to a wicked world, for one hundred and twenty years, though he foreknew that very few would be reformed by Noah's preaching; and he told Noah, that at the end of those years he would bring a flood over the world to destroy the wicked inhabitants of it, who would not be reformed. Again, when he put Adam and Eve into paradise under the law of innocency, and forbid them to eat of the fruit of the tree of knowledge, we also believe he foreknew that Adam and Eve would eat this fruit, and disobey their Creator; and yet he wisely forbid them to eat it. Now since we know that a just God hath in fact done these things, we must confess there cannot be the least injustice in them. Nay, we may go a step farther in these matters of fact. God has actually sent his Son and his gospel with miracles and divine evidence, where he knew they would not be received, or at most by a very few, that is, to Chorazin, Capernaum, and Bethsaida in Galilee; and yet he never sent this gospel, with such evidence, to Tyre and Sidon, to Sodom and Gomorrah, where Christ tells us, it would have been received, and the inhabitants would have repented in sackcloth and ashes; Mat. xi. 21. we are sure there is nothing unjust in all this transaction, because we know God has done it, who is righteous in all his ways, and holy in all his works; Psal. cxlv. 17. Let us then content ourselves with knowing the things that make for our own peace, and humbly submit to the wise and gracious government of God, for our own eternal happiness, though we cannot enter into the impenetrable secrets of his counsel, nor solve all difficulties therein, because our short and narrow view of things cannot comprehend them: And yet, at the same time, if we can, by our reasonings according to scripture, cast any happy gleam of light into these darknesses of providence, whereby any honour may be done to God, any imputation of injustice taken off from his conduct, any scruples of mankind satisfied, and any angry contentions removed; it is neither unlawful nor improper to attempt and seek after such advantages: And with this view and hope I would propose the three following questions:

QUEST. XIV. Can the different Opinions of Christians, concerning the Operations of divine Grace on the Souls of Men, be reconciled?

The corruption and degeneracy of mankind, by the fall of Adam, is generally and truly supposed by our protestant divines, to be so great and universal, and their weakness or impotence to change their own sinful natures into holiness, is so evident, both in the discourses of the sacred writers, and in the experience of men, that it is agreed among most or all of them, there is a ne

cessity of some aids of divine grace towards our recovery; and that not only to provide, by proper outward means, such a salvation as may be answerable to the miseries we labour under, and to propose it outwardly and plainly in the gospel, but the best of us stand in need, in our fallen state, also of some further favour from heaven, some inward assistances and influences of the grace of God, and his Spirit, in order to restore us from the ruins of our fall by repentance, and to enable us to accept of the salvation which is procured by our Lord Jesus Christ, the Mediator.

There have been some writers indeed, who profess christia nity, who suppose nothing else is necessary, in order to the recovery of fallen man, where the gospel is preached, but the mere outward proposal of this gospel, and the representation of the readiness of God to pardon the sins of those that repent and believe, together with all the motives of hope and fear, &c. which are made use of in the bible, to awaken and excite sinners to return unto God. They imagine that the providential disposal of the outward circumstances of men, by their enjoying the benefit of a pious education, or their sitting under a useful ministry, or the advantage of having good company frequently to converse with, and religious books brought in their way, with opportunity and leisure for reading, &c. are abundantly sufficient to turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of satan unto God; Acts xxvi. 18. to renew them unto holiness, and to make new creatures of them, fit for the business and blessedness of heaven. Now these kind providences are what they call the grace of God, and the only grace they will allow to be necessary to our salvation. This was the most common sentiment of the ancient pelagians*, who gave so much trouble to the churches

It is pity the professed disciples and followers of the religion of Christ should have been divided into so many different opinions, and thereby given occasions to distinguish them by so many different names, which are chiefly de. rived either from their several tenets, or some practice of their forefathers, or from some signal writers who espoused, defended or propagated those different sentiments. I could wish with all my soul that they were all of one opinion, and all confined only to the single name of christians, which was given them first at Antioch, to distinguish them from heathens, Jews and infidels of every kind. But since there are such multitudes of different sentiments among them, and in writing controversies one cannot convéniently use a long pariphrasis to describe each of them, sufficient to distinguish them from the rest, we are constrained to make use of those names by which they have either distinguished themselves, or the world hath distinguished them, such as pelagians, strict calvinists, arminians or remonstrants, and moderate calvinists or reconcilers.

But here let it be observed, that the most rigid calvinists, who pretend to carry the doctrines of divine grace to the greatest height of resistless and sovereign efficiency, and the pelagians, who generally reduce it to the lowest degree, that is, to mere favourable outward providences, are counted the two extremes in this controversy about divine grace: And between these two there are almost as many degrees and classes of different sentiments, as there are writers. Some of them approach a little nearer to the one side, and some to the other. And it

of Christ in early times, and which occasioned the labours of St. Augustine to be much employed in the refutation of their errors: Afterward they allowed some illumination of the understanding by divine grace.

But I fear those who embrace the old pelagian doctrines, have too little regard to the express language of scripture, and to its most obvious sense, when it speaks so much about the power or grace of God, and the operations of the Spirit of God, in giving us a new heart, creating a clean heart in us, enlightening our minds, converting our souls, or turning us to God, and creating us anew after the image of God, working in us both to will and to do, &c. whereby some inward and effectual operations of divine grace, upon the minds or hearts of men, are so plainly expressed, that even the remonstrants or arminians themselves, I think in all their ranks and classes have supposed some such inward workings of the grace of God upon the heart; because so many plain texts of scripture could never be otherwise interpreted, without an unreasonable force put upon them. Yet I think it must be acknowledged, that these last named writers do expressly allow these inward operations of God, to go no farther than to render men salvable, and to leave the powers of men in a state of indifference, to convert and turn them selves to God, but not effectually to determine and secure their salvation; of which I shall speak more immediately. Among those who admit of divine grace to operate inwardly on the minds and hearts of men, there have been several different opinions what this grace is, how far it reaches, and how much of it is necessary towards the recovery of man. But before I represent these several opinions, I would lay down some general propositions, which I think may be assented to by most or all of them, and exhibit them as a medium of reconciliation to one another : And I shall rejoice, if I may be so far favoured of providence, as to convince them how their several different sentiments may all be tolerably reconciled to these general propositions, and thereby take away a great deal of that noisy controversy which has unhappily perplexed the church of Christ upon this subject.

Proposition I. God has provided a glorious salvation for fallen men by Jesus Christ, which is sufficient for all men in its own nature, and shall be certainly effectual to all that are willing to accept of it upon his appointed terms, or in his own appointed way, that is, in a way of repentance for sin, renewal unto holiness, and faith or dependence on the mercy of God through Jesus Christ.

is not fit that any persons should be comprehended under any of these names, but which they themselves allow or chuse, according as they come nearest to the opinions of this or the other party.

II. Since God has made so glorious a provision for the recovery of mankind, he will not leave it to mere chance and uncertainty, whether any person shall repent and accept of this offered salvation or no; lest, through the universal depravation and wretched obstinacy of men, his own gracious counsels for our salvation should be frustrated, and the important labours and sufferings of his Son be sustained to no saving purpose, and rendered almost useless to the world.

III. There is no way, which I can conceive of, how God should secure or ascertain the salvation of any in general, or make it sure even to his own foreknowledge, unless it be some way or other ascertained, which particular persons shall accept of this grace and salvation. Observe, I do not here go so far as to say, the salvation of those particular persons should be made necessary by any such absolute decree, or such irresistible influences as some have asserted; but it must some way or other be made certain to the foreknowledge of God, that such particular persons shall be saved; for if it be left at utter uncertainty as to every individual, how can it possibly be known that any individuals at all shall be finally partakers of it?

IV. God will magnify his grace in the salvation of all those who are saved in such a manner, that every one shall acknowledge his own salvation perfectly owing to the divine mercy; and that none shall have any cause or occasion to glory in himself, but shall confess to the glory of divine grace, that it is grace that is the supreme and the chief cause that has made him to differ from others. Without this there could not be a holy harmony and concert among all the saved number, in their songs of praise to God and their Savour: Not unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but to thy grace be all the glory: Nor indeed could any tolerable interpretation be given to many scriptures, which humble the pride of man, by ascribing all to God.

V. How much soever the blessed God may design to manifest and magnify his free and sovereign grace towards sinful men, yet in every step of his procedure he will maintain such an invariable regard to his equity, as Governor of the world, that he will never exercise his grace in such a manner as to take away the necessary regards and honours due to his governing justice. The great God has given man an understanding mind to distinguish between good and evil, and a freedom of will to chuse one or the other, and ordained him to be always, and in all circumstances, a proper subject of his moral government. And he has determined and resolved in righteousness to manifest himself at last as a Judge, and render to every one according to their works; Rom. ii. 6. And therefore he will maintain this righteous design of his government, to make the eternal rewards and

punishments of men to depend on what they themselves have freely chosen, whether it be good or evil: Nor will he ever do any thing inconsistent with this his glorious and universal design, as a righteous Governor and Judge of his intelligent

creatures.

VI. Therefore when divine grace operates upon the minds or wills of men, in order to their conversion and salvation, it is generally done in such a soft, gentle and connatural manner, that does not put any violence upon the faculties of the soul: But for the most part, the grace of God, and his Holy Spirit, seem to operate insensibly, as though our own faculties wrought this of themselves, and without any strong, certain, and evident notice, that it is the operation of any spirit superior to our own: And yet by the blessed effects of our conversion and sanctification, compared with the records of scripture, we certainly infer it must be by virtue of some divine influence received from above, that the glory may be given unto God and his grace, as the supreme cause of our salvation. Now if all the particular opinions of parties, about the methods and degrees of the exercise of this inward grace towards the salvation of men, may be pretty well reconciled to these propositions, I do not see any sufficient occasion for such very noisy and angry contests as have been found in the christian church upon this subject; since they agree in these most necessary and important things which relate to the honour of divine justice, and divine grace, as they are represented in scripture, though perhaps there may remain some particular texts and expressions of scripture, to which it may be hard to reconcile the contenders on either side. However, since I think these propositions contain the most important sense and design of the revelations of scripture on this subject, and I am persuaded they may be solidly maintained and defended by scripture, and reason, and experience, I hope we shall be able to shew, that all the different schemes are consistent, in some measure, with these propositions.

Let us now recount the three chief sentiments of men under the several letters of the alphabet, A, C, and R, for the sake of better distinction.

Cimagines mankind to be so entirely and universally corrupted by the fall, and impotent to all that is good, the mind to be so blind, the will so perverse, and the affections set upon carnal objects with such obstinacy, that there must be an immediate operation of God, by his grace, in a physical or supernatural manner, on all the several powers of our nature, to rectify them, and make them capable, willing and fit to be partakers of this salvation. He supposes there must be special, efficacious, and irresistible influences of the Holy Spirit on the mind or understanding to enlighten it, to see and discern divine things in their