noah, that is in that latter part or age of that 
world, who (some way or other) preached to the whole world to condemn it, 
as Heb. xi. 17, thereby making way for their destruction and damnation 
that followed thereupon, as upon disobedience to the gospel it now also doth ; 
but now under the gospel, ' great is ' (and was in Peter's days) * the com- 
pany of preachers,' as the psalmist speaks. 

4. Peter, to admonish the present world of that great sin of neglecting the 
great salvation, tells theuL, 

(1.) That as then, so now, few are saved by this gospel preached. • Few, 
that is, eight persons' then; and now, take times and means, * the whole 
world lies in wickedness,' comparatively to these, few are saved. 

(2.) That look, as then the event was, that the souls of them that dis- 
obeyed went to hell ; he preached to the souls in prison, says Peter, and by 
prison, hell is there meant (as Christ's speech imports) ; * he shall be cast 
into prison, and pay the utmost farthing f so it will fall out inevitably now, 
and with a greater damnation, as the means are greater. 

(8.) Their sin was cleaving to their lusts, and pleasures in wives, and 
eating and drinking, that they would not be persuaded to embrace Christ ; 
which is here termed ' disobedience ;' so now. 

And that we may further clear this to have been Peter's scope to institute 
this parallel, those correspondent allusions which Peter useth (speaking here 
of those of the old world), unto what in the very story we find in Genesis 
recorded of them, doth evidence this, and are very remarkablo in three par- 
ticulars. Yfhereas, 

(1.) Peter says that Christ in his Spirit went and preached to them ; 
answerably in Gen. vi. 8, Christ thus speaks, * My Spirit shall not always 
strive,' that is, in the ministry of my sei'vants, as hitherto it hath done of 
Enoch's, and others, and particularly in that of my servant Noah. 

(2.) Whereas Peter says that the long-suffering of God waited for their 
repentance upon Noah's preaching, in like manner Christ there in Genesis 
in the same verse says, ' Yet man's days shall be a hundred and twenty 
years,' as a space to repent in, after and upon Noah's preaching and warning 
so long before, 

(3.) That clause inserted by Peter, that they were the spirits of those 
men that were now in prison, that is, in hell, who were then preached to by 
Noah, holds an affinity unto that known tradition and language among the 
Jews, that of all mankind afore or after, those men Noah preached unto, of 
all others, had been notified and famed to have gone to hell ; insomuch that 
hell itself (this prison) had its name from their company and inhabitation 
there. They were made a proverb of all in the Old Testament all along ; 
to go down to ' the company of giants,' was all one to go to hell ; thus in 
the Proverbs* again and again, as Mr Mede hath observed. Those giants 
were the ringleaders of the ungodly, as Peter speaks of the whole of that 
world who perished, and generally went to hell, and so being the fii'stbom 
of hell, as it were the first inhabitants of that plac-e, hence hell had that 
denomination, as on the contrary of saints to Abraham's bosom. As if we 
should say to malefactors, you shall go amongst your companions of thieves 
and cut-purses, to Newgate, so designing forth that prison from the com- 
panv there. 

li. That our being saved by Christ now, was signified by Noah's being 
saved then in the ark, through or in the midst of the waters. 

For whereas he says, ' baptism now saves us,' the meaning is, Christ 
now signified in baptism saves us, who was prefigured then by the ark in 
♦ See Prov. ii. 18 ; xxi. 16.— Ed. 



Chap. IV.] of election. 88 

the waters, for it is Christ that is sif^nified and sealed up in this ordinance 
of baptism. And as it is said, ' That rock was Christ,' 1 Cor. x. 4, so 
this baptism is Christ, and signifies him, and his saving of us. 

And look as Noah preached this salvation by Christ to the old world 
verbally and in sermons, so that very action of his, in building and enter- 
ing into the ark, and God's transaction with him, and his preservation 
therein, was the figure of Christ's saving us, signified to us in our baptism. 

And though the ordinance of baptism itself, as now instituted, was not 
understood by Noah then as prefigured, yet Christ and the salvation itself 
signified thereby was. 

I was long kept from the right understanding of this place, by my ordinary 
and cursory reading of it, by our translation ; and so perhaps many others. 
They translate it, * saved by waters,' so ascribing their salvation to the waters, 
as the means of Noah and their salvation ; and so I still understood the 
allusion here had been, that the outward element of our baptism being water, 
and that Noah having been saved upon the waters, that therefore the parallel 
had been that they were saved by water, as the instrument, and as signifying 
and typifying forth the blood of Christ washing us, and saving us, as those 
waters had done them. 
^^ But when I came upon this occasion narrowly to examine this matter, 

1. I considered that the salvation by waters in the flood held not at all a 
correspondency with our salvation, through our being washed in Christ's 
blood, as in baptism is signified ; whereas here the apostle affirms, that 
there is a like figure answering each other, which, to be sure, holds not in 
this. For the persons of those in the ark were not washed by the water of 
the flood at all, as we are washed in baptism by Christ's blood ; but it was 
the ark only which was washed with those waters. 

2. I found that the salvation of Noah is said to have been in and by the 
ark. So expressly in the text, ' wherein ' (speaking of the ark) ' eight per- 
sons were saved ' as the means of their salvation ; and as for the watA's 
saving them, that was but an accidental efi'ect, for otherwise the waters 
overflowing tended to destroy them. 

3. I found that diu vdarog, translated here * by the water,' is more properly, 
both to the sense and phrase, rendered ' through the water,' and so the sense 
is ; in the ark they were saved from the flood, being carried in it through 
all its waves, and still kept safe from all danger from them ; as in the Acts, 
chap. iv. 22, it is through many tribulations we enter into glor}'- (it is the 
same particle). So these were saved through these waters, which otherwise 
of themselves, directly and indeed, did threaten and hazard their salvation. 

Again I found dia vdccrog is rendered in this very epistle, ' in the water,' 
or the midst of the water, by this very apostle, that kept to his own dialect : 
2 Epist. iii. 5,- * The earth that now stands in the water,' or, ' in the midst 
of the water,' Just thus here, they were saved in the ark, floating in or 
through the midst of the waters. 

4. So as those words, the like figure ivhereimto, refer not, 1, to the word 
water, but unto the word ark, as ' wherein ' it is said, * they were saved ; ' 
2, or else, unto the matter of that whole foregoing sentence ; and so the 
coherence runs thus, that the substance of our salvation by baptism, or 
Christian baptism, answcreth in similitude unto that salvation of those eight 
persons in the ark then, and is a like figure thereunto. 

So then the summary result of all is, that Christ our ark, and our salva- 
tion in him, now signified in baptism, was the thing lively forefigured in that 
salvation of theirs in the ark, bearing them up in and through the waters. 
* See Mr Mede in Lis paraphrase upon that chapter. 



84 OF ELECTION. [BoOK II. 



BOOK II. 

Of the order of God's decrees about man's election and reprobation. — Of the 
end to which we are ordained; a supernatural union with God and coin- 
municaiion of himself . — 2'he infinity of grace discovered therein. 



CHAPTER I. 

That God had a respect unto man considered as wif alien, in his election of him 
unto the end, and also unto man as fallen into sin in his decrees to the means. 

This distinction to the end and to the means, in the decrees of God, is so 
generally acknowledged, that I need not insist on it. 

But concerning what is the end, and what are the means, as in my sense 
I intend it, needs some explication. 

1. The end is either (1.) God's glory, and that I call the supreme end of 
all. Of this my assertion proceedeth not. (2.) There is that fulness of 
glory God designed to bring his elect into, and this I call the ultimate end 
or issue of all (as the other the supreme). And this end (which the apostle 
terms ' the end,' 1 Cor. xv, 24, and Rom. vi. 22, and Christ the ' perfec- 
tion' of his members, John xvii. 22, 23 compared) is that I mean, when I 
affirm that the decree to this end was not after, or upon the consideration 
of, the fall first had. But, indeed, that all those means to accomplish or 
bring us through unto the attaining of this end, they all suppose man fallen 
as the object of them. 

2. And then, secondly, I distinguish again of what are termed means to 
this end among several divines. The pure superlapsarian he takes into the 
means to this end, the creation, and the permission of the fall, and calls 
them means to bring about that intention or decree to thai ultimate end or 
glory specified.* But I do limit myself that those only are means, either 
which on Christ's part he, as a redeemer, hath performed thereunto, or 
which on our part are wrought in us or by us ; such as are calling, justifying 
faith, and repentance, which are termed preparations unto glory : Rom. 
ix. 23, ' Whom he hath afore prepared unto glory.' Also good works, and 
an holy hfe : Eph. ii. 10, ' Which God had afore prepared' (so in the 
margin and Greek), ' that we should walk in them.' He will give grace as 
the means then, glory as the end. These I am sure are such means as do, 
ex se, prepare for glory, by way of direct and proper influence. And all 
such do presuppose a fall, and are a restoration of us out of it. And it is 
of these I now speak, and unto these I do limit my discourse. 

And as for that other of creation, &c., sure I am that that holiness in 
Adam by creation, whilst he stood, and in which he was created, was not a 

* Nisi tribus illis mediis, 1, homine condendo ; 2, condito integro sed labili ; 
3, denique lapso, intervenientibus, ad istos fines Deus pervenire non potuit. — Piscator 
Quest, de Objecto Frcedestinat. p. 176. 



Chap. L] of election. 85 

means at all of that glory, that is, of that election glory, which we are now 
speaking of. But therefore it must be cast upon some other consideration, 
notion, or account, than of a means which election should have prepared for 
that glory. Also the sin of Adam, no man must say that it was a means, 
but at the utmost of it, but an occasion, or rather indeed but a mere outlet 
or passage through which election wrought itself into a new enlargement or 
amplification and magnifying of the grace of itself towards the elect, in a new 
way, considered as sinners, and as now become miserable, which by creation 
they were not ; in which new way and course the grace of election would 
further expiate, and as with a fetching a compass about, * bring us to' that 
ultimate * glory' it had designed (as in Heb. ii. 10 the phrase is) ; thereby 
the more illustriously to glorify itself by making thereby a new edition of 
grace, which should give all anew after sinning, and desert of the contrary, 
foreseen. 

Whereas the former grace, considering us unfallen, and designing us unto 
that end, was a mere supercreation and supernatural grace through Christ 
as a mediator of union ; but this last was by him as by a Saviour purchas- 
ing all anew, and restoring us unto such graces, now utterly lost, as were 
requisite for man fallen to have ere he should be brought unto glory. 

But what aspect or subserviency any way, creation or permission of the 
fall have unto the decrees of election or reprobation, I have a more proper 
place to shew it in. But it is certain they serve but in common unto each 
of those decrees, and are but such matters as common providence. That 
which at present I would say is only that I rank them not among proper and 
direct means unto that ultimate end spoken, but I limit the proper notion 
of means unto such as do suppose the fall ; for that Christ considered as a 
redeemer ; as also that we should be called and believe ; these are all such 
means as have an immediate influence into that glory, as all do and must 
acknowledge ; and they suppose the fall first, and therefore I limit the decree 
of the means unto such. This for the stating of it. 

Now as touching my assertion, as thus stated, viz., his making this apart- 
ment, that in the decree to the end God had an eye unto man considered as 
not fallen, I am not alone in it. Polanus speaks adequately unto this my 
sense, whom I the more willingly cite, because he also makes Christ as he 
is Christ the head and foundation of election, considered afore the fall ; as 
also, suitable unto this my present argument in hand, I profess myself to do. 
He speaking how man is the subject or object of election, and how con- 
sidered by God therein, hath these words :* * God in his decree of election 
did behold (or look upon) his elect as to the end he predestinated them unto, 
so as men absolutely in common, without all consideration of qualities in 
them. But if we consider the means leading to the end, so he looked upon 
men, not as in their upright condition (afore the fall), but as they would 
be corrupt of and in themselves by the fall, and fallen headlong by their 
own default into eternal death.' Than which nothing is more fall unto that 
division or distinction of ineans and end which I have made. 

I know there is a controversy among divines, — not at all whether election 
be not as yell to the means as to the end, and so unto both, — none that I 
know deny that, — but the controversy is, whether the whole act of God's 

* Eos Deus in decreto electionis intuitus est, quod finem attinet, ad quem eos 
prsedestinavit, ut homines communiter et absolute extra ahquam quahtatum in iis 
considerationem ; quia de iis disponendi liberrimam potestatem tanquam Dominus 
habet. Sin vero media ad finem ducentia consideremus, intuitus est homines non ut 
integros, sed quatenus futuri erant a se, et in se corrupti per lapsum, et in mortem 
jetemam, propria culpa prsecipitati. — Polan. Syniag, 1. iv. c. 9, p. 249, folio. 



86 OF ELECTION. [BoOK II. 

decreeiDgs nnto botli should not have been pitched, either wholly upon man 
considered in the mass of creahility afore the fall, or wholly upon the mass 
of mankind considered and viewed first as fallen into sin. And many do 
judge it incompatible that both should stand. 

I profess not to enter upon the merits of so great a question here, but 
only that both conditions were at once viewed by God, so that one was 
neither first nor second to the other in time, but that God having all afore 
him in his immense understanding, had in his purpose of election to the end 
a respect unto man considered as unfallen, but in that to these means, unto 
man considered as fallen ; and decreed both, and all in one and the same 
determination of his divine will. 

That there have been some eminent divines that have gone about to recon- 
cile those difierent opinions, whether men fallen or unfallen were the object 
of predestination, may be well known among them that are versed in this 
controversy. 

That judicious and good divine Keckermanus, he first states the contro- 
versy : * ' The whole question (says he) about the object of God's decree of 
election is, whether men were absolutely considered (as creatures) or under 
the consideration of the fall ; ' and then determines it by the application of 
this very distinction in the sense I have given it. Thus : ' The decree of 
election falls under a double consideration : the first, in respect of the end, 
namely, life eternal ; and so the consideration of the fall was not necessary, 
because the fall was not a means thereof, but rather an impediment ; secondly, 
this decree may be considered as in respect unto man's frail condition, which 
God foresaw, as also of the means, such as in respect unto man's (frail) 
condition were to come, namely, of redemption and regeneration ; and 
so the decree of election necessarily includes a respect and consideration of 
the fall.' 

And interpreting that to the Romans, chap. viii. 29, ' "VMiom he hath 
foreknown, those he hath predestinated to be conformable to the image of 
his Son,' he further draws out of these words the state and decision of this 
controversy. The apostle (says he) distinguisheth the decree of God into 
two acts: 1, foreknowledge of such as are his; 2, of predestination. Which 
when I weigh (saith he) I understand by the foreknowledge, his decree simply 
considered of giving to men eternal life, as man is considered without the 
consideration of the fall. But by predestination I understand God's decree 
concerning man fallen, as he was to be raised up again, and to be brought 
to eternal life. And indeed election, in the import of it, is very ordinarily 
distinguished by divines from predestination : the first to be unto the end 
simply ; the second to import the decree unto the means, as including 
the end. 

I shall here omit what Junius and Piscatorf have attempted to the recon- 
ciling of this controversy. 

But I add this : 1. That God's decree unto these means specified, they 

* Tota quaestio est de objecto facti hujus decreti, utrum nimimm fuerint homines 
absolute spectati, an vero sub consideratione lapsus. Ad quam questionem respon- 
dendum videtur electionis decretum dupliciter posse considerari. Primo respedu 
Finis, vid. vitae seternse, et sic non fuisse necessariam considerationem lapsus ; quia 
lapsus non est medium hujus finis, sed potius impedimentum. 2. Considerari posse 
decretum hoc, ratione tum ipsius hominis, cujus fragilis conditio a Deo praevidebatur ; 
tum etiam mediomm qualium respectu humanse conditionis futura erant ; vid. redemp- 
tionis et regenerationis, et ita decretum electionis includere necessario respectum et 
considerationem lapsus. — Keckerman. System. Theolog. 

t See Junius in his Arnica Collatio cum Arminico ; and Piscator, Qucest. de Objecto 
Prcedcst., p. 176. 



Chap. I.] of election. 87 

must certainly presuppose the consideration of the fall ; for to believe on 
Christ a redeemer, &c., necessarily presupposeth it ; and although these 
concern the execution of God's decree, whereby to bring men unto that 
end, yet certainly God decreed the means from everlasting as well as the end. 

2. That for God to have decreed unto glory without any respect or con- 
sideration of the fall, thus far, even those that are of that other opinion, 
that is, for election after the fall considered, do yet freely and frankly 
acknowledge. 

That most learned, perspicuous, and candid author. Bishop Davenant, 
doth acknowledge, * * that if by predestination any do understand the de- 
signation unto the end, viz. of glory, as many (says he) of the ancient school- 
men did ; and by reprobation, only the negation of that act (namely, a non- 
election unto glory), though I think (says he) it is not necessary to suppose 
sin to have been first in the person or subject, either elected or reprobated.' 
And his answer is, * Because sin (as first foreseen) is altogether impertinent 
unto either of these acts ; for it is not the ground or reason of electing or 
not electing (as all confess), nor is it a qualification of the subject, without 
which these acts could not befall these persons, as appears evidently in the 
case of angels.' Thus he, although for his own opinion, he rather incHned 
to think that the Scripture (as Austin had done) seemed rather to place the 
decrees of the end and that to the means, both of them upon man presup- 
posed as fallen, and yet speaks tenderly in it. 

Now, I readily grant that the decree of end and that of means were both 
in God's mind at once, and in it neither had a priority or a posteriority. 
But still the question will be, whether both these estates of man unfallen 
and fallen (though in execution they succeed one after the other), yet lying 
alike level unto the prospect of the divine mind and will of God, he might 
not have, yea, had not in the decree of the end, or to glory simply, a respect 
unto man, considered by him as unfallen, as the terminus d quo, or rise in 
his choosing of him, as also in his denying that glory to other. And then 
again, in his decree of the means or iraj/ to that glory, he had not a respect 
unto that fallen condition of man; and both thus, the one and the other, and 
all Ipng at once afore him, whether he did not place and pitch his decree 
to the end upon their unfallen and creable condition, and make that estate 
or condition the terminus d quo of it, and his decree to the means upon his 
fallen condition ; and this is it that I affirm. 

Obj. 1. The learned bishop urgeth that predestination in Scripture is not 
only to the end, glory, but also to the means, as faith, &c. which means 
(says he) are such as suppose man fallen, and therefore election to the end 
doth also. 

Ans. 1. For answer, 1, 1 grant that election to glory as the end, doth not 
take up the whole of the act of eleetion, as the object of it ; but takes in 
election to the means that makes up the whole of it ; nor do I find those 
schoolmen he speaks of, that they do not acknowledge election to be also unto 
grace as the means. But it no way follows that because election to those 
means do suppose man fallen, that therefore election unto glory also should 
necessarily do the same ; for the grace of God in his electing us unto glory, 
first of man considered as unfallen, might and did design an ampletion or 

* Prirao si per praedestinationem quis intelligat solam designationem ad finem 
glorise (sicut multi intelligunt ex antiquioribus scholasticis) et per reprobationein 
solam negationem hujus actus, vel decretum non elegeiidi ; puto non iiecessarium 
nt supponaraus peccatura fuisse praevisum, quia peccatum ad actum divinse elec- 
tionis, velnonelectionis omnino impertiuenter se habet. — Davenant, Dissert, de Elect. 
p. 116. 



88 OF ELECTION. [Book II. 

magnifying of itself, the more by permitting them to fall into sin, whom he 
had ordained to glory, and so redeem them and save them through snch 
means as are requisite to save man fallen, and through them to bring them 
unto glory. 

Ans. 2. And, 2dly, M-e find that the Scriptures, when speaking of election, 
do pitch the ordination of it upon no other than eternal life and glory, as 
the object of it ; and faith, which is that consequent of that ordination to 
life : Acts xiii. 48, * As many as were ordained to eternal life,' as the end, 
* believed,' as the means through which God brought them to that end ; 3'ea, 
and through which I acknowledge they also, by an act of election, were 
ordained to be brought ; yet still the ordination unto life is there only and 
precisely mentioned. He says not ; those that were ordained to believe, 
believed ; but those that were ordained to eternal life, believed, as that 
through which they arrived at it. But as this election to the end was one 
thing, and that to faith as the means another, so they may respect these two 
several conditions of man chosen mentioned. Again, elsewhere, though it 
be true that faith is said to be given by an act of election, as well as eternal 
life, and therefore is styled ' the faith of God's elect,' Titus i. 1, yet eternal 
life is there also, not distinctly alone and apart spoken of, in ver. 2, but as 
that which being originally promised by God, ' who cannot lie,' afore the 
world began, viz., as that which being promised and decreed, had drawn on 
the believing, and the ordination thereof by election ; so as although these 
two are coujunct, yet still they may and are to be abstractly considered, not 
only as distinct decrees, but as those that may be determinated upon the elect 
under distinct considerations or notions of fallen and unfallen. 

Ohj. 2. And again, that it is said, 2 Thes. ii. 13, * He hath from the 
beginning chosen you to salvation, through sanctification of the Spirit, and 
belief of the truth.' Where our election to the means and to the end are 
joined, and that end itself is termed * salvation,' which respects the fall ; for 
out of that it is that we are said to be saved. 

Ans. 1. I grant that that ultimate grand story of God's being all in all, 
hath upon the fall the title of salvation anew put upon it ; and Christ's 
purchase of it anew for us did deserve that title. And so I grant also ; yet 
when we were ordained unto these means of faith, &c., we were withal 
ordained unto this end, as it is salvation ; yea, and as that which was to be 
purchased anew by Christ as a Redeemer, by reason of the fall foreseen ; yet 
this hinders not another gift of it by God, and title of us thereby to it, by 
an act of election in Christ as an head, without respect unto the fall, and as 
it considered primely and simply glory, the glory which God gave Christ 
himself as an head first, and he and his Father by that title, unto us as so 
considered by him : John xvii. 22, ' And the glory which thou gavest me, I 
have given them : that they may be one, even as we are one.' Things being 
fallen, he was fain to purchase it anew for them ; but as in that respect it is 
termed salvation, ver. 13 of that 2 Thes. ii., so it is also styled the glory of 
Chiist in the next words, ver. 14, to the ' obtaining of the glory of the Lord 
Jesus Christ ;' that is, that which Christ had given him by an election ' before 
the foundation of the world,' John xvii. 24, which, as an head to us, he says 
he had given us, ver. 22, and is therefore, in 2 Thes. ii., styled ' the glory 
of Christ,' as elsewhere * the glory and kingdom of God,' which Christ is said 
to receive us unto, Pcom. xv. 7. 

Ans. 2. So as in truth the allegation of this or other Scriptures to the 
same purpose, is but to insist and to urge one truth to include another, as 
falls out almost in all controversies ; for as it is a truth that there is an elec- 
tion to the end, without consideration of the fall, and these means to that 



Chap. I.] of election. 



89 



end upon the fall, so also it is as great a truth that an election to the end is 
specified in Scripture, when it no way relates unto the fall, but is considered 
apart from it. Thus those benefits we are chosen unto, Eph. i. 3, where 
election is handled, tanquam in propria sede, are such as no way depend upon 
the consideration of the fall, but hold upon our election unto Christ, and are 
given by election upon grounds higher and distinct from that of his being a 
Kedeemer: ver. 5, ' Having predestinated us unto adoption of children, by 
Christ unto himself;' which, if relating to God the Father, speaks this great 
truth, that God ordained us into immediate communion with himself, as else- 
where it is said ; or if that word doth refer unto Christ himself (as some), 
yet farther still, a predestination to adoption is all one in efi'ect, as to say, 
predestinated unto glory ; for adoption and a sonship in election unto Christ, 
speaks withal a title unto glory, as that place, Romans 8th, shews : 'If 
children, then heirs and coheirs with Christ,' &c. ; and, it is added, * heirs 
with* God himself,' as Christ also is. And so those words, Eph. i. 3, ' Pre- 
destinating us to adoption to himself,' as referring to the act of God the 
Father as predestinating, it is all one as to say, we were predestinated to 
inherit God himself, and to immediate communion with himself ; and so it 
refers us to that ultimate glory, when God shall be all in all. Now this title 
of adoption holds clearly by another right besides that of redemption ; for 
Christ, as the natural Son, being by election onef head and husband, a rela- 
tion unto him upon that account bestowed, doth convey adoption and son- 
ship to us, and so a right to that inheritance ; which agrees with what I have 
elsewhere said. In like manner, by our choice unto complete and immutable 
holiness, in the 4th verse, is not meant that imperfect holiness in this life, 
which is ordained as such to be means of glory (as our sublapsarian divines 
allege it) ; for it is that holiness which is without blame before God, and so 
such an hohness which will never be subject to change or mutation ; yea, 
and so perfect an holiness in God's own view, for time to come as well as 
time present, as God shall find no defect in to blame. Whereas even the 
most perfect holiness the angels had by creation, whilst made mutable, was 
* charged with folly' and imperfection in that respect. Job iv. 18 ; but this 
is that unchangeable holiness, the holiness which is the end itself, as well as 
glory, and the concomitant of it, or the ground- work of it ; and this also 
might and doth flow from a relation unto Christ, as an head given by elec- 
tion, and an influence from him considered as such, and not only from him, 
as supposed as a Kedeemer first, although to man when fallen, he is an head 
also ; and these benefits are accordingly there distinguished from those that 
Christ, supposed as a Redeemer, doth convey ; and severed from those other 
by the apostle in the same place, ver. 7, * In whom we have redemption 
through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his 
grace.' And so on in calling us by the gospel, ver. 8, 9, * Wherein he hath 
abounded towards us in all wisdom and prudence : having made known unto 
us the mystery of his will, according to his good pleasure, which he had pur- 
posed in himself;' which are manifestly the benefits or blessings (as here 
are called, ver. 3), of the means which suppose us sinners, and being sin- 
ners, we are carried through them unto glory ; but those former are benefits 
of the end, which in that their fulness there spoken of take place in the other 
world, and which we were capable of, being designed unto, without the con- 
sideration of being sinners, or Christ his being a Redeemer, as might at 
large be shewn, and as Bishop Davenant acknowledgeth ; and are accord- 
ingly distinguished from what we have by redemption. We must not there- 
fore allege the one of either to exclude the other, but take both in their 
* Qu. 'of'?— Ed. t Qu. ' our ' ?— Ed. 



90 OF ELECTION. [BoOK II. 

differing respects to either condition of the elect specified ; to unfallen the one, 
and of fallen the other. 

Obj. 3. And a like unto this objection taken from 2 Thes. ii. 13, are those 
other, as that election is said to be joined with giving us to Christ, and that 
runs as he is a Redeemer and Saviour, to bring us to glory ; and therefore 
the whole of election, both to means and end, must have proceeded only 
upon foresight of the fall. But, 

The answer is. That Christ himself beareth (as was even now said) two 
relations and respects to us : first, simply of an headj and that in the first 
place ; and then, secondly, of a Saviour: Eph. v. 23, * Even as Christ is the 
head of the church ; and he is the Saviour of the body.' His being an 
head there, is his being an husband to us ; and so the foundation of that 
relation to God, of being his adopted children as by marriage with his Son ; 
and that latter of our Saviour necessarily respecteth sin, but not the other ; 
and accordingly election may and doth respect those several conditions of 
the elect. And a double giving to Christ in both respects will well fall in, 
and agrees with Christ's pleas made to his Father on our behalf, in the 17th 
of John. 

Obj. 4. Another argument against my assertion, urged by others, is, 
that election being an immanent act within God himself, must therefore be 
unicus, but one single, complete, and perfect act at once, and not divided 
into two, nor incomplete ; whereas to suppose that there is an election to the 
end, and then unto the means, and one to respect man unfallen, but the 
other man fallen, seems to render it imperfect, incomplete, not at once, but 
distracted, &c. 

Ajis. For answer, I must tell those that will urge this argument, that take 
all the decrees in God (which are immanent acts in him), both the decrees 
of election and reprobation, and those of common providence, and there is 
but one individual act in all of them, and yet themselves will acknowledge 
that the Scriptures do set them forth to us as distinct acts ; and that dis- 
tinguished by election to diversities of objects they are terminated upon, and 
as proceeding from several properties in God, some from justice, some from 
mercy. As likewise, in respect of their dependence in, and of one thing 
upon another, the reason whereof is in this, that the series of things are set 
out to us ad nostrum intelUgendi modimi, and as the things do suit, and sort, 
and correspond each with other. And thus they were made distinct acts, 
election from reprobation, and both from his decrees of common providence. 
Now, bring this general notion of all acts thus made distinct, though all one 
in God, and the distinction may be accounted to have been in election itself, 
and the like in reprobation itself. This matter is clear. Bishop Davenant, 
although he professeth to be against those instants or several moments (take 
them as the school affirmeth of them) to have been in God's decrees, yet in 
the point of reprobation, himself holds not only a distinction of acts, negative 
or a non-election, and j^ositive, a pre-ordination to damnation (which two acts 
all generally do confess) ; but furthermore, he doth positively express him- 
self in this manner, ' It is a far difi'ering thing,' says he,* ' to will to punish 
one, which is reprobation positive, and not to will or decree to give him glory 
or the chiefest good, which is the negative act.' ' The first,' says he, cannot 
be in God, but with a respect unto sin first considered as preceding ; but 
the other act of non-electing to glory may be considered without any respect 
unto the sin of the person.' His reason I omit, because the thing is clear. 
And he adds, ' Concerning those divines, that, under that one word of repro- 
bation, do jointly include both those acts of pre-election (the negative act), 
* Dissertat. de Electione, oh. xvi. p 173. 



Chap. I.] of election. 91 

and predamnation (the positive), that they could never as yet judge anything 
certainly about reprobation.'* Nay, he goes on further, that * God did not 
will or decree to punish, nor put forth a positive act, in the first or same 
instant (as in reason we are to apprehend of God's counsels) in which his 
will was not to glorify such as he passed by, but in the other instant, in which 
he considered them as sinners. 'f And again, ' God's deputation or ordain- 
ing men to death is not to be conceived as that which was performed in the 
same signo rationis (or instant according to reason) in which God's non- 
electing them was appointed, but in another, after which such a non-elected 
person, finally persevering in a state of sin, was foreseen.'} 

Now if in the two sorts § of this sort of decrees in reprobation, the one 
was and might be passed without the consideration of sin, and so of the fall, 
the other, but upon the foresight of it ; yea, and performed, as he says, in 
several instants, according to reason, and the manner of our conception 
(according unto which the Scriptures have set forth these things to us) ; then 
why should it be uncouth to any that the two acts of election, viz., to the 
end and to the means, which those other two acts of reprobation do accom- 
pany and answer to (as the dark shadows to light bodies), should be con- 
sidered not distinct only in themselves, but distinguished also by this, that 
the one is transacted in the divine will and understanding, without respect 
had unto sin or the fall, and that the other should respect the foresight of 
the fall. 

Ohj. 5. Another farther objection may be against the partition of God's 
decrees, as suited to the end and the means, and so against that decree of 
our election in Christ as an head, without consideration of the fall considered; 
that this is to make two elections, that first to the end to be incomplete 
without the other to the means to complete it. Whereas it is an error our 
divines find fault with in the Arminians, to make decrees incomplete, and 
then afterward complete ; yea, whereas God decrees all unico actii. 

Alts. 1. The Arminians, indeed, are justly charged with incomplete 
decrees of election, their sense therein being, that then only when a man 
first beheves God doth elect him in Christ to salvation, and that that act is 
also suspended, and in that sense it is an incomplete decree ; because that 
man thus believing may fall away, and therefore election with them is not 
completed until a man doth die, and the man is found to believe at death. 
Now this kind of incomplete and complete election, and in this sense, we 
utterly deny. 

Ans. 2. These two acts of ordaining unto the end and the means, as I 
have stated them, are but two gradus or degrees || in this decree, as in respect 
to the things decreed, and that of the decree to the end, veliit initlum pro- 
positi Dei, but as the beginning or entrance of God's purposes, and so both 
not to be understood as of two acts of decree, though for our understand- 
ing we are enforced thus to speak. 

Ans. 3. That God, considering and viewing all at once unfallen and 

* Qui sub unico vocabulo reprobationis ambos hosce actus divinse voluntatis, prae- 
electionis scilicet et prjc-damnandi, conjunctim includunt, nunquam poterunt aliquid 
certi de reprobatione affirmare. — Ibid. 

t Neque voluit eos punire in primo instanti rationis in quo noluit f^lorificare, sed 
in illo altero in quo illos consideravit ut peccatores. — Davenant, ib. p. 174. 

X Hsec ad mortem deputatio non concipienda est ut in eodem signo rationis peracta 
quo non-electio statuitur. Sed in alio posteriore quo non-electi perseverentia finalis 
in statu peccati prrevidetur, p. 175. 

§ Qu. ' parts ' ?— Ed. 

II Hos duos actus nonnulli vocant gradus satis apposite. — Alstedius Theol, Didact. 
p. 206. Et decretum finis veluti initium propositi Dei. — Ibid. 



QQ 



OF ELECTION. [BoOK II. 



fallen, ynico intuitu, with one act of his di\dne omniscience, yet consigned, 
or designed in two differing respects, of what himself comprehended in one 
act, as unto two several objects which he decreed, as, namely, that decree to 
the end, or to glory, to respect man simply considered, that state or con- 
sideration best suiting, and being more correspondent unto that sort of 
decree, but that to shew his grace the more, he designed him withal to these 
means of redemption, &c., specified upon the intuition of the fall, for they 
only do suppose the fall. Like as in the act of God's justif3'ing of us, he 
first justified us when we had been afore and until then utterly ungodly ; 
and he withal worketh sanctification and godliness in the heart, which is 
really a new condition, differing from that state afore. And yet when we 
are thus made godly, yet still his act of justifying of us is terminated upon 
us, considered by him as ungodly; so Kom. iv. 5, ' But to him that worketh 
not, but believeth him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for 
righteousness.' And his proof for this is, the instance of Abraham's being 
justified many years after he was godly by sanctification ; w'hereupon G-od, 
when he justified him, must needs be supposed to have had afore him, and 
in his eye, both that Abraham was now a godly man, and yet he was, be- 
cause he had been once, an ungodly person. He terminates or pitches his 
justifying him in the act thereof upon him considered as ungodly. Thus in 
like manner, although God had man's pure estate and his corrupt estate 
both in his view afore him, yet he chose to terminate his election to glory 
upon the pure estate, as well as upon him considered in his fallen estate, 
and as to be redeemed out of it. 

So as my assertion no ways introduceth any pause to come in between the 
decrees of the end and the means, to make the first incomplete, no, nor so 
much as two acts (as in God himself), but only a termination of one and the 
same act of his will on two several objects he had at once in his view and 
understanding, according to his good pleasure. 

Aiis. 4. I find that, in another case, divines of note and worth do acknow- 
ledge such a kind of incomplete act in God as this I here propose in these 
decrees.* 

To conclude ; that this was the opinion (the tendency at least) of those 
ancient schoolmen, thus to distinguish these two acts in election with a 
differing respect unto these two conditions of men, fallen and unfallen, is 
evident enough. There is this evidence in general, that Suarezf should in 
the name of the rest afore him, pronounce th^-t to have been the more 
common opinion of his schoolmen, that the election of men was afore the 
permission of the fall ; and that yet themselves, as generally, should acknow- 
ledge another decree, viz., to give them faith, &c., which latter doth in the 
nature of the thing itself necessarily respect man's fallen estate. 

Particularly, first, as for Scotus| his draught of election runs thus, that 
in the first instant God decreed glory to a certain number of elect ; then in 
the second, decreed to give grace ; then foresaw the fall, &c. ; yea, and in 

* See Walceus, torn. ii. Contra Carvinum, cap. 26. Sed quid si nos dicemus in Deo 
fuisse quidem affectum misereudi certorum liominum, sed hunc affectum impeditum 
fuisse a justitia, quominus actu complete salutera iis destinaret, atque adeo inter hunc 
affectum, et peremptoriam ad salutem misericordiam, Christi electionem, ac proinde 
et satisfactionem intervenisse, ac turn demum eorum salutem actu completo intendisse, 
ac decrevisse, ciim decreta jam morte Christi, atque iis Christo redimendis datis, 
justicias Dei plene in decreto Dei est satisfactum. 

t Probabiliorem existimo, communem sententiam theologorum asserentium elec- 
tionem hominum prsedestinatorum antecessisse permissionem originalis peccati. — 
Suarez. part iii. quest. 1, disput. 5. 

X Lib. i. diss. 41, quest, unica. et lib. iii. disc. 19, qugest. 7. 



Chap. II.] of election. 93 

his series of decrees of reprobation, makes a respect to have been had to 
both estates. 

Reprobation is considered, says he, 1, negatively, wherein God ordained 
not to elect them ; 2, affirmatively, by which God ordained after the per- 
mission of the fall to damn them for sin. The first consideration must bo 
as afore the fall, the latter doth suppose the fall. 

And if reprobation did respect both those estates, then much more elec- 
tion ; because election hath of the two the more benign and gracious aspects 
to manifest itself all sorts of ways, to illustrate itself by grace, cast on both 
states, the highest and most comprehensive. 

For Aquinas, he is alleged by those writers for each of the opinions, 
whether of the pure or corrupted mass. Suarez, who had studied him as 
much as any of his followers, cites him for this opinion, if, says he, what 
he delivers be but attentively considered ; * and Bishop Davenant himself 
mentions him as favouring that opinion. f And although Aquinas, part. 1, 
quest. 23, art. i., ad tertlum, seemeth rather to put the term from which, or 
object of predestination on which, God should pitch his predestination to be 
man considered as fallen ; yet Suarez, interpreting him, compounds it with 
that very notion and distinction I have prosecuted. Aquinas,]; says he, 
speaks of that predestination which is unto the means by which men are 
saved, but not according to God's fore-intention or election unto glory. 

And as for Calvin, he is cited for either, both for masm corriqjta, or the 
fallen mass, to have been the object of predestination, by Bishop Davenant 
in express words, p. 116, out of Calvin's Institutions, § as also in his Treatise 
of Predestination against Pighius ; and yet that he is cited for predestination 
to have been afore the consideration of the fall, is so well known, as there 
needs not any allegation for it. It is the common opinion put upon him. 
Now I cannot think that a man of so great a judgment was wavering in the 
point, but that he had indeed both in his eye, and saw by the Scriptures 
that there was in God's decrees, as laid forth therein, a respect had unto 
both. 

CHAPTER 11. 

A brief draught of the order of Christ's election, and ours, as it lies represented 

in the Scripture. 

I. God was pleased, and so resolved, to go forth to creature communion. 

II. His own glory was alone the supreme end therein ; he made all things 
for himself: Prov. xvi. 4, ' The Lord hath made all things for himself; yea, 
even the wicked for the day of evil.' And this was his sole, supreme motive : 
Rom. xi. 35, 36, * Who hath first given to him, and it shall be recompensed 
to him again ? For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things : 
to whom be glory for ever. Amen.' 

* Omnes salvandi electi fuerunt ante prtevisum peccatum Adami, ut absolute 
futurum et ante voluntatem permittendi ilhid. H?ec conclusio suraitur ex TliorasB 
qusest. 23, art. i. ad tertium, et ex articulo quarto, si attente legatur. — Suarez, fib. i. 
de Prctdest., c. xii. sec. 8. 

t Uissertatio de Elect, p. 115. Potest (secundum Thomam) actus prsedestinationis 
cadere in subjectura peccati raiseria nondum implicatum, Im5 videtur Aquinas 
magis inclinare in illam sententiam, qu93 asserit ipsam reprobation em de facto ante- 
cessisse prsevisionem originalis peccati. 

X Loquitur Aquinas de priedestinatione quoad Media per quae homines salvantur. 
non quoad primam intentionem, seu electionera gloriee. — Suarez, ibid. 

2 Institut., lib. iii. c. xxiii. sect. iii. 



94 OF ELECTION. [BoOK II. 

III. The principal glory he designs to himself in election, is the manifes- 
tation of the glory of his grace : Eph. i. 5, 6, 'Having predestinated us, 
according to the good pleasure of his will, to the praise of the glory of his 
grace.' 

rV. His Son, the second person, who was predestinated God-man, simply 
considered in his person as God-man, and absolutely first decreed; for we are 
'chosen in Christ,' Eph. i. 4; therefore he is supposed chosen first, as the 
soil in whom we are set and chosen. We were ' predestinated to the adop- 
tion of sons by Jesus Christ,' itg avrhv; ver. 5, 'for him and his glory,' as 
many understand it. So in 1 Peter i. 20, ' Who verily was foreordained,' 
as Christ, ' afore the foundation of the world, but manifested' (and ordained 
to be manifested, as he is the Lamb slain*) 'in these last days for you.' 
There are two be/ores annexed to this predestination, /or(?-ordained and before 
the foundation of the world. 

And he was first ordained for these higher ends than our salvation is, 

1. For God's own self to delight in more than in all creatures he could 
make, to be 'the man God's fellow,' Zech. xiii. 7; and Isa. xlii. 1, 'My 
elect, in whom my soul dehghteth;' 'I was daily his delight,' in the con- 
tinual thoughts of me ; ' and my delights were with the sons of men,' Pro v. 
viii. 31. We were chosen to be Christ's delight, but Christ to be God's. 

2. To behold the image of himself in a creature, and of all his attributes. 
That life and brightness shining therein, as could never have appeared in all 
mere creatures ; but did in him, ' who being the brightness of his Father's 
glory, and the express image of his person ' (it is spoken of the person of 
Christ as God-man, as the next words in their current coherence shew). Of 
this image, see my sermon on Col. i. 15-18. 

3. By that union with that man to communicate the Godhead unto that 
one creature, the man ; thus decreed to be assumed, in such a high, supe- 
rior way, as could no way have been otherwise communicated to mere crea- 
tures ; see my said sermons on Col. i. All which are ends that stand out of 
his being mediator for us ; and are far higher ends than the glory thereof, or 
our salvation accomplished thereby. 

V. Upon and together with his being predestinated God-man, there falls 
upon his person as his inheritance to be the sovereign end (I say not the 
supremest end, for God himself is above, and the end of him as well as of 
all things else ; but a sovereign end as in respect of us and all things, he 
having joint authority with God, under God, over all), of all things else 
God should make, and the end of whatever of his intelligent creatures he 
should be pleased to choose unto glory ; according to that 1 Cor. iii. 22, 23, 
' All things are yours, and you are Christ's, and Christ is God's,' which is 
spoken in respect of endship. That as you the saints are the end of and for 
which all things were ordained, so you ; Christ is the end of you, and God of 
Christ : John xvii. 10, * All mine are thine, and thine are mine ; and I am 
glorified in them.' And so it is said of him, that ' for him, and by him, all 
things were created,' Col. i. 18, as well as it is said of God the Father, Rom. 
xi. 36. And as it fell to him by inheritance, God's Son, now subsisting in 
our nature, being one person therewith, so God freely gave it him, and be- 
stowed it upon him : John iii. 35, ' The Father loveth the Son, and hath 
given all things into his hand.' 

VI. In this predestination of this man unto that union, and constituting 
him through that union to be the sovereign end of us and all things, there 
was conferred on that individual man that was thus exalted the highest 
grace or favour, transcending all that grace which was or could have been 

^ Compare the words in the verse afore. 



Chap. II.] of election. 95 

cast upon all his elect, any way considered; so that if the election of us be 
to the praise of the glory of God's grace, his much more. There could be no 
desert foreseen, no worth in that man simply considered, that would require 
such an exaltation. It must be said to him as well as to any other creature, 
* Who hath first given him, and it shall be recompensed to him again ?' Rom. 
xi. 35. And to be sure, he had more given him by that election of his than 
what the whole creation had, or possibilities of being created could have had ; 
for all his righteousness extends not unto God, all is nothing to him, Ps. 
xvi, 2. And in that God was for ever perfectly free, as to his will, to have 
decreed him or not, to have decreed either that man, or any other intelligent 
creature, to this high dignity, it was therefore free grace in him to decree it. 
And the greater was the grace, by how much the dignity was above what [by] 
the law of creatureship unto men or angels were their dues by first creation, 
and enhanced also by this, that that creature alone was exalted unto it, and 
none other partook with him. It was the glory of the only begotten Son of 
God, peculiar to him who was that one Lord, 1 Cor. viii. 6. And therefore 
the predestination of the man Jesus is made by Austin the highest example 
and pattern of the election of grace * that is of us. 

And thus God's greatest end in predestination to manifest his grace (from 
whence election hath its title to be styled the election of grace) was accom- 
plished in him above his brethren, that he should be to the praise of the glory 
of God's grace, far above what we are. 

VII. From the pattern and example of whose election it is evident, that 
grace is not to be limited, or only to be understood of the favour towards 
creatures that have sinned, and are delivered out of sin and misery; for the 
highest grace (which divines style gratia unionis, the grace of the personal 
union in the man Jesus), above all other elevations or demonstrations of 
grace whatsoever, was found in the instance of him, who could have no sin, 
nor was capable of it, the grace of that union was so impregnable, and far 
above all danger of it ; wherefore grace, and the election of grace, as all 
election unto glory is, when it is said to be of grace, and not of works, im- 
ports not solely an opposition to, or exclusion only of, works since the fall, 
but of all sorts of works, in what state soever ; of works in innocency in 
Adam (the reward then promised being of works, not grace, Rom. iv.), and 
also of the angels, w^hom the best divines acknowledge elected out of grace, 
and not works of their own foreseen; and so their instance therein may be 
conjoined wath that of Christ's, in that respect to confirm this. 

VIII. God having thus absolutely chosen him, and therewith endowed him 
with the royalty to be the sovereign end of all, whom God would either de- 
sire to create or elect to glory, those whom, therefore, he would or did elect 
of us men, were and must be ordained, and intended in their very ordina- 
tion of them in election, to be for his glory as the end of their election, as 
well as God's own glory was (as is acknowledged by all) the end of their 
election. 

We were not absolutely ordained (as Christ in his singular predestination 
was in the first intention of it), but from the first of ours the intention of God 
concerning us was, that they should be Christ's, and have their glory from 
him, ' the Lord of glory ' (as, 1 Cor. ii. 8, he is styled). The person of 
Christ, God-man, was predestinated, for the dignity of himself ; but we, for 
God's glory and Christ's. And though God the Father, first and alone, de- 
signed who the person should be, as he did this and that individual of us, 
yet that there should an election of any, this was for Christ's sake as well 

* Incarnatio summum exemplum gratise : nee potuisset gratia Dei gratius coin- 
^nendari, quam ut ipse filins Dei hominem indueret. — De Civitate Dei, lib. x. c. 19. 



96 OF ELECTION. [BoOK II. 

as for the glory of the Father: ' Thine they were, and thou gavest them me,' 
and * that all men (elect) might honour the Son, as they honour the Father,' 
John V. 23. So as God in their election had his Son in his eye as God- 
man, and in the intuition of him as their end, it was he chose them, and for 
his sake, to be his fellows, companions, Ps. xlv. 7 ; as he was God's- de- 
light, so that we might be his, as in Prov. viii. 31, * Rejoicing in the habi- 
table part of his earth, and my delights were with the sons of men.' And 
further, in the act of election God gave them to him, for this giving them to 
him was conjunct with the electing of them ; yea, and our election is ex- 
pressed thereby, not as mediator only, to save them from sin, but as mem- 
bers to an head ; as a mere and pure gift to his person, for his honour, to 
have fellows and companions belong to him, who might, in their allotment and 
sphere, be partakers of a supernatural glory with him, and from him, yea, and in 
him, which was his glory : John xvii. 22, ' And the glory thou gavest me I have 
given them,' (as concurring with thy election of them, at thy giving them me 
to be mine), and thou thus loving them as thou hast loved me, ver. 23 ; that 
is, both them and me with an everlasting love ; yet in and with thy loving 
cf them thou gavest them to me, and for my glory as their end, and for 
which chiefly thou lovedst them ; as ver. 24, ' Father, I will that those 
whom thou hast given me, be with me where I am ; that they may behold 
my glory which thou hast given me : for thou lovedst me before the foundation 
of the world.' Now he was loved in his election from everlasting, and they 
also with him, and chosen in him, and out of that love were given to him ; 
and to what end, or out of what intention ? Even to behold, and admire, 
and adore him in his person and glory, as being that very thing they were 
ordained for, more than for their own glory, which he mentions not, for it 
ariseth from their beholding his, and was ordained for his. And what glory 
is it of his ? The glory of his person first absolutely decreed him, which is 
the height of his glory in heaven, where it is they are ordained to behold it ; 
and therefore he says, ' that they may be where I am,' whither he was now 
a-going, even the highest heavens. And what is the main motive to God 
there mentioned, thus to love them, and to give them to him in election ? 
' For thou hast loved me afore the foundation of the world.' He resolves 
his loving and electing them into this : ' For,' &c. ; that is, thou having 
chosen me absolutely for my own glory, in thy first and primary inten- 
tion ; and then thou lovedst them, and gavest them me for my sake, to 
that end, to behold that glory which in predestination thou gavest me, 
that so all of them might redound to the glory of me, as first and singularly 
chosen. 

IX. We being thus chosen for Christ's glory as our end, and for his sake, 
as well as to the glory of God's grace towards us, God did ordain a double 
relation of Christ unto us for his glory, additional unto that absolute glory of 
his person : 1, the relation of an head, wherein we were given as members 
to him, as members of the body are to the natural head, or as a spouse unto 
an husband to be her head; 2, the relation of a Saviour and redeemer, 
which is a super-addition to that of headship, and both these for the further 
glory of Christ, and also for the demonstration of God's grace towards us. 
These two relations we find distinct : Eph. v. 23, ' Even as Christ is the head 
of the church, and the Saviour of the body ;' both which are as distinctly 
related, as those which were by the good pleasure of God's will, decreed him 
to be. Col. i. 18-20, ' And he is the head of the body, the church, who is 
the beginning, the first-born from the dead, that in all things he might have 
the pre-eminence ; for it pleased the Father that in him should all fulness 
dwell ; and (having made peace through the blood of his cross) by him to 



Chap. II.] of election. 97 

reconcile all things unto himself ; by him, I say, whether they be things in 
earth, or things in heaven.' And all that is over and above the absolute 
royalties of his person, set forth in the verses afore. 

X. These two relations of his to us, have answerably a double and distinct 
aspect and condition upon us and of us in our election, which election was re- 
lative unto these two of Christ's, and not absolute as his was : 1. Of our 
persons, without the consideration of the fall, i)i massa pura, in the pure 
lump of creatureship, or as to be created ; and under that consideration God 
ordained us unto that ultimate glory, under relation to him as an head, 
whether as of members, or of a spouse, and church to him, or rather both ; 
of either or both which our persons were fully capable before, or without 
the consideration of, our fall. 2. Of our persons viewed to be fallen, and 
so as objects to be saved, and redeemed from the thraldom thereof, under 
our relation to him as a Saviour. * 

XI. And each of these were for the glory of God's grace : 1. In his 
designment to advance us, considered purely as creatures, to an higher glory 
by his Christ than was attainable by the law of creation, but wholly super- 
natural ; for to have ordained us was pure grace, no less than to redeem us 
from sin or misery when fallen may be said to be, and was wholly indepen- 
dent of works, or without works of any kind ; even as Christ's election 
(who is in ours our pattern) was an election without works of any kind, 
that is, or without the consideration of works of any kind. And unto 
this notion of pure original grace may those words well be thought to 
extend, 2 Tim. i. 9, ' Not according to works, but his purpose of grace, 
which was given us in Christ, afore the world began,' as comprehending 
this we speak of, as the mother of all grace, even of redemption grace and 
calling ; and it is a mighty argument that it was a mere grace in God's 
heart that moved him to redeem and call us, not according to works, afore 
the fall, if that this first purpose of grace towards us, and ordination of us 
to glory, was not founded on works that could any way have been supposed 
to have been afore the fall performable by the holiness of our creation, that 
being but the law of our nature when created, and by creation due. And see- 
ing there is such a grace acknowledged, de facto, to have been towards Christ, 
and the elect angels, why may it not be supposed to have been here in our 
election also ? 

But although this grace was the original mother of grace to us, and that 
therein lay the grand and ultimate design, — for it will have its full accom- 
plishment last after all, and as the issue and perfection of all ; and God 
might have immediately, upon the first creation of each of us, have taken 
us into that glory, — ^yet for the further glory of Chi'ist, and ampliation of or 
ampler demonstration of his grace, and to the end to draw it out and ex- 
tend it (as the Psalmist's word is, Ps. xxxvi. 10, ' Draw out at length thy 
loving-kindness :' so in the Hebrew) unto the furthest length it will reach 
to, God was pleased not to ordain to bring us in an immediate manner 
unto the possession of that full glory, in beholding the personal glory of 
Chi'ist our head (as was specified), as soon as we should be created ; but 
withal permissively ordained, that we, who were thus ordained unto this 
glory as our end, should by the way to fall into sin, and therefore ordained 
to create us first in a mutable condition, as the law of mere creation re- 
quired ; by which falling into sin there was way made for an ampliation and 
illustration of the grace of God unto us as sinners, which causeth grace to 
abound, as Rom. v. 1 5, thereby to shew the riches of his love and grace in extend- 
ing them, or rather turning them into mercy by letting us, the objects of his 
•^ See for this the foregoing chapter, of the order of God's decrees. 

VOL. IX. G 



98 OF ELECTION. [BoOK II. 

grace, fall into the extremest misery ; for mercy properly respects present 
misery, and is but love or grace extended, or love becoming mercy also to 
them it loves, when viewed to be in misery : ' God, who is rich in mercy, 
for the love wherewith he loved us,' Eph, ii. 4. First loved, and that be- 
came the foundation of mercy to us as sinners ; and unless sin had been 
thus in execution first, afore we should arrive at the glory we were ordained 
to, as the ultimate complement of all, additional riches of merciful grace to 
us as sinners had never been, without which grace had not had its full 
demonstration as towards us. Hence, 

XII. And upon this occasion it was, that Christ had for his great and 
further glory the office of Redeemer and Saviour superadded in his 
election unto that of headship, and that because our being miserable and 
sinful is that which is our present and immediate concern, which we are 
most solicitous about in this world, whilst we are sinners ; yea, and con- 
tinues our concern until we, by that final sentence and judgment passed at 
latter day, have them for ever declared and published to be forgiven ; 
and therefore both mercy is said to be shewn and forgiveness to be ob- 
tained at that day, 2 Tim. i. 18, Mat. xii. 32. Therefore it is the Scrip- 
tures do set forth Christ to us most thereby, though they are not altogether 
silent in the other, and thereby call and draw our thoughts and intentions 
most fixedly thereupon. 

XIII. And these two relations of Christ, of head and Saviour, are simul- 
taneous with God's election of us, considered in those prospects fore-men- 
tioned, and neither afore nor after, neither in time (for so no decree in God 
is afore or after another), but not in order, as to our understanding. For 
he could not be our head but there must be his correlate, his body ; and so 
of the other, of being a redeemer. Neither had Christ been ordained to 
either, had it not been for us and our salvation. But still the election of 
Christ's person remains in the primary and first intention of it absolute, and 
for itself, and for higher ends than these which are specified ; and that did 
not depend at all on us or our election. And although there were these other 
ends in God's heart in relation to us which occasioned his relative election, 
as I may term it, of Christ as in relation to us, yet God said within himself, 
if I may so represent it, though I have those other ends to be accomplished 
by him, yet I choose his person for himself, and unto that person all glory 
above all, and for those higher ends fore-mentioned, which alone were motive 
sufficient to choose him, if I had no other, though I take in all in the choice 
of him (for in God all was but one act). He is at once mine elect and de- 
light, and withal my servant in redeeming : Isa. xlii. 1, * Behold my servant 
whom I uphold,' in that work of redeeming I have ordained him for, ' mine 
elect, in whom my soul dehghteth.' 

XIV. As the glory of the person of God-man, absolutely thus considered, 
was the primo-primitive design, as I may so speak it, which God's heart was 
intent upon, and then next unto that his ordination of him to be an head 
unto us, as a body to him, and that by our mere union to him as an head, 
and bare relation to his person as such, he was ordained to be the sufficient, 
efficient, and author of many sorts of blessings ; as of sonship from his son- 
ship, a gracious acceptation of our persons in him as the chief beloved, heirs 
of the same glory with him, heirs of God, co-heirs with Christ. And all 
these blessings were we capable of, considered as pure creatures, through 
union with him, and needed not his death to have purchased them for us, 
and are made distinct from the blessings of redemption, as Eph. i. 4-7, &c., 
shew : ' According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the 
world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love : having 



Chap. III.] of election. 99 

predestinated ns unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, 
according to the good pleasure of his will, to the praise of the glory of his 
grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved. In whom we have 
redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches 
of his grace.' And he is the object in whom, as a supreme sovereign good 
to us, in whom, and beholding of whose person, and that glory of his, we 
shall for ever be made happy. This was the first design in God's intention, 
which comprehended us, Christ and us in mutual relation together ; so it 
shall be the last in execution, as being the greater of these two ; and in 
execution or performance also the most lasting, even for evermore. It will 
be the issue, the conclusion, the crown of all. For after the work of media- 
tion for us as sinners is fully over, and every way perfected, and the day of 
judgment ended ; when sins shall finally be forgiven, and then for ever for- 
gotten, as the promise intended, Christ will give up his mediatory kingdom 
and glory to his Father;* and then that rer/mim anternundanum, that king- 
dom afore, and abstracted from the consideration of this world, or what we 
were, or Christ as Redeemer for us therein, shall for ever predominantly take 
place, when God, in the Father, Son, and Spirit, shall be all in all to him as 
God-man as well as us ; and when Christ the Son, having laid down only 
the economy of his mediation as a Redeemer, shall yet in his person, as he 
shall appear with the fulness of the Godhead dwelHng bodily in him, and the 
brightness of the glory of God shining in the human nature, which he can 
never lay down, or divest himself of, shall be as he is, and was constituted, 
an head, an husband unto us ; and we chosen as fellows and companions 
with him, be the object and efficient of our happiness for ever, by our behold- 
ing that his glory, according to that of John xvii. 24 (I opened) : ' Father, 
I will that they also whom thou hast given me be with me where I am, that 
they may behold my glory which thou hast given me : for thou lovedst me 
before the foundation of the world.' And after the day of judgment ended, 
it is whereof the apostle speaks, when he says, * We shall be ever with the 
Lord,' 1 Thes. iv. 17. 

CHAPTER III. 

That the supreme and utmost end or termination of election (as it respects us), 
is God's choosinff us to himself, and to a siiper^iatwal union with himself, 
and communication of himself , proved from 1 Cor. viii. 6. 

Ajid ice in him. — 1 Cor. viii. G. 

We have seen the mutability of our first estate by creation, the infinite 
distance of the creature from God, the high and lofty One ; the necessity of 
super-creation grace, if any either of men or angels be fixed immutably unto 
him, which God was pleased should be by an election by grace of some. 
The next is. 

That God (who was at this distance from us as creatures, &c.) did by that 
election also ordain those whom he so singled forth unto a super- creation 
union with himself and communication of himself, as the highest and utmost 
end (as to what concerned us) he elected them unto ; so as the height and 
top of our salvation is consummated, and that union with himself which is 
far above that oneness we had by the law or dues of our creation. 

To found this assertion on the w^ords, 

1. Observe the difierence he puts between this us, as a special parcel of 
* For this see Dixon, Cameron on 1 Cor, xv., and divers others. 



100 OF ELECTION. [BoOK II. 

his creation, from the all things. We and all other things are from him, of 
him, or by his power, as the efficient cause. This is common to us and all 
as his creatures. But we he speaks of as a company or parcel, severed and 
set apart to some higher excellency and dignity ; and this special separation 
of us from all things is twice said : ' One Lord, &c., and we by him.' We 
are m him, that is, taken into himself out of a special love and by a special 
union with him. The word hg a-oTov signifies both in him, and so denoting 
this union ; and so interpreters (being to give but some one signification) 
generally choose to render it. Yet withal it signifies to him, as denoting our 
appropriation to him pecuharly : a being of us in the most eminent and 
singular manner, a peculiar people and treasure to him, as himself often 
speaks. It also imports our being singled forth for his highest glory ; 
si; dvT6v,for him; that whereas all things are for his glory as well as we, yet 
they not so for him as we ; and therefore to be for him is here in the text 
set over our heads, not theirs, as if we had that lot alone, not they ; because 
we are ordained so to be for him, and in such a singular way and manner as 
all things are not. Nor doth all the glory that ariseth out of them to him 
rise up to any considerableness, in comparison of what shall, and doth, out 
of us, and specially out of this our union with him. Our being in him is the 
great foundation of our being /or him. 

2. And for the further illustration and confirmation of this interpretation, 
I have recourse to a parallel scripture to this: Eph. iv. 5, 6, ' One Lord, one 
God and Father of ail, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.' 
Observe the difference of the phrases used about all things there, and of us. 
1. Of all things, it is said he is ' above all ;' whereby I understand the sub- 
limity and transcendency of his divine nature and essence, as being of an 
higher differing kind, infinitely above that being which all creatures have by 
participation from him, and is all one with that which in the prophet Isaiah 
God speaks of liimself, when he speaks of union with his creatures, of which 
by and by. He is ' that high and lofty One ;' so in his nature, yet so as, 
2dly, he, though diverse from the creatures, yet is near to, and piercing 
' through air creatures, and filling them. He is present with them all, yet 
holding a distinct different being from all. He is through all, excluded by 
none, as the air is not out of our dwellings. So first, as his being is no part 
of their being, nor mingled with them, but ' above all ' glorious excellency 
and perfection ; and then ' through all,' in respect of immensity of being. 
But these two are spoken in common, as in relation to all creatures, and 
common also to us. But, 3dly, he turns his speech to the saints, and adds, 
* in you all.' There is your difference put by grace from them all. In you 
that are saints : oh, an infinite difference and grace ! He that is thus that 
high and lofty One, far above all, and in a common way present to all his 
creation, and cannot be otherwise, he is, over and above all this, in you 
all, and in you alone ; united to you, and one with you, in a special manner, 
and upon a special relation. He, the high and lofty One, whose being 
stands out from all the works of his hands, as transcending the scale of their 
entity ; inhabiting eternity long afore there w^ere any creatures made, and as 
then dwelling in, and possessing himself with an all-sufficient blessedness ; 
and he who, now he hath made them, is still above them all, as an immense 
supreme Being can be supposed to be above what his hands made ; as he 
speaks in Isaiah ; and withal filling all : ' Heaven is my throne, and the 
earth my footstool,' saith God there ; and is ' through all,' as Paul ex- 
presseth it here. 

3. Yet, thirdly, this high and lofty One affected a special union with 
some, and he mentions that sublimity of his own divine being, as he doth 



CUAP. III.] OF ELECTION. 101 

his omnipresence with and through all creatures, here, to shew and enhance 
great condescension of his grace and favour, to be that he is in you, and 
dwells in j'ou, that is, to be united to you above all the rest. That is but 
a common presence vouchsafed to all things, — he is through them all, — but 
an indwelling in us, with a communication and participation of himself. Oh 
infinite grace ! This is the height of our privilege and happiness. 

And the height of the grace and favour of this, in both respects, God 
himself doth set out and magnify unto us, in that prophet Isaiah, chap. 
Ivii. 15, compared with Isaiah Ixvi. 1,2,' For thus saith the high and lofty 
One that inhabiteth eternity, whose name is Holy ; I dwell in the high 
and holy place, with him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit, to 
revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart of the contrite ones.' 
' Thus saith the Lord, The heaven is my throne, and the earth is my foot- 
stool : where is the house that ye build unto me ? and where is the place of 
my rest ? For all those things hath mine hand made, and all those things 
have been, saith the Lord : but to this man will I look, even to him that is 
poor, and of a contrite spirit, and trembleth at my word.' But I defer that 
scripture unto an use of magnifying the grace of God, in ordaining such an 
union. 

That such a supernatural union with God, and communication of God, is 
the height of, and his ultimate design towards us, in his choosing of us ; 
that one comprehensive expression (we so often meet withal) is big with, 
that he * chose us for himself,' as Ps. cxxxv. 4, ' Jab hath chosen Jacob for 
himself;' and Rom. ix. 4, 'I have reserved seven thousand to myself; ' 
which, ver. 5, the apostle interprets to be (in the case of others he speaks 
of) an election of grace ; also Isaiah xliii., ver. 20, ' My people, my chosen,' 
and, ver. 21, immediately follows, ' This people have I formed for myself.' 
All which to be meant of election I have at large elsewhere shewn. Now, 

Thus to choose us for himself is not only to set us apart to be a peculiar 
treasure of precious goods ; as among men, especially kings, above all other 
things, what they love and delight in they use to hoard up, reserve, and 
keep in store for themselves. As, Eccles. ii. 8, Solomon, who had power 
and opportunity above all men else to do it, says, ' He gathered gold and 
silver, and the peculiar treasure of kings, consisting of all sorts of rarities 
and precious things, brought from all countries and provinces (as it follows 
there), which they accordingly value. And thus in Exod. xix. 5, says God 
of us, ' Thou shalt be for a pecuhar treasure unto me,' and, Ps. cxxxv. 4, 
* He hath chosen Jacob for himself,' is explained, ' and Israel for his pecu- 
liar treasure.' 

Nor is it only that God hath separated them for his peculiar worship and 
service, to be holy unto him, consecrated, separated for ever to glorify him, 
as Jer. ii. 3, 'Israel was holiness unto the Lord, and the first fruits of his 
increase.' 

Nor speaks he it only that he hath chosen them to shew forth his praise, 
as in that Isaiah xliii. 21, we cited, it follows, ' They shall shew forth my 
praise.' For in that sense, ' the Lord hath made all things for himself, yea, 
even the wicked for the day of evil,' Prov. xvi. 4. This his end is common 
unto all things, yea, even to the wicked, who are yet otherwise lost unto 
God, and those whom he remembers no more. But this of ours is in a con- 
trary way peculiarly for himself, and so as his glory on us is wholly in a 
way of grace and kindness. You may therefore observe it in Eph. i. 5, 6 ; 
that unto his predestinating us to himself, ver. 5, is added, ver. 6, ' to the 
praise of the glory of his grace.' Now, put them two together — 1, ' He 
hath chosen us to himself; ' 2, ' For the praise of the glory of his gvacf/ — 



102 OF ELECTION. [BoOK II. 

and they speak a special communication of his very self unto us in a way of 
grace, in pure and mere love and kindness, as whence that glory of his 
grace should arise. Now, if it be thus, that it is a communication of himself 
in a way of grace, then, 

1. This promiseth first, that all that which grace can do for us, in com- 
municating God himself to us, and that all that he will do for us, for his 
gloiy and the magnification thereof, is to arise from out of what favours he 
shall shew us, and no otherwise. He shall have no more glory in us and on 
us than accrues out of what he bestows and lays forth in grace upon us ; so 
that our happiness as the efi'ect, will extend as far as his own glory as the 
end. It speaks that his glory on us shall not be severed in anything from 
our good ; as in that other, it being said that ' all things ' and ' the wicked 
are for himself ' it is. But here that his glory which is to be had out of us, 
and likewise our happiness, doth both run along complicated, twisted, inter- 
woven together as threads in one woof, and are of like extent, whereof his 
glory is the gloss, and our blessedness is the groundwork or stuff. And 
therefore if he design to have a glory to the utmost, then he will shew 
favours to the utmost, and grace will be sure, of all others, to glorify itself 
to the utmost, and in the utmost way the creatures are capable of, remain- 
ing mere creatures. 

2. Yea, secondly, in that /or himself is put in, and annexed to the glory of 
his grace, it manifestly shews that grace is so large-hearted, as it gives all, 
even to himself (as we say). It is not to shew grace only in all sorts of 
gracious effects, and in heaping favour upon favour, as a king doth upon his 
favourite ; but this is to communicate to us himself, to the utmost, and in 
the utmost way that mere creatures (for Christ always must be excepted) 
are capacitated for. 

3. Thirdly, It is the communication of the whole of himself, whether of 
his divine perfections, so far as to bless us therewith, or likewise of all the 
three persons. Father, Son, and Holy Ghost ; for these, namely, persons 
and attributes, are all that are in himself, and are himself, or which he hath 
in and for himself to enjoy and be happy in. And all in God shall as truly 
serve to make thee blessed, according to a creature's capacity, as it serves 
to make himself blessed in his own immense sphere of blessedness. If thou 
hast himself, and the whole of himself, thou shalt be ' heir of God,' Kom. 
viii. 17, for thou shalt be a 'joint heir with Christ ; ' and it is all in God is 
Christ's inheritance, Ps. xvi. 5, ' The Lord is the portion of mine inheri- 
tance, and of my cup : thou maintainest my lot.' And thou canst not have 
more ; for, as Rev. xxi. 7, ' he that overcometh shall inherit all things ; 
and I will be his God, and he shall be my son.' God himself hath but all 
things for himself ; and thou shalt have himself, and what canst thou have 
more ? 

4. Fourthly, He reserves himself for thee, and all that is him. As the 
text, Rom. ix. 4, speaks of his elect, that he hath reserved them for himself, 
so he hath reserved himself for them, and all of himself wholly for them. 
Is God your inheritance ? (as afore). Then none shall share therein but 
the designed heirs ; the rest have portions.* Is it God that is your inheri- 
tance ? It is he, then, that is said to be reserved in heaven for you, 1 Pet. 
i. 4. There he waits, as it were, for you, and that until you shall come, 
and lets the crowd, the great ones in all ages, pass, as they pass afore him 
all along, reserving himself (as in election he did design) for you : as if a 
great prince, in a dream or vision, should see the idea of one not yet born, 
and should fall in love so with the image of her, that he reserves himself till 

* Qu. * no portions ' ? — Ed. 



Chap. III. J of election. 103 

she is born and grown up, and will not think nor entertain any other 
loves. 

5. Fifthly, When he hath brought thee through all disasters to heaven, 
then, even then, to shew that his lirst, and ultimate, and eminent design in 
electing of thee, was for himself, in that special sense I have singled forth, 
lo ! your first entertainment or welcome thither will be, a presenting yoa to 
himself. Oh wonderful ! We have need that an angel tell us, as he did 
John, upon the Lamb's marriage, Rev. xix. 9, that ' these are the true 
sayings of God,' so slow of heart, and dull, through unbelief, are we. But 
you have it express and full, to the same purpose which now I have held 
forth, in Jude 24, ' Now unto him that is able to keep you from falling, and 
to present you faultless before the presence of his glory, with exceeding joy,' 
&c. He speaks this as of what God means to do ; and those he wrote to 
being yet alive on earth, he therefore brings it in and presents it to their 
faith in a way of exhorting them to praise and give glory to him aforehand, 
upon the account that he is able to do it (as his doxology runs), yet so, as 
withal it more strongly imports, he will certainly do it. And who is it that 
will do this ? What ! is it spoken of Christ his presenting you to his 
Father ? No, not here in this place. Or is it Christ his presenting you to 
himself, as being your designed husband ? No, neither ; although you shall 
see that by and by said of him too. But it is the great God, the Father 
himself, for it is the presence of him, the Father's glory, which we are pre- 
sented afore ; and you see withal that it is the same person that presents us 
to himself whose presence it is afore which we are presented, ' afore his own 
presence of glory,' so that it is he whose glory it is. And again, it follows, 
ver. 25, ' To the only wise God our Saviour, be glory and majesty, 
dominion and power, now and ever. Amen.' All which attributes are the 
attributes of the great God the Father, in the usual current of doxologies ; 
and yet you may take in both Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, considered 
unitedly in that one act of presenting us, as they are one God, though three 
in person, who will thus present you to themselves, or himself, as one God, 
so as it shall be one joint act of them all, and yet as one God ; and that 
of ' our Saviour ' is no objection, for it is said of them all three, that they 
save us. 

It is added in that place, * with exceeding joy.' It is at our very first 
coming to heaven this is spoken of, and spoken that, as we on our part shall 
rejoice, as you will all say we shall have reason, so God on his part too. 
He is pleased to present us with great joy to himself, as making our salva- 
tion his own concern more than it is ours ; and that it is spoken of his joy, 
doth that word shew : that it is a presenting us to himself afore the presence 
of his own glory, and shews that he esteems it to be matter of joy to himself 
to have us so with himself; and though expressed of him but after the 
manner of men, that are overjoyed when their children come home to them, 
yet sufficiently signifies that his heart works with joy in the doing it, as of 
the father of the prodigal it is also spoken. And the word, presenting 
afore his glory, manifestly declares whose joy it is which is most intended, 
even his own, more than ours. For it speaks how it is his own interest, 
his self-interest, his glory, which moves him ; and what he hath in his heart 
when he doth it, that moves him so to present us, and therefore fills him 
with joy in doing it. And it is as much as to say, he doth it for his own 
solace, with the highest delight and greatest pleasure to himself ; he gratifies 
himself in it. It is matter of dearest enjoyment of those whom he hath so 
long loved, which he tuketh in them, now when he sees them perfectly holy. 
As elsewhere God is said to rejoice over us : Zeph. iii. 17, ' The Lord thy 



104 OF ELECTION. [BoOK II. 

God in the midst of thee is mighty ; he will save, he will rejoice over thee with 
joy ; he will rest in his love, he will rejoice over thee with singing.' If in this 
life, when absent from him, much more when we come home to him, and he 
hath us present with him in the presence of his glory. * And that land,' the 
type of it, ' shall be called Beulah ;' that is, * Thy delight is in her : for the Lord 
delighteth in thee,' Isa. Ixii. 4. He loves us when sinners ; but delights in 
us but so far as we are holy. And now, when he sees us come first afore 
his presence, faultless and perfectly holy, then his delight and his joy in us 
is full ; and then, at that time, when we come first into his presence, says 
God with himself, Lo, I loved this my creature from everlasting, and I 
designed him then by choice, not only to be mine, my peculiar, but I chose 
him for myself to rejoice in, and to communicate my whole self unto. And 
now that, after so long a time, seeing that holiness I designed, to be com- 
pleted in him, to prepare him for my enjoyment of him, and for his full en- 
joyment of me, in the presence of my glory, I thus solemnly present him with 
exceeding great joy unto myself ; for I shall have more joy and solace in him 
than he shall have in me : for it was for myself that I first did choose him, 
as my ultimate end, which is now accompHshed and perfected. 

And thus understood, respondent ultima 2:)rimis ; and that maxim, so used 
and applied, in the point of God's decrees, that what is last in execution is 
first in intention, and e contra, is fully cleared up. Though I think that 
that will not hold in all things about those decrees, yet in this it is perfectly 
true, this being the ultimate end of God's first choice and cast of his eye 
upon us. And in like manner, you see, it is last in execution, he chose us 
for himself ; that was his primitive intention ; and he presents to himself, 
as last in execution. He delighted with infinite delights to choose us, fore- 
seeing all he meant to bring us to ; and above all, his own enjoyment of us. 
Thus Deut. x. 15, * Only the Lord had a dehght in thy fathers to love them, 
and he chose their seed after them, even you above all people, as it is this 
day.' And at the last, he presents them, having accomplished his end once, 
to himself with exceeding great joy. 

And now, to tell you how happy and blessed you will be for ever, after 
this so solemn a presentation of you made by himself to himself, none knows 
but himself, that knows himself and his own blessedness. Only, in brief, 
carry home this, that you will be as happy as God himself can make you ; 
as for the kind of it, of which I spake before. 

I might next shew you that we are also ordained for Jesus Christ ; for 
unto him, and for him, you were likewise chosen, as well as for the Father, 
as I have interpreted that in Eph. i. 5, where it is said, ' God the Father 
having predestinated us by Jesus Christ, g/'c ahrov, unto him,' that is, to the 
same Jesus Christ, as well as g/'c avrov, or, that God the Father did it to 
himself: I take in both in that g.'$ aurov, both to him, that is, to Christ, as 
well as to himself ; that is, to God the Father, who himself predestinated 
us. And Christ himself, from heaven, said of Paul, 'he is a chosen vessel 
to me.' Yea, and Christ also chose you from everlasting with the Father ; 
and as God the Father predestinated you for him, that is for Christ his Son, 
so Christ also for himself. And that he will in like manner present you to 
himself also, you have it in Eph. v. 27, ' That he might present it to him- 
self a glorious church ;' and you will easily grant that this might in some 
respect more properly be said of him than of the Father ; because, as the 
discourse in that chapter was, he is the husband, and the church the spouse. 
But, as Christ is an everlasting Father, Isa. ix. 26, as well as an husband, 
so God the Father is our husband, as well as Christ : Isa. liv. 5, * For thy 
Maker is thy husband;' and multitude of other speeches shew: 'I am 



Chap. III.] of election. 105 

married to thee,' and the like ; so that each of them may be said to present 
us each to himself. 

But, besides this passage in the Ephesians, Christ himself doth more than 
insinuate the same with the greatest affections, and as with a delight to speak 
of it, in John xiv., as being that thing wdiich most intimately and ultimately 
pleased him, and was a gratifying of himself, even this, that he should one 
day take us to himself, to his infinite personal joy and contentment. For 
he having first said, ' I go and prepare a place for you,' as a kind bride- 
groom doth for his spouse, and then that ' I will come again to fetch you,' 
he adds, ' and receive you to myself.' The words are, John xiv. 3 : * And 
if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto 
myself; that where I am, there ye may be also. You see to himself still 
comes in ; and methinks in those words he doth express his heart in such 
a manner as implies that it was his own dearest interest that filled and 
acted his very soul in so speaking, as well as our interest ; and that all was, 
for himself to enjoy us, and to that end to have us with himself for ever. 

Thus much for the first part of my assertion, for the communication of 
himself. There remains a second branch intended in it, and that is, union 
with himself, which in reality is the first of the two. 

All communication in a waj" of grace is founded upon an union with him 
first who communicates himself, as upon which it is he doth communicate. 
Thus all communion between man and wife, in such acts as are proper to 
that relation, is founded upon their being by a marriage union first made 
' one flesh,' by an assumed relation first constituted between them ; their 
union and relation is not founded upon such transient acts of communion, 
for such, without a previous marriage union of right and order, would be 
fornication, but upon a marriage union first made. The schoolmen do make 
something equivalent to this, the ground why God shews mercy to his 
children, that God makes and reckons them first, nt aliquid sui, as some- 
thing of himself; the Scripture speaks the same, when it saith, they are as 
dear to him as what can be thought dearest to one's self: Zech. ii. 8, ' He 
that toucheth you, toucheth the apple of his eye ;' and Deut. xxxii. 9, God 
made himself ' the portion of his people,' viz., by giving himself to them; 
and by virtue thereof it follows, ' he kept him as the apple of his eye,' ver. 
10, thus in the Old Testament — ' Why persecutest thou me ?' Acts, ix. 4 — 
so in the New. ' When I heard a language I understood not,' says God, 
Ps. Ixxxi. 5 ; and he speaks it in the person of his people when in Egypt ; 
for otherwise there is no language which God understands not ; and it is 
God that utters that / there, as the next words shew, ver. 6, ' I removed his 
shoulder from the burden ' ; and ver. 7, ' Thou calledst, and / delivered thee.' 

Now this union was election's design, whereby to bring about that com- 
munication of himself; thus the psalmist, Ps. Ixv. 4, 'Blessed is the man whom 
thou choosest, and causest to approach unto thee ;' or, as Ains worth, 
* makest near to thee ;' as also, ' who shall separate us ?' Rom. viii. 35 
doth imply ; and from hence flows the communication of himself, as it fol- 
lows in that verse of the psalmist, ' he shall be satisfied with the goodness 
of thy house ;' which house is himself in our hearts, and so by this choice 
of his to that near approach unto him, we come to have all of what God in 
heaven doth communicate ; whereof that temple and house was then the 
type, in the language of which the psalmist there speaks. 

And that the communication of himself is founded upon union, is emi- 
nently seen in the man Jesus, whose predestination is the pattern of ours : 
Rom. viii. 29, ' For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be 
conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among 



106 OF ELECTION. [BoOK II. 

many brethren ;' and -^^hose union with God is the instrumental original of 
ours. The whole foundation of that glory, &c., the man Jesus hath, is his 
union with the Son of God, whose original right it was to say, * I in my 
Father, and my Father in me.' It was that union of him with the Son, who 
had this union with the Father, gave him right to all those other privileges 
he hath. This entered him fellow with the Trinity : ' the man, God's fellow,' 
as in Zech. xiii. 7 ; and this union alone gave him right to ' have life in 
himself,' and made all the royalties of the Son of God naturally to flow in 
upon him as his due. Insomuch as our divines have said, that there is no 
other gi'ace shewn to him, but this gratia unionis, the grace of union ; for 
that union drew along all else with it, as of right and by inheritance. But 
yet, to us, all our privileges, and communications that follow, are as perfect 
grace to us as our union at first. Yet still they are all founded on the grace of 
an union, from whence communion flows ; and look, that as union with God 
was the height and top grace vouchsafed Christ, and the end of his predesti- 
nation, so that of ours is of all the grace communicated to us. 



CHAPTER IV. 

That our union with God the Father, and Christ, is the utmost end of our 
election, further proved in an interpretation of several passages of Christ's 
prayer, in the seventeenth chapter of John. 

Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me 
through their word; that they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, 
and I in thee, that they also may be one in us : that the world may believe 
that thou hast sent me. And the glory which thou gavest me I have given 
them ; that they may be one, even as we are one : I in them, and thou in 
me, that they may be made perfect in one ; and that the world may know that 
thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me. Father, I 
will that they also whom thou hast given me be with me where I am ; that 
they may behold my glory, which thou hast given me : for thou lovedst me 
before the foundation of the world. righteous Father, the world hath not 
known thee : but I have known thee, and these have known that thou hast 
sent me. And I have declared unto them thy name, and will declare it ; 
that the love wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them, and I in them. — 
John XVII. 20-26. 

The assertion was, that God, in and at his electing, did ordain the body 
of his elect to a super-creation union with himself, and communication of 
himself, as the highest and utmost end, he (as to what concerns us) chose us 
unto, above the law or dues of our creation ; and so as the height and top of 
our salvation is consummated in that union, which is far above that law or 
dues which is by the law of our creation. 

I repeat the assertion, because now I am to prove it, and every part of it, 
which I shall endeavour by these four or five following deductions out of this 
prayer. 

1. The subject of his prayer, his whole church. 

The subject of this prayer, or persons prayed for, in this part of it, are 
his whole church of his elect, to the end of the world ; and the aim of his 
prayer, or thing prayed for by him, in ver. 21, is, ' that they all ' (that 
is, all and every one of them) ' may be one.' He had prayed for himself to 
ver. 6 ; for his apostles then present, from thence to this 20th verse ; but 



Chap. IV.] of election. 107 

here, for his whole church, who, in the whole body of them, must needs be 
supposed infinitely more dear to him, than those eleven persons, his apostles, 
so small a parcel of the whole, who are a company which cannot be numbered, 
as Kev. vii. 9, who now stood afore his view. 

John and Jude wrote catholic epistles (as they are entitled). And this 
part of Christ's prayer we may style, Chrlsl's catholic prayer. 

2. Let us next take in the greatness of this person who prays, and all the 
circumstances he then stood in, when and whilst he was uttering of it ; and 
think with yourselves, of what an infinite weight and concernment that 
prayer for that his whole church must be of. That he, the great Son of 
God, that had been glorified with God's own self afore the world was, the 
true high priest, bearing now all the tribes' names, that is, all the persons 
of his elect, and every one of them, on his heart, — all, ver. 21, and every 
one, — and being within a small space, to go forth to be taken, and then to 
ofibr up himself a whole burnt- sacrifice for them, and every of them ; and 
now by his prayer, pouring forth the bottom of his heart and soul-blood 
desires into the bosom of his Father for them ; and this, chosen out as his 
last and solemn request, to be left upon record to all posterity for them ; and 
this also the last part and conclusion of that prayer, when his heart was 
most enlarged (as towards the end of prayers ours use to be), himself rapt 
up into heaven, and filled with the sense of his own sooner approaching 
glory, when he breathes it forth almost at every word ; when you find him 
also deeply afiected with the joyous thoughts of that glory and happiness 
which his whole church should have, in order unto, and through this union, 
eflected by his mediation ; and which should be the fruit and effect of that 
his own glory, and those his sufferings ; and how, at the latter day, his 
glory, and his church's blessedness in their conjunction with God through 
him, should so gloriously appear, and be acknowledged even by all the rest 
of the world ; and that his heart was full of all these contemplations and 
foresights, you may discern from every verse, especially 23 and 24. 

Now, then, consider that he being thus, through his shortness of time, to 
single forth one boon or largess, to ask of his Father, who (he pleads) had 
loved him afore the foundation of the world ; and as he urgeth also, had 
loved this his whole church, and every member of it, as he had loved him. 
And that to utter this request, as his dying request too, with his last breath, 
I say. If you look on him in these circumstances, you will all conclude that 
it must be some grand thing his heart was now big withal, and of all things 
else the choicest and most comprehensive of good, yea, and of universal 
concernment to them all. Sure you do, and would expect in this case, that 
it should be the utmost blessing which he could ask ; or that he knew (who 
was his Father's counsellor) to be the best his Father would bestow. And 
now what is it ? It is union, union, our mystical union. 

There are indeed some other things fall in, but I may assure you this, our 
union is the grand subject of the whole, the ocean all the other run into. 
And in that 21st verse, he at first plainly proposeth it, as the sum of his 
intended request, ' That they all may be one ;' and spends the rest of his 
prayer either in explaining what union he meant, and indigitating over and 
over, in more particularising expressions thereabout, which are, for substance, 
this one and the same thing, even this, ' That they may be one, as I in thee, 
and thou in me,' &c., that they may be ' perfect in one ;' and pressing his 
Father by those nearest endearments between himself and him, which he knew 
were the most taking efl'ectual motives to grant it, as his eternal love to him- 
self, and the same love to them, ver. 21, 23, 24. And he goes over and over it 
again, and amplifies upon it, as one that knew not how to leave it, nor to 



108 OF ELECTION. [BoOK II. 

get his heart oJ0f from it : so dear and precious a request it was to him 
(which is usual with us in petitions our hearts are in), yea, and ceaseth and 
leaves it, but because he was called off by another as great an occasion, for 
the very time appointed by his Father for him to be taken by Judas and his 
crew was now come ; read chap, xviii. And he so longed to be baptized with 
that baptism, that he resolved to be at the place, designed aforehand to meet 
them, rather than come too late. And that he was mindful of the time, his 
words, chap. xiv. 31, ' Arise, let us go hence,' do shew. And so he was 
forced to break off, and yet then he makes it his last word, ' That the love 
wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them, and I in them.' 

3. But, thirdly, what union is this intended, or with whom ? 

Our commentators do generally (except some few) limit it unto that kind 
or species of union, which the catholic church hath and shall have for ever 
one with another, and among themselves, as gathered out of and separated 
from the world, into one body, to Christ as the head ; and the oneness to 
be that of love and affection, to be of one mind and judgment, and to pre- 
serve concord and ' the unity of the spirit in the bond ol peace,' according 
as it was at first exemplified in the primitive pattern, who were ' of one heart 
and of one soul,' Acts iv. 32 ; and so fast joined and glued together, as 
the word is, Acts v. 13, that, as of ' of the rest ' (that were of the world) 
' durst no man join himself unto them.' And yet the people magnified 
them, ' and many were added to them.' All which agrees (say they) with 
Christ's speech, ver. 21. That this their being one, the rest of the world 
did tacitly acknowledge Christ to be the Messiah ; and the sight of it 
brought divers to believe, as ver. 14. 

But sure this is too narrow a vessel to contain the big words by which 
Christ expresseth this union here to his Father ; but it is directly and im- 
mediately intended of that grand union of all unions whatever, even of om' 
union with God and Christ themselves, which doth indeed by way of con- 
sequence draw on after it, this other union of saints one with another among 
themselves, as the sunbeams being one in the sun, the nearer they become 
unto the sun, they be so much nearer unto one another, and among them- 
selves, as being originally united unto the sun itself; yet still this is not the 
union primarily intended here. 

And although the common current be for that other opinion, yet there are 
some commentators of great note, who cast their thoughts upon this last 
proposed opinion. 

Toilet being convinced that those words of ver 21, 'As thou. Father, art 
in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us,' do in the very sound 
of them reach higher than that inferior union of the saints one with another, 
yet thus far complieth with the common vogue, and compounds it, bidding 
the reader attend, that there is a twofold union of believers. 

(1.) One among themselves, from the unity of faith and love, and that that 
is it (says he) Christ means in the former part of ver. 21, in those words, 
' that they all may be one.' But, 

(2.) There is another, our union with God and Christ, and their indwelling 
in us, and we in them ; and of that union (saith he) the following words are 
to be understood : ' As thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee ; that they 
also may be one in us.' 

Joannes Bence* also, in his excellent (though short) manual, falls into the 

same ; Brugensis comes off to the same, though later, yet at last. Those 

other issued with it upon the 21st verse ; but Brugensis falls in at the 22d 

verse, upon those words, ' that they may be one, as we are one.' Not 

* Super quatuor Evangelia. 



Chap. IV.] of election. 109 

only (says he) that they may be one amongst themselves (for he had [prayed] 
for that already), says he ; but that they be one with us : for that is it which 
follows, * I in them, and thou in me ; and so they may be perfectly one.' 
Which (though he carries to the sacramental eating Christ's body, &c.) yet 
concludes, the most perfect union that can be with God and Christ is here 
intended : and for this cites the interpretation of Cyril of Alexandria, that 
most ancient and grave author ; and truly I judge we might have discerned 
this higher up than either the 21st, 22d, or 23d verses ; for I hope by the 
connection of ver. 10, 11 (in the latter part of which, ver. 11, the matter of 
union is first mentioned, * that they may be one as we are'), I hope, I say, 
afterwards to make it appear, that our union with God and Christ is there 
the eminent subject in the speech. Upon which verse, our own judicious 
Cartwright, upon ver. 11, where this union is first spoken of, propounds this 
question. What union it is that is meant ? whether that thereby they are 
one among themselves, or that with Christ, and with God, or rather with 
all these ? And answers, Onni'md cum omnibus ; altogether, and upon all 
accounts, it is our union with all these. And that that of our union with 
himself, and his Father, is chiefly intended by Christ, his reason shews, viz., 
that this part of Christ's prayer is but herein consonant unto that he had 
so much impressed upon them in his sermon to them immediately afore, in 
chap. XV. ver. 4, 5, 10 : ' Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch can- 
not bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine ; no more can ye, except 
ye abide in me. I am the vine, ye are the branches : he that abideth in me, 
and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit. If ye keep my command- 
ments, ye shall abide in my love ; even as I have kept my Father's com- 
mandments, and abide in his love.' Which is all one, as to say, union with 
himself; and so, what he had so much urged upon them in his sermon to 
themselves, he now puts into a prayer to his Father for them. 

And even those that are for that union of the saints amongst themselves, 
as the primary intendment, yet are forced to take in that latter union with 
God and Christ, as that which is the fundamental cause of the saints' union 
amongst themselves ; as in whom, they being one first, do become one with 
one another. 

And so the question will rest in this, whether the union of the saints, &c., 
be first and directly intended by Christ ; and that of our union with God and 
Christ be but supposed as the cause thereof, though not expressly held 
forth in the words ; or that, primarily and directly, our immediate union 
with God and Christ be meant, and that other union be supposed, but as the 
consequent thereof; and so, but secondarily and implied, as that which doth 
and must necessarily follow upon that union first had with God and Christ, 
and so in the first place prayed for here by Christ. 

Our Mr Hooker of N. E.* who hath wrote sermons upon these verses, 
from verse the 20th to the end (which are in print), he doth plainly and 
directly cast the interpretation solely upon the saints' immediate union with 
God and Christ, and says, that though the other follows thereupon, yet it 
is not here otherwise than secondarily intended ; but that immediate union 
with God and Christ is alone the primary and direct intendment which 
Christ's prayer and petition falls upon. 

He makes apology why he so dissents and diverts from the common opi- 
nion. I profess, upon the consideration of all, to make none for this dissent, 
but shall give my reasons instead thereof. And the reasons are, 

1. That those words, ' As thou. Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they 
also may be one in us,' are a manifest explication of what manner of union 
* Qu. ' New England ' ?— En. 



110 OF ELECTION. [BoOK II. 

he intended, when first he had said, * that they all may be one.' In which 
first words he sums up first, in general, the pith of his petition ; but then 
explains it by this, ' that they may be one in us ;' and again indigitates it, 
ver. 23, * I in them, and thou in me, that they may be perfect in one ;' and 
so plainly terminates or issues upon the Father and the Son, and our being 
in them ; and herein he speaks what union he meant, as plain as plain 
can be. 

The other interpreters divert this, by making the intent of him in his men- 
tion of the Father's union in the Son, and the Son's in the Father, to be, to 
hold forth, by way of example, what the union of the saints amongst 
themselves should 136 ; even after that manner of nearness of union, as that 
whereby the Father is in the Son, and e contra. 

But this interpretation so applied to the saints' union among themselves 
doth destroy itself ; and I infer from that very thing, that the union he 
intended is such as bears a similitude of that union, in respect of their being 
one in the other ; and so form up a 

2. Second reason, both negative and affirmative: (1.) Negatively, that 
the union of the saints among themselves is not such as that it may be said, 
that they are one in another. They may indeed be said to be one with 
another ; and being members, they are said to be members of one another, 
Eph. iv. 25 ; but they are never said to be members one iyi another : Peter 
is not in Paul, nor Paul in John. (2.) But affirmatively, our union with 
God the Father and the Son is such, as that multitudes of scriptures give 
testimony, that the Father is in us, and Christ in us, and we in Christ; and 
do use these very phrases to express our union with God the Father and the 
Son ; as when it is said, * God dwells in us, and we in God,' 1 John iv. 15 ; 
and ' the church that is in God the Father :' 2 Thes. i. 1, * Unto the church 
of the Thessalonians in God our Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ.' Yea, 
it is the phrase Christ useth in this very gospel of John, chap. xiv. 20, ' At 
that day, ye shall know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in 
you.' And there, to be sure, he intends not that union the saints have 
amongst themselves ; but simply that which they have immediately in and 
with Christ, and that exemplified by what he hath with the Father ; and 
here indeed in this union, the similitude of that which the Father and Son 
have together, ver. 11, or after the example of God the Father's being in the 
Son, and the Son in the Father, is found to hold. And I acknowledge it to 
be the archetypal example of this our union with the * us,' that is, the Father 
and Son ; and so, ' that they may he one in us' must be rather meant of our 
immediate union with that * us,' in that manner the Father is in the Son, 
and the Son in the Father ; for after the similitude thereof we are in them, 
and they in us. 

And truly, this was a phrase or word so sweet in Christ's mouth, and so 
dear to his heart, as he will have it the very last word in this prayer, ' and 
I in them ;' as if he had said, take this in as the very punctum or point which 
this latter part of my prayer centres in. 

3. In ver. 23, * I in them, and thou in me, that they may be perfect in 
one ;' that is, they being in me, and I being in them, this makes their union 
in us perfect. Now the union the saints have among themselves is not the 
perfection of their union ; it is but a piece of it, and so incomplete ; but, 
on the other hand, their being one in the Father and in Christ, and so in the 
us, is that which is the perfection and top of their union, which the other is 
not ; and, therefore, this is mainly intended. 

4. Lastly, ver. 22, ' And the gloiy which thon gavest me, I have given 
them ; that they may be one, even as we are one.' These words declare the 



Chap. IV.] of election. Ill 

very glory of the saints in heaven to be but a means to consummate and 
perfect (as his word is after, vcr. 23) that union which was the intended 
and proposed subject of this his prayer ; and, therefore, that union here 
intended must be a greater and higher thing than all the grace in this life ; 
yea, and all the glory of the saints in heaven (abstract it from their union) ; 
for the end is better than the moans (which is Mr Hooker's reason, and was 
long since also mine). This all reason acknowledgeth ; and, if so, then 
certainly the union of the saints among themselves, in being one in love, 
affection, concord, of one heart, not only as in the highest attainment they 
have reached to in this life, but not as it shall be in heaven, cannot be the 
full meaning of this that he saith, the glory I have given them, is for this 
end, ' that they may be one.' This lower union, as I may call it, is but a 
part and piece of that grace the saints in this life have, among the many 
other graces vouchsafed them. And alas, how imperfect is it ! and in heaven 
also, is but a part of their glory. But this supreme union of the saints in 
the us here, is meant of Christ and God ; their being in them, and they in 
them, as the Father is in the Son and the Son in the Father, and this in 
the full accomplishment and perfection of it. This may deservedly be said 
to be greater than the whole of that grace and glory, simply considered, the 
saints shall have here and hereafter. 

There are two things yet remaining that were put into the main doctrine 
or assertion, not hitherto spoken unto. 

1. That this union with Christ and God was and is the very design of 
God's electing of us from everlasting ; and this also to be proved out of this 
prayer of Christ in John xvii., for that was it was also undertaken for, whilst 
I chose that Scripture forth, as a punctual proof of the whole. 

2. The second is, that the union is such as is the highest (next to that of 
Christ's) the creature is capable of; a super-creation union, or above what 
Adam had by creation. 

For the first of these, which, in order with the former, makes the parti- 
cular. It may easily be discerned by multitudes of passages, how Christ tra- 
versed with his Father, the Son who lay in his Father's bosom ; he recounts 
transactions between himself and his Father, or concernments that reached 
so high for their original. This, in a cursory view, will appear by ver. 5 : 
* And now, Father, glorify thou me with thine own self, with the glory 
which I had with thee before the world was.' And by ver. 24, * Thou 
lovedst me before the foundation of the world ; ' which he enters as his 
plea for his saints beholding his own glory, which he had with the Father, 
ver. 5. 

But more particularly, it appears from his pleading God's electing of us, 
whilst he seeks to obtain this union for us, as the highest thing could 
be asked ; and therefore this union was included in that election as the 
design of it. 

Now, that he pleads election in order to that union, is evident from his 
pleas, ver. 6, where it is he first enters upon our concernment : ' I have 
manifested thy name unto the men which thou gavest out of the world : thine 
they were, and thou gavest them me, and they have kept thy word.' 
Thine, how ? By election, whereby it is we first became his : 2 Tim. 
ii. 19, ' The Lord knoweth them that are his.' When* he calls ' his people, 
when* he foreknew,' that is, chose, Rom. xi. 2, as I opened it ; his, that is, 
his elect, ' my chosen,' as his o\mi words often are, of them in the Old Tes- 
tament ; and in that he had manifested his name unto them, whilst yet ye 
had preached to others indifferently, he shews what it was that put tie 
* Qu. 'whom'? — Ed. 



112 OF ELECTION. [BoOK II. 

difference, even that these belonged to God : ' Thine they were, and thou 
gavest them me.' 

That clause also, * and thou gavest them me,' repeated so oft, both ver. 6, 
9, 11, 12, 24, I confess, it is to be understood of God's giving them at 
effectual calling them, and in that sense was true of these apostles ; but 
that is not all : there is a double giving ; one at our caUing, and another at 
and with election. And that giving to him was a distinct act from that of 
mere election, though done at election. They were first the Father's by elec- 
tion, who singled forth the persons, and then gave them unto Christ upon 
his electing of them, and so these two are here joined ; thou gavest them 
me, for they are thine : first, thine by election, then given to me, in the 
same sense that grace is said to be ' given in Christ before the world began,' 
2 Tim. i. 9. In the same sense were these given to Christ afore the world 
began also, which is the import of that phrase, John vi. 37, 39, ' All that 
the Father giveth me, shall come to me ;' where the Father's giving is not 
their effectual calling, for that is besides noted out by coming to Christ. But 
it is an act of the Father's, preceding conversion, or their calling ; for it is 
the cause of their coming ; so the words manifestly shew, ' All that the 
Father giveth me shall come to me.' And when was it that act of giving 
was put forth afore calling ? Not at the instant of calhng, but in some time 
before ; for in ver. 39 he says, ' of all that thou hast given me,' as in the 
time past ; and that was afore he came down from heaven, as his words 
shew : ver. 38, 39, for ' I came down from heaven, not to do mine own will, 
but the will of him that sent me. And this is the Father's wall which hath 
sent me, that of all which he hath given me I should lose nothing.' That 
is, it was the instruction given him afore he came down, and he came down 
with that errand, he brought it with him, that of all the Father had given 
him afore he came from heaven, he should be sure not to cast off, nor lose 
any he had thus before given him ; and if afore [he] came down, then from 
whence must that act commence, but from everlasting ? when it was that 
that grace was given in Christ, as 2 Tim. i. 9. 

And truly, in ver. 24, that clause, * those whom thou hast given me,' 
cannot well otherwise be understood. ' Father, I mil that they also whom 
thou hast given me be with me where I am ; that they may behold my glory 
which thou hast given me : for thou lovedst me before the foundation of the 
world.' For the glory given to Christ — hast given me — is apparently said 
to be from everlasting, as the reason and explication given of it shews, ' For 
thou lovedst me afore,' &c. And therefore, if the giving me those thou hast 
given be suitably understood, then it is, that thou hast given me those from 
everlasting also ; which is so to be interpreted, because he had said in the 
words just afore, thou hast loved them as thou hast loved me ; and so, 
amongst other likenesses, from everlasting, as thou hast loved me. 

Besides, there he prays for his whole church to come ; and how is it that 
they had been given him ? And that was not at calling, for many of them 
were yet uncalled, and therefore given, it must be, in God's everlasting decree. 
This argument the words of ver. 2 do manifest, ' As thou hast given him 
power over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to as many as thou hast 
given him.' This as many, are as many as he had amongst all flesh of mankind 
in all ages, and of all and every one of them many, he says they had been 
given him by his Father, which was before they were, many of them, yea, 
most of them, born in all ages to come ; for they are all that many whom he 
died for and prayed for accordingly ; which is strengthened by ver. 20, 
* Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me 
through their word,' which is a- doing to the end of the world. Yet of all 



Chap. IY.] of election. 113 

these he speaks in that second, that they had been given him ; then when he 
prayed for [them] this prayer ; yea, and long afore. 

The second (or, in order, the fifth and last) additional assertion was, that 
this union was t!ie highest the creature was capable of, next unto Christ's, 
and a super-creation union, above the dues or rewards by creation. This, 
though I mention, yet I need not much insist upon the proof. I might say, 
no more, but that this our union is brought in wholly by Christ, as the head 
of his church, and here pleaded for us upon his transcending interest, on 
the highest accounts that that interest will afford (which is wholly super- 
natural). And how high that will leach, our thoughts cannot rise up to 
apprehend. Sure I am, that look how far Christ the Lord from heaven 
exceeds the first Adam, a man on earth earthy ; or that the elevation of a 
man, who is a * quickening spirit,' super-excels the low and inferior state of 
a ' living soul ;' and the unions with God, which each of these were the 
subjects of, and conveyers of the like with them proportionate to us (being 
compared together), will be found more or less excelling ; so far will thitt 
union conveyed by Christ also excel, and the one be but natural, by crea- 
tion dues, and the other supernatural, as the comparison of the two Adams, 
instituted by the apostle, 1 Cor. xv. teacheth us to make the estimate. But, 
because I confine myself to this prayer, that one passage in ver. 22 is over 
abundantly sufficient to prove this ; ' And the glory which thou hast given 
me I have given them ; that they may be one, oven as we are one.' This 
is Christ's glory in himself, by personal union, communicated to us by a 
participation from him, even as Christ's glory was from his Father's glory 
immediately, as his Son by eternal generation, and to the man Jesus, or 
God-man, by personal union ; this is a genealogy or descent from an higher 
fountain or rise than Adam's union was, and more fixed. But this branch 
will and may appear and rise up afore us, out of almost every thing I can 
speak about this union ; and when I come to speak of the height of this 
union itself, it will every way be justified to the children of union, and unto 
that I shall refer it. 

That it was a top union, super-creation, &c. 

1. See Hooker of comparison with Adam ; see Cartwright on either ver. 
11 of John xvii,, or ver. 21 and 22. 

2. It is God's glory given over Adam's head, as ver. 22, John xvii. Adam 
never had the honour to have given that ; it is proper to Christ, and had it 
given afore the world. 

3. It is the utmost he prayed for, and so a corollar}^ from that head (that 
it is the great thing Christ prays for), it is argued, it was the greatest could 
be praved for. See CartwTight's Harmony, third part, on John xvii., page 
321, 322. 

Use. Learn, then, from Christ what thing of all other to pray for, and to 
make the most endeared object of our desires. There was an one thing of 
David's desires : Ps. xxvii. 4, * One thing have I desired of the Lord, that 
will I seek after.' And what was that ? He speaks according to his eleva- 
tion under the old testament : ' that I may dwell in the house of the Lord 
all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the Lord.' And this indeed 
is near unto what Christ here under the new (and David's is spoken in the 
type of his) ; and this of Christ's is, that God the Father may dwell in you, 
and that Christ, God the Son, may be in you, as the Father is in him, and 
make your hearts his temple, wherein he shews and utters all his glory ; that 
you may be one with the ?/.s here ; that Christ may dwell in you, and you in 
him ; and thereby you will come to behold the beauty of the Lord indeed : 

VOL. IX. H 



114 G!F ELECTION* [BoOK II. 

* that tliey may "behold my glory,' saitTi Christ, ver. 24. It is to have ■* fel- 
lowship with the Father, and with the Son,' as the apostle John speaks. 
Paul, that was a man that came nearest to Christ of any other — ' follow me 
as I follow Christ' — what was the great and first pursuit of his soul ? In 
Philip, iii., where in some half a dozen verses he sets out the spiritual exer- 
cises and pursuances of his soul (I use to call them Paul's ascertions*) ; 
and there the first and main great one is this, ver. 9, * That I may win 
Christ, and be found in him ;' that is, united to him ; that is the grand point 
of his desires. You pray for redemption and forgiveness of sins, &c., and 
you do well, for ye have need on it ; and to sinners, when they are heavy 
laden and burdened with their sins, it is that which is first objected and laid 
before them by the Spirit in the word ; but yet let me tell you, there is a 
thing behind that is more remote and further ofi*, and hidden to our thoughts 
at fii'st, and that is, union with Christ and God, which in the utmost enjoy- 
ment of it will take place in the other world, when sin shall be forgotten, 
and remembered no more ; yea, and which is a blessing of blessings, that we 
might have been made perfect in, though we had never sinned ; yea, which 
is beyond heaven and glory itself, abstractly considered as it is ours, which 
is beyond our beholding, the glory of Christ in heaven ; for it is that which 
is accomplished in us by that beholding. And, my brethren, a true genuine 
spiritual desire, carrying out the heart unto a union with God the Father 
and the Son, this proceeds from pure love, from a love to the things and 
persons themselves the soul would be united to ; love is always joined with 
a desire of union ; and so much the more purely that love is carried to de- 
sire an union with things lovely, so much greater is that love. 

I add this : what though your hearts have not been so intensely and directly 
carried out to seek this for yourselves, as the top and crown object of your 
desires ; yet be not discouraged ; the apostles themselves had it not thus in 
their thoughts, when Christ prayed for this for them ; their faith and their 
spirits had been little carried forth to, and exercised about, this union. * Have 
I been so long time with you,' and * believest thou not that I am in the 
Father, and the Father in me ?' John xiv. 9, 10. But ' in that day they 
should know,' namely, when the Holy Ghost came upon them, * that I am 
in my Father, and you in me, and I in you,' ver. 20 of that 14th chapter. 
And here in this his prayer I observe, that he mentions them but so far as they 
had then gone ; and, alas \ it was but a little step ; as ' they have known 
that thou hast sent me ;' and ' they believed in me,' ver. 8 ; and again, 
at last, ver. 25, ' These have known that thou hast sent me ;' but they yet 
knew not their spiritual union with Christ, which therefore he prays for. 
And again, at the 26th verse, he saith, ' I have declared unto them thy 
name,' and that by an inward manifestation of many things I have taught 
them outwardly, concerning thy name, and love, and the way of salvation 
by me ; but yet they were defective in great and many things therein still, 
and needed new declarations of new and further things unto them. And, 
therefore, he adds those words, ' and I will declare it ;' ye know how short 
they were in knowledge. * Ye believe in God, believe also in me ;' ' hitherto 
ye have asked nothing in my name.' And therefore it may much rather be 
supposed that they needed God's revealing to them, inwardly and sensibly, 
their union with him ; and therefore he prays for it again in the very next 
words, and concludes therewith. They little dreamt at this time of his 
praying of this so high a mystery, the sense thereof was reserved till after 
his being glorified ; our union is hid with God in Christ, as our life also is ; 
and our growth in grace lieth in higher advances of spiritual knowledge, and 
* That is, things that he strove after. — Ed. 



Chap. V.] of election. 115 

impressions of heart affecting us, running along with accordingly upon what 
is still more and more spiritual. 



CHAPTER V. 

The infiuitD of grace and condescension in God, the high and lofty One, to 
ordain such an union and communion with himself of us his creatures, ivho 
are at such a distance from him as ice are creatures; and, more than douhhj 
infinite grace, in that we are also sinners. 

Use. You have, then, great reason to adore our holy, and "great, and blessed 
God for this his original and foundation grace of ordaining this high and 
super- creation union of and communication with himself, and of yourselves 
thereunto. My exhortation is, that under the contemplation of God's height 
and gi'eatness, you would especially adore his grace, according to the tenor 
of the angels' song, ' Glory be to God on high, good will to men,' &c., Luke 
ii. 14. My intent is not upon this occasion to magnify this benefit itself, 
and shew how great this union in itself is ; but to magnify the grace of God's 
heart himself in ordaining it, and us thereunto. 

Only touching the union itself, I shall say but two things at the present, 
that shew the greatness of this our union. 

1. First, That bate but two things, which you that are mere creatures are 
eternally incapable of. 1. Never think to become God himself; I will not 
again say not only bate, but abhor, that thought. First, you must be so 
united to him as God and you may still remain distinct beings for ever. 
And indeed this were not union, but sameness and identity ; but yet so near 
will this oneness be, as God will be ' all in all ' to you, and ' all the fulness 
of God' shall fill you, as Eph. iii. 19; and so fill you, as the fire of an hot 
furnace doth a small piece of iron cast into it (when yet not dissolving it, or 
converting it into fire itself), that you see not, or discern not the iron, but 
it appears to be altogether fire ; it so fills, penetrates, and throughout pos- 
sesseth it. So in glory, yourselves will not mind or think of your own selves, 
or of your glory as yours, through your being swallowed up into the thoughts 
and enjoyments of his gloiy shining in and through you. 2. Bate you also 
that union which the man Jesus hath with God (God's first fellow), which 
is to be one person with him that is God, and so by inheritance to have the 
name, and be styled, 'Son of God,' yea, 'God,' &c., though his creature 
frame remains distinct from God eternally, in Col. ii. 9, ' The fulness of the 
Godhead dwells bodily,' that is, personally, ' in him,' as bodibj notes (which 
I cannot stand to shew) in our and other languages. When you would sig- 
nify and denote a person, you use the denomination of a body; such a body 
did this, you use to say, and somebody ; yea, and nobody, that is, no person. 
As body signifies person, so bodily personally; and thus the Godhead dwells 
bodily in Christ by his union with the person of the Son of God. But this 
is his transcendent privilege alone. Would you be all Christ's ? I pray, 
content yourselves ; there is but ' one Lord Jesus Christ, and we by him,' 
1 Cor. viii. 6. 

But, excepting these tw^o, call all the angels and spirits of men made 
perfect, and let them imagine for you the sublimest, highest, nearest 
union with God else, and communication of God himself accordingly, and 
you shall have them, and be perfect in one, as Christ says, ' as we are one,' 
John xvii. 11. 

2. The second thing I say of this union, it is indissoluble : ' Who shall 



116 OF ELECTION. [BoOK II. 

separate ns from the love of God ? ' Rom. viii. 35. And if not from his love, 
then not from himself; for his love made the union, and will never suffer 
a separation. Neither his height, who is the high and lofty One, shall work 
in his heart, the looseness of his heart towards you, nor any, nor all, of that 
depth of sin and misery; for his love hath an height, and depth, and breadth, 
and length in it passeth j^ours. And in this our union (as in other things) 
transcends that of Adam's by the law of his creation ; the least sin dissolved 
it, it was but a running knot; and how slight and slender an union and 
friendship must that be founded upon, quamdiu bene se gesserit, and which 
the least wiy, unwary thought may unknit ! And so the creature could 
look at the love of God with it, but as might be turned away. And to love, 
or apprehend one's love to me as one that may perhaps one day hate me, this 
is vencnum amiciticB, the poison of friendship. 

This for the union itself; now for the greatening of the grace thereof 
(which is my proper scope). I shall only refer you to God himself; hear 
what himself speaks of it, and what he sets it forth by; how he himself 
values the favour of it who best knows how to value it, that is, best 
acquainted with himself, and knows what he bestows on us, when he unites 
himself. • 

The scriptures I refer you to for this are, Isa. Ivii. 15, 'For thus saith 
the high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity, whose name is Holy; I dwell 
in the high and holy place, with him also that is of a contrite and humble 
spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart of the con- 
trite ones;' parallel with Isa. Ixvi. 1, 2, * Thus saith the Lord, The heaven 
is my throne, and the earth is my footstool : where is the house that ye build 
to me ? and where is the place of my rest ? For all those things hath mine 
hand made, and all those things have been, saith the Lord ; but to this man 
will I look, even to him that is poor, and of a contrite spirit, and that trem- 
bleth at my w^ord.' 

1. It is union with his poor creatures which he here indigitates, and holds 
up to their view, as the great benefit bestowed. ' With him will I dwell ;' 
by which phrase, in the New Testament, union with God and Christ are still 
expressed, as also in the Old : 1 John iv. 15, 16, ' Whosoever shall confess 
that Jesus is the Son of God, God dwelleth in him, and he in God. And 
we have known and believed the love that God hath to us. God is love ; 
and he that loveth, dwelleth in God, and God in him.' And the highest 
union of the Son of God, in and with the human nature, is termed the dwell- 
ing of the Godhead bodily or personally, Col. ii. 9. 

Now, the course God takes to magnify this his grace of union, or indwell- 
ing in us, is, by setting forth the greatness of himself in a comparative with 
our meanness and lowness. 

I shall not here at large or industriously set forth his height or loftiness, 
that is not my main design at present, though that was elsewhere my argu- 
ment upon the same text, which I opened then, to shew the distance of God 
from the creature; but at present my single intent and purpose is to glorify 
this grace of union. 

Brethren, God here appears in and puts on as great a glory as anywhere 
else the Scriptures do express, and he doth it to endear the condescension of 
his love in uniting himself unto us. I shall make instance of it in each par- 
ticular, whereby he sets forth his greatness. 

(1.) ' The high and lofty One:' high, for the transcendency and excellency 
of his being; lofty, for his sovereignty and dominion. To speak to each. 

[1.] The high One, or Most High, a title frequently given him in Scrip- 
ture, and even by the devil himself: ' God most high,' Luke viii. 28. And 



Chap. V.j of election. 117 

it notes out his divine being and essence to be of another kind than his 
creatures are of; yea, and infinitely surpassing theirs in that respect ; as in 
Eph. iv. 5, 6, * One Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of 
ail, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.' 1. He is said to be 
above all, denoting the sublimity of his Godhead and being ; and in an higher 
kind excelling theirs. And, '2dly, he is through all, in respect of the im- 
mensity of his being, that extencleth to and pierceth through all. Or if you 
look that other parallel place, Isa. Ixvi. 1, 2, ' Thus saith the Lord, The 
heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool : where is the house that 
ye build unto me ? and where is the place of my rest ? For all those things 
hath mine hand made, and all these things have been, saith the Lord ; but 
to this man will I look, even to him that is poor, and of a contrite spirit, and 
trembleth at my word ;' where God, comparing himself in like manner with 
his creatures, speaks thus slightly of them and their existence. These ! why, 
these have my hands made, and made out of nothing ! which expresseth their 
utter diiierence in kind from him, as well as his efficiency ; for what are the 
ai'tificial works of any man's hands unto what himself is that made them ? 
and bespeaks of their existence. Those words 'all these have been' — 
Parens renders jje/- eum exiatunt. 

Now stand aghast, my brethren, to think that infinite pure being of his 
(which runs through ad immixed with his creatures ; and that, in the kind 
of it, doth transcend and differ, as a man doth from a picture he hath drawn ; 
or as the rational soul or an intelligent spirit doth from the body of a man, 
or the sensitive soul in him, or in a brute) should contract so near an one- 
ness with us his poor saints. When x\dam was to have a companion, God 
brought all sorts of earthly creatures to him for him to choose one out of ; 
but they being none of them of his kind, he refused them all. And shall 
God vouchsafe to mingle himself with us, and dwell in us, as the soul doth 
in the body, be one with us, and make us companions with himself, yea, and 
reckon us as himself. It is spoken of as a debasement of our souls that 
their condition should be ' to dwell in houses of clay,' Job iv. 19, and their 
foundation to be in the dust ; and will he that is the potter dwell in his 
earthen pots he makes, and become one with them ; for him that is above all 
and through all, as you have it in Eph. iv. 6. It is the immensity of his 
being that he fills heaven and earth, and he were not God if he were not so 
immense. For this God to be in you all (which is spoken of the saints with 
a discriminating difference from ail else, and to enhance the grace of which 
he had rehearsed those other) is grace indeed, and a presence infinitely be- 
yond that common to them with all things, of being through them. 

Put together these two ; that he that is above all in the eminency of his 
being, and but through all things else, should further be in you all. And 
there is the grace. 

[2.] The lofty One ; which imports, 1, that, according unto that height of 
his being, he might, in a grandeur answerable thereunto, carry it towards 
his creature loftily and aloof; and might, out of a due and just valuation of 
himself, so keep off from any communion with them. Sure I am the Scrip- 
ture speaks at this rate of him as of what he might do, and that out of lofti- 
ness, when it says that it is an humbling of him to cast an eye, or so much 
as a thought, upon any of his creatures ; not on earth only, but in heaven. 
This is expressly spoken of him : ' Ps. cxiii. 5, 6, * Who is like unto the 
Lord our God, who dwelleth on high ; who humbleth himself to behold the 
things that are in heaven and in the earth.' It is as if he had said, It is a 
condescension or stooping, a coming down from his loftiness, to cast a 
thought or look upon any of them under any consideration ; to take them 



118 OF ELECTION. [BoOK II. 

SO mucli as to be the object of his cogitation. And in this sense we use the 
phrase of one who, knowing his own worth and height, and rating himself 
proportionably, that he is too lofty to deign to do such or such a thing, that 
is far below him. Oh, therefore, how far must he be from deigning to have 
any such a thought or inclination as to be one with us, and to dwell in us, 
and exchange thoughts, affections, and joys with us in so near a manner ! 
yea, bestow even himself upon us ! I had almost said, to cast himself away 
upon such worthless things ! I will make this supposition (if it could be 
supposed), that if any creature should ever have so presumed and aspired as 
to have made such a but far-off motion to him, how would he, out of his 
loftiness, have with indignation rejected it, and them that made it ! Well, 
but this grace within himself made the motion for us, and caused this lofty 
One to think of it. 

It is said in Scripture that he purposed all things within himself, Eph. 
i. 11 ; and to be sure this, of all others, must have been purposed within 
himself, and have come from himself, and that makes the grace of it. 

2dhj. The lofty One ; that is, in respect of absolute sovereignty, as in 
1 Tim. vi. 15 he is described, 'Who is the blessed and only potentate, the 
I^ing of kings, and Lord of lords.' And further, to make it appear he is so, 
he hath a Son that is lesser than himself, considered as God-man, namely, 
Christ, and who is accordingly styled ' the Prince of the kings of the earth,' 
Rev. i. 5 (even as the king's son hath the title of prince under the king his 
father), whom he will, in his times, one day shew, and cause to appear in 
glory, as it is in the same place of Timothy. And this his Prince or Son, 
less than himself, is yet under him as God-man, styled also ' the King of 
kincrs and Lord of lords.' 

Think with yourselves, then, but of a great and lofty spirited prince, that 
is Lord of all, that he should deign to unite to himself the lowest beggar, 
and take her into his bosom, and bestow his son or prince upon her in mar- 
riage, and unite himself therewith in the nearest tie and bond of union. 
And yet earthly kings are but kings by birth, and in their essence or nature 
but of the same kind as other men ; and yet this doth God. To conclude 
this : in Rom. viii. 39 you read that ' neither height, nor depths, shall 
separate from this love of God in Christ Jesus.' Shall not separate implies 
an union made ; heights are those heights of God's loftiness, in being so 
infinitely above us ; the depths are your depths of lowness, miseries, and sins. 
Now these hindered not his conjunction with us at first, nor shall they ever 
separate or work off his heart from us. In marriages of persons mean by 
birth, though perhaps rich, with or into the nobility, it is often seen that 
their height and loftiness makes them in time despise those they have mar- 
ried, and to have their hearts taken off from them for the disproportion in 
respect of meanness, so that it proveth in the long-run an uncomfortable 
union. But it is not thus with the lofty heart of our God. His loftiness 
and your lowness, his heights and your depths, make the happiest union 
that ever was, because it is his grace makes it and brings it about, and holds 
us together. 

2. '"Wlio inhabiteth eternity;' that is, 1, when none of these his creatures 
had a being, but made in the beginning of time. Gen. i. 1; whereas he, for 
an eternity of time past, when there was no creature with him, as Prov. viii., 
ver. 23—32, dwelt alone in himself, who is his own eternity, and is an 
house to himself, completely furnished within himself, and hath no need of 
us^ or anything, nor would not have had unto all eternity to come : Acts 
xvii. 24, 25, ' God, that made the world, and all things therein, seeing that 
he is Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands : 



Chap. V,] of election. 119 

neither is worshipped with men's hands, as though he needed anything, 
seeing he giveth to all life, and breath, and all things.' They thought their 
gods such (as Paul's speech implies), that they contributed a glory unto them 
to build them temples, to invite them to come and dwell and receive worship 
and sacrifices from them offered therein. 

And the vulgar Jev/s had some like narrow conceits of our great God, as 
that our parallel place, Isaiah Ixvi. 1, insinuates; for what doth God say 
there to them ? ' Thus saith the Lord, the heaven is my throne, and the 
earth is my footstool ; where is the house that ye build unto me ? and where 
is the place of my rest ?' Which is as if he had said, This temple, nor all 
these things, are neither worthy of me, to be a place or dwelling to me, nor 
have they all room enough to hold me, that they should be my rest, to take 
contentment in. 

Solomon himself, after he had built that stately temple (the wonder of 
the world whilst it stood), when he came to dedicate it by that solemn 
prayer, 1 Kings, chap, viii., that God would dwell in it, and hear all sorts of 
petitions made in it, or towards it, as the throne of his presence, doth, in the 
midst and full career of his prayer, make a stand, and puts a strange check 
or correction to himself, and a stop to his petitioning any further : ver. 27, 
' But will God indeed dwell on the earth ? Behold the heaven, and heaven 
of heavens, cannot contain thee, how much less this house that I have 
builded !' Whereas God's promise to dwell therein was the very corner- 
stone of his prayer, laid at the entrance of it: ver. 12, ' The Lord said that 
he would dwell in the thick darkness,' which he builds all his petitions 
upon. This so abrupt a clause and parenthesis to a prayer that had run on 
so smoothly for so long a series of such petitions for God's presence, seems 
at first blush to have been a recalling or calling into question that his foun- 
dation. But it was either a divine rapture, an ecstasy, swallowing up his 
soul into an adoration of God's infinite graciousness so to descend, or that 
his faith took breath a little, by a brief query made unto God, seeking to 
draw and suck in from him a confirmation and strengthening of his faith 
therein, that so immense a God should thus dwell, &c., was a thing became 
too big for his narrow faith to retain, without some new impression from 
God to enlarge and widen it. And truly, by such free queries made in 
prayer, the saints often draw from God manifestations and impressions of 
his love ; as to say, * But wilt thou indeed pardon, and yet love me,' or the 
hke. For that this should have been vox dubitantis, the voice of unbelief or 
of doubting, I cannot well suppose, although the thing was, but that God 
had said it, in itself utterly incredible, because that, ere he began his prayer, 
he saw with his eyes the presence of God filling this temple, ver. 11. And 
having his faith fully confirmed there, he at the beginning of his prayer 
rehearsed the promise God had long before made of dwelling in it, ver. 12, 
which the dark cloud was the testimony of. I understand it,^ therefore, to 
have been vox admirantis, the voice of admiration and astonishment, pro- 
ceeding from a strong faith of it. His spirit was stounded at the thoughts 
of it, whilst he was carrying it all along in his prayer, and was indeed the 
main petition in and of his prayer ; and therefore when he had recovered 
himself, or came, as it were, to himself again, having uttered this, he goes 
on in the next verse, 28, as he had done before, ' Yet have thou respect 
unto the prayer of thy servant, and to his supplication, Lord my God,' 
and so on ; so as this, hut will God indeed dwell on earth, and in a temple 
made by me ? This was but a stounding parenthesis, that so immense a God, 
whom the heaven, and heaven of heavens, cannot contain, should vouchsafe 
to dwell, &c., and it is as if he had said with wonderment, But is this true. 



120 OF ELECTION. [BoOK II. 

and true indeed ? Oh, infinitely strange, and beyond all imagination ! A 
condescension that would never have entered into the heart of man, and 
never enough to be admired at. Thus this proceeded not out of doubting 
of the thing, though thus great, but from an adoration of God that he should 
vouchsafe it, considering his infiniteness and immensity, thus to lower him- 
self to dwell under so unworthy a roof; as that centurion also spake of Christ, 
whom this temple of Solomon's did typify. However it was, whether the 
one or the other, or both, either serves as a great step to my purpose, which 
is to greaten the grace of God in dwelling on earth ; and withal, take this 
along with you, that the prophet Isaiah his grand wondering, and this of 
Solomon's, was, that he that inhabiteth eternity before heaven or the heaven 
of heavens were built, or a stone thereof laid, should thus do. 

But will you have me unfold the mystery of all this admiration of Solo- 
mon's, and bring it down more home to my scope in hand ? For God to 
have dwelt thus in that outward pile of building, the stone, gold, and furni- 
ture of Solomon's temple, as understood in the outward letter, was not the 
great. object that Solomon's faith or wonderment was exercised about ; yea, 
that simply or abstractly, or alone considered, if no mystery had been in it, 
was not at all to have been believed. For, if so, then it had been contra- 
dictory to that we heard from the apostle. Acts xvii. 24, ' God that made 
the world dwelleth not in temples made with hands.' 

Solomon's temple, indeed, was God's ordinance, having the promise of 
his presence ; but there was this further deep and great mystery intended 
by it, which Solomon's faith and the beheving Jew had in their eye, and 
that we must understand to have been the sul ject of his admiration as well 
as of his faith. 

This temple, and the ark in the holy of holies thereof, in which God 
dwelt between the cherubims, was his Christ that was to come in the flesh, 
God's Immanuel, or God with us, even the fulness of the Godhead dwelling 
bodily and substantially in an human nature, whereof this temple and ark 
were but the shadow (which opposition of shadow and body is another inter- 
pretation we may take in, to make that phrase of dwelling bodily complete). 
It is Christ who is that true tabernacle to be in heaven, which not man but 
God pitched, and was to be the ark of his testament, as Christ under the 
new testament is called. And Christ not being then to come, there was 
nothing extant on the earth visibly to signify that presence and union of God 
with man by, as this of Solomon's did ; so as this of Solomon's was in a 
shadow ordained to be, and had promises belonging to it, and a reverence 
peculiar to it, though it was but a dwelling in darkness, as ver. 12 of 
1 Kings viii., and in a shadow. 

This temple likewise signified God's church and saints on earth, and in 
heaven likewise, as those in whom God dwells by so intimate a presence ; 
which inhabitation of his in them, is by derivation from and in the virtue of 
that personal union that the man Jesus (typed by the ark) had with the Son 
of God, and dw^elling in him therewith. 

By these things forelaid, the subject-matter of Solomon's wonderment, 
^ Will God indeed dwell on earth ? ' doth prove to be really and indeed 
intended (though thus veiled under the temple, and Solomon's admiration 
so immense a God should dw^ell in it) of a wonderment that this God should 
vouchsafe to dwell in the temple of Christ's human nature, as Christ himself 
calls his body, John ii. 19, and the fulness of the Godhead bodily fill and 
possess it ; and that then, through him, in the hearts of all his saints, his 
mystical body, whether in earth or heaven, united unto him as the head. 
And we that live under the new testament, and understand the mystery of 



Chap. Y.] of election. 1-1 

all these things, should therefore fall into a far deeper astonishing admira- 
tion, with ravishment, at the thoughts of this, as Solomon did at God's 
dwelling in his temple, and this when we shall further consider that Solo- 
mon, in this his prayer of consecration of his temple, did therein sustain the 
type of our Jesus, consecrating his flesh and human nature, by strong cries, 
and tears, and humblings of himself to his Father, whereof the 16th Psalm 
and 22d Psalm (made for him), are evidences, as also his story and the 
epistle to the Hebrews shew. So that, indeed, this argument in hand will 
rise in this : that the man Jesus wondered as much at his own advance- 
ment unto this honour, that God should vouchsafe to dwell personally in so 
sorry and poor a man as himself (considered as a creature) was ; and that 
he says as well as Solomon, for Solomon doth it as representing him, ' And 
will God indeed dwell in a tabernacle of flesh,' and by virtue of that union 
take me up into glory ? So near himself that I should be able to say, ' I in 
my Father, and my Father in me ? ' Oh, wonderful ! And if all this will 
not make an impression hereof on you, that even this done to Christ (who 
is that holy Thing, that holy One, &c.) is matter of such astonishment. 
Then add to this of Solomon's, that other more clear testimony of David his 
father in Ps. viii., wherein, whether you understand David himself as a pro- 
phet taking up the like aghnstment to speak in his own person, or whether in 
the name and person of Christ, he utters it as that which the man Jesus as 
man should take up : his w^ords of him are these, ver. 4, 5, 6, ' What is 
man, that thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that thou visitest 
him? For thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and hast 
crowned him with glory and honour. Thou hast made him to have dominion 
over the works of thy hands ; thou hast put all things under his feet.' And 
that he speaks thesethings of Jesus as he is man, the apphcaiion the apostle 
makes of these words, as properly intended of Christ, so as of no man else, 
in the 2d chapter to the Hebrews, ver. 6-9, do directly shew : * But one in 
a certain place testified, saying, What is man, that thou art mindful of him ? 
or the son of man, that thou visitest him ? Thou madest him a httle lower 
than the angt Is ; thou crowned st him with glory and honour, and didst set 
him over the works of thy hands; thou hast put all things in subjection 
under his feet. For in that he put all things in subjection under him, 
he left nothing that is not put under him. But now we see not yet 
all things put under him : but we see Jesus, that was made a little 
lower than the angels for the sufiering of death, crowned with glory and 
honour.' Yea, and it may well be thought that David uttered this as in the 
name and person of the man Jesus himself ; for he had the fullest experi- 
ence, and knew best what these high and glorious visitations of grace, or 
dealings of God, proper and pecuhar to himself, were, and which were such 
as were vouchsafed to none else of the sons of men. He therefore had the 
greatest cause to speak these things himself unto his Father, who, though a 
Son, learned obedience, and to know what a man he w\as in distance from 
God. And surely if David spake these things of him by way of wonder- 
ment, and they therefore being true of him, he therefore did frequently in 
his soliloquies with his father utter the same, or what were equivalent thereto, 
so as to meditate and say to God, Oh what was I, and what am I, the son of 
man, so sorrv a man, that thou shouldst thus visit me, or that thou shouldnt 
be thus mindful of me ! that is, set thy heart so on me, to visit me in my 
incarnation at first, when thou tookest mv frail flesh into union with thy 
eternal Word and Son ; and that I should be called the Son of God, and 
bear the name of thy Immanuel, God with us, by virtue of that union; 
and that thou shouldst then make this flesh or manhood of mine, by being 



122 OF ELECTION. [BoOK 11. 

through death made lower than the angels, the means and instruments of so 
great a service to thee as to save by my death thine elect of the sons of 
men; and then, after that work performed, I should be crowned with glory 
and honour, far above all principalities and powers, and have dominion over 
all the works of thy hands, and have all things put under my feet. My 
brethren, you may extract much of the substance of this language out of 
many passages in John xvii., and his prayer in the garden ; as to which 
latter, the 7th and 8th verses of the 5th chapter to the Hebrews, I take to 
be a comment upon it, ' Who in the days of his flesh, when he had offered 
up prayers and supplications, with strong crying and tears, unto him that 
was able to save him from death, and was heard in that he feared ; though 
he were a son, yet learned he obedience by the things which he suffered.' 

And now when thou hast seen Solomon, David, and Christ himself, won- 
dering at this, then return to thyself and fall down afore this God, and 
wonder at thyself and the rest of thy fellow-sinners, that God should deign 
thus to visit and mind thee and them, and say. Oh what is man, that thou 
art mindful of him, that w^e, such worms and wretches, should be thus and 
in this manner so highly honoured as for the high God to dwell in us ; and 
will God indeed dwell in such houses of clay, mingled with sin, and make 
us his temple? Thus, 2 Cor. vi. 16, 'You are the temple of the livin 
God ; ' and Rev. xxi. 2, 3, ' And I John saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, 
coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her 
husband. Behold the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with 
them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, 
and be their God.' Where the church is described, 1, by her union with 
Christ, ver. 2, as being his bride ; and then by their union with God, and 
his dwelling in them, ver. 3. And if Solomon wondered God should dwell 
in that his temple, made of the best and gloriousest of inanimate creatures 
the world affords, but such as never had displeased him, and if David and the 
man Jesus wonder that God should so dwell in him who was the holy One of 
God, how much more that he should dwell in us, who were once temples of 
Satan, and in whom at present sin dwells, as Rom. vii. 20. Oh infinite 
grace ! 

And having thus led you along through these windings, and landed you at 
the same point we began with, let your thoughts thus possessed return again 
to our prophet Isaiah, who raiseth this wonder far higher than Solomon did, 
and reflect with yourselves and say : Oh, that ever that God that hath not 
the heaven of heavens only to dwell in, which yet cannot contain him, but 
that hath had eternity to dwell in still, should ever ordain to dwell in a 
cottage that was built but yesterday, and take that up for his eternal habi- 
tation, cages of sin and uncleanness, and bring eternity down with him, the 
fulness of God into so narrow a heart, yea, and to fill them, in the end, with 
all the fulness of God, as in that 3d to the Ephesians, ver. 19, ye have it ; 
that the whole blessedness of God should come down into thy heart, who 
extendeth himself to fill all eternity, both past and to come, in one instant. 
And because thou wert not extant then with him, during his eternity, nor 
knewest none of what his thoughts were then, for him to bring with him 
down into thy soul all the thoughts of love and affection, and all his dearest 
delights he had then of thee and in thee, during that eternity, whereof you 
read, Prov. viii., when he was alone, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost together; 
and so possess thee of his eternity past, as far as it is possible for thee to 
be possessed of it ; and to gratify thee so far as to open the full mystery of 
his will, the intimacies of his counsels so far as they do concern thee ; to 
discover the manifold contrivements of his wisdom impregnated of love, in- 



Chap. V.] of election. 123 

tended aforehand ; and forecast how to shew his love in the most ample 
and graceful way to thee, thereby to take thy heart. He will bring down, I 
say, with him into thy heart, all those everlasting transactions he had with 
Christ about thee ; all the promises he made to him for thee, as Titus i. 2 ; 
all the blessings which in his own gracious purposes he had continually a 
design of blessing thee with in Christ. That these and all other the ' deep 
things of God,' the bottom of his heart, as the apostle styles them, which 
* eye hath not seen, nor ear heard,' but which God then was a-preparing for 
them that were to love him, these he will reveal ; whereof some, and in part, 
his Spirit, who searcheth the deep things of God, doth now in this hfe upon 
sense of union, begin to make known, as things freely given us of God. 
And the whole that remains, will God himself, in that other world, fully 
unfold and relate unto thee, for the space of another eternity yet to come, 
as being time Httle enough to do it in ; for, oh, ' how many are thy thoughts 
to US-ward ! If I would declare and speak of them, they are more than can 
be numbered,' says he, that was our friend and his counsellor, Ps. xl. 5 ; 
and that that psalm was penned for him the next verse shews. 

3. Again, thirdly, in Isa. Ixvi. 1, you have this also mentioned: ' Thus 
saith the Lord, the heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool ; and 
where is the house ye build me, and where is my rest ?' And in Isa. Ivii. 
15, ' I that dwell in the high and holy place ;' it is I that dwell with you 
and in you ; that is, that he, who hath built himself a throne for himself, 
which is in heaven, an high and holy place (as Nebuchadnezzar, forsooth, 
says, he built himself a palace, for the glory of his majesty, so he foolishly 
boasted) ; that this God should choose to build another throne for himself to 
dwell in, in a poor and broken spirit ; and therein by grace to reign, as 
Rom. V. 21, as being a spirit, of all other, so disposed and framed as to give 
grace the honour and dominio^Q of all. Kings use to say, that the hearts of 
their subjects are their surest and best throne, and to sit in which they most 
delight ; and be assured of it, that God accounts your hearts a greater throne 
thaa what that high and holy place, the local heavens, is to him, which is 
called holy, because the glory of the holy God doth so appear there, as no 
unclean thing did ever enter it, or can abide in it ; and that God magnifies 
this place so much that he hath holy spirits with him there, and none other, 
whose holy hearts, and the glory they give him therein, he accounts a far more 
glorious throne than the place ; for it was for them he did build and prepare 
the place, as Christ speaks, John xiv. 3 : ' And if I go and prepare a place 
for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, 
there you may be also ;' and Heb. xi. 16, * But now they desire a better 
country, that is, an heavenly : wherefore God is not ashamed to be called 
their God : for he hath prepared for them a city.' And thus much is in- 
sinuated in Isa. Ixvi. 1, where God first asketh them the question, where is 
the place of my rest, and abode ?' He speaks it to these tern piers, as I 
may call those Jews that cried, ' The temple of the Lord, the temple of the 
Lord !' Where is it, can you imagine, says God, I should have room or rest 
in '? a sufficient dwelling, wherein I may dwell like myself; dwell like a God, 
so great a God as I am ? What ! will you confine me to j^our temple, and 
think that house good enough for me, that have heaven for my throne ? 
When he had thus confuted them, he answers it himself: I have spied out 
a place for my rest, you little think of; yea, which you generally despise, 
even a poor broken spirit ; and I will rest in my love there, as Zeph. iii. 
17, for ever, and seek no further; and not rest only, but sit down therein 
with the greatest joy and full contentment. ' The Lord thy God will rejoice 
over thee with joy ; he will rest in his love, he will joy over thee with sing- 



124 OF ELECTION. [BoOK II. 

ing.' It is his love causeth him to do it ; and they are a poor people, ver. 
12, even as here in Isaiah he also characters them. 

4. ' The earth is my footstool ;' and I could kick it, or tread it to dust 
and nothingness, if I pleased, as well as I trample upon it now as my foot- 
stool. Well, but these poor contrite souls, whom I looked at, ver. 2, and 
have looked at, and had in my eye from everlasting, these clods of earth 
and dust, these worms creeping on this earth (yea, these small pieces, 
and small motes and atoms of this earth, compared to the whole of it), these 
I have taken into my everlasting aiTQs, and taken up into my bosom to 
dwell in them, even whilst I make the whole earth my footstool ; and they 
shall sit on my Son's throne, as a queen doth with her lord, and he sits on 
my throne, as Rev. iii. 21 : ' To him that overcometh will I give to sit with 
me in my throne, even as I also overcame, and am set down with my Father 
in his throne.' 

5. ' Whose name is Holy.' And so holy as the heavens I dwell in, whicli 
I call my high ,and holy place, are not pure in my sight ; that is, do not 
come up to that holiness which I am fully delighted in ; and yet I, this 
highly holy One, will be one with these sinners ; and that they are sinners, 
and their sins is that that humbles them, and breaks their hearts, and doth 
it whilst they look upon me in my holiness, who am so holy, as I cannot 
endure to behold any iniquity ; and who, if I had chosen for holiness, would 
have chosen the angels that fell, whom I made excelling in holiness, as well 
as strength ; I chose the humble, poor, and contrite spirits, broken for their 
s'.ns, and the miserablest and remotest in their condition, from any such a 
preferment and favour as this, to be vouchsafed them ; yea, and in their 
own thoughts, the farthest oflf of all the rest of my creation, looking with 
trembling at my word, fearing the shaking of every leaf therein ; at every 
example of my wrath upon others, at every threatening ; yea, lest I should 
in wrath swear against them as I have done against others ; lest I should 
tread on them, as men use to do on worms, whilst they lie crawling with 
their mouths in the dust, if there may be hope. 

But what is the reason he should affect thus to unite with such to choose, 
and so should ordain them to be such then when he chose them ? That 
whereas he had respect in his choice to nothing in the creature to move him, 
for which he should first choose them, he would shew he had not, by this, 
that those he chose, he ordained withal to be such as should neither really 
have anything to respect, and in their own apprehensions of themselves, 
utterly without anything in themselves he should regard. But the clean 
contrary, which their being termed the poor, and humble, and contrite, do 
both here in the prophet, and up and down in Christ's speeches, import ; 
he decreed them therefore to be such, and to work these apprehensions and 
dispositions of spirit in them, to prepare them for this union, and to accom- 
pany it when it should come to be actually bestowed on them. The pure 
creatures, had they stood without his election grace, had been too full, too 
rich, and apt to reign, in some respect, without him ; and all the rest of 
mankind that fell, are full of themselves, of their own righteousness, and 
their bellies are filled with his hid treasure of outward comforts, privileges, 
&c., and they are all, whilst remaining such, too full for God to dwell in ; 
intus existens prohibet alienum, there is no room for him, as of Christ it was 
said at his birth, in the inns. There is not a creature emptiness in them, 
to take me in to the full of my goodness, that so I alone might fill them ; 
and, says God, I bring fulness enough with me where I come ; the fulness 
of my Godhead, which filleth all in all ; and I need no addition from what 
is in my creature ; and the emptier my creatures are, the more receptivity 



Chap. VI. J of election. 125 

and capacity there is of me, to take up my dwelling in, and whole posses- 
sion of them. And therefore their poverty, vacuity, and brokenness of 
heart, not only as sinners, but as creatures, and their becoming in their own 
eyes stripped and divested of all their excellencies they had, or might imagine 
to have, as such, even to be brought to nought in whatever they may think 
they are, as the apostle's word is, this makes them fit for my Godhead to 
fill. And these are the meet matches for him with all readiness to close 
with ; then, when they can no way subsist in themselves ; nor have comfort 
in their own being any longer without him ; nor in anything else besides 
him ; nor bear up their own souls fnmi sinking, even to nothing, and worse 
than nothing ; and are become actually, and in their desires, nothing in com- 
forts, nothing in their own righteousness, nothing in their own ends and 
aims, nothing in their own abihties to any good, nothing in any creature 
privilege ; and that when they look back unto their best estate by creation, 
they see their subjectness to vanity, and continually to have fallen and lost 
all (as they did) when the soul is thus humble under its creatureship, and 
the vanity of that ; and likewise of sin, and its sinful condition. Now, says 
God, looking at the disposition of such a soul, now shall I be God alone in 
the heart of this man ; here I see a seat to erect a throne to myself in ; when 
I come to join with this man, I alone shall be exalted in that day ; and he 
that glorieth will glory in the Lord ; and my design in my election is, that 
DO tlesh should glory in my presence, or where I come to dwell and reside, 
and manifest my presence in: 1 Cor. i. 28, 29, 31, 'And base things of 
the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things 
which are not, to bring to nought things that are : that no flesh should 
glory in his presence : that, according as it is written, he that glorieth, let 
him glory in the Lord.' 

Again, If God would have the whole of glory entirely to and for him- 
self, these empty nothingnesses are fully fitted to give it all wholly to him, 
and to entertain him upon his own terms of being glorified as himself can of 
creatures. But above all, these are prepared to give him the glory of his 
grace, W'hich in this condition will be sure to be acknowledged, and to be 
adored as the donor and founder of all unto them. 

To conclude ; there is not, nor could there have been, a greater demon- 
stration given, that God had no respect to what is in us, for which he chose 
us, than that he should design, together with his choosing us, to bring us (in 
the deepest sense of our own hearts) unto this utter emptiness of all respect 
for which God should regard us ; and choose out this as the highest and 
most pleasing frame or qualification of heart in us, upon which he should 
promise to come and dwell in us, or rather declare that he doth dwell in us. 



CHAPTER VL 

The primordial or foundation motives in the heart of God, that moved him to 
affect, desif/n, and decree so hif/h an union of creatures with himself, as they 
are expressed in Christ's prayer, John xvii. — The first motive was to mani- 
fest and declare God s name, and to illustrate his grace and mercy to the 
sons of men. 

The Holy Spirit, who is the intercessor in us, and who searcheth the deep 
things of God, doth offer, prompt, and suggest to us in our prayers those 
very motives that are in God's heart, to grant the thing we desire of him, so 
as it often comes to pass, that a poor creature is carried on to speak God's 



126 OF ELECTION. [BoOK II. 

very heart to himself, and then God cannot, nor doth not deny. But yet 
therein the Spirit prays not immediately himself, but forms those prayers 
in us, so as we are they that pray. But, 

Here is one, as great an intimate with God as the Spirit himself is, who 
here prays himself personally unto God, and was of counsel with God from 
everlasting ; and therefore, surely when he shall speak to God for anything, 
and go about to move his Father thereto, he must needs utter the bottom of 
what did move him from everlasting, and will move him now to bestow it. 
He speaks the intimacies of things between his Father and himself, which 
are privately known to them, with the Holy Spirit alone. 

And truly, methinks when I read this prayer, and therein his pleadings 
and memorials to his Father, I am admitted into the cabinet council of 
heaven, and am made privy to what were and had been the bottom grounds 
that swayed that great consultation from eternity unto that determination 
which he prayeth to be accomphshed.* Likewise, it became Christ, that as 
the thing prayed for, our union, was the highest and utmost good that was 
to be, or could be prayed for by him for us, so answerably, to bring forth 
the deepest motive in God's heart to urge him withal to grant it; for he was 
his Father's counsellor, and prays accordingly. 

The inducements are many. I shall single forth two principal grand ones 
of those which we find here in this prayer, which two do yet make three, the 
latter being divided into two. 

1. The manifestation of God's name, that is, of God himself, in his per- 
fections towards us, especially of his love and grace, in his doing of which 
God's manifestative glory, as it is made to us, doth consist. 

2. The second is taken from the oneness in essence, and then the inti- 
macy and sweetness of communion that was and had been from everlasting 
between his Father and himself as persons, and so amongst the three per- 
sons themselves, the iis and the ice spoken of, ver. 11 and 21. 

There is a third, from the interest of Jesus Christ as God-man, and from 
the love his Father bears him, his Son, as first set up to be personally united 
to that man Jesus, and in him and through him, cast and difl'used upon his 
elect, as they be considered in him and for his sake, with diflference fi'om the 
world. But this I shall refer unto another head, of Christ's election as he 
is God-man, and his interest in our election. 

Motive 1. To manifest and declare God's name. 

I. This he mentions first and last of his prayer ; the first at the sixth verse 
(where our interest begins to be mentioned), ' I have manifested thy name 
unto the men which thou gavest me out of the world.' There election is 
made the ground why he did declare God's name to them ; and therefore 
had been the motive in God's heart why he had by election given them unto 
Christ : ' Thine they were, and thou gavest them me : ' the force of which 
lieth in this, that because he had designed them by election to be his, he did 
ordain that he should manifest his name to them, as that which had moved 
him to elect them. Then again, ver. 26, ' I have declared thy name, and 
will declare it,' which is at the conclusion of his prayer. 

AVe must first explain what is meant by God's name. 

1. In general. God's name is God himself, and expresses what he is that is 
the only true God, as he had said, ver. 3. When it is said, ' Bless the name 
of the Lord,' that is God himself. 'What is his name, or his Son's name, 
canst thou tell?' as Prov. xxx. 4, and Ezek. xxxvi. 22 ; his name is put for 

* Non ex nudo tantum fidei et charitatis sensu Christus orat, sed ingressus, ante 
oculos habet arcana patris judicia. — Calv. on John xvii. v. 9. 



Chap. VI.] of election. 127 

his glory. Now that this was the great design of God, to have his name 
declared by Christ in such a manner as never before, Ps. xxii. shews ; which, 
as in Christ's name, it prophesieth of his being crucified in the fore part, so 
the effect and consequent of that being crucified is, * I will declare thy name 
unto my brethren, in the midst of the congregation I will praise thee,' ver. 22, 
which is quoted also Heb. ii. 12. And this declaring of his name, and this 
great congregation, is not to his saints only upon earth; it reacheth to hea- 
ven, and unto all that shall be there manifested. Ver. 26, when he saith, 
* I have declared' what he had already done upon earth, ' and I will declare,' 
it w^as not only what he would do while they were upon earth, but in heaven 
also, so as the declaring of God's name is the great design of God in this 
world to his saints, and to be perfected for ever in the world to come. 

2. Christ came not only to open what God's name was, as it was more 
frequently held forth afore in the world, as explaining the attributes of God, 
as they are set forth in the Psalms and elsewhere, not so much as to open 
the heart of God in the continuance of our salvation and the bottom founda- 
tions of them. 

3. Especially, therefore, to lay open his grace, and love, and mercy to 
mankind, that was the most eminent peculiar subject of Christ's declaring 
God's name; so it is expressly said by Christ himself, ver. 26, *I have 
declared thy name, and will declare it ; that thy love may be in them.' So 
then, that part of his name especially is it Christ pretended, with which 
accords that passage, Ps. cxxxviii. 2, ' I will praise thy name for thy loving- 
kindness, and for thy truth : for thou hast magnified thy word above all thy 
name.' The true intimate meaning whereof is this, thou hast magnified that 
part of thy word that speaks thy loving-kindness and truth above all thy 
name else that is in thy word ; and so refers unto that name proclaimed, 
Exod. xxxiv. 6, * The Lord God gracious and merciful, abundant in good- 
ness and truth.' 

II. * To declare thy name, Father ! ' (who is the fountain of the Deity). 
This he saith in the 25th verse, ' Father, the world knoweth thee not : but 
I have known thee, and I will declare thy name.' Jesus Christ came in an 
especial manner to open the heart of the Father to the world : John i. 18, 
he came out of the * bosom of the Father,' and he hath explained him ; he 
hath disintrinsecated him, laid open what is in him, in his thoughts, pur- 
poses, and ends of sending him into the world. The design of his preach- 
ing in his sermon in the Gospel of John, is to let open his Father's heart, 
and his own as the Son. And this is the knowledge which he boasts of as 
proper to himself, and magnifieth, ' Father, I have known thee,' ver. 25, 
that was Christ's eminent skill and learning, and therefore I declare and 
teach it, ver. 26. Though all the treasures of wisdom besides were in him, 
yet he magnified this wisdom above all. 

III. The declaring the Father was to declare also the other two persons, 
how they are in God, and that himself, the Son, proceeded from God the 
Father. The Father, as he is the fountain of the Deity, so he is set for the 
three. 

In a word, all in God is reduced to these two: 1, the perfection of the 
divine nature of the Godhead itself; and, 2, the three persons subsisting 
therein; and enjoying of those perfections, and the manifestation of these 
persons, and of their joint counsels and ofiices about our salvation, are the 
great subjects of Christ's preaching, especially in the Gospel of John. And 
I am to shew how these were the original inducements to him ; for God is 
primordially moved with nothing out of himself. And therefore I have 
singled forth these two out of the many other motives which Christ useth in 



128 OF ELECTION. [BoOK II. 

this prayer (as, namely, that one I mentioned of his own interest as God- 
man), which yet I here leave out and refer to another place, because as he 
is such, it is a thing out of God himself, and set up by election, as we are. 

These things first explaining what God's name is, I come, secondly, to 
shew how this was a motive ; for which there are these demonstrations : 

1. It is the nature of perfection to manifest itself, and so it is in God ; 
and to be brought unto union with God is the utmost perfection of the crea- 
ture : * I in them, and thou in me, that they maybe mB,de perfect in one,' ver. 23, 
and so unto the uttermost that they were capable of. Now, it is the nature 
of true perfection to manifest itself ; our Saviour here expresseth it by the 
word manifest this name, which accordingly holds forth the reason of the 
thincr itself, for it is a known rule, that it is the nature of true perfection to 
be manifestativuni sui, to manifest itself; and so it is in God, and that 
moved him. Not that by being known any perfection could be added to 
himself, but that he might perfect others thereby, as our Saviour here, that 
they may be made perfect in one, praying for this union. We see the 
creatures' desire to manifest their poor and low perfections, but they because 
they think themselves perfected by being known to others, which style God 
himself indeed condescends to utter himself in, in the manifestation of his 
perfection, as in that speech, ' his power is perfected in weakness,' 2 Cor. 
xii. 9, but in a clean contrary sense the phrase there imports to be made 
known or manifested ; that is, to be made known or manifested to be most 
perfect and glorious, in and upon occasion of our weakness, for in any other 
respect than of giving an occasion to discover itself, what perfection can 
weakness crive to power ? As for making any such manifestation, there was no 
necessity or impulse on his part for himself to have done, for his essence 
being immense, it is comprehensive and big enough to have contained his 
own blessedness within himself without flowing over. He is to himself a 
perpetual spring of happiness, and also a sufficient cistern to receive, and 
hold, and retain all the Sowings and reflowings thereof within himself ; all 
falls still back again into himself, which is from the infinite vastness of his 
being, and therefore it is a mere act of his grace and will, which the Scrip- 
ture everywhere so celebrates and attributes this unto. 

Besides, it was far from any necessity or addition to his perfection to have 
them thus made known, for there were three persons that communicated in 
these perfections, that knew, and loved, and delighted, as I have shew^ed 
elsewhere, in each other's blessedness. 

But then, secondly, these his perfections being crowned with goodness 
and grace, his goodness moved his will unto this communication of himself; 
and it is as known a maxim that goodness is sid communicativwn : Ps. cxix. 
68, ' Thou art good ' (in thy nature) ' and thou doest good,' that follows ; 
and the greatest goodness he can do us, is to make known his goodness. 
Thus God to Moses, Exod. xxxiii. 14, ' I will make all my goodness pass 
before thee.' 

Bat it was not simply his goodness, but his grace, which is the top per- 
fection of his name; and '.his grace our God did value as his choicest riches: 
his grace, his mercy, you have it up and down in Paul's epistles. And this, 
as it is the excellency of his goodness, so still helped forward to make his 
will to communicate all his goodness, for (mark it) grace and mercy are such 
attributes as have not himself for their object, though for their subject ; and 
so if any needed a manifestation unto creatures, then these. Himself indeed 
is the object of his own love (he loves himself), but himself is not the object 
of his own grace, to be sure not of his own mercy. God is nowhere said 
to be gracious or merciful to himself, nor is it meet to have it said of him ; 



Chap. VI.] of election. 129 

and therefore in this respect he is not said to be rich to himseir, but, as Rom. 
X. 12, he is rich to others, ' even to all that call upon him.' God, in- 
deed, hath a glory arising from his own mercy and grace, but then it is but 
what is dispensed unto others ; the riches thereof are disposable no way br.t 
to the use and benefit of creatures. Well then, says God with himself. These 
riches lie by me, and I have no use of them, and yet I have them ; I will 
therefore put them to use, and lay them out upon others, as rich men do their 
riches, and lay them out upon some purchase. So God resolved that one 
day somebody might be the better for them. 

And lastly, to instance in no more particulars, take the result of that whole 
blessedness which arose from the enjoyment of his own perfections, namely, 
the sweetness, the contentment, he had in his own happiness ; it most strongly 
moved him to make creatures partakers of it. He would not be happy alone ; 
he would have others (as Christ expresseth his spirit, and his Father's also, 
John xvii. 23, 24) who might ' see his glory,' and be glorified in seeing of 
it. And this is made the original of this gospel of salvation, and of our 
salvation itself. For what other doth the gospel hold forth than God's 
blessed intentions, contrivements, and purposes for our salvation, for the glory 
of his name, which Christ came to preach and declare? The motive there- 
unto is intimated in one small word added, yet clearly enough, 1 Tim. i. 11, 
* According to the glorious gospel of the blessed God.' It is a sure rule, 
wherever you find any special attribute of God singled forth in connection with 
some other thing that flows from him, it is still such as is peculiarl}^ efiective, 
or more properly the cause of that thing mentioned ; and so here, the blessed 
God (blessed in the enjoyment of his own glory) is here inserted to shew what 
had moved him thereby to make his creatures blessed, and therefore to con- 
trive the whole of this gospel of our salvation. 

But it will be said. If this goodness and blessedness in himself were that 
which moved him, why then shewed he not this favour unto all ? 

The answer is, That is not my part now to speak to ; the account thereof 
belongs to another place. My present business hath been, that whether it 
should be to many or to all, to manifest himself was the motive. 

The second answer is. That it was not to many, because grace was the 
great thing in his name he meant to shew, and was that which managed his 
goodness, and had the prevalent sway and hand in this matter, as every- 
where the Scripture ascribes it, then the glory of this grace will shew itself 
in a free love, and so in a choice of the persons. Says grace, I am free and 
will use a freedom, and not communicate them to all, ' I will be gracious to 
whom I will be gracious.' So the words run in Moses : Exod. xxxiii. 19 
' I will be merciful to whom I will be merciful ;' and as Paul, Rom. iii. 18, 
' There is no fear of God before their ej^es.' And was yet more free in this, 
and therefore he calls the elect vessels of mercy, singled out of mercy, ' on 
whom,' and unknown,* ' he will make known the riches of his glory.' He 
compares them to smaller vessels, and himself to the sea that fills them ; 
and what is it ? A created glory out of himself ? No ; but that glory which 
is in himself, which fills them in making them glorious, which is properly 
his own ; and thereupon if it be to be resolved and determined by the will 
of God and the graciousness of his will as concerning what persons, or why 
not others, then and thereupon the apostle demands, Rom. ix. 22, 28, 
' What if God, willing to shew his wrath, and make his power known, en- 
dured with much long-suflering the vessels of wrath fitted for destruction : 
and that he might make known the riches of his gloiy on the vessels of mercy, 
which he had afore-appointed unto glory ?' This hath still bred a murmur- 
* Qu. ' unto whom ' '?— Ed, 

VOL. IX. I 



130 OF ELECTION. [BoOK II. 

ing at God in all ages, even in David's, who takes men up for it : Ps. iv. 3, 
' Know the Lord hath set apart him that is godly for himself;' and God's 
setting him apart is that which made him godl}' ; and therefore do yon all 
stand in awe, and sin not by murmming at it ; for God will enjoy his free- 
dom, having mercy on whom he will. 



CHAPTER VII. 

The oneness and intimacy of communion which the Father, and Son, and Holy 
Ghost had and have amongst themselves, was an original and j^rimordial 
motive of God's ordaining us unto union and communion with himself. 

It is an ancient and renounced* saying of Nazianzen, Bonum unitatis a 
Trinitate originem ducit, that this good blessing of unity draws and derives 
its rise and original from the Trinity ; that three persons subsisting, and 
being one in the Godhead, was the foundation and original inducement for 
the union of a creature with God, or of persons of an intelligent nature, who 
only were capable of it. 

And that which hath induced me to take this as a motive, and not as a 
bare exemplar and sampler of it, is the inculcation and reiterated mention 
by Christ of his and his Father's oneness so oft and so many ways in this 
short prayer. You find it first in ver. 11, ' that they be one, as we 
are;' and again, ver. 21, ' that they all may be one ; as thou. Father, art 
in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us ; ' and ver. 22, ' That 
they may be one, as we are one ;' and then again, ver. 23-, ' I in them, and 
thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one.' These so many repeated 
indigitations, with so much urgency in this last short prayer, I know not 
how to understand them to be only explanations of what kind of union he 
meant, which I intimated before was yet meant ; or that onl}^ their union 
was the pattern or exemplar of ours, to which many interpreters do only 
carry it. Nor it is only to shew the order and descent of our union ; as that, 
first, the Father is in Christ, which union of them is the supreme rank of 
union, and then, Christ in us is a lower and inferior. All these, I confess, 
are intended, and as such intended, and are high instructions and doctrinal 
truths to be observed by us concerning this union, from this his so praying 
about it. But he uttering them to his Father prayer-wise, or in way of 
petition and supplication to obtain this union for us, I cannot but withal 
consider them intended also as arguments and grounds to move him there- 
unto as well as any other. And the rest of the passages are generally so 
understood. And there is one word in ver. 21, ' That they also may be one 
in us.' This word also hath more in it than what is in ver. 11, ' as we are 
one ; ' or than that it should barely be to signify, that b}^ way of exemplar 
or similitude only they should be one ; but it further speaks an inducement 
to move his Father to grant it, because he and his Father were one ; that 
therefore also let them be ' one in us.' Which is as if he had said. Thou 
knowest what an entire intimacy of union hath been between us, ' Thou in 
me, and I in thee,' and how sweet it hath been unto us ; I enjoy it, and 
thou art and hast been intimately delighted in it. Farther (says he), be 
moved to let these cdso have the like participation of it in us, and with us. 

That each of the persons in the Trinity do speak one of and to the other 
in this language of us and we, and withal that their being one in essence or 
in the Godhead, though persons distinct therein, is signified thereby, I have 
* Qu. * renowned ' '? — Ed. 



Chap. VII.] of election. 181 

in a foregoing discourse* traversed the Scriptures to demonstrate, beginning 
at Moses, Gen. i., ' Let us make man,' and carried it on throughout unto 
this very speech of Christ's in this prayer, and found that alone, with other 
such Scriptures as fall in with it to illustrate it, to be a full and rich argu- 
ment of the Trinity of the persons, and their being one God, so as I sought 
no other proof. And I did single out and premise that sole proof, because 
the pursuit of that truth under the style of us did happily aforehand make 
way for, and especially give light unto, this I am now to prosecute upon this 
foundation : ' As we are one.' 

At the first making of man there was such a consultation of the persons 
held, and God the Father says to the other two, ' Let us make man accord- 
ing to our image.' Wherein yet man's union with God was then no way 
expressed or signified by the union which those three persons had in the 
Godhead, either as the motive unto it, or as the pattern of it. Nor was that 
communion they held made any motive or inducement to make man, but ail 
that is said is, that he should be made ' according to their image.' Whereby 
whether the image of the divine perfections in holiness and righteousness, 
or of Christ as God-man, predestinated afore all worlds, be meant, is not 
material here, but only that a consent and consultation of the persons was 
held to make him such. But here we see that when this super-creation union, 
whereby the elect were to be made one with Christ, and so with God his 
Father, and by consequence with the Holy Ghost indwelling in us also, 
comes to be spoken of, our Lord doth, as in the person of the second person 
(which he was) as well as of man, pray to his Father to vouchsafe a like 
union unto that of their own between themselves, and, as a motive there- 
unto, induceth the oneness themselves had, ' That they may be one in us, as 
we are one.' 

And look as when the apostle would move the saints to be one among 
themselves, endeavouring to ' keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of 
peace,' as Eph. iv. 3, he there enforceth his persuasive by the unity of the 
three persons in their oflices or relations towards us : ver. 5-7, ' There is 
one God, the Father of all, and one Lord Jesus Christ.' There is but one 
that hath dominion over you all, and there is but one Spirit, which, as the soul 
in the body, enliveneth, informs all and every member. In like manner when 
Christ, in prayer to his Father, would move him to admit and entertain us 
into that oneness with the three persons themselves, he urgeth it upon the 
union and fellowship those persons have among themselves; and it is not 
their having agreed to take several relations or offices to us, and for our 
salvation, which he specifies and denolates them by (as in that other in 
Eph. iv,), but simply their oneness and communion one with another. 

And although the third person, the Spirit, is not here in this prayer 
specified (as neither is he in usual blessings of wishing grace, &c., or doxo- 
logies, and glory be to, &c., but only the Father and the Son), yet elsewhere 
(besides in that of Genesis, * Let us make man,' I have shewtd) he comes 
in as one of this supreme us as a third person, and that as particularly as 
the Son and Father here: Isa, vi. 8, * 1 heard the voice of the Lord, saying, 
Whom shall I send, and who will go for us ?' The second person, the Son, 
had appeared in glory, ver. 1, compared with John xii. 41. And wlio then 
is this other person that says, ' Wliom shall / send ? ' who also is one of 
the iiSy but even the Holy Ghost, who (as Acts xiii. 2) sends out his ministers 
as a distinct single person of himself ; and that it was the Holy Ghost, will 
be evident, if we also compare Acts xxviii. 25, 'And when they agreed not 
among themselves, they departed, after that Paul had spoken one word, 
* Vide Of the Kuowlcdge of God and Christ, book i. chap. ii. 



132 OF ELECTION. [BoOK II. 

Well spake the Holy Ghost by Esaias the prophet unto our fathers.' The 
apostle applying that speech in Isaiah expressly unto the Holy Ghost's having 
uttered and said it. So then, as there in Isaiah, there are but two persons, 
the Son and the Spirit, who are in express mentioned, and yet in that us 
11 three are intended, so here in the 2ve and us which Christ speaks in the 
language of, unto his Father, the Spirit is also involved and intended. 

Yet I find Cahdn to caution against this interpretation, which the ancient 
fathers against Arius did so much and so oft betake themselves unto as a 
strong bulwark and fortress, maintaining and defending the deity of the 
second person in oneness with the Father, as ice are one ; they also witbal 
observing that oneness of the persons in the divine essence to be the pattern 
or exemplar of our union. But Calvin, although he takes notice of this 
argument of the ancients, yet runs counter, and afiirms,* that whenever in 
this chapter Christ speaks of his being one with the Father, he speaks not 
simply of the divine essence (or his being one with the Father in respect of 
that essence), but speaks it only as he is God-man and mediator. But 
Gerard herein doth rightly oppose him, arguing from that parallel speech of 
Christ's in chap. x. ver. 30, ' I and my Father are one,' which being taken 
with Christ's own interpretation of it, ver. 38, ' The Father is in me, and I 
in the Father,' both which are just the same speeches that Christ useth of 
his union and the Father's here ; now, there, says he, we must understand 
it of the oneness he had with his Father as God, and so as simply considered 
a person that was God ; and that was it the Jews quarrelled his speech for, 
that ' he being a man, made himself God,' ver. 33. 

But I shall compound this difference, and yield unto Calvin thus far, that 
Christ herein prays, both as he is mediator and man, and also in the name 
and interest of himself, as second person, as in many other passages he 
speaks ; and there is no absurdity in comprehending both, whilst both inte- 
rests conduce, and are pleadable to obtain the same thing. May not any 
one, who hath two interests or personal conditions, whereupon to pray for 
one individual, use arguments from both ? There is no contradiction in so 
doing : as for a prince to pray as a king for his subjects, and as a man and 
a Christian, upon a common account, and to urge motives from either. 
And if two such pleas may agreeably and suitably meet in and under one 
expression that will comprehend both, who shall except against this ? espe- 
cially when the one of them is the foundation of the other. The truth is, 
Christ hath a double oneness with his Father ; the first and original one- 
ness, as he is second person, one God with his Father; and this is the 
sovereign, essential, and supreme rank of onenesses which is proper to the 
Trinity ; it is the oneness of the * first three' simply and alone considered 
amongst themselves. But, secondly, there being an admission and assump- 
tion of the man Jesus (who spake this) into a personal union with the Son 
of God, the second person, he thereby is become free of the us, or of the 
company of the persons, and one with them : in respect of which union, the 
man Jesus might and doth say, as on our behalf, * Let them be one with us, 
as I am with thee, Father ;' and this union is a lower union than the 
first, and the first is the original and the ground of this : and when one inte- 
rest is the ground and original of another, we may very well understand 
both to be comprehended in such a speech, but yet especially that which is 
the original one ; for it is in the virtue of that, that the secondary un- 
derived one comes to have its existence. And therefore his being one with 

* Tenendum est quoties unum se cum Patre esse in hoc capita, pronunciat Christus, 
sermonem non haberi simpliciter de divina ejus essentia, sed unum vocari in persona 
mediatoris, et quatenus caput nostrum. — Calv. in John xvii. 21. 



Chap. YII.] of election. 133 

God, as second person, is chiefly to be attended in the saying, * That they 
may be one, as we are one,' &c. 

Look, then, as in the fore-cited place, John x. 80, he says, * I and my 
Father are one,' he there speaks both as second person, and that in that respect 
he is one in power, will, &c., with God his Father (for in respect of equal 
power it is he speaks it, as the former speeches in ver. 28 and 29 do shew) : 
the same holds true in all other essential attributes of the Godliead, that as 
such, he is one with the Father in them (which is the primary and funda- 
mental oneness), and yet withal we must take in the man Jesus, who being 
one person with that second person (who was thus one God with his Father), 
that he also in a true sense speaks it, as appears by his own explanation 
of that former speech : ' Say ye. Thou blasphemest, because I said I am the 
Son of God : and so one in essence with God ?' And then, ver. 37 and 38, 
* If I do not the works of my Father, beheve me not : but if I do, though ye 
believe not me, believe the works ; that ye may know and believe that the 
Father is in me, and I in him,' which he speaks as God-man, as well as 
second person ; for he refers himself as to the evidence of this, that he was 
in the Father, and the Father in him (which is all one, and to be one with 
God, as ver. 30) unto the works put forth visibly in him, as he was a man 
visible afore them, whom they heard to utter it : ' Believe me for the works' 
sake, that the Father is in me, and I in him ;' and so that I am the Son of 
God, and therefore as man one with the Son of God, who is one God with the 
Father. In like manner, when here in prayer he says, * My Father and I 
are one,' this speech is to be understood as comprehending both these unions, 
both as Son of God, as second person, and also God-man, through union with 
that person. 

Thus much in answer to Calvin's caution, and for a general introduction 
unto this second motive, from the thi'ee persons. 



SECTION I. 

The second motive in God's heart, drawn from the union and commumon of 
the Three Persons in the Trinity , branched into two particulars: the first is, 
that their union in essence, or their common enjoyment of one and the same 
Godhead, did move them to make creatures partakers of such an enjoyment, 
as far as they could possibly be capable of it. 

This motive, drawn from the Trinity, divides itself into two branches, 
which in themselves are distinct, and apart to be considered : 

1. Their oneness in essence ; or that the father, and Son, and Spirit, 
have, in their common and blessed enjoyment, one and the same Godhead, 
and all the perfections thereof; and how this did move them to make 
creatures partakers of the same enjoyment, as far as creatures possibly are 
capable of. 

2. The second is, their mutual intercourse and society, as persons, one 
with another, and the sweetness of that converse those three persons had 
among themselves ; that also was an inducement to take up creature-fellow- 
ship and communion into a participation of that sweet society. 

These are different notions and considerations ; the first being founded 
npon the oneness of the three persons in an ooe enjoyment of that one God- 
head ; the other upon their converses had between themselves, as persons 
subsisting in that Godhead, glorifying, loving, and speaking to each other 
from everlasting. 



134 OF ELECTION. [BoOK II. 

The first of these I found upon John xvii. ver. 10 and 11 : ' And all 
mine are thine, and thine are mine, and I am glorified in them. And now I 
am no more in the world, and I come to thee. Holy Father, keep through 
thine own name those whom thou hast given me, that they may be one, as 
we are.' 

In which words the grand and final petition, and in which all the rest of 
the words do centre, is that short clause at the close of ver. 11, * that they 
may be one, even as we are one.' But he had permitted as a foundation 
thereunto (or for a fore-explanation rather), what it was he meant to com- 
prehend in the last words of that petition, ' as we are one.' And the words 
he premits that do fore-explain his clause, are the first words of ver. 10, 
' All things that are mine are thine, and thine are mine.' And these two pas- 
sages, which are the first and last in those two verses, are to be brought 
together, and more closely connected, as holding the nearest intimacy, as 
will appear. But yet there is the interposition of another petition before 
this last grand one, that coming between keeps them tw^o passages a long 
while asunder, and from closing each with other, until he should finish that 
other petition ; and that intervening request is, ' Holy Father, keep them 
which thou hast given me through thine own name.' And to insinuate that 
to keep them in holiness, is that which he means, he accordingly compellates 
or calls upon his Father under the title or attribute of Holy Father ; thereby 
suiting the attribute to the thing prayed for, as that which was to be the 
cause proper of the thing prayed for as the efi'ect, and the fittest motive 
thereunto, which is frequently done in Scripture prayers. Now, this some- 
what long petition, with these adjacents, coming between those two, first, 
verse 10, and last passages, verse 11, mentioned ; the last of them (which 
I call the grand petition), ' that they may be one, as we are one,' at the first 
appearance seems wholly, and only to join, or connect with, or belong to, 
that long intervening petition, whereunto he prefixeth this motive also, ' And 
now I am no more in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to 
thee.' The petition is to keep them in holiness ; and that whilst they are 
in the world : ' Keep them' in holiness, ' that they may be one as we are 
one.' And it is true, these do relate and connect thus together ; but they 
do not solely, or only refer thus together; as if that they maij he one, &c., 
were cut off from, and had nothing at all to do with, those other so distant 
words at the beginning of verse 10, * All that are mine are thine," &c. ; 
whereas, indeed, there is the nearest alliance and affinity, yea, identity be- 
tween the very last words, ' as we are one,' with those first words, ' All mine 
are thine, and thine are mine.' Both of them are perfectly one and the 
same in sense and substance, and a plain explanation the one of the other ; 
for, for Christ to say to his Father, ' All mine are thine, and thine are mine,' 
is all one as to say, * we are one.' For the first signifies that there is no- 
thing that we have divisum, apart, as Calvin's word is, and must therefore 
be one : so perfectly doth this express their unity. When, therefore, Christ 
shall, in the close of this gi'and petition, make this as his great gi'ound and 
foundation to obtain this like union on our parts, both with himself and his 
Father, and urge and plead ' as ve are one,' which imports both that because 
we are one, as also after the similitude of our being one, let them be so ; 
and when we do find that declaration that went before (and indeed stands 
alone), ' All mine are thine, and thine mine,' to be the most exquisite (though 
in larger words) description or periphrasis to set out ivhat and wherein the 
unity of these two persons we doth consist, then certainly that speech, ' All 
mine are thine,' must most rationally be conceived by us to have been in- 
tended and forelaid as a like ground and plea for this our union also, and 



Chap. YII.J of election. 135 

withal explanatory of it. And being one and the same in substance and 
etiect of sense, it must be accounted that Christ doth, both at the beginning 
of this part of his prayer, and again in the close, enforce this for us ; with 
a double repeated strength. In the first, that seeing we are so much one, 
that all things the one of us have, the other hath ; and thou having designed 
an oneness for them with us, let them attain a participation of the same ; 
that all things that are thus ours, may be theirs also together with us. And 
then again, that in the close he should reiterate, ' that they may be one as 
we are,' this drives the nail home to the head a second time, and at last. 
And herein we may discern our Lord his vehement zeal and desires for us, 
to have this our union granted and accomplished with his Father and him- 
self ; and that it should be sure to be such a union, that is as like unto their 
own union as was possible, in the participation of all things which themselves 
have in common between them. And this, he shews, he desires above all 
things else which his soul did, or indeed could desire for them, which argues 
the depth of his love and dear affection to us. And indeed, there is nothing 
is, or can be, above this ; and you see how express he is, to set out what he 
meaneth by that oneness he prays for, and wherein it consisteth, in so ex- 
quisite a deciphering of it ; namely, verse 10, that it was a participation of 
all things with God and Christ, which themselves have one with another ; 
no less, than that all that is God's might be theirs ; than which, there is 
not a more comprehensive and greater blessedness (as to the matter of it) to 
be conceived or imagined. 

You may now also easily discern the reason, why he brought in that in- 
terposed petition, that they might be kept in holiness whilst they were in 
this world, afore he would conclude with that final gi'and petition, ' that (so) 
they may be one,' &c., which yet was his general aim and centre, w^herein 
all lines afore in verse 10 and 11 do meet. It was an advantage that the 
bringing in of that was delayed to the last. Here are two things differing, 
that are the several subjects of these two several petitions : the first, is the 
accomplishment of a perfect union of us with Christ and God, to be attained 
in the life to come ; for it is the perfection of our union which Christ's heart 
and eye was intent upon in this prayer, as appears by verse 21. And this 
is the last petition, and final conclusion of all, ' that they may be one.' The 
second is for the means, in order to the attainment thereof, that they may 
be ' kept in holiness,' and this throughout the rest of their time in this life. 
And this is in the intervening petition subordinate to the last, as a means 
to an end ; ' that they may be one,' as the particle ha, that, doth shew ; and 
this beimj kept he prays for, as that which in this world was to be done for 
them so expressly ; ' these are in the world, and now keep them,' &c. And 
therefore the oneness, in order to the attainment of which he intends this, 
their being kept, &c., is principally that union at the end with him in the 
other world ; which also this falls in to confirm, it is, that all things of God's 
and Christ's do become theirs ; and so makes them as entirely one with God 
and Christ, as mere creatures can be : it is ' he that overcometk. shall in- 
herit all things, and I will be his God, and he shall be my son,' Rev. xxi. 7. 

And they do but narrow it, who understand it only of our oneness one with 
another ; and who limit it yet further, unto that which ought to be in this 
life, which I have spoken to elsewhere. Now, then, although that first 
passage at the beginning of verse 10, ' All mine are thine,' &c., might pre- 
sently have had to succeed it, that last petition at the end, ' that (so) they 
may be one,' according to the true tenor of Christ's meaning in those other 
words, yet our Lord, to make his prayer yet more full and comprehensive, 
he chose to fetch in and interweave this other, which he knew was the 



136 OF ELECTION. [BoOK II. 

necessary means for the attainment of complete union, and suspends that 
conclusive one, that they may be one, which was the end and aim of all, 
until that was finished ; and then doth at once bring in what was his aim, 
and the elixir of that his premised speech, * All mine is thine,' &c. Take 
both the description also of what that oneness was he prayed for ; take it 
also as it imported the most bottom ground, and strongest motive to Obtain 
it at his Father's hands ; that seeing we are both so happy, as that all things 
are mutually one another's, let them all be theirs also, according to thine 
own intendment ; and then you will see which was the end why he would 
have them kept in holiness without fail throughout this life. And indeed it 
is the great end, the greatest we can arrive at, and the end of all the words ; 
into which as into the common sea, or receptacle of all, those remoter words, 
* all mine,' &c., do with the fuller stream pour forth, and empty themselves 
most of all. 

In fine to sum up all (for I would be understood), it is as if Christ had 
said, Father, seeing that all things whatsoever in the Godhead, or any 
way belonging to the Godhead, being in common mine as thine, and thine 
as mine ; and in that community, that unity and communion of us both 
consists, and is that whereby we as two persons are one, communicating in 
all these ; yea, and that withal these apostles, whom I now pray this for, 
are in a more special and endeared manner both thine and mine, and 
endeared to us by our mutual-like propriety and interest in them for each 
other's sake ; my great request is, that these may be also one as we are, 
that is, by their oneness with us, let them partake of, and communicate in, 
all the good things and blessedness that we do, even of the divine nature, 
and of what belongs to us, in their capacity, with us : even as we by our 
beirg one, do enjoy all these glories together (only we are one with an essen- 
tial oneness and communication, which these can never be) ; but let these be 
one with us, in a fruition of all of ours for their good and happiness, as far 
as creatures are capable of it, for their eternal blessedness. 

Therebeing not a greater truth which concerneth our salvation, or that 
makes for our comfort ; and it being so full to that which we have pursued, 
and which hath been the main design of our election, wherein Christ, know- 
ing what God's heart is, doth pray at this rate, viz., our union with God ; 
and this text also more clearly expounding, and laying open wherein the 
quintessence of our union with God consists, viz. in a possession and en- 
joyment of all that is mutually God's or Christ's ; and also it discovering 
the very original motion, inotus primo primits, the first firstly motion of all 
other, and is the very corner stone and original both of our election and 
salvation amongst the persons : I shall therefore insist yet more largely, and 
speak to what may be further supplied to what hath been said, to confirm 
more fully the truth of this interpretation and connection. 

There are four things incumbent on me to explain, in order to demonstrate 
this to have been the true and natural scope. 

1. What should be the extent of the 'All mine are thine, and thine 
are mine ;' that is, what that all should be, and what it reacheth to ; and 
whether it be to be limited to the persons of the apostles, of whom he had 
s;iid afore, ' they are thine,' in the words afore ; and in the words after, * I 
am glorified in them.' Thus some, especially the Socinians, would have it, 
so to cut ofi" the argument firom thence that Christ is God, because all things 
the Father hath are his. 

2. Since that speech of his is spoken of his Father, and of himself; and 
himself therein considered as the second person, as well as that he is God- 
man, and so of them as simply they are persons in the Godhead, though not 



Chap. VII. j of election. 137 

on * Christ's part, as he is God-man, is also intended, and to be taken in ; 
now it is to be queried whether the intent of this all t/iiiir/s, &c., reach unto 
the perfections of the divine nature itself, for so I do include both the one 
consideration of them as well as the other. 

3. That this speech, ' All mine,' &c., doth most expressively set forth, 
yea, is all ona in substance with what he closeth this part of his prayer with, 
ver. 11, 'as we are one ;' and is all one in effect as to have said, Herein 
consists our oneness, that all mine is thine, and thine mine, according to 
the similitude of which, lot them be one with us also. 

4. How putting thus all these things together, there should be a motive 
plea, and an argument arise up in it, that God the Father, and God the Son 
(as two persons), being one in the enjoyment of the divine nature, and all 
things belonging to them, that therefore he should have ordained, and 
accordingly should bo moved now to grant, that these his elect should be 
one as they are, and admit them unto this communication of all things also, 
and wherein that motive should lie. 

These four things are punctual to the point in hand, and must all four 
necessarily concur to the demonstration of it. 

1. As to the first, there is some appearance, and that entertained by many 
interpreters, that he having just afore said, ' I pray for all those thou hast 
given me, for. they are thine ;' and after, in the next words that follow in the 
same ver. 10, ' I am glorified in them ' (and in both these meaning and in- 
tending the persons of his apostles) ; that therefore in these words that come 
between his sole, or at least primary, intent, should be only to plead that all 
the persons that are mine through thy gift, ver. 6, are thine, and thine are 
aiine ; and that therefore we, Father, being, both my mutual interest and 
consent, engaged to these persons, as ours alike, therefore save, keep them, 
and make them one with us, as it follows, ver. 12. And thus unto the 
persons of the apostles, whom he prays for, do some interpreters wholly 
and strictly limit the words, and the Socinians especially ; the all here 
being to be limited (say they) unto the subject he was speaking of, which 
were the persons of the apostles. And by this their limitation of it, they 
utterly exclude and cut ofl' all or anything else belonging to the Godhead in 
common, as no way here intended. 

But I would and do take in all, both the persons of the apostles and all 
things else : the persons, as the subject prayed for, involving and strengthen- 
ing his motive ; for in that they were mutually and alike his Father's and 
his, and for one another's sakes ; and then all things I take in, as the things 
for which he prayed for them to be made partakers of, with the Father and 
the Son, and also as the ground of the petition. And thus compounded both 
senses will stand, and be involved. 

You must know that the word ' All mine,' &c., is in the neuter gender, 
and so notes forth properly thuujs, not persons only. And in that parallel 
place, John xvi. 15, ' All that the Father hath are mine,' it is spoken of 
thinr/s, and it is so translated there, ' All thinrfs the Father hath are mine,' 
and accordingly, it must here be understood that all things universally that are 
mine are thine. We may also observe that these words, ' All mine are thine, 
and all thine are mine,' are in their station a parenthesis, which Brugensis 
hath observed, and reads as such, and so stand out apart from the words. 
And as concerning the apostles' persons, the sense runs currently on afore, 
and after, without these words. And it is apparent, they are a maxim super- 
added by the way, that submit themselves, not as if they had nothing at all 
to do with what is immediately said round about them, but yet as uttering 
* Qu. ' though on ' ?— Ed. 



13S OF ELECTION. [BoOK II. 

some further thing, and spreading and extending itself unto all things what- 
soever, though upon occasion of having said of the apostles to his Father, 
' They are thine ;' and so thence they do include the persons of the apostles, 
or elect. It must be founded upon this, as a general maxim, that all things 
whatever that are mine are thine, and therefore it is that these persons I 
pray for are both mine and thine ; and it is as if he had said, no wonder 
that they are mine, and thine, for, lo ! all things whatever that are mine are 
thine, even to the Godhead itself ; and upon that account it is this speech 
relates to and involves the persons. 

But it may be objected that if the apostles their being his, should come 
in but upon this general account, whereupon all things else are, this were 
only a common interest, and so they would be his but as all things else were. 
Whereas he intends, and in the reality of the thing it is so, that these 
apostles were his, and the Father's, upon a special property, as chosen out 
of all things else. This may some object, and that therefore we must either 
Hmit the speech to the apostles' persons, or if we would interpret it of all 
things whatever, as well as of them, we must leave the apostles out, because 
their special interest cannot be intended by the common one. I will not 
detain the reader here with disputes about this question, but have cast it 
into the margin.* But the solution of all these difficulties will be easy, by 
supposing (which is rationally to be supposed) that there is tacitly impKed, 
and to be supphed, this further maxim to be added unto that fore-mentioned, 
that look as in their several ranks, or kinds, or degrees, any or every thing 
amongst the all things, are owned to be mine, or thine ; and as our pro- 
priety in them is more or less, and so in our value they are dearer, or less 
dear to us ; according to this measure these apostles and the elect, being 
thine and mine, in a special lot and degree, are therefore infinitely dearer to 
us than all creatures besides. Now of these he had said to his Father, they 
were thine by special propriety of choice and election out of all ; and they 
became mine by thy gift : ' They are mine, and thou gavest them me ;' and 
that therefore look in what endeared respect they w^ere thine, they are mine 
in the same also. And this rule supposed (which those former words give 
warrant for) fetcheth in the persons of the apostles as God's, and his own 
choicest elect, and with them the persons of all the elect else, saints, small 
and great ; and will also admit an extension of the speech unto all things 

* It is certain that if we shoiild hmit this speech to the persons of the apostles, 
then Gerhard's argument would have place. Saith he, if you limit this to the persons of 
the apostles, as that whereby Christ should make proof of that he had said just afore 
(which they that do must make to be the coherence), ' They are thine,' and then bring 
this as his reason, ' and for for) all mine are thine,' &c. Then, says he, you make 
Christ to prove but idem per idem, the same thing by the same ; and it had been but as 
if he had said, These are thine, for the persons of these are both mine and thine ; now 
this must be admitted. And again, to have intended to say. These apostles are mine, 
for all the persons that are mine are thine, and thine mine, and therefore these, this 
had been thwart to his scope and method, which was singularly to pray for, and 
present his apostles as his chiefest and choicest elect, and pattern of God's election of 
the rest ; so as if he had intended to note forth that tliey were his and his Father's 
elect ones, then rather all the elect with them must come in as intended, for he says 
all things, &c., as well as the apostles; and so still it w^ould fall out that the apostles' 
persons should come in, but because the whole body of the elect are God's, and his ; 
whereas Christ's method in this prayer and this place is, vice versa, clean otherwise, 
for he mentions not the rest of liis elect until ver 20, ' Neither pray 1 for these alone, 
but for them also which shall believe on me through their word :' having intended 
this foregoing part of his prayer especially for his apostles, for their particular com- 
fort, and all other the elect, but by consequence and inference from what the apostles 
were to him. So as the main and grand lot of the interpretation must still be ex- 
tended unto things, ' All things that are mine are thine. 



Chap. YII.] of election. 139 

else that are God's, in their several order and deifyree ; which ends the differ- 
ence, and comprehendeth all we aim at in this point. 

This for the first head, what these all in general should he, not only the 
persons of the apostles, or the elect (though included in the all), but all things 
whatsoever. 

2. The second contains two things in it. 

(1.) That *«// mine are thine,' &c., reacheth unto and principally intends 
the perfections of the Godhead itself; all those divine glories are mine and 
thine, and thine are mine. 

(2.) That this speech is spoken by Christ in the persons of himself and his 
Father, considered as they are two persons in the Trinity, enjoying the same 
Godhead, and not only as he is God-man (and I am for both); and unto this 
sense many interpreters of weight do carry it. 

There hath been a question raised by some, whether any sentence in this 
prayer be uttered by Christ under the notion or consideration of his being the 
second person in the Godhead essentially considered, and so to speak anything 
simply as that person ; or that rather (as they assert it) all that which he 
speaks of himself in this prayer should not be understood of himself as he is 
man, personally united unto God, and so that in that sense only it is that he 
as God-man, head of his church, should speak this here, ' That they may be 
one, as w^e are one.' And one general argument they have is this, that 
otherwise the second person, as such, should pray; unto which (ere we go 
any further) there is this easy answer, that the man Jesus prays, yet as the 
mouth that urgeth the interest of the second person (to whom he was united) 
as such, which is for his honour as he is God, and not a lowering of him; it 
is the man that prays, but it is the name of the second person he is united 
unto which he prays m. Indeed, for the second person, simply as such, to 
have prayed for anything belonging to him properly as such, as some would 
understand the words, ver. 5, ' And now, Father, glorify thou me with 
thine owti self, with the glory which I had with thee before the world was,' 
this indeed had been below him ; but that his interest, as he is God, should 
be urged on our behalf, this is no more improper than for us to plead what 
is in the name of God the Father, as God, ' The Lord God, gracious,' &c. 

For the second, the ancient fathers, in their disputes against Arius, who 
held Christ not to have been God, or a second person co-equal with his 
Father, partaking of the same divine essence or Godhead with his Father, 
had a great recourse unto the passages of this prayer, and particularly to 
this, ' AH mine are thine,' ver. 10; and ' as we are one,' ver. 11, 21 ; ' Thou 
in me,' ver. 22, 23 ; that therelbre he was one God with the Father in 
essence, though they were distinct as persons in that one Godhead ; one, as 
God, though as persons distinct, which is argued from his saying we and iis. 
Thus also our divines, in their opposition against the Socinians, who deny 
Christ to be God, or a second person in the Godhead, make use of this place. 

Now, by all (hini/s he means all things that are God's, whether they be 
essentially his (that is, all attributes of the Godhead), as also all that belong 
unto God by his dominion over all as he is God, such as his works ad extra 
(that is, which exist and are wrought out of himself, as the world, the sal- 
vation of men, &c.), which are by possession God's. These, or whatever 
else that are God's as God, he intends here to be his, as well as they are his 
Father's. 

But above all, the essential perfections of the Godhead, which are (as 
Brugensis on the words expresseth them) all those uncreated, infinite riches 
and glories of the Deity whatsoever ; for the Father communicates all and 
the whole of himself unto the Son, giving him, by his eternal generation of 



140 OF ELECTION. [BoOK II. 

him, the fulness of the Deity; and so the sense is, all mine, that is, what- 
ever essential glory or perfection, whatever blessedness, &c., is in thee is in 
me, for we are one and co-equal in respect of essence, and of all the same 
divine perfections of the Godhead ; though as persons, and in our relation as 
such, we are distinct (personal properties being necessarily here to be ex- 
cepted), for he says, * We are one,' and so supposeth two persons distinct, 
whiles yet he saith that they are one, or but in all things else they are one. 
Kow this, all of us that believe the Trinity do hold ; but that which is to 
be proved is, that the intent of this speech is eminently to include these in 
this place, for which observe, 

[1.] First, He says universally, ' all things;' et qui dicit omnia, nihil relin- 
quit, which are Austin's words upon it: He that saith all things, leaves no- 
thing excepted. 

[2.] He says not, as in Mat. xi. 27, ' All things are delivered to me of my 
Father,' but speaks in a language indifferently appropriating all to himself 
and his Father: 'All things are mine' as well as the Father's; all things 
that are mine are thine, et e contra. 

fS.J That parallel place, John xvi. 15, * All things that the Father hath are 
mine,' doth confirm the like to be the intent here ; and this here, compared 
with that speech there, confirms the same to be the intent there ; he there 
says, not in an indefinite way, * what the Father hath is mine,' but puts a 
double universality upon it (as Gerhard hath observed on the place), -Travra, 
all thinrfs, and adds, o6a, whatever, 'all things whatsoever;' which doubled 
emphasis is left out of our translation. If he meant not to have said that 
he had the essence, the nature of God, the perfections of the Godhead, how 
should he say, 'All things whatever which my Father hath,' and yet be 
understood that there is an infinity of things or perfections which his Father 
hath as God (as eternity, immensity, &c.), which Christ should not have 
intended whilst he said ' all things wdiatsoever ' ? Who shall limit this 
universally universal, and except the essentials of the Godhead, when Christ 
(whom we all acknowledge God) doth not except them ? We say the Father 
hath omnipotency, the Father hath eternity, immensity, &c. ; and these are 
all Christ's, for ' w^hatsoever the Father hath are mine.' Surely these should 
not be excluded here ; not by us, who all believe that he is God, and hath 
all and the whole Godhead communicated to him in the fulness of it, for 
essentice communicatio J'acit omnia communia, the Godhead being communi- 
cated by the Father, all things of the Godhead, or that can be attributed 
thereunto, are communicated to all three, only the distinction of persons 
excepted. Nor is it an objection worth much considering that he saith, ' All 
that the Father hath are mine,' and therefore that he should mean by that 
word hath the things only which the Father possesseth as external to him ; 
as the things which concern our salvation, and the like, the world, and the 
fulness of it, as a man is said to have his goods possessive ; but the Father is 
said to have his own essence, and the perfections of it, as well as the works 
of his hands. The phrase is used of what he is essentially; as, ' Who only 
hath immortality,' &c., 1 Tim. vi. 16, which is an essential attribute ; or as 
a man is said to have a soul in him, noting the substantial being of him. 

But moreover that which confirms this to be his scope is this, let it be 
further observed in that place, John xvi. 15, that plainly he declares at once 
both that he is God as well as his Father ; as also that he is the second 
person in order next unto his Father in the divine nature, and in order afore 
the Spirit ; and both these you must suppose intended, or he had not given 
a sufficient reason or account of that which follows. And you may observe 
by the words that immediately follow in verse 15, ' Therefore said I, that he 



Chap. VII.] of election. IJ-l 

shall take of mine, and shall shew it unto you,' his professed intent to be to 
render a full and sufficient reason why he had in the words of the 14th verse 
immediately afore this 15th verse said, 'He' (the Spirit, namely) 'shall 
glorify me, for ho shall receive of mine, and shall shew it to you.' And 
farther they are an account of what he had also said in verse 13, 'He shall 
not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear,' from me and my 
Father, ' that shall he speak.' Now, if he had not been truly God, and 
second person in the Godhead, he had not held out a full and sufficient 
reason why the Holy Spirit should not speak of himself, but must have all 
that he speaks and shews from him ere he can shew them to us ; but being 
second person, he could truly say, Though the Spirit is God, and the third 
person of the three, yet I am, in order of subsistence, afore him ; and I am 
God likewise with the Father, and the second next person to the Father, and 
therefore he is to receive all from me. 

Now for the first, that he is God, and one God with the Father, that he 
signities and expresseth by this, that all things his Father hath are his, 
which is what I have argued to the same purpose. And that he is the 
second person of the Godhead in order also, he declares by the same words 
also, all whatever the Father hath are mine. Take them as they are a rea- 
son that the Spirit must receive all from him first, &c., for they are mine, 
and mine all in order first ; and so of necessity the Spirit must have all 
from me as well as from the Father. And otherwise, his account had been 
weakened by this, that the Spirit else might have had all from the Father 
without him; for this is an assured rule, that look in what order the per- 
sons are in subsisting, and dependence each of other for their personal sub- 
sistence in the Godhead, in the same order they do depend upon each other 
for their operations also as they do for their subsistence. The Son's sub- 
sistence, or his being God, is from the Father, who is the fountain of the 
Deity, and his Son isj' very God of very God ; ' and thereupon his operations, • 
as the Son, do depend upon what his Father first doth, and that he doth 
nothing but what he sees the Father do, and the Father shews it him: John 
V. 19, 20, ' Verily, verily, I say unto you. The Son can do nothing of him- 
self, but what he seeth the Father do : for what things soever he doth, these 
also doth the Son likewise. For the Father loveth the Son, and sheweth 
him all things that himself doth.' And as elsewhere, ' I speak not of my- 
self,' saith he : ' but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doth the works,' 
John xiv. 10, and chap. viii. 28. And what is the reason of this depend- 
ence in doing and speaking, but his being God, of and from the Father ? 
Whereby it is (as the words have it) that ' all that the Father hath is mine.' 
Now look, as his person hath all in order first from the Father ; and there- 
fore it is he cannot speak anything of himself, nor do anything of himself, 
but only what the Father sheweth him, as you heard himself speak of him- 
self ; in like manner, and upon the same ground, the Spirit must have all 
from him too, as he hath from the Father. It is not sufficient that the 
Spirit proceeds from the Father, as he is said to do, John xv. 26, that there- 
fore he should have all wholly from the Father, and shew it to you, and 
pass by ihe Son of God. No, saith Christ ; he must have it from me too ; 
because the order of our subsisting in the Godhead is, that all the Father 
hath is mine first in order of nature ; for my generation by the Father, as 
his Son, is first, ere the Holy Ghost's procession, for he is the third person ; 
and then, all that the Father hath being communicated to me, thence it is 
that the Spirit proceeds from both. For even that power to breathe forth 
the Spirit, together with the Father, is one of those things intended when 
he saith, ' All that my Father hath is mine.' So as it is the account of the 



142 OF ELECTION. [BoOK II. 

order of their subsistence, as the foundation of this their order in working, 
which he aims at in saying, All that my Father hath is mine, as well as to 
shew he is God, and that therefore necessarily the Spirit must take of mine, 
since it is I that send him as well as my Father. This he had said afore, 
ver. 6 of that 16th chapter. And it is as if he had said, This I had not 
power to do, nor ought to have taken upon me to say or do, unless I were 
God with the Father, for the Holy Ghost is God ; and were I not God as 
well as the Father, and that the Spirit proceeded from me, I, as merely 
Mediator, could not have sent him. 

If then this parallel speech in chap, xvi., ver. 15, imports that all things 
in the Godhead were his with the Father as a person that was God with 
him, why should we not, yea, how dare we but understand it of the same in 
this prayer also ? For the one comes in as a part of his doctrine in a ser- 
mon just preceding afore his prayer, and this follows after in the prayer. 
This for the confirmation of this sense fi'om John xvi. 15. 

[4.] A fourth argument from the manner of this speech in John xvii. 10, 
is, that Christ speaks in terms of equality wath his Father, ' All mine are 
thine, and thine mine ; ' that is, mutually, and equally, and alike ; and 
therefore it is spoken of him as God, and a person in the Godhead. Yea, 
lo, he says not only ' all mine are thine,' but he says vice versa on the other 
side, 'all thine are'^mine.' It is after the manner of equals among men ; you 
may observe that when the same things are said of two equals, the manner 
is indifferently to place either first and then the other So here, mine thine, 
and thine mine ; no matter which first, so the same things be said. It is 
to shew they are equal. But if Christ only spake this as God-man, in and 
under that consideration solely, the Father being greater than he, he would 
not have ranged it with this equality, unless he had spoken as he is a person 
of the Trinity equal with the Father, and one God with the Father. There- 
fore it is he "speaks it as second person chiefly, especially if he had spoken 
as God-man, and had withal intended by the all things that are mine are 
thine the apostles' persons only, as some have it. He would rather have 
said, ' All thine are mine.' And why ? Because he had said before, they 
were first the Father's, ' and thou gavest them me.' 

[5.] Toilet upon the place casts in this, that our Lord had spoken afore 
of the persons of the apostles, how they were thine, Father ; so in the 
6th verse, thine by election, which is signified in that speech, ' Thou gavest 
them me,' and they were given to me as I am God-man. Therefore here 
in these words, says he, Christ ascends to urge a further and higher interest 
in them, and in all things else, viz., as he is God, and coequal with the 
Father. And certainly that other particular interest, viz., that the persons 
of those apostles were both his and the Father's also, he had before so suffi- 
ciently expressed both in ver. 6, and over and over again afterwards, within 
this small compass of the words that follow in ver. 11 and ver. 12, as it may 
well be admitted that some greater thing, and more intensive, should in 
these words be intended. 

This for the second branch, that by all things is not meant only all things 
extrinsecal, or all of the persons of the elect, &c., but the divine essence 
itself, and the perfections thereof proper to God, and common to the three 
persons, that all these were his as well as the Father's. 

3. Thirdly, This speech doth fully import, and is all one as to say (though 
in a larger compass of words), that his Father and he are two persons, one 
in essence; or (as he himself after in fewer words expresseth it), *We are 
one.' And mark it, brethren, that very thing it is that his prayer here doth 
issue in, ' That they may be one, as we are.' For two persons to have all 



Chap. VII.] of election. 143 

the perfections of the divine nature equally and in common, 'All thine are 
mine, and mine are thine,' this is all one as to say, that these two persons 
are one. This is so clear, as I need not insist on it. And truly Calvin, 
who is against the interpretation of ' we are one ' to be meant of the oneness 
of the persons, as in the divine nature of God, throughout this chapter, yet 
when he is upon this place, he, considering the weight and extension of this 
word ' all things,' hath these words,* The unity of the Father and the Son 
is such as they have nothing apart between them. Which is that very thing 
which I say, that their being one God is expressed by this, that all things 
are in a community theirs. 

4. This issues all the former, that it is spoken as a motive or plea, that 
therefore ' they (the elect) should be one, as we are.' There is this aspect, 
this true and genuine connection between these two passages, though (as I 
at first noted) there comes in a petition between for that which was to be 
the means of their union ; yet these first words, ' All mine are thine,' &c., 
do centre in this grand petition, * That they be one, as we,' or, ' Let them 
be one.' And the reasons of this their first connection and reference are 
these : — 1. So it is that that speech, * All mine are thine,' &c., stands as a 
parenthesis from the rest of the words, whether afore or after, and are to be 
separate by an inclosure from the rest. And so Brugensis reads the words, 
and in his comment notes it to be such. It is a speech stands by itself 
among the rest, and sent aforehand, a good way ofi", expecting a mate, a cor- 
respondent, it should yoke and clasp withal, and this is it, * That therefore 
they may be one, as we are.' And the coherence of the w^ord^ in the verses 
afore these words, 'All mine are thine,' &c., and of those that immediately 
follow them, you may observe that the other verses run on smoothly without 
them, so as those words are a parenthesis, ' I pray for them which thou 
hast given me, for they are thine,' ver. 9, and ' I am glorified in them,' ver. 
10, and so on. And interpreters generally are so wholly intent upon this, 
that the persons of the apostles are only intended in his saying ' all mine 
are thine,' as they fill up the whole of Christ's meaning therewith ; which 
also hath caused them to judge the oneness of the saints themselves to be 
only meant in those words, ' that they may be one.' But I hope I have 
sufficiently proved it, that our oneness with God and with Christ is here to 
be understood. 2. ' That they may be one ' is the centre of his prayer, 
which what is before determines and falls into, and therefore this passage of 
' all mine ' centres therein also. 3. The suitableness and correspondencv, 
yea, sameness of sense that is between these two passages, ' All things that 
are mine are thine,' and that which is last of all, ' as we are one,' is such 
as makes it undeniable. For if any should have studied never so much to 
express what the Father and Son being one is, or what the unity of the 
persons, in respect of their essences or Godhead, is, it could not be more 
fully and adequately set out than by this, that it is a communion of all things 
in God between those persons ; and that saying of Christ which expresses 
this communion, 'All mine are thine,' is the same with this other, 'As we 
are one.' So then, that our union with God should be expressed by our 
being one in our measure and proportion, as the Father and the Son are 
one, is the most significant way of expressing it that could be, so as we see 
all to agree in a blessed harmony. 

Now the force of the plea therein, wherewith he moves his Father, is, 
that they being one in the enjoyment of all these uncreated riches of the 
Godhead which are mutually theirs, as of that essential wisdom, power, 

■5^ Tenenda est unitas Patris cum Filio, quse facit ut nihil in se divisum habeant. 
— Calvin in loc. 



144 OF ELECTION. [Book II. 

omniscience, holiness, blessedness, glory, all, and being thus one in essence, 
had agreed and conspired in love towards these (for all the acts of the God- 
head mternal are common to the three persons). And so it is as if he had 
said, I am concurring with thee, Father, as second person, in the choice 
of these persons, and in the love of them, or in what degree of special love 
soever there is, in respect of which they may be said to be thine, in the 
same love and degree thereof, they are mine also as second person ; and o3i, 
therefore, brines those whom we have loved into a communication of all 
those glories and riches with us ; let them have all things that are ours, 
with a y-aJ^jg, an as, by way of similitude of what we have therein ; let us 
not be happy alone, nor keep the communication of these things wholly 
among ourselves, but let them have all, as far as mere creatures are capable 
of ; which that it might be fully accomplished, according to my true intent 
in my saying, All mine are thine, &c., and completing my prayer about this, 
I enlarc^e it ere I conclude, and end it with this further request, that thou 
wouldst keep them in this life in holiness, that so they may perfectly attain 
this blessedness, that all that is mine and thine may be the-irs also, as hath 
been desi^^ned by us for them ; which I reinforce in these words, to be 
granted them, ' that they may be one as we are one,' which is effected by 
their having all in common between us, whereby we are one, communicated 
unto them also, whereby it is they shall be made one with us also. And oh, 
let them thus have all, though not with an essential sameness (that is im- 
possible), yet with a fruition ; let them have all the power, wisdom, grace, 
love, blessedness, that is in thee and me ; let them have them all in the en- 
joyment to make them happy possessively, though not essentially ; (or, as 
Christ afterwards dilierenceth it) let them be ' one in us,' ver. 21, not ' one 
with us,' and as we ourselves are one with another, for as their union with 
us is of a lower kind, so the communication of all these must be ; yet let 
them have all as far as is communicable ; let all their interest be ours but 
their sips, which let us separate from them, that so they may be entirely 
one in us, that they may be able, in the knowledge and sense of their one- 
ness with us, to say in their measure unto us, K\\ ours is thine, God, and 
all thine is ours, and may say the like to me the Son, I am heir of thee, 
Father, for I am thy Son, and to inherit all things in thee, and let them be 
heirs of God, and of all of God, with me, co-heirs with me, as Rom. viii. 17 
hath it. 

And this plea of his, as second person, for us, shews the bottom counsel 
of the heart of God among the Holy Three from everlasting, when that 
blessed and Sacratissimus Consessus Trinitatis was held, that most sacred 
sitting of the Trinity, as Gerhard speaks on John xvi. 14, 15, that Concilium 
Tnnitatis, as Rolloc on the same place, then it was this motion on our be- 
half was made amongst them, which the Son here expresseth ; and the 
original ground of that motion was the communion the three persons do 
hold in that one Godhead, therefore they designed to communicate the same 
to those they loved and foreknew, and were then a-choosing unto an union 
with them. And this the second or middle person, God's counsellor, An- 
geliis mogni Concilii (as the Septuagint renders it, Isa. ix. 6), he, knowing 
his Father's counsels, utters it here in John xvii., through the mouth of the 
man who was now become one person with him ; his part being now in a 
way of prayer to move his Father, he reminds him of the original ground 
thereof, and he doth it to his Father in a prayer, rather than in a sennon to 
them his apostles ; and he does it in this his last prayer, in which he layeth 
open the secrets of God. And higher than this we cannot go. And that 
this is the true meaning of this connection, ' All thine are mine, and mine 



Chap. VII. J of election. 145 

are thine,' with this, ' That they may be one, as we are,' if ever I did sub- 
mit any interpretation that ever I have given of any scripture in my whole 
hfe, I do submit this. 

We may see, then, the great stead the being of the Trinity stands us in. 
We see first the original motion made for our eternal blessedness to have [been] 
founded on this, that there are three persons that have the same Godhead, 
and all in it as one ; whereby they were moved to make the creatures one 
in them, and to communicate all in the Godhead, and all else that was theirs 
unto them, and for them for their good. 



SECTION II. 

The second sort or branch of the motive in the three jjersons. — The mutual in- 
tercourse and society which as persons they have, and had one with another ; 
and the sweetness of that converse was an inducement to them to ordain crea- 
tures to be taken up into the like communion with themselves. — I'his 1 found 
upon John xvii. 21. 

That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and 1 in thee, that they 
also may be one in us. — John XVII. 21. 

Wherein, among other things, the intimate communion of the Father in 
and with the Son, and of the Son in and with the Father, is expressed by 
the Father's being in the Son, and the Son in the Father ; and that con- 
verse is of the import of those terms of expression. And besides the per- 
sonal indwelling of the Father in the Son, which divines call circumcession 
of the persons, those phrases do import all sorts of intimate acquaintance 
and knowledge of each other. We use to say, we know^ such a man as if we 
were within him. Now, the Father is in the Son, and the Son in the Father, 
and so are perfectly acquainted one with the other ; and therefore, accord- 
ingly, that which follows, that ' they also may be one in us,' is as much as 
for him to have prayed, that they in like manner may partake of, and enjoy 
in, a like communion and intercourse in us and with us, as we are. And 
such a blessed intercourse betw^een the Father and the Son, the 5th verse of 
this chapter shews to have been from everlasting : ' the glory I had with thee 
afore the world was ;' as also Christ had in his sermon, chap. xvi. 13, 14, 
towards the end of it, made mention of : ' Whatsoever the Spirit shall hear, 
that shall he speak : he shall glorify me, and take of mine ; all the Father hath 
is mine.' The Scriptures do present the three persons, not only as three 
witnesses to us, but as three blessed companions of a knot and society 
among themselves, enjoying fellowship and delights accordingly in them- 
selves ; and indeed, if this had been wanting, there had not been an abun- 
dant or a complete happiness, for much of sweetness lies in society (the * sweet- 
ness of a man's friend,' is Solomon's character), which, if the divine nature 
had not alibrded in having in it three persons really distinct, knowing, 
rejoicing in, glorying of, and speaking unto each other, there had not been a 
perfection of blessedness. But from forth of this society, an all- satiety did 
and doth arise ; the Son is presented as in the bosom of the Father : John 
i. 18, * No man hath seen God at any time : the only begotten Son, which 
is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him ;' and John x. 15, ' As 
the Father knows me, even so I know the Father.' And the Son speaks 
not, but what he hears of the Father, as you find again and again in that 
Gospel of John ; nor doth the Spirit speak but what he hears of both : John 

VOL. IX. K 



146 OF ELECTION. [BoOK II. 

xvi. 13-15, * Howbeit, \\-hen the Spirit of truth is come, he "will guide you 
into all truth ; for he shall not speak of himself, but whatsoever he shall 
hear, that shall he speak, and will shew you things to come. He shall glorify 
me, for he shall receive of mine, and shall shew it unto you. All things 
that the Father hath are mine ; therefore said I, That he shall take of mine, 
and shall shew it unto you.' 

And this fellowship and communion mutual is, and was, matter of infinite 
delight and pleasure in them, as Wisdom, i. e. the Son declares, Prov. viii. 
30, in there uttering what had been between the Father and him afore the 
world : ' Then was I by him as one brought up with him ; and I was daily his 
delight, rejoicing always before him ;' and this he says was before the world ; 
and then, when their delights thus lay in what by way of intercourse had 
passed between him and his Father, as those words, * rejoicing always afore 
him,' signify; that he, as a companion, had been always in his sight, his pre- 
sence, his company ; now conformable and like unto, and next to these 
delights which had been between themselves, were their delights in the sons 
of men : ver. 31, ' Rejoicing in the habitable parts of the earth, and my de- 
lights were with the sons of men.' The sons of men are sociable creatures, 
intelligent and understanding, and much of their delights lie in mutual con- 
verses. Now the delights of these divine persons with the sons of men afore 
the world was, lay much in thoughts taken up aforehand, of what a sweet 
fellowship one day they should have in admitting them into an intimate con- 
verse and acquaintance with themselves. The sons of men were their 
delights, not as things that are incapable of converse are said to be, but 
which the correspondencies held among persons do afford. You read in the 
apostle John, 1 John i. 3, of a fellowship which we now have with the Father, 
and the Son, and they with us ; and as in ver. 7, that following clause ex- 
pounds it, we ' have fellowship one with another ;' that is, they with us, 
and we with them. And it was the thoughts of these mutual delights in our 
and their fellowship, one day to be had and enjoyed, when we should actu- 
ally exist, was a special objective matter of delight unto their thoughts so long 
afore ; they infinitely pleased themselves in the view and contemplation of 
this. Now when I say it was such, both to the Father as well as to the Son, 
my ground even in that place of the Proverbs is, chap. viii. ver. 30, 31, 
that although it be Wisdom, the Son, that only says, *my delights were with 
the sons of men,' yet that the Father's delights were in common with his in 
them, the words afore instruct us, ' I rejoiced in the habitable part of his 
earth ' (he loving the very ground they go on), wherein these sons of men 
should dwell. The insertion of his name, by* his Father's, shews us it was 
his Father' interest as well as his own, yea, and his own for his Father's 
sake. And elsewhere his Father is said to have delighted in them, to choose 
them, Deut. x., which common interest this text expresseth, 'thine they 
were, and thou gavest them me ;' and 'mine are thine,' holds good even 
here. 

And the mention thus fii'st of these proper delights, peculiar to the per- 
sons, and then of theirs in us, and the thoughts of our fellowship with them 
to come, and the one in so near and immediate a conjunction to, and with 
the other, strongly insinuates that they affected this secondary fellowship with 
us creatures, from the delights of what originally they had among themselves, 
both as the exemplar of that to be had in time with us, and as the rise and 
inducing motive, that so they among themselves, and we together with them, 
might all rejoice together, which was the freeness and greatness of the grace 
of it ; that though they had a perfection of delights in what was proper to 

* Qu. ' viz.' ?— Ed. 



Chap. VII.] of election. 147 

themselves, yet they would have other company to delight in. It was the 
sweetness and delightfulness of their own proper conmniam, which induced 
them to have more company, partakers of their joy, who might rejoice to- 
gether w^ith them in their capacity and proportion, who might therefore bless 
and adore them for taking them up into it, and make, as Christ speaks, their 
joy, if possible, more full ; they would not be happy alone. 

And that the three persons, both singly and joint, were prone and pre- 
pense unto such a creature- fellowship, and admission of them unto their 
converse with themselves, the Scriptures and the reason of the thing doth 
show. 

For as you have ' fellowship with us,' attributed to the Father and the 
Son, in that of 1 John v. 3, and other places, so you have as express the 
communion and fellowship of the Spirit, distinct from that of theirs with us : 
2 Cor. vi. ver. 13, 14, ' Now for a recompense in the same (I speak as unto 
my children), be ye also enlarged. Be ye not equally yoked together with 
unbelievers ; for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness ? 
and what communion hath light with darkness ?' 

And the reason of the thing, how it came to pass it should be so, may be 
fetched and drawn down from what was said in that head of the first princi- 
pal motive, viz. the manifesting and declaring the name of God ; whereby, as 
I shewed, was principally meant the grace, love, and goodness in the 
divine nature, all which are in common the perfections of each person alike, 
of one as well as the other : ' for all mine are thine, and thine mine,' saith 
Christ.^ As therefore the Godhead, or divine nature, is disposed to this union 
and creature communication to us, so they being the properties of the per- 
sons subsisting in that nature, the persons themselves are inclined there- 
unto, both jointly and singly. There is love and infinite riches of grace in 
God the Father : Eph. ii. 7, ' That in the ages to come he might shew the 
exceeding riches of his grace, in his kindness towards us, through Christ 
Jesus.' There is grace in God the Son ; a free heart to bestow the riches, 
the fulness of delights, that himself possessed : 2 Cor. viii. 9, * For ye know 
the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your 
sakes he became poor, that ye through his poverty might be rich ;' and 
there is the highest readings* and propenseness in the Holy Ghost unto 
creature communion also. You have all in one verse : 2 Cor. xiii. 4, ' The 
grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of 
the Holy Ghost, be with you all. Amen.' And as I then f^hewed that it is 
the property, the nature of goodness, grace, and love, to communicate and 
manifest themselves to others, so we find the same said of the persons 
singly, each of them having the same blessed property. Thus of manifesta- 
tion it is said : John xiv. 21, 22, ' He that loveth me shall be loved of my 
Father, and I will love him, and manifest myself to him ;' and ver. 23, * My 
Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with 
him.' Thus of the Father and Son. And there is the manifestation of the 
Spirit also, 2 Cor. xii. ; and he is promised to 'dwell in us,' and ' be with us 
for ever,' John xiv. 17, and is the revealer of God's and Christ's mind to us, 
and of the deep things of God, 1 Cor. ii. 10-16 ; and all these dispensations 
in time have, for their spring and well-head, these original purposes and 
transactions from everlasting. 

They each singly, and jointly for one another, desired to have themselves 

made known to us, to the end to be glorified by us. The Spirit loves to 

glorify the Son to us : John xvi. 14, ' He shall glorify me, for he shall 

receive of mine, and shall shew it unto you.' The Father to have his Son 

* Qu. ' readiness ' ? — Ed. 



1-18 OF ELECTION. [BoOK II. 

honoured as himself is : John v. 22, 23, ' For the Father judgeth no man, 
but hath committed all judgment unto the Son: that all men should honour 
the Son, even as they honour the Father. He that honoureth not the Son, 
honoureth not the Father which hath sent him.' ' Father, glorify thy name,' 
says the Son of the Father ; John xii. 28, * I have glorified it, and will 
glorify it again,' says the Father to the Son in answer thereunto. They love 
to have their own personal in-beings, and communications among themselves, 
made known to us, as far as we are capable : John xiv. 20, ' At that day ye 
shall know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you.' 

The man Christ Jesus united to the second person speaks the sense of 
that person, and his Father's also in this: John xvii. 21, 22, 'As thou, 
Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us.' Which 
is as if he had said, Thou, Father, knowest how blessed and delightful this 
oneness of ours together hath been unto us ; what infinite joy and happiness 
it hath produced to us, and in us ; and it will be sweet to us to have fellows 
who also may be partakers of our joys, who may both be enjoyers of it 
themselves, and also may understand what hath been among ourselves from 
all eternity (according to those w^ords of Christ's, John xiv. 20, ' Ye shall 
know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you'), and adore us 
for it. You see also that this man, God's fellow, w^hen he was taken up 
into that fellowship, he became of the same disposition, he desired not to 
be alone. And he had it from the disposition of the person he was united 
to, the Son of God ; and so God gave him fellows thereupon, Ps. xiv. 7, and 
he being manifest in the flesh, expresseth and utters but what was in the 
heart of all the three. Thus this natural society of the three, and the 
pleasure thereof, induced this acquired, and sought-out society, made up of 
creature converse with this God and three persons, ' to whom be all glory 
for ever.' 

I conclude with this, the divine nature, and the three persons are all, 
and the whole that are in God ; and, lo, you have all these graciously 
inclined unto this our union and communion with them, and then you have 
all that is in God become motives, and inductives to it, and you can have 
no more. 

I might add for the confirmation of this notion, that what was in the 
nature of God had influence upon his gracious will to move him to do the 
like for us in many particular instances. Only what he should do for us, 
being matter of will in him, he might do it, or not do it as he pleased, and 
to whom, or whom not, as he pleased, because it was matter of will, yet 
something that was natural was the inducer of his will thereunto. 

Use. Oh let us take heed lest we be left out of this * royal society ! ' as 
by allusion to what is lower and lesser I may call it, lest our lot should 
fall to be with the rest of the world, as in ver. 23 of this John xvii. Christ 
sets it forth; lest that we only know, and that too late, that there have been 
a company of men whom God hath loved, and taken up into union with 
himself, to be ever with the Lord, when ourselves shall have that fatal sen- 
tence pronounced against us by our Lord Christ, ' Depart from me, I know 
ye not.' And it is that you are workers of iniquity that will cause this 
eternal separation. He therefore saith, ' Depart from me, ye workers of 
iniquity ;'' and as the apostle saith, ' Let every one therefore that names the 
Lord, depart from iniquity.' The words of Christ concerning the world are 
these in the 23d verse, ' That the world may know that thou hast sent me, and 
hast loved them, as thou hast loved me,' which will be the efiect upon all 
the world of wicked men at that great day, which is called the day of their 
visitation, that they shall see unto what an infinite blessedness the saints 



Chap. YII.] of election. 149 

are raised up unto, through union with God and Christ, and what a glorious 
Christ he will appear to be, that even they all shall know that God hath 
sent him, and that he is the Christ indeed, and has loved these his members, 
united to him, as God has loved him. But this conviction will be too late, 
for it is to be joined with * depart from me,' and therefore seek unto God to 
keep you in this world, to kesp you pure from the evil of it, that the world 
lieth in, that in the end this union may break forth in you, and upon you, 
unto your own glorious sense of it ; and so Christ's words run, * Holy 
Father, keep them through thy own name, those whom thou hast given me, 
that thoy may be one, even as we.' 

To sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob was the phraseology of the 
Old Testament, though Christ used it coming in the verge of it ; but to sit down 
with the lis, the three, another manner of three than Abraham, Isaac, and 
Jacob, to sit down with God the Father, and God the Son, and God the Holy 
Ghost, and to have these to dwell in us, and we to dwell in them, this is Christ's 
language, this is New Testament language. Oh to be bound up in that bundle 
of life with the living God, and with Christ, that hath life in himself! Oh let 
this be the whole of the strength of the aim of our souls, and be moved and 
affected so with it, so as not to want a part and share in and with this good 
company ! They were sufficient company to themselves when they inhabited 
eternity, and sufficient to make themselves happy one in another ; how 
mu(;h more are they sufficient to make us so, by taking us up into their 
intimate converse ! Suppose (we will make but a supposition of it) that 
God had chosen but one soul besides that man Jesus, whom he took up into 
one person with his Son (for we mere creatures should not have been imme- 
diately united to God without a mediator of union, who was more than a 
creature, and therefore his presence is necessary unto our happiness, as 
ver. 24), upon this supposition, how infinitely blessed would that one soul have 
been in the sole and single society of God the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, 
and with the man Jesus, made one person with the Son; he would not have 
needed to have had the company of Peter and Paul to have made that 
happiness perfect ; but ' I in thee, and thou in me,' would have made that 
soul perfect in one. It is but an additional and adscititious happiness which 
the saints have from their oneness one with another ; but it is, * I in them, 
and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one,' is their happiness 
in solido, wherein the substance thereof consists. If of that single soul 
Christ had said, ' Father, I will that this soul also whom thou hast given 
me, may be with me where I am, that it may behold my glory which thou 
hast given me,' this soul would have been perfectly happy. Have you had 
experience at any time, any of you — I do not say you have not grace, if you 
have not had it — of that in John xiv. 21, * My Father will love him, and I 
will love him, and will manifest myself to him,' /. e. have you had the 
Father telling you he Joves you ? And then again, have you had the Son 
saying to your poor souls, how he loves you, and manifesting himself, and 
his heart unto you ? And have you had the Holy Ghost communicating 
himself in like manner ; and this vouchsafed here in this life, in some short 
converses of each of these persons with your souls, which are but imperfect 
manifestations of them to us in this life ? Oh what sweetness will there 
one day be then in heaven, in the fulness of converse and manifestation of 
these three persons, when it will be, if not all, yet the gi'eat discourse that 
will be had and heard in heaven with your poor souls, by all the three per- 
sons, bringing all the delights they have had in you from eternity down into 
your hearts, and making discoveries of them to eternity. 



150 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 



BOOK III. 

TJie hifinity of grace in God's choosing us, jjroved from the nature of election, 
both simply considered in itself, and also compared uith that other act of 
rejyrobation. 



CHAPTER I. 

The grace of electing us simply considered, and the greatness of it jyroved from 
the greatness of the benefit. 

I. Let us consider, it is ' the election only. Critics will put upon it a meto- 
nymy in rhetoric, as the creation for the creatures ; but in God's book and 
rhetoric it speaks and denotes a grandness put upon the persons chosen. 
To such, ELECT is the greatest word can be asked of us. One of Christ's 
most eminent titles, Isa. xl. 1, ' mine elect' (speaking of Christ j ; and 
even the Pharisees, apprehending that the Messiah should be some emi- 
nently eminent person, expressed it by this, ' The Christ whom God hath 
chosen,' Luke xxiii. 35. 

II. Let us consider. Who hath chosen ? God : 1 Thes. i. 5, ' Knowing 
your election of God.' In all choices the person choosing puts a value on 
the chosen, and upon the act. To be made choice of by a king unto such an 
office-employment, or by a whole state that are wise and honourable ; how doth 
it dignify a man ! It is one of Titus's commendations : 2 Cor. viii. 19, * who 
was also chosen of the churches,' &c. ; but that the great God, the blessed 
and only potentate, the only wise Gocl, who hath glory, immortality, majesty, 
and dominion, and power, should choose so poor, contemptible, weak, and 
foolish a thing as thou art : 1 Cor. i. 26, 27, ' For ye see your calhng, bre- 
thren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many 
noble, are called : but God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to 
confound the wise ; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to 
confound the things that are mighty ; and base things of the world, and 
things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, 
to bring to nought things that are : that no flesh should glory in his pre- 
sence.' And as the emphasis is put upon Christ's choice, ' the Christ whom 
God hath chosen,' so it is put upon ours also, ' the elect whom God hath 
chosen,' Mark xiii. 20. 

III. And these two put together : 1, elect, or chosen ; and then, 2dly, 
* whom God chose.' And it speaks, 1, all worth, honour, and excellency : 
the chosen of God must needs be choice, it makes them such. If elect, then 
precious, 1 Pet. ii. So of Christ ; then again of us. Take God's eminent 
saints, what is their highest title and honour ? ' Moses the chosen of God,' 
Ps. cvi. 3 ; ' Aaron the chosen of God,' Ps. cv. 16 ; * Paul a chosen vessel,' 
Acts ix. 15 ; 'Ye are a chosen generation, a pecuhar people,' 1 Pet. ii. 9, 
that is, elect. He had begun his epistle with, ' To the elect,' &c., chap. i. 2 ; 
and that phrase, Xdog eig 'Ki^iiroii^aiv, as the rest there mentioned, is taken out 



Chap. I.] of election. 151 

of Exodus v., where it is 'a peculiar treasure to me,' says God, 'above 
all people.' It imports all that is dear and precious to God : Isa. xliii. 4, 
' Since thou wert precious in my sight, thou hast been honourable ;' that is, 
since I have chosen thee, and loved thee, as it follows, and thereby becamest 
precious in my eyes, that hast been, and art, and shall be honourable in 
mine, so in all the whole creation's esteem ; this did put the preciousness. 
Men's choosings are out of whom they find the choicest : 1 Chron. xix. 10, 
' Joab chose out of all the choice of Israel ;' but God's choosing makes them 
choice. 

2. It speaks all blessedness, and the fulness of it. ' Blessed is the man 
whom thoa choosest,' Ps. Ixv. 4 ; * yea, he is most blessed,' Ps. xxi., or, as 
the Hebrew hath it, ' set for blessings,' set apart, and appointed for bless- 
ings. * He hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in things heavenly, 
according as he hath chosen us,' &c. It is the womb, the treasury fountain 
of all blessedness. 

3. Let us consider unto what he hath chosen us : unto the nearest approach 
to God, that is, to the highest communion with himself; and that is founded 
on his choosing us to the nearest union with himself. 

4. Let us consider the time since when he chose us. Of old ; of old, even 
from everlasting were w^e ordained unto this salvation. Paul dates it from 
the beginning, 2 Thes. ii. 13. God hath loved us ever since he was God, 
and whilst he is God he will continue to do so. The eldest date of his being 
God is from everlasting, and his continuing to be God is to everlasting : 
Ps. xc. 2, ' Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever thou hadst 
formed the earth and the world : even from everlasting to everlasting thou art 
God.' And his love to us is as old : Jer. xxxi. 3, ' I have loved thee with 
an everlasting love ;' and Ps. ciii. 17, ' The mercy of the Lord is from ever- 
lasting to everlasting.' And as it is a love as ancient as God himself, — he 
hath loved thee ever since he was God, — so it is a love that hath fixedly con- 
tinued ever since eternity ; it hath been constant ever since the very time 
God chose us, even unto the moment of our being called. This I take to be 
the genuine aim of Jer. xxxi. 3, ' The Lord hath appeared of old unto me, 
saying. Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love.' The true aim or 
sense of that Scripture lies in this : it is a true dialogue between God and 
his church ;* God had begun, ver. 2, ' Thus saith the Lord, The people 
which were left of the sword, found grace in the wilderness, even Israel, when 
I went to cause him to rest.' The church now in desertion interposeth her 
complaint and scruple, ' The Lord hath indeed appeared of old unto me ;' 
that is, in former ages, which is a concession to God's speech in the fore- 
going verse, what he had been to her of old. ' The people in the wil- 
derness found grace,' &c. True, say [they], the Lord hath appeared in 
former times : Oh, but now, what answer doth God return to this ? * Yea, 
I have loved thee with an everlasting love.' (The word saijinr/ is not in the 
original, and its being put in hath marred the scope.) As if he had said to 
her. Again dost thou speak of my appearances of old to thee, and as if now 
I had left thee ? Yea, my love is of an ancienter date by far, than my 
appearances unto thee, which thou sayest are of old ; l. e. those appearances 
you speak of were but a thousand years ago in the wilderness, &c., but my 
love in my heart to thee hath been from everlasting, &c. Everlasting is 
opposed to old ; hidden love, unknown love from everlasting, unto appear- 

* That which hath diverted this interpretation is, that our translation hath made 
the forepart of the verse to be God's speech, as well as the latter, ' The Lord hath 
appeared of old, saying,' wliereas taying is not in theHebrew ; and therefore the first 
is the church's SI 



, saying,' wliereas saying is not in the Hebrew ; and therefore the 
speech, and the other God's reply.— Fi-ie Juniuiu el TreineUium. 



152 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

ances. It hatli suffered no ellipsis, no interruption, no pauses between ; to 
ratify which, God sets his great yea, or his amen. ' Yea (says he), I have 
loYed thee with an everlasting love ;' which to be all one, that of the apostle 
shews, 2 Cor. i. 20, ' All the promises of God are yea and amen.' It is a 
great yea this ; and set to the gi-eatest thing that ever God did concerning 
us, which you may see how himself accounts of by it ; and it comes in the way 
of a most punctual answer unto the greatest doubts and thoughts his people 
use to harbour. And further, besides his own yea or asseveration, he gives 
this evidence that he had borne such a continued love unto them : * There- 
fore with loving-kindness have I drawn thfee,' ver. 2. Now consider, what 
should it be that moved me so to do, when you had nothing but enmity in 
you against me ? Certainly, it could be nothing but my own mere loving- 
kindness borne towards you before, that must move me to it : it must be 
f ome aforehand purpose ; and when, or at what time, think you, did that 
kindness first begin in me, or that loving fit first take me ? Was my love 
ever nay, and then after a time become yea? No, says he; here I am an 
everlasting God, and I have no new purposes, that are of yesterday, but 
which are as of old as myself am ; for then I should have an alteration or 
change made in me, as you creatures have ; new thoughts to-day, which I 
had not yesterday ; and to be sure, in my love towards you, of all things 
else, I have not such ; for I love like God, hke the great God, where I love. 
Neither could there be anything but such a love so borne to you, that could 
ever move me to call you, for there was nothing in you to draw on my love ; 
for the truth is, I was forced to draw you, you were so backward and utterly 
averse. And now, after I have called you, I am a God that changeth not : 
Mai. iii. 6, * For I am the Lord, I change not : therefore ye sons of Jacob 
are not consumed.' And so my love is from everlasting to everlasting : 
Ps. ciii. 17, * But the mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting, 
upon them that fear him : and his righteousness unto children's children.' 



CHAPTER IL 

The injimty of grace in GocVs electing us, discovered hy a. comparison of it with 
the other act of reprobation. — The vast disparity between election, and the 
grounds and issue thereof ; and the act of rejection of others, and the grounds 
and issue thereof. 

I can put the doctrine of the foregone discourse unto no better use than 
an exaltation of the grace and love of God towards his in his decrees of elec- 
tion ; both, 1, to the end, as of them considered unfallen ; and, 2, to the 
means, considering them as fallen, by and through a comparative made of 
these his decrees of election with those parallelly opposite of his denials of 
those, both end and means, unto others; which so vastly differing comparison 
between the one and the other the called elect of God are deeply to consider, 
to the end the more to adore the surpassing grace of God towards them. 

And that this high duty is due from us upon the account of this difference 
and discrimination that electing grace hath made, I shall insist but upon one 
grand example, that of Christ himself on our behalf. We find our Lord 
blessing his Father on our behalf upon this comparative account : Mat. xi. 
25, 26, Jesus said, ' I thank thee, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, 
because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast 
revealed them unto babes : even so. Father, for so it seemed good in thy 
sisht.' 



Chap. II.] of election. 153 

In which passage observe, 

1. That God's good pleasure in putting this difference between his elect 
and others is here the subject-matter of his speech. 

2. That Christ, the natural Son of his Father, and so privy to his secret 
counsels touching these disposements, doth rest and acquiesce in his Father's 
good pleasure, which wdth an emphasis Brugensis* hath observed out of 
these words, Na/ 6 Uutyjo, which we translate ' even so' ; but he renders it, 
Becte, Pater, * Thou hast done rightly, Father, in so doing ;' so in the 
highest measure approving it. 

3. That he allegeth no other reason for this difference, but only his 
Father's good pleasure, and resolveth all into that : he speaks not, quel 
ratione placuit, upon that reason it pleaseth his Father, but only that it 
pleased him ; and therefore only allegeth it, because it is that which should 
silence all. f 

4. That which is special to my purpose is, that he not simply approves 
of this, but singularly blesseth his Father for it ; and that not only or merely 
because he had ' revealed these things to his babes,' but comparatively also, 
setting before it, and together with it, his having ' hid these things,' which 
are the means of saving men, ' from the wise and prudent.' ' Father, I 
thank thee that thou hast hid them,' &c. ; which he mentions as that whereby 
his Father's love was magnified the more unto his elect, in whom his good 
pleasure was pitched. And Christ was moved to do this, they being those 
he loved so much, having been given him by the Father as his sheep to 
die for, 

5. The occasion he takes for this his thanks, uttered in this comparative, 
was the hardness of heart and impenitency of those many cities he had 
preached to, ver. 20, and especially of those wise and great men that lived 
therein, and had been made partakers of his ministry. 

And his saying ' Father, I thank thee,' &c., must be understood in such a 
sense as the apostle useth : Rom. xvi. 17, ' God be thanked, ye w^ere the 
servants of sin.' What ! doth he thank God simply that they had been 
such? No; but that which follow^s must be taken in, viz., ' but ye have 
obeyed from the heart,' &c., which expresseth their conversion. So as that 
they "had been the servants of sin is brought within those thanks, not simply, 
but by way of comparison, to extol the more the mercy of their being now 
the avowed servants of God, which this former contrary condition did set 
out the grace and wonder of. And thus here in Christ's speech the like 
intention holds. 

Now what affected Christ's heart to provoke him to so high a thankfulness 
on our behalf, ought to affect ours unto the same end, and so much the more, 
as it is our personal interest which this concerns. 

Thus far in general, that it is our duty to compare the difference of these 
two procedures of God to the sons of men, to the end to bless and magnify 
the Lord the more for his special love to us. 

I come particularly to institute the comparative itself, that is, to enlarge 
upon the particulars of it; all which particulars I shall reduce to two 
heads. 

First, That infinite disparity that is between those two acts themselves, 
of election, and the grounds thereof in the heart of God, and the issue 
thereof, and the act of rejection of others in the grounds and issue thereof; 
setting both in view together, by which the transcendency of electing love 
will the more appear. 

* BrugeBsis in verba. 

t Ejus beneplacitum pro mills rationibus amplectendum. — Brugensis ibidem. 



154 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

Secondly, A comparative made in respect unto the persons refused and 
elected, as considered in the common condition of both, and the circum- 
stances which both stand in ; and that he should, viewed in the same cir- 
cumstances and condition, choose thee, and not others, which will also 
wonderfully magnify the electing love unto us. And for the several of these 
you may take two texts as instances of such a comparison : 1 Thes. v. 9, 
' For God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our 
Lord Jesus Christ.' 

The matter of this comparative are the two acts themselves, and although 
brought in there as motives to us unto obedience, yet also they serve as well 
to us to be matter of thankfulness, that God hath not ordained us to wrath. 
In the connection of the words immediately afore, they follow as the object 
of the hope every Christian hath : ' God hath not ordained them to wrath, 
but,' &c. And in saying hath not appointed us to wrath, he stirs them up 
to reflect upon what he hath done to others, and supposeth such an ordina- 
tion of God's to have been towards others.^- 

^cUy. For the second comparison, of persons, you have, 2 Thes. ii. 13, 
* But we are bound to give thanks always to God for you, brethren, beloved 
of the Lord, because God hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation, 
through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth.' 

This, you see, comes in a more express way, provoking unto thankfulness ; 
and those words, hut for you, &c., do as expressly refer unto what the lot of 
others was, whose fate he had particularly deciphered in the verse before : 
ver. 11, 12, ' And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that 
they should believe a lie ; that they all might be damned who believed not 
the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness.' 

1. For the comparative between the acts themselves. It is not unknown 
that in election there is discerned by divines two eminent parts, as some 
call them ; or gradus, or degrees of proceeding therein, as others ; several 
instants the schoolmen call them. And it is also acknowledged by them 
that there are two eminent parts of what is termed reprobation, oppositely 
accompanying those two of election, as dark shadows do lightsome bodies ; 
for election acts are the first and primary in order of nature, and reprobation 
acts do follow or answer thereto, as those words, speaking of election, ' the 
rest were blinded,' Rom. xi. 7, does shew. God's first act (which his heart 
is upon) is his choice, and those left out therein are called the rest ; as 
when the choice of some are first culled out of an heap, those that remain 
are the rest. 

The first act of election is adfinem. Thus Acts xiii. 48, 'As many as were 
ordained to eternal life believed.' 

2. To the means to that end — as in 2 Thes. ii. 13, ' Through sanctifica- 
tion of the Spirit, and belief of the truth' — whereinto Christ's death and 
redemption is also to be taken in. 

Now, how the first of these is to be referred unto man considered before 
the fall, as the object of it, and the latter unto man as fallen, as the object 
of it ; as likewise how there are two acts towards those, the rest, whom 
vulgarly we call reprobates, that answer unto these two of election ; I have 
in a former treatise handled. 

The one is a bare not ordaining them unto that ultimate glory which is 
the end, viz. God's being all in all to them, as 1 Cor. xv. 28 ; the other a 
withholding from them these effectual means, after or upon foresight of their 
fall. Such means, as through which he ordained his elect to come unto that 

* Neganrlo quod nos posuit Deus in iram, aflQrmationem insinuat, quod reprobos 
Deus posuit ad ixdLm.—Cajetan. 



Chap. II.] of election. 155 

glory, denied to those other, which act it is the word reprobation doth pro- 
perly denote. 

In the first they are considered as unfallen (I express it so indeterminately, 
unto them whether as created or creahiles, or that were to be created), and 
so that ultimate glory, being supernatural to the creature by the law of 
creation, that glory was God's own propriety, which he might dispose of as 
his own at free pleasure. In the other act of denial of the elibctual means, 
they were considered as fallen into sin, and therein justly denied those eiiec- 
tual means by which the other are restored out of that estate. 

Now, my business in this first branch is an exaltation of election grace, in 
respect of these its two acts of grace shewn in election, through the help of 
a comparative disparity of the two acts of electing grace, with those corres- 
pondently opposite acts of reprobation in their aspects unto either state. 

1. Compare we that act of absolute ordaining them unto that ultimate 
glory, as viewed without the consideration of the fallen estate, with that other 
of simply not ordaining the rest to that glory. 

It is true concerning either of these that there is in both a pure absolute 
act of dominion exercised, even in his not ordaining those unto that glory 
as the end, as much as electing these other unto that glory ; for that glory 
is wholly supernatural, and purely God's own. And I may here. apply that 
speech of Domiuicus Baunies, Est niaiii/estatio viaximoj lihertatis, quam hahet 
divina voluntas c'uca dispensationem hononmi suj)ernatural'uim, qua maxima 
est perfectio divina. In the bestowing therefore of this supremest glory, the 
greatest liberty of the divine will is seen. And as liberty and freedom is 
most conspicuous in it, so answerably a love super-eminent; insomuch as 
let us suppose God should by another decree bestow never so many and so 
great good things on these, and yet not this superlative good of super-creation 
glory, the bare denial or omission of this were an act of hatred in respect 
to a mere comparison of that love in that ordination of others to that glory. 
I conceive that the instances of Jacob's election, and the denial to Esau of 
this ultimate blessing, do most properly and pertinently hold iorth the difier- 
ence of these two bare acts of election to glory, and the negation of it, as to 
what God doth towards men, considered as afore the fall, even as Pharaoh's 
instance in the same, Rom. ix., was alleged of men considered as fallen and 
hardened; and therefore the apostle saith, upon occasion of this example, 
' Whom he will he hardens;' whereas in the estate of the example of Jacob 
and Esau, he here useth this gloss of his own upon it, ' Being not yet born, 
nor having done good nor evil,' that is, as they were purely and abstractly 
considered from any sin or guilt any way contracted, as also before they were 
born, our birth being that which brings us into an actual and visible resi- 
dency in this world. And unto this he applies that in verse 13, ' Jacob 
have I loved, and Esau have I hated,' thus in the type alleged, signifying 
men unfallen. Now, God ordained Esau (in the type) to many good things 
and great blessings, as in Isaac's blessing of him : Gen. xxvii. 39, 40, 
' Behold, thy dwelhng shall be the fatness of the earth, and of the dew of 
heaven from above,' &c. But that which was the blessing indeed, this his 
brother (he says) had taken away, ver. 35, which was by that election 
(which we are upon). And thus did God without the consideration of the 
fall, ordain his chosen to that super-creation glory, though he denied the rest 
that great good. He yet did purpose to ordain them to other good thmgs 
of an excellent nature and kind, as that creation perfect holiness which was 
God's image, and the dominion over all the work of his hands, which Adam, 
and in him we all, were appointed unto by the law of his and our creation, 
which condition we all predicate as a complete happiness ; but still this was 



156 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

not that good we speak of, not that gloiy in which God becomes all and in 
all. And although unto so great a good all men were in this manner made 
heirs of, yet that will hold true which was said of Esau in comparison of 
Jacob's portion, 'Esau have 1 hated;' and in that comparison, election to 
that super-creation glory only hath the name of love. And I understand 
the purport of those speeches thus, that there was so vast a diflference put, 
and so great a love cast upon the one, and so transcendent, as that com- 
paratively the other was as hatred ; I understand it, I say, that this love 
was so infinitely high as that it made all other love, and that love to all 
mankind in their creation, to be but as no love, no glory (as the apostle says 
of the law in comparison of the gospel which excelleth), yea, it was as 
hatred.* And thus I am taught to understand that hatred may be under- 
stood of a lesser love, when set in comparison with a love far exceeding ; as 
when our Saviour speaks of what love ought to be bestowed upon himself, 
so desei-vedly above what to father and mother, he says, ' If ye hate not 
father and mother, ye are not worthy of me.' Hatred there imports not 
barely a less loving, but also serves to express and set out how great a love 
that must needs be, and ought to be, that shall only deserve the name of love, 
in comparison unto which all other love, of what is and ought to be in other 
respects the highest love amongst men (for we ought to love parents and 
wives above all other relations on earth), should be accounted hatred ; and 
that whilst we thus love them, we must but love them with a love so far 
below that love we owe to Christ, as it must be but an hatred of them in 
collation with that towards him. And thus in like manner to magnify the 
love he beareth his elect Jacobs, he termeth that love he beareth all others 
of mankind but hatred. 

And the comparing alone of this supernatural good with all other good 
things God did bestow either on Adam, or on men after the fall, in gifts 
supernatural, as enlightenings and tastings of the powers of the world to 
come, &c., or outward blessings, the glory and happiness suppose which 
milHons of worlds could afford, might alone be sufficient to enhghten us in 
this argument to magnify electing grace by. I may say, that if all the 
common mercies and favours of all or any sort that God hath scatteredly 
vouchsafed to and among all men, were heaped upon one man alone, and he 
made the possessor of them, they all would be found too light in the balance 
with the endowment of this eternal weight of glory on us, and so light as 
that they will be allowed no better account than of hatred ; and it is a big 
word to be said this. 

It is true indeed that commonly men do not discern or conceive of the 
greatness of this election privilege, made without or afore the consideration 
of the fall, but by the fall and the misery they are brought into by sin. Yet 
in this other way of comparison I have now made, these other good things 
fore-mentioned must be acknowledged (if taken in by us) to be a most pierc- 
ing and accommodate way to aggrandise it by. I shall further urge this 
comparative of it, with this supposition made concerning Adam's state and 
condition. Suppose we that Adam and all men had stood to this day (and 
to illustrate things we may make suppositions of things that were never, but 
might have been, as Christ does, Luke x. 13), and not only so, but should 
have so continued for ever, and that God, out from among them, had elected 
some to that ultimate glory and kingdom we have been speaking of, whom 

* Thus Vasques and Estius: Habet se ad modum odientis, quod aliquid donum qui 
uni dat, alteri non concedat. Deus amat omnes homines in quantum vult aliquid 
honum omnibus ; in quantum quibusdam non vult hoc bonum, nempe vitam seternam, 
dicitur eos odio habere. — See Arrowsmith, p. 314 ; and Daven. de Electione, p. 177. 



Chap. II.] of election. 157 

be bad taken up immediately into it witbout redemption, &c., wbilst tbose 
otbers sbould have enjoyed but tbat bobness and bappiness tbey were created 
in, and continued in still upon eartb, sucb as Adam and Eve themselves 
did, which is the opinion of many divines, he only should have enjoyed ; 
what an infinite diU'erenco would this have been ! as much as of an earthly 
and heavenly state. And thereby even all along during that estate so con- 
tinuing, there had been an infinite illustration given unto that heavenly 
glory, in that a complete bappiness on earth, in enjoyment of God, had, 
as a lower way, been extant, infinitely short of that heavenly glory elec- 
tion bad designed some of them, over the bead, as we say, of that earthly 
state. 

But, further, if we withal suppose (as defaclo it was), that all this bob- 
ness and bappiness in Adam's state did mutually depend upon the change- 
able vertibility and slipperiness of free will, liable to fall, and so to forfeit 
it all in the twinkling of an eye, by admitting one sinful thought, whereas in 
that first act of election we have been speaking of, this ultimate glory was 
immutably and unchangeably endowed upon tbose God foreknew ; and so 
whereas that other holy and happy state hung but as a comet or meteor, 
wavering in the air, this gift of glory was fixed in God's heart towards them, 
as the sun is in the firmament, as Ps. Ixxxix,, whereas the other were not 
liable only to fall, but de facto would have fallen (even as Adam also did), 
at one time or another. What an infinite favour and grace then was it 
aforeband to ensure this victory of his elect ! Whether fall tbey, or not fall, 
tbey lie under an unchangeable decree. 

Again, under this head the comparison comes in between God's intention 
of our salvation as his end in election, and of men's damnation in the point 
of rejection. 

It is true, tbat in his decrees of either, bis own glory is the supremest end 
in both decrees ; but yet in the point of election, the glory and salvation of 
the elect themselves is an ultimate end, which his heart is directly and 
absolutely set upon — an end simply and for itself desired by him, as which 
his soul singly and absolutely delighted in, for and in itself; whereas in re- 
probation the case is otherwise ; damnation is the end indeed of the persons, 
yet no otherwise but as death is said to be the end of life, which is indeed 
the issue, the terminus which life expires into ; but it is not the end for 
which we live.* And accordingly God professeth of the death of a sinner, 
tbat be bath no pleasure in it, that is, not simply for itself. Every end of 
anything is optimum quid, and the perfection of a thing ; but damnation is 
the extremity of evil, and the highest imperfection ; and therefore was not 
the end God propounded to himself, which be cannot be said to make the 
creature for. And, therefore, most assuredly the matter of election and re- 
probation is not stated w^ell by tbose who say, tbat men's damnation and 
reprobation, and man's salvation in election, do stand in a like posture or 
reference in God's intention, that is, intended by God upon like terms, for 
his own glory's sake. No, there is an infinite diflerence ; for besides the 
tendency which our salvation bath unto bis glory, it was also intended by 
God simply and directly in itself as bis end, though inferior to his own glory ; 
but that of damnation was never intended by him for itself, as an end which 
be debghts in. 

This for the act of election, considered as afore and witbout the fiill, and 

* Cum reterna damnatio non sit finis hominis, sed tantum extremum, rh idyarh, 
ut vocant Grrcci, omnis finis est optimum quid et perfectio rei : damnatio autem est 
eytremum malum, et summa imperfectio, et ultimum malum, ut mors est terminus vitae, 
quae non tamen est finis vitae. — Keeker. Si/st. Theol. bb. iii. chap. iii. 



158 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

a comparative of that glory denied in that act unto those God passed by, with 
all the other good things God did or might bestow upon them. 

But it pleased our God permissively to decree those elect to fall together 
with the rest, as for many other holy ends, so for this one especially that 
respects the matter in hand, that we might discern the difference of immutable 
hoHness running along with glory, which election brings unto, Eph. i. 4, 
from that of created holiness ; which, if we suppose man had not fallen from, 
but stood by, his free-will grace had not been so manifestly discerned, but 
the glory of it would have been obscured and attributed unto man's free will, 
and not the grace of election. 

I therefore, secondly, come to a comparison of the acts of election and 
reprobation, as they were framed for and respected man's fallen condition. 

Now this first purpose unto this ultimate end, though it stand firm, yet it 
cannot bring unto that glory but by new means, and such as must be suited 
to brine? sinners to God. And hereupon that first decree to glory, out of 
absolute dominion, will not now serve the turn ; for without faith and hoh- 
ness no man can please or see God. And without these God stood as per- 
emptorily resolved none should see his face, as he did to that other, to bring 
us to that glory ; and therefore a decree of these new means are necessarily 
required. For though God should have taken (as he might), his elect by 
the first decree, immediately out of that state of creation, with that holiness 
they were made in, unto that supreme glory, yet that holiness then, though 
perfect in its kind, was never ordained as a means to that glory, viz., the 
kingdom of the Father, as faith on Christ and hoHness flowing from thence 
now are ; for that anything should be a means unto glory, depended upon 
an ordination of God, and an ordering of one for the other. And this ulti- 
mate glory, the kingdom of the Father, and God being all in all, should never 
have gone by works only, which was Adam's covenant ; so that, if we should 
suppose that act of his grace had purposed and ordained to take up these 
his elect unto glorv, out of that state of holiness by creation (supposing Adam 
also not to have fallen, but to have propagated that holiness to his posterity), 
yet the holiness of that covenant had not been an influential means to that 
glory, but was thus far, and upon this account necessary, yet, indeed, it 
must have been continued ; for if it had not, then guilt had arisen, and so 
a bar unto that glory ; so that indeed it was a requisite, sine qua non, but 
not a means of influence by that covenant, no more than creation itself was. 
Well, but now upon the fall, there is an absolute bar to glory : the elect are 
fallen into the demerit of the contrary, of hell and damnation, as well as those 
others which the Scripture calls the rest or the refused. 

Hence, therefore, if the elect be brought to glory, considered as fallen, 
there must be new decrees of means in order to that end ; Christ must be- 
come a redeemer, a redeemer from sin, to remove that demerit ; and then 
on our part, faith on him, and repentance for sin (in which two our calling 
consists), are ordained to be given them to bring them to salvation. When 
those means came to be decreed, it will be tried whether his first purpose of 
ordaining the elect to glory be firm or no. In the apostle's words, Ptom. 
ix. 11, now when they are considered as fallen, whether God will now in 
this necessity (as absolute as the former), further shew forth his love in 
giving Christ as a redeemer, and efi'ectual calling to you, not at all proceed- 
incT therein by works, which our first creation-covenant proceeds by ; and if 
fallen man would have attempted to perform, he could never have obtained 
at God's hands, to call or work repentance in them. 

Now, as to the magnifying God's grace in his ordaining to give his elect 
those new means after the fall, these things may be considered. 



Chap. II.] * of election. 159 

1. When the decree of those means should come to be made, there was, 
and must have been, a new or second election, or renewal of that first act of 
ordaining to the end, as often after the miscarriages of the elect the Scrip- 
ture speaks : Isa xiv. 1, ' For the Lord will have mercy upon Jacob, and will 
yet choose Israel.' And as for the thing itself, it is no absurdity to say, that 
God in continuance renews his acts of election every moment ; but here 
there was a necessity of it, a necessity at least of another act to be added to 
the first, namely, that which divines mostly appropriate the word predestina- 
tion unto, as they distinguish it from election simply considered, which, say 
they, more ordinarily imports barely a choice unto the end ; but predestina- 
tion to be an ordaining of means, and through these means unto the end. 
And therefore, now there needed a new further extent of love and mercy, not 
only to continue his resolution to love, notwithstanding the fall, but to con- 
trive the means of carrying them through to glory notwithstanding that fall. 
And upon and for this act it is, and upon ocasion of it, that the' Scripture 
so celebrates the love of God. * God so loved the world, as he gave his only 
begotten Son,' namely, as a redeemer, John iii. 10; and 1 John iv. 10, 
* Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his 
Son to be the propitiation for our sins.' And herein the strength and firm- 
ness of that first act of election appeared, and shewed that God was so 
resolute therein, that nothing could dissolve or alter it. And thus bv this 
order of decrees (which in the former treatise we shewed), and by this second 
act, the grace of election comes to be the more magnified. 

2dly. That together with this new act ordaining to these means, there was 
a denial of giving the same unto the rent, to whom he had also denied glory 
afore in the first act of preterition. And this second denial of the means, to 
be made with so manifest a difierence, doth mightily enhance electing grace : 
Mat. xiii. 11, ' It is given to you to know the mystery of the kingdom of 
heaven, but to them it is not given.' And how given to them, but by and 
from election ? ' The election obtained it, whereas the rest was blinded.' As 
also Christ : John x. 26, ' Ye believe not ' (which is the means to salvation). 
Why ? ' Because ye are not of my sheep,' namely, by election ; also John 
vi. 64, 65, ' But there are some of you that believe not. For Jesus knew 
fi'om the beginning who they were that believed not, and who should betray 
him.' And he said, ' Therefore said I unto you, that no man can come unto 
me, except it were given unto him of my Father ;' compared with John 
xiii. 13, ' I speak not of you all ; I know whom I have chosen : but, that 
the Scripture might be fulfilled, he that eateth bread with me hath lifted up 
his heel against me.' Where the reason of giving faith is plainly resolved 
into election (and it is not chosen unto apostleship^ that is there meant, but 
unto salvation before the world), and exemplified in the instance of Judas 
there brought, as also of those others spoken of in that 6th of John, which 
enjoyed the best and most powerful outward means (Christ's ministry) that 
ever was or shall be ; but it was election that put the difierence, by which 
they were made Christ's sheep originally, and which ordained to give the 
other apostles saving and eflectual inward means, and workings of grace, 
over and above those outward means vouchsafed. 

And this is amplified as the former was by this, that as in the first act of 
election, though God gave that holiness that was by creation due, or to be 
due unto those of Adam's posterity, suppose he had propagated, whom yet 
he had denied that supreme glory unto, or did ordain that creation holiness 
to be a means to that glory, so here with this second decree of his elect to 
saving means. God indeed answerably ordains to give the best of good 
things that in this world men are capable of, unto many of those the rest, 



160 OF ELECTION. ' [BoOK III. 

which are yet short of true faith and grace. He gives them spiritual gifts, 
' unto the rebellious also,' as he says in the psalmist, enlightenings, tastings 
of the powers of the world to come, which are given indeed, that men might 
be saved, as Christ speaks of his preaching, which are an outward means of 
salvation, John vi. ; that is, they have a tendency to salvation, even as 
Christ's ministry (as himself witnesseth) tended to the salvation of them that 
heard those things. ' I speak,' says Christ, 'that you might be saved,' but 
yet they have not salvation in them, or accompanying them, and annexed to 
them, as Heb. vi. 4, 5, and 9 compared, true grace is said to have. And 
God doth this to illustrate by this difference his electing grace in giving 
saving means unto his chosen. 

3dly, Let us compare the grounds of those acts themselves, viz., the 
decree to give effectual means to the one, and the denial thereof to the 
other; let us compare, I say, these two together, and such a difference 
appears, the grounds or foundations of doing the one and the other, as will 
serve greatly yet more to enhance the grace of God in this act of election to 
the means, through that comparison of those several grounds. 

The foundation of his decreeing his elect to those effectual means proves 
still to be as pure an act of dominion, and so out of mere love, and grace, as 
much as was the former act of election to the end, and with a super-addition 
of mercy to it, yea, and further degree of dominion exercised therein ; where- 
as on the other hand, the ground of his denial of those means to the other 
considered now as fallen, becomes not an act of pure dommion, but of justice, 
though put forth by his will. 

And how from this comparison of these two there accrues that which will 
yet macrnify the grace of election, I shall shew after I shall have first cleared 
and explained the premises. 

That God's denial of effectual means to those we call reprobates, to bring 
them to salvation, after man is considered as fallen, is not as then an act of 
pure dominion, sovereign dominion, but has a jus ordinatum in it, which 
justly may move him thereunto. 

It is true, indeed, those that hold all acts of election and reprobation to 
have been after the fall considered, they do in this respect make reprobation 
an act of pure dominion, namely, that if the inquiry be why he chose those 
and those, and not the others, and why he reprobated, when he might have 
chosen them whom he cast away ; and on the contrary, have cast away whom 
he chose, according to that, ' I will be merciful to whom I will be merciful, 
and whom he will he hardens ;' and in so doing (say they) God looked not 
at all at sin as the motive to his passing by those individual persons he did 
pass by ; and though this be true, yet I withal must add that there remains 
still this difference, that sin and the loss of hoHness man had before the fall, 
did bring in a desert to be reprobated, and to have the means to bring men 
effectually to salvation denied them ; and this none can deny. And there- 
fore it is acknowledged by some,* that though sin is not causa reprobationis, 
take the act, est tamen causa repwbabilitatis. 

And further, that efficacious means should be withdrawn is from their sin, 
they being now fallen, according to that of Christ, ' lest they should see with 
their eyes,' &c., Mat. xiii. 15. For the fall foreseen did from the first pre- 
clude them from those means, for it brings in a want of all good, and 
possesses the whole of the heart with the contrary unto all those means, so 
as God should not have needed to exercise any act of dominion unto the 
person thus fallen, in this denial of means, for the guilt and power of sin in 
the heai-t do preoccupate and prevent, or rather prepossess the room of those 
* Wollevius, Ub. i. cap. iv. can. 6. 



Chap. II.] of election. 161 

principles which are now to be the means of bringing men to glory, so as 
although as to the persons whom, after the fall viewed, he reprobated, whilst 
he chose others to those means, there was indeed a dominion exercised ; yet 
as to the thing denied, there was not a pure prerogative exercised, but Q,jus 
ordinatiun concurred with it, and was mingled with it ; a just cause or 
reason de jure, or in right, for God so to do ; and this is a certain truth, 
that not to grant a thing de novo, or anew, that is by a forfeiture excluded 
and debarred to be given, is not a mere act of denial thereof, or pure act of 
prerogative, for there is desert in it, why it should be done ; but this is the 
case in the point afore us. And I speak thus of it, although they forefeited 
in Adam what indeed was less in some respects than is required now, as the 
means to bring them unto glory, yet in substance it is the same image of God 
that was created then that is created now ; yet so as by the guilt of that 
loss there arose a just prohibition in law against the giving of new means to 
briug fallen man to salvation by, without a new interposition of sovereign grace. 

So as now the working of that grace and of holiness in us, that are now 
ordained to be the effectual means having salvation in them, as the apostle 
speaks, Heb. vi. 9, flow all purely and immediately from election, and the 
fruits of it ; yea, and become an act of higher dominion than was exercised 
in that other, to the end, and that not only because that all is a free gift, as 
Rom. V. 15, 16, in this respect, that there was an utter want of power to 
bring forth such efficacious acts unto salvation, yea, a principle contrary unto 
all the works of grace ; but also in this, that there was a desert to the con- 
trary by a law, even the law of our creation, so as now there must be an 
overruling dominion of grace exerted to work them. And now ' it is not in 
him that runs, nor in him that wills, but in God that shews mercy,' 
which is spoken in respect to the means of salvation. And indeed all the 
withdrawings of those means after the fall are to be considered as judicial 
acts in God, as leaving them unto sins, and damnation following thereupon. 
These are all along, after the fall, acts of judicature on God's part, and his 
decreeing of them, or disposing of them foreseen, are to be put unto the 
account. And as God decrees not to damn, but only for sin, so he decrees 
not to withdraw the inward means of salvation, but for sin foreseen. 

Hence therefore, for God to choose to the means effectual to bring to salva- 
tion his elect considered as fallen, there is Sijus ahsolutionis in it, heightened 
to the highest; but in reprobation, not to give them to man fallen, there 
was what should move him to it, and a justice in it. 

Now, if this second act of election unto the means be thus an B.ct juris 
ahsohiti in the highest kind, which the other is not, as by the former com- 
parative appears, then how may and should we afresh magnify the grace and 
love of God shewn therein ? If God had, in decreeing to give those effec- 
tual means, gone by a jus ordinatum, or a rule, or anything revived in us 
that should have deserved the giving those means, as our running, or cm" 
willing, as motives to bestow them, then the dominion of giving them had 
gone by ^jus ordincdum ; and then it had gone by works, and had not been 
' of him that calleth,' namely, out of his pure dominion, as that opposition 
declares in l\om. ix. ; and then his gi'ace and love would have been lessened 
in this act. But being otherwise, now the purity of the glory of grace con- 
tinues still as high, and shines as clear and glenous,* as in that other act of 
election to the end ; yea, higher, for the reasons given aforesaid, How, 
then, should this love and grace be magnified by us in this second act of 
election by these considerations ! 

* Qu. ' glorious '?— Ed. 

VOL. IX. L 



162 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

1. For where more of dominion is and appears in an act, that is, an act 
of grace, there is the more of grace shewn therein ; for then it is grace 
absolutely, and every way gi'ace, when there is nothing obliging or moving 
thereunto in the least, and grace is then grace when it is every way grace, 
and kept free of all obligations or encouragements that are from us. It is 
not only the greatness of the gift that sets out the grace, but the freeness 
and absoluteness of the giving and bestowing of it ; now where there is the 
more dominion, there is the more liberty in the giving, and the more free- 
ness, and so the more grace in it. Kings are said in their gifts to be gra- 
cious, because they have so hicrh and sovereign dominion, and free from 
obligations to their subjects. The glory of grace lies in freedom, when it is 
mero motu, as the style of kings in giving gifts doth run. 

2. In that former act of election to the end, towards us as not fallen, but 
creahiles, or as considered in creating, appears (as it was indeed) an absolute 
dominion, because in bestowing it God bestowed purely what was his own, 
and wherein there was maxima libertas, as out of Bannies was she^n. And 
besides ihe greatness of the dominion, its being a destination to so great a 
glory doth enhance it. For think with yourselves, a thing out of nothing, 
decreed to be created, and then created, and whilst it is yet nothing, could 
no way be considered to have anything in it to move or oblige, but yet so 
as still there was nothing contrary which could be viewed therein. If you 
will say it was simply in the power of God and the sovereignty of God to 
ordain this, but yet there was no bar to hinder the procedure of it, and yet 
put in a caveat or plea against it in the least, but where sin is (as in man 
considered as fallen) there is a law utterly to the contrary, as was said, and 
therefore it is a higher dominion to remove those cross bars, to answer those 
pleas, and overrule and give means to fallen man to salvation anew, than to 
ordain to the end at first. And therefore it is the Scripture sets forth by 
this ' the love of God to us, that while we were sinners Christ died for us,' 
and ' so God loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son,' and the 
like, which were but means to save man fallen. 

3. There was in that fallen condition, when it was in view, causa reproha- 
bilitatis, a cause to have been reprobated : not so in the former act. A 
reprobability there was, to the denying of all means for the future, and so 
of salvation itself; for without these means, none that were fallen could be 
saved, and there was the same provocation to deny it to those the elect, 
considered as now fallen, as was to the other, if the dominion of grace and 
love had not stepped in. And therefore in Isa. xli. 9, it is said that when 
God's law chose thee he might have cast thee away : ' Thou whom I have 
taken from the ends of the earth, and called thee from the chief men thereof, 
and said unto thee, Thou art my servant, I have chosen thee and not cast 
thee away.' Of which speech there maybe a double meaning: 1, that 
God was immutable in his love, that whom he had so chosen he would 
never cast away ; or, 2, that when he chose them, it was free to him, and 
he might as easily have laid them aside. It was to him but as a man would 
turn a key one way or the other, to lock or unlock. It was but saying, 
yea, or no ; I know you, or I know you not. . 

* Qu. 'love'?— Ed. 



Chap. III.] of election. 163 



CHAPTER III. 

The infinity of ff race in electinff uh further evinced hj a comparative made in 
respect unto the persona refused and elected, as considered in the common 
condition of both, and the circamstances which both stand in. — Of their first 
condition in the possibility before the creation, an then viewed by God, repre- 
sented in his infinite mind, the elect were separated from the others rejected. 

This for the first head, of comparing the acts themselves ; my next is a 
comparative of the persons elected or passed by, as they are considered in 
their conditions or circumstances out of which they are chosen or refused. 
And for this my text is 2 Thes. ii. 12, 13, * That they all might be damned 
who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness. But we 
are bound to give thanks alway to God for you, brethren beloved of the 
Lord, because God hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation, through 
sanctification of the Spirit, and belief of the truth.' 

Those words, bitt for you, are a discrimination and exception of these 
from others, whose condition he had declared in the immediate verses afore, 
ver. 11, 12, in these words, ' And for this cause God shall send them strong 
delusions, that they should believe a lie ; that they all might be damned 
who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness.' And that 
election had put in that but, and made the difference ; so stirring them up 
to thankfulness, by his own giving thanks on their behalf. 

It is true the condition of those considered as fallen into sin is the matter 
here compared, yet is it in a special manner pitching the comparison upon 
the condition of persons. I therefore take it for a groundwork for what 
concerns a comparative of persons, whether considered as fallen or without 
the fall, no scripture adequately comprehending both. Yet upon occasion 
of handling the comparison about the state of man fallen, I may extend it 
to either, and begin it higher with that afore the fall, which other scriptures 
warrant the truth of, as our divines have defended it out of Rom. ix., and 
other places. 

1. The state of elect and non-elect, afore or without the consideration of 
the fall, is that of creatureship simply and absolutely considered, wherein 
God in and at his decree for creation, whilst he was determining to create, 
and viewed the whole crop of them a-growing up but as yet in his purpose 
and will to create them, his gracious good-will did, together with that his 
creation decree, both of those he elected and of all things else, put forth 
that election purpose, pre-ordaining them to be the first fruits of his whole 
creation, setting them apart for himself, and consecrating them unto the 
highest communion with himself, and of ultimate glory above the rest of 
their fellow-creatures, and thus but as considered as creatures, though in 
their kind wherein they were to be created. 

You have this foresaid expression in the apostle James, ' That we might 
be the first fruits of his creatures ;' and put we all the particulars that do 
follow together, and the assertion will come out of them. 

1. It is the whole heap or harvest of the first creation, as standing on the 
ground afore him, he means by creatures, whereof these are said to be the 
first fruits ; for it is the saints universally, all of them, that are as the first 
fruits, severed and differenced from the rest of God's creation as universally 
taken, and not of some special saints of that age, the first fruits of other 
saints to come, as Vorstius would have it. 

2. The fii'st fruits were in their original condition, but of the same that 



1G4 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

other their fellow-fruits Mere of, and were considered but as such in them- 
selves, only were by God's choice consecrated to himself in a special manner, 
because the first, as the first fruits of their kind. 

3. These in James were made the first fruits wholly by a free election or 
choice of them ; but those other first fruits were those that were fii'st by 
nature's production shot forth out of the earth, and then consecrated by God. 
But that these persons should be the first fruits was the whole of it merely 
from a choice made of them, from a special love and good will, calling and 
singling them forth out of that common creature condition, that which they 
were by creation. And the text insinuates thus much, even God's special 
good will to have been the cause, as the immediate words afore do shew, ' Of 
his good will he begat us, that we might be the first fruits.' What will ? 
That h'jho'/tia (whereof Eph. i. 5) ; that special good will from whence their 
being begotten again, and their being the first fruits, which is the end and 
issue thereof, and all do flow. And indeed the reason of the thing itself 
would carry so much ; for it is election from eternity that moulds all, orders 
all to the main end thereby aimed at, and so must have done this, and it 
could have no other original it depended on. 

4. Then surely that special good will and choice must be supposed to have 
taken them up as viewed in the common condition of creatureship. And it 
must not be said that this their election was only (in the order of act) after 
the fall, but he climbs up higher, and places it from the first with that of 
their own and others' creation, out from amongst whom, and considered 
simply at creation (together with the rest of their fellow-creatures, whereof 
as such they were to be the first fi'uits), it was they were chosen. And why 
else doth he say, of the creatures or creation, and not of mankind ? Why 
not of man fallen, but of the creation? and the first fruits of the whole first 
creation ? This doth at least import that they were chosen the first fruits, 
as early as they and their fellow- creatures, considered as creatures, and 
decreed to be created. So as these two decrees of creating all things, and 
electing of these with the first, must at least have been twins of the same 
birth at once brought forth, for they have mutual respects of creatureship 
and first fruits one to the other, and are as old one as the other. And 
what is said to be the first thing compared with other things, must be sup- 
posed to exist from the first with those that are compared unto. And there- 
fore these two, creatures and first fruits, had the same order in God's decrees; 
and those two acts and decrees are allied and akin, and associated more 
than any other, comported, and connexed together. 

5. Add this also, that the first fruits were not styled the first fruits of the 
rest of the kind, when corrupted and proved rotten; not of a basket of 
Ezekiel's bad figs, so bad as they could not be eaten. No ; it were most 
improper to institute such a comparison ; it relates therefore to the creation 
of all things, when viewed in his purpose and decree as good (as, after 
the creation perfected, God did view them and approve them) and such like- 
wise in his intuition of them in his decree and purpose such to make, and 
under that view ordained these in the issue to be made such. And there- 
fore this doth refer to a decree made of them at that of the creation, and 
that then it was God did will them the first fruits. 

If it be objected, that he speaks there of what they are made by regene- 
ration, and not of God's first decree ; and regeneration supposing their being 
ordained the first fruits, and upon the consideration of the fall, — 

_ I reply, It is true indeed, he speaks not expressly or immediately of what 
his decrees were, but it must be supposed, according to what was said even 
now, that they are the moulders and framers of what is in the event. 



Chap. III.] of election. 165 

Secondly, it is true, that in the execution or performance of the decree they 
became not actually the tirst fruits, but by regeneration, which supposeth 
them fallen ; and yet this the ultimate end of being the first fruits, may and 
was notwithstanding (according to the former arguments) intended with the 
first of their creation with other creatures. 

Now this of their being the first fruits is eminently and emphatically in 
the text set forth, as the ultimate end of all, &/f rh hw.i, ' to the end that 
they may be the first fruits,' which end was first designed conjunct with the 
decree of the creation of the whole. 

And although in execution or first performance they first became at regene- 
ration to be the first fruits actually by this new creation, and that supposeth 
the fall afore, viewed (that is granted) so as their hval, or e.s.sr actuate, is the 
fruit thereof, yet their esse iwtitiouale, their being such, might be and was 
intended as the end of their creation, and with the first of the decree thereof. 
It is evident that the being the first fruits is here the end of their regenera- 
tion, and 3'et intended and aimed at with their creation, and his good will, 
that was from eternity engaged in both ; but his decree of you to be the first 
fruits, was the primitive decree as of the end, and that of regeneration, but as 
of the means to accomplish that end. This the means of execution, but that 
of being the first fruits of the creation, that is the end ; and indeed denotes 
the ultimate end, even that the performance of it will be next unto Christ's ; 
for it is to be even the first fruits of the whole creation, as he the first-born 
of every creature, and in the issue to be exalted and preferred unto the 
highest top of glory, even above any of his creatures, angels or men. And 
unto what a height the privilege and dignity imported thereby will amount 
to, will not be known until the latter day be over, and that we be estated 
into the glory and kingdom of the Father : Mat. xxv. 34, ' Then shall the 
King say to them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit 
the kingdom prepared for you from the beginning of the world.' And ' it 
became him, by whom are all things,' to join the decree of creating the elect 
(as the subjects of that kingdom), and to elect them therewith as their 
ultimate highest end, and of their first creation. 

In fine, therefore, as to the objection itself, the sum of my answer, and 
the series of the words, is that by regeneration, which is decreed after the 
fall foreseen, our being God's first fruits of all creatures, which was decreed 
at and with that of the creation of all, doth by regeneration begin to be 
efi'ected in a smaller degree of first fruits in this life, and accompHshed in 
glory. 

And so the contexture fairly stands thus, as if he had said, that God hath 
created us anew out of his everlasting good will, thereby to bring about that 
which was his great and first design of all other, of making us the first fruits 
and glory of the whole creation, and conjunct with his decree of creation of 
them, and all things else, and as such viewed by him when he first decreed 
to make them as the ultimate end, he with their creation had ordained them 
unto. 

2. Let us advance the terminus a quo, or the objective consideration of 
us, out of which election at first took us, yet higher. Mundus nondum con- 
ditus, the world as yet not decreed to be created, must first be in God's view 
ere he put forth that decree to create it. For so in every artificer the frame 
and model of what he purposeth to make is first in his thought ere he 
resolves to make it. And by the rule aforesaid, viz. that creation and 
election ran as parallel acts, there was, and in order of nature it must first 
be supposed, that those elected were first in view, but as things he could 
both create and elect under the view of eliffible and creable, and the state of 



166 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

other things to be created, and these to be elected and created, was but of 
mere possibihties ; to have a being decreed them as God pleased, whether 
yea or not ; and so their state they were taken forth of when first elected 
was the same with that which all things created had afore the decree of 
their being created, mere possibles in reality of creatureship, pure nothings 
every way, utter nonentities, which yet God could decree, and give an 
existence unto. 

When I say every way nonentities, not having a shadow of being, the 
meaning is, that not only they were nothing, in that they were not yet de 
facto created ; for so the whole world, until decreed to be created, was no- 
thing in actual existence ; but that they lay afore God, as not yet so much 
as decreed to be created, and so had not a being in God's decree, till 
that passed on them together, both for their creation and election to glory. 

For the understanding hereof we may, with the schoolmen, make a three- 
fold esse or being ascribed to the creature. 

1. An esse actiiale, an actual being, which is when it is created. 

2. An esse volitum, which is a being that lies in God's will, which is the 
state of them after God hath purposed to create them. 

3. An esse possibile, which is a mere possibility, afore God's decree passed 
to have being first decreed it, and then to be by creation given to it, which 
lying in God's power in that he can, if he please, make it, or otherwise not, 
merely lies in God's understanding in the image or forms of it. 

Now the state and common condition of all creatures, immediately afore 
God decreed to create them, was this latter only, which arose from this, that 
God's power presented to his infinite understanding an infinity of shadows 
or ideas, images of creatures, which he might make if he pleased, which yet 
he never did or ever willed to make ; and the number of these are infinite, 
because his power is infinite to create such, and his understanding is infinite 
to fashion and form up the shapes or images in his mind, of all that his 
power can eflfect. Man is narrow both in his understanding and power, and 
his understanding may never have the forms or models of all that he is able 
to do or make, for to enter into his thoughts. But with God it is other- 
wise : his understanding, being infinite, doth form up the idea of all, and 
everything his power can efiect distinctly. The state and condition of 
these things, as they lay in God's simple single intelligence, the Scripture 
expresseth in such speeches and terms as these, ' To God all things ai'e 
possible.' 

Now the mediate state of all the elect afore God's decree to choose them, 
being no other than this of all things else, as they lay in a capabihty to 
creation and the decree of it, and under that view of things possible only, 
they were objected or proposed to God's will, both for their creation and 
election together ; and God's choosing of them having been (as was said) an 
immediately conjunct and associated act with God's decree to create them, 
without a presupposition of their being yet to be created, much less fallen ; 
and that both these acts proceeded hand in hand together, or rather Uke 
twins twined about together, and their hands embracing each other, not de- 
pending upon any other consideration or view that was had of them : this, I 
say, being supposed true, — 

Hence it will follow that the state of God's elect was of mere possibles, as 
immediately afore their being elected, as other creatures or themselves were 
in respect unto creation, and the decree thereof ; for it is certain there could 
be no other state of things afore creation was decreed, nor could the divine 
understanding have any other view of anything, or all things, until his will 
had passed a decree upon them, and given SLjiat to create them. And what 



Chap. IV.] of election. 167 

could that be other than that which God's understanding hath now still in 
his mind, of things which he never means to create, and yet might if he 
pleased ? And the same was the case and condition immediate of the elect, 
unto election and creation both, until the divine sanction of his will had come 
upon them. Till then they were mere appearances and shadows, as all things 
else were, which God might or might not choose and create ; and still they 
lay in that indisposed heap of things, about which God had made no deter- 
mination at all, no, nor ever will make any, they floated in a mere vacuity 
and pure emptiness, both as to being or glory. And look, as his decree to 
create gave his elect and others a being to come in due time, so his decree 
of election estated on them that glory to come, and both immediately brought 
forth by these his decrees out of that mere lump of possibilities fore-mentioned. 
Let the more learned reader excuse my so often repeating things to the same 
effect : it is for the w^eaker their sakes, that they may both understand and 
fixedly retain the notion of it. 

The proof of this, that God might have chosen others out of mere possi- 
bilities, whom he hath not nor never would, and so that they remain in their 
pure possibility to eternity, may adequately be drawn from God's offer unto 
Moses : Deut. ix. 14, ' Let me alone that I may destroy them, and blot out 
their name from under heaven ; and I will make of thee a nation greater 
and mightier than they;' and to be in their room a surrogated people to him, 
as they by election had been, for else he had not made up a supply ; yet this 
people God never did make, nor will make, but could have done. The like 
out of the Baptist's speech : Luke iii. 8, ' I say to you, God is able, out of 
these stones, to raise children unto Abraham.' 



CHAPTER IV. 

Of the common condition of the elect, and rejected, in the fallen estate of man- 
kind. — The infinity of (p-ace toward the elect, magnified by the consideration 
of their being segregated out of that general corrujjt mass, wherein they lay 
equally with others. — God's infinite grace in choosing us also discovered by 
the vast disproportion of number between the elect and the rest. 

We have seen what that act of election without and afore the consideration 
of the fall doth afford. 

Let us now descend unto what the prospect of man's condition, as it lay 
also afore God, and was disposed of by him, considered as fallen, will in 
the like comparative way contribute to this ai'gument. And this the 
Scriptures do more enlarge upon, as that which doth far above the former 
magnify the glory of electing grace, and by so much more as the evil of sin 
man is fallen into, and the misery thereby, doth exceed a state of mere no- 
thing, or of no being at all, or but mere possibility of being. And here also 
that query of the apostle hath its most eminent lustre, * Who made thee to 
differ?' 1 Cor. iv. 7. God. And what in God ? Election : ' The election 
obtained it, and the rest were blinded.' 

And it is this comparison between elect and the rest after the fall, it is the 
condition wherein the one or other are found in after the fall, which is the 
chief and principal to enhance this discriminating or differencing grace, al- 
though the comparison of number will follow us in this too. 

Now the view of the conditions of men after the fall, are reduced to two 
heads. 

1. The common alike universal condition, by and through the fall of 



168 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

Adam, that all have sinned and come short of the glory of God, as the apostle 
declares. Or, 

2. The several and more particular conditions amongst mankind upon the 
fall, in theu' variety : as, for instance, several sizes and degrees of actual sin 
and other circumstances, which men elect, with the rest, stand in, and were 
thereto foreseen and disposed of by God, so to fall out, when he then chose 
US through the means of salvation, all and each of which do tend to magnify 
this election grace. 

1. The common, universal, and alike condition of man fallen. And to set 
forth the greatness of this grace and mercy, is the full and set scope of the 
apostle in Eph. ii. 1, 2, where, speaking of their calling (which is the look- 
ing-glass of election), he presents them alike ' dead in sins and trespasses,' 
as the whole bulk and body of mankind were in, and these elect ones, chap, 
i., together with them : ' We,' says he, ' even as others,' that is his compara- 
tive, as it is mine here, and those others were of such as God eternally left 
in that condition, passing by them, and leaving them even as he found them : 
and by this he heightens the grace, love, and mercy God had borne to them 
as the cause of all this: ver. 4, 'Accordicg as he hath chosen us in him be- 
fore the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame 
before him in love ;' and he concludes thereupon, ' by grace j'ou are saved,' 
ver. 5, an infinite grace, manifested by this common condition of us with 
others. And although these things are spoken of them, of what they were 
at and afore the time of their calling, and in their unregenerate condition, 
yet this act of election we are now upon, that had man fallen for its object, 
and the common condition thereof, did take men, and viewed as at and afore 
calling them, they are found to be in. And of this act the rule certainly 
holds, that look what a calling God found us to be, in that election viewed 
us, which that passage, — 1 Cor. i. 26, 27, 'For ye see your calling, 
brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not 
many noble are called ; but God hath chosen the fooHsh things of the world 
to confound the wise ; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world 
to confound the things which are mighty,' — evidently shews. Those words 
' but God hath chosen,' &c. come in as an explanation or confirmation of the 
former words, ' You see youi' calling ;' as if he had said. Look what those 
were whom calling singles out, and what they are after calling in paucity ; 
the same they were, therefore, for their conditions, whom God chose, and in 
his view such to be. 

2. And here let us now add to the consideration of this common condition 
the infinite number of those others whom God hath laid aside in this fallen 
condition, in comparison of so very a few, who, together with thyself, w^ere 
elected out of them, which the event doth manifestly declare the multitude 
of those left, and the paucity, or fewness, of those whom God sets his heart 
upon ; and unto what a stupendous infinity will this enhance the grace of 
that election towards those few. ' Though the number of the children of 
Israel be as the sand of the sea, a remnant shall be saved,' and that rem- 
nant is that of election : fiom. xi. 5, ' A remnant according to the election 
of grace.' A remnant signifies a small number in comparison to the whole. 
As also his comparison, ver. 29, shews, ' Unless God had left us a seed, we 
had been as Sodom, and been made like unto Gomorrah.' That notes their 
fewness, being but as when the most of a man's crop is sold and eaten, there 
is but a very small part reserved for seed against the next harvest. The like 
unto this doth that comparison of the first fruits in James and in the type 
import. 

Now the paucity of men enjoying any privilege magnifies it the more ; as 



CUAP. lY.] OF ELECTION. 169 

in the case of Noah's preservation and salvation fore-mentioned in the third 
chapter of the first of Peter. It is expressly noted, ' that few with him were 
saved, that is, but eight persons,' saith he, 'unto the whole world,' ver. 20. 
Likewise, Luke the 12th, says Christ, 'these things do the nations seek,' 
ver. 30 ; viz., the things of this world ; and God gives them to them, but 
in opposition thereto : ver. 32, ' Fear not, little flock ; for it is your Father's 
good pleasure to give you the kingdom ; ' 7. cl. he hath reserved that of the 
kingdom for yon. And his scope is withal to shew that hereby it is rendered 
the greater mercy, and that so few of you should be preserved unto such 
favours, whilst the rest are left to seek other things as their best and only 
portion. The old law in dividing the lands by inheritance to the people of 
Israel, had this rule given them, ' Thou shalt give the more inheritance unto 
many, and unto few thou shalt diminish or give the less inheritance,' Num. 
xxvi. 54. But this inheritance of heaven and of himself, God took a few of 
mankind, and gave the whole of that inheritance to all and each of them. 
It is said, Deut. xxxii. 8, that ' when God divided the inheritance to the 
nations, he set their bounds according to the number of the people of Israel.' 
Seventy nations (as Gen. x.), according to the number but of seventy souls, 
which was their whole number when they came out of Egypt, Gen. xlvi. 27. 
A small proportion of seventy men, to seventy whole nations of others, of one 
man to a whole nation. But then, what did God reserve for these seventy 
men, and those of their seed which he had chosen? It follows in the same 
place of Deut., ver. 9, ' The Lord's portion is his people ; Jacob is the lot of 
his inheritance,' whom he reserved for himself to be his inheritance, and he 
to be their inheritance, as you often find. And this only because (as in the 
same Deut., chap. x. 15), ' Only the Lord had a delight in thy fathers to 
love them, and he chose their seed after them, even you above all people, as 
it is this day.' Although at ver. 14 (and he says it with a behold of infinite 
wonderment), ' Behold, the heaven and the heavens is the Lord's thy God, 
the earth also, with all that therein is ; ' which is as if he had said. Though 
he had enough before him of angels once in heaven, and of men on earth, 
yet this is thy privilege above all, that God chose out so few at first when 
he chose thee, which, ver. 22, he minds them of, ' Thy fathers went down 
into Egypt with threescore and ten persons ; and now the Lord thy God 
hath made thee as the stars of heaven.' And again, though he had the 
heaven of heavens, large enough for millions of worlds of men to have filled 
it, * many mansions,' as Christ says, yet he took those few of Israel, and of 
those but a remnant to possess it, and gave the earth only unto all the rest; 
with which falls in Ps. cxv. 15, 'You are the blessed of the Lord, which 
made heaven and earth.' For so it follows, ver. 16, ' The heaven, even the 
heavens, are the Lord's ; but the earth hath he given to the children of men ; ' 
that is, he hath culled or singled forth you from out of the rest of the chil- 
dren of men, as whom he would bless with all blessings 'in heavenly things,' 
but hath given the earth, and the blessings thereof, to the rest of the chil- 
dren of men. 

And now, to affect your hearts, begin to cast your eyes first upon that 
world of mankind which is now extant and in being at this day, and you 
may even well nigh say of the men of this age and world in all nations at 
the present, as the apostle did of all nations for the time past until his 
times, ' God sufi'ers them to walk in their own way.' Or you may say as 
the apostle John said of the same age, and the then present evil world (as 
Paul epithets it. Gal. i. 4), so of this present froward generation of mankind, 
that ' the whole world lies in wickedness.' And those few of us that are of 
God are thin sown, a poor small handful of gleaning unto the whole great 



^'^ OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

crop of mankind ; you have it 1 John v. 19, ' This we know,' saith he there. 
And by the same anointing we also now may see the same event, and de 
facto to be the same. And what falls out thus in the event is but speculum 
decretivum Dei, the looking-glass of, and representeth what lay in, God's 
decrees from everlasting. 

And oh, how deeply should the comparative of this affect our hearts ! 
For a few to be singled forth and saved, when a multitude, yea, a generality 
of others are suffered to perish, how doth it heighten the mercy and grace 
of a salvation to us, that is but of a lower kind, as if but temporal deliver- 
ances from bodily death, or the like ; and for God in his providence to order 
many outward means to save and deliver a few, which he denies to those 
others who perish, how doth this affect the persons that are preserved! 
How much more when it falls out thus in ' so great a salvation ' as this is, 
as the apostle says of it ! 

This you may see in such examples as were but types and mere shadows 
m comparison of this very thing, as in the instance of Noah and his family 
m the flood appeared, * God saved Noah,' says the text, ' bringing in the 
flood upon the world of the ungodlv,' even the whole world of them. And 
it IS resolved into this by God himself: Gen. vi. 7, 8, 'But Noah found 
grace m the eyes of the Lord ; ' which grace was as there heightened by this 
comparative of his destroying man from off the earth, as in the same verse, 
w^ho were a world of ungodly, as the apostle says. The same appears in 
the example of Lot, pulled out of Sodom by the hand and force of angels, 
even as we were ordained to be delivered, as by force, as the word l^^^mro 
signifies in Col. i. 14; ' Saved out of the fire,' says Jude ; ' and Paul also 
m 1 Cor. iii. 15 ; ' The Lord being merciful,' says the text. Gen. xix. 16. 
And behold with what and how deep a sense and value did Lot entertain 
this mercy. Lot did greaten it to himself, from this comparative between 
him and those in Sodom, in the same Gen. xix. 19, ' Behold now thy ser- 
vant hath found grace in thy sight, and thou hast magnified thy mercy, 
w^hich thou hast shewed unto me in saving my life.' 

But there is this further to be considered in our being thus delivered 
forth of this our condition of like sinfulness and wrath, that was different in 
the case of Lot or Noah. Noah was ' righteous in his generation,' &c., and 
of Lot it is said, his ' righteous soul was vexed,' &c. They were not guilty 
of the same sins in common with others, for which God brought the flood 
and fire. ^ And their condition was then, de facto, changed by grace from the 
state of sin unto a state of holiness. 

But here, when we wxre ordained unto salvation, we lay afore the great 
God in a like condition of guilt and reprobability, as to the means, that all 
lay in; and that then the decree concerning us should alter and change that 
state of sin into which we were fallen into a state of grace and righteousness, 
as the means to bring us to glory. How stupendous was the mercy of God 
towards us ! All had sinned, and ' there was no difference,' as Rom. iii. 19. 
None such as between Noah and the old world there was when God saved 
him in the ark. 



CHAPTER V. - 

The infimte grace of God in election, by a view of the imrticular conditions of ■ 
elect and others compared. 

These particular conditions are drawn from the several sizes and degrees 



Chap. V.] of election. 171 

of actual sin greater or lesser in the elect, compared with others passed by ; 
or else some other outward circumstances, wherein many of the elect and 
those others are found sometimes the same, sometimes again diverse in the 
one and the other (all which conditions are disposed of upon the foresight of 
the fall), and yet all of them do in various, and sometimes contrary respects, 
in a way of comparing each condition with the other, conduce and conspire 
all and each of them unto the magnifying of God's special and super-emi- 
nently singular grace of election (as indeed all things serve to do). The 
particular instances will shew the truth and meaning of the premiss. 
There are many of them, and it may prove that I shall instance but a 
very few. 

And yet, ere I come to those particulars, I must yet premise one thing 
further; namely, that the elect, in comparing any of these particulars I 
shall instance in, may take a survey, for the affecting of his heart, of the 
conditions not only of believers in the present age, but that have been in all 
ages past, yea, and to come, and some way or other (as I shall endeavour 
to direct) improve it for the adoring God's grace to himself. Look, as in 
the last general comparative, common to all mankind, thou hadst the whole 
world of mankind afore thee, in respect to the common condition of sin and 
misery, so here thou hast, in forming up this new sort of comparison, the 
particular cases and various conditions of all sorts of men in all ages, and 
those as fore-viewed by God when he chose them, to compare with thine 
own, to the end to glorify his grace towards thee in particular the more. 

My warrant for our entering this comparative into the condition of persons 
in all ages, is, first, that passage in 2 Thes. ii., &c., which shall be my 
present text : * But we are bound to give thanks always to God for you, 
brethren beloved of the Lord, because God hath from the beginning chosen 
you to salvation, through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth.' 
For that particle, but for you, sending us to the verses afore, there we find 
the condition of others set out, whom God had rejected, ' but hath chosen 
you.' Now w^ho were these others, but such as the apostle foretells were 
yet to come, and to be a more corrupt generation than ever had been in the 
world before them, and that were to come many years after ; concerning 
whom he prophesies thus, ver. 3, ' There must be a falling away, and that 
man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition ;' ver. 9-12, ' Even him, whose 
coming is after the working of Satan, with all power, and signs, and lying 
wonders, and with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish ; 
because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved. 
And for this cause God shall send them strong delusions, that they should 
believe a lie ; that they all might be damned who believed not the truth, 
but had pleasure in unrighteousness.' And then follows that, ' But w^e are 
bound to give thanks for you, that God hath chosen you,' &c. And this 
man of sin he means is antichrist, the pope and his deceiving clergy, the 
whole body of them, who for so many ages should be able to deceive the 
whole world, as their multitude, those deceived, are termed, Rom. xiii. 3, 
and to continue and prevail throughout many and many ages after these 
Thessalonians should be in their graves, being at this day, and to make up 
the greater part of the European world. Now these Thessalonians, that 
lived in the first pure age of Christianity, were notwithstanding, in blessing 
God for their own election, to take their view unto that whole succession 
and multitude of men, and for so many ages, during which popery was to 
continue, and comparing themselves (though but a particular comparison) 
with the condition these generations were to be left unto by God's just pre- 
ordination, to magnify that love of God to themselves, as illustrated by all 



172 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

that unrighteousness and infidelity so great a multitude, for so long a con- 
tinuance, should be given up unto. 

Thus doth he propose this very comparative to heighten this love of God's, 
and their thankfulness for election. In Rev. xiii. 7, 8, the Holy Ghost 
makes the same comparison, indeed, between a few elect and the others of 
all nations, tongues, kindreds ; yea, in a manner all that dwell on the earth 
that worshipped the beast ; and, on the other hand, a few elect that should 
not be deceived by him ; which he doth to greaten the same love of election. 
Thus expressly, ver. 8, ' And all that dwell upon the earth shall worship 
him, whose names are not written in the book of life of the Lamb slain 
from the foundation of the world.' There is this small difference between 
these two comparatives in these two scriptures, both of which yet remain 
full to this purpose we have in hand, that that in the Revelation concerned 
and was spoken of those elect who should live in those very ages wherein 
popery and antichristianism should reign, and be in its ruff, who should be 
then alive, and see with their eyes all the w-hole world, &c., worshipping the 
boast (who is the same man of sin in the Thessalonians), that so they might 
adore and worship God and the Lamb for their election out of the rest of 
the world, with whom they then lived, ond with the highest admiration 
attribute theu' preservation from that idolatrous worship unto their having 
been written in the Lamb's book, and glorify God. Whereas these Thes- 
salonians lived in the apostle's times, when that mystery began but to work 
in heresies that w^ere the forerunners of that apostasy, and as smaller streams, 
emptying themselves at last into that great sea or lake, and yet were to take 
in the prospect of this apostatising world so long afore, and yet to adore and 
glorify God, that by election had secured them in their effectual salvation ; 
and this they were to do, as well as those other elect, that were to live in 
those times amongst those idolatrous worshippers. However, both instances 
serve to our argument in hand, viz., that this comparative with others ought 
to be made by us both with the present world, and corruption of the times 
and persons we live in, and with whom we live ; and also to be intended to 
all ages to come, yea, and the world that shall be, to the end of the world ; 
and then, by like reason, ought also to be improved to the like glorifying of 
God for his electing mercies, in comparison wdth his rejection of men in all 
ages that are past, since the beginning of the world. 

So, then, this our comparative stretcheth itself over all times, and to take 
into the account the infinite number of persons that have been, are, and 
shall be, whom God hath cast off"; and are accordingly bound to give thanks 
unto God for his election of us, and not them, from out of all, as we and 
they lay in one heap and view afore him. And the reason is clear ; for 
when God elected thee, thou wert not chosen out of the lump of this present 
age, but all the sons of Adam lay afore him in a like great level. It was 
free to him to have appointed then any of the several times they should live 
in, when he disposed of their several everlasting conditions. He then ap- 
pointed the times they should each live in, so as he might have allotted 
thee to have lived in any of those ages, past or to come, as easy as the 
present time thou livest in ; and therefore there is the same reason thou 
shouldst set thyself in this comparison with the whole lump of mankind in 
all times as with that with whom thou livest. And thou art to consider 
election to have proceeded upon the common first level, and so to compare 
thyself with all men that are, or have been, and when all mankind shall be 
visibly extant, either the goats at the left hand, and this little flock at the 
right, when with us they shall hear that voice, ' Come, ye blessed of my 
Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the beginning of the 



Chap. V.] of election. 173 

world.' To the other the contrary pronounced, ' Depart from me, I never 
knew you ;' and therehy reprobation expressed in its negative act of nescio, 
' I never knew you,' as in the other speech declared oppositely, < you were 
foreknown and chosen hereunto ;' and accordingly that kingdom they were 
entering into was prepared from the foundation of the world, unto which 
they were chosen. And the opposite negation thereof will be avowedly pro- 
fessed and acknowledged by Christ himself to have been at the head of these 
two issues of the sons of men. Whereby, how will (as it must needs) 
electing grace be infinitely extolled, and with what exaltation of it, and exul- 
tation of spirit in us, and adoration of God, will this comparative (so little 
minded) be then entertained by us, even which I have all this while exhorted 
you unto ; and yet whose heart almost doth the consideration of this enter 
into and strike ? Indeed, because what is yet to come we know not, and what 
is past is failed out of sight, and so affects us not. Oh, yet how conspicuous 
shall all this be at that day when Christ shall have the whole world ren- 
dezvoused afore him ! even when the succession and account of the world 
shall have been finished and perfected, and the stories of all be told. 

You that are the chosen of God, having this large prospect afore you, 
may further afi;ect your hearts with these particulars of your several condi- 
tions. 

First xxirticular. You were fore- vie wed by God when chosen, as those 
that would actually of themselves run into the same excess of siunings, the 
very same sins, with all and the like circumstances of aggravation, and in a 
continued course of sinning, afore their effectual calling, that others, the rest, 
are and have been, and shall be left unto ; no diflerence at all in that respect 
neither, as the same Eph. ii. 2, 3, ' Wherein in time past ye walked accord- 
ing to the course of the world, according to the prince of the power of the 
air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience : amon^^ 
whom also we had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, 
fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind ; and were by nature the 
children of wrath, as well as others.' And then comes in the like hut — 
ver. 4, * But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he 
loved us, even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with 
Christ,' &c. — as in that 2 Thes. ii. 13, 14. Now consider that God hath 
and doth suffer these others to go on and persist in that course to the end of 
their days, and to die in their sins. And if thou hadst gone on, what a 
monster in sinning wouldst thou have proved to be ! How great and swell- 
ing a toad in wickedness ! This might have been thy lot. But God hath 
ordained thee by faith and repentance (whereby he called thee with an holy 
calHng) to obtain salvation through Jesus Christ. This the foregone rule 
given, concerning both calling and election, doth sufficiently also confirm ; 
for calling finds us in all the sinfulness of our forepassed course, and there- 
fore election viewed us in the same at calling. The same horrid sin of 
crucifying Christ, which the elders of the Jews ran into, and the generality 
of the people, for which they were remitted to that condemnation, thousands 
of the elect Jews were guilty of, together with them, and yet they were saved 
from that ' froward generation,' which expression, used by Peter, respecteth 
the generality of that nation in that age, and is used to set forth the great- 
ness of that salvation tendered them (they now beginning to repent), so to 
move and promove thern thereunto, and to draw them unto faith on Christ ; 
and yet the sin of crucifying Christ was committed by them that were there 
saved, as well as by those that perished. And as the persons were ordained 
to one or the other of these ends or issues of them, so all things that con- 
cerned that hideous act, were all fore- determined by God's eternal counsel, 



174 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

as they were committed by the one as by the other : Acts iv, 28, ' For to 
do whatsoever thy hand and thy counsel determined before to be done.' 

Second jmrticular. That even after effectual calling many of these elect 
(and it may be it hath been some of their cases that hear me) were fore- 
viewed to run through many of the same sinful temptations, yea, and to fall 
into the like gross acts of the like kind of sinning for a season, which of 
themselves would hazard and endanger their ever coming unto glory, if elec- 
tion redeemed them not, as much as de facto it falls out that the damnation 
of the other is carried on thereby. And the difference lies in this, that God 
takes and resolves to take advantage against the one, as he did against Saul, 
and the Jews that crucified Christ, when not against David, nor against 
those. This magnified electing love in the case of David and Solomon, in 
that though they ' forsook his laws, and walked not in his judgments,' but 
brake his law, &c. ' Nevertheless, I will not break my covenant,' &c. Ps. 
Ixxxix. from verse 28 to 35. The apostle Jude doth the very same, for 
writing to the saints of that age, the preserved in Christ from amongst such 
fatal ruins as other professors had then fallen under, the whole structure of 
their profession falling on them, and the fall of that house was great, as 
Christ speaks, he, to magnify God's electing grace to us, sets before them, 
first, their having been chosen and beloved by God the Father, in ver. 1, as 
the foundation of their preservation ; and then the contrary fate of those 
wicked men in that age, ver 4, ' There are certain men, who were ordained 
afore of old to this condemnation, ungodly men, turning the grace of God 
into lasciviousness, and denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus 
Christ.' And the very measures, both of their sin and their condemnation, 
he, to this our purpose afore us, sets out, ver. 11-13, ' Woe unto them ! 
for they have gone in the way of Cain, and ran greedily after the error of 
Balaam for reward, and perished in the gainsaying of Korah. These are spots 
in your feasts of charity, when they feast with you, feeding themselves with- 
out fear : clouds they are without water, carried about of winds ; trees whose 
fruit withereth, without fruit, twice dead, plucked up by the roots ; raging 
waves of the sea, foaming out their own shame ; wandering stars, to whom 
is reserved the blackness of darkness for ever.' 

Third particular. Thou mayest single forth the worst of mankind that are 
now in thine eye alive, and acting the height of wickedness, or whom thou 
hast heard or read of in ages past : the gigantic monsters of mankind, as 
were the sinners of the old world, great for renown in sinning, the Hectors 
in wickedness, as the worst of emperors, the Neroes, or the wickedest popes, 
the men of sin, many of whom sin hath sublimated unto meriting the name 
of men of sin, in comparison of other sinners ; thou ma^^est take also such 
as have had their spirits envenomed with that which is the devil's sin, a 
wilful malice against God, his Christ, and their saints, the sin first against 
the Holy Ghost, the Pharisees, the Julians, &c., that have been in the world ; 
pitch upon any, the thought of whose case did at any time most dread thee 
to be in, and go home and bless God he left thee not to the same ; that 
thou wert not Cain, nor Judas, nor any of these fore-mentioned (which thou 
mightst have been) ; and, further, that God hath chosen thee to such a 
glory. For what in God made thee to differ ? That which you heard out of 
the Thessalonians : ' But God hath chosen you.' That very Scripture doth 
not only give the warrant to do this, but doth plainly and directly excite to 
it, whilst he sets afore them some of those wicked popes, &c., whom he 
brands with the dreadful mark worse than Cain, the man and men of sin, on 
purpose to aggrandise the mercy of this particular election thereby, that they 
were not left by a permissive decree to have been such as one of them. 



Chap. V.J of election. 175 

Fourth particular. On the contrary, compare thyself and thy condition in 
sinning, with those that have been far less sinners than thou hast been, and 
this consideration also will conduce to exalt electing grace towards thee ; for 
upon the consideration of the fall God viewed this their condition of less 
sinning, together with thine, and yet chose thee and refused them, when it 
is certain there was found a far greater matter of reprobability (as I spake 
afore) in thee than was in them. It is certain, both from Scripture and 
experience, that God vouchsafes that transcendent mercy and privilege of his 
word and gospel unto some that were, and afterwards prove, the wickedest of 
men, whenas he denies unto others far less wicked, and more teachable and 
receptive of it. Thus in the prophet Ezekiel, God tells the prophet that if 
he had sent him to any other nation, utter stranger to any of his messages 
from God, as a prophet, which were familiar to the Jews, yea, that were un- 
acquainted with the prophet's language, had I sent thee unto them, they 
would have hearkened unto thee : Ezek. iii. 7, * But the house of Israel will 
not hearken unto thee ; for they will not hearken unto me : for all the house 
of Israel are impudent and hard-hearted.' And yet God passed by them 
nations. Now God, according to his pleasure, disposeth the outward privi- 
lege of his word with so great a difference towards men, even of them whom 
he calls, away so much more doth he shew it in electing grace, in his not 
vouchsafing to cast it upon lesser sinners, nor to go by such a rule, but often 
upon greater, as upon publicans and harlots, when not upon pharisees, the 
strictest sort of justiciaries, as Paul, Acts xxvi. 5, said, and as Christ's 
speeches and parables shew. And look as God's vouchsafing his word 
(gospel) to those fore-mentioned, was the highest aggravation by reason of 
the comparative difference between them, so, on the contrary, that God hath 
left such a multitude of better-disposed sinners in all ages past than we, and 
yet given us both the outward knowledge of his word, and inward grace of his 
Spirit to accompany it, this heightens his love and mercy to us. In Mat. xi. 
Christ having instanced in the most debauched cities that have been in the 
world, Sodom and Gomorrah, and withal in the most civil and most in- 
genuous of all the heathens. Tyre (I characterise them such, because of their 
ingenuity unto God's people the Jews; not malicious as w^as Edom, &c., but 
friendly and assistant, even to the building of the temple, and who by their 
vicinity might easily have been made partakers of the privileges of the Jews), 
all advantages they had, and their susceptiveness and aptness to have received 
the gospel if preached unto them was such, as Christ says, that ' if those 
works had been done in Tyre, they would have repented in sackcloth and 
ashes.' And yet God afforded not to these the knowledge of his ways, much 
less of the gospel, as he had done to these cities of the Jews whom Christ 
there upbraids, the mercy of which towards them he upbraids them with to 
their just condemnation; which, when he had done in verses 22-24, he 
takes occasion from thence much more to magnify God's mercy vouchsafed 
unto his elect (whether those few of those cities whom his ministry had 
wrought upon, or others elsewhere converted by himself or John) in his 
subsequent thanksgiving, we have so often made mention of: ver. 25, 26, 
* At that time Jesus answered and said, I thank thee, Father, Lord of 
heaven and earth, because thou hast hid those things from the wise and 
prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes. Even so. Father; for so it 
seemed good in thy sight.' In which speech he had his eye uj^on those 
fore-cited examples, both of Tyre and Sodom, in compare with these hardened 
Capernaites ; that God had hid these things from both lesser and greater 
sinners, and had not only outwardly declared them, which he had done unto 
Capernaum, but inwardly and effectually had wrought upon his babes 



176 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

thereby; for it was upon occasion Christ broke forth into so solemn an 
adoration of God, as these words — * At that time Jesus answered and said ' 
— do shew, for they are continuatio orationis, a continuation of his former 
discourse, as Chemnitius observes; and the word he answered, referreth not 
to others having first spoke to him, whom he should have answered, but it 
relates to the matter foregone, and so that he speaks answerably thereto, so 
as this of Christ, and the matter by-past, do hold a congenial connection with 
the fonner. And Christ's adoration of God for electing those he had con- 
vei-ted, drew down into it, and involved in it, a comparative with those ex- 
amples of those others mentioned that had been passed by, both Tyrians, 
Sodomites, and those of Capernaum. 

And indeed, if there were no other, this alone would argue what I intend, 
viz., that by the same rule whereby Christ aggravates the sin and punish- 
ment of those cities, a sin so highly perpetrated against so great a mercy of 
Christ, his preaching the gospel, which he had not vouchsafed to sinners of 
a lesser size, and that would have repented if they had enjoyed it, and that 
notwithstanding God had not designed it to them ; by the same rule, I say, 
by way of parallel, a like reason (though alleged to this clean contrary pur- 
pose) ought those that had been converted by Christ's ministry in those 
cities (and so ought we) to have celebrated God's electing grace, in his hav- 
ing revealed those things to them inwardly and efi"ectually : the very 
outward manifestation of which to those Tyrians, &c. in former ages, would, 
if they had known them, have brought forth some fruits of repentance, as 
the Xinevites had also done. And these babes he speaks of, upon Christ's 
speech, and after his example they might have said, "We, whom our Lord 
hath thus converted, and God fore-chosen, had yet as hard and impenitent 
hearts as any in Capernaum and Bethsaida had, until God, by his mighty 
power, inwardly revealed his Son to us ; yea, and they were some of the 
nations that were our neighbours in former ages, that were far less sinners 
than we, and of more noble and ingenuous spirits, more readily to have 
entertained the gospel (as of the Bereans it is said), and God passed by them, 
but hath revealed it unto us. Unspeakable mercy ! What cause have we 
then to bless God in the sense thereof, for this his discriminating good 
pleasure towards us. And if Christ involves and wraps in the examples and 
instances of these into his thanksgivings, as matter of thankfulness, then 
how ought we ? 

But we need not go by inferences thus to make good the truth of this 
branch, for God hath more plainly and explicitly resolved this difference of 
greater and lesser sinners, &c., into his electing grace : Deut. x. 15, 16, 
' Only the Lord had a delight in thy fathers to love them, and he chose their 
seed after them, even you above all people, as it is this day. Circumcise 
therefore the foreskin of your heart, and be no more stiff-necked.' When 
he says only, that secludes all other motives and considerations, and shews 
God barely and simply chose thee out of love above all nations else, not for 
thy righteousness. He speaks it in a comparison with other nations, and 
not simply alone ; for he there brings and presents them to a view of other 
nations, and so the scope runs thus, that they were no more righteous than 
other nations whom he refused, nor did he refuse other nations upon that 
account ; and not only so, but that they were worse than other nations, as 
that additional, he no more stiff-nedced, imports ; insinuating thereby the 
special obduration of that nation above any other ; it is a comparative speech 
that too. And with that character God frequently brands and upbraids them, 
as more peculiar to them ; as in Exod. xxxii. 9, ' I the Lord said unto 
Moses, I have seea-.Jhis people, and behold, it is a stiff-necked people.' 



Chap. V.] of election. 177 

And in chap, xxxiii. 3-5, and Moses in his time had said the same of them ; 
Exod. xxxiv. 9, which in Deuteronomy he repeats again and again to them, 
as upon his constant experience of them ; and tells them, though the nations 
that were cast out were very wicked, and for their wickedness cast out, that 
yet they themselves were in a more eminent manner, a stiff-necked people ; 
compare for this Deut. ix. 5, G, ' Understand therefore that the Lord thy 
God giveth thee not this good land to possess it for thy righteousness, for 
thou art a stiff-necked people.' This was that brand and black mark of 
them, by God himself, which Moses terms hardness : ' Look not to the 
hardness of this people, and their wickedness,' Deut. ix. 27, which God fore- 
saw, yet he chose them ; yea, he saith it of them, whilst he is a-teUing them 
he chose them above all people, as those places shew ; insinuating also 
thereby, that as he chose them above all, so that they were stiff-necked 
above all. 

Fifth particular. Thou mayest compare thy condition with others, whom 
God hath wrought great and mighty works upon, that yet fall short of saving 
grace ; as those in Heb. vi. 4, 5, that have been enlightened, tasted the 
good word of God, and the power of the world to come, and yet fall away, 
as ver. 7, in a way of supposition he there intimateth, and experience hath 
shewn in multitudes in our days afore our eyes. And as in the third par- 
ticular, I bade thee there single forth the highest and worst of sinners, and 
magnify the grace of God towards thee, in that thou mightest, and wouldest of 
thyself have been like to the in, yea, the same; so now I send thee to the 
best of sinners (as I may so term them, for, for a time they are such), that 
have by a work of the Holy Ghost been elevated and raised up to the highest 
pitch of gifts (I cannot say graces) which brought them near the kingdom of 
God, that were even at the door, as the foolish virgins were, and yet at 
length shut out ; and many other instances of such do the Scriptures afford. 
The first prove last, and the last first, that is, some of the most forward and 
eminent professors vanish, and come to nothing ; and poor weak believers, 
they come to be the first, that is, the highest attainers of grace. 

Now, what is it that pots the difference but (originally) electing grace, as 
our Saviour hath resolved us ; Mat. xx. 16, * So the last shall be first, and 
the first last ; for many be called, but few chosen.' Those last words, as that 
particle /or shews, give that as the reason of it. By the like comparison, 
though of a lower size, the apostle Paul doth magnify electing grace in the 
latter end of chap the 9th and 10th to the Romans, and at the beginning of 
the 11th, which continues that his discourse, chap, ix, 30, 31, * The Gentiles, 
which followed not after righteousness, have attained to righteousness, even 
the righteousness which is of faith : but Israel, that followed after the law 
of righteousness, hath not attained to the law of righteousness.' And again, 
X. 20, 21, * But Esaias is very bold, and saith, I was found of them that 
sought me not ; I was made manifest to them that asked not after me. But 
to Israel he saith. All day long I have stretched forth my hands unto a dis- 
obedient and gainsaying people.' Which in the beginning of chap, the 11th, 
he resolves into election of grace, ver. 5 and 11, ' Israel hath not obtained 
that which he seeketh for, but election hath obtained it, and the rest were 
blinded.' 

Thou mayest in the contemplation of this branch, enlarge thy thoughts 
unto all the several sizes of those who have been more or less wrought upon by 
works not saving, which defect is herein, in their not persevering, and so 
they fall short of grace ; as Heb. xii. 15, ' Look diligently lest any man fail 
the grace of God ; lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you, and 

VOL. IX. M 



178 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

thereby many be defiled.' And herein thou mayest extend thy thoughts 
unto the highest attainments, of such that have after proved apostates, thou 
hast ever read or heard of, that have abounded in all knowledge, come be- 
hind in no spiritual gift, whilst thou a poor, weak, yet sincere saint, art 
behind in all such kind of spiritual gifts of praying, speaking, utterance, 
memory, &c., and yet hast a little thing in thy heart, called sincerity and 
honesty of heart (as Christ calls it), towards God, which is the fruit of elec- 
tion, which puts as great a difference between thee and those, as is between 
a star in heaven and a meteor in the air, or glow-worm on the earth. The 
other may have done far greater outward service to Christ in outward works, 
as in prophesying in his name, &c., and have suffered as great things for 
Christ, and may have inwardly been wrought upon with affection to things 
spiritual, though not spiritually ; their conversation, their speeches, their 
prayer about holy things, the same ; and the difference to be but as of oil 
in the lamp, serving to present performances, and oil in the vessel, in the 
heart itself, inwardly and habitually bringing forth fruit, but yet without root 
in themselves. They have yet wanted that great principle of love unto God, 
and his saints, as 1 Cor. xiii., Paul there, though in a way of supposition, 
affirmeth their defect to lie therein : ver. 1-3, ' Though I speak with the 
tongues of men and angels, and have not charity, I become as sounding 
brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and 
understand all mysteries, and all knowledge ; and though I have all faith, 
so that I could remove mountains, and have no charity, I am nothing. And 
though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body 
to be burned, and have no charity, it profiteth me nothing.' But, if thou 
canst (though in a very weak, yet sincere measure), say, as the apostle, of 
these believing Hebrews, chap. vi. 9, 10, that ' thou hopest better things, 
and things accompanying salvation ; for God is not unrighteous to forget 
your work and labour of love, which ye have shewed towards his name, in 
that ye have ministered to his saints, and do minister ;' — the difference be- 
tween thee and them in appearance so small, but yet is such in that respect, 
as is between the counterfeit of a jewel and a diamond itself ; and yet in 
reahty, and according to true worth, and the price which God sets upon things, 
should have so infinite a difference as by the issue and event (so great as 
salvation and damnation are of), appears, which issue it is that election did 
design to bring the one unto ; and that same providential free-will-grace 
rising no higher than mere self-love, wrought upon by spiritual objects, 
brings the other unto. Oh, what thanks art thou bound to give unto God, 
because God hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation and belief of 
the truth, whereunto he called you by the gospel, to the obtaining of the glory 
of our Lord Jesus Christ ! 

This, as to the point of actual sinnings, and a comparative reared there- 
upon in these several variations. Secondly, there are -certain circumstances 
•which were cast and disposed of by God upon the fall among the sons of men, 
the continuation of which serve in as great a variety to enhance this election 
grace also towards those that are his. 

Sixth ][jarticular. As take such as are hard ; contempt, poverty, honour, 
and riches, thou mayest consider the great disproportion of thy outward 
condition in this world, with what hath been and is of those others, the rest, 
whom God hath past by, that give a just occasion in the like variety for 
the declaration of God's grace to thee. Thou art poor, and mean, and 
despicable in the world : and take thy intellectual parts, the most of you 
are weak, and comparatively a foolish generation ; and the children of this 
world, says Christ, are generally wiser in their generation. You know how 



Chap. V.] of election. 179 

Paul urgeth and indigitateth this for the saints to reflect upon in compari- 
sion with others : 1 Cor. i. 2G, ' For ye see your calling, brethren, how 
that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many 
noble are caHcd ; ' and resolves the obtaining of it into election, as the dis- 
poser that it should so be : ver. 27, 28, ' But God hath chosen the foolish 
things of the world to confound the wise ; and God hath chosen the weak 
things of the world, to confound the things which are mighty ; an(? base 
things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, 
and things which are not, to bring to nought things that are.' So as an 
eminent glory ariseth to God thereby. Our Saviour also particularly 
instanceth in such a difl'erence of wisdom for all other whatever, &c. For it is 
the greater excellency man hath to glory in, and excelleth folly, as Solomon 
says, as far as light excelleth darkness : Eccles. ii. 13. Wherefore Christ 
magnifies this grace of election : Mat. xi. 25, 2G, * At that time Jesus answered 
and said, I thank thee, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou 
hast hid those things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them 
unto babes. Even so Father, for so it seemed good in thy sight.' And it 
is for certain, that the consideration of these kind of outward differences, 
although they are but such as are and continue, but whilst we are in this 
world, had a mighty weight and impression upon our Saviour's heart whilst 
he thus extolled his Father thereupon, as those considerations which do 
mightily tend to the glory of God's grace in choosing such comparatively 
to others, and therefore should have the like place and esteem with our 
hearts ; for Christ was privy to God's counsel, and an equal estimator of 
things as they stand in God's own intention and esteem. I need not 
amplify how much the Scriptures do inculcate this very thing, as James ii. 5. 
If you say these are but outward respects, that are but for the moment 
of this life, how should these then have much subserviency to glorify 
electing grace, which is to eternity and from eternity? 

I answer, Even as well as our outward sufferings, though but for a 
moment, work an eternal weight of glory to us, these small differences in 
condition insinuate and conduce to the everlasting glory of God's decrees, 
and particularly for that of wisdom. The matters of the other world run 
upon other feet, another account, from what in this world men's natural 
abilities and gifts, largeness and quickness of understanding, and notional 
knowledge, even in divine things in this world proceed upon ; they con- 
tribute nothing at all as any preparative of the understanding, the subject 
they are in, to widen or extend it the more, or capacitate men to take in 
the knowledge of God, as in heaven he is known ; but an understanding 
that was narrow, and clung, even of fools and weak ones here, is there 
stretched by an intuitive height of glory to take in the knowledge of God 
more sublimely and largely than the widest in outward wisdom, although 
withal they be saints, when God yet doth not vouchsafe a greater measure 
of intuitive height unto them. The saints, that are of the largest size of 
understanding, and of the greatest capacity here, shall not at all have the 
greatest measure of knowing God in heaven ; but babes and weak ones 
may excel! them. Much more is it true of worldly-wise men, that their 
great parts make them not nearer, &c. God hath no need of any kind of 
men's abilities to make them more capacious of seeing his face in glory, no, 
nor of attainments to a greater measure of faith or holiness here. And, 
therefore, God in election is at a perfect liberty to choose out babes, and to 
leave out those wise ones ; yea their wisdom is the greatest hindrance unto 
that grace election worketh. 
, And what Christ appHes to wisdom in such respect unto electing grace, 



180 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

thou majest apply the same unto any other excellencies whatsoever, as 
riches, glory, power, renown, &c., Isa. xli. 9. God magnifying electing 
grace, ' I have chosen thee, and not cast thee away,' sets it out by this, that 
he singled them, he chose them out from the chief men of the earth. 

Again, on the other hand, those few elect that are honourable, and rich, 
and mighty in this world, they have in other respects as gi'eat cause to 
glorify God as the former, as upon another occasion James speaks, ' The 
poor rejoiceth he is exalted' ; the rich hath cause to do so, and that both in 
respect of the fewness of that sort of men, 'Not many wise, not many noble,' 
and therefore some. These of high degree may exalt and adore that grace 
which singled them forth from the heap of those their peers in riches and 
honours ; thus a prince and nobles that are godly have cause to do so, in respect 
of the fewness of such. Ne unus ex centum, says Calvin often, as he a-dying 
sent back word to his king, having sent to visit him, Tell him I am going to a 
place where few kings come. So for nobles, &c. ' Have any of the rulers 
or pharisees believed on him ? ' John vii. 48 ; ' which ' none of the princes 
of this world knew,' 1 Cor. ii. 8, but only Nicodemus and Joseph of Arima- 
thea. And as for the rarity, so the privilege, for a prince to be born to a 
crown here and hereafter, what a great mercy is it ! 

And here in the manage of thy meditations about this branch, thou mayest 
again assume and make use of that forementioned survey of the conditions 
of men in all ages past, and through that telescope take in the prospect of 
all men that have been great and worthy in this world upon any such re- 
spects, and then viewing thyself in thy differing condition of meanness, 
lowness, contemptibleness, every way, mayest thereby take occasion to 
exalt the gi'ace of God to thee, who hath loved thee and chosen thee ! Oh 
think with thyself what and how many wise, heroic, valiant, virtuous, 
generous grandees, what great souls have been in the world, men of renown 
in the famous nations, as the prophet speaks, Ezek. xxxii. 18, ' Son of Man, 
wail for the multitude of Egypt, and cast them down, even her, and the 
daughters of the famous nations, unto the nether parts of the earth, with 
them that go down into the pit ; ' whom God hath laid aside in hell, with 
their swords under their heads and their iniquities upon their bones, as the 
prophet Ezekiel speaks, chap, xxxii. 18—22, but hath chosen thee, a despised 
man ; and as godly Isaiah says, * He hath chosen thee from the ends of the 
earth, and from the chief men thereof, and not cast thee away,' that is, as 
he hath done them. There is a small word in Peter, which is yet of infinite 
import to this, 1 Pet. i. 5, 'Begotten,' says he, 'to an inheritance reserved in 
heaven for you, ready to be revealed in the last time.' Reserved for you (that 
is the word), though it had been ready, or prepared even from the beginning 
of the world, as Christ speaks ; and the import it seems to speak to me is, 
that God having had in all ages past multitudes of persons that had passed 
afore him, whom he might have bestowed this inheritance upon, and as they 
passed along they might have tempted him (if I may so speak after the 
manner of men) to have letted and bestowed this inheritance upon millions 
of great and excellent souls. If respect of persons (which phrase is pro- 
perly meant of a respect unto men's outward condition) might have had any 
place with God, so as to have given their places away ere you had come 
into the world, and have filled heaven, and the number of whom he meant 
to save, with such goodly personages as these, yet those places in heaven 
reserved for you stood thinly inhabited, and in a manner vacant, all that 
while. Oh ! therefore stand astonished at his special grace to you, says 
the apostle. That he reserved it for you, and that he still said all along 
with himself, Pass them by, let them all go, I have others who are yet in 



Chap. V.] of election. 181 

mine eyes I keep those mansions empty for, and none shall have them from 
them. And the wonder is set forth by this, that it was for those that are 
born in these latter days of the world, and, as Paul says of himself, ' bom 
out of time,' as one would think. I may illustrate it by what indeed was 
the type of this, 1 Sam. xvi., even by the stay of David's choice to the 
kingdom. God, to set off the greatness of his grace, ordered first that ten* 
sons of Jesse should pass afore Samuel (as the word is in ver. 8-10) the 
elder first, so goodly a person, and that looked like a prince already, and so 
great a majestic grandeur in his person, that Samuel when he looked on 
him, said at first sight, ' Surely the Lord's anointed is afore me,' ver. 6. 
If Samuel had been to choose, this should have been the man, he would 
have said. What shall we look any further ? * But the Lord said unto 
Samuel, Look not on his countenance, or at the height of his stature, for the 
Lord sees not as man sees,' &c., ver. 7. And in like manner to this did 
the other ninef brethren in a successive way pass afore him. But God had 
(to speak in Peter's language) reserved this kingdom for David, the young- 
est, not yet grown up, nor now at home, but out of sight in the field, and 
so out of mind, a youngling, born out of time. It entered not so much as 
into his father's thoughts that God should have intended him, or that he 
have stayed his coming, having such other choice of so many worthies afore 
him. But Samuel, inquiring if he had no more sons, bade him send for 
him, and no sooner came he in but God said, ' This is he,' ver. 12. I have 
stayed for [him] till he should come, &c. And by this, or such like repre- 
sentations as these, mayest thou in like manner quicken and actuate thy 
meditations of thy election, and the mercy in it. And we that are born 
sixteen hundred years yet further downwards in the world, after Peter wrote 
this unto them, after so many more revolutions have passed over the gene- 
rations of the sons of men, we have more occasion and matter greater 
to improve and enhance this grace towards us, that by virtue of eternal 
election, we should be in this latter end of the world begotten to this in- 
heritance, reserved all along for us from the beginning, I say, by virtue 
of election. 

Form what was it that had thus reserved it for thee in these days, and for 
them then ? The apostle had premised it at the first dash, in an entrance 
in ver. 2, ' elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father,' that 
was the original of all, and it was it he had said, that God had viewed all 
others that had been afore him, but foreknew and fixed his love by choice 
on these, and overlooked all the rest, winked at them, as the apostle's phrase 
is in another case. ' These have my hands made, but it is these to whom 
I look.' 

Election itself is, in respect of the persons chosen, styled a reservation of 
a remnant : Rom. xi. 4, 5, 'I have reserved unto myself seven thousand 
that have not bowed the knee to the image of Baal. Even so then that at this 
present time also, there is a remnant according to the election of grace.' 
As a man foreseeing common and general ruins, makes a reservation of some 
few whom he especially fancies to be kept out of it, thus election is there 
expressed ; and here, in Peter, there is a reservation or keeping of an inhe- 
ritance by virtue of the same election ; as by a father for a son whom he 
loves, till he come of age, as Abraham did the inheritance of Isaac, reserva- 
tions both, equipollent unto which is that acknowledgment of the apostle 
Paul of himself, and those others in the primitive times, * That God had hid 

* * Seven.' The three that are named, ver. 7-9, are included amongst the seven 
in ver. 10, as appears from the next chapter, xvii. 12. — Ed. 
t ' Six.'— Eu. 



182 OF ELECTION. [BooK III.; 

the mystery of the gospel from foregone ages ; having ordained it for our 
glory, kings and prophets having desired to see and hear what we do, as 
Christ speaks, Luke x. 25. 

And hereby thou mayest adore the constancy of God's love, and the firm- 
ness of his purpose, according to election, as the apostle's speech imports, 
Rom. ix. 11. It is like as if a prince having (as some have feigned) had 
when young, a foresight in a dream, of a great beauty as then unborn, 
should be so set and fixed in love unto her, that although when grown 
up, he hath a thousand greater beauties perhaps to pass afore him at sundry 
times, yet is so constant in his purpose to the person whose idea he had 
taken in, and resolved to make his spouse so long afore, as he refuseth them, 
and stays till she is both born and grown up marriageable for him. And by 
this similitude (casting off what after the manner of man was to be supposed to 
make up the parable, and for the imperfection thereof must not be applied 
to God), you may help your conceptions also of God's love to you, who 
having had but the idea and image of you afore the world was, yet bore that 
entire and indissoluble affection to you, comparatively to those infinite mil- 
lions that have been in the world, and hath shewn it by this in refusing 
them, though appearing in all sorts of excellencies unto him, and staying all 
that while, reserving himself for you, as in that speech, * I have reserved to 
myself,' &c., you have it; and reserving the inheritance of heaven and glory 
likewise for j^ou. 

Seventh jmrticular. There are other sorts of outward circumstances, rela- 
tions, and considerations, that the elect are placed, wherein God comes near 
home to you, as in near relations, &c., that are more approximate. Thou mayest 
perhaps behold this much of differencing grace put between thee and others 
in thy father's house, thy own family, kindred, thy relations, and compa- 
nions, play-fellows, school-fellows, friends, colleagues, fellow- servants, and 
multitude of the like relations. By the providences of God, others have 
been yoked and conjoined with thee, and thou with them ; and by the dif- 
ferences which by election God hath put (as in the issue of men's lives, 
courses, and spirits, doth and may appear) between thee and them, thou 
mayest discern conspicuously God's special electing love that hath taken 
hold of thee, when not on them, they remaining still in nature, or some, yea 
perhaps many of them, having died without any evidence of a saving work 
upon them, and so in their sins. 

That infinite love of God to thee, hath cast about and contrived all sorts 
of ways (and even by such ways as these) to make endearments of itself unto 
us ; and his variety of wisdom did, upon the foresight of the fall, dispose of 
men's conditions several ways, to the end to enhance this love to his own by, 
if we had but eyes to see and understand, hearts disposed to be affected 
therewith accordingly. 

But you will say, do such small differences as these put between men so 
conjunct in one and the same relations, or like employments, partnerships, 
office, &c., that one should be taken and chosen of God, and the other 
rejected ? Have such small circumstances as these any weight or influence to 
heighten electing love ? 

Yea, verily, much every way; for evidence of which take these instances: 

1. The instance of Jacob and Esau : Mai. i. 2, 'I have loved you' (says 
God to Israel, as ver. 1), * yet ye say, wherein hast thou loved us ?' Do you' 
say so ? says God. Nay, then, I will give you a manifest demonstration of 
it. * Was not Esau Jacob's brother ? saith the Lord. Yet I loved Jacob 
and hated Esau ;' thus speaks God again. This so near relation of being 
brethren, although but an outward relation, yet served wonderfully to enhance 



Chap. V.] of election. 183 

and make apparent the grace shown to Jacob through so vast a difference ; 
yea, and the greater nearness of the circumstances there were in that con- 
junction, proportionably the love appeared ; and so, by the Hke reason, pro- 
portionably in other relations that are more afar off. This instance the 
apostle Paul takes the advantage of, and improves it to this very purpose I 
now insist on, applying it to election and rejection, Rom. ix. (for thereof he 
plainly treats in that chapter), ver. 10-13 ; and his instance is so fall to my 
purpose as nothing can be fuller, and he accordingly presseth it. These two, 
Jacob and Esau, were not half brothers only, as Ishmael and Isaac, whom 
he had spoken of afore, ver. 7-9, having but one father, but not one mother, 
and yet he argues it from them also ; but here are two, who had one and 
the same father and mother, of whom also they came not in a succession of 
time, one in one year, the other in a year after, as brethren use to do, but 
both were conceived at one time, yea instant, which those words iudigitate, 
ver. 10. When Rebecca had conceived * b}^ one, even our father Isaac,' at 
one and the [same] act of generation, she conceived them both out of the 
same substance of matter that came from Isaac's loins at once ; where (when 
fallen into her womb) there was a division made by God's providence, one part 
thereof setthng to the one side of her womb, and made Esau, another to the 
other side, and made Jacob : they were twins ; and, as we say of two pieces of 
the same cloth cut out for several uses, there was but a pair of shears went 
between them; no difference, whether in worth or works foreseen or the like ; 
born also at the same birth, wherein if were there any difference, Esau had it ; 
for he was the eldest, and so by the law then in force had the dignity of the 
birthright ; and afore they were born God declared his different purpose and 
counsel about them, * The elder shall serve the younger,' and so be deprived 
of his birthright, and thereby of the blessing and of the inheritance of Canaan, 
the type of heaven. 

Now this nearness of relation and circumstance heightened the love in the 
purpose of God according to election ; that is, his discriminating purpose in 
his freely having aforehand chosen the one and rejected the other ; for to 
that very purpose God, in Malachi, mentions it, to set out and greaten his love 
to Jacob, as Paul, in this his citation of it, doth to make good his assertion 
of the different grace in the promise of salvation, whereof election was the 
original, and the promise the extract copy. Yea, and to this purpose of 
aggrandising God's love to Jacob, it is that Paul also intends it, as those 
words in ver. 10, which are introductory to this instance, do shew, ' Not 
only this,' &c., as connecting this new instance with the former instance of 
Ishmael and Isaac, ver. 7 and 9, and both to the same purpose; who, 
although Abraham's children, yet on Isaac was the blessing settled and 
entailed, and not Ishmael, which greatened God's special love to Isaac in 
that respect. Well, but saith the apostle, ' Not only this' instance or 
example of Isaac's, &c., doth shew this, but much more that which I now 
bring (saith he) of Jacob and Esau ; and from both I have what I pursue to 
make good, viz., that the nearness of such relations, through circumstances 
therein, that do make relation between brethren the nearest, ought to be a 
matter of provoking such persons elected to glerify God's grace towards their 
particular, and taking up God's own words, to say with themselves. Hath not 
God loved me, and that with a transcendent discrimination, when he hath 
afore mine eyes laid aside those that lay in the same womb that I did, 
or that were my brethren by the same father, or perhaps my parents 
themselves ? 

And you may and ought to extend this comparative to other relations and 
circumstances wherein thyself and others do stand, and are or have been 



184 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

yoked and coupled together in, though not rising up to so great a nearness. 
Thus Peter and the apostles did, that Judas who ate bread at Christ's table 
with them, was an apostle sent forth as they : ' For he was numbered with 
us, and had obtained part of this ministry,' Acts i. 17, should prove a cast- 
away, and themselves chosen. Compare this : John xiii. 18, * I speak not 
of you all ; I know whom I have chosen : but that the Scripture may be 
fulfilled, He that eateth bread with me hath lifted up his heel against me.' 
And John xvii. 12, ' While I was with them in the world, I kept them in thy 
name : those that thou gavest me I have kept, and none of them is lost, but 
the son of perdition : that the Scripture might be fulfilled.' Take for con- 
firmation of this the instance of the two thieves, both brethren in iniquity, 
and fellows in the same condemnation in being crucified together, the one 
on Christ's right hand, and the other on his left ; and that whilst they were 
hanging on the cross, election should break forth in the one and call him, 
and Christ should take him within an hour or two after into paradise to him- 
self, and the other left to his own accursed cursing spirit, and at the same 
time dying with the other, should go to hell. Do not you think that this 
association or fellowship in these circumstances, though remoter than that 
of brethren, did not wonderfully affect the good thief's heart, w4iilst he with- 
out question heard Christ promising him, ' This day shalt thou be in para- 
dise,' whilst with the other ear he heard his fellow thief persisting in his 
blasphemy, and dying in his sin ? A difierence put in such like near cases 
and circumstances as these, although but in outward mercies, and not in 
point of salvation, do use wonderfully to afi'ect men's hearts ; as in the case 
of Pharaoh's butler and his baker, both in the same prison and in danger 
of death together, Gen. xl. ; and that, according to Joseph's prophecy of the 
fate of each, ver. 13, 19, that Pharaoh should, upon his birth-day, when 
princes use to do acts of grace, as ver. 21, ' restore the butler to his place 
again, and he gave the cup into Pharaoh's hand ;' and so, on the contrary, 
hanged the chief baker, ver. 22, as Joseph had interpreted ; and thereupon, 
is not that butler's ingratitude eminently branded, that he laid no more to 
heart the kindness of Joseph, although shewn but in telling him his difi'erent 
fate and destiny, that was shewn within three days, as ver. 13, ' Yet did not 
the chief butler remember Joseph, but forgat him.' And if the mere predic- 
tion of this should have obliged him unto a grateful acknowledgment, &c., 
unto Joseph the diviner, as he styles himself, how much ought he to have 
done it unto Joseph's God, who it was that revealed this to Joseph, and 
■whereof assuredly, to the end that God might have the glory, Joseph had 
declared so much unto him, who in his everlasting purpose and providence 
was the author 'of this merciful difi'erence ? 

And if you say he knew him not, this yet however you must say, he was 
obliged then to extol the grace of Pharaoh towards him herein. And there- 
fore all you that know God and are know^n of God, and that it is he who 
made thee to difier so greatly from another that is thy fellow and companion ; 
how should this comparative affect thee to think with thyself, [be] who lived 
so many years in one and the same family together, and were joined in part- 
nership or office together, so and so familiar in a constant converse, and 
that it now proves God hath received me for himself and left him to Satan, 
and his lot and portion, and has so cast and designed this difference that 
thou mightest understand and consider it, and be afi'ected accordingly ! And 
this as certainly thou shouldst do, as on the contrary thy fellow and marrow 
and associate once with thee, doth in hell for ever lie under this tormenting 
consideration amongst others ! That such a brother, such a companion, 
such a fellow-apprentice, fellow-servant of mine, is by electing grace calling 



CllAP. VI. J OF ELECTION. 185 

him gone to heaven, and there is in evedasting bliss (as Abraham told the 
rich man that Lazarus was), and, lo, here I am tormented, and shall be for 
ever I As the loss of heaven will cause weeping and wailing, so that thy 
fellow should obtain it when thou art refused, will cause indignation and 
gnashing of teeth. Shall hell be affected at this difference put, and that in 
respect unto such relations as have been mentioned, and at the day of 
judgment shall the stories thereof affect angels and men, when Christ comes 
to be glorified in his saints, and shall not these things have due place in our 
hearts, according to the merit of them in the things themselves, and inten- 
tion of God in his love therein ? I conclude, referring you for more such 
particular conjugates or yokings together, unto what Christ hath so seriously 
declared : Mat. xxiv. 40, 41, ' Then shall two be in the field ; the one shall 
be taken, and the other left. Two women shall be grinding at the mill ; 
the one shall be taken, and the other left.' And in Luke, hath enlarged it, 
chap. xvii. 33-85, ' Whosoever shall seek to save his life, shall lose it ; and 
whosoever shall lose his life, shall preserve it. I tell you, in that night 
there shall be two men in one bed ; the one shall be taken, the other shall 
be left. Two women shall be grinding together; the one shall be taken, 
and the other left.' And certainly, among many other blessed aims Christ 
had in these speeches (as that he will take some few instances, and other the 
like) he certainly had also this in his eye, that through this comparative 
difference men might learn to bless and adore God. 



CHAPTER VI. 

The grace of election illustrated in one particular, the most eminent demonstra- 
tion of it, viz. discriminating grace, as by God's design it appears in God's 
dispensations towards, and the difference put between, temporaries highly 
enlightened by the gospel, and his elect whom he invincibly saves. 

There appear in the execution and event many contrivements to have been 
in the heart of God, whereby he designed to illustrate and magnify his 
grace of election towards us the saved of the Lord. Some of which I have 
particularly spoken of in the chapter before, wherein I discoursed of the 
grace of election comparatively with others, and their several conditions, 
whom God passed by, and whereby he sets out his grace the more to his. 

But above all such extrinsecal contrivances and disposements, there is 
this one, which the Scriptures do single out and insist upon, and that is 
God's dispensations towards temporaries, and children of the outward king- 
dom, who are the corrivals, if any rejected may be styled to have been such, 
and pretenders with the elect for grace and mercy, which doth above all 
serve to glorify this electing grace. 

For my text, I take our Saviour's words, so oft inculcated. 

* Many are called, but few are chosen,' Mat. xx. 16. 

For the exposition of this text, it is not as if the elect and non-elect were 
both called with the same work of calling, and that some of them called with 
the same true calling, being non-elected, do fall away in time. But the Scrip- 
ture doth distinguish (happily) of a twofold calling, one proper only to the 
elect ; and the other more common, in several degrees of it, to non-elect ; 
thus, Rom. viii., the elect are differenced in their very calling at first from 
the rest that profess to have been truly called, but were not ; by this, the 
'called according to purpose,' that is, by election, which original difference 
works differing calling from others. And in that text the difference is 



186 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

expressed, ' those that love God,' as the proper principle wrought in them 
at their callings, which is not wrought in any temporary. It is found also 
distinguished by the proper effect of holiness wrought in their calling : 
2 Tim. i. 9, * Who hath saved us, and called us with an holy calling, accord- 
ing to his own purpose and grace, &c., in Christ Jesus afore the world 
began.' Holiness is the peculiar effect of election. Also faith distinguished 
by its original, ' the faith of God's elect,' proper to them, though the doctrine 
of faith is thereby also meant, both the object and the act of faith. 

That God, to set out his grace towards his savingly called ones the more, 
hath in his just and all-wise disposing providence set up together by them, 
and with them, examples of men called with an imperfect work, whom he 
leaving in the end to the conduct of their own wills, do fall away, whilst he 
invincibly carries those others on to establishment and perfection. 

Oh quantum turbarum j^eperit liberum arhitrium in ecclesia: ejus arrogantia, 
exaltatio ejusdem, vires ad salutem obtinendam, in quo conatu, fnistralur ! 
What a stir and ado hath the pride and presumptuousness of the liberty 
and changes of man's free will in itself bred, in seeking to attain salvation of 
its own ability; and how many ways, and by several degrees, hath God tried 
it, by assisting it with helps and aids of several supernatural elevations, more 
and less, to let men see that vain opinion of man of himself, by all those helps, 
to attain to glory without regenerating grace. Falling short after all God's 
strivings with them, they are in the end left unto their lusts and hardness 
of heart. 

The point thus drawn out, there are two or three things I am to perform in 
the prosecution of it. 

1. To give you advertisements concerning what is the proper dint of my 
scope in this point. 

2. Some explanations of the assertion. 

3. Some proofs, both (1) from instances, and (2) from the tenor of the 
Scripture. 

1. Concerning my drift, 

(1.) It is not to repeat unto you that there are two sorts of professors, 
sound and unsound. 

(2.) My drift is not in this discourse to shew you that God magnifies this 
his grace to us- ward, as with difference, in that vast extensiveness that is 
between us and all the rest he passeth by of the whole world, but from that 
special narrower difference he puts between those others whom he calls, as 
well as us, out of the world, who are arrived very far in religion, whom yet he 
suffers to fall short of the glory of God. 

(3.) That this point is a new additional unto the glorifying grace of God, 
the ' God of all grace,' towards us, besides all that I have or shall insist on, 
it is a new exemplification of his grace beyond all other ; it is a discovery 
of a new mine of free grace exalting itself towards us by a comparison of his 
different dealings with us and others ; not the vast and wide world only, but 
a comparison more contracted to a far less number, even with those whom he 
calls only, and who profess this name ; which ought therefore anew to affect 
your hearts, and cause you to break forth into a new acclamation and fresh 
adoration of God and his grace towards you, and to cry, and cry aloud. 
Blessed be the God of grace, yea, of all grace, shewn all sorts of ways 
towards us ; and that hath not so dealt with others, who yet have had the 
knowledge of his ways, and those under gospel light, in so high a measure ; 
which is a strain far beyond the Ela,* which the psalmist's note of praise rose 
up unto, whilst he magnified his grace towards his people in comparison 
* The highest note in the musical scale. — Ed. 



Chap. VI.] of election. 187 

with the heathens, whilst he says, Ps. cxlvii. 19, 20, * He shewed his word 
unto Jacob, his statutes and his judgments unto Israel. He hath not dealb 
so with any nation : and as for his judgments, they have not known them. 
Praise ye the Lord.' 

2. For the explanation of the thing itself, the first is, how God's grace to 
us may be said to have any inliuence upon what God doth to others whom 
he passeth by. 

That grace hath an influence hereunto for the illustration of itself, will 
easily be yielded when we shall consider that the God of grace, in his order- 
ing all things to make salvation sure to his elect and called ones, did put 
all his other purposes and counsels into grace's hands, to dispose of so as to 
infinite manifold wisdom might best serve to magnify his grace ;* this was 
his top and eminent design, the glory of his grace. Grace had the dominion, 
the throne, given it; the dispositive power (which the throne always carries 
with it) of all, both without God, that is, of all creatures, &c., and of all 
within God, that is, of attributes and persons in the Godhead, to conspire 
unto his glory. And let it not be looked at as so strange a thing, though it 
be not simply or directly the first mover of God's other decrees and pur- 
poses, yet so far it rules as to cause them all to serve and be subordinate 
unto this one supreme counsel of all other of his will, as those of justice and 
wrath, &c., that yet grace should overlook, supervise them all, and order and 
dispose of them all, and the execution of them to persons under sin, as they 
might turn unto grace its praise and glory ; and so obliquely, collaterally, 
and at the rebound, they all serve to illustrate and advance this of grace, 
which is the top and first design and dehght of God's heart, even the 
* praise of the glory of his grace,' as Eph. i. 6; and therefore in verse 11 of 
that chapter, it is expressly said, that we are ' predestinated according to the 
purpose of him who worketh all things according to the counsel of his will,' 
which words, if we take in with other scriptures, as 2 Cor. v. 18, Heb. ii., 
are there added to shew that his counsel ordered all things to subserve to 
that his grand purpose of predestination, which is all one and to serve his 
purposes of grace to us ; so that whilst God for other ends, of glorifying his 
justice, &c., was purposing such and such persons called, to be left in 
the end to the counsel of their own wills and ways, for the immediate and 
direct glory of other his attributes; yet free grace stepped in, and took 
the advantage to mould and order the ranging of such persons as in pro- 
vidence might comparatively serve to set forth the glory of itself, that as 
'the wrath of man shall praise thee,' says the psalmist to God, so even the 
wrath of God shall praise thee, thou the delight and darhng of God's heart, 
free grace. 

(1.) I do not say that this is his primary end of such his dealings with 
such. No ; but the primary end therein is to shew his own sovereignty, and 
glory of his justice, and to confute and confound the utter disability of the 
creature, which will be a-setting up its own free will and ability, with an 
opinion of attaining salvation, if it be but in any degree elevated and assisted 
by God. These are his primary, direct ends, yet so as in the manage and 
carriage of it, and his providence, ordering, and disposement thereof, there 
is a remote end thereof (as some of our divines f have said) that puts a great 

*■ See my first sermon on 1 Peter v. 10, ' The Ood of all grace,' &c 

t Quia haec secretio negativa (vel non-electio) quro in reprobatione reperitur, pendet 
ab ilia secretione quce est in electione ; hinc reprobationis finis remotus est splendor 
illius gratiflR, qusa in electione manifestatur. — Amesius Medal. 1. i. c. 25, n. 36. Amesiua 
cites for this in the place now quoted, Rom. ix. 22, 23, ' He endured with much long- 
suffering the vessels of wrath, that he might make known the riches of his glory on 
the vessels of mercy.' 



188 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

and a glorious reflection and lustre upon his grace towards his elect thereby, 
and was intended by God it should be so. You may observe that the first 
declaration of the election of grace runs in these terms, ' The elder shall 
serve ihe younger,' as if the elder had been made for the younger, which yet 
is obliquely and collateral!}" done, though directly only for God himself, 
Prov. xvi. 4. 

(2.) If you ask how this serves to illustrate grace to us-ward, the answer 
is obvious, as contraries serve to illustrate one another, that as dark shadows 
set forth pictures unto a greater life, and glory, and beauty, so is it here. 
You have the like, though upon another occasion : Rom. xi. 22, ' Behold the 
goodness and severity of God: on them which fell, severity; but towards 
thee, goodness, if thou continue in his goodness,' &c. 

The like parallel comparative course to illustrate this grace, he ordinarily 
takes and gives demonstration of in the elect themselves, whereof many of 
you have experience in yourselves ; all being fallen, free grace took advan- 
tage of improving itself by the fall even of the elect in Adam. 

That whereas when fallen he might yet have sanctified them all in the 
womb (as he doth multitudes of infants that die), no, but he rather doth 
very generally leave them that live to years of discretion, and to remain and 
live in an unregenerate condition, to be as ignorant, profane, &c., as any 
other: Eph. ii. 1-3, * And you hath he quickened, who were dead in tres- 
passes and sins ; wherein in time past ye walked according to the prince of 
the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobe- 
dience : among whom also we all had our conversation in times past, in the 
lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind ; and 
were by nature the children of wrath,' and adds this in the close of all, 
'even as others.' And why? But as it follows, ver. 5, 6, to make grace 
the more glorious, ' Even when we were dead in sins, he hath quickened us 
together with Christ (by grace ye are saved) ; and hath raised us up together, 
and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus.' When dead 
in sins, by grace ye are saved ; this contrivement, which cost Christ's soul 
the more for them, was free grace's. So that you see he gives an exemplar 
of such a comparative illustration of grace in the very persons of the elect 
themselves he saves, that so, by a comparative view of themselves in a two- 
fold estate, their estate of sin and their estate of grace, after which former 
estate of sin and wrath afore, they might be provoked to glorify his grace 
the more. 

Well, now, bring this to the present point in hand ; in like manner free 
grace, the great disposer, takes advantage of what God's purposes are to 
others (observe the difi'erence ; in the foregoing instance it was a comparing 
of two diflering states in the same persons ; here, of two difi'ering works of 
calling, in the persons of elect ones and others), I say free grace, that super- 
viseth all God's decrees, txakes the advantage and guides providence in the 
execution of them, to cast and dispose it so as that such and such of them 
that should be so and so far wrought on, who yet fall away, that some of 
them should live in such an age, at the same time, &c., wherein some of his 
elect and called ones live also, who should also profess in so and so high a 
manner, and that ovrojg, really, as Peter's word is, as from a real work wrought 
on them. And its design herein is to shew, that by a mere pure grace his 
truly called ones are saved, which is clearly seen by this comparative, which 
is herein contrary to that former instanced in, that was, that the elect were 
in the same state even as others ; but this even not as to others you Hved 
withal, who were wrought upon so far, and yet their state was never altered 
from that of nature to grace. I shall conclude by saying of free grace, that 



Chap. VI.] or election. 189 

great sovereign, and its disposements, and the varieties of them, to set forth 
itself, what Job says of the great God himself. Job v. 9, it forecasts and 
contrives works of this kind ' without number, and many such thing's are 
with it.' 

3. For the proof and demonstration of the great point, 

I shall (1) shew how the doctrinal scope and tenor of the scriptures that 
treat of election, &g., to be for this great truth, as thus it stands stated. 

(2.) Give you pregnant instances, throughout the Old and New Testament, 
confirming it. 

(1.) For the first, to shew you that it is the scope of those scriptures that 
treat of election to be for this truth, as thus I have stated it. 

[1.] It is the very set scope of the apostle Paul in the Epistle to the 
Romans, chap. ix. and x. It is well known that in those chapters it is his 
general scope to set out the doctrine of election and reprobation ; but that 
which falls under my cognizance is, that ho sets the one, that is, God's pur- 
poses of mercy and grace, and those other, his purposes ol justice and wrath, 
he sets them, as Solomon says in another case, the 'one over against the 
other,' or in comparison together, on purpose that the examples there alleged, 
and the doctrine of preterition there insisted on, might the more illustrate 
and set forth those other dispensations of electing grace. Thus, ver. 21-23, 
* Hath not the potter power over the clay,' &c. Here the making of one a 
vessel of dishonour, reflects not only the more honour on those that were 
vessels of honour, but above all, upon that mercy and grace that made them 
such ; and did put the difference, as it appears there is put, which is of 
mercy indeed, as there, ver. 18, ' Therefore he hath mercy,' &c., that here 
also he should so shew mercy on whom he will, whilst he yet leaves others 
to the hardness of their hearts, this tends to magnify the mercy to others 
the more ;- for, as chap. xi. 22, ' Behold therefore the goodness and severity 
of God : on them which fell, severity ; but towards thee, goodness, if thou 
continue in his goodness ; otherwise thou shalt be cut off.' 

And though he speaks of the whole mass of mankind, who are passed by, 
in ver. 20, 21, &c. ; and therefore allege th instances of heathens as well as 
of the Jews, viz., of Pharaoh and his Egyptians, raised up by God on pur- 
pose to shew his power upon man, apposite parallel with Moses and his 
Israelites, to manifest his mercy upon them, in giving nations for them, as 
Isaiah, in chap. xi. ver. 2, and the Psalmist celebrates it ; and these 
set up in one and the same age, in one another's sight and view, that the 
difi'erence might be the more conspicuous ; though I say, the apostle extends 
his discourse to this universal of mankind, yet as if such instances were too 
wide, and served not enough to magnify this discriminating grace, he gives 
another sort, contracted into a narrower compass of parallel together, and 
tells us there was an Israel in Israel itself, ver. 6 ; he says not an Israelite 
of election, in the word, but in and amongst the Israelites themselves. And 
in ver. 27, ' Though the number of the children of Israel be as the sand of 
the sea, a remnant shall be saved.' Just as in the apostle's time we heard 
there were a tJie]) of false Christians, that had once been amongst and num- 
bered with us, 1 John ii. 19. Yea, and the Israel he speaks of were suchf 
as were sons of Belial, but that sought after righteousness : Rom. i. 31, 
had a zeal for God;' chap. x. 2, who yet fell short of true righteousness, 
as those who had 'willed and ran,' ver. 16 ; that is, who had made use of 
legal and natural helps and endeavours to attain unto salvation. And in- 
deed the occasion, or rise he took, of bringing in that discourse of election 
and preterition, was to give an account how it came to pass that those ' who 

^ Vide that of Ames. Med. Theol. lib. i. c. 27. f Qu. ' were not such '? — Ed. 



190 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

were Israelites, to whom pertaineth the adoption, and the glory, and the 
covenants, and the giving of the law, and the service of God, and the pro- 
mises,' &c., ver. 4, should so generally miss of salvation, he clearly resolves 
the account into the difference which election had originally set, and to the 
condition which pretention had left the other unto. And upon that occasion 
it is he breaks into the doctrine [about] these two in the following part of 
his discourse, continued from ver. 6 of that chapter unto the end of the 11th 
chapter, at least pursues it in all them chapters, as the ultimate conclu- 
sion he aimed at, which, by chap. xi. ver. 5 and 7 compared, is evident, 
ver. 2; that but *a remnant,' ver. 5, whom he calls 'the election, had 
obtained it, but the rest were blinded,' ver. 7. And he shews likewise that 
there was an effectual calling of grace, which was the fruit of election, which 
that diffierence had been manifested thus in, ver. 11, chap, ix., ' For the 
children being not yet born, neither having done any good or evil, that the 
purpose of God according to election might stand, not of works, but of him 
that called.' And ver. 16, * So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of 
him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy.' And this comparative 
thus stated is close and home to our point in hand. 

[2.] I have observed that in some eminent places of the epistles, where 
the condition of temporary, or professors abortively called, and their falHng 
away, is spoken of, there the doctrine of election and immutabihty of God's 
love is hkewise adjoined, as in an opportune season for the mention of the 
same ; and to what end should it be, but because by setting them still to- 
gether, the glory of discriminating gi^ace doth in that most eminent manner 
appear thereby, and the fixedness and unchangeableness thereof is magnified 
by the contrary mutability and failure of the highest workings and gifts 
vouchsafed the non-elect. 

First, In that known place, 2 Tim. ii., after and upon occasion of the 
mention of Hymeneus and Philetus their apostasy, ver. 18, * Who concern- 
ing the truth have erred, saying that the resurrection is passed already ; and 
overthrowing the faith of some,' he presently subjoins, ver. 19, ' Never- 
theless the foundation of God standeth sure, having this seal. The Lord 
knoweth them that are his,' &c. This passage extends not itself unto the 
comparative of God's dispensations with the world, or whole mass of repro- 
bation, but contracts itself unto such * as call upon the name of the Lord.' 
And that which follows, ver. 20, ' But in a great house there are not only 
vessels of gold and of silver, but also of wood and of earth ; and some to 
honour and some to dishonour,' shews the difference to lie there in utensils 
and vessels used in the same house or family, the church of God, as that 
instance of Jacob's and Esau's was of those of the same womb, and the foun- 
dation of that difference between them to be, that God knew who were his, 
and so had severed them from those other. And there is this observable in 
it, that though the apostle useth the similitude which he had done. Rem. 
ix. ver. 21, namely, of vessels of honour, and vessels of dishonour,' whilst in 
those verses there he yet speaks of that election and rejection that divides 
the whole lump of mankind ; yet herein, simply he applies it restrictively 
unto those vessels of honour and dishonour that are found in the same 
house, the visible church of God, which have the same outward shape of 
profession, but differ in the stuff or matter they consist of, and were made 
use of in the church ; whereby his grace in foreknowing his with so vast a 
difference from the others, is by the nearness of this their relation, and 
rendered far more conspicuous than in that other of election from out of the 
whole world at large. 

A second scripture is Hebrew vi., in the beginning of which chapter he 



Chap. VI. J of election. 191 

had delineated the state of temporaries that fell away in the highest of their 
attainments, ver. 4-6, who were once enlightened : * For it is impossible 
for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted of the heavenly gift, 
and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost, and have tasted the good word 
of God, and the powers of the world to come, if they shall fall away, to 
renew them again unto repentance, seeing they crucify to themselves the Son 
of God afresh, and put him to an open shame.' And then, after some 
encouragements and exhortations given to the true and sincere believers, ho 
brings in the doctrine of immutability of God's counsel, declared and con- 
firmed by God's promise and his oath, in ver. 16-18, * That by two immut- 
able things, in which it was impossible for God to lie, we might have a 
strong consolation,' &c., which are inserted, as to assure them that God 
would carry such through, notwithstanding those other fell, so to shew the 
foundation of that difierence to be the eternal counsel of God, uttered in that 
promise and oath made to Abraham, as likewise to glorify his grace by these 
comparatives of two such different dispensations. 

(2.) In a set of instances. 

You shall see how both in the Old and New Testament God's prudence 
did set up at one and the same time, and in one another's view, such differ- 
ing examples ; yea, and sometimes when their sins, for the kind and hein- 
ousness of the fact, were the same, yet his grace did make a difference. 

Concerning which instances I premise this one for all of them, that these 
things fell not out by chance, and therefore they had, and must have had, 
that disposement and intendment from God which we are speakin^ of, viz., 
of exalting his mercy to the one by his contrary dealings with the other. 

First instance; Cain and Abel. These, from the first, were professors of 
religion, sacrificing both of them unto God, according to his own word, own 
institution, alike, and together. Gen. iv. 3, 4, and you know the different 
issue of either as unto salvation, and the ground thereof, out of Heb. xi 4 
and 1 John iii. 12, 13. 

Second instance ; Esau and Jacob. Concerning whom God in the womb 
declared his different purpose, afore they had done good or evil, as in Rom. 
ix. the apostle urgeth. But I shall waive that, and shall flu'ther insist on 
what, when they came to do either what was good or what was evil, was 
their condition. Esau had the outward advantage of Jacob in spirituals, 
having by eldership the birthright, which was a spiritual privilege, and 
engaged him unto an holy profession of religion above what his brother was, 
as being thereby designed to be the priest of the family, and performer of 
the worship thereof, and to have thereby occasion of nearer address and 
access to God, and God doth promise to draw near to them that draw near 
to him ; but he profanely despised it, and sold it. And upon his father 
giving the blessing from him also, there came a gi'cat fit of the Spirit upon 
him, stirring self-love in him, which moved him with all earnestness to seek 
the blessing ; and yet God would not, yea, God held his father's heart so 
fast and fixed to a declaration of God's purposes therein, that he would not 
repent, though Esau sought it with tears. You have the kind of this pro- 
ceeding alleged and thus explained in Heb. xii. 16, 17, * Lest there te any 
fornicator, or profane person, as Esau, who for one morsel of meat sold his 
birthright. For ye know how that afterwards, when he would have inherited 
the blessing, he was rejected : for he found no place of repentance, though 
he sought it carefully with tears.' And yet then again he comes to have the 
advantage in outward spiritual opportunities of his brother Jacob ; for he 
lived and continued still in his father's family, where God was worshipped, 
and religion professed, and the ordinances of God were dispensed, whereas 



192 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

Jacob was driven into an heathen family, where outwardly there was only a 
worshipper of false gods ; hereby he was in hazard to be lost as to his pro- 
fession. And yet though God might have taken the advantage against Jacob 
for him to have lost his birthright, for his sin committed in seeking to get 
it for his He, as well as God had done against Esau for selling it for a mess 
of pottage, yet God kept and carried Jacob through these and other great 
trials to the very last of his days, and his blessed end you know. 

And all these passages served but to magnify that grace of God as to 
Jacob ; whereof, as the apostle there intimates, Esau did fall short. 

It was a short and quick answer God gave by his prophet Malachi, chap, 
ii. ver. 3, * Behold, I wall corrupt your seed, and spread dung upon your 
faces, even the dung of your solemn feasts.' As if he had said, Did you ask 
wherein I have loved you, the posterity of Jacob ? Compare but my dif- 
ferent dealings with Esau and with Jacob your father, first in their own 
persons, and ever since between the Edomites your brethren and yourselves; 
and was not Esau as fair an object, think you, for my love to have been set 
upon as Jacob, when both were in the womb, as also in those respects fore- 
mentioned ? And my grace might have been as free to the one as to the 
other (God on purpose compares those together, to set out his love to Jacob 
the more) ; and did you now ask whether I have loved you or no ? I trow, 
saith God, I have hereby shewn it to the purpose. 

Third instance ; in Ephraim and Judah. The like we find between the 
ten tribes and the tribe of Judah. Though at the fii'st, and for a long time, 
both were alike his people, yet at last election began to pass a discrimination, 
as you have it set forth in Psalm Ixxviii., towards the close of that psalm. 
Ephraim, or the ten tribes, had at first the advantage of Judah in spirituals; 
for the ark, the token of God's presence, was committed unto their keeping 
at Shiloh ; the seal of God's worship and ordinances were betrusted to them, 
and Judah must come up thither, if they would seek the Lord. But Eph- 
raim, for their sinning against that worship, forfeited and lost it, and should 
therefore have the keeping of it no longer, no, not for ever any more ; but 
Judah had it at Bethlehem, till at last it was fixedly seated in Sion, as the 
earth is estabhshed, in that psalm ; and this for no other reason than that 
he had loved them, and out of love had chosen them : ver. 67-69, ' More- 
over, he refused the tabernacle of Joseph, and chose not the tribe of Eph- 
raim ; but chose the tribe of Judah, the Mount Sion which he loved. And 
he built his sanctuaiy hke high palaces ; like the earth which he had estab- 
lished for ever.' For otherwise Judah was, as well as Ephraim, alike 
involved in the same guilt of sin which had forfeited it, as ver. 56-60 of 
that psalm plainly shews : ' Yea, they tempted and provoked the most high 
God, and kept not his testimonies,' &c. He speaks it of the whole in those 
verses, and yet takes the occasion against Ephraim to remove it for ever. 
Thus the first are last, and the last first ; and those whom God's presence 
is with for a while, upon some eminent sin God begins to withdraw from 
them, and by degrees, as he did by that people of the ten tribes, till at last 
he cast them ofi" from being a people : but dealt not so with Judah, though 
these made a forfeiture of their temple, and worship, and nation, in the 
captivity of Babylon, yet God restored all again to a greater glory at last. 
The ground was that in ver. 68, ' Zion which he loved.' 

Fourth instance; in David, and Said, and Solomon. And this instance 
follows next in that psalm, and endeth it : ver. 70, ' He chose also David 
his servant,' &c. You know I have, in the preceding part of this discourse, 
alleged David as the great pattern of grace, in ordering all things about him 
for his salvation, and shadowed forth in his dealings with him about his 



Chap. VI. j of election. 193 

kingdom ; yet behold, God thought not enough to shew mercy simply and 
absolutely to David's own person, but set up Saul together with him, yea, 
indeed afore him, as a foil of a contrary dispensation, to illustrate his grace 
towards David. As for Saul, you know what once Samuel said to hira, as 
from God : 1 Sam. x. G, 7, * And the Spirit of the Lord will come upon 
thee, and thou shalt prophesy with them, and shall be turned into another 
man,' &c. Yet in a short time God soon takes the advantage of a sin of 
Ids, upon which to declare his rejection of him from the kingdom. And ever 
after that, upon every occasion, he withdrew from him more and more, till 
at last he answered him neither by Uriffi nor by Thuininim, nor any other 
way, but gave him up to inquire of a witch, a practice the most contrary to. 
his mostavoM^ed principle; for of all other wickednesses, he had been zealous 
against that. David committed as great a sin, yea, gi'eater by far than that 
first of Saul's sins was for which God rejected him. 

Then Solomon his son, who had the covenant of grace entailed upon him 
together with David, and he committed greater sins for kind than that of 
Saul's was or David's either. Saul's first fatal sin was but worshipping the 
true God a few hours afore Samuel came ; and he was in great distress, 
which moved him so to anticipate it, and he had that awe of God in it, that 
he would not go to battle without having sacrificed first ; whereas Solomon's 
sin was the permitting the worship of false gods, of devils, yea, and building 
temples for them on the hill opposite to mount Sion, where the temple 
stood ; concerning whom the prophet thus speaks, 1 Kings xi. 33, ' Because 
they have forsaken me, and have worshipped Ashtoreth the goddess of the 
Zidonians, Chemosh the god of the Moabites, and Milcom the god of the 
children of Ammon, and have not walked in my ways, to do that which is 
right in mine eyes, and to keep my statutes and my judgments, as did David 
his father.' This charge, you see, hes upon many more than Solomon, but 
yet in the last words thereof there is a sting that turns all that guilt upon 
Solomon, in those words, ' as did David his father.' The indictment lies 
against him, as he that caused Israel to sin ; aggravated by this also, that 
he had the example of so good and holy a father as David. Notwithstand- 
ing all which, God yet profcsseth he would not take the kingdom away in 
his days, but that he should be a prince entirely over the whole all the days 
of his hfe, as in the following verse, 3 J: ; and afrer his death he left to his 
posterity that part which God had chosen out of all the tribes, ver. 32, as 
also in ver. 36 : ' And unto his son will I give one tribe, that David my 
servant may have a light always before me in Jerusalem, the city which I 
have chosen to put my name there.' 

Again, what was another of Saul's great sins, but persecuting of David, 
whom God had declared and anointed king in his stead by the prophet ? 
Solomon did the very same, in the like case of Jeroboam his being anointed, 
1 Kings xi. 40 ; yet lo, what says God in 2 Sam. vii. 13-15 ? 'But my mercy 
shall not depart away from him, as I took it from Saul, whom I put away 
before thee.' God was not contented to express his grace simply, as in and 
to their own persons discovered, but would needs add, ' as I took it from 
Saul, whom I put away afore thee ;' that is, in thine own view, afore thine 
own face. So then, God in this his dealing with Saul (besides what was of jus- 
tice in it towards his person) had this great aim in it, to cast a lustre on David's 
mercies ; and this instance makes good the words I put the doctrine into. 

Thus much for the Old Testament instances. I come to those of the New, 
which are more direct and punctual to God's discrimination as to the point 
of salvation. Some of those of the Old are such wherein this election and 

VOL. IX. N 



194: OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

rejection were seen, in respect of outward privileges ; for outside of them, 
and yet such as shadowed out withal the eternal rejection of the persons 
themselves fore- mentioned, from salvation, as well as in respect to those tem- 
porary things. 

1. You have an instance in Peter and Judas. 

These are the first and leading ones unto all the other that followed, and 
were accordingly the most eminent and conspicuous. The great God, the 
more to shew and magnify (even to an infinity of grace) himself as a Grod of 
all grace to Peter, did in his providence order a contrary occuiTence to fall 
out unto Judas, whom he had set up an apostle, like as Peter himself was. 
God thought it not enough to manifest his grace towards Peter, singly con- 
sidered in such an issue of dehverance out of and preserving him therein, but 
was farther pleased to set it ofi" in the highest, in a comparative way with 
Judas. It cannot but be highly remarkable unto this purpose, that God so 
ordered it that one and the like temptation for kind against their master 
Christ (though not in degree of sinning), the one of renouncing and for- 
swearing him, the other of betraying him ; and both within the compass of 
a few hours, the same night. They both lay as malefactors, bound in chains 
of guilt, afore God ; and God foreseeing Peter's forswearing him with a 
curse, ' I know not the man,' he might have said, as at latter day he will to 
Judas, ' Depart from me, thou cursed, I never knew thee, thou worker of 
iniquity ;' and so, in like manner, I swear concerning thee, that thou shalt 
never enter into my rest. And he might have taken Judas, and shewn 
the same grace to him in Peter's stead ; and yet admire ! for see the 
difierence he puts ; he sends Peter out a- weeping bitterly with godly sor- 
row, and repentance never to be repented of, and restored him to grace and 
apostleship again ; but sends Judas forth to hang himself, though repenting 
also, yet out of horror and despair. And all this was transacted in twelve 
or fourteen hours' space. 

We farther read that the self-same Peter, having been perfectly pardoned, 
healed, restored, strengthened, and recovered that very night of his fall, 
within a very few days after the Spirit of God singled him out of all the com- 
pany of disciples to preach Judas his fatal funeral sermon. God would have 
him, of all other men, to tell and relate that tragical story of Judas his 
apostasy and undoing ; and the same Spirit immediately inspired him with 
sight into a prophecy, that had foretold this of Judas, which otherwise he 
would never have apphed to him ; of which I may say, that Peter took it for 
his text ; read the whole : Acts i. 15-20, ' And in those days Peter stood up 
in the midst of the disciples, and said (the number of names together were 
about an hundred and tw^enty). Men and brethren, the Scripture must needs 
have been fulfilled, which the Holy Ghost, by the mouth of David, spake 
before concerning Judas, which was guide to them that took Jesus. For he 
was numbered with us, and had obtained part of this ministry. Now this 
man purchased a field with the reward of iniquity ; and falling headlong, he 
burst asunder in the midst, and all his bowels gushed out. And it was known 
unto all the dwellers at Jerusalem ; insomuch as that field is called in their 
proper tongue, Aceldama, that is to say. The field of blood. For it is writ- 
ten in the book of the Psalms, Let his habitation be desolate, and let no 
man dwell therein; and. His bishoprick let another take.' Oh, with what 
a bleeding, melted, broken, and yet with a rejoicing heart, and adoring of 
the grace of God towards himself, and blessing him for it, must we needs 
suppose that penitent Peter (when now filled with the Holy Ghost) did utter 
these passages, ' He was numbered amongst m ;' Oh, that I, who deserved 
to have been hanged on the same tree together with him, and then to have 



Chap. VI.] of election. 195 

hung in hell next to him, shonld still be here among you the holy apostles, 
the called ones of God, and still be numbered among the us, among you, who 
are the choicest of his saints, even his apostles. Oh, I was in danger for 
ever to have been excluded, as we have but now seen Judas was. 

2. There are instances out of the epistles. 

That age that followed, which first were termed Christian, afforded plenty 
of such parallel examples of apostatizing professors and persevering saints, 
growing up together in one another's view, such as the apostles in their 
epistles abundantly did shew. Paul, from his experience and observation, 
sets both together in Heb. vi., from ver. 4th to ver. the 11th, as in one 
scheme, as also scattered in divers other passages of that epistle, especially 
chap. X., ver. 22-27, and from ver. 32 to the end, the connection whereof, 
in ver. 39, is this summary : ' But we are not of tlicm who draw back unto 
perdition ; but of them that believe to the saving of the soul ;' also in his 
epistles to Timothy, especially the latter, he sets Phygellus and Hermogenes 
over against Onesiphorus, 2 Tim. i. 15-18; Hymoneus and Philetus over 
against those whom he had known to be his, chap. ii. 17-21. In chap. iii. 
he adds the same almost throughout ; then in chap, the 4th he sets the 
names of Demas, who had * forsaken him, and loved this world', ver. 10, 
once his fellow-labourer, with Marcus, Lucas, Philemon, together with the 
very same persons, whom he here, in Timothy, again mentions, as conti- 
nuing and persevering, ver. 11 ; likewise Alexander the coppersmith, of 
whose zeal and suflferings for Paul you read. Acts xix. 33, but now turned 
apostate ; as in ver. 14 of the same 4th to Timothy ; as also in 2 Tim. ii. 
18-21, as hath been shewn. James his whole epistle is but a continued 
character and discovery of unsound professors ; and of the true intermingled 
set. John doth the like in his first epistle, chap. ii. 10 ; and up and down 
in the rest of the epistle, from first to last. Peter the like, in his second 
epistle, chap. ii. throughout, graphically describes both professors now 
fallen ; and another company of faithful ones living with those, and within 
one another's knowledge, to whom (the faithful ones) he inscribes in that 
epistle, under the title of those that ' had received hke precious faith with us,' 
the apostles themselves, chap. i. 1, whose pure minds he stirs up to look 
for and hasten to the kingdom of Christ, chap. iii. 2, and so on. 

But instead of all other, I choose out the epistle of Jude, and in the next 
paragraph shall, to this purpose, more insist on it, in which the Holy Ghost 
represents, as in a glass, the difiering face and condition of professors in the 
last scene of the primitive times, and holds up to our view the ' preserved in 
Christ,' ver. 1 ; and bears the title of the whole epistle oppositely to those 
multitudes that had withered and fallen away. His decipher of them takes 
up the greater part of that epistle, but of this in the next paragraph ; so as 
upon the matter, though I will not say that in all and every epistle this 
argument should be insisted on, yet I may justly say, that of all the apostles 
that wrote, they have in their epistles, one or another, touched upon, yea, 
enlarged this very subject ; and the records thereof are for an admonition 
unto all succeeding ages, especially unto us, * upon whom the ends of the 
world are come,' as that which ordinarily should fall out, especially in such 
ages and places wherein the gospel should break forth with a brighter light 
and warmer beams. Paul prophesies of this like different event of Chris- 
tianity in the profession of it, 2 Tim. iii. 1-14, ' This know also, that in 
the last days perilous times shall come,' &c. ; and exemplifies the character 
of such by the like sort or gang, which in those times were then extant, whom 
he accordingly points unto, ver. G, * Of this sort are they,' &c. So as those 
examples then were parallels of what in after ages was to come, which differ- 



193 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

ing sort of professors extant together, will continue until the end, and be 
found to hold true, even at the very last. For at Christ's coming, Mat. 
XXV. 1,2, our Lord tells us, that ' then,' that is, at that time ' The kingdom 
of heaven shall be like unto ten virgins, &c. And five of them were wise, 
and five were foolish.' There are as many of the one sort as of the other, 
and both had lamps, and both slept ; yet the one sort fell short, and were 
shut out ; the other were preserved, and taken in. 



CHAPTER VII. 

A brief exposition of Jude, by way of confirmation of the precedent doctrine, 
that God's discriminating grace appears in the vast difference he puts be- 
tween enlightened temporaries and his elect that persevere ^ with uses and 
directions j^rojjer to the doctrine out of that epistle. 

This hath been the doctrine, and here is a whole epistle made on purpose 
for it, both for the confirmation of it, by the greatest and most famous in- 
stance of all others (which I therefore reserved last) and plentifully afibrding 
the most pertinent uses fitted unto the doctrine. 

An introduction to the exposition. Before I can set out the doctrinal points 
and uses conta'ned in this epistle, I must first speak some things as to, 

1. The inscription. 

2. The time, or season. 

3. The occasion of writing the epistle. 

1. The inscription, To tJte jyreserved in Christ. This inscription or dedica- 
tion of the epistle in general speaks the argument of the whole. ' To the 
preserved in Christ,' which comes in after ' beloved in God the Father,' of 
which reading afterwards. A strange and uncouth title, and not found in 
other apostolical epistles ; as Beza also observes, he giving withal this wit- 
ness concerning it, that this passage alone fully testifies or argues the epistle 
to have fallen from an apostle's pen. It is indeed full of a spiritual emphasis 
in itself, and also breatheth forth the spirit and design of the whole epistle, 
which is the sum of this doctrine I have insisted on ; for the true reason and 
ground of his saluting the Christians under this title of ' the preserved in 
Christ,' was the occasion of his writing against another sect and company of 
men, said to be fore-ordained to a contrary condemnation, ver. 4, which two 
sorts of men he sets as in opposition each to other, as those words, ver. 20, 
'But you,' &c., do expressly shew, besides the evidence of the thing itself. 
And this so glorious a preservation, and that other so dreadful a condemna- 
tion, do take up the whole. And the epistle containeth nothing else ; I say 
nothing else, but what belongeth unto these two ; we are therefore called 
the more deeply to consider this argument, in that one whole and entire 
piece of Holy Writ, should be on purpose penned by the Holy Ghost upon 
this argument, even as Solomon's Book of Ecclesiastes was to shew the 
vanity and vexation in all worldly things. I shall not be solicitous about 
any accurateness of analysis, but will endeavour to give the rays and gleam 
of it under these heads. 

2. The season and time of uriting thereof. Jude lived the last of the 
apostles but old John ; and at this time when he wrote this it may seem that 
Peter, and James, and Paul were dead, with the rest of those apostles, who 
did not write anything, who yet in their preaching had foretold this great 
apostasy Jude here speaks of. And this (as Estius hath observed) may not 
obscurely be gathered from his manner of citing the other apostles: ver. 17, 



Chap. YII.] of election. 197 

* But, beloYed, remember the words which were spoken before of the apostles 
of our Lord Jesus Christ,' as speaking of them now dead, and not then 
extant, as to whose living testimony, otherwise, he might have had recourse ; 
and therefore also bids them remember their words, as of persons now gone 
off the stage ; whereas Peter, when he wrote his second epistle concerning 
the same men that Judo here writes against, speaks in another strain : 2d 
Epistle, iii. 2, * Be mindful of the commandments of us the apostles,' the 
most being yet alive as well as himself. Not so Jude. However, it is certain 
our Jude wrote in the latter end of that apostolical ago, or the last of those 
primitive times, when the profession and course of Christianity had now ran 
out well nigh (if not the full) forty years since Christ's ascension into heaven. 
In which space as perfect an essay and discovery has been made of what 
period, end, or issue, the profession of all, or any sort of professors con- 
verted by the apostles had come unto. Forty years was long enough for 
such a trial, and it is very likely that, as the people of Israel's coming out of 
Egypt, and falling in the wilderness through unbehef, Caleb and Joshua 
holding out to the end, is made in the New Testament a type of those primi- 
tive Christians, and of us all to the end of the world, and the issue of us all, 
one way or oth^r, as 1 Cor. x., Heb. iii. iv, and is here likewise in the first 
and chief place of all other old instances remembered by Jude, — ver. 5, ' I 
will therefore put you in remembrance, though you once knew this, how that 
the Lord having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward des- 
troyed them that believed not,' — so that in the very space of time there 
might some correspondency have been intended by God, that is, between 
that time of tentation then, and this of the first primitive ages, which was 
forty years to both. 

Now tow\ards the declinings of that age it was that Paul wrote to the 
Hebrews ; and Peter likewise his second epistle, after Paul ; and then Jude, 
this his epistle after that of Peter'.s. For Peter therein setteth a seal of con- 
firmation to all Paul's epistles, and also to that of his to the Hebrews, in a 
special manner in his second epistle, third chapter ; and both those epistles 
touch much upon this argument of temporaries, and backsliders. But Jude 
wrote after Peter, for he in a manner cites him, if you compare Peter's third 
chapter, third verse, and this of Jude, ver. 17, 18 ; as also because he takes 
up the instances which Peter useth in his second and third chapters ; yea, 
the very words whereby Peter had set forth apostates, in that epistle of Jude ; 
following Peter herein, as Mark in his Gospel doth that of Matthew. 

3. As for the occasion. The thing being thus stated as for the time or 
season, the occasion now follows. That age aforesaid of Christians, which 
had thus enjoyed the apostles' ministry whilst they were all or most of them 
alive, I may compare unto the season of a hot jind bright summer, such an 
one as no age ever since can be supposed to have had the light and heat of. 

I also might assimilate John Baptist's and Christ's time to have been as 
the spring or beginning of the gospel, as Christ expressly calls it, Mat. 
xi. 12, 13, Luke xvi. 16 ; but the very last of that age, w4ierein Jude and 
Peter wrote his second epistle, were as the autumn at the end of the summer; 
and this of Jude was the last of that autumn, and so the declining of that 
age as the fall of the leaf, which John calls the last hour, namely, of that first 
day of the apostolic age, and not of the world only in the evening of which 
he WTote, and he proves it by this very token, 1 John ii. 18, 19, * Even 
now there are many antichrists ; whereby we know that it is the last time. 
They went out from us,' &c. 

And now to return to this my begun allusion. This age was as the 
autumn, and so fall of the leaf, after that foregone summer, in which the 



198 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

goodly fruit of many withered. It is Jude's own comparison, ver. 12 ; he 
compareth these apostate professors unto 'trees whose fruit withered,' dsvdpa 
(pdivo'TTOj^ivu; the use of which words is to signify trees of autumn* (as is well 
known), which is translated 'whose fruit wdthereth,' because fruit and leaves, 
and all fell off at the expiring of this age, as trees in autumn use to do. 

Now, there having fallen out so great a falling away of many, as Christ also 
foretold should be afore the end of that age, which was at the dissolution of 
Jerusalem (which also fell out towards the end of this autumn), — Mat. xxiv. 
12, 13, 'Because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold. 
But he that shall endure to the end, the same shall be saved,' — hence these 
faints that continued to keep faith and a good conscience to the end, these 
were precious saints indeed ; as in the account of God and Christ, so of 
these apostles that were left alive. And Peter so sfyles them in the begin- 
ning of that his second epistle: ver. 1, 'To them that have obtained like 
precious faith with us ;' that is, with us the apostles of Christ, and called 
by the 'communication of the divine nature,' ver. 3; and Jude in like 
manner here. And the mind of this his frontispiece and dedication is as if 
he had said. Oh you preserved ones in Christ, I congratulate you, and 
Christianity preserved in you, that but for whom the Christian professors of 
this decayed age had been like unto Sodom and Gomorrah (unto whom Jude 
compareth those other apostates, ver. 7) ; but you remain as lasting monu- 
ments of perseverance, let this be written on your tombs, ' The preserved in 
Christ, and called.' In you, and upon you, bath that other part of Christ's 
prophecy been fulfilled. Mat. xxiv. 24, ' For there shall arise false Christs, 
and false prophets, that shall shew great signs and w^onders, insomuch that 
if it icere possible, they shall deceive the very elect.' And such are you ; it is 
apparent that you are them these false Christians could not deceive. 

3. The iveight and moment of the matter of this epistle, which is industri- 
ously insinuated in his preface unto it : ver. 3, ' Beloved, when I gave all 
diligence to write unto you of the common salvation, it was needful for me 
to write unto you, and exhort that ye should earnestly contend for the faith 
which was once delivered unto the saints,' which hath been in these times 
vehemently opposed, and in danger to be lost. 

In which words I do take notice of three things : 

(1.) That it was a more than ordinary impulse which he had upon him, 
caused him to write of this matter and in this manner. It is true indeed, 
sa^^s he, 'I had a great desire upon me to write to you,' as some other 
apostles have done, ' I gave all diligence or study ;' that is, I had a purpose 
and attention of mind to write to you, and waited for the Holy Ghost to 
come with a stream upon me, &c. But this proceeds not merely out of 
such an ordinary provocation; for when I did attempt, I found a necessity, 
AvdyKr,v Uyjiv (it is under-translated to say, 'I thought it needful'), I was 
constrained or impelled, a necessity lay upon me ; thus Calvin.f And 
therefore seeing I was thus singularly carried on by the Holy Ghost to write 
what now I do, it is your part and duty, and a necessity lieth upon you also, 
to attend unto it. 

(2.) Secondly, Whereas this my own desire of writing had pitched upon 
matters of salvation, as they did in common concern all us Christians, — his 
word is ' the common salvation,' — that is, to have delivered such points of 
doctrine about salvation in a promiscuous way, as Paul and other my fellow 

*^- Willet: In autumnales aut extremi autumni, item finientis autumni, cra^a to 
<pdhiG&ai rriv O'Trujpuv, a finiente autumno. 

^ t Quod ad scribendum propensus et sedulo intentus fuisset, ad scribendum neces- 
sitas etiam cum coeD:erit. 



Chap. YII.] of election. 199 

apostles have done in their epistles ; when, says he, I began to set pen to 
paper by the impulse of the Holy Ghost, I was diverted by him from out of 
that common channel and general road into this particular channel, to write 
singularly and alone of this argument, the fatal condemnation of many the 
professors of this age, and the grace vouchsafed you that are sincere Chris- 
tians in the preservation of you. I found my spirit bound up and con- 
fined to this ; and this the Holy Ghost directed me unto, and this alone ; 
yea, and by a strong hand constrained me, as he did the prophet, Isa. viii. ; 
I was (pioo/Msvog, carried as with a stream into this channel, and it is all the 
message which the Holy Ghost hath, as by my hand, to deliver to you ; yea, 
and though Peter had written afore of the same sort of persons as dreadful 
things as I do, yet the Holy Ghost would have me to do it again, he would 
have this word set on by two witnesses; and therefore, beloved, do you en- 
tertain and regard this with the greatest attention, as that which is more 
than ordinarily intended for you by God. 

(3.) For, thirdly, these things which I write are wholly for you and your 
instruction, and therefore * I write to you,' ver. 3 ; it is to you only I wrote 
this. For as for those others whom I write about, I know it to be as to 
them but as a sentence of death and condemnation (to which, he says, they 
were ordained) pronounced by the Holy Ghost upon them, except some few 
there yet may be on whom he did shew compassion with difference, ver. 22, 
as of whom there may as yet be hopes ; and therefore take it all as yours, 
directed and intended for your admonition. And accordingly we may observe 
how, beginning with the apostates, from ver. 4, he ends with the preserved 
saints ; with divers exhortations, from verse 20 to the end ; so as indeed what 
he had so much enlarged upon concerning these apostates from verse 4 to 
verse 20, served but to afford the stronger consolation and more powerful 
provocations to incite the called unto those duties he from the first had 
intended to exhort them unto. Those that he so declares against had not 
been always profane ones of the world, that had never been wrought upon, 
or that knew not God ; but such as had been eminent professors of Chris- 
tianity, but now were corrupted in faith and manners more than the worst 
of the heathen. The wrathful vials of woe and destruction he denounceth 
against them, as determined and prophesied by Enoch, ver. 16, 17, and by 
the apostles, ver. 18. This for the introduction; the exposition itself follows. 



SECTION I. 

The first part of the exjwsition of Jiide's epistle, wherein is demonstrated God's 
discriminating (/race, as it appears in the vast diference God hath put be- 
tween enlightened temporaries that fall aicay, and his elect he doth in Christ 
preserve. 

These things premised concerning the occasion, &c., I come to the matter 
of the epistle itself, which I shall divide into two parts. 

Two doctrinals, 

And two uses suited thereunto. 

I. The first part and doctrinal is, the differing fate and condition of these 
two sorts of persons. 

1. Apostates. 

2. Preserved ones. 

The condition of which apostates is set forth in, 
(1.) Their sin. 



200 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

(2.) Their punisliment, from verse 4 unto verse 18, 19. 

"^Vhat the condition of the preserved in Christ was, is scatteredly and pro- 
miscuously set out up and down in the whole epistle. 

And as to this first doctrinal head, there is a singular use made thereof 
by the apostle, proper thereunto ; an use consisting of several directions given 
upon occasion hereof unto those preserved ones, of what their duties are, that 
they may still be kept and preserved, and this from verse 21. 

And these two — 1, the doctrinal part; and, 2, those uses — do make up 
that which I call the first part of my exposition of this epistle. 

In the second part there is, 

1. The doctrinal, which concerns the different fountain or original (as in 
God's heart of old) of both these two so vastly differing conditions of these 
two sorts of persons. 

(1.) The original causes of the preservation of the one, ver. 1, 2, 21, as 
their having been beloved in God the Father (of which reading afterwards), 
and given to Christ to be preserved and called, ver. 21, 22. 

(2.) The original of that condemnation which befell those other: ver. 4, 
* Fore-written of old unto this condemnation.' 

This second doctrine, as the former, hath an use shaped out for it, and 
proper to it, as had the former been to its doctrinal specified ; and that use 
begins explicitly, ver. 24, 25, in the close and conclusion of the epistle, 
' Now unto him that is able to keep you from falling, and to present you 
faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy, to the only 
wise God our Saviour, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, now 
and ever. Amen.' And this second-mentioned doctrinal, and this use, I 
cast together, to make up a second part of this epistle, and all serving 
properly and pertinently unto the main doctrine I at first proposed, con- 
cerning discriminating grace towards, &c. ; and those two shall be all the 
uses I mean to make thereof, these being thus made unto my hands by the 
apostle himself. 

I. As to the first part, and therein the first doctrinal head, setting forth the 
state and condition of these two sorts of persons. 

1. "WTiat concerns the apostates' condition, which I reduce unto these three 
heads : 

(1.) That these he so inveighs against had been professors of the true 
Christian religion once ; both enlightened professors and eminent professors. 

(2.) Their sin and apostasy. 

(3.) The judgment denounced against them. 

(1.) They were enlightened professors once. 

[1.] Yer. 4 speaks thus of them, ' men crept in,' &c. It would seem by that 
word that there was a solemn admission ordinarily in use amongst professors 
of Christianity, which admission was carefully heeded and observed, with a 
strictness and wariness about them, when they were admitted. And the 
apostles had given all churches warning aforehand that there would be such 
as would prove false professors in the end, would notwithstanding ' arise 
from among themselves;' and some that were * wolves in sheep's clothing,' 
as Christ gave warning, and Paul warns the Ephesians, Acts xx., who yet 
pretended their having had a work of the Holy Ghost upon them, and had 
been received ; yet on their part (they having never been truly called) their 
admission is termed but as a creeping in amongst the other that were sin- 
cere. For as Christ said to him that had not fhe wedding garment, * How 
earnest thou hither ?' and as John, * They were never truly of us,' there is 
one respect for which they are said to be crept in. And it may perhaps be 
said that many did creep in through negligence and want of strict heed and 



Chap. VII.] of election. 201 

vigilancy in those that ought to have taken them in upon a thorough know- 
ledge of Ihem. Elders and churches should diligently inquire into whom 
they receive, which in those decaying times they did not. 

[2.] These persons here in Jude were such as have ' known the grace of 
God ;' for so, ver. 4, it is said they ' turned the doctrine of grace unto wan- 
tonness,' both in loose opinions, and also practices, which, if they had not 
been enlightened in the doctrine of grace more or less, they could not be 
said to have so perverted the grace of God ; that is, the gospel way ; for the 
doctrine it consisted of is styled the grace of God, which taught the contrary: 
Tit. ii. 11, 12, ' For the grace of God, that bringeth salvation, hath appeared 
to all men, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we 
should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world,' &c. ; and 
especially the doctrine of free grace revealed therein, and the love of God in 
Christ. Likewise they are here said to have once professed the true and 
only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ, in the same 4th verse ; for now 
it is said of them, they had * denied him, the Lord that bought them,' whom 
once they had owned. Professors, then, of Christianity these had been, and 
received into their churches, though crept in. 

They were eminent professors ; which the examples he allegeth to set 
forth, and paint out their condition by, sufficiently shews. These examples 
are only such as are taken out of the Old Testament (as the manner of the 
apostles' allegations and applications unto men under the New was to do), 
yet of such therein, for the most part, as had been of men enlightened in 
the word and law, and had been persons eminent in their profession in their 
respective times. He compares them to such as came forth of Egypt at 
first, which is attributed to have been done by some light of faith wrought 
in them, which Moses testifies of them, Exod. iv. 31. The examples of 
these men whom he prosecutes the description of in the fore-front, ver. 5, 
of this epistle, * I will therefore put you in remembrance, though ye once 
knew this, how that the Lord having saved the people out of the land of 
Egypt, afterwards destroyed them that believed not.' Who indeed were 
lively types, as 1 Cor. x., of these professors now, who through the light 
and power of the gospel, by the apostles' ministry, had come forth from 
under that common bondage of wickedness in which the heathenish world 
or generality of men doth lie; who, as John says, and as Peter says of them, 
had escaped from them that lived in pollutions and errors of that world ; and 
this through the knowledge of Christ. 

His second allusion is yet higher, even to the condition of the angels that 
fell : ver. 6, ' And the angels which kept not their first estate, but left their 
own habitation, he hath reserved in everlasting chains under darkness, unto 
the judgment of the great day.' His drift is to compare like sin and punish- 
ment of the angels that fell from heaven with that of those professors, having 
once shined in their churches as angels of light, but, out of their own lusts 
and corrupt free will, have forsaken and fallen from that station, as these 
angels did. 

Thirdly, Likewise to Balaam, the man (as himself speaks) ' whom the 
Spirit of God came upon ; the man whose eyes were open, which saw the 
vision of the Almighty,' Num. xxiv. 2, 4, ' and knew the knowledge of the 
Most High,' ver. 10; and what affections he had from that enlightening, you 
know that passage. Num. xxiii. 10, also shews, * Let me die the death of the 
righteous, and let my last end be like his.' Who yet, for a reward, gave 
that cursed counsel to entice the Israelites from God, by the Moabitish 
women, drawing them also to idolatry with that mischievous design, so to 
bring a curse from God upon them. Num. xxxi. 16. 



202 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

And he also makes his allusion to Cain, the eldest son of rejection, yea, 
and of profession; for he offered sacrifice to God as well as Abel, as I 
shewed, yet in the end hated and persecuted his brother, as these also did 
the faithful Christians. 

Likewise so Korah and his company (you have all these three together, 
ver. 11). Now you read. Num. xvi. 1, 2, ' Now Korah, the son of Izhar, 
the son of Kohath, &c., took men : and they rose up before Moses, with 
certain of the children of Israel, two hundred princes of the assembly, 
famous in the congregation, men of renown.' So in like manner these were 
such as had been famous in the congi'egation of the saints in their times, 
but now were rebellious against their elders, churches, and all. 

In the same verse he says they had once been trees, that had had fruit 
on them, and after their first death in Adam, had yet had some life, sap, and 
greenness renewed in them, whereby they had put forth that fruit ; but their 
fruit was now withered, and they were utterly become without fruit, and were 
now dead a second time, twice dead ; and so incurably dead for ever, having 
no life to come into them again. 

Lastly ; His allusion is to stars, that had their place and station in the 
heavens, and gave forth a shining light, and who had seemed in their motion 
to have gone the common course of the other stars ; so these of the profes- 
sion and practice of the churches they lived in ; but now, after some progress 
of time, were discovered to be but ' wandering stars,' and to have had another 
by and eccentric motion of their own, differing from the common course of 
the rest ; crooked ways, as the psalmist terms the private paths of such, Ps. 
cxxv. 5. To instance in no more. 

(2.) As to their apostasy, and what sort of apostates they proved, and 
how great. 

[1.] As to the grace of God, which they had entertained and professed, 
their ungodly hearts turned this gi'ace into wantonness ; their lust abused 
the doctrine of God's free grace, to warrant all licentiousness or liberty to 
sin, which Peter in other words expresseth of them ; they promised, as if 
they had had God's warrant and encouragement for it, 2 Pet. ii. 18, 19, 
' For when they speak great swelling words of vanity, &c. ; while they pro- 
mise them liberty, they themselves are the servants of corruption,' &c. 
Simon Magus, they say, the first heretic of the primitive times, began this 
doctrine from the first, viz., that believers were free to do what they would; 
for men were saved by grace, and not good works ;* and taught that good 
[works] had come in but by accident, through the envy of the angels, that 
had laid bands upon men's consciences. Thus Irenaeus. 

Now, indeed, this Simon Magus having, afore he professed Christianity, 
been, through his famed sorceries, accounted the power of God, — Acts viii. 
9, 10, * But there was a certain man, called Simon, which beforetime in the 
same city used sorcery, and bewitched the people of Samaria, giving out 
that himself was some great one : to whom all gave heed, from the least to 
the greatest, saying. This man is the great power of God,' — his pride became 
such, now under Christianity, as he took upon him to be the great God him- 
self; yea, and in imitation of the commonly received doctrine among Chris- 
tians of the three persons, he affirmed of himself that he was both God the 
Father, and the Son that was crucified at Jerusalem, and the Holy Ghost ; 
and so, in imitation of the Christian doctrine, he taught that men w^ere 
saved by his grace, as being himself alone that God in three persons ; (which 
is a great confirmation also that to be saved by free grace had been the doc- 

* Liberos esse credentes agere quae velint ; secundum enim ipsius gratiam servari 
liomines, et non secundum opera justa.—Jren., lib. i. cap. 20. 



Chap. YII.] of election. 208 

trine of the apostles). But he cursedly added, besides bis other blasphemy, 
that all were at a liberty, as himself, to all sorts of actions free (as the cursed 
language of some in our age hath been), be it adultery, or any action else 
never so wicked, there being nothing, as they have said, in itself evil or un- 
lawful, nothing common, unclean ; and though these latter heretics, in this 
autumn of the gospel, when Jude wrote against them, after Magus had broke 
his neck, were ashamed to own him as their master (so Irena^us* expressly 
speaks), yet, saith he, they taught his opinions ; that is, like opinions unto 
the example of his, viz., that it was God's free gi-ace indeed that saved men 
(not Simon, they were ashamed to own that), yet so as that grace did utterly 
set them that believed at loose from anything in respect of its being sin to 
them. 

And the ground of this perverting so glorious a principle as God's love 
and free grace into so high wickedness, is that monster of self-love which, 
remaining in enlightened professors wholly unmortified, and the power of it 
remaining entire, and only directed unto other new divine objects, but is in 
them suited to a gratification unto self. Hence self in them drinks in and 
entertains this grace greedily ; but Hke as an impoisoned plant perverts the 
rain, yea, a sovereign cordial or w^ater it is bedewed or watered withal, and 
by reason of its innate venom, turns all into poison like itself, so doth self- 
love the grace of God. 

Two principles there are in man's nature, w^hich (when a man is once 
enlightened) do endanger him, though to a contrary way, viz., conscience 
and self-love. 

Conscience, not subordinated by faith, sets a man into a legal way, and 
calls upon him for strictness to satisfy conscience, but then turns all per- 
formances into legality, yea, even in gospel duties, and makes them, as it 
were, works of the law. Well, if that rock comes to be discovered, and the 
light of free grace comes in upon the soul, then self-love meets therewith, 
which receives the news thereof, that is, the doctrine of free grace, with joy, 
but converts all of it into itself, takes all to itself; and self is the most dis- 
ingenuous abominable principle that ever was. We daily see and find, even 
amongst men one with another, how self will take all the love and kindness 
that another man shews it, and entertains all with selfish ends, and makes for 
a time some returns answ^erable, but in the end proves unthankful. But to 
God (whom, to be sure, naturally we love not, no, not so much as men do one 
another), to him self-love proves a devil, and will take and swallow down all 
the love and grace that he declares and revealed towards man ; and not only 
proves unthankful to return nothing again, but will in the end turn it all 
into an encouragement to sin and injuries to God, and a nourishment of 
lusts, which are the darling natural children of self, and not into the service 
of God : Deut. xxix. 18-20, ' Lest there be any among you, man or 
woman, or family, or tribe, w^hose heart turneth away this day from the 
Lord our God, to go and serve the gods of these nations ; lest there should 
be among you a root that beareth gall and wormwood ; and it come to pass, 
when he heareth the words of this curse, that he bless himself in his heart, 
saying, I shall have peace, though I walk in the imagination of mine heart, 
to add drunkenness to thirst : the Lord will not spare him ; but then the 
anger of the Lord and his jealousy shall smoke against that man, and all the 
curses that are written in this book shall He upon him, and the Lord shall 
blot out his name from under heaven.' Yourselves that have true love to 
God, yet having this bitter root self, find such (many such) springings up. 

^ Quamvis non confiteantur nomen magistri, attainen illius sententiam doceut. — 
Iren., hb. i. cap. 30. 



204 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

And these two rocks men most ordinarily split upon ; the circumcision did 
fall upon the first, these in Jude fell foul on the other. 

You have next their sin and apostasy. And therefore you need not 
wonder at that wickedness in practice that you here read of, as that they 
ran into sodomy, fornication : ver. 7, * Even as Sodom and Gomorrah, and 
the cities abf ut them in like manner, giving themselves over to fornication, 
and going after strange flesh, are set forth for an example, sufiering the 
vengeance of eternal fire.' Ver. 8, ' Likewise also these filthy dreamers defile 
the flesh, dtspise dominion, and speak evil of dignities.' They were despisers 
of dominion, dignities, that is, of ministry, whether ecclesiastical, as apostles, 
or others set over them, as all civil magistrates' power, and therefore are said 
to persist in the ' gainsaying of Korah,' that rebelled against both Moses 
and Aaron, Num. xvi. 3. And again, ver. 10, they sinned even against 
what they knew naturally, as it follows of them, ' But these speak evil of 
those things which they know not : but what they know naturally, as brute 
beasts, in those things they corrupt themselves.' They sinning as freely as 
brnte beasts do actions of nature ; these having first sinned away their 
light, you may read the other characters that follow, ver. 11-13, 15, 16, 
' Woe unto them, lor they have gone in the way of Cain, and ran greedily 
after the error of Balaam for reward, and perished in the gainsaying of 
Korah,' &c. (as indeed what wickedness would not hereupon follow). 

Then, again, in opinions, in the 4th verse, * Denying the Lord God, and 
our Lord Jesus Christ.' For men began soon to turn or change (as the 
apostle's words is of the heathens concerning their religion) : Rom. i. 23, 
' And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like 
to corruptible man, and to birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things.' 
So these, the glory of the person of Christ, which consists only of God-man 
in one person (the man crucified at Jerusalem), into multitudes of specula- 
tions and dotages. They had begun to impose upon the saints, to set up 
another Christ, even in the time before Paul had wrote his second epistle 
to the Corinthians : 2 Cor. xi. 3, 4, * But I fear lest by any means, as the 
serpent beguiled Eve, through his subtilty, so your minds should be cor- 
rupted from the simplicity that is in Christ. For if he that cometh preach- 
eth another Jesus, whom we have not preached,' &c. And to err in this 
point concerning the person of Christ, there is nothing more easy, nor 
nothing more dangerous ; in nihilo faciUuSf in nihilo periculosius, erratur. 
For his peison consists in indivisihili, that is, in what nothing must be de- 
tracted from, or added to, and so as by either we do un-Christ him, make 
no Christ of him. There is an unity oi' faith concerning the Son of God, 
Eph. iv. 4, 5, in all ages, which if any deflect from in the least, they spoil 
and evacuate the true Christ unto their faith, and embrace a cloud, and run 
into a fancy or j^hcpnomenon, which we see hath been verified in the varieties 
of heresies about his person in elder times ; and since he is the Son of God, 
• God united into one person with a perfect man, the man Jesus, who was 
crucified at Jerusalem in our Christ, add hereto, or detract from this, and 
he ceaseth to be Christ, a Saviour ; as take away God, and take Saviour 
too ; and so of the rest. And these men did both, and so denied him, as 
the text hath it. 

Again, these were high-flown, seraphic, 'super-celestial professors, and 
were so much in spirit, as they professed, that as for all those ordinances 
Christ had appointed, and themselves had embraced and once joined withal, 
(as the word separating shews), they pretended to be above them, being 
profited or benefited thereby, and now needing no such things ; and upon 
that ground it was that they separated themselves : ver. 19, * These be they 



Chap. YII.] of election. 205 

who separate themselves, sensual, liavinnf not the Spirit,' as being past a 
building up by public preaching, or the hke action and means, as the Lord's 
supper, &c. This you may discern to have been the apostle's meaning in 
that expression, 'separating themselves,' by the opposite that follows, 'But 
you, &c., ver. 20, 'But ye, beloved, building up yourselves on your most holy 
faith, praying in the Holy Ghost.' From these, therefore, and such ordi- 
nances as those, it was they wholly sequestered themselves ; and it was not 
a setting up these same ordinances among themselves, as we do, but a total 
relinquishing of them. And yet observe, these would partake in the good 
cheer of church fellowship therein with the true Christians, and their assem- 
blings, as to such ends, when they had only feasts of love ; and yet therein 
they, by their gluttony and riot, shewed and discovered they were utterly 
without all reverence or fear of God, from whom those blessings came, 
' feeding themselves without fear,' ver. 12. But truly I would say to all 
such, that surely while their bodies needed those ordinances of meat and 
drink (the ordinances of nature), to repair their natural spirits, that surely 
their souls should need the Lord's supper and all the ordinances of grace 
much more. 

They pretended unto a living in the Spirit, and being filled with the 
Spirit; and hence it is that the apostle says of them, ver. 19, ' These be 
they who separate themselves, sensual, having not the Spirit,' as in perfect 
contradiction unto what they gave out of themselves, and what they pre- 
tended to, the most of any other. And this their life in Spirit, they pro- 
fessed to consist, 1st, In points of knowledge of higher mystery than the 
tenets of that common salvation Jude speaks of did (which yet were gene- 
rally held forth by the communit}^ of Christians, and once delivered by the 
apostles), but they pretended unto a knowledge more sublime, and far more 
spiritual, which the apostle Paul (it beginning in his time) aims at, whilst 
he reflects thus upon them, ' Science,' or knowledge (as they cried it up), 

* but falsely so called,' 1 Tim. vi. 20 ; as also the evangelist John, 'Depths,' 
as they speak ' (says he), but ' of Satan,' Rev. ii. 24. ' The common 
salvation,' as Jude here, ver. 3, ' once delivered to the saints ; ' 'the com- 
mon faith,' as Tit. i. 4 ; this they, as too common, despised, because of 
the commonness of it. 

And, 2dly, They pretended to incomes of the Sj^irit, revelations and en- 
joyments, &c., which their doctrines and that Spirit raised them up unto, 
above what the doctrine of Christ and faith in him did elevate the true 
Christians unto (though that fills them often with joy unspeakable and full of 
glory), so as they boasted themselves to be the only spiritual men. L-e- 
naeus says that they styled themselves, (pban irvrjiJ^anyM, naturally spiritual, 
and all other men, ^ikt/xo/, living but an animal life, as appeareth by Ter- 
tullian's title of a book, and themselves to be spirited above all gracious 
actings or habits, beyond an having the Spirit communicated by ordinances. 
' Sensual,' says the apostle of them, ' not having ihe Spirit.' And as to 
these their rants and high-flownness, the apostle, by simihtudes, fully express- 
eth both them and their doctrines : ' Clouds they are,' ver. 12, that soar high, 
and the emptier the higher, ' but without water,' that is, any solid doctrine to 
make their hearts, or others, fruitful ; and ver. IG, ' Their mouths speak great 
swelling things,' s,uina modura turgida, v-niooyxa, or hke bubbles swelled with 
wind, which therefore Peter, 2 epist. ii. 8, termed ' swelhng words of vanity.' 
But as for this high pretence of the Spirit, we also find it in 2 Cor. xi. 4, 

* For if he that cometh preachcth another Jesus, whom we have not preached, 
or if ye receive another spirit, which ye have not received, or another gospel, 
which ye have not accepted,' &c. ; and the reason of it was, as in those words 



206 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

afore, ' The simplicity ' of the gospel, of the person, that is, Christ, and the 
truths about him, which thev look upon as too mean, and not high enough 
for them. But what spirit that was they had got instead of ours, and which 
inspected * them, and made a supply to them instead of our Holy Ghost by 
ordinances, and which blew them up above all apostolical truths, you may 
inform yourselves from the same apostle, in the very same chapter, if you 
read ver. 13-15, ' Raging waves of the sea, foaming out their own shame ; 
wandering stars, to whom is reserved the blackness of darkuess for ever,' &c. 
This for their apostasy. 

(3.) As for the judgments he denounceth against them, they are the most 
dreadful. For Capernaum's case is a universal measure, that the higher 
men are lift up in enlightenings once, and in their affections unto spiritual 
things heavenwards, if they apostatise, the lower they fall into hell hereafter, 
and a diabolical frame of spirit hereupon. This Heb. vi. 4th and 8th verses 
shews. 

Now the dreadfulness of their judgment is set out, 

[l.J In general, ver. 4, this condemnation with an eminency and tran- 
scendency. 

[2.] Particularly. 1, * Destroyed,' ver. 5 ; 2, * reserved ' irrecoverably ' in 
everlasting chains ' under darkness, to the judgment of the great day, ver. 
6, as the devils, to whom in their fall they had there been Ukened; 3, ' suffer- 
ing the vengeance of eternal fire,' ver. 7 ; 4, ' woe to them,' verse 11 ; 5, 
' They perish in the gainsaying of Korah ;' and 6th, ' are trees twice dead, 
to be plucked up by the roots,' ver. 12 ; 7, 'to them is reserved the black- 
ness of darkness for ever.' Not darkness only, but ' the blackness of dark- 
ness ;' if there be any place in hell darker than another, these shall have 
it ; and darkness is attributed to hell, as ' the inheritance of light ' is to 
heaven. 

The sole observation I raise from hence is, that in such ages wherein the 
light of the gospel shines brightest and with most power, in that age God in 
his providence disposeth it so, that there shall be enlightened professors to 
the highest eminency of profession, that fall into the worst of errors, and the 
most abominable of practices. 

Where there hath been such a summer, look for a great fall of the leaf ; 
and this, instead of being a stumble or scandal to any against the profession 
of the true religion, doth rather give a witness and seal unto the soundness 
and power of it. Such an age breeeds up desperate apostates, like as the 
excessive heat in Africa doth monsters. The primitive times produced this, 
and also the times of Luther and Calvin, and of those other holy reformers, 
did the like, which the papists object against us ; and our own experience 
in this age, in this nation, hath seen the same ; so as we may say, As it was 
then, so it is now. Nor could such hellish abominations have been made 
even principles of religion amongst us, had not our light and privileges in 
that respect been alike, had not heaven been let down amongst us, or that 
we had not been lift up to heaven (as they were), this had not fallen out. 
I could make a great and large application of all these things, unto the com- 
plexion of twenty years last past, which was the autumn of a glorious sum- 
mer foregone ; and I believe that yourselves, in these characters I have drawn 
out of Jude, made by him of primitive deserters, have had jom thoughts all 
along, in this my discourse of them, upon a reflexion on our times past which 
you have seen, and your experience had in your view ; and the monsters of our 
times have been painted unto the life, in these portraitures of Jude's drawing 
of those of old, of many principles, doctrines, and actings that have been 
* Qu. ' inspired ' ? — Ed. 



Chap. VII. J of election. 207 

found amongst us. The devil hath read over his old collegian methods or 
lectures anew, but did it with some refinements, that old serpent growing 
wiser and learncder every age, and attempers his addition of falsehood to 
the temperament of the ages. 

The use of the doctrine from those words in Jude 24, 25, * Now unto 
him that is able to keep you from ftilling, and to present you fiiultless be- 
fore the presence of his glory with exceeding joy, to the only wise God 
our Saviour, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, now and ever. 
Amen.' 

To provoke you, the called and preserved ones in Christ, to give glory to 
God, and adore him for those dilfcring dispensations of his, with difference 
from those other professors, this doxology at the close of the epistle, like a 
strong whirlpool, draws down and swallows up into itself the main stream 
and current of the whole epistle, as matter of praise to God, and that is the 
general scope of these two last verses. And it is evident that the main drift 
of that stream, from the first to the last, had been to shew how the love of 
the Father, and the mercy of Christ, had been the original causes of the 
calling, and the contriving causes of the keeping and preservation of those 
called ones, whenas others had been not only left, but fore- written, unto so 
sad a fate ; so the epistle begins, ver, 1, 2, 'Jude the servant of Jesus Christ, 
and brother of James, to them that are sanctified by God the Father, and pre- 
served in Jesus Christ, and called : mercy unto you, and peace, and love, be 
multiplied.' So it runs on to verse the 4th, * For there are certain men 
crept in unawares, who w^ere before of old ordained to this condemnation ; 
ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness, and denying 
the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ ;' and appointed to this 
condemnation that follows. Thus the epistle begins, and so it continues in 
ver. 21, ' Keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our 
Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life.' And thus drawing to a conclusion, the 
apostle celebrateth God for all these specifications, the comprehensive drift 
of which celebration, I take up and methodise thus: 

1. He takes in all those attributes or acts of God and Christ, mentioned 
afore, either in ver. 1, 2, or in the 21st verse ; as love, mercy, which are all 
one wdth free-grace, and that we should for these glorify God and our Saviour 
is implicitly intended. 

2. Those attributes and acts which have had an hand hitherto, and must 
have, and still continue to carry on and perfect our salvation ; as (1) his 
power, * to him that is able,' ver. 24, which supposeth (2) his willingness 
to do it, and which being engaged, it will be sure to perfect it to the last 
and greatest act of it ; which last act or scene he sets forth to be a 
' presenting them faultless, &c., before the presence of his glory, with ex- 
ceeding great joy.' (3) That great attribute of wisdom, which had secretly 
and hiddenly in his foreknowledge laid and contrived the whole of the 
design, from first to last, so as to glorify his grace the most that might be 
towards us. 

[1.] To the wise God, 

[2. j The only wise God ; and this as shewn in being our Saviour, for all 
which give glory to him again. 

3. He mentions the ends which God had in these several designs in lov- 
ing us, calling us, and preserving us, and to that end lays afore them the 
demonstration of his (1) glory, (2) dominion, (3) power, (4) magnificence, 
as Beza renders the word ixiya\(j)cb\r\ ; and with these, and for these also 
themselves, celebrate him also, as those which eminentl}' and above all ap- 
peared therein. 



208 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

4. He specifies the time and the contrivance of our doing this : (1.) now 
at present ; (2.) for ever. The love out of which he did all this was from 
everlasting, and therefore good reason we should adore him for ever. There 
is added the whole of our souls giving this praise, contracted and poured 
out in an Amen. 

You w^ill say unto me, Is not this doxology or praise given to God only 
upon that general account, that it is ordinarily elsewhere given, as intending 
only the setting forth of his praise, what a glorious, wise, powerful God he 
is in himself? And upon that account only to give glory to him, as the 
apostle seems also to do, 1 Tim. vi. 15, 16, in that passage, ' Which in his 
times he shall shew, who is the blessed and only potentate, the King of 
kings, and Lord of lords, who only hath immortality, dwelling in the light 
which no man can approach unto, whom no man hath seen or can see ; to 
whom be honour and power everlasting. Amen.' 

My answer is, 1, That this being so short an epistle for the matter of it, 
and that yet it should have in the close a large enumeration of attributes 
(larger for number enumerated) in this his doxology, than in the close of great 
and large epistles w^e find the apostles to have used, this must have some 
special reason for it, as relating to the eminency of the drift and subject 
matter therein. 

2. And seeing every tittle thereof falls in so aptly, and suits unto that 
foregoing matter and scope of the body of the epistle itself, which tends to 
magnify God in his love and grace in electing, calling, preserving to the 
end, in which his wisdom, power, glory, majesty, dominion do appear. 

3. And thirdly. Two of the titles of God here, for which he gives him 
praise, do eminently relate to his grace in electing, loving us, calling us, 
and preserving us unto the end : namely, 1, ' To him that is able to keep 
vou,' &c., which begins the conclusive doxology, ver. 24. And ' to God and 
our Saviour,' ver. 25. This shews particularly, that what went afore is here 
again considered ; and therefore to him, as such a God, be glory and power, 
&c. And for this reason all the other of glory, majesty, dominion, power, 
as contributors to this salvation, are to be included, and glory to be given 
for them. 

4. The instances of the like doxologies, in other epistles, warrant this ; 
as Rom. xvi. 25, 26, 27, ' Now to him that is of power to stablish you, 
according to my gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the 
revelation of the mystery, which was kept secret since the world began, but 
now is made manifest, and by the scriptures of the prophets, according to 
the commandment of the everlasting God, made known to all nations for the 
obedience of faith : to God only wise, be glory through Jesus Christ for 
ever. Amen.' In which the principal matter of that epistle is summarily 
wrapt, as the special ground of that praise given to God therefor : and 
therefore that epistle is a complete system of the doctrine of the gospel, 
which had been the great subject delivered in that epistle ; and he winds 
in, as you see, and contracts the brief or main of all, as matter for which 
God is to be praised and adored by us. And Jude doth here the like, and 
exceeds that other apostle in enumeration of attributes and praises. The 
like you find done by Paul to the Hebrews ; he, in a prayer, summing up 
the most material matters of that foregoing epistle in the close of it, Heb. 
xiii. 20 ; for which, see my sermon on that text. 

So as, although I will not wholly limit this doxology in Jude unto the 
matter of his epistle (though most eminently it is suited to it), but also 
allow it to be extended unto all of this glory attributed to God in himself 
(as was objected), yet upon this warrant I shall at least handle all the 



Chap. YII.J of election. 209 

particulars, only as they may and do relate unto the love and mercy of God 
the Father, and of Christ, as the original and continuing causes of oar 
calling, preservation, &c. As this love is set off by those his differing dis- 
pensations unto the other apostates, as they have been opened ; and 
thereby, by way of z/.se, I shall endeavour to provoke you to bless God for 
each one of them, as he doth here those he wrote unto ; and shall briefly 
shew how all these attributes are to be adored by us, in relation to these 
dispensations. 

1. Go up to the original cause. Take, beloved, ' the love of God the 
Father,' ver. 1, and bring it down hither, and say, and cry aloud, 'To the 
only wise God and our Saviour, be glory,' &c., for that his love. Bless 
him that he hath such, and so great a love in him, that he can love some 
of his creatures so well, who had not, nor could give anything to him, to 
move him to it ; with which the apostle concludes his doctrine of election :. 
Kom. xi. 35. That he hath loved them so wonderfully, so immutably, so 
infinitely, in his electing love, that although you read he is willing, f(*r his 
glory, to pass by others, and to take an occasion to shev,f the power of his 
wrath on such as have prepared themselves by sin for destruction ; that 
yet he hath it in his heart, nature, and purposes to love some so singularly 
transcendently,. who was bound to none more than to deal with them 
according to the law of their creation, which was and is the covenant of 
works. Draw but a draught in your own thoughts, an idea of what a love 
our doctrine of election out of Scriptures hath given ; a love so great, as 
everlasting as himself ; so free, unlimited, absolute, peremptory, unchange- 
able, invincible, and the same in such respects wherewith he loves the 
same ; * and then bless him that such a love is in him, w^hich must needs 
render him lovely, though thou hadst no share in it ; a love of the greatest 
intimacy, ' Beloved in God the Father.' Let Beza quarrel the phrase as 
improper ; to my soul, and that as it hath been opened, it is most expres- 
sive, importing that 3'ou lie next his very heart, you lay in his very bowels ; 
matrix, in the womb, or mother of his will, as that word in the Canticles 
signifies : Cant. iv. 9. Moses says, his ' people are in his hands ; ' as 
Deut. xxxiii. 8, * Yea, he loved the people ; all his saints are in thy hands : 
and they sat down at thy feet ; 6very one shall receive of thy words.' And 
afterwards he says they are ' in his everlasting arms.' And being in his 
hand, Christ says, ' None shall pull them out.' Well, but you are nearer 
yet, you are in his heart, in the very womb of God, his bowels ; and a 
piece of that must be pulled out, if you be pulled out. The phrase imports, 
as I have shewed, out of 1 Thes. i. 1, and 2 Thes. i. 1, ' The Church in 
God the Father, and in Jesus Christ.' You would be safe enough in either 
of them, but for sureuess, you are in both. 

2. Consider his commending you, and giving you to Christ, as those that 
were his own, and whom he had loved ; and had loved them with the same 
love he had loved himself, as John xvii. tells you. And that, therefore, by 
all the love there was between them two, God the Father and himself, he 
supplicates, that God would be sure to love and take care of them. Christ 
remembered it well, and it stuck with him when he was to die. ' Thine 
they were, and thou gavest them me ; and I have kept them in thy name.' 
Things dear and precious to us, we lay up in safest places. If a king hath 
a dearest spouse, an only one of his love, and there be armies and dangers 
round about in the dominions where she is, he will be sure to stow her so 
as to be preserved in some castle that is impregnable, if he have any such, 

♦ Qu. 'the Son'?— Ed. 

VOL. IX. O 



210 OF ELECTION. [EOOK III. 

and with a garrison to defend her. Now God hath done so with you in 
Christ ; he hath committed you to Christ, you are the preserved in Christ, 
and he is your rock, defence, strong tower. Even all that the Psalmist so 
much and so often celebrates and inculcates, — that way is fulfilled in him : 
nor are you kept in Christ only as in your castle, but as with a garrison, 
which is all the power in God : 1 Peter i. 5, ' Kept as with a garrison,' as 
the word signifieth. If any have any jewels, where will he bestow them ? In 
a cabinet, a strong iron chest. Remember who is your cabinet : it is Christ, 
who yet is more worth than all your jewels : in him are hid all God's 
treasures ; as of knowledge, and wisdom, and riches, of merit unsearchable 
to save you ; so also yourselves, your persons, your salvation are laid up 
in him, as God's choicest jewels ; and as, indeed, for whom all those other 
treasures are designed : never fear plundering, you are as safe as all ; yea, 
' your life is hid with Christ in God,' Col. iii. Hid as treasures are, and 
therefore you are as sure and safely lodged as Christ himself is. 

3. *You have the mercy of Jesus Christ, both inver. 2. andver. 21, ' The 
sure mercies' of that David, Christ, as they are called : Isa. Iv. 3, 4, and 
Acts xiii. 34 compared. These are the summity, the height, the sum of 
mercies God hath to bestow ; the mercies of eternity. Take all other 
mercies bestowed on the world, which yet are infinite 'riches of goodness, 
patience and long-sufi'ering,' Ptom. ii., that are spent upon wicked men, to 
whom also he vouchsafeth such precious gifts, enlightenings, tastings, which 
you read of, short of grace ; yet if you could suppose all such mercies that 
have been, from Cain the eldest son of wickedness, shewn and bestowed 
upon all of that sort, to the end of the world ; if God should heap them all, 
and every one of them, in never so great measure, of such kind of mercies 
together, with all those gifts of enlightenings, and that man also were to live 
as many ages as the years of each man's life that have lived in a succession 
amount to, which would make a great hole in eternity to come, yet one call 
of his grace and loving kindness unto those, wbom in Christ he terms the 
meanest, poorest, despicablest, miserablest of his called ones, is infinitely 
more worth than them all : for all that would not amount to the pardon of 
so much as the least sin. 0, therefore, look to the mercy of Christ, as 
ver. 21. In Ps. xxxvi., David having first discoursed at large of God's 
common mercies towards the wickedest of men, whose wickedness he had 
set out from the first verse to the fifth, he then stands admiring at the 
infinite vast heaps of mercies which he leaves with them, notwithstanding 
that wickedness ; of which I understand the next immediate words : ver. 5, 6, 
* Thy mercy, Lord, is in the heavens ; and thy faithfulness reacheth unto 
the clouds. Thy righteousness is like the groat mountains ; thy judgments 
are a great deep ; Lord, thou preservest man and beast.' Which is to 
be understood common mercies vouchsafed to man, such as to beasts: that 
were he not a God that lives in heaven, and in perfect blessedness, from 
whom those mercies came, he would never leave them with them, nor be in 
that manner good unto them. He then, in the contemplation of those other 
so far excelling mercies we are speaking of, with which he pursues his 
children that know him, breaks out, ver. 7-9, * How excellent is thy 
loving-kindness, God ! Therefore the children of men put their trust 
under the shadow of thy wings : they shall be abundantly satisfied with the 
fatness of thy house : and thou shalt make them drink of the river of thy 
pleasures. For with thee is the fountain of light ; in thy light shall we see 
light.' 0, therefore, bless God for this his mercy in Christ; and the 
mercy of this Christ our Saviour. 

4. Bless God for the continuance of these both from everlasticg, after they 



Chap. VII.] of election. 211 

had been set upon their persons by the Father, until our calling, ver. 1, and 
until their being presented to himself before the presence of his glory, as 
ver. 24. The real import of the word multipUedy says de Quiros, in ver. 2, 
imports three things. 

(1.) A continuation of them. 

(2.) And that by a multiplication. 

(3.) Until all be presented and completed. 

(1.) Bless him for the continuation of these towards you, his love and 
mercy, as hath been opened. The constancy whereof I have opened ; for 
such, and so great a love to continue the same, fixed and firm, from everlast- 
ing to everlasting, is of a long continuance ; and for God to have you in his 
heart, eye, what can be more ? No lover that ever was, had him or them 
he loved continually in his actual thoughts, much less for an eternity of 
time. This is only proper to the eternal and unchangeuble God. And that 
God hath had his people thus in his heart, Isa. xlix. 16, shews, * Behold I 
liave graven thee upon the palms of my hands ; thy walls are continually 
before me.' God did portray a model or draught of what he would make, 
and rear them up to be in glory in the end, and he bore it continuallv in his 
heart and thoughts ; and did set them, ' as a seal upon his heart and arm,' 
Cant. viii. 6, as the Church speaks of his love, ver. 7. It is said of Christ, 
who had chosen them (as God had done), that ' whom he loved, he loved to 
the end,' John xiii. 1. It ceased not after it first began, Isa. Ixiv. 5, ' In 
those is continuance, and we shall be saved.' In tlio^e ; what thinf^s are 
those ? His ways of mercy and grace, spoken of before, which poor souls 
remembering, and having recourse unto by faith ; though God be wroth for 
a while when we have sinned, yet in those ways of mercy is continuance, 
and we shall be saved. I quoted afore the 36th Psalm for the difl:erence of 
those mercies which God vouchsafes his elect, that know him and trust in 
him, from those that are common to the rest of the world ; this in ver. 7-9. 
And then he continues, ver. 10, '0 continue thy loving-kindness to them 
that know thee, and thy righteousness to the upright in heart.' The word 
in the original, as also in the margin, is varied, is * draw out at length.' 
It hath been, one would think, drawn out unto a length great enough, in 
that it hath been continued from everlasting ; but these mercies, and this 
infinite loving-kindness, will be drawn out to an infinity of length further, 
even to eternity in heaven, which follows, ' In thy light we shall see li<^ht.' 
They will stretch and reach from everlasting to everlasting, Ps. ciii. 

(2.) They continue and are drawn out at length, and so have been by their 
being multiplied, which was another thing I opened upon ver. 2, * Renewed 
every moment.' And this still proves a higher aggrandizing of this. As they 
say of beams, or the species, or visual images that flow from the object unto 
the eye, that they are a multiplication of the same image, without interrup- 
tion falling upon the eye, such as those rays and wings of the sun, it is but 
one and the same love multiplied in the acts of it continually ; as justifica- 
tion is said to be but actus unicns, and yet is renewed all of the same every 
moment ; so both is God's choice and love (which shews * over-abundantly), 
that is, what it appertained to ; yea, there is not only a new act of remem- 
brance, but a cannot fon/et put upon it, Isa. xlix. is. 'I will yet choose 
Jerusalem,' Isa. xiv. 1, and Zcch. ii. 12. Oh ! at once comfort thyself, and 
bless and adore God ; thou multipliest to sin, and he multiplieth to love ; 
thou multipliest breaches between him and thee, and he ' multiplieth to 
pardon,' Isa. Iv. 7. And the older you grow, the more you do need this 
multiplication of love and mercy the more : for your sins, take them fi'om 
* Qu. ' flows ' ?— Ed. 



212 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

first to last, are multiplied. And all your sins of youth, middle age, are 
afore him, and would one day also ' encompass you round about,' as Ps. 
xlix. 5, were it not that God multiplies to pardon. Thus also grace, con- 
tinuing to sanctify, is renewed day by day, 2 Cor. iv. 16. Yea, night and 
day ; yea, every moment : Isa. xxvii. 3, ' I the Lord do keep it ; I will 
water it every moment : lest any hurt it, I will keep it night and day.' 
bless him and adore him for this ! 

(3.) It is continued until all is perfected, even as here, till thou comest 
to be presented afore the presence (ver. 24) of his glory, and then thou art 
safe enough. Thus, 2 Thes. i. 11, ' Wherefore also we pray always for 
you, that our God would count you worthy of this calling, and fulfil all the 
good pleasure of his goodness, and the work of faith with power ; and Ps. 
xxiii. 6, ' Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life ; 
and I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever.' 

And lastly, When thou art in heaven, that is the time when love and the 
kindness of love are drawn out, and drawn at length indeed : ' That in ages 
to come he might shew the exceeding riches of his grace, in his kindness 
towards us through Jesus Christ.' Heaven is but the kindness of God, 
heaped upon kindness ; kindness indeed, and this continued in the fulness 
of it to all eternit}'. 

Hitherto of our celebration of God for those attributes or efiects thereof, 
which we find to have an hand and influence into our salvation in the fore- 
going part of this epistle. 

I come now^ to those attributes and acts, which here in the conclusion of 
his epistle he more directly incites us to give God the glory of, for those his 
dispensations towards us, that are called and chosen with such a vast difi'er- 
ence from others, as eminently appearing therein ; w^hich part of the epistle 
begins at ver. 24, ' Now unto him that is able to keep you from falling, and 
to present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy.' 
These words that celebrate his power, &c., have two scopes or aspects, as 
Estius hath observed. 

1. The one implicit, yet strongly implied, viz., a support or prop unto 
faith, from what in God they should further eye, besides his mercy and love, 
as which are engaged to preserve them, and that is his power, ' To him 
that is able,' &c., or, as in Rom. xvi. 25, ' To him that is of power to 
establish you.' 

The 2d scope is explicit, and that is, to give glory to God for that his 
power joined with his love, as that which would certainly keep them to the 
end ; and that he should provoke them to praise God for this, afore the 
work was carried through to perfection (as in those he wrote to, as yet it 
was not), imports withal God's faithfulness to be joined with that power, 
which they might be assured of, he would put forth, even all the power that 
was in him to perform it. 

Three particular things, then, you have further here to celebrate God for 
in this verse. 

1. His power ; that is engaged by his love to carry you through, ' to him 
that is able,' &c ; and that his power is said to be engaged to be put forth, 
(1.) in this life, to keep us from falHng ; (2.) when jon come to die, to 
present you, &c. 

Where, secondly, comes (as a new head to be considered) the end or issue 
of all, as that which his love had designed (though it is his power must efi'ect 
it), which is to bring you to the presence of his own glory faultless; for 
which so glorious end and issue of all you are to glorify God. 

Thirdly, the exceeding joy that will be in God and Christ's heart, when 



Chap. VII.] of election. 213 

be hath brought you safe home to himself, which argues his great and con- 
stant love. This as to the setting out that division of the words, and the 
heads drawn out from thence, which I am to enlarge upon. 

I. Celebrate his power ; whereto, 

1. In general : Ps. lix. 10, 17, ' But I will sing of thy power; yea, I will 
sing aloud of thy mercy in the morning : for thou hast been my defence and 
refuge in the day of my trouble. Unto thee, my strength, will I sing : 
for God is my defence, and the God of my mercy ;' where you see mercy 
and power are still joined ; as also in Ps. Ixii. 11, 12. In Eph. iii., having 
first prayed, ver. 19, * And to know the love of Christ, which passeth know- 
ledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God :' he then adds this 
doxology made to his power, as that which must work and eflect all in them, 
ver. 20, * Now to him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that 
we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us.' The power 
that worketh in us is all one as to say, the power that is engaged in us, by 
having begun, is interested to continue to work. And you see how, upon 
the account of that alone, he gives glory to him (even as here) : ver. 21, 
' Unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, 
world without end. Amen.' And as his love passeth knowledge, so, for 
our comfort, his power doth. The like to both you have, Rom. xvi. 25, 

* Now to him that is of power to establish you, be glory for ever :' ver. 27, 

* To God only wise, be glory through Jesus Christ for ever. Amen.' 

2. But particularly, bless his power for two things. 

(1.) For that it engaged to ' keep you from falling' in this Hfe ; that is, 
both from apostasy, which you have seen others run into, and in this life 
from falling into gross sins, which is Peter's sense of falling : 2 Pet. i. 10, 

* If you do these things, you shall never fall ;' that is, into any foul, scan- 
dalous miscarriage. As also Paul to the Galatians, chap. v. 16, 'This I say 
then, walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfil the lusts of the flesh.' And 
for that also, secondly, that if they do fall, they shall rise again, and by 
repentance shew themselves ' clear in that matter,' as if they had never 
sinned. This is to keep you so, as in the end and issue of all to be blame- 
less : and to carry us in this manner through all rocks, hazards, and dangers, 
as in respect of sinnings, is a far greater miracle than to steer a ship through 
the most dangerous seas that are known to be in the world, or to carry a 
candle through a vast heath in the midst of winds and storms, and to pre- 
serve it from being extinguished. 

(2.) The second thing is at j^our deaths, and at the day of judgment to 

* present you faultless ;' which faultlessness must needs be understood of 
perfect holiness : for it is that faultlessness which is at your coming to glory, 
and is a further degree than that of being kept from falling, or a being 
reduced again in this life ; for this faultlessness at death is to be without all 
sin, ' made perfect.' Is it possible, says the guilty and deliled soul, that 
ever I should be presented faultless, especially on such a sudden as the 
instant of death ? Yes ; God hath power in him to do it : Eph. v. 27, 

* That he might present you to himself a glorious church, not having spot, 
or wrinkle, or any such thing ; but that it should be holy, and without 
blemish.' And there needs no purgatory for it, but Christ's blood, and the 
eflficacy thereof (so in the words afore), * who gave himself for his church, 
that he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word.' 
glorify his love that this is, and hath been, the design thereof: Eph. i. 4, 

* According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, 
that we should be holy and without blame before him in love.' Ye see that 



214 . OF ELECTION. ' [BoOK III* 

was the first of his thoughts, as the order of its placirg there shews ; and 
indeed it is a greater benefit, and more than glory. And again, glorify hi^ 
power that is able to efi'ect this in you, when you look upon your ' vile 
bodies,' now vile or base ; or if jonr souls would cast an eye into their 
graves, and see how they lie in dust and rottenness, and then consider that 
God's power is able, and will present them to himself as glorious as Christ's 
body now is ; the shine that came from which is, and was, more glorious 
than the sun in its strength, as Paul testifies. Acts xxvi., who himself saw 
it. And yet be assured his power will effect this for you : Philip, iii. 21, 
' Who shall change our vile body, that it may be like unto his glorious body, 
according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things to 
himself.' And now from off the present condition of your bodies cast your 
eyes upon your souls, with all the more abominable filth and rottenness in 
them, and believe that that power that subdues all things [to] itself wilJ 
change them into so glorious souls in holiness, as they shall be able to beai- 
the presence of God's own glory without dazzling or winking. bless in 
God his power ! ' To him that is able thus to present you, to him be 
glory, &c. Amen.' This the first main head, to present you faultless in 
the other life. 

The second thing proposed was the presenting of you before the presence 
of his glory, and your enjoyment of it, which is the ultimate end that God 
aimed at to bring us unto in his first loving us, calling us, and preserving 
us ; the end, as it is called, which he made with our Lord Christ : James v. 
11, * You have seen the end of the Lord,' says he, as if it had been spoken 
in reference there unto that which Paul says, Heb. ii. 9, ' We see Jesus 
crowned with glory and honour ;' that was the end God made of him. And 
this end of Christ is the enjoyment of the presence of God's glory; as Christ 
says of himself, Ps. xvi. 10, 11, ' Thou wilt shew me the path of life : in 
thy presence is fulness of joy ; at thy right hand there are pleasures for 
evermore.' There is an enjoyment of God in and by effects of his, and 
means that manifest him, whether of his law, our graces, or creatures. 
And there is an enjoyment of his immediate presence. And thus Hales, 
that ancient schoolman (whom Aquinas and Bonaventure were scholars to), 
did clearly, and with evidence, long since state and difference it.* There is 
a twofold knowledge of God, savs he, one by his effects, the other by his 
presence to and with the soul. And he is present, says he, to the soul, in 
that he presents or makes present that blessedness which is in himself 
(which are the very words of our text here). And the one,t the first, he 
says, is not of grace, but nature ; but the other of grace. That is, say I, 
the one was by the knowledge of God, which by creation Adam was made 
for; the other is by Christ and grace only in glory: Ps. xvi. 11, ' Thou 
wilt shew me the path of life ;' and is termed in Scripture the glory of God, 
which Christ receives us unto. Now this glory of ours is not the issue, or 
event, or close which God's love brings us unto, but it was the original 
design of all at first ; both unto which he hath subordinated all things (' All 
things are yours, and you are Christ's, and Christ is God's,' 1 Cor. iii. 22, 
23), as that which above all things his heart hath been in ; this is the 
hdoTiia, or the ' good pleasure of his will.' 

Now, therefore, that whereby I would provoke you to bless God for is 
this, that if our glory (as it is ours) be not only the issue of his election, 

* Duplex est cognitio Dei, una per effectus suos, ah'a per pr£esentiam sui apud 
animam. Preesens autem est in quantum prsesentat seu prtesentem facit beatuchneiu 
quae est in ipso. — Alexander de Hales, par, 3, quest. 61. 

t Una est sine gratia ; altera per gratiam. — Hid. 



Ckap. YII.J of election. 215 

but a primary intended end, and tlie direct ultimate end taken in for itself, 
out of pure and mere love intended, then there is all reason and obligation 
on our part that we should give all glory unto God for this, not only that 
himself intended it should be for his glory, but that he in such a mauner 
also intended it as your glory, yea, and his own glory to be the immediate 
cause of yours ; and this end of all out of grace to be the close and last 
scene of this continued plot and story. There is all reason, I say, for this, 
&c. ; for nothing can be more proper or suitable than that for glory thus 
intended and designed to us we return glory unto God again, especially when 
God's glory is the principal and immediate cause of ours, as here in the 
text you see it is made to be. And therefore no wonder if in heaven the 
whole of their time runs out, and is spent in glorifying God. For why ? 
Their glory riseth immediately from the glory of God communicated unto 
them as the cause. And his being glorified in us ariseth not from the glory 
which he hath bestowed upon us, but from our being presented afore the 
presence of his glory ; and so it is but the return or the reflection of that 
to him and upon him which they receive from him, glory for glory, not only 
given and received, but for glory given, as the immediate cause of that glory 
received; and therefore be provoked to give gloiy to God, as ver. 25, for 
his presenting you to the presence of his glory, the fountain of them and 
all, as the design of his pure love and heart towards you, as out of verse 1 
I shewed. 

The third thing to bless God for is, that himself will preseiit you to him- 
self with exceeding great joy ; which joy is mutual, not on your parts only, 
but on his also. (What joy will be on your parts, I handled in the use of 
direction.) For as it is his joy he admits you into, — ' Enter into thy Mas- 
ter's joy,' — so it is the joy of his heart to admit you into it, as well as yours 
to be admitted. And to testify this, he presents you to himself, and rejoiceth 
with infinite joy (when that time comes) in doing of it. 

You may measure what this joy on God's part will then be. 

1. By what joy is in his heart at their conversion, which is indeed the first 
calling of you into glory, as Peter hath it, 1 Pet. v. 10. There is one whole 
chapter- on purpose spent upon it, to declare the joy that is in God's heart 
at that time. 

Both in the parallelf of the lost sheep and groat, which is spoken of the 
Lord himself, and shepherd of that lost sheep, who also, ver. 6, says unto 
his friends, ' Rejoice with me,' so as it is God and Christ himself that are 
the great rejoicers, for he calls upon his friends to rejoice with him. The 
bridegroom that hath the bride rejoiceth more than the friends of the bride- 
groom. 

Secondly, In the parable of the lost son, ver. 22, the father said to liis 
servants, * let us eat and be merry.' It is the father says it, ver. 23 ; and 
these parables are applied unto what joy is in heaven upon the conversion of 
a sinner here in this world, ver. 7. Thus in that parable, ' I say unto you, 
that joy is likewise in heaven,' and the scope in both is therefore chiefly to 
set forth what is the heart of God the Father, under the representation of 
the father of a prodigal. Now, if this joy be at the initiation and birth of 
an heir of glory, how much more is there in the heart of God and Christ 
upon his coronation, and upon his first arrival in heaven, afore the presence 
of God's glory, to be for ever made partaker of it. 

Thirdly, There is this farther manifest reason for it, because * the fulness 
of time,' so long afore designed and waited for, is now come, and also the 
consummation of that which all his decrees about us from everlasting had 
* Luke XV. — Ed. f Qu. ' parable ? ' — Ed. 



216 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

centred m, and primarily pitciied upon, as that which was the end of all 
aimed at, and that which he had from before the world so much pleased 
himself in with the thoughts of that day ; for his delights aforehand were in 
them, as Prov. viii., even so long ago, and still continued ; and to delight so 
long beforehand, must needs produce full and complete joy, when the thing 
delighted in is accomplished, and did begin the first consummation of all 
them delights, as this first presenting us afore him is. Moreover, between his 
electing of them and this consummation, he had called them, which is indeed 
a kind of new election, and the first beginning of the execution of the first 
election, and bears the image of it. Look as a merchant having launched a 
ship to sea (and such our calling is), for a great, long, and dangerous voyage, 
with certain hopes of great returns of profit if he come home safe in her, 
and proves also a ship that hath run through many hazards and dangers of 
shipwreck and piracies (as we through manifold temptations, &c.) ; and look 
as the merchant or owner rejoiceth when his ship doth come home so rich 
laden, through such great adventures, so doth God at our safe arrival in the 
haven, to which metaphor the Scripture once and twice alludes. 

Now that God will entertain you with such an exceeding joy and triumph 
too (as the word here imports), afi'ords the highest ground unto you to bless 
him, and give glory unto him in the faith and confidence hereof beforehand. 
For nothing can more argue that this glory was the design and longing desire 
of his heart, and delight of his soul from eternity, than that he so exceed- 
ingly rejoiceth when it is perfected ; and it is a true and certain measure we 
may make hereof, that so much joy as ariseth in any one's heart, in such a 
case there was so much love, for these afi'ections are commensurable. And 
therefore if God aforehand tells us he will present every particular person of 
us afore his own glory with so great joy as to himself, this infallibly argues 
the like proportion of an infinite love to have been borne by him towards us 
in his heart. Let us therefore, first casting our eyes backward unto his eternal 
love that designed all to us, and then turning and setting our eyes forward 
unto that joy that will be at the accomplishment, retire in the view of both 
to bless and adore him for all, and sanctify him in our hearts ; and this for 
that third and last thing in ver. 4, 



SECTION IL 

The discriminating grace of election, as it appears in the difference God puts 
between temporaries, and those whom he Jinally preserves, further illustrated, 
in an exposition of the other part of Judes epistle ; wherein are discovered 
the different fountains and causes in God's heart of our salvation, both original 
and continued. 

You have in ver. 1, 2. of this epistle of Jude, the causes of salvation, and 
of our being kept, held up unto our view. 

Then, secondly. The eminency of that grace and favour illustrated by the 
opposite thereof, viz. the condemnation and apostasy of others, ordained of 
old to this condemnation. 

Then, thirdly, A provocation of these saved and preserved ones, to give 
glory unto God for all his discriminating grace towards them, ver. 24, 25. 

And that we all should adore and bless this God for all these, is my second 
use which I intend to prosecute at this time, founding all I shall urge upon 
you therein, upon what Jude hath spoke before me. 

In the doing of which I shall but open the remaining passages in Jude, not 



Chap. YII.] of election. 217 

spoken to the last time, and which, added to the former, will prove as some 
brief exposition upon the rest of the epistle. 

You have the causes of salvation and our preservation in Jnde, ver. 1, ' To 
them that are the beloved of God the Father, and preserved in Jesus Christ, 
and called.' 

In this first verse you have the original causes, both of the persons : God 
the Father, and Jesus Christ ; as also of the acts in both which are the 
foundation of our salvation, &c. 

1. Love in God the Father, which speaks his electing of us. ' Beloved in 
God the Father,' for which reading I shall give an account. 

2. Preserved in Christ ; which speaks his having given us unto Christ, out 
of that love, for him to keep and preserve us. 

3. That third, of being called, is brought in as the first breaking forth 
of that love of God upon us, at and from which Christ's actual perform- 
ance in keeping of us, com.menceth, and from thence is continued to the end. 

Ver. 2, ' Mercy unto you, and peace, and love be multiplied.' 
In this verse you have the continuing and continued causes of our sal- 
vation (as in the former the original), by the multiplication of which, with their 
proper effects upon us, it is that we are preserved to salvation, which yet ior 
substance are no other than the former, in ver. 1, and these are three affec- 
tions and dispositions in God's heart and Christ's. 

1. Mercy or grace in Christ's heart, who undertook the preservation 
of us. 

2. Peace in God's heart towards us, wrought and purchased by Christ. 
He is our peace, Eph. ii. 14. 

3. The love of God the Father at first set on us. These being continued 
and multiplied in eflects suitable to each, I call the continuing causes of our 
salvation. 

As 1, The mercy and grace in Christ multiplying the attributes of mercy 
on us. 

2. Peace from God, being at peace with us through Christ, and multi- 
plying the sense of that peace in our hearts with joy, &c. 

"3. The love in the heart of God the Father, multiplied in all spiritual 
blessings, as Eph. i. 2, by which we are carried on unto salvation. 

And although these come in as a prayer or wish, such as is used afore 
epistles, yet that here they are brought in with a pertinent connection with 
ver. 1, and the general scope of the whole epistle, as the causes of the pre- 
servation there specified, I shall after shew. 

1. As for the original causes of our salvation and preservation. Yer. 1, 
' Beloved in God the Father,' &c. 

Three things are to be performed for the explication of this : 

1. Some reasons why I so read the words. 

2. To explain what the import of that phrase should be, ' In God.' 

3. To prove that by that expression, ' Beloved in God the Father,' is 
connotated that God the Father chose and elected us. 

You have it indeed here read, and translated, ' Sanctified by God the 
Father;' but if we consult both commentators and Greek original copies, as 
they are also cited by interpreters, we shall find that diverse, as authentic 
copies, as those that read it sanctified, &c., do write it beloved, in, or of, or by 
God the Father, rr/a'7:r,/zsmc, beloved, instead of rr/ia6[ximc; and the phrase 
£!/ Qiu) 'naroi, is all one, say some, with dcro Qiou tsoltdIc, Beloved of God the 
Father, or 6/a, by God the Father, which reading Parens justifies, and com- 
mentators generally do willingly agree to take either. 

Now where there are found two such readings in so many copies ancient, 



218 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

and but a small difference in the Greek words themselves, which might 
easily occasion a mistake in the writers ; in this case, that which must cast 
it is, unto whether of the two, the scope, series, and order of the matter afore 
or- after, rationally considered and compared with other Scriptures, do most 
incline ; and therein (I take it) rr/u-'fiiMyoic,^ Beloved, in and of God the 
Father, hath far the advantage and appearance for it, to have originally 
fallen rather from our apostle's pen. 

For which there are these reasons unto me of weight. 

1. Their being sanctified is apparently mentioned, and comes in afterwards, 
included under and in the word called, as in like manner often our sanctifi- 
cation doth ; as in Rom. viii. 30, and ' saints by calling,' 1 Cor. i. And I 
confess the reading as here it stands, sanctified first, then 'preserved, and 
after both of them, then called ; this did always in former times in the read- 
ing of it breed some jar in my thoughts, as if the words had not been, at 
least, rightly and orderly placed ; but when I met with this other, ' beloved 
of God the Father,' it reconciled all to me. 

2. I consider that the act or work of grace here intended is that which is 
properly God the Father's, and so is to speak what his special hand is in our 
salvation and preservation. Now, to say. Beloved of God the Father, speaks 
what is most proper unto God our Father, and what his hand and original 
act in our salvation is, and is that which is more generally proclaimed 
throughout the New Testament, everywhere almost where he is spoken of in 
distinction from Christ. 

For both, 1, love is in a way of eminency attributed to the Father, ' the 
love of the Father,' when the work of the three persons are distinguished, 
2 Cor. xiii. 14, 2 Thes. ii. 13, 16, and up and down everywhere. 

Also, 2. Election is peculiarly attributed to him as his eminent work; and 
to be beloved of the Father and to be elected are equivalent, and are put for 
each other, or are often joined together, love being the first and chief mov- 
ing cause of election. Thus, Bom. xi. 28, * Beloved according to election;' 
that is, therein and thereby the}- are the beloved of God indeed. And 2 Thes. 
ii. 13, ' We give thanks to God for you, brethren, beloved of the Lord, 
because God hath chosen you,' &c., and so therein and thereby hath mani- 
fested you to be his dearest beloved, and for that, and in that respeet bearing 
the title of beloved; and join thereto ver. 16, where his having ' chosen us,' 
that went afore, in ver. 13 is here, ' who hath loved us.' 

3. By this reading the series and order of the three things in verse 1 is 
set right, and rendered more clear at least : 1, beloved of God the Father, 
who is the first person, as that of election is the original act ; 2, preserved in 
Christ, which is the second person's part ; 3, called, which is the Holy 
Ghost's. Beza's gloss and interposition is very observable upon that second, 
preserved in Christ ; that is, says he,* having been set apart, or chosen in 
and by God's eternal counsel, they who should be given to Christ to be kept 
by him. So as he, though he inclines rather to the other reading of sancti- 
Jied, and makes a difiiculty of our reading it beloved of God the Father, and 
is against it ; yet he take in the sense thereof, as touched in the other word, 
* preserved in Christ.' He discerned both from the scope of the epistle, and 
the great emphaticalness of that expression, 'preserved in Christ.' So that 
election by the Father must be supposed first, and necessarily taken in, and 
a giving us to Christ (which accompanied that election) to be the proper 
cause of our being preserved in and by that Christ ; and so that ' preserved 
in Christ' referred unto the Father's act of giving, and therefore he would 

TsrTjJTj/xsvo/s (i e.) sepositis seterno Dei consilio, qui Christo traderentur custo- 
diendi. 



CnAr. YII.J OF election. 219 

have it to be brought in somewhere, though but implicitly aimed at in that 
expression, * preserved in Christ.' But why then should we avoid this 
other reading of ' beloved of God the Father,' which more plainly and 
expressly denotes that act of God's, out of which and together with which 
God did give us to Christ ; and gave us thereby with this coinmendaimis and 
declaration of his will, that he the Faiher, having loved them first, and 
thereby made them his, and had now given them to him, and that therefore 
out of all that love to him, and between them, he would preserve them (which 
I shall by and by again speak to) ; so then, that beloved of God the Father, 
that is, elected by him, should be said first to hold the most fair coherence 
of all other with preserved in Christ, as that which follows next, declaring 
therein the very ground and foundation of that our preservation, and that as in 
Christ, and so shewing the true order of causes; God the Father's love firht, 
in choosing, &c., and Christ's next, to whom they were given, and is 
answerably in order here first placed, it having been the fountain and original 
of all, the source and beginning of our salvation, as the Father is of the 
persons. 

4. The parallel of other Scriptures does favour this our reading of the 
w^ords ; the apostle Peter in like manner annexing this benefit of preserva- 
tion, as Jude here, unto election ; for wdiereas, 1 Peter i. 5, he says, ' Who 
are kept by the power of God unto salvation,' he had first entitled his epistle, 
as Jude doth ' to the elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father,' 
ver. 1 ; and then, ' who are kept by the powder of God,' ver. 5, and the word 
is the same that here. 

5. The opposite mention of God's rejecting and ordaining those apostates 
to that judgment, ver. 4, as the original of their conuemnation ; this casts 
backward, and refers unto what he had said of these other, their having been 
ordained unto salvation and preservation. And therefore this reading, 
* beloved of God the Father,' is rather to be supposed to have been his mean- 
ing. For, 1, the apostle's scope being to comfort and instruct tLe saints in 
this epistle, much more than to set out the fate of these apostates, and tl;e 
narration thereof being but to illustrate that state and grace to those saints, 
surely of the two he would to that purpose rather make mention of their 
election than of the other's reprobation. Especially, 2dly, seeing acts of 
grace do more readily proceed from God than acts of avenging justice, 
therefore if the one's reprobation be mentioned (as it is) much rather tLe 
others' election. 

2. What the import of the phrase should be i)i God. ' Beloved m God 
the Father.' 

Beza indeed sticks at the phrase ' Beloved m God the Father,' as the 
Greek ordinarily hath it. This is an unusual phrase to be used of the act 
of the Father's election, but it ordinarily runs, and much oftener, ' chosen 
and beloved in Christ,' but ' in the Father,' we now^here read. 

But this is so far from being an objection, as it turns to be a reason to 
confirm our interpretation. 

For, besides what was said, that sv is put for u'tto, dia, or i/to, and so it 
is all one to have said. Beloved of, or by the Father, the phrase in the 
Father aptly notes out the eminency of that act in God himself, rising up 
and abiding within himself, in his own heart and breast, in himself alone, 
as from himself. And such acts, his loving us and choosing us from ever- 
lasting, were and must be acknowledged purely to have heen, and thus in 
like manner it is termed, his * good pleasure which he purposed in himself,' 
Eph. i. 9. 

Nor is it an objection of weight enough, that it is said, ' Beloved and 



220 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

chosen in Christ,' to exclude this of ours, as if therefore * beloved in God 
the Father ' should be improper, no more than because in that place last 
cited it is said, ' which he purposed in himself,' speaking of the Father, 
that therefore it should be improper to say the same of Christ, which yet 
we find, Eph. iii. 11, ' According to the eternal purpose which he purposed 
in Christ Jesus our Lord.' For that phrase, in the Father, denotes the sub- 
ject and efficient cause, and that of in Christ, the medium or instrumental 
cause. Yea, according to this rule, their reading, ' sanctified in God the 
Father,' should be excluded also, because it is more often said, and in use, 
* sanctified in Jesus Christ,' than ' in God the Father.' 

3. The third thing for explaining this of beloved in God the Father is, 
that thereby is imported and connotated, that God the Father chose and 
elected us. 

Yea, these two are mutually put each for other. The very act of election 
is expressed by God's loving us : ' Jacob have I loved,' Rom. ix. 13, which 
is alleged as a proof of Jacob's being elected, spoken of afore, ver. 11, and 
is there termed the ' purpose of God according to election,' towards him. 

Thus God's election of Christ (whose election is the pattern of ours) as 
he is God-man, is expressed by his having loved him : John xvii. 24, ' Thou 
lovedst me afore the foundation of the world ;' that is, thou lovedst me, and 
out of love chosest me. And he speaks not of that love he bare to him, 
purely considered as second person, but that of him as God-man and 
mediator ; whilst Christ speaks it, he also says, that God had loved us as 
he had loved him. Now, between the love which God bare him as second 
person simply considered, there ought not to have been any such comparison 
made of what his love is to us, so as to say that he loved us as he loved him 
as second person ; but as mediator it might be said ; and therefore it was all 
one as to say he chose him ; so that here for God the Father to be said to 
love us, is equivalent to say he chose us. 

2. Preserved in Christ. 

Between these two, beloved in God the Father, and then preserved in 
Christ, doth rise up, as couched in each of them, and as the result of both 
in this connection, — 

Our having been given by the Father out of his love to Jesus Christ for 
him to preserve, and that Christ undertook so to do. 

This is strongly implied here, if withal we bring those other scriptures 
which Estius and divers others* (having observed this as connotated here) 
have sent us unto to explain this passage, in which is set forth the original 
rise, the descent, and story of our being preserved in Christ : 1, love in the 
Father made us to be his ; thereupon, secondly, proceeded a giving us to 
Christ, that as he loved him, he would keep us as the end of his giving us ; 
which, thirdly, Christ w^illingly undertook and performs. All these you have 
fully expressed by Christ in his last public prayer, John xvii. 

1. That they had been given him by his Father as his own ; so the second 
verse begins, that ' he should give eternal life to as many as God had given 
him.' He pursuing this again saj^s, ver. 6, ' I have manifested thy name 

* Gerard upon both the epistles of Peter, in which 'grace and peace be multiplied' 
are wished (even as here), interpreteth there grace to be meant as I did here, and love 
and mercy not to be meant chiefly of the efi'ects of grace, but of the fountain of all, 
the free grace of God: Per gratiam quidam fMirmviMiTtcoc, intelligunt beneficia gratioe 
collata : sed rectius intelUgitur fons illorum beneficiorum omnium, viz. favor Dei gratuitus. 
And for the proof of this sense in Peter, allegeth this parallel in Jude, Nam in 
parallelo Judce 2, Xdoig exponitur per to 'iXiog. Thus he on 1 Peter i. 2, as also 
upon 2 Peter i. 2. 



Chap. YII.] of election. 221 

unto the men which thon gavest me out of the world : thine they were, and 
thou gavest them me ;' then verse 9, ' I pray for them : I pray not for the 
world, but for them which thou hast given me ; for they are thine.' 

2. Given him they were, for that end, for him to keep; and therefore he 
returns an account to his Father how he had kept them, and indigitates it 
twice : ver. 12, ' While I was with them in the world, I kept them in thy 
name : those that thou gavest me I have kept, and none of them is lost.' 

3. That he had undertaken to keep them upon his Father's giving them, 
all and every of those words declare ; as, namely, his giving that account of 
the discharge of his trust therein : ver. 6, ' I have manifested thy name unto 
the men which thou gavest me out of the world,' &c. ; and that he had done 
(what in him lay to do) that which might preserve them : ' I have manifested 
thy name,' ver. 6 ; * I have given them thy words,' ver. 8. And also by the 
effects he had wrought in them : ver. 8, ' They have received them, and have 
known surely that I came out from thee, and they have believed that thou 
didst send me.' And then likewise by his care to recommend them again 
unto his Father: ver. 12, 'While I was with them in the world, I kept 
them in thy name : those that thou gavest me I have kept, and none of 
them is lost.' 

4. And all this, and those other great benefits that follow, do run up into 
God's having loved them, which is not only imphed in his urging they were 
thine, but that God had chosen them : * Thou hast loved them as thou hast 
loved me,' ver. 23. Now of himself he says, ' Thou lovedst me afore the 
foundations of the world ;' that is, hast chosen me, which I shewed even 
now. And he expressly gives it as the reason why he had so kept them : 
ver. 9, for ' they were thine.' 

If you wall take another scripture they also refer unto, John vi. 39, ' And 
this is the Father's will which hath sent me, that of all which he hath given 
me I should lose nothing, but should raise it up again at the last day,' these 
words shew, 

1. That they were given by election; for he says, 'All that the Father 
hath given me shall come to me,' ver. 39 ; and therefore given before their 
coming, and as the cause of their coming. And when afore, but at the date 
the Scripture placeth election at ? ' Afore the world began.' 

2. Given for this very end to be kept, and that to be God's will and in- 
tention in giving them, and expressed at his giving them, doth as manifestly 
follow there : ver. 38, 39, ' For I came down from heaven, not to do my 
own will, but the will of him that sent me. And this is the Father's will 
which hath sent me, that of all which he hath given me I should lose nothing, 
but should raise it up again at the last day.' 

3. Their being called ariseth from their having been given by the Father, 
ver. 37, ' And all that the Father giveth me shall come to me,' &c. And so 
you have in this one Scripture all those three things met which are men- 
tioned in my text, and likewise the prop, order, and connection of all these : 
first, ' beloved of the Father ; ' and so, secondly, given to, and ' preserved 
in Christ ; ' and, thirdly, ' called.' 

And this is a clear reason vfhy preserved in Christ is set afore called, because 
it prc-imports that original act of giving us unto Christ, and also is the 
ctiuse of our being called. For although indeed Christ's actual preservation 
of us, and his performance of it upon us begins from calling, and follows for 
ever after it ; yet because the foundation of that preservation lay in God's 
having given us unto Christ out of his love, and this from everlasting, as 
hath been said. Therefore this of preservation in Christ is made conjunct 
with, and set next after beloved in God the Father ^ and before called ; for 



222 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

cftlling itself proceeds out of that love, and our being given to Christ, as out 
of tho'se passages of John hath been observed. There might other reasons 
be given \\-hy called is fitly set after preserved in Christ, as that because there 
wer°e some new converts, who had sprung up in that, though a declining age 
of old professors, which young ones had not had time or continuance long 
enough to experiment the grace of perseverance as those others had done ; 
and vet they having been savingly wrought upon with an holy calling, were 
concerned iDoth in the comfort and duties that he after gives, as well as 
those others that had been for a long time preserved. Alas ! might some 
such novices say, I have not had the trial of having been kept long ; I am 
but of vesterday. Well, but says Jude, thou yet hast the blessed experience 
of having been called, and thereby mayest comfort and assure thyself of thy 
being certainly kept against all the fears of falUug away, which are incident 
to such Christians, from the examples of such apostate professors ; the pro- 
mise is as well unto the truly called as it is to you that have been a long 
while preserved. But though this be a reason of weight for this placing of 
called last, yet I conceive the other of more. And this for the first, the 
original causes. 

n. The continuing causes of our salvation and preservation in their being 
multiplied follows in ver. 2, ' Mercy unto you, and peace, and love be mul- 
tiplied ;' and in ver. 21, ' Keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for 
the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life.' 

Three things are here to be explained. 

1. What is meant by mercy, and peace, and love. 

2. That here they are prayed for to be multiplied as causes, and the 
carriers on of our salvation and preservation. 

3. What is meant by the multiplication of them. 
For the first, the interpretation I give is, that 

1. Mercy in the heart of Christ. 

2. Peace or reconciliation having been made by Christ, and continued in 
the heart of Cod towards us by and through Christ. 

3. That original love in the heart of God borne towards us being for ever 
continued and multiplied with the efi'ects thereof; these are eminently 
intended. 

I know interpretators generilly understand love in our hearts to God, 
peace in our hearts, and all sorts of good things which are usually wished, 
under the names of peace, he wishing that these should be multipHed more 
and more in them. 

But though I deny not these, as the effects of the former, to be included, 
vet I take it that the more principal, the other, as they are in God's and 
Christ's heart, are mainly intended as being the fountains of these effects, 
and so the effects with their causes were at once prayed for. 

And my reasons are, 

1. That look what is meant by love and mercy in ver. 21, the same is 
meant here. Let Jude interpret Jude. Now there he tells us, ver. 21, it is 
the love of God, and the mercy of Christ, which we keeping ourselves in, 
and by faith looking unto them to keep us, are the means of our being kept. 
Now, in the first verse, he had named, first, God the Father ; and, secondly, 
Christ. Why, then, his intention is to wish the love of God the Father, 
and the mercy of Jesus Christ to be multiplied towards us, as being the 
causes of that preservation and salvation likewise. 

2. For one of these, this of mercy, all will acknowledge to be understood 
of the CTrace and mercy in Christ's heart ; and not of the grace or merciful- 



Chap. VII.] of election. 223 

ness in ours ; nor yet merely the efFects of mercy ; and therefore, by the 
same reason, why should not love also be meant of the love in God the 
Father's heart borne to us ? 

The Quern will be. How peace should be meant in such a sense, which yet 
comes in between mercy and love ? For the multiplying of peace would 
seem to import onlj^ the grace of peace in our hearts, as it is the fruit of jus- 
tification and reconciliation with God, according to that in Rom. v. 1, * Being 
justified by faith, we have peace with God.' Also peace imports all good 
things whatever, and so the effects. 

Ans. I grant this, and take them all in ; but I desire it to be considered, 
that all those effects of peace flow^ from this, that there first is a peace in 
God's heart borne towards us, which we may and must style the original 
peace of all, whatever that peace may import in us, or towards us. When 
Christ was born, the angels proclaimed this original peace in God's heart ; 

* Peace on earth, good will towards men,' Luke ii. 14 ; and his decrees and 
purposes of grace, as to sinners, are styled * thoughts of peace,' Jer. 
xxix. 11, * For I know that the thoughts that I think towards you, saith 
the Lord, are thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected 
end.' 

My third reason why I interpret them of what is in God's and Christ's 
heart towards us, as well as of the efi'ects, is, that elsewhere these three are 
mentioned together in the like salutation, as in the second epistle of John, 
ver. 3, ' Grace be with you, mercy, and peace from God the Father, and 
from the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of the Father, in truth and love.' By 
grace there, love is meant, being distinct from mercy ; and withal, mercy 
and peace are added even as here, and thereby not the efFects of merc}^, &c. 
But the grace and mercy itself, which is in God's heart and Christ's towards 
us, are also intended there. It is expressly added, ' from God the Father, 
and from Jesus Christ, the Son of the Father ;' and that as distinct from the 
efiects on us ; for they follow, ' In truth,' that is, sincerity and love, w^hich 
are the eftects in us of the former, in our hearts. 

II. But the query will yet be. How is it that these are multiplied ? 
Gerard, upon the Epistles of Peter, in both of which grace and peace are 
wished to be multiplied, maketh the same objection ; for he there inter- 
preting grace, as I have here interpreted mercy and peace, not of the 
efiects of grace chiefly, but of the fountain of them all, the free-grace of 
God, as I afore cited him,* thereupon he puts this objection, how the love 
in God, remaining always the same, should be said to be multiplied. 

1. Himself answers it chiefly by this, that in respect of the manifestation 
of it to our souls, and the shedding it abroad in our hearts, it is therefore 
said to be multiplied : and to this effect he speaks in both those epistles, 
1 Pet. i. 2, and 2 Pet. i. 2. 

And unto this indeed agrees, what in that second epistle follows : where, 
when grace and peace are wished to be multiplied, it is added, ' In the know- 
ledge of God, and of Jesus Christ :' which (as he) is all one with 6/a, 

* through the knowledge,' &c., because through the knowledge of God and 
Christ, the love and peace that are in the hearts of God and Christ, are 
come to be multiplied upon us ; so as by this answer and interpretation 
given, it is still more manifest, that it is the love in God the Father, and 
peace of Christ, which are the things multiplied in us, through and by the 
means of faith in us taking them, and receiving of them thereby into our 
hearts. 

But, secondly, I should give a farther answer, viz., that even the love and 
* See note, p. 220. 



224 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

mercy in God's heart, and Christ's, are within themselves truly said to be 
multiplied towards us. The word ta'/j^ov^s/tj, signifies both a continuation of 
the same thing, and a renewal thereof, and also an increase, or the fulfilling 
of a thing unto perfection. ^i-- Now the two first significations do fitly agree 
unto this love in God to us ; for there is both a continuation of it, after it 
was once taken up towards us, and that continuation is maintained by a 
renewal or repetition of the same, again and again, for every moment : I join 
both and so it is continued by multiplication. Of justification, divines use 
to sav it is one act at once, actus unicus et individuus; but yet because it is 
contiiQued, yea, renewed every day, as our Lord's Prayer teacheth us, and 
many other scriptures, therefore the Scriptures expressly speak of it as a 
multiplying pardon, Isa. Iv. 7. We multiply transgressions, by adding unto 
the heap new acts of sinning ; and for our comfort God multiplies to pardon 
bv renewincf the act of grace in a full and perfect pardon every day ; not 
onlv of those daily sins committed (which yet we are most sensible of), but 
of ail our sins, as at fii'st, Col. ii. 13 ; yea, and correspondingly hereto, the 
Scripture speaks of God's election itself, which of all other acts of God's, is 
supposed to have been done but once, and that before the foundation of the 
world ; and yet the Scripture, in many places, speaks of it as reiterated or 
renewed again and again, which repetition, or renewal of it, is spoken of 
upon solemn occasion of God's taking his people into his favour after some 
displeasure. Thus you have it : Isa. xiv. 1, ' The Lord will have mercy on 
Jacob and will yet choose Jerusalem ;' and in Zech. i. 17, upon occasion 
of restoring them, he speaks thus : ' The Lord shall yet choose Jerusalem ;' 
and chap. ii. 12, 'The Lord shall choose Jerusalem again.' Nor is this 
meant wholly and altogether of a temporary choice (as yet in the type I 
acknowledge it was), but so as that type holds forth the substance towards 
his elect people among them ; for it is such a choice as upon which his 
people's sins are done away, and whereby Satan, that impleads them, which 
in the next words, chap. iii. ver. 2, is rebuked. The angel, Christ, that 
pleads against him, answers him with this : ' The Lord, who hath chosen 
Jerusalem, rebuke thee.' And it was by such an election renewed, as by 
virtue of which Joshua's filthy garments were taken away, that is, his sins, 
chap. iii. 4, and so proper to God's elect, which that in Kom. viii. fully 
answers to, ' Who shall lay any thing to the charge of God's elect ? It is 
God that justifies.' 

Now as justification and election are thus renewed and multiplied, so I 
say not onlv, why may not, but that necessarily withal, mercy, and love, and 
peace, as in God's heart, must be together with them supposed to be so ; 
for these mercies are but the thoughts and purposes of grace, love, &c., im- 
manent in God borne towards us, as well as those acts of justification and 
election are acts of God upon us, and yet immanent first in himself ; yea, 
and those mercies and that love are the causes of those acts, and therefore 
are renewed together with them, upon this renewal of them within himself. 
And hence, in the same sense, may love and mercy in God's heart be said, 
bv a multiplication, to be continued to us, as those acts are. And in this 
respect it is that, Ps. xl. 5, like as the works of God, so his thoughts to- 
wards us are said to be many, and multipUed : ' Many, Lord my God, 
are thy wonderful works which thou hast done, and thy thoughts which are 
to us- ward ; they cannot be reckoned up in order unto thee : if I would 
declare and speak of them, they are more than can be numbered.' It is 

* Turn de multiplicatione in quantitate discrela, turn de augmento in quantitate 
continua accipiatur, Inde quidam reddunt multiplicetur, quidam verb adimpleatur. — 
Gerard, in 1 Pet. i. v. 2. 



Chap. VII.] of election. 225 

Christ's speech, of whom the psalm is made, and that relating unto his 
Father's resolved purposes and contrivements from eternity, and those con- 
tinued unto his sending Christ into the world to die for us, as ver. G, 7. It 
follows so, as although his thoughts and purposes were but one individual 
act at first, and never to be altered ; yet they became many, through a per- 
petuated reiteration of them, wherein his constancy to himself is seen. The 
prophet David, in Ps. xxv. G, imprecates God's loving-kindness in these 
words, * Remember, God, thy tender mercies and thy loving-kindnesses ; 
for they have been ever of old ;' which phrase imports * it is of old,' that is, 
from eternity. So * for ever of old ;' that is, all along from eternity per- 
petuated, and therefore suitable to this meaning, he desires that God would 
remember them. It is good now to remember these, and remembrance is 
but a reiterated act of the understanding, with the same afifections that were 
taken up at first. 

And the reason from all this is as evident, for such acts as are of pure, free, 
and absolute grace in God, are in their kind such, as though he doth act 
any of them towards us in this moment, yet to continue the acting of the 
same the next moment, or upon the next occasion, is from, and depends upon, 
a new grace in him ; yea, the promises of grace have a fresh act of gi'ace to 
move him unto the performance : Lam. iii. 22, ' It is of the Lord's mercies we 
are not consumed, because his compassions (those which are in himself) fail 
not. They are new every morning (both the mercies which are the effects, 
and his compassions which arc the cause) : great is thy faithfulness.' And 
thus much for how they are multiplied. 

The third thing is, to prove that mercy and love thus multiplied should 
here be mentioned and intended, as the causes of preservation and salvation 
unto the end. 

And, indeed, that these are causes hereof, none shall deny ; but the ques- 
tion only proceeds whether here in this salutation and wish, they be in- 
tended by the apostle ? To which I answer. That they are so intended here. 
Perhaps in other such salutations (especially in Paul's large epistles) they 
come in abstractly, or as altogether severed from a coherence with the matter 
afore or after ; as human salutations among the Jews, and those eastern 
nations, ordinarily were wont to do, Dan. iv. l,yet here in this short epistle 
I take it, they hold a strict coherence with what immediately went afore, and 
follows after. 

And the reason in general of this difference in this epistle and in others 
is, because that the sole and entire subject of this short epistle (I speak of 
what immediately concerned the saints) is professedly the preservation of 
them unto salvation, as hath been shewn ; and also it was the love and 
mercy of God and Christ, that had hitherto been the preservers of them, as 
ver. 1. And so as the series and order of things in those two verses 
proceeds thus : 1. That a love in God's heart hath given them to Christ to 
keep ; 2. A mercy in Christ's heart hath moved him to undertake this ; and 
thirdly, in order thereto he had purchased their peace with his father ; 4. 
All which, love, mercy, and peace, hath broke forth in their first calling ; 
and 5. From thence had been their cinitodes, the keepers of them thereunto. 
This is the substance or real sum of ver. 1. Hereupon, says our holy 
apostle, in ver. 2, in a pertinent coherence hereunto, what other is my wish 
and prayer for yon, but that the same ' mercy, peace, and love of God the 
Father, and of his Son Jesus Christ ' (as another epistle, 2 John iii., in 
words supplies this), ' be multiplied ?' and thereby so continued on you, so 
as still to preserve you to the end, even all along, from the first being called 

VOL. IX. p 



226 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

unto the being * presented faultless afore the presence of his glory with ex- 
ceeding joy,' ver. 24. From this genuine coherence, I conclude, that this 
his prayer for the multiplication of this love and mercy, holdeth a strict con- 
nection with, and aspect unto, that cause (preserved in Christ) as those 
which had been the causes of that their having been preserved for time past ; 
and to that end he prays for the multiplication of them for time to come. 

And that which more expressly shews them this reason is the aspect that 
ver. 11 hath upon this second verse. In ver. 21 it is and hath been made 
evident, that he points the eye of their faith to the mercy of Christ, and love 
of God the Father, as those, which from time to come, the eye of their faith 
was to look at, as the p-imb moventia, the supreme causes of all other, of 
their being kept. The words are, ' Keep yourselves in the love of God, 
looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life.' 

And that this interprets to us what love, and in whom, or whose (even 
that of God's and Christ to us) love it is that in ver. 2 is intended ; espe- 
cially when we take in thereto the coherence of ver. 1, ' Beloved in God the 
Father, and preserved in Christ,' hath been already opened. Now, then, 
what is the difference between these two verses, but this : tbat this second 
verse is an apostolical prayer to God, that the same mercy and love might 
be multiplied, which, in ver. 21, is an exhortation to them to have the eye 
of their faith upon ; but so, as both do agree and centre in this, that those 
are the primary causes of their being kept, this being the common ground 
of either. And to shut up this, there being the same mercy and love in 
both verses intended, the argument proves strong from the latter to the 
former, ver. 2, that if the mercy and love in ver. 21 be directed unto, as the 
causes of preservation, then that the same are intended in their being prayed 
for, as the causes of our preservation, ver. 2, which is the point in hand. 

Thus much of the causes of salvation, in ver. 1, 2, both original and 
continued. 

I come next to discover ; 

II. The original or antecedent in God's disposement of the apostates' 
judgment and condemnation, as it is in ver. 4, ' There are certain men 
crept in unawares, who were before of old fore- written unto this condemna- 
tion,' &c. 

That this passage is set in way of opposition to and comparison with the 
former in ver. 3, ' Beloved in God the Father,' d'c, to the end to illustrate 
the grace of electing, and discriminating grace the more, is evident at the 
very first view of both, to any intelligent reader's thoughts. 

And how infinitely the grace of election is magnified to us by such a com- 
parative way of setting that of reprobation by it, I have remitted to another 
place or method. I shall now only give an exposition of this passage, and 
shew how this ordained of old unto this judgment is to be understood, this 
being in view one of the harshest speeches concerning God's dispensations 
to the sons of men, that is found in Scripture. 

We are first to inform ourselves of these two words therein. 

1. Fore-iuritten, translated appointed. 

2. This judgment, translated condemnation. 

1. Fore-written, so the word in the original. We must know that God's 
decrees about the persons of us intelhgent creatures, the sons of men (being 
the top of his decrees), are expressed to us under the metaphor of writing in 
a book their names, taken from what is usual amongst men, that is, of such 
as have power to dispose of persons and things at their will, for ratification 
sake, do it by writing, or setting their pleasure down in some record ; as 
when a man hath goods, or an estate to dispose of, he doth it unto persons 



Chap. VII. j of election. 227 

by a written will, or record ; or if offices to bestow, he pricks down (as our 
kings do sheriffs) whom he thinks fit, and leaves out whom he pleaseth ; as 
among the Romans, patres coHscripti, of senators ; milites descripti, of soldiers. 
Thus the Scriptures do attribute unto God a book of life, in which the names 
of all his elect are registered, and thereby we find election itself expressed : 
Philip, iv. 3, * And I entreat thee also, &c., and with other my fellow-labourers, 
whose names are in the book of life.' They do set forth in like manner 
God's disposal of the rest of mankind, as Rom. xi. 5, they are termed under, 
the same allusion. That in general, Rev. xx. 12, it is said, that at the day 
of general judgment, * the books were opened,' importing that there were 
other books concerning the rest of men, besides the book of life, which is 
there termed ' another book,' that is, a more special, and, as it were, a more 
choice private book, which God keeps by him ; answerable, there is a black 
doomsday book, in which, what concerns those the rest, is registered and 
recorded, as foreseen by God concerning them. 

And in prosecution of this metaphor, the Scriptures do more particularly 
set out what concerneth them under two acts. 

(1.) Negative ; That they are left out of the book of life, their names 
are not found written there. Thus Rev. xiii. 8, ' Whose names were not 
written in the book of life.' So that the first and main act concerning 
them, is but a leaving them out, and not writing them in that special book. 
And that negative act is indeed an act of pure, and mere, and absolute will 
in God, and is but this. That God did not love them so far, as absolutely to 
design them unto super-creation grace and glory. Observe how I express it, 
it is but a leaving them out of that book, wherein was an ordaining men 
unto such benefits and blessings as were purely supernatural, and above the 
due of creation ; whether for grace as the means, or glory as the end. In 
such things they were left out, and it was but a mere leaving them out, as 
to such things unto which the other were elected, and their names set down 
to inherit. Those blessings are thus expressed : Eph. i. 3, ' All spiritual 
blessings;' (1.) in heavenlies ; (2.) in Christ, which were not due by law 
of creation in Adam ; and in such only the rest were left out ; but other- 
wise, as to creation grace, and what herein by any law of their creation it 
was meet for God to give them, he ordained to give them it to the utmost, 
and to deal with them therein according to that law, even whatever, as to 
creatures, was any way requisite, all the good of holiness, life and reward, that 
by creation could be meet for intelligent creatures, endowed with free-will, 
to have, which was the law of their creation. This did God set out for 
them ; but mark what holiness, by a super-creation title, was to be renewed 
in Christ, and by Christ, if they fell ; the unchangeableness of that estate 
in holiness, which, as I take it, is the holiness which in Eph. i. 4 i? said, 
that in election, as there it is intended, we were chosen unto, what life, and 
glory, and a participation of God above the law of creation, or the attain- 
ment thereof, such as is in heaven, these were supernatural blessings in 
heavenlies, and in Christ ; wherein God was at full liberty to dispose 
thereof where he pleased. It was no part of that estate which was due to 
creatures, as creatures, but as a third part of a Londoner's estate is by law 
purely his own to bestow. Now these were the blessings only which God 
left them out of his will about. Now search the Scriptures, and you shall 
generally find, that the stress of reprobation is put upon this negative act ; 
as throughout the Scriptures of the New Testament I might shew you how 
it is expressed by this negative of not choosing : as ' the election obtained 
it, the rest,' Rom xi. 5 ; that is, the non-elected ' were left out.' So the 
one written in the book of life, impHes the other not written ; so of the 



228 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

one, *the Lord knows who are his ;' of the other, *I never knew you,' Mat. 
vii. 23. That word, never, reacheth backward to eternity. So of the one, 
* they are my sheep,' John x. 14, ' which my Father hath given me,' John 
vi. 36, 37, 'But I said unto you, that ye also have seen me, and believe 
not.' * All that the Father giveth me, shall come to me,' &c. And ' I 
must bring them,' &c., ver. 16, * Because I know the Father,' ver 15, and 
whom he hath decreed to save. * But ye believe not, because ye are not 
my sheep,' ver. 26. It runs on in the negative. 

(2.) But now you will say to me. But here in this place there is a posi- 
tive act expressed, a being of old * forewritten to this condemnation,' and 
that doth import, that God not only had a book of life, which they were 
left out of, but a book of death, their names were set down in. 

I will not answer you here as Dr Hammond doth ; they were forewritten, 
that is, prophesied of by Christ, Mat. xxiv., which gospel was then writ in 
Jude's time. 

I shall in few words give you my thoughts of this. 

[1.] Those men, as to this act, are looked upon by God as fallen ; for 
however election, and non-election in the sense given, might have proceeded 
upon man, considered as not fallen ; yet fore- writing to condemnation, 
necessarily importeth more. And in that their fall, God used no prero- 
gative will at all, no super-creation act, only decreed to permit it : and that 
Adam sinned was from the mutability of his own will and defect, unto which, 
as a creature, he was obnoxious ; and for God to have kept him from falling, 
as here, ver. 24, Jude speaks of us, had been super- creation gi^ace, and 
belonged to the rank of those benefits which are in Christ, as, to be * pre- 
served in Christ,' is said here to be ; God must have gone out of his line of 
communication to have kept him, and it had been an act of super-creation 
grace. 

Then the first man being fallen, by the same creation law it was that all 
men fell or sinned in him, as Rom. v. 12. I say by the law of creation, 
the law of our nature, viz., that equal law, that holds as justly one way as 
the other ; that he, being the first father of all mankind, as Isa, xliii. 27, 
if we should have received holiness from him, by the same we should receive 
sin from him ; it was the law of our propagation from him, such as was 
given to all creatures having seed of life, Gen. i., to bring forth in their 
kind"; and in that sense we are * children of wrath by nature,' that is, by the 
force of the law of nature, Eph. ii. 3, as well as by birth. 

[2.] Now, then, secondly, all men being fallen, and their being fallen 
having been at one and the same instant foreseen by him, as all his own 
works were uno actii intuitus, by one intuitive act, thereupon all men were 
now by nature viewed prone to all sin ; for so their nature, being fallen, 
disposed them even to all or any kind of sin whatever of themselves, and 
still not by any influence of his. 

[3.] Hence, thirdly, their running into sin is only of themselves, and 
from their own corrupt nature and inclination, according to the outward 
circumstances and conditions, &c., which they should stand in, and all that 
of God is said, as to any positive influence of his into sin, you have well 
expressed : Acts xiv. 16, ' Who in times past sufi'ered all nations to walk in 
their own ways.' 

[4.] Yea, and fourthly, they being not ordained to super-creation grace, 
in and by Christ, by which their sin should be any way healed, in order to 
eternal glory, but left unto themselves, without it ; hence that mere nega- 
tive, and not being elected, that alone without any positive act of God's 
ordaining, would have left them to all or any sin whatever. And hence you 



Chap. VII.] of election. 229 

find, that in those Scriptures, where but only that negative act of non- 
election is mentioned, in the same places, the sins they commit are men- 
tioned as the consequents of it. I do not say the efifects, for they flow from 
their own corruption. Thus, 1. For their not doing good, that they beheve 
not, is attributed as the consequent of their not being God's sheep : John 
X. 26, * But ye believe not, because ye are not of my sheep, as I said unto 
you.' 2. For their doing evil, their own corruptions so carry them thereto. 
Rev. xiii. 8, * and all that dwell upon the earth shall worship him, whose 
names are not written in the book of life of the Lamb slain from the foun • 
dation of the world.' Where plainly, their giving themselves up to anti- 
christian worship and idolatry, is attributed to the negative, that their 
names were not written in the book of life ; for why, super-creation grace 
being restrained, which at no time was their due, their own corrupt hearts 
would of themselves carry them on to those sins. So in that other place 
cited, for I instance in all I quoted, Mat. vii, 23, their damnation is ulti- 
mately resolved into two acts. 1. The negative, * I never knew you.' 
2. Their own, being * workers of iniquity.' Which a mere negative act of 
God's could have no positive influence into ; for out of a mere negative, 
never did anything positive arise ; all this is but to them, whereto the said 
cause of men's damnation is to be resolved. 

Well, but you still urge, that here is a positive act of God's, his f6re- 
writing them to this condemnation. Mr Cotton observes, that the word 
x^/>a, signifies contention, as in that place to the Corinths : 1 Cor. vi. 7, 
* There is utterly a fault among you, in that you have, x^/'/xara, contentions.' 
And that in like manner it should be here used, of their opposition unto that 
faith, which upon that occasion he has exhorted true believers that they 
should ' contend earnestly' for, &c. And so that should come to this, that 
amongst the sinners of that age, that were afore of old in God's view (when 
he was the uyuvo&riTog, orderer of those contentions), he had wrote down 
their names, as the men and persons that should so oppose the faith ; and 
80 it is an allusion from the manner of those games, which was couscrihere, 
to set down in writing the names of those that ofi'ered themselves to enter 
into the lists. 

But, secondly, the strength of my answer rests upon this small word, sig 
70VT0, to this condemnation, or sinful contention ; and it is to me a mighty 
word, to clear this matter in hand, that God did forewrite their individual 
persons unto this or that particular way of sinning. Now consider what 
that will amount to at the utmost, taking in what was aforesaid ; but only 
unto this, how that all men lying fallen in God's view, and of themselves 
prone to all sin, he might leave them to their own swing and corruption, to 
one sin as well as another ; but he shews himself a God in ordering or rank- 
ing their actual sinfulness, and particular ways of sinning ; some to this sin, 
some to that sin, that all might not run into any ;* and so it is but merely 
the disposing of men's sinnings, which of themselves they would commit. 
When all the world were sinners, and there was no difi'erence, and all and 
every man would be as devils, and run wildly, headily, and as horses into 
the battle, into all manner of wickedness, the great God in his infinite wisdom 
and goodness, leaves one man to such a particular sin, as those here to this 
contention ; another man unto that, and not all to perpetrate every one, 
which of themselves they would do. As he turned the heart of the Egyp- 
tians to hate his people, and restrained them from other sins, as he did 
Abimelech, ' I kept thee,' from that act of adultery. But then he suffers 
them to take a liberty to such or such particular corruptions and wickedness ; 
♦ Qu. ' that many might not run into all ' '?— Ed. 



230 OF ELECTION. [BoOK III. 

SO as indeed this fore -writing these men to this contention, rather than other 
sins, was no more than leaving them electively, to that, and not to another, 
and leaving them to that way of sinning, and not other men of the same age, 
and in the same circumstances with them ; which particular way of sinning 
is purely their own way, and their own doings, without his decree having 
any influence upon them, but setting them in such and such circumstances. 
And this ordering thus some men to this sin, some men to that, though it 
be from God's will, to order and leave them thereto ; yet the fact itself is 
not from God, and yet is justly styled a fore-writing, appointing it so and so, 
and deserves the name, because it is electively, and designedly, and truly 
done by him ; and yet herein this appointment of his has no more outward 
influence than of a man that would di^aw water into such and such a channel, 
he adds nothing to the propension of the waters, they run of themselves ; 
and thus God is said to have turned the Egyptians' hearts to hate his people, 
and to turn the hearts of kings as rivers of waters. 

2. This fore-writing to such great sinnings, is but by the way of punish- 
ment of other sins which they first commit ; as Rom. i., ' Therefore God 
gave them up.' That these men, Rev. xiii., ' worshipped the beast ;' this 
account is given, 2 Thes. ii. 10, 11, ' Because they received not the love of 
the truth, that they might be saved. And for this cause God shall send 
them strong delusions, that they should believe a lie : that they all might 
be damned,' &c. And so he wrote down these men to this contention and 
apostasy, upon the foresight of their sinning. | 

3. Let me add this to justify God, that this fore-writing of men to several 
particular ways of sinning, whenas they are all prone to all or any, and ever}' 
man would be as wicked as the devil, to whom no sin comes amiss ; to act 
or set that man to this, is so far from being that harsh act of absolute repro- 
bation, so exclaimed upon, that it is goodness and mercy to the generality 
of mankind. For, 1, it is done with a restraining them from other sins, 
which else would make this world an hell. I may express it by this com- 
parison : Suppose a thousand barrels, full of either precious or poisonous 
liquor, that had each of them a thousand holes to let that liquor run out at ; 
for a man that is the disposer of them, to stop with pegs the most of those 
holes, in every such barrel, and to let out here and there as he pleaseth ; 
some he lets run at the top, and there comes out weaker kind of poison, 
others at the bottom, whence the most deadly flows ; and he did all these in 
a wisdom and discretion, and by an appointment with himself : will any one 
say, that this man is the cause of those efiiuxes of poison, which he barel}- 
lets out, and yet he is the appointer of them ? 

Lastly, Hereby God shews an infinite wisdom, in the variety of those his 
appointments, so shewing every man what is in his own heart, whilst he lets 
it out in others ; and in this manner, appointing all manner of sinners to be 
extant in the world, as in Rom. i., as he doth all sizes of grace in his own, 
and all by appointment. 



Chap. I.] of election. 231 



BOOK IV. 

The w'Kfhty and powerful f/mce which God dispenses to his elect, in effectually 
calling them, in j)reservin(j them from temptations and sin, in strenfjtJieniny 
and enabling them to jJersevere unto the end, and in bringing them at last 
securely to an eternal glory, by all which, the greatness of election grace is 
more fully cleared and proved. 

But the God of all grace, who hath called us into his eternal glory by Jesus 
Christ, after that ye have suffered a while, inake you [or will make you] 
perfect, stahlish, strengthen, settle you. — 1 Peter V. 10. 



CHAPTER I. 

The explication of the words. — What it is for God to be a God of grace. — A 
threefold grace in God. — His purposing grace. — That which he dispenses to 
his elect. — And the riches of grace that are in his nature. — What the grace 
of his purposes is. 

Our apostle Peter had himself greatly suffered for a while. Satan sought 
to winnow and to devour him, but the God of all grace did by Christ, and 
his fore-warning of him, and through his prayer for him, graciously restore, 
strengthen, settle, stabhsh him, as the story of the evangelists and the Acts 
record. So all this was exemplified first in himself ; and he, who himself 
hath been instructed in temptations and sufierings, is the ablest fore-warner 
and instructor of others. You know our Saviour did thereupon take occa- 
sion to command him, that ' when he should be converted or restored, he 
should strengthen his brethren,' Luke xxii. 31. And this our holy apostle, 
you see, is carefully mindful of, and that to the utmost ; and hath left it 
behind him for ail his brethren to the end of the world, the greatest con- 
solatory against Satan and all temptations that hath in so few words fallen 
from any apostle's pen. 

And when I more seriously compare things together, I am strongly in- 
duced to think and beheve that Peter, in uttering these words of exhorta- 
tion and comfort in the 8th, 9th, and 10th verses, had those very passages 
of Christ to himself in his eye and view ; and be yourselves the judges : 
Luke xxii. 31, 'And the Lord said, Simon, Simon, behold, Satan hath 
desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat.' And observe the 
parallel. 

1. * Satan hath sought;' that is, obtained leave of God, by seeking 'thee 
(Peter) to wiuDOw thee,' and shake forth all grace out of thee. Thus Christ 
to Peter. Correspondently Peter here to us : ' Satan, your adversary, goes 
seeking whom of you he may (have leave to) devour.' And as Christ gave 
Peter fore-warning there, so Peter here his brethren. 

2. Christ 'prayed' that his 'faith fail not.' That was the matter of 



232 OF ELECTION. [Booz IV. 

Christ's prayer for him on that occasion. Faith's not failing is Satan's 
foiling. Answerabl}' the subject matter of our apostle also in his exhorta- 
tion here is, ' Whom resist stedfast in the faith,' as that which is the most 
effectual remedy and shield of resistance of all other, Eph. vi. 16, It is not 
iji the faith as understanding the doctrine of faith only, as some would seem 
to restrain it, because of the article rjj 'ttIgtsi, but in the grace of faiths as 
Calvin more genuinely. And the grace of faith is so eminent in itself, and 
hath so great an hand, and bears so great a stress in this business of tempta- 
tions, that it deserved here the honour of this article. 

3. * Strengthen thy brethren.' There are but two words, yet both are 
here in tenninis. * Knowing that the same afflictions are accomplished in 
your brethren in the world,' so ver. 9, there is the one, and then ver. 10, 
'After ye have suffered, God will strengthen you,' there is the other. So 
publisheth he the comfort and concernment thereof to all his brethren in the 
world ; and contents not himself to utter it barely in the very same word of 
strengthening, but further surroundeth that, for the more abundant consola- 
tion, with a multiphcation of words to the same intent: he shall 'restore 
you' (see Gal. vi. 1), xara^r/cs/ ; that is, when you are fallen, 'set you in 
joint again,' which was Peter's very case, ' stablish, strengthen, settle you.' 

4. Lastly, which is not to be neglected, Christ, in strengthening Peter's 
faith against Satan, sets a ' but I have prayed,' as in direct opposition unto 
all that Satan could do ; and Peter, when he had set forth Satan as our 
professed adversary in the greatest dreadfulness, he then in like manner of 
opposition, brings in his intended consolatory with a ' but God, the God of 
all grace by Jesus Christ,' &c., set in full array and counter against him on 
our behalf, as our undertaker, guardian, and the strength of our hearts for 
ever. This for an introductory preface, and, it may be, not a little conduc- 
ing to discover the main scope of the w^ords. 

These words are the public faith of heaven ; that is, of God and Christ, 
given for the safe conduct of all the called of God, through all temptations 
and assaults in this world unto glory. 

Two things more at present requisite to our understanding this to be his 
scope. 

1. That under the phrase of afflictions in the ninth verse, and sufferings 
in the tenth, not outward persecutions only or chiefly are intended to be 
comforted against, but all inward assaults, either from our own lusts or 
Satan, and so all temptations whatsoever. This the coherence, intent, and 
extent of this consolatory exhortation shews, 'Be sober and watch,' so the 
8th verse, this respecteth lusts ; ' whom resist,' this relates to inward 
temptations of Satan unto sin ; ' knowing the same afflictions ' or conflicts 
* do befall your brethren.' And then his setting afore the eyes of our faith 
God, as the ' God of all grace,' for our relief and help, argues it. For his 
grace principally and more specially stands to help us against inward sins 
and temptations to sin, &c. And then that extent of it, the all of his grace 
reacheth, not only unto all sorts of outward miseries, but unto all sins, 
which are our greatest miseries, which do need his all-sufficient grace above 
all other, and which grace in God chiefly respects. And therefore this is 
extensive unto all evils that grace may be supposed a remedy unto. These, 
therefore, are the afflictions principally intended, wherein also those very 
sufferings of Peter mentioned did also lie. 

Neither is the word suffei ing averse to be taken in such a sense. 

1. For temptations from Satan. For of Christ the head it is said, 'He 
suffered in that he was tempted,' Heb. ii. 18, where temptations are plainly 
termed sufferings. Nor yet unusual to be understood of sins themselves ; in 



Chap. I.] of election. 238 

1 Cor. X. 13, ' God will not suffer you to be tempted above what you are 
able to bear,' this is spoken of sinnings ; and the word to hear imports them 
to be sufferings ; and indeed they are of all the greatest to them that are 
truly holy, and to such he there speakoth. And when it is said Christ was 
* tempted in all things like as we are, though without sin,' as the issue of 
the temptation, yet he was tempted intto sin by Satan ; which is the differ- 
ence put between his temptation and ours, Heb. iv. 15, and was no small 
part of his sufferings. 

The second thing is, that the words do hold forth a promise that God 
will strengthen, and estabhsh, &c. Besides that many original copies read 
the words in the indicative, xara^rion, he will perfect, and not '/caraPTiaai, the 
optative, by way of wishing it, or praying for it. And however, if they 
should have been intended as a prayer, as they fell from Peter's heart, yet 
still that prayer supposeth and must contain a promise which God is 
engaged in to perform, for so all prayers are supposed to do. This beiog a 
sure rule, that as we are to turn promises into prayers, so we may extract 
promises out of all those prayers which we find in Scripture, for promises 
are the foundation of them ; and so it comes all to one. We will take, 
therefore, the words promise-wise, as Gerard and others do, to this sense, 
that ' after ye have suffered a while, God will or shall perfect, strengthen, 
Btablish you.' To confii'm which reading and intent, there are more reasons 
to follow when that clause comes more particularly to be spoken to. 

The division of the words. 

The words being thus understood, the parts thereof are two. 

I. The great engagement : the engagement of God and Christ to relieve 
and carry all that are truly called in and through all temptations and 
sufferings. 

II. The promise of performance, or the execution of it. 
I. In the engagement. 

1. The persons, God and Christ. 

2. The pledge or gage already given by both to assure the performance, 
♦Who hath called us into his eternal glory; ' no less; not into the state of 
grace merely, as Rom. v. 2, but of glory ; that is, the undoubted right to it 
from the first step we set into our being called. 

II. In the promise to perform it. 

1. That God will be sure, as he is a 'God of grace,' to strengthen and 
uphold. 

2. The limitation or manner of performance, 'After you have suffered a 
while,' &c. And, 

3. All these are propounded to behevers, in order to produce stedfastness 
in faith, which he had pre-exhorted to in ver. 8, and unto which these words, 
and every word of them, do visibly look and refer, as a comjjlete, adequate 
ground set forth unto their faith, and which if we believe, we have abundant 
matter of stedfastness and security. 

I. I begin with the engagement of the two persons : 1, God; 2, Christ, 
which was the first part of the division ; and accordingly the first words 
that pres'jnt themselves, are the first of these persons, ' but the God oi all 
grace.' 

Neither shall I insist on these words, nor any of the other, any farther 
than as they directly tend to, and issue in the proof of my main subject, which 
I have proposed at first as the sum of all the words, and to serve unto that 
purpose, I do undertake for each and every word. 

1. But God. You may observe in what a terrible manner he had set forth 
ur adversary the devil, in all things that may render him dreadful to us 



234 OF ELECTION. [BoOK IV. 

An adversary for malice, a lion for strength, a roaring lion for dread, — * The 
lion roars, who will not tremble ?' — walking about, seeking, such is his dili- 
gence, ivhoni he may devour, being able by one temptation to drink up (as the 
word y.ara'riri) at one draught, any soul suddenly and at once, as it were, 
making no bones of it, as he did Judas, and held him fast in his belly, as a 
lion his prey, so as never to get out again ; and farther (which of itself 
would increase the trouble), he tells them that all and every saint were in 
danger at least of being tempted sorely by him, if not continually, yet at some 
time or other every saint, both great and small, the whole brotherhood (as 
the word is) were ordained to suffer by his hand, so ver. 9 ; and when he had 
done this, then in full opposition unto all, comes in but God as a carer and 
undertaker for us. So he is styled ver. 7, but God, the God, &c. so setting 
him in full butt, as we say, against the devil and the fears of our own hearts, 
as our preserver, vindex, and undertaker (as Job), and great care-taker for 
us, as Peter here, ver. 7. So then, take all these verses and join them to- 
gether, that is, from the 6th to the 10th verses, as meeting in this one 
great scope, and you may behold (and it is a pleasant sight to see) the 
devil, our adversary, besieged, and every way surrounded, that if he but offer 
to meddle with us, God is presented ready to rise up on every side against 
him (as the Psalmist speaks, Ps. cxxiv. 1). There is God, the mighty 
God that careth for us, on the foreside afore him ; then, but God, the God 
of all grace, on the other side behind him ; and what should we now fear ? 

If it were not for this but God, what strange doings from men's lusts, yea 
in saints' hearts, yea and from Satan, would there be in the world ? Parallel 
unto this is that of another apostle, ' The spirit that is in us,' saints, ' lusteth 
after envy ' and revenge, &c. And whither would these carry us ? ' But 
God giveth more grace ' to help us against these, James iv. 

Oh, that this, but God, were but always in remembrance with us, when 
the ' iniquity of our heels,' and strong and various temptations ' do encom- 
pass round about,' to oppose this through faith against them, as the apostle 
here. The like coming in of a but God, you have again and again in the 
New Testament, Eph. ii. 4 ; 1 Cor. x. 13. In the Old, Ps. Ixxiii. 26, ' And 
if God be for us, who shall be against us ?' Ptom. viii. 31. 

2. The God of grace ; ' If God be for us,' &c. But if, moreover, God, as 
the God of grace be for us, who then can be against us ? You may observe 
how proper and suitable the singling forth and mention of this attribute of 
God's is, a God of grace, when you have to do with Satan in point of personal 
temptations, &c. When elsewhere, the church at Rome had to do with him 
in respect of divisions raised up amongst them by him, the style the apostle 
giveth to God for their relief against him and them is, the God of peace, in 
full opposition unto divisions ; that is, a God who was able, and would one 
day therefore settle and compose them : Rom. xvi. 17-20, ' The God of 
peace shall bruise Satan under your feet shortly ;' he speaks it in relation 
unto divisions, as ver. 17. But when our apostle here would raise up our 
spirits against temptations, which are personal from Satan, or corruptions of 
what kind soever, he then, as appositely styleth him the God of grace', no- 
thing so proper, nothing so sovereign a remedy for these as is his grace, no 
not in God himself. It is that which we need in that case, above all other. 
When Paul was under temptation, and a ' messenger of Satan,' or the angel 
Satan (you may read either) ' was sent to buffet him,' what was it that God 
did immediately suggest unto him for relief ? ' My grace is sufficient for 
thee ;' that is, the grace that is in my heart towards thee, and the grace 
that is the effect thereof working in thy heart, and both are ready to assist 
thee, and is sufficient for that present need ; yea, all that could befall him. 



Chap. I.] of election. ^35 

And this was an answer which God himself gave ; for in answer to his pray- 
ing thrice, it was that God made this return, ' And God said, my grace,' &c. 

So then, both apostles, who had both run through temptation themselves, 
knew none more pertinent supports to faith than this ; yea, God himself 
could speak no greater comfort than this. It was ' he said, my grace is 
sufficient for thee.' 

3. You may further observe, that though we find it everywhere else almost 
' the grace of God,' and that God is * gracious and full of bowels,' and the 
like ; yet nowhere but in this place, this style ♦ the God of grace,' especially 
nowhere ' of «// grace ;' but there only man needed it, when temptations are 
spoken of, especially when they come upon him ; and the Holy Ghost re- 
served it for this special occasion. And it is not spoken only to shew what 
God is in his nature simply, but what he is to his childien. Even as else- 
where, when it is said that ' God is love,' 1 John iv. 8, it is not only in- 
tended what God is in his essence, but especially what he is to his children, 
out of his love, and from his nature, and the like is not said of any attri- 
bute else. And what doth it signify ? Verily that God is all love, nothing 
but love, is made up (in his carriage towards them) as a God all of love, 
and so here the like. That God, in point of temptations, sufierings, trials 
of his children (yea, and in all things else), deals purely upon the terms and 
principles of free grace, and will in the issue shew he was no other but a 
God of grace, and of all grace towards us, ' All whose ways are mercy and 
love,' not one excepted, Ps. xxv. 10. 

What it is to have God to be a God of grace to us. 

Now, brethren, do you indeed know what this means, the God of grace, 
or the gi-ace of God ? Or what it is to have God to be a God of gi'ace to 
your souls ? To know this in reality, as it is in God toward us, our apostle 
makes it the periphrasis, the very character of a man savingly converted, ' If 
so be ye have tasted that God is gracious,' 1 Pet. ii. 3. 

My meaning is not to enumerate all particulars, in respect of which 
God is a God of grace to us. It is not requisite to the subject I pro- 
fess to handle (which is my main scope), and indeed it would be infinite ; 
for that would comprehend all the wa^s wherein God is gracious, all the 
benefits bestowed, all the acts of grace which God hath done or does for 
us, all the workings of grace in us, the whole of what Christ did, w^hich 
is styled 'the grace of Christ, by which we are saved,' Acts xv. 11, in a 
word, the whole gospel, and all contained therein, is therefore entitled, 
'the grace of God.' I shall first reduce all unto three general heads, 
which I shall in time and in their order treat only of, and that in generals. 
There is a threefold grace in God : 

1. His purposing grace afore this world, and still continued in his heart. 

2. Bispematory grace in the w^orld, or his gracious dealings with, and 
giving forth of grace to us. 

3. The riches of grace that are in his nature. 

The grace of his nature moved him to form up all sorts of purposes of 
grace within himself, and then he dispenseth grace exactly according to those 
his purposes. And then again, the riches of grace in his nature are such, 
and so vast, as they have wherewith to maintain and make good both these. 
The grace in his nature is the fountain, the spring ; the grace of his purposes 
is the well-head, and the grace in his dealings and dispensations are the 
streams. When I come to the next head, his being the God of all grace, I 
shall then speak to the first and latter of these ; but in treating of this his 
being a God of grace, I shall speak of the grace in his heart, or his pur- 
poses of grace toward us, which are by the Psalmist, Ps. xl. 5, and the pro- 



236 OF ELECTION. [BoOK IV. 

phet, termed his * thoughts of peace and mercy,' which in his heart he hath 
taken up towards us, or which he thinks towards us, as the prophet's word is, 
Jer. XX. 11. Nor jet shall I speak of all of these his thoughts neither ; for 
as the Psalmist says, * Thy thoughts, God, which are to us-ward, cannot 
be reckoned up in order,' Ps. xl. 5. But I shall insist but upon such 
particulars only, as directly serve to the point afore us, of his carrying us 
through all temptations unto glory. 

1. And to speak of this his purposing grace first the text itself invites, 
yea, requires us ; for it manifestly speaks of that grace which God had in 
his heart to us afore he calls us, and out of which he calls us, and which 
moved him thereunto, as that parallel place in 2 Tim. i. 9 more expressly 
shews : ' Who hath called us with an holy calling, not according to our 
works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in 
Christ Jesus before the world began.' We are apparently then sent to con- 
sider that purposing grace which was given us in Christ afore the world was ; 
for as here, so there, it is declared to be that grace out of which we are 
called with an holy calling, and is rightly styled his purposing grace ; for 
* according to his purpose and grace,' &c. And that of the apostle, Rom. 
viii., concords with both, ' The called according to his purpose.' Begin we 
with that then. 

(1.) The first act of which grace towards us, and by which, indeed, it is 
that he first becomes a God of grace to us, is seen in the choosing and 
singling forth the persons of those he purposes to be a God of grace unto, 
who are to be the objects or subjects, or rather the creatures of free grace, 
as I may so style them. Election of the persons, therefore, is styled the 
election of grace. Bom. xi. 9, and this is the fundamental grace and act of 
all other graces, which are all built upon it : ' The foundation of the Lord 
remains sure ; the Lord knows who are his ;' and this the us, not others, in 
the text imports, ' who hath called us,' out of his being first a God of grace 
to m; which word, when I shall in its order come to treat of, I shall then 
enlarge upon this discriminating grace. 

(2.) To be a God of grace to you is to love you (your persons) merely 
because he loves you. I say merely because he loves you. The very word 
gi^ace imports so much, w^ithout any addition. Grace is the freeness of 
love ; the import of it is a super-addition of freeness both to mercy and 
love: Piom. iii. 24, * Justified freely by his grace;' Hos. xiv., 'Receive us 
graciously,' said the church in her prayer, ver. 2 ; in answer to which, says 
God, ' I will love them freely.' This is grace ; which freeness of grace, 
because it was first put forth, and was primarily seen, in that first act of 
the choice of the persons, afore they had done good or evil, to invite him 
thereunto, therefore it is that it is termed * the election of grace ;' that is, 
it was such a choice of persons as grace merely swayed, it choosing accord- 
ing to its own genius, frank inclination, nobleness, and free disposition. 
And what that was, follows : ver. 6, * And if by grace, then it is no more of 
works ' (distinguish you of works as you please, it excludes them all) ; grace 
afi'ected therein to be so absolute, entire, and alone, to and within itself, as 
it riseth up against all works, and their intermingling any respects of .them- 
selves therewith, as those which should any way sway or move it in this its 
resoluteness about persons, and as those that would stain that sole glory 
that it afiected therein ; yea, as being opposite to the very being of it, ' other- 
wise grace is no more grace,' says he. And he speaks all this of electing 
grace, as the coherence specified shews. 

Now this second assertion, I stated it thus, He loved us merely because he 
loved us. And lo ! this we have in terminis : Deut. vii. 7, 8, ' The Lord 



Chap. I.] of election. 237 

did not set his love upon you, nor choose you because ye were more in 
number; but because the Lord loved j^ou.' Where you have two things: 
the act, and the ground of that act. 1. The act is his loving them, cleaving 
to them in love, as the original hath it, ver. 7. For in his saying, ' The 
Lord did not set his love upon you for your number,' there is the most 
pregnant supposition and vehement affirmation that he had set his love upon 
them upon some other respect and ground ; and that negative not relates 
but to the removal of what was not the cause of that love. 2. The ground 
or motive to that act is set out not barely negatively, as was said, ' not for 
your number ;' and by the same reason, not for any other qualifications in 
them, as of righteousness or the like, which he after also doth as expressly 
name and exclude : Deut. ix. 5, G, * Not for thy righteousness, or the up- 
rightness of thy heart,' &c. For what then ? 

The positive ground is, * But because he loved you,' which, indeed, is but 
what he supposeth, and had afiirmed sufficiently afore in ver. 7, and yet 
comes in again with an indignation, purely to shew that this was the only 
ground or reason itself of that act of his having set his love upon them, 
' because he loved,' &c. ; and it is ushered in and amplified with a hut, as in 
opposition unto, and with an exclusion of all other things in the elect them- 
selves that might have any supposition of being motives to him thereunto. 
So, then, there being but that supposed insinuation in the 7th verse, ' The 
Lord did set his love upon you,' unto these first words of the 8th, ' but be- 
cause he loved you,' that is, put the act, and this as the ground, together, 
and the issue and result is as if he had said, ' The Lord loved you because 
he loved you,' and for no reason else as in you, but for this alone in himself, 
and in his heart taken up towards you, and so loved you merely because he 
loved you. That is his reason, which were the words of this third assertion 
at first. And though it be spoken of the election of them in time unto that 
good land, as in the type, yet as shadowing forth his election to glory as the 
substance of both. 

3. For God, to be a God of grace to you, is to resolve to love you, and 
that for ever ; to be unchangeable in his love, and never to have his heart 
taken ofi" you. 

There are two words in the text, for upon the text I would found each and 
every of these heads, and all along. 

(1.) That he is such a God of grace to us, as, in calling, he * calleth us 
into his eternal glory,' no less, at the very first entrance. He doth not say 
he hath called us into grace only, or unto his favour, but * into glory,' and 
* eternal glory ;' that is, by calling he estates us into the whole and full right 
thereof for ever. The meaning whereof, w^hat is it, but that he calls us out 
of such a grace and love as he did, and doth resolve to be a God of grace to 
us for everlasting, and therefore calls us past recalling, Rom. xi. 29, even 
into eternal glory ? A God of all grace indeed ! 

(2.) The second w^ord is underground, and not rendered by our interpreters ; 
for having said this first, that he is a ' God of all grace,' who hath called us 
into eternal glory, then proceeding on, dvrog, * He,' says he, ' the same God, 
will perfect you,' &c., which durog, there placed, repeats and di'aws in that 
former clause into itself, and carries it on to the rest ; and so is, as if he 
had said, * He, this sauw God of grace, whom I have thus set out, and who 
hath called you, he will preserve you by settling, &c., and so bring you 
infallibly unto that glory.' So then the mind of it is, that first and last, and 
all along, he is a God of grace in all. He was a God of all grace to you in 
loving you afore calling, and out of that grace it was he called you, and he 
continues the same after calling, to restore you, semper idemy always the 



238 OF ELECTION. [BoOK IV. 

same, from eternity to eternity, * I am God, I change not' (of which more 
afterwards, upon James i.). He speaks it of his love to his people, ' there- 
fore ye are not consumed,' and the ground of this continuance and stedfast- 
ness of his love is merely because he is a God of grace to them : ' Whom he 
loved, he loved unto the end,' John xiii. 1. Grace causeth him first to fall 
in love, and that fixeth his heart ; his heart is said to cleave in love, Deut. 
vii. 7 (the word the same that is used of Shechem to Dinah, Gen. xxxiv. 3). 
But hear free grace itself speak in its own free and proper language and 
native tongue, ' I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious.' It was 
spoken to God by Moses'*' first, God thereby expressing his having chosen 
him, Exod. xxxiii. 19, and then applied by the apostle to all the chosen of 
God, Rom. ix. 15. It is spoken like grace itself, which is moved by and 
from nothing but himself, and which hath no other reason but itself within 
him. He loves because he loves ; so at first, Deut. vii. And he will love 
because he will love, stat pro ratione voluntas, that is all his reason. There 
is will upon will ; I will and I will. Grace is the most resolved (I had almost 
said), wilful principle in the heart of God. If in other purposes of his you 
find his resolution fixed, as Isa. xiv. 27, ' The Lord of hosts hath purposed 
it, and who shall disannul it ?' much more in this matter ; and the reason 
is evident, for acts of grace are not barely acts of his will, but of ' his good 
will,' and of ' the good pleasure of his will,' Eph. i. 5. In which he is 
delicrhted, Deut. x. 15 ; and * rejoiceth with his whole heart, and his w^hole 
soul,' Jer. xxxii. 41. The property of grace is to love because it will, there- 
fore to love whilst he hath a will, or love to love withal. 

4. This grace thus fixed in God's will is the most sovereign and pre- 
dominant principle;in the heart of God, to overrule all other things he willeth, 
so as effectually to carry on his resolutions of free grace. Grace, as it is 
the most resolute, so the most absolute principle in the heart of God ; unto 
it beloncreth the dominion. What means else ' the throne of grace' ? Heb. 
iv. 16. And why else is it said, to ' reign unto eternal life' ? Bom. v. 21. 
You find this round about the text in the words afore, ver. 6, 7, * Humble 
yourselves under (or submit to) his mighty hand,' that is, his sovereign 
power, ' that will exalt you in due time ; ' so ver. 6, after which follows, 
' Who is a God that careth for you,' ver. 7. All which is carried down to 
this head of his being ' a God of all grace.' Then in the next words to 
those, 'The God of all grace will estabhsh you,' &c., it follows, verse 11, 
' To him be glory and dominion for ever ; ' that is, to him as a God of all 
grace, who professedly deals thus graciously with his people. The efiect of 
both is, that he being a God of all grace, to whom the dominion belongs ; 
therefore give yourselves up to him as such a God, whose grace in caring for 
you, and exalting of you, hath the sovereignty. ^ 

And this sovereignty of his grace is given to it, not only in respect of all 
ihmos out of God, that should be supposed to stand in the way to its reso- 
lutions, but is attributed unto it as in a comparison to all other the attributes 
in God himself, all which come in and give up their interest as to the 
accomplishing free-grace designs, which were the supreme and top designs 
that were to be found in the heart of God. Thus in the first and second 
chapter to the Ephesians, where he mentions other attributes as having a 
hand in our salvation, — he magnifies 'the wisdom of God' discovered 
therein, ver. 8, as also ' the exceeding greatness of his power therein, 

ver. 19, yet he sets the crown on free grace its head, all ' to the praise and 

glory of his grace,' so ver. 6. And in reason that must be acknowledged to 

have the dominion, that hath the principal glory, as that for the glory of 

* Qu. ' by God to Moses ' ?— Ed. 



Chap. I.] of election. 239 

which all was at first designed. Now the whole of all spiritual blessings 
(particularly election, predestination, redemption, &c., Eph. i. 4-6) are all 
said to be ' to the praise of the glory of his grace,' ver. 6. Yea, those other 
attributes employed in this work, although they are to have their proper 
glory out of our salvation, yet in the work of our salvation they have but as 
it were an acting under free grace, to effect what it designs ; they put in 
their joint stock indeed, but are content that their glory should come in to 
them, so far as they subserve this glorious grace in its contrivements. 

If any hereupon shall query. Is this the prerogative of grace which you 
mean, that it saves men, continue they what they will, and so saves them 
merely out of an absolute sovereignty, because it will save them ? 

Am. 1. God forbid. We defy* such a sovereignty so understood, as if 
it saved any man without rule, much less against rule. The very text, that 
speaks as high of grace as any other Scripture, yet when it styles him * The 
God of all grace,' as in relation to our salvation, adds, ' who hath called us,' 
as without which all the grace in God would not be able to save a man ; and that 
calling is to be an holy calling too, ' Who hath saved us, and called us with 
an holy calling, according to his grace ; ' * without holiness no man shall see 
the face of God.' The reason of this is, that this dominion and monarchy 
of grace hath fundamental laws, as all well regulated monarchies have. Let 
this foundation of the Lord be never so sure, that ' the Lord knows who are 
his,' yet it is added, 'Let him that calls on the name of the Lord depart 
from iniquity,' 2 Tim. ii. 19, or he cannot be saved. 

Ans. 2. If by prerogative and sovereignty be meant an effectual, infallible, 
over-bearing, over-powering all in our hearts, and all things else for the 
bringing about of our salvation, and enabling us to keep those rules that are 
set us as essentially requisite to' salvation, then from such a sovereignty and 
prerogative we detract not to affirm, that it is attributed to grace. And 
there is nothing that may be supposed to stand in its ww, or in opposition 
to this, but, forsooth, man's freewill ; as if God had made a creature, which 
himself, and all in him, could not rule ; and that such a sovereignty is in 
his grace, as that it engageth all in God, and draws all in him, unto its 
assistance ; this we are not ashamed to affirm. And look as grace complies 
with all those other attributes, as with his holiness, wisdom, &c., in settino- 
such rules, so withal it draws those other attributes into an engagement, to 
undertake to assist it for the keeping us, and our otherwise perverse wills, 
within the compass of such rules, and to overcome all opposition to the con- 
trary ; and herein it is that grace its prerogative is seen. In the strength 
of which it is that, Jer. xxxii. 40, God maketh an everlasting and so abso- 
lute a covenant with us, ' That I will turn not away from them to do them 
good.' But what ? Is this spoken in so absolute a manner, that let them con- 
tinue to do what they shall or would do, however he will continue to do 
them good for ever ? No. But * I will put my fear in their hearts, that 
they shall not depart from me,' and he adds, ' for ever.' The result whereof 
is plainly this, that unless they have the fear of God preserved so in their 
hearts, as not to depart from him, God himself must turn away from them, 
and from doing them good ; and so it is manifest that God considered that 
as one of his own rules he could never dispense withal, and this whilst he 
uttered that everlasting promise ; for he cautioneth it there ^nth a but (for 
with a but it comes in) : ' But I will put my fear in their hearts, and they 
shall not depart from me for ever.' The resolve of all which is to this effect, 
that that very same grace, which at fii-st had so fixed him as to say, I am 
resolved, ' I will not turn away from them ;' the same grace undertook to 
* Qu. • deny ' ?— Ed. 



240 OF ELECTION. [BoOK IV. 

cause them to observe and keep this rule, and unto that end engageth all 
that is in God (for elsewhere it is said, ' He doth this with his whole heart ') 
to put his fear in their hearts, that they shall not depart, that is, wickedly 
depart, from him. Now unless it were for this his undertaking to work thus 
in them, God by the mouth of the same Jeremiah professedly declares, he 
would never save them. Thus chap. iii. 19, ' How shall I put thee among 
the children ? ' so wicked wretches as he had described them in ver. 4, 5, 
' Wilt thou not from this time cry unto me, My Father, thou art the guide 
of my youth ? Behold, thou hast spoken and done evil things as thou 
couldest.' God demurs, as it were, upon the matter : what shall I, then, 
do to put thee among my childi^en ? Thy present wickedness is utterly 
incompatible with my rule, therefore how shall I do it ? But free-grace steps 
forth and answers it, and I said. Thou shalt call me Father, and shalt not 
tm-n away from me ; and then God says, I will work on them at last. The 
effect of which resolve of his is, I will cause him to keep my rule, and so 
bring him within the compass of the benefit of it. 

5. This grace, this purposing grace in God's heart, had the ordering and 
dispositive power of all left to it, that is, of what should prove opposite, to 
see to it that it should not hinder ; or, secondly, the disposing of all neces- 
sarily conducing to the salvation of those God loved. 

And in the general there is this reason by way of deduction from the 
former, that if it had the sceptre, the throne (as was shewn), then the dispos- 
ing power of all, the legislative or dispositive power, always follows the 
dominion. 

But particularly in reason, if grace had all the power given up to it, then, 
to be sure, it would continue and forelay all things so (as to this point of 
perseverance) as to make sure work: * That the purpose of God, according 
to election,' which indeed is no other than free-grace's purpose in God's 
heart, 'might stand,' as Bom. ix. 11, and not be defeated, frustrated, or 
overthrown ; or as elsewhere, it would lay such a ' foundation ' as might not 
stand only, but ' stand sure,' as 2 Tim. ii. 19. Certainly free-gi'ace that 
sat in the throne, among all the other attributes of God, would see to this. 
It had all that God should purpose to do before it, all in his hands to dis- 
pose of ; and the heart of God being, through his grace, so full of those two 
great interests mentioned, 1. Of such a love to those whom he was pleased 
to love ; 2. The other of exalting the glory of that his love in their salvation; 
certainly, it would contrive all that should befall us so, as should advance 
these two interests most. God was now to set down his will, and gave to 
free-gi'ace the commission to draw up the writings, conveyances, and deeds, 
with this charge, to be sure to make all sure. And all this, though after the 
manner of men set out by me, you will find up and down in the Scriptures 
singly and apart. I shall single forth one place or two, which speak home, 
in terminis, to the substance of the words I have now delivered this fifth 
assertion in. 

In 2 Sam. xxiii. 5, when David came to die, and then had the prospect 
of all God's foregone dealings throughout his whole life, what doth he resolve 
the whole manage of his salvation, he now expected, into ? ' God hath made 
an everlasting covenant with me, ordered in all things, and sure : for this is 
all my salvation.' I quote it as being a full and adequate proof to every 
word of this fifth head. 

(1.) This covenant was the covenant of grace, as you ordinarily style it, 
and it carries that name from all the other attributes ; for, indeed, free-grace 
made that covenant, and contrived it, and brought God himself under the 
bond of it. To confirm which, compare Isa. Iv. 3, ' An everlasting covenant, 



Chap. I.] of election. 241 

the sure mercies of David,' — this passage in Isaiah eminently alludes to this 
speech of David at his death, — it is mercy's covenant then you see ; and to 
say, it is mercy's covenant, is all one as to say, free-grace's covenant ; and 
observe, it is called * sure mercy ;' and sure mercy will be sui-e to make a 
sure covenant. 

(2.) This grace, the great covenant-maker there, having all in God to 
concur with itself, and all that should come from God at its disposure, it is 
said to have * ordered ' matters, so as to effect and bring about its purpose. 
The three versions render the word ' made ready ' and prepared ; and what 
is predestination but pni'paratio bnieficiorum Dei, as Austin of old hath it ? 

(3.) And thirdl}^ ordered all thinrjSy not a few passages or events only, 
but all that should concern David, or befall him, even all and every one; 
which designment David, in Ps. lix. 10, calls his mercy, properly and per- 
sonally set out for him. 

(4.) And all and each unto what end or issue, but unto David's salvation? 

* This is all my salvation.' 

(5.) And all things ordered so firmly as to make sure work to arrive at 
that, and bring David to that end, and issue, and period at the last. And 
this David had so clearly discerned throughout the whole course of his life, 
in the chain and series of things that befell him, as at his death, upon the 
view of all he saw by experience, besides his faith on the promises, that the 
whole had been, and must needs be a plotted, contrived design by God, that 
it could be no other ; and therefore it is, that now he set his seal and testi- 
mony to this at death ; I have found it so upon the view of all the passages 
of my life. 

And in like tenor of speech to this, God speaks in general of all his works : 

* Known unto God are all his works from the beginning,' yea, eternity, Acts 
XV. 18 (which speech yet is spoken by the apostle James, with a particular 
aim and relation unto his decrees about the salvation of the Gentiles, and 
casting off the Jews, as the verses before and after shew). As likewise that 
speech, that he ' disposeth the whole world,' Job xxxiv. 13 ; a word near of 
kin to this of ordering all things, used by David in his case, but in a more 
special manner. He useth this word, or what is equivalent to it, in other 
scriptures, viz., that he hath set in order and appointed his own people, and 
what belongs to them or concerns them. 

You have this in terminis : Isa. xliv. 7, 'And who, as I, shall call, and 
declare it, and set it in order for me ' (and that he speaks of all his works), 
but it follows, ' since or seeing that it was I that appointed the ancient 
people ; and the things that are coming, and shall come.' God here takes 
on him, to himself alone, the declaring things to come, upon this invincible 
reason, that he had the setting in order of all things in his eternal purposes, 
and the calling of things that are not, or were not, into being ; and there- 
fore he alone can foretell them, none having been his counsellor ; for when 
he says, ' who shall set in order for me ? ' it implies that himself did, and 
none for him, or besides him. And that word settinrj in order imports his 
having all afore him, even as now our compositors or printers have their 
letters, which they place and cause to stand fixed every tittle in order to 
impression ; and so things in his counsels stand fixed and ready to be 
brought into existence, and are all so setly placed as nothing can be added 
thereunto ; and therefore, no wonder, says God, I can declare things to 
come. 

But then, secondly, for a visible evidence of this, he produceth this one 
singular eminent instance for all the rest, what he had declared and ordered 

VOL. IX. Q 



242 OF ELECTION. [BoOK lY. 

concerning his own people : ' since I appointed the ancient people, and the 
things that are coming, and shall come.' The ancient people in the Hebrew- 
is the people of antiquity or of eternity, that is, in the time past ; as the 
word is used in Isa. xliv. 15, 17, and imports how from everlasting, afore the 
world, he had singled them forth, and appointed them, and accordingly had 
set in order all things about them, as it there follows ; and in respect unto 
this also it is that in the verse he had said, ' I am the first.' 

And herein lies God's argument, or the evidence I speak of: Lo, I have 
ordered by appointment and decree from everlasting all things about this 
my so ancient people, and accordingly have in my Scriptures, which you all 
may read, things about them which have come to pass many of them already, 
and many other I have appointed too, which shall assuredly come to pass ; 
and therefore all the world may be convinced that I have set in order all 
other things, and only can declare them aforehand. • 

I understand the word translated since, not for a note of time, as if he had 
meant since the time, &c., but as a note of evidence, or inference alleged, or 
of appeal unto ; that is, since that, or seeinr/ thxit, I have done thus and thus 
about my ancient people, you may be assured, says God, that I have ordered 
all other things else, and only can declare them. 

And for the confirmation of this concerning my own people, I refer you, says 
God, to all that I have written in all my Scriptures hitherto, and for whose 
sake it was I wrote them, from Moses's to Isaiah's times, whereof a word 
hath not fallen to the ground ; yea, and I began to declare sundry things 
about them when there was not one man of them born, but Abraham him- 
self, to whom I fu'st declared it, Gen. xiii. 16 and xv. 5, so as all the world 
may thereby see that I alone have disposed and ordered all things else, 
having exercised my grace and wisdom so exactly herein towards these my 
chosen ones, and the first-fruits of my creation. I shall cast in another 
passage of David's ; in Psalm Ixi, he having declared in his own behalf the 
purpose of Ged toward him for everlasting salvation, * he,' speaking of him- 
self, ' shall abide before God for ever,' ver. 7 ; he withal considering what 
he was to run through in tbis life, and what it might require to keep him 
unto the end, and so for ever, doth presently thereupon, in way of prayer, 
subjoin, ' Oh pre];mre mercy and truth, which may preserve me.' As if he 
had said, I have yet a long journey to go, and through many hazards, and 
thy promise is, * I shall abide afore thee for ever.' Lord, thou hast need 
lay up and aforehand prepare an abundance of mercy and truth to preserve 
me for time to come. I have cited this and that other passage of David's, 
rather than any other scriptures (which abound as to the effect of this asser- 
tion), to gain the advantage and light which this word ordering, first used by 
David, gives to this great point in hand, and yet is indeed no other than in 
the plain song of it, and in fuller terms more largely, you find in the apostle, 
Piom. viii. 28-30, ' And we know that all things work together for good to 
them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose. 
For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the 
image of his Son, that he might be the first-bom among many brethren. 
Moreover, whom he did predestinate, them he also called ; and whom he 
called, them he also justified ; and whom he justified, them he also glorified.' 
And the real issue of all is this, that if God did thus appoint them afore the 
world was unto salvation, as Eph. i. 3, 2 Thes. ii. 13, then also he ordered 
and disposed all that should fall out to them, or from themselves, in this world, 
so as they should no w^ay disannul their salvation, but work together for it: 
* so as neither life nor death,' &c. You know the triumph in the conclusion 
of that Piom. viii., that as it is said of the law, that coming four hundred years 



Chap. I.] of election. 243 

after the promise, Gal. iii. 17, it can never make the promise of none efiJBct, 
so here. 

(0.) Now, sixthly, if all things were thus ordered aforehand to the salva- 
tion of them, then specially all their temptations, sutierings, distresses, sins-, 
are so either prevented or precluded ; as Psalm lix. 10, ' The God of my 
mercy shall prevent me,' or so disposed, overruled, and succeeded with 
repentances, reducements, and eluctances out of thom, and all so forelaid 
together with, the temptations, that there is a sureness (which is David's 
word), yea, an inipossihiliti/ (which is Christ's), that they should miscarry by 
all or any of these. And unto this his special ordering of temptations, our 
apostle in these words of the text, and in what is round about it, hath a 
special and particular eye and aim ; and as in tho whole, so in several words 
points at it. 

[1.] Ho first particularly and expressly sets out temptations, &c., as the 
object-matter about which his discourse was intended, under the name of 
sutferings from Satan, as hath been shewn. 

[2.1 He then had presented God as aforehand, ver. G, to be a ' God that 
careth for us,' in reference unto those temptations ; as one whose vigilant 
and foreknowing care is taken up, and busied both over us and those our 
sufierings. And it is the property of care, you all know, in one that is wise 
and able to foresee, and order a prevention or relief; and it is accordingly 
often synonymously expressed by forecast, to forelay and provide against. 

[3.] To this scope also it is that he draws our eyes upon, and would have 
us look at God, in all these things that so fall out, as upon a sovereign 
God, that hath a mighty hand in bringing them upon us (with which accords 
that in Acts iv. 28 concerning Christ our pattern, 'to do whatsoever tin/ hand 
and thy counsel determined before to be done'), and then in delivering us 
from under them, and who hath a prerogative, a power, to oi-der them, sub- 
due them, &c. ; and withal a God of all grace, which grace makes him will- 
ing to exercise and use that sovereignty towards us, and this in relation unto 
all that may depress us or cast us down, as those words, ver. 5, clearly shew, 
' Humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you,' 
&c. Such a ' prerogative hand' it is,, as he is said to have brought Israel 
with out of Egypt, and destro^'ed the Egyptians ; whereof the same and like 
phrase is used Exodus xiv. 31, xxxii. 11, Deut. iii, 24, and by which Christ 
was incarnate, and the blessed virgin conceived, Luke i. 49-51. 

[4.1 And farther, he declares how in those sufierings and depressments 
that his prerogative hath a design upon you to exalt you the more in the 
issue : ' Humble yourselves, that he may exalt you ;' with which that of 
David accords, ' Thou hast lifted me up, and cast me down,' Ps. cii. 10. 

[5.j Yea, fifthly. And hath in his eye a time, a due time to exalt you 
again, in that he may exalt you ' in due time,' in a set time to have mercy ; 
so as it follows in the 13th verse of that psalm. 

[6.] He again tells us, God hath set both the time how^ long, and the 
measure how much, after ye have suffered, oXiyov, which is translated, * a 
little while,' as for time only, but signifies both a little space, for the time, 
and also but a little deal, for the measure ; yea, and he has so designed 
this, that you shall not be exalted afore, but after that ye have sufi]ered first : 
all these having been thus ordered by him, out of his prerogative or sove- 
reign power, and out of his care moderating them. 

[1.] And then, seventhly, He declares his design to be to perfect and sta- 
bhsh, &c., after all these sufferings ; not reduce you only, or bring you forth 
of them, but bring you to a perfection thereby : "What can be more manifest 
than that this design is driven in all these ? 



244 OF ELECTION. [BoOK IV. 

[8.] But lastly, If you require the word appointed to be given, as used 
hereof, you may discern and find it in the word accomplished ; ' Knowing the 
same afflictions are accomplished in your brethren in the world ;' and an 
accomplishment,* we know, is but the fulfilling of what was afore designed, of 
which afterwards. 

So as the text confirms every tittle of the assertion, and so sufficiently, as 
I shall not need call in the help of any other Scripture. 

The main conclusion by way of inference from hence is, that if things be 
thus, then there is an absolute sureness, unto an impossibility of a miscar- 
riage, which, as I said, Christ himself pronounced concerning the elect in 
the very case of hazard from temptations. One iiii2:)08sihh is used of God's 
promise and oath pawned to his covenant of grace, and his decrees thereof, 
Heb. vi. 18 ; and the other, or rather the same, is used by Christ his coun- 
sellor in the very case in hand, namely, of temptations ; such as if it were 
possible the elect should be deceived. And well he might ; for God hath 
ordered and taken care of all, out of a prerogative and grace. God foresees 
the objection, and hath the answer ready. He permits the wound, the poi- 
son, and hath the antidote, the salve ready. This you have in terminis : 
Isa. Ivii. 17, 18, ' For the iniquity of his covetousness was I wroth, and smote 
him : I hid me, and was wroth, and he went on frowardly in the way of his 
heart. I have seen his ways, and will heal him ; I will lead him also, and 
restore comforts,' &c. It is the worst extremity supposable. He suffers, 
and moderates the temptation, and appoints the issue, the escape, the outlet 
of it; this is also in terminis: 1 Cor. x. 13, ' There hath no temptation 
taken you but such as is common to man : but God is faithful, who will not 
suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able ; but will with the tempta- 
tion also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it.' 

If a great and gracious prince, being to send his son on an embassy into a 
far country, where there are many dangers and hazards to run through from 
thieves and enemies ; but withal if he did punctually foreknow all the coun- 
sels of enemies, their motions — as God speaks of Sennacherib, ' I know thy 
abode,' &c., — at what passages they will lurk and lie in wait (as God did of 
the King of Syria, 2 Kings ii. 8, &c., at such and such a place, as there), 
and then withal should send an invisible guard (that is invisible as to the 
enemies) stronger than they, secretly to accompany them, as he did to the 
prophet Elisha, either to bring them off when in extremity, or to give them 
secret warnings to beware at such a time, as in that case, 1 Kings vi. 10, 
the prophet from God did the king ; or in case they would be too hard for 
them, then either not suffer them to assault at all, or to befool them, as the 
prophet in the same chapter did that great host in the way, at Dothan, ver. 
14, 16, 19, &c. In this case, if all be thus certainly forelaid, although they 
may hardly escape sometime, yet they will certainly come to their journey's 
end, be it never so long. 

Now this is the very case here : 1 Pet. i. 5, ' We are kept as with a guard 
of soldiers unto salvation,' says the apostle there ; and God knows how to 
preserv^e the righteous, as in 2 Pet. ii., and suffers not the temptation to 
assault, unless there be need, as in 1 Pet. i. 6, ' Wherein ye greatly rejoice ; 
though now for a season, if need he, ye are in heaviness through manifold 
temptations :' and only to the end to glorify his gi'ace in the issue, as ver. 7, 
it follows : ' That the trial of j^our faith, being much more precious than of 
gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise, 
and honour, and glory, at the appearing of Jesus Christ.' And God hath 
infinite and strange ways to keep and preserve them from sin, and to deliver 
* Gerard on that word. 



Chap. I.] of election. 245- 

out of temptation. Sarah, when in bed with Abimelech, as some have 
thought, * I restrained thee,' says God to Abimelech ; so Joseph's brethren 
were withheld from killing him ; and David was kept from cruelty and rage 
by Abigail's wisdom : 1 Sam. xxv. 22, compared with ver. 32-34, ' David 
said to Abigail, Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, which sent thee this day 
to meet me : and blessed be thy advice, and blessed be thou,, which hast 
kept me this day from coming to shed blood, and from avenging myself with 
my own hand. For in very deed, as the Lord God of Israel liveth, which 
hath kept me back from hurting thee, except thou hadst hasted and come to 
meet me, surely there had not been left to Nabal, by the morning light, any 
that pisseth against the wall.' In this case, though the righteous may be 
* scarcely saved,' as the same Peter speaks, jet they are surely saved ; for 
all that hinders is ordered and contrived. Or, to give another instance : 

The authors and contrivers of romances, or feigned stories, they usually 
design with themselves to exalt and magnify such and such persons, whom 
they make great and glorious in the end, or conclusion and issue, but do tell 
you stories about them first, and all along, of the greatest hazards, encoun- 
ters, perils, difficulties, and extremities by the way, which they run through; 
and those often such, as he that reads stands wondering, how and by what 
means they shall be delivered out of them ; but still the author of them hath 
aforehand invented ways by v/hich deliverances, rationally supposable, should 
still be wrought unto a glory. And this is a rule and law observed by such, 
in framing such stories, that they will be sure never to set down such or 
such perils, or put them into writing, if they had not aforehand the thoughts 
and ideas of rational ways of delivering them out of them, and themselves 
being the fictioners and framers of all those stories, both of the one and the 
other, have all afore them of what they do invent to set down, as their plea- 
sure is, they can and may aforehand order and frame a thousand distresses, 
and still as many strange deliverances as they will, yet so as to be sure to 
make a pleasant and joyful close at last. 

Now the great and sovereign God had the sole power and sovereignty of 
ordering and disposing of all about his people of antiquity afore the world 
was, or themselves were ; and, to be sure, he could unto a reaUty of effect, 
contrive, and with an infallibility dispose of the various conditions, and the 
issues and events of them, and of all things about them, with such an inter- 
changeable mixture dispersed amongst them, as his wisdom saw meet : and 
his grace designing glory at last invincibly to be the goal or prize to be 
attained, his wisdom and grace can and will order all, so as to be sure of that 
event ; and he doth, and could do this, and effectually carry it on with more 
facility and easiness, than ever the greatest wits can or have done their pro- 
jections and intentions, concerning those issues of their fancies, as they set 
themselves to magnify and exalt them. Our very thoughts and purposes 
are far less the creatures and figments of our minds (which yet they are 
styled, Heb. iv. 12, 13, compared with Gen. vi. 5), than all things that really 
are come to pass and exist, and are brought into being (as the apostle's 
word is), which he calls into being, Rom. iv., and that in their existences, 
that are or were the creatures of his infinite power, wisdom, and sovereignty, 
' for whose pleasure they were created,' Rev. iv. 11 ; and he can and doth 
bring all his resolved thoughts and contrivances that come into his mind, his 
will and purpose, more easily to pass, than the greatest understanding can 
invent, or having invented, can set down in writing, the imaginations and 
fictions of his brain ; yea, and God can and doth so order them, as to be 
sure to bring it to pass, ' For who hath resisted his will ?' And it is as 
certain, for it is the grand proviso and work committed to free-grace to see 



246 OF ELECTION. [BoOK IV. 

to it in this disposement, that no temptation should he brought upon any 
of* his, which he had not in his purpose a sure and effectual way to bring 
them out of. 

You have had a brief doctrinal scheme, what it is for God to be a God of 
grace in his purposes about us, specially in his fore-ordering sins, tempta- 
tions, and then reducements and deliverances forth of them, or preventings 
of them, hitherto delivered, but as in an assertory way. 

And the two or three latter of those assertions were, as you have seen, 
founded chiefly upon that speech of David's on his death-bed, uttered to 
God, ' Thou hast made a covenant with me, ordered in all things, and 
sure,' &c. 

In which you have heard of David's faith about this great point in hand. 
* This is all my salvation,' said he, and so closeth up his eyes. It may not 
be amiss to take in David's experiments also, upon the view of which it was 
that he uttered this at his death. And for a furt^her encouragement unto 
this, let us have recourse unto another speech of his, a little afore his death 
(for it was upon the occasion of one of the last acts he did that he spake it), 
wherein he indeed refers us to the whole story of his life, as a most mag- 
nific exemplification of the truth of the performance of th^t covenant. And 
hereupon, as we use to subjoin examples unto rules in teaching arts, which 
add no small illustration to those rules, so I shall produce and join unto 
those two latter assertions or maxims before given about covenant grace, 
David his trials and emergings out of them throughout his whole life ; in 
which will rise up and appear an ocular demonstration of what hath been 
but assertorily delivered, specially in those two last, and in the whole of 
the main conclusion which was from them last inferred. 

The passage is in 1 Kings i. 29, * And the king sware, and said, As the 
Lord liveth, that hath redeemed my soul out of all distress,' &c., wherein, 
in this last public scene of his life, which was the crowning of his successor, 
his son Solomon, he sums up the whole in a general protestation or oath, 
made both unto God and for God, the matter of which in effect is this. 
That look as God had promised him in that covenant of grace, that even so 
he had exactly performed for him in every point and tittle, and therefore 
would perform that remainincr part of his promise, concerning his son Solo- 
mon, yet left behind to be fulfilled. 

Concerning which, take it as it is an oath for God, and about his faith- 
fulness to him, I shall afterwards enlarge in the close of this head ; but in 
the mean time, it fairly leads us into the examination and view of the 
passages of David's whole life, that are recorded (for he refers us, as you 
see, thereunto) in the narrative of which you will perceive and discern all 
things about him had been indeed ordered and made sure, in the manner 
we have been discoursing. 

Now, in the story of David's life, his ordering grace appeared both, 

1. In his being preserved in the midst of all outward distresses and hazards 
to his person, which were and had been temptations to him to try his faith. 

2. And, secondly, in his sins, which were his greatest trials, together 
with repentances and returnings out of them. 

The first had been from Satan and his own heart, 1 Chron. xxi. 1 ; the 
other from God ; and yet all so ordered, as he was safely and surely carried 
through unto salvation in the issue. 

I join both these two together ; for his very outward distresses and deli- 
verances from dangers were a type, and pawn, and pledge to him of his 
being kept unto salvation, which the promise of the kingdom shadowed out, 
and yet besides were in themselves also great trials of his faith, as to the 



Chap. I.] of election. 247 

point of salvation ; and both involved in that covenant of his which hath 
been insisted upon. 

(1.) In his being preserved and brought unto the kingdom, what a multi- 
tude and variety of hazards, dangers, distresses, did he run through ? It 
were intinite to reckon up all, much more to enlarge on each. And as 
strange deliverances had he. He sums up all, Ps. xviii., ' from Saul and 
all other enemies,' as in the title of that psalm, afore his flight from court, 
in the first chapters of Samuel. And then after his flight, from other ene- 
mies besides Saul : as from Doeg that informed Saul ; from the king of the 
Philistines, whose champion Goliah he had killed, and the courtiers in- 
formed the king it was he of whom that triumph for it was made, 1 Sam. 
xxi. 11, 'And the servants of Achish said unto him. Is not this David the 
king of the land ? did they not sing one to another of him in dances, saying, 
Saul hath slain his thousands, and David his ten thousands ? ' Which is as 
much, in eflect, as if they had said. This is he that killed Goliath. Then 
from the people also, that ever and anon ran and told Saul where he v;as 
quartered, 1 Sam. xxvi. 1, and when some among them would, to gratify 
Saul, have given him up ; yea, from his own party, that followed him at 
Ziklag, 1 Sam. xxx. 1, who speak of stoning him, ver. 1. 

But above all from Saul, from whom he was in jeopardy every moment, 
and had been so oft in danger, and so often had escaped, that his carnal 
reason concluded at length, ' I shall one day perish by the hand of Saul,' 
1 Sam. xxvii. 1. The pitcher will be broken at last. And these all were 
purposely designed by God, who would have it so, whereof this is one sufli- 
cient evidence ; for when he had got into a safe hold, with his father and 
mother with him, and with the favour of the king of Moab, in whose domi- 
nion he was, he was commanded out of it by God and his prophet Gad, sent 
on purpose for that end, bidding him come into the land of Judah, yea, and 
confined him to that territory, where he was in Saul's power and dominion 
perfectly. God would have it thus, and him to be within the power of this 
lion, who hunted him as a flea and a partridge ; as if he had been too safe, 
and would have been too quiet and secure in Moab, for God to shew forth 
his grace towards him, but God would have him in continual danger, to 
enact his gi'ace in deliverances of him; 'Yet have I set my king, &c., 
Ps. ii. 6. 

(2.) Then after he was king : — 

[l.j Absalom. ' The conspiracy,' it is said, * was strong, and the people 
increased continually with Absalom,' 2 Sam. xx. 2. 

[2.] Then Sheba. 2 Sam. xx. 2, ' Every man of Israel went up from 
after David, and followed Sheba.' It was as great a defection, of the ten 
whole tribes sheer, for the time present, as that fatal one from Rehoboam 
afterwards ; but God brought in the tide again to David. 

[3. J Then at last Adonijah was made king, against David's mind, and 
against his promise, and God's also, w^hich was for Solomon ; * And all the 
kingdom was for it, and against David in it,' 1 Kings ii. 15. Yet God 
delivered David out of this and all his distresses, there was none he was not 
delivered out of. And why ? For all these dangers and the deliverances 
were part of God's sure covenant, as the pawns and pledges of it, and so 
were one and the same time forelaid, even from eternity ; and there was no 
distress designed then but there was also a deliverance out of it ioreset, and 
so all was ordered and made sure. 

2. In the personal preservation of him unto salvation. What are the 
dangers and hazards about that, but sins ? And if ever any man put 
free grace to it, in that respect, it was David. I may say of it, he did make 



248 OF ELECTION. [BoOK lY. 

bold to try whether the sure mercies of David would hold or no, hold tackling 
or no, he put them to it. Yet all was ordered, and his reducements out of 
them therewith ; and not barely to bring him off within the compass of the 
rules of salvation, but with an addition of a glorious issue and advantage, 
yea, and of triumphs unto free grace. 

His eminent sins were his murder, and adultery, and numbering the people. 

(1.) His adultery, and then murder of Uriah, as bad as bad could be. 
But God not only ordered the means to bring him out of it, sent Nathan 
the prophet to him, but his repentance also upon his ministry, the accom- 
plishment whereof you have in Ps. li. I say, God not only forelaid these, 
that his salvation might not be prejudiced, but brought him off with an 
overplus advantage ; for what were the eminent mercies of David's life ? 

His son Solomon (for that any other of his children had grace we read 
not), however, he was Jedidiah, the eminently beloved of God, and to whom 
the promise of his house was made. Now behold, and stand astonished ! 
If Uriah had not been killed, he had not married Bathsheba, and by her, in 
lawful marriage, it was he had Solomon ; yea, and his repentance was so 
accepted by God, that (stand astonished at it) he had Solomon for a reward 
(see Ps. cxxvii., the title, compared with ver. 3), to be sure not of his sins, but 
of his repentance, that was fore-ordered to follow his sin. 

(2.) A second sin was his numbering the people, and provoked thereunto 
by Satan ; and how many more we know not. This was ordered, and his 
repentance, and the issue of it is as glorious as the other. One of the most 
famous things or promises spoken of, was God's choice of a place whither 
they should bring their sacrifices, where the temple was to stand, and where 
God was to meet his people worshipping of him, the highest type of Christ ; 
and where that place should be, was reserved as a great secret for four hun- 
dred years. Lo, and behold how God ordered it ; David comes to profess 
a public repentance with the elders ; the angel directs him by Gad to go 
and set up an altar in the threshing-floor of Arawnah, 1 Chron. xxi. 18, and 
David sacrificed there, ver. 28, though the ark was at Gibeon, ver. 29. But 
what was the issue of this ? Bead chap. xxii. 1, ' Then David said, this is 
the house of the Lord God ; and this is the altar of the burnt- offering for 
Israel.' And it was so revealed to him ; and from that time it was he 
began to prepare materials for the temple : ver. 2, &c., ' And David com- 
manded to gather together the strangers that were in the land of Israel ; and 
he set masons to hew wrought stones to build the house of God ; and David 
prepared iron in abundance,' &c. And compare with these 2 Chron. iii. 1, 
* Then Solomon began to build the house of the Lord at Jerusalem in 
mount Moriah, where the Lord appeared unto David his father, in the place 
that David had prepared in the threshing-floor of Oman the Jebusite.' 
Were not these ordered mercies ? sure mercies ? and yet the issues of his 
greatest sins, by which you may judge of all the rest of the passages of his 
life. 

Well, you heard what about the covenant of grace itself he had declared 
at his death, which was his foundation, and hath been of our discourse. 
Let us now see in another place, how, at his death, having the view of his 
whole life, both of his distresses and deliverances, both in respect of dangers 
and sins (which are our greatest dangers), he sums up the experience of all, 
1 Kings i. 29, ' And the king sware, and said, as the Lord liveth, that hath 
redeemed my soul out of all distress.' David was now to die, and this was 
his last act and one of his last speeches, whilst he wrote the Psalms in his 
lifetime. He had again and again said, * many are the troubles of the 
righteous; but the Lord delivereth them out of all.' But he seals it by 



Chap. I.] of election. 249 

experience at his death. And it is as if [he] said, If you ask me what a God 
he hath been to me ; he hath been a God hath redeemed me out of all dis- 
tress, he hath left me in the arrear of none, not one. At their deaths, 
saints have used to entitle God by what they have eminently found him to 
be, and under the title and notion thereof, have recommended that God to 
their friends to serve. And David here entilleth God by this, and Jacob at 
his death had done the like. Gen. xliii. 10; yea, and as Dr Preston had 
wont to say,* that he often tried God, but now he would trust him ; David 
here goes further, he swears for God ; he takes his oath upon it for him : 
* And the king sware and said, as the Lord liveth that redeemed me,' &c. 
You have had confirmation enough of this head, both from the covenant to 
David, and from David's example, and from his own testimony both of faith 
and experience at his death, given in by one of the most tried saints in the 
world; even this, that God orders and contrives all distresses, temptations, 
sins, aforehaud, together with such issues of them as shall make salvation 
sure. 

Use. For you that be ' old disciples ' of Christ, let me speak to you first 
(the apostle calls them so with honour. Acts xxi. 16), there are some of such 
among you. You have heard all that hath been said, and you have pro- 
fessed the truth a long time, it may be thirty, it may be forty years ; come 
hither, let me speak freely to you : you must subscribe that God is true in 
this his dealing and promise, or study your case that you may subscribe it ; 
I use that phrase, ' subscribe to the Lord,' for you have it, Isa. xliv. 5. 
One that was a dying said, ' Is there not such a promise ?' specifying a 
special promise had taken his heart ; pray turn to it, ' bear witness,' said 
he, * that this promise is true : God is faithful, and hath fulfilled his pro- 
mise to me.' The like do you, according to your experiences of his having 
ordered all, and carried you through hitherto, as hath been related, that as 
David says, Ps. xcii. 14, * The righteous shall bring forth fruit in his old 
age, to shew that the Lord is upright ;' that is, that he is a God of all 
grace, who having called me so many years ago, hath carried me through all 
my temptations, and through my sins, and hath kept and brought me 
hitherto. I do not inquire what your sins have been ; but some may 
have run into sin more than others, and perhaps scandalous ones. But I 
demand of you, hath not God still reduced, settled, stablished you more in 
the end ? As David also says, Ps. Ixxi. 18, 19, ' Now also when I am old, 
and grey-headed, God, forsake me not; until I have shewed thy strength 
unto this generation, and thy power to every one that is to come. Thy 
righteousness, also, God, is very high, who hast done great things : God, 
who is like unto thee ?' God exalts pardoning grace to some more, and 
sanctifying grace to others ; he is the God of grace. Those ships that have 
been in long voyages at sea, three or four years out, have gone through hot 
climates and cold, passed the equinoctial again and again, and have run 
through many a difficulty, and great storms, and yet have been kept alive 
at sea, as they speak, when these shall meet one another at sea near the 
haven, how will they congratulate ? And old disciples should do so, that 
God hath kept grace alive in their souls. And I would ask you how many 
thousand ships have you seen cast away before your eyes ? How many 
that have made ' shipwreck of faith and a good conscience,' as the apostle 
speaks ? This and that professor, that has run into this and that error 
damnable, or false opinions and teachings, though all of smaller moment ; 
others that have struck upon quicksands of worldly preferments, and many 
split upon rocks, and yet you have been kept. This should move you to 
^. So Dr Preston did to some of his friends. 



2-50 OF ELECTION. [BoOK IV. 

bless this your God, the God of grace, the more. Come, let me knock at 
your hearts ; are none of you old professors, like old hollow oaks, who 
stand in the wood among professors still, and keep their stand of profession 
still, and go to ordinances, &c., but the * rain they drink in,' as the apostle's 
word is, serves to no other end but to rot them. * These are nigh unto 
cursing.' Or have you green fruits still growing on you, as quickly and 
lively affections to God and Christ, and faith and love, as at the first, and 
more abounding ? 0, bless God, you are so near the haven, and lift up 
your hearts, your redemption draws near ; and withal raise your confidence, 
that that God of grace, who hath called you into his eternal glory, will keep 
you for it, and possess you of it shortly. 



CHAPTER II. 

That God is the God of all grace dispensatorily . — He gives supplies of grace 
proportionahlij to the needs, distresses, and temptations unto which his elect 
are obnoxious in the course of their lives here on earth. — He is the God of 
all grace essentially, in that his nature contains infinite riches of grace. 

He is ' the God of all grace,' dispensatorily, or by way of performance 
and execution, and gracious dispensations of all sorts. This differs from 
that other last despatched. There was shewn how God had decreed, per- 
missively at least, all sorts of needs and wants, sins that may possibly befall 
saints, miseries of all kinds, on purpose, and with a purpose to shew himself 
a God of all grace, in giving supplies and reliefs thereunto ; but in this 
head is to be shewn that there is in God that grace, which in actu exercito 
will supply the needs, and de facto, doth it. He is a God of all grace execu- 
tively, and in respect of the effects. He hath decreed, and is engaged to be 
the effecter and giver forth of an all of gracious reliefs and supports ; sup- 
plies of all sorts of wants, needs, temptations, sufferings, his elect can be 
supposed capable of. 

I shall despatch this head by three things. 

1. By proof out of the text that so it is intended. 

2. An explication. 

3. A confirmation of your faith added to these proofs. 

1. For the first, that this sense is intended in the text, I take my obser- 
vation from the fifth verse, where it is said, ' God gives grace to the 
humble,' and it leads on to the matter of this text. That word, ' giveth 
grace,' speaks the performance, a dispensing or bestowing of grace, by way 
of gracious effects. In his fellow apostle James, chap. iv. 6, there you find 
it, ' He giveth more grace,' quoting the same words of Scripture which the 
apostle Peter doth, ' God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace to the 
humble.' And observe the occasion of it in James ; it is spoken in 
relation to subduing his people's lusts, particularly lusting after envy; so 
in the verses 1-5. And truly that is grace indeed ; that when lust 
grows high, the grace in God should provoke him to give the more grace 
whereby to destroy it ; unto them that humble themselves for those lusts 
he gives more grace to the humble. And therefore when here in the text 
he goeth on to give this promise of perfecting, stablishing, strengthening, it 
is in further prosecution of what he had begun with, and relates unto God's 
giving grace in the fifth verse. And so by this coherence his being styled 
the God of all grace is to be understood as in relation unto all sorts of 
gracious effects that flow from him as the God of all grace. 



Chap. II.] of election. 251 

(1.) That other style of his, when he is said to be 'the God of all com- 
fort,' as in 2 Cor. i. 3, helps likewise to clear the sense of this here, how he 
is called * the God of all grace ' in the like manner. Now that is spoken in 
relation to effects of comforting, and what he doth (as in the Psalms it is 
said, ' He is good, and doth good'); and so it follows, ' Who comforteth us 
in all our tribulations,' ver. 4. And as we may say of that attribute of 
goodness, that he is a God of all comforts dispensatorily, the like we say of 
this. And again, you have it, chap. vii. G, of that epistle, ' God that com- 
forteth those that are cast down.' It is an attribute, ah cfjcctu, as that 
when he is said to be * A God hearing prayer,' and a ' God of pardons,' 
Neh. ix. 17 (so in the Hebrew), from what he doth, * He is a God pardoning 
iniquity,' &c. 

Although this is to be added, that when in 2 Cor. i. 3, he is called the 
God of all comforts, this may take in his being the God of comforts objec- 
tive, as to us, L e. that our souls may hud in God as our chiefest good all 
sorts of comforts, and in him alone. And that as God is subjective in him- 
self, a God of all blessedness in himself, unto himself, so all that is com- 
fortable in him is for our comfort. But still the direct and proper scope of 
that place in its coherence, respects what he is in giving forth comforts to 
his people. This parallel hath been alleged for the clearing the sense of 
the phrase, ' the God of all grace,' that is in respect of all gracious effects 
w^hich the grace in God doth afford. 

(2.) Secondly, Let us next come to the thing itself. Look, as when it is 
said, he is ' the God o^ all comfort,' in that place afore, you easily understand 
that it is spoken respective, in relation unto all sorts of distresses and dis- 
comforts, &c., which the saints at any time have, and are capable of; and 
so Paul interprets himself in the fourth verse, ' Who comforteth us in all our 
tribulations.' And then the meaning of that title, the (Joel of all comforts, is, 
that he hath in apparatu, in a readiness, a particular special comfort to 
give forth to every discomfort, and that in due time, de facto, he doth it. 
And then in like manner, when he is said here to be * the God of all grace,' 
it must be understood as spoken respective to every want, to every need the 
saints may be supposed to be in, and that God hath a proportionable grace 
for the supply and relief of it. 

Only in the third place I add this, as touching these two which I allege 
as parallels, ' the God of all comforts,' and ' the God of all grace,' that 
though that of his being the God of all comforts serves, as I have alleged it, 
to clear the sense of the phrase, viz., that he is the God of all grace, unto 
all sorts of gracious effects ; that yet, which tends to magnify this his style 
of all grace, above and beyond that of comforts (and yet that tends to our 
comfort too), is that these two are not adequate, or of the same commeu- 
suration ; but of the two, his being the God of all grace, is larger in respect 
of its gracious effects ; for God's dispensations of grace are larger than his 
dispensations of comfort in this world. He gives grace in cases wherein he 
doth not give comfort, and so he is the God of all grace in a far larger 
extent than of all comforts, though still both are alike to be understood in 
respect to effects ; yea, and often he gives most grace when not comfort, 
further than so as to uphold the soul from sinking. He carries on some 
souls, as he did Christ at his death for a while, unto the highest gracious 
acts of obedience, whilst yet he vouchsafes no comfort ; witness that doleful 
expression of Christ, ' My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me ? ' 
when yet he was in the highest performance of obedience, ' obedience 
unto death,' as the apostle aggrandizeth it. Thus in thy temptation God 
influences thee with grace, secretly assisting and strengthening, when he 



2o2 OF ELECTION. [BoOK lY. 

affords not comforting grace to thy own sense. Carry this home with thee, 
thou who hast so many years been ' afflicted, tossed with tempest, and not 
comforted.' 

(4.) Fourthly, And take that other epithet, coupled with this already 
mentioned in the same place of the Corinths, namely, * the Father of 
mercies' too ; for that is parallel also with this, 'the God of all grace,' as 
to the interpretation and sense given in relation to the effects of mercies ; 
for mercies there so called are the works of mercy, the effects of mercy, and 
so often and usually styled in Scriptures. And it is not spoken in the 
singular only, ' the Father oi mercy,' but of mercies, which imports a multi- 
tude, and variety of them. Now, grace here, and m-ercy there, are all one ; 
and the God of all yrace is all one, as to have said, the Father of mercies ; 
that is, of all merciful dispensation. 

This for the proof of this sense which I have given. 

2. Next for explication of the thing itself. 

(1.) That when it is said, there is all of dispensatory grace to be given 
forth, the consectary that followeth from thence is, that there is no tempta- 
tion that doth or can befall a saint that is under the dominion of free grace, 
but God hath a grace prepared, to be applied in due time. It speaks that 
he hath a grace fitted and suited to give it forth, as need and occasion shall 
require. There is no sore in the heart, but he hath a plaster ready spread 
for it, to be laid on in due season ; he hath cut out his grace into single 
plasters. The reason of this consectary is, that look as the word grace in 
the thing itself, is a relative to need and to temptation ; so all grace must 
needs be a relative to all, or any needs whatsoever. If there were any want 
which the liege subjects of free grace (so I shall still call them, as in re- 
lation to the dominion of grace), are capable of, and God had not a special 
grace for it, he were not the God of all grace. For then the misery of these 
his subjects of free grace would be more extensive, and larger than his grace, 
which to be sure shall never be said of God. When God is said to be al- 
m^ighty (which is by interpretation, the God of all power), what is the import 
of that ? That all matters of extremest difficulty are possible to him ; yea, 
* nothing too hard,' as Jeremiah first, chap, xxxii. 17-27 ; and an angel to 
the blessed virgin afterwards, Luke i. 85. 

But you will say, God may be almighty, and nothing is too hard for his 
power, when yet I may not be relieved, for God is said to be omnipotent, but 
not omnivolent ; and so he may be the God of all grace, and yet I for ever be 
denied in my particular case. But I reply. When you shall say he is the 
God of all grace, who is in himself also the God of all power, put but all 
grace unto all power, and the result will be, that he hath a gracious will to 
put forth power, and put forth all his power, and it is at grace's disposal. 
That he is the God of all grace, makes him all-willing ; and that he is the 
God of all power, speaks his ability to help according to his will, which grace 
hath engaged. Join, I say, but these together, according to that of the 
Psalmist, ' God hath spoken once, twice have I heard it. Power belongs to 
God ; also unto thee, Lord, belongeth mercy,' Ps. Ixii. 11, 12. And thou 
that art a dependent upon, and liege subject of free grace, must needs be 
secure in all thy temptations for a gracious issue ; for if all grace did not 
serve to help in all cases that grace serves for, grace were not grace. 
Join God of all power, and God of all grace, and what will not be done ? 

(2.) The second thing : As he hath grace for all needs, so he is a God of 
all grace, to give forth help as the need and occasion shall require. For 
need is the time and season for grace to shew itself: Heb. iv. 16, ' Let us 
therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy 



Chap. II.] of election. 253 

and find grace to help, in time of need.' And as Solomon, 1 Kings viii. 59, 
frames his prayer, ' That God would maintain the cause of his people Israel 
at all times, as the matter shall require.'' This is full to my joining the former 
and this together, for he saith at all times, as well as in all matters. If God 
should let slip any one due time and season for help to any one need, he 
were not the God of all grace ; for it is one part, and a great part of being 
gracious, to relieve one's need, in time of greatest need. 

(3.) That God is a God of all grace, in respect of dispensation, shews 
that God takes not this title upon him, potentially ; that is, that he hath 
grace in him which is able to help. But it speaks that he is a God that, 
de facto, in actu exercito, doth and will manifest himself to be so; and that by 
instances of all sorts he will actually give full proof of his ministry or econo- 
my of grace (that I may allude to that speech of Paul to Timothy, 2 Tim. 
iv. 5). That so at latter day, he may have the honour, not only of having 
been the God of all grace potentially, but the God of all grace actually, and 
in the porto nuance of it ; and this is seen in sin, which is the worst of all 
temptations and miseries. There is one temptation or sin, indeed, that is 
excluded from this grace : 1 Cor. x. 13, ' There hath no temptation taken 
you, but such as is human,' so in the Greek. The sin against the Holy 
Ghost, is the devil's sin ; a settled revenge against God, and so is dis- 
tinguished from all other sins that are human or common to men. As 
Beza, upon 1 John v. 16-18, hath observed ; and the apostle in giving that 
exception in that distinction hath confirmed the general rule of all sins else, 
that they are capable of pardon, and the place shews that all such human 
temptations may befall, and de facto, do befall some or other of the elect. 
Christ expressly saith of sins, that ' all manner of sins shall be forgiven ;' 
and then he adds that exception. And not sins committed before calling 
only, but also after. For who shall limit it ? And the reason of that speech 
of Christ there, is the same that is here, that God is the God of all grace ; 
and therefore will shew all sorts of grace, in pardoning all sorts of sins ; and 
as this holds true in pardoning grace, so in supporting and relieving grace. 
Some will be apt to say, their temptations have been such as never befell 
anj^ that have been saved. Why truly, as some persons must be the chiefest 
of sinners, and yet are in heaven, so some must be miserablest for outward 
trials. I go further, if thou hadst no instance of any that ever was under 
the like, and knewest no particular promise or example for thy case, yet this 
one manifesto of God's, that he is the God of all grace, speaks home to thy 
case fully and sufficiently. God said but to Paul, * My grace is sufficient 
for thee,' and that was enough. If no man or angel could tell thee of 
any, yet this is instead of all, that he is the God of all grace ; that would 
reach it. 

3. I shall add confirmations unto your faith, to help you in the belief 
of this. 

(1.) God, who is the fountain of all grace, hath given to all and each 
saint, all graces, in their several degrees ; yet all for the kind that is proper 
to make them saints, to exercise towards himself and their brethren, with 
command to exercise them as opportunity and occasion shall be ofl'ered, 
and draws forth in some one saint or other all sorts of graces ; though in 
some, one sort of grace more, and other graces in others. So as take the 
whole body of them, we may call them saints of all graces, as to the exer- 
cises of all graces amongst them. Hence, therefore, it invincibly follows, 
that God, who is himself the God of all grace, in his kind, and the Father 
and fountain of all grace that is in us, that he will be sure to do, and per- 
form this. 



254 OF ELECTION. [BoOK lY. 

[1.] That he hath given each, and all sorts of graces to every saint habi- 
tually, 2 Pet. i. 3 informs [us], ' He hath given us all things belonging to life 
and godliness.' And it is spoken in imitation of God himself, of his 
divine nature, that as he is the God of all grace in his nature, so we have all 
grace in ours ; and so it follows, ver. 4, ' Being made partakers of the 
divine nature.' 

[2.] He hath furnished his saints with all, and each grace, to the end 
that, as occasion is, they should exercise and put forth these graces. And 
accordingly in the same chapter, ver. 5, he exhorts them to add grace to 
grace ; and in 2 Cor. viii. 6, he exhorts that ' as God had begun, so he 
would also finish in them the same grace also.' He speaks of a particular 
grace of liberality to the poor saints ; and means that they should exercise 
that, and by the same reason, every grace, as occasion and a fit opportunity, 
and just matter is offered to draw it out to others, as their need shall 
require. 

[3.] Take the whole body of saints, and God doth give opportunity to draw 
forth every sort of grace among them, all sorts of ways that grace is exten- 
dible unto, from the lowest sort to the highest. So there is no kind of 
grace, no strain or vein of grace, no disposition of grace, but God will give 
the experiment of the acting of it in one saint or other. Shall I give you an 
instance of one sort of gracious dispositions, and that of the highest sort, 
which was put forth in one saint, as an evidence not only of what grace in 
anv other might be raised up to ; for if any one had such a high elevation 
of his grace, that none [other] ever had ; yet it being the acting of his grace, 
the principle whereof is common to all, it will follow that the same might be 
raised up in any other. But also it is an evidence that any other grace of 
lower sort may be educed and acted in the heart of some other ; and in like 
manner every grace in some one or other, and that God will in such a like 
manner certainly do it. The note or strain which I shall mention, being as 
the note Ela in music, the highest that one man's voice could reach to, it 
will readily be yielded, that all other degrees lower may much more easily be 
reached by some or other ; and that they are it will shew how far the divine 
nature in us, that is, love to God, will stretch and extend. Think with 
yourselves, how high! Will it be ordinarily thought and imagined that to 
wish a man's self accursed from Christ, should ever have been found in the 
heart of any saint, which yet upon occasion, and a fit ground presented, hath 
been found in the heart of one saint, who yet professed to love Christ, and 
did love Christ more than any other saint we read of, to be accursed from 
Christ, whose enjoyment he so longed for, and so impetuously desired to be 
dissolved, and to be with Christ, and had been with him in the third heavens, 
vet having before his eyes a meet occasion and opportunity, as he judged it, 
to put forth this act upon, God did draw it out of him, Rom. ix. 1-3. The 
occasion was the glory of God (as he thought), in the salvation of Israel, which 
would arise to God more than out of his own particular salvation alone ; in 
this iuncture he wished himself accursed from Christ. And we may inter- 
pret his heart in it by what was Christ's, who was made a curse for man that 
sinned, which was his own flesh, and in being made a curse was not separated 
from acting grace and love to God ; for his grace towards God never wrought 
more than when on the cross, but it was a separation from all present comfort. 
And thus it was in Paul's heart, who was content to have all the comfort he 
should have had from Christ, debarred him for ever, but not the exercise of 
grace, for this was of the highest. And that so he might for ever have 
glorified God in the highest manner, it being with the greatest self-denial 
that ever was. 



Chap. II,] of election. 255 

Now what do I infer from hence, but, 1, that there being so full and proper 
an occasion, or ground for Paul's grace to rise up to this elevation, and that 
God did draw it out accordingly ; that therefore in like manner God will 
extract from out of the hearts of the rest of his saints (some or other) all, 
and any other sorts of graces, when the like meet occasions and opportuni- 
ties shall be, to draw them forth to the end, that he may give a full experi- 
ment of all grace in the exercises of them upon all such occasions ? The 
second thing I infer is, that on God's part there can be in us no temptation, 
or need ; no case so desperate in any one that is called, but that there must 
be supposed that he hath in him a grace, and a love to extend and apply 
itself thereunto, and overcome it. Shall Paul rise up in the way of the 
exercise of his grace, unto the highest strain that is supposable, and exceed 
God in the exercise of the grace that is in him towards us ? There is no 
case but God can find in his heart a suitable grace for it ; yea, he being the 
God of all grace too, if there were any case more extraordinary than an- 
other, he would greedily take the advantage thereof to choose, and not slip 
so great an opportunity of shewing his grace to the uttermost to such a soul, 
and then certainly for the glory of his grace will do it to all, or any other 
need, in some of his saints or other. 

I might illustrate this by that which is the greatest opposite unto grace in 
us, and that is self-love in its reign and height. Do you know, or can you 
imagine into what shapes this Proteufi, this monster, this devil self-love, will 
be turned into, as occasions and circumstances one is put into, may and do 
draw it forth in some or other ; unto what heights of wickedness it may, by 
occasion, be broached forth into, what infinite varieties of its workings there 
are of all sorts ? We may say, that every man's heart in this respect is the 
seed of all sin ; and yet withal we may say, that every man's corruption is 
not drawn forth to all, and every sort of evil ; and yet, likewise, that there 
is no sort of sin, or wickedness, or strain of inordinate acting of self-love, 
but hath been acted, and shewn itself in some manner or other ; so as take 
the whole body of mankind, and we may say, the body of sin amon^^ them 
hath had a completeness, as a body in the community of them ; and for 
this you may read the Scriptures. Look about you throughout the world, 
stories of all ages, and read your own hearts. If God should seal up to any 
man, as he hath done to the devils, that he will never be merciful unto them, 
even any man that hath had the light of the gospel with any power upon his 
heart, he would certainly fly in God's face, fixed with an eternal revenge 
against him, as the devils also do ; and this is but the efl'ect of self-love, thouo-h 
the highest ; which is all wickedness in the nature, in the principle of it, and 
dispensatorily (if I may allusively use this word in this matter), is all wicked- 
ness in the exercise of it, in the body of mankind. And certainly self-love 
cannot bo drawn out to more varieties of sinfulness, and higher actings of it, 
than the divine nature may be in the saints, in contrary dispositions of in- 
genuity to God ; and therefore, as all sins, so all graces have acted in some 
saints or other towards God, and their brethren saints, even so as to die for 
one another (as John speaks), as the opportunity hath been. God will be 
as sure to give the experiments of the workings of graces of all sorts as well 
as sins, and though not in the parallel perfection for degrees, yet for kinds. 

Now parallel to these things bring your sins, and temptations, all ye 
saints, before the God of all grace. Will grace in us, and will sin in us, 
stretch to all sorts of the actings of each supposable, and shall not God's 
grace, who hath the title of the God of all grace ? He is said to be the 
God of all grace ; and his grace being the pattern of all ours, and infinitelv 
exceeding it, then how much more shall he do the like, by the exerting of his 



256 OF ELECTION. [BoOK IV. 

grace upon all occasions of it in all cases, yea, the worst ? Doth God de- 
clare himself in this manner to be the God of all grace, in the high divine 
principles thereof ; and shall he not, to those to whom he hath said, ' I will 
be gracious,' put it forth upon all occasions, which are his opportunities to 
glorify his grace by ? 

(2.) Consider, secondly, how that not only our graces will thus extend, 
and may be thus acted, as hath been said ; but, further, himself com- 
mands us poor creatures, who have yet but little grace in us (narrow vessels 
are we in this respect), yet to ' abound in every grace : ' 2 Cor. viii. 7, 
' Therefore, as ye abound in every thing, in faith, and utterance, and know- 
ledge, and in all diligence, and in your love to us ; see that ye abound in this 
grace also.' Observe how it is spoken concerning the relieving of the neces- 
sities of others in their wants, concerning which he gives this particular 
command, ' See that ye abound, as in everything, so in this grace also ;' 
and however poor creatures fall short in the performance of these commands, 
yet the scope and intent of God's command is, and there is that in our 
grace which might be wi'ought up to it, that it should be drawn out as any 
occasion and opportunity is ofiered to exercise it. Nor is there any way 
supposable, for so I state it, wherein to shew forth any grace, of any 
kind, but the intent of the command reacheth it. And do you think that 
God himself, that commands this of us, and that professeth this style of him- 
self, that he is the God of all grace, in order to the relieving of our wants, 
whom he hath taken care of, do you think he will not abundantly supply 
you ? As in the seventh verse of this chapter in Peter, the apostle hath 
aforehand assured us, for in that he saith, he declares himself to be the God 
of all gi'ace to his called ones ; it doth not only shew what he is in himself, 
but it intimates and insinuates a promise of shewing himself the God of all 
grace to them ; and if in these his commands he doth bind and oblige us 
unto obedience, then surely he himself obligeth himself by his promises to 
perform them. The very same thing that he commands us towards others, 
the same he will himself certainly fulfil. Alas ! we are creatures ungracious, 
and have no grace but what he puts into us. And shall God, that is the 
fountain and original of all grace, that requires this of us, not execute it him- 
self ? Certainly yes. God saith, as it were himself, I am a holy God, true, 
just, faithful (as was said to us before) ; I abound in all these, and in every 
perfection else, shall I not abound in this grace also, to reheve the spiritual 
needs of my poor children, that have declared myself to be a God of all 
grace ? What doth the apostle John say ? 1 John iii. 17, ' Whoso hath 
this world's goods, and seeth his brother need, and shutteth up his bowels 
of compassion from him, how dwelleth the love of God in him ?' If God 
speak thus to us concerning a brother, to us, I say, that love but in part, 
and oh how little ! yea, and in the verse before, he commands us, if the case 
so calls for it, and require it of us, to ' lay down our lives for the brethren.' 
And shall not that God, of whom the same apostle John saith, that he is 
love itself, chap. iv. 16, ' God is love,' that is, he is all love towards his own 
children, for that is the meaning of it there ; and of whom he also saith im- 
mediately, afore the afore-cited speech, in the sixteenth verse of the third 
chapter, ' Hereby perceive we the love of God, because he laid down his life 
for us ;' and thereupon he obliges us, ' and we ought to lay down our lives 
for the brethren.' Shall not he, I say, if he seeth a son of his in pure need 
of spiritual grace, and deliverance out of temptation, shall not he draw out 
his bowels towards him ? Or else it would be said, How doth this love, this 
all-grace, by which the apostle Peter here sets him forth, how doth it dwell 
in him, the fountain of all grace and love ? And he persuades and obligeth 



Chap. II. J of election. 257 

us to lay down our lives for, and relieve our brethren's needs, because he 
hath professed to love us so, as to lay down his life for us. 

Now, to apply this. Suppose that Christ himself were alive, or that any 
were alive that were commissionated by him to heal all manner of diseases, 
as the apostles were. Mat. x. 1, would any of you that had (I will make 
the supposition) the worst disease that ever any man had, yea, that you had 
never heard of to have been since the world began, wouldst thou refuse to 
make trial whether he would or could heal thee or no ? Now God hath set 
up his bills, as I may say, upon every post, proclaiming himself to be the 
God of all grace, the * God that healeth thee,' Exod. xv. 26 ; and elsewhere 
hath applied it unto souls, * That healeth all thy diseases, and forgives all 
thy sins,' Ps. ciii. ; that healeth thy backslidings,' Hosea xiv. 4 ; and often 
backsliding is the most desperate case of all other, yet the God of all grace 
hath undertaken to heal them. And as bad a case as a saint is capable of 
after calling is that in Isa. Ivii. 17, ' For the iniquity of his covetousness was 
I wroth, and smote him : I hid me, and was wroth, and he went on fro- 
wardly in the way of his heart.' He did not only fall into interrupted or 
intermitted acts of backsliding, but he went on, as in a course for a while, 
in the way of his heart, and that frowardly. Well, but what saith the God 
of all grace to this ? ' I have seen his ways, and will heal him,' ver. 18. 
And Hosea gives this his reason of it, even because he is a God of grace, 
ver. 2, and loves freely, ver. 4, * I will heal their backsliding, and I will love 
them freely,' that is the reason of it ; * and receive us graciously,' say they 
accordingly, ver. 2, when they return to him, * so will we render the calves 
of our lips.' The love that is in the heart of God will in the end cause him 
to turn all anger towards them away, ' For mine anger is turned away from 
him ; ' as it follows in the same, ver, 4, ' And I will be (anew) as the dew 
unto Israel : and he shall gi'ow as the lily,' and so forth. ' Who is wise, 
and he shall understand these things ? prudent, and he shall know them ? 
for the ways of the Lord are right, and the just shall walk in them,' though 
they may often fall in their way ; * but the transgressors,' that were never 
savingly called, ' shall fall,' if they persist, ' therein.' It is the conclusion 
of that chapter and prophecy, and serves to prove this other place in Peter, 
that God is the God of all grace in dispensing supplies answerable to the 
needs, distresses, temptations, and sins of his elect children. 

(3.) He is a God of all grace essentially, or in respect that in his nature 
he hath infinite riches of grace, which is the root and fountain of these his 
designs to maintain and make good this his all-dispensatory of grace. He 
is the God of all grace ; that is, he is an all-gracious God in himself, even 
as well as that he is said to be a God almighty, which is an essential attri- 
bute. He says not that God is all grace, for he is just also. As when it is 
said he is almighty, it imports not that he hath no attribute else, but he 
says he is a God of all grace ; that is, that no perfection that should make 
him essentially gi'acious is wanting in him. He is an all-gracious God, and 
so in his nature. There is a sea of grace in him to feed all the streams that 
his purposes or dispensations of grace are to issue forth. And so our con- 
solation from hence is, that all the grace that is [in] the nature of God is in 
this promise of his being a God of all grace to his children, declared to be 
engaged to alford supplies unto his poor people, even to the utmost expend- 
ings and layings forth of those riches upon them, as their need shall require. 
And further, that in all his dispensations of grace, he will shew himself 
gracious as God, and to be a great God of grace ; that is, he will be gracious 
suitably, and at the rate of the greatness of his being God, or of so great a 

VOL. IX. R 



258 ,' OF ELECTION. , [BoOK IV. 

God. This David (the greatest subject, and favourite, and adorer of this 
grace that we find in the Old Testament) was apprehensive of, and it took 
his heart and faith : 1 Chron. xvii. 19, * According to thine own heart hast 
thou done this.' And it follows, * Lord, there is none like thee, none 
besides thee ; ' that is, thou art a God of grace (for it was a point of grace, 
and of high grace he there speaks it of), and shewest thyself so to be; for 
he speaks it of his covenant of grace with him in Christ, then newly declared 
to him. And ver. 18, he says, ' What can David say more ? ' As if he had 
said, the favour, the thing itself, is too great for me, that I can say nothing 
to it ; but if God will have it to be ; even as Paul, ' What shall we say to 
these things ? If God be for us,' &c., so David here. He speaks as an 
astonished man that could say no more. The greatness of the thing made 
him silent ; but he considered that God had done it out of his greatness as 
God. Thus, if he pardons, he pardons after the rate and manner of a great 
God, He will ' abundantly pardon ; ' not according to your thoughts (saith 
he), but my thoughts; Isa. Iv. 8, ' As the heavens are higher than the earth, 
so are my thoughts ' in pardoning ; for it is of pardoning abundantly that 
he utters this, ver. 7; for this sets his children a- wondering at him. *Who 
is a God like our God? pardoning,' &c., Micah vii. 8. Yet withal there 
observe how his pardoning mercies, in the exertings and dispensings of them, 
are limited to the remnant of his inheritance, free grace's subjects, as I call 
them. 

And as it is thus in pardoning, so in all other exertings of pure grace, 
whatever they be, towards the remnant of his inheritance. He doth them 
all as a great God. Thus David, 2 Sam. vii., speaks of the advancement of 
himself and his house to the kingdom, which ended in the promise of Christ, 
which in ver. 18, 19, he spreads afore the Lord, ' Then went king David in, 
and sat before the Lord, and he said. Who am I, Lord God ? and what 
is my house, that thou hast brought me hitherto ? And this was yet a 
small thing in thy sight, Lord God; but thou hast spoken also of thy 
servant's house for a great while to come; and is this the manner of man, 
Lord God ? ' The latter clause that I take hold of is, * Is this the 
manner of man, Lord God?' * The law of man,' as in the original, the 
intendment of which is, to discriminate God's manner of dealings, in point 
of grace, from man's. And grace being the sovereign in God, enacteth its 
laws as well as men-sovereigns use to do. And with God, the purposes of 
his grace to save his children are suprema lex of all other with him ; and all 
bis wonted degrees of grace are made according to his divine greatness, or 
as God, and are infinitely differing from and superior to those of men, though 
never so gracious. The height of our comfort (which is the result of this 
passage of David) lies in this, that in all his dispensations of grace, he is 
gracious as God, and as becomes the great God to be, and whom he takes 
on him to be, a God of all grace; and therein to act and do for them, and 
to shew himself in such a manner and measure to be a God of all grace, 
as is worthy of so great a God in himself, and that he may be owned as 
such a God. And how far this will reach never yet entered into the heart 
of man. 

Now, for me to set forth the infinite ocean of the mercy and grace of his 
divine nature, is not, shall not be the main part of this discourse, but how 
this may minister support to us, coming in the rear to all the former, and 
how all the grace that is in God is engaged to succour us against tempta- 
tions, and that it will extend itself to the utmost to carry us through them ; 
this I shall insist on a little. 

It is observable, to the end to shew how this of the graciousness of his 



Chap. IL] of election. 259 

nature, is that which engageth itself to make good the two foregone asser- 
tions about his purposes and dispensations ; that then when God uttered 
that great charter of grace, ' I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious/ 
— and that is the sum of his decrees, or purposing grace, we have been 
speaking of, — he prefaceth this unto it, * I will cause all my goodness to pass 
before thee ;' that is, all the goodness that is in myself and nature, * and I 
will proclaim the name of the Lord afore thee,' that is, all that whereby my 
nature, as to the point of grace and mercy, is to be made known to men. 
Then and after that, come in, *I will bo gracious to whom I will be gra- 
cious,' the resolve of which two passages, thus joined together, is, that on 
whom God's heart and will (which directs his grace to the persons whom and 
how) is set to be gracious by election (which is called ' the good pleasure of 
his will,' or the ' gracious purpose of his will '), there he interesteth all the 
goodness of his nature, and it remains engaged for their good. And to make 
demonstration of this, he thei^fore caused the whole train of his goodness 
to pass afore Moses, to let him see, and to hearten him by seeing of it, how 
great a strength, magazine, and treasure of power in goodness, was stored 
up in him, to maintain that resolution of his will when he said, *■ I will be 
gracious to whom I will be gracious.' And to make good that speech fur- 
ther observe, that whereas at first God had there begun to declare his grace, 
but particularly and personally unto Moses his person, ' Thou hast found 
grace in my sight,' ver. 12, IB, 16, 17of Exod. xxxiii. Yet afore he did proclaim 
openly and publicly all that his goodness thereafter specified, chap. xxxiv», 
or caused it to pass afore Moses, he before it, declared this the common in- 
terests of all his elect to be the same that Moses's was, in that matter of grace 
so proclaimed, ' The Lord, the Lord gracious,' &c. declared first, I say, in 
that clause, ' I will be merciful to whom I will,' &c., thereby shewing that 
what was said and done to Moses herein, concei-ned the bulk and whole body 
of the election, that they all (being called) might view and take comfort in 
that proclamation of all his goodness in that proclamation, chap, xxxiv. 5-7, 
* And the Lord descended in the cloud, and stood with him there, and pro- 
claimed the name of the Lord. And the Lord passed before him and pro- 
claimed. The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, long-suffering and 
abundant in goodness and truth ; keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving 
iniquity, and transgression, and sin, and that will by no means clear the 
guilty, visiting the iniquity of the father upon the children, and upon the 
children's children, unto the third and fourth generations.' Just as in 
Rom. viii., online inverso (though in an inverted method) you find the un- 
separableness of God's love to the whole lump, ver. 35-37, loudly proclaimed 
in the single name of Paul, ver. 38, 39, * For I am persuaded that neither 
death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things to come, 
nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us 
from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.' The just infer- 
ence from both which instances is, that what God in point of grace is to one, 
that he is to all of his elect ; and what he is to all (as to their interest in 
grace), that he is to every person of them ; yea, and withal, that his pro- 
clamation there to Moses, is to shew that he is gracious as he is the great 
God (which is that I have been a-saying all this while) ; for in the fore part 
of that proclamation, he first styles himself, and that three times : 1, the 
Lord ; 2, the Lord ; 3, God ; to shew that he is gi-acious as God, as the 
great God ; and that grace and mercy are inherent in his divine nature, and 
his being, and also to shew that all in him as God, is turned into grace and 
mercy towards those he will be gracious unto; as when the apostle says, * God 
is love,' all love. So then, you have all the essential grace in God, which is 



260 OF ELECTION. [BoOK IV. 

rooted in his being God, the -whole of the goodness that is in God, and that 
turned into grace, to back and uphold your faith. And what engagements 
greater can your souls desire ? 

Consider, then, thou called soul, called with a holy calling (I speak as to 
this point only now to such), that through that little chink, or narrow i)as- 
sage from death to life, thy effectual calling, which was thy first entrance 
into thy eternity, thou mayest (as through a small cranny we use to view 
the sun) first contemplate that purposing grace of God's will set on thee ; 
for by calling election is made sure. And then again, through that being 
thus fixed on thee, thou mayest behold an infinite boundless ocean of grace 
and love beyond that of his will and purposes, which is in his divine nature, 
and mayest draw into thy soul to fill it. Enlarge * (and a little of God soon 
fills us) all and the whole thereof, for thy comfort and support, limirire die- 
tatem, as he said. Calling will bring thee to election. And therein, if by 
thy calling, with the Spirit of God shedding abroad his love into thy heart, 
thou findest God ' knows thee by name,' as he said to Moses, and Christ 
' knows his sheep by name, and is known of his,' thou wilt further find this 
little word, or sentence of God, ' I will be gracious to whom I will be 
gracious,' will be as a sluice set open, and all the grace and mercy in God's 
nature will through it flow in upon thee as thine, for thy heart to swim in 
the abundant consolation of. 

May I take the boldness, for an improvement of this head, to make a sup- 
position, which yet is not truly to be made on God's part, but which in case 
thy unbelief should make ; and how wacked supposals that forge will make 
and bring out, we find too much by experience. We will therefore make it, 
and give thee a support beyond it, drawn from this topic head, — the engage- 
ment of the grace of God in the divine nature, where calling and election 
have once for ever fixed themselves. The supposition which thy unbelief 
might make is this, that thou fearest lest God, in his purposes of grace, had 
been too narrow as to thy particular allotment ; and thou shouldst imagine 
they may have been too scant, and fallen short through thy too prodigal ex- 
pensiveness in sinnings, or remiss neglects of ' so great salvation' since thy 
calling, so as they should not have been large enough to serve thy turn as 
to the discharge of what those infinite arrears arise unto, beyond that parti- 
cular portion of mercy his will made at first, and allotted thee (I alluding to 
that of the prodigal his portion), but that thou hadst sinned beyond the ex- 
tent of purposing grace ; as if God had not set apart gi'ace and mercy enough 
in those his legacies and bequeathments in his decreeing or purposing will, 
and that it had not clauses so full and large enough, nor provisions for num- 
ber or variety suflicient that may reach all thy cases and aggravations of 
sinnings. And so, out of the dreadful view of these, or such-like vain ima- 
ginations, thy faith and spirits sink and despond. 

Though this would be in thee, or an^^ a most wicked supposition, and 
derogatory to the foreknowledge of God, who knew all th}^ thoughts afore - 
hand, and what thy sins would be, yet if thou wouldst but further suppose 
and believe that he hath bound over all, and the whole of those vast and 
boundless unsearchable mines of grace that are in his nature, to aftbrd 
v.herewith to discharge his called and chosen ones of sinning, though never 
so grievous, and that his purposing had kept them from so falling, as is 
utterly incompatible with grace, certainly this engagement of the grace in 
his nature may, beyond the former, insure thee against all such fears and 
suppositions ; for to be sure this grace can afford assets, and sufficient 
enough to relieve against all ; against whatsoever hath fallen out, or shall 
* Qu. ' engage '?— Ed. 



Chap. II.] of election. 2G1 

iiiU out, to forgive what is past, and to prevent for the future what threat- 
eneth to destroy thee, as thou judgest. 

Use 1. You call uses applications ; I will give you one properly so called, 
which presseth you to seek to apphj all this to yourselves. That God is a 
God of all grace, is, as I have handled it, but a general to and among all 
saints. But the query may be, What may I, or you, or any particular saint, 
apply to ourselves of all this ? You find an example of the application I 
intend made to your hands by David : it is in Psalm lix. 10, * The God of 
uiy mercy shall prevent me.' God, ' the God of all grace,' that is the doc- 
trine ; but the God of my mercy, says David. And again, ver. 17, he ' is 
the God of my mercy ;' that is the application. And this usage of speech 
is nowhere else in Scripture. * The God of all grace,' sa^^s Peter to the 
brotherhood, but ' the God of my mercy,' says David for himself. The 
greatest application you can make of anything is to be able to say, this is 
■mine. All the stirs in the world are about ineuni and tuma, mine and thine. 
As Luther said, there is more force in pronouns, meum and tuum, than in any 
words. If a man be absolute to say, the grace of God is mine, it is no 
matter what else thou canst say is thine, if thou canst say the God of my 
mercy. I will give you what senses either are or may be put upon that 
passage, to comfort you in this way of application. And they are reduced 
unto those three heads, which in the doctrinal part I have gone upon, — of 
grace in God's dispensations, of the grace in his purposes, and of the grace 
in his nature. 

1. The first sense may be, take mercy as it signifies the mercies given 
from or bestowed by God dispensatorily. Thou mayest say to this God, He 
is the God of all the mercies that anyway belong to me, or that I ever have 
need of. Begin we there. Brethren, it is a wonderful condescension that 
God should make this an attribute of himself, I am the God of the mercy of 
every particular saint of mine. That as he is thy God, the God of thee 
personally, so also of thy mercies, it notes out that he hath taken this on 
him as an office. 

When any one takes a title upon him of a particular thing, it argues his 
undertaking the charge thereof, and that he puts himself under a trust, and 
enters into the bond of faithfulness to perform it, as to say one is a guardian 
of a child, or steward of one's house, it betokens an office, a trust, and 
engageth to faithfulness. For the great God to say, I am Deus tibi d mise- 
ricof-diis, I am the God of all thy mercies, it imports a devoting himself to 
take care of all the mercies that shall anyway concern thee. And when God 
takes a title upon him, it becomes his name, and God will not take his own 
name in vain ; to be sure he will perform his trust. That is one sense, and 
it is a comfortable one. 

2. The second is this, that every saint hath in purposing grace a set and 
sufiicient portion for him of grace and mercy set apart and allotted to him, 
which he may call his mercy, ' my mercy.' Suppose thou shouldst not need 
all the mercy that is in God's nature for thine own particular, yet be sure 
God in his decrees hath set apart a portion big enough for thee, and that is 
thy mercy, a portion so large, that it shall never be exhausted either by thy 
sins or miseries, which is God's meaning to the apostle : 2 Cor. xii., ' My 
grace is sufficient for thee ;' and Paul's meaning in that speech of his, 
Philip, iii., ' That for which I was apprehended by Christ ;' that is, that 
which was allotted me by God, for Christ to give forth to me ; it was his 
portion. There is a phrase carries it to this sense in Psalm lix. 10, * The 
God of my mercy shall, or doth, prevent me,' or ' hath prevented me.' 

^1.) If we read it, he hath j^revtnted me, the meaning is, there is no kind 



262 OF ELECTION. [^BoOK IV. 

of need I can have, but the God of my mercy hath prevented me in his pur- 
poses from eternity ; as a careful father, he lays up plasters ready spread 
against the time, knowing that his children will cut their fingers. In the 
text it is said, ' God careth for you;' care is that which forecasts what will 
fall out, and orders what may prevent it. He hath made provision before- 
hand by his mercy for whatever I shall need of any kind, and in that respect 
* he is the God of my mercy.' That is the first. 

Or (2.) he shall or doth ijrevent me. I am in a distress, and I pray, and 
God oftentimes prevents me and my prayer. He comes in the nick, in due 
time, as if he had lain in wait. I can no sooner pray, yea, often before I 
pray, he doth the thing for me. Why ? For * he is the God of my mercy ;' 
he prevents me. In the confidence of which, ver. 8, says he, ' God shall 
laugh at them,' speaking of his enemies; deliveranco from them was the 
mercy he speaks of. If one stood at the top of a watch-tower that belongs 
to a city (as in Holland they are wont), and saw an army coming against 
that town, and ^vithal saw a stronger army (as Elisha did) that would cer- 
tainly prevent them, he would in that case certainly laugh all the while to 
see what a stir the one kept, and what ado they made, and all in vain ; and 
in the hke confidence hereof David concludes, ' he is the God of my defence, 
the God of my mercy.' For he hath prepared a defence for every assault of 
the enemy ; and the same holds true of spiritual enemies. 

(3.) You may interpret it of the mercy in the nature of God, and in that 
sense you may say all the mercies that are in God are my mercies, carry it 
home with thee. In this same psalm you find him saying, * I will sing aloud 
of thy mercy,' ver. 16, he calls it God's mercy ; and yet, ver. 17, ' The 
God of my mercy ;' the meaning is, that all the mercy of God is my mercy, 
I can lay claim to it as need is. And the reason of it is pregnant ; for, is 
God our God ? If so, then all the mercie^ in God, upon the same account, 
are our mercies ; yea, it was mercy in him that moved him to become our 
God at first, and that made him make himself over to us ; so that, if thou 
canst say (poor soul) the God of my mercy, this doth contract the whole of 
God's being, and all the grace in him, to thyself. Art thou called ? Do 
but lay thy eye through that little hole of vocation, as through a perspective ; 
that is, through this consideration, I am one whom God hath called with a 
holy calling, and saved. And so thou mayest draw in all of God through 
that little hole ; even all the grace in God's nature hath an inlet through 
that sluice, and comes in upon thee, and thy faith may take it in. This one 
expression, ' I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious,' sets open (as I 
said) the flood-gates of all in the nature of God, to a poor soul, to whom 
God hath been gracious in calling him. Shall I speak a very big word to 
you, and so end ? You heard, God is the God of all grace to the brother- 
hood ; I tell thee, if any one soul had all the needs that all the brotherhood 
have, if nothing would serve his turn, but all the grace of God that he hath 
for the whole, yea, in the whole of himself, he would lay it out for thee. 
The Lord help us to consider these things, for they are true. Poor soul, 
thou usest to say, this or that is my sin, and it is so ; a grievous sin per- 
haps, and I am prone to it. And again, this is my misery ; but withal, I 
beseech thee to consider, that God is the God of thy mercy, and that all the 
mercy in God, upon occasion, and for a need, is thine, and all upon as good 
a title as that sin is thine ; for the free donation of God, and of his will, is 
as good a title as the inheritance of sin in thee. 

Use 2. You have heard what God is in his grace ; shall I invite you to 
the latter part of an intercourse, which as great a subject, yea indeed a 
favourite of free-grace as ever any, had with God, when his soul was filled 



Chap. II.] of election. 268 

and flushed with the apprehension of God's free-grace towards him, when 
he hung as a Httle globe of glass in the sun, as full of glory, shining through 
and through him, as he could take in or hold ? Shall I bring you where 
you may listen to and overhear at what a rate such a soul talks and speaks 
to God, when he is in such a frame ? You find it in 2 Sam. vii. 18-22, 

* David sat before the Lord, and he said, Who am I, Lord God ? and 
what is my house, that thou hast brought me hitherto ? And this was yet 
a small thing in thy sight, Lord God ; but thou hast spoken also of thy 
servant's house for a great while to come : and is this the manner of man, 
Lord God ? And what can David say more unto thee '? for thou. Lord, 
knowest thy servant. For thy word sake, and according to thine own heart, 
hast thou done all these great things, to make thy servant know them. 
Wherefore thou art great, Lord God : for there is none like thee, neither 
is there any God beside thee, according to all that we have heard with our 
ears.' 

God had first begun with him, and had thereby set his soul thus on fire. 
God had said his say by Nathan, which that conclusion unto what had fore- 
gone in verse 17, * According to all those words, and this vision, so did 
Nathan speak to David from God,' shews. It would be too long to enlarge 
on the fore-part of this visit made by God in that of the foregoing chapters ; 
only this I will say, there was never any favourite so courted and caressed 
by any great king, as David had been by God before this. The occasion 
God took to express what he did to him was, there came into the heart 
of David a motion to build God an house, and it was free-gi'ace from 
God that put that into David's heart too; for God doth but pump, if I 
may so say ; it is but as putting in water to draw out more ; he puts in 
grace, and we return it ; and God took this kindly : ver. 2, David had said, 

* I dwell in an house of cedar, but the ark of God dwelleth within curtains ;' 
so he would build God an house. God took this kindly, for God takes 
advantage to express his love to us. David had spoken this as to day ; 
God took it so kindly, and his heart was so full of it, that that very night, 
as you read, ver. 4, he says to Nathan, ' Go and tell my servant David,' 
&c. ; he would not defer one moment [his] answer. The grace of God is 
often seen in swift returns and answers to our prayers, and the message is 
all of grace. God pours out his heart upon him from ver. 8 to 18. And 
let me only add this, that in all this message of God's about building, to 
David, an house, and about his Son, David eyed Christ, and understood it 
so ; for, Heb. i. 5, what God says here of David's Solomon, ' I will be to 
him a Father, and he shall be to me a Son,' refers unto the 14th verse of 
this very chapter, and yet is there plainly applied to Christ. And that 
David understood it so, that of Peter warrants : Acts ii. 30, ' David being 
a prophet, and knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him that of the 
fruit of his loins, according to the flesh, he would raise up Christ to sit on 
his throne,' &c. Therefore he eyed Christ, and his eternal salvation in him, 
as Abraham did in Isaac, and saw Christ's day. And verse 21 of this chapter 
insinuates this : ' For thy word's sake,' says he (that is, for thy Christ's 
sake), * and according to thine own heart hast thou done this.' Nay, there 
had been no former word delivered unto David about this which he should 
here refer to, therefore that ]Vo}-d is Christ, o Xoyog, like that of Daniel, 
chap, ix., ' For the Lord's sake.' 

What God is to us in point of grace, is not my business now, the doctrine 
hath cleared that enough. It is the after part, David's reception and enter- 
tainment of all this from God, and how his heart took it, that I would make 
you to overhear, and work an impression of upon you answerable thereto. 



264 OF ELECTION. [BoOK lY. 

This is it will concern you for a pattern and example to jou, and will serve 
as a proper use of this doctrine. 
^ Now then, thou that professest thyself a subject of free grace, come and 
sit down a little with David (for as ver. 18, * David sat down ' when he 
uttered this), and let his meditation be thine ; what David says of his house 
and kingdom, apply thou to thy soul, for that was chiefly in David's eye : 
* My house indeed is not so,' as I had hoped, says he ; ' but this is my 
(personal) salvation :' 2 Sam. xxiii., ' yet God hath made with me an ever- 
lasting covenant, ordered in all things and sure, for this is all my salvation 
and all my desire.' It is true, thou hast no Messias to come out of thy loins 
as David had ; thou hast no earthly kingdom to be advanced to, but thou 
hast greater things ; though thou hast not Christ to come out of thy loins, 
yet thou hast Christ to dwell in thy heart, and that is more ; ' Christ to be 
formed in thee,' as the apostle says in the Galatians, and thou art more 
intimately one with him, than if thou hadst been his forefather, yea, his 
mother, or hadst had him in thy womb, for that alone is but an outward 
privilege of the flesh, as Eom.ix; yea, and as Christ speaks it of his mother 
and brethren. And though thou hast not an earthly kingdom, yet thou art 
interested in the true kingdom of David, as that of glory is called : Luke 
i. 32, < The Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father David,' 
&c. And what David here speaks of his house, ver. 19, as ' for a long time 
to come,' thou mayest apply to heaven : thou hast ' a house, not made with 
hands, eternal in the heavens,' 2 Cor. v. 1. And, as I said, the truth is, 
David is fain, as for his own person, to betake himself to this at last. Now 
this premised, I will go over David's speech, and do thou in such a way 
apply it to thyself all along. 

1. Says he, * what is my house, that thou hast brought me hitherto ?' 
Alas, had God said, thou wert a shepherd, ver. 8, ' I took thee from the 
sheep-cot, from following the sheep, to be a ruler over my people, over 
Israel, and have made thee a great name, like unto the great men that are 
on the earth ! 

Now, what in heu of this canst thou say ? I was dead in sins and tres- 
passes, an Assyrian ready to perish. 'By grace thou art saved,' and he 
hath ' caused thee to sit in heavenly places with Christ Jesus.' To David, 
God only said, I have made thee like unto the great men that are but in 
the earth ; but he hath made thee a greater name, like unto the name of 
those that sit with Jesus Christ in heaven. The Lord called and converted 
thee when thou wast in thy blood and filth, and cast out to the loathing of 
thy person ; and he said unto thee, Hve ; and he called thee the first mo- 
ment of thy being, called into eternal glory, into as perfect a right of it as 
ever thou shalt have when thou shalfc have been millions of years in heaven ; 
and God hath hitherto kept thee, and thou mayest say, as David did here, 
Lord, thou hast brought me hitherto. How many temptations hast thou had 
to sin ? How many reducements and dehverances ? And the more thy 
temptations have been, the more of his power has been expended in keeping 
thee. Thou hast been like a ship at anchor, held by a straw, as to thine 
own sense, and yet held. Thou hast reason to thank God thou hast been 
brought hitherto, that thou hast escaped so well, and hast had so good 
quarter in the world. Thou hast escaped many sins and scandals thou 
mightest have fallen into, but God kept thee ; this the first. 

2. Then, secondly, David being overpowered with free grace in his soul, 
said ' Who am I, Lord ?' Do thou also put these two together. Who am 
I, thou great God ! Set that dust of the balance, I, a creature, and I, a 
sinner, with the great God, ' the high and lofty one that inhabiteth eternity,' 



Chap. II.] of election. 265 

and humble thyself to the dust in the sense of thy nothingness and 
baseness. 

3. Then, thirdly, take the next words of David, ' and this was yet a small 
thing in thy sight, Lord God, but thou hast spoken also of thy servant's 
house for a great while to come ; and is this the manner of man, Lord 
God ?' (the word is, ' is this the law of man ?') His purpose in that phrase 
is, as the opposition shews, to set in comparison the wont, the law, the 
usage of God's free grace, with the manner or law of men's kindnesses, so 
to aggrandise it. God comes with some one, and that so great a kindness, 
that shall make a man think, and justly, what can be more ? And yet, 
before he hath done with him, he will make that but a small thing in com- 
parison with others. Free grace, after calling, loves to exceed itself, outdo 
itself in what it hath done. God will still do as Christ said to Nathanael, 
' Dost thou wonder at this ? Thou shalt see greater things than these, thou 
shalt SCO the heaven opened,' John i. 51. I shall give you some instances. 

(1.) Look to thy first calling; wort thou called with seeing thy sin? 
And was thy heart changed then, and sanctified withal, and didst thou find 
the image of God spick and span new in thee ? Thou thoughtest this 
wondrous great. But then, 

(2.) Thou foundest that all this would not justify thee, and thereupon all 
thy sanctification became but a small thing to thee, and ! then did thy 
soul cry, ' Blessed is the man whose sin is covered ;' and that I had 
Christ's righteousness to cover my sin ! And then thou esteemedst all thy 
sanctification * but as dross and dung ' in comparison of being * found in 
Christ, not having thine own righteousness, but the righteousness of faith,' 
&c. And what ado hadst thou atter that first work of sanctification, to work 
thyself out of that thy new created righteousness, and to obtain that of 
Christ ? 

(3.) When thou hadst pursued thus after justification through the blood 
of Christ, and hadst obtained some quiet and easement, and perhaps thereby 
assurance, then adoption appeared, and thereupon justification alone and 
pardon became but a small thing to thee, when you were assured of being 
a son and heir, a co-heir with Christ ; and then your soul began to rejoice 
with a new joy, as Rom. v. 2, 3, ' we rejoice in hope of the glory of God.' 

(4.) Then union with Christ and being one with him came into view; and 
then how did thy soul value this above all, and pursued after it accordingly, 
even to know, that as the Father lives in the Son, so that the Son lives in 
me, as John xiv. 20. And upon this, all those former privileges simply 
considered, became but small things : John xvii. 22, 23, you will find union 
with Christ preferred to glory; 'and the glory which thou gavest me, 1 
have given them, that they may be one, even as we are one ; I in them, 
and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one,' &c. 

(5.) And not only so, but ' we joy in God,' llom. v. 11, through Christ ; God 
is to become all in all. And thus still as thou goest on, farther and farther, 
so free grace presents thee with new things, greater and greater ; and 
although thou mayest have known and heard of all these privileges at first, 
yet they were not set on with an impression worthy of them, but that was 
done by such a gradual succession as hath been shewed. Yea, I add, 

(6.) Suppose thou hadst been millions of ages in heaven, and there been 
satiated with the fulness of God and Christ, yet thou wilt then say. Lord, 
* hitherto thou hast brought me ;' but this is but a small thing, a finite 
portion of time of enjoyment hitherto, compared to eternity. Eternity is 
for * a long time to come,' indeed, as David here, the thoughts of which do 
multiply our joys by every moment wherein we are yet to enjoy them. 



2Bf) OF ELECTION. [BoOK IV. 

So as I may really say of this series of dispensations what your new pro- 
jectors of philosophy have feigned ; say they, every fixed star is a sun, and 
if we should travel over and through the infinite heavens, we should meet 
still with new suns, which at this distance seem but stars, and then this sun 
itself would become to view but as a star, when they are ascended up so far 
above it. Now, it is certain that Christ himself, considered as God-man, 
and as now shining in his dispensatory kingdom, is but as the ' bright 
morning star,' Rev. xxii. 16, unto God himself, when he ' shall be all in all,' 
1 Cor. XV. But to return again to David. 

4. What doth David further say to all these things ? Even this, 
* What can David say more unto thee ? for thou, Lord, knowest thy ser- 
vant.' He speaks as a man uon-plussed ; his thoughts swallowed up his 
words, as Job's ; he could go no further, seeing that as a creature he could 
make no proportionable return nor acknowledgment, no, not in words. And 
the apostle also doth the like, Rom. viii. When he had run his course 
through all the progresses of free grace, ver. 31, he stops with this, 'What 
shall we say to these things?' I use to say, faith is never non-plussed ; 
bat we see that love is. Faith and love divide that verse between them : 
' If God be for us, who can be against us ? ' that is the voice of faith, and 
therefore it hath still to reply against all can be said to the contrary, ' What 
shall we say to these things ? ' for love sits down overwhelmed and silenced 
therewith, and hath nothing to say but to embrace them. 

5. Says David, ' Thou knowest thy servant,' that is, 1, thou knowest what 
my heart is to thee ; as Peter said to Christ, ' Lord, thou knowest I love 
thee.' 2. He also resolves all the grace of God bestowed upon him into 
God's foreknowledge : ' Thou knowest me,' and that ' by name ;' as of 
Moses God said, ' I