284 Homily and Harmonist alike disclaim SECT. dience we pay to God does not obtain righteousness or salvaV. tion by its own force or merit, but by force of the covenant or free promise which is received by faith." But in what manner II. Diss. faith leads us directly to Christ, I have thus shewn. "But v. 5. p. 71. because the promise of eternal life, given in the Gospel, is founded in the meritorious satisfaction of Jesus Christ, and confirmed by His most precious blood, therefore the obedience of faith continually refers to Christ as the only Propitiator: and His most perfect obedience in life and death is the only circumstance which makes our imperfect and spiritless obedience acceptable to God unto salvation, and to carry off the reward of eternal life." The reader would do well, if he has leisure, to read the whole of this paragraph. But that neither here nor elsewhere the author of the Homily ever thought of that instrumentality, strictly so called, of faith in the matter of justification for which many so sharply II. Diss. contend, I have sufficiently proved in the Harmony: wherefore, all these things being weighed, I shall leave it to the aßλeía judgment of the conscientious reader whether recklessness is to be here ascribed to the young or to the old writer. xviii. τας pt. ii. [p. 22.] § 8. There yet remains the third and last passage from the Homily which Dr. Tully has brought against our opinion, and from which he holds thunders and lightnings over our εργοδιώκ- heads. "Against the followers of works, our mildest of mothers, kindled with zeal towards God, thus, contrary to her custom, fulminates in the Homily of Salvation; "This doctrine,' (i. e. of justification by faith alone without works,) 'all old and ancient writers of Christ's Church do approve : this doctrine advanceth and setteth forward the true glory of Christ, and beateth down the vain glory of man: this, whosoever denieth,' (attend, O reader,) 'is not to be accounted for a Christian, but for an adversary to Christ and His Gospel, and for a setter forth of men's vain glory.' What stupendous words are these, of what an awful sound!" I answer: What Dr. Tully means here by epyodióktas, I do not know, as neither do I understand some other of his elegant expressions. But whatever it is, these thunderbolts do not strike us, inasmuch as they are aimed by our mildest of mothers, roused by just fervour and zeal towards God, only at the supporters of human merits. Let us quote V. the whole passage as it stands, which Dr. Tully, that it might sECT. serve his own cause, has given us cut up and broken. "This saying, that we be justified by faith only, freely, and [Hom. i. without works, is spoken for to take away clearly all merit of P. 22.] our works, as being unable to deserve our justification at God's hands, and thereby most plainly to express the weakness of man and the goodness of God; the great infirmity of ourselves and the might and power of God; the imperfectness of our own works, and the most abundant grace of our Saviour Christ; and therefore wholly to ascribe the merit and deserving of our justification unto Christ only, and His most precious blood-shedding. This faith the Holy Scripture teacheth: this is the strong rock and foundation of Christian religion this doctrine all old and ancient authors of Christ's Church do approve:" and so it goes on, as quoted by the Doctor. Surely, nothing is more evident from these words than that those alone are affected by this anathema, and are rejected from the society of Christians, who defend the meritoriousness of good works. But what is this to the author of the Harmony? So far is he from defending the merit of good works, that he is clearly of the same opinion against them as the author of the Homily. Hear his own words from the Harmony: "Surely those do not deserve the name II. Diss. of Christians who teach such a kind of merit. And I will xviii. 4. p. confidently pronounce that those who have thoroughly imbibed such a shocking principle, have scarcely, ay never, known or felt the grace of Christ. Modesty of mind is the very soul of Christianity, and he that is without it, is as the dead body of a Christian, not a true and living Christian : but to such modesty, what can be more opposite than the above proud presumption of merit?" From this the reader will see with what fairness Dr. Tully has abused the words of the Homily, that he might crush his opponent with the anathema of the English Church. § 9. I have at length gone through all those passages which Dr. Tully, after having carefully searched every nook and corner, as it appears, could bring forward from the Homily of the Salvation of Man, in support of his own against our explanation of the article. Now let passage be compared with passage, namely, the many clear and distinct 195. V. SECT. passages from the Homily which I have fully and fairly quoted in the Harmony and Examen, with those few which Dr. Tully has given, broken, cut up, and evidently distorted by his own interpretations, and then I will willingly leave it to the decision of any fair-minded person to say to which interpretation of the article, mine or his, the author of the Homily would give his assent, to whom the article itself expressly refers us as its legitimate interpreter. Indeed I cannot but be surprised at the consummate confidence of the Doctor, who after so light a contest, or rather a skirmish, so unsuccessfully brought to a close, thus votes himself a triumph. "It is more than sufficiently evident, as I think, on the part of the Church of England, that she not only does not support with her assent, but utterly abominates all pyodikal kind of righteousness of works:" i. e. even that which we defend. ωσις p. 26. § 10. Before, however, we proceed to the rest of this chapter, it may be as well to strengthen our explanation of the article, which to the fair-minded reader we must have already sufficiently proved by the passages cited from the Homily, with the authority and support of one of our most learned and most approved theologians, who was famous for Just. Paul. his writings long before those twenty years which Dr. Tully has determined as the æra of the new ecclesiastical doctrine introduced amongst us: and this too, lest any one, finding that he is unable to refute it by other means, should brand it with the invidious name of novelty. This is the late most worthy Dean of Gloucester, Richard Field, a divine of keen p.323,324. judgment and great reading, who in the Appendix to the ed. Oxon. second chapter of his third book on the Church, after he had 1628.] answered the Papists who objected against our doctrine that "man is justified by faith only without works," by saying that the same doctrine had been handed down by the ancients in the very same formula of words, goes on to enquire in what sense both ancient and modern divines have understood these words. "By these phrases of speech," he says, "they sometimes exclude (1.) all that may be without supernatural knowledge, all that may be without a true profession (2.) sometimes the necessity of good works in act, or external good works: (3.) The power of nature without V. illumination and grace. (4.) The power of the law. (5.) SECT. The sufficiency of any thing found in us to make us stand in judgment, to abide the trial, and not to fear condemnation. And in this sense faith only is said to justify, that is, the only mercy of God, and merit of Christ apprehended by faith and then the meaning of their speech is, that only the persuasion and assured trust that they have, to be accepted of God, for Christ's sake, is that that maketh them stand in judgment without fear of condemnation. And in this sense all the divines formerly alleged, for proof of the insufficiency of all our inherent righteousness and the trust which we should have in the only mercy of God, and merit of Christ, do teach as we do, that faith only justifieth. For neither they nor we exclude from the work of justification, the action of God as the supreme and highest cause of our justification : for it is He that remitteth, and receiveth us to grace: nor the merit of Christ, as that for which God inclineth to shew mercy to us, and to respect us: nor the remission of sins, gracious acceptation and grant of the gift of righteousness, as that by which we are formally justified: nor those works of preventing grace, whereby out of the general apprehension of faith, God worketh in us dislike of our former condition, desire to be reconciled to God, to have remission of that which is past, and grace hereafter to decline the like evils, and to do the contrary good things. For by these we are prepared, disposed, and fitted for justification, without these none are justified. And in this sense, and to imply the necessity of these to be found in us, sometimes the Fathers and others say we are not justified by faith only. And we all agree that it is not our conversion to God, nor the change we find in ourselves, that can any way make us stand in judgment without fear, and look for any good from God otherwise than in that we find ourselves so disposed and fitted as is necessary for justification, whence we assure ourselves God will in mercy accept us for Christ's sake." § 11. This explanation of the article certainly coincides in all its parts with our interpretation of it, as given in the Harmony: but it does not in any way square with that of the Doctor. For 1st. Good works, which the most learned gentleman wished to have excluded from the proposition, 'we V. 288 the same as maintained in the Harmony. SECT. are justified by faith only without works,' are by himself reduced in all to five heads. 1. Works done without an external revelation of the Gospel. 2. External works, or the actual righteousness of works. 3. Works of nature, done without the internal grace of the Gospel. 4. Works of the law, i. e. the Mosaic. 5. And lastly, meritorious works, which are done with the opinion and in the confidence of their being meritorious. Now I ask the Doctor to bring forward a passage where the author of the Harmony attributes the first justification to any of these works: on the contrary, he expressly and very frequently excludes all these works from that first justification. 2ndly. He expressly shews that the meaning and view of all our divines who have used this mode of speaking, was on the whole this: that there is no virtue or good work of ours on which we can rely and stand fearless at the judgment of God, without the mercy of God and the merits of Christ our Saviour: and that next, all those divines who acknowledge that all our inherent righteousness is insufficient, and that we ought to place our trust only in the mercy of God and merits of our Saviour, teach the same thing, namely, that faith only justifies. And this is the very explanation of the article for which we are contending, but which Dr. Tully rejects as not being full or sufficient. 3rdly. He makes the formal cause of our justification to consist in the admission of our sins, and our acceptance to salvation, and not (as does Dr. Tully) in the imputation of Christ's righteousness. Forsooth, that clear-sighted divine perceived that the righteousness of Christ, which, in agreement with all Catholics he had laid down as the primary meritorious cause of our justification, could not be made at the same time its formal cause, without a gross absurdity, and even a manifest contradiction. For the meritorious cause is of the nature of an efficient, which is only an external cause: but the formal cause is internal, and constitutes the essence of the thing effected: so for the same thing to be at once the meritorious and formal cause of the same thing that is effected implies a contradiction: for thus it would be and not be of the essence of the thing at the same time. Hence it is that the learned man in the same chapter clearly teaches from Durandus that the righteousness of Christ does |